A Friend wrote this. These are good words:

I feel the cloud of evil that's settling on this country. The deception is getting thicker and thicker, the hostility towards Jesus Christ and the church is more palpable, and the church itself has been led away into complacency.

Everybody's looking for a rapture, but how many are really ready?

Let's try the other "R" word that bothers so many people.

repentance.

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Alberta Kelley, Grandma, Says She Was Tricked Into Growing Pot By Bearded Stranger

First Posted: 1/6/12 02:23 PM ET Updated: 1/6/12 02:23 PM ET

Associated Press

UNIONTOWN, Pa. -- A southwestern Pennsylvania grandmother says she's no marijuana grower, just a woman who wanted something that would look pretty next to her tomatoes.

A Fayette County jury cleared 67-year-old Alberta Kelley of drug possession and manufacture charges on Wednesday after she told them she simply tossed a handful of seeds into her garden after a bearded stranger gave them to her.

Connellsville police charged Kelley a year ago after receiving a tip about Kelley's garden. Investigators say they found seven well-cultivated, four-foot marijuana plants behind her home.

But Kelley claimed she didn't know what she was growing. She said she'd been given the seeds by a stranger in a pointy hat who told her they were flower seeds.

Kelley tells WTAE-TV that to her, "weeds are weeds." •

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Woman Shot In Eye Finishes Beer Before Accepting Medical Treatment

First Posted: 1/5/12 03:45 PM ET Updated: 1/6/12 09:27 AM ET

Talk about one for the road.

The Winnipeg Free Press reports that authorities found a 30-year-old woman who, after being shot in the eye, refused to accept any medical treatment until after she finished her beer.

"It was like she was oblivious to what had happened," one source told the Free Press. "She didn't want any treatment until after she finished her beer."

Though the woman survived the incident, the woman's friend, 46-year-old Michael Warren Sinclair, was shot dead.

According to a neighbor who spoke with the Winnipeg Sun, the home in which the shooting took place was a hotbed for illegal activity.

"There's always troubles down there," the resident, who did not want to be identified, told the paper. "Cars are coming and going like God damn flies down there. It's been like that for years."

The news comes one day after a woman bodybuilder from Nevada miraculously survived being shot in the head during a carjacking. •

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Connecticut Paramedic Accused Of Raping Woman Inside Ambulance

01/ 6/12 03:32 PM ET

HAMDEN, Conn. — A paramedic raped a woman as she lay unconscious and strapped to a stretcher in the back of an ambulance on the way to a hospital, police said Friday.

The 22-year-old woman, who had fallen and suffered a concussion at a holiday party, says she woke up to find the man assaulting her inside the ambulance on Dec. 25, according to Hamden police. She said she could not move because she was strapped down.

Mark Powell, 49, of North Haven, surrendered Thursday to face charges of first-degree sexual assault and unlawful restraint and was released on $25,000 bond. He did not respond to a phone message seeking comment, and it was unclear whether he had an attorney.

Hamden Police Chief Thomas Wydra said the allegations represent "outrageous and horrifying conduct" by an emergency medical professional.

"Our society places the greatest level of trust and confidence in its public safety providers, and the circumstances in this case reflect a tremendous breach of that faith. The victim in this incident demonstrated enormous strength and courage in bringing this complaint forward," he said.

Police responded to the report of the woman's fall around 3 a.m., and she was treated at the scene. She was allegedly assaulted en route to Yale-New Haven Hospital and contacted police after she was released.

Powell was the only person in the American Medical Response ambulance aside from a driver and the victim, according to Hamden Police Capt. Ronald Smith. He said investigators are still conducting interviews and waiting for lab results, but charges are not expected to be filed against anybody else.

AMR spokeswoman Deborah Hileman said it is a national standard to have only one person in the back of the ambulance during the transport of a patient.

The company said Powell has been placed on administrative leave.

"This kind of behavior is an affront to AMR caregivers across Connecticut who provide high quality care to their patients each and every day, with integrity and compassion," AMR General Manager Charles Babson said. •

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Relatives who suspected a British teenager of practicing witchcraft beat and drowned him Christmas Day 2010 as he "begged to die" because of the pain they were inflicting, prosecutors alleged in a London court.

Kristy Bamu, a 15-year-old boy from Newham, east London, allegedly died at the hands of Eric Bikubi and his partner, Magalie Bamu, Kristy's sister. Both of them have denied the charges.

