FEDS: We may not process illegals referred from AZ...

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-AL, said it appeared the Obama administration is "nullifying existing law" and suggested Morton may not be the right person for his post if he fails to enforce federal immigration law.  "If he feels he cannot enforce the law, he shouldn't have the job," Sessions told Fox News. "That makes him, in my view, not fulfilling the responsibilities of his office."  Sessions said the U.S. government has "systematically failed" to enforce federal immigration law and claimed Morton's statement is an indication that federal officials do not plan on working with Arizona authorities regarding its controversial law.  "They're telegraphing to every ICE agency in America that they really don't intend on cooperating with Arizona," Sessions said. "The federal government should step up and do it. It's their responsibility."

AZ gov. to Obama: Order Guard choppers from other states to border...

PHOENIX (AP) - Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer is asking President Barack Obama to reallocate National Guard helicopters from other states to help Arizona secure its border with Mexico.

The Eyes Have It

There is still something of that in all Americans, which means as a people were not really suited to the age of surveillance, the age of no privacy. There is no hiding place now, not here, and this strikes me as something of huge and existential import. It's like the closing of yet another frontier, a final one we didn't even know was there.

Krauthammer: The fruits of weakness

The real news is that already notorious photo: the president of Brazil, our largest ally in Latin America, and the prime minister of Turkey, for more than half a century the Muslim anchor of NATO, raising hands together with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the most virulently anti-American leader in the world.   That picture -- a defiant, triumphant take-that-Uncle-Sam -- is a crushing verdict on the Obama foreign policy. It demonstrates how rising powers, traditional American allies, having watched this administration in action, have decided that there's no cost in lining up with America's enemies and no profit in lining up with a U.S. president given to apologies and appeasement.

Krauthammer: This administration is lawless

US lifts sanctions against Russians linked to Iran

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday removed sanctions against three Russian organizations the U.S. had previously accused of assisting Iran's effort to develop nuclear weapons. Penalties against a fourth Russian entity previously accused of illicit arms sales to Syria also were lifted.

Chris Christie - Doing what needs to be done

TRENTON — It took about two minutes from the time Senate President Steve Sweeney certified the passage of the millionaires tax package for Gov. Chris Christie to veto the bills at his desk.  "While I have little doubt that the sponsors and supporters of this bill sincerely believe that the state can tax its way out of this financial crisis, I believe that this bill does nothing more than repeat the failed, irresponsible and unsustainable fiscal policies of the past," wrote Christie in his veto statement. "Now is not the time for more of the same. Ultimately, another tax increase will punish the state’s struggling small businesses and set our economy further back from recovery."

'Millionaires tax' bills pass both houses, but are vetoed by Gov. Christie

Church warns scientists... only God can create life

ROME (AP) - Catholic Church officials said Friday the recent creation by researchers of the first synthetic cell can be a positive development if correctly used, but warned scientists that only God can create life.

'Artificial Life' breakthrough announced by scientists

Scientists in the US have succeeded in developing the first living cell to be controlled entirely by synthetic DNA.  The researchers constructed a bacterium's "genetic software" and transplanted it into a host cell.  The resulting microbe then looked and behaved like the species "dictated" by the synthetic DNA.

'Frankenstein' doc creates life?

Professor Paul Freemont, of Imperial College London, called it "a landmark study".   He said: "This is a key step in the industrialisation of synthetic biology, leading to a new era."   Dr Eckard Wimmer, of Stony Brook University. New York, warned: "The possibility of misuse exists." And Dr David King, of Human Genetics Alert, said scientists were "playing God".   Dr Venter insisted the bacterium he used is found in cows, not people. But a relative of it causes pneumonia in humans.

D.C. Metro Police Escorted SEIU Protesters to Bank Of America Executive’s Home

So, let’s sum this up: A caravan of SEIU buses receive a Metropolitan (D.C.) Police Department escort to a private home in Maryland where the protesters, from all appearances, violate Montgomery County law by engaging in a stationary protest. The Montgomery County police were not informed by their cross-jurisdictional colleagues of the impending, unusually large protest pending in their jurisdiction.  What’s up with that? Had the mob decided to torch the house, the D.C. police would not have been authorized to intervene. Not their jurisdiction. They’re just escorts. Meanwhile, a teenage boy is home alone, frightened by what’s happening outside his front door.  There’s something very wrong with this picture.

Cops: Bullies tattooed boy against his will...

I added this story in to remind people what a huge problem bullying is. 

Markets Plunge for Third Day On Jitters Over EU, Economy

"For Germany to come in and unilaterally make a decision to affect the markets was seen as the first step toward dissolving the EU," said Marc Pado, U.S. market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald. "There is a real fear factor going on here, it is unraveling every day that the currency gets hit."

