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19 minutes ago
Obama Defends Drones, Lays Out Plan for Closing Gitmo
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In a speech outlining the future of his counter-terrorism policy, President Obama laid out new rules Thursday for drone strikes and offered steps to close the Guantanamo Bay prison camp. Obama said drone attacks will be restricted to known terrorists under new rules he signed this week. "Before any strike is taken, there must be near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured – the highest standard we can set,” he said. He defended the use of drones saying that “the terrorists we are after target civilians, and the death toll from their acts of terrorism against Muslims dwarfs any estimate of civilian casualties from drone strikes.” The president said he has tried to close Guantanamo and announced that he's lifting the 2009 ban on transfers of detainees to Yemen and appointing a new envoy at the State Department and Defense Department whose role will be to transfer detainees from the prison to third countries. The speech came a day after the administration publicly acknowledged for the first time that drone strikes have killed four Americans overseas since 2009, NBC News reported.
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2 hours ago
U.K Officials Identify Slain London Soldier
The British soldier hacked to death on a London street in a suspected terror attack was a drummer in a military band who had served in Afghanistan, the U.K. Ministry of Defence said in a statement on Thursday, NBC News reported. Lee Rigby, 25, known as “Riggers” to his friends, was killed in broad daylight on Wednesday as he walked in the southeast London neighborhood of Woolwich, near an army barracks. Rigby was “a loving father” to his two-year-old son, the statement said. He was deployed in Helmand province, Afghanistan, and had previously helped guard the U.K.’s royal palaces. Two alleged attackers were later shot by officers and taken to a hospital where they were arrested. One of the men was confronted at the scene by a woman who said she decided to engage him to protect the crowd that was beginning to gather, NBC News reported. “He was obviously a bit excited and the thing was to talk to him,” said Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, 48.
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27 minutes ago
Funeral For Young Tornado Victim is Held
AP
The first funeral for a child killed when a tornado struck the Plaza Towers Elementary School in Oklahoma was held Thursday morning.
Antonia Candelaria, 9, who died along with six other children when Monday’s massive EF-5 twister tore through the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, was due to be buried at a local church. She was nicknamed "Ladybug" and was “specially gifted in art as well as music” and “loved to draw, paint, color and make crafts, according to an obituary published in The Oklahoman. “She was a beautiful young lady on the inside and out,” the obituary said. In total, 24 people were killed and as many as 13,000 homes damaged or destroyed. Antonia's funeral is the first of three to take place in the next two days for children who died from Monday's twister.
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24 minutes ago
What’s at Stake in Boy Scouts Vote on Gay Membership
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After years of emotional debate, the Boy Scouts of America is considering a proposal at its annual meeting to allow gay youths to openly participate in the organization, NBC News reported. Activists on both sides of the issue have gathered to rally support for their cause. A group opposed to allowing gay Scouts issued a call to prayer on their Facebook page, while those against the ban met Wednesday across the street from the Boy Scouts' annual meeting of 1,400 delegates in Grapevine, Texas. The results are expected to be announced shortly after 6 p.m. ET Thursday. Thirteen years ago the Supreme Court ruled that as a private membership organization the Boy Scouts was free to decide whom it would admit. The exclusion of gay Scouts has been the subject of much squabbling and soul searching in the century-old organization — from local troops and councils to online petitions to national board meetings. But many questions — for example: Under the proposal, what would happen to an Eagle Scout who is gay and wants to volunteer as an adult? — still persist. For answers and analysis, click through.
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2 hours ago
Lawmakers Unveil New Military Sexual Assault Bill
Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat and Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican introduced a new bill Thursday that would require a dismissal or a dishonorable discharge for a member of the military found guilty of rape or sexual assault, NBC News reported. The new legislation – the second bill aimed at addressing sexual assault in the military this month – comes after a string of military sexual misconduct scandals. McCaskill, the sponsor of the new bill, said that her legislation would guarantee that “never again will a victim have to salute an assaulter." The bill would not require a charge of sexual assault to be handled outside the chain of command, a provision included in a competing measure sponsored by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat.
