The latest media theory about the missing Malaysian jetliner is that it fell into a black hole. A more likely explanation seems to be that the newly-discovered pieces of wreckage in the far south of the Indian Ocean are from the missing plane.
In other news, the Turkish government has restricted access to Twitter after recordings of wiretaps of Prime Minister Erdogan were leaked on social media.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, Jerry Gordon, JP, Kitman, KP, MC, 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.
Bank of England Admits That Loans Come First … and Deposits Follow
The above is from a new official video released by the Bank of England.
The Bank of England notes in a new article:
Broad money is a measure of the total amount of money held by households and companies in the economy. Broad money is made up of bank deposits — which are essentially IOUs from commercial banks to households and companies — and currency — mostly IOUs from the central bank. Of the two types of broad money, bank deposits make up the vast majority — 97% of the amount currently in circulation. And in the modern economy, those bank deposits are mostly created by commercial banks themselves…
Commercial banks create money, in the form of bank deposits, by making new loans. When a bank makes a loan, for example to someone taking out a mortgage to buy a house, it does not typically do so by giving them thousands of pounds worth of banknotes. Instead, it credits their bank account with a bank deposit of the size of the mortgage. At that moment, new money is created. For this reason, some economists have referred to bank deposits as ‘fountain pen money’, created at the stroke of bankers’ pens when they approve loans.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
EU Reaches Provisional Deal on Winding Down Failing Banks
The European Union has reached a provisional deal on how to wind down troubled banks in the 28-member area. The settlement came about after marathon talks between parliamentary and government leaders.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Spending on F-35 Fighter Jets Frozen During Review
Parliament to consider trimming spending on defence programs
(ANSA) — Rome, March 20 — Italy has frozen spending on its F-35 jet fighters program, pending a parliamentary review of military spending, says Defence Minister Roberta Pinotti.
Her comments during a television interview with La7 Wednesday night, came several days after Premier Matteo Renzi said that defence spending — including the budget for the F-35 program — was under review.
This could include three billion euros in potential savings for defence budgets.
The government could decide to trim its Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets’ budget, which is currently about 11.8 billion euros over 45 years beginning in 2015. “Today we suspended payment of installments,” on the F-35, Pinotti told the program The Barbarian Invasion.
“We are having a moratorium, pending the results of an inquiry by Parliament,” she added.
The F-35 fighter jet program has been cut before.
Italy in 2012 announced plans to cut its order to 90 from the 131 originally agreed in 2002, saving the country some five billion euros.
However, last July, the Italian government rejected another call to cancel the purchase altogether of the 90 F-35 fighter jets which, at an estimated $200 million per unit, are among the costliest fighter jets in the world.
Pinotti has also said that as many as 385 military barracks could be sold to cut costs.
During the television program, Pinotti defended the overall F-35 purchase program, saying they are necessary to protect Italian soldiers in a dangerous world. The Lower House defence committee has been considering spending on military weaponry and Gian Piero Scanu, the Democratic Party (PD) leader in the committee, said Wednesday that significant cost savings may be found by streamlining programs.
“In recent years, nearly 70 different programs were overlapping one another without an adequate conception (plan), leading to an abnormal expenditure of more than five billion euros,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Renzi to Ask for EU Funds to be Outside Stability Pact
Premier says Europe must change to survive
(ANSA) — Rome, March 20 — Italian Premier Matteo Renzi will request Thursday that European Union structural funds be placed outside the budget restrictions imposed by the Growth and Stability Pact, Emilia-Romagna Governor Vasco Errani said. Errani, who is also the president of the conference of Italian regional governments, was speaking following a meeting with Renzi’s executive before the premier flies to Brussels for a summit of EU leaders in Brussels. “The government will raise the issue in Brussels, like the previous executive (of Enrico Letta) did,” Errani said. “We’ll see what the outcome is”.
Renzi, who became Italy’s youngest premier at 39 after unseating his Democratic Party (PD) colleague Letta, has vowed Italy will not breach the EU’s deficit-to-GDP ratio of 3% even though he considers the rule outdated.
He has also said the EU must change and be more than a severe teacher that checks if the member states have done their “homework”, otherwise populist, Eurosceptic parties will gain momentum.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Puerto Rico Seeks Citizens’ Advice on Economy
The government of Puerto Rico has asked its citizens to send in their ideas on how to revive the economy.
The US territory has been in a recession since 2006. Official figures put the unemployment rate at 15.2%.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Survey Shows 60% Jobless Italians Would Work for Mafia
(AGI) Rome, March 19 — Six out of 10 jobless Italians would be willing to accept a job in a company set up with laundered money from organised crime, according to a survey by farmers association, Coldiretti and the Ixe’ Institute. The results of the poll were presented at an event for the Italian Foundation “Observatory on crime in agriculture and in the agri-food industry,” promoted by Coldiretti and chaired by Prosecutor Giancarlo Caselli.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
The Federal Reserve Seems Quite Serious About Tapering — So What Comes Next?
The truth is that the Federal Reserve is at the very heart of the economic and financial problems of this country. When the Fed intervenes and purposely distorts the operation of free markets, the Fed creates economic and financial bubbles which inevitably burst later on. We saw this happen during the great financial crisis of 2008, and now it is happening again.
This is what happens when you allow an unelected, unaccountable group of central planners to have far more power over our economy than anyone else in our society does.
Most people don’t realize this, but the greatest period of economic growth in all of U.S. history was when there was no central bank.
We don’t need a Federal Reserve. In fact, the performance of the Federal Reserve has been absolutely disastrous.
Since the Fed was created just over 100 years ago, the U.S. dollar has lost more than 96 percent of its value, and the size of the U.S. national debt has gotten more than 5000 times larger. The Fed is at the very center of a debt-based financial system that has trapped us, our children and our grandchildren in an endless spiral of debt slavery.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
ABC Family’s ‘Alice in Arabia’ Draws Concern From Muslim Advocates
The greater Los Angeles-area office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) announced Wednesday that it has asked ABC Family to meet with Muslim and Arab-American community leaders to discuss concerns about potential stereotyping in the pilot for the network’s new series “Alice in Arabia.”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
By James Delingpole
Excerpt: As Anthony Watts has noted, this is news guaranteed to make a Warmist’s head explode. The reason it’s so significant is that it comes only three years after one of the APS’s most distinguished members — Professor Hal Lewis — resigned in disgust at its endorsement of what he called “the global warming scam.” Disturbed by an “appallingly tendentious APS statement on Climate Change” which “was apparently written in a hurry by a few people over lunch, and is certainly not representative of the talents of APS members”, Lewis went public with his letter of resignation to the APS’s then President Curtis G Callan Jr. (Callan’s replacement Malcolm Beasley appears to be of a more skeptical bent…)
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Austin Police Train Alongside National Guard at Military Base
Local police absorb military training tactics for possible future use on unsuspecting citizens
Members of the Austin Police Department trained alongside Texas Army National Guard troops at Austin’s Camp Mabry yesterday, learning various military tactics they say will help them be better prepared for the next Ford Hood.
“In light of recent events, the Fort Hood shooting, the Navy yard shooting, These are all incidents that strike home the importance of being ready and prepared,” Lt. Colonel Les Davis told Fox News Austin…
While on the surface the training seems innocent enough, similar preparations taking place countrywide are stoking fears that federal, state and local law enforcement agencies are training to take on the American people in the event of mass civil unrest.
Last month, we highlighted the military’s $96 million “fake city” located in Virginia, purportedly built for use in different combat training scenarios. Though the Army didn’t specify a particular training purpose, the city contained a school, a bank, and a subway station whose trains bore “the same logo as the carriages in Washington DC,” according to the London Telegraph…
Last year, former Navy SEAL Ben Smith told Fox News the Obama administration was carrying out a litmus test on its top officers with the main focus being whether they would be prepared to order NCOs to fire on Americans.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
By the Way, Obama’s Waving the Surrender Flag on Control of the Internet Too
One thing you can count on with Barack Obama is that, if the United States is taking the lead in promoting freedom, Obama will put a stop to that. So it’s no surprise that the White House has sided with leftists around the world by surrending control of the domain name system. By fall 2015, the system will be totally controlled by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Administratively this is not a dramatic change because ICANN currently manages the system via a contract with the U.S. Department of Commerce.
But it’s one thing to be a contractor. It’s another thing to be in control. The U.S. no longer is willing to maintain control. What could go wrong? Plenty, writes Daniel Castro of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
California DNA Collection Law Upheld
Anyone arrested for a felony in California can now expect both an unpleasant trip to jail and a demand for a sample of their precious DNA.
To the dismay of civil liberties advocates, a federal appeals court on Thursday unanimously upheld California’s law allowing collection of DNA samples from anyone arrested for a felony, citing a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year backing a similar Maryland law. A special 11-judge 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected the American Civil Liberties Union’s argument that California’s law is broader than Maryland’s and poses a greater threat to privacy rights.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Does the Government Want us to Know it’s Spying on Us?
The President’s own task force concluded that NSA spying in the US hadn’t prevented a single act of terrorism (e.g.,Washington Post, 12/23/13) (see also this and this).
The spying is really about gathering information on everybody. Innocent citizens.
But if citizens didn’t know the NSA was engaged in such a gargantuan program of snooping…they would, in blithe ignorance, just go about their business and live their lives.
