It's Been Reported

Senate Passes $60B War Bill, Kills $20B in Add-Ons [a.k.a. Pork] WASHINGTON (Fox/AP) — In a take-it-or-leave-it gesture, the Senate voted Thursday night to reject more than $20 billion in domestic spending the House had tacked on to its $60 billion bill to fund President Barack Obama's troop surge in Afghanistan. Instead, the Senate returned to the House a measure limited chiefly to war funding, foreign aid, medical care for Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange, and replenishing almost empty disaster aid accounts. The moves repel a long-shot bid by House Democrats earlier this month to resurrect their faltering jobs agenda with $10 billion in grants to school districts to avoid teacher layoffs, $5 billion for Pell Grants to low-income college students, $1 billion for a summer jobs program and $700 million to improve security along the U.S.-Mexico border. See full story	City Lays Off Firefighters, but Spends $850,000 for 'Water Art' ANN ARBOR (Mackinac Center) — The debate in Ann Arbor, where firefighters are being laid off due to a multimillion dollar budget deficit, is over an $850,000 piece of art. That's how much the city has agreed to pay German artist Herbert Dreiseitl for a three-piece water sculpture that would go in front of the new police and courts building right by the City Hall. The city has the money to do it because in 2007, it agreed to set aside for public art 1 percent of money that went into capital improvement projects that were $100,000 or larger. Most capital projects involve streets, sewers and water. Ann Arbor City Council member Stephen Kunselman, a Democrat, opposed the art deal. "I think it is incredibly insensitive," Kunselman said. "It is insensitive to the staff and their morale. It is insensitive to the community." See full story
El Salvador Gang Member Nabbed In Sweep (Fresno Bee) — A 24-year-old gang member from El Salvador has been arrested on felony drug charges, the Madera County Sheriff's Department said. County law enforcement officers and immigration agents found more than $500 worth of methamphetamine at the man's home. He remains in custody on an immigration hold awaiting deportation. He was one of five gang members arrested – three on probation violations – during a five-day operation that ended Saturday. See full story	Illegal Charged With Raping 12-Year-Old Girl YAKIMA, Wash. (Yakima Herald) — A Toppenish man accused of raping a 12-year-old neighbor girl he accosted on her way to summer school was arraigned Thursday in Yakima County Superior Court. Jose Jesus Velazquez-Palomino, a 23-year-old farm worker, is charged with second-degree rape of a child and unlawful imprisonment. Authorities allege Velazquez accosted the girl moments after she left home for summer school July 7. The girl told police Velazquez forced her into his home, where he sexually assaulted her. She escaped to the Safehaven Community Center while he was taking a shower afterward. See full story
U.S. Navy Successfully Uses Laser to Shoot Down Drones (CBS) — The U.S. Navy has used a a laser weapon to shoot down four unmanned aerial vehicles in a test that rings up memories of Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars" missile defense shield in the 1980s. The successful test of the Laser Weapon System off the coast of California was announced during the Farnborough International Air Show, which is taking place this week in England. The technology, jointly developed with Raytheon, used industrial strength lasers, is more than just your run-of-the-mill PR exercise. In its write-up of the technology, Scientific American correctly notes that the shoot-down of the drones over water constitutes an advance over previous Raytheon tests which focused on static targets. See full story	Burkini-Clad Muslim Women Arrested in France (Daily Mail) — Two Muslim women were ordered out of a swimming pool in France because they were wearing 'burkinis'. They jumped into the water wearing garments that covered their entire bodies, including veils over their heads. The incident came ten days after French MPs voted to outlaw the burka in public places. The new law, which brands the garment 'an insult to the country's values', means women will be fined or jailed for hiding their faces in public. See full story
Sen. John Kerry Skips Town On Sails Tax (Boston Herald) — Sen. John Kerry, who has repeatedly voted to raise taxes while in Congress, dodged a whopping six-figure state tax bill on his new multimillion-dollar yacht by mooring her in Newport, R.I. Isabel – Kerry’s luxe, 76-foot New Zealand-built Friendship sloop with an Edwardian-style, glossy varnished teak interior, two VIP main cabins and a pilothouse fitted with a wet bar and cold wine storage – was designed by Rhode Island boat designer Ted Fontaine. But instead of berthing the vessel in Nantucket, where the senator summers with the missus, Teresa Heinz, Isabel’s hailing port is listed as “Newport” on her stern. See full story	Pantsless Burglar Caught On Tape ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, Fla. (IBS) — After two burglaries in a row, a day spa installed a security camera and ended up catching the burglar with his pants down – literally. Blush Day Spa on Forest City Cove in Altamonte Springs was burglarized twice at the end of May. The burglar shattered a door or window and took cash from the register, police said. After the incidents, the owner installed a surveillance system, which caught a man breaking in at 1:30 a.m. on July 9, police said. In the video, the burglar can be seen with his pants down and his shirt unbuttoned. See full story
Morons Mistake Woman's Dog For a Coyote, Set Loose In Wild FRANKFORT, Ky. (State-Journal) — A little lost dog named Copper is in the middle of a bureaucratic snafu stemming from a mistaken identity that involves city and county governments, Frankfort police and others. "We don't take coyotes," a Frankfort Humane Society employee told a Frankfort police officer, who brought an animal later identified as Copper to the Kentucky Avenue shelter. "If it's a coyote, either shoot it or release it back to the wild," Wildlife Solutions told a police sergeant who called the business for advice after Copper was turned away. Animal activist Trudi Johnson summed up Copper's dilemma: "This story just goes downhill and at the bottom of that hill lays the Humane Society's inability to recognize a dog from a coyote." See full (sad) story