GOP bill would allow states to defund Planned Parenthood

The House voted Thursday to make it easier for states to deny federal family-planning funds to groups such as Planned Parenthood that also perform abortions. A rule imposed by the Obama administration says that states cannot deny funding to clinics for reasons unrelated to their ability to provide basic family planning services.

MANILA. Senator Leila de Lima

THE Department of Justice has found probable cause to charge Senator Leila de Lima before the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court. De Lima was charged Friday with three cases for violation of the Republic Act 9165 or the Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002 in connection with her alleged involvement in the drug trading in the New Bilibid Prison .

Critics: Trump should not ignore domestic terrorist threats

In this Friday, June 18, 2015 file photo, police tape surrounds the parking lot behind the AME Emanuel Church as FBI forensic experts work the crime scene where nine people where shot by Dylann Storm Roof, 21, in Charleston, S.C. Since the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, the Southern Poverty Law Center has tracked domestic terrorist plots and attacks in the United States.

Argument: No scheme at GJ airport

Even if the Grand Junction Regional Airport Authority had not erred in its initial grant application to the Federal Aviation Administration in 2011 for a $5 million fence around most of its facility, the federal agency would have approved helping to pay for the project anyway. And because of that, the FAA and the U.S. Department of Justice said they believed there was no conspiracy or fraud going on at the airport, and only reached a settlement agreement with the authority after one error was discovered during a two-year investigation that wasn’t part of the initial complaint.

Closer look doesn’t cast Pence, DeVos in pleasant light

Billionaire Betsy DeVos, the new U.S. secretary of education, just gave Vice President Mike Pence his Gloria Swanson/”Sunset Boulevard” moment: Pence, a former governor and congressman from Indiana, cast the deciding vote in the U.S. Senate to confirm DeVos. Pence’s vote was the first time in U.S. history a vice president has had to break a tie to confirm a Cabinet appointee.

Photo credit: NEWSCOM

Donald Trump has promised a foreign policy of muscular retrenchment, in which a better-resourced U.S. military intimidates our enemies without serving as a global cop. More than any president since Richard Nixon, our new commander in chief sees virtue in brutal authoritarians, especially if they are fighting radical Islam.

Farther Left or Farther Right?

There is a great public debate taking place among the intelligentsia, the political talking heads, and in written media concerning the relative positional/ideological shift of the two main parties. Barely a day goes by when one side or the other doesn’t say something along these lines: “Today’s Republicans have moved so far Right that there are no more ‘moderate’ Republicans and that’s why compromise is no longer possible.”

Trump unleashed, and a press conference for the ages

Donald Trump entered the East Room of the White House on Thursday reeling from a week filled with resignations, withdrawals and continued questions surrounding his campaign’s contacts with Russia. It was a return for Trump to what worked for him during the course of the 2016 campaign: a circus-like atmosphere in which he uses the media – and his supporters’ distrust of the media – as a sort of tackling dummy to re-centre the narrative on ground more favourable to him.

The Mexican left campaigning in Los Angeles?

During my work days in Mexico, many of my Mexican friends would joke with me about “el 33” or Article 33 of the Mexican Constitution. It goes like this : Article 33 of Mexico’s constitution establishes the right of the president to detain and deport “any foreigner” and prohibits foreigners from participating “in any way” in the political affairs of the country.

Illegal aliens too terrified to apply for welfare

A government social worker for Durham County, N.C., said that the number of Hispanic residents seeking assistance had dropped off rapidly in recent days amid swirling rumors about an ICE checkpoint at a Durham intersection and ICE agents making arrests in a supermarket parking lot. “Today, I haven’t gotten one Hispanic client in the entire check-in today,” said the social worker, a longtime government employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.