Green Bay News

Journalists covering terrorist threats worldwide have become part of the story with threats to their own lives while searching for the truth in wartime.

This week Japan revoked a passport of a journalist going to Syria because of the country’s fears of ISIS threats. The decision by Japanese leaders came after Japanese journalist Kenji Goto was beheaded by ISIS terrorists. A video of his beheading was released worldwide by ISIS.

Monday night, Sinclair National Correspondent Jeff Barnd moderated a “Your Voice, Your Future” National Town Hall discussion on the fight to protect our freedoms. Journalists also seem to have fallen victim to these new atrocities.

“They don’t want to be held ransom for a couple hundred million dollars and then see one of their citizens murdered on national TV,” said Pennsylvania Congressman Scott Perry via satellite.

“To prevent journalists from going seems highly preemptory,” said Jane Hall, Associate Professor at American University, “And it’s very alarming to me although I can understand.”

In a recent interview with VOX News, President Obama defended his current strategy, “We don’t have solutions to every problem in the 21st century.”  In that same interview, the President blamed the media for over-hyping the terror threat coverage, “If it bleeds it leads,” he said regarding media decisions that focus more on terrorism than climate change or Ebola. You can read the complete VOX interview here.

“The bulk of this is about power; it is about how dominant and who in the end will be in control,” Frank Gaffney, president of the Center for Security and Politics, said during the national Town Hall.

Former New York Times Reporter Clifford May says, “Now, they want to cut your head off and put it on videotape. Because that’s how they tell their story best.”

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – Republican Gov. Scott Walker’s top aide says if tax collection re-estimates this spring look good Walker would look to refund the money to the people.

Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch told a Wispolitics.com luncheon in Madison that legislators would make the final call on how to use any extra money but Walker would try to give it back.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Rochester Republican, told reporters later Tuesday that unless the re-estimates are a billion dollars or less the Legislature should use the extra money to reduce cuts to a number of agencies and programs Walker has included in the state budget, most notably a $300 million cut to the University of Wisconsin System.

Walker has said he’s open to working with the Legislature to reduce those cuts.

Find information about the sounds sturgeon make and listen to an example.

BERLIN – Officials have doubled the cash reward for anyone with information regarding a vandalism incident at St. Michaels Cemetery in the City of Berlin.

Anyone with information can receive a $1,000 cash reward that leads to the arrest of the suspect or suspects that intentionally damaged approximately 6 grave markers during the weekend of Dec. 28-29, 2014.

If you have any information, please call Green Lake County Crime Stoppers at 1-800-GET-THEM (1-800-438-8436) or email to [email protected] or text to 847411 keyword “getthem”.

ST. FRANCIS — The president of the Milwaukee Bucks says the team is standing by Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal for the state to help fund a new arena after the Menominee Nation offered an alternative.

The tribe’s offer is tied to Walker reversing course and approving the Menominee’s casino project in Kenosha.

Bucks president Peter Feagin said Tuesday at the team’s suburban Milwaukee training facility that he had not spoken to tribal leaders, and that he was not focused on the Menominee proposal.

Feagin says he is focused on working with state and local officials, and that the Bucks are following the governor’s lead.

Walker’s state budget proposal calls for issuing $220 million in state bonds to help pay for the new arena, a plan that drawn criticism from some fellow Republicans.

WAUTOMA – Two people have been charged in connection with a marijuana bust in Wautoma.

Waushara County sheriff’s officials say they raided John and Marie Knudtson’s home in January. Detectives found 21 marijuana plants, about 220 grams of marijuana and 30 drug paraphernalia items.

Marie Knudtson, 38, is due back in court later this month. John Knudtson, 42, is due back in court in March.

WAUTOMA – Three people have been charged in connection with a heroin ring in Waushara County.

Sheriff’s officials say they started investigating Shawn Knaup, 28; Amanda Hopp, 31; and Bridgette Messa, 38, in November. They say Hopp and Knaup, who live in northen Marquette County, would travel to southeastern Wisconsin to pick up heroin. They would then deliver the heroin in Wautoma, and the towns of Dakota and Plainfield, to Messa and others.

Hopp and Knaup were on probation for drug convictions at the time, investigators say.

All were arrested and charged last month.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says his private meeting in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron was “very good.”

Walker made the brief comment after exiting the meeting with Cameron on Tuesday at Downing Street.

Neither Walker nor Downing Street would provide details on what had been discussed. The encounter was billed as a private meeting between the two men.

Walker is leading a coalition of Wisconsin government and business officials on a trade mission to London that runs until Friday.

