FOX News Twitter Hacked – Announces Death of President Obama - Photo

Boy, when people say FOX News has made enemies they’re not kidding.

In what seems to be a pretty serious hack Monday morning of the news organizations twitter account @foxnewspolitics, hackers tweeted that President Barack Obama had been shot twice and killed.

The original FOX logo was altered and the text "H4CK3D BY TH3 5CR1PT K1DD3S" added.

The photo below shows the progression of the hoax, first saying the President had been assassinated by two gunshot wounds to the pelvic and neck area and bled out, and later congratulating Vice President Joe Biden in his new role as Commander in Chief.

The hackers said that Obama had been shot at Ross Restaurant in Iowa while on a campaign function, and later tweeted condolences to the country for the assassination that occurred on the fourth of July Holiday.

FOX later responded with a news release indicating they were aware of the problem saying,

“Fox News Twitter feed for political news was hacked early Monday morning.

Hackers sent out several malicious and false tweets claiming that President Obama had been assassinated. Those reports are incorrect, of course, and the president is spending the July 4 holiday with his family.

The hacking is being investigated, and FoxNews.com regrets any distress the false tweets may have created.”

We can only imagine the initial panic people felt after seeing the original comments and there was, indeed, quite a stir when this news broke.

Note to hackers:

Next time, please try to hack into Sarah Palins account – she needs to be knocked down a couple pegs.

Follow InfoStar on Twitter – no hacking allowed

Crime and politics in Mexico

Crime and politics in Mexico

A turning tide

With a year to go until the presidential election, voters are tiring of the drug war

MEXICO CITY

FOR most of Felipe Calderón’s four-and-a-half years as Mexico’s president, voters have worried more about jobs than crime. Since 2001 average income growth per person has been below 1% a year, one of the lowest rates in the world. Whereas the drug war has raged mainly along the cocaine trail, with two-thirds of its estimated 40,000 killings occurring in just 3% of the country’s municipalities, economic hardship has touched nearly everyone.

That is changing. For the first time under Mr Calderón, security is now a greater concern for Mexicans than the economy is. That is partly because GDP is growing again: last year it rose by 5.5%. But it is also because the violence caused by the crackdown on gangs continues to spread. Last year the government recorded more than five times as many mafia-linked murders as in 2007. A tally by Reforma, a newspaper, suggests that this year has been worse still. In March Mr Calderón’s approval ratings dipped below 50% for the first time.

The restless mood of voters comes as Mexico begins its countdown to a presidential election next summer. The race will unofficially begin on July 3rd, when three states elect new governors. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which ruled the country for 71 years until 2000, is expected to win all of them, boosting its hopes of retaking the presidency. A convincing victory in Mexico state, the country’s most populous, would be particularly valuable to the PRI. The departing governor, Enrique Peña Nieto, is almost certain to be its presidential candidate, and he will need a clean handover on his home turf.

As Mr Peña gains momentum, the PRI’s rivals are still struggling to launch their campaigns. Mr Calderón has unsubtly backed his finance minister, Ernesto Cordero, for the candidacy of his conservative National Action Party (PAN). But polls suggest that Mr Cordero is less popular than both Santiago Creel, who lost the 2005 PAN primary, and Josefina Vázquez Mota, a former education secretary. The leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) is torn between Marcelo Ebrard, the moderate mayor of Mexico City, and Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a populist who lost to Mr Calderón in 2006 but still claims to be Mexico’s “legitimate president”. Since Mr López Obrador says he will run for a smaller party if he loses the PRD nomination, the pragmatic Mr Ebrard may choose to wait for a clear run in 2018.

So far the opposition has been reluctant to set out its policies on crime. The PRD has avoided the topic, perhaps because prosecutors say some of its members in Michoacán state were involved with the mobs. The PRI has focused on the economy. Amid this “failure of the entire political class” to suggest alternatives, says Edgardo Buscaglia, a law professor at Mexico City’s ITAM university, the public may consider radical measures like legalising drugs.