'Chain of Dominoes' Giving Investors Cause For Worry

"We've kind of kicked the can down the road. We haven't fundamentally addressed anything...and we're hoping that over time things will work themselves out," says Doug Roberts, chief investment strategist for Channel Capital Research. "What we're finding now is it's much more difficult because it's a global system. Everything is interlinked, so it's like a chain of dominoes."

Dollar Index to Hit 88.5, then 'Collapse': Charts

The U.S. dollar index will continue rising over then next three weeks, but then collapse thereafter, Daryl Guppy, CEO of Guppytraders.com, told CNBC Thursday.  Guppy said he sees the U.S. dollar index reaching 88.5 in the coming three weeks and then "collapse" to 81.5.  "Volatility is the characteristic of the dollar index at the moment," he said.

Cramer: Europe to Collapse in 48 Hours – or Never

If we don’t see total capitulation in Europe over the next two days, Cramer said during Wednesday's Stop Trading!, investors may have to admit that the Continent is “merely” suffering a downturn. Because the repercussions from the expectations of a collapse, which have fed the negativity in the American markets and driven down stocks, can’t continue for much longer without it actually happening.

China to US: Put Your Fiscal House in Order

Sovereign debt troubles in Europe underscore how important it is for the United States to control its own borrowing as its indebtedness reaches concerning levels, a senior Chinese official said on Thursday.

Germany's Schaeuble Says Markets Out of Control

He admits that the greatest problem affecting the markets is one of trust in the ability of the EU, and especially the 16 members of the common currency area at its heart, to bring their debt and deficits under control as they have promised. “That is the task we must perform,” he tells the Financial Times aboard his Luftwaffe Challenger jet bound for Berlin. “But that doesn’t alter the fact that financial market regulation is also necessary.  “I’m convinced the markets are really out of control. That is why we need really effective regulation, in the sense of creating a properly functioning market mechanism.”

New Claims Shoot Higher as Jobless Problem Persists

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 25,000 to a seasonally adjusted 471,000 in the week ended May 15, the highest level since the week ended April 10, the Labor Department said.

North Korea warns of war if punished for ship sinking

Tensions deepened Thursday on the Korean peninsula as South Korea accused North Korea of firing a torpedo that sank a naval warship, killing 46 sailors in the country's worst military disaster since the Korean War.  President Lee Myung-bak vowed "stern action" for the provocation following the release of long-awaited results from a multinational investigation into the March 26 sinking near the Koreas' tense maritime border. North Korea, reacting swiftly, called the results a fabrication, and warned that any retaliation would trigger war. It continued to deny involvement in the sinking of the warship Cheonan.  "If the (South Korean) enemies try to deal any retaliation or punishment, or if they try sanctions or a strike on us .... we will answer to this with all-out war," Col. Pak In Ho of North Korea's navy told broadcaster APTN in an exclusive interview in Pyongyang.

Greek strikers march on parliament against cuts

The strike was called by unions representing 2.5 million workers, half the country's workforce, who want the government to withdraw austerity measures agreed with the EU and IMF in return for a 110 billion-euro ($137 billion) emergency loan.  Schools and government offices were shut and hospitals were operating on skeleton staff. Tourist sites such as Athens' ancient Acropolis were also closed, ships were kept in port or prevented from docking, and domestic flights were disrupted.

One in 7 US Homeowners Late Paying or In Foreclosure

One out of seven U.S. households with a mortgage ended the first quarter late on mortgage payments or in the foreclosure process...

The delinquency rate for one-to-four-unit residential loans in the first quarter rose to a seasonally adjusted rate of 10.06 percent of loans outstanding from 9.47 percent the prior quarter and from 9.12 percent a year earlier.

County to charge 50-cent-per-ride fee for school-bus...

Parents in Colorado's third-largest school district are being asked to pay if their kids want to ride the bus to school.  The Douglas County school board voted 5-0 Tuesday night to approve a 50-cent-per-ride transportation fee starting next school year. The decision will affect about 17,000 students who ride the bus this year. The district hopes to raise $2 million with the program.

