After two months Italy has finally formed a new government, headed by a compromise prime minister, Enrico Letta. A Congo-born doctor named Cecile Kyenge will become Minister for Integration, making her Italy’s first black cabinet minister. Two police officers were shot and wounded outside the swearing-in ceremony for Mr. Letta, apparently by a man who was upset and despairing over being unemployed.
In other news, the Taliban began their “spring offensive” in Afghanistan by detonating an IED in Ghazni Province, killing three policemen.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, Jerry Gordon, KGS, McR, Paul Green, Steen, TV, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.
Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.
EU OKs Spain’s Deadline Postponement to 2016
European Commission OKs Spanish reform, stability program
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS — The European Commission on Friday said it “welcomes Spain’s adoption of a national reform plan and of a stability program”. Pending a presentation of its findings on May 29, the Commission also said that postponing its 3% deficit-reduction target from 2014 to 2016 is “coherent” with its own analysis of Spain’s situation.
With the Spanish government’s newly approved program for fiscal stability Premier Mariano Rajoy sought a two-year extension to meet European Union deficit rules.The cabinet’s program for fiscal stability postpones the 3% deficit-reduction target from 2014 to 2016 and aims to reduce the national deficit this year from 10.6% to 6.3% (against previous estimates of 4.5%). The deficit will fall to 5.5% in 2014 and to 4.1% in 2015, while 2013 GDP is now estimated at -1.3% (against the government’s previous estimate of -0.5%). The Spanish economy is expected to rise slightly 0.5% in 2014, adding 0.9% in 2015 and 1.3% in 2016.
Having just approved a new packet of austerity measures, the government estimates unemployment will remain unchanged this year at 27.2%, falling to 26.7% in 2014 and to 25.8% in 2015 and 24.8% in 2016. The new deficit-busting measures leave the VAT tax unchanged, prolong the income tax hike by another year, and add new taxes on companies and bank deposits. “We will not increase income or VAT taxes”, said Deputy Premier Soraya Saenz de Santamaria. “Today’s Spain has nothing to do with that of a year ago”, Economy Minister Luis de Guindos said of the new unemployment estimates.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
European Countries Can Relax Austerity Policies, Says Rehn
ECB has helped boost financial stability says commissioner
(ANSA) — Brussels, April 25 — European countries like Italy have done so well with fiscal consolidation, including austerity measures, that they may now be able to slow their pace, the European Union’s top economic official said Thursday.
Policies can now be a bit less aggressive because of previous strong measures, said Olli Rehn, commissioner of economic and monetary affairs.
The work of authorities including the European Central Bank has also contributed to greater financial stability in the region, he told a conference in Brussels.
“The slowing of consolidation is now possible, thanks to the efforts made by the countries in difficulty, the commitment by the ECB, and credible budgetary policies,” he said.
Earlier, a senior official with the International Monetary Fund said that continued austerity policies could hurt Europe’s economies and that policymakers should now turn to boosting growth.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Everything is Rigged: The Biggest Price-Fixing Scandal Ever
Conspiracy theorists of the world, believers in the hidden hands of the Rothschilds and the Masons and the Illuminati, we skeptics owe you an apology. You were right. The players may be a little different, but your basic premise is correct: The world is a rigged game. We found this out in recent months, when a series of related corruption stories spilled out of the financial sector, suggesting the world’s largest banks may be fixing the prices of, well, just about everything.
You may have heard of the Libor scandal, in which at least three — and perhaps as many as 16 — of the name-brand too-big-to-fail banks have been manipulating global interest rates, in the process messing around with the prices of upward of $500 trillion (that’s trillion, with a “t”) worth of financial instruments. When that sprawling con burst into public view last year, it was easily the biggest financial scandal in history — MIT professor Andrew Lo even said it “dwarfs by orders of magnitude any financial scam in the history of markets.”
That was bad enough, but now Libor may have a twin brother. Word has leaked out that the London-based firm ICAP, the world’s largest broker of interest-rate swaps, is being investigated by American authorities for behavior that sounds eerily reminiscent of the Libor mess. Regulators are looking into whether or not a small group of brokers at ICAP may have worked with up to 15 of the world’s largest banks to manipulate ISDAfix, a benchmark number used around the world to calculate the prices of interest-rate swaps.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
French Socialists Slam Rigour, Merkel’s ‘Selfishness’
Document accuses Europe’s conservatives
(ANSAmed) — PARIS — France’s Socialist party has once again spoken out against the Europe of austerity and rigour in a document slamming European conservatives and the ‘selfish intransigence of chancellor Merkel’.
In a text published on Friday by Le Monde, which will be presented this afternoon at a committee tasked with preparing the party’s convention on Europe on June 16,d the Socialist leadership directly criticized the chancellor. ‘The European project is today humiliate by an alliance of convenience between the Thatcher spirit of the current British premier who conceives Europe only ‘ a la carte’ and shrinking in importance and the selfish intransigence of chancellor Merkel’, said the text.
The French Socialist party of President Francois Hollande accused Merkel of only considering the ‘savings of deposit holders on her side of the Rhine, Berlin’s budget and her electoral future’.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Slovenia to Begin Recovering in 2014, Bloomberg Says
But GDP to shrink by 1.9% this year
(ANSAmed) — LJUBLJANA, APRIL 26 — Slovenian GDP will shrink by 1.9% in 2013, add 0.4% in 2014 and grow by 1.5% in 2015, according to Bloomberg estimates released on Friday. An obstacle on the road to recovery are Slovenia’s ailing banks, which need recapitalization of 900 million euros by July, Premier Alenka Bratusek estimated. Economy Minister Uros Cufer last week met with US investors to assess their interest in Slovenian bonds, ahead of an issue to shore up the nation’s banking system as well as state coffers. Slovenia in October 2012 placed 2.25 billion euros’ worth of 10-year bonds at 5.5% interest on the US market.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Ban Lifted on Italian Salami Imports to U.S.
Demand for cured meats could bring 250 million euros in exports
(ANSA) — Rome, April 26 — A long-standing ban on the import of Italian salami to the United States due to Federal Drug Administration (FDA) rules against cured-pork meat imports will be lifted starting May 28, an announcement by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services (Aphis) said on Friday.
“This is a momentous event — one of the most important for the production and export of Italian salami and the result of 15 years of (lobbying) work,” Italian industry association Assica said.
“Until now Americans have been forced to buy low-quality imitations of Italian cured meats,” said farmers’ organization Coldiretti.
Coldiretti estimates that the ban costs the industry more than 250 million euros per year in lost exports.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Bloomberg: You Will Never Know Where Our New Spy Cameras Are
New York City police officials intend to expand the already extensive use of surveillance cameras throughout town. The plan, unveiled Thursday, comes as part of a drive for increased security around the US following the Boston Marathon attack.
New York City Police Department Commissioner Ray Kelly announced the plan during a press conference with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, in which the two announced that the suspected Boston Marathon bombers were planning to attack New York next. The pair said they hope to discourage criminals by using so-called “smart cameras” that will aggregate data from 911 alerts, arrest records, mapped crime patterns, surveillance cameras and radiation detectors, among other tools, according to The Verge.
“You’re never going to know where all of our cameras are,” Bloomberg told reporters gathered outside City Hall.”And that’s one of the ways you deter people; they just don’t know whether the person sitting next to you is somebody sitting there or a detective watching.”…
The commissioner previously said that at least 16 terror plots had been thwarted in New York City since the attack on September 11, 2001, asserting that such law enforcement success show that the surveillance tools put in place since then have been effective. His boast came in the face of the New York Civil Liberties Union and similar privacy advocates who have asked for more transparency on the issue of police monitoring.
“The privacy issue has really been taken off the table,” Kelly said Thursday. “I don’t think people are concerned about it. I think people accept it in a post-9/11 world.“
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
DARPA Looks for a Guided Bullet With DEAD Reckoning Navigation
DARPA has long had aspirations toward a guided sniper bullet, though the intriguing EXACTO project has thus far seem to focus more on a heavy .50-cal projectile to be guided smartbomb-style by a laser dot.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
HHS Spending Millions in Taxpayer Money to Run Obamacare PR Campaign
(NaturalNews) Every supporter of Obamacare, from the president on down, has spent hours upon hours and expended exhaustive amounts of energy telling Americans what a wonderful law it is and how fortunate we are to finally have the federal government running (sorry — “managing”) our healthcare system.
