The Associated Press has eliminated another controversial word from its stylebook: “Islamist”. From now on, its writers will have to find other words, or more elaborate circumlocutions, to describe people who wage violent jihad in the name of Allah and his prophet. We have solved this thorny problem here at Gates of Vienna by devising the completely neutral Mohammed Coefficient to help readers understand the sensitive cultural context of certain news stories.
In other news, ice-breakers in the Baltic Sea report that the amount of solid ice still clogging the body of water this spring is the greatest since records have been kept.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Fjordman, JD, JP, McR, Steen, Takuan Seiyo, 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.
21 Statistics About the Explosive Growth of Poverty in America That Everyone Should Know
If the economy is getting better, then why does poverty in America continue to grow so rapidly? Yes, the stock market has been hitting all-time highs recently, but also the number of Americans living in poverty has now reached a level not seen since the 1960s. Yes, corporate profits are at levels never seen before, but so is the number of Americans on food stamps. Yes, housing prices have started to rebound a little bit (especially in wealthy areas), but there are also more than a million public school students in America that are homeless. That is the first time that has ever happened in U.S. history.
So should we measure our economic progress by the false stock market bubble that has been inflated by Ben Bernanke’s recklessmoney printing, or should we measure our economic progress by how the poor and the middle class are doing? Because if we look at how average Americans are doing these days, then there is not much to be excited about. In fact, poverty continues to experience explosive growth in the United States and the middle class continues to shrink. Sadly, the truth is that things are not getting better for most Americans. With each passing year the level of economic suffering in this country continues to go up, and we haven’t even reached the next major wave of the economic collapse yet. When that strikes, the level of economic pain in this nation is going to be off the charts.
The following are 21 statistics about the explosive growth of poverty in America that everyone should know…
1 — According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately one out of every six Americans is now living in poverty. The number of Americans living in poverty is now at a level not seen since the 1960s.
2 — When you add in the number of low income Americans it is even more sobering. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, more than 146 million Americans are either “poor” or “low income”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
42-Year-Old Media Entrepreneur Jeff Berwick Hopes to Bring Bitcoin Atms to a City Near You Soon.
Berwick expects to put the first two ATMs in Los Angeles and Cyprus in the next two weeks and is choosing between several different retail locations in both areas. He added that orders are coming in by the hundreds from 30 different countries.
Bitcoin, a virtual currency that was created four years ago, has generated tons of media attention in the past few weeks. The value of Bitcoins has surged in the wake of the botched bailout and mini-bank run in Cyprus and concerns about the health of government-backed paper currencies like the euro and dollar.
So how does a Bitcoin ATM work? Somewhat like a traditional ATM, says Berwick. Instead of connecting to your bank account, the software he and his team has developed is installed on an ATM and converts cash to Bitcoins stored in a Bitcoin wallet or extracts cash based on what’s stored in your personal Bitcoin account.
Berwick will charge roughly $10,000 to ATM operators to maintain the machines and then split fees with those operators. He expects those fees to be around 3%. That’s slightly higher than what you’d pay to get cash from an ATM outside your banking network.
So far, Berwick has used his personal savings to develop the software and build out the first prototype. He is currently hoping to raise between $1 million and $3 million in outside capital to get more ATMs in the hands of operators.
While more cybercurrency rules may be coming, this isn’t likely to hurt demand for Bitcoins and Bitcoin ATMs. Virtual currencies are a quickly evolving marketplace.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Bank of Japan’s Haruhiko Kuroda in Aggressive Growth Move
Japan’s central bank has surprised markets with the size of its latest stimulus package, as it tries to spur growth and end years of falling prices.
The move was seen as a clear signal by the bank’s new boss, Haruhiko Kuroda, that he was willing to spend heavily to achieve an inflation target of 2%.
The bank said it would increase its purchase of government bonds by 50 trillion yen ($520bn; £350bn) per year.
That is the equivalent of almost 10% of Japan’s annual gross domestic product.
The bank added that it would buy longer-term government bonds as well as riskier assets.
“The previous approach of incremental easing wasn’t enough to pull Japan out of deflation and achieve 2% inflation in two years,” Mr Kuroda said.
“This time, we took all necessary steps to achieve the target.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
California County Administrator to Get $423,644 a Year — After Retirement
When local California official Susan Muranishi retires from her job in a couple of years, she’s going to be walking away with a fat paycheck — $423,664 a year — for the rest of her life.
Muranishi, an Alameda County administrator, makes $301,000 in annual base pay. But in addition to that, the San Francisco Chronicle reports she’ll also receive:
[…]
News of Muranishi’s payout comes at a time when nearby Stockton, Calif., is trying to enter bankruptcy.
According to The Associated Press, one attorney mentioned “the 800-pound gorilla in the room” — whether public employees’ pensions, long thought to be legally untouchable, could be reduced via bankruptcy.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Things just keep getting worse for the American worker, and by implication US economy, where as we have shown many times before, it pays just as well to sit back and collect disability and various welfare and entitlement checks, than to work .The best manifestation of this: the number of people not in the labor force which in March soared by a massive 663,000 to a record 90 million Americans who are no longer even looking for work. This was the biggest monthly increase in people dropping out of the labor force since January 2012, when the BLS did its census recast of the labor numbers. And even worse, the labor force participation rate plunged from an already abysmal 63.5% to 63.3% — the lowest since 1979! But at least it helped with the now painfully grotesque propaganda that the US unemployment rate is “improving.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
For Americans, financial and economic Armageddon might be close at hand. The evidence for this conclusion is the concerted effort by the Federal Reserve and its dependent financial institutions to scare people away from gold and silver by driving down their prices.
When gold prices hit $1,917.50 an ounce on August 23, 2011, a gain of more than $500 an ounce in less than 8 months, capping a rise over a decade from $272 at the end of December 2000, the Federal Reserve panicked. With the US dollar losing value so rapidly compared to the world standard for money, the Federal Reserve’s policy of printing $1 trillion annually in order to support the impaired balance sheets of banks and to finance the federal deficit was placed in danger. Who could believe the dollar’s exchange rate in relation to other currencies when the dollar was collapsing in value in relation to gold and silver.
The Federal Reserve realized that its massive purchase of bonds in order to keep their prices high (and thus interest rates low) was threatened by the dollar’s rapid loss of value in terms of gold and silver. The Federal Reserve was concerned that large holders of US dollars, such as the central banks of China and Japan and the OPEC sovereign investment funds, might join the flight of individual investors away from the US dollar, thus ending in the fall of the dollar’s foreign exchange value and thus decline in US bond and stock prices.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Added Only 88,000 Jobs in March; Unemployment Dips to 7.6%
The nation’s employers increased their payrolls by 88,000 last month, compared to 268,000 in February, according to a Labor Department report released Friday. The unemployment rate, which comes from a different survey, ticked down to 7.6 percent from 7.7 percent.
| [Return to headlines] |
Court Rules 8 Oregon Children to be Vaccinated Against Parents’ Will
Parents in Marion County, Oregon lost their battle in court Wednesday to choose whether or not their eight children would be vaccinated after losing custody to the state last year.
