Tuesday 09-20-16

More than 800 immigrants mistakenly granted citizenship

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government has mistakenly granted citizenship to at least 858 immigrants from countries of concern to national security or with high rates of immigration fraud who had pending deportation orders, according to an internal Homeland Security audit released Monday.

The Homeland Security Department's inspector general found that the immigrants used different names or birthdates to apply for citizenship with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and such discrepancies weren't caught because their fingerprints were missing from government databases.

DHS said in an emailed statement that an initial review of these cases suggest that some of the individuals may have ultimately qualified for citizenship, and that the lack of digital fingerprint records does not necessarily mean they committed fraud.

The report does not identify any of the immigrants by name, but Inspector General John Roth's auditors said they were all from "special interest countries" — those that present a national security concern for the United States — or neighboring countries with high rates of immigration fraud. The report did not identify those countries.

DHS said the findings reflect what has long been a problem for immigration officials — old paper-based records containing fingerprint information that can't be searched electronically. DHS says immigration officials are in the process of uploading these files and that officials will review "every file" identified as a case of possible fraud.

Roth's report said fingerprints are missing from federal databases for as many as 315,000 immigrants with final deportation orders or who are fugitive criminals. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has not reviewed about 148,000 of those immigrants' files to add fingerprints to the digital record.

The gap was created because older, paper records were never added to fingerprint databases created by both the now-defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service and the FBI in the 1990s. ICE, the DHS agency responsible for finding and deporting immigrants living in the country illegally, didn't consistently add digital fingerprint records of immigrants whom agents encountered until 2010.

The government has known about the information gap and its impact on naturalization decisions since at least 2008 when a Customs and Border Protection official identified 206 immigrants who used a different name or other biographical information to gain citizenship or other immigration benefits, though few cases have been investigated.

Roth's report said federal prosecutors have accepted two criminal cases that led to the immigrants being stripped of their citizenship. But prosecutors declined another 26 cases. ICE is investigating 32 other cases after closing 90 investigations.

ICE officials told auditors that the agency hadn't pursued many of these cases in the past because federal prosecutors "generally did not accept immigration benefits fraud cases." ICE said the Justice Department has now agreed to focus on cases involving people who have acquired security clearances, jobs of public trust or other security credentials.

Several members of Congress criticized the Obama administration Monday in the wake of Roth's report, though the report suggests that the gaps extend several years earlier than the Obama administration.

Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee Michael McCaul said ICE should quickly investigate all of the cases at issue and ensure that all immigration fingerprint records are digitized in short order.

Mistakenly awarding citizenship to someone ordered deported can have serious consequences because U.S. citizens can typically apply for and receive security clearances or take security-sensitive jobs.

At least three of the immigrants-turned-citizens were able to acquire aviation or transportation worker credentials, granting them access to secure areas in airports or maritime facilities and vessels. Their credentials were revoked after they were identified as having been granted citizenship improperly, Roth said in his report.

A fourth person is now a law enforcement officer.

Roth recommended that all of the outstanding cases be reviewed and fingerprints in those cases be added to the government's database and that immigration enforcement officials create a system to evaluate each of the cases of immigrants who were improperly granted citizenship. DHS officials agreed with the recommendations and said the agency is working to implement the changes.

 

https://www.yahoo.com/news/more-800-immigrants-mistakenly-granted-citizenship-130452164--politics.html

Friday 07-15-16

This is the result of having politicians and not Statesmen anymore. 
Small stepping stone finally made it with over 50,000 page views.

Three Foreign-Born Cases of Multi-Drug Resistant TB in Nashville, Tennessee

NASHVILLE, Tennessee–Three foreign-born residents of Nashville, Tennessee were diagnosed with multi-drug resistant (MDR) tuberculosis (TB) in 2014 and 2015, according to the Tennessee Department of Health.

All told, in the six years between 2010 and 2015, seven cases of MDR TB were diagnosed in the state of Tennessee, including the three Nashville cases. The Tennessee Department of Health confirms that two of these seven cases of MDR TB were refugees, four were foreign-born but not refugees, and one was U.S.-born.

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“One of those [two refugees] was diagnosed [with MDR TB] in 2013 and one was diagnosed in 2010. The one diagnosed in 2013 did not have a TB B-classification in 2007 upon arrival,” a spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Health says.
The spokesperson did not add whether this refugee diagnosed with MDR TB in 2013 was tested for latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) upon the initial medical screening that every refugee is supposed to undergo upon arrival in the United States.
As Breitbart News reported previously, 27 percent of refugees recently resettled in Tennessee have tested positive for LTBI, one of the highest rates in the country.
Four percent of the general population tests positive for LTBI. The rate at which those in the general population who test positive for LTBI develop active TB at some time in their life is ten percent.
The refugee diagnosed with MDR TB in 2013 developed the disease six years after arriving in the United States in 2007.

Several recent studies have indicated that the high rate of LTBI among resettled refugees poses a risk of active TB in resettlement communities because many refugees who develop TB do so as much as five or more years after their arrival in the country.
“The one [refugee diagnosed with MDR TB] in 2010 had a TB B1-classification upon arrival in 2010,” the spokesperson says.
Under the federal refugee resettlement program operated by the Office of Refugee Resettlement, all refugees are given overseas medical screenings as part of a program developed and supervised by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) that supporters frequently describe as “stringent.”
When those screenings reveal health risks in a refugee, they receive specific classifications. Refugees diagnosed with active TB are given Class A classifications, meaning they are not allowed to be admitted to the United States, with one very big loophole.
Refugees diagnosed overseas with active infectious TB and are classified as Class A medical risks are permitted to resettle in the United States if they receive a medical waiver from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) of the Department of Homeland Security.
Breitbart News has asked CDC to report on the number of refugees given Class A active tuberculosis classifications in their overseas medical screenings who have received medical waivers from the USCIS that allow them to enter the United States, but has not received a response.