So why is Uncle Sam spending tens of millions of our tax dollars on public relations campaigns aimed at convincing us what we supposedly should already know?
And yet, that’s exactly what the federal government is doing. According to the investigative Washington Free Beacon, the Department of Health and Human Services — the agency charged with implementing Obamacare — just announced a multi-million dollar PR contract “to convince people to join the program and keep it from collapsing…”…
Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., a member of the Congressional Health Care Caucus, bashed the administration in a statement to the WFB for “spending millions of hard-earned in taxpayer dollars on an advertising campaign to tell Americans what’s ‘good for them’ in the flawed and harmful healthcare law.”
“As Americans are harmed because of these disastrous policies, no public relations campaign will convince them otherwise,“ said Price.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
How Pothead Terrorists Almost Outsmarted the Police
The local police reacted heroically to the Boston terror bombings, and it is tragic that MIT police officer Sean Collier was a victim of the terrorists’ shooting spree. However, the inescapable conclusion, after the media get done praising local police reaction to the bombings, is that law enforcement at all levels broke down, leaving law-abiding citizens and the police themselves exposed and vulnerable to criminal and terrorist elements. So-called “Boston Strong,” a solidarity campaign with the community and the victims, is a concept that should have been in place to prevent terrorism from happening.
One of the officials who used to be in charge of homeland security for the state of Massachusetts is Juliette Kayyem, a former Obama Administration official who suddenly emerged on CNN after the bombings as an expert unable or unwilling to identify the terrorists as Islamic. It was a disgraceful performance.
As if the bombings were not bad enough, the emerging evidence is that the terrorist brothers were marijuana dealers before they took up jihadism, and that they avoided law enforcement while dealing drugs in the community and on campus. In other words, these terrorists were planning violence against Americans while breaking our drug laws, perhaps to finance their own terrorism. They made a mockery of the local police and the feds and almost got away, if not for their own reckless behavior after they were publicly identified, and a resident who spotted one of the fugitives in his backyard on a boat.
It was not a success story for law enforcement, no matter how much spin is applied by the media. And while Obama has expressed his sympathy for the victims, the federal government failed to stop the bombings in Boston when they already had information about the older brother’s foreign travels and jihadist activities. Obama’s administration has to explain how federal agencies like the FBI and CIA let the older brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev travel in and out of a Muslim region of Russia where terrorist groups apparently openly plot against the West.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Incredible! NYT Pushing Toxic Cancer Drugs for Healthy Women Who Have No Cancer
(NaturalNews) A taxpayer-funded government task force has issued new guidelines that literally urge healthy women to take toxic cancer drugs “preventively” in order to allegedly decrease their risk of developing breast cancer. As recently promoted by The New York Times (NYT), these shocking new recommendations from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) have been issued despite a complete lack of evidence that the dangerous cancer drugs being recommended have any preventive efficacy whatsoever.
[…]
However, as many as seven additional women per 1,000 taking tamoxifen or raloxifene will also admittedly develop blood clots during the same time frame, according to the report, while about four others per 1,000 will develop uterine cancer from the drugs. These figures represent a doubled risk of both conditions as a result of taking either of the two drugs preventively rather than doing nothing at all, which means millions of women are now at substantial health risk due to USPSTF’s recommendations.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Informant: Taliban Already in US, May Attack Any Time
An FBI informant says he worked to infiltrate the world of terror sympathizers and that members of the Taliban already are in the United States. It was the Taliban that controlled the largely ungoverned Afghanistan when the U.S. coalition went into that nation to clean out the influences that allowed Osama bin Laden’s agenda to thrive before the 9/11 terror attacks on the U.S.
And the comments from South Floridian David Mahmood Siddiqui come just as the nation is breathing a sigh of relief over the death of one of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects, and the capture of the other. “I am an informant and all I can tell you is that Talibans are walking freely right here in the soil of America right now, right now,” he told CBS4 in Miami.
The interview was conducted by CBS4 Chief Investigator Michele Gillen. He told the station that America is at risk of another such attack any time.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Irish Muslim Radical Says Americans Should be Grateful More People Didn’t Die in Boston
An Irish Muslim who once threatened to kill Barack Obama has refused to condemn the Boston bombers and claimed they gave Americans ‘a taste of their own medicine’.
Khalid Kelly, a 46-year-old from Dublin, made the controversial remarks in an exclusive interview with the Irish Sun newspaper.
In the course of the interview, he refused to condemn Chechen terror brothers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev for the attack which killed three people including an eight-year-old boy.
Nicknamed Taliban Terry, Kelly told the paper that he was not surprised by the attack, the first on US soil since 9/11.
And he told Americans to be glad nobody else had died in the marathon bomb.
Kelly said: “Thousands of Muslims are being killed every day from Syria to Afghanistan.
“A lot of them are being murdered at the hands of the Americans, and they never have a minute’s silence.
“Where are the tears for these people? Three people get killed and they have a big day of remembrance. They should remember the people they are killing.
“This is a war and they should be thankful that it wasn’t more.”
Formerly known as Terence Kelly, the converted Muslim warned of more attacks on American soil.
He said: “Sheikh Osama Bin Laden said that until the last soldier leaves our land, you will never enjoy one day of security. And his words are coming through now.
“They are worried all the time and they should be worried. As long as you are killing people, then you will be killed.
“This is a taste of the same medicine that America is dishing out around the world.”
The report says that Dubliner Kelly converted to Islam while serving a jail sentence in Saudi Arabia for illegally distilling and selling alcohol.
He claims that he trained with tribal warlords with the intention of going to Afghanistan during time in Pakistan.
Irish police arrested Kelly in May 2011 following a newspaper interview when he said al-Qaeda had chosen Ireland as a perfect place to launch an attack on Obama. The paper says he has since denied those claims.
Kelly has insisted that Ireland would not be a legitimate al-Qaeda target.
And he even compared the 9/11 bombers to Irish rebel leader Michael Collins.
He claimed: “Michael Collins was celebrated on the Late Late Show on TV a few years ago as a hero, but 100 years ago he was a terrorist.
“At a later stage, the IRA said it would have a bigger effect on the English if we bombed them at home. And it did.
“They went to London and it was very effective. I think that is what is happening at the moment. You have come to our homeland and are bombing and killing Muslims.
“If people cannot get to the Jihad, what are they going to do? They are going to fight the enemy where they can find them.
“Whether it is right or not I don’t know, but I’m telling you what is happening. And in America, where they have easy access to weapons, it’s honestly surprising that it’s not happening every week.”
| — Hat tip: McR | [Return to headlines] |
Marco Rubio: Corrupted by Washington in Only Two Years
From Tea Party favorite to corrupt Washington insider in only two years, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Marco Rubio.
It’s hard to believe that Marco Rubio has only been in the Senate since January 2011. With the way he has been going on lately, telling conservatives what a bunch of unenlightened rubes we are for objecting to his immigration reform, you would think he’d been a Senator for 20 years.
The once Tea Party favorite, whose chances of being elected President are now on par with Mark Sanford, has been at the forefront of jamming the Democrat’s dream of opening the immigration floodgates through Congress, an effort that shares many the hallmarks of the passage of Obamacare:
1. Put together in the dead of night by Washington insiders with zero transparency. Check. 2. Rushing the bill through the legislative process as fast as humanly possible before the opposition can get their act together. Check. 3. Refusing to accept even the barest hint of cooperation with Republicans who aren’t RINOs. Check. 4. We’ll have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it! Check.
Representing everything the Tea Party movement has dedicated itself against Rubio is blazing a trail of lies and deceit that must make Obama proud.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Monsanto Now Threatens to Sue Vermont if Public Allowed to Know About Genetic Danger
Despite overwhelming public support and support from a clear majority of Vermont’s Agriculture Committee, Vermont legislators are dragging their feet on a proposed GMO labeling bill. Why? Because Monsanto has threatened to sue the state if the bill passes. The popular legislative bill requiring mandatory labels on genetically engineered food (H-722) is languishing in the Vermont House Agriculture Committee, with only four weeks left until the legislature adjourns for the year. Despite thousands of emails and calls from constituents who overwhelmingly support mandatory labeling, despite the fact that a majority (6 to 5) of Agriculture Committee members support passage of the measure, Vermont legislators are holding up the labeling bill and refusing to take a vote.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Jokes About Not Being “Young Muslim Socialist”
(AGI) Washington, Apr 28 — U.S. President Barack Obama joked about himself and the Congress at this year’s annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday evening.