The point is this: the most effective means of curtailing dissent and creating a cautious conforming population isn’t the spying itself. It’s letting people know the spying is happening all the time.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Elitism, Not Liberalism, Is the Real Problem
It is an absolute fact that, for all intents and purposes, there has been virtually no discernable difference in presidential administrations since Ronald Reagan left office. George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, G.W. Bush, and now Barack Obama have been nothing more than one very long and continuous administration. Yet, supposedly both the left and the right have had almost equal terms in office. But, as the game-makers in “The Hunger Games” movies use illusion and manipulation to control people, so, too, the game-makers in Washington, D.C., and New York City use illusion and manipulation to control us. The left-right, conservative-liberal paradigm is an illusion, folks.
Hardly anyone in Washington, D.C., of either major party truly believes in limited government. Their only disagreements surround how increasing federal expenditures will be spent and who will decide how it’s spent. Hardly anyone in Washington, D.C., of either major party truly gives two-cents for what the Constitution says about anything. Most of them never even mention the Constitution — except when they are on the campaign trail. Hardly anyone in Washington, D.C., of either major party truly gives a tinker’s dam about the erosion of the Bill of Rights. The only time they even talk about reclaiming freedom is when the other party is in power. To most of them, tyranny is fine — as long as the tyrant is a member of their political party.
The reality of the situation is that a very real caste-system has developed in this country. Once most of them (Republican or Democrat) are ensconced in Washington, D.C., they see themselves as having become part of the ruling class. From then on, everything that happens — and I mean EVERYTHING — is designed to augment the pleasure, prosperity, and power of the ruling class. In a word, this is ELITISM. The problem is not liberalism or conservatism; the problem is elitism.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Exclusive: ‘Welcome Home Daddy, I’m a Porn Star!’
‘Heartbroken’ devout Catholic Army doctor returns from Afghanistan to find beloved daughter is the Duke student Belle Knox starring in X-rated films
Welcome home daddy, I’m a porn star!
That was the shocking news Dr Kevin Weeks was greeted with as he returned from a tour of duty serving as an army doctor in Afghanistan.
Online and on TV, his beloved daughter is loudly and proudly proclaiming how she’s paying for her college education by making X-rated films under the pseudonym Belle Knox after she was outed by a fellow student.
The real identity of the 18-year-old student who has caused a nationwide uproar and family heartache is Miriam Weeks, raised a devout Catholic in a loving home in Spokane, Washington.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Follow-Up on Sharia Law in Detroit, Michigan
After writing the column on Sharia Law manifesting in Detroit, Michigan, I received countless responses thanking me for exposing the onslaught of Islam into America. Most Americans flat don’t know what to do or how to stop it. Many fear for our future. I’m right there with you — I am scared to death.
Several wrote telling me:
– From Rochelle, New York, Robert said, “Frosty, sorry, but this is a lot of hysterical fear-mongering B.S. which stereotypes a huge number of people. Additionally, he called me a “racist” and “hate-monger.” Actually, I respect all races and tribal groups of the world stemming from my world travels. At the same time, because of the knowledge I learned in those travels, I stand against multi-culturalism because it represents the worst “theory” ever perpetrated onto the Western world. You notice that no one emigrates into Somalia, Syria, Sudan, North Korea, India, Bangladesh or Iraq because they want to get a taste of those multi-cultural boiling pots!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
General Accused of Sexual Assault Receives Minor Punishment, No Jail
Brig. Gen. Jeffrey A. Sinclair received a reprimand on Thursday from a military judge, after he pleaded guilty to charges that included mistreating his mistress, adultery and requesting explicit photographs from female Army officers.
He was also ordered to forfeit $5,000 a month in pay for four months, but he was allowed to keep his pension. He will not serve any time in prison.
The sentence, decided by a military judge at Fort Bragg, N.C., was far less than what he had potentially faced when the case began: a possible life sentence on charges of sexually assaulting a female Army captain who had been his lover for three years.
| [Return to headlines] |
Google Encrypts All Gmail Messages After NSA Snooping
The Web giant on Thursday announced that from now on, Gmail will always use an encrypted HTTPS connection when you check and send email. Gmail has always supported HTTPS, and in 2010 Google turned it on for everyone by default, but users still had the option to turn this protection off. From now on, Gmail is HTTPS-only, meaning the mail service no longer allows the more insecure HTTP connections.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
GOP Begins to Fight Back Against Obama’s Broad Executive Overreach
After five years of his flouting the letter and spirit of the law in an increasingly brazen fashion, congressional Republicans have been starting to ramp up their rhetoric about Obama’s lawlessness, their most concerted effort on the issue to date.
Several new reports from top Republicans underscore the breadth of Obama’s executive overreach. Viewed comprehensively, it involves laws ranging from healthcare to immigration to privacy to technology to social issues to national security matters and more.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Heavily Armed Police Raid Teens Playing With Airsoft Rifles
While confronting a group of Kentucky teenagers playing with airsoft rifles, heavily armed police arrested one of the teens after he told his friend to keep filming their encounter with the officers.
Ryan Seaman, 18, and his friends were on a field in Radcliff tagging themselves with airsoft rifles similar to a game of paintball when a neighbor decided to report them to authorities despite the fact that there were no audible gun shots.
“I didn’t hear no weapons fire or anything like that,” the neighbor said to the 911 operator. “They may have been paintball rifles, I don’t know but it seemed odd.”
Yet this somehow prompted police to show up to the field heavily armed to confront the teenagers.
“The officers came out of the trees with their assault rifles,” one of the teens, Jeremy Anderson, said to Wave 3.
One officer noticed that Anderson was recording the confrontation with his GoPro camera and told him to shut it off.
“You don’t have to,” Seaman told Anderson.
Seaman was soon arrested.
After reviewing the incident, Jon Fleischaker, an expert attorney on First Amendment issues, said that the arrest appears to be “possible retaliation by police” for recording the encounter.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hilarious: Notorious Democratic Underground Blogger Tries ObamaCare
By Thomas Lifson
Excerpt: An Obama dupe has had his eyes opened by the experience of trying to sign up for Obamacare, and the results are hilarious for conservatives to read. P. J. Gladnick of Newsbusters chronicles the tale of Will Pitt, the guy who soared to fame with the 2006 “scoop” that Karl Rove would be indicted and frog marched out of the White House. Yes, that obnoxious jerk. Well, he has learned that his guy Obama is not quite as cool as he thought, and as Gladnick puts it, “Harry Reid is going to have a hard time portraying Will Pitt as a Koch brothers shill…”
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Internet Control in an Anti-Free Speech World
What happens when the “international community” oversees the web?
Last Friday, U.S. officials announced plans to relinquish control of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which manages Internet infrastructure to the so-called “global community.”
Despite denials from the administration, the consequences of that move do indeed include the possibility of the Internet falling under U.N. control. That reality has been pursued for years by pro-censorship factions led by Russia and China. As such, enormous questions exist about the future of the Internet under the stewardship of international interests — questions that the Obama administration seems wholly unconcerned with.
The consequences of relinquishing control of the Internet involve more than censorship. U.S. security could be jeopardized as well. “Under invariably incompetent U.N. control, it could mean a hostile foreign power disabling the Internet for us,” former Bush administration State Department advisor Christian Whiton warned. He also sounded the warning on the possibility that any U.N. control of the Internet could engender taxes. “While the Obama administration says it is merely removing federal oversight of a non-profit, we should assume ICANN would end up as part of the United Nations,” Whiton said. “If the U.N. gains control what amounts to the directory and traffic signals of the Internet, it can impose whatever taxes it likes. It likely would start with a tax on registering domains and expand from there.”…
Regardless of which scenario is accurate, ICANN’s motive is transparent. The organization has elicited the wrath of many in the business community who believe their decision-making is aimed at accommodating the industry that sells domain names, and whose fees provide the lion’s share of ICANN’s revenue. They believe ICANN’s contract with the U.S. mitigates some of those abuses, and that international control would amount to no control at all…
While I certainly agree our nation must stridently review our procedures regarding surveillance in light of the NSA controversy, to put ourselves in a situation where censorship-laden governments like China or Russia could take a firm hold on the Internet itself is truly a scary thought,” said Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC). “I look forward to working with my colleagues on the Senate Commerce Committee and with the Commerce Department on this, because — to be blunt — the ‘global Internet community’ this would empower has no First Amendment. “
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
LA Police: All Cars Under Criminal Investigation as Part of License Plate Reader Surveillance
Police in LA have attempted to justify an Automatic License Plate Reader surveillance program by claiming that every single car in the city is part of a criminal investigation.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) recently acquired documents under the Freedom Of Information Act that show the Police Department and the Sheriff’s Department in LA argued that “All [license plate] data is investigatory.” The law enforcement departments also stated that the fact that the data will likely never be connected to any specific crime is insignificant.
The claims were made by police in briefs filed in response to a lawsuit brought by EFF and the ACLU seeking a week’s worth of the License Plate Reader data. The rights groups have taken issue with the surveillance program because the cameras used automatically and indiscriminately photograph all license plates, without any reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
By Thomas Lifson
Excerpt: In my lifetime I have seen dietary advice supposedly based on “science” go through multiple iterations, so much so that I have little trust in any of it. Eggs, coffee, and other delights were demonized, only for subsequent studies to say, in effect, never mind. But one constant has been the advice to avoid saturated fats. Now that is under question, too. Anahad O’Connor writes in the New York Times:
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Muslims Booted From Empire State Building for Praying: Suit
A Muslim family from Long Island slapped the owners of the Empire State Building Tuesday with a scathing $5 million lawsuit that claims they were booted from the building’s observation deck for praying.
