Raleigh committee OKs assistance for some(the BLACKS), and The NC Baptist Men willing to donate their services to tornado victims

Who didn't know something like this wouldn't happen, I know they where hit by a big ole mean racist tornado!  Thats out to get em....whats in it for us.  Is what I get out of it.  WTH.  Then you have this Godly group of men from NC Baptist willing to donate their services for free to help tornado victims.

RALEIGH, N.C. — Raleigh’s Budget and Economic Development Committee approved a measure Tuesday that would provide financial assistance to some city homeowners affected by last month’s tornadoes.

The proposal, which would be funded with $400,000 in uncommitted housing bonds, will be presented to the City Council at its next meeting on June 7.

Proposed by Councilman Eugene Weeks, who represents District C in southeast Raleigh, the program would provide up to $20,000 in deferred loans for low- and moderate-income homeowners who have exhausted other means of financial assistance to get their homes back to the city’s minimum living standards.

Other types of financial assistance would include homeowner’s insurance or grants from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

To qualify, applicants would have to have a maximum income ranging from $43,550 for a one-member household to $82,050 for an eight-member household, be in good standing with their mortgage and property taxes and have a homeowner’s insurance policy at closing.

The loans would be repaid to the city if the house is sold or the homeowner moves.

Some committee members expressed concern, in light of a tight budget, and said the city would be setting a precedent for damage caused by future storms.

The tornado ripped through portions of Raleigh on April 16, causing an estimated $115 million in damage and destroying 138 homes and damaging nearly 700 others.

NC Baptist Men helping tornado victims for free

RALEIGH, N.C. — Almost three weeks after the tornadoes, a neighborhood off Brentwood Road in Raleigh is still a mess, but it's getting better.

Storm victim Daniel Wilkinson says his morning got off to a noisy start recently.

“I woke up this morning to chainsaws, and I looked at my phone. My mom had called and said, ‘Hey, the Baptist Men are going to be here,’” Wilkinson said.

With the smell of fresh-cut wood and chainsaw exhaust in the air, several volunteers from North Carolina Baptist Men Disaster Relief worked all day cutting up trees and carrying them away.

The crews have done this kind of storm clean up at more than 1,000 sites around the state, and they've done it for free.

“We don't charge anything. People travel from all the way across the state to come here and work in the name of Jesus, and that's why we do what we do,” said Lin Honeycutt, with N.C. Baptist Men.

The group wants to help more people. As volunteers go through neighborhoods, wherever they see storm damage, they're leaving flyers, saying, "Please call us.”

Volunteers from Samaritan's Purse were focusing on clean up in North Raleigh, but they had to leave this week to help in Alabama. 

Congratulations you have healthy new baby. . . . ?

Baby Storm

Parents keep child’s gender under wraps

When many couples have a baby, they send out an email to family and friends that fills them in on the key details: name, gender, birth weight, that sort of thing. (You know the drill: "Both Mom and little Ethan are doing great!")

But the email sent recently by Kathy Witterick and David Stocker of Toronto, Canada to announce the birth of their baby, Storm, was missing one important piece of information. "We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now--a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place? ...)," it said.

That's right. They're not saying whether Storm is a boy or a girl.

There's nothing ambiguous about the baby's genitals. But as Stocker puts it: "If you really want to get to know someone, you don't ask what's between their legs." So only the parents, their two other children (both boys), a close friend, and the two midwives who helped deliver the now 4-month-old baby know its gender. Even the grandparents have been left in the dark.

Stocker and Witterick say the decision gives Storm the freedom to choose who he or she wants to be. "What we noticed is that parents make so many choices for their children. It's obnoxious," adds Stocker, a teacher at an alternative school.

They say that kids receive messages from society that encourage them to fit into existing boxes, including with regard to gender. "We thought that if we delayed sharing that information, in this case hopefully, we might knock off a couple million of those messages by the time that Storm decides Storm would like to share," says Witterick.

