A culturally enriched gunman attempted to crash his explosive-laden car through the gate of an army barracks near Namur in Belgium. Failing in his plan, he fled while being shot at by police, and then drove through a chain-link fence into a field, where he abandoned the car. The suspect in the alleged attack was later apprehended, and is in police custody. The incident had nothing to do with Islam.
In other news, more than thirty “refugees” refused to get off a bus in western Sweden at a remote holiday park where they were to be relocated. They said that the area was too rural, and they were afraid to be surrounded by so many trees.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Diana West, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, Jerry Gordon, Nick, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.
Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.
British Billionaire Bankers Backing Brexit Bandwagon
Billionaire hedge fund are behind an anti-EU campaign aimed at taking the UK out of the European Union following a referendum promised by British Prime Minister David Cameron that would allow them to make millions by avoiding Brussels regulators.
Following the global financial crisis of 2008-9, the EU began imposing a series of stiffer regulations on the financial services industry throughout Europe. In particular, it required banks to pass ‘stress tests’ to ensure they were capable of withstanding another global financial crisis.
As part of the reforms, three European supervisory bodies were set up to help co-ordinate the work of national regulators. These comprised the European Banking Authority (EBA), which deals with bank supervision, including the supervision of the recapitalization of banks; the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), which deals with the supervision of capital markets and carries out direct supervision with regard to credit rating agencies and trade repositories; and the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA), which deals with insurance supervision.
However, a split is emerging in the London financial center, with billionaire hedge fund managers putting their weight behind a campaign to take the UK out of the EU in an effort to maintain the capital’s control over its own regulatory system that will net the bankers millions of dollars in extra profits, once freed from Brussels.
Yet the governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, said last week that Britain’s membership of the EU had made Britain’s economy more open, dynamic and competitive, in a clear signal of his wish to keep the UK within the EU.
Divided City
But, according to analysis by the London-based Independent newspaper, freed from the European financial regulatory regime, hedge funds — which specialize in high-risk, short-term investments — would save about £250m a year.
“There are quite a few hedge fund managers who are anti-EU,” one Mayfair hedge fund boss, who did not want to speak publicly, told the newspaper. “Many are generally opposed to it.”
Billionaire Crispin Odey, who founded Odey Asset Management has pledged to “end the supremacy of EU law”.
“We joined an economic union, not a political union, and you should give voters a say. This is nothing to do with hedge funds and the EU. My criticism of the EU pre-dates the regulations which have come in.”
Sir Michael Hintze, the fourth-richest hedge fund boss in Britain, is a board member of Business for Britain, which is affiliated to the Vote Leave campaign. He has complained in the past about how EU regulations are stifling financial markets. He told the Daily Mail newspaper last year:
“Do I really think that people would stop trading with us if we go outside the Eurozone? I don’t think so.”
However, other bankers, including Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Standard Chartered are campaigning to remain within the EU.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
IMF Ready to Add Yuan to Reserve Currency Basket
The International Monetary Fund is about to give a green light to the inclusion of the yuan to the reserve basket of currencies. The final decision is due in November.
“Everything is on course technically and there is no obvious political obstacle. The report leans clearly towards including the RMB [yuan] in the basket but leaves the decision for the board,” an IMF official told Reuters, preferring not to be named.
“There is no real discussion, no obstacles, all seems on course,” another official added.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Tops EU for Economically Inactive in Q2
35.7% in Italy moved to inactivity, 16.8% EU-wide
(ANSA) — Brussels, October 26 — Italy had the highest percentage increase of unemployed people who had moved into economic inactivity in the second quarter of 2015, according to figures released by EU statistics bureau Eurostat on Monday.
The Eurostat report on labour market flow showed that 35.7% of unemployed workers in Italy moved into economic inactivity in the second quarter of 2015, compared to the EU average of 16.8%.
Eurostat defines the inactive population as those classified neither as employed nor as unemployed and not working at all and not available or looking for work.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The wise thinkers of history have always understood that political systems are the products of our conception of truth and justice. Since 1776, we in America have believed that a just political system must be based upon a concept of rights, and government must be enshrined as a protector of those rights. This, as the Declaration of Independence states so eloquently, is the purpose of government.
But unfortunately our modern day rulers in Washington, and the intellectuals who shore them up ideologically, have warped this vision of political philosophy. Government is no longer to be a “protector of rights” to maintain freedom and order. It is now to be a “provider of privileges” to create socio-economic equality.
Why this is so wrong is because whenever a privilege is conveyed by government to some specific faction of society (such as low income earners, minorities, corporations, banks, unions, etc.), it requires the destruction of someone else’s basic rights. For example, if the government is to provide subsidies to low income earners or loans to corporations and banks, it must get those subsidies and loans via progressive taxation, which violates other people’s right to their property and their right to equality under the law.
If government chooses to employ currency inflation to fund its subsidies and loans, this violates everyone’s right to their property via debasement of their savings. If government chooses to borrow the money for its subsidies and loans, this merely delays the violation of rights; the wealth redistribution and currency debasement come later to repay the loan.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Saudi Arabia to Run Out of Cash in Less Than 5 Years
Not even the mighty Middle East can survive cheap oil forever.
If oil stays around $50 a barrel, most countries in the region will run out of cash in five years or less, warned a dire report from the International Monetary Fund this week. That includes OPEC leader Saudi Arabia as well as Oman and Bahrain.
Low oil prices will wipe out an estimated $360 billion from the region this year alone, the IMF said.
Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil producer, needs to sell oil at around $106 to balance its budget, according to IMF estimates. The kingdom barely has enough fiscal buffers to survive five years of $50 oil, the IMF said.
After years of huge surpluses, Saudi Arabia’s current account deficit is projected to soar to 20% of gross domestic product this year, Capital Economics estimates. Saudi Arabia’s war chest of cash is still humungous at nearly $700 billion, but it’s shrinking fast.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
But, as Central European countries are discovering, European values don’t have much to do with the preservation of viable functioning European states. Instead they are about the sort of static Socialism that Bernie Sanders admires from abroad. But even a Socialist welfare state requires people to work for a living. Maine’s generous welfare policies began collapsing once Somali Muslims swarmed in to take advantage of them. Denmark and the Dutch, among other of Bernie Sanders’ role models, have been sounding more like Reagan and less like Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren.
