A two-year-old Florida boy died on Wednesday after accidentally shooting himself with his father’s .380 caliber handgun that he found in the family car.

The toddler, Kaleb Ahles, climbed into the front seat of the family’s vehicle while his parents carried boxes to move out of their home in Tarpon Springs, located about 30 miles north-west of Tampa.

Kaleb, alone in the car, crawled across the seat and found the gun that was stored in the glove compartment, sheriff Bob Gualtieri of the Pinellas County sheriff’s office said during a Wednesday evening press conference.

Kaleb then grabbed the gun, turned the barrel toward his chest, and squeezed the trigger, Gualtieri said.

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jan/22/florida-toddler-fatally-shoots-himself-father-gun

So sad - please gun owners, secure your weapons properly.

Republican lawmakers responsible for delaying a controversial abortion bill are on notice from conservative activists in 2016.

“I believe in political retribution, otherwise you might as well close up shop,” Susan B. Anthony List president Marjorie Dannenfelser told The Hill.

Anti-abortion advocates say electoral challenges could be in the cards for those who worked to stall a 20-week abortion ban bill that was widely expected to pass the House on Thursday. Amid concerns with the language on rape exceptions, however, the bill was abruptly pulled from consideration late Wednesday.

“I think that there probably will be [primary challenges],” added Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a religious political group in Washington. “I think there will be some consequences for this.”

The House had spent weeks coordinating its vote on a late-term abortion bill on Thursday to coincide with the national March for Life rally as well as the 42nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade. The bill, with more than 100 cosponsors, was expected to easily clear the chamber.

At issue was a provision granting the victims of rape an exception from the ban on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy only if the rape was reported to police. The Justice Department estimates that nearly 70 percent of rapes go unreported, often due to victims' fear of retribution.

But a number of Republican moderates, led by Reps. Renee Ellmers (N.C.) and Jackie Walorski (Ind.), warned that a certain provision on rape would erode support for the GOP from women and young people in future national elections, along with how it might play in their more centrist districts.

Instead, a new bill was quickly unveiled that would prohibit taxpayer funding for abortion. It passed the House largely on party lines Thursday morning.

Still, the House GOP’s unexpected retreat from its original bill is emboldening abortion rights activists to force the issue in 2016, forcing opponents of abortion on the offense.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/230490-abortion-dissenters-face-backlash

Grrrrrrrrrrr - I was listening to a story about this on NPR as I was driving home - good thing I was by myself because I was cursing up a real storm.

Since the implementation of the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion in 2014, 23 states have refused the federal money to offer health insurance to their low-income residents, depriving almost 4 million people of coverage. Slowly, some of the holdout red states are finding a way to say yes, but only if they can claim a conservative twist on expanding coverage. Tennessee last week became the latest state to release details on a proposal for its own unique version of Medicaid expansion via a waiver of Medicaid rules (known as an 1115 waiver). "We made the decision in Tennessee nearly two years ago not to expand traditional Medicaid," Gov. Bill Haslam, a Republican, has said. "This is an alternative approach that forges a different path and is a unique Tennessee solution.”

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/120781/republican-governors-accept-medicaid-expansion-make-it-costlier?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=TNR%20Daily%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=Daily%20Newsletter%20Template%20-%20Jan%2019

The Great Lao-Tzu said:



"It is only when you see a mosquito landing on your testicles that you realize there is always a way to solve problems without using violence.”

(Contains swear words)
Sent from relative in the UK - PM Cameron, but sure could be any right-winger...........




https://m.

so answered a right-wing colleague when we were discussing the keystone xl pipeline.

They actually said it has passed but, Obummer is just going to veto it, and I said good, we don't need it and it would be terrible for America. The only people benefiting are the Kochs while they destroy America and that was the reply I got............

Well someone has to make money from it (and, of course, nothing about the lack of jobs, the destruction of the environment and that the "oil" is going to China).

I decided that it wasn't worth an argument in the work place and went back to work, but this is the way the RW think.......... someday I will be the rich one, someday I will be making boatloads like the Kochs and I won't say anything bad about them..... talk about delusional.

Thanks for reading my vent.

On Saturday, Boko Haram militants seized the Nigerian Multi-National Joint Task Force Base in Baga, one of the few strategically significant towns still under the military control in the northeastern state of Borno. Borno’s senator, Ahmed Zanna, said that Nigerian soldiers deserted their posts, handing Boko Haram heavy weaponry and vehicles in the process. Locals say that militants razed 16 towns with petrol bombs and shot indiscriminately at civilians. As of Thursday, dozens of people are confirmed dead, 2,000 are missing, and an estimated 30,000 are displaced.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014979998 did announce these attacks, but honestly dozens of people confirmed dead and 2,000 missing and if it wasn't for DU I wouldn't have known.

Is this a case of the repuke owned media not caring about Africa and Africans and stirring the pot because westernized France has a terror attack?

WASHINGTON — As Republicans prepare to take full control of Congress on Tuesday, the party’s leaders are counting on judges, not their newly elected majority on Capitol Hill, to roll back President Obama’s aggressive second-term agenda and block his executive actions on health care, climate change and immigration.

On health care, Republicans in Washington have sued the president and joined state lawsuits urging the Supreme Court to declare major parts of the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional. On climate change, state attorneys general and coal industry groups are urging federal courts to block the president’s plan to regulate power plants. And on immigration, conservative lawmakers and state officials have demanded that federal judges overturn Mr. Obama’s plan to prevent millions of deportations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/04/us/politics/gop-turns-to-the-courts-to-aid-agenda.html?ref=todayspaper&_r=0


We are in for a rough ride with these traitorous bastards.


(Didn't find this previously posted, if it is duplicate, please feel free to lock/delete...... .thanks)