How In The World Did These Iraqi Terrorists Get Visas To Come To America, For Christ Sake?

2 Iraqis indicted on terrorism charges in Kentucky

Two Iraqis living in Bowling Green have been arrested and charged with conspiring to kill U.S. soldiers with improvised explosive devices in Iraq.

The pair also is accused of plotting to send Stinger missiles, cash, sniper rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers to Iraq.

They allegedly picked up the weapons, including machine guns, from a storage facility in Kentucky, believing that it would all be sent to insurgents supported by al-Qaeda.

In fact, it was all part of an elaborate sting set-up by a confidential informant, and none of the weapons ever had any chance of being shipped abroad.

Waad Ramadan Always, 30, and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi, 23, both former residents of Iraq who lived in Bowling Green, were charged in a 23-count indictment unsealed Tuesday for which they could be sentenced to life in prison.

They made their initial appearance Tuesday in a federal court in Louisville, where they both pleaded not guilty and were ordered detained.

Neither is charged with plotting attacks within the United States.

The arrests were jointly announced by the FBI, the U.S. attorney’s office, the Louisville Joint Terrorism Task Force and the Justice Department’s national security division.

U.S. Attorney David Hale said the indictment should send a message to terrorists.

“Whether they seek shelter in a major metropolitan order or in a smaller city in Kentucky, those who would attempt to harm or kill Americans abroad will face a determined and prepared law enforcement effort,” Hale said.

According to court records, the FBI began investigating Alwan in September 2009, a few months after he entered the United States.

The records indicate that a confidential source for the FBI secretly tape recorded him as he bragged about used IEDs hundreds of times against Americans in Iraq from 2003 until he was arrested by local authorities in 2006.

He also allegedly told the informant that he was very good with a sniper rifle, saying that his “lunch and dinner would be an American.”

Asked whether he’d achieved results from the various devices in Iraq, Alwan allegedly told the informant, “Oh, yes,” adding that his attacks had “f--- up” Hummers and Bradley fighting vehicles, according to court records.

FBI Special Agent Richard Green said in an affidavit that investigators discovered Alwan’s claims about his use of explosive devices were not idle boasts: The FBI identified two of Alwan’s fingerprints on an unexploded bomb recovered by U.S. forces near Bayji, Iraq.

Alwan also allegedly told the confidential source that he liked to use a particular brand of cordless telephone in constructing his IEDs, and his prints allegedly were found on a phone of the same brand, according to Green’s affidavit.

At the informant’s request, Alwan also drew diagrams of four types of IEDs that the FBI later determined would have produced workable devices.

The indictment says Alwan recruited Hammadi to help export weapons and cash to Iraqi insurgents, and that Hammadi also claimed to have experience deploying IEDs.

In one conversation with the informant, Hammadi allegedly said he had been captured by authorities after the car in which he was driving got a flat tire shortly after he and others placed an IED on the ground.

The criminal complaint filed in Kentucky against Alwan said that in November 2010 he allegedly picked up machine guns and other weapons from a storage facility and delivered them to a designated location, believing they would be shipped to Iraq.

He and Hammadi in January and February also allegedly delivered cash and additional weapons to a tractor trailer, believing it would also be shipped by the informant to Iraq. But the truck was owned by the FBI, and the weapons all remained in control of law enforcement, a news release said.

Alwan is charged with conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals abroad; conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction against U.S. nationals abroad; distributing information on the manufacture and use of IEDs; attempting to provide material support to terrorists and to al-Qaeda in Iraq, as well as conspiracy to transfer, possess and export Stinger missiles.

Hammadi is charged with attempting to provide material support to terrorists and to al-Qaeda in Iraq, as well as to transfer, possess and export Stinger missiles.

Alwan told the informant that he had come to the United States so he could get a passport to back to “Turkey, Saudi or wherever I want to.”

“I didn’t come here for America,” he said, according to the criminal complaint.

Hale stressed that the charges are not an indictment of any “particular religious community or religion,”

Elizabeth Fries, the FBI’s special agent in charge in Louisville, said the agency would “vigorously pursue anyone who targets Muslims or their places of worship for backlash-related threats or violence in the wake of these arrests.”

Is GOP Congressional Candidate In Ohio, Rich Lott, A Nazi Sympathizer?

GOP hopeful Rich Iott slammed for being photographed in Nazi uniform, defends self as history buff
BY Meena Hartenstein

Nazi or nerd?

That's the question hovering over GOP congressional candidate Rich Iott, after a photo of him posing in a Nazi uniform surfaced online this weekend.

Iott, a Tea Party favorite who is running for a seat in Ohio's ninth district, says he is not a Nazi sympathizer but a history buff who liked participating in historical re-enactments.

"It's purely historical interest in World War II," Iott told The Atlantic after the magazine discovered the photo.

But Eric Cantor, House Republican Whip (R.-Va), slammed Iott, telling Fox News Sunday, "I would absolutely repudiate that and do not support an individual who would do something like that."

Iott has admitted being involved with the WWII historical re-enactment society Wiking for many years, and the organization’s rosters reportedly show him being a member as early as 2003. He said he joined "as a father-son bonding thing" but quit in 2007 when his son was no longer interested.

