Cross Burnings Ignite 'Family Values' Debate

By Chester Molenestar, TYDN Family Affairs Writer
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- (TYDN) Federal authorities are investigating a spate of lynching and cross burning nationwide: The frightening scenes, once of the civil rights era, are being perpetuated by a growing coalition of "concerned and wholesome parents" worried about children and family values, TheYellowDailyNews has learned.

At least eight Federal Bureau of Investigation sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told TheYellowDailyNews early Tuesday that the animosity stems from these parents' disdain that their parental counterparts allow their children to walk to school or play outside without adult supervision – sometimes for minutes at a time, the FBI sources said. These sources said race was not the motive.

The federal officials expressed alarm over the Ku Klux Klan-style methods of terror, including the kidnapping and torture of some elementary school-aged kids "to teach these parents how wrong it is to let their children out of their eyesight," an FBI source told TheYellowDailyNews.

At least one U.S. historian, in an exclusive interview with TheYellowDailyNews, acknowledged it was the first time in American history that neighborhood strife was born absent prejudices in color, religion and social-economic status.

"This is the first time in American history that neighborhood strife was born absent prejudices in color, religion and social-economic status," said Harry Jeffers, a Cal State Fullerton historian  and former Nixon administration official, in an exclusive interview with TheYellowDailyNews. "We've never seen anything like this. Usually, everybody just surfs the Internet or watches TV in their free time."

The authorities said the marauding group of parents calls itself, "The Wholesome Family Against Children Walking and Playing Absent Adult Supervision," or TWFACWAPAAS for short.

Many members are sporting tattoos emblazoned with TWFACWAPAAS, the authorities said. Several motor vehicle departments across the nation have denied vanity license plates displaying TWFACWAPAAS, prompting First Amendment challenges.

"Apparently, the atrocities plaguing American neighborhoods are the alarming work of a growing group of concerned and wholesome parents called TWFACWAPAAS worried about the children and family values," an FBI source, requesting anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic, told TheYellowDailyNews after being granted anonymity by TheYellowDailyNews.

"In many instances," the source added, "TWFACWAPAAS members would kidnap children on their way to school, while waiting at the bus stop or playing in the park, just to teach their loser parents of the dangers of allowing their children out of their eyesight. The unspeakable perpetrated by the TWFACWAPAAS goes without saying, and many local police departments would look the other way."

TheYellowDailyNews could neither immediately nor independently verify the FBI's claims.

Photo:  Image Editor

'Holy Grail' Twitter Coverage Wins NY Times Pulitzer

by Linus Blanketship, TYDN Media Affairs Writer
NEW YORK -- (TYDN) The New York Times won the media battle Thursday in social-networking coverage, taking home the Pulitzer Prize for being the first to report someone engaging in sex acts while using the popular microblogging site Twitter, TheYellowDailyNews has learned.

The Pulitzer Prize Board said The Times' coverage exemplified "the Holy Grail of quality journalism, and Twitter coverage in particular." The committee added that the paper's 80-member Twitter reporting team "faced stiff competition from dozens of media outlets, both online and print, that had been scouring Twitter in what best can be described as one of the greatest public-service endeavors since Woodward and Bernstein."

Honorable mentions included Wired's report of the first person defecating while on Twitter. The Associated Press was mentioned as another runner up for its recent coverage of Iranian dissidents using the 140-character Twitter service to plot protests amid a government crackdown.

Media historians said it was the first time in Pulitzer history that the prize went to a 10,000-word article – Sex Acts Meet Twitter -- that had meaning and engaged the general public.

"Usually, the prizes are given to reporters who uncover graft, corruption, pollution and government waste," Tim Histo, a Harvard University historian, said in an exclusive interview with TheYellowDailyNews. "Many people find such topics boring. This Twitter story was the convergence of a perfect storm of sorts: Twitter and sex."

The New York Times, in an exclusive statement to TheYellowDailyNews, said its investigative reporters recently received an anonymous tip that somebody had registered the username SexOnTwitr. Reporters scrambled to that Twitter page and found this garbled message: "Dude, I'm having sex while tweeting. Schwing!"

The investigation concluded that it was the twitterer's first tweet. For privacy reasons, The New York Times did not publish the SexOnTwitr's account holder.

Stock Market Shuttered, Declared Ponzi Scheme

by Jonathan Montoblan, TYDN Financial Affairs Writer
NEW YORK – (TYDN) Culminating a swift and nearly 80-year investigation, federal regulators shuttered U.S. stock markets early Tuesday after declaring them a "classic Ponzi scheme," TheYellowDailyNews has learned.