The fight over Arizona's illegal immigrant law escalates to the power grid

Well, as our beloved buddy Ed Morrissey points out over at HotAir, it seems that Arizona's power plants generate about 25% of the electricity that runs what Briton Eddie Izzard calls the City of Angles.  In a delightfully stern letter written for the desert home front, possibly indicating Mr. Pierce's higher political ambitions, the commissioner warns Villaraigosa of the retaliation consequences of an LA city boycott.  Pierce writes:  If an economic boycott is truly what you desire, I will be happy to encourage Arizona utilities to renegotiate your power agreements so Los Angeles no longer receives any power from Arizona-based generation. I am confident that Arizona’s utilities would be happy to take those electrons off your hands. If, however, you find that the City Council lacks the strength of its convictions to turn off the lights in Los Angeles and boycott Arizona power, please reconsider the wisdom of attempting to harm Arizona’s economy. People of goodwill can disagree over the merits of SB 1070. A statewide economic boycott of Arizona is not a message sent in goodwill.

BAILOUT OF BANK WITH OBAMA TIES RAISES EYEBROWS; CITI, GE, TAXPAYERS TO RESCUE...

Some of the nation's largest banks have agreed to contribute enough money to save Chicago-based ShoreBank, the community lender with strong ties to the Obama administration, FOX Business has learned 

The banks have agreed to contribute $140 million to bail out the bank, while the federal government will donate tens of millions more, according to people close to the talks. In addition to major Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs (GS: 139.307, 1.897, 1.38%), which agreed to contribute $20 million to the bailout effort, as well as Citigroup (C: 3.7101, -0.0099, -0.27%) and JPMorgan (JPM: 38.75, -0.27, -0.69%), General Electric's (GE: 17.0716, -0.1584, -0.92%) GE Capital will also contribute $20 million to the rescue effort. All the firms have either received massive government assistance during the financial crisis or, in the case of Goldman Sachs, are facing multiple regulatory investigations into their business practices.  The bailout has been controversial. Senior Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett served on a Chicago civic organization with a director of the bank, and President Obama himself has singled out the bank for praise in lending to low-income communities.  But the bank has made its share of bad bets, and some of the Wall Street firms that have given money have said they've received political pressure to contribute to the bailout of a business that under normal circumstances would have been left to fail.

Bangkok in Flames

BANGKOK (AP) - Downtown Bangkok turned into a flaming battleground Wednesday as an army assault toppled the Red Shirt protest leadership, enraging followers who fired grenades and set numerous fires that cloaked the skyline in a black haze.  Using live ammunition, troops dispersed thousands of anti-government protesters who had been camped in the capital's premier shopping and residential district for weeks. Four protesters and an Italian news photographer were killed in the ensuing gunbattles and about 60 wounded.  After Red Shirt leaders gave themselves up to police, rioters set fires at the Stock Exchange, several banks, the headquarters of the Metropolitan Electricity Authority, the high-end Central World shopping mall and a cinema complex that collapsed. Thick smoke drifted across the sky of this city of 10 million people.

"That is our historic task; if the euro fails, then Europe fails,"

BERLIN (AP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for tougher regulation aimed a stock and bond traders along with a crackdown on government debt to contain the continent's financial crisis, warning the future of the euro itself was at stake.  As she urged lawmakers to pass Germany's share of a new euro750 billion ($1 trillion) eurozone rescue package, Merkel said that defending the shared European currency is "about no more and no less than the preservation of the European idea."  "That is our historic task; if the euro fails, then Europe fails," she told the lower house of parliament on Wednesday. "The euro is in danger - if we do not avert this danger, then the consequences for Europe are incalculable, and then the consequences beyond Europe are incalculable."  Merkel's warning follows Germany's decision Tuesday to ban so-called naked short-selling of eurozone government debt and shares of major financial companies in an attempt to ward off steep market drops.  Naked short-selling involves traders selling shares or investments they don't hold in hopes of buying them cheaper later; it's a way of betting a financial asset will fall in price and profiting from the fall.  Germany's roiled financial markets, in part because it suggested to traders that policymakers were grasping at straws to stem the crisis of confidence over the ability of European governments to pay off their heavy debt loads amid slow growth.  Fears that some governments may eventually fail to pay all they owe, or will have to cut back so severely that they sink their economies into prolonged recessions, have weighed on stocks and led to discussions that the 11-year-old eurozone will someday break up. The $1 trillion backstop is an attempt to calm those fears by removing the possibilty of immiment default, though it does little to address the underlying debt issue.  Politicians have also roundly condemned "speculators" for selling off government bonds, which drives up their borrowing costs and makes it even harder to keep their finances under control. But many analysts say the real problem is simply too much debt.

Senators load financial overhaul with irrelevancies

SOME OF THE PROPOSED MEASURES

Here are some of the proposed amendments that lawmakers have added to the financial regulation bill, with their original sponsors in parentheses:

- Require construction of the U.S.-Mexico border security fence within a year (Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C.)

- Strip health insurers of their antitrust exemption (Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.)

- Make it easier to train lead paint removal contractors (Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla.)