A ruling from The Oregon Court of Appeals said that the parents did not have the right to exempt their children from forced vaccinations after child welfare workers and the Oregon Department of Human Services fought to obtain a court order demanding the children receive multiple vaccinations last year.
The court also decided that since the state had custody of the children, it had the right to make all their medical decisions without the parents’ consent. Although the children are living with relatives, they are considered wards of the state.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Dino Stars of Jurassic Park to Remain Featherless
“No feathers. #JP4” This enigmatic recent tweet by Colin Trevorrow, the director of Jurassic Park 4, has riled dino buffs. It suggests his CGI giants will be bald, flying in the face of science.
Since the early 1990s, when the first Jurassic Park came out, evidence has mounted that many of its lizard-skinned stars in fact wore feathery bling. The turkey-sized Velociraptor and at least some of the gigantic tyrannosaurs had feathers. A few dinosaurs even had iridescent ones, perhaps for display.
Palaeontologist Darren Naish, of the University of Southampton, UK, isn’t impressed with Trevorrow’s choice. “I’m pissed off by a disregard for knowledge,” he says. “It helps perpetuate the notion that dinosaurs were all scaly dragons, alien and unlike modern animals.”
“(The decision) jars with overwhelming evidence that some JP dinosaur stars were feathered, and misses an terrific chance to affirm modern concepts of dinosaur palaeobiology with a wide audience,” blogs palaeontologist and movie consultant Mark Witton.
Trevorrow has remained tight-lipped, so we can only speculate as to why he is sticking with bald beasts. Feathers are tricky to render in CGI, but the last few years have seen rapid progress. Pixar’s Up featured a bird with iridescent feathers, while armies of CGI owls starred in the 2010 film Legend of the Guardians. Even a recent Doctor Who episode, made on a television budget, managed to put some feathers on its dinosaurs.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Facing the Hardest Truth on Public Education
There are several major obstacles to overcome if there is to be any hope of saving civilization from the grip of the authoritarian pre-education camps we call “public schools.” The most stubborn obstacle of all, however, is perhaps the one embedded in our own hearts, namely the all too human instinct to comfort ourselves with the thought that the soul-deforming corruptions of public education began in earnest only after our own school days, and hence that we ourselves escaped the harm we so easily recognize in others.
This instinct forms the rationale for the many objections I get to my calls for the complete abolition of public schooling, from people who claim that if the schools just got back to the methods of the good old days, all would be well. In other words, these people are unwilling to see the problem as anything deeper than the superimposition of some bad textbooks or teaching methods on an essentially noble system, because to admit that the problem is more fundamental than this is to admit that one’s own education was harmful, which is to concede that one was indeed harmed — that you are less than you might have been…
John Dewey did not get the progressive, individualism-crushing system he wanted all at once. But the slow encroachment of his theories into the educational establishments of the world, beginning more than a century ago, has allowed his intellectual heirs to achieve a level of socialist indoctrination and anti-West moral degradation that, in many ways, have surpassed Dewey’s most depraved hopes.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Federal Framework Being Set Up to Arrest Sheriffs
Colorado, and apparently Texas (next) are being targeted with an attempt to set up a federal authority framework that will enable Secret Service agents (not just those guarding the president), and others of the U.S. Secret Service including uniformed division officers, physical security technicians and specialists, and other ‘special officers’, to arrest and remove an elected sheriff for refusing to enforce the law (or anyone breaking the law).
The bills being introduced define law as including any rule, regulation, executive order, court order, statute or constitutional provision.
Why are they doing this?
Here’s why…
It would establish federal authority police powers in a State, enabling an enforcement arm reporting directly to the president (Secret Service).
It would enable the president / executive branch to theoretically override the actions and preventative measures that are now being taken by many States throughout the country who are trying to preserve 2nd Amendment gun rights and who are prohibiting the enforcement of unconstitutional law passed by Congress or pushed by executive order.
As some of you may know, a growing list of sheriffs (more than 340 so far) across the country have expressed that they will not enforce a Washington mandate that clearly violates the Second Amendment.
Many State laws to preserve gun rights are gaining momentum. States include Montana, Ohio, Kentucky, Idaho, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas, Arizona, Michigan, Utah, and New Mexico.
However, in Colorado, Senate Bill SB-13-013 has evidently just passed, and is now ready to be signed by the governor, giving police powers and arrest authority to the federal/executive branch of government (Secret Service) within the State. In Texas a similar bill has just been introduced in the State legislature.
The president and vice-president Biden have been actively pursuing state legislatures and pushing for passage of the bills. Obama is scheduled to visit Colorado in just a few days. “Colorado is a pawn for the Obama-Biden plan,” and then on to the next… at least those that won’t fall into line.
It is a full court press by the federal government to empower themselves even further by inserting themselves as police authority within the state, to eliminate opposition.
| — Hat tip: McR | [Return to headlines] |
Is Facebook Smartphone Just a New Way to Collect Data About You?
Using Facebook on your phone? Soon, the company will make it much easier, but, some say, at a steep cost to your privacy.
That’s the tradeoff as the social media giant announces on Thursday that it is launching a branded smartphone that will reportedly operate on software called Facebook Home. Unlike the current Facebook app that allows users to access the site, the new Facebook phone will further integrate the software into features such as text messaging, photo uploading, and more.
“The more you integrate with a mobile phone, the more data you can collect,” says Parker Higgins, a spokesman for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a cyber-rights advocacy group in San Francisco. “In the case of Facebook, there’s more concern because Facebook doesn’t have a great track record with respecting people’s sense of privacy.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama: “I Am Constrained by the System Our Founders Put in Place”
During a speech in Denver, Colorado, President Obama remarked that his gun control agenda was “constrained by the system our founders put in place,” as he lambasted Second Amendment advocates who argue that gun ownership is a means of protection against government tyranny…
At first glance, Obama’s admission that his actions are constrained by the authors of the Constitution is a seemingly glib nod to safeguards ensured by the bill of rights and the Second Amendment. However, when placed in a more sinister context, the quote could also be interpreted as a complaint that a President who in January introduced 23 executive orders to address “gun violence reduction” should be given an even greater free reign to take a bite out of gun rights.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Talk about hyper hypocrisy! Today on Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough slammed Quentin Taratino as a “pornographer of violence.” Too bad Joe didn’t have even a small fraction of such moral outrage yesterday when he and the Morning Joe crew allowed Robert Redford to ramble on and on promoting his new movie “The Company You Keep” which glorified Weathermen murderers.