Sources close to what insiders described as "the longest-running investigation in U.S. history" – second in length to the hunt for Osama bin Laden -- said chief executives at the New York Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ Stock Exchange were being rounded up and arrested in connection with a record-setting financial fraud totaling trillions of dollars. Thousands of brokers, bankers and others assisting in the massive scam were also being arrested nationwide.

Stunned onlookers watched along Wall Street here as regulators tossed Wall Street Journal executives into the paddy wagon, accusing them of creating a leading stock-tracking index -- the Dow Jones Industrials -- enticing tens of thousands of victims along the way. Hundreds of suit-and-tied executives were seen jumping from their penthouse windows or corner offices.

"The whole financial system appears to be founded on a classic Ponzi scheme, just like the Social Security retirement system," a well-placed Securities and Exchange Commission official told TheYellowDailyNews on condition of anonymity. "New investors were enticed to get in because they saw the early adopters making money. Eventually, the system implodes on itself, a phenomena we just learned about that has secretly been called a 'correction' or a 'crash.'"

Historians said it was the first time in U.S. history regulators have raided and shuttered leading equities exchanges since the New York Stock Exchange was founded in 1817.

Meanwhile, defense attorneys decried the allegations, saying the markets were not a Ponzi scheme but instead symbolized "the fabric of the American Way."

"This just shocks the conscience that the government would declare the fabric of the American Way a scam," defense attorney Cash Shyzsteeshia said in an exclusive interview with TheYellowDailyNews. "What are they going to target next: lawyers and pay-to-play lobbying?"

Entrepreneurs seized on the shakeout, immediately hawking specially crafted mattresses advertised as "replete with hidden storage compartments to securely store your life savings." Warranties lasted up to five years, but were null and void for smokers.

The authorities discovered the latest Ponzi scheme about a month ago as they were readying indictments stemming from the Great Depression "crash" eight decades ago in which equities lost about 90 percent of their value, sources familiar with the probe told TheYellowDailyNews on condition of anonymity.

The term Ponzi stems from Charles Ponzi, an Italian immigrant who stole about $1 million from U.S. investors in a 1920 postage stamp scam resembling the now-defunct U.S. equities market.

Photo: onohoku

Every Member of Congress Being Indicted

by Thornhille Broome, TYDN Editor at Large
CHICAGO -- (TYDN) Prosecutors here are readying a federal indictment against all members of Congress on allegations of "honest services fraud," the same law being invoked to prosecute high-profile defendants including former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich for allegedly trying to sell the Senate seat Barack Obama was vacating after winning the presidency, TheYellowDailyNews has learned.

At least six sources with direct knowledge of the probe, speaking on condition of anonymity, told TheYellowDailyNews early Thursday that the Chicago indictments and arrests could come down perhaps as early as Monday. Legal experts said it was the first time in U.S history that prosecutors have moved to indict all of Congress.

The federal sources said Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for northern Illinois, has convened a federal grand jury here in a bid to indict the 100 Senate members and the 435 House representatives "for committing honest services fraud against the people of the United States of America."

Defense attorneys decried the allegations, saying the law in question was so vague it could lead to the indictment of a ham sandwich. The 28-word statute includes language making it illegal to perform "a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services."

The anticipated indictments come as the U.S. Supreme Court is weighing the constitutionality of the 21-year-old statute that recently ensnared the likes of media mogul Conrad Black, Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling and lobbyist Jack Abramoff. In February, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote that the corruption law (.pdf) was so poorly crafted that it could cover "a mayor for using the prestige of his office to get a table at a restaurant without a reservation."

Local and state lawmakers, meanwhile, started worrying that they, too, would fall under Fitzgerald's sword.

Details of the charges being levied against Congress were not immediately available. But sources suggested the allegations relate to lawmakers having already generated a combined $219.5 million campaign war chest a year before the 2010 elections.

That means each legislator has, on average, received $410,280 from special interests for a job paying annual wages of $165,200 – and not all lawmakers are up for renewal.

"If this doesn't fit the definition of honest services fraud, then I don't know what does," a federal prosecutor familiar with the pending indictments told TheYellowDailyNews on condition of anonymity and was granted anonymity by TheYellowDailyNews because of the sensitivity of the topic.

"This just doesn't pass the smell test," the source continued, "and doesn't even begin to scratch the surface."

Photo: OpenCongress.org