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Author: Mary Chastain

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Mary Chastain

Mary is the resident libertarian. She covers stories in every vertical, but her favorite thing to do is take on the media. She saw its bias against the right when she was a socialist.

Mary loves the Chicago Cubs, Chicago Blackhawks, tennis, cats, Oxford comma, Diet Coke, and needlework.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 07, 2017 15 Comments
Wikileaks has published almost 9,000 documents from the CIA about the agency's own malware used to hack into anyone's electronics and spy on them. Most concerning? The CIA has malware from Russia, and other countries, so it looks like an attack came from that country:
The CIA's Remote Devices Branch's UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques 'stolen' from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 06, 2017 24 Comments
Some schools across the country will close on March 8,  the same day as the Day Without a Woman March, due to concerns they'll be short-staffed. The Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools in North Carolina will close. Durham Public Schools may close but have not reached a final decision. Chapel Hill-Carrboro Superintendent Jim Causby has decided to make March 8 a teacher workday and students will not have to make up the day:
“The expected absences would make it difficult to teach students on March 8 and to provide essential services including transportation and food service,” the school system said in an emailed statement Thursday.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 06, 2017 2 Comments
President Donald Trump has signed a new immigration order, exempting Iraq and those who already hold visas. It still prohibits people from six nations "from entering the U.S. for 90 days." From The Wall Street Journal:
The new order doesn’t ban citizens of Iraq, one of many changes made to an original order in hopes of putting the measures on stronger legal and political footing. The White House says the ban is intended to stop potential national-security threats.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 06, 2017 46 Comments
The Supreme Court has chosen to send a Virginia transgender student's bathroom case back to the lower court after President Donald Trump's administration decided to do away with a directive from former President Barack Obama that stated students in schools can use which bathroom they want. The court should have heard the case later this month. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit had decided to allow transgender teen Gavin Grimm to use the bathroom of her choice.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 06, 2017 8 Comments
North Korea continues to defy the world. This time, the communist country fired four ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan as a way to show the world it will continue its missile program despite sanctions and threats. Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada stated that the missles "landed in waters as close as 300 km (190 miles) to Japan's northwest coast."

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 06, 2017 68 Comments
Former President Barack Obama's Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Chuck Todd on Meet The Press that evidence between President Donald Trump and Russia do not exist:
We did not include any evidence in our report, and I say, "our," that's N.S.A., F.B.I. and C.I.A., with my office, the Director of National Intelligence, that had anything, that had any reflection of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and the Russians. There was no evidence of that included in our report.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 04, 2017 9 Comments
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick started a trend last year when he decided to kneel for national anthem for social justice. Athletes in other sports decided to follow, with leagues supporting their decisions and not really taking a stance either way. But now the U.S. Soccer Federation has passed a bylaw that states everyone must stand for the national anthem.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 03, 2017 8 Comments
Jaws dropped when authorities announced they arrested Juan Thompson for threatening Jewish community centers. Thompson made these threats in his ex-girlfriend's name as an act of revenge, to frame her for the crimes. But this isn't the first time Thompson has made headlines. In fact, Thompson flew into the spotlight for fabricating references when he worked at The Intercept.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 03, 2017 46 Comments
On Thursday, The Wall Street Journal published a report that then-Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) used campaign money to travel to the event where he mingled with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. There's a few problems with this assertion. Sessions used his campaign account to travel to the Republican National Convention...which is a campaign event for all of those politicians.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 03, 2017 13 Comments
A court in New York has indicted 13 members, including 10 undocumented immigrants, of the notorious MS-13 gang for the killing of two teenage girls and five other killings over the past three years. These charges include murder, attempted murder, racketeering, assault, arson, and obstruction of justice. The members slaughtered Nisa Mickens, 15, and Kayla Cuevas, 16, "with baseball bats and machetes."

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 03, 2017 14 Comments
Authorities have arrested Juan Thompson, 31, in St. Louis, MO, for threatening Jewish community centers as revenge against a former lover. From ABC:
The suspect, 31-year-old Juan Thompson, is accused of what federal prosecutors called a “campaign to harass and intimidate.” He’s charged in New York with cyberstalking a woman by communicating threats to JCCs in the woman’s name. Prosecutors said Thompson “appears to have made at least eight of the JCC threats as part of a sustained campaign to harass and intimidate” the woman after their romantic relationship ended.

Posted by Mary Chastain on March 03, 2017 12 Comments
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) wanted to view the House GOP Obamacare replacement bill, but could not gain access to it from a secure room. This did not please the senator, who wants to keep everything transparent:
“If you recall where Obamacare was passed in 2009, 2010, Nancy Pelosi said we’ll know what’s in it after we pass it. The Republican Party shouldn’t act in the same way," Paul said in a circus-like atmosphere outside the offices of House leaders. “This is being presented as if it were a national secret, as it if it were a plot to invade another country. … That's wrong. It should be done openly in the public. And conservatives who have objections that don't want Obamacare-lite should be able to see the bill."
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