January 13, 2014

Is John Boehner a gay icon?

[font color=green]I was reading the following article and I noticed that statement in the fourth paragraph.[/font]



http://newsfeed.time.com/2014/01/06/and-the-gayest-city-in-the-u-s-is/?iid=obnetwork

January 12, 2014

Black Rhino Hunting Permit Auctioned for $350,000

A permit to hunt an endangered African black rhino sold Saturday night for $350,000 at a Dallas auction held to raise money for conservation efforts but criticized by wildlife advocates.

Steve Wagner, a spokesman for the Dallas Safari Club, which sponsored the closed-door event, confirmed the sale of the permit for a hunt in the African nation of Namibia. He declined to name the buyer.

Ben Carter, executive director of the Safari Club, has defended the auction. He said all money raised will go toward protecting the species. He also said the rhino that the winner will be allowed to hunt is old, male and nonbreeding -- and that the animal was likely to be targeted for removal anyway because it was becoming aggressive and threatening other wildlife.

But the auction drew howls from critics, including wildlife and animal rights groups, and the FBI earlier this week said it was investigating death threats against members of the club.

More at http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Black-Rhino-Hunting-Permit-Auctioned-for-350000-239784481.html .

January 11, 2014

Teen mob ransacks Bryan convenience store

Girls twerked and did the splits as a mob of rowdy teens ransacked a Bryan convenience store Saturday.

It was as 19-year-old store clerk Terry Polsgrove was getting ready to close down for the night that teenagers started trickling into the store. Soon there were 30 to 40 teenagers dancing and acting "crazy" inside the Chevron Food Mart and in the parking lot at the corner of Wiliam J. Bryan and Texas 21, Polsgrove said.

Some are seen in surveillance video shoplifting chips, candy and soda worth about $200, said Kelly McKethan, spokesperson for the Bryan Police Department.

Polsgrove said he even saw one person steal some beer.

More, including video, at http://www.theeagle.com/news/local/article_7b6b1ce3-bd6b-53c8-a95b-6bbfa2a7981b.html .

January 11, 2014

Teen stabs mom, cuts own penis off while high on ‘meow meow’

MEOW MEOW? OW: Teen High On Mephedrone Stabs Mom. Cuts off Own Penis (Newsbreakers)

Police in England made a horrific discovery after finding a West Sussex teen had stabbed his mother and sliced off his own penis under a narcotics haze.

London’s Daily Mirror reports the unnamed 19-year-old had taken the party drug mephedrone or “meow meow” back in late December.

Mephedrone is a synthetic amphetamine-like stimulant, causing users euphoria but also hallucinations and sometimes paranoia.

After she was stabbed, the 46-year-old mother called police. When they arrived, they found her son hanging from a bedroom window.

More at http://blog.chron.com/hottopics/2014/01/teen-stabs-mom-cuts-own-penis-off-while-high-on-meow-meow/?cmpid=hpts .

January 11, 2014

Stockman Hopes to Hang Onto Cruz's Coattails

One year ago, two pugnacious Texas Republicans with very different backgrounds were sworn in as members of Congress.

Ted Cruz, a freshman senator from Houston, had advised President George W. Bush and argued before the U.S. Supreme Court nine times. Pundits were already talking about him as a presidential candidate.

Steve Stockman of Friendswood was returning to the U.S. House after serving one boisterous term two decades earlier in which he drew attention for various outlandish comments and ties to domestic militia groups.

Now, Cruz’s star continues to rise, and Stockman has hitched his wagon to it in his primary challenge of the state’s senior senator, John Cornyn. Stockman is framing his campaign largely around the argument that Cruz would be a more effective fighter with Stockman at his side than Cornyn.

More at http://www.texastribune.org/2014/01/10/hanging-cruzs-coattails-tenuous-grasp/ .

January 11, 2014

La Villa ISD refuses to pay $50K water bill, city cuts off service. Will school open on Monday?

More than 600 children in a South Texas border town may be prevented from returning to school on Monday because of a long-standing dispute over water rates, which have skyrocketed in recent years amid attempts to make badly needed upgrades to the town’s water infrastructure.

Several attempts at negotiation between the city of La Villa and the La Villa Independent School District have failed, after the district refused to pay more than $50,000 in overdue water bills and the city cut off its water service. School officials say they are being charged too much for water from a mismanaged utility, while the city contends that it needs money to cover millions of dollars in needed repairs to water and sewer treatment systems.

Beyond the political and financial tussle, the situation illustrates the struggles facing the small Texas border towns that operate the treatment plants that supply drinking water and clean up wastewater.

