The majority of voters did not vote for Donald Trump for president; the majority of voters did not vote for Republican candidates for the Senate; and fewer than 51% of voters cast their ballots for Republican candidates for the House of Representatives. The Republican Party now controls the White House, both houses of Congress and the Supreme Court, no matter how that came to be. I believe it is worth bearing in mind that a majority of U.S. citizens did not support the Republican winners.   read more

Gonzalez, a former military sniper, had 800 rounds of ammunition in his car at the time of his attempt to find President Barack Obama. Gonzalez said he wanted to tell the president that the “atmosphere was collapsing” so he could warn the nation. His vehicle also contained a machete and two hatchets. Gonzalez left all these weapons behind when he climbed the White House fence, and was carrying only a small pocket knife when the U.S. Secret Service apprehended him.   read more

In the lawsuit that was originally filed 10 years ago, the 297 plaintiffs cited the U.S. Anti-Terrorism Act (pdf), which for the first time was successfully used to hold a financial institution responsible for knowingly supporting terrorism efforts. They claimed Arab Bank supported Hamas by handling transfers and payments for the group. And they did so despite a “high” burden of proof, which entailed proving Hamas was behind 24 suicide attacks.   read more

When television writers or screenwriters need some expert advice for a medical storyline, they turn to Hollywood, Health, and Society, a private group of experts funded by the federal government’s leading health research agency. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provides up to half a million dollars a year to Hollywood, Health, and Society, which has been advising the entertainment industry for 13 years.   read more

In a lawsuit filed by the Oglala Sioux, plaintiffs claim the lack of an election office on reservation land has forced Pine Ridge tribal members to travel at least 27 miles to Kadoka to register for voting and to vote. And that’s the struggle for Sioux who own a car. Federal census data reportedly shows 25% of reservation residents have no access to an automobile.   read more

Former members of Congress and aides to the president have been left wondering what happened to the arms-reduction version of Obama who took over the Oval Office. Former Democratic Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia, whose positions favoring nuclear disarmament reportedly meant something to Obama at one time, told the newspaper that the president’s new position is “hard to explain.”   read more

The U.S. averaged 16.5 metric tons of carbon dioxide spewed into the atmosphere for each individual—a rate that’s far ahead of all other nations. China, the second largest per-capita polluter, averages 7.2 metric tons. The U.S. emission rate had slowed because of increased use of natural gas in power generation, but coal has recently made a bit of a comeback in that role, causing more carbon to flow into the atmosphere.   read more

The Los Angeles Police Department received more than 1,600 M16 assault rifles even though the LAPD was under the supervision of a federal monitor until just last year following accusations of excessive force, false arrests and unreasonable searches. Warren, Ohio, reached a settlement in 2012 with the U.S. Department of Justice for excessive force and illegal searches, but is expected to receive 30 M16 rifles.   read more

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) has decided to divest its investment portfolio of all hedge funds, a total of 24 plus six “funds of funds.” The total comes out to about $4 billion out of CalPERS’ total assets of $300 billion. The amount may not be that significant compared to the overall investing CalPERS does, but the pension fund’s sheer size makes any decision noticeable among investors.   read more

Officer Chris Poncia has 461 people in his case file, all the sex offenders in Providence. His beat includes 175 Level 2 and 3 offenders, who are classified this way because they’re considered likely to commit sex crimes again. Poncia is unique among his peers in Rhode Island, which has about 1,600 sex offenders. He is the only cop in the state who does nothing but patrol the sex offender beat.   read more

Lawmakers took five weeks off from Washington during their summer break. They came back this month to work…for eight days. Now, they’re jetting off again to their districts, where they’ll spend nearly the next eight weeks not doing any legislative work. Congress is scheduled to return on November 12. Its members will have just a few more lame-duck weeks to avoid setting a record for enacting the least number of laws of any Congress since such statistics began being kept in 1973.   read more

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals was forced to throw out the conviction of a man caught distributing child pornography because the case was initiated by Naval investigators randomly searching computers in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits the military acting as a civilian police force. NCIS agent Steve Logan's excuse for searching all computers in Washington was that the state has a high percentage of military personnel.   read more

Last year, there were 449 prosecutions for environmental crimes. That’s less than half the 927 prosecutions initiated in 2007, toward the end of the Bush administration. And the trend line is falling; there were 271 prosecutions in the first nine months of this fiscal year. If cases are filed at the current rate, that would result in only 361 for 2014, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) at Syracuse University.   read more

Nonprofit groups that aren’t supposed to have politics as their primary purpose have reportedly put $63 million into ads and other efforts to influence the outcome of the 2014 midterm races, according to the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP), which tracks electoral spending. Mother Jones’ Andy Kroll pointed out that this amount nearly matches the $69 million in dark money that was spent during the entire 2008 presidential campaign.   read more

Botticelli ran afoul of Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon) during a Congressional subcommittee hearing. Blumenauer, who is hoping to change marijuana’s status as a Schedule I narcotic, asked Botticelli which is more dangerous, marijuana or methamphetamine. Botticelli wouldn’t give a straight answer and Blumenauer chastised him, "If the deputy director of the office of drug policy can't answer that question how do you expect high school kids to take you seriously?”   read more

The majority of accidental shooting deaths of children are performed by other children. In 73% of the cases, the shooter was age 14 or under. The shooters and victims are also overwhelmingly men and boys: 82% of shooters and 77% of victims were male. The deaths also usually occurred in familiar surroundings. Sixty-one percent were in the victim’s home, with 10% in a relative’s home, 10% in a friend’s home and 3% in a relative’s car.   read more

Acting VA Inspector General Richard Griffin stood by the report, while saying its wording allowed for the possibility that care delays caused the deaths. “A careful reading would show that in some of those cases, we say that they might have lived longer,” Griffin said. The admission could make it a bit easier for those who have filed suit against the VA for the deaths, particularly for cases that don’t go to trial.   read more