Nation Briefs
BY Wire reports
Monday, February 25, 2013
2/25/13 at 3:08 AM
Farrakhan focuses on economics in Chicago
CHICAGO - Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan is calling on blacks nationwide to curb economic disparities by cutting back on excessive spending, pooling resources and investing in land.
The 79-year-old leader laid out the action plan Sunday during his three-hour speech at the Chicago-based movement's annual Saviours' Day convention.
National Assistant Minister Ishmael Muhammad tells The Associated Press that the group is looking at thousands of acres of land in the Midwest.
Saviours' Day commemorates the founding of the Nation of Islam, which has espoused black nationalism and self-reliance since the 1930s. When President Barack Obama was elected in 2008, the resounding tone of the convention was jubilant.
But the tone was different Sunday, with Farrakhan saying Obama's re-election doesn't solve all of blacks' problems.
More in Pa., Ohio claim sexual abuse by friar
TOLEDO, Ohio - About 50 more people have come forward to say they were sexually abused at Catholic schools in Pennsylvania and Ohio by a Franciscan brother who killed himself in January, said an attorney who settled 11 alleged abuse cases against the friar.
Brother Stephen Baker, 62, stabbed himself in the heart at a western Pennsylvania monastery Jan. 26, a little more than a week after the disclosure of financial settlements in alleged abuse cases in Warren, Ohio. A coroner told the Altoona Mirror that Baker left a short note apologizing for his actions.
The new accusers have alleged in recent weeks that they were abused between 1982 and 2007, attorney Mitchell Garabedian said Sunday. Some said Baker abused them even after he left teaching in 2000 when he would attend school events in Johnstown, Pa., Garabedian said.
Senators dispute record for private gun sales
WASHINGTON - A dispute over whether to require record keeping for private gun sales is holding up a compromise between Republican and Democratic senators over expanding background checks for firearms transactions, one of President Barack Obama's top gun control priorities, people familiar with the private talks said Sunday.
Two GOP and two Democratic senators have been looking for a compromise on requiring more of the checks, currently required only for transactions by federally licensed dealers. Private transactions at gun shows, online and elsewhere are not covered by the system, which is designed to keep firearms from criminals, people with serious mental problems and others.
The senators have been bargaining quietly over ways to expand the checks to private sales. But Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., a conservative who has taken a leading role in the talks, has opposed requiring record keeping for private transactions because of a concern it could lead to a national registry of gun owners.