The trip gives Walker a chance to bolster his overseas and foreign policy credentials as he considers running for president in 2016. He is scheduled to give a public speech Wednesday about the global economy at the prestigious Chatham House think tank.

NEW YORK (AP) — Home Depot Inc., the nation’s largest home-improvement retailer, says it has started to hire more than 80,000 seasonal workers for the spring selling season, the company’s busiest period.

That’s level with the last few years. The positions include both part-time and full-time workers in stores and distribution centers.

The hiring comes as the Atlanta-based company is moving beyond a huge data breach last fall that affected 56 million credit and debit cards. Home Depot reported in November that its third-quarter profit rose 14 percent on rising sales. That suggests the breach has not shaken the faith of its customers.

Home Depot’s stock has risen more than 40 percent in the past year.

Typically, more than half of Home Depot’s spring seasonal workers stay on, says Tim Crow, Home Depot executive vice president of human resources.

Crow told The Associated Press the hiring level isn’t an indication of the business environment or what it sees for the spring season, but more about its needs.

“It gives us the ability to get a whole new wave of folks to join our team,” he added.

For most retailers, the holiday shopping season, which spans November to December, is their busiest season. But for Home Depot and other home-improvement stores, it’s the spring selling season that’s the biggest sales generator as shoppers spruce up their lawns and work on their homes.

The company is expected to report fourth-quarter results Feb. 24.

The broader employment picture hasn’t been better in years. On Friday, a federal report showed that the past three months have seen hiring at the most robust pace in 17 years.

Home Depot, which operates 2,269 stores in all 50 states and employs more than 300,000 associates, has benefited from the housing recovery. The Commerce Department reported last month that construction of new homes rebounded in December, helping to push activity for the entire year to the highest level since the peak of the housing boom nine years ago.

This spring, Home Depot is giving its sales associates with 40,000 Web-enabled devices to speed checkout and help associates find products, check inventory or explain product features. Crow says that will make workers more productive.

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Elvis Constantin Cluci and his wife had planned a second child, their dreams set on a little brother for their 2 ½ year-old daughter. But due to a surge in the Swiss franc that caused the Romanian couple’s mortgage payments to rise, not only is another child out of the question but they have had to send their daughter to live with grandparents 100 kilometers (60 miles) away.

Now they see her only once or twice a month. They simply cannot afford both day care and their mortgage on a small studio apartment in Bucharest. They can barely even scrape together the gas money to drive to see her.

“I can hardly smile anymore,” said Cluci, 37. “My wife is completely destroyed. As the man I have to be strong and bear it.”

On Jan. 15, the Swiss national bank ended a policy meant to limit the franc’s value against the euro — causing the franc to surge. That move by one of Europe’s richest countries is adding to the financial despair of hundreds of thousands of people across some of the poorest regions of the continent due to mortgages taken out years ago in Swiss francs.

Many of the borrowers were in their 20s and 30s who took out loans in the boom years before the crisis of 2008. They were supposed to be the first generation to benefit fully from the economic promise that came with the fall of communism and the entry into the European Union. Mortgages in foreign currencies were particularly popular because they came with lower interest rates.

Instead, these borrowers now find themselves stuck in a new kind of servitude, their fates tied to the ups and downs of a currency that many have never held in their hands.

The pain of the borrowers is turning into a key political issue in many countries, primarily Poland and Croatia, where elections are on the horizon. Many of the borrowers feel they were tricked by the banks into financial products that are now called “toxic” — and have been banned in many countries. They want governments to push banks to give them some relief.

It’s a tricky position for leaders: do you force banks to take a financial hit to help people who willingly entered into risky contracts?

Responses by governments have varied.

The Hungarian government forced banks in November to convert Swiss franc loans to the local currency at the exchange rate of the time. In hindsight, the timing prevented financial disaster for many Hungarian borrowers come January.

The government of Croatia, where there are 60,000 such loans, froze the franc-kuna exchange rate at pre-Jan. 15 levels for one year to help borrowers.

Other countries, like Poland and Romania, are still debating what to do, but have ruled out a Hungarian-style solution. Polish authorities are urging banks to take voluntary steps to help borrowers.

Wiktor Nozycki, a 31-year-old Pole who has a mortgage on an apartment in Poznan, says what the Polish authorities have proposed primarily benefits the banks and that he considers the government and bankers to be acting like gangsters.

“No one warned the consumers about any risks,” he said. “Banks here are above the law.”

