TV News LIES

Only one week until the government shutdown because the tea baggers need to be in the spotlight for as long as possible. The thing is, we've been here before.

An actual government shut down in the 90s was a disaster for the Republicans which makes seeing Newt Gingrich on the Sunday morning shows acting like an expert statesman all the more hilarious. People forget that he was run out of the Congress by Republicans. And the tea baggers have already tried this fiscal brinksmanship themselves, and failed miserably.

This is considered the holiest place in Judaism, yet it has been largely off-limits to Jewish worshipers because of concerns that range from violating Jewish law to provoking riots.

But in recent years, religious Jews are increasingly asserting their right to be here and are pushing for Israel to claim sovereignty over the Temple Mount. Their effort is testing the resolve of the Israeli government and the patience of 1.6 billion Muslims around the world. At stake are freedom of worship and the future of the most contested sacred space in the world. And the effort could potentially inflame the Israeli-Arab conflict, which is increasingly taking on a religious tone.

A group of German hackers claimed to have cracked the iPhone fingerprint scanner on Sunday, just two days after Apple Inc launched the technology that it promises will better protect devices from criminals and snoopers seeking access.

If the claim is verified, it will be embarrassing for Apple which is betting on the scanner to set its smartphone apart from new models of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and others running the Android operating system of Google Inc.

Sick and injured 9/11 first responders, recovery workers and survivors who aren't already registered with the Victim Compensation Fund are being urged to do so before Oct. 3 — the deadline to file for financial compensation.

U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand held a press conference Monday at 7 WTC to ask those afflicted by the 9/11 tragedy to register immediately.

"This fund is not open forever. In fact, the clock is ticking and time is running out for victims and survivors to participate," said the senator, a Democrat from upstate New York.

A powerful storm hit Hong Kong and the southern China coast on Monday blowing cars off roads, crippling power lines, causing flooding and killing at least 25 people.

Typhoon Usagi, the strongest storm to hit the western Pacific this year, began pounding southern China late Sunday. More than 370 flights were canceled, and financial markets closed for at least part of the morning. Shipping and train lines were also shut down before Usagi weakened to a tropical depression over the southern Chinese province of Guangdong on Monday.

Angela Merkel won a landslide personal victory in Germany's general election on Sunday, but her conservatives appeared just short of the votes needed to rule on their own and may have to convince leftist rivals to join a coalition government.

Partial results put support for Merkel's conservative bloc on 42 percent, their strongest score since 1990, the year of German unification, and a ringing endorsement of her steady leadership during the euro zone crisis.

Russia has been asked to free a Greenpeace ship and its crew detained during a protest at an arctic oil-drilling platform, the World Wildlife Fund said Monday.

The organization said more than 40 environmental groups signed a letter to President Vladimir Putin requesting the release of the Arctic Sunrise and the 30 people reported aboard, RIA Novosti reported.

Pope Francis has removed a Roman Catholic bishop in Peru who an influential former prelate says is suspected of sexually abusing minors.

Gabino Miranda, 53, was removed as part of the new pope's "zero tolerance" policy against abuse, the Rev. Luis Bambaren, the retired former Peruvian bishops' conference chief, told reporters on Friday.