Explore our interactive map of Mexico's drug traffic routes, "cartel" areas and crime-related homicides

Citizens’ movements are stepping in. Until recently, Mexico’s “indolent civil society…left everything to the government,” says Alejandro Martí, a sports-goods businessman who has advocated judicial reform since the kidnap and murder of his 14-year-old son in 2008. Crime victims have now found a leader in Javier Sicilia (pictured), a writer whose 24-year-old son was killed in March by thugs linked to drug gangs. Mr Sicilia led a “peace caravan” of thousands to Mexico City and then to Ciudad Juárez, the country’s most violent city. Another group has filled public fountains with blood-red dye. On June 23rd Mr Calderón held a televised meeting with Mr Sicilia and relatives of the dead or disappeared. “We must ask forgiveness for not protecting the life of the victims,” he said, “but not for having acted against the criminals who are killing them.”

Yet Mr Sicilia’s supporters, a mixture of leftists, liberation theologists and ordinary victims who are “hasta la madre” (have “had it up to here”), are still squabbling over their demands, such as whether the army should get off the streets at once or withdraw gradually. One useful concession would be a truth commission to determine exactly how many lives the drug war has taken and how. (Many victims’ families doubt the government’s claim that most of the dead are criminals.)

The biggest obstacle to better security policies is corruption. Mr Buscaglia reckons that criminal gangs make political contributions in 60% of Mexican campaigns. Spending in the Mexico state governor’s race is “clearly beyond what the law authorises,” says Luis Rubio, the head of CIDAC, a think-tank. Yet precious few politicians have been hauled into court. “Until we start seeing indictments against all parties,” says Mr Buscaglia, “the beginning of the end will still be far away.”

I have a particular affinity for Irish street art and political posters.  

Somewhere you’d like to move or visit.

I’ve been to Ireland and it’s absolutely lovely.  The people are friendly and the landscape is beautiful, plus there’s a lot of rich history mixed with wild legend.  I’d like to visit again. 

As for moving, I’d love to move to Washington, D.C.  I love it there and I’d like to make it my home.

having a good crack means having a good time or enjoying yourself in irish slang. sometimes they say: “how’s the crack?” or “what’s the crack?” or “i’m having a crack”. pretty funny sounding to me. it comes from the gaelic word “craic” which essentially means “fun” though it doesn’t have an exact english translation. 

monday night we went out to dinner to get some “pub grub” as it’s called here. i, of course, ordered a guinness and it tastes so much better here! seriously. never buying it in the bottle from the states ever again, haha. since i bought a pint, i decided to buy something cheaper for dinner and i got some creamy vegetable soup with homemade brown bread. uhhhh AMAZING! so delicious and extremely filling. only 8 euros all together too. i was expecting great, filling soup and bread in ireland and i was not at all disappointed (:

after that, we were all a little jet lagged and decided to call it a night. the weirdest part of being here is walking home around 10:15 at night and it’s completely bright out. that’ll take me awhile to get used to, haha. 

the next day (tuesday) we met up with our CEA correspondant. CEA is the program i went with through my school. (sorry if that sounds confusing.) his name is brian and he is a graduate student here. so nice and his accent is adorable! haha. he showed us the path to take to get to school where we got our class schedules. after, we got a tour of campus. the campus is really small and very modern in most parts. my favorite part is the oldest part of campus. it’s called the quad and it is exactly what you would picture an irish university to look like. 

 

after the campus tour, we went to lunch and CEA bought our lunch so i was able to finally get some fish and chips since we could spend up to 15 euro and the fish and chips are about 9 or 10 euro here. SO DELICIOUS. i’m not even kidding. i’ve had fish and fries in the states before, but there is no comparison here. the irish definitely know their fish. and the tarter sauce was amazing. ask my parents and you’ll know that i don’t normally like tarter sauce, but it was perfect here. 

when we were done with lunch, we walked through town and brian showed us the direction to take to get back to the apartments and then he left us on our own. all of us split up in groups and about 4 of us stuck together and wandered through town. we needed to buy phones/sim cards so we got those first. we found out that it costs more to call an irish person than for me to call the states. weird, right? we found this amazing chocolate shop. it has chocolate that is made in dublin. soooooo good. i was expecting it to be just alright, but it was so yummy. i got an irish cream truffle… heaven. we saw this little boy playing music on the street and he sounded so much older. he is definitely the next justin bieber. i got about 10 seconds of him singing on video and i’ll upload it to facebook later so you all can it (:

we also took a few pictures by the corrib river. we were able to dangle our feet over the ledge and just sit for awhile. we decided that we were always going to study outside, as long as it’s not raining! haha. the river is so pretty and peaceful. you can see a church across the way and the city behind you. i still feel weird calling it a city, though, since it’s so rural and quaint. 