The anger is huge in Poland, where there are more than 550,000 outstanding loans, and class-action lawsuits against banks are in the works. In Slovenia an association of affected citizens is also threatening to sue the banks.

Economist Piotr Bujak with Bank PKO BP said many of the accusations against the banks are unfair and that customers were generally informed of the exchange rate risks.

“As long as the servicing of mortgages in Swiss francs was cheaper, customers were happy, while now they want others — banks, taxpayers — to cover the increased costs,” Bujak said.

Many borrowers now owe more on their homes than they are worth and cannot sell without incurring significant loss, also because property prices have fallen since the boom years. The media have reported cases of people so desperate they have sought treatment in psychiatric hospitals. In Romania, the suicide of a borrower prompted a consumer protection agency to investigate whether the loans were fairly handled.

Dorota Smetek, a 30-year-old assistant professor of linguistics in Poznan, feels she was tricked by her bank and is considering joining one of the lawsuits.

In 2008, at 24, she took an 11-year mortgage to buy a small one-bedroom apartment for 250,000 zlotys ($68,500). The bank had predicted her installments would be around 2,500 zlotys ($685), but right after she signed the deal the financial crisis hit, and she immediately found herself paying 3,000 ($825) per month. Her most recent installment was 3,500 zlotys ($960), something she can’t pay without her parents’ help.

“There wasn’t a single installment that was what the bank said it would be,” she said. “I am starting to think someone is taking me for a fool. I feel I was cheated.”

Now she feels stuck: She can’t sell because she would lose too much. She can’t rent because that income would only cover about half of her monthly mortgage payment. She has been forced to make sacrifices, like canceling plans for a winter vacation. Lately she has needed sleeping pills at night.

And like the Romanian couple, she and her husband would also love a second child — but not when money is so tight and they are stuck in an apartment of only 45 square meters (485 square feet).

“How can I have more children when I can’t change my flat?” she asked.

The only hope for her and so many others lies hundreds of kilometers away in Switzerland. They simply want the franc to fall.

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Associated Press writer Vanessa Gera reported from Warsaw, Poland. Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, and Pablo Gorondi in Budapest, Hungary, also contributed.

WASHINGTON (AP) – The top recruiter for the Islamic State group’s affiliate in Afghanistan was killed in an American drone strike on Monday, a Pentagon spokesman said Tuesday, marking the first targeted attack on a leader of the IS extremists in that country.

Abdul Rauf and seven others were killed when the strike hit their car, said Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby. Officials have expressed concerns about the Islamic State group seeking recruits in Afghanistan, as U.S. forces withdraw and Afghan forces take control of the country’s security.

Kirby said Rauf and his associates were targeted because they were planning attacks, but he said the strength of the Islamic State in Afghanistan is “nascent, and aspirational at best.”

Although the U.S. is no longer doing combat operations in Afghanistan, troops there – including special operations forces – are still conducting counterterrorism missions. There are about 10,600 U.S. troops in Afghanistan now.

The deputy governor of the southern Helmand province had said earlier this week that Rauf was killed, but U.S. officials had awaited further evidence.

During the Taliban’s rule, which ended in late 2001, Rauf was a corps commander in the western province of Herat and in Kabul. Rauf spent years in the Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba before being released in Afghanistan in 2007. He was jailed in Afghanistan and released in 2009.

WASHINGTON, Pa. (AP) — A 75-year-old man helped in the arrest of a shoplifting suspect at a Pennsylvania mall by tackling him and threatening to break his arm if he tried to escape.

Charlie Burton, of Fombell, says he was a vendor at the Washington Crown Center mall for a gun show when he saw an officer struggling with the suspect, 29-year-old Jonathan Fekete Jr.

Police say Fekete was trying to get away after taking $200 worth of clothes from a Macy’s store Saturday.

Burton says he ran over to help, grabbed the man’s arms and forced him down. Burton says, “He started hollering his arm hurt, and I said, ‘Quit struggling or I’ll break the thing.'”

Fekete is jailed. Court records don’t list an attorney.

CNN – Hey, universe! Smile, you’re on camera!

It sure looks like a smiley face beaming down from the heavens but this is actually a massive galaxy cluster known as SDSS J1038+4849.

The hubble space telescope captured the image, made public this week by NASA and the European Space Agency.

It looks like two glowing yellow eyes and several curved lines forming a face and a smile. The two glowing eyes are actually two distant galaxies.

And the smile? That’s a result of what astronomists call “strong gravitational lensing.”

That happens because the gravitational pull between the two galaxy clusters is so strong — it distorts time and space around them!

