When will these people get serious about the government corruption.
Democrats who are hoping that President Donald Trump will face harsh repercussions for paying settlements to women who allege relationships with him passed legislation on Thursday that requires them to make payments for sexual harassment with their own money.
Current law addressing sexual misconduct that was put in place in 1995 — ironically when Bill Clinton was in the White House — requires an accuser to get counseling, wait 30 days, and allowed accused lawmakers to use a slush fund of taxpayer money to pay off their accusers.
Part of the reason it took Congress all year to get this done is because the House wanted tougher punishments and more transparency when lawmakers sexually harass or discriminate against staff, while Senate Republicans, for some reason, insisted on watering down those provisions.
House lawmakers, for example, wanted to make members of Congress pay out of pocket for discrimination settlements too and wanted to provide legal representation to all accusers. But the Senate, which finally caved on requiring lawmakers to pay out of pocket for sexual harassment settlements, rejected both of those provisions and neither ended up in the final bill.
The passage of the bill, which President Donald Trump has to sign into law, is Congress’s response to the #MeToo movement launched last year, wherein women across the country accused men ranging from Hollywood moguls to media celebrities and members of the House and Senate of sexual harassment and worse.
Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) spearheaded the movement in Congress last year after announcing that she, too, had been the victim of sexual misconduct as a young congressional staffer. She was one of the main sponsors behind the House legislation, and she promised to push next session to put that chamber’s tougher terms back in place.
“Taxpayers should never foot the bill for Members’ misconduct,” Speier said in a statement provided to the Huffington Post. “And having spoken with many survivors, the process of going up against a lawyer for the institution and the harasser was as traumatic, if not more traumatic, than the abuse they suffered. … We are committed to offering victims the tools they need to pursue justice. We will address these issues in the next Congress.”
The law is not retroactive, so the members who have left their Congressional seats because of sexual misconduct charges will not be affected, including Blake Farenhold (R-TX), Patrick Meehan (R-PA), Trent Franks (R-AZ), John Conyers (D-MI), and Al Franken (D-MN).
The Daily Caller asked Speier why lawmakers paying off women who make accusations against them differs from what Trump is alleged to have done when his lawyer paid funds to women who claimed to have had a relationship with him.
“They’re totally unrelated,” Speier told The Daily Caller on Wednesday. She later explained, “One was to impact an election and the other was bad behavior within Congress.”
“When pressed further about the Congressional settlements being taxpayer money, as opposed to any money allegedly paid to Stormy Daniels through Michael Cohen, Speier responded, “I’m the one who has carried the legislation to make sure that members are held accountable. These members are now gone. There’s no one left who was sexually harassing.”
3 Perverted Men Charged With 1460 Counts Of Sex With Animals! Another Man Says Horse Winked At Him
Three Pennsylvania men have been arrested and charged with 1,460 counts of “sexual intercourse with animals,” in addition to animal abuse and endangering the welfare of children, according to Clearfield County District Attorney.
In what District Attorney William A. Shaw, Jr described as one of the “most extreme cases of animal abuse,” the three suspects were detained after a search at their makeshift farm last week, authorities announced on Monday. Bail was set at $100,000 each for Terry Wallace, 41, Matthew Brubaker, 32, and Marc Measnikoff, 34.
Authorities conducted the search following a tip-off from a “16-year-old juvenile male” who was reportedly living with the trio, and has since been taken into protective custody. “Right now we don’t believe the juvenile was sexually victimized,” Shaw said, although the suspects were still charged with “endangering the welfare of children.”
Information obtained from the 16-year old led State Police to believe that that the accused had sex with a number of animals, including dogs, horses, a cow and a goat. Allegedly, a specially designed V-shaped pen was used to facilitate the sexual intercourse. A substantial number of homemade videos of the acts were seized during the search on August 18.
Authorities are working to determine the extent of any mental or physical abuse to which the teenager may have been exposed. A Clearfield County Jail judge will preside over the preliminary hearings on Wednesday.
Man who had sex with horse claims filly winked to give consent
An Australian man has been jailed for having sex with a horse. Daniel Raymond Webb-Jackson, 31, told the New South Wales court the 2-year-old filly gave consent by smelling his crotch and winking at him.
