LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY “What a terrible, terrible day for Wisconsin. I am incensed. I am shocked.”State Rep. Jon Richards, D-Milwaukee, after Assembly Republicans passed a measure to strip collective-bargaining rights from most public workers before most Democrats had a chance to vote Article, 1A
Lawmaker: ‘Shoot Obama’ query vile
WASHINGTON - A Georgia Republican said Friday that he didn’t immediately condemn a constituent who asked about assassinating President Barack Obama because he was stunned by the question and didn’t want to dignify it with a response.
U.S. Rep. Paul Broun, a conservative who has criticized the president, confirmed that at a town hall event in Oglethorpe County, Ga., on Tuesday a man asked, “Who’s going to shoot Obama?”
After the exchange was reported by the Athens Banner-Herald, Broun issued a statement Friday calling the question “abhorrent.”
“I deeply regret that this incident happened,” Broun said. “I condemn all statements - made in sincerity or jest - that threaten or suggest the use of violence against the president of the United States or any other public official.
Such rhetoric cannot and will not be tolerated.”
Ed Donovan, a spokesman for the Secret Service, said the elderly man who made the comment was questioned and is not considered a threat.
Saudi student
appears in court
LUBBOCK, Texas - The world is watching to see how the justice system treats a college student from Saudi Arabia who is accused of buying chemicals online as part of a plan to blow up key U.S. targets, his attorney said Friday.
Khalid Ali-M Aldawsari appeared in federal court in Lubbock on Friday. He has been charged with attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction after federal authorities said he bought explosive materials online and planned to hide them inside dolls and baby carriages to blow up dams, nuclear plants and former President George W. Bush’s Dallas home.
Aldawsari’s attorney, Rod Hobson, declined to comment as he left the courtroom but said in a statement that his client will plead innocent.
The “eyes of the world are on this case” and how Aldawsari is treated, Hobson said.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Nancy Koenig asked the 20-year-old Aldawsari whether he understood the charges against him, and ordered him to remain in custody until a March 11 detention hearing.
Amish buggy flips; 4 kids die in creek
MAYFIELD, Ky. - A horse-drawn buggy carrying an Amish family home from dinner and from using a community telephone toppled in a rain-swollen creek in rural Kentucky, killing four children who were swept away in the swift-moving water, authorities said Friday.
The group was traveling in a downpour in the dark Thursday about 8:30 p.m.
CST when the buggy flipped just a mile from their house.
Those killed were a 5-month-old, a 5-year-old, a 7-year-old and an 11-year-old girl. The youngest three were siblings and the girl was a cousin.
Two adults and three other children escaped. The horse that was pulling the buggy also survived.
Samuel Wagler, the father of the dead 11-year-old girl, said the family had traveled a few miles to his house despite rainy weather to use an Amish community phone.
Front Section, Pages 3 on 02/26/2011