He said he was “not the strapping young Muslim socialist” he used to be. His audience laughed as he poked fun at them. “My job is to be President; your job is to keep me humble. Frankly, I think I’m doing my job better,” he said to the press.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Obama as Messiah — Anointing Oil Included!
Recent developments in the American petroleum sector have utterly exposed the rhetorical excesses of Obama, suggesting his speeches are designed towards supporting a certain ideology over known facts. During a period where Barack’s energy policy can be succinctly quoted as, “We can’t drill our way out,” huge advances are being made in stateside production, daily. In fact, America recently passed Saudi Arabia as the world’s #1 petroleum producer. Moreover, the EIA announced the US will be fully energy independent by the year 2035.
It seems as if Obama is against developing new sources of native oil, given his recurrent embargoing of the industry. There are said to be few direct statistical correlations in economics, but one certainly stands out. Charles C. Mann declares this in What If We Never Run Out of Oil?:
…a basic truth: economic growth and energy use have marched in lockstep for generations. Between 1900 and 2000, global energy consumption rose roughly 17-fold, the University of Manitoba environmental scientist Vaclav Smil has calculated, while economic output rose 16-fold — “as close a link as one may find in the unruly realm of economic affairs.” According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the United States has experienced 11 recessions since the end of the Second World War. All but one were associated with spikes in energy costs — specifically, abrupt jumps in the price of oil.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Police State Registry System Being Set Up to Track Your Vaccination Status
The Centers for Disease Control has been quietly rolling out a nationwide program called the Immunization Information Systems (IIS), registering your vaccine information into a database. [1] This effort has been run in parallel with state vaccine registry implementations. What is the intention of such programs? My colleague Leslie Manookian, writer and director of the movie The Greater Good, wrote in a recent article, the “CDC has openly stated that vaccine registries are a tool to identify areas of ‘undervaccination’ so that they can be ‘addressed’ and brought into ‘compliance.’“ If you exempt your child from being vaccinated, your refusal is also being tracked and put into the database. If you want to know why this is a big deal, read on.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
What kind of idiot would write, “Until we fully understand what turned two brothers who allegedly perpetrated the Boston Marathon bombings into murderers, it is hard to make any policy recommendation other than this: We need to redouble our efforts to make America stronger and healthier so it remains a vibrant counterexample to whatever bigoted ideology may have gripped these young men.”
“Whatever bigoted ideology”? This is what Thomas L. Friedman of The New York Times wrote on April 21.
Friedman had spent years in Lebanon, first as a reporter for the United Press International from 1979 to 1981. From 1975 to 1990, Lebanon was convulsed by a civil war between its Christian population and Palestinian forces aligned with Syrian-backed Muslims. In 1981 he was hired by the New York Times and won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon after years of Katyusha rocket attacks on northern Israel. He also won the George Polk Award for Foreign Reporting.
He would serve as the Times Bureau Chief in Jerusalem from June 1984 to February 1988, receiving a second Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the first Palestinian intifada. He witnessed Islamic terrorism first hand and learned nothing from it.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Time for the Republican Party to Step Aside?
The history of our nation will show that the great political question of our era is the contest between ideals of limited government and individual freedom versus central planning and bureaucratic control. At this crucial point in our history, it would be of value to the free citizen, if the philosophies of the two dominant political parties reflected these contending positions. Unfortunately, in that contest, one has to wonder whether the Democratic Party and the Republican Party are but two sides of the same coin of big government?
In the march toward accumulation of power by the federal government, the so-called “liberal” Democrats usually get all the blame for their initiation of grandiose, unsustainable social schemes. LBJ’s “Great Society” comes to mind. Jimmy Carter’s creation of the Department of Education is another example. But what are we to say of the Republicans?
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Top Fifty Threats From Obamacare
A special thanks to Greg Kellogg for posting this on Facebook and sharing so many interesting articles and news-stories to help wake up America. Permission was given to share this. Please feel free to send me your stories and news that moves you. Also, if you would like a free guide on 25 tips that will save your life, order your complimentary guide at: http://www.OregonHealthNews.org
1) Pg 22 mandates that the Government will audit books of ALL EMPLOYERS that self insure. So every employer in the United States will be subjected to a health insurance audit just as all taxpayers are subject to audit. Of course, we will have to pay for an entire new bureaucracy to do this — the Internal Health Revenue Service?
2) Pg 30, Sec 123 states that there will be a government committee that decides what treatments you are allowed and what your overall benefits are.
3) Pg 29, lines 4-16 basically mandates the rationing of health care as is being done in Canada.
4) Pg 42 recognizes the power of the Health Choices Commissioner to determine your health benefits. You will have no choice.
5) Pg 50, section 152 states that free, taxpayer-paid health care will be given to the 30 million non-citizens in the USA, even illegal aliens.
6) Pg 58 states that government will have possession of all your health care records & history including finances and you will have to have a National ID Health card.
7) Pg 59, lines 21-24 gives direct access to your banks accounts to compel you to pay any out-of-pocket or premium costs electronically without your previous consent…
Pg 65, sec 164 provides for a political payoff from the Democrats and Obama; a special subsidized plan for retirees and their families in unions community groups like ACORN…
Pg 203, line 14-15 actually says that “The tax imposed under this section shall not be treated as tax.” Yes, it says that.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Gives Big, Secret Push to Internet Surveillance
Senior Obama administration officials have secretly authorized the interception of communications carried on portions of networks operated by AT&T and other Internet service providers, a practice that might otherwise be illegal under federal wiretapping laws.
The secret legal authorization from the Justice Department originally applied to a cybersecurity pilot project in which the military monitored defense contractors’ Internet links. Since then, however, the program has been expanded by President Obama to cover all critical infrastructure sectors including energy, healthcare, and finance starting June 12.
“The Justice Department is helping private companies evade federal wiretap laws,” said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which obtained over 1,000 pages of internal government documents and provided them to CNET this week. “Alarm bells should be going off.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
World War II Vet Who Provided Flag on Iwo Jima Dead at 90
LOS ANGELES — A World War II veteran who provided the flag in the famous flag-raising on Iwo Jima has died. Alan Wood was 90.
Wood’s son, Steven, says his father died April 18 of natural causes at his Sierra Madre home.
Wood was in charge of communications on a landing ship on Iwo Jima’s shores when a Marine asked him for the biggest flag that he could find. Wood handed him a flag he had found in Pearl Harbor.
Five Marines and a Navy Corpsman later raised the flag on Mount Suribachi as Allied forces struggled to capture the Japanese-held island. The stirring moment was captured in an iconic image by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal.
Steven Wood says his father was always humbled by his small role in the historic moment.
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
Dr. Ingrid Mattson Keynotes Canadian Muslim Women’s Dinner
Our colleague in Ottawa, David B. Harris, former Canadian Intelligence and Security Service official, and noted Canadian counterterrorism expert, , has once again shown the cupidity by official circles in Canada for former Muslim Brotherhood leader in America, Dr. Ingrid Mattson. Dr. Mattson is the keynote Speaker at the 12th Annual Festival of Friendship dinner of the Ontario Muslim Women’s Organization (OMWO) to be held Sunday night in Ottawa . In this Investigative Project on Terrorism article, “Being Had for Dinner in Ottawa”, Harris discusses the irony of Dr. Matson’s keynote speech before a national Canadian mental health association dinner in Ottawa set against the backdrop of the recent occurrences of Islamic terrorism with the Boston Marathon Massacre perpetrated by the Chechen immigrant Tsarnaev brothers and the RCMP foiling a plot to blow up a Canadian Via train crossing between the US and Toronto by two foreign Jihadi wannabees with alleged Iranian links. Harris presents a dossier on Dr. Mattson exposing her Wahhabist and Muslim beliefs that received a pass in Washington by the Obama Administration and in this instance apparently in liberal circles in Ottawa, as well. This despite Dr. Mattson well documented expert practice of taqiyyah, deceiving the naive infidels.
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
2 Officers Are Shot as Italy’s Government is Sworn in
ROME — Two military police officers were shot and wounded on Sunday in a crowded square outside the prime minister’s office close to where the new government of Enrico Letta was being sworn in.
