Elton John Contributed To The Clinton Foundation

(RTTNews) - Elton John is on the list of high profile contributors to the Clinton Foundation, a charity founded by former president Bill Clinton. It was revealed that the Elton John AIDS foundation donated between $5 million and $10 million when the Clinton Foundation published its donations list at President Barack Obama's request.

Other well-known contributors to the cause include Donald Trump and the Coca-Cola Corporation.

The Clintons agreed to disclose their donations list when Hillary accepted her position as secretary of state. The move was made to prevent any conflicts of interest with her appointment to the Obama administration, Wnyc.org reports.


Source:rttnews.com/

Americans in Pakistan terror probe

Police in Pakistan are trying to determine whether five arrested Americans planned to attack a complex that houses nuclear power facilities.

The young Muslim men from the Washington DC area were picked up in Pakistan earlier this month in a case that has spurred fears that Westerners are travelling there to join militant groups.

Pakistani police and government officials have made a series of escalating and, at times, seemingly contradictory allegations about the men's intentions, while US officials have been far more cautious, though they, too, are looking at charging the men.

A Pakistani government official said that the men had established contact with Taliban commanders and planned to attack sites in Pakistan.

Earlier, local police accused the men of intending to fight in Afghanistan after meeting militant leaders.

The men had a map of Chashma Barrage, a complex that along with nuclear power facilities houses a water reservoir and other structures, said Javed Islam, a senior police official in the Sargodha area of Punjab province.

He stressed the men were not carrying a specific map of any nuclear power plant, but rather the whole of Chashma Barrage.

The detained men had also exchanged emails about the area, Islam said.

"We are also working to retrieve some of the deleted material in their computers," he said.

Pakistan has a nuclear weapons arsenal, but it also has nuclear power plants for civilian purposes.

Source:AFP

DC Sports In The 2000's: A Decade In Review

We continue our look at the trials and tribulations, the failures and successes of DC's four pro franchises in the past decade. In Part 1, we analyzed the Redskins' performance over the last ten years. In Part 2, we broke down the Wizards' journey in the 2000s. In Part 3, we hit the ice with the Capitals, their a dynamic owner and their two-time MVP. In our fourth and final installment, we take the field with a new team in search of an identity, the Nationals.

Source:csnwashington.com/

Has the Alleged Fort Hood Gunman's Imam Been Silenced?

Imam Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen, October 2008

Muhammad ud-Deen






U.S. officials are awaiting confirmation that a Yemeni air strike killed Anwar al-Awlaki, the radical American cleric who exchanged email messages with the alleged Fort Hood Shooter, Maj. Nidal Hasan. Counterterrorism officials and experts have differing views on Awlaki's importance to the wider jihadist cause. "The death of Awlaki would deprive al-Qaeda of a prominent face, a prominent voice, and someone who'd gotten involved in operations," says one counterterrorism official, who asked not to be named because he is not authorized to discuss the air strike with the media.

But Peter Bergen, an Al-Qaeda expert at the New American Foundation, says Awlaki was merely "important as an inciter to jihad, no more." Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University says it's unlikely Awlaki would have beeen involved in operational activities. "He was a cleric, not a field commander," he says.
(See the effect of Al-Awlaki's sermons.)

Whatever his position in the Al Qaeda hierarchy, Awlaki had emerged as a major headache for U.S. officials. American-born and educated, he had contact with at least two 9/11 hijackers before fleeing the US in late 2001. In Yemen, he became something of an e-imam, using the internet to preach fiery anti-American and anti-West sermons. He called upon believers to rise up against the U.S. Because his sermons were published in English, he became popular with radical American Muslims. "He understood American society and was able to tailor his message to American audiences," says Hoffman.
(See pictures of the Fort Hood shootings.)

Hasan, accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood, reached out to Awlaki a year ago. Although Awlaki denies encouraging Hasan to kill, the cleric praised the major on his website as a "hero" after the shootings, and exhorted other Muslims in the U.S. military to follow his example.
(See an assessment of the growing al-Qaeda threat in Yemen.)

Initial reports that the airstrike may have been the work of the CIA seem to have been mistaken: Yemeni authorities say it was their jets that conducted the dawn operation, in the province of Shabwa, 400 miles south of the capital Sana'a. In a statement, the Yemeni embassy in Washington D.C. said the strike targeted a meeting of "scores of Yemeni and foreign Al Qaeda operatives." The meeting had been called to discuss retaliation for government raids in mid-December on al-Qaeda hideouts in Abyan and Sana'a provinces.

Around 30 people are reported to have beeen killed in the strike, among them, Nasser Al-Wuhayshi, the regional al-Qaeda leader and his deputy, Saeed Al-Shihri, a former Gitmo detainee. Shihri was repatriated in 2007 to Saudi Arabia, where he was enrolled in a rehabilitation program for hardcore jihadists. Shortly after his release, however, he returned to the al-Qaeda fold in Yemen.

Source:time.com/

President Obama And Family To Spend Christmas In Hawaii

Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) - The Obamas will spend their first Christmas as the first family not in the White House but in Hawaii, where President Barack Obama was raised by his late grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, who died a day before he won the election last year.


According to the White House, the President, first lady Michelle Obama and their daughters Malia and Sasha will travel to Honolulu on Thursday morning.

The President had said Tuesday after meeting with small banks about efforts to fix the economy that his vacation plans would depend on whether Senate Democrats are able to pass their healthcare bill.


