President Donald Trump invited the Dodgers to the White House. Many of their fans feared that the team, by accepting, would humiliate themselves and betray the team’s large Latino, Asian and African-American fan base. Dodgers controlling owner Mark Walter, along with co-owner Magic Johnson, have proposed a solution. Trump has promised that if he can keep the championship trophy, the Commissioner’s Trophy, he will end all seizures and deportations of immigrants.   read more

More than half of the 62 shootings took place either at a workplace (20) or a school (12). Forty-four of the killers were white males. Only one shooter was a woman: Jennifer San Marco (Goleta, California, in 2006.) The average age of the killers was 35. The youngest shooter was only 11 years old: Andrew Douglas Golden (Jonesboro, Arkansas, in 1998.)   read more

ATF decided to take this step after realizing the number of legal entities in the gun trade that were not federal firearms licensees had ballooned from about 840 in 2000 to 40,700 in 2012. The reason for the increase, according to ATF, is a growth in the number of trusts.   read more

Some drug-resistant bacteria are becoming widespread, although they haven’t killed a significant number of people yet. One type, known as CRE (carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae), was found in healthcare facilities in 44 states. On the one hand, CRE causes only 600 fatalities each year. But on the other, this type of bacteria has become resistant to nearly all antibiotics on the market, leaving doctors with no real solutions for stopping it.   read more

By far the most popular venue is The Capitol Hill Club, a purely Republican site that plays host to nearly 2,000 fundraising parties per year. A distant second is Johnny’s Half Shell, which entertains 861 bashes annually—two-thirds for Democrats and a third for Republicans. The top 10 venues account for 44% of all DC fundraisers.   read more

IHS Jane’s says the rebels include 10,000 jihadists with ties to al-Qaeda, as well as another 30,000 to 35,000 hardliners who see eye-to-eye with the jihadists, although they are focused on toppling Assad and not on a global struggle against the West. “The insurgency is now dominated by groups which have at least an Islamist viewpoint on the conflict,” Charles Lister, author of the study, wrote. “The idea that it is mostly secular groups leading the opposition is just not borne out.”   read more

More than 100 committees and subcommittees claim jurisdiction over DHS. This results in the agency spending inordinate amount of time just responding to congressional requests, instead of focusing on potential threats. “Think of having 100 bosses,” said Kean. “Think of reporting to 100 people. It makes no sense. You could not do your job under those circumstances.” In 2009 alone, the agency spent the equivalent of 66 “work-years” responding to congressional inquiries.   read more

Supporters of the controversial plan said providing undocumented immigrants with driver’s licenses would make California roads safer, improve national security and allow immigrants to fully contribute to the state economy. The bill passed with overwhelming support, 28-8 in the state Senate and 55-19 in the Assembly.   read more

U.S. District Court Judge B. Lynn Winmill temporarily halted the shipment of an oversized water treatment system on U.S. Highway 12 that was bound for Canada’s tar sands fields. Winmill said the government must first conduct a study of environmental, economic and tribal impacts before the equipment move can proceed.   read more

Over the Labor Day weekend, another 20,000 gallons was stolen from the county, this time from the Bridgeville Elementary School. The thief pumped the school’s water tank dry using a garden house and either a water truck or a trailer fitted with tanks, according to police. School officials were forced to cancel school for the day, while maintenance workers replenished the tank with water from an underground well.   read more

Only 52% of middle-income households had savings in a retirement account in 2010, but their savings came to only 8.12% of total savings in retirement accounts. In contrast, 88% of the households in the top income-fifth had retirement accounts, which came to 72% of total retirement savings. White households have more than six times as much saved in retirement accounts as Hispanic and black households, which is even larger than differences in participation.   read more

The order, signed by Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV, specifically covers cases concerning the legal interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act used by the National Security Agency (NSA) to justify its indiscriminate collection of domestic telephone metadata. Metadata includes phone numbers of both parties involved in calls, the international mobile subscriber identity number for mobile callers, calling card numbers used in the call, and the time and duration of the calls.   read more

“The total number of extremists who have been indicted has declined from 33 in 2010 to six to date in 2013, domestic terrorist incidents are relatively rare, and the character of the perpetrators has shifted from a mix of plots conducted by groups of extremists or individuals to those entirely conducted by individuals or pairs.”   read more

Lying to the world about your drug use won’t make you liable in court, but lying to your insurance company about it sure will. That’s the bottom line of two recent decisions in two legal cases filed against disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong, who admitted earlier this year to extensive doping during his career—something he had aggressively denied for years.   read more

Veronica Valdez, who had worked at the hospital for 13 years, was on the operating table for finger surgery. While she was out cold, Yang cut up medication labels, colored them and stuck them on her face to create teardrops on her cheek and a mustache. Everyone who was conscious had a good laugh.   read more

If convicted, the company faces a fine of $25,000 a day per violation. The leak went on for about 65 days, beginning on November 10, 2010. If Exxon ended up having to pay the full amount for eight violations, it would have to dole out approximately $13 million…less than the annual compensation for XTO CEO Keith A. Hutton.   read more

“He and his fellow troops were constantly under attack by insurgent extremists whose word for the American soldiers was ‘infidel.’ Seeking to reclaim or reappropriate this term as a source of American pride and patriotism, Sergeant Matwyuk and other soldiers came to embrace their identity as ‘infidels.’ He and other American veterans proudly refer to themselves as ‘infidels’ as a reminder of the bond they share as survivors of a bloody war in a hostile part of the world.”   read more