Fahad and Amina Tirmizi of Farmingville said their civil rights were violated when they were “assaulted, battered and forcibly removed” from the famed observatory last July…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Muslims Protest Anti-Sharia Bill in Tallahassee Today
About 100 Central Florida Muslims are traveling today to join about 300 other Muslims from throughout Florida to lobby the state Legislature against an anti-Sharia bill.
It’s the sixth year that Muslims have participated in the Florida Muslim Capitol Day to lobbied legislators on issues ranging from education to jobs, and the fourth year to voice opposition to an anti-Sharia bill…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Naked Woman Arrested After Trying to Visit Husband in Virginia Jail
Police say a naked 26-year-old woman was charged Saturday with indecent exposure after she showed up at an Arlington County magistrate office demanding to see her jailed husband, The Washington Post reported.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
New York Trains to Install Audio, Video Recorders
Thousands of audio and video recorders to protect passengers from “train derailments”
New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced its plan to install several thousand audio and video recorders on its commuter trains Wednesday, reportedly in response to federal safety recommendations…
Officials say the technology will also be used to control undesirable behavior while giving detailed conversations and video to accident investigators following any derailment or incident.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Not Just Java Anymore: Beer, Wine Coming to More Starbucks
Starbucks plans to turn more of its cafes into a destination for beer and wine in the evenings. The coffee company says it is looking to expand alcohol sales to “thousands of select stores” over the next several years, although it didn’t provide details on an exact timeline.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
NRA Does Not Oppose Weakening Stand Your Ground Law in Florida
Florida’s Stand Your Ground self-defense law tested during the George Zimmerman trial is under assault in Florida. Marion Hammer, a former NRA president who is one of the chief architects of the law in Florida, is not opposed to changes to the law. She has served as the NRA’s lobbyist in Tallahassee for more than three decades.
On Tuesday, the Florida Senate Criminal Justice Committee voted unanimously to pass SB 130. Both Democrats and Republicans voted to change the law.
The proposed changes will significantly modify Stand Your Ground and if enacted will give anti-Second Amendment groups around the country a green light to attack and rollback the concept of armed self-defense.
A large number of states have some form of stand your ground laws under Castle Doctrine statues. The Castle Doctrine concept stretches back to the Roman era and is central in English common law under the historic dictum that “an Englishman’s home is his castle” and thus inviolable.
Democrats in the state, however, believe self-defense laws are brutal and uncivilized. “The legislature must change Stand Your Ground to clearly define the parameters of a civilized society in Florida,” Senator Christopher L. Smith of District 31 has declared, summing up the opinion of liberals in the state.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Says Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick Would be a Great President
President Barack Obama said on Wednesday Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick — a rising Democratic star — would make “a great president or vice president” but will likely take a break when his eighth and final year as state chief executive ends.
“Deval’s done a great job and I think (it) signals that he could be very successful at the federal level as well,” Obama told Boston NBC station New England Cable News.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
ObamaCare Provider Knows When Clients Visit the Bathroom
Obamacare provider Humana knows when its clients visit the bathroom, sleep, walk, open the medicine cabinet or use the fridge under a new “telemedicine” program that allows constant monitoring of individuals in their home.
Ernestine Marshall’s apartment is fitted with several sensors that are monitored in real time by Humana employees in Pinellas County. If anything untoward is detected, Marshall receives a phone call. She also gets a monthly visit from a field agent.
“The diabetic and MS patient’s home is outfitted by insurer, Humana, with sensors that keep track of when she opens her medicine cabinet, her fridge, sleeps, walks, and uses the bathroom,” reports Fox 13.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Pelosi: We ‘Couldn’t be Prouder’ of ObamaCare
House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi defended the president’s healthcare law as “a winner” despite worries of increasing premiums and the drag it could have on Democrats this fall.
Four years after the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, Pelosi defended the hiccups of its implementation in a rare recess-week press conference. The California Democrat pushed back on the idea that ObamaCare would hinder Democrats’ hopes in this year’s midterms, saying, “I believe that it’s a winner.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Planning Begins for Another Obama Vacation
Like the annual return of pinkletinks and crocuses, inns and hotels around the Island are getting familiar calls this week from White House officials planning a vacation on Martha’s Vineyard for President Obama and his family.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Second Amendment Advocates Fear UN Could Ban Gun Websites
Internet domain system to be transferred to “global community”
Could the United Nations ban gun websites? That’s the fear being expressed by some second amendment advocates after the announcement that control over key aspects of the Internet would be transferred over to the “global community”.
Last week it was announced that the Los Angeles-based nonprofit the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, would relinquish control over domain names and other aspects of Internet architecture in favor of a new “global” governing structure that would involve multiple “stakeholders.”
The United Nations subsequently welcomed this “transition” of key aspects of the web over to the “global community” as a “major step towards the multilateral Internet governance that the UN has been advocating for many years.”
But could such a transition herald a new era of Internet censorship?
[Comment: Yes.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Supreme Court Faces Wave of Free-Speech Cases From Conservatives
Once embraced by liberals, 1st Amendment arguments are now being applied to contest campaign contribution limits, union dues and no-protest zones at abortion clinics.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Poor Neglected Gifted Child
In 2002, President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act, which penalizes public schools that don’t bring the lowest-performing students up to grade level. The federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act regulates special education and provides schools with more than $11 billion annually.
Not surprisingly, programs oriented toward gifted children get barely any federal funding. The Javits Act, the only federal law aimed at gifted students, pays for research and pilot education programs and is currently funded at $5 million, down from a peak of $11 million several years ago.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Top Ten Real Medical Conspiracies That Actually Happened
The mainstream media is focused this week on trying to convince you that “medical conspiracy theories” are whacky and untrue. Published by Reuters, USA Today and other mainstream media outlets, a false story based on distorted research is now trying to convince you that there is no such thing as a “medical conspiracy.” No, drug companies never conducted experiments on children, killing many in the process. No, the NIH never took part in criminal medical experiments on prisoners. No, the U.S. government never lied to you, or covered up natural cures, or conspired with Big Pharma. GMOs were created by people who LOVE the ecosystem, too!
That’s the nonsense we’re all supposed to believe, according to the mainstream media.
By invoking the phrase “conspiracy theories,” junk science authors and corporate-sellout journalists try to marginalize the true history of Big Pharma felony crimes, medical experiments on children, factual government collusion with industry and the incredible harm which has been perpetrated on the American people by the medical industrial complex.
In fact, the mainstream media’s coverage of all this is truly Orwellian, as if the Ministry of Truth is trying to rewrite U.S. history to eliminate all the parts where drug companies, the NIH and the U.S. government quite literally murdered prisoners, blacks, babies and soldiers in the name of “scientific medicine.”
I refuse to gloss over the history of TRUE medical conspiracies and all the lives lost to the destructive pursuit of medical profits at the expense of human dignity. So to answer the mainstream media’s delusional attempt to gloss over the real history of true medical conspiracies, we’ve put together the top ten TRUE medical conspiracies along with links to sources.
Read and learn the true history the mainstream media is trying to erase!
Top ten TRUE medical conspiracies:…
#3) Vaccine manufacturers knew their vaccines were killing people — One of Merck’s top developers knew that the company’s polio vaccines were heavily contaminated with carcinogenic viruses. The scientist, Dr. Maurice Hilleman, can be heard discussing it in this shocking video.
He and other “scientist” colleagues are actually heard on the recording laughing about the fact that the stealth viruses would kill people. The mainstream media has never reported on this important piece of medical history because it would expose the truth about vaccines.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
WH Press Secretary Gets Questions From Reporters Before Press Briefing
CBS reporter from Arizona reveals that President Obama’s press secretary, Jay Carney, receives questions from the press in advance of his daily press briefing. In fact, she says, the reporters often receive the answers in advance of the briefing, too.
According to the reporter, Jay Carney told her this yesterday at the White House:…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Why One Mother Gave Back Her Adopted Son
Stacey Conner, a 41-year-old mom and former attorney from Spokane, Wash., dreamed of having a large family with biological and adopted kids. “The world is a big place with a lot of children in it; we wanted to bring some of those into our family, to give our love to kids without it,” she says.
Conner and her husband, Matt, a pharmacist, decided to adopt two children. But the process was so slow that by October 2006, when they brought home their (unrelated) 5-year-old Haitian son and 1-year-old Haitian daughter, Conner had given birth to a son, who was 1. “Having an instant multicultural family was magical,” Conner says, “for about two weeks.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
All EU Nations Agree Plan to Combat Tax Evasion
(BRUSSELS) — All 28 EU member states have now signed up to an agreement to combat tax evasion after Austria and Luxembourg dropped their objections to a plan first mooted in 2008, officials said Thursday.
There “is a green light” from Luxembourg, Prime Minister Xavier Bettel said. Luxembourg, an important financial centre, “has been advancing towards becoming a transparent banking” system, Bettel told a briefing. “We confirmed today that this is the course we want to follow,” he added.
Officials said Austria had also indicated it would now come on board.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Britain’s Micro-Monitored Muslims
by Rachel Shabi
Are the UK’s security services using terror fears over Syria as a hook to win ever more powers of surveillance?
