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Accused cat killer Tyler Hayes Weinman was ordered to remain in custody to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. Judge Mindy Glazer set the 18-year-old's bail bond at $249,500, and she ordered that he be detained for at least 48 hours. In an interview with police, accused cat killer Tyler Weinman eagerly detailed how to dissect cats, even describing the ''tearing sound'' made when cutting open a feline's flesh, according to an arrest affidavit released Monday. Miami-Dade police detectives concluded Weinman fits the bill of a ``sociopath.'' The arrest affidavit, released one month after Weinman's arrest, details a circumstantial case based on...

WASHINGTON, July 8, 2009 – Bright blue skies above the National Mall today belied the solemnity of the ceremony commemorating the first two American combat casualties of the Vietnam War. U.S. Army Master Sgt. Chester Ovnand and Maj. Dale Buis were the first two U.S. servicemembers killed in the Vietnam War. Their sacrifice was honored in Washington, D.C., Jyly 8, 2009, in a ceremony commemorating the 50th Anniversary of their deaths. DoD photo by U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael J. Carden   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. “On this date 50 years ago, two men lost their lives...

WASHINGTON, July 8, 2009 – Afghan and coalition forces detained suspected militants and destroyed homemade bombs in operations in Afghanistan today and yesterday, military officials reported. In Ghazni province, Afghan and coalition forces detained suspected militants last night during operations aimed at disrupting Haqqani terrorist activities, including attacks on coalition bases by a key Haqqani commander, assassination attempts of Afghan government officials and the flow of foreign fighters and weapons into the region. The forces assaulted three compounds south of Ghazni city. In one of the compounds, the forces engaged a suspected militant who did not comply with instructions to...

All but invisible in Latin America a decade ago, China now is building cars in Uruguay , donating a soccer stadium to Costa Rica and lending $10 billion to Brazil's biggest oil company. It's supplanted the United States to become the biggest trading partner with Brazil , South America's biggest economy. China has moved aggressively to fill a vacuum left by the United States in recent years, as the U.S. focused on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the global economic crisis sapped its economy. " China is rising while the U.S. is declining in Latin America ," Riordan Roett...

Bodies Dug Up, Plots Resold at Historic Cemetery: Police As many as 100 bodies disinterred at Alsip's Burr Oak Cemetery By BJ LUTZ and PHIL ROGERS Updated 6:19 PM CDT, Wed, Jul 8, 2009 As many as 100 human bodies may have been dug up from a South suburban cemetery and the burial plots resold, investigators said Wednesday. Often called the first African-American cemetery in Chicago, Alsip's Burr Oak Cemetery has a storied past and is the final resting place for several notables, including boxing great Ezzard Charles and blues legends Willie Dixon and Dinah Washington. Emmett Till, whose murder...

SAN DIEGO—U.S. Attorney Karen P. Hewitt announced today the unsealing of a 25-count indictment charging six individuals with corruption and fraud charges related to defense contracting at Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR), a government organization based in San Diego that is responsible for the development of technology to collect, process, display and manage information essential to successful military operations. A federal grand jury sitting in San Diego handed up the indictment on June 30, 2009, which was sealed until their arrests earlier today. According to the indictment, federal employees Gary Alexander and his wife, Kelly Alexander, worked at...

WASHINGTON, July 8, 2009 – The commander of a U.S. Marine brigade in southern Afghanistan is cautiously optimistic at progress made in the first week of an offensive there, but says more Afghan forces are needed.“We're still very early into this operation. … [I’m] very cautiously optimistic that things have gone well,” Marine Corps Brig. Gen. Lawrence Nicholson, commander of the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, said in a conference call from Marine Camp Leatherneck in Helmand province with reporters at the Pentagon. Some 4,000 Marines and 650 Afghan security forces launched the ongoing Operation Khanjar, which translates to Strike of...

Shocking footage of the riots in Urumqi, China, between Muslim Uighurs and Han Chinese has emerged, showing the true brutality of the protest.

Valerie Jarrett is one of Obama's longest serving advisers and "closest campaign aides" it was no surprise when the President selected Jarrett to serve as White House Senior Adviser and for Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs. She manages the White House Office of Public Engagement (formerly the Office of Public Liaison) Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, and Chairs the White House Commission on Women and Girls. You may remember that the ISNA and its financial wing the NAIT were named as unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation Hamas funding trial. Last May the ACLU filed a lawsuit on their behalf...

ATLANTA, GA—VICTOR ABILES GOMEZ, 20, OMAR MENDOZA-VILLEGAS, 19, and GERARDO SOLORIO REYES, a/k/a “Gera,” 23, all illegal immigrants from Mexico, have been sentenced to federal prison on hostage-taking and related charges, arising from the week-long kidnapping and abuse of a drug dealer. United States Attorney David E. Nahmias said of the case, “This case demonstrates the danger inherent in the illegal business of drug-dealing. All of these drug dealers—captors and victim—have now been sentenced to federal prison. Fortunately this violent episode did not spill over to innocent members of our community.” DEA Atlanta Field Division Special Agent in Charge Rodney...