"In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, 'Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s (he) wants to be?!." she wrote in an email.

Thank you battleskin88

It's always More of the Same

May 23, 2011

More of the Same

By Mark Fogarty  

The National Association of Home Builders for the first time has added race and ethnicity data to the quarterly housing affordability survey it has produced for the past 20 years. That's all to the good. The story the new data tells, however, is an old one.
NAHB found that 80.3% of white families nationwide could afford the median-priced home of $178,000 based on their media family income of $69,000. But African-American, Hispanic and American Indian affordability were all more than 20 points lower than that. And Asians managed to have a higher median income than whites ($80,500) but not a higher affordability ratio, 76.4%.
Some of the individual metropolitan statistical areas proved even more disparate. Take the New York City MSA, where just 8.8% of Hispanics and 15% of American Indians could afford the median-priced home of $430,000. However, since even whites only had 46% of families who could afford that median-priced home, this proves what we've thought all along-New York is completely unaffordable.
San Francisco is similarly unaffordable, with a median price of $599,000. Just 7.7% of blacks and 8.3% of Indians could afford that ticket. Nearby San Jose was also mostly unaffordable to anyone, with a median home price of $451,000. Los Angeles was also unaffordable to everybody except whites, at 68.2%.
Looking for an affordable place to live? Try Mansfield, Ohio. Its median price of $75,000 was affordable to 95.4% of MSA residents. All minorities had affordability ratios in the 90s, except for African-Americans, at 87.5%.
Michigan cities are pretty affordable right now. Detroit's median home costs just $86,000, and is affordable to 90.2% of MSA residents. Flint manages to edge it out, at $85,000 median, affordable to 91.8% of all people. These are sad stories on both the high and low ends. Detroit's affordability comes at the expense of the loss of a quarter of its residents in 10 years.
MSAs approximately equal or at least fairly close to African-Americans and whites in 2010 affordability included Boulder, Colo., Olympia, Wash., and Santa Cruz-Watsonville, Calif. MSAs approximately equal in affordability between Hispanics and whites included Akron, Ohio, Pittsburgh, and Jacksonville and Port St. Lucie, Fla.
African-American affordability exceeded whites' in just four places with population of more than 250,000,

Mel the Viking: Now Gibson is invading England AND Scotland in movie... speaking Old Norse

I look forward to seeing this, sure to be a great movie!

He may have faced criticism for his interpretation of William Wallace's battle for Scottish independence in Braveheart, but that hasn't deterred Mel Gibson from producing another history-based movie.

This time the actor is planning to turn his directorial skills towards the Viking invasion of England and Scotland in the ninth century.

Gibson, 54, will follow a similar route to his previous films The Passion Of The Christ and Apocalypto by filming all of the scenes using Old Norse language, with English subtitles. 

The forthcoming movie is as-of-yet untitled, but Gibson plans a historically accurate and violent recreation of the Viking terror that engulfed Scotland and England over a thousand years ago.

Gibson said: 'I think it's going to be [in] English - the English that would have been spoken back then - and Old Norse. Whatever the ninth century had to offer. I'm going to give you real.

'The very first idea I ever had about making a film was when I was 16 years old and I wanted to make a Viking movie.

'And I wanted to make it in Old Norse, which I was studying at the time. That was the first big, epic, wacky idea I ever had.'


He revealed: 'I want a Viking to scare you. I don't want a Viking to say, "I'm going to die with a sword in my hand."

I want to see somebody who I have never seen before speaking low, guttural German who scares the living - out of me coming up to my house.'

The script is being developed by William Monahan, who wrote the screenplay for the Oscar-winning crime drama The Departed and work is expected to begin in the autumn.

Producer Graham King said: 'This will be an awe-inspiring story.'

