A freak lightning storm across northeast California has resulted in nine more wildfires for an overworked California firefighting team.
The new blazes are in Lassen, Modoc and Shasta counties and are in rural areas that are not threatening any homes or outbuildings. A spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said crews are trying to contain them quickly so they can “concentrate on the large ones we still have.”
The main fire is a wildfire sparked by lightning on July 30th that has burned 13 ½ square miles of land in Mendocino County. Six communities north of San Francisco are dealing with various evacuation orders as at least 60 homes are considered in severe danger from the flames.
More than 2,000 firefighters are working in what spokeswoman Lynne Tolmachoff said are “steep, rugged terrain.” Only 35% of the Mendocino County fire has been contained by the fire crews.
On Friday, 8 firefighters were reported injured in an incident connected to that fire. The fire has injured through burns or injuries eleven firefighters since the start.
“While we’ve been making some progress, this is a very stubborn fire,” Tolmachoff told Fox News. “And we’re not even close to our peak fire season.”
A wave of thunderstorms rolled through Southern California Sunday causing massive flooding and landslides that left at least one person dead.
Two towns, Oak Glen and Forest Falls, were completely cut off from surrounding areas because of mudslides that blocked all roadways. At least 2,500 people are trapped including 500 campers at a Christian campground.
A U.S. Forest Service spokesman told KNBC-TV reported that the campground was hit hard with flooding and many campers had only seconds to escape a rush of mud and debris.
San Bernardino County Fire officials confirmed one person was found dead inside a car that was swept into a flooded creek.
Authorities were making reverse 911 calls to residents of the effected areas telling them to remain in their homes until maintenance workers could clear roads and officials were able to determine it was safe to travel.
The National Weather Service said that some areas received up to 5 inches of rain.
Cartoon Network will be airing a show in its late night “adult swim” block that will feature a character who the show says is Jesus that smokes marijuana, swears and use the Lord’s name in vain.
The show is called “Black Jesus.”
The show will have the “Jesus” character living in Compton, California, participating in illegal activities with drug addicts and alcoholics and conducting other activities that mock Christians.
The character claims that he’s just about “spreading love and kindness” while participating in questionable activities.
Several groups including One Million Moms is calling for Christians to protest the show saying that the Christian faith should not be used as a source of derision in manners that would never be allowed on television for Muslims or Jews.
Supporters of the show’s creator Aaron McGruder say that the show is just satire and people need to develop a sense of humor.
A California school district has been caught lying about a project that told students to see if the Holocaust was an actual historical event or “a propaganda tool.”
Rialto United School District came under fire in May when it was revealed that around 2,000 8th grade students were given the project that the school termed an “exercise in critical thinking.” The school tried to appease community members by stating that none of the students actually argued the Holocaust did not occur.
The Los Angeles Daily News did an investigation that showed the school lied to parents and the public.
“At least 50 essays (that) denied or doubted the Holocaust occurred,” the LADN reported. “Even many students who agreed the Holocaust occurred said there were good reasons to believe it had not or that elements of the historical record were actually hoaxes.”
Some of the student deniers wrote:
The Holocaust is “a profitable hoax made by the Jews to obtain land, money and power.”
“With the evidence that was given to me, it clearly was obvious” that the Holocaust never occurred “and I wouldn’t know why anyone would think otherwise.”
If the Nazis “would have even experimented these so called gas chambers the Nazis would have died also, so I do not believe in gas chambers.”
Even more disturbing than the comments of the students was praise from some teachers to the students who denied the Holocaust. One paper obtained by the Daily News had a comment to a denying student “You did well using the evidence to support your claim.”
Even with the school district being exposed as having deceived parents and the public, they are still not revealing who created the assignment or the educators who gave out the lesson. They also won’t say if any discipline has been taken against the teachers in question.
A California school district is being defiant in its refusal to apologize for infringing on the First Amendment rights of students by censoring God or Jesus from student led functions.
