Racism or just a misunderstanding

There's a political cartoon in today's New York Post that some social activists are questioning this morning.
The Sean Delonas drawing morphs together two stories in the news this week -- the Obama administration's economic stimulus bill and the pet chimp that police shot to stop his attack on a Connecticut woman. The cartoon, which shows police shooting a monkey, seems to imply that a monkey (who some are interpreting as President Obama) wrote the stimulus bill.
Civil rights activist Al Sharpton called the cartoon "racially offensive" and released this statement.
"The cartoon in today's New York Post is troubling at best given the historic racist attacks of African-Americans as being synonymous with monkeys. One has to question whether the cartoonist is making a less than casual reference to this when in the cartoon they have police saying after shooting a chimpanzee that 'Now they will have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill.'"
The New York Post is standing behind the cartoon. Editor-in-Chief Col Allan said: "The cartoon is a clear parody of a current news event, to wit the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut. It broadly mocks Washington's efforts to revive the economy. Again, Al Sharpton reveals himself as nothing more than a publicity opportunist."
Sharpton's National Action Network has already planned a protest outside the Post's mid-town Manhattan headquarters at noon on Thursday. The White House says it will not respond to the story. more

Octuplets' Mom: Wanted Big Family

"I wanted them all transferred," Nadya Suleman told NBC's "Today" show. "Those are my children, and that's what was available and I used them. So, I took a risk. It's a gamble. It always is."
"It turned out perfectly," Suleman added in a portion of the interview broadcast Friday. Other portions of interview, her first since the octuplets were born, are scheduled to air next week.
Experts say there is a small chance that embryos can divide, which apparently led to eight babies.
The interview and public documents obtained by The Associated Press lifted the veil of secrecy in which Suleman shrouded herself after the Jan. 26 births.
The 33-year-old single, unemployed woman has been widely criticized for having a fertility procedure and risking multiple births when she already has six young children, including twins.
During the interview, she said the same fertility specialist implanted all the embryos and explained the risks each time. In portions of the interview yet to be aired, NBC said Suleman told them all 14 of her children were born using sperm donated by the same man, a friend. She said she hoped that when he's ready, he would be in the lives of her and her children.

She also said she had never been on welfare and would find a way to get by with the help of family, friends and her church. She said she planned to return to school in the fall.
With in vitro fertilization, doctors frequently implant more than one embryo to improve the odds that one will take. However, the U.S. fertility industry has guidelines that call for no more than two embryos to be implanted for women under 35 "in the absence of extraordinary circumstances." more

House Bill titled 'HR 45 will make it illegal to own a firearm unless it is registered

