NYC may yank terrorism report to appease mosque ‘spying’ critics - Qatari man, once held as enemy combatant by US, returns home

In top-secret talks to settle federal lawsuits against the NYPD for monitoring mosques, the city is weighing a demand that it scrub from its website a report on Islamic terrorists, The New York Post has learned.

The groundbreaking, 92-page report, titled “Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat,” angers critics who say it promotes “religious profiling” and discrimination against Muslims. But law-enforcement sources say removing the report now would come at the worst time — after mounting terror attacks by Islamic extremists in Paris, Boston, Sydney and Ottawa.

Here in New York, Zale Thompson, a man who heeded online calls by ISIS for jihad, attacked two NYPD officers with a hatchet in October.

“The harm is that it sends the message that the NYPD is going to back down on its counterterrorism effort in the name of political correctness,” said a former NYPD official. “Shame on the NYPD if they do.”

Click for the full story from the New York Post.

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NYC may yank terrorism report to appease mosque ‘spying’ critics - Qatari man, once held as enemy combatant by US, returns home

Jennifer Aniston happy to prove critics wrong

Jennifer Aniston focuses on what makes her and Justin Theroux happy. The 45-year-old actress, who has been engaged to the Leftovers actor since 2012, insists she no longer cares about rumours that their relationship is on the rocks. She claims she is trying to let negative energy roll off her back.

The former Friends star said: “I think I used to really (care). There was a period where I was hell bent on saying, ‘That’s not true. That’s not right. That’s not fair, but now, I just think you have to let it roll off your back and you realise. I think everyone knows it’s all B S, and like a soap opera on paper.

“The main thing is to try to just keep refocusing on what you know is true and what makes you guys happy. We know what our truth is. That’s all just static.”

Meanwhile, Jennifer is thrilled she has been nominated for both a Screen Actors Guild Award and Golden Globe for her portrayal of a suicidal woman addicted to painkillers in her latest film Cake. She feels she has finally proved critics that suggested she should stick to romantic comedies, wrong.

She told CBS Sunday Morning in an upcoming interview, airing January 4, 2015: “A little part of me saying, “I told you so?” … Maybe a teensy one. “This felt for me … I was really ready to, you know, just disappear and really go into the depths of a character. “We were a little teeny weensy movie made for four dollars and we poured our hearts into it, and everyone worked so hard, so that this [the nominations] is happening on top of that, it’s just like a huge giant juicy cherry on top.’

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Jennifer Aniston happy to prove critics wrong

Up for track honours, Gatlin shrugs off critics

BY PAT GRAHAM AP Sports Writer

Sunday, October 12, 2014    

JUSTIN Gatlin is far more interested in winning races than popularity contests.

Still, the American sprinter with a doping history doesn’t quite understand the backlash over his nomination for track and field athlete of the year.

Gatlin went undefeated in the 100 and 200 metres this season, a year that didn’t include a major meet and one in which Usain Bolt chose to give his nagging injuries time to heal.

But Gatlin’s inclusion for track’s annual award has angered some athletes. So much so that Olympic discus champion Robert Harting even withdrew from consideration.

Gatlin insisted again and again in an interview with The Associated Press that he’s served his time — four years for testing positive for excessive testosterone in 2006 — and should be at least considered, especially after going 18-0.

His reaction to those showing so much displeasure is this: Why over an award? Why not after he captured a bronze medal at the 2012 London Games or silver at the 2013 World Championships?

“Not a peep, then. Not a stir,” Gatlin said. “I don’t make any waves. I don’t say anything bad about anybody. I don’t point fingers.

“I’m sad to say that a lot of people out there feel that, ‘Once a doper, always a doper.’ But that makes no sense. That means you don’t believe your system is working.”

The 32-year-old sprinter said he’s been tested often by US Anti-Doping Agency, World Anti-Doping Agency and IAAF, the governing body of track.

Scepticism remains, though, when he finished in 9.77 seconds in Brussels last month, a mark achieved only by the world-record holder Bolt, Tyson Gay, Yohan Blake and Asafa Powell. That’s also the time Gatlin was running in 2006, when he tested positive.

“For some reason in an off year, when I run 9.77 with no medal of any sort, and now I get all of this backlash?” Gatlin said. “I guess people feel like if my two feet get me across the line in first, that’s good enough. But they don’t want me to win a popularity contest.”

There was originally a 10-man list of nominees for the award issued by IAAF, until Harting took his name out of the running, with the German telling Spiegel magazine, “It’s insulting for me and my fans.” The winner will be announced next month.

“I didn’t ask to get nominated,” Gatlin said. “My choice was to run and win races and be dominant for myself. My job is not to go out and lose. My job is to win. That’s what I’m supposed to do, like everyone else nominated.”

