When Pope John Paul II visited Damascus in May 2001, Bashar used his welcoming speech to denounce the Jews, saying, “They tried to kill the principles of all religions with the same mentality in which they betrayed Jesus Christ and the same way they tried to betray and kill the Prophet Muhammad.”   read more

Although the agency processes hundreds of safety violations each year, it appears that not a single case has ever been referred for criminal investigation, the report said. The inspector general's office estimated 20 percent, or 227 out of 1,126 violations, may have warranted criminal referral. The agency's attorneys told the watchdog that they didn't make criminal referrals because they didn't know the procedures for doing so, and they didn't think it was part of their job.   read more

With his enormous online platform, Trump has badgered and humiliated those who have dared cross him during the presidential race. He has latched on to their vulnerabilities, mocking their physical characteristics and personality quirks. He has made statements that have later been exposed as false or deceptive — only after they have ricocheted across the Internet. The experience is nightmarish and a form of public degradation intended to scare off adversaries by making an example of them.   read more

The shortcomings underscore the findings of a blistering audit by the inspector general from last June that drew attention to the safety agency’s undertrained staff and weak processes for analyzing the safety data it collects from automakers and consumers. In one especially glaring example, the agency workers in charge of interpreting data that can help regulators detect potential defects told auditors that they have no training or background in statistics.   read more

"We are disappointed that the court reached this decision despite the unrebutted evidence that this law poses a real hardship to many Florida women, but will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that this demeaning and intrusive law is quickly stopped in its tracks," said Florida ACLU's Nancy Abudu. Meanwhile, legislation sponsor Rep. Jennifer Sullivan called the news "a huge win for women's health."   read more

A Washington spy court's "secret, ex parte proceedings" do not provide the oversight required to restrain the NSA's Upstream program, a privacy group argued in a court filing Thursday. Brought to light by Edward Snowden, the NSA program Upstream intercepts traffic from what has been called the "Internet's backbone." Last year, the ACLU represented nine media and human rights groups in challenging the program for its "suspicionless seizure and searching of Internet traffic."   read more

State police treated the media like an enemy and made no distinction between journalists and environmental protesters they were removing and arresting at a highway construction site, a news photographer testified Friday. Photojournalist Stephen Eberhard said officers subjected him to a pattern of intimidation, threats and harassment to deter him from covering one of the state's largest highway projects in decades. "I was not expecting any officer of the law to attack me like that," he said.   read more

A sweeping sage grouse conservation effort that the government announced last September is riddled with loopholes and will not be enough to protect the bird from extinction, according to a new lawsuit. There are too many exceptions favorable to industry at the expense of the bird, it claims. It follows legal challenges against the same rules from mining companies, ranchers and state officials, who argue that the administration's actions will impede economic development.   read more

Problems related to cars’ rapidly advancing technology are now at the top of the list of consumer complaints. The biggest issues are balky voice recognition systems and problems with Bluetooth pairing, accounting for 20% of all customer complaints. Overall, the discontent drove a 3% decline in vehicle dependability in the study. Complaints about technology have gone from being fifth most troublesome in the 2014 study to now being first.   read more

It takes about 22 hours to reach Florida by car for a person traveling from Wisconsin. But if you're a cat, the 1,484-mile journey likely takes closer to two months. At least that's how long it took Nadia, the Russian blue, to trek from her home on a snowy December day to sunny Naples this week where animal officials helped find her owners.   read more

Some faculty members say sensitive subjects may become taboo in their classrooms because of a law allowing Texas public university students to bring guns to class. "Academics know the intrusion of gun culture into campus inevitably harms academic culture," Snow told the Board of Regents. A faculty senate slideshow shown at a recent meeting featured a message that said instructors "may want to be careful discussing sensitive topics" or may choose to drop "certain topics" from their curriculum.   read more

The change would relax longstanding restrictions on access to the contents of the phone calls and email the NSA vacuums up around the world, including bulk collection of satellite transmissions, communications between foreigners, and overseas messages. The idea is to let more experts across U.S. intelligence gain direct access to unprocessed information. Civil liberties advocates criticized the change, arguing it will weaken privacy protections.   read more

In his quest for the Republican presidential nomination, Trump has stoked his crowds by promising to bring back jobs that have been snatched by illegal immigrants or outsourced by corporations, and voters worried about immigration have been his strongest backers. But he has also pursued more than 500 visas for foreign workers at Mar-a-Lago since 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, while hundreds of domestic applicants failed to get the same jobs.   read more

Gracida grew sicker and sicker and vomited after nearly every meal over four months while in custody, but never received proper care for his condition. He eventually died at a Tucson hospital. "Remarkably, the Office of Detention Oversight inspection claimed that Mr. Gracida's death was the first death 'to ever occur' at Eloy when, in fact, it was the 10th death at the facility," Chan said. "Today, Eloy is known as the deadliest immigration detention center in America," the report states.   read more

Judge Kearney ruled that citizens don't have an unfettered right to record police activity. He said police are free to stop such recordings unless the person shooting the video announces he or she is recording as a challenge or protest to officers' actions. ACLU attorney Mary Catherine Roper says the ruling reduces "the ability of the public to monitor police activity."   read more

SeaWorld CEO Joel Manby vowed Thursday to end the practice, but the company refused to say who had authorized the infiltration, how long it had been going on, or how many workers were used to infiltrate animal rights groups or other opponents. A SeaWorld spokeswoman cited the confidential nature of its security practices. PETA said a SeaWorld employee attempted to incite protesters and had posted incendiary comments on social media while masquerading as an animal-rights activist since 2012.   read more

The procurement network stretches to 20 countries, with some parts originating as far away as the United States, Brazil, China and Japan. The IS group has a considerable amount of military-grade weapons and supplies taken from captured army bases in Syria and Iraq, including machine guns, mortars and U.S.-made armored Humvees. It also likely acquires weapons and ammunition on the black market. The most commonly used explosive was made with ammonium nitrate, a common fertilizer.   read more