Refugees who have abnormal chest x-rays but are sputum smear negative, or who have successfully completed the full regimen of treatment for active TB are classified as B1 medical risks with “active non-infectious tuberculosis,” using the CDC’s terminology, and are allowed to enter the United States without a waiver.
In the case of the one refugee who was diagnosed with MDR TB in 2010, it appears that refugee may have received a B1 “active non-infectious tuberculosis” classification overseas, but been diagnosed with MDR TB almost immediately upon arriving in the United States.
The spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Health tells Breitbart News none of the three foreign-born cases diagnosed in Nashville in 2014 and 2015 were refugees, but refuses to provide either their country of origin or their immigration status. If not refugees, they were either illegal aliens, asylees, parolees, student visa holders, foreign tourists, or permanent legal residents.
“Due to the small number of persons with MDR TB in one county, we have determined providing information about the country of origin for each could contribute to their identification and could violate their protections under HIPAA,” the spokesperson tells Breitbart News.
The HIPAA excuse, a long legal stretch at best, is one often made by politically correct public health officials in an effort to conceal the immigration status of patients with TB or other infectious diseases.
Michael Evans of the Tennessee Office for Refugees (TOR), the subsidiary of Catholic Charities of Tennessee hired by the federal government as the resettlement agency in the Volunteer State, tells Breitbart News, “Because the Tennessee Department of Health does not directly track immigration status, the Tennessee Office for Refugees provided research support to TNDH staff.”

TOR has previously claimed that it does not monitor the medical status of resettled refugees and is unable to provide data on the number of refugees that have been diagnosed with active TB.
Breitbart News has asked both the Tennessee Department of Health and TOR to provide information on the number of refugees diagnosed with active TB over the past five years, but neither organization has done so.
Under the Refugee Act of 1980, TOR is required by law to both report and monitor illnesses such as LTBI, active TB, and MDR TB diagnosed among refugees to the county public health departments in which those cases are diagnosed.
To date, TOR has not fully complied with that requirement.
As Breitbart News reported previously, public health directors in Davidson County and Shelby County (Memphis is another refugee resettlement community in the state) have said that TOR has not reported any of this data – LTBI, active TB, or MDR TB – to them.
Nashville, in Davidson County, is the leading refugee resettlement community in the state. In 2015, 1,162 of the 1,601 refugees resettled in the Volunteer State were placed in Nashville.