Read more: 

U.S. official: Canadian border a bigger threat then Mexican border

.US. official: Canadian border a bigger threat then Mexican border 

We have all seen and read story after story about horrific crimes and brutal deaths pouring over the US/Mexican border with what seems to be no end in sight just another day deal with it.  Try to smuggle 385 pounds of lunch meat and the border agents are patting themselves on the back like they saved America from that most dangerous bologna.

The reason the U.S.  Government is  stating this is not because of the amount of narcotics being smuggled. But because many US citizens  cross over the Canadian border for the benefit of attainableness in  Narcotic and Non-Narcotic  prescription drugs and health care . Thus derpiving the US Government and Big US Pharmaceutical /Health Insurance compnaies their profit and gains from backing political parties.  Shera

Canadian border a bigger threat:

thank you battleskin88

The U.S. border with Canada, even though it sees far fewer detentions and arrests every year, is a “more significant threat” to American security than the Mexican border, a senior Homeland Security official said Tuesday.

“In terms of the terrorist threat, it’s commonly accepted that [it's] the more significant threat, because of… people who can enter Canada then and come across our bridges into the United States,” Alan Bersin, head of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, told a U.S. Senate subcommittee hearing in Washington.

Bersin was responding to questioning from Senator John Cornyn, a Texas Republican who demanded to know why the southern U.S. border, with about 445,000 arrests and detentions annually, isn’t considered far more sensitive than the northern boundary, which saw 6,000 arrests and detentions last year.

Bersin said the U.S. has to “maintain a very high security profile” on the Canadian frontier, in part because Canada and the U.S. don’t share their no-fly lists and so can’t keep out people deemed security threats who might travel by airplane into one country, then cross the border by land.

American politicians and officials have often expressed alarm about their northern boundary, frequently stemming from the false belief that some of the 19 men who hijacked four airplanes on Sept. 11, 2001, entered the United States from Canada. In February, several senators decried the findings of a government report that determined that less than one per cent of the U.S.-Canada border had reached an “acceptable level of security.”

Senators at Tuesday’s hearing also asked what efforts are afoot to stem drug smuggling between Canada and the U.S.

The Customs and Border Protection chief replied that the latest step in cross-border policing will see Canada send 22 radar feeds to his agency’s centre in California that tracks non-commercial aircraft, with the goal of cracking down on narcotics smuggling by small planes flying low over the border to escape detection.more

Despite our best efforts, drug trafficking still occurs in significant quantities in both directions across the border. The principal illicit substances smuggled across our shared border are marijuana, cocaine, precursor chemicals and steroids. Marijuana is the most widely produced, trafficked and consumed illicit drug in both Canada and the United States. Seizures of marijuana from Canada to the United States have increased significantly and are mainly in bud form, although this represents only a small percentage of overall U.S. seizures. Cocaine enters both countries by a variety of routes originating in South America. About 25% of the seized cocaine intended for Canadian markets either transited or was intended to transit the United States. While cocaine use appears to have stabilized, it remains a principal drug threat to our two countries. Recent domestic and international law enforcement efforts, coupled with new Canadian regulations to govern the import and export of precursor chemicals, have had a positive impact in reducing the cross-border trafficking of these chemicals that can be used in the production of synthetic drugs such as methamphetamine. Significant amounts of anabolic steroids originating mainly from Mexico continue to transit the United States en route to Canada.

Cross-border distribution and transshipment

While the majority of marijuana cultivated in both the United States and Canada is produced to support domestic demand, the importation of foreign-produced marijuana is an issue for both countries.

