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

John P. Carlin was confirmed as head of the National Security Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) by the U.S. Senate on April 1, 2014. He had filled the post in an acting capacity since March 8, 2013, when then-National Security Division head Jill Monaco moved to the White House as assistant to the president for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism..   read more

Aas was born May 25, 1955. He is from the Tøyen neighborhood in Oslo and is the son of a construction worker. He was initially ticketed for vocational school, but was able to talk his way into a more academic setting. Aas joined the foreign ministry in 1983. In 2008, Aas won his first posting as an ambassador, to Afghanistan. Much of his work there involved seeing that Norway’s funding for school construction was put to good use.   read more

The House of Representatives passed an amendment that would stop enforcement of federal marijuana laws against therapeutic use in states where it’s legal.The DEA appears to be trying to get in its last licks before the proposal is approved by the Senate. DEA agents in Massachusetts have been coming to the offices and homes of doctors affiliated with marijuana dispensaries.   read more

Wheeler, a graduate of Harvard Medical School, developed an impressive reputation for his medical knowledge and skills—and for consistently standing in the way of patients winning their cases against their employers. In its letter dated June 2, the Labor Department noted how the media investigation found Wheeler “had never once, in more than 3,400 X-ray readings, interpreted an X-ray as positive for complicated pneumoconiosis [or black lung].”   read more

“Let’s be frank,” the man who has ruled Belarus for 20 years was quoted as saying. “Serfdom” was exactly what he wanted, adding: “You can’t quit and you can’t get a different job.” Belarus is a signatory of the 1957 Abolition of Forced Labor. But this probably doesn’t mean much to Lukashenko, a former Communist Party member who ran collective farms in the Soviet Union.   read more

In 2006, Lukashenko was reelected president with the announced support of 82.6% of voters. The campaign of his opponent, Aleksandr Milinkevich, was so severely restricted by the government that he was reduced to surreptitiously distributing fliers that gave a phone number where he could be reached for an hour. Lukashenko was reelected again in December 2010. After the election was over, he had five of the nine candidates who ran against him arrested.   read more

In 1998 she was made chairperson of that Malta’s housing authority, serving in that post for 10 years. She also became active in politics with the Nationalist Party, running in a district election under its auspices. In 2009, Micallef, with much fanfare, switched her political allegiance to the Labour Party at the behest of its leader Joseph Muscat, in an effort to woo Nationalist voters. Muscat, for whom Micallef served as an advisor for several years, is now Malta’s prime minister.   read more

Those that rely heavily on coal, like Montana, Kentucky, Wyoming, West Virginia, and Nebraska, don’t have it as bad as their political leaders claim. For instance, West Virginia will have to cut carbon pollution by 19.8%, while Kentucky’s goal is only 18.3%. Meanwhile, Washington state, one of the lowest carbon emitters, is supposed to cut its pollution output by 72%. Louisiana faces a 68% goal, Arizona and South Carolina 52% each, and Texas 44%.   read more

Unlike Viagra, which treats male sexual dysfunction by addressing blood flow, Sprout’s drug alters chemicals in women’s brains to help them achieve sexual desire. Its rejection by the agency triggered a storm of protest from women’s advocacy organizations. “There’s absolutely some sexism at play,” said Streicher of the FDA roadblock. Some doctors disagree, saying the agency rejected the drug because it’s a cure for a non-existent disease.   read more

Using New Jersey correctional statistics from 2008, the study said parolees had a rearrested rate of 51%, while max-outs were at 65%. Similarly, reconviction rates for parolees were also lower (38% vs. 55%), as was the rate for committing new crimes (25% vs. 41%) within three years of release.   read more

The Soufan report estimates less than a hundred individuals left the U.S. for the Syria campaign, and perhaps 3,000 total from all Western countries. That’s about a quarter of all the foreign jihadists and others to join one of the many Syrian rebel groups. In contrast, more than half of all the foreign fighters have traveled from three Arab nations: Tunisia (3,000), Saudi Arabia (2,500) and Morocco (1,500).   read more

With the departure of the Taliban prisoners, more than half of Gitmo’s population now consists of individuals approved for release (78 out of 149). Another Reprieve official, founder Clive Stafford Smith, says the freeing of the Taliban Five was an act of hypocrisy. “The five Taliban were arguably among those who had actually committed crimes, if fighting foreign troops who invaded their country could be deemed an offense. At the very least, they had taken part in hostilities."   read more

The ACLU, which was contesting Florida police’s use of surveillance technology, got quite the surprise recently when federal marshals unexpectedly confiscated police records pertaining to the controversial program that had been requested by the ACLU. The organization was to have reviewed them at a police station in Sarasota when members of the U.S. Marshals Service swept in and took the files.   read more

52.4% of male doctors who made political contributions did so to the GOP during 2011-2012, while only 23.6% of women doctors chose the Republicans. While money from physicians has shifted away from the Republican Party, the profession’s overall political giving has increased dramatically. Over the course of two decades, doctors’ contributions jumped from $20 million to $189 million, according to the study.   read more

Szema’s research shows that 14% of service members who had deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan suffered from new-onset respiratory issues. The dust could have been formed in the notorious burn pits used by the military to dispose of everything from plastics to computers to munitions. It is also possible the dust was forged during the 1991 Gulf War, when thousands of tons of ordinance were exploded, turning dust to metal in the process, according to scientists in Italy.   read more

Laroche jokingly remarked in class that his students should get something out of spending the equivalent of a week’s worth of class time taking the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) test, one of the Common Core programs, as a trial. The Obama administration gave $350 million to two groups to create standardized to judge states receiving federal education aid.   read more