Webb-Jackson pleaded not guilty to committing an act of cruelty to an animal after being caught at the stables of a Grafton horse trainer on January 22. The trainer installed CCTV cameras in the stables following a string of disturbances in the previous month.
When Webb-Jackson broke in to the stables, he triggered an alarm and was subsequently spotted on camera by the horse trainer opening a number of stalls. Police were called and they found Webb-Jackson hiding in the corner of the fourth open stall. After a short fracas he was arrested. The trainer told the Magistrate’s Court that the filly had been left “traumatised” by the incident.
“The filly went from being quiet to just being highly strung, she changed in 24 hours. We had to put her in the paddock to try and get her head right,” the trainer told the Grafton Daily Examiner. “You don’t want to see this sort of thing happening, it’s really sick stuff.”
In her judgment, Magistrate Karen Stafford said the two sexual acts — allowing a horse to fellate Webb-Jackson and digitally penetrating the horse — amounted to acts of cruelty, jailing Webb-Jackson for 10 months with a non-parole period of four months. He was also fined $700, but could be eligible for release as early as next week thanks to time served.
Webb-Jackson dodged a charge of bestiality, which in NSW can land a person in prison for up to for 14 years.
Pakistan rapist ‘let off’ after sick deal ‘allowing victim’s brother to rape his sister’
The case of ‘revenge rape’ involving two families has was uncovered by cops after they drew up documents agreeing to the depraved deal
A FAMILY allegedly let off their daughter’s rapist after a sick trade let the victim’s brother do the same to her attacker’s sister.
The twisted case of “revenge rape” involving two families has been uncovered by cops in Pakistan.
One man had been accused of raping a woman in Pir Mahal in the Toba Tek Singh district of Punjab province, on March 20.
The suspect’s family had approached the victim’s family for “pardon and reconciliation”, according to local news reports.
Staggeringly the victim’s family agreed to pardon the rapist, on the appalling condition that “her brother would commit the same act with the suspect’s sister”, dawn.com reports.
A meeting between the two families agreed to the terms, and the brother then allegedly had sex with the suspected rapist’s sister on March 21.
Cops found out about the case when the two families prepared legal documents agreeing not to press charges against each other.
Pir Mahal Police Sub-Inspector Shaukat Ali Javed saw the papers and reported the families to his superiors.
All 12 people at the meeting, including four women, one of which was the victim of the second rape, were arrested on Saturday.
The case has chilling similarities another incident in the southern city of Multan last July, where a village council ordered the “revenge rape” of a 16-year-old girl.
The girl’s brother had sexually assaulted a 12-year-old, and the attack was reportedly carried out in front of her parents and 40 members of the village council.
Oprah Winfrey supported and help get Barack Obama Elected. I’m done with the damn argument.
The media mogul delivered a powerful speech at the Golden Globes Sunday night, almost immediately launching speculation on the topic.
Bringing a room full of Hollywood’s elite to their feet several times during the speech, Winfrey addressed the Me Too movement head on, lighting up social media with the hashtag #Oprah2020.
“It is not lost on me that at this very moment there are little girls watching me become the first black woman to get this award,” said Winfrey as she collected her Cecil B. DeMille lifetime achievement award.
This is not the first time rumors have circulated regarding Winfrey’s presidential aspirations. Political observers compared her speech to then Sen. Barack Obama’s speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.
Oprah herself has denied that she’s considering a run for president, but her partner Stedman Graham was later quoted as saying she “absolutely” would if people wanted her to.
For some, the specter of an Oprah presidential campaign raises questions on whether the country needs another big name celebrity with no political experience. But many don’t seem to mind.
Yes she will clean up the mess in Hollywood. Looks like she needs to start with her friends.
“I don’t see her as a celebrity, I see her as a leader,” said West Loop resident Kristine Singer.
“As a longtime Chicago resident, she’d have my vote,” said Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.
According to political veteran Thom Serafin, the bigger question is whether Winfrey would be willing to put herself through a grueling presidential campaign.