The British media has been full of fears about UK jihadists fighting in Syria — and then wanting to commit acts of terror upon returning home. Hundreds of Brits are thought to be waging war in Syria — and the government has warned that such individuals may face arrest upon return…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
British Schools Beset by Islamists; Open Letter Exposes Plan to End Secular Public Education
Public schools in Birmingham, UK, have been beset by Islamists who are pressuring principals to fire teachers, revamp curricula and impose strict Muslim guidelines on public education, according to the UK Daily Mail on Wednesday…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Dutch Ruling Parties Lose Heavy in Municipal Elections
THE HAGUE, March 20(Xinhua) — Dutch ruling parties the Labor Party (PvdA) and the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) suffered major losses in municipal elections on Wednesday, according to the final results presented on Thursday. D66 was a big winner, claiming first position in three of the four major cities…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
East Germany in Colour — Everyday Propaganda
The official view of everyday life in socialist East Germany was beaming children and happy farmers rather than grey concrete and queues — as is shown in a new exhibition of official colour photos from the GDR.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
France: Driver Takes Wrong Turn Into Paris Metro Station
It seems the manic hunt for parking spaces in Paris is forcing drivers into some tight spots. The search went awry for one driver on Wednesday who accidentally drove into a Metro station entrance on the Champs Elysées of all places.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
France: Four ‘Wild Kids’ Found Locked in Flat Since Birth
Social services in Paris made a shocking discovery when they found four children, aged between two months and six years old, they believe have been kept locked in the same apartment since birth by their parents. The two eldest “could barely talk or walk”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Germans Buy Half Their Wine at Aldi and Co
Practically every second bottle of wine bought in Germany comes from one or other of the country’s fable discount supermarkets such as Lidl and Aldi.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Claim for Carpet Price Error Fails to Fly
An auctioneer who valued a carpet at €900, only for its anguished owner to see someone else sell it for €7.2 million has been told he will not have to pay compensation to the owner who missed out on the windfall.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
How Many Forced Marriages in Finland Annually?
In its Sunday edition, the Tampere paper Aamulehti interviews Nasima Razmyar, chair of the Multicultural Women’s Association Monika, an NGO aimed at supporting immigrant women in Finland. She believes that dozens of young women or men based in Finland are forced into marriage with someone of their parents’ choosing annually.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ikea Founder Moves Back to Sweden After 40 Years
Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of Ikea, has moved back home to Sweden after four decades abroad. The elderly Swede plans to spend his days with family, but also to keep working.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Child Killing Shows Mafia ‘Code of Conduct’ Is Myth
The brutal murder of a three-year-old boy in a mafia ambush in southern Italy shows that the so-called “code of honour” among members of organised crime groups is pure myth, according to experts.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Sicilian Mafia Boss Was ‘Dissolved in Acid’
In a scenario reminiscent of a Hollywood film, a Sicilian mobster who went missing in 2002 is thought to have been dissolved in acid, after being strangled with a seat belt by his enemies, police said this week.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: ‘Rome Thinks it is Still an Empire’: Veneto President
Rome treats Venice and the surrounding area “like the suburbs of the Roman Empire”, the president of the Veneto region said Wednesday, as local residents vote on whether to split from Italy.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Bulgari to Fund Rome’s Spanish Steps Renovation
Luxury jeweller Bulgari on Thursday answered the Italian government’s appeal for help in financing a renovation of Rome’s famous Spanish Steps.
Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi called this month for private investors to help restore and maintain the country’s heritage monuments, after a series of wall collapses at the ancient ruins of Pompeii in southern Italy.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Magistrates Investigate Milan’s Chief Prosecutor
(AGI) Rome, March 19 — An investigation opened on Wednesday into suspected irregularities in the assignment of cases by Milan’s chief prosecutor Edmondo Bruti Liberati, reported prosecutor Alfredo Robledo. The Superior Council of the Magistrature’s presidential committee has assigned the orders to the first and the seventh commission.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: ‘Gypsies Banned’ From Rome Bakery
‘Akin to Nazi-era racism’ say advocates
(updates previous) (ANSA) — Rome, March 20 — A bakery in the working-class Tuscolano district in east Rome came under fire on Thursday for barring entry to Roma Gypsies. The sign on the door reading ‘Gypsies are severely prohibited’ used the Italian ‘zingari’, a derogatory catch-all term used to describe members of the capital’s minority Roma and Sinti population. It was removed after being reported by an activist of the Roma rights association 21 July, which compared the bakery’s discrimination of Roma to that of “Jews in Nazi Germany” and of “blacks in South Africa under apartheid”.
Roma and Sinti also fell victim to Nazi discrimination and at least 500,000 are estimated to have lost their lives in the Porajmos, or Roma Holocaust, during WWII. The association 21 July also wrote to the President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano ahead of the international day for the elimination of racial discrimination on March 21 to express its “deep concern at the level of conflict and hostility registered towards the Roma and Sinti communities” in Italy.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy More and More Determined to Bring Marines Home
Special envoy says country owes thanks to anti-piracy duo
(ANSA) — Caserta, March 20 — Staffan De Mistura says the two Italian anti-piracy marines held in India after the shooting deaths of two fishermen two years ago are fine and Italy is determined to bring them home.
Speaking from India via telephone to a conference in Sant’Angelo in Formis in Caserta province, De Mistura said Italians owe a thank you to Massimiliano Latorre and Salvatore Girone, who have been held in India without charges since the February 2012 incident.
“The marines are fine and Italy is more and more determined to bring them home,” said De Mistura.
Meanwhile, they are continuing to work at the Italian Embassy in New Delhi as they wait for the next move by the Indian government in the case.
“Our military…are proud to always honor their homeland,” said De Mistura.
“We must thank them as they continue to do their duty”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy’s Inland Revenue Reforming Land Registry
Chief defends Equitalia’s aggressive tax collection
(ANSA) — Roma, March 20 — Italy’s inland revenue service is overhauling its land registry system to ensure it better reflects property values, its head Attilio Befera said Thursday.
The move is meant to update calculations for property-tax rates, Befera told a parliament committee.
Befera also defended the actions of tax-collection agency Equitalia during his speech, saying the state entity helped fight tax dodging. Before it was founded, “the citizen who failed to pay would be at ease and carefree, as absolutely nothing would happen to him,” Befera said. Equitalia has been in the headlines in recent years amid allegedly aggressive tax recovery systems, and has been criticized by three-time premier and convicted tax dodger Silvio Berlusconi. A number of business owners have committed suicide in recent years citing the agency’s aggressive methods as the last straw.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Former Lombardy Infrastructure Manager Arrested
Rongoni under investigation for bid rigging, fraud
(ANSA) — Milan, March 20 — The former manager of Infrastrutture Lombarde, an infrastructure company wholly owned by the northern Lombardy Region, was arrested Thursday on charges of criminal association, bid rigging, fraud against the regional authorities and forgery.
Antonio Giulio Rognoni was arrested together with the head of the company’s procurement office, Pierpaolo Perez, on the same charges. A further six people were placed under house arrest in connection with the allegedly outsourcing of legal consulting and contract-control services in particular. Rongoni was already under investigation for alleged bid rigging in connection with a contract linked to Expo 2015 in Milan.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: M5S Wants to Question Premier About Business Friendship
(AGI) Rome, March 20 — Italy’s anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) called on Thursday for “the scheduling as soon as possible of a question time session, to ask Prime Minister Matteo Renzi would be called upon to explain his relationship with the businessman Carrai and above all, explain to the Italian people under what title he had use of an apartment near Palazzo Vecchio.” The request was made by M5S Senate leader, Vincenzo Maurizio Santangelo, during a party group leaders’ meeting. In addition M5S demanded an “immediate debate on a motion calling for the resignation of Undersecretary Barracciu” who is currently under investigation.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Justice Minister Sells Spain to US Jews
Spain’s Justice Minister told American Jewish groups on Wednesday why the European country is offering citizenship to descendants of Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain in 1492, an event he has labelled “the biggest mistake in Spanish history”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
On the Set of Western Movies in Spain
Around 50 years ago, hundreds of famous western movies were made in the Spanish windy barren desert an hour from the Mediterranean Sea. Today, all that’s left from the glory days are western-style cinema theme parks.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
PVV Call for Less Moroccans Raises Controversy in Netherlands
THE HAGUE, March 20(Xinhua) — Although the right-wing populist party PVV only participated in two cities during the Dutch municipal elections on Wednesday, its leader Geert Wilders received most attention due to his anti-Moroccan remarks.
The remarks raised an outrage and discussion on social media, with some even comparing Wilders with what Adolf Hitler said about the Jews in Nazi Germany. Prime Minister Mark Rutte said he got “a bad taste in his mouth” from what Wilders said.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Scotland: Underwater Archaeology: Digging Gold Cufflinks From the Watery Depths
Scotland’s west coast — with its islands and inlets — has hidden secrets. Beneath the crashing waves lie shipwrecks, where final voyages ended on jagged rocks. More than 40 years ago, Colin Martin — a pioneer of underwater archaeology — started to look for these lost vessels.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Valencia Goes Up in Flames for Las Fallas
Valencia celebrated the end of its annual Las Fallas festival on Wednesday night with the dramatic annual burning of the festival sculptures, known as La Cremà.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spain’s Wine Surplus Overflows Across Globe Following Year of Unusual Weather
A soggy spring and sunny summer made Spain the world’s top wine producer in 2013, according to figures from the country’s agriculture ministry.