Are you ready for the House Bill titled 'HR 45, Blair Holt Licensing and Record Act of 2009'. It will make it illegal to own a firearm unless it is registered with the database in Washington D.C. As a gun owner you will have to be finger printed, you will be required to provide your DL#, SS#, you must maintain a valid address at all times, submit to mental amd physical health records being put on file, you will also be required to file any address changes and you any ownership changes even if private sale. Each update will cost $25 and if you fail to comply you will lose your right to own firearms. This bill and its language mirror almost completely one defeated last year in the House of Representatives by soon to be Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. Will we the citizenry be as lucky this time?Pass this on to everyone who believes in strict Constitutionalism and remember that laws only apply to those who obey them. Criminals by definition and nature do not abide by laws. New laws and restrictions only apply to the law abiding citizen and are not written with the criminal in mind. With guns, it is not about having laws on the books to prosecute individuals, it is about taking guns away from the people so that no one has them in the first place. One last item to note, when assuming power and creating a facist state, Hitler was a proponent of strong gun laws because a disarmed populace was much easier to control than an armed one. The kings of old also outlawed weapons of any kind in any region that they conquered to quell the ability of the citizens to uprise against them.The Founding Fathers of this nation understood all of the above and because of this they included the second amendment in the constitution. In fact, they knew that at some point in every society's life span that the need for the population to arise came about. To this end they made the right to keep and bear arms against a tyrannical state an absolute right that could not be revoked. They did this because the first thing tyrants and despots do is to remove a populations right to defend themselves. When this is done the tyrants have no problem with the destruction of society as we know it.Send this on to all true patriots! Protect your Second Amendment!The following is a summary of the bill as provided by the Congressional Research Service. If you read the whole bill, you'll find it will effectively preclude the ownership of ANY firearms by law-abiding people unless licensed by the Attorney General. How long do you think THAT would take??Congressional Research Service SummaryThe following summary was written by the Congressional Research Service, a well-respected nonpartisan arm of the Library of Congress. GovTrack did not write and has no control over these summaries.1/6/2009--Introduced.Blair Holt's Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009 - Amends the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act to prohibit a person from possessing a firearm unless that person has been issued a firearm license under this Act or a state system certified under this Act and such license has not been invalidated or revoked. Prescribes license application, issuance, and renewal requirements.Prohibits transferring or receiving a qualifying firearm unless the recipient presents a valid firearms license, the license is verified, and the dealer records a tracking authorization number. Prescribes firearms transfer reporting and record keeping requirements. Directs the Attorney General to establish and maintain a federal record of sale system.Prohibits: (1) transferring a firearm to any person other than a licensee, unless the transfer is processed through a licensed dealer in accordance with national instant criminal background check system requirements, with exceptions; (2) a licensed manufacturer or dealer from failing to comply with reporting and record keeping requirements of this Act; (3) failing to report the loss or theft of the firearm to the Attorney General within 72 hours; (4) failing to report to the Attorney General an address change within 60 days; or (5) keeping a loaded firearm, or an unloaded firearm and ammunition for the firearm, knowingly or recklessly disregarding the risk that a child is capable of gaining access, if a child uses the firearm and causes death or serious bodily injury.Prescribes criminal penalties for violations of firearms provisions covered by this Act.Directs the Attorney General to: (1) establish and maintain a firearm injury information clearinghouse; (2) conduct continuing studies and investigations of firearm-related deaths and injuries; and (3) collect and maintain current production and sales figures of each licensed manufacturer.Authorizes the Attorney General to certify state firearm licensing or record of sale systems.
Bill introduced 1/6/2009
Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary 1/6/2009
They will keep trying to take away your rights. Tell your Congressman and Senators how you feel about gun control.

Doctors baffled that baby is not getting bigger

Meet Suraya Brown – the little girl who is baffling doctors by refusing to grow.
The brown-eyed youngster is now 14-months-old and should weigh at least 20lb. Yet she is still the size of a newborn baby, tipping the scales at just over 7lb and a mere 19in.
Suraya has been examined by a whole team of specialists including paediatricians, nutritionists, geneticists and hormone experts.
But doctors say they still have no idea why she won’t grow – describing her condition as a “real conundrum”.

Mum Atlanta Ruzman, 24, said yesterday that her daughter was like a real-life baby doll.
She said: “The doctors haven’t got a clue what is wrong with her.
“They’ve consulted international experts about her case but her condition seems to be a complete mystery.
“She cannot sit, talk or crawl and she has to be fed through a tube to keep her alive. But she just hasn’t been putting on any weight.
“She is way behind other youngsters of her age and when they mark her growth chart they have to plot her off the graph. She is a just like a real-life doll. In fact my other daughter has a doll that is bigger than her.”

Suraya was born four weeks early weighing 2.6lb. But specialists say nine out of 10 babies born at this stage will immediately start growing and put on weight.
In Suraya’s case she stayed at her birth weight for the first eight months and has only put on a small amount over the past six.
Experts at various hospitals in London have carried out all kinds of tests on Suraya to find out what could be wrong with her. These have included checks to see whether she is suffering from some form of dwarfism.

Teen shot by neighbor over TV s

Police are looking for Cloves Roche, who is suspected in a shooting of a Harlem teenager over a 32-inch television.
Eleventh-grader Rodney Lewis just wanted his family's TV back, but he was shot to death Wednesday by the neighbor who borrowed it, his family said Wednesday.
The East Harlem 17-year-old confronted his downstairs neighbor Wednesday afternoon demanding the return of 32-inch set. Words led to punches in a fourth-floor hallway inside the Woodrow Wilson Houses on E. 105 St., and the neighbor ended the fight with two shots, police said.
"He went to get one of his cousin's television back," said Yolanda Lewis, who lives a floor above her son's suspected killer. "No one in their right mind is going to kill somebody over a TV."
The Manhattan School for Career Development student was pronounced dead minutes after arriving at Metropolitan Hospital.
Cops were hunting for neighbor Cloves Roche, 26, Wednesday night. Investigators released a picture of the ex-con who was recently released from state prison. Roche just finished a five-year stint for robbery and drug charges, records showed.
Lewis' relatives said Roche pulled out a gun during the brawl, shooting the teen in the leg and stomach. more