Despite cultivation within Canada, marijuana smuggled into the country from foreign sources accounts for an important share of the Canadian market. Between 2000 and 2003 inclusive, Canadian authorities seized a total of 7.8 metric tons of marijuana at Canadian ports of entry. Of this quantity, 1.23 metric tons (16%) either transited or originated in the United States. For example, in September 2003, Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) officers seized 50 kilograms of marijuana along with 3.5 kilograms of cocaine from the trailer of a commercial motor vehicle at the Ambassador Bridge port of entry in Windsor, Ontario. The cocaine was concealed inside a large block of compressed marijuana located within the commercial shipment. Additionally, U.S. and overseas authorities seized a total of 4.3 metric tons of marijuana destined for Canada between 2000 and 2003. Of this quantity, 1.3 metric tons (30%) were either in transit or were intended to transit the United States. In June 2002, U.S. authorities seized 346.3 kilograms of Jamaican marijuana from a sailboat in Florida that were to be smuggled to Canada via the United States by land.

The vast majority of foreign-produced marijuana available in the United States is cultivated in Mexico, followed by Canada, and to lesser extents, Colombia and Jamaica.

Cocaine

Demand for powdered and crack cocaine remains high in both the United States and Canada. Most of the cocaine destined for either country is shipped directly from the source country in South America. Although cocaine moves in both directions across our shared border, most smuggling activity is northbound.

Production

Colombia is by far the largest source of coca in the world, with Peru and Bolivia also identified as significant source countries. Coca is not cultivated in the United States or Canada. Cocaine is produced in illicit laboratories that are primarily located in source countries.More at Source

Officers seize 385 pounds of bologna at U.S.- Mexican border; Man fined $1,000 for lunchmeat

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers working the port of entry at Santa Teresa have made a big bust, but it didn’t involve drugs or human trafficking.

The officers seized 385 pounds of Mexican bologna after finding the contraband meat behind the seat of a pickup truck that had been stopped at the port Friday morning.

It’s illegal to bring the bologna across the border because it’s made of pork and has the potential for introducing foreign animal diseases to the U.S. pork industry.

The 33-year-old Mexican man who was transporting the meat was assessed a $1,000 fine and released.

Usually officers see one or two rolls of bologna, not 35 as in this case.

Officials say this marked the largest bologna bust ever recorded at the Santa Teresa crossing.

source Thank you Dad

Mexico’s Drug War

An ongoing analysis of southwest border violence issues by an experienced intelligence professional.

State Dept. wants to make it harder to get a passport – So you can’t legally leave the USA

State Dept. wants to make it harder to get a passport – So you can’t legally leave the USA 

If you don’t want it to get even harder for a U.S. citizen to get a passport — now required for travel even to Canada or Mexico — you only have until Monday to let the State Department know.
The U.S. Department of State is proposing a new Biographical Questionnaire for some passport applicants: The proposed new Form DS-5513 asks for all addresses since birth; lifetime employment history including employers’ and supervisors names, addresses, and telephone numbers; personal details of all siblings; mother’s address one year prior to your birth; any “religious ceremony” around the time of birth; and a variety of other information. According to the proposed form, “failure to provide the information requested may result in … the denial of your U.S. passport application.”
The State Department estimated that the average respondent would be able to compile all this information in just 45 minutes, which is obviously absurd given the amount of research that is likely to be required to even attempt to complete the form.
It seems likely that only some, not all, applicants will be required to fill out the new questionnaire, but no criteria have been made public for determining who will be subjected to these additional new written interrogatories. So if the passport examiner wants to deny your application, all they will have to do is give you the impossible new form to complete.
It’s not clear from the supporting statement, statement of legal authorites, or regulatory assessment submitted by the State Department to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) why declining to discuss one’s siblings or to provide the phone number of your first supervisor when you were a teenager working at McDonalds would be a legitimate basis for denial of a passport to a U.S. citizen.
There’s more information in the Federal Register notice (also available here as a PDF) and from the Identity ProjectIdentity Project..
You can submit comments to the State Dept. online at Regulations.gov until midnight Eastern time on Monday, April 25, 2011. Go here, then click the “Submit a Comment” button at the upper right of the page. If that link doesn’t work for you, it’s probably a problem with the javascript used on the Regulations.gov website. There are alternate instructions for submitting comments by email here.

see link above for more  


DO NOT GET APP FROM HERE, You can go to the US POST OFFICE and get one for free instead of paying $15 for the exact same form http://usa.gov-passport.org/

Just one more way China is destroying North America via The Great Lakes

Strange ? They can put this to plants and animals ...... But come invasive human scum they do not say a word. ( please read comments left by readers )thank you battleskin88


The aliens have landed and their favourite province is Ontario.