The “ring like structure” forming the smiley face is known as an “Einstein ring” — named after the man whose theory of general relativity explains such phenomena.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States is closing its embassy in Yemen amid political deadlock and deteriorating security conditions after the takeover of the country by Shiite rebels, two U.S. officials said.

The officials said that diplomats were being evacuated from the country on Tuesday and that the embassy in Sanaa would suspend operations until conditions improve. Yemen has been in crisis for months with Iran-linked Shiite Houthi rebels besieging the capital and then taking control. The U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the closure publicly on the record.

Marines providing the security at the embassy will also likely leave, officials said, but American forces conducting counterterrorism missions against al-Qaida’s Yemen affiliate in other parts of the country would not be affected.

Spokesmen at the Pentagon and State Department had no immediate comment on the closure.

Although operations against al-Qaida’s Yemen affiliate will continue, the closure of the embassy will be seen as a blow to the Obama administration, which has held up its partnership with ousted Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi’s government as a model for his strategy in combatting terrorism, particularly in unstable countries.

“Yemen has never been a perfect democracy or an island of stability,” President Barack Obama said late last month as conditions in the capital of Sanaa became worse. “What I’ve said is, is that our efforts to go after terrorist networks inside of Yemen without an occupying U.S. army, but rather by partnering and intelligence-sharing with that local government, is the approach that we’re going to need to take.”

The embassy closure will also complicate the CIA’s operations in Yemen, U.S. intelligence officials acknowledge. Although CIA officers could continue to work out of U.S. military installations, many intelligence operations are run from embassies, and the CIA lost visibility on Syria when that embassy was evacuated in 2012. The CIA’s main role in Yemen is to gather intelligence about members of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and occasionally kill them with drone strikes. Both the CIA and the military’s Joint Special Operations Command run separate drone killing programs in Yemen, though the CIA has conducted the majority of the strikes, U.S. officials have said.

There were 23 U.S. drone strikes reported in Yemen last year, 26 in 2013 and 41 in 2012, according to Long War Journal, a website that tracks them through media reports.

The Houthis last week dissolved parliament and formally took over after months of clashes. They then placed President Hadi and his Cabinet ministers under house arrest. Hadi and the ministers later resigned in protest.

Earlier Tuesday, Yemeni military officials said the Houthis, aided by troops loyal to Hadi’s predecessor, former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, took full control of the key central province of Bayda province.

Bayda is the gateway to the country’s south, which remains in the hands of pro-independence southerners and to the strategic oil-rich Maarib province, to the east, also still not in rebel hands.

The U.S. Embassy in Yemen is the third in an Arab country that has closed since the turmoil of the Arab spring began in December 2010. The other two were embassies in Damascus, Syria and Tripoli, Libya. The embassy in Damascus was closed in Feb 2012 and the embassy in Tripoli was closed in July 2014.

The embassy in Yemen was operating with only a small portion of its usual diplomatic staff and had closed to the public for all but emergency services in January. It had been operating with reduced manpower since September 2014, when the State Department ordered all non-essential personnel to leave the country.

In May, 2014 the embassy in Sanaa was closed for several for several weeks due to heightened security threats.

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Associated Press White House correspondent Julie Pace and Intelligence Writer Ken Dilanian contributed to this report.

NEWTON, Mass. (AP) – Boston-area transit officials say they are prepared to resume rail service on a reduced schedule after a more than 24-hour shutdown.

The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority announced Tuesday afternoon that subways, trolleys and commuter rail will resume on Wednesday. They have been idle since Monday night because of the severe winter weather.

But officials are telling commuters to expect fewer cars and less frequent service on most lines.

MBTA General Manager Beverly Scott strongly defended the decision to shutter rail service on the nation’s oldest transit system because of the buildup of snow and ice on the tracks and concerns for passengers’ safety.

Scott says she hasn’t yet spoken with Gov. Charlie Baker, who had called the T’s storm performance “unacceptable.”

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Net income for U.S. farmers is expected to fall by nearly 32 percent this year because of low crop prices and increasing expenses, placing many farmers in an unprofitable situation.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture released estimates on Tuesday that show 2015 is expected to be the second year in a row that farmers will see their income fall. Income was down 16 percent from 2013 to 2014.

The report estimates net farm income will be $73.6 billion in 2015, down from $108 billion in 2014. It was at a record $129 billion in 2013.

The report also anticipates that as income falls, expenses will increase by one-half percent.

Government programs that pay farmers when commodity prices are low are expected to increase 15 percent this year.

WAUPACA – A woman was arrested Monday in Waupaca after investigators found evidence that indicates heroin was being processed used and distributed from the residence.