Two years ago, the Dutch King declared that, “The classic welfare state of the second half of the 20th century in these areas in particular brought forth arrangements that are unsustainable in their current form.” That same year, the Danish Finance Minister called for the “modernization of the welfare state.”
But the problem isn’t one of modernization, it’s medievalization.
27% of Moroccans and 21% of Turks in the Netherlands are unemployed. It’s 27% in Denmark for Iraqis. And even when employed, their average income is well below the European average.
Critics pointed out in the past that a multicultural America can’t afford the welfare states that European countries have. Now that those same countries are turning multicultural, they can’t afford them either.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Fed Can’t Raise Rates, But Must Pretend it Will
Waiting for Godot is a play written by the Irish novelist Samuel B. Beckett in the late 1940s in which two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, keep waiting endlessly and in vain for the coming of someone named Godot. The storyline bears some resemblance to the Federal Reserve’s talk about raising interest rates.
Since spring 2013, the Fed has been playing with the idea of raising rates, which it had suppressed to basically zero percent in December 2008. So far, however, it has not taken any action. Upon closer inspection, the reason is obvious. With its policy of extremely low interest rates, the Fed is fueling an artificial economic expansion and inflating asset prices.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Amish Girl Who Fled United States to Escape Forced Chemotherapy is Now Cancer-Free
(NaturalNews) Some might call it a “miracle,” but alternative and holistic medicine healers aren’t really surprised to learn that a 12-year old Amish girl is now cancer-free — after her doctors testified in court just six months ago that she would be dead by now if her family were permitted to refuse her chemotherapy.
As reported by the Medina Gazette, of Medina County, Ohio, Maurice Thompson, head of the libertarian non-profit group 1852 Center for Constitutional Law, said young Sarah Hershberger now shows no signs of being stricken with cancer at all and appears to be healthy.
“She had MRIs and blood work, and the judge over the last year helped facilitate at least one trip to the Cleveland Clinic. The MRIs did not show any cancer,” Thompson told the Gazette recently.
He added that her family is continuing to treat her with less invasive alternative medicine.
“Once you have it, you’re never 100 percent out of the woods, whether or not you get chemotherapy,” he said. “I know how she looks isn’t really an indication of whether she has cancer, but she’s looking very healthy.”
And yet, as the paper noted, not a single trace of cancer has shown up in any test.
Court finds parents have no rights — again
When Sarah was diagnosed with cancer in 2013, her parents, Andy and Anna Hershberger, initially agreed to chemotherapy treatments. However, they opted to end such treatments when Sarah’s condition grew worse, fearing that the treatments themselves might eventually lead to her death.
As is typical in today’s post-constitutional America, officials at Akron Children’s Hospital responded with a legal attempt to strip Sarah’s parents of their right to choose their own daughter’s medical treatment. The hospital sought court permission to obtain “limited guardianship” over her, thereby giving them the authority over medical decisions pertaining to her. Doctors testified she would not make it six months without chemotherapy.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Celebrating 14 Years Since We Kissed Our Freedoms Goodbye
If you haven’t already, now’s the time to get out your party hats to celebrate the 14th anniversary of the USA PATRIOT Act.
You know about the law, I’m sure; passed barely six weeks after the 9/11 attacks, the USA PATRIOT Act is one of the most sweeping, liberty-destroying pieces of legislation in American history.
Remember the rule of thumb: the more high-sounding the name of a law, the more disastrous its effects. And the USA PATRIOT Act absolutely conformed.
It stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Interdict and Obstruct Terrorism.
And this name is truly disingenuous when you think about it.
Seriously, how was America to become more ‘united’ by allowing warrantless searches, vastly expanding the powers of secret courts, and completely doing away with entire sections of the Constitution?? That’s just absurd.
The name itself is a cruel joke on liberty.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
Civil-Rights Leader: Black Lives Matter ‘Angry, Godless, Hateful’
A black civil-rights activist is slamming Black Lives Matter, which has booed speakers off stage just for saying all lives matter, for its increasingly violent actions and radical rhetoric.
“The Black Lives Matter group is an evil group which is now being promoted as the next civil-rights movement,” said Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson. “They are being held up as a good organization but they are no different from the KKK or the skinheads.”
Peterson, a WND columnist, is the author of the upcoming book “The Antidote” and the founder of the civil-rights organization BOND (Brotherhood Organization for a New Destiny.) Peterson was shocked at what he sees as the media’ s consistent and dedicated support for what he called a “radical” group.
“Black Lives Matter is an angry, godless, hateful group being held up as something good,” Peterson charged. He believes the group is only being emboldened by what he sees as the total collapse of law enforcement in the face of increasingly aggressive activism.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Earth’s Gravitational Pull Cracks Open the Moon
Earth’s gravitational pull is massaging the moon, opening up faults in the lunar crust, researchers say.
Just as the moon’s gravitational pull causes seas and lakes to rise and fall as tides on Earth, the Earth exerts tidal forces on the moon. Scientists have known this for a while, but now they’ve found that Earth’s pull actually opens up faults on the moon.
“We know the close relationship between the Earth and the moon goes back to their origins, but what a surprise [it was] to find the Earth is still helping to shape the moon,” study lead author Thomas Watters, a planetary scientist at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., told Space.com.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Prince Majed bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud is accused of doing cocaine, getting drunk and forcing himself on three female members of staff, exclusively obtained court documents reveal
A Saudi Arabian prince ordered his entire household to gather by the pool and strip off because he wanted to see ‘some naked p***y’, Daily Mail Online can reveal.
The claim is made in legal documents laying out details of the civil case against Prince Majed bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, 29, who was arrested in Los Angeles last month after neighbors spotted a crying, bleeding woman attempting to scale a wall of his compound…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
FBI Reveals Terrifying Number of Islamic Operatives Inside CONUS
ISIS has made it very clear that they will be infiltrating civilized nations, including the United States, for the purpose of committing barbaric acts of terror in the name of ‘Allah.’ We’ve already seen several lone wolf attacks here in America by ISIS inspired jihads.