The society models itself on the Wiking division of the SS, Hitler’s Nazi military force. In the controversial photo, Iott grins while wearing a Waffen-SS uniform.

Iott says his interest in the group came not from Nazi leanings but from a respect for their tactical accomplishments during WWII. “They took over most of Europe and Russia, and it really took the combined effort of the free world to defeat them,” he told the Atlantic. "From a purely historical military point of view that's incredible."

He chose the Wiking unit, he said, because the real-life division fought against the Russian Army, not American or British soldiers.

Historians, however, take issue with this version of events.

"The entire German war effort in the East was a racial crusade to rid the world of 'subhumans,'" military historian Rob Citino told the Atlantic. "The multimillion Jewish population of Eastern Europe was going to be exterminated altogether…It sends a shiver up my spine to think that people want to dress up and play SS on the weekend."

Following the furor over the photo, Iott took to his campaign website to post a statement and photographs of himself participating in re-enactments wearing other military uniforms.

"Never, in any of my re-enacting of military history, have I meant any disrespect to anyone who served in our military or anyone who has been affected by the tragedy of war, especially the Jewish Community," he said. "I also believe we need to 'never forget' what happened to Jews during that war."

Despite the firestorm, Iott hopes the photo's publication won't affect voters.

"They have to take it in context," he told the Atlantic. "There's re-enactors out there who do everything. You couldn't do Civil War re-enacting if somebody didn't play the role of the Confederates. [This] is something that's definitely way in the past."

Was Louisville Metro Police Investigation Of One Of Its Own, Crystal Marlowe, Merely "Shoddy", Or Is Coverup In Play?

Read more here, and decide for yourself.

I Wonder Why I Have Not Received A Campaign Mailout From Rand Paul, But Have Received Many From Trey Grayson. Does Grayson ALONE Appreciate My Vote?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Is Former President Clinton A Closet Racist Who Likes His "Coffee Boy(s)"? Inquiring Minds Want To Know.

Read more here, and you be the judge.

What Is Going On In Kentucky And Why Is Dan Mongiardo Refusing To "Man Up", But Is Instead "Biting His Tongue"?

From The Lexington Herald Leader: Explanation, please
Mongiardo must give words context

It's time for Senate candidate Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo to man up.

We're talking about the recordings of him that keep popping up on the Internet. Yes, they were surreptitiously taped, are obviously spliced and have been distributed anonymously. As such, they are both high-tech dirty trick and political comedy in the old Kentucky tradition.

Yet some of Mongiardo's statements, which he has not denied making, are provocative no matter the context.

What did he mean when he said that being Gov. Steve Beshear's lieutenant governor is like "being married to a whore"? Or that "the only difference between (former Gov. Ernie) Fletcher and Beshear is Beshear has not had a blowup yet, but it is coming"?

The Fletcher administration's "blowup" was a raft of criminal indictments for violating state laws against political interference in hiring. What exactly was Mongiardo implying?

These recordings, for which no one has claimed responsibility, cut with a double edge. They make Mongiardo, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, look like a disloyal motormouth and ingrate. Beshear has endorsed his Senate bid.

They also can be heard as an administration insider, someone who should know, making accusations of corruption against Beshear.

Only Mongiardo can supply the context for his remarks. Only he can explain what he meant and why he said it. It seems to us he owes that much to taxpayers and voters.

If Mongiardo knows of something foul in the Beshear administration, he should speak up. He is, after all, asking voters for a position of trust. How can they trust him if he won't come clean about what he says when he thinks no tape recorder is running?

Editor's comment: to read and watch news video, go here.

Also, the Lexington Herald Leader is right in suggesting that inquiring minds want to know what Dan Mongiardo knows -- or is hinting he knows.

BLOGNETNEWS Site Never Publishes My Blog Links When I Get A Lot Of Traffic -- Or Towards The Weekend. What Gives?

Yesterday, none of my blog postings appeared on the site's aggregator, and it has happened to me numerous times before!

Is this by design, is anyone else experience this disappearing act, or is it just me?

Inquiring minds, particularly mine, want to know.

OK, Back To Serious Stuff. NEWS: CIA Says Pelosi Was Briefed on Use of 'Enhanced Interrogations'. Hmmmmmmm.

Read the story here.

The question is: what did Nancy Pelosi know about "Torture" -- and when did she know it?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Update: Speaker Nancy Pelosi contradicts herself.

Talking About Hillary Clinton, Senate Has Confirmed Her As Secretary Of State. But Will She Be Able To Resist The Urge To Over Shadow Her BOSS?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Polaroid Files For Bankruptcy. I Did Not Know The Company Still Existed. Who Uses Polaroid Anymore?

More updates coming, but why did President Bush NOT bail them out?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Snow Storm Advisories Issued For Texas, Lousiana And Mississippi. What Is The World Coming To?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Anyone Know Why Gas Prices Went Up Twenty Cents In One Day Yesterday? I Don't Think The Massacre In Mumbai Had Anything To Do With It, Or Did It?

Any thoughts out there, as inquiring minds want to know?