MDR TB is a very dangerous form of active TB. Only 60 percent of those diagnosed with the disease survive, according to one medical expert who specializes in tuberculosis.
In contrast to active TB, which can be successfully treated over 9 months with four standard drugs at a cost of $17,000 per patient, MDR TB takes 20 to 26 months to treat at a cost of $150,000 per patient.
In 2014, there were only 91 MDR TB cases in the entire United States, out of a total of 9,421 cases of active TB. Worldwide, however, there were 480,000 cases of MTB TB out of a total of 9 million cases of active TB.
Breitbart News asked Nashville Mayor Megan Barry what specifically she plans to do to limit the health risk to Nashville residents from foreign-born MDR TB.
Mayor Barry has not yet responded.
With a population of 644,000 and at least two confirmed cases of MDR TB in 2015, Nashville, Tennessee appears to have the highest rate of MDR TB of any county in the country: one case for every 322,000 residents during the year.
Across the country in 2014 the 91 MDR TB cases were diagnosed out of a total United States population of 323 million, or one case for every 3.5 million residents during the year.
Breitbart News asked the three members of Congress who represent the metropolitan Nashville area–Rep. Jim Cooper, Rep. Marsha Blackburn, and Rep. Diane Black–to comment, but none have yet responded.
Their challengers, however, readily offered their views on the news that Nashville has developed such a high rate of MDR TB.
“Rep. Diane Black and her Democratic allies in Washington, like Rep. Jim Cooper, have combined to pass budgets bringing refugees into Tennessee and the United States that now have apparently contributed to making Nashville, Tennessee the multi-drug resistant TB capital of America,” former State Rep. Joe Carr, who is challenging Rep. Black for the GOP nomination in the Sixth Congressional District, tells Breitbart News.
Stacy Ries Snyder, who is running for the GOP nomination to take on Rep. Jim Cooper in the Fifth Congressional District this fall, tells Breitbart News, “Jim Cooper, who has served in Congress for 26 years and represents Nashville/Davidson County, should be out in front of this issue since these refugees affect his district more than any other in Tennessee. He is either uninterested or unable to protect the citizens of his district.”
“There are refugees being allowed into this country unfettered – we don’t know who they are or even if they have contagious diseases. We must re-institute an Ellis Island type of inspection station where those with diseases can either be treated or some returned to their native country. Until such an inspection station is instituted, there needs to be a moratorium on refugees until we can find out who is in this country and in what state of health they are,” Snyder says.
“As a Catholic, I am extremely disturbed by the knowledge that Catholic Charities is helping to bring in these refugees and failing to protect the American populace in the meantime. They are doing this in violation of the Refugee Act of 1980 which allowed States to opt out-which Tennessee did. Catholic Charities is not operating under laws, it is operating under regulations that circumvent the people’s voice to its own government,” she adds.
Big John Smith, who is competing with Snyder for the GOP nomination in the Fifth District, tells Breitbart News, “it’s very puzzling to me why our federal government seems hell-bent to bring immigrants into our country from places where TB infections are common, if not rampant.”
“At Ellis Island, individuals were admitted to America after a medical screening.  Those
policies were designed to protect Americans, to keep them safe.  Our life boat will sink and all will perish if our earlier American policies are not resurrected, ” Smith adds.
“In my town of Nashville, the local office of refugee resettlement with its sister organization, Catholic Charities,  have been very sly in concealing which of its current immigrants are infected.  Catholic Charities is paid for each person entering America through their crowded offices,” Smith adds.
“What is unfair to Nashvillians and Tennesseans in general is that it is they who will have to bear the costs for housing, medical care, food stamps, earned income tax rebates and the thousands of dollars spent every year for a people with no education and few marketable skills. These policies are so costly and unfair to the people in my own community as they struggle to keep their own families fed and housed,” Smith concludes.
The Department of Health presentation from October 2015, “MDR in NDR: Nashville’s Trio of Multidrug-Resistant TB Cases,” by Ben Katz, MPH, of the Tennessee Tuberculosis Elimination Program offered a description of each of the three foreign-born patients who were diagnosed with MDR TB.
Patient 1 in Nashville was a 44-year-old, foreign-born male who “presented to local hospital with cough and abnormal chest x-ray,” on May 15, 2015.
Two weeks later, on June 2, “Molecular detection of drug resistance (MDDR) showed INH, EMB, and PZA mutations.”
Patient 2 in Nashville was a a 47-year-old, foreign-born female who had a “Previous diagnosis 2011 with treatment.” On March 30, 2015, she had a “TST placed.” On April 3, that test revealed the presence of TB. That same day she “[r]eported night sweats, weight loss, fatigue, and cough.”
Patient 3 in Nashville was a 28-year-old, foreign-born female who “[r]eported TB treatment overseas” between February 2013 and February 2014 “with Isoniazid, Rifampin, and Ethambutol.”
On April 14, 2014, two months after completing a year of treatment for active TB overseas, Patient 3 “[s]ought care related to lump in neck and related medical complaints,” in Nashville.
On May 29, 2014, Patient 3’s “[b]iopsy reported MTb probe positive.”
As of October 7, 2015, more than one year later, Patient 3 was still undergoing treatment.
Tennessee is one of fourteen states that have withdrawn from the federal refugee resettlement program. In those states, the federal government has hired contractors, voluntary agencies (VOLAGs), to resettle refugees under the statutorily questionable Wilson Fish alternative program.
In April, the Tennessee General Assembly passed Senate Joint Resolution 467 declaring its intent to sue the federal government on Tenth Amendment grounds for its operation of the refugee resettlement program in the Volunteer State.
In July Tennessee Attorney General Herb Slatery gave the state legislature the green light to proceed with the litigation, though he said he would not personally represent the state in the proceedings.
“This news of two refugees with MDR TB in Tennessee underscores the need for judicial relief through our Tenth Amendment lawsuit. Inconsistent data and conflicting reports indicate unacceptable risk when it comes to the health and safety of our citizens,” State Senate Majority Leader Mark Norris (R-Collierville), the sponsor of SJR 467, tells Breitbart News.
An attorney familiar with the federal refugee resettlement program agrees.
“Recent articles detailing cases of refugee arrivals with TB including those of greatest concern, being active and multi-drug resistant, highlight the need for meaningful accountability and transparency on the part of the federal resettlement contractors who bring refugees to our communities,” the attorney tells Breitbart News.
“VOLAG (volunteer agency resettlement agency) accountability has been discussed in Congress repeatedly since the passage of the Refugee Act of 1980 and unfortunately, not much has changed.  The federal program continues to operate with sanctioned secrecy, including the concealment of resettlement plans prior to the start of the fiscal year and other information that has serious implications for public health,” the attorney adds.
“This secrecy surrounding the whole refugee program must be unveiled,” State Rep. Terri Lynn Weaver (R-Lancaster), the main sponsor of SJR 467 in the Tennessee House tells Breitbart News.
“We want to know who, how many and where these refugees are coming from. It is wrong to put our state in danger of epidemic proportions that will only escalate that could be prevented if we knew the truth,” Weaver adds.
The Tennessee General Assembly is expected to hire the Thomas More Law Center, which has said it will represent the state at no cost, to litigate the case on its behalf in federal court.

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/07/15/hold-til-three-foreign-born-cases-multi-drug-resistant-tb-nashville-tennessee/

Tuesday 07-05-16

Report: Released Criminal Aliens Committed Nearly 10 Times More Crimes Than Obama Admin. Told Congress

The Obama Administration “grossly misrepresented” the number of crimes the criminal aliens it released from custody in FY 2014 subsequently committed by nearly tenfold, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) charges.

According to FAIR, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) obtained via a Freedom of Information Act (FIOA) request on FAIR’s behalf reveal that the 30,558 criminal aliens ICE released in FY 2014 committed 13,288 additional crimes.

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The number of subsequent convictions contained in FIOA documents is far higher than the 1,423 additional offenses ICE reported to the House Judiciary Committee last July.
The criminal aliens released in FY 2014 who went on to commit those additional crimes had convictions for offenses like homicide, kidnapping, assault, sexual assault, and drunk driving. The new crimes, according to ICE’s report to Congress, included vehicular homicide, domestic violence, sexual assault, DUI, burglary and assault.
“Rather than end dangerous politically-driven policies that have put a total of 85,000 deportable criminal aliens back onto the streets in the last three years, ICE tried to hide them by providing grossly inaccurate information to Congress and the American people,” Dan Stein, the president of FAIR, said in statement.
In April, ICE revealed that it released an additional 19,723 criminal aliens —who had a total of 64,197 convictions among them including 101 homicide convictions, 216 kidnapping convictions, 320 sexual assault convictions, 1,728 assault convictions, and 12,307 driving under the influence of alcohol convictions — from custody in FY 2015.
In response to the FY 2015 numbers, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte warned that the Obama Administration’s immigration policies are creating “a sanctuary for tens of thousands of criminal aliens.”

“The American public has been misled by the enforcement priorities, deferred action, and executive action policies of this Administration, which categorize only certain so-called ‘serious’ criminal aliens as worthy of detention and then removal,” Goodlatte said in a statement. “Despite its rhetoric, the fact remains that the Obama Administration continues to willingly free dangerous criminal aliens, allowing them to continue to prey upon communities across the United States.”