“I think she has the ability to educate, the ability to inspire, the ability to legislate. But you have to have the guts and stamina to go out on the campaign trail and take the crap you have to take 24-7. . . She was perfect in that event. She was just perfect. Can she be perfect in Iowa, New Hampshire, in Peoria where Caterpillar is leaving and there are no jobs? Those are questions I would suggest she has no interest in getting into,” said Serafin.
For those who’ve known her from the beginning, like Dennis Swanson, whom Winfrey thanked on stage for giving her a chance on AM Chicago many years ago, the possibility is not that far-fetched.
“I said, are you going to be able to handle success, that is my concern. She said, ‘Do you think I’ll be that successful?’ I said ‘Lady, you’re going to cost me a lot of money but you are going to shoot the lights out,'” said Swanson.
Winfrey finished her speech to a standing ovation.
“A new day is on the horizon. When that new day finally dawns, it will be because of a lot of magnificent women…and some pretty phenomenal men fighting hard to make sure they become the leaders who take us to the time nobody ever has to say ‘me too’ again,” Winfrey said.
Only time will tell whether an Oprah for President campaign will materialize. If social media is any indication, just the idea of it has sparked tremendous debate. Oprah related posts have reached more than 1.5 million people on ABC7’s Facebook page.
A full transcript of Winfrey’s speech can be found here.
Cardinal Bernard Law, symbol of church sex abuse scandal, dead at 86
Cardinal Bernard Law, the former Boston archbishop who resigned in disgrace during the Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal, has died, the Vatican confirmed. He was 86.
Law died in Rome, where he had served as archpriest of the Papal Liberian Basilica of St. Mary Major after he was forced to resign in 2002 as archbishop of Boston.
Law’s name became emblematic of the scandal that continues to trouble the church and its followers around the globe after it was revealed the he and other bishops before him had covered for pedophile priests in the Boston Archdiocese.
Law at the time apologized during a news conference to victims of abuse by a priest, John Geoghan, who had been moved from parish to parish, despite Law’s knowledge of his abuse of young boys. Law insisted Geoghan’s abuse was in the past.
Cardinal Bernard Francis Law looks on as Pope Francis celebrates Mass in 2016 in Vatican City.
Geoghan was eventually convicted of indecent assault and battery on a 10-year-old boy.
Law never faced criminal sanctions for his role in allowing abusive priests to remain in church parishes. The scandal reverberated through the church, exposing similar allegations worldwide that compromised its moral authority and led to years of multimillion-dollar settlements.
The Vatican early Wednesday issued a one-line news release, reading, “Cardinal Bernard Law died early this morning after a long illness.”
Survivors recount betrayal
To his detractors, Law’s second career at the Vatican was a slap in the face to victims of church sex abuse, one that further undermined the church’s legitimacy.
“Survivors of child sexual assault in Boston, who were first betrayed by Law’s cover-up of sex crimes and then doubly betrayed by his subsequent promotion to Rome, were those most hurt,” according to a statement after his death from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “No words can convey the pain these survivors and their loved ones suffered.”
The group advised the Vatican to keep the abuse survivors in mind when planning Law’s funeral. It asked: “Every single Catholic should ask Pope Francis and the Vatican why. Why Law’s life was so celebrated when Boston’s clergy sex abuse survivors suffered so greatly? Why was Law promoted when Boston’s Catholic children were sexually abused, ignored, and pushed aside time and time again?”
Law’s successor as Boston’s archbishop, Cardinal Sean O’Malley, said Wednesday that Law “served at a time when the church failed seriously in its responsibilities to provide pastoral care for her people, and with tragic outcomes failed to care for the children of our parish communities.”
“I recognize that Cardinal Law’s passing brings forth a wide range of emotions on the part of many people. I am particularly cognizant of all who experienced the trauma of sexual abuse by clergy, whose lives were so seriously impacted by those crimes, and their families and loved ones,” O’Malley said.
“To those men and women,” O’Malley added, “I offer my sincere apologies for the harm they suffered, my continued prayers and my promise that the archdiocese will support them in their effort to achieve healing.”
Widespread child abuse by the Catholic clergy in the Boston Archdiocese was uncovered by The Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative reporting team, which won a Pulitzer Prize for its efforts. A big-screen dramatization of the team’s investigation in the 2015 movie, “Spotlight,” won the 2016 Best Picture Academy Award, bringing the story to a much wider audience.