Attorneys representing the Brawley Union High School District wrote a 10 page letter defending the school’s right to silence students from mentioning God or Jesus at graduation.
“It is well established in the Ninth Circuit and California that a public school salutatorian has no constitutional right to lead a prayer or include sectarian or proselytizing content in his/her graduation speech,” the document reads.
The district is the place where 18-year-old Brooks Hamby made national headlines by standing up for his Christians beliefs and his right under the First Amendment to say the name of Jesus during a graduation ceremony speech. His lawyers have been demanding the school apologize for their infringement on his religious freedom.
“The district was legally obligated to ensure prayers and other sectarian, proseltyzing content were omitted from Mr. Hamby’s speech,” the school’s attorneys wrote. “Censorship of the speech was necessary to avoid an Establishment Clause violation.”
“I was really surprised the school would deny my speech not once, twice, but three times,” Hamby told Fox News Todd Starnes. “I just wanted to say a few nice words and allow people to see the good news – which is the Gospel.”
A California wildfire is raging out of control, burning homes and forcing the cancellation of a Fourth of July parade and celebration.
The fire near Julian, California is one of several in the state that has been hampered by a major drought. The Julian fire has forced 200 families out of their homes and is covering six square miles.
Firefighters had the flames 40 percent contained but the fire increased to 217 acres from 150. The growth of the fire forced Julian to force it’s Fourth of July celebration that brings up to 5,000 tourists a year.
Another fire near Napa that’s burned more than 4,300 acres raced up a steep hillside so fast that firefighters were forced to build containment lines without the help of heavy equipment. The fire was burning north, saving the county’s famous vineyards from the flames.
The causes of the fires remain unknown.
A student at California’s Brawley Union High School defied the school’s leadership during his graduation ceremony speech.
The school’s officials had told Brooks Hamby, the class salutatorian, he would not be allowed to make any reference to his Christian faith during his speech. He submitted his speech three times to the school only to have it rejected over issues of faith.
“In coming before you today, I presented three drafts of my speech, all of them denied on account of my desire to share with you my personal thoughts and inspiration to you: my Christian faith,” Hamby said in his speech. “No man or woman has ever truly succeeded or been fulfilled on the account of living for others and not standing on what they knew in their heart was right or good.”
Hamby also quoted Matthew 5:13: “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”
Hamby has been a leader for the school’s mock-trial team and also a U.S. Senate page.
A new study from the University of Southern California shows fasting for as little as two days can regenerate the body’s immune system.
The study showed that fasting worked not only for normal, “healthy” people but also the elderly and people whose immune systems have been compromised because of chemotherapy treatments.
The periods without eating would lower the amount of white blood cells in the body, which would trigger stem cells to begin regeneration of the white blood cells, rushing them into the body. However, the scientists also found that the rush of white blood cells also repaired damage.
“[Fasting] gives the OK for stem cells to go ahead and being proliferating and rebuild the entire system,” Professor Valter Longo said. “And the good news is that the body got rid of the parts of the system that might be damaged or old, the inefficient parts, during the fasting.”
A pilot clinical trial found that fasting for 72 hours prior to chemotherapy protected the patients against toxicity.
“He responded in an extremely emotional manner.”
That was one of the excuses given by a spokesman for the Oakland Unified School District after a school resource officer was arrested on felony charges for dumping a wheelchair bound student onto the floor after punching him several times.
A wheelchair bound student, Francisco Martinez, was lingering with some other students in a hallway late for their classes. Two officers were seen in a security camera video telling the students they needed to move on to their classrooms. The students refused, so one of the officers, Marchell Mitchell, grabbed the handles of Martinez’ wheelchair and started to push him down the hallway.
Martinez objected and started slapping the officer’s hands in an attempt to get him to stop pushing the wheelchair.
The officer then handcuffed Martinez, struck him several times and then dumped the student onto the floor. The school immediately fired Mitchell and had him arrested by Oakland police.
“We as a district apologize to the family of the victim,” said Oakland Unified School District spokesman Troy Flint.