FBI Director James Comey recently revealed that federal authorities currently have at least 900 active investigations against suspected Islamic State-inspired operatives inside our country.
Comey stated that the number of individuals inspired by the Islamic State is “slowly climbing,” as reported by USA Today.
The Islamic State has largely targeted young people in the United States who, for whatever reason, have a hatred for America. The Islamic State has attempted to brainwash these people into joining their murderous crusades through provocative social media campaigns.
Comey referenced this past summer, when fears were at an all-time high that the jihads were planning attacks on celebrations during the Fourth of July holiday.
“If that becomes the new normal […] that would be hard to keep up,” the director said. He also noted that it was unclear whether the bureau had the necessary resources to conduct the necessary investigations.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
Fear of the Walking Dead: The American Police State Takes Aim
By John W. Whitehead
The zombies are back. They are hungry. And they are lurking around every corner.
In Kansas, Governor Sam Brownback has declared October “Zombie Preparedness Month” in an effort to help the public prepare for a possible zombie outbreak.
In New York, researchers at Cornell University have concluded that the best place to hide from the walking dead is the northern Rocky Mountains region.
And in Washington, DC, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have put together a zombie apocalypse preparation kit “that details everything you would need to have on hand in the event the living dead showed up at your front door.”
The undead are also wreaking havoc at gun shows, battling corsets in forthcoming movie blockbusters such as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, running for their lives in 5K charity races, and even putting government agents through their paces in mock military drills arranged by the Dept. of Defense (DOD) and the Center for Disease Control (CDC).
The zombie narrative, popularized by the hit television series The Walking Dead, in which a small group of Americans attempt to survive in a zombie-ridden, post-apocalyptic world where they’re not only fighting off flesh-eating ghouls but cannibalistic humans, plays to our fears and paranoia.
Yet as journalist Syreeta McFadden points out, while dystopian stories used to reflect our anxieties, now they reflect our reality, mirroring how we as a nation view the world around us, how we as citizens view each other, and most of all how our government views us.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
In its first big announcement, the lab tested hundreds of hot dogs and veggie dogs and found some very disturbing things.
For starters, it found human DNA in hot dogs. “Two percent of all samples were found to have traces of human DNA in them. Veggie dogs were the worst off, accounting for 67 percent of the hygiene issues and two-thirds of the human DNA found,” reports Yahoo News.
See the full report here.
The fact that human DNA is being found in hot dogs might mean Bob fell into the meat grinder again. More likely, however, it just means that people working on these food lines aren’t wearing beard nets or gloves. It’s interesting that most of the problems were found in veggie dogs, which are positioned as being healthier than meat-based hot dogs. Apparently, veggie dogs aren’t 100% vegetarian because they also contain some human parts.
According to the Clear Food report, 10% of vegetarian hot dogs contained meat. Sadly, Clear Food refuses to name which brands were contaminated!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Islam and 9/11 Not Connected, 12-Year-Olds Taught in America
Parents in Illinois are outraged that a public school there is painting a positive picture of Islam and teaching impressionable young students that Islam bears no responsibility for the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States.
This is just the latest incident demonstrating a growing trend in American education to portray the intolerant, slavery-sanctioning, woman-oppressing, genocidal, and relentlessly expansionist Religion of Peace as a misunderstood force for good or as just another world religion, no better or worse than the others. The relativist, multiculturalist, pro-Sharia compliance perspective is that a few bad, weird people who just happened to be Muslims flew airplanes into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field on Sept. 11, 2001, and that these jihadist extremists in no way represent the core teachings of the Koran and the whole Islamic community, even though Muslims have been slaughtering, enslaving, and otherwise subjugating unbelievers for 1,400 years.
One of the education sector’s gatekeepers Mark Halwachs, superintendent of High Mount School in Swansea, Ill., is proud to be serving humanity by presenting Islam as a positive thing that had absolutely nothing to do with the horrors of 9/11. The Kindergarten-to-8th Grade school he oversees has no plans to abandon its Islamic misinformation efforts and the teaching of revisionist history.
Halwachs, who sounds very much like a spokesman for the pro-Islamist Southern Poverty Law Center, made a series of admissions in an interview with the Belleville News-Democrat. The newspaper account states:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Media’s Bet: You Don’t Care That Hillary Lied to You About a Terrorist Attack
Because they’re going to keep telling you that you shouldn’t care. And you’ll take your cue from them.
It’s a curious world we’re living in when the media can declare Hillary Clinton triumphant after a day of questioning in which it was proved beyond all doubt that she knowingly lied about the terrorist attack in Benghazi, and in which she chuckled on live television about Ambassador Christopher Stevens’s desperate attempts to get more security at the compound — attempts that failed because of her, resulting in his murder.
Yeah, that’s hilarious.
So how exactly does the media get off trying to tell us that she “won” and that her Republican questioners “lost”? Essentially, they’ve decided it doesn’t matter that Hillary lied and that she denied Stevens the security that would have saved his life (and laughed about it on national television), because you don’t care. And why don’t you care? Because they’re going to tell you that you shouldn’t.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
This past weekend, conservative talk radio icon and author of multiple New York Times bestsellers Dr. Michael Savage and Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alexander Marlow discussed his latest book Government Zero: No Borders, No Language, No Culture.
Appearing on Breitbart News Saturday, which airs on SiriusXM Patriot channel 125, Dr. Savage explained that this is the first interview in the campaign for his new book. Marlow said he was honored and reminded Savage that their interviewtogether last year, discussing Stop the Coming Civil War: My Savage Truth, was one of the highlights of the year for Breitbart News Saturday.
Savage, who holds a PhD in nutrition from the University of California at Berkeley, recounted that during his last interview with Marlow, when they discussed Stop the Coming Civil War, “I don’t know if we stopped it or started it.”
