NC: Winston-Salem CONSIDERS ILLEGAL GUN BAN

As you recall, when GRNC successfully fought to pass concealed carry in state and municipal parks in 2011, some city governments opposed to the changes adopted ordinances with over-broad interpretations of what constitutes a "recreational facility" where they could still ban guns. Given that HB 937, which becomes law on Oct. 1, expands concealed carry into restaurants, campuses and into more areas of parks, you can expect more local government resistance.

The most egregious offender has been Winston-Salem, which effectively continues to ban guns on greenways, lakes and entire parks. In response, GRNC has taken two actions: First, our non-profit arm, Rights Watch International, filed a lawsuit against the city. Second, we went back to the legislature and successfully narrowed the definition of "recreational facility" such that local governments could no longer ban guns on athletic fields (except during organized events), or on playgrounds, greenways and walking trails, or open fields.

Winston-Salem stonewalls on lawsuit & continues to flout the law

In the Rights Watch lawsuit against Winston-Salem over its illegal parks ordinance, city lawyers are trying to stonewall on the discovery stage, refusing to provide the plaintiffs with:

• The identity of each person involved in drafting the illegal Ordinance.
• Documents written by the City and its employees relating to the City’s definition of: “playground, athletic facility, athletic field, and swimming pool” in the Ordinance.
• Documents related to the research, development, drafting, and debate on the Ordinance.
• Police reports for crimes occurring at the parks, greenways, lakes, picnic shelters, and recreational facilities in the past three years.
  

For a legal update on Winston-Salem's efforts to subvert your will, CLICK HERE or go to: http://grnc.org/documents/PT-Writeup-on-Winston-Salem-lawsuit.pdf.

In its most recent and attempt to defy the will of voters, the Winston-Salem City Council is once again plotting to undermine our newly improved parks carry law. At the bottom of the alert is a hand-wringing letter from council member Molly Leight to her constituents, and then GRNC President Paul Valone's response.

Action, Please

Extraordinary: Seasick Steve and Tom Jones - You Gotta Move

Via Chuck

Government

Via San Jacinto County Outlaw

ENLARGED

Al-Qaeda pivots to the economy: This is what I'd feared for some time now.

Via The Feral Irishman

...He [Zawahiri] goes on to emphasize the importance of so-called "lone-wolf", or small-scale attacks as part of al-Qaeda's strategy. 

Such attacks, he argues, will have an economic impact above all.

"We must bleed America economically by provoking it, so that it continues its massive expenditures on security. America's weak spot is its economy, which began to totter from the drain of its military and security expenditure," he says...

We all know how effective the Mohamed/Malvo shooting spree was at inducing regional paralysis, and those turds were amateurs, practically begging to get caught. Had they taken their show on the road, moved around a bit more, stretched the hit interval somewhat, they could still be doing it today.

More @ Ace Of Spades

Feds: FBI tailed top terror recruiter to Pentagon

The federal government has released documents that show Anwar al-Awlaki, the former Denver resident and onetime al-Qaida leader who died in 2011 in a U.S. missile strike in Yemen ordered by Barack Obama, was followed by the FBI to the doors of the Pentagon, where he was an invited guest.

WND reported earlier this year that officials with Judicial Watch, the government watchdog agency that investigates and reports on government corruption, found  FBI authorities knew Awlaki was linked to several 9/11 hijackers weeks before he was invited to lunch at the Pentagon during an “outreach” to Muslims.

At the time, Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said, “The more we learn about Anwar al-Awlaki, the more questions arise not only about his activities before and after 9/11, but also about the al-Qaida operational and support network still active in the United States. It is now even more concerning that al-Awlaki was invited to the Pentagon after 9/11 and then let go by the FBI despite warrants for his arrest.”

More @ WND

NC: Fraud Stealing $100 Million Shows Flaws in U.S. Crop Insurance

Via Cousin John

Harry Dean Canady will learn next month whether he’ll spend the rest of his life in prison for cheating taxpayers of more than $1 million and threatening to kill the U.S. agents who brought him to justice.

