Jonathan Gruber Was Obama’s Top Health Expert In The 2008 Presidential Campaign

MIT professor Jonathan Gruber served as the key health care consultant to Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and even visited Obama’s office to sell the idea of the “individual mandate,” which Obama later championed, according to a 2007 news article. Gruber, who said Obamacare passed due to the “stupidity of the American voters” and their “lack of economic understanding,” was described by the Washington Post as the Democratic Party’s “most influential health-care expert” who “consulted with the three leading Democratic campaigns about their health plans,” including Barack Obama’s. He pressured the Obama campaign to support the “individual mandate” he helped developed for Massachusetts’ state-run health care, which forced people to buy insurance or face a penalty.

Israel: 4 dead after men with knives, gun attack Jerusalem synagogue

The people who killed the four worshipers at a Jerusalem synagogue “came with great hatred and … incitement against the Jewish people and its state,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday. He blamed the Palestinian Authority and others for spreading “libels against the state of Israel” and other incitements that he said have led to today’s killings and other recent deaths.

More Than Half The U.S. Is Covered In Snow

There was already four feet of snow on the ground at noon Tuesday in Elma, N.Y., and it was snowing so hard Dennis Powers couldn’t see out his window.

The most popular drug in America is an antipsychotic — and no one really knows how it works

Does anyone remember Thorazine? It was an antipsychotic given to mentally ill people, often in institutions, that was so sedating, it gave rise to the term “Thorazine shuffle.” Ads for Thorazine in medical journals, before drugs were advertised directly to patients, showed Aunt Hattie in a hospital gown, zoned out but causing no trouble to herself or anyone else.

New Jersey cop exposed himself to young male drivers during traffic stops

A Newton police officer was arrested Monday on accusations that he unzipped his pants and exposed himself to young male drivers during “numerous” traffic stops. Jason R. Miller, 37, of Hampton Township, a patrolman since 2001, turned himself in at the Sussex County Prosecutor’s Office and has been indefinitely suspended without pay pending the outcome of the criminal case, according to a statement issued by Sussex County Prosecutor Francis Koch and Newton Police Chief Michael Richards.

Florida woman dismembered neighbor, cooked remains

Angela Stoldt told officials she took a hacksaw to her neighbor’s body last year and tried to cook away evidence of James Sheaffer. One leg went in the oven. Other parts went into pots.

Thief Swipes Disabled Women’s Tricycle, Walker From Home

The mother of two disabled women is pleading for a thief to return the walker and tricycle taken from their home. Anna Lisa Abrahams was shocked when she looked through her surveillance video. Despite the signs warning about her cameras, she watched as the thief came back not once, but twice.

Ferguson Cop Advises Residents to Get a Gun: ‘We will not be able to protect you or your family’

Things are about to get real in Ferguson, Missouri, regardless of the decision of the Grand Jury in the Michael Brown case. So real, in fact, that the governor of Missouri has already declared a State of Emergency and called in the National Guard. So real, in fact, that at least some of the local cops believe citizens need to arm themselves, because they know they won’t be able to protect them from the chaos that is sure to ensue.

Secret EU document outlines sanctions to impose if Israel thwarts two-state solution

The European Union has distributed a confidential document to its 28 member states that contains the draft of a proposal for sanctions to be imposed on Israel if it takes action in the West Bank that could make the two-state solution impossible, European diplomatic sources and senior Israeli officials said. (Read the rest of the story here…)

Putin Warns He Won’t Let Ukraine Defeat Eastern Rebels

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned he won’t allow rebels in eastern Ukraine to be defeated by government forces as European Union ministers met to consider imposing more sanctions on the separatists. “You want the Ukrainian central authorities to annihilate everyone there, all of their political foes and opponents,” Putin said in an interview yesterday with Germany’s ARD television. “Is that what you want?

Israel economy shrinks for first time in more than 5 years

Israel’s economy contracted for the first time in more than five years in the third quarter, as growth was hit by the effects of a war with Islamist militants in Gaza. Gross domestic product fell 0.4 percent in the July-September period, the Central Bureau of Statistics said on Sunday.

Three years into drought, Californians adapt to a drier way of life

Three years into a historic drought in California, with 2013 being the driest year on record for the state, stories like the ones above are proliferating. They point to the fact that Californians are finally turning their concern about the drought into changed behavior. “I think people are just taking it more seriously,” says John Moore, an insurance salesman from Sherman Oaks.

ISIS has 200,000-strong force, says Kurdish leader

Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) militants have an army of about 200,000 fighters, over six times larger than previous CIA estimates, a senior Iraqi Kurdish leader has claimed. “I am talking about hundreds of thousands of fighters because they are able to mobilize young Arab men in the territory they have taken,” Fuad Hussein, the chief of staff of Iraqi Kurdish President Massoud Barzani, told the UK Independent in an exclusive interview. Controlling roughly one third of Iraq and Syria, Hussein says the 250,000 square kilometer territory has provided IS a 10 to 12 million-large population from which to attract potential fighters.

U.S. government houses veterans in dilapidated building filled with mold, bedbugs and disease-carrying rats

It’s becoming clear — honorable US service men and women are becoming nothing more than expendable numbers filed away in a system set up to profit off their service, rather than respect and honor their service. For those who volunteer to serve, it’s about defending the country’s freedom and values, but as they begin to take orders, many realize that they are just being used. Some soldiers feel like they are nothing but mere pawns in a global industrial chess match.

David Cameron warns of looming second global crash

David Cameron has issued a stark message that “red warning lights are flashing on the dashboard of the global economy” in the same way as when the financial crash brought the world to its knees six years ago. Writing in the Guardian at the close of the G20 summit in Brisbane, Cameron says there is now “a dangerous backdrop of instability and uncertainty” that presents a real risk to the UK recovery, adding that the eurozone slowdown is already having an impact on British exports and manufacturing. His warning comes days after the Bank of England governor, Mark Carney, claimed a spectre of stagnation was haunting Europe.

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