Watch the video below the fold but the viewer will wonder at what point in Redford’s long spiel that Scarborough or anyone else on his show challenges Redford on the fact that his movie gives sympathetic treatment to the murderers loosely based on the 1981 Brinks robbery by radicals who had previously been involved in Weathermen bombings. That robbery resulted in the murder of two police officers and a security guard. However, not a word of protest on Morning Joe about Redford being a “pornographer of violence” even those his movie gave a sympathetic portrayal of the killers.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mankind’s capacity for hatred never fails to impress me. It is the source for the evils of war, genocides, and the long litany of horrors. In the last century it manifested itself with the Armenian genocide by the Turks, the Holocaust by the Nazis, the inter-tribal massacres in Rwanda, and, of course, wherever you found communism, you found also the deaths of millions.
There has been a spate of articles regarding the rise of fascist groups in Europe and, in February, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing on the rise of anti-Semitism, calling it not only a threat to Jews, but to other religious minorities and the ideal of tolerance in general.
Anti-Semitism ranks among the world’s oldest hatreds. It is endemic to Islam, but the hatred of Christianity and all other religions is a pillar of faith in Islam whose “holy war” is contributing so much unrest in the world today. Islam’s earliest efforts to penetrate Europe were stopped in 732 at Poitiers, France and 1683 outside of Vienna. In 711, Muslims had invaded Spain and remained until they were driven out seven centuries later. The Crusades to redeem Jerusalem were conducted from 1095 to 1291.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
USDA Caves to Food Industry Pressures, Approves Three New Toxic Meat Preservatives
(NaturalNews) After intense lobbying by Kraft Foods Global Inc. and Kemin Food Technologies, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), a division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), has agreed to reverse existing regulations that prohibit the use of three toxic meat preservatives.
According to Courthouse News Service (CNS), sodium benzoate, sodium propionate, and benzoic acid will now be permissible for use in preserving and treating meat and poultry products, despite having been previously banned. FSIS has long been of the persuasion that major food corporations would attempt to use such additives to “conceal damage or inferiority in meat and poultry,” but the agency’s view has apparently changed.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Communist Party of Canada Moving Socialism Onto the Agenda
Meanwhile, the one difference separating the Communist Party of Canada and the Liberal/NDP is that the CPC does not try to hide what it is.
“Socialism won’t come on a plate. But for the price of a plate, you can help us get it onto the agenda!”
So declares the Communist Party of Canada (CPC), kicking off its 37th Convention Banquet in Toronto today.
“Delegates from Nova Scotia to Vancouver Island are gathering in Toronto for the 37th Central Convention of the Communist Party of Canada. About 50 delegates and alternates elected over the past several weeks at provincial membership meetings will debate a wide range of policy issues, focusing on the struggle to block the right-wing, pro-corporate polices of the Harper Conservative government, and to win a “People’s Alternative” to the neoliberal agenda sweeping the capitalist countries,” according to a CPC media release.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: Bishop Seraphim Wants Athens Mosque Stopped
As the Greek government readies to build the country’s first official mosque, the hard-line Bishop Seraphim of Piraeus has gone to the Council of State to appeal the decision, saying he doesn’t want Muslims in Greece to have a sanctioned place of worship.
Seraphim, already known for his anti-Semitic opinions, has described a 2006 law paving the way for the creation of the mosque as “a disgraceful and humiliating sacrilege.” He defended his action as a bid “to protect the religious rights of Greek Christians.”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Late-Season Freeze Sets Baltic Ice Record
Ice breakers navigating the Gulf of Bothnia have been astounded at the record spread of ice on the Baltic Sea, while scientists say they have never seen anything like it.
“Since record keeping began in the sixties, we’ve never encountered anything like this before,” ice breaker Ulf Gulldne told the local newspaper Örnsköldsviks Allehanda.
On March 29th, 176,000 square kilometers of the Baltic Sea was covered in ice, a record for the time of year. On a map, it means about half of the central and northern parts are frozen over. Far north, the ice is both thick and difficult to break through.
The date on which the ice reaches its maximum spread usually falls much earlier in the year. The previously latest date record was March 25th, 2008. That year, only 49,000 square kilometeres of the Baltic was covered in ice, which was the smallest maximum spread of ice in the previous 100 years.
“I’ve never seen this much ice this late in the season,” said Karl Herlin, captain of the icebreaker Atle, currently working off the coast of Luleå in northern Sweden.
His crew is freeing up a path through the ice for the ship Rautaruukki that is picking its way to Luleå. It is one of the between five to 15 ships that Atle has assisted every day in the past week, the busiest so far this winter.
“It’s kind of cool to see how the weather changes from year to year,” Herlin added.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Meet the Scourge of France’s Political Crooks
For 30 years he’s been France’s muck-raking journalist par excellence, and this week his investigative news site caused one of the most spectacular political downfalls in recent French history. Edwy Plenel is our French Face of the Week.
Who is Edwy Plenel?
Edwy Plenel is a 60-year-old political journalist, former editor-in-chief of French daily Le Monde, and a co-founder of the investigative news website Mediapart.
Why is he in the news?
Earlier this week, his website Mediapart played the key role in one of the most spectacular falls from grace of any French politician in recent French history, and bear in mind there’s been a few.
Former French Budget Minister Jérôme Cahuzac was charged on Tuesday with “laundering the proceeds of tax evasion,” after admitting he had held a foreign bank account for 20 years, until 2010.
The court based the charges on secret audio recordings procured by Mediapart, and partly published by them in December, which appear to feature Cahuzac speaking with his financial advisor about moving money from a secret Swiss bank account to one based in Singapore.
Until his mea culpa this week, Cahuzac strenuously denied the allegations, which over the last few months he described as everything from”scandalous” to “delirious” to “crazy”. He said at one point that the scandal would end in either his downfall or that of Plenel and his website. He proved himself right. Plenel and his journalists held firm and Cahuzac fell.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: Renovated Rijksmuseum Lets Cyclists Ride Through the Building
Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum has reopened after 10 years of renovation, but the decision to allow a cycle path through the museum is causing controversy.
Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum reopens today, and while many visitors will appreciate the architectural renovation and old masters on show, others might be more excited about being able to ride their bike through the museum again…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
[WARNING: * Disturbing Content *]
The daughter of a frail 97-year-old woman smothered her with a pillow for asking to be cooked Christmas dinner, shouting: ‘You’ve lived too long and you’re a nuisance.’
Julie Faulkner, 67, has now been jailed for five years for the assault, which almost cost the life of her mother, Connie Goodman.
