Casey Anthony looked like she was ready for freedom. For the first time since her trial began in late May, she let her hair down, and she smiled and occasionally played with it in the courtroom.But she’ll have to spend several more days in jail, and she turned stone-faced as the judge pronounced her sentence for lying to investigators about the death of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee.

Thursday’s sentencing means Anthony will go free less than two weeks after she was acquitted in the slaying.

The Orange County Corrections department originally stated that Anthony would be released on July 13, but later revised the projected date to July 17.

Public furor
The extra time in jail did little to satisfy throngs of angry people convinced of her guilt who gathered outside the courthouse. But it could provide time for the public furor over her acquittal to ease somewhat and give Anthony’s attorneys a chance to plan for her safety.

Two days after the verdicts, most of the jury remained silent, with their names still kept secret by the court. One juror explained that the panel agreed to acquit Anthony because prosecutors did not show what happened to the toddler.

When she is released, the 25-year-old Anthony must decide whether to return to a community in which many onlookers long ago concluded that she’s a killer, or to a home strained by her defense attorneys’ accusations of sexual abuse.

Judge Belvin Perry gave her the maximum sentence of four years for four convictions of lying to authorities. He denied a defense request to combine the misdemeanor counts, which could have made her eligible for immediate release.

“As a result of those four specific, distinct lies, law enforcement expended great time and resources looking for Caylee Marie Anthony,” the judge said.

JUBA — Saturday meant that South Sudan and its black tribesmen would for the first time be linked politically with sub-Saharan Africa.

Kenya and Uganda are already laying strong economic ties with their northern neighbor, an oil-rich country that may one day ship its oil to a Kenyan port, instead of through the pipelines controlled by Khartoum.

“From today our identity is southern and African, not Arabic and Muslim,” read a hand-painted sign that one man carried as he walked through the crowds.

South Sudan first celebrated its new status with a a raucous street party at midnight. At a packed midday ceremony, the speaker of parliament read a proclamation of independence as the flag of Sudan was lowered and the flag of South Sudan was raised, sparking wild cheers from a crowd tens of thousands strong.

“Hallelujah!” one resident yelled, as other onlookers wiped away tears.

The U.S. and Britain, among others, announced their recognition of South Sudan as a sovereign nation.

Sudan President Omar al-Bashir, a deeply unpopular man in Juba, arrived to a mixture of boos and murmurs. He stood beside Kiir and smiled during the ceremony, and said in a speech that he respected the south’s choice to secede, even as he prodded President Barack Obama “to meet his promise and lift the sanctions imposed on Sudan.”

 

In a statement, Obama said he was “proud” to formally recognize the Republic of South Sudan “as a sovereign and independent state,” NBC News reported.

A ‘dream realized’
He recalled Martin Luther King reflecting on the first moment of independence on the African continent in Ghana.

“I knew about all of the struggles, and all of the pain, and all of the agony that these people had gone through for this moment,” the president quoted King as saying.

Obama said that now, decades later, “we are moved by the story of struggle that led to this time of hope in South Sudan, and we think of those who didn’t live to see their dream realized.”

“Today is a reminder that after the darkness of war, the light of a new dawn is possible. A proud flag flies over Juba and the map of the world has been redrawn. These symbols speak to the blood that has been spilled, the tears that have been shed, the ballots that have been cast, and the hopes that have been realized by so many millions of people,” he said.

Obama said many Americans had been “deeply moved by the aspirations of the Sudanese people, and support for South Sudan extends across different races, regions, and political persuasions in the United States.”

Years of war have flooded South Sudan with weapons.

So like most things this will definitely be a turning point in our history.. its not as big as knowing where where u on September 11th, but its damn near close to it if you live in new york or the tri state area.  Possibly more so if u have a loved one or a close friend who is gay , bi , lez, ect.

After a string of defeats in recent years from California to Maine, the movement to legalize same-sex marriage is hoping its unexpected victory in New York will revive efforts to legalize gay weddings around the nation.

But the movement’s success here could prove difficult to replicate. Twenty-nine states have constitutional bans on same-sex marriage, while 12 others have laws against it. And many of those states where support for same-sex marriage is high have already acted on the issue.

Officials at several gay-rights organizations said they would seek to move quickly in Maryland, where legislation to legalize same-sex marriage was shelved in February by Democratic leaders concerned that it lacked the support to pass….

symbolically where do we stand…

The vote on Friday in New York, home of the nation’s economic and cultural capital, carries enormous symbolic importance for the same-sex-marriage movement, particularly after its defeat, with Proposition 8, three years ago in California.

New York is now the sixth and largest state in the country where gay couples will be able to wed legally; when the state’s law goes into effect in late July, twice as many Americans will live in jurisdictions where same-sex marriage is permitted.

But beyond symbolism, gay-rights advocates said that New York had provided them with a new political model.

