Domestic Glance
US police spark outrage by using wartime acoustic weapon to disperse G20 protesters in Pittsburgh.
Only a few hundreds protesters took to the streets of Pittsburgh to mark the opening day of the G20 summit of world leaders, but the police were taking no chances.
Sonic weapons or long-range acoustic devices have been used by the US military overseas, notably against Somali pirates and Iraqi insurgents.
But US security forces turned the piercing sound on their own citizens yesterday to widespread outrage. Pittsburgh officials told the New York Times that it was the first time "sound cannon" had been used publicly.
"Anyone who's looked at some of the signs at the various 'tea parties' knows perfectly well that race is a significant part of this backlash," he said. " . . . I'm not suggesting that every person angry about health care or immigration is a Klansman in disguise, but at the back of this white-hot rage that we've been seeing are people who are genuinely furious about the way the country is changing and changing racially."
A federal appeals court has struck down regulations that strictly limited how nonprofit groups raise and spend money for political campaigns.
Only one in four Oklahoma public high school students can name the first President of the United States, according to a survey released today.The survey was commissioned by the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs in observance of Constitution Day on Thursday.
President Obama is continuing President George W. Bush's effort to advance North American integration with a public-relations makeover calculated to place the program under the radar of public opinion and to deflect concerns about border security and national sovereignty.
When the U.S. Census Bureau counts same-sex married couples next year, demographers expect hundreds of thousands to report they are spouses -- even though legal same-sex weddings in the United States number in the tens of thousands.