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/06/21/report-released-criminal-aliens-committed-nearly-10xs-crimes-obama-admin-told-congress/


ALERT: This Is Only The 2nd Time In History This Has Happened In The Silver Market!

With silver surging nearly $1.50 in early trading to $21.25, traders and investors just witnessed an event that has only happened for the 2nd time in the history of the silver market.
(King World News) The following is from Jason Goepfert at SentimenTrader:  “Short-term optimism on silver is at a maximum. The Optimism Index for (the silver ETF) SLV closed at 100 on Friday, only the second time in its history (see chart below).

The other was June 11, 2007, after which it dropped about 6% over the next week. With Optimism above 95, the fund’s worst performance tended to occur during the next 7-10 days, suggesting a high risk level for those looking to buy into a market that is generating a lot of interest.” The chart and commentary above are from SentimenTrader. To try a free 14-day trial of the internationally acclaimed work that Jason Goepfert produces at SentimenTrader simply CLICK HERE.

http://kingworldnews.com/this-is-only-the-2nd-time-in-history-this-has-happened-in-the-silver-market/

Saturday 06-04-16

It is amazing to me that I can not volunteer at a halfway house, without being TB tested and yet they will allow people all over this country with out one.

 

More than one-third of refugees in Vermont test positive for tuberculosis

Data from the Vermont Department of Health show that more than one-third of refugees resettled in Vermont test positive for tuberculosis.
Since 2013, about 900 refugees admitted to the Green Mountain State have been tested for tuberculosis, a potentially fatal infectious disease affecting the lungs. Of that number, 318 refugees, or 35.4 percent, tested positive.
Watchdog.org obtained the health data on Wednesday following reporting by Stateline that the disease may be making a comeback in the United States.
Refugees brought to the United States undergo TB tests as part of comprehensive health screenings. State health departments track the data to monitor cases and protect against public health crises.
According to IGRA (Interferon-Gamma Release Assays) blood test results from 2013 to the present, the highest percentage of incoming refugees to Vermont infected with TB occurred in 2013. That year, 108 refugees out of 248 tested, or 43.6 percent, showed positive for TB.

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Test results showed slight improvement in subsequent years, with 34 percent of incoming refugees having TB in 2014 and 32 percent showing positive in 2015. Children under age 5 are excluded from the results, as they undergo tuberculin skin tests, or TSTs.

While active TB is fatal in half of cases that go untreated, Ben Truman, health policy and web program coordinator at the Vermont Department of Health, said only a handful of TB cases each year in Vermont are “active.”
“The Vermont five-year average of active TB cases for 2011 to 2015 is 5.4 cases, with a range of two to eight cases per year,” Truman said.
Using Truman’s active TB averages, Vermont reported 27 active TB disease cases between 2011 and 2015. Truman would not say how many resettled refugees in Vermont have active TB disease, or if refugees are included in the Health Department’s five-year average of active TB cases.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that tuberculosis is common worldwide, with one out of every three people carrying the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In 2014, about 9.6 million people had active TB and 1.5 million people died from the disease. TB disease is rare in the United States, however, with just 9,421 active TB cases reported in 2014.
Unlike active TB disease, latent TB infection is not contagious, and people who have it experience no symptoms. Latent TB infection can advance to active TB disease, however, where symptoms typically include weight loss, fever, and chronic cough and phlegm, often including blood. About 10 percent of untreated latent infections advance to active TB disease, according to the CDC.
Last week Breitbart reported that most of Arizona’s 222 active TB cases among resettled refugees over the past two decades were caused by latent TB infections that advanced to active TB disease. A fact sheet from Arizona’s Department of Health states that the cases were “caused by latent tuberculosis infections that became active after years or even decades of lying dormant.” The department urges people with latent TB infection to “complete an entire course of medication” to prevent possible activation.
Truman said advancement from latent TB to active TB is not typical in Vermont cases.
“Many people who have latent TB infection never develop TB disease. In these people, the TB bacteria remain inactive for a lifetime without causing disease,” he said. “The TB incidence in Vermont is low at 1.11 cases per 100,000 (2015), which is less than the national average of 3.0 cases per 100,000.”
Refugee resettlement is facing fresh scrutiny after President Obama pledged to admit 100,000 refugees to the United States, up from the prior cap of 70,000. As distinguished from immigrants, refugees are people who have fled their countries due to war or persecution.
State Refugee Coordinator Denise Lamoureux said Vermont plans to admit 350 refugees this year. One hundred refugees may be placed in Rutland, where Mayor Chris Louras is facing a backlash from residents for hiding the city’s resettlement plans from the public.
Refugees may be entitled to multiple years of taxpayer-funded medical, cash and social assistance. Assistance benefits range from Medicaid and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families to job preparation and placement. Funding for Vermont’s refugee resettlement program comes from federal grants distributed to the Vermont Agency of Human Services and the the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants.
Lamoureux said the current year funding is in line with the 2013-2014 funding grants, except that cash and medical assistance expenses dropped by about $350,000, due to lower refugee medical assistance costs following the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid expansion. She added that social services allocations are down to $195,737 for fiscal year 2016.
While Truman didn’t say how the Health Department was handling active TB cases among Vermont’s refugees, a single active TB case for a teacher at Charlotte Central School in 2015 led the department to test about 500 students and coworkers. Test results found that 19 children and two adults had become infected with latent TB.

http://watchdog.org/266740/vermont-refugees-test-positive-for-tuberculosis/

Tuesday 05-17-16

Hidden Microphones Exposed As Part of Government Surveillance Program In The Bay Area

