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The presidents and other top officials from the three nations considered ground zero for the deadly Ebola virus are still planning to attend President Obama’s U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit next week, adding another layer of concern to a world meeting expected to gridlock Washington for three days. At least one of those leaders attending the Sunday-Wednesday summit, Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan, is bringing a 73-person entourage. Those from Guinea and Liberia are also expected to be large. While the travel of the entourages and support staff such as jet crews is naturally raising concerns, the White House tamped down worries and...

The Editors would like to extend our condolences to Senator Harry Reid and his family as they go through this difficult time. While we can only guess at the exact nature of the psychiatric or neurological trauma the Senate majority leader has suffered, we assume that it is severe, judging by his symptoms, the most prominent of which is his new habit of taking to the Senate floor to deliver speeches that sound like they ought to be coming from a man wearing a bathrobe in front of a liquor store in Cleveland. The Washington Post, which once had the...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7VSkdj5IsI&feature=youtu.be

A Chinese family successfully rang the mobile phone of a passenger on board Malaysia Airlines plane MH370 which is still missing after it lost contact with the ground on Saturday. A video clip of a man dialing the number of his elder brother was shown on Beijing Television's news bulletin. The call got connected, but no one picked up. The man, who did not give his name, spoke to reporters at a Malaysia Airlines briefing in Beijing. He claimed that he made a total of three calls, but no one answered. Desperate family members have asked Malaysia Airlines to use...

(CNN) -- The University of Oklahoma in Norman reported a shooting on campus Wednesday. "Avoid Gould Hall. Seek immediate shelter in place," the school said on Twitter and on its website. Gould Hall houses the university's college of architecture.

They continue to insist that they’re on track for “major improvement” or whatever to the website by November 30th, but if it was as major as they’d hoped, they never would have resorted to this. A little heads up for our twentysomething readers: In case you haven’t decided yet what you’ll be buying with the cash you get for Christmas, good news — Obama and the insurance industry have decided for you. Wait a sec. I thought the reason they set December 15th as the deadline for enrolling if you want your new coverage to start on New Year’s Day...

The Washington Post reported Wednesday that President Obama has come out in support of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-Nev.) plan to reform the filibuster. This goes counter to Obama's view of this parliamentary procedure when he was a part of the Senate minority in 2005. As a little background, the Republicans in the Senate at the time were angered by Democrat filibusters that were preventing President Bush's judicial appointments from getting an up or down vote. The GOP threatened what was called the "nuclear option" of circumventing the filibuster by using reconciliation to get these jurists to be voted...

“Let me get this correct,” Gardner asked incredulously, “60 to 70 percent of healthcare.gov still needs to be built?” Chao answered, “Healthcare.gov, the online application, verification, determination, plan compare, getting enrolled…that’s 100 percent there.” But he admitted, “There is the back office systems, the accounting systems, the payment systems, they still need to be built.”

MIILLBORO, Va. (WRIC)—Former gubernatorial candidate and Democratic State Senator Creigh Deeds is in critical condition after being stabbed in his home Tuesday morning. At 7:25 a.m. on Nov. 19, Virginia State Police responded to Deeds' home in Bath County, where Deeds had been stabbed. The senator's son, Gus, was found fatally shot at the scene. Deeds was flown to the University of Virginia Medical Center, where he remains in critical condition. The Virginia State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation's Salem Field Office is conducting an investigation into the assault. 8News crews are headed to both Deeds' Millboro home and the...

Over the last few days, I have spoken in some detail about the state of the federal Obamacare exchanges with several officials of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (the HHS agency that is running the exchanges), and with a number of reasonably well placed insurance company officials in Washington. The picture they paint of how the rollout of the exchanges has gone is similar in its broad strokes to what has emerged in other reports in recent days, so I don’t think I’ll be breaking much news here, though some of the details have (I think) not been...

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On Tuesday evening, Robert Zimmerman, brother of George Zimmerman, responded to reports that Eric Holder’s Department of Justice had solicited the public for information about George that could help a federal civil rights prosecution. The DOJ has even set up an email address for tips on Zimmerman. In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News, Robert labeled the effort a “witch hunt,” asking, “How many other individuals has the DOJ witch-hunted in this way? I think that the state of FL when they embarked on their malicious prosecution of George would have liked nothing more than for he FBI to uncover...

(CNN) -- Despite the many differences I had with former President George W. Bush on a range of public policy issues, or as he called them, "decision points," I found common ground with him in one area, simply because we decided to put aside partisanship and do something good. Hurricane Katrina's devastation and the bungled rescue efforts are seared in the national memory. Bush's "heckuva job" remark turned into a byword for government incompetence and public distrust. The shallowness of it coming at such a terrible and low point left deep wounds that are still healing. That was what it...

Zubeidat K. Tsarnaeva, the mother of Boston bombing suspects Dzhokar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, suggested Friday that the FBI had been surveilling her older son for several years prior to Monday's attack. In an interview with Russia Today Friday, Tsarnaeva said that Tamerlan Tsarnaev got involved in "religious politics" five years ago, and that the FBI had previously contacted her about her son's activities. "He was controlled by the FBI, like for three, five years," she said. "They knew what my son was doing, they knew what actions and what sites on the Internet he was going [to], they used to...

Long have atheists cried foul when plastic baby Jesus was placed in front of a courthouse, when public schools cultishly indoctrinated their children with choir songs about silent nights involving baby Jesus, when animated holiday specials suddenly transitioned into stories about the adorable baby Jesus and how three kings gave him expensive jewelry, and he turned milk to chocolate milk and started talking at 6 months instead of the usual 12 to 14 and tested well in placement evaluations, etc., and so forth. Atheists deserve a holiday free from problematic religious associations (or as atheists call it, Insidious Mind Poison),...

Iran has fired at a U.S. drone, the Pentagon confirmed Thursday. The incident occurred Nov. 1 at 4:50 a.m. ET, Pentagon spokesman George Little said. He said the unarmed, unmanned drone was conducting "routine surveillance" when it was "intercepted" by Iran. He said the drone was not in Iranian airspace.

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FORT BLISS, Texas -- President Obama was planning to visit storm-stricken Louisiana before GOP rival Mitt Romney announced his plans, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters aboard Air Force One Friday morning. Romney's campaign announced his trip to New Orleans -- he is touring areas hit by Hurricane Isaac this afternoon -- hours before the White House announced Obama would cancel a planned Monday campaign event in Cleveland to divert to Louisiana. Carney offered no details about where in Louisiana Obama would travel during his Monday trip. "In terms of the President's travel, obviously when you're president of the...

When President Obama was first elected, aides say, he saw Rep. Paul Ryan, another ambitious Midwestern policy wonk, as someone he could possibly work with to reverse the building federal debt. He soon would change his view, as Obama made plain Sunday in welcoming Ryan to the race as Mitt Romney's running mate. "The ideological leader of Republicans in Congress," Obama called him, affixing a label clearly not meant as praise and also saying Ryan was an advocate of the same "top down" economics as Romney. "I know him, I welcome him to the race," Obama said at a Chicago...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The United States Secret Service, Charlotte-Mecklenburg police and North Carolina State Highway Patrol released security restrictions and transportation plans Wednesday morning for the Democratic National Convention. The plan provides the general outlines for road closures, vehicular and pedestrian restrictions and public transportation. The press release stated road closures, parking restrictions and changes to public transportation routes and public works services will be necessary during the DNC near Time Warner Cable Arena and the Bank of America Stadium.