Governor of New Mexico considers pardon petition for infamous outlaw Billy the Kid
From:AFP December 17, 2010
An outgoing US state governor hinted Thursday that he could soon give a posthumous pardon to Billy the Kid, the infamous19th-century Wild West outlaw.
New Mexico, US Governor Bill Richardson, who stands down next month, said his office had received a formal petition, which he will consider and make a decision on before the end of the year.
“As someone who is fascinated with New Mexico’s rich history, I’ve always been intrigued by the story of Billy the Kid and, in particular, the alleged promise of a pardon he was given by Territorial Governor Lew Wallace,” he said.
“I will diligently review this new petition and all the facts available regarding an agreement between Billy the Kid and Governor Wallace before rendering any decision,” he added.
The legend of Billy the Kid - who was variously known as William H. Bonney, Henry McCarty and Henry Antrim - has inspired dozens of books and films, several impostors and attempts to exhume his grave to test for DNA.
Some say Governor Wallace, who wrote the novel Ben Hur from the Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe, promised to pardon the Kid, shot down by Sheriff Pat Garrett on July 14, 1881.
Sheriff Garrett’s grandchildren oppose granting a pardon.
It would amount to painting Sheriff Garrett as a cold-blooded killer, “accusing our grandfather, in national and international media, of hideous crimes,” wrote Jarvis Patrick Garrett of Albuquerque and Susan Floyd Garrett of Santa Fe.
“We consider that an abomination as well as an inexcusable defamation of a great man.”
Curses! Romania’s witches forced to pay income tax
By Alison Mutler in Mogosoia, Romania From:AP January 06, 2011 9:39AM
EVERYONE curses the tax man, but Romanian witches angry about having to pay up for the first time are planning to use cat excrement and dead dogs to cast spells on the president and government.
Also among Romania’s newest taxpayers are fortune tellers - but they probably should have seen it coming.
Superstitions are no laughing matter in Romania - the land of the medieval ruler who inspired the Dracula tale - and have been part of its culture for centuries. President Traian Basescu and his aides have been known to wear purple on certain days, supposedly to ward off evil.
Romanian witches from the east and west will head to the southern plains and the Danube River tomorrow to threaten the government with spells and spirits because of the tax law, which came into effect on January 1.
A dozen witches will hurl the poisonous mandrake plant into the Danube to put a hex on government officials “so evil will befall them”, said a witch named Alisia….........
hahaha… “but they probably should have seen it coming” ROFL ;)
[ Edited: 06 January 2011 09:19 AM by Kevin Goddard]
January 4, 2011 Billy the Kid Denied Posthumous Bid for Pardon; N.M. Gov. Refuses Reprieve After All
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) The rehabilitation of Billy the Kid lies dead in the dust.
In one of his last official acts - or non-acts - before leaving office, New Mexico’s governor refused to pardon the Old West outlaw Friday for one of the many murders he committed before he was gunned down in 1881.
Gov. Bill Richardson cited ambiguity surrounding the pledge of a pardon 130 years ago as the reason. “I felt I could not rewrite history,” Richardson told The Associated Press, hours after announcing his decision on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on his last day in office….....
From correspondents in Honolulu From: AP January 25, 2011
A US federal judge has sentenced a former B-2 stealth bomber engineer to 32 years in prison for selling military secrets to China.
Noshir Gowadia, who was born in India, had faced up to life in prison. The 66-year-old showed no emotion as Chief US District Judge Susan Oki Mollway pronounced the punishment today.
A federal jury in August convicted Gowadia of 14 counts, including conspiracy, communicating national defence information to aid a foreign nation, and violating the arms export control act.
Prosecutors said Gowadia helped China design a stealth cruise missile to get money to pay the $US15,000-a-month mortgage on his expensive home overlooking the ocean in Haiku on Maui. The defence argued during the trial he only provided unclassified information to China.
Boy, this 66 year old guy must be ecstatic. Before he was looking at a life sentence - but now he’s only looking at 32 years ‘jail’. I bet he’ll be celebrating long into the night ;) link
From correspondents in Columbia, South Carolina From:AP January 26, 2011
A WOMAN has been charged with animal cruelty after she hanged her nephew’s pit bull from a tree with an electrical cord and burned its body because the dog chewed her Bible, police say.