Rookie bank robber scares woman to death

RALEIGH, N.C. — Larry Whitfield was on foot, his getaway car wrecked, his rookie attempt at robbing a bank thwarted by a set of locked doors, according to detectives. Looking for a place to hide, police say, he found himself inside the home of a frightened old woman.
There's no evidence Whitfield ever touched 79-year-old Mary Parnell. Authorities say he even told the grandmother of five he didn't want to hurt her, directing her to sit in a chair in her bedroom. But investigators have no doubt he terrified her so much that she died of a heart attack.
Now Whitfield, a 20-year-old with no prior criminal record, is charged with first-degree murder, a rare defendant accused of literally scaring a person to death.
"He could've avoided all this by turning himself in, and life would've went on for Mrs. Parnell," said Capt. Calvin Shaw of the Gaston County Police Department, which handled the investigation.
Under a legal concept known as the felony murder rule, it's not uncommon for prosecutors to bring a murder charge against a defendant who doesn't intentionally harm a victim. The rule exists in some form in every state and lets authorities bring murder charges whenever someone dies during a crime such as burglary, rape, or kidnapping.

"If you're committing any of those offenses and a person dies, that's first-degree murder," said Locke Bell, Gaston County's district attorney and the prosecutor in Whitfield's case.
Prosecutors typically use the rule to charge all of the suspects with murder when, say, one of them shoots a teller during a bank robbery. But cases of prosecutors using the felony murder rule to charge a defendant with scaring someone to death are isolated.
Jurors convicted Willie Ingram in 1982 after 64-year-old Melvin Cooper died from a heart attack in his New York home, caused by what medical experts said was the "emotional upset" of a robbery attempt. Likewise, a Pittsburgh jury convicted Mark Fisher last year in the 2003 murder of 89-year-old Freda Dale, who medical examiners said died in her home from a fear-induced heart attack.
Whitfield is being held without bail, and his attorney and his family declined to comment. He's charged with several other crimes in addition to murder, and has not entered a plea. He faces life without parole if convicted.
Authorities said Whitfield and an accomplice, armed with semiautomatic rifles, planned to rob the Fort Financial Credit Union in Gastonia. The bank's staff locked its security doors as the men approached, leaving them stuck outside. They fled but crashed on Interstate 85. Officials said the other man was caught shortly after the crash, while Whitfield ended up at Parnell's doorstep.
Parnell's husband came home from a funeral and found her around 4:30 p.m., slumped over in the chair. Whitfield, police say, had fled after Mary Parnell went into cardiac arrest and broke into another nearby home. He was arrested while walking in the neighborhood.
Parnell's autopsy report said she had an enlarged heart, was overweight and had advanced liver disease, kidney disease, hypertension, heart disease and was a diabetic, all of which were decided to be secondary factors. Dr. Steven Dunton, the deputy chief medical examiner in Dekalb County, Ga., said an autopsy finding of natural causes can be upgraded by what he calls an external environmental factor.
In Parnell's case, doctors listed her cause of death as a heart attack due to "stress during home invasion."
"There's nothing seen by the pathologist that would show a person died that way," Dunton said. "That's entirely from circumstantial information." more

Man received 5 years for filming woman having sex with dogs

TULSA — A man received a five-year prison term Monday for videotaping a co-defendant — who got no prison time — as she engaged in sex acts with dogs.
Donald Roy Seigfried He pleaded no contest in November to one count of committing a crime against nature.

Donald R. Seigfried, 56, pleaded no contest in November to one count of committing a crime against nature.
Tulsa County District Judge William Kellough sentenced Seigfried to five years in prison and ordered him to spend three years on probation.
Co-defendant Diane Sue Whalen, 55, received a five-year suspended sentence and no prison time in October. She pleaded no contest in September to one felony count.
Records show Seigfried has prior felony convictions for theft and drug offenses committed more than 25 years ago. Whalen had no prior criminal record.
Attorney Jerry Truster, representing Seigfried, said if Seigfried had not had the past convictions, he would have had a possibility of serving his entire sentence on probation.
According to Whalen’s sentencing report, she was recorded on video engaged in sex acts with three dogs. more