Rise of Boston’s spiritual leader
Law was born in Torreon, Mexico, on November 4, 1931, to Helen and Bernard Law, an Air Force colonel. He completed his postgraduate studies at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Louisiana and at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio. He was ordained as a priest on May 21, 1961, in the diocese of Natchez-Jackson, Mississippi, and became vicar general of that diocese in 1971.
In 1973, he was appointed bishop of the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese in southern Missouri. He served as chair of the Bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interracial Affairs, and in 1976, he was named to the Vatican Commission on Religious Relations with Jews.
The posts were stepping stones to his becoming the spiritual leader of Boston’s large and influential Catholic community. In 1984, Pope John Paul II appointed Law to be the archbishop of the Boston Archdiocese, with its 362 parishes serving 2.1 million members. That same year, Law received a letter from a bishop expressing concerns about then-Rev. Geoghan. Law assigned Geoghan to another parish despite the allegations.
In 1985, Pope John Paul II elevated Law to cardinal, one of just 13 Americans holding that office at the time.
Calls for resignation
Law attempted to resign as Archbishop of Boston in April 2002, but Pope John Paul II rejected his request. In 2002, a judge presiding over the child rape case of Rev. Paul Shanley ordered Cardinal Law to be deposed by lawyers of one of Shanley’s victims.
Law testified about his supervision of Geoghan in 2002, saying he relied on his assistants to investigate charges of abuse. In May 2002, he apologized for his role in the clergy abuse scandal in a letter distributed throughout the archdiocese. But he denied knowledge of sexual abuse allegations against Shanley until 1993.
In August 2002, Law appeared in court to testify about a settlement reached between the archdiocese of Boston and victims of clergy abuse. The archdiocese rescinded the monetary offer shortly afterward.
That December, as calls grew for him to resign, Law was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury investigating “possible criminal violations by church officials who supervised priests accused of sexually abusing children.” Days later, he resigned as chairman of the board of trustees of the Catholic University of America, followed by his resignation as archbishop of Boston.
Catholic Church abuses under scrutiny
The breakdown of trust in the Catholic Church continues to reverberate around the world.
This month, the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse delivered, after five years of work, 189 recommendations to address what it described as a “serious failure” by Australia’s institutions to protect its most vulnerable citizens.
The country’s senior Catholic leaders, however, rejected recommendations by the wide-reaching investigation, declining to end mandatory celibacy for priests and break the secrecy of confession.
Of survivors who reported abuse in a religious institution, more than 60% said it occurred in a Catholic organization, the report found.
Kansas Dem Andrea Ramsey, accused of sexual harassment, will drop out of US House race
Andrea Ramsey, a Democratic candidate for Congress, will drop out of the race after the Kansas City Star asked her about accusations in a 2005 lawsuit that she sexually harassed and retaliated against a male subordinate who said he had rejected her advances.
Multiple sources with knowledge of the case told The Star that the man reached a settlement with LabOne, the company where Ramsey was executive vice president of human resources. Court documents show that the man, Gary Funkhouser, and LabOne agreed to dismiss the case permanently after mediation in 2006.
Ramsey, a 56-year-old retired business executive from Leawood, was one of the Democratic candidates vying to challenge Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder in 2018 in Kansas’ 3rd District.
She was running with the endorsement of Emily’s List, a liberal women’s group that has raised more than a half-million dollars to help female candidates who support abortion rights
Ramsey will drop out on Friday, her campaign said.
“In its rush to claim the high ground in our roiling national conversation about harassment, the Democratic Party has implemented a zero tolerance standard,” Ramsey said in a statement Friday. “For me, that means a vindictive, terminated employee’s false allegations are enough for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to decide not to support our promising campaign. We are in a national moment where rough justice stands in place of careful analysis, nuance and due process.”
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which has not endorsed anyone in the race, said in a statement that members and candidates must all be held to the highest standard.
“If anyone is guilty of sexual harassment or sexual assault, that person should not hold public office,” said committee spokeswoman Meredith Kelly.
Emily’s List said in a statement on Friday that the group supported Ramsey’s decision to drop out of the race and wished her well.
