Singapore News Channel, Singapore News Network

So much of the gun control debate is about things that might go wrong. Democrats, who just took control of the Virginia state legislature, are about to pass a law that will dramatically limit the ability of people with concealed handgun permits from other states to carry in Virginia. There haven’t been any problems with these permit holders, but that doesn’t matter for gun control advocates.

Currently, Virginia recognizes concealed handgun permits issued by all other states. Out-of-state permit holders can carry in Virginia as long as they follow local laws and carry photo identification.

The current rules came about in 2016 because Virginia’s Attorney General Mark Herring, a staunch gun control advocate, announced that he was going only to recognize the permits issued from five other states. Republicans who then controlled the state legislature fought back and took away Herring’s authority. The new proposed law will again give Herring control over whether permit holders from other states can carry.

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A former Obama administration lawyer who long defended investigating President Donald Trump’s Russian ties and spying on a campaign aide concludes in a new report that the FBI’s proposed reforms are “insufficient” to prevent abuses from occurring again.

The new criticism follows Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s scathing report last month on the FBI’s warrant application under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to eavesdrop electronically on a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser.

In doing so, the FBI used an unverified opposition research document paid for by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign as the factual basis for seeking the warrant from the secret FISA court.

The FBI did not disclose the source of its information to the court. It in fact was compiled for Democrats by a former British spy, Christopher Steele, working with the opposition research firm Fusion GPS.

After release of the inspector general’s report, the FISA court on Jan. 10 appointed David Kris, a former assistant attorney general with the Justice Department’s National Security Division, to oversee reforms to the court’s process for reviewing warrant applications.

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Considered one of the biggest captures in recent months due to his heading up still active but underground “ISIS gangs” in the region, he was nabbed at his hideout in Mosul earlier this week. Lately he was known to issue sermons and messages to his followers to target Iraqi police.

And according to an Iraqi police statement, “He is considered one of the foremost leaders of ISIS and was responsible for issuing fatwas that led to the murder of scholars and clerics.”

The fat mufti was also well-known for issuing a fatwa in 2014 to bomb one of Mosul’s most revered pilgrimage sites — a mosque believed to be site of the tomb of the Prophet Jonah — which attracted Muslims and Christians alike.

The Islamic State’s strict Wahhabi interpretation of Islam forbids such veneration of tombs or religious places, and therefore sought to demolish any historical site it considered ‘unIslamic’.

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The flu season is far from over, yet a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states this season’s vaccine for the flu strain primarily affecting children is only a 58 percent match.

“It’s not a very good match for B/Victoria,” Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), told CNN Health. “It’s not an awful match, but it’s not a very good match.”

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases is part of the National Institutes of Health, an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services.

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Twitter mistakenly suspended and later reinstated the account of Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, on Saturday.

On Saturday morning, Farrakhan’s Twitter timeline disappeared and was replaced with a message saying his account had been suspended for violating the Twitter rules.

However, Twitter later reinstated Farrakhan’s account in the afternoon. A Twitter representative confirmed to the Washington Examiner the initial suspension was an error, saying that “the account was caught by our spam filter in error and has been reinstated.” After being reinstated, Farrakhan’s account did not immediately display his correct follower account. The representative said an account’s followers take time to replenish after being reinstated.

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Police charged 55-year-old Albert Thomas Vasquez, 34-year-old Antonio Quirino Salvador and 31-year-old Hediberto Gonzalez Avarenga

A 14-year-old girl who was kidnapped in Northern California used Snapchat to share her location with her friends, who then called 911, police said.

The girl met Albert Thomas Vasquez, 55, in Capitola on Tuesday, the San Jose Police Department said in a statement.

Vasquez gave the girl drugs and she became incapacitated, police said. He called two other men — Antonio Quirino Salvador and Hediberto Gonzalez Avarenga — to help move the girl in their vehicle.

Vasquez then sexually assaulted the girl in the vehicle, police said. The men drove the girl to a motel in San Jose, where they carried her to a room on the second floor and Vasquez sexually assaulted her again, police said.

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The Obama administration sent $1.7 billion cash to the government of Iran right around the time that five American hostages/prisoners were freed by the Iranian regime on January 17th 2016 – and naturally one would assume those events were connected. President Trump made such a claim while on the campaign trail (and later again this year), and was widely dismissed by the media, and then-President Obama himself for his “conspiracy” theory.

The Official Line of Defense

In response to allegations of paying ransom money, the Obama administration claimed the payments were a return of money for payments (plus interest) that the Iran made to the U.S. in 1979 for military equipment they did not receive. That $400 million went into a Foreign Military Sales trust fund, and that remained untouched since Jimmy Carter froze Iran’s assets in ’79.

Obama personally stated in August 2016 that “We do not pay ransom. We Didn’t here, and we won’t in the future.” He went further, claiming that the payments were completely unrelated. “We announced these payments in January. Many months ago. They were not a secret,” Obama said “It wasn’t a secret. We were completely open with everybody about it.” John Kerry also denied that the payment and freed hostages were related.

So in summary, Obama’s defense is that the cash payment was owed to Iran regardless ($400 million plus 1.3 billion in interest), and the freed prisoners are completely unconnected. How well does that narrative hold up?

Let’s take a look..

Does Delaware’s Joe Biden have a diversity problem in his Democrat run home state? Delaware courts are too “white, wealthy and male” according to the liberal group Citizens for a Pro-Business Delaware and Rev. Al Sharpton who joined the group at the state capitol in Dover on Wednesday to protest the nomination of attorney Paul Fioravanti, Jr. to the state Court of Chancery by Gov. John Carney (D). Sharpton’s demand to speak before the Democrat controlled state Senate about the appointment was rejected. The Senate voted unanimously on Wednesday to confirm Fioravanti to replace African-American Vice Chancellor Tamika Montgomery-Reeves following her elevation to the state Supreme Court last month.

Delaware is solidly Democrat, with the party holding all six statewide elected offices, the state Senate, state House, both U.S. Senate seats and the state’s lone U.S. House seat.

A group of African-American pastors participated in the protest.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The
United States treated 11 of its troops for symptoms of concussion after
an Iranian missile attack on an Iraqi base where U.S. forces were
stationed, the U.S. military said on Thursday, after initially saying no
service members were hurt.

The attack was retaliation for a
U.S. drone strike in Baghdad on Jan. 3 that killed Qassem Soleimani,
the commander of the

Trump supporting Senate Republicans have warned their moderate GOP colleagues that if they side with the Democrats to force witnesses in the upcoming impeachment trial, they’re going to flip the script and weaponize the process to call controversial witnesses such as Hunter Biden and Alexandra Chalupa – people central to the core claims behind the impeachment, yet were ignored like the plague by House Democrats during their investigations.

The pressure tactics are the latest shift in strategy as Republican leaders try to navigate the factions in their caucus, where moderates want to leave the potential for witnesses on the table and conservatives are anxious to quickly acquit President Trump. –The Hill

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) warned fellow GOP senators that if four or more of them join with Democrats to entertain witness testimony, he’ll make sure the Senate holds a vote on subpoenaing President Trump’s preferred witnesses – including the Bidens.

“If you vote against Hunter Biden, you’re voting to lose your election, basically. Seriously. That’s what it is,” Paul told Politico on Wednesday. “If you don’t want to vote and you think you’re going to have to vote against Hunter Biden, you should just vote against witnesses, period.”

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