World: A report released in Britain today says at least 200 children, some as young as 8, were victims of sexual abuse by the late BBC host Jimmy Savile. The report says Savile, who in public was a zany shaggy-blonde character, did charity work to get access to children. Most of the activity took place between 1966 and 1976 at the peak of Savile’s popularity. The report said Savile’s behavior was known, but neither the BBC nor authorities took action at the time.

• Three Kurdish women, including a founder of the Kurdistan Workers Party PKK, were shot execution style inside a Kurdish institute in Paris. The PKK is fighting for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey. Kurdish militants speculated that the killings were done by the Turks … Turkish authorities suggested it might be the result of internal strife within the PKK.
• Two bomb blasts in the Pakistan city of Quetta killed at least 80 people. The first was a suicide bomber, the second a car bomb, authorities said. No one claimed responsibility, but the area has struggles between Sunni and Shiite Muslim sects as well as with the Taliban.

National: President Obama is taking heat for lack of diversity in his cabinet after naming four white men to fill vacancies at State, Defense, Treasury and CIA.

•   American Express announced it is cutting 5400 jobs, mostly in its travel business, suffering because travellers can make their own reservations.

Gunbeats: Vice President Joe Biden said he would deliver his gun violence recommendations to The White House on Tuesday. Although not showing his hand, he indicated that measures might include near-universal background checks and a limit on high-capacity magazines.

  The National Rifle Association issued a statement saying The White House has an agenda to attack the Second Amendment right to own guns and, “We will not allow law-abiding gun owners to be blamed for the acts of criminals and madmen.”

  As Biden was speaking one student was seriously wounded when a classmate opened fire with a shotgun yesterday morning at Taft High School in Kern County (Central), CA.

Cold, Dead Hand Dept.: James Yeager, CEO of a Tennessee company that trains people in weapon use, raged in an online video that “I’m not gonna let anyone take my guns. If it goes one inch further I’m gonna start killin’ people.”  Well then, would you settle for psychological screening?

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