Bikubi and Bamu allegedly forced Kristy's four siblings to join in the attack.

The alleged attackers hit the teen with sticks, metal bars, a hammer and chisel, prosecutors said, and he "begged to die" because of the pain from the beating.

"It was only when he [Bikubi] realized that he [Kristy] wasn't moving that he stopped what he was doing … by then it was too late," prosecutor Brian Altman said.

Kristy suffered more than 100 injuries.

Kristy and his siblings had arrived in London from Paris to see the East London couple for Christmas. But Kelly, Kristy's elder sister, said the trip turned sour when Eric Bikubi accused her and Kristy of practicing witchcraft and sorcery. Eric Bikubi also accused them of influencing his 3-year-old son.

"Despite her own siblings' denials that they were sorcerers, Magalie Bamu joined her boyfriend in repeating these fantastic claims and participating in the assaults," Altman alleged.

"They beat them, refusing to let them eat, drink or sleep for days while the punishments being meted out became increasingly violent, with them using many implements found in the flat as weapons of torture," Altman said.

"However, it was Kristy Bamu who became the focus of Bikubi's attention and, in a desperate attempt to prevent any further suffering, he and his two sisters were eventually to admit to being sorcerers. Wickedly, the defendants also recruited sibling against sibling as vehicles for their violence," Altman told the court. •

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Alaska town buried in 18 feet of snow; National Guardsmen recruited to help

Hit by one of the snowiest winters on record

By Rheana Murray / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Monday, January 9 2012, 2:36 PM

National Guardsmen were recruited to help dig an Alaskan fishing town out from under record-breaking snow, the Associated Press reported.

Dozens of troops arrived Sunday evening in Cordova, the small coastal town hit hardest by the snow, which has triggered avalanches and even trapped some people in their homes. At least three buildings have collapsed and six homes are deemed “severely stressed” by wet snow.

“We had no alternative but to declare an emergency,” said Cordova Mayor Jim Kallander. “It became a life-safety issue.”

Southeast Alaska has been crushed with weeks of persistent snow, kicking off one of the snowiest winters on record. More than 18 feet of snow has fallen in the past weeks, the Guard reported, and another storm is expected to hit Cordova on Tuesday.

“There’s nowhere to go with the snow because it’s piled up so high,” said Wendy Rainey, owner of the Orca Adventure Lodge in Cordova, to the Associated Press. “This is more quantity than can be handled.”

“The thing I’m impressed most with is we haven’t had any injuries. Maybe a few back strains from all the shoveling.”

In nearby Valdez, nearly 290 inches of snow have already fallen, an alarming amount for so early in the season.

Average snowfall for an entire winter is only 320 inches, the Alaska Dispatch reported.

“It’s just white,” said Valdez resident Trish Stowe, to MSNBC. “It’s hard to see the edges of the road or – well, there are no edges. You just run into snow banks.”

Major roads in both regions are closed, and heavy rain poses a threat for more avalanches. A small break in the weather permitted about 70 Guard members to arrive to Cordova via ferry, the Associated Press reported.

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Furor in Greece Over Pedophilia as a Disability

Greek disability groups expressed anger Monday at a government decision to expand a list of state-recognized disability categories to include pedophiles, exhibitionists and kleptomaniacs.

The National Confederation of Disabled People called the action "incomprehensible," and said pedophiles are now awarded a higher government disability pay than some people who have received organ transplants.

The Labor Ministry said categories added to the expanded list — that also includes pyromaniacs, compulsive gamblers, fetishists and sadomasochists — were included for purposes of medical assessment and used as a gauge for allocating financial assistance.

But NCDP leader Yiannis Vardakastanis, who is blind, warned the new list could create new difficulties for disabled Greeks who are already facing benefit cuts due to the country's financial crisis.

"What's happened is incomprehensible. I think there is some big mistake. The ministry should have a different policy on disability," Vardakastanis told the Associated Press. "The list contains major changes to disability quotients, which could effectively remove many people from access to benefits."

The new list gives pyromaniacs and pedophiles disability pay up to 35 percent, compared to 80 percent for heart transplant recipients.

"It's really not serious to grant Peeping Toms a 20-30 percent disability rate, and 10 percent to diabetics, who have insulin shots four or five times a day," said Vardakastanis.