Official ranking from the International Organisation of Vine and Wine will not be released until May, but the Spanish ministry said that wine production surged 41% last year, with vineyards producing 50m hectolitres — enough to fill 6.7bn bottles of wine. Spain beat competitors France and Italy, who reported harvest of 42m and 47m hectolitres respectively.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Stained Glass Artist to Come to Austria
A glass painter who has had his work featured in museums and galleries around New York is coming to Austria next year to provide glass painting workshops. Initially a graphic designer, Joseph Cavalieri is now a glass artist who is best known for producing original and sometimes controversial stain glass pieces depicting familiar characters or emotions.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Stoltenberg Held Winter Talks in US on NATO Role
German Chancellor Angela Merkel proposed Jens Stoltenberg as the next Nato Secretary General as early as October, opening the way for talks throughout the winter with US Secretary of State John Kerry, Norway’s DN business newspaper has reported.
According to the paper, Merkel made her proposal directly to President Barack Obama, who apparently agreed that Stoltenberg was a good choice for the role.
Denmark’s Anders Fogh Rasmussen is set to leave the post in September.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Stonehenge Druids Celebrate Spring Equinox
Druids, pagans and revellers gathered at dawn by Stonehenge’s ancient stones to mark the vernal equinox, the official beginning of springtime.
Twice a year, the earth’s axis is angled so that the world gets an equal amount of daylight and night, a highly-significant event in the pagan calendar. At the spring equinox, the sun rises exactly in the east, travels through the sky for 12 hours and then sets exactly in the west. All over the world, day and night are of equal length.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Fake Firemen Cite Safety Check to Enter Homes
Swedish emergency services have warned people against opening their homes to people who claim they are firemen calling in to check the fire alarm.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: ‘Woke to Find MP Nigel Evans Raping Him’
A man who alleges the former deputy speaker Nigel Evans raped him was warned by colleagues he would “get Nigelled” before going to the MP’s home, a court has heard.
The man, aged in his early 20s, claims he woke up to find the 56-year-old MP on top of him, and he was then raped as he lay “in shock”. The man told Preston Crown Court he “froze still” and “couldn’t move” during the attack.
Mr Evans denies nine sex charges.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Thousands of women and girls have been treated in London hospitals for the effects of female genital mutilation, suggesting that many more have received similar treatment nationwide.
Nearly 4,000 women and girls, some of them born in the UK, were treated for FGM in hospitals across the capital since 2009, according to figures released under the Freedom of Information Act.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
[WARNING: Disturbing Content.]
Osironke Olugbile’s treatment of residents at the Bupa-run Collingwood Court Nursing Centre in Clapham, south London amounted to ‘serious abuse’ a Nursing and Midwifery Council hearing found.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A Cambridge University college was forced to drop plans for a ‘racist’ Gone With The Wind themed ball after complaints from students.
St Edmund’s College had planned to theme its annual summer ball around the 1939 Oscar-winning film staring Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable. However, organisers have been forced to abandon their original plans, and instead re-brand the event the Journey Through The Seasons ball after concerns were raised over the racism in the film.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Here’s What British Muslims With Violent Radical Sympathies Have in Common
A new study from Queen Mary University in London refutes the assumption that people sympathetic to violent protests and terrorism have limited education, earn a low income, and are isolated from others…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Human Rights Global Campaigner, Peter Tatchell, Joins the Work of TELL MAMA as a Patron
The TELL MAMA national campaign which supports victims of anti-Muslim prejudice and which maps, measures and monitors anti-Muslim prejudice is proud to announce that Peter Tatchell, the global human rights campaigner, has joined us a patron.
Peter Tatchell has campaigned for nearly 50 years on human rights issues and has been one of the key drivers against homophobia. He has also campaigned against tyranny in Zimbabwe and in Russia, where he was brutally assaulted calling for LGBT rights…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Is This the Future of the Village Shop?
Giant VENDING MACHINE in pub car park dispenses everyday essentials for rural community who lost their local store
It may not provide that great village shop tradition of a catch up with the latest gossip or a chat about the weather.
But despite the lack of a human touch, this automated shop is a lifeline for residents.
The giant vending machine opened this week in Clifton, Derbyshire, which has been without a village shop for 14 years.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A jealous lover who murdered his girlfriend over her affair with a man she met on a dating site for Oxbridge graduates was jailed for life today.
Jonathan Tebbs, 46, stabbed dedicated town hall chief Kate Dixon 29 times with a Swiss Army knife before reading an Oscar Wilde poem about a man who kills his wife.
He stripped her clothes off and calmly carried her into the shower where he washed the blood from her lifeless body at a flat in Streatham, south London.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: So Now We Know — the BBC is More Scared of Offending Muslims Than Gay People
By Rod Liddle
I had good reasons for turning down BBC3’s Free Speech. But now I really wish I hadn’t
[…]
Anyway, this discussion programme was held in a mosque and included a short film from a young Muslim drag queen called Asifa Lahore, who asked the question: ‘When will it be right to be Muslim and gay?’ The question, however, was not discussed by the panel and audience, because the BBC feared it would offend the owners of the mosque. In other words, they censored the discussion. The programme in question was called Free Speech, by the way. Ha. Or maybe LOL would be more apposite. Either way, my ribs have just split in two…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Thieves Dig Tunnel to Steal £80k From Salford Cash Machine
Thieves who built a 50ft (15m) tunnel to a cash machine in Salford got away with more than £80,000. The theft happened on Friday at Tesco on Liverpool Road, Eccles, between midnight and 06:00 GMT, police said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: You Can’t Breastfeed Here Because it Could Offend Other Patients, Nurses Say
Gemma Murphy, 37, was barred from feeding six-week-old Niamh while she waited for a blood test with her husband at a hospital in Rugby, Warwickshire.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
US Envoy: Cyprus Peace May Ease Europe Gas Supply
The US ambassador to Cyprus says an agreement to reunify the ethnically split island could ease the supply of newly-found offshore gas to Europe by allowing it to go through Turkey.
John Koenig says that easier access to eastern Mediterranean gas deposits after a peace accord would help diversify Europe’s energy sources and feed the needs of energy-hungry Turkey.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Venice Voting on Independence in On-Line Referendum
Closely watched by Russia
(ANSA) — Silea, March 20 — Residents of Venice and the surrounding affluent Veneto region continued voting Thursday in an extended on-line referendum that asked whether they wanted to remain part of Italy or secede as an independent state.
“The whole world understands and is watching Veneto,” said Gianluca Busato, who led the drive for the referendum. Busato spoke at a press conference in Silea, outside Treviso, which was attended by international media, namely from Russia, which recently supported the independence referendum of Crimea. The results are due to be announced after voting closes on Friday and follow a survey commissioned by the movement Idipendenza Veneta, which showed that in January, 56.7% of residents questioned said they were in favour of secession compared to 53.3% a year before.
The outcome will have only political significance but is expected to lend weight to a bill currently before the Veneto regional council calling for a referendum on whether Veneto should break away from Rome.
Veneto is governed by Luca Zaia of the regionalist and separatist Northern League party, which supports the initiative.
However opponents on the council, including members of the centre-left Democratic Party as well as centre-right Forza Italia and New Centre Right (NCR) oppose the scheme on grounds that a popular vote on the long-mooted issue would be illegal, even if it was not legally binding.
Regardless, Busato said that if the referendum receives a requisite two million votes, “there will be some immediate actions, such as the nomination of a 10-member committee who will engage with foreign governments”. Supporters of the initiative point out that for more than 1,000 years, Venice and its surrounding region formed an independent republic — older than the modern Italian State.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
In cooperation with the Greek Interior Ministry and the Greek EU Presidency, the EU-funded EuroMed migration III project held a meeting on legal migration in Athens this month, taking stock of progress and focusing on ways to enhance labour migration cooperation in the Euro-Mediterranean region.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Egyptian Students Raise Jihad Banner at Pro-Brotherhood Rally
A group of Egyptian students who raised the black flag of jihad associated with al-Qaida during a protest Tuesday at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University could face criminal charges, al-Ahram reports. A similar episode reportedly took place during a similar pro-Muslim Brotherhood protest at Cairo University.
Video posted to YouTube shows a handful of students holding the black flag, along with a mock American flag, with Israel’s Star of David over the stars.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Libya Mobilises Anti-Terrorism Forces and Calls for Help
(AGI) Tripoli, March 20 — The Libyan government has for the first time acknowledged its terrorism emergency mobilising security forces and is asking the international community for help. After months of attacks on military and western targets the government website no has a post stating, “The country is facing terrorist groups and it is the government’s duty to mobilise military and security forces to oppose this threat. There is no place for terrorism in Libya.” The government also asked citizens to be prepared for the fight.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt Adopts “Chaos for Reconciliation”
CAIRO, March 20 (Xinhua) — By calling supporters to hold more protests, the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is pursuing a “ chaos for reconciliation” approach to push the government to negotiate with the blacklisted group, some analysts say.
On Wednesday, rallies by supporters of Brotherhood, from which ousted President Mohamed Morsi hails, triggered clashes with the security forces nationwide, leaving two people dead and more than 30 others injured…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Israel Budgets Billions for Plan to Attack Iran
Israel believes agreement reached on Iran’s nuclear program presents an existential threat
Despite what is characterized as substantive progress in talks between Iran, the United States, and the European Union on Iran’s nuclear program, the state of Israel has announced it is allocating in excess of 10 billion shekels for war preparations…
Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said during a speech recently that Israel reserves the right to strike Iran and may do so if an accord is reached.
“We think that the United States should be the one leading the campaign against Iran. But the U.S. has entered talks with them and unfortunately, in the haggling in the Persian bazaar, the Iranians were better,” Ya’alon said. “Therefore, on this matter, we have to behave as though we have nobody to look out for us but ourselves.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Ancient City of Petra Built to Align With the Sun
An ancient civilization built the famous, stone-hewn city of Petra so that the sun would illuminate their sacred places like celestial spotlights, a new study says.