At 2:32 p.m. multiple agencies in Waupaca and Waupaca County carried out a search warrant at a home located on Clarke Street.

The 29-year-old woman was taken into custody.

CHICAGO (AP) — Health officials say three more cases of measles have been confirmed in suburban Chicago, bringing the total number of cases to eight.

The Cook County Health Department said Monday that those infected include two adults and six infants, all of whom were not vaccinated. Seven cases are associated with a Palatine day care.

Officials say the overall risk of contracting measles in suburban Cook County is low, but that vaccination is critical to stopping the disease’s spread.

They cautioned parents to consider limiting outings for children younger than 1 because infants are too young to be vaccinated.

Ninety percent of people who aren’t immunized are infected if exposed to the virus.

Common symptoms include fever, runny nose, cough and a rash. Some people suffer complications including pneumonia and encephalitis.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate Armed Services Committee has approved President Barack Obama’s choice of Ashton Carter as the next secretary of defense.

The committee voted 25-0 on Tuesday to support Carter to replace Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who resigned under pressure from the president.

Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he hopes the full Senate will vote to confirm Carter on Wednesday.

The 60-year-old Carter served as the Pentagon’s second-ranking official from 2011 to 2013, spent two years previously as the department’s technology and weapons-buying chief and was assistant secretary of defense for international security policy during Bill Clinton’s administration.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House sought to narrow differences with members of Congress on Tuesday on President Barack Obama’s widely anticipated request for legislation approving the use of U.S. military force against Islamic State fighters in the Middle East.

White House chief of staff Denis McDonough and counsel Neil Eggleston were meeting with Senate Democrats as Obama prepared to formally unveil his proposed authorization. Press secretary Josh Earnest said the proposal should be finished this week as the White House steps up negotiations with lawmakers from both parties to finalize details. “Hopefully there will not be a significant delay in Congress acting on that legislative language,” Earnest said.

The meetings unfolded against a fresh reminder of the threat posed by terrorists who occupy large areas of Syria and Iraq — the confirmed death of a 26-year-old American aid worker who had been held hostage by the group.

Obama pledged to bring anyone responsible for Kayla Mueller’s captivity and death to justice “no matter how long it takes.”

Of more immediate concern, though, was a legislative struggle — the search for a compromise that could satisfy Democrats who oppose the use of American ground forces in the fight against IS, and Republicans who favor at least leaving the possibility open.

Republicans control both houses of Congress, but Obama is likely to need Democratic support on any legislation he submits.

Congressional officials who have been briefed in recent days said they expected Obama to request a relatively short-term authorization of perhaps three years, enough to last through the end of his term. The administration’s proposal, while still subject to changes, also would likely be targeted exclusively against the fighters seeking establishment of an Islamic state, wherever they are and whatever name they use.

The legislation is also expected to terminate Congress’ vote to use force in Afghanistan, enacted in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. It also would end a second authorization approved the following year, before President George W. Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq.

There was little evident dispute in Congress that new legislation was needed, both to replace outdated measures and also to underscore a bipartisan desire to defeat the terrorists seeking an Islamic state. The group has seized territory in Syria and Iraq, imposed a violent form of Sharia law and beheaded several hostages from the United States and other Western countries. Last week, it distributed a horrifying videotape showing the execution-by-burning of a Jordanian pilot by burning him alive.

Mueller’s reported death was the latest event to produce calls for retaliation.

Among members of Obama’s party, Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said during the day that some rank and file lawmakers want to set geographic limits and restrict the types of forces that can be used.

“They want some time limit so we can reconsider at some point in time, whether it’s 24 months, 36 months, 48 months,” he said at a news conference.

As top White House aides met privately with Senate Democrats, Republicans praised Obama’s willingness to seek legislation, up to a point.

“This president, you know, is prone to unilateral action. But when it comes to national security matters, and particularly now fighting this barbaric threat — not only the region but to our own security — I think it’s important to come to Congress and get bipartisan support,” said Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the Senate’s second-ranking Republican leader.

Many Republicans have said they prefer legislation that at least permits the use of ground troops if Obama decides it may be necessary. Some, including Sen. John McCain, have gone further, saying ground troops are needed if the Islamic State fighters are to be defeated.

Obama so far has relied on congressional authorizations that Bush used to justify military action after 9/11. He said last year he had the legal authority necessary to deploy more than 2,700 U.S. troops to train and assist Iraqi security forces and conduct ongoing airstrikes against targets in Iraq and Syria.

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Associated Press writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.