The shooting was broadcast live by the state broadcaster RAI, which had a television crew in the square in front of Palazzo Chigi, where the ministers were to go after the ceremony at the presidential palace. Italians who had tuned in to the swearing-in ceremony of the long-awaited government — finally formed nine weeks after national elections — watched the unfolding events.
What was supposed to be a day of celebration, marking the beginning of the new government, quickly turned into a national drama. The square in front of Palazzo Chigi was cordoned off, while ambulances and police cars blocked traffic in one of Rome’s busiest downtown areas. Inside the palace, the ceremony continued undisturbed; most of the ministers were not made aware of the shooting, which occurred about half a mile away, until after the ceremony was over.
The man believed to have shot the two officers was caught. Authorities identified him as Luigi Preiti, born in 1964 in Calabria and a resident of Piedmont.
“I heard seven or eight shots,” said Enrica Agostini, an RAI reporter who was in the square when the shooting occurred, describing the subsequent panic. “I was pushed back into Palazzo Chigi. The police was screaming, ‘it’s an attack, it’s an attack.’“
One officer was wounded in the throat and the other in the leg, an official with the military police said. The wounds did not appear to be life threatening. Mr. Preiti was also shot, the official said.
A woman, passing by, was also hit but was not seriously injured, according to reports…
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Centre-Right Opposition Parties Win Iceland Election
(AGI) Reykjavik — Iceland’s centre-right Independence and Progressive parties won the election with over 52 percent of votes.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Chickens in Italy, Greece Living ‘Outside the Law’ Says EU
Hen houses too small
(ANSA) — Brussels, April 25 — The chickens have come home to roost for Italy and Greece, now facing charges in the European Court of Justice over the size of hen houses.
The two countries are in trouble for failing to enforce requirements for the minimum size of cages where laying hens are bred. The pair had been given 12 years to meet new standards and authorities say that allowing some breeders to get away without upgrading penalizes those producers who have invested in new facilities.
European animal welfare laws, effective last year, say that all laying hens must have spacious cages in which to nest, scratch, and roost. Not only are the hens at risk but their eggs are then seen as being laid “outside the law”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Don’t Take German Anti-Euro Party Seriously, Says Minister
(AGI) Berlin — Finance Minister Schaeuble said that the new party that wants Germany to quit the euro should not be taken seriously ..
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Dutch Reality Show Aims to Send Humans to Mars
ARE you crazy enough to sign up for a one-way trip to Mars?
Applications are being accepted by the makers of a Dutch reality show that says it will deliver the first humans to the red planet in 10 years.
The main requirements are strong health, good people and survival skills, being 18 or older, and having a reasonable grasp of the English language.
The company, called Mars One, aims to land its first four astronauts in 2023 for a televised reality show that would follow the exploits of the first humans to attempt to establish a colony on Mars.
Already, the organisers have received “10,000 emails from more than 100 different countries from people who are interested in joining us for this mission”, said founder Bas Landsdorp at a news conference in a New York hotel.
In all they are seeking six groups of four people each. A new group would make the seven-month journey every two years after the first crew departs in 2022.
The cost for the first mission is about $US6 billion ($A5.9 billion).
“It sounds like a lot of money. And actually it is a lot of money. But imagine what will happen when the first people land on Mars. Literally everybody on the globe will want to see it,” Landsdorp said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Irish Muslim Radical Says Americans Should be Grateful More People Didn’t Die in Boston
An Irish Muslim who once threatened to kill Barack Obama has refused to condemn the Boston bombers and claimed they gave Americans ‘a taste of their own medicine’.
Khalid Kelly, a 46-year-old from Dublin, made the controversial remarks in an exclusive interview with the Irish Sun newspaper.
[…]
“This is a war and they should be thankful that it wasn’t more.”
Formerly known as Terence Kelly, the converted Muslim warned of more attacks on American soil.
[“This is a war,” eh? Thanks for the candor, wee Terry. It’s more than we can get from our president.}
| — Hat tip: Paul Green | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Entry Exams for Rome’s Medical University Attended by 8,000
Many applicants accompanied by parents, organizers say
(ANSA) — Rome, April 22 — Some 8,000 students attended entry exams for Rome’s Sacro Cuore (Sacred Heart) medical university on Monday, many of whom were accompanied by their parents, organizers said.
Exams were held at the trade show center Fiera di Roma on the outskirts of the capital after last year’s high number of attendees flocking to the city caused traffic snarls and delays.
Many parents complained of “disorganization” and lack of information.
“They should put themselves in the shoes of those who have to organize exams for 8,000 candidates,” Faculty of Medicine Dean from the Catholic university, Rocco Bellantone, said.
“Our Italian habit for at least one, if not two, parents to accompany their kids, combined with the bad weather complicated logistics,” he said.
“But considering all, 8,000 applicants were processed in 40 minutes, which is not bad,” Bellantone said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Cortina Mayor Arrested in Fraud Probe
‘Jewel of the Dolomites’ official suspected of contract rigging
(ANSA) — Cortina d’Ampezzo, April 25 — The mayor of Cortina d’Ampezzo has been arrested in a probe into alleged rigging of contracts for waste disposal and speed traps at the well-known Italian ski resort.
Andrea Franceschi, an independent re-elected in May on a civic ticket, was placed under house arrest.
Franceschi loudly protested against a tax sweep at the ‘Jewel of the Dolomites’ at New Year 2012, part of Premier Mario Monti’s efforts to raise the profile of the tax-evasion fight. Soon after his re-election he was among nine placed under investigation for suspected bid-rigging.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Letta Seals Deal for Left-Right Italian Govt
Broad coalition admin to end two months of political deadlock
(By Paul Virgo) (ANSA) — Rome, April 27 — Premier designate Enrico Letta said Saturday he was ready to form a broad coalition government to end two months of political deadlock in Italy following February’s inconclusive general election. Letta, of the centre-left Democratic Party (PD), said he had shed his “reservation” about accepting a government-forming mandate from President Giorgio Napolitano after reaching a deal with other parties.
He then present a relatively young government team, which will be sworn in on Sunday and probably face confidence votes in parliament on Monday and Tuesday.
The executive should pass those votes as it has the backing of the PD, ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi’s centre-right People of Freedom (PdL) party — the two biggest groups in parliament — and outgoing Premier Mario Monti’s Civic Choice party. But there are fears parts of the PD hostile to forming a government with the party of Berlusconi, who has been seen as their enemy for two decades, may vote against the new government. Saturday’s breakthrough came after three days of talks between Letta and representatives of the other parties on ministerial posts and policy issue.
If they had not reached an agreement the nation would probably have been forced to return to the polls with the same highly criticised election law that failed to produce a winner in February.
Napolitano said the outcome was the “only government possible” and called on the country’s political parties to unite behind the unprecedented left-right administration.
“My hope is that there is maximum cohesion,” said Napolitano, who had threatened to resign if no deal were reached after being re-elected head of State last week because the parties were unable to agree on a successor.
The president added that the new government was the “fruit of a patient, tenacious effort by the premier designate and the political parties, who chose the path of cooperation despite the predictable difficulties they faced”.
Letta’s cabinet will feature ministers from the PD, the PdL and Civil Choice, along with several highly respected institutional figures.
As expected Berlusconi is not in the Cabinet. PdL Secretary Angelino Alfano will be deputy premier and interior minister.
Former European commissioner Emma Bonino, a senior member of the small Radical Party, will be Italy’s first woman foreign minister.
Bank of Italy Director General Fabrizio Saccomanni will be economy minister.
The government will work on the basis of a programme Napolitano recently asked a group of experts, dubbed the 10 wise men, to prepare on key reforms, including a new electoral law.
Letta’s government is also expected to cut the number of MPs, turn the Senate into a regional chamber, pass urgent measures including tax breaks to boost the economy and create jobs, and possibly try to reform the justice system.
Italy is in its deepest recession for 20 years and unemployment has hit new heights of over 11%.
After February’s election Napolitano first gave a mandate to then PD leader Pier Luigi Bersani to try to form a government after the coalition he had led came first in February but did not win a working majority in the Senate.
Bersani ruled out forming a grand coalition with the PdL party and failed in a bid to reach out to the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S), which won about a quarter of the vote, leaving the country in a situation of gridlock.