Petra, a giant metropolis of tombs, monuments, and other elaborate religious structures carved into stone cliffs, was the capital of the Nabatean kingdom, a little-understood Middle Eastern culture that ruled much of modern-day Jordan from the third century B.C. until the first century A.D.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Disillusioned Foreign Fighters Abandon Rebel Ranks in Syria
Hundreds of foreign fighters have abandoned rebel ranks in northern Syria as frustration rises over bloody infighting there — a trend that suggests declining enthusiasm among hard line Sunni militants participating in Syria’s torturous civil war and raises concerns among western security officials that these combatants may head to other countries.
The outflow of foreign militants is still small, rebels and activists say, but illustrates the disillusionment many appear to feel as they spend more time fighting each other than the regime of President Bashar Al Assad.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Dozens Killed in Another Bloody Day for Iraq
Clashes and shelling in Fallujah, and violence in Baghdad and elsewhere kill 37 as elections loom.
Violence across Iraq, including shelling and clashes in a rebel-held city on Baghdad’s doorstep, have killed 37 people amid a protracted surge in bloodletting with polls looming next month.
In the city of Fallujah, 60km west of the capital, government-led shelling and fighting between soldiers and gunmen killed 15 people and wounded 40, according to Ahmed Shami, the chief medic at the city’s main hospital…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Dubai Teenager: ‘My Father Sold My Virginity’
Dubai: A 16-year-old girl cried when she confronted her father and mother in court for pressuring her emotionally to sell her body for Dh16,000 in order to become rich and overcome poverty.
“My father sold my virginity because he wanted me to help our family not to stay poor anymore. He and my mother forced me to work in prostitution… I was coerced to yield because my father got angry when I first refused to sell my body,” said the tearful Pakistani teenager when she testified against her parents before the Dubai Court of First Instance.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Has Al Qaeda Looted Syria’s Bio-Warfare Laboratories?
There is a troubling briefing by the UK-based Henry Jackson Society (HJS), co-authored by Dr. Jill Bellamy van Allst , NATO Bio-warfare Expert and Oliver Guitta , Director of Research , reported by Adam Kredo in the Washington Free Beacon , “Al Qaeda-Aligned Groups in Syria May Have Access to Biological Pathogens”. Our New English Review interview with Dr. Bellamy Van Aalst on Syria’s Bio-warfare program in 2007 was reprised to heightened interest in 2013, “The Dangers of Syria’s Bio-Warfare Complex Should Assad Fall”. More recent concerns have emerged about the possible use of drones by terrorist group Hezbollah as a delivery platform for possible BW attacks against Israel.
The Washington Free Beacon cited this warning by HJS authors Dr. Bellamy Van Aaalst and Guitta:…
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey to be ‘Too Old’ By 2023, Population Projections Say
Turkey is at risk of joining “too old” countries by 2023, as the latest population projections released by state-run statistics body indicate that the proportion of elderly people will rise to above 10 percent within 10 years.
The Turkish province that had the highest proportion of elderly people was the Black Sea province of Sinop with 16.7 percent. Sinop was followed by Kastamonu at 15.7 percent and Cankiri with 14.3 percent. Meanwhile, the eastern provinces of Turkey appeared to have the lowest proportion of elderly people, as only 2.8 percent of Hakkari’s population, 3 percent of Sirnak and 3.2 percent of Van’s populations are old, the data showed.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Erdogan: I Will “Wipe Out” Twitter
Turkey’s embattled Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, threatened today to “wipe out” Twitter. The outburst comes after a series of audio recording allegedly implicating Erdogan and his son in a major corruption scandal were posted on social media ahead of a local election on March 30. The EU had already expressed grave concerns after Erdogan passed a new law tightening control ove rthe internet.
“We will wipe out Twitter. I don’t care what the international community says,” Turkey’s PM said Erdogan said in an election rally on March 20. “They will see the Turkish republic’s strength,” he added.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Turkish Government Blocks Access to Twitter
Turkey has restricted access to Twitter hours after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to “root out” the social media network where wiretapped recordings have been leaked, damaging the government’s reputation ahead of local elections.
Many users trying to access the network early on Friday were confronted instead with a notice from Turkey’s telecommunications authority, citing court orders for the site’s apparent closure. On Thursday, Erdogan said the government would take steps against Twitter regardless of “what the international community will say.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Defence Chief: Russia Aiming to Restore Soviet-Era Prestige
Finland’s Chief of Defence, General Ari Puheloinen, says the ongoing political crisis in Ukraine could lead to tighter security in Europe. Puheloinen said however, that Finland doesn’t face any direct threat, noting that there are potent restraints preventing the crisis from escalating.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s Facebook Strategy for Ukraine
By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: The left has confused the overlay, its commentaries and memes, for reality. It has come to believe that The Daily Show is real news, that Obama is a real leader and that a Twitter hashtag is real power. The Russian soldiers in Crimea are a reminder that, as Mao said, “Every Communist must grasp the truth: Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.” The Western left has forgotten the simple truth that no Eastern leftist has ever become decadent enough to forget.
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Says Putin is Weak, Agrees to Let Him Conquer Ukraine
By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: At this rate, why not just dismantle NATO and let Russia have its old empire back? ‘Obama said Wednesday that the U.S. would not take military action in Ukraine against Russia. “We are not going to be getting into a military excursion in Ukraine,” Obama said in an interview Wednesday with KNSD, the NBC affiliate in San Diego. “I think even the Ukrainians would acknowledge, for us to engage Russia militarily would not be appropriate and would not be good for Ukraine, either,” Obama added.’ Yes, I’m sure they would absolutely hate to be saved from being conquered.
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Pro-Russian Crowds Seize 2 Ukrainian Warships, As Ukraine Prepares to Pull Troops From Crimea
Pro-Russian crowds seized two Ukrainian warships Thursday and Ukraine said its troops were being threatened in Crimea as it prepared to pull its troops and their families from the region.
National Security and Defense Council secretary Andriy Parubiy said that Ukraine will seek U.N. support to turn Crimea into a demilitarized zone as it prepares to relocate as many as 25,000 soldiers and their families to the Ukrainian mainland.
Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and sailors are trapped on military bases, surrounded by heavily armed Russian forces and pro-Russia militia.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Russia Bans Following US Citizens From Entering Russia…
…in response to US sanctions:
1. (Caroline Atkinson)
2.(Daniel Pfeiffer)
3.(Benjamin Rhodes)
4.(Harry Reed)
5.(John Boehner)
6. (Robert Menendez)
7.(Mary Landrieu)
8. (John McCain)
9.(Daniel Coats)
| — Hat tip: Kitman | [Return to headlines] |
The Honeymoon is Over: Ukraine to Stun Citizens With 40% Gas Price Hike
Back in 2011, when as part of the Arab Spring one after another regime were toppled in North Africa following violent coups, not without substantial support by the US foreign service and the CIA, the local population was delighted — after all there is nothing quite like the specter of Hope and Change to lift one’s mood, and murder the reigning dictator. Unfortunately, what is usually not discussed, is that within a very brief period of time, usually within a year or two, the post-coup nations promptly reverted to violence and kicked out the ascendent coupy rulers themselves. Hardly new, this is process has been observed in history throughout time, most notably with the French revolution, where the concept of the Thermidorian Reaction was first penned. Most recently, this was best captured by events in Egypt in the past year, when the Hillary Clinton-blessed regime of Morsi was toppled last summer with even more violent witchhunts organized against its Muslim Brotherhood supporters. No wonder one hardly hears a peep about this particular US success story.
So where should we look for the next such process? Why in Ukraine of course. Only right now the general population is still in its euphoric Hope and Change phase. Understandable — the evil regime has been toppled and the new and pure (even though in reality they are just as corrupt as the old ones) politicians are in charge, so why not look to the future with rose-colored sunglasses?
Alas, Ukraine’s honeymoon period with its new rulers may end far sooner that most expect, and it will be certainly accelerated with news such as this. A few hours ago, Interfax reported that Ukraine expects to increase domestic gas prices by 40% once discounted import prices from Russia expire, the country’s Energy Minister Yury Prodan told journalists in the European Parliament on Thursday.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Ukraine Set to Sign EU Political Agreement
Ukraine PM Arseniy Yatseniuk is to sign a political agreement with the EU on Friday following leaders of the 28-nation bloc deciding on whether to step up sanctions against Russia.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
WaPo: Obama Doesn’t Grasp Putin’s Eurasian Ambitions
By Rick Moran
Excerpt: An editorial in the Washington Post exposes the Obama administration as the naive claque they appear to be. “Western officials seem to be betting that Mr. Putin won’t dare to extend his aggression beyond Crimea. But then, just last week they were saying they did not expect Moscow to move quickly on Crimean annexation. The Obama administration and its European allies have been too slow to grasp that Mr. Putin is bent on upending the post-Cold War order in Europe and reversing Russia’s loss of dominion over Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia.”
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
Afghanistan Prisoner Release Could Pose “Security Threat”
At least 55 prisoners have been released from an Afghanistan prison despite concerns from NATO-led forces. A similar operation last month to free suspects captured by foreign troops caused tension with the US.
Last month, at least 60 alleged “Taliban fighters” were freed through a decree by Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The move further damaged Washington-Kabul relations, which were already strained over Karzai’s refusal to sign a deal that would keep US troops in the country beyond 2014.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Afghanistan: Kabul Luxury Hotel’s Attackers Killed — Police
Afghanistan’s special forces have killed three gunmen who broke into a luxury hotel in the capital Kabul, police have told the BBC. They say the special forces are now searching the five-star Serena hotel for more attackers.
