At home and abroad, America’s disastrous war in Iraq hangs over the debate on Syria, feeding skepticism that US military action can deliver as promised. “It’s the elephant in the room,” said Larry Korb, a former Pentagon official and a senior fellow at the Center for...
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Why are Americans so against a strike on Syria? Because of the Iraq debacle
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A complete U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014? Don’t count on it
A US envoy on Tuesday dismissed suggestions that Washington would withdraw all troops from Afghanistan after next year, saying that both countries wanted to preserve a smaller force. Aides to US President Barack Obama earlier this year openly mulled the so-called “zero option” of a...
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Newlywed with ‘second thoughts’ allegedly pushed husband ‘face first off a cliff’
Newlywed Jordan Linn Graham appeared in federal court yesterday on felony charges of second-degree murder for allegedly pushing her husband, Cody Lee Johnson, off a cliff in Glacier National Park. Law enforcement believes that on the afternoon of July 7, 2013, just eight days after the couple had...
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North Carolina teacher ‘disciplined’ for playing pro-marriage equality song
A school district in North Carolina was recently disciplined for playing a music video in class in support of equal marriage rights for LGBT people. The Taylorsville Times reported on Monday that it contacted Alexander County Schools after receiving a tip that about the incident. “At West...
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Apple unveils 2 new iPhones: The $99 plastic iPhone 5C and the gold-tone aluminum iPhone 5S
Apple Unveils iPhone 5C, iPhone 5S (via slashdot) Apple has unveiled a pair of new iPhones. Apple CEO Tim Cook took to a California stage Sept. 10 and, after a couple of brief updates on the iTunes Festival (now in its seventh year, this edition featuring musicians such as Justin Timberlake and...
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Jordan lawmaker fires Kalashnikov assault rifle at colleague
A Jordanian MP was arrested after firing a Kalashnikov assault rifle in parliament at a colleague on Tuesday, without causing injuries, judicial and parliamentary sources said. “The prosecutor general of Amman on Tuesday ordered the detention for 15 days of Talal al-Sharif after he opened...
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FBI documents show it decided to ‘memorialize’ the late Michael Hasting’s articles
Today the FBI released a heavily redacted document about journalist Michael Hasting, who died in a single-car accident this past June. At the time, the FBI denied that Hastings was under any sort of investigation. The documents reveal that, a year before Hasting’s death, the FBI wanted to...
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Civil rights activist: U.S. system is based on dehumanization and exploitation of the poor
Veteran civil rights activist Rev. James Lawson said in an interview that the United States has a long tradition of dehumanizing and exploiting groups of people for labor and profit. He told Laura Flanders of Grit TV that that the U.S. economic system is modeled on what he calls “plantation...
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Anti-LGBT author who compared Obama to Hitler appointed to PBS board in NC
A science fiction author who opposes equal rights for LGBT people and has a history of comparing Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler was appointed to a board of trustees overseeing North Carolina’s public television stations this week. In a statement on Monday, UNC-TV announced that Republican state...
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School that sent home 7-year-old girl for ‘dreadlocks’ is reversing policy
The Tulsa, OK charter school that sent home 7-year-old Tiana Parker last week for having the wrong hairstyle has adopted a more inclusive dress code in the wake of the incident. According to Tulsa’s Channel 6 News, officials at the Deborah Brown Community School voted to change the code on...
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Richard Dawkins defends ‘mild pedophilia’: Teacher putting hands down my shorts didn’t do ‘lasting harm’
Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins refused to condemn sexual abuse he admitted to having suffered as a child in an interview with The Times magazine of England, Religion News Service reported on Tuesday. While he told the Times that an unidentified schoolmaster “pulled me on his knee and...
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Pat Robertson links 9/11 attacks to ban on prayer and Bible reading in public schools
Televangelist Pat Robertson marked the 12th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that happened on Sept. 11, 2001 by slamming former President George W. Bush for calling Islam a “religion of peace,” and said that countries that welcomed Muslims were “committing suicide.”...
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Kerry and McCain’s favorite Syria ‘expert’ fired for faking credentials
A prominent pro-Syrian intervention expert, cited by both Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Sec. of State John Kerry, lied about her academic credentials and failed to disclose her ties to rebel groups in the embattled republic. According to Buzzfeed, the Institute for the Study of War, a non-partisan...
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Pope Francis to atheists, agnostics: ‘God forgives those who obey their conscience’
Pope Francis responded at great length to questions from Eugenio Scalfari, the former editor of the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, in a letter published Wednesday. In it, he said that non-believers must “obey their conscience,” because “God forgives those who obey their...
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Is Assad just buying time with his pledge to turn over chemical weapons?
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may have averted a US strike by agreeing to hand over his chemical arsenal but the move could backfire against his weakened regime, analysts say. Damascus quickly embraced a Russian plan for it to hand over its chemical arsenal. The initiative defused talk of a...
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Trayvon Martin medical examiner claims prosecutors intentionally lost case
Dr. Shiping Bao, the Volusia County medical examiner who handled teenager Trayvon Martin’s body after he was shot by George Zimmerman in February of 2012, claims that the prosecution team in the case were biased against the African-American teen and intentionally lost. Furthermore, Bao said...
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Christian schools shreds $20,000 in literature over ‘satanic’ peace sign
A Christian school in the Netherlands said it sent about $20,000 worth of student-created literature to the shredder after officials did research on Google and determined that a peace sign was a symbol used by Satanists. The Dutch daily newspaper Trouw reported this week that for years, the Pieter...
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Florida man accused of ‘walking on wrong side of the road’
A Florida man is suing the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office over a violent arrest in December 2012 that the officer was not able to defend in court. First Coast News reported on Monday that Bobby Wingate was cited by an officer for “walking down the wrong side of the road” during the...
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New genetic test could identify aggressive prostate cancers
A new test — looking at three genes — could predict which prostate cancers will turn aggressive, helping avoid invasive treatments for those that will grow more slowly, a study out Wednesday said. Used alongside existing tests, the analysis will help doctors determine whether treatment...
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South African arrested in Paris for rocking out with his coq out
An eccentric South African artist has been charged with sexual exhibitionism after a street performance in central Paris in which he tied a rooster to his penis. Steve Cohen was arrested on Tuesday on a busy public square a stone’s throw from the Eiffel Tower. Sporting platform shoes, dressed...
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