Ramsey was not a party to the lawsuit or the settlement, although she’s referred to throughout the complaint as Andrea Thomas, her name before she married her husband in late 2006. She denied the allegations to the Star in two interviews over the last two weeks and said the lawsuit is surfacing now for political purposes.
Ramsey repeatedly said that she was not aware of any settlement in the case, but said that if she had been a party to the case she would have opposed settling.
“Had those allegations, those false allegations, been brought against me directly instead of the company I would have fought to exonerate my name. I never would’ve settled,” Ramsey said in an interview on Thursday. “And I would have sued the disgruntled, vindictive employee for defamation.”
Individual supervisors are not named as defendants in federal sexual harassment or discrimination lawsuits because they are not considered employers under Title VII, the law that protects employees from discrimination, harassment and retaliation for color, race, sex and national origin.
The lawsuit has been circulating in Kansas political circles as the first-time candidate runs for Congress amid a wave of sexual misconduct allegations that have rocked the political, entertainment and journalism industries.
The national Democratic Party is targeting Kansas’ 3rd District as part of its push to reclaim control of the House. Yoder is one of 23 GOP representatives seeking re-election in districts where Democrat Hillary Clinton won more votes than Republican Donald Trump.
The allegations against Ramsey were outlined in a lawsuit filed by Funkhouser against LabOne and in a complaint to the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Reached by phone, Funkhouser would not discuss the case.
“All I can say is the matter has been resolved,” he said.
In the EEOC complaint, which alleged sex discrimination and retaliation by LabOne, Funkhouser accused Ramsey of subjecting him to “unwelcome and inappropriate sexual comments and innuendos” beginning in September 2004, when he was a LabOne human resources manager.
In late March 2005, Ramsey made sexual advances toward him on a business trip, Funkhouser alleged in the complaint.
“After I told her I was not interested in having a sexual relationship with her, she stopped talking to me,” he wrote. “In the office she completely ignored me and avoided having any contact with me.”
Ramsey even moved him out of his office into a cubicle far from her office, Funkhouser wrote.
Before he rejected her advances, Ramsey “repeatedly told me she heard great things from others about my performance,” Funkhouser wrote. “After I rejected her, she told me she now was hearing bad things about my performance and on June 13, 2005, terminated my employment.”
The EEOC closed its file on Funkhouser’s charges of discrimination and retaliation in October 2005, noting that an investigation was unable to conclude whether any statutes had been violated. The document did not certify that LabOne was in compliance with employment law, however, and informed Funkhouser that he had a right to sue the company.
Funkhouser then sued LabOne in federal court.
LabOne denied the allegations and said Funkhouser’s termination was “non-discriminatory and non-retaliatory.”
Ramsey told The Star she made the decision to eliminate Funkhouser’s job in conjunction with LabOne management.
“It became clear to me that he wasn’t managing his subordinates adequately,” she said. “… He didn’t have open lines of communication with his subordinates and furthermore there was this additional layer of management.”
She also said in a second interview that she has no memory of the business trip, noting that 12 years had passed.
The lawsuit was still pending in April 2006 when Ramsey retired from LabOne. At the time, LabOne was being acquired by Quest Diagnostics, a company Ramsey had worked for until 2004. She told the Star she had no interest in working for such a large company again, and she wanted to spend more time with her children, who were 8 and 10 at the time.
Later that month, Ramsey took a part-time job as senior counsel for Black & Veatch, an international engineering firm based in Overland Park.
In July 2006, LabOne and Funkhouser agreed to dismiss the case without the possibility of bringing it again.
Quest Diagnostics declined to comment on behalf of LabOne, saying its policy is not to comment on litigation.
Shirley Gaufin, who was head of HR at Black & Veatch from 2002 to 2011, described Ramsey as an exceptional colleague. “All I heard was praise,” said Gaufin, who has donated to Ramsey’s campaign.
Ramsey left Black & Veatch in October 2012 after six years as the company’s employment attorney.
She served as board chair at the nonprofit Turner House Children’s Clinic in Wyandotte County from 2015 until she stepped down in May to launch her congressional campaign.
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/news/politics-government/article189931704.html#storylink=cpy