The gunmen managed to get into the building, which is popular with foreigners, claiming they were heading for a meal at the hotel restaurant. They then opened fire, reportedly injuring two hotel staff.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for the raid, but the Afghan authorities have blamed Taliban militants for similar attacks.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘Best Lead’ Emerges in Lost Plane Search: Satellite Imagery Shows 2 Objects in Remote Waters
A freighter used searchlights early Friday to scan rough seas in one of the remotest places on Earth after satellite images detected possible pieces from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane in the southern Indian Ocean.
In what officials called the “best lead” of the nearly two-week-old aviation mystery, a satellite detected two objects floating about 1,000 miles off the coast of Australia and halfway to the desolate islands of the Antarctic.
The development raised new hope of finding the vanished jet and sent another emotional jolt to the families of the 239 people aboard.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘Black Hole’ Theory for Missing Malaysia Flight 370? CNN Anchor Actually Asks
As the search effort for the missing Malaysia Flight MH370 continues, some questionable theories are being floated for the strange disappearance of the passenger jet, including — it seems — black holes, Yahoo News reports. On Wednesday (March 19), CNN anchor Don Lemon mentioned receiving Twitter messages from viewers with wild theories on the missing plane, which included black holes and the Bermuda Triangle.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Gunmen Attack Hotel in Afghan Capital; Police Kill 4 Attackers
(Reuters) — Taliban gunmen attacked a luxury hotel on Thursday in the centre of the Afghan capital Kabul, police said, and four of the assailants were killed in a shootout with Afghan security forces.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack and said the attackers had fired at foreign and Afghan guests celebrating the Afghan new year.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Osama Bin Laden’s Son-in-Law Tells of Post 9/11 Cave Meeting at Trial
Suleiman Abu Ghaith unexpectedly testifies in New York court and denies ever joining al Qaeda
On Sept. 11, 2001, just hours after hijackers deliberately crashed passenger aircraft in attacks on the United States, a Kuwaiti teacher and imam named Suleiman Abu Ghaith met Osama bin Laden inside a cave in Afghanistan…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Taking Control of Everest Climbers’ Environmental Impact
The boom in alpine tourism has left Mount Everest covered in debris. Nepali authorities are taking action this climbing season, requiring each climber to bring back their trash. But how can the new rule be enforced?
More than 3,000 people have stood atop Mount Everest since the world’s highest peak was first climbed by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay 60 years ago. Each year, hundreds of climbers ascend the 8,848-meter high mountain.
But not all of them are professional mountaineers. Climbing Mount Everest has become part of the adventure industry. In 2013, the first Saudi woman, set of twins, and female amputee made the summit. Other mountain records include the first wedding, the first video call, and the first Harlem Shake. But all of these firsts come with a downside: the booming alpine tourism industry is having a big environmental impact.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Taliban Attack Against Afghan Police Kills 11
A suicide car bomber blew up his vehicle near a police station in eastern Afghanistan while other Taliban insurgents stormed the building Thursday, killing 10 police officers and a civilian, officials said…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Air Pollution May Cause Genetic Harm in Kids, China Study Finds
Air pollution led to genetic changes that may have sapped learning skills in children whose mothers were exposed to a Chinese coal-fired power plant before it was shuttered a decade ago, researchers found.
The findings add to a growing body of evidence on the health fallouts of China’s pollution crisis, which has sparked public outrage and forced its leaders to pledge stronger efforts to protect the environment. Outdoor air pollution can cause lung cancer and is linked to higher risk of bladder cancer, a World Health Organization agency said in October, ranking it as a carcinogen for the first time.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
China on Alert After 131 Pigs Die in River
(AGI) Beijing, March 19 — According to the Xinhua state news agency, China is once again on alert after 131 pigs were found dead in a river running through the city of Nanchang, capital of the eastern Jiagxi province. According to local authorities, the pigs were discovered on Sunday along the Ganjiang River which runs into the Blue River. This river provides drinking water to the provincial capital, but initial testing shows the water has not been contaminated.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Looming Property Default in China Raises Fears of Broader Crisis
China faces the biggest property default on record as credit curbs threaten to break the housing boom, leaving a string of “ghost towns” across the country.
The Chinese newspaper Economic Daily News said Xingrun Properties, in the coastal city of Ningbo, is on the brink of collapse with debts of $570m, mostly owed to banks. The local government has set up a working group to contain the crisis.
“As far as we know, this is the largest property developer in recent years at risk of bankruptcy,” said Zhiwei Zhang, from Nomura.
“We believe that a sharp property market correction could lead to a systemic crisis in China, and is the biggest risk China faces in 2014. The risk is particularly high in third and fourth-tier cities, which accounted for 67pc of housing under construction in 2013,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Navy Family: Fukushima Gave Our One-Year-Old Brain and Spine Cancer
A U.S. Navy family is blaming their one-year-old’s brain and spine cancer on radiation from the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant.
Since the 2011 meltdown, more than 50 U.S. sailors involved in the Navy’s Fukushima rescue efforts have been diagnosed with multiple forms of cancer.
According to Charles Bonner, an attorney representing dozens of the cancer-stricken sailors, Fukushima’s radiation is being passed onto his client’s children.
“This radiation not only hurts the young sailors, but it hurts their offsprings,” Bonner told Democracy Now.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mosque Plan Opponents Come Forward
ABOUT 40 objections have been lodged against a mosque planned for Bendigo, with one submission supporting the development. Plans for the $3 million Rowena Street project have been lodged with the City of Greater Bendigo. The Stop the Mosque in Bendigo Facebook page, which has 4700 members, has promoted a council objection form and encouraged people to fill it out…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Congo: Jailed Norwegian Faces Death After Stops Eating
Joshua French, the Norwegian ex-soldier jailed for more than four years in Congo, has stopped eating, leading his lawyer to speculate that “it is only a matter of time” before he dies.
A court in the Democratic Republic of Congo last month found French guilty of strangling his cellmate and countryman Tjostolv Moland to death, despite evidence from the autopsy, which was overseen by Norway’s criminal investigation service, indicating that this was not the case.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Kenyan Police Park Massive Car Bomb Outside Their Offices After Missing Explosives in Vehicle
Officers overlook six pipe-bombs, guns, detonators, ammunition in Somali suspected terror plotter’s Toyota four-wheel-drive
Kenyan police failed to realise that a car that they impounded from a Somali man and stored outside their anti-terror unit offices for a week was packed full of explosives already attached to a Nokia detonator…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Kenya: Sh779 Million Reward for ‘Terrorists’ Arrest
THE United States government has placed $9 million (Sh779.4 million) bounty for information leading to the “arrest or conviction” of Abdukadir Mohammed Abdukadir, alias Ikrima and two other men. Abdukadir is a Kenyan born al Shabaab commander. The other two are Jafar and Yasin Kilwe who are said to be based in Somalia…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Colombian President ‘Wets Himself’ During Political Speech
(AGI) Bogota, March 19 — Colombia’s President Juan Manuel Santos urinated in his trousers during a political rally in Barranquilla. The video of the incident was broadcast on RWTE, but Santos reassured his countrymen that the incident was linked of a 2012 prostate operation to remove a tumour and there was no reason to worry about his health.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UN Agency in Haiti Begins Food Distribution Amid Drought
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Aid workers in Haiti have begun distributing food to help some of the Caribbean nation’s poorest people cope with a severe drought, an official with a United Nations agency said Thursday.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Venezuelan Government Strikes Swift Blows to Opposition Leadership After Month of Protests
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has used the military, legislative and judicial power consolidated during 15 years of socialist rule in a sudden series of blows against opponents who have spent more than a month protesting in the streets, knocking down their barricades and throwing dissident leaders in jail.
The federal government itself moved in this week to clear out the plaza at the heart of the demonstrations against inflation, shortages, crime and perceived official intolerance, sending national guardsmen to take over Plaza Altamira in the capital.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
By John Derbyshire
Excerpt: As a clue to what actually happens when black ‘n’ brown numbers rise to a majority, the Uncle Tims might want to check out the last dozen presidents of Mexico or Brazil, who don’t look anything like California lettuce-pickers or Carnavaleras.
| — Hat tip: KP | [Return to headlines] |
France: Calais Struggles With UK-Bound Illegal Migrants
The northern French port of Calais is facing a double problem: a high concentration of illegal immigrants hoping to make their way across the Channel to Britain and one of the highest levels of unemployment in the country.
Hundreds of the homeless migrants throng the streets around the port, living in makeshift camps and squatting in empty houses in this economically blighted city. Every day the immigrants, from countries as diverse as Syria and Ethiopia, line up for food handouts from local charities.
But not everyone in Calais is so well-disposed towards them.
And the deaths of three of the migrants in the last month — one drowned, one stabbed and another crushed to death in the back of a lorry — have made their presence in the city a key issue in this weekend’s local elections, an issue France’s far-right is keen to exploit.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Navy Rescues 1,000 Migrants Off Southern-Most Coast
Latest operation comes after 2,100 people saved earlier in week
(ANSA) — Rome, March 20 — Navy ships rescued approximately 1,000 migrants in rickety boats off Italy’s southern coast in less than 24 hours between Wednesday and Thursday, official sources said.