“They’ve shown a way to actually get a bill through a Legislature,” said Richard S. Madaleno Jr., a Democratic state senator in Maryland and sponsor of the marriage bill that was shelved. “And I think we’re going to use some of the same lessons, the same tactics, in Maryland over the next six months

..Side note…..

my opionion. im not expecting anyone to understand where im coming from but try to  let it sink in….

as much as feel that this is a turning point in our history.. this is all about politics and who will benefit from this economically more… the democratic or republican party…  this is a holly war on many levels…. .. but taking my two cents away from this..   this is a great day  in history

WASHINGTON — Secret documents about detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison reveal new information about some of the men that the United States believes to be terrorists, according to reports about the files released by several American and European newspapers. The U.S. government criticized the publication as “unfortunate.”

The military detainee assessments were made public Sunday night by U.S. and European newspapers after the WikiLeaks website obtained the files. The records contain details of the more than 700 detainee interrogations and evidence the U.S. had collected against these suspected terrorists, according to the media outlets.

It’s not clear if the media outlets published the documents with the consent of WikiLeaks.

The files – known as Detainee Assessment Briefs or DABs – describe the intelligence value of the detainees and whether they would be a threat to the U.S. if released. To date, 604 detainees have been transferred out of Guantanamo while 172 remain locked up.

The disclosures are likely to provide human right activists with additional ammunition that some cases against inmates appear to be based on flawed evidence. However, the DABs show certain inmates were more dangerous than previously known to the public and could complicate efforts by the U.S. to transfer detainees out of the controversial prison that President Barack Obama has failed to close.

The dossiers provide new insights into some of the prison’s most notorious detainees such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. According to The New York Times, Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, commanded a Maryland resident to kill Pakistan’s former present Pervez Musharraf.

Another high-value detainee, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, bragged that he outranked Mohammed who was then considered the terrorist group’s No.3. Al-Nashiri faces charges before a military commission for his suspected role in the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. According to The Times, Al-Nashiri was also consumed with jihad and believed women were a distraction.

He was so “dedicated to jihad that he reportedly received injections to promote impotence and recommended the injections to others so more time could be spent on the jihad,” according to al-Nashiri’s file.

U.S. officials said the documents “may or may not represent the current view of a given detainee” and criticized the decision by media organizations to publish the “sensitive information.”

“It is unfortunate that several news organizations have made the decision to publish numerous documents obtained illegally by WikiLeaks concerning the Guantanamo detention facility,” said Ambassador Daniel Fried, the Obama administration’s special envoy on detainee issues, and Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell.

NEW YORK-After NPR’s Michel Martin asked Malcom X’s daughter, Ilyasah Shabazz about alleged homosexual encounters referred to in Manning Marables’ book, “Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention,” she walked off the show, due to the focus on the alleged encounters, rather than his life.

NPR reports:

Ms. SHABAZZ: Right. I think the things that I take issue with are the fact that he said my father engaged in a bisexual relationship, a homo – you know, he had a gay lover who was an elder white businessman, I think, in his late 50s when my father was in his teens. And, you know, my father was an open book. And we actually have four of the missing chapters from the autobiography. And, you know, he is very clear in his activities, which nothing included being gay.

And certainly he didn’t have anything against gay – he was for human rights, human justice, you know. So if he had a gay encounter, he likely would’ve talked about it. And what he did talk about was someone else’s encounter.

Ms. SHABAZZ: I cannot tell you, Michel, OK? Because right now I’m a little annoyed by this discussion because this is not what I agreed to. I can tell you that if they did not find out who killed my father, then most certainly this person in New Jersey, I can’t even think of his name right now, Mustafa Shabazz, if he’s one of the persons that pulled the trigger, then absolutely. I think he should be, you know, brought to justice.

MARTIN: We actually had planned to continue our conversation and to discuss other issues of interest with Ms. Shabazz about her life and current work, but she decided to end the interview. We confess that we are puzzled by that. We think we were clear that we wanted to speak about the book as well as about her life and current work. We would still like to have that conversation and we have extended another invitation by email

An Arizona sheriff says he has been flooded with calls and emails of support from local and federal agents who back his claims that the U.S. Border Patrol has effectively ordered them to stop apprehending illegal immigrants crossing the U.S.-Mexican border.

“Upper management has advised supervisors to have agents ‘turn back South’ (TBS) the illegal aliens (aka bodies) they detect attempting to unlawfully enter the country … at times you even hear supervisors order the agents over the radio to ‘TBS’ the aliens instead of catching them,” one San Diego border agent wrote in an email to Cochise County Sheriff Larry Dever.

“This only causes more problems as the aliens, as you know, don’t just go back to Mexico and give up. They keep trying, sometimes without 10 minutes in-between attempts, to cross illegally,” continued the email, which was among a number of communications to Dever reviewed by FoxNews.com. “This makes the job for agents more dangerous. Not only are the aliens more defiant, they also begin to feel like they can get away with breaking our federal laws.”