A convicted felon with an alcohol-fueled temper, Canady, 64, pleaded guilty in December to defrauding the federal crop insurance system and is behind bars pending sentencing.

His thieving was just a sliver of the largest fraud in the program’s 75-year history, a case that so far has ensnared 41 North Carolina tobacco farmers, insurance agents and claims adjusters whose law breaking cost taxpayers close to $100 million, federal prosecutors say.

“The system has checks and balances in place,” says Banu Rangarajan, 45, the assistant U.S. attorney who led the prosecution. “The problem is all the checks and balances here were involved in the fraud. The adjusters were paid off. The agents were paid off. Everybody was paid off.”

More @ Bloomberg

NBC/WSJ Poll: By a 44-22% margin, Americans oppose raising the debt ceiling

 

Americans overwhelmingly do not think Congress should raise the nation’s debt limit as President Barack Obama and Congress prepare once again to wage battle over the issue, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

Republican House Speaker John Boehner comments on the upcoming deadline to avoid a government shutdown

By a 44-22 percent margin, Americans oppose raising the debt ceiling, which again puts the president in the difficult position of needing to make the case for an unpopular policy with a deadline quickly approaching.

The poll results come as the U.S. Treasury Department says the country will reach its debt limit by mid-October. The Bipartisan Policy Center estimates the limit will be reached by Oct. 18, and the U.S. could default by Nov. 5.

More @ NBC

HSLDA's Generation Joshua requests comments on Syria

 

 

Russian President to the U.S.: “Stand Down in Syria”

This week, the New York Times published an op-ed by Russian President Vladimir Putin. In his article, Mr. Putin expressed his concern over proposals of U.S. military action in Syria. He cited international law and said that any use of American force would “constitute an act of aggression” unless approved by the UN Security Council. He also sought to cast doubt on allegations that the Syrian government was behind the recent chemical weapons attacks, suggesting that it was more likely that the attacks were committed by Syrian rebels looking to undermine the Syrian government. 

Mr. Putin’s article was met with a wide variety of response from American leaders, citizens, and press. Some suggested that he raised valid and clear-headed arguments, while others pointed to Russia’s support and vested interests in Syria (as well as the Russian government’s dubious record on the topic of human rights) as reason to question the motives and true intentions of the communication. 

We want to know what you all think! Do you think that Mr. Putin was right in his assessment and advice? Is there a conflict of Russian interest? Do you think that the U.S. should take action in Syria? How do you think our government should respond to this situation--if at all?

You can weigh in on the discussion by commenting on this Facebook post. We look forward to hearing your thoughts!

US equipped Saddam with chemical arms in Iran war

Via Billy

 

A retired US military officer says Washington provided chemical and biological weapons to executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein during the eight-year war against Iran.

In an interview with Voice of Russia published on Thursday, Karen Kwiantowski elaborated on America’s use of chemical weapons, saying that Washington gave Saddam Hussein chemical weapons to to be used against Iran during the eight-year Iraqi imposed war on the Islamic Republic of Iran in the 1980s.

“So, yeah, we've done it. It's old news how we took sides in the Iraq-Iran war ...we did provide chemical weapons and biological weapons to Saddam Hussein as he was fighting in that long war with Iran. And we did this, it's been well publicized,” she said.

More @ Alalam

Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent

Horace recommends this book 

 

 

The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. 

 

In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior. The volume of federal crimes in recent decades has increased well beyond the statute books and into the morass of the Code of Federal Regulations, handing federal prosecutors an additional trove of vague and exceedingly complex and technical prohibitions to stick on their hapless targets. 

 

The dangers spelled out in Three Felonies a Day do not apply solely to “white collar criminals,” state and local politicians, and professionals. No social class or profession is safe from this troubling form of social control by the executive branch, and nothing less than the integrity of our constitutional democracy hangs in the balance.

 

@ Amazon