The rescue operation came after more than 2,100 migrants were rescued earlier in the week by the Italian Navy and Coast Guard vessels, as they fled North African across the Channel of Sicily.
The operations were made through the Mare Nostrum task force established last autumn to try to prevent migrant deaths in waters off Italy.
The task force was triggered by the deaths of around 400 people in two separate migrant-boat disasters in October near the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, which is often the migrants’ first port of call.
The United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) has called the operations “an example to follow also in other countries”.
Before this week’s rescues, Mare Nostrum reported saving a total of 12,228 people and capturing 46 alleged human traffickers.
The air and naval operation Mare Nostrum (Latin for ‘our sea’, as the Mediterranean was called by ancient Romans) was established as a military and humanitarian operation aimed to strengthen surveillance and rescue forces at sea.
It makes use of amphibious ships, unmanned drones and helicopters with infrared equipment in its search-and-rescue missions.
Tens of thousands of migrants arrive in Italy from North Africa every year and many others die attempting the crossing in often rickety vessels.
Boat arrivals in Italy more than tripled last year from the previous year, fuelled by the conflict in Syria and strife in the Horn of Africa.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Rescues 2,000 Boat Migrants
Italy has rescued over 2,000 boat migrants traveling in boats from North Africa in the past 48 hours, reports Reuters. The boats were intercepted off the southern coast of Sicily. Three merchant ships, alongside the Italian navy and coastguard, took part in the rescue operations.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: 600,000 Spaniards Head Overseas to Flee Crisis
Over 600,000 Spanish citizens have left Spain since the country’s economic crisis began give years ago, new government figures show.
The figures show that the majority of Spanish-born emigrants have chosen to remain in Europe, while most people born overseas have moved to the Americas. Over 200,000 native-born Spaniards are now living in France, while 122,218 people have found a home in Germany, the stats show.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Immigration Vote Triggers Political Mud Fight
Allegations, demands, proposals and questions — a heated debate in parliament about immigration quotas has shown the impact the ballot box decision is having on political parties nearly six weeks after Swiss voters approved limiting the number of foreigners.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Abstract — Background
Doctors, lawyers and criminal justice agencies need methods to assess vulnerability to violent radicalization. In synergy, public health interventions aim to prevent the emergence of risk behaviours as well as prevent and treat new illness events…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Most parents want their children to read. What the market calls Young Adult fiction is pitched particularly to teenagers, who are a little old for Dr. Seuss and a little young for Serious Mainstream Literature in Which Nothing Much Happens. I’m too young for that stuff, too.
So the publishing industry invented the YA category, the American Library Association and the public schools got involved with it — and what have we got today?
Let Meghan Cox Gurdon, Children’s Book Reviewer for The Wall Street Journal, answer.
In a speech at Hillsdale College last year, Ms. Gurdon spoke of “the increasingly dark current that runs through books classified as YA, for Young Adult — books aimed at readers between 12 and 18 years of age — a subset that has, in the four decades since Young Adult became a distinct category in fiction, become increasingly lurid, grotesque, profane, sexual, and ugly. Books show us the world, and in that sense, too many books for adolescents act like funhouse mirrors, reflecting hideously distorted portrayals of life…”
No wonder Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys are still in print.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
South Carolina House Passes Bill to Ban Abortions After 20 Weeks
The South Carolina state House has passed a bill, on an 84-29 vote, that would ban abortions after 20 weeks based on scientific evidence showing unborn children feel pain. Currently the state allows abortions up to 24 weeks of pregnancy unless the life of the mother is at risk.
The vote included 70 Republicans and 14 Democrats. All 29 votes against the bill were Democrats.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Cowardly BBC Bows to Islam
By Giulio Meotti
All about the program whose motto is “Britain is a democracy where we can say what we want. So let’s say it.”[…]
The BBC likes to consider itself a brave broadcasting company when attacking the Catholic Church on sexual abuses (the famous BBC documentary entitled “Sex Crimes and the Vatican” consisted of 38 minutes and 57 seconds of accusations against the Vatican) or when airing a horrible live program from a clinic where doctors perform abortions.
The BBC also likes to depict itself as libertine when proposing “gay friendly entertainment” for its viewers. The CBBC, the branch of the UK public broadcaster in charge of programs for children, has launched a format for the “cultural diffusion of gender diversity”, a euphemism for gay culture.
But when it comes to gays and Islam, “Auntie”, as the British call the broadcaster, is cowardly and bows to sharia.
The British public broadcaster has just been accused of censorship after its Free Speech show, symbolically dedicated to freedom of speech in the UK, banned a part of the program which dealt with homosexuality in the Islamic world. It was to included a clip of an interview with Asifa Lahore, the most famous lesbian Muslim in England: “A question that I would like to submit to the Islamic community is: when will be right to be Muslim and homosexual?”
The question was removed after pressure from the Birmingham Central Mosque. But isn’t this a program whose motto is “Britain is a democracy where we can say what we want. So let’s say it”?
Created by the homosexual Lord Reith and with a program that recognizes equal opportunities for homosexual employees including the right to a marriage leave, the BBC has responded to criticism: “Acting on the basis of respect for the mosque, we took the decision to postpone the debate on the rights of gay Muslims”.
Wow! This is the same media source that does not hesitate to accuse other religions, Jewish and Christian, of “homophobia”, just about every day. It is the same media source that fomented a war against Russia’s Putin on LGTB propaganda.[…]
[don’t you just love it when PC trips over MC]
| — Hat tip: MC | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Mosque Leader Compares Being Gay to Paedophilia and Murder
Dr Mohammad Naseem, chairman of the mosque at the centre of a BBC censorship row, said Asifa Lahore, a Muslim drag queen, was ‘free to leave Islam’
The chairman of a mosque at the centre of a BBC censorship row over the issue of being both Muslim and gay has compared homosexuality to being “a compulsive murderer, gambler, or paedophile”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Can a Man Marry a Jinni Female?
In his book Akam Al-Murjan, Ash-Shabli, a Hanifi scholar, stated: Scholars are of two opinions regarding marriage between humans and jinn. One says it is unlawful and the other says it is lawful. The first view was adopted by a group of Hanbali scholars and was also reported in As-Seraji Fatwas.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Dinosaur Dubbed ‘Chicken From Hell’ Was Armed and Dangerous
Feathered beast, Anzu wyliei, was built for speed, measured three metres from beak to tail and had long, sharp claws
The fossilised remains of a bizarre, bird-like dinosaur, nicknamed the “chicken from hell” by scientists, have been unearthed in the US.
The 66-million-year-old feathered beast would have resembled a beefed-up emu with a long neck, a metre-long tail and a tall crest on its head. At the end of its forelimbs were long, sharp claws. The creature stood 1.5 metres high at the hip and reached more than three metres from beak to tail. Researchers believe it lived on ancient floodplains and fed on plants, small animals and possibly eggs. An adult weighed up to 300kg…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Genetic Mugshot Recreates Faces From Nothing But DNA
A MURDER has been committed, and all the cops have to go on is a trace of DNA left at the scene. It doesn’t match any profile in databases of known criminals, and the trail goes cold. But what if the police could issue a wanted poster based on a realistic “photofit” likeness built from that DNA?
Not if, but when, claim researchers who have developed a method for determining how our genes influence facial shape. One day, the technique may even allow us to gaze into the faces of extinct human-like species that interbred with our own ancestors.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Human Nose Can Detect 1 Trillion Odours
The human nose can distinguish at least 1 trillion different odours, a resolution orders of magnitude beyond the previous estimate of just 10,000 scents, researchers report today in Science.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Crisis of Islamic Masculinities, By Amanullah De Sondy
Julia Droeber praises an interrogation of the image of the Muslim man
Masculinity, so they say, is in crisis. The notion of a crisis in (Western) masculinity appeared in the 1990s, positing that because of the impact of feminism, old certainties about masculinity had become obsolete and men no longer knew what a “real man” should be like. This argument has been the subject of scholarly critique since then, but it continues to have currency in everyday discourse.
The Crisis of Islamic Masculinities takes up this idea, arguing that masculinity in the Muslim world is also in crisis. This crisis is the result of the existence of multiple masculinities in Muslim societies on the one hand, and of an influential discourse about a singular kind of masculinity on the other…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Top Quark: Mass of World’s Heaviest Elementary Particle Found
In the first joint result from the world’s two leading particle colliders, scientists have determined the mass of the heaviest elementary particle, the top quark.
The measurement was made using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, and the Tevatron at Fermilab in Batavia, Ill.
The four LHC and Tevatron experiments — ATLAS, CDF, CMS and DZERO, respectively — are the only ones that have observed top quarks, which are 100 times the mass of a proton. In addition to top quarks, there are five other types, or flavors: bottom, up, down, charm and strange.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UV Wristband Helps You Get Vitamin D Without Sunburn
Now you can measure everything under the sun with the technology you carry. A wristband that monitors exposure to UV rays allows users to soak up the light needed to make vitamin D without getting burned, and without the need for sunscreen.
“Vitamin D deficiency is pandemic around the world,” says Karin Edgett, co-founder of UVA+B SunFriend. The vitamin is important for managing calcium levels in the body and maintaining healthy bones. In recent years it has also been implicated in reducing the risk of diabetes, arthritis and cancers such as breast cancer.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Why is Dark Chocolate Good for You? Thank Your Microbes
Dark chocolate might pack a double positive punch for our health—thanks to the microbes that live in our gut. New research suggests that beneficial bacteria that reside toward the end of our digestive tract ferment both the antioxidants and the fiber in cocoa.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |