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Feds Funneled Billions To Charter Schools; Have No Clue Where The Money Went

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An investigation into federal funding for charter schools revealed that American taxpayers have been kept in the dark about how their money is being used to bolster education profiteers. The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) released a report on Wednesday highlighting transparency woes related to more than three billion dollars spent at the federal level since 1995 to proliferate charter schools around the nation. According to CMD, the Department of Education has very little information on how much money it has granted to charter school organizations…

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Congress, Courts Protect California Medical Pot Dispensaries From D.O.J. Overreach

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In a move that could have set an important legal precedent, a federal judge cited Congressional intent to protect a California medical marijuana dispensary from being shut down by the feds. US District Judge Charles Breyer on Monday barred the Department of Justice from proceeding with legal actions to shutter the state’s first licensed pot dispensary, pointing to a budget amendment passed by Congress at the end of 2014. The policy rider prohibited the DOJ from using funds to crackdown on medical marijuana sellers complying with state…

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Financial Markets Expect Debt Ceiling Clown Show, But No Default

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Investors aren’t expecting Congress to raise the debt ceiling in a timely fashion. Yields of US Treasury bills that mature next month rose on Monday to a two-year high, The Wall Street Journal reported. Treasury bills maturing on Nov. 12 saw yields rise to as high as 0.178 percent, up from a Friday closing level of 0.036 percent. Bond yields and prices are inversely correlated. “It marks the highest intraday level since Oct. 16, 2013, when the yield spiked to 0.505 percent on fear of a…

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Obama Gets Corporate Pledges Ahead of Paris Climate Talks

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President Obama met Monday with five corporate executives and received commitments about emissions reductions from 68 companies ahead of a UN conference in Paris. The White House is hoping to use the pledges to rebut Republican accusations that efforts to combat climate change are part of an anti-business agenda, The Hill noted. The President was scheduled to meet with leaders from Berkshire Hathaway Energy Co., Hershey Co., Pacific Gas and Electric Co., Johnson & Johnson and Intel Corp. All five companies have already made commitments similar to the ones…

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Afghan War Prolongation Not Good Enough for McCain

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Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) responded to the White House’s decision to abandon its Afghanistan withdrawal plan by calling on President Obama to keep even more troops there to fight what is already the United States’ longest-running foreign war. The Senate Armed Services Committee chair said that the administration’s plans to keep only 5,500 troops in Afghanistan beyond 2017 puts “our mission in Afghanistan, as well as our men and women serving there, at greater risk.” “All of us want the war in Afghanistan to be…

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Edward Droneden–Intercept Publishes Stories on Targeted Killing Program

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Top secret documents published on Thursday provide fresh insight into US security forces’ long-running drone assassination program. The information, which came in the form of PowerPoint slides, was provided to The Intercept by an anonymous source. It details details the CIA and Pentagon’s use of unmanned aerial vehicles for targeted strikes that occurred between 2011 and 2013, and sheds light on the inner-working of the program. “Taken together, the secret documents lead to the conclusion that Washington’s 14-year high-value targeting campaign suffers from an overreliance on signals intelligence,…

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War In Afghanistan To Rage On Beyond Obama

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President Obama has scrapped plans to end the War in Afghanistan before he leaves office. White House officials told the Associated Press Thursday that the US will keep its current force size of nearly 10,000 soldiers in tact through 2016, and that it will plan to indefinitely keep roughly 5,000 troops there. The AP said the scaling back of that force will occur “at a pace still to be determined by commanders.” The administration had previously been hoping to pare down the US contingency in Afghanistan to an embassy…

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3D Printer? I Barely Even Know ‘Er — Pentagon Failing to Track “Additive Manufacturing”

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Defense officials have described it as important if the US military wants to maintain “technological superiority.” The Senate Armed Services Committee has requested briefings on it. But the Pentagon is unable to keep tabs on how it uses 3D printers. While military officials aren’t totally in the dark, they’re unable to “systematically track” the Defense Department’s use of so-called “additive manufacturing,” according to a Government Accountability Office report published Wednesday. “DOD officials could not readily tell us the activities underway or the amount of funding…

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As Dems Call for Student Debt Relief, Admin Presses Unemployed 65-year-old on Repayment

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If Democratic presidential candidates want to earn the support of people calling on the government to do more to help Americans awash in student debt, they might want to run from the Obama administration’s record. On Tuesday, the same day of the first Democratic presidential primary, the Department of Education told a federal judge in Boston that a 65-year-old former blue collar worker should not be discharged of his student loan obligations. The department said that the unemployed man shouldn’t be entitled to relief because…

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Two of His Ex-Pentagon Chiefs, Others, Ask Obama To Maintain Afghanistan Troop Levels

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Twenty former top ranking officials and two key lawmakers from both parties are calling on the US and its NATO partners to maintain troop levels in Afghanistan “at or close to present levels.” The recommendations come through endorsements of an Atlantic Council paper released Wednesday, according to The New York Times. “The main argument of the paper, which was written by James B. Cunningham, a former ambassador to Afghanistan, centers on the need to continue helping Afghan forces, and to give the next American administration as…

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Mother of Saudi Dissident Teen Condemned to Crucifixion Makes Obama Plea

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The mother of a Saudi dissident teen sentenced to be decapitated and crucified pleaded for the White House to intervene in his case. Nusra al-Ahmed, the mother of Ali Mohammed al-Nimr, made the appeal to President Obama in an interview published Wednesday by The Guardian. “He is the head of this world and he can, he can interfere and rescue my son” she said. Al-Nimr, who was 17 when he was arrested, was charged with attending a protest, using his phone to foment more protest,…

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