They may be tough to recognize because they aren't green with beady eyes and bulbous heads, but a Government of Ontario planrecommends drastic measures for dealing with the large number of invasive species.

"The ecological effects of invasive species are often irreversible and, once established, they are extremely difficult and costly to control and eradicate," reads the Ontario Invasive Species Strategic Plan.

Ontario is already part of a national plan called "An Invasive Alien Species Strategy for Canada", which was approved in 2004.

However, with 1,017 non-native vascular plants, Ontario has almost the same number as the rest of Canada at 1,384 species. The plan states Ontario is a haven for invading species due to the nature of its society, economy and geographic location.

The geographic location being key because it is at the end of the St. Lawrence Seaway and has multiple land and water entry points with the Great Lakes. Canada's most populous province also leads in the invading freshwater fish category with 26 known species.

While there is no analysis of the net cost in Ontario, the Commission for Environmental Cooperation said in 2009 the environmental affects and economic loss exceed $100 billion in the U.S. alone.

Toronto will spend $37 million over five years to cut and replace trees killed by the emerald ash borer and zebra mussels have cost Ontario Power producers $6.4 million per year. The Ontario Biodiversity Council also shows the aliens are affecting 20 per cent of the native species.

The report, which was posted this week on the province's environmental registry, recommends developing "rapid response protocols which respond to new infestations with an understanding of the social, economic and environmental impacts."

In addition to coordinating with all levels of government to design the plan of attack, it recommends giving the agencies the tools to, if necessary, eradicate the species quickly. more at Daily Brew

Just one more way China is destroying North America 

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Kim Hoelmer stood beneath a tree in eastern China a year ago and studied its leaves.  

He scanned a section as sunlight passed through the foliage, revealing the backlit image of the first thing he was looking for — an egg mass laid by a brown marmorated stink bug.

Hoelmer pulled the leaf down for a closer inspection and spotted the second thing he had hoped to see — evidence that a particular parasitic wasp had been there, too.

Bingo.

The scientist collected the eggs and returned to his lab at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where he hopes to turn the wasp into a weapon to stop the stink bug.

The invasive species was first identified in Allentown, Pa., in 1998, but researchers there think it had been around for at least a couple of years. It hit Ohio in 2007 and now is in 33 states, including every state east of the Mississippi River and along the Pacific coast.

The bug, they say, probably hitched a ride on containers from Asia, where it damages fruit and soybeans from China to Japan.

The emerald ash borer arrived in much the same manner from China and has left in its wake millions of dead trees.

Adult Female brown marmorated stink bug

Where it is found, the brown marmorated stink bug, which has no natural predators here, outnumbers native stink bugs 10 to 1. And they eat at least 100 different plants. Last summer, the stink bug damaged 20 percent to 100 percent of the fruit crops in some areas of Maryland and West Virginia, according to government entomologists.

Trissolcus

In Asia, however, the bug is kept in check by a wasp in the genus Trissolcus. This wasp preys exclusively on the eggs of the brown marmorated stink bug. It simply injects its own eggs into the stink bugs' eggs. Within days, wasp larva hatch and feed on the developing stink bugs.

Nasty and effective.

Hoelmer is studying the Trissolcus in hopes of one day setting the wasp loose on the brown marmorated stink bug in the U.S.
"Our approach is to introduce a permanent solution," said Hoelmer, who works in the agency's Beneficial Insects Introduction Research Unit.
Right now, it might be the only thing that works. Commonly used pesticides have had little effect on the bug.