Animal control officers said 65-year-old Miriam Smith told them she killed a female dog named Diamond because it was a “devil dog” and she was worried it might harm neighbourhood children.
Authorities said bond wasn’t immediately set for Mrs Smith, who remains jailed in Spartanburg County after her arrest at the weekend.
She faces 180 days to five years in prison if convicted.
Authorities say the dog’s remains were found under a pile of grass with part of an electrical cord around its neck.
January 27, 2011, 11:57 am Jailed for Choosing a Better School?
By LISA BELKIN
Kelley Williams-Bolar got out of jail yesterday, having served 9 days of her 10-day sentence. Now she faces two years of probation and 80 hours of community service.
Her crime? Sending her children to a better school.
Back in August of 2006 Williams-Bolar registered her two daughters in the Copley-Fairlawn schools in Ohio’s Copley Township. Where the forms asked for an address, she gave her father’s, saying she and the girls were living there with him.
But in November of 2009 Williams-Bolar was arrested and charged with two felony counts of tampering with official records, because a school-district investigation found she was actually living in a housing project in Akron. During a four-day trial earlier this month, she maintained that she had taken her daughters from that crime-ridden building after a home invasion several years ago, and gave their grandfather power of attorney and guardianship. The school district argued that was merely a ruse to game the system.
Sorry Ros, but I think you’re flogging a dead horse here. Not sure what your “point” is with this one ?
( she was ) charged with two felony counts of tampering with official records, because a school-district investigation found she was actually living in a housing project in Akron.
A case of Joseph Smith’s sItuational ethics perhaps ?
Just the picture it gives of how poverty traps operate.
she maintained that she had taken her daughters from that crime-ridden building after a home invasion several years ago, and gave their grandfather power of attorney and guardianship.
… school-district officials testified that some 30 to 40 similar residency issues had arisen with other families during the two years at issue in Williams-Bolar’s case.
No one else faced criminal prosecution or civil court action, the school officials said.
Has it been established whether the children were actually living with the grandfather or not? She says they were; the authorities don’t believe her. If they weren’t, I agree, she acted wrongly, but also singled out, whereas in the other cases there was no legal action.
If you thought I was simply agreeing with the point of view of the article I mis-communicated. Sorry.
Sorry to have misinterpreted your mis-communication ;)
You’re right - it is indeed terrible how poverty can entrap some people ( maybe most of them ). I guess, when you’re desperate, you’ll attempt anything in order to try and get your kids a better life. There must be a better way. Thank God for Christians who seek to work in these depressed areas for justice.
It’s a very imperfect world and a hard call for Christians working in these areas. But I’m convinced people can ‘escape’ from these traps through putting faith in Christ, who does indeed intervene and lead people to a better place.
I have discovered “Menzies House” ( described as Australia’s leading online community for conservative, centre-right and libertarian thinkers ) :
February 2, 2011
Six Year Old Driven To Tears By Environmentalists. His Sin ? A Sandwich Bag
The (Canadian) National post reports:
A couple in Laval, Quebec has sparked a fierce debate over how far schools should go to teach children about environmental responsibility after their six-year-old son was shut out of a kindergarten draw to win a stuffed animal because he had an environmentally unfriendly sandwich bag in his lunchbox.
Marc-André Lanciault said he hadn’t heard of the school’s draw or any environmental policy until his wife, Isabel Théorêt, was making their son Félix a sandwich and he begged them not to put it in a plastic bag.
“He said, ‘No mommy, you can’t do that. Not a Ziploc,’ ” Mr. Lanciault said.
Through tears, the boy told his parents that the school had held a draw to win a stuffed teddy bear and only children who didn’t have any plastic sandwich bags could enter. The family normally uses Tupperware, but it was all in the dishwasher, and so they had packed their son’s ham sandwich in a plastic bag.
When Mr. Lanciault questioned his son’s teacher, she confirmed the school had staged the draw at a lunchtime daycare and that any student with a plastic sandwich bag was excluded. “You know Mr. Lanciault, it’s not very good for the environment,” the teacher told him. “We have to take care of the our planet and the bags do not decompose well.”