Bersani quit as PD secretary last week after internal revolts sank two candidates he has proposed to be president. The M5S and the left-wing SEL party, which was allied with the PD in February’s election, have both said they are opposed to the new government but will judge the legislation it proposes on merit.
The regionalist Northern League, which was allied with the PdL in February, may provide “external support” for the executive without being part of it.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
by Cynthia Yacowar-Sweeney
Calls to summon Muslims to prayer were broadcast over loudspeakers for the first time ever in Sweden this past Friday on April 26th at the Fittja Mosque in the Stockholm municipality of Botkyrka. The Islamic call to prayer (adhan), resonating from the towering 104-foot (32-meter) minaret, began with the ear-shattering “Allahu Akbar” (Allah is Great) and was followed by the Shahada, the Muslim declaration of faith: “There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah”. Every Friday, people from as far as two kilometers away will be subjected to hear what U.S. President Obama called “one of the prettiest sounds on earth”.
This is what Swedes in the Stockholm municipality of Botkyrka will have to get used to, now that the decision rendered by the Botkyrka Municipal Assembly and authorized by the Botkyrka Police to approve the public call to worship, has taken effect. Whether or not Swedes find it offensive, loud, or disruptive, they have no choice but to listen every Friday to the live three-to-five-minute amplified recitation of the Muslim declaration of faith that calls the people to come together and pray.To pray for what?
Has anyone ever wondered, or taken the time to understand what these prayers, to which Muslims are now being publicly called, are all about? One of the Friday prayers consists of the seven verses of the opening chapter of the Koran, Al-Fatiha (The Beginning). This prayer, which is repeated twice during Friday noon prayer, and repeated 17 times a day by religious Muslims, instills distrust of the non-believer by asking Allah to keep Muslims away from the path of the Jews and Christians:…
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Syria: EU: Lack of Definitive Evidence on Chemical Weapons
UN to monitor situation, Ashton worried about abducted bishops
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, APRIL 26 — The use of chemical weapons in Syria would be totally unacceptable for the European Union although Brussels is still waiting for more definitive evidence on their employment as alleged by Israel and the US, Micheal Mann, a spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, said on Friday.
‘We are still monitoring this along with our international partners to see what has really happened as it doesn’t seem entirely clear at this point in time’, Mann said, stressing that the use of chemical weapons would be ‘completely unacceptable’.
Mann called for the United Nations to be granted permission to investigate from within Syria.
US reports have not been definitive, Mann also said, calling for closer monitoring. President Barack Obama has said that the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime would be the ‘red line’ which, if crossed, would prompt western military intervention in Syria.
‘We have seen that the regime in Syria doesn’t seem to have much respect for human life but we can’t be definitive on this until we see definitive evidence’, Mann said.
Meanwhile Ashton expressed great concern over the fate of two Orthodox bishops kidnapped in Syria and called for their ‘immediate release’.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tsipras in Portugal on Anniversary of Carnation Revolution
(ANSAmed) — ATHENS, APRIL 25 — Greek Leftist SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras will be in Portugal on Thursday and Friday for the anniversary of the Carnation Revolution when the Portuguese rose up and peacefully overthrew the right-wing dictatorship that had ruled the nation for half a century. Tsipras will take part in the commemoration march and give a speech while he is expected to hold a series of meeting with local political officials as daily Kathimerini reports. During a speech at the Hellenic American Chamber on Wednesday, Tsipras, whose party is neck and neck with conservative New Democracy in opinion polls, spoke of the need for “effective alliances” particularly among states on the southern European periphery.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UK: How Anti-Racism Lessons Increase Pupil Intolerance by ‘Causing Animosity to Other Cultures’
Children who are given anti-racism lessons in school are more likely to be intolerant outside the classroom, a major study found yesterday.
It said accusing white pupils of racism causes animosity, and discussing sensitive ethnic concerns such as honour killings paints minority group children in a bad light.
The survey said children who live in mixed neighbourhoods are often free of hostility towards other racial groups.
But it found that ‘when more attention in class is being paid to the multicultural society, the liberalising effect of positive contact in class on youngsters’ xenophobic attitude decreases’.
The project carried out in the Netherlands comes at a time of controversy over the place of multiculturalism — which blames Britain for historic racism and demands the encouragement of minority cultures — in the national curriculum and teaching in British schools.
Education Secretary Michael Gove has been under fire from Left-wing academics over plans to stop teaching teenagers about topics such as ‘the wide cultural, social and ethnic diversity of Britain from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century and how this has helped shape Britain’s identity’.
Instead, in future pupils will be taught much more British history. The study, published in the European Sociological Review, was based on a survey of 1,444 pupils aged 14 and 15 in ten schools in the city of Nijmegen.
The teenagers, drawn from different class and racial backgrounds, and with differing academic abilities, were questioned on their attitudes to those from different ethnic backgrounds and about multicultural teaching in their schools.
It said boys tended to be more intolerant of other groups than girls, and intolerance was greatest among those with strong religious or ethnic identity, among those from Turkish or Moroccan backgrounds, and those with the lowest educational achievements.
But it said the teaching of multiculturalism had an ‘unexpected negative effect’.
It added: ‘The impact of positive inter- ethnic contact in class disappears or even reverses when multiculturalism is more emphasised during lessons. Discussing discrimination and the customs and habits of other cultures during lessons affects the youngsters’ xenophobic attitudes indirectly.’
The report added that bad feelings among minority groups could be generated by discussion of topics such as honour killings or female circumcision. Animosity could also be caused by ‘a one-sided offender- victim approach to racism’.
The findings echo the views of Bradford head teacher Ray Honeyford, who was driven from his job nearly 30 years ago over his claim that multicultural teaching was harming pupils…
| — Hat tip: TV | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: Nikolic Begs Forgiveness for Srebrenica Massacre
A year after denying 1995 slaughter of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, APRIL 25 — In a YouTube video posted on Thursday, Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic asked forgiveness for the July 1995 slaughter of 8,000 Bosnian Muslim civilians in Srebrenica. In today’s video, a preview of an interview with Bosnian BHRT TV to be broadcast May 7, Nikolic stated he wants to “kneel and beg forgiveness for the crimes committed in the name of our nation and our people” by Serbians. This is a significant change since Nikolic denied Serbians ever committed the massacre in Srebrenica soon after taking office. The slaughter was carried out by Serbian-Bosnian troops under the command of Ratko Mladic, who is on trial for war crimes at the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egyptians Grab Ancient Land of the Pharaohs to Bury Their Dead
Archaeologists Fear for Pyramid Sites as Illegal Building Gathers Pace in Wake of Arab Spring
In Manshiet Dahshur, 25 miles south of Cairo, the villagers recently extended the boundaries of the cemetery. For Ahmed Rageb, a carpenter who buried his cousin in the annexe, it was a logical decision. “We want to bury the dead,” he said, strolling through the new cemetery after visiting his cousin’s tomb. “The old cemetery is full. And there is no other place to bury my family.”
There is just one problem. The new tombs are perilously close to some of Egypt’s oldest: the pyramids of Dahshur, less famous than their larger cousins at Giza, but just as venerable. This is protected land, and no one is supposed to build here — yet more than 1,000 illegal tombs have appeared in the desert since January.
“What happened was crazy,” said Mohamed Youssef, Dahshur’s chief archaeologist. “They came and took space for about 20 generations.”
The tombs nestle in the dunes below the Red Pyramid, considered the pharaohs’ first successful attempt at a smooth-sided structure. To the south is the Bent Pyramid, named for its warped walls. In the east, nearer the Nile, lies the Black Pyramid — a collapsed colossus on which the villagers are most in danger of encroaching. This is their right, claimed Reda Dabus, a clerk worshipping at the mosque next to the cemetery. “All the people are born here,” Dabus said. “They died here. They should have the right to be buried here.” Inhabitable land is hard to come by in Egypt, where 99% of the population live on 5.5% of the territory.
But it is an argument disputed by local archaeologists, who say there is something darker afoot: looting. “Some of them have a real need for the tombs for their families,” said Youssef, who said that the land had been designated as government property since the late 1970s. “But when you have 1,000 people, some of them will want to do illegal excavation.”