OAKLAND (CBS SF) — Hidden microphones that are part of a clandestine government surveillance program that has been operating around the Bay Area has been exposed.
Imagine standing at a bus stop, talking to your friend and having your conversation recorded without you knowing.  It happens all the time, and the FBI doesn’t even need a warrant to do it.
Federal agents are planting microphones to secretly record conversations.
Jeff Harp, a KPIX 5 security analyst and former FBI special agent said, “They put microphones under rocks, they put microphones in trees, they plant microphones in equipment. I mean, there’s microphones that are planted in places that people don’t think about, because that’s the intent!”
FBI agents hid microphones inside light fixtures and at a bus stop outside the Oakland Courthouse without a warrant to record conversations, between March 2010 and January 2011.
Federal authorities are trying to prove real estate investors in San Mateo and Alameda counties are guilty of bid rigging and fraud and used these recordings as evidence.
Harp said, “An agent can’t just go out and grab a recording device and plant it somewhere without authorization from a supervisor or special agent in charge.”
The lawyer for one of the accused real estate investors who will ask the judge to throw out the recordings, told KPIX 5 News that, “Speaking in a public place does not mean that the individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy…private communication in a public place qualifies as a protected ‘oral communication’… and therefore may not be intercepted without judicial authorization.”
Harp says that if you’re going to conduct criminal activity, do it in the privacy of your own home. He says that was the original intention of the Fourth Amendment, but it’s up to the judge to interpret it.

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/05/13/hidden-microphones-exposed-as-part-of-government-surveillance-program-in-the-bay-area/

The buying and selling of America, it is on going, this is just a drop in the bucket

Chinese pour $110bn into US real estate, says study

Investment is set to double in the next five years as wealthy rush to get their money into overseas assets, especially houses.

Chinese nationals have become the largest foreign buyers of US property after pouring billions into the market in search of safe offshore assets, according to a study.

A huge surge in Chinese buying of both residential and commercial real estate last year took their five-year investment total to more than $110bn, according to the study from the Asia Society and Rosen Consulting Group.
The sheer size of that total has helped the real estate market recover from the crash that began in 2006 and precipitated the 2008 economic crisis, they said.
Chinese investment in property has also helped to inflate prices in other developed countries, notably the UK and Australia in the wake of the dip in world stock markets in 2015.
And despite a slowdown due to Beijing’s subsequent clampdown on capital outflows, the figure for the second half of this decade is likely to double to $218bn, the study said.

Related: Poetry or property punts: what's driving China's love affair with Cambridge?

“What makes China different and noteworthy is the combination of the high volume of investment (and) the breadth of its participation across all real estate categories,” including a “somewhat unique entry into residential purchases,” the study said.
The authors of the study said their numbers, based on public and real estate industry data, understate the total. They necessarily miss purchases made by front companies and trusts that do not identify the sources of the funds.
Big deals such as the Anbang insurance group’s $2bn purchase of the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York last year and its failed $14bn offer for the Starwood group in March have made headlines. But the study said Chinese buying of US homes far outpaces its investment in commercial land and buildings.
Between 2010 and 2015, Chinese buyers put more than $17bn into US commercial real estate, with half of that spent last year alone. Unlike many countries, there are very few restrictions on what foreigners can buy in the US.
But during the same period at least $93bn went into US homes. And in the 12 months to March 2015, the latest period for which relatively comprehensive data could be gathered, home purchases totaled $28.5bn.
That took the Chinese past Canadians, who have long been the biggest foreign buyers of US residential real estate.
Geographically, Chinese buyers are concentrated in the most expensive markets: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle. Property in Chicago, Miami and Las Vegas is also popular.
That focus means they pay well above the average US home price: last year, Chinese buyers paid on average about $832,000 per home in the United States, compared with the average for all foreign purchases of $499,600.
The motivations are broad: some are buying second homes, some are buying as they move to the United States on EB-5 investor visas; some are investing for rental and resale.
Most of the money in US homes, the study noted, is private wealth, not corporate.
“This familiarity of utilizing real estate as an investment or wealth preservation tool is more prevalent in China and reflects the broader comfort of purchasing second homes in the United States by Chinese individuals and families,” the study noted.

Related: Super-rich may quit London homes under new anti-corruption rules

Since last year, there has also been the motivation to get money outside China and into dollar assets amid worry about the continued fall in the yuan, which was devalued slightly against the US dollar in August.
The study says it expects a lot more commercial real estate buys in the United States by Chinese companies.
Last month, Chinese conglomerate HNA announced it would buy the 1,400-hotel group Carlson Hotels, owner of the Radisson brand.
“Anbang is not the only firm looking at these assets. Other Chinese entities were originally interested in acquiring Starwood in 2015 before Marriott reached an initial deal, including Jin Jiang Hotel Group, which had already acquired a European hotel chain in 2015, and CIC, the sovereign wealth fund,” the study said.
In Australia, the government recently blocked an attempt by Dakang Holdings to buy the Kidman farmland empire whose assets cover 1.3% of the Australian land mass.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/may/16/chinese-pour-110bn-into-us-real-estate-says-study

Wednesday 05-11-16

Measles Outbreak in Memphis Began at Mosque

The first reported case of a person with measles in the recent Memphis outbreak, which now numbers seven confirmed cases, was at a local mosque on April 15, according to the Shelby County Health Department.
“The first public place where there was a public exposure potentially [to measles] was the Masjid Al-Noor Mosque on April 15,” Dr. Alisa Haushalter, Director of the Shelby County Health Department, tells Breitbart News.
“The mosque is one location we know that individuals who were infectious were during their infectious period, but that’s not necessarily where the first case occurred. I don’t want you to draw conclusions without sufficient information,” she added.
Haushalter acknowledged, however, that the measles outbreak could have originated with an unvaccinated for measles adult or child brought to Tennessee under the federal refugee resettlement program, something she called “a possibility amongst many.”
There had been no reported cases of measles in Shelby County for the previous 24 months, according to a spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Health. “There have been nine previous cases of measles in the entire state of Tennessee in the past 12 years,” WREG reported.
The Shelby County Health Department first notified the public of a measles outbreak on Friday morning, April 22, reporting two confirmed cases, an adult and a child.
“We take the testing [of patients for measles] to the state lab then to CDC. We went public as soon as we received the confirmation,” spokesperson Elizabeth Hart tells Breitbart News.