Mrs Goodman, who suffers from mobility problems but is mentally alert, managed to call for help by pressing an emergency alarm on her bracelet.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: A Third of Anti-Social Behaviour Victims Say Calling Police Makes No Difference
More than one in three victims of anti-social behaviour say their calls to police have made no difference.
And the problem is even worse among those whose lives are made a misery by yobs in their neighbourhood. Nearly half of the victims who suffer the most said officers took no action.
Details of the scale of police failings over anti-social behaviour were revealed in a report by academics published yesterday.
A survey of nearly 10,000 victims revealed that people tormented by gangs of thugs were most likely to ‘fall through the net’.
Critics said the study showed forces cannot be relied on to protect the public from threatening behaviour, vandalism and intimidation.
It came as one force was criticised for plans to categorise attacks on goths and punks as ‘hate crimes’.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Bullfinch: Dad ‘Outraged’ Over Sex Grooming Claim
A MARRIED dad-of-four has told the Old Bailey he only met a girl twice before she accused him of grooming, drugging, and violently sexually abusing her. Mohammed Karrar said he was “outraged” at the allegations and said they were a “product of a fertile imagination”. The 38-year-old is one of nine men who deny involvement in an alleged child prostitution ring in Oxford. Karrar, who began giving evidence yesterday, is accused of giving drugs to complainants known as Girl 3 and 4 and trafficking them across the country to have sex for money. He faces 18 charges…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Operation Bullfinch: Day 41: Friday April 5
9:43 am: Oxford Mail crime reporter Ben Wilkinson is at the Old Bailey
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
A police officer is suing a burglary victim for £10,000 after allegedly falling into a drain while investigating a break-in.
PC Richard Seymour says he tore an Achilles tendon and spent four months in a cast after the fall during a 4am call-out to the man’s shop in March last year.
The 34-year-old officer is now suing owner Stuart Lambley for ‘loss of overtime’ during his six-month absence from work — despite being on full pay throughout this time.
A letter from PC Seymour’s lawyers adds that the officer also missed out on special duties during the London 2012 Olympics — something which came as a ‘bitter disappointment’ to him.
Mr Lambley said: ‘I was in complete shock when I received the letter last month.
‘I won’t be calling the police any more. I don’t see the point. Not if there’s a danger of getting sued. It should not be allowed.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Philpott Case Should Prompt Debate About Britain’s Underclass
by Douglas Murray
The Philpott case has already turned into a row about media reporting. You can see why. It is so much easier to argue about a newspaper front-page than to talk about the terrible underclass this country has created.
In a nutshell our problem is this. For hard-working couples, having children in 21st century Britain is unbelievably costly. Having been taxed at every turn of their lives they have to think extremely carefully about whether they can afford to have a child. Many will decide they cannot. Others will decide that they can but will spend endless nights worrying over how they are going to support the child they have brought into the world. If they find they can afford that first child they will still think very hard about whether they can afford a second, let alone a third.
The cosmic joke is that at the same time that such couples are worrying about their bills, they will be paying money to encourage another group of people to have children with few such concerns. Of course most of this latter group do not live like millionaires. And naturally most do not burn their children to death. But there is a substantial class — or underclass — in this country which no longer shares the concerns of what used to be ordinary people…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Zakir Naik Booklet Given Out at Keele
by Sarah AB
I thought readers might be interested to have a look at this little book which was handed out recently at a Keele University Islamic Society event. It attempts to help Muslims explain aspects of Islam to non-Muslims, and surveys topics which, it is asserted, crop up most often in discussions. Here are a few passages which caught my eye, but, before quoting them, I want to note the response of a mortified Muslim who wished to distance herself from the booklet
[…]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: EU Foreign Policy Chief to Visit Nation Saturday
Catherine Asthon, a European Union foreign policy chief, will arrive in Egypt on Saturday for a two-day visit, the Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported. President Mohamed Mursi will meet with Ashton on Sunday, MENA reported European diplomatic sources as saying. Ashton, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, will also meet with a number of political party leaders including prominent figures in the National Salvation Front…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: Arabic Version of Mo Yan’s “Bull” Brings Chinese, Arab Cultures Closer
CAIRO, April 4 (Xinhua) — Opening for Arabs a new window to look at the Chinese culture, Egypt’s General Agency for Cultural Palaces has released the first translated version of the novel “ Bull” written by China’s Nobel laureate novelist Mo Yan. Translated into Arabic by Egyptian translator Mohsen Fergani, the novel has been released Wednesday among a book series entitled “Universal Horizons” sponsored and published by the Egyptian Culture Ministry. “Bull” is Mo’s second novel to be translated into Arabic after his “Red Sorghum.” Yet “Bull” is believed to be more impressive and popular in Arab book markets in general and in the Egyptian market in particular…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
On the Menu at Egypt’s Most Prestigious University: Maggots and Nails
Students at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo are furious. They have been protesting against the dismal hygienic conditions at their university after several hundred students fell ill due to food poisoning.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, hundreds of students gathered around the offices of the president at the Cairo university to demand his resignation. On Monday, many of their classmates had fallen ill after eating a meal served at a university dormitory. According to a public health official, 479 students were hospitalized.
Egypt’s attorney general has ordered an investigation into this mass food poisoning. Meanwhile Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi visited several victims in the hospital.
Faced with the students’ outrage, the university’s board held an emergency meeting on Wednesday and announced the dismissal of the institution’s president, Oussama al-Abd. He will leave his position once a new university president is elected in mid-April.
Before the scandal broke, students had already been complaining to the administration and had filmed a shocking video of the dismal hygienic conditions in their cafeterias. The students showed meals infested with maggots, nails, bits of wood, and cockroaches.