Others agree. “They use the new tombs to hide what they are doing,” explained Ramadan al-Qot, a site inspector who grew up in the village…
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia, Africa Face Global Challenge
At ongoing World Tourism Organization meeting in Tunis
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, APRIL 25 — The ongoing 54th meeting of the World Tourism Organization committee for tourism in Africa sees 250 delegates from 24 countries debating ways for the continent to meet the challenge of competing for the world tourism business, which earned it $38 billion in 2012. As the host country Tunisia is very active in promoting itself at the conference, which is addressing issues such as balancing public-private partnerships, streamlining visa procedures and improving technology and infrastructure in African destinations. Tunisia is experiencing a post-Arab Spring crisis with losses of 2 million visitors and 3,000 jobs in a sector that employs 15% of the national workforce, and at 7% of national GDP is the country’s second source of income.
The trend continues in 2013, with turnover down by 7.5% in the first quarter over the same period last year. Analysts attributed the spate of cancellations of Tunisia bookings to political tensions following the attack on the US embassy in Benghazi and the murder of an opposition politician. The government is trying to revert this trend with a packet of security, environmental and cultural heritage protection measures, Tourism Minister Jamel Gamra said.
“Tourism is like an inexhaustible oil supply and remains the main driver of development” in Tunisia thanks to its natural beauties and immense cultural treasures, the minister pointed out. Prime Minister Ali Laarayedh echoed Gamra’s words, asserting that Tunisia’s will to actively overcome the current crisis remains stronger than ever.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Abu Mazen in Naples to Get Honorary Citizenship
Naples rabbi ‘appaled’, PNA president ‘negates Holocaust’
(ANSAmed) — NAPLES — Rabbi Scialom Bahbout, who leads the Jewish community of Naples and Southern Italy, is “appalled” that Palestinian National Authority President Abu Mazen will become an honorary citizen of Naples and Pompei as of tomorrow. Mayor Luigi De Magistris is conferring that distinction on the Palestinian leader as an “instigator of the dialogue in the construction of the difficult peace process between Israel and Palestine”.
“This kind of recognition should only be conferred on deserving people, ones with no skeletons in the closet”, said the rabbi. “There are beautiful people out there who are worthy of such an honor, and we are not against conferring honorary citizenship on a Palestinian. This is not the case with Abu Mazen, who denied the Holocaust in his university thesis, and who never distanced himself from Palestinian terrorist attacks”.
“If you want to understand the position of the Palestinians, you should also want to understand that of the Israelis. Shimon Peres would have been a worthy honorary citizen, not as an alternative to Abu Mazen, but because he, a Nobel peace prize winner, is a person who deserves it”, the rabbi concluded. Abu Mazen, who has arrived in Naples today, tomorrow is also scheduled to meet with Palestinian families living in the Campania region, and to accept a prize from the Fondazione Mediterraneo.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Bibi Capitulates to Muslim Threats, Orders Feiglin Off Temple Mount
The Waqf threatened Netanyahu with “World War Three” should Feiglin go on the Mount tomorrow.
For the past ten years, MK Moshe Feiglin (Likud-Beitenu) has been visiting the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on the 19th of the Hebrew month, every month. But on Sunday, April 28, 2013, Feiglin received a phone call from Deputy Commander Moshe Barkat, Chief of the Israeli Police David Precinct, which includes the Old City of Jerusalem.
“He informed me that, on direct order from the prime minister, I would not be permitted to enter the Mount tomorrow,” MK Feiglin wrote in his Facebook page.
A source close to Feiglin told The Jewish Press that the deputy commander told the MK that the Waqf, the Jordanian charity organization which runs the Temple Mount, warned the Prime Minister’s office that should Feiglin go up on the Mount on Monday, it would “start World War Three.”
No one wants that. Except that the same Waqf has been cautioning about new world wars frequently, and is often involved in organizing, rather than trying to prevent them.
According to Feiglin, the prime minister has no legal authority to give such an order, because it violates three basic laws:…
| — Hat tip: KGS | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Delivers Strong Warning to Israel
Amid fears Iran about to cross so-called red line
TEL AVIV — According to informed Middle Eastern security officials, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel delivered a strongly worded message to Israel — do not attack Iran.
The officials told WND that Hagel informed the Israeli government the Obama administration will not accept any unilateral Israeli attack against Iran and that Israel must not strike Tehran without coordination with the U.S.
Hagel further told Israel that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cannot decide alone whether Iran has crossed the nuclear threshold, or the so-called Red Line previously outlined by the Israeli leader.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Saudi Arabia: Authorities Expel Men Because ‘Too Handsome’
Three men from Dubai forced to leave country,protest on Facebook
(by Giuseppe Maria Laudani) (ANSAmed) — ROME, APRIL 26 — Beauty can be a problem in Saudi Arabia where three men from the United Arab Emirates were allegedly expelled by religious police as considered ‘too fascinating’ to the point of ‘making women fall into temptation’. A report on the incident was first published a few weeks ago by Arab daily Elaph, sparking worldwide speculation.
Many wondered whether the report, which was not corroborated either by photos or videos, was in fact true and the real motive behind the three men’s alleged expulsion. However on Friday the newspaper Arabian Business reported that one of the three men is Omar Borkan al Gala, an actor and fashion photographer based in Dubai. According to the daily, the incident dates back to the beginning of April, when the man was taking part with another two UAE nationals in a cultural festival in Riyadh. Religious police reportedly arrested the three men after religious authorities with the local Committee for the promotion of virtue and the prevention of vice ruled that the men ‘were too handsome and would induce women to fall in love with them’. The three were subsequently expelled and forced to return to Dubai.
Their alleged ‘deportation’ sparked a wave of protests on the web and in particular on al Gala’s Facebook page after the man posted the news, receiving widespread support from his fans.
‘You are welcome in Korea, we will be receiving you with open arms’, was one of the many comments posted on his page, including many pictures portraying the handsome young man wearing the Kefiah, showcasing his full lips, light skin and sexy look. Now media outlets are trying to discover the identity of the other two ‘irresistible’ men.
Saudi society is extremely conservative and denies women many rights. Women will be allowed to vote only in 2015 although recently they were allowed the right to be appointed by the king as members of the Shura, the consultative council which does not have legislative powers. They have recently been allowed the right to ride a bicycle in parks and recreational areas provided they are with a relative and wear the abaya, the traditional black dress covering the whole body.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Appeals Court Orders Retrial of Famous Pianist
Fazil Say convicted of blasphemy via Twitter
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, APRIL 26 — An Istanbul court of appeals overturned a suspended 10-month sentence against world-famous pianist Fazil Say, 43, who was convicted of blaspheming Islam via Twitter, Anadolu news agency reported Friday.
The appeals court has ordered a retrial in the controversial case that has sparked reaction in Turkey and abroad. Say was handed a suspended 10-month prison sentence on April 15 for “insulting religious beliefs held by a section of the society”. The trial and sentencing of an artist Germans have dubbed “the Turkish Mozart” sparked protest from the European Commission, with Brussels saying it was “concerned” and inviting Turkey “to fully respect freedom of expression”.
A declared atheist and vocal opponent of Islamic Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Say had called the proceedings against him a “political trial” orchestrated by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
Say had been the focus of a legal battle since he referred ironically to a hasty call to prayer via Twitter: “22 seconds…why in such a hurry? A lover? Raki? (Turkish anise-flavored spirits)”. In April 2012 he tweeted several lines attributed to 12th-century Persian poet Omar Khayyam: “You say its rivers will flow in wine. Is the Garden of Eden a drinking house? You say you will give two houris to each Muslim. Is the Garden of Eden a whorehouse?” The musician, who is supported by artists, intelllectuals, and 103 German MPs, said he would go into self-exile in Japan if convicted. “I may be the first in the world to be put on trial for being a declared atheist”, he said.
Opposition leader Kemal Kilicadaroglu criticized Erdogan, saying, “If you want to jail our artists, tell the judges to keep going this way. If you convict our artists, you will cover with shame not only yourselves, but our entire country. And Turkey does not deserve this”.
Making no comment on the sentencing, Erdogan invited reporters “not to waste time on such things”, while Deputy Premier Bulent Arinc stated that “insulting that which others believe in deserves penal sanctions”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Taliban Kill Three Policemen as Spring Offensive Begins
(AGI) — Ghazni, Apr 28 — The Taliban killed three Afghan police officers on Sunday, the day they said their spring offensive would begin. The three officers died as a roadside bomb exploded close to their convoy in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province in the district of Zana Khan. Ghanzi deputy police chief Mohammad Hassan Adel was among those killed .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Hollande Hunts Chinese Investments in Beijing
‘We will remove obstacles, trade deficit not sustainable’
(ANSAmed) — BEIJING, APRIL 25 — France will remove “all obstacles and checks” on Chinese investments on its soil, French President Francois Hollande told his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at an economic forum here on Thursday. Hollande arrived in Beijing today on a mission to “restore balance” to bilateral economic relations, as France considers its trade deficit with China “unacceptable”.