As of May 10, the number of reported cases of measles in Memphis has increased to seven.
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the number of measles cases in the United States grew from 63 in 2010 to 667 in 2014. It fell to 189 in 2015. That year, “the United States experienced a large, multi-state measles outbreak linked to an amusement park in California. The outbreak likely started from a traveler who became infected overseas with measles, then visited the amusement park while infectious; however, no source was identified.”
Surprisingly, the majority of the more than 70,000 refugees resettled annually across the United States  through the federal refugee resettlement program are not required to have been vaccinated for measles prior to their arrival here.
“Refugees being resettled in the United States, unlike immigrants seeking residency, have not been subject to immunization requirements,” according to a Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) released by the CDC in January 2015.
Kristen Nordlund, a spokesperson for the CDC, tells Breitbart News, “I think you may not be reading the full MMWR, which does discuss a program that CDC set up that requires refugees from some countries to be vaccinated.”
Refugees settled in the United States under the refugee resettlement program arriving from all but six countries — Thailand, Nepal, Malaysia,Kenya, Ethiopia, and Uganda — are not required to demonstrate they have received immunizations, specifically including measles, according to that January 2015 MMWR from the CDC.

Of the 1,601 refugees resettled in Tennessee in fiscal year 2015, 186 were resettled in Memphis, according to a report provided by Catholic Charities of Tennessee, which administers the program in the Volunteer State on behalf of the federal government under the Wilson-Fish alternative program.
Less than one percent of those 1,601 refugees (a total of twelve individuals) were from the six countries (Thailand, Nepal, Uganda, Kenya, Malaysia, and Ethiopia) where refugees are required to be vaccinated for measles as a condition of their entry to the United States.
Of the refugees resettled in Tennessee by Catholic Charities of Tennessee under the federal refugee resettlement program, 1,589 (99 percent) came from countries of origin where the United States government does not require that refugees have measles vaccinations, including 332 from Iraq, 214 from Somalia, 206 from Congo, 393 from Burma, 138 from Bhutan, 57 from Sudan, 47 from Afghanistan, and 31 from Syria.
Breitbart News contacted the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the part of the Department of Health and Human Services responsible for the federal refugee resettlement program, for comment several times over the past two weeks but has not received a response beyond the acknowledgement they had received our original inquiry.
Michael Evans, State Refugee Health Coordinator for the Tennessee Office for Refugees, part of Catholic Charities of Tennessee, the VOLAG (voluntary agency) hired by ORR to operate the federal refugee resettlement program in Tennessee, did however respond to Breitbart News.
“The Tennessee Office for Refugees has not been contacted by the Shelby County Health Department, and has no information beyond what is publicly available through reputable news sources,” Evans tells Breitbart News.

This seems to be a rather curious oversight by the Shelby County Health Department, given that the first instance of potential exposure occurred at a mosque in Memphis likely to be frequented by refugees resettled by Catholic Charities.
Evans did not deny that the vast majority of refugees resettled in Tennessee by Catholic Charities of Tennessee are not required to be vaccinated for measles prior to their arrival in the United States.
He did, however, offer this statement:

I am happy to confirm that a refugee suffering from a measles infection would not be permitted to travel to Tennessee, and our screening program has not detected a person infected with measles. As indicated in the link you provided (and also found here), a majority of refugees begin or complete their MMR series before setting foot on a plane to the U.S. Once in Tennessee, medical providers review the vaccinations that were administered overseas to determine what series need to be completed here. Additionally, in order for a refugee to adjust their status to permanent resident (a step required of all refugees), the refugee must be vaccinated against measles, as required by U.S. immigration law. The Tennessee Office for Refugees—through the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement—provides access to all immunizations required to adjust status.

The Tennessee Department of Health has been reluctant to provide details on the point of origin of the measles outbreak.
“Due to the small number of individuals confirmed with measles in one county, our HIPAA Compliance Office has determined we may not provide any information at this time that could be used to identify an individual. We take our obligation to protect individuals – and to protect population health – most seriously,” Woody McMillen, director of communication and media relations for the Tennessee Department of Health, tells Breitbart News.
According to the Shelby County Health Department, the first visit of a person infected with measles who may have spread the disease to others came at the Masjid-Al-Noor-Mosque between the hours of 5:30 am and 8:30 am on Friday, April 15.

The Masjid Al-Noor Mosque offers “Adult Quran Class” every morning after “Fajr,” the first of five daily prayers offered by Muslims, according to the mosque’s website. On April 15, those classes would likely have begun shortly after 5:00 am.
Breitbart News contacted the Masjid Al-Noor Mosque for comment, but has not received a response.
The second visit of a person infected with measles came at the same location during the same three morning hours the following day, Saturday, April 16.
By Sunday, persons infected with measles visited two additional locations, the nursery at the Collierville United Methodist Church, which is only open on Sundays from 8:15 am to noon, and a Goodwill store located in Millington, Tennessee.
“From my knowledge it was detected at a local doctor’s office. They caught it early on it was an adult, a woman [who was infected with measles] …. No one else from my knowledge who was infected visited our store. I was not here when she [the woman infected with measles] came in [to the store on Sunday morning],” Ashley Brooks, the manager of the Goodwill store in Millington tells Breitbart News.
According to the Shelby County Health Department:

The investigation of the measles outbreak in Shelby County has identified the following locations as sites visited by people with measles during the time when they were infected with measles and could have spread the illness to others.
You may have been exposed to a person with measles if you were at the following locations on the dates listed.