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
MSNBC Host: White Males Can’t be Described as ‘Hard Workers’ Because of Privilege
During a discussion about Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) chances of gaining control of the speakers’ gavel, executive director of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles Alfonso Aguilar called the lawmaker a “hard worker.” MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry immediately berated the guest for using the term to describe a white male.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
New ‘Anti-American’ PSYOP Ran on Arizona High School Football Fans
TEMPE (INTELLIHUB) — Well it doesn’t get anymore anti-American then this folks—’patriotic gear’ has now been banned for anyone attending the upcoming football game at Corona Del Sol High School against rival Marcos de Niza High School.
The upcoming football game “which was supposed to have a USA theme” will now have no theme at all after the school decided that such a theme would have “offensive condemnations.”, as reported on Fox News earlier Friday.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
New Horizons Pluto Probe Heads Toward 2nd Flyby Target
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has begun chasing down another distant, icy object. New Horizons, which in July performed the first-ever flyby of Pluto, fired up its engines yesterday (Oct. 22) in the first of four maneuvers designed to send the probe zooming past a small object called 2014 MU69 on Jan. 1, 2019.
New Horizons’ historic encounter with Pluto revealed the dwarf planet to be an incredibly diverse and geologically active world, complete with towering ice mountains and glaciers of frozen nitrogen.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Of Course, Justice Department Will File No Charges Against Lois Lerner
I suppose there was no other way this could have ended.
The Obama-era Justice Department does not exist to enforce the laws on the books except to the extent that doing so is politically helpful to Democrats, so just as her predecessor Eric Holder would have done, Attorney General Loretta Lynch has declined to bring any charges against Lois Lerner for using her position at the IRS to harass nonprofit conservative groups.
Justice’s report acknowledges what no one could possibly deny — that the Lerner’s conduct in her job as director of exempt organizations was marked by mismanagement and poor decisions. But, the report insists, that is not a crime.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Roger Waters Fears Clinton to Drop Nuclear Bomb
Outspoken rock legend Roger Waters has voiced concern that Hillary Clinton is too hawkish, quipping that she might use nuclear weapons if elected president.
Waters, the former Pink Floyd member best known for the classic album “The Wall,” said he is supporting liberal insurgent Bernie Sanders as he challenges Clinton for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination.
“I have an awful worry that she might become the first woman president (only) to drop a
ing nuclear bomb on somebody,” Waters told Rolling Stone magazine in an interview released Monday…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Senior Healthcare Costs Skyrocket to $245,000 Per Year Despite Obama’s Empty Promises
The facts make it clear that the promises of the Affordable Care Act are backfiring. A new report from Bloomberg shows that senior healthcare costs are skyrocketing, years after the law was passed. The average 65-year-old couple preparing to retire in 2015 is looking at healthcare costs of $245,000 per year, and this number is projected to climb. This average, which has jumped 11 percent from 2014, shows how domineering and enslaving the medical system has become. Government intervention through the years, which has legitimized the faults in the medical system, has only driven up costs.
The promises of cost-saving government programs are all theater to cover up the fundamental problems within the system. Health insurance plans are a part of the problem. Mandating these plans on the population, like the Affordable Care Act did, only perpetuates the problems. Health insurance plans are expected to cover costs, so many medical professionals naturally prescribe more pills and schedule more tests to stay on the safe side. There’s no incentive for true cost-effective, nutrition-based prevention because costly interventions will be covered by health insurance plans.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Seven Key Facts About Cassini’s Oct. 28 ‘Plume Dive’
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft will sample the ocean of Saturn’s moon Enceladus on Wednesday, Oct. 28, when it flies through the moon’s plume of icy spray.
Enceladus is an icy moon of Saturn. Early in its mission, Cassini discovered Enceladus has remarkable geologic activity, including a towering plume of ice, water vapor and organic molecules spraying from its south polar region. Cassini later determined the moon has a global ocean and likely hydrothermal activity, meaning it could have the ingredients needed to support simple life.
The flyby is not intended to detect life, but it will provide powerful new insights about how habitable the ocean environment is within Enceladus.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sniffing Enceladus’ Spray — Spacecraft to Fly 30 Miles From Saturn Moon
On Oct. 28th, 2015, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft will zoom past in excess of 19,000 mph, sampling the water plume emanating from its south pole. The instrumentation will be looking for signs of habitability on the icy world.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The American Terrorist: White, Christian, Owns Guns and Believes in Liberty
The Barack Obama regime has shown once again who it believes are the real terrorists.
The Russian intervention in Syria has revealed what I (and others in alternative media) have been stating for months: that the U.S. war (so-called) on ISIS has been a sham from the beginning.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
The Vindication of Reed Irvine
By Cliff Kincaid
When Reed Irvine started Accuracy in Media, he was hoping that the public would begin to question the sources of news and information. His mission to educate the public about liberal media bias has been so successful that, as Mike Flynn notes in a perceptive piece (url) at Breitbart, candidates like Donald Trump and Ben Carson surge when they are attacked by the media. Many regard media attacks as proof that the candidate is saying something that is politically incorrect and therefore makes political sense.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
This Man Took One Look at Hillary’s Post-Benghazi ‘Pose’, Immediately Realizes Something…
Among the chief complaints regarding Hillary Clinton’s performance in front of the House Select Committee on Benghazi last week was a perception that she treated the serious matter of four murdered Americans far too flippantly. After laughing several times and making what some interpreted as inappropriate jokes during her testimony, the Democrat presidential candidate capped off the marathon hearing with a celebratory pose that received significant social media feedback.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
Time to Do the Constitutional Thing
There is no question anymore where the greatest threat to America is coming from… It is coming from within the halls of our government. All three branches of the Federal government have been compromised.
The Judicial Branch is no longer in the business of upholding or defending the Constitutionally protected Rights of all legal American citizens, or enforcing the constitutional laws of the United States as passed by Congress. They are in the unconstitutional business of “social justice” — making up national policy to suit global interests by way of totalitarian judicial fiat, often in direct violation of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. The judicial branch has gone completely rogue…
The Legislative Branch, the only branch of the Federal government with any law-making authority whatsoever, Congress, has abdicated all constitutional law-making and oversight authority of Congress to the unconstitutional Senate, Executive and Judicial branches… Congress has rendered itself, especially the House of Representatives, a vacant useless body no longer operating as “the people’s representatives” in Washington DC. The House is a reckless and feckless enemy of “the people” today, with no promise of self-correction anywhere in sight, no matter who the next Speaker may be.