“The imbalances between Chinese and European trade are not sustainable”, Hollande added.
The president will address the issue of human rights in China “when the timing is right and without provocation”, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on the eve of Hollande’s visit.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Vietnam Sucker-Punches the US on Human Rights and Religious Freedom
By Michael Benge
For years, the American Embassy, the State Department, and the Senate have enabled communist Vietnam, ignoring the regime’s abuses of religious freedom and human rights to allow it privileged access to U.S. and international investments, markets, and donor aid. Now, Vietnam has sucker punched the U.S. by increasing its repression.
On April 11, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, chaired by Congressman Chris Smith, highlighted a litany of abuses by the communist Vietnamese. Congressman Smith explained that the House of Representatives had twice passed the Human Rights Act on Vietnam, only to have it rejected by the Senate. He noted the repeated recommendations by both the House and the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom to have the Department of State designate Vietnam as a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC) for its ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom, as is required by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998.
John Sifton, from Human Rights Watch — Asia, reported that “Police brutality, including torture in detention and fatal beatings, continued to be reported in all regions of the country.” His testimony covered a plethora of human rights abuses, starting with fact that “a growing number of dissidents — including religious leaders, bloggers, and politically active people — are being convicted and sent to jail for violations of Vietnam’s authoritarian penal code, which prohibits public criticism of the government and the communist party. Others are jailed for exposing corruption.”
Former Congressman Anh “Joseph” Cao said, “Since 2007, Vietnam has been backsliding on human rights, and is now the proud possessor of the title ‘The Worse Violator of Human Rights in Southeast Asia’. Political opposition is outlawed; repression of dissidents intensified; severe restrictions on freedom of expression imposed; bloggers and peaceful activists are arrested, imprisoned, and tortured. In most cases, national security has been cited as a pretext for the illegal arrests and criminal investigations. One of the main groups of people who have suffered greatly under Vietnam’s opposition has been the religious faithful and leaders.”
Religious abuses
Vietnam is an equal opportunity religious rights abuser: its targets include Protestants, Catholics, Buddhists, Hoa Hao, and CaoDai as well. The regime fears all religions as an organized threat to its own political religion — communism.
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‘World’s Most Expensive Holiday’ Sold to the Man With Time and Money to Burn
When VeryFirstTo.com launched its £1m package deal to every Unesco world heritage site last month, even they didn’t expect it to sell. Now they have a taker for the two-year trip
When VeryFirstTo.com launched their £1m holiday last month, many dismissed it as a typical PR stunt. Indeed, even the company offering it never expected anyone to take them up on the offer: a two-year, luxury holiday taking in the planet’s 962 Unesco world heritage sites (an intense itinerary that would mean taking in more than one site every single day for two years).
Then the phone rang.
An unnamed man from China, with an undisclosed background but apparently studying for a PHD, has signed on the dotted line and is now preparing to begin his journey next year. His trip will include visiting more than 150 countries over in two years, staying in the most luxurious hotels and flying business class.
Although the phone was hardly ringing off the hook, the company said they have another tentative booking and have received 15 enquiries.
“When we launched it, we didn’t know if it would sell. Not all of our products do,” says company founder Marcel Knobil, who launched Veryfirsto.com in November 2012, seemingly as a one-stop shop for those with so much money they need someone else to come up with ludicrous ways to spend it. Or, as they call it, “a haven for early adopters”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
A Brazilian website documents a brutal military crackdown including murders of supporters of Henrique Capriles. They believe the re-election of Nicolas Meduro, Chavez’s designated successor, was a fraud. The website also claims that Meduro is a Cuban agent, and that Castro arranged for Chavez’s demise in order to install their agent. (Scroll down on Brazilian site for videos)
Marcos: “Because of Facebook and twitter, there are more than 3200 examples of fraud. Videos of military guys dumping ballots in holes in the ground, burning votes, shooting at people in cold blood. When people took to the streets “en masse”, the Venezuelan Marxists flipped out. Eight protesters were murdered, army on the streets, massive repression. People who voted for Capriles are being persecuted. Dilma, Argentina’s Kirchner, Uruguay’s Mujica, and other Marxist politicians hurried to support and inaugurate Cuba-trained Maduro before things got ugly.
For us in Brazil, it became clear that Lula’s Workers Party will never leave power democratically. Inflation is rising, industrial output has fallen 5%, a recession is coming. If people get angry, they will manipulate the election. Brazil has 99% of ballots in electronic form and there is NO paper trail. The machines are made by Diebold, the company caught red handed in fraud events.”
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“Unobtainium” And Border Deception
The “Gang of Eight,” aka the “Eight Gangsters,” are concocting Comprehensive Immigration Reform legislation. Purportedly this legislation is needed to address the presence of the officially-estimated population of 12 million illegal aliens.
While the legislation is referred to as being “Comprehensive,” there is nothing truly comprehensive about their approach, other than the fact that it would provide nearly all illegal aliens who are in the United States, or who will arrive in the months to come, with lawful status and ultimately, a pathway to United States citizenship. It would also increase the number of visas for many thousands of foreign workers and allow them to compete unfairly with American workers.
The “one time” amnesty of 1986 was supposed to involve approximately one million illegal aliens. Over 3.5 million actually came forward. If history were to repeat itself, Comprehensive Immigration Reform would involve between 30 and 40 million aliens.
And that is just one of the deceptions inherent in the coverage of the current debate. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) was on ABC’s “This Week” last Sunday, and expressed concern that pledges to secure the border between the U.S. and Mexico won’t be kept, leading to a massive influx of illegal aliens.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
According to Eric Holder, Illegal Aliens Have Civil Right to US Citizenship!
Equal opportunity now encompasses: Right to ignore a sovereign nation’s borders, Defy nation’s immigration laws, expect citizenship.
With America’s ruling class about to surrender US sovereignty, the rule of law, homeland security, American language and culture, and good old-fashioned common sense to the irresistible forces of partisan politics, slave labor, and multi-cultural pap, millions of people around the globe longing to come here are greatly conflicted by two options:
1. Simply Invade: After all, US borders are mere figments of Janet Napolitano’s rich imagination and have no real meaning, certainly not to foreigners anxious to materially improve their lives, courtesy of American taxpayers.
2. Follow the Law: For the weak willed, one can follow the law and apply for the right to migrate to the US legally.
This option is rarely used because the American media, in concert with the Democrat Party, has brain- washed the world into believing that there is no path to US citizenship other than by breaking and entering and waiting for a corrupt Congress to grant amnesty as a reward for lawlessness and fraud.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Congo-Born Doctor to be Italy’s First Black Minister
Cecile Kyenge to be Integration minister
(ANSA) — Rome, April 27 — Cecile Kyenge, a doctor who was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is set to become Italy’s first black minister after being named in premier designate Enrico Letta’s new cabinet.
Kyenge, a 48-year-old MP for the centre-left Democratic Party, will be sworn in as Integration minister on Sunday.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: Racist Attacks Rise in the Country
(ANSAmed) — ATHENS, APRIL 25 — Following news of the shooting and wounding of 35 Bangladeshi immigrants on a strawberry farm in the Peloponnese, for which its owner and three foremen were arrested, human rights groups say racist attacks are still climbing in Greece, and becoming especially violent. As GreekReporter writes, the Racist Violence Recording Network released the figures which it said showed the backlash against immigrants is continuing, even as the government is preparing to deport illegal immigrants caught in a roundup over the past year. Kostis Papaioannou, head of the National Commission for Human Rights, said the network documented 154 cases of racist violence in 2012, a 20% increase over the previous year.
But, he said, the number could be much higher as many victims are afraid to come forward, fearing further mistreatment by authorities or deportation for entering the country illegally.
The government has complained that Greece, the southernmost entry point to the European Union, can’t cope with waves of illegal immigrants who arrive by sea or through its borders, although a fence has been erected along its northern territory abutting Turkey.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Immigration — What is the Cost?
