The Hollywood Liberal

CNAS’s Exum on targeted killings
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Regulators adopting new whistleblower awards; can get up to 30 percent of money recovered

WASHINGTON — Federal regulators are adopting a new system of paying awards to whistleblowers who report fraud or other violations at companies to the government.

Under the new system, the Securities and Exchange Commission will pay sizable cash awards to people who come forward to provide the agency with original information that leads to an enforcement action resulting in more than $1 million in penalties. Whistleblowers will be eligible to get as much as 30 percent of the money the SEC recovers from a company or individual.

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FEMA aid bill advances as tornado response continues

Lawmakers are pushing a $1 billion aid package for the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the wake of the deadly Joplin, Mo., tornado — even as the agency is already stretched thin by other twisters and floods one week before hurricane season begins.

FEMA has already deployed more than 4,300 workers this year in response to dozens of federally declared disasters and has distributed about $149 million in aid. But it is carrying more than $17 billion in debt from storm-related aid in the past six years.

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For Romney, Pawlenty and Huntsman, Florida’s 2012 primary is wide open

CORAL GABLES, Fla. — All the signs indicate that the early presidential battleground of Florida is Mitt Romney territory.

The former Massachusetts governor finished a strong second here in the 2008 Republican presidential primary. He would almost certainly have the money to compete on Florida’s costly television airwaves. And in a big state where the nation’s economic ills are magnified — more people are out of work, more homes are under foreclosure — a candidate running as a turnaround specialist could resonate.

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Obama’s Hostility to Israel Continues
Ed Koch, RealClearPolitics
Not since 1973 and the Yom Kippur War when Egypt and Syria – with logistical help from other Arab countries — joined forces in an attempt to crush Israel has the survival of Israel been in question. Today, however, Israel is in danger.In 70 AD, the Jewish nation was sold into slavery by the Romans and condemned to wander in the Diaspora until David Ben-Gurion, its George Washington and founding Father, called it back into existence. A United Nations vote in 1947 called for the creation of two states in the historic mandate of Palestine, one Jewish and the other Palestinian.The Jews…

Religious Doomsdays vs. Leftist Ones
Dennis Prager, Townhall
It appears that the Rapture leading to the end of the world predicted by a Christian radio broadcaster for this past Saturday, May 21, 2011 did not take place. And the failure was covered worldwide. A Google search on Saturday evening, Pacific Time, yielded more than 32,000 articles — in English alone — in the world media.The secular, especially the anti-religious, left, enjoy these spectacles of religious foolishness. They seem to confirm for them not only how absurd these end-of-days predictions are, but how absurd religion is in general.But the left should not laugh too loudly. The…

Obama Embraces Middle East Complexity
James Fallows, The Atlantic
Three points about Obama's recent speeches on the Arab world and the Middle East — the one at the State Department, and the one today at AIPAC. Jeffrey Goldberg has been responding to these in detail.1) It's complicated. We should no longer be surprised that a major Obama speech on an important topic is characterized mainly by its embrace of complexity.