| — Hat tip: Takuan Seiyo | [Return to headlines] |
Israel, The Little Nation That Could, Part 1
Although Israel is about the size of New Jersey, she is surrounded by her sworn enemies with a landmass comparable to the whole of the United States of America. In A.D. 635, Mohammed conquered Palestine, subjugated Jews, and used Jewish spoil to support his religious movement. The 1981 Mecca Declaration pledged jihad against Israel until the last Jew in the world is eliminated.[2]
Before Arafat, there was Palestinian spiritual leader Haj Amin al-Husseini. Called “Fuhrer of the Arab world,” the Mufti of Jerusalem befriended Hitler, supported his “Final Solution,” and murdered Jews. To this day, Mein Kampf is a best seller in Arab countries. Additionally, throughout the Arab Middle East, government press promotes a long debunked source for turn-of-the-century hatred of Jews. In his anti-Semitic campaign (1933-45), Hitler likewise used The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.[3]
Repeatedly and unremittingly, Jewish sovereignty has been attacked — not to mention Israeli El Al airliners, busses, schools, restaurants, peace spokespersons, and friends of Israel. At the Olympics in Munich (1972), Black September terrorists attacked even Israeli athletes. Egyptian president Anwar Sadat became one of three Arab leaders assassinated by fellow Arabs for having sought peace with Israel.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Kerry Faces Obstacles in Bid to Restart Israeli- Palestinian Peace Process
JERUSALEM, April 4 (Xinhua) — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is set for a bumpy ride in his upcoming visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories aiming to revive the peace process stalled for more than two years. While Washington termed Kerry’s third tour to the Middle East in a month as a “listening trip,” Israeli and U.S. media suggest the U.S. top diplomat will try to find ways to rebuild confidence for both sides in resuming the peace talks. One such measure Kerry could employ is to persuade Israel to release some Palestinians it held in prisons and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) to drop its bid to sue Israel in the International Criminal Court…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Russia May Delay Chemical Weapons Destruction Until 2020
Russia may extend the deadline for complete destruction of its chemical weapons arsenal until 2020 as it lacks industrial capacity to finish the task on schedule, RIA Novosti reported citing the Izvestia newspaper.
The relevant draft proposal is being prepared by the Trade Ministry and will be submitted to the upper chamber of the Russian parliament, the Federation Council, on April 16, the paper said. The final decision will be made by the Russian president after consultations with the Russian lawmakers and experts.
Russia has destroyed about 25,000 metric tons of chemical weapons, or 62 percent of its 40,000-ton stockpile as of April 29, 2012 — the deadline set by the Chemical Weapons Convention for complete arsenal destruction.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Afghan Donkey Bomb Kills Policeman
A bomb strapped to the back of a donkey killed one policeman and wounded three civilians in eastern Afghanistan on Friday, officials said.
The explosives were set off when the animal walked close to a police post in the volatile district of Alingar in Laghman province early in the morning, provincial spokesman Sarhadi Zwak told AFP. “The bomb on the back of the donkey was remotely detonated, one policeman was martyred and three civilians wounded,” he said. Provincial governor Fazlullah Mojadidi confirmed the incident and casualties. The officials blamed the attack on Taliban militants who have been waging an insurgency against the western-backed Kabul government since they were overthrown in a US-led invasion in late 2001…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Five Nepalis Self-Immolate in Gujarat State of India
KATHMANDU, April 4 (Xinhua) — Five Nepalis have self-immolated in India’s western province of Gujarat fearing evacuation from their 35-year-old house, Indian media reported Thursday. The incident occurred in Rajkot municipality after it became clear that the municipality was all set to demolish their house. Of the five, three have been pronounced dead in a local hospital, while the remaining two are severely injured…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
France’s €12 Billion Jet Deal With India Stalls
India’s negotiations with France’s Dassault Aviation on a $12-billion deal for Rafale fighter jets have stalled due to disagreements over the production of the planes in India, a report said on Friday.
The defence deal, one of the biggest ever, was to see the manufacture of the first 18 of the jets in France with the remainder to be produced under licence by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), a state-run Indian aerospace behemoth.
The Indian Express newspaper, citing anonymous sources in its report, said that Dassault had refused to take responsibility for the 108 jets to be manufactured by HAL, sparking a row with New Delhi.
The French firm reportedly told Indian officials that New Delhi would have to negotiate two contracts, one with Dassault for 18 fighters and the other with HAL for the remaining 108 aircraft.
The defence ministry “completely rejected this suggestion and made it clear to Dassault that it (the French company) will be solely responsible for the sale and delivery of all 126 aircraft,” the newspaper reported, citing sources.
Dassault is thought to have reservations about the ability of HAL, a firm renowned for its inefficiencies, to handle the complex manufacturing and technology transfers which are a crucial part of the deal.
The Rafale beat off stiff competition from six rivals from Russia, the US and Europe last year when India selected the French fighter to replace its ageing fleet.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia Seeks to Prevent Violence Among Asylum Seekers in Detention Center
JAKARTA, April 5 (Xinhua) — Indonesian Foreign Affairs Minister Marty Natalegawa said on Friday that his ministry would make efforts to prevent violence among asylum seekers in the country’s detention center, following a riot that left eight dead in North Sumatra province’s detention center.
Speaking after opening a conflict prevention workshop jointly held by ASEAN and UN offices here, the minister said that he had already received reports on the riot in which eight Myanmar refugees were killed, 15 injured and three refugees fled from the detention center…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Myanmar Muslims Kill 8 Buddhists in Indonesian Centre
A group of Myanmar Muslims beat eight Buddhists to death at an Indonesian detention centre on Friday after becoming enraged at news of deadly communal violence in their homeland, officials said. The Rohingya Muslims launched the attack at the immigration centre on Sumatra island using weapons fashioned from smashed up beds and broom handles after seeing pictures of religious violence in Myanmar, in March, that left dozens dead…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Stop Extra UK Aid to Pakistan Unless Taxes Increase, Urge MPS
The UK government should withhold extra aid to Pakistan unless the country does more to gather taxes from its wealthier citizens, a group of MPs has said.
The International Development Committee said British taxpayers should not be paying for health and education in Pakistan while rich Pakistanis were paying little tax.
They also urged ministers to ensure aid was focused on anti-corruption efforts.
Ministers said they were committed to ensuring tax reform took place.
The government is planning to double the amount of aid it provides to Pakistan from £267m in 2012-13 to £446m in 2014-15, making it the largest recipient of UK aid.
The UK is the world’s second-largest donor of international aid, with only the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Luxembourg spending a higher proportion of their national income on overseas support, according to the latest OECD figures.
The committee accepted there was a “powerful case” for maintaining bilateral aid to Pakistan, which has “long-established ties” with the UK and “real poverty and serious security problems”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Tarantula the Size of a Dinner Plate Discovered
It’s big, it’s hairy, and it’s venomous.
The newest spider to give arachnophobes the willies, a tarantula named Poecilotheria rajaei has been discovered on the island nation of Sri Lanka.
With a leg span of 8 inches (20 centimeters) and enough venom to kill mice, lizards, small birds and snakes, according to Sky News, the crawler is covered in subtle markings of gray, pink and daffodil yellow.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Chinese Tourists Now Biggest Source of Travel Spending
The Chinese have become the single biggest source of global tourism income after spending $102bn (£67bn; 79bn euros) while travelling abroad in 2012.
The total is 40% higher than the year before, and puts them well above the next two highest-spending countries, Germany and the US.
The figures come from the UN World Tourism Organisation. It says higher incomes, looser travel restrictions and a strengthening currency are behind the surge.
Other emerging market countries saw their tourism numbers jump, too.