- Call on the U.S. to back multilateral efforts to probe and stop activities involving natural resources that "contribute to illegally armed groups and human rights violations in eastern Congo" (Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kans.)

- Require publicly traded companies to disclose occupational health and safety conditions at coal mines and oil rigs (Sens. Robert Byrd and Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.)

- Prevent senators from secretly blocking legislation from floor consideration (Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.)

- Require companies to disclose payments to foreign countries for oil, natural gas and mineral rights (Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md.)

- End the practice of "secret spending" by requiring most spending proposals to be available on a public website well in advance of final congressional action (Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.)

Forget Europe, Worry About China: Hugh Hendry

“Some of these businesses will not survive; others will have to be radically restructured and my investors will make money," Hendry said.  Following Europe’s debt crisis it is “now commonly accepted that the magnitude of the financial problems confronting the world economy are so great that in all likelihood we will be confronted by a hyperinflation allowing sovereign debts to be paid off in worthless flat currency," he said.  China is at the mercy of its own credit bubble, Hendry said and he predicts it will explode as it fuels instability within the Chinese economy and political system.

Investors Should Avoid Banks 'At All Costs': Meredith Whitney

Investors should "avoid financials at all costs, particularly in the banking sector" because the Senate's financial reform bill will end up restricting credit and hurt bank earnings, well-known banking analyst Meredith Whitney told CNBC.  "Politicians have proven far worse than our worst expectations," she said in an interview. "It could be very bad for banks."

Sell it All, Risk of 'Major Crash': Dow Theory’s Russell

The author of the closely-watched Dow Theory Letters newsletter warned investors to get out of US stocks now in a report published Tuesday.  Richard Russell wrote that there is a risk of a “major crash” if the Dow Jones Industrial Average falls below the May 7 closing price of 10,380.43, according to several media reports.

Land-grab continues: Homeland Security threatens to seize farmland at US-Canada border...

It intends to acquire 4.9 acres of border land on a dairy farm owned for three generations by the Rainville family. Last month, the Rainvilles learned that if they refuse to sell the land for $39,500, the government intends to seize it by eminent domain.  The Rainvilles call this an unjustified land-grab by federal bullies.  “They are trying to steamroll us,’’ said Brian Rainville, 36, a high school government and civics teacher whose grandfather bought the farm in 1946 and whose parents and two brothers run it now. “We have a buyer holding a gun to our head saying you have to sell or else.’’

Iran vows more enrichment

Iran will continue its uranium enrichment activities, including production of 20 percent enriched uranium, even after signing a nuclear fuel swap deal with Turkey and Brazil on Monday, a senior official told Reuters.

Israel wargame assuming Iran has nuclear bomb

Sunday's event at a campus north of Tel Aviv followed other high-profile Iran simulations in Israel and the United States in recent months. But it broke new ground by assuming the existence of what both countries have pledged to prevent: an Iranian bomb.

Obama administration gave rig 'safety award' last year

In response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by AP, the agency has released copies of only three inspection reports — those conducted in January, February and April. According to the documents, inspectors spent two hours or less each time they visited the massive rig. Some information appeared to be "whited out," without explanation.

Euro Falls to Lowest Since Lehman as Breakup Concern Increases

The euro fell to its lowest level since the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. on concern that the 16-nation currency may be headed for disintegration.  The shared currency fell for a fourth week versus the dollar and a third week versus the yen, the longest losing streaks since February, as German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that Europe is in a “very, very serious situation” despite a rescue package for the region’s most indebted nations.

New al-Qaida in Iraq chief warns of "dark days soaked in blood"

"Wait for the long gloomy nights and dark days soaked with blood," said Abu Suleiman, addressing Iraq's "polytheistic rejecters," an insulting term for Shiites common among extremist Sunnis. "What is happening to you nowadays is just a drizzle." The written message was posted on militant websites Friday.  One of the major doctrinal disputes between Sunnis and Shiites can be traced back to the first three rulers of the Muslim community after the Prophet Muhammad. Shiites reject those first three successors as illegitimate.  Al-Qaida attacks on Shiite shrines in 2006 plunged the country into a bloody cycle of mutual sectarian attacks. A measure of fragile calm, however, has returned to Iraq in the past two years.  There are fears that with the new round of attacks, mostly targeting Shiites, al-Qaida is hoping to provoke a backlash against Sunnis and re-ignite the sectarian warfare that brought the country to the brink of civil war.

Iranian cleric urges creation of 'Greater Iran'; caliphate would rule Middle East, central Asia...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - A radical cleric called Saturday for the creation of a "Greater Iran" that would rule over the entire Middle East and Central Asia, in an event that he said would herald the coming of Islam's expected messiah.