The Executive Branch has been changed from an administrative branch obligated to uphold, enforce and administer the Laws of this Land, to a lawless tyrannical dictatorship actively aiding and abetting known enemies of the United States, violating the US Constitution and Bill of Rights on a daily basis, and ignoring all legitimate U.S. Laws while inventing new “laws” via unconstitutional Executive orders and memos, as if the White House is the Kremlin…
The Founders had plenty of experience with everything we face today. They knew that all governments, no matter how carefully designed, had the potential to eventually become destructive of the sole purpose of government. They fought a bloody battle to win our sovereignty, security, freedom and liberty. They knew the price of freedom all too well…
So, they made it possible for all future generations to avoid the need for mass bloodshed in order to free themselves from a government of, by and for the people, once that government had become destructive towards the people. They set Constitutional Solutions in place for the people to follow, in order to peacefully alter their government, before abolishing through bloodshed, would become the people’s only option.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Unprecedented Flooding Has Hit the U.S. Within the Last 30 Days
Over the past 30 days, major floods have hit the east coast, the west coast and now the middle part of the country.
So why is this happening? Why is the U.S. being hit by so many catastrophic weather events all of a sudden? During the past month flooding has caused billions of dollars in damage, and in many areas the clean up is going to take well into next year. Some pundits are blaming El Nino, but others are pointing to other potential reasons for why this may be happening. Let’s start by taking a look at some of the biggest flood events that have happened over the past 30 days…
Hurricane Joaquin never made landfall on the east coast, but moisture from the storm had a tremendous impact — particularly in South Carolina. In fact, the governor of the state said that the region had not seen that type of rain “in a thousand years”…
“We haven’t had this level of rain in the low-country in a thousand years — that’s how big this is,” said South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. Days of record rainfall and catastrophic flooding left at least seventeen people dead in South Carolina and two dead in North Carolina, Oct. 6, 2015. Thirteen dams have failed.
It would be very difficult to overstate the amount of damage that was caused by this storm. Some officials are estimating that the total amount of economic damage done “will probably be in the billions of dollars”…
The rains may have stopped in South Carolina, but the danger and the work to rebuild are far from over…
But some climate “experts” are really playing down the impact of El Nino. Instead, they are attempting to convince us that what we are witnessing is simply the result of “man-made climate change”, and they are using this as an opportunity to promote their agenda.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
World Would be Much Better if Hussein, Gaddafi Were Still in Power — Trump
The world would be much better if Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi were still in power, US presidential candidate Donald Trump believes.
“100 percent,” Trump answered when asked the question during an interview with CNN on Sunday.
Trump explained that Iraq and Libya would be more sustainable and contribute to a more stable Middle East if the two leaders had not been removed from power.
“I mean, look at Libya. Look at Iraq. Iraq used to be no terrorists. He [Hussein] would kill the terrorists immediately, which is like now it’s the Harvard of terrorism,” Trump said.
“I’m not saying he was a nice guy, he was a horrible guy, but it was a lot better than it is right now. Right now, Iraq is a training ground for terrorists. Right now Libya, nobody even knows Libya, frankly there is no Iraq and there is no Libya. It’s all broken up. They have no control. Nobody knows what’s going on,” the candidate pointed out.
Earlier, Trump said he liked the Russian actions against the Islamic State (ISIL) terrorist group in Syria.
“I like that Putin is bombing the hell out of ISIL,” he said. “Putin has to get rid of ISIL ‘cause Putin does not want ISIL coming into Russia.”
He also said that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is a better leader than those Washington is supposed to be backing. According to Trump, without Assad in power Syria would collapse and turn into another Iraq or Libya.
The situation has been unstable in Iraq since Hussein was forcefully pushed out of power in 2003, shortly after the US invasion in the country. The situation aggravated in 2014 after the Islamic State terrorist group seized large parts of Iraq and Syria.
Libya is currently facing its worst wave of violence since the beginning of a civil war prompted by the 2011 overthrow of long-standing leader Muammar Gaddafi.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Abstaining From Alcohol for ‘Dry January’ Reduces Liver Damage and Blood Pressure, New Study Finds
Abstaining from alcohol for one month significantly reduces an individual’s blood pressure and cholesterol, a new study has found. Researchers from University College London monitored more than 100 men and women in their 40s who took part in Alcohol Concern’s “dry January” campaign. They found that refraining from a tipple also lowered the subjects’ risk of developing liver disease and diabetes.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Almost 40% Oppose Mosques in Iceland
Four times as many Icelanders oppose the building of mosques in Iceland than oppose the building of Church of Iceland churches, according to a new opinion poll.
Icelandic pollster MMR asked people to what extent they supported or opposed the building of places of worship by various religious denominations.
Of those responding, 61.7% said they were in favour of the Church of Iceland building new churches in Iceland. This was followed by the Ásatrú pagan association (50.5%), Buddhists (33.4%) and the Russian Orthodox Church (33.4%).
Places of worship built by the Icelandic Muslim Society are the least popular option, with just 32.0% of those replying directly in favour.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Bronze Age Skeletons Were Earliest Plague Victims
Deadly disease suspected to have driven mass migrations across Europe and Asia.
The Black Death notoriously swept through Europe in 1347, killing an estimated 50 million people. Yet DNA from Bronze Age human skeletons now shows that the plague had first emerged at least as early as 3,000 bc.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Climate: EU Exceeded 2020 Target of 20% Cuts in Gas Emissions
But to attain its 2030 objective much more must be done
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, OCTOBER 20- Between 1990 and 2014 the EU has already cut 23% of its emissions of carbon gas, going beyond the 20% target set for 2020, but in order to attain its 40% objective by 2030 it must do much more, the European Environment Agency (EEA) indicated.