The Russian Federation saw spending rise by 32% to $43bn, putting it in fifth place in the ranking of international tourism spending, up from seventh.
The organisation’s secretary general, Taleb Rifai, said: “Emerging economies continue to lead growth in tourism demand.
“The impressive growth of tourism expenditure from China and Russia reflects the entry into the tourism market of a growing middle class from these countries, which will surely continue to change the map of world tourism.”
Bitcoin ATMs coming soon
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
North Korea Provokes, Dems Retreat
A missile defense system for the eastern seaboard that was dropped from the final version of the 2013 Defense Authorization Act is getting a second look, in light of North Korea’s escalating threats. Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) characterized that threat as a “wake up call,” noting that “the next issue that needs to be taken up right away is [a] missile defense site to protect the East Coast of this country.”
It would appear to be a logical argument in light of the administration’s recent move to shift $1 billion in defense spending from developing a missile shield for Poland and Bulgaria, to adding 14 land-based interceptors in Alaska. The move would expand to 44 the number of long-range ballistic missile interceptors that comprise part of the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
North Korea: You Don’t Yell Fire in a Crowded Theatre
Under the latest crazed dictator Kim Jong-un of North Korea, threats and bluster are going to a new level. Kim Jong-un is the 29-year-old son of Kim Jong-il, the last tyrant of North Korea known for his bad hair days and largest porno collection in the world. I said more than once on my show that I could see why with ‘stand straight up’ hair like he had and the personality from hell, why he needed a porno collection. What woman in their right mind would go near him other than at gunpoint?
This week Fox news revealed the statement from a high ranking military officer from North Korea, that their military was now cleared to wage a nuclear attack against the US. It was also reported that North Korea had moved a ‘considerable range’ missile to their east coast that could travel at the very least to South Korea and Japan. It was estimated to have a range of 1,800 miles.
All these years, during the Bush days and now Obama, North Korea has secretly been building their nuclear weapons capability and intent to destroy the west and regain South Korea. They have gotten used to sanctions, ‘should’ statements from the six-party talks over the years and the ‘bad egg’ reputation and threats. They could care less. They now have nuclear missiles, a great friendship with Iran and the fourth largest military in the world, 1.1 million members. Sources say South Korea has 690,000.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
South Koreans Are Getting a Little Nervous
It still seems more likely than anything else that Kim Jong Un is just blustering very clumsily. But there’s no way to be sure, and if you live in the South and you’d been used to shrugging off similar nonsense from his father and grandfather before him, you can’t help but notice that it has a different feel to it this time. No one can be sure we haven’t finally found ourselves facing the sort of delusional potentate who really thinks he can poke the tiger in the nuts and walk away without getting mauled. The Washington Post:
“This bustling South Korean capital has been defined for decades as a place of traffic jams and luxury shopping malls, long days of work and longer nights of sipping rice liquor. Residents rarely behaved as though their routines could be upended in minutes by the Kim regime to the north and its 10,000 artillery pieces.
“But after years of largely ignoring threats from North Korea, some residents say they are becoming a bit jittery, with the ascension of an unpredictable young leader in Pyongyang and levels of fury not seen since the early 1990s.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Why Does the US Continue to Appease Sudan?
Genocide by attrition in the Nuba Mountains
Imagine a corrupt Third World dictator who took power in a coup, who locks up opponents, journalists, civil society leaders, students and anyone else who dares doubt his right to absolute power.
Imagine a leader who counts Iran and Hezbollah as his closest friends; a man who gave sanctuary to Osama bin Laden for five years; and who has been indicted for genocide by the International Criminal Court (ICC). Imagine a leader who denies rape exists in Muslim societies, even as his soldiers and their proxies systematically rape women and girls whom they consider racially inferior. Then imagine that America considers this leader their friend in the war on terror.
Why does the Obama Administration continue to handle Omar al Bashir and the Government of Sudan with kid gloves? Bashir’s regime, based in the capital, Khartoum, perpetrated genocide by attrition in the Nuba Mountains in the 1990s, and has carried out what Colin Powell, then US Secretary of State, defined as genocide in Darfur since 2003. Khartoum is once more committing crimes against humanity in both the Nuba Mountains and the Blue Nile regions today in an effort to ethnically cleanse the land of non-Arab groups.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Denmark: Ethnic Minority Group’s Funding “Better Spent Elsewhere”
A group representing young minorities will lose a million kroner in state funding due to concerns that a speaker at one of its events was “anti-democratic”
A group representing ethnic minorities has lost its state funding after it last year invited a controversial Muslim scholar to speak at an anti-radicalism conference.
Ny-Dansk Ungdomsråd lost its one million kroner in funding from the ‘satspuljen’ — a government fund set aside for projects helping marginalised social groups — due to resistance from the anti-immigration party Dansk Folkeparti (DF).
DF was highly critical that the Muslim scholar Tahir ul-Qadri was invited to the conference as he is accused of playing an instrumental role in developing Pakistan’s anti-blasphemy laws that critics argue have been used to persecute religious minorities.
His involvement is unclear, however, as despite repeatedly denying playing a role, he allegedly admitted writing the laws in video seen by Jyllands-Posten newspaper.
Ul-Qadri is more widely known, however, for issuing a 2010 fatwa, or a Muslim legal pronouncement, against terrorism in which he declared that there was no justification for carrying out violence in the name of Islam.
But despite his high-profile anti-terrorism work, such as an inivtation to speak at the World Economic Forum in 2011, Ul-Qadri’s link to the blasphemy laws led social affairs minister Karen Hækkerup (Socialdemokraterne) to pull out of the conference at short notice, even though she had allegedly known for a long time that she would be sharing a platform with him.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Exposing a Mass Amnesty’s Ultimate Results: 100 Million Immigrants
The First Basic Law of Human Stupidity asserts without ambiguity: always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation. At first, the statement sounds trivial. Closer scrutiny reveals its veracity. No matter how high are one’s estimates of human stupidity, one is repeatedly startled by the fact that: people whom one had once judged rational and intelligent turn out to be unashamedly stupid. Additionally, day after day, with unceasing monotony, one is harassed in one’s activities by stupid individuals who appear suddenly and unexpectedly in the most inconvenient places and at the most improbable moments. (Source: Carlo M. Cipolla, Professor of Economics, UC Berkeley)
Eight stupid U.S. senators, known as the “Gang of Eight” huddle to ensure the destruction of the United States of America. Their gracious amnesty of 20 million illegal alien migrants now working and living in our country, will, in the end — result in an additional 100 million immigrants within the next three decades. Those are the scientifically projected figures by Fogel/Martin in their “US Population Projections.” (Source: www.fairus.org )
Everything about a mass amnesty allowing 20 million illegal aliens instant citizenship smoulders under a cloak of hidden agendas in Washington, DC. At present, eight U.S. senators negotiate the future of our country. Not only will they allow illegality by making it legal, they will increase legal immigration from its current 1.2 million annually to as high as 3.1 million annually. In other words, they will swamp this country with third world immigrants from every corner of the globe.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Illegal Migrants May be Banned From Entering Russia for 10 Years
MOSCOW, April 4 (Xinhua) — The Russian government is considering a bill to deny entry for 10 years to foreigners who repeatedly violated the country’s immigration laws. “The bill is aimed to increase the efficiency of the fight against illegal migration,” Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Thursday at a government meeting. If violation against the immigration policy was registered for the second time, “A foreign national will be banned from entering Russia for 10 years,” the Interfax news agency quoted Medvedev as saying…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
The only official Government report into future Romanian and Bulgarian migration into Britain has been branded a ‘whitewash’ — after it failed to answer the key question of how many would arrive next year.