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3 hours ago
Colo. Gov. Blasted for Death-Row Reprieve
Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper’s decision to block the execution of a man convicted of killing four people at a Chuck E. Cheese in Aurora, Colo., two decades ago has infuriated some victims' relatives and law-enforcement officials, NBC News reported. The Democrat said he would not sign a death warrant for Nathan Dunlap as long as he's in office even though he declined to back a repeal of capital punishment two months ago. Dunlap, who killed the restaurant workers after he was fired, was scheduled for an Aug. 18 execution. "What he did was horrific," said former Aurora Police Officer Dan Jones. "And now 20 years later...the governor passes the buck." Hickenlooper said he did not support a bill to repeal capital punishment because he did not want to force that decision on his constituents. At the same time, he said, he could not let Dunlap be put to death when studies show execution is not a deterrent to crime. The governor is running for re-election, and his critics accused him of trying to have it both ways on a divisive issue.
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3 minutes ago
Wall Street Rises Midday After Global Sell Off
AP
Stocks made a rebound during midday trading on Thursday after a slow morning as global markets were roiled by uncertainty about when the U.S. Federal Reserve may pull back on its $85 billion a month bond purchases and by weaker-than-expected manufacturing report out of China. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is slightly higher, as Hewlett-Packard rises 14 percent after a strong earnings report. The S&P 500and the Nasdaq are still lower but well off their worst levels, CNBC reported. In his Congressional testimony Wednesday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke reiterated the central bank's intention to "maintain highly accommodative monetary policy as long as needed," according to CNBC. He added that any near-term decision on scaling back bond purchases depended on an improvement in jobs data. Newest figures out of the Labor Department on Thursday show that the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits is down by 23,000 to a seasonally adjusted 340,000, falling below the 350,000 mark that economists normally view as a sign of an improving job market, according to Reuters.
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6 hours ago
Cleveland "Hero" Gets Free Burgers for Life
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Charles Ramsey, the Big-Mac-munching man who was credited with helping a woman escape from a Cleveland, Ohio, home where she had been held captive for over a decade, will enjoy free burgers for life, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. More than a dozen Ohio restaurants and at least one in Pennsylvania have pledged free burgers for life to Ramsey, who mentioned in numerous interviews earlier this month that he had been eating a McDonald's burger when he heard screams from the house across the street. A restaurant where he works as a dishwasher also created a special burger in his honor. The “Ramsey Burger” started out as a temporary menu item, but has since become permanent and the concept has spread to other restaurants, according to the Plain Dealer. “We want to honor our local hero with local food,” Cleveland restaurateur Scott Kuhn told the paper. “He stopped his meal midway through to help those women."
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57 minutes ago
There is nothing Scout-like about exclusion of other people, and there is nothing Scout-like about putting your own religious beliefs before someone else’s.
Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 8:16 AM
Tamerlan Tsarnaev Had Role in Triple Homicide: Sources
Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev and a Florida mixed martial arts fighter -- who was killed while being questioned by the FBI in Orlando on Wednesday -- murdered three people in Massachusetts in 2011 after a drug deal went awry, sources told NBC News. What began as a drug ripoff ended as a triple homicide when Tsarnaev and his friend Ibragim Todashev realized their victims would later be able to identify them, the sources said. An FBI agent shot and killed Todashev on Wednesday after he allegedly attacked the agent with a knife, investigators said. The agent sustained non-life threatening injuries, the FBI said in a statement. Todashev was not suspected of being involved in the bombing, but he did confess to being involved in the brutal 2011 killings in Waltham, Mass., investigators said.
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Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 7:41 AM
Okla. at Risk of More Tornadoes as Storms Threaten Much of U.S.
AP
More bad weather – thunderstorms bringing large hail and the chance of “a tornado or two” – was in the forecast for southwestern and central Oklahoma and northwestern Texas on Thursday, NBC News reported. The risk of severe thunderstorms extended from Texas and Florida to New England and the Great Lakes and from Texas up to Montana and Washington. “The activity is expected to be far less significant than the outbreak earlier this week, but hail could be particularly large in northwest Texas and western Oklahoma,” the National Weather Service said. In the Northeast, the weather service said “storms may undergo a gradual intensification” with a chance of “mainly isolated damaging wind.” “Any severe threat should diminish by early evening,” it said.
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Bronx "Ghetto Tours" Halted Amid Residents' Outrage
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Jersey Shore Towns to Vacationers: We’re Still Here
Ryan Morrill/The SandPaper
Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 8:18 AM
West Point Sergeant Charged with Secretly Filming Female Cadets
A staff member at West Point is accused of hiding cameras in the women’s shower and locker room. Army Sgt. 1st Class, Michael McClendon was relieved of his duties at West Point and has been charged with four counts of indecent acts, dereliction of duty, cruelty and maltreatment and violations of good order and discipline, according to The New York Times.
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N.J. Shore Town Destroyed by Sandy Confronts an Uncertain Future
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