According to the agency, following current measures ,the European Union will reach only the 24% target and, adding additionnally planned ones, 25%. For this reason, Brussels is already working on new provisions, starting from the reform of the European Emissions Market (Ets).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
First Female Bishop Sworn Into Britain’s House of Lords
Rachel Treweek has become the first woman to serve as one of the Lords Spiritual in the British Parliament. Despite the honor, she has acknowledged there is still inequality within the Church of England.
“God is not to be seen as male. God is God,” she said. She also told the newspaper that there’s still “a long way to go” when it comes to gender inequality within the Church of England, and that more participation from a wider cross section of society is needed.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Global Bishops Call for ‘Complete Decarbonisation’ By 2050
Bishops launched a global appeal Monday for a breakthrough at upcoming Paris climate talks, including a “complete decarbonisation” of the world’s economy and more help for poor countries battling the effects of climate change.
The bishops said any agreement “should limit global temperature increases to avoid catastrophic climatic impacts, especially on the most vulnerable communities”.
From across five continents they called “not only for ‘drastic reduction in the emission of carbon dioxide and other toxic gasses’, but also for ending the fossil fuel era”.
The goal should be “complete decarbonisation by mid-century, in order to protect frontline communities suffering from the impacts of climate change, such as those in the Pacific Islands and in coastal regions”…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
A gunman was arrested in Belgium today after an attempted terrorist attack on a military base using a car feared packed with explosives.
The assault happened soon after 9am in the village of Flawinne, east of Charleroi, where a commando unit is stationed.
Shots were fired after a dark blue Ford Escort was driven through a perimeter fence towards the barracks, said a judicial source from nearby Namur.
‘The car did not get through the gates,’ said the source. ‘There was a brief gunfight and then the masked man fled from the scene. He appeared to be acting alone.’
The car was abandoned in a ploughed field, and could be seen covered in bullet holes and with its front tyres deflated.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Child Saved From Serious Allergy by ‘Blood Wash’ In World First
Treatment at Rome’s Bambino Gesù children’s hospital purged boy of antibodies responsible
(ANSA) — Rome, October 8 — A seven-year-old child has been saved from a serious allergy by a special “blood wash” treatment practised for the first time in the world by Rome’s Bambino Gesù children’s hospital. The treatment ‘washed’ the child’s blood of the antibodies responsible for his condition after pharmaceutical therapies proved ineffective. The boy, Michele, suffered a very serious form of allergy to foods, including milk, eggs, fish and fruit, which combined with asthma, caused a series of bad fits. The treatment is not considered a definite cure, but it has made it possible to bring the condition under control and significantly increased the boy’s quality of life.
As a result, it a breakthrough that could open up new options for the treatment of extremely serious allergies.
The paper related to the ground-breaking treatment has been published by scientific journal Pediatrics.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: MotoGP: CONI Chief Malagò Backs Rossi, Says Title ‘Distorted’
Rider victim of ‘provocation’ says head of Italian sport
(see related) (ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — Giovanni Malagò, the head of Italian Olympic Committee CONI, said Monday that he was backing Valentino Rossi in the row over his clash with Marc Marquez at the Malaysian MotoGP Grand Prix. He added that punishing Rossi by making him start the season-ending race in Valencia from the back of the grid risked distorting the outcome of this season’s championship of motorcycling’s premium class. “Valentino himself has recognised that he let himself get dragged into provocation,” Malagò said. “Some of the responsibility is his, but I want to defend him and not just for institutional reasons. I think that, in this way, the world championship is being distorted”. Some media outlets, especially Spanish ones, suggested Rossi kicking out at Marquez was the motorcycling equivalent of former France great Zinedine Zidane’s moment of madness when he headbutted Italy’s Marco Materazzi during the 2006 World Cup final. But many Italians are sticking up for Rossi, especially in the light of footage that appears to show Marquez bang his helmet into the Italian’s leg before he reacted.
Malagò said the incident proved that Rossi’s claims before the race that Marquez wanted to scupper his title hopes to favour his compatriot, Jorge Lorenzo, “were absolutely true”. But the head of Italian sport also advised Rossi not to snub the last race of the season.
“I understand his sorrow and anger… but I’d say he should participate in order not to give an alibi and satisfaction to the people who created this problem”. Ernesto Carbone and Stefano Esposito, lawmakers for Premier Matteo Renzi’s centre-left Democratic Party (PD), supported Rossi via Twitter with posts carrying the hashtag #iostoconVale (#i’mwithVale). Materazzi and Italy’s 2006 World Cup-winning coach Marcello Lippi also came out on his side.
“There are men and there are little children,” Materazzi commented on social media with the hashtag #difendiamoVale46 (#let’sdefendVale46) along with the video showing Marquez’s helmet touching Rossi. Lippi told RAI radio that Rossi had “fallen into a trap” adding that “as always, a great champion generates great envy”. Paolo Rossi, the top scorer in Italy’s 1982 World Cup-winning campaign in Spain, said Rossi should do what his Azzurri side did and show the Spaniards who is best on their own territory.
“Show that you’re greater than all the rest,” the former striker told ANSA.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Moroccan Stabs Wife to Death Then Calls Police to Arrest Him
Murder carried out in front of couple’s three children
(ANSA) — Cesena, October 26 — A Moroccan man stabbed to death his wife in front of their three small children then called the Carabinieri police and asked them to arrest him, police said Monday.
The 35-year-old north African at around 10:30 pm Sunday killed his wife of the same age from whom he had been separated, police sources said.
The man used to visit his children regularly but the relationship with his wife was stormy and they frequently fought, neighbours said.
In the last such row Sunday the man stabbed his wife repeatedly and she died before an ambulance arrived.
The man appeared confused and offered no resistance when the Carabinieri arrived to arrest him.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Marino Indicates Won’t Confirm Resignation
‘I won’t disappoint you’ tells supporters after expenses row
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — Outgoing Rome Mayor Ignazio Marino said Sunday he “would not disappoint” supporters who have called for him to withdraw his resignation over an expenses row when the legal term for him to do so expires on November 2.