– From January 1, EU controls on workers from the two countries will expire, allowing almost 29million people free access to work here.
Following repeated refusals by ministers to estimate how many will come, the £30,000 Foreign Office-commissioned study said it was ‘not possible to predict the scale of future migration’ from the two EU countries.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Mass Immigration is a Radical Rightwing Policy — But Not in a Good Way
If someone were to declare their enthusiastic support for mass immigration, dismissing anyone who thinks otherwise as a backward xenophobe, what would you assume about their politics more generally? You’d probably place them on the left of the political spectrum, but as Ed West reminds us in the Telegraph, there are those on the right who also also favour a liberal immigration policy
[…]
[Reader comment by Malcom Stevas on 5 April 2013 at about 9 am.]
“.full-on libertarians… would go even further, arguing for completely unrestricted immigration”
Wrong. I’m not a “full on” (whatever that means) libertarian but “unrestricted immigration” must surely be recognised by anyone as wholly inimical to the central concern with liberty. The more libertarian culture I wish to see in England would be subverted instantly, were unrestricted immigration permitted, by foreign hordes keen to grab whatever was going, thereby chucking the baby out with the bathwater.
This article commits the vulgar error of so many on this topic, regarding immigration and immigrants as mere economic phenomena. They are not. Our culture — in the broad sense — has already been altered, some say deliberately though I think incompetence & indolence are responsible, so that broad swathes of many cities are not recognisably English. We remain predominantly a North West European people, but continuing high levels of immigration from far distant cultures can only continue to dilute our sense of self.
I am very content with my Germanic/Nordic/Celtic heritage, my history, my culture, and I suspect the great majority of my fellows are too. I know where I came from, the history of my country, the whys and wherefores of our cultural development: I already resent very strongly the assault on these things perpetrated by the political class, and I do not forgive them their crimes.
So whoever might wish to continue mass immigration to this country of people whose roots, language, religion, values and aspirations are so often antithetical to ours had better watch out.
Only this morning I listened to a spokeswoman from the NIESR floundering through an interview on the Today programme, suggesting there was little cause for concern about a wave of immigrants next year from Romania and Bulgaria. I suspect our political class will continue to prevaricate and do nothing substantive to head off this possibility, but if the worst predictions are fulfilled and many thousands of Roma (etc) arrive, at least this will have the benefit of focusing still more hatred and contempt on those responsible, and increase the chances of our having a fresh government with a smidgin of patriotism.
[Reader comment by Iain Moore on 5 April 2013 at about 9:45 am.]
As I have been pointing out, the mass immigration policy is the result of an un-holly alliance between the globalist right and internationalist left. Agendas that were kept in check while we had a sovereign Government were let rip when the political establishment lost control of the country by selling us out to the likes of the EU. A control they lost under heavy prompting and pressuring from the political right and left. The result has been to economically rape a large portion of the country to make a fast buck , while the left got their agenda to disconnect the people from their country and install a client state.
[JP note: See here for the Ed West article http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100208866/mass-immigration-and-the-housing-market-two-ponzi-schemes-that-benefit-the-wealthy/
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
BBC ‘Provokes’ Christians With Show That ‘Sexualises Christ’
An Easter BBC programme that suggested Mary Magdalene was married to Jesus Christ has been described as “highly provocative” by a bishop.
Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali criticised the programme, which was broadcast on Good Friday, saying the timing was when “Christians are thinking about Christ on the cross”.
He added that the show has references to Jesus “being kissed on the mouth by Mary Magdalene and it refers to her being his wife”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Diversity Gone Wild: Lifeguards Who Can’t Swim?
Here is another case of just how messed up our country is. The left is notorious for finding a “problem” that doesn’t really exist and then doing everything, fair or not, to correct the so-called problem or injustice. That’s exactly what’s going on in Phoenix where there is a push to hire minority lifeguards, even if the recruits can’t swim!
As reported at NPR.org, the Phoenix aquatics department noticed a “problem.” At the public pools that are used mostly by black and hispanic kids, the lifeguards were mostly white. Horrors, right? Thus, the quest began to recruit more minorities to be lifeguards.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Judge Orders F.D.A. To Make Morning-After Pill Available Over the Counter for All Ages
A federal judge has ruled that the Unites States government must make the most common morning-after pill available over the counter for all ages, instead of requiring a prescription for girls 16 and under.
The decision, on a fraught and politically controversial subject, comes after a decade-long fight over who should have access to the pill and under what circumstances, and it counteracts an unprecedented move by the Obama administration’s Health and Human Services secretary who in 2011 overruled a recommendation by the Food and Drug Administration to make the pill available for all ages without a prescription.
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During the same time period when Dame Cicely Saunders developed the basic tenets of Hospice philosophy, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross published results from her groundbreaking studies of dying patients. Her books about the psychological stages of response to catastrophe, and her lectures to health professionals, helped to pave the way for the development and acceptance of hospice programs in the United States. In her book, “On Death and Dying” she identified five stages of grief — denial, anger, depression, bargaining and acceptance. Time Magazine remarked of the book, “It has brought death out of darkness.” The topic and study of death (thanatology) had been avoided by many physicians, and the book quickly became a standard text for professionals who work with terminally ill patients.
Kubler-Ross, a Swiss-born American psychiatrist, pioneered the concept of providing psychological counseling to the dying. Hospice care has subsequently been established as an alternative to hospital care for the terminally ill, and there has been more emphasis on counseling for families of dying patients. However, Hospice has not been the American panacea for dying patients which was envisioned in England by Dame Cicely Saunders.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Outraged Parents Flood Victoria’s Secret With Complaints Over New ‘Wild’ Underwear Line for Girls
Outraged parents are flooding the provocative lingerie company Victoria’s Secret with complaints after it announced a new underwear line for girls in its sub-brand called “PINK.”