“Basically, it’s planning and lack of money, and lack of management,” said Carlos Acevedo, a senior project manager for the Border Environment Cooperation Commission, a binational agency charged with improving environmental conditions along the U.S.-Mexico border.

More at http://www.texastribune.org/2014/01/10/border-towns-struggle-protect-water-infrastructure/ .

January 11, 2014

Court upholds 2012 oil spill settlement

Source: AP

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A federal appeals court has upheld a judge's approval of a multibillion-dollar settlement between BP PLC and lawyers for Gulf Coast businesses and residents who claim the company's 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill cost them money.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier did not err by failing to determine whether the class of eligible claimants included individuals who haven't actually suffered any injury.

A divided three-judge panel of the court said in its 48-page ruling that it could not agree with arguments raised by BP and other appellants and affirmed Barbier's initial ruling in 2012.

One of the three appellate judges, Emilio M. Garza, disagreed in a 14-page dissent.


Read more: http://www.chron.com/news/science/article/Court-upholds-2012-oil-spill-settlement-5132756.php?cmpid=hpbn

January 11, 2014

Dallas County’s flu death toll rises to 26

Dallas County’s death toll from the flu climbed to 26 along with a record number of hospitalizations in the first week of January, according to a report released Friday.

The fatalities represent nine new deaths since the county’s last surveillance report a week ago.

“The outbreak is more severe this year than the last couple years,” said Dr. Christopher Perkins, medical director of Dallas County Health and Human Services.

Denton County confirmed its third flu-related death Friday — a Highland Village woman in her 80s.

More at http://thescoopblog.dallasnews.com/2014/01/dallas-countys-flu-death-toll-rises-to-26.html/ .

January 11, 2014

Ted Cruz: President Obama runs America like a “corrupt dictator” not bound by the law

Sen. Ted Cruz compared America under President Obama to a corrupt dictatorship in which the chief executive decides which laws to follow and which to ignore. He cited the Obama administration delay of the employer mandate under the Affordable Health Care Act. He said the directive to ease deportation of immigrant parents and not to defend the federal ban on marijuana in states like Colorado and Washington that choose to legalize it were other examples of the president’s “consistent pattern of lawlessness.”

“If the president of the United States can simply pick and choose which laws to follow… we know what that looks like,” Cruz told small-government conservatives Friday. “There are countries on this globe where that is how the law works. You look at corrupt countries where the rule of law is meaningless, where dictators are in power and they have things they call law. But what does law mean?”

Cruz, who delivered an extended speech on the Senate floor against Obamacare and was a prime factor in last year’s government shutdown, told a conference of the Texas Public Policy Foundation he has not given up the fight to repeal the federal health care law. At a news conference afterwards, Cruz declined to say whether he would use upcoming budget battles in Congress to press the administration and potentially shut down government again. But he leveled a sharp critique against the Obama administration as an “extraordinary threat to the liberty of this country. A president who is not bound by the law is no longer a president. And if you love liberty that should concern you greatly.”

Phillip Martin, deputy director of the left-leaning Progress Texas, said Cruz’s opposition to Obamacare has hurt Texans, not helped them. “Ted Cruz’s temper tantrums cost taxpayers billions of dollars and did nothing for the 6 million Texans without health insurance,” he said.

More at http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2014/01/ted-cruz-obama-runs-america-like-a-corrupt-dictator-not-bound-by-the-law.html/ .

January 11, 2014

Euless apartment owners ordered to pay fines in Fair Housing Act suit involving South Asians, MEs

The U.S. Justice Department has settled a housing discrimination lawsuit in Euless over discrimination against persons of Middle Eastern and South Asian ancestry.

Under the consent order, issued by federal Chief Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater of the Northern District of Texas, the defendants at the apartment complex known as Stonebridge at Bear Creek will pay a total of $107,000 in civil penalties and $210,000 in a damages fund to compensate victims. The consent order doesn’t constitute a “judicial finding of any violations of law,” it reads.

The federal civil rights complaint was filed in April of last year alleging for several years, the owners, employees and management company of Stonebridge violated the Fair Housing Act. The 184-unit Stonebridge complex is managed by S&H Realty management of Minnesota.

According to the suit, Stonebridge manager Nancy Quandt told her leasing agents they were prohibited from leasing to Middle Eastern or South Asian people unless there were openings in buildings No. 16 or 18, which were designated for “curry” people.

More at http://thescoopblog.dallasnews.com/2014/01/euless-apartment-owners-ordered-to-pay-fines-in-fair-housing-act-suit-involving-south-asians-middle-easterners.html/ .