“I will not disappoint you,” Marino told about 2,000 cheering supporters at Rome’s Campidoglio (Capitol), quoting Che Guevara’s saying “We are realists, we want the impossible”.
Marino said he will try to muster support on the city council to keep his term going despite losing the support of his own Democratic Party (PD) of Premier Matteo Renzi.
According to media reports Monday, the PD on the city council is split on whether to join with the opposition in demanding Marino quit in a no-confidence vote.
The PD has said it will ask its councillors to resign en masse to sink Marino rather than risking the secret vote that would be tabled on any no-confidence motion.
The PD says the expenses row was just the last in a long series of cases that mean Marino cannot regain its trust. In the latest row, Marino has said he never used public money for private ends.
He told a press conference last week that he had “never used public money for private purposes, if anything the contrary”.
He said when he met social housing officials in New York last summer “I paid for the hotel myself”.
He noted he was not under investigation in a criminal probe.
Marino stepped down earlier this month after two opposition parties filed suits claiming he ran up thousands of euros of private expenses on his municipal credit card.
He was effectively ditched by the PD who pulled the plug after months of sometimes grudging support through woes including the ‘Capital Mafia’ case, an illegally parked car, the glitzy funeral of a mafia boss and Pope Francis’s public disowning of him after he claimed to have been invited to an event in Philadelphia.
But Marino has been defiant on the expenses case.
“The petitions filed against me by (anti-establishment 5-Star Movement) M5S and (Fratelli d’Italia) FdI are shameful, written by ignorant people or by people in bad faith,” Marino said.
The city of Rome has asked to stand as civil plaintiff in the Capital Mafia trial, starting November 5, involving allegations that an organised crime group muscled in on council contracts worth millions including work with migrants and Roma.
Most of the Capital Mafia cases began under Marino’s rightwing predecessor Gianni Alemanno.
Marino has claimed credit for unearthing much of the graft.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Coming Back as Lead Player, Renzi Says in Peru
Premier says country back after years of controversy, rows
(ANSA) — Lima, October 26 — Premier Matteo Renzi has said that Italy is overcoming years of sterile attrition and is taking back a role as a lead player on the international stage during his tour of Latin America. “After years of controversies, debates and big rows about our role, Italy is back and wants to be a lead player again,” Renzi told a meeting of the Italian community in Lima, Peru. “We are conducting the necessary reforms, which have brought a return to growth and an increase in the number of people in work. Our love for ourselves up too”. Renzi also spoke about international development, saying that his government is reversing the trend to cut funding to development aid and cooperation.
“Development cooperation funds will start going up again — 120 million this year, 240 next year and 360 the year after”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Guard Convicted of Attempted Murder in Thief Shooting
Legitimate defence ruled out
(ANSA) — Milan, October 26 — A security guard was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to four years and eight months in jail Monday for shooting and wounding a Romanian thief who was trying to steal copper in a disused factory. Legitimate defence was ruled out as a defence argument, because the thief was fleeing the scene when he was shot. The sentence comes amid a row over a pensioner who killed an intruder near Milan and is being probed for voluntary manslaughter.
The pensioner, Francesco Sicignano, has been defended by conservative politicians and the rightwing press who have criticised the charge he may face.
The family of the victim, 22-year-old Albanian Gjergi (RPT Gjergi, NOT Gjegi) Gjoni, told La Repubblica daily Monday “our son should have been arrested, not killed”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Treasury Stands by Tax Agency Chief
After econ undersecretary says she should resign
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — The Treasury said in a statement Monday it has “undiminished esteem” for Internal Revenue Agency Director Rossella Orlandi. The statement came after Economy Undersecretary Enrico Zanetti, secretary of the small centrist Civic Choice party, told La Repubblica paper in an interview that if Orlandi “continues to express so much malaise, a resignation becomes inevitable”.
Zanetti went on to say that he spoke “as a member of government” and is certain “my position is absolutely shared” by the premier’s office.
Orlandi reportedly protested the fact that the Constitutional Court ruled some Internal Revenue Agency executives had been illegitimately appointed their posts.
“These executives cannot be allowed to return to their posts without a selection competition,” Zanetti said. Orlandi’s “mistake is that she is defending her most trusted men, not the institution”, he said.
The opposition anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S) also weighed in.
“We’ve been saying so for ages: Italy’s taxation machine is a hostage in a gang war, while the government winks its eye at large-scale tax dodgers,” the M5S Lower House caucus said in a statement.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: ANAS Official Admits to Corruption Says Defence Lawyer
‘Dark Lady’ pleads the fifth under questioning
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — An official of Italian highway company ANAS has admitted to corruption, his defense lawyer said Monday.
Giovanni Parlato was among a number of managers and officials arrested last week in a corruption probe into ANAS, which saw former transport ministry undersecretary Luigi Meduri also taken to Rome’s Regina Coeli prison.
Parlato admitted that 25,000 euros police found in an envelope in his car were a bribe.
Also being questioned today are jailed suspects Antonella Accroglianò — who pled the fifth — Oreste De Grossi, Antonino Ferrante and Sergio Lagrotteria. Accrogliano’ — an ANAS executive whom finance police investigators dubbed the Dark Lady — is thought to be the ringleader and allegedly steered work towards firms linked to Italy’s richest and most powerful mafia, the Calabria-based ‘Ndrangheta.
Meduri is to be questioned tomorrow.
The owners of several companies that won major public works contracts from ANAS and several lawyers are also under investigation in the probe.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Majority Coalition Budget-Related Rows Rumble On
Junior members question govt commitment to fighting tax evasion
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — The majority coalition engaged in two separate rows over budget-related issues Monday as Premier Matteo Renzi was half a world away in Peru, drumming up foreign investments for Italy’s lethargic economy.