According to reports, girls can choose between a lacy black pair with the message “wild” on the back, a lace trimmed thong with the phrase “call me” or a polka-dot hip-hugger that asks “feeling lucky?”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Parents Transition 6-Year-Old Son Into Girl, File Complaint Over School’s Denial of Girls’ Restroom
Fountain, Colorado — The parents of a six-year-old Colorado boy who was denied the use of the girl’s restroom at his local elementary school have filed a complaint with the state against the school district.
Last year, Coy Mathis decided to stop living like a boy and become a girl. His parents state that he complained about wearing jeans and t-shirts, and gravitated more toward tutus and dresses.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Lord Bates’s criticism on this site of my recent article in the Daily Mail is well worth addressing because we both value frank exchanges of views — perhaps one of the greatest benefits of living in a democracy.
Let me begin by looking at the word ‘persecution’ which is a loaded one I prefer not to use about the plight of Christians in the UK. In my many travels to countries such as Sudan, Nigeria and Pakistan I have interceded on behalf of Christians who have faced punishment and death for one crime only — that of being a follower of Jesus Christ. That is persecution.
The type of experience increasingly facing Christians in the UK involves much less dramatic encounters with the authorities but in some cases the discrimination or marginalization experienced is both heartfelt and unjust. In only a few years we have moved into a situation where Roman Catholic adoption agencies have been forced to close down, where public servants have been disciplined for expressing Christian beliefs, or been sacked for wearing the cross.
Very few people in public life have bothered to stand up for these people. Is it any wonder then that according to the recent ComRes poll an increasing number of Christians believe they are experiencing something akin to ‘persecution’?
I will continue to support people facing hardship because of their Christian beliefs. This is because I believe that the creation of a hierarchy of rights in which the manifestation of religious belief is often misunderstood or consigned to the bottom of the heap, is an unnecessary trajectory for a society which has always prided itself on its tolerance…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Welcome to Margaret Sanger’s Brave New World
“To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.” — Thomas Jefferson
[WARNING: * Disturbing Content *]
So why is anyone surprised to learn that Planned Parenthood “doctors” may be killing babies on the operating table after they are born? The current President of the United States favored the practice back home in Illinois, as evidenced by his strenuous opposition to the Born Alive Infant Protection Act put forth in the Illinois State Senate when he was a part of that body. (It was one of the few times he didn’t vote “present,” so you know he must have been passionate about it.)
The macabre possibility that Planned Parenthood physicians may be committing infanticide was inadvertently brought to light by one of the organization’s lobbyists, one Alisa LaPolt Snow, during her testimony before the Florida State House of Representatives, which is considering a bill similar to the one Obama stood against. The proposed “Infants Born Alive” bill would extend protection to live infants born in the wake of a failed abortion.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Associated Press Revises Another Politically Charged Term
Stylebook entry for ‘Islamist’ revised two days after ‘illegal immigrant’ dropped
Following on the heels of the Tuesday decision by The Associated Press to discontinue use of the term “illegal immigrant,” the news agency on Thursday revised its stylebook entry for another politically charged term.
The term “Islamist,” the AP clarified in a Thursday afternoon alert to online stylebook subscribers, should not be used as “a synonym for Islamic fighters, militants, extremists or radicals.”
“Islamist” is frequently used as a label for conservative Islamic political movements, particularly Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas, the group’s Palestinian offshoot. It generally carries a negative connotation.
The AP first added the term to its stylebook in 2012. The definition initially read:…
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
The Universe Will Always Keep Us in the Dark — That’s Exciting
by Tom Chivers
Physics is full of what Donald Rumsfeld would call “known unknowns”, the things that we know we need to find, but don’t know exactly what they are. This week we may have come a little closer to working out the nature of one of them: “dark matter”. We are living in an exciting time for the study of the universe.
Dark matter is the archetypal known unknown; it is named for its unknown-ness. In the early 1930s it was noticed that galaxies were spinning far too fast to hold together under the gravity of the “luminous matter” — stars and dust and gas — that astronomers could detect. There must have been something else, something making up the bulk of each galaxy, which was stopping them from flying apart. It was christened “dark” matter to distinguish it from the rest of the ordinary, visible stuff, but no one knew what it was. It is now believed to be 85 per cent of all matter…
Matt Ridley put it nicely once, in his book Genome: “A true scientist is bored by knowledge… The fuel on which science runs is ignorance. Science is like a hungry furnace that must be fed logs from the forests of ignorance that surround us. In the process, the clearing we call knowledge expands, but the more it expands, the longer its perimeter and the more ignorance comes into view.”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Volcanoes on Jupiter’s Moon Io Are All Wrong, NASA Says
The hundreds of volcanoes on Jupiter’s moon Io aren’t where they’re supposed to be, scientists say.
Io’s major volcanic activity is concentrated 30 to 60 degrees farther east than models of its internal heat profile predict, a recent study reports, suggesting that the exotic, volcanic Jupiter moon Io is even more mysterious than researchers had previously thought.
“The unexpected eastward offset of the volcano locations is a clue that something is missing in our understanding of Io,” study lead author Christopher Hamilton, of the University of Maryland, said in a statement. “In a way, that’s our most important result. Our understanding of tidal heat production and its relationship to surface volcanism is incomplete.”
Io is the most volcanic body in the solar system, boasting activity 25 times that of Earth. Some of Io’s volcanoes blast plumes of sulfur and other material 250 miles (400 kilometers) above the moon, which is completely resurfaced every million years or so. On Thursday (April 4), NASA released a video of Io’s volcano plumes based on five images snapped by the agency’s Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft in March 2007.
This intense activity is ultimately generated by gravitational tugs from Jupiter, with an assist from the nearby moons Europa and Ganymede.
Io completes two orbits for every one that Europa makes, and four for every one of Ganymede’s laps. As a result of this regular timing, Europa and Ganymede have pulled the orbit of Io into an oval, with explosive consequences for the 2,260-mile-wide (3,640 km) moon.
As Io moves closer to Jupiter, the planet’s powerful gravity pulls hard on the moon, deforming it. This force decreases as Io retreats, and the moon bounces back. This cycle of flexing creates friction in Io’s interior, which in turn generates enormous amounts of volcano-driving tidal heat.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Mustn’t say ‘Islamist’ any more? O.K., we’ll have to say something else. What about ‘Muslim’?
What Salome said. The use of “Islamist” is invariably an intentional obfuscation; all CJ advocates well know and avoid it. So good. This’ll backfire on the leftnecks.
Thinking further, “Practicing Muslims” seems a most pleasant replacement for “Islamists.”
Orthodox muslim would be apt, too.
Muslie would be appropriate.