Mr. Lanciault said he objects to the fact that a school would penalize a kindergartner for his parents’ choice to use non-recyclable lunch containers and that his son hadn’t learned any valuable environmental lessons, except to fear plastic bags.
“If we want to teach people about the environment, I can understand that,” he said. “But surely there’s a better way than to penalize kids. The goal wasn’t achieved anyway. At the end of the day my son doesn’t know why he shouldn’t use a Ziploc bag. It’s not only the bag, it’s the whole idea that we’re being brainwashed from everywhere. They told us Ziploc bags are bad, so we’ve stopped thinking about it and just started applying the rule.”
Enviro-nazis are here to tell you how to run your life… Ze thought police are here ..... yet zey are incapable of thinking - really thinking. More details on this story at :
First we have floods, then we have bushfires, more floods and a cyclone. Now comes the most tragic disaster to hit Australia. What is God trying to tell Australia ?
Christian beliefs DO lose out to gay rights: Judges’ ruling against devout foster coupleBy Tamara Cohen
Last updated at 2:02 AM on 1st March 2011
A Christian couple facing a foster parenting ban because of their views on homosexuality were told by a court yesterday that gay rights ‘should take precedence’ over their religious beliefs.
Owen and Eunice Johns heard that their values could conflict with the local authority’s duty to ‘safeguard and promote the welfare’ of those in foster care.
...
But social workers raised concerns that their attitudes to homosexuality would conflict with the new Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007.
The couple decided they were ‘doomed to failure’ and sought a clarification of the law over whether their religious beliefs excluded them from becoming foster carers.
Their case, heard last year, was supported by senior clergy including former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey who, in an open letter, warned that gay rights were taking precedence over the rights of others.
During the case, the Equality and Human Rights Commission argued that children risk being ‘infected’ by Christian moral views.
Yesterday the retired couple’s request for a ruling that faith should not be a bar to becoming a carer was denied at the High Court in London.
.....
(excerpt)
However, another Christian perspective is that the Christian outrage at this ruling is misplaced, basically because the case as presented, simply wasn’t a good case in law.
Second moral of story: How bizarre, that with so many children in need and at risk, social workers need to consider it such a high priority that children not be exposed to the dangerous idea that homosexuality is wrong. edit: revise that - not be influenced by people who hold that dangerous idea.
Church of hate says hell-O
By S.A. MILLER March 7, 2011
President Obama is hell-bound, said the Westboro Baptist Church lawyer who convinced the Supreme Court to uphold its right to stage anti-gay protests at military funerals.
“That’s a big 10-4,” Margi Phelps said yesterday of Obama’s afterlife date with the devil.
“The president is going to be king of the world before this is all said and done, and he is most likely the beast spoken of in the Revelation,” Phelps said on “Fox News Sunday.”
Nazi gaffe at Russian biathlon tournament
NewsCore March 09, 2011 8:14AM
GUESTS got a Nazi surprise at the opening of the 2011 World Biathlon Championships in Siberia when they discovered their dinner tables had been inadvertently decorated with Third Reich propaganda.
Organisers decided to use a selection of old newspapers from across the globe to spruce up place settings at a media reception, newspaper Bild reported.
But the idea backfired spectacularly when diners unwrapped a series of novelty bouquets and came across pages reproduced from Nazi-era Germany.
One, headlined “Reich Chancellor Hitler,” was reproduced from Der Angriff (The Attack) - a hate-filled Nazi party journal published by Hitler’s notorious propaganda chief, Joseph Goebbels.
The second, taken from a 1944 edition of the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, declared: “The invasion has begun!”
The gaffe prompted an immediate apology from the Ugra-Classic Theater Centre, which has hosted events for the annual biathlon competition in the Siberian town of Khanty-Mansiysk for the past five years.
“It had no political reasons. Neutrality is important to us,” said general director, Irina Taschenko.
The newspapers were mistakenly picked out by a Russian designer who evidently did not have a grasp of German, Bild said.
More than 60 million people perished in World War II, including as many as 24 million Russians.
