THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
JULY 2, 2015
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The Week when they asked if he needed help. Officers rushed to the area, and late Sunday afternoon, Sgt. Jay Cook of the New York State Police noticed Sweat running north along a roadway, just several miles from Canada. He chased him across a hayfield and shot Sweat twice in the torso, ending the long, historic manhunt. After the 23-day manhunt, it was revealed that neither convict made it more than 40 miles from the Clinton Correctional Facility, from which they escaped. On Sunday, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo reassured residents. “The nightmare is finally over. We wish it didn’t happen in the first place. But if you have to have it happen, this is how you want it to end.”
Christie Enters the Race
It was inevitable. On Tuesday, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie ended the presidential race, promising a campaign of “big ideas and hard truths.” “We need to have strength and decision-making and authority back in the Oval Office. And that is why today I am proud to announce my candidacy for the Republican nomination for president of the United States of America,” Christie said during a rally at Livingston High School in New Jersey. The often-blunt Republican played up his penchant for straight talk during his announcement, promising to speak honestly “whether you like it or not.” “I mean what I say and I say what I mean and that’s what America needs right now,” Christie declared.
Even before officially launching his campaign, Christie sought to portray himself as one of the few GOP voices willing to propose major overhauls to key entitlement programs, a move that risks alienating senior citizen voters. Christie has traveled extensively to the early voting states, especially New Hampshire, where he has delivered other major policy speeches and held his signature town hall discussions. Christie becomes the 14th Republican presidential candidate to officially enter the race and will face a tough, uphill climb to the top of the crowded field. The Bridgegate scandal that has consumed much of his governorship over the past year-and-a-half has taken a major toll on Christie’s standing among fellow Republicans. “Part of it is, you know, we had the Bridgegate situation which turned out not to be anything about me, but the coverage was overwhelming,” Christie told NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell after his announcement, referring to the significant hit his approval numbers have taken in his state of New Jersey. “And the last thing is, you make hard decisions over a long time. If you look at the history of my poll numbers, I’ve gone up and down in this state. I earn political capital to spend it. Not to keep it in a drawer or put it on a frame on the wall,” he added.
Supreme Court: OK Lethal Injection is OK
The U.S. Supreme Court made a court ruling this week in support of Oklahoma’s method of legal injection for the death penalty.
In News The court ruled 5-4, with its five conservatives in the majority, that a drug used by Oklahoma as part of its lethal injection procedure does not violate the U.S. Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, a setback for activists against the death penalty and a loss for three convicted murders on the state’s death row. The three-drug process used by Oklahoma prison officials has been under scrutiny since the April 2014 botched execution of convicted murderer Clayton Lockett. During the proceedings, liberal Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg expressed their belief that the death penalty is unconstitutional. “We believe it highly likely that the death penalty now violates the Eighth Amendment,” Breyer said in a statement he read from the bench. Conservative Justice Antonin Scalia called Breyer’s arguments full of “internal contradictions” and “gobbledy-gook.” Justice Samuel Alito wrote that the prisoners who brought the case failed to identify an alternative method of execution that offered a lower risk of pain.
That’s Odd
anese. And if you need more red on your burger, it’s decorated with a spicy sauce that the chain describes as an “angry” sauce. Don’t know what it’s angry about. Maybe it doesn’t like the color red.
Good Luck Glasses It was a case of good luck that didn’t seem too good at first. Bob Sabo of Easton, Connecticut, couldn’t wait in line to buy a lottery ticket this week, so he headed to the vending machine to purchase his lucky numbers. But Sabo wears glasses and this time he left them at home. Just his luck: instead of buying two $20 tickets, he bought a $30 ticket. When he got home, though, he realized that he was a winner—the glasses-less man is now $30,000 wealthier because of his spectacles snafu. You know, Bob, it’s all good. Sometimes, though, you just have to look a little deeper.
The Granny Grandmaster
Crimson Cuisine
This burger will have you seeing red. In Japan, fast-food goers will have the rosy opportunity to chow down on an Aka Samurai Burger, an all-red bun with a slice of red tomato along with bright-red cheese. In case you haven’t figured it out, “aka” means red in Jap-
She’s 87-years-old, but don’t let that fool you. On Sunday, Brigitta Sinka clinched a world record for playing the most games of simultaneous chess when she replaced 1920s Cuban grandmaster Jose Raul Capablanca for the title. Almost 60 years since her first simultaneous games, on six boards sideby-side at a Chess Olympiad in 1957, Brigitta Sinka overtook the magic 13,545 number attributed to Capab-