News

A notoriously combative MP was booted from the room after calling out Prime Minister David Cameron over his father being named in the Panama Papers leak. The Mirror reports: Labour veteran Dennis Skinner has been thrown out of the House of Commons chamber for calling the Prime Minister ‘dodgy Dave’. The infamous Beast of Bolsover made his attack as he …

The BBC reports: Music producer and reality television star David Gest has died in a London hotel aged 62, a statement from his friend says. Gest, who was 62 years old, passed away at the Four Seasons hotel in Canary Wharf. His friend and former bodyguard Imad Handi confirmed the news in a statement. “It is with great sadness that …

From the Agenda Project: Today, the Agenda Project Action Fund released a new ad calling on Senator Chuck Grassley to “Quit Stalling” and hold a hearing on President Obama’s pick for the Supreme Court. “Republicans like Senator Grassley have again and again demonstrated just how highly they view the American public,” said Agenda Project Action Fund President Erik Altieri, “Stop …

TIME recaps: This week, Last Week Tonight tackled credit reports, or as John Oliver calls them, “the basis for the single most important three digit number in your whole life other than 311, the Beatles of rap-rock.” Credit reports can affect many aspects of your life, including whether banks will lend you money or whether a landlord will rent you …

NBC News reports: CIA Director John Brennan told NBC News in an exclusive interview that his agency will not engage in harsh “enhanced interrogation” practices, including waterboarding, which critics call torture — even if ordered to by a future president. “I will not agree to carry out some of these tactics and techniques I’ve heard bandied about because this institution …

Via Talking Points Memo: President Barack Obama railed against the Republican senators who are stalling a consideration of his Supreme Court nominee, D.C. circuit judge Merrick Garland and vowed to support him through his term as President in an interview aired Sunday. I think there’s no doubt that Democrats and Republicans have gotten into a fix inside the Senate in …

From The Japan News: Starting this summer, the government will test a system in which foreign tourists will be able to verify their identities and buy things at stores using only their fingerprints. The government hopes to increase the number of foreign tourists by using the system to prevent crime and relieve users from the necessity of carrying cash or …

And this is not the first he’s been sued for proselytizing during traffic stops. Via the Washington Post: Indiana State Police trooper Brian Hamilton pulled over Wendy Pyle in January, according to a lawsuit filed earlier this week. He told Pyle that she had been speeding, went back to his patrol car and returned with a warning ticket. Then, the …

BOOM. Via the New York Daily News: Ted Cruz came to New York Wednesday talking about education, but he’s the one who got schooled. The lesson came from a group of Bronx high school students who told the Republican presidential candidate to stay away. Cruz was scheduled to speak at Bronx Lighthouse College Preparatory Academy until students wrote a letter …

Via Yahoo News: Country legend Merle Haggard, often called “the Poet of the Common Man,” whose music reflected his hardscrabble roots and hard-living ways as well as a tenderness that made him a revered songwriter, has died at his home near Redding, Calif. He was 79. The Associated Press confirmed his death. Haggard along with fellow Bakersfield, Calif., superstar Buck …

Last week it was announced the George Mason University was naming its law school after Antonin Scalia, prompting some of you to immediately note that the new name, the Antonin Scalia School of Law, yielded the acronym ASSoL, which is especially funny in our hashtag-happy era. Well, snicker no more. Or at least, snicker less. Via the Wall Street Journal: …

Politico reports: State lawmakers in Alabama said they had begun the impeachment process for the state’s governor on Tuesday. Rep. Ed Henry, a Republican, announced during a news conference at the statehouse in Montgomery that a bipartisan group would follow through and move to impeach the governor unless Gov. Robert Bentley resigns on his own. “We will start this process. …

From the New York Daily News: Sen. Chuck Schumer issued an urgent plea Monday for iGun Control ahead of the release of a new firearm that looks like a smartphone. The .380-caliber double-barrel handgun, manufactured by Ideal Conceal, is expected to hit the shelves in mid-2016 and will only cost $395, Schumer said. “At first glance or even second glance …

From Radar Online: Embattled White House candidate Ted Cruz‘s cheating scandal is set to explode wide-open, with fresh — and blockbuster — allegations that the married conservative senator was named in the black book of a notorious Washington D.C. madam who mysteriously died, RadarOnline.com has learned. Montgomery Blair Sibley, a former lawyer for madam Deborah Palfrey, has filed a dramatic …

Oh, let’s have a happy ending story. ABC News reports: A Chihuahua is in animal custody after leading police on a chase across the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge. The California Highway Patrol tweeted the small black dog “led us on quite a chase” Sunday and posted a video of it running furiously on the upper level of the bridge while …

The Hill reports: Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly said in an interview broadcast Sunday that there have been threats against her life since her hard-lined questioning of GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump. “It’s how he gins up anger among so many. So it manifests in my life in several ways,” Kelly said during an interview with Charlie Rose on “CBS …

Mediaite recaps: The deep-dive on Sunday night’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver took a look at the role of money in politics, but not in the we-all-know-there-should-less-money-in-politics sort of way. Instead, the segment examined the hours lost to congressional fundraising, and the mind-numbingly dull process for elected officials to ensure that they stay competitive in their reelection bids. Oliver …

Bernie Sanders is on a roll after sweeping last Saturday’s three Democratic caucuses and according to a CBS/YouGov poll issued today, he has a narrow lead in Wisconsin, where 96 delegates are at stake on Tuesday. The same poll shows Clinton holding a ten-point lead in New York’s April 19th primary. This weekend the two campaigns are battling over proposed …

From the Wall Street Journal: George Mason University School of Law, named after a founding father known for his refusal to sign the Constitution, is renaming itself after a man famed for a strict adherence to its words: Justice Antonin Scalia. George Mason University’s Board of Visitors, who are appointed by the Virginia governor, voted in favor of the renaming …

Megyn Kelly’s new hairstyle has prompted a minor Twitter meme comparing her look to the Star Trek: Voyager character Seven Of Nine, who was a former member of the Borg. Last night Kelly acknowledged the meme by appearing at the end of her Fox News show in a Starfleet uniform. Jokes about Fox News and the Borg are just too …