Tens of thousands of uninsured residents in the poorest and most rural parts of Mississippi may be unable to get subsidies to buy health coverage when a new online marketplace opens this fall because private insurers are avoiding a wide swath of the state.

No insurer is offering to sell plans through the federal health law's marketplaces in 36 of the state's 82 counties, including some of the poorest parts of the Delta region, said Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney.

As a result, 54,000 people who may qualify for subsidized coverage would be unable to get it, estimates the Center for Mississippi Health Policy, a nonpartisan research group.

North Carolina's newly unfettered attack on voting rights has three main prongs:

    Require ID at the polls. North Carolina's voter ID bill could pose problems for 1 in 10 voters, according to an analysis by the State Board of Elections. About 613,000 North Carolinians lack the required government-issued ID. Nearly a third of these voters are black, while over half are registered Democrats.

    Penalize college students for voting. Republicans are also pushing a bill to raise taxes on families with college students who choose to vote at school rather than at home, effectively discouraging college students from voting.

    End early voting and same-day registration. Other states that restricted early voting, like Ohio and Florida, needlessly created mammoth lines on Election Day, forcing some voters to wait until 1 a.m. to cast a ballot. The backlash in Florida has been especially strong, prompting Gov. Rick Scott (R) to reverse his own voter suppression laws. In North Carolina, black voters make up 29 percent of early voters and 34 percent of voters who took advantage of same-day voter registration at the polls.

A first-time adjunct professor teaching a full course load at the City University of New York can expect to pull in around $25,000 per year. If you recently resigned as C.I.A. director over a long-time affair with your biographer, however, you can expect to be paid eight times as much for a fraction of the work.

In April, CUNY announced that Petraeus would do a stint as a visiting professor of public policy at the school's Macaulay Honors College, leading a seminar on "developments that could position the United States...to lead the world out of the current global economic slowdown." According to documents Gawker obtained from CUNY via a Freedom of Information Law request, the fallen war architect will net a whopping $200,000 a year for the course, which will total about three hours of work, aided by a group of graduate students to take care of "course research, administration, and grading." (He will also throw in two lectures.)

[That salary has now been reduced to $150,000; see update below.] link

"As you know, last week the Supreme Court handed down two terrible decisions on marriage. But the Court stopped short of fabricating a "right" to redefine marriage in our Constitution, choosing instead to allow the states to settle the question.

This means winning or losing marriage is still up to us, The People.

Within hours of last week's rulings, Governor Mike Pence of Indiana issued a statement calling upon the General Assembly to place a constitutional amendment on the ballot for the people of Indiana to vote on next November.

...

This is an opportunity to go to a thriving, Midwestern state, and demonstrate that heartland America believes in marriage."

After repeatedly denying (as recently as yesterday, as "old and discredited attacks") that he hid assets from clergy abuse victims who were demanding compensation when Dolan was Archbishop of Milwaukee (2002 to 2009), documents released by the Milwaukee diocese lift the skirts of his cassock to reveal an ugly picture.

The release of documents, including a deposition of Dolan's taken in February 2013, show movement of $57 million into a cemetery trust fund to protect assets. The documents are the byproduct of a diocese bankruptcy proceeding involving  575 clergy abuse victims who have filed claims.

 The documents include an"embarrassing"  2007 letter to the Vatican in which he explains that by transferring the assets, "I foresee an improved protection of these funds from any legal claim and liability."  The request was approved with Vatican dispatch (five weeks) as compared with the glacial speed taken to remove a convicted sex offender from the priesthood (five years).

Dear Ed:

Thank you for your revelations of government wrong-doing over the past week. You have done the country a great public service. I know that it feels like the weight of the world is on your shoulders right now, but as Americans begin to realize that we are devolving into a police state, with the loss of civil liberties that entails, they will see your actions for what they are: heroic. Remember the immortal words of Abraham Lincoln: "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." That is what's happening to our country now. Your whistleblowing will help to save us.

I wanted to offer you the benefit of my own whistleblowing experience and aftermath so that you don't make the same mistakes that I made.

First, find the best national security attorneys money can buy. I was blessed to be represented by legal titans and, although I was forced to take a plea in the end, the shortness of my sentence is a testament to their expertise.

Second, establish a website so that your supporters can follow your case, get your side of the story, and most importantly, make donations to support your defense.

Third, you're going to need the support of prominent Americans and groups who can explain to the public why what you did is so important. Although most members of Congress are mindless lemmings following our national security leadership over a cliff, there are several clear thinkers on The Hill who could be important sources of support. Cultivate them. Reach out to the American Civil Liberties Union, the Government Accountability Project and others like them who value our individual freedoms and who can advise you.

Finally, and this is the most important advice that I can offer, DO NOT, under any circumstances, cooperate with the FBI. FBI agents will lie, trick, and deceive you. They will twist your words and play on your patriotism to entrap you. They will pretend to be people they are not - supporters, well-wishers, and friends - all the while wearing wires to record your out-of-context statements to use against you. The FBI is the enemy; it's a part of the problem, not the solution.

I wish you the very best of luck. I hope you can get to Iceland quickly and safely. There you will find a people and a government who care about the freedoms that we hold dear and for which our forefathers and veterans fought and died.

Sincerely,
John Kiriakou

Let's assume that intervention by the US would be a good thing - which after experiencing our track record in these things I do not - there should be a way to convince us that it is a good thing. I mean by reasoned discussion - not the usual scare tactics and misrepresentations so endemic since 2001.

The contempt that Bill shows for the war-weary people of this country along with his fellowship with John (100-years-of-war-is-okey-dokey) McCain is infuriating and sickening imo.

The 61-year-old brother of Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) is missing after embarking on a solo backpacking jaunt through the Rocky Mountains in Wyoming, CNN reported.

Randy Udall began hiking the Wind River Range in Wyoming on June 20 and was due to return last Wednesday but never did. He has been identified in multiple media reports as an experienced hiker and, according to CNN, he was familiar with the trail. link

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Several times every day, at airports across the country, passengers are trying to walk through security with loaded guns in their carry-on bags, purses or pockets, even in a boot. And, more than a decade after 9/11 raised consciousness about airline security, it's happening a lot more often.

In the first six months of this year, Transportation Security Administration screeners found 894 guns on passengers or in their carry-on bags, a 30 percent increase over the same period last year. The TSA set a record in May for the most guns seized in one week -- 65 in all, 45 of them loaded and 15 with bullets in the chamber and ready to be fired. That was 30 percent more than the previous record of 50 guns, set just two weeks earlier. link

To Austria On Suspicion Snowden On Board

LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) -- The plane carrying Bolivian President Evo Morales home from Russia was rerouted to Austria on Tuesday after France and Portugal refused to let it cross their airspace because of suspicions that NSA leaker Edward Snowden was on board, the country's foreign minister said.

Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca denied that Snowden was on the plane, which landed in Vienna, and said France and Portugal would have to explain why they canceled authorization for the plane.

"We don't know who invented this lie. We want to denounce to the international community this injustice with the plane of President Evo Morales," Choquehuanca said from Vienna, where the plane landed.