Today we are seeing a move to open the borders of America to any and everybody that wants to come. This concept is primarily the brainchild of the Democrat Party. There are some Republicans in the mix, RINO’s all of them, with the new Senator Rubio among them. I will state up front my position on this subject so there is no question as to where I am coming from.
Senator Rand Paul made the statement that we need to find a place for those that have stolen across our borders, taken American jobs, stolen social security numbers and flaunt the fact that we don’t enforce or laws and that statement is a slap in the face to all American citizens and those that have immigrated to America legally. My position is simple. The only ‘place that I can find’ for these people that spit I our face is on the other side of the border and standing in line to come back. If that take 15 or 20 years, so what? These people have broken the law. Why reward them with a ‘pathway to citizenship’? They should be at the back of the line. Period!
Our Founders set up an immigration schedule because they knew that open borders would not work. There has to be a certain amount of economic growth to sustain any kind of immigration. If there is no economic growth then immigration numbers will only make matters worse.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
(NaturalNews) Documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) reveal the Obama administration is actively marketing the federal food stamp program (SNAP) to illegal immigrants. A Spanish-language flyer obtainer by Judicial Watch says, “You need not divulge information regarding your immigration status in seeking this benefit for your children.”
A copy of the document is viewable by clicking here.
“USDA is actively working with the Mexican government to promote food stamps for illegal aliens,” said Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton.
Although it’s far worse now, this has been going on for years. Back in 2006, Judicial Watch wrote in its Corruption Chronicles: “The United States Department of Agriculture is spending taxpayer money to run Spanish-language television ads encouraging illegal immigrants to apply for government-financed food stamps.“…
The big banks like JP Morgan Chase collect billions of dollars a year off the transaction fees supporting the SNAP program.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Do Not Resuscitate’ Reminds Reader of Nazi Germany
Gasping for air in an ER, Ron Graham, a welfare patient, was told to sign a “Do Not Resuscitate” order. He believes this is the first step to euthanasia, getting rid of undesirables as they did in Nazi Germany.
Emergency room duty is hard work, emotionally as well as physically. I must be clear that 99% of EMT paramedics and ER nurses, doctors are empathetic. But it only takes being at the mercy of one, or God forbid, two, that have lost compassion due to burnout or personal issues to frighten you when you’re helpless on a gurney in a chaotic ER triage or “shock room” setting.
When you see state legislatures talking about granting public provided doctors to enter a ‘do not resuscitate’ order in your chart — without your knowledge and signed consent — it means you may be handed over to the 1% who lack empathy and compassion, for these are the ones that capable of withholding the simple oxygen or CPR that routinely saves lives.
Needing oxygen or CPR is not an ‘end stage’ terminal notice. Most people recover after standard treatment with antibiotics, electrolytes, steroids, or surgery, etc, and walk out of the hospital within a day or a week.
At the media and tv level they try to frame the ‘end of life’ thing as something that doesn’t come up till somebody is brain dead on life support for ten years. In reality it’s about meeting Obama’s austerity budget cuts, so the money can be diverted to the endless banker ‘bailouts’.
It so happens I’ve been working for the Texas Catholic Conference lobby to rescind current law which enables a “Physician or NURSE, or NURSE PRACTITIONER” to write up a DNR without the patient’s knowledge or consent. Under Obamacare, a “social worker” could do that too.
I’m giving advice to people in similar circumstances to find out how to request a copy of your hospital chart, and prepare a document to ask to be put in your record to the effect of, I WANT TO BE RESUSCITATED. “I want caregivers to do everything possible to keep me alive including restoring pulse and breathing.”
I advise buying medical dog tags online, the USB storage type in which you can enter your name and needs, and that you WANT to be resuscitated and kept alive and have not given consent to a DNR.
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School Forces All Girls to Lesbian Kiss, ID ‘Sluts’
Outraged parents say a New York middle school instructed young female students to ask one another for a lesbian kiss — and boys learned how to spot young sluts — in an anti-bullying presentation on gender identity and sexual orientation, according to Fox News’ Todd Starnes. According to Starnes’ Report, the children attended a special April 11 health class taught by college students at Linden Avenue Middle School in Red Hook, N.Y. Parents say they were not notified of the presentation. The students were introduced to terms such as “pansexual” and “genderqueer.” Some of the young female students said they were told it was common for 14-year-old girls to have sex and their parents couldn’t stop them. Mandy Coon, a mother of an eighth-grade student said, “I am furious. I am her parent. Where does anyone get the right to tell her that it’s OK for her to have sex?”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Scientists are genetically altering cows so they have no horns in a bid to make them safer.
The genetically modified dairy cow will be identical in every way to other livestock but without the horns, in order to cut the risk of injury to farmers, walkers and other animals.
The scientists are using gene-editing techniques to insert an extra DNA, which is known to halt horn growth in other breeds of cattle, into the geneome of holsteins, the world’s highest-production dairy animals.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Re UK anti-racism lessons increase intolerance.
I must confess that I recognise and identify with the findings. After years of attempted “brain washing”,by the state and the law, my levels of intolerance have massively increased. Problem is that I am prohibited from making any statements publicly from threat of imprisonment.
A drunken Englishman was last week fined for saying that the welsh were “sheep s******”.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2316196/Tourist-described-Welsh-people-sheep-s—s-drunken-rant-holiday-park-fined-150.html
Funny that. As an English Derbyshire man there is NO such charge of racism when a Nottinghamshire person calls me that (they often do) . Then again I regard it as jocular banter and have a regular “offensive” response. We really have lost the plot.
Erich Kästner: German Author on the time of National Socialist Party under Hitler:
“Niemals in unserer Geschichte hat ein solcher Generalangriff auf die menschlichen Tugenden stattgefunden. Nie zuvor sind Eigenschaften wie Zivilcourage, Ehrlichkeit, Gesinnungstreue, Mitleid und Frömmigkeit so grausam und teuflisch bestraft, nie vorher sind Laster wie Roheit, Unterwürfigkeit, Käuflichkeit , Verrat und Dummheit so maßlos und öffentlich belohnt worden.”
“Never before in our history such an immens attack on human virtues was led through. Never before characteristics as moral courage, honesty, loyalty to truthfulness, empathy and saintiness have been that brutal and devilish been punished (…punished is the wrong meaning…it was not “punishment” it has been the result of cowardice and wrong proudness ), never before have sins as brutality, wrong devoutnesses, coruptibility, treason and sillyness so enormous and publically been rewarded.”
Before treason is rewarded publically its rewarded for some time “behind the curtains” …. is`nt it so, Hussein Obama ?
Journalists who side with Islam are the allegorical spearhead of the King of Liars …..
When a Hungarian “right wing” Politican brought out a more stiff laws against the abuse of Journalism EU Commissions and the Choir of Liars cried out loudly ……… the hypocrites did as if any truth seeking Journalist would be touched by this laws.
Today Europe`s Journalism is almost DEAD under the weights of Islamic pressures of the “unseen” ……… and under the “difficulty” to predict the “foreseeable” they seek treason…….. the rest is done in the “upper floors” with money.
KNOWING HITLER, GOEBBELS; STALIN; MAO; POL POTH; MOHAMMED;…ase….. AND DOING AGAIN THE BAD THINGS HOW MUCH HARDER SHOULD BE THEIR PUNISHMENTS COMPARED TO THOSE WHO NEVER HAD THE KNOWLEDGE OF HOW EVIL SOULS CAN BE …
As they do know and do not remorse …even do not stop perpetrating evilnesses under the lie of “security” (devils most cherished word to “protect” false developments) and “dance” with the joking Obama – who works on his maskerade of innocense – how shall their ends be and how their curses of their children upon such ……..
Just for information: I made a comment about the article about Myanmar and Muslim Rohingya people. Whoever wants should read it. The thread started at 27th of April. Sorry about “advertising” this in this new thread.
Statistics in german,english and italian.
http://messerattacke.wordpress.com/neue-falle-einsortieren/kriminalstatistik/
Don’t they need a Congolese doctore more in the Congo than in 21st Italy? Why does Europe continue to allow the draining away of what skilled labour there is from the third world when it is much needed at home. Could the reason they come to Europe be that they earn a fortune here compared with back home. Should we still continue to condone such selfishness? Whilst they come here to earn megabucks, we are expected to send aid to their needy compatriots.