In chronological order, these locations are listed as follows:

Masjid-Al-Noor Mosque
3529 Mynders Ave, Memphis TN
4/15/2016 5:30 a.m. – 8:30 a.m.
4/16/2016 5:30 a.m. – 8:30 a..m.
Collierville United Methodist Church Nursery
454 W. Poplar Ave, Collierville TN
4/17/2016 9:00am – 12:00pm
Goodwill
8059 US 51, Millington TN
4/17/2016 9am – 2pm
Parkway Village Church of Christ
4400 Knight Arnold Rd, Memphis TN
4/17/2016
River City Pediatrics
6401 Poplar Ave, Memphis TN
4/19/2016
Yukon Clinic
1355 W. Brierbrook Rd, Germantown TN
4/19/2016 9:45am – 12:45pm
Methodist Le Bonheur Germantown Hospital – Emergency Department
7691 Poplar Ave, Germantown TN
4/20/2016 7:00pm – 4/21/2016 3:00am
Family Physicians Group PC
8110 Cordova Road, Memphis TN
4/20/2016 10:00am – 2:00pm
4/22/2016 8:00am – 12:30pm
Primary Care Pediatrics
9091 Highway 51N, Millington TN
4/21/2016 1:00pm – 6:00pm
St. Francis Hospital – Bartlett – Emergency Department
2986 Kate Bond Rd, Memphis TN
4/22/2016 any time after 10:45am to 4/23/2016 3:30 p.m.

“What we listed are public places we know individuals were… however somebody could have been ill, but it may not have been at a public case,” Shelby County Director of Health Dr. Haushalter tells Breitbart News.
Haushalter acknowledged, however, that the mosque was “the first potential exposure in a public place… I am familar with the refugee process and how people come through and how their immunization status is checked. Once they come to the US they have a window [of time] through which.. often they can get immunization.”
Haushalter also acknowledged that “In some cases they are required. I don’t know for measles.”
On Friday May 6, the Shelby County Health Department confirmed a seventh case of measles:

The Shelby County Health Department has received confirmation of a seventh case of measles.
According to the Shelby County Health Department, six of those infected were not immunized against measles.
We are told the cases are all over the county.
The original two cases involved an adult, and the other a child.
Four of the cases were connected to each other.
Two other cases were connected to each other.

The possibility that immigrants brought to the United States under the federal refugee resettlement program pose a potential health risk to the rest of the population is one of a number of objections raised to the continuation of the program. Other objections include the unfunded mandate financial burden social welfare benefits impose upon states where the refugees are resettled, as well as security concerns that the resettled refugees, many of whom are Muslim, may pose due to possible ties to Islamist terrorist groups or ideologies.
The prevalence of communicable disease among refugee populations is well documented. In January 2016, for instance, a severe outbreak of measles occurred in a refugee camp in Calais, France.
In April, the Tennessee General Assembly declared its intention to sue the federal government over its operation of the refugee resettlement program on Tenth Amendment grounds.

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/05/10/measles-outbreak-memphis-began-mosque/

 

Over 120 languages spoken in Nashville schools; Spanish, Arabic rank highest after English

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Recently released data from the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools shows about a third of the district’s 85,000 student population does not speak English as a first language.
Of those 25,300 students, more than 12,300 require special services, primarily in elementary schools, The Tennessean reports.
The majority of Nashville students learning English speak Spanish at home, and Arabic speakers comprise the second largest group.
According to statistics provided to the Tennessean by the district, a total of 120 different languages are spoken in Metro schools, with the most popular being Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, Somali, Vietnamese, Burmese, Napali, Amharic, Chinese and Karen.
Spanish speaking students are by far the largest group with 16,896 students, while Arabic and Kurdish round out the top three at 3,435 and 1,181, respectively.
Data shows the number of Metro students requiring special services to learn English has been on the rise, from 8,751 in the 2011-12 school year to 12,329 in 2015-16.
The highest concentration of Arabic students is found at Antioch High School, where about 264 students speak the language.
The situation, for some reason, prompted district officials to launch a new Arabic language program last year, and they apparently targeted Antioch and several other schools with high Arabic student populations to pilot theprogram.

“The schools – Antioch High School, Margaret Allen Middle Prep, Cane Ridge High School, Antioch Middle Prep, Overton High School and McMurray Middle Prep – were selected based on a survey of students’ home languages,” Chalkbeat reported this spring.
“Because all of the schools have several Arabic-speaking students – in some cases, hundreds – two different courses will be offered: beginning Arabic and heritage Arabic, for native speakers to deepen their knowledge of the language and learn to read and write in Arabic,” according to the site.
District officials touted the program as a way for students to “stay connected to their native culture” in a press release this past May.
“Native Arabic speakers have this innate skill they can take into adulthood. We want them to develop it further and use it to also strengthen their English skills,” said Metro Nashville’s chief academic officer, Jay Steele.
But not everyone thinks the new program is a good idea, or that school officials are implementing the Arabic language lessons for the right reasons.
VDare blogger Allan Wall believes “schools shouldn’t be pressured to teach a language because a lot of people in that area are speaking that language. Immigrants need to learn English.”
He took particular issue with the “Heritage Arabic classes” for students with “Arabic-speaking backgrounds.”
“Why do they need the classes?” he questioned. “To reinforce their otherness? Will these classes encourage assimilation?
“It’s not the job of our public schools to ‘help them stay connected to their native culture,’” he wrote. “In some cases, such ‘connections’ are only going to cause more problems.”

 

http://eagnews.org/over-120-languages-spoken-in-nashville-schools/

Thursday 04-28-16

Reports: Drug Cartels Assisting ISIS Terrorists Into US

Mexican drug traffickers help Islamic ISIS terrorists stationed in Mexico cross into the United States to explore targets for future attacks, according to information forwarded to Judicial Watch by a high-ranking Homeland Security official in a border state. Among the jihadists that travel back and forth through the porous southern border is a Kuwaiti named Shaykh Mahmood Omar Khabir, an ISIS operative who lives in the Mexican state of Chihuahua not far from El Paso, Texas. Khabir trained hundreds of Al Qaeda fighters in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen and has lived in Mexico for more than a year, according to information provided by Judicial Watch’s government source.