"I will not leave until my friends in the Senate have completed their work," Obama told reporters at the White House. "My attitude is, is that if they're making these sacrifices to provide health care to all Americans, then the least I can do is to be around and to provide them any encouragement and last-minute help if necessary." Senate Democrats, the same day, reached an agreement with Republicans that the final vote on passage of the healthcare bill would be held at 8:00 am on Thursday. The measure is expected to pass, having cleared a filibuster by the GOP on Monday with the minimum 60 votes required.

After passage, the measure will still need to be reconciled with the bill passed by the House last month, which has a government insurance plan. The merged legislation will then undergo final approval by each chamber before being sent to the White House for Obama to sign into law.

The President also spent the holidays in Hawaii last year with his family, as the president-elect. While on vacation, he "will continue to get daily intelligence updates and security updates," Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said on Tuesday, but will hold no public events.

"As he's wont to do, he will probably take the girls out for shaved ice; they may go do various and sundry things in and around Hawaii. But there are no public events," Gibbs said.

The White House has not said if Obama will spend New Year's in Honolulu just as he did last year. The President is set to give his first State of the Union address in January, and the tone of that speech will be contingent on whether he is successful in passing healthcare reform, his top legislative priority.

Lawmakers are to re-convene in Capitol Hill on January 5. Obama spoke before a joint session of Congress a month after he was inaugurated. In September, he spoke to both chambers again, making clear, "Let there be no doubt: healthcare reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year."

Source:allheadlinenews.com/

Swan Song: The End of the Jim Zorn Era in Washington, D.C.

The Washington Redskins haven't experienced much success this past decade, and last Monday night was an ode to the pain and suffering this once-proud franchise has undergone.

With the Redskins losing 45-12 to the rival New York Giants in the waning minutes of the fourth quarter in a meaningless game, one could look out into the stadium bowl and see a sea of blue. Redskin fans were long gone; Giants fans had made FedEx Field their home.

The Redskins turned in a dismal performance in front of a national TV audience not only showing themselves to be incompetent, but downright stupid. The Giants beat them in every facet of the game, and then the 'Skins shoveled the dirt on top of their own coffin with an idiotic fake field goal attempt.

It was an ugly game. But then Washington made it laughable when they trotted on the kicking unit only send them in motion out to the left side of the field. At first I had to wonder, what does special teams' coach Danny Smith have up his sleeve?

After all, the 'Skins do have two special teams scores on trick plays this season.

However, this wasn't a calculated risk. It was the death rattle of the Jim Zorn era in Washington. Punter Hunter Smith lobbed up a duck, which was intercepted. Cue the subdued guffaws by Mike Tirico and Co. in the booth.

Exit Zorn. Stage left.

Albert Haynesworth summed it up afterwards: "I mean, the score, the record, they'd say that we're horrible, that we don't know how to play football," Haynesworth said. "But I've been around these guys a lot. I think they know how to play football. I think we're all just going different directions, and we need somebody to lead us in the right direction."

Truer words were never spoken.

Zorn was doing a good job this past month keeping his players focused. He had showed an ability to facilitate and prepare the team in the previous weeks of this lost season.

I believed he had at least saved his credibility with the team's performance the past month. In fact, I was willing to hear a case for retaining him.

However, any good will he had merited was quickly snatched away with this latest catastrophe.

How can the Redskins bring back a guy who had his play-calling duties stripped midway through the season? How can they bring back a guy who turned in three of his worst losses on Monday Night Football (Pittsburgh in 2008, Philly and New York this year) in front of national TV audience?

I want stability for this franchise; I really do. However, keeping Zorn doesn't give the Redskins much stability in anything but losing.

Zorn is a genuinely nice guy. He's a class act. However, that's really all he has going for him.

He wasn't even supposed to be the head coach, but was handed the job when Dan Snyder couldn't find a replacement for Joe Gibbs.

He has had almost no success here in DC; his struggles as a play-caller are astounding; and he has overall failed to get the most out of his players on the field (with the exception of a handful of games over the past two seasons).

Maybe he hasn't been given the best chance because he has lacked personnel on the offensive line, but the fact of the matter is that the Redskins have flopped too many times in many different situations.

They have failed in big games. They have failed in winnable games. They have failed as the favorite and the underdog. They have failed in close games.

All of that adds up to too much failure.

Source:bleacherreport.com/

Washington D.C. couple crashes presidential party

A wealthy couple is under investigation, for crashing a presidential party in our nation’s capitol.
The two crashed President Obama’s first official state dinner Tuesday night, and now the secret service is trying to find out who’s to blame.
Tariq and Michael Salahi are well known on the D.C. social register for their activities on the party circuit. The couple managed to talk their way into the President’s state dinner honoring India’s Prime Minister.
Secret service spokesman Ed Donovan says the President was never in any danger and that the party crashers went through the same security screening as the more than 300 people who were actually invited to the dinner. But the fact that they made it in at all raises serious questions about security.
The Salahis posted pictures of their visit to the state dinner on their Facebook fan page. Michael posed with Vice President Joe Biden, the mayor of Washington, D.C., and other dignitaries and stars at the event. They were also in the same room with the President and First Lady.
The secret service first learned about the breach Wednesday morning. It says it will fully investigate its procedures to insure something like this doesn’t happen again.


Sourcewnct.com