Travis Tygart, the CEO of USADA, believes Gatlin deserves a chance at redemption.

“The rules incorporate the notion of second chances by allowing someone to return after they have served their sanction,” Tygart wrote in an email. “If we don’t like this then let’s change the rules but it’s not fair to move the goal line during the game.”

In the middle year of an Olympic cycle and with no World Championships this summer, Gatlin overhauled his training programme. He ate healthier and slimmed down to 175 pounds. He also fine-tuned his technique in Florida.

For as fast as he runs, though, his past always catches up. A number of Diamond League meets won’t include him because of his history.

The 2004 Olympic champion tested positive for amphetamines in 2001, but arbitrators decided Gatlin didn’t take it to cheat and that doctors prescribed it to treat attention deficit disorder, first diagnosed when he was nine.

“Stopped taking it cold turkey right then, once I tested positive,” said Gatlin, a former star at the University of Tennessee.

Five years later, he tested positive again, this time for testosterone. USADA and the IAAF pushed for an eight-year ban. He served four years.

“I took my lumps, sat my time down, came back and worked hard to make my way back to the top,” he said.

When he returned in 2010, Gatlin was running 10.26. As he lowered his time, he increased his detractors.

That didn’t bother him.

This insinuation, however, did: At the University of Oslo, researchers gave mice testosterone — the same hormone for which Gatlin tested positive — and found the resulting super-mice developed muscle changes and performance benefits that lasted long after doping stopped.

“For the few haters out there, seems like that’s what they want to do, discredit my name and label me with laboratory rats in Oslo, and say, ‘Oh, steroids are in your system for decades and decades,”‘ Gatlin said. “A lot of athletes that tested positive, they never came back and ran times close to the times they ran when they were positive. I think that proves hard work and dedication on my behalf.

“I’m not doing anything that’s a secret to anybody. I’m just going out there and believing in myself.”

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Up for track honours, Gatlin shrugs off critics

Lady Gaga slams critics

File – Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga says she’d “rather be fat than shallow”. The Bad Romance hitmaker – who previously admitted her weight fluctuates because of her love of Italian food – lashed out at critics of her figure after photographs of her in a flesh-coloured swimsuit attracted some negative comments on Instagram.

The 28-year-old star captioned one of the images, taken in Dubai: “#bodyrevolution Proud at any size, because the inside is what really counts. Plus, it’s all how you pose! Just ask the supermodels!”

After receiving support from a fan on Twitter, she replied: “Id rather be fat than be shallow (sic)”

When another fan wrote: “I honestly can’t imagine receiving comments about my weight everyday. How insulting and degrading. Also gaga is perfect so back off,” the blonde beauty responded: “all day long every day, so what if I got a belly sometimes, sometimes I don’t. There’s people starving in the world. #whocares.”

The Applause hitmaker, who also recently insisted she is “curvy and proud,” previously admitted she used to battle with an eating disorder.

She said at the time: “I have struggled with an eating disorder for over 10 years and I take that very seriously, I take the struggle of others very seriously.”

But earlier this year, she claimed she had overcome her troubles. She said: “I am better with food. I don’t have an eating disorder anymore. I’m also better at not letting people take advantage of me. I should be around people who cherish my talents, my health, my time … I’m an artist. I deserve better than to be loyal to people who only believe in me because I make money.”

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Lady Gaga slams critics

Lady Gaga slams critics

File – Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga says she’d “rather be fat than shallow”. The Bad Romance hitmaker – who previously admitted her weight fluctuates because of her love of Italian food – lashed out at critics of her figure after photographs of her in a flesh-coloured swimsuit attracted some negative comments on Instagram.

The 28-year-old star captioned one of the images, taken in Dubai: “#bodyrevolution Proud at any size, because the inside is what really counts. Plus, it’s all how you pose! Just ask the supermodels!”

After receiving support from a fan on Twitter, she replied: “Id rather be fat than be shallow (sic)”

When another fan wrote: “I honestly can’t imagine receiving comments about my weight everyday. How insulting and degrading. Also gaga is perfect so back off,” the blonde beauty responded: “all day long every day, so what if I got a belly sometimes, sometimes I don’t. There’s people starving in the world. #whocares.”

The Applause hitmaker, who also recently insisted she is “curvy and proud,” previously admitted she used to battle with an eating disorder.

She said at the time: “I have struggled with an eating disorder for over 10 years and I take that very seriously, I take the struggle of others very seriously.”

But earlier this year, she claimed she had overcome her troubles. She said: “I am better with food. I don’t have an eating disorder anymore. I’m also better at not letting people take advantage of me. I should be around people who cherish my talents, my health, my time … I’m an artist. I deserve better than to be loyal to people who only believe in me because I make money.”

View the original article here

Lady Gaga slams critics