The Republicans bring a knife to a gunfight, and lose again. One of the most terrifying moments of my political life came last summer at the Republican convention in St. Paul. No, I don’t mean seeing John McCain careering around the Xcel Energy Center like Eyegore in Young Frankenstein, his face frozen in a Lon Chaney Sr. rictus grin as he reached across the aisle to his erstwhile friends in the media and got his hand bitten off. Rather, I’m referring to the aftermath of Sarah Palin’s outrageous acceptance speech, which whipped up the Rotary Club delegates into a frenzy...

Hardcover Non-Fiction 1. CATASTROPHE, by Dick Morris and Eileen McGann 2. LIBERTY AND TYRANNY, by Mark R. Levin 3. OUTLIERS, by Malcolm Gladwell 4. HORSE SOLDIERS, by Doug Stanton 5. THE END OF OVEREATING, by David A. Kessler Paperback Non-Fiction 1. GLENN BECK’S ‘COMMON SENSE’, by Glenn Beck 2. THREE CUPS OF TEA, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin 3. WHEN YOU ARE ENGULFED IN FLAMES, by David Sedaris 4. BLINK, by Malcolm Gladwell 5. AN INCONVENIENT BOOK, by Glenn Beck

Republican challenger Chris Christie has lost his post-primary bounce but still leads incumbent Democrat Jon Corzine in the New Jersey governor’s race. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the state shows Christie with a seven-point lead over Corzine, 46% to 39%. A month ago, immediately following his GOP Primary victory, Christie led by 13 percentage points. The current numbers are just about identical to the pre-primary numbers from May.

Oscar G. Mayer, retired chairman of the Wisconsin-based meat processing company that bears his name, has died at the age of 95. Mayer's wife, Geraldine, said he died of old age Monday age at Hospice Care in Fitchburg. He was the third Oscar Mayer in the family that founded Oscar Mayer Foods, which was once the largest private employer in Madison. His grandfather, Oscar F. Mayer, died in 1955 and his father, Oscar G. Mayer Sr., died in 1965.

NEW ORLEANS, LA—WALLACE BOURGEOIS, JR., 35, a resident of LaPlace, Louisiana, was charged today in a one-count bill of information relating to fraudulent applications he made to the American Red Cross for financial assistance during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, announced U.S. Attorney Jim Letten. According to the bill of information, the American Red Cross made disaster assistance money of up to $1,565 available to those affected by the hurricanes of 2005 on a one-time only basis. Documents show that on six occasions between September 2005 and October 2005, BOURGEOIS applied for and received disaster assistance funds from the Red...

Credit card delinquency figures bring to mind the rock classic “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet.” Ever after today’s record report — delinquencies jumped to 6.6 percent of all card debt in the first quarter from 5.52 percent — the peak may still be far off. The sunniest forecast in the Obama administration’s stress test suggested that credit card loss rates for banks would climb to between 12 and 17 percent in total over the next two years. This assumed an unemployment rate averaging just 8.4 percent in this year. Based on the gloomier scenario of 8.9 percent joblessness, the two-year...

House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes has suggested Republicans would be well advised to avoid politicizing the intelligence authorizaton bill later this week in light of evidence that, he says, shows that the CIA “affirmatively lied to” the panel. In a Tuesday letter to his committee’s top-ranking Republican, Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, that was obtained by Congressional Quarterly, Reyes, D-Texas, wrote that the committee has recently received information that reveals significant problems with the intelligence agency’s reporting to the panel. “These notifications have led me to conclude this committee has been misled, has not been provided full and complete notifications, and...

TEMPE, Ariz. – Earth's 4.5-billion-year history is filled with several turning points when temperatures changed dramatically, asteroids bombarded the planet and life forms came and disappeared. But one of the biggest moments in Earth's lifetime is the Cambrian explosion of life, roughly 540 million years ago, when complex, multi-cellular life burst out all over the planet. While scientists can pinpoint this pivotal period as leading to life as we know it today, it is not completely understood what caused the Cambrian explosion of life. Now, researchers led by Arizona State University geologist L. Paul Knauth believe they have found the...

em>If this keeps up it will be "bye bye Obama" in 2012!A record uptick in Rasmussen's Presidential Approval Index portends disturbing news for the Hopey-Changey brigades. This is the first time that the index has gone so sharply negative. Other trends in this latest polling round include: Fifty-four percent (54%) say the average Democrat in Congress is more liberal than they are, while 36% believe the average Republican congressman is more conservative. Among all voters, Republicans now have a three-point edge on the Generic Congressional Ballot.Just 27% of voters nationwide favor passage of a second economic stimulus package. Sixty percent...

The banks just never do quit, do they? July 8 )-- Morgan Stanley plans to repackage a downgraded collateralized debt obligation backed by leveraged loans into new securities with AAA ratings in the first transaction of its kind, said two people familiar with the sale. Morgan Stanley is selling $87.1 million of securities that it expects to receive top AAA ratings and $42.9 million of notes graded Baa2, the second-lowest investment grade by Moody’s Investors Service, according to marketing documents obtained by Bloomberg News. The bonds were created from Greywolf CLO I Ltd., a CDO arranged in January 2007 by...