The email is one of more than 100 messages Dever said he received from active and retired Border Patrol agents and law enforcement officers from across the country. Many wrote of what they said was their own experience and first-hand knowledge of Border Patrol’s efforts to reduce apprehension numbers by making fewer arrests.

FoxNews.com first reported this month that Dever said several Border Patrol officials, including at least one senior supervisor, told him they had been directed to keep the number of border apprehensions down by chasing illegal immigrants back toward Mexico. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has recently cited a reduction in border apprehensions as evidence of an increasingly secure border.

Three days after FoxNews.com’s initial report, Border Patrol chief Michael Fisher sent a letter to Dever in which he denied the accusations and invited the sheriff on a ride-along with federal agents at border.

“That assertion is completely, 100 percent false,” Fisher wrote in the letter. “That it comes from a fellow law enforcement official makes it especially offensive.”

But accounts from law enforcement officials around the country continue to pour in supporting Dever and the conversations he says he had with Border Patrol officers, including at least one supervisor, about keeping arrest numbers down.

“This is nothing new, during my career with the border patrol, this was done regularly,” said another email to Dever reviewed by FoxNews.com. “By assigning agents to different tasks, locations, etc., the apprehensions can be increased or decreased dramatically,” wrote Dan McCaskill Jr., a retired Border Patrol agent who worked in the Anti-Smuggling Unit.

McCaskill went on to describe how, he said, apprehension numbers were regularly manipulated to achieve various budget, equipment or manpower goals.

In response to request for comment on the new allegations, Homeland Security offered the same statement from Jeffery Self, commander of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Joint Field Command, that was provided to FoxNews.com earlier this month:

“As the commander for border enforcement operations in Arizona, I can confirm that the claim that Border Patrol supervisors have been instructed to underreport or manipulate our statistics is unequivocally false. I took an oath that I take very seriously and I find it insulting that anyone, especially a fellow law enforcement officer, would imply that we would put the protection of the American public and security of our nation’s borders in danger just for a numbers game. Our mission does not waiver based on political climate and it never will. To suggest that we are ambiguous in enforcing our laws belittles the work of more than 6,000 CBP employees in Arizona who dedicate their lives to protect our borders every day.”

Local 2544, the Tucson branch of the National Border Patrol Council union, has also come out in support of Dever, and posted this message on their website after the FoxNews.com report.

“Sheriff Dever is right. We have seen so many slick shenanigans pulled in regards to ‘got-aways’ and entry numbers that at times it seems David Copperfield is running the Border Patrol. Creating the illusion that all is well and you can start having family picnics in the areas where we work has been going on far too long. Has there been improvement in some areas? Absolutely. Is the border anywhere near ‘under control’? Absolutely not. Do some in management play games with numbers and cater to the wishes of politicians like Janet Napolitano and David Aguilar? Resoundingly, yes. Time for the foolish political games to stop.”

The union posted another response on their website following Fox News’ publication of Fisher’s April 6 letter to Dever:

“Just remember, for years now we have been told from the highest ranking managers in our agency that ‘every apprehension is a FAILURE’ (Johnny Williams – former INS Western Region Director), and that we ‘are NOT immigration officers’ (current CBP Deputy Commissioner David Aguilar to Border Patrol agents when he was the Chief of the Border Patrol)…. We have been told that – Apprehensions = failure, we are not ‘immigration’ officers, we should not ‘lower’ ourselves to the status of an immigration officer, and our primary job is not apprehending illegal aliens. Couple all this with Secretary Napolitano’s recent public announcement about what she expects our apprehension numbers to be this fiscal year, and it’s not hard to figure this thing out.”

A second Arizona sheriff, Paul Babeu of Pinal County, also testified at a Senate Homeland Security Committee last week in support of Dever’s charges. Dever was slated to appear at the hearing, but said he could no longer attend when the date of his appearance was changed.

Asked specifically about Dever’s assertion that agents were told to turn back illegals to reduce apprehensions, Babeu told the committee he’d specifically asked his top lieutenant, Matt Thomas, about the claims.

“He said, ‘Sheriff, I have heard that myself directly from border agents in the Tucson sector,’” Babeu testitified.

Babeu told FoxNews.com he’s been told by Border Patrol officials that for every person apprehended at the border, an average of 2.7 succeed in crossing into the U.S. With those numbers, he said he was concerned paramilitary or terror cells equipped with more sophisticated support and training could easily get through.

“This is no longer just public security threat, this is national security threat,” he told FoxNews.com.

T.J. Bonner, retired president of the National Border Patrol Council, said in an interview with FoxNews.com that he’s familiar with “TBS-ing” and shares Babeu’s concerns about criminals and terrorists crossing the border.