Now Khabir trains thousands of men—mostly Syrians and Yemenis—to fight in an ISIS base situated in the Mexico-U.S. border region near Ciudad Juárez, the intelligence gathered by JW’s source reveals. Staking out U.S. targets is not difficult and Khabir actually brags in an Italian newspaper article published last week that the border region is so open that he “could get in with a handful of men, and kill thousands of people in Texas or in Arizona in the space of a few hours.” Foreign Affairs Secretary Claudia Ruiz, Mexico’s top diplomat, says in the article that she doesn’t understand why the Obama administration and the U.S. media are “culpably neglecting this phenomenon,” adding that “this new wave of fundamentalism could have nasty surprises in store for the United States.”

image: http://www.trunews.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Screen-Shot-2016-01-18-at-1.54.38-PM-300x153.png

THE TERRORISTS ARE HERE NOW

This disturbing development appears on the Open Source Enterprise, the government database that collects and analyzes valuable material from worldwide print, broadcast and online media sources for the U.S. intelligence community. Only registered federal, state and local government employees can view information and analysis in the vast database and unauthorized access can lead to criminal charges. Updated data gathered on Khabir reveals he’s 52 years old and was ordered to leave Kuwait about a decade ago over his extremist positions. Khabir is currently on ISIS’s (also known as ISIL) payroll and operates a cell in an area of Mexico known as Anapra, according to the recently obtained information.

A year ago Judicial Watch reported on an ISIS camp in this exact area, just a few miles from El Paso. JW’s April 14, 2015 report identified Anapra as the location of the ISIS base, details that were provided to JW by sources that include a Mexican Army field grade officer and a Mexican Federal Police Inspector. Anapra is situated just west of Ciudad Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. At the time JW reported that another ISIS cell was established to the west of Ciudad Juárez, in Puerto Palomas to target the New Mexico towns of Columbus and Deming. Sources told JW that, during the course of a joint operation, Mexican Army and federal law enforcement officials discovered documents in Arabic and Urdu, as well as “plans” of Fort Bliss – the sprawling military installation that houses the US Army’s 1st Armored Division. Muslim prayer rugs were recovered with the documents during the operation.

Read the full article on Judicial Watch April 26, 2016

 

http://www.trunews.com/reports-drug-cartels-assisting-isis-terrorists-into-us/

Tuesday 04-05-16

Of all the stupid things they have done, this one takes the case, imo

Supreme Court rules in redistricting case: Illegal immigrants, other non-citizens can be counted

A unanimous Supreme Court ruled Monday that illegal immigrants and other non-citizens can be counted when states draw their legislative districts, shooting down a challenge by Texas residents who said their own voting power was being diluted.
The ruling does not grant non-citizens power to vote, but says the principle of “one person, one vote” doesn’t require localities to only count those who are actually eligible to vote.
Justice Ruth Baden Ginsburg, writing for the court, said even though only eligible voters are supposed to cast ballots, elected officials represent all people within their districts, and it is that act of representation, not the election itself, that the boundaries are drawn to
“As the Framers of the Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment comprehended, representatives serve all residents, not just those eligible or registered to vote,” she wrote. “Nonvoters have an important stake in many policy debates — children, their parents, even their grandparents, for example, have a stake in a strong public-education system — and in receiving constituent services, such as help navigating public-benefits bureaucracies.”
Texas residents had challenged the way districts were drawn in their state, saying that because they ended up in districts with more eligible voters, their vote counted less than someone in another district.
Because of illegal immigrants, other non-citizens and children under 18 years of age, state legislative districts in Texas can vary by as much as 40 percent.
The process of dividing up districts is known as apportionment.
At the federal level, congressional districts have been drawn based on total population under the strictures of the Fourteenth Amendment.
All 50 states have followed the same rules, though the Constitution wasn’t explicit on the matter.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/apr/4/supreme-court-illegals-count-apportionment/

It is all about control you and your choices.

HUD Wants to Make Living in a Tiny House or RV Illegal

TOPICS:Daisy LutherHousingLifestyle

March 31, 2016

By Daisy Luther
The tiny house movement has taken America by storm, in part because our economy is in the toilet. People are striving to reduce their expenses by embracing minimalism. They’re breaking free from the corporate grind because, as I’ve always advised, they are learning to live with less and radically reducing their expenses.
But, these days in America, you are sharply admonished when you try to live your life outside of the strictures of the 9-5 world. Is it any surprise that the government is now taking steps to limit our ability to drastically reduce our expenses? They always seem to make illegal anything we try to do to be more independent and moving into a tiny house appears to be the next on their list.

HUD has proposed the following law:

This proposed rule would modify the current exemption for recreational vehicles in the Manufactured Home Procedural and Enforcement Regulations.  Under the current exemption, questions have arisen regarding whether park model recreational vehicles are regulated by HUD’s manufactured home program. These park models are being produced with patio roofs, screened in porches, and other extensions that exceed the 400 square foot maximum exemption in the current regulations. Additionally, some of these models are being marketed as suitable for year round living.
HUD’s proposed rule would permit recreational vehicle manufactures to certify that a unit is exempted from HUD’s regulations. Specifically, HUD’s proposed rule would define a recreational vehicle as a factory build vehicular structure, not certified as a manufactured home, designed only for recreational use and not as a primary residence or for permanent occupancy, and built and certified in accordance with either the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) 1192-2015, Standard for Recreational Vehicles, or the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) A119.5-15, Recreational Park Trailer Standard. In addition, to provide consumers notice regarding the manufacturing standards used to construct the unit, HUD’s rule would require that units claiming the exemption display a notice that identifies the standards used to construct the unit and states that the unit is designed only for recreational use, and not as a primary residence or permanent dwelling.

That’s right – if this law is passed, living in a tiny house or an RV may become illegal in April of this year.

http://www.activistpost.com/2016/03/hud-wants-to-make-living-in-a-tiny-house-or-rv-illegal.html