Two Houston women have filed a lawsuit against the Texas Department of Public Safety claiming they were subjected to a humiliating roadside body cavity search that left them violated and traumatized. - “I was embarrassed, in a bikini, on the side of the freeway. And it hurts so bad to even go through something like that,” 27-year-old Brandy Hamilton told KTRK News. Hamilton and 26-year-old Alexandria Randle were driving home to Houston after spending last year’s Memorial Day at a nearby beach with family and friends when Texas Trooper Nathaniel Turner pulled them over for speeding on the side of Highway 288 and ordered them to exit their vehicle. The women were still wearing their bathing suits and were not permitted to put clothes on or cover up before exiting the car. The trooper claimed to smell marijuana in the car and called a female trooper to search the women’s body parts for drugs, despite numerous pleas from the ladies.

Nicolás Maduro says whistleblower has 'told the truth in spirit of rebellion', while Nicaragua also weighs asylum offer. - Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro said on Friday he had decided to offer asylum to former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, who has petitioned several countries to avoid capture by Washington. "In the name of America's dignity...I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to Edward Snowden," Maduro told a televised military parade marking Venezuela's independence day. Maduro said Venezuela was ready to offer him sanctuary, and that the details Snowden had revealed of a US spy program had exposed the nefarious schemes of the US "empire". "He has told the truth, in the spirit of rebellion, about the US spying on the whole world," Maduro said.

RNV: Gobierno venezolano ofrece asilo humanitario a Edward Snowden + Audio
Venezuela Analysis: Maduro: Venezuela Will Offer Snowden Political Asylum
CNN: Venezuela offers asylum to U.S. intel leaker Snowden, "state News" says
Jason Ditz: Venezuela Offers Asylum to Snowden, Nicaragua Also Hints at Possibility

Gas chambers could be brought back to life in the state of Missouri, where the attorney general has indicated replacing lethal-injection with the long-forgotten and controversial means of execution before the former’s drug supply runs out. "As each supply expires, the department's ability to carry out lawfully imposed capital sentences diminishes," Attorney General Chris Koster said in a motion filed with the court. "Unless the court changes its current course, the legislature will soon be compelled to fund statutorily-authorized alternative methods of execution to carry out lawful judgments." Only two forms of execution are permitted by Missouri law: lethal injection and death by gas.

The Takfiri militant who was seen eating an organ of a dead Syrian soldier in a recent video has threatened to commit more gruesome murders if foreign-backed terrorists in Syria do not receive more military aid from abroad. “We will do worse than this if we don’t get help and no-fly-zone and heavy weapons,” said Khalid al Hamad, known by his nom de guerre Abu Sakkar, in an exclusive interview with the British state-run broadcaster, the BBC.

SANA: Large amounts of dangerous chemicals seized in Banias - The competent authorities seized large amounts of dangerous chemicals inside a terrorists' den in a farm in Banias. An official source told SANA that the seized amounts included 79 barrels of polyethylene glycol, 67 barrels of Monoethylene glycol, 25 barrels of Monoethanolamine, 68 barrels of diethanolamine and 42 barrels of Triethanolamine.

■ Egypt’s Health Ministry has confirmed at least 30 deaths and over 200 people wounded today, as supporters of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) government, deposed earlier this week in a military coup, rallied in Cairo and elsewhere to protest the junta. ■ Troops from the Egyptian Republican Guard shot several of the protesters, and mobs of junta supporters, many of whom participated in last Friday’s protest which precipitated the coup, attacked the pro-Morsi crowds, accusing them of trying to “divide” Egypt. ■ FJP protesters vowed to remain in the streets in spite of the violence, and said they will not accept the “interim” government imposed by the junta. President Morsi and materially all of the top FJP leadership are now missing, detained at locations unknown without charges. ■ The African Union has also become the first international body to take serious note of the coup, announcing that it will suspend Egypt’s membership until civilian rule is restored. This is standard practice in the AU, though with many Western nations refusing to call the coup a “coup” it was uncertain if the AU would simply gloss over it as well.

Russia Today: 36 dead, over 1,000 injured
Stephen Lendman: Business As Usual in Egypt
Robert Fisk: When is a military coup not a military coup? When it happens in Egypt, apparently
Zero Hedge: 15 Photos From the Tahrir Square Protests You’ll Never See In Legacy Media

At least six supporters of deposed Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi have been killed today as a crowd of hundreds tried to march towards the military barracks in Cairo where he is being held by the military that overthrew him. Thousands of Morsi supporters demonstrated in cities across the country on what his Muslim Brotherhood called a 'Friday of rage' against what they describe as a military coup that toppled Egypt's first elected leader a year after he took office. In Cairo, a crowd of Islamists surged across a bridge over the Nile River after nightfall and clashed with Morsi opponents near Tahrir Square and outside the state TV building.

The Christians United for Israel Washington Summit will convene once again on July 22-24, 2013.
■ In a world where discernment and sensibilities prevailed, the ravings of these lunatics would be ignored and laughed at. That's not exactly what we have. These religious 'leaders', politicians and media propagandists are dangerous, not only to our own country but to the world. We can't look the other way and hope that they will disappear.
■ We can boycott, divest and support sanctions against Israel (BDS). We can walk away from liars and deceivers. We can try to educate others. We can refuse to enter into a relationship with churches and organizations whose message is not one of peace and who literally worship the tribe of the 'chosen ones' including all of their criminal elements.
■ We can approve of the notion of Eretz Yisrael, World War III and crimes against humanity in the name of God. Fallacies of epic proportion. — No, we reject those fallacies emphatically.
■ Yes, we are as opinionated as the CUFI crowd. We just don't have the mass media to talk our opinions up, few politicians attempting to stop the foreign influence and our collection plate is empty. Heart...maybe that's all we have left...maybe.

■ Demonstrations were held in over 100 cities throughout the United States on Thursday in opposition to the illegal and unconstitutional spying programs revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden. ■ The “Restore the Fourth” movement, which began on the aggregator site Reddit and describes itself as a “non-partisan, non-violent movement,” organized demonstrations on July Fourth, US Independence Day, in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, Seattle, Memphis, Miami, and many other cities. ■ The movement takes its name from the Fourth Amendment, which upholds the right of citizens to be free from “unreasonable searches and seizures” of their “persons, houses, papers, and effects,” without the issuing of a specific warrant based upon probable cause.

Paul Craig Roberts: - No Hope On The Jobs Front. - Do you remember the promise of the New Economy that was going to replace the lost “dirty fingernail” manufacturing jobs with innovative highly paid New Economy jobs? Well, the promise was just another deception from the elites who have stolen Americans’ future. For the umpteenth consecutive month and year, the June BLS payroll jobs report (released on July 5) shows that the US economy has created no such jobs. The same old tired categories account for the same old lowly paid new domestic service jobs.

Paul Craig Roberts: Lawlessness Is The New Normal - In various articles and in my latest book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism And Economic Dissolution Of The West, I have pointed out that the European sovereign debt crisis is being used to terminate the sovereignty of the countries that are members of the EU. There is no doubt that this is true, but the sovereignty of the EU member states is only nominal. Although the individual countries still retain some sovereignty from the EU government, they are all under Washington’s thumb, as demonstrated by the recent illegal and hostile action taken on Washington’s orders by France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Austria against the airliner carrying Bolivia’s President Evo Morales.