Russia to spend $700b on new weapons From: AP March 18, 2011
PRESIDENT Dmitry Medvedev says Russia will spend the equivalent of $717.84 billion by 2020 to modernise the military’s aging arsenals, but sternly warned arms industries from jacking up prices.
Medvedev said today the new plan would re-equip the armed forces, which have mostly relied on Soviet-built weapons. He said the price for new armaments must not be too high.
Russian military officials have complained in recent years that the nation’s arms makers are offering slightly remodelled designs dating back to the Soviet era at artificially high prices.
Analysts say the nation’s military industries have been crippled by the post-Soviet industrial meltdown and continued to rely on outdated equipment and an aging workforce.
Makes one cry when you think what $700 billion could do to help starving people around the globe. And that’s just from Russia’s purse.
From correspondents in Chicago From:AP March 28, 2011 9:26AM
A FLOTILLA of yellow rubber ducks intended for a fundraising event has been stolen from a police academy in suburban Chicago.
The Beacon-News in Aurora reported that some 2500 ducks took flight this week from the Yorkville Citizens Police Academy. Police say several of the toy ducks have been found on a Yorkville roadway and request that any more found be returned to the academy.
Police plan to use the toy ducks in their annual “Duck Pluck” to raise funds for the academy.
Announcing Church Planter: The Video Game
Resurgence
Think God might be calling you to plant a church? What if you’re a 19-year-old undergrad, and planting is still years down the road? How do you prepare in the interim?
Introducing Re:Play, our new video game branch. On April 15, the Resurgence will release its first game: Church Planter, based off Pastor Darrin Patrick’s book. It gives the player hands-on training for what the trenches of ministry looks like as they learn to navigate the turbulent waters of religion in contemporary culture.
About the Game
Players will work their way out of their room and into the streets to find out what it’s like to plant a church. You’ll have to find your pants, your Bible, a shirt with buttons, while battling temptations (old and new) along the way. Next, you’ll need to gain knowledge of the Old and New Testaments while also studying prominent theologians across church history.
Once you’re grounded in your faith and good Bible teaching, you’ll need to gather your core group and think about where to plant. Take a missiological survey of the city to see how you can be contextually relevant to your flock. You’ll battle through the hardest parts of ministry as you start a church from the ground up while shepherding your wife and family, fighting the difficulties of working two jobs, and always looking to kill sin. Ministry is tough, and that’s why you need training.
Play Online
Get online and connect with your friends. These connections will play a crucial role in the game as you start to build your core group. You’ll also be able to have Sunday services where everyone can join in. The preaching pastor can use his headset and mic to give sermons while other players listen. As an extension, worship leaders can use their Guitar Hero controllers to lead the online congregation.
Endorsements:
“Unless heaven is real, let’s forget the church and go play video games.”
Just checked Emergence’s website - and beneath their article is :
April Fools’
Don’t know if having that Youtube link ( of Mark preaching ) the other day was a good thing. It looked like it was from an actual Mark Driscoll sermon. Comedy is one thing - but I don’t think it should be at the expense of your brand name’s integrity. Perhaps, it was a case of ‘any publicity is good publicity’. (They’re all Yanks after all - so “go figure”. )
Meanwhile, and this will upset plenty of Generation Y NOT, many others actually think that video games are stupid ;)
[null]Jean Pakter Dies at 101; Women's Health AdvocateNew York Times[{}]Abortion was still illegal during Dr. Pakter's early years in public health, and she had the task of compiling reports about the commerce in abortion. These reports provided some of the few reliable estimates in the country about the number of women ...
[null]Is the Church Becoming Less Catholic?New York Times[{}]That said, there is more to the Catholic Church's position on abortion than Maureen Dowd cares to acknowledge. The church views abortion as the murder of innocents and thus as an absolute evil, so “absolute intolerance” is not an inappropriate response ...
[null]Does It Mean Anything that a Record Low Are 'Pro-Choice'?New York Times (blog)[{}]Asked to pick one of the two labels applied to the abortion debate, a full 50 percent said they were pro-life, whereas only 41 percent said they were pro-choice, down from the previous low of 42 percent recorded in May of 2009. Republicans are the most ...
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