Greece has been fighting to avoid bankruptcy since 2009. Public spending on health and welfare programs has been sharply cut under austerity measures imposed as a condition for receiving emergency loans from the International Monetary Fund and other countries using the euro currency.

Independently run welfare programs that survived on state grants have been the hardest hit, leaving some disabled groups, including the deaf, facing sudden drops in their standard of care.

The government is also battling widespread abuse in the welfare system, forcing tens of thousands of disabled people to be reassessed.

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Welcome to a brave new world: Genetic scientists create freakish man-made monster ants with huge heads and jaws

• Ancient genes activated by dab of hormones
• Ants seem to contain a 'toolkit' for creating monsters
• May be a throwback to ancestors from millions of years ago

By Rob Waugh

Last updated at 5:46 PM on 6th January 2012

Nightmarish 'supersoldier' ants with huge heads and jaws have been created by activating ancient genes.

Scientists believe the monster ants may be a genetic throwback to an ancestor that lived millions of years ago.

Scientists say they can create the supersoldiers at will by dabbing normal ant larvae with a special hormone - the larvae then develop into supersoldiers rather than normal soldier or worker ants.

Supersoldier ants can occur naturally in the wild, but only rarely. In the deserts of America and Mexico, their job is to protect the colony from raids by invading army ants.

The supersoldiers use their enormous heads to block the nest entrance and attack any enemy ants that get too close.

Scientists showed that ordinary ants of the species Pheidole morrisi contain all the genetic 'tools' needed to turn them into supersoldiers - they just need a hormonal push.

The research is reported today in the journal Science.

Authors Dr Rajendhran Rajakumar, from McGill University, Canada, and colleagues wrote: 'We uncovered an ancestral development potential to produce a novel supersoldier subcaste that has been retained throughout a hyperdiverse ant genus that evolved 35 to 60 million years ago.'

The results suggest that holding on to ancestral development tool kits may play an important role in evolving new physical traits, say the researchers.

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BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) — An armed eighth-grader gunned down by police officers in the hallway of his Texas middle school Wednesday was brandishing a pellet gun that looked like a firearm, and he refused repeated orders to lower the weapon before the officers opened fire, police said.

The carbon-dioxide powered pellet gun 15-year-old Jaime Gonzalez was holding looked like a handgun, and the initial report to police that sent officers rushing to Cummings Middle School Wednesday morning was for a student seen holding a gun, Orlando Rodriguez, Brownsville's interim police chief, said at a news conference.

Robert Valle, a 13-year-old who was among the school's 750 students locked down in their classrooms during the confrontation, said he heard police run down the hallway and yell "put the gun down," before several shots were fired.

"He had plenty of opportunities to lower the weapon ... and he didn't want to," Rodriguez said. Two officers fired three shots, striking Gonzalez at least twice, he said. The autopsy results are pending.

Rodriguez said that before the confrontation with police, Gonzalez walked into a Cummings Middle School classroom and punched another boy in the nose. He said he doesn't know why Gonzalez was brandishing the weapon.

Earlier Wednesday, before police said the weapon was actually a pellet gun, Jaime's godmother Norma Leticia Navarro told The Associated Press she couldn't imagine what led to the fatal confrontation.

"Jaime was not a bad kid, and I wish I could ask him why he did that, why did you put yourself in that position?"

Still, she said she understood that police were doing their job, but she expressed frustration that a child was killed and wondered if something else could have been done.

"I'm not saying he was perfect or an angel, but he was a very giving person."

She said both of his parents work, and that his stepmother raised him from infancy and was very strict with him.

As word of the shooting spread quickly through the city on Texas' southern tip, where violence frequently spills over from Mexico's drug war, frantic parents rushed to reach their children.

Those who got their early on were able to retrieve their frightened children, but some who arrived later found the street outside the school lined with squad cars and blocked off. About two hours after the shooting, dozens of frustrated parents and relatives flooded out of the park pavilion without their children after school officials announced that all remaining children had been bused to a high school and could be picked up there.

Julie Tomalenas waited for an hour to pick up her 13-year-old sister before being told of the relocation.

"It was very stressful not knowing if she was OK, where she was, when we could see her again," Tomalenas said.

The lockdown was lifted about two hours after the shooting, but the students and employees were relocated while officers investigated at the school, Brown said.

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Blessings from me to you, friends! Keep your eyes on the skies- our Deliverer is coming for His bride!-Missygirl*

LOVE YOU FRIENDS!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!