The FBI and law enforcement officials in Monroe, Washington are searching for a man who robbed a bank and made a getaway down a nearby creek on an inner-tube. Seriously. Investigators believe the thief may have employed the help of decoys recruited on Craigslist.

The suspect is described as a white male about 25 years old and between 5 7 and 5 10. He was wearing a blue shirt and and a dust mask, which appears to have been essential to the heist. An ad placed on Craigslist searching for road workers is now at the center of the investigation. The ad asked more men to show up at a site near the bank just before the robbery took place. The respondents were asked to wear safety vests, goggles, blue shirts, and face masks, just like the suspect was wearing.

No one ever showed up to meet these hired road workers, leading to the theory that the ad was posted by the thief to create a distraction for responders. The inner-tube used as the getaway vehicle was found along the banks of Wood creek near the Skykomish River.

Anyone who may have information that could aide investigators are asked to contact Monroe police at 360 863-4600. From: Seattle Times null

Bank Robber Gets Away With the Help of Craigslist

According to the Chicago Sun-Times, LiLo wanted to promote Obama but was turned away by his camp due to her wild ways. Now daddy Michael Lohan is biting back.

"For Barack Obama to condemn my daughter for past indiscretions when he admitted to the exact same himself is indicative of what kind of president he would be," Michael Lohan told Pop Tarts via e-mail on Wednesday night.

"His visions of a positive future for this country should be representative of a positive future for people as well. It is looking beyond the difficult times and letting go of the past," Michael said. "Obviously, Obama can do this for himself and not others, when in fact a good president should have hope for all."

Michael and his famous daughter have had a rocky relationship in recent weeks, but he had nothing but nice words for his little one in his e-mail.

"Lindsay is gifted — she has a wonderful heart and she can and will affect millions of people in a very positive way. She is here to stay," he said. "Obama might have eight years, and then he will be giving lectures. Who knows, maybe Lindsay will give him a part in one of her movies."

Lindsay Lohan's Dad Slams Obama Over Reported Dis...

The tops carried slogans in German and Polish that translate as Jews forbidden from entering the park .

They were reproduced from Nazi signs from 1940 that targeted the Jewish community in the Polish town of Lodz.

Some 95% of more than 200,000 Jewish people there would die in concentration camps during World War II.

The sales assistant at the Parisian store, in the Belleville district, said one person had bought five of the grey, sleeveless garments for about 18 euros $27 each.

She said she did not understand what the inscription meant.

The neighbourhood of Belleville in eastern Paris has been the site of ongoing scuffles between groups of Jewish youngsters and youths of North African origin.

France has one of the largest Jewish communities outside Israel, numbering about half a million people.

Paris anti-Semitic T-shirt probe

Michael Savage, the incendiary radio host who last week characterized nearly every child with autism as “a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out,” said in a telephone interview on Monday that he stood by his remarks and had no intention of apologizing to those advocates and parents who have called for his firing over the matter.

Now main stream media as we know likes to speak before they think. And I think this is the case... should he be fired, NO, thats why we have the freedom to speak our minds... but I think the war on stupidity is far from over...

Late Monday afternoon, Aflac, the insurance company, announced it was withdrawing all advertising from Mr. Savage's show. "We understand that radio hosts pick on any number of targets," Laura Kane, a company spokeswoman, said in a statement, before adding that Aflac considered "his recent comments about autistic children to be both inappropriate and insensitive.”

So now he has lost $$$ for his show and I am 100% positive someone else will pick up the slack... But I really think that it is funny that misinformed people get paid to say anything about everything... Kind of makes me want to start a magazine called, "Modern Jackass," and Mr. Savage would be on the August Ed....

:P

Modern Jackass: Savage Stands by Autism Remarks

The factory in Guangdong had been completing overseas orders for the flag of the Tibetan government-in-exile.

Workers said they thought they were just making colourful flags and did not realise their meaning.

But then some of them saw TV images of protesters holding the emblem and they alerted the authorities, according to Hong Kong s Ming Pao newspaper.

Funny... Read on...

Free Tibet flags made in China

The Bush administration last week filed responses to a federal magistrate judge's questions relating to ongoing litigation over what critics say is thousands of missing e-mails. Administration lawyers submitted a 22-page legal brief and a 7-page declaration from Theresa Payton, CIO of the White House's Office of Administration. The brief strenuously objected to the demands of the lead plaintiff, the National Security Archive (which filed suit alongside Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), that special measures be taken to preserve hard drives and removable media that could be useful in future forensic efforts to retrieve e-mails.

White House insists it has e-mail recovery under control

Congressional Quarterly (03/09/08); Harkness, Peter

Governing magazine Editor and Publisher Peter Harkness reports there is concern that the federal government is attempting to dictate what policies states, counties, and cities must follow to meet national challenges rather than letting lower-level governments pursue such goals independently. "The White House intergovernmental office is a sham--a purely political operation manned by junior aides whose sole interest is promoting the administration's policies, and not at all about working with state or local officials to solve problems," Harkness writes. "Washington lobbyists now are working for more centralization, with the idea that their industries can cut a better deal at the federal level and avoid a patchwork of statutes and regulations." National League of Cities Director Don Borut calls this trend a move toward "coercive federalism," while the federal government also desires more authority but less responsibility for covering the bill. But Harkness says states are fighting back, and federal officials have been yielding on many key issues mainly because the states have the political imperative. For example, the U.S. Education Department has become more flexible in dealing with the No Child Left Behind law because a lawsuit from school districts claiming that states cannot be forced to do all the required testing unless Washington pays for it has been revived by a federal appeals court, and also because more and more of the Republican suburban base is unfavorably disposed toward the law. (www.cq.com)

States and Localities: 'Shift-and-Shaft' Federalism

CQ MoneyLine reports a 17 percentage point decline on average in donations by the top 10 corporate PACs to Republican candidates during the first 11 months of 2007 from the two years prior to the 2004 presidential election. During the previous election cycle, these PACs donated most of their money to Republican candidates. Despite the decline in funding to Republicans, the report indicates that concerns about business issues have prevented most of them from shifting their donations entirely to the Democrats. Only Bank of America Corp., Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc., and General Electric Co.'s PACs have made such a move.(www.cq.com)
This story appeared in a recent issue of Public Affairs News Monitor. Click here to read the entire issue.

REPS get less in '07 ...

A University of Tennessee coed had a terrifying encounter when she found a convicted rapist hiding under her bed.

Police charged 31-year-old Jason Paul Tims with aggravated burglary.

Investigators said Tims snuck into the apartment of a UT Martin student, and hid under her bed until she fell asleep.

Then, police said Tims sat with the girl and ignored her commands to leave. Police said she eventually got Tims outside the apartment.

Wednesday morning, Tims was being held without bond.

Monster Under Bed Has New Meaning For College Student

Israeli police are on the lookout for a thief with a super-sized chocolate craving.

The robbers broke into a factory in the northern Israeli city of Haifa late Monday and walked away with nearly 100 tons of chocolate spread.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said such a large heist indicated it may have been an inside job and police were searching the area of any traces of the sweet stuff.

Moshe Veidberg, one of the company's owners, told the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot it would require five large trucks to transport the stolen chocolate, which he valued at roughly $415,000.

He said the company's alarm system was deactivated and its surveillance footage stolen as well, leaving the fate of the creamy chocolate a mystery.

Police Searching For 100 Tons Of Stolen Chocolate