“TBS has been going on for a number of years. You’ll never find orders in writing, and some agents have even been disciplined for TBS-ing people. That’s a practice that dates back to quite some time, to try and discourage is part of their ‘strategy of deterrence.’”

Bonner said Border Patrol agents are receiving “TBS” orders from someone higher up, but he isn’t sure who.

“Agents don’t just do this on their own. The orders must come from on high. They don’t just wake up one day and say I’m going to risk my job, my livelihood,” said Bonner, who retired last year after 32 years with Border Patrol. “I’m not sure if it’s Napolitano or folks in Customs and Border Protection, but somebody wants to silence critics in Arizona to claim success in Arizona.”

As for Dever, he says he’s just hoping that some good will come out of this.

“Frankly, I don’t want to create a firestorm,” he said. “I only want this problem solved.”

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/04/19/arizona-sheriff-cites-flood-border-agents-confirming-feds-apprehension-policy/?test=latestnews

CNN’s Nic Robertson and Anderson Cooper discuss Robertson’s sit-down interview with Eman al-Obeidy

Here is the link from Anderson Cooper

http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2011/04/07/video-this-is-a-very-very-strong-lady/

Tripoli, Libya (CNN) — Eman al-Obeidy, the woman who says forces loyal to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi raped her, is grateful for support she has received, said CNN’s Nic Robertson, who met briefly with her Wednesday.

“She is a very strong lady who told me to thank all (the) people who have stopped her case from disappearing,” Robertson said.

Al-Obeidy said she had a message for humanitarian organizations: They should come to Tripoli and “see how life is here,” he said.

She said she is still recovering physically from the alleged assault and displayed faded bruises and rope burn marks on her wrists, Robertson said. But, she told him, she is unable to leave Tripoli and be reunited with her family and faces abuse whenever she leaves her house, he said.

The Libyan government is insisting on a review of the interview by a government representative before transmission. The review was scheduled Wednesday night, but an apparently imminent airstrike postponed the review until Thursday morning.

Al-Obeidy reconnects with mother

Meanwhile, al-Obeidy’s mother said Wednesday that talking to her daughter by telephone Tuesday night was an emotional experience.

“Of course, I felt worse,” Aisha Ahmad said. “Because she was crying. I couldn’t understand a word because she was crying. She even made me cry.”

The two women spoke on Tuesday. Al-Obeidy told her mother that a court employee pulled a weapon on her when she went to a courthouse.

The 29-year-old law school graduate burst into a Tripoli hotel last month to tell her story to journalists. Authorities rushed her away from the hotel, but she is no longer in custody. Still, she told CNN’s “AC360″ Tuesday she fears for her safety in Tripoli, which she called a “large prison.” She said authorities had taken her passport and were not letting her cross into Tunisia.

Al-Obeidy: Tripoli is a prison

Al-Obeidy said she spent 72 hours under interrogation after being dragged away from the Tripoli hotel where she tried to tell journalists about her alleged abuse. She has said the public statements from a state TV anchor and government officials, who initially called her mentally ill, drunk and a prostitute, have ruined her reputation.

Ahmad, who lives in the eastern Libyan city of Tobruk, said her daughter told her in the call “she was trapped. She said, ‘They’re taking me back and forth, interrogating me, hitting me.’ She said, ‘They want to kill me. Help me, come and get me,’ she said. ‘Where are the human rights groups?’ ”

Asked how she is coping, Ahmad said, “Our hope in God is very strong.”

She told her daughter Tuesday that the world is praying for her and not to be afraid.

All eyes on Eman al-Obeidy

On whether she has a message for those who might be listening, Ahmad said, “I want [President] Obama and all the Western world to get involved and bring me back my daughter. Just bring her back to me. I would like to tell the mothers all over the world, and the Arab world, that if something happens to someone, they need to speak out. They just need to speak out.”

Al-Obeidy burst into the Rixos Hotel in Tripoli on March 26 while international journalists staying there were having breakfast. She told reporters she had been taken from a checkpoint east of Tripoli, held against her will for two days and was beaten and raped by 15 men.

When CNN saw her in March, al-Obeidy’s legs and face were bruised and she had blood on her right inner thigh. Her visible injuries appeared to support her allegations.

Human Rights Watch, in a statement Wednesday, called for Libyan authorities to immediately allow al-Obeidy to leave Tripoli and receive medical care. Nadya Khalife, the Middle East women’s rights researcher for the organization, said authorities have further victimized al-Obeidy by refusing to allow her to leave Tripoli.

When rape is a tool of war

“It’s very difficult for women in Libyan society to report that they have been raped because of the shame and fear they feel, and it has been even more difficult for al-Obeidy,” Khalife said. “But she has courageously ignored all these barriers to tell her story to the world.”

CNN’s Reza Sayah contributed to this report