HOLD THE PRESSES AS THE "CESSPOOL" EXPLODES: Contractor Leonard Lawson & Former Transportation Secretary Bill Nighbert INDICTED.

Just as I called it here.

Read more on the C-J, and here.

Read the indictment.

Can you spell F-E-D-E-R-A-L P-R-I-S-O-N!?!

Inquiring minds want to know if these folks will "squeal" to save their necks.

If they do, which I suspect someone will, some more indictments are STILL coming as the U. S. Attorney's office has promised.

And the indictments will reach higher up the chain of command.

Update: I forgot to especially mention that the penalty for counts 1 and 6 are up to 5 years imprisonment, and on the rest of the 8 counts is up to 10 years inprisonment.

In addition, each of the 8 counts also carries a fine of a quarter of a million dollars.

But MOST IMPORTANT of all is that the charges also carry restitution; that in lay man's terms means money paid back to the victim(s).

Since the indictment alleges that the total amount of the FRAUDULENT contracts is $1,129,969,573.58, and over $300,000.00 that was paid to those indicted by Leonard Lawson, can't you begin to sense that there is a lot of restitution that a court will possibly order be paid back to us -- the victims of this crime -- in this case?

Update #2: This other guy, Brian Russell Billings, was also indicted:


Update #3: Here is Steve Beshear's statement:

“For too long, the important work of the Transportation Cabinet – and of its thousands of conscientious employees – has been tainted by misguided leadership and a culture of cronyism and corruption.

"Eliminating this culture, a culture we inherited, has been one of our chief goals – and biggest challenges.

We welcome and have cooperated fully with this federal investigation into the previous administration, recognizing its potential for helping us scrub clean this cabinet.

At the same time, we have instituted new policies, created new practices and have carried out strict ethics standards at the cabinet – all designed to maximize the taxpayer dollars and trust invested in us.

I was elected to create a culture of integrity at the Transportation Cabinet and throughout state government, and I intend to do so. I hope for a quick and thorough conclusion to this legal process. For Kentuckians who like us are dedicated to clean, honest and efficient government, this is a day of hope."

Update #4: Not sure what this means from the indictment, do you?:

On or about March 7, 2008, LEONARD V. LAWSON spoke by phone from Florida with James Rummage in Lexington. Among other things, LEONARD V. LAWSON told James Rummage that he shouldn’t worry about the investigation into leaking engineer estimates because (1) he and CHARLES WILLIAM “BILL” NIGHBERT had “covered everything that you said;” (2) that LEONARD V. LAWSON has talked to the Governor about the mistreatment of James Rummage; (3) that the Governor said it was going to stop; (4) that “Youve said what you said and that’s all you need to say;” and (5) that “There’s a lot of people that I know you — a lot of people would dream up stuff to say if they could help you.”

Stay tuned for more.

Here's more by way of update #4, according to Poll Watchers:

In his statement, Beshear did not mention a reference to him in the indictment.

A section on page 11 of the indictment said that on March 7, 2008, Lawson spoke by phone to Rummage and told him that he should not worry about the FBI investigation in part because he had talked to Beshear about the mistreatment of Rummage and that Beshear replied that it was going to stop.

Beshear spokesman Jay Blanton said Lawson and Beshear did talk to each other by phone about that time but the conversation did not deal with Rummage.

"It was about Lawson's intention that his company was not being treated fairly by the state," Blanton said. "The governor told him that he expects people to be treated honestly and fairly."

Blanton said he did nothing about Lawson's call because he already had told Transportation Secretary Joe Prather to treat everyone honestly and fairly.

Blanton added that Beshear has not testified before the grand jury but he did talk to investigators.

Stay tuned for more updates.

More On University Of Louisville's "Bride" And "Corpse", Robert Felner.

Read the damning letter 21 former faculty sent to the Board of Trustees regarding "the abominable actions allowed during Felner’s tenure".

Notice that the letter writers stated "Felner often bragged openly at faculty meetings that he had the full support of the Provost and President and were additionally "... insulted by President Ramsey’s response to this crisis."

Will further "heads roll" on this mess?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Fayette County Jury Returns $63.4 Million "Symbolic" Verdict For Trent DiGiuro And Against Shane Ragland. Yes, You Heard It Right: It's All Symbolic.

Read more here, about the verdict for fatally shooting University of Kentucky football player Trent DiGiuro in 1994.

Inquiring minds are wondering "what's the use"?, since the money will likely NEVER be collected.

Since John McCain Was NOT Under "The Chief's Cone Of Silence", Inquiring Minds Want To Know: Did He Cheat?

Well, did he?

Can you blame inquiring minds from wanting to know?

Did U. S. Government Make A Deal With The "Butcher"?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Lexington Jail Creates Soviet Style GULAG, FBI Notices And Feds Deliver Indictments.

Read more here.

The question on everyone's mind MUST be whether the Lexington GULAG is just an anomaly, or is just one of a pattern in Kentucky's locally run prison/jail system.

Inquiring minds want to know.

Does Hillary BILLARY Clinton Have A Drinking Problem?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Bye, bye BILLARY.

Is BILLARY Clinton Just Trying To Put On A Show For The Voters?

Inquiring minds want to know.