this is a picture of shop street below. there are tons of little shops (hence the name, haha) and some restaurants and pubs on this street. i love the way it looks. 

we decided to walk back to campus and buy some hoodies. 35 euro for one hoodie (over $45 converted) and there was only one choice… but i know i’ll love having it later. it’s super comfy and i didn’t bring a hoodie, so it’s perfect to sleep in (:

we decided to eat a small dinner at home since we’d already eaten out for lunch and then we headed out to the local pubs. we started walking there and it started pouring. not just a light drizzle, but to the point where we stayed under a bridge until it let up a little. then we eventually called a taxi to take us the last 15 minutes of our walk to the pub. it cost us 9 euro all together, which is not how i would like to spend my money next time. i will not be forgetting my umbrella next time, no matter how lame i look haha. 

i tried a bulmers last night at the pub. it’s a hard irish cider. it was really delicious. a nice alternative to the heavy guinness. this is my friend meggie and i. she’s a really sweet girl. i really seem to hang out with her and my friend jamie a lot, which is great. i love having some pretty close friends already. all of the girls are super nice and friendly, though, which makes this all so much fun. oh yeah, and there’s one guy in the group… poor guy, haha. 

today, i woke up and went to a small lecture that discussed what all the classes would be going over. then i went to my first class at 11am: irish society. it seems pretty fast paced and i’m a little worried since i’m one of the only people taking two courses. i hope i still have time to explore ireland as much as i want to. later today at 4pm i have my “representing ireland in literature and film” which i’m excited about. wish me luck! also, my class schedule is completely different each week, which i hate. i would love to just have two different days that i have class, but it varies each week. 

i have my window in my room open right now. it’s a gorgeous day today. the sun is shining and it’s nearly 60 degrees. perfection (:

fun fact of the day: yesterday was the longest day for ireland. it was the summer solstice and the sun set at 11pm and apparently rose at 3am. (i was asleep at this time so i do not know if this is true or not, haha. our cab driver told us this.) but i kinda wish i would’ve stayed up to see it because that’s pretty amazing.

another fun fact: it is not customary to tip people here. you normally tip maybe 10% at restaurants, but for cab drivers and anybody else, it would be weird for you to tip.

Lough Eske, Donegal

The world can be quite beautiful sometimes.

Dunguaire Midsummer (by Robert Riddell)

Moody sky on a June evening as the tide was turning.
Dunguaire Castle (Irish: Dún Guaire) is a 16th-century tower house on the southeastern shore of Galway Bay in County Galway, Ireland, near Kinvarra. The castle’s 75-foot tower and its defensive wall have been restored to excellent condition, and the grounds are open to tourists during the summer. It is thought to be the most photographed castle in Ireland.

The castle was built by the Hynes clan in 1520, a family who may have been associated with the area since 662, when the site is believed to have once been the royal palace of Guaire Aidne mac Colmáin, the legendary king of Connacht and progenitor of the clan. Dunguaire Castle was transferred in the 17th century to Oliver Martin, (father of Richard Martin fitz Oliver). It remained in his family until it was purchased in the early 20th century by the surgeon and poet Oliver St. John Gogarty. Gogarty began restoring the castle and established it as the meeting place for the leading figures of the Celtic Revival, such as W.B. Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, Augusta, Lady Gregory, and John Millington Synge.

The officer and the champion golfer

Barney Murphy is a 49-year-old Irish-born cop on Cape Cod with a golf game so utterly hopeless that he can’t bring himself to keep score. Rory McIlroy is the new United States Open champion, a 22-year-old Northern Irishman who has captured the hearts and hopes of the entire golfing world.

Help Stephen Colbert Turn His ‘ColbertPAC’ Into a ‘Super PAC’

The time is at hand my friends.

Here is our opportunity to propel Stephen Colbert into the annals of the American political system.

Allow him to wield the mighty sword of capitalism in an attempt to influence the very survival of the most tested politicians - in a way that only Colbert knows how to do.

And just how does he plan to do it? He doesn’t know yet.

Who is he going to try and influence? He doesn’t know yet.

But he does know that it he can create a PAC (Political Action Committee) to raise free money, he will use its power for the good of our great country.

But suddenly, big corporate America stepped in and said he couldn’t do it. They said no to his dreams.

But it is not over yet.

Jay the Intern's pony is rested, watered and ready to take Steven's super PAC forms to Washington, D.C.