Mallory, education is the silver bullet. Education is everything. We don't need little changes, we need gigantic, monumental changes. Schools should be palaces. The competition for the best teachers should be fierce. They should be making six-figure salaries. Schools should be incredibly expensive for government and absolutely free of charge to its citizens, just like national defense. That's my position. I just haven't figured out how to do it yet.

A government watchdog has found that the Internal Revenue Service spent about $50 million to hold at least 220 conferences for employees between 2010 and 2012, a House committee said Sunday.

The chairman of that committee, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., also released excerpts of congressional investigators’ interviews with employees of the IRS office in Cincinnati. Issa said the interviews indicated the employees were directed by Washington to subject tea party and other conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status to tough scrutiny.

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The conference spending included $4 million for an August 2010 gathering in Anaheim, Calif., for which the agency did not negotiate lower room rates, even though that is standard government practice, according to a statement by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Instead, some of the 2,600 attendees received benefits, including baseball tickets and stays in presidential suites that normally cost $1,500 to $3,500 per night. In addition, 15 outside speakers were paid a total of $135,000 in fees, with one paid $17,000 to talk about “leadership through art,” the House committee said.

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NOGALES, Mexico. Last week after being accused of smuggling drugs from Mexico to Arizona the nightmare for Yanira Maldonado started, but ended well this Thursday night when she was released from a Mexican jail. She and her husband took a bus from Mexico to Phoenix and the Mexican military found 12 pounds of marijuana under her sit.

Yanira Maldonado walked out of prison happy and above all very grateful with her family, US department officials and her lawyers. She also declared that she doesn’t hold grudges and that she will go back to Mexico, because she has family there, “Its not Mexico´s fault. It’s a few people who did this to me”, she said in comments aired by KSAZ TV.

Yanira was release from the Mexican prison because there was not case against her, nothing proved there was a connection between the pot package and her. The security footage showed that they only have blankets, bottles of water and a purse. Francisco Benitez, her attorney was very pleased with the result and he said that the video was very important evidence. The military men who held her suspect of smuggling didn’t appear to her hearing.

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In a press conference Governor Jan Brewer said she is thankful that Yanira Maldonado is back home with her family. There was a lot of pressure from US Congressmen regarding this case, they condemned the processing of the corrupted Mexican authorities, but worked closely with them to let her go.
The encounter with her husband was emotional and she thanked the Media for supporting her during this traumatic time. If she wouldn’t have been released she would’ve gone to a security Mexican prison until a trial date, but fortunately there was not enough evidence.

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Dave May 31, 2013 at 11:53 am

Luckily that woman is free, but apparently apostrophes are NOT free, as this editor couldn’t afford to buy three of them for this headline. C’mon, PEOPLE! It’s journalism – it should be a high example of proper usage and grammar. An apostrophe is pretty basic.