One dispute was over a higher cash transaction ceiling in the 2016 budget bill, with Culture Minister Dario Franceschini saying Interior Minister Angelino Alfano had “won” after the government’s bill raised the ceiling from 1,000 to 3,000 euros. “We had a lot of discussions but this time Alfano won,” Franceschini said. Alfano is the leader of a junior government partner, the small New Centre Right (NCD) party while Franceschini is a prominent member of Premier Matteo Renzi’s Democratic Party (PD). A leading figure in the PD’s dissenting leftwing minority, former House caucus leader Roberto Speranza, said the new ceiling “favours corruption” and called on Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan to “clear things up”. The PD replied that the government has its ducks in a row on nabbing tax dodgers. “I would remind the absent-minded Speranza that this is the government that brought money back from Switzerland and the Vatican while others talked,” PD MP Ernesto Carbone tweeted. Renzi has said in the past that the cash transaction measure will stimulate domestic consumption. He denies that it favours corruption or tax evasion. In a separate tiff, another junior coalition member, the small centrist Civic Choice (SC) party requested a meeting with Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan and Renzi to “clarify and settle” the issue of Internal Revenue Agency Director Rossella Orlandi. The request came from SC chief and Economy Undersecretary Enrico Zanetti, who told La Repubblica paper in an interview earlier that if Orlandi “continues to express so much malaise, a resignation becomes inevitable”. Zanetti told the paper he spoke “as a member of government” and said he is certain “my position is absolutely shared” by the premier’s office. Orlandi has reportedly protested the fact that the Constitutional Court ruled some Internal Revenue Agency executives had been illegitimately appointed their posts. “These executives cannot be allowed to return to their posts without a selection competition,” Zanetti said. Orlandi’s “mistake is that she is defending her most trusted men, not the institution”, he said.
The dispute gathered steam even as sources said the Internal Revenue Agency is being reorganized and slimmed down, with fewer executives and more of a focus on catching tax dodgers. The leaner, meaner Agency will have 995 executives — down from 1,095 — but will have more mid-level managers. These are slated to rise from 325 to 339, the sources said. Later, the Treasury appeared to contradict Zanetti when it said in a statement that it has “undiminished esteem” for Orlandi — thus sparking his demand for a meeting with Padoan and the premier himself. “We want to understand whether we are the government that is signing international treaties against offshore tax havens, that is ramping up on cross-referencing data checks, that has introduced the crime of self-money laundering…or whether we are the government that is letting tax agencies die (as Orlandi has publicly said),” Zanetti said. The opposition anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S) — currently the second-largest party in Italy after Renzi’s PD — also weighed in. “We’ve been saying so for ages: Italy’s taxation machine is a hostage in a gang war, while the government winks its eye at large-scale tax dodgers,” the M5S Lower House caucus said in a statement.
The 27-billion-euro budget bill goes before parliament sometime this week.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Poland: Investment in Italy is 40 Times Bigger Than in 2003
It reached 58 million in 2014, but Italy gets low ranking
(ANSA) — ROME — The presence of Polish companies in Italy is constantly growing. Services, transport, biotechnology, construction, cosmetics: Polish direct investment in Italy today is 40 times bigger (57,9 million euros) than it was in 2003 (1.4 million).
If Italy’s taxes weren’t too high, if civil justice system weren’t so slow-moving, and if the level of infrastructure and security in some parts of the country weren’t so low, things would definitely go much better. Among Polish investors are Oknoplast (plastic products, 850 outlets throughout the country and 50 employees hired locally), Bioton (biotechnology sector, 17 million investment, the largest in Italy), Solaris (among the largest producers of buses), Pesa (production, maintenance and modernisation of railways and trams), Inglot (cosmetics).
‘We have recorded a growth not only in investments in Italy, but also in the number of employees hired by our companies” says Tomasz Orlowski, Poland’s ambassador to Italy. According to the National Bank of Poland, the overall share of Polish direct investment abroad is 13 times bigger than in 2003 (1.7 billion euros), and 4 times bigger compared to 2005 (5.3 billion euros). About 72% of foreign investments (i.e. 14.9 billion) are made in the EU. However, the diplomat underlines, ‘Italy does is not ready to welcome productive investments from Poland. Our top five partner countries are Lithuania, Czech Republic, Norway, Germany and the United Kingdom”, Orlowski says. After joining the EU, the country has experienced a boom in the expansion of capital to foreign markets. “Polish companies have reached a certain degree of maturity — Orlowski concludes -, therefore, they are now ready to explore new markets”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Pope Tells Romani to Avoid Lies, Swindles, Calls for End to ‘Centuries of Prejudice’
Francis says don’t give media excuse to talk badly about you
(ANSA) — Vatican City, October 26 — Pope Francis told a audience of Romani people on Monday that they should not give others an excuse to criticise them. “You can do this if you are good Christians, avoiding all that is not worthy of this name — falsehood, fraud, swindles and fights,” the pope said. “Dear friends, don’t give the media and the public the chance to speak badly of you”. He also told the Romani pilgrims that must send their children to school.
Pope Francis also called for the end to centuries of prejudice against Romani people. “I’d like for a new start for your people,” the pope said an audience. “The time has come to eradicate centuries of prejudice, preconceptions and reciprocal diffidence that are often at the base of discrimination, racism and xenophobia”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Satellite Internet Gets a Fresh Look, Cash Infusion
The race for Internet service from space is on, again.
After a series of failed satellite Internet projects over the past two decades, fresh investment is coming into the sector, and at least three high-profile projects are moving forward.
OneWeb, a London-based consortium backed by tycoon Richard Branson, announced in June it had raised $500 million from investors including Airbus, Qualcomm and Intelsat to advance its plan for satellite broadband to underserved parts of the world.
Also this year, US-based space exploration firm SpaceX secured a $1 billion investment that could help founder Elon Musk’s plan to build a satellite Internet network, with backing from Google and the financial firm Fidelity…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: From Metallica Fan to Demure Jihadist
Maria Ángeles didn’t have a suitor — she had three. Three combatants from Islamic State (ISIS) had been keeping her glued to her computer for months.
Locked inside her room, in her mother’s house in Almonte (Huelva), she would sit in front of the screen and morph into Maryam Al-Andalusiya (Mary of Andalusia).
The 22-year-old had secretly converted to Islam in a Seville mosque in April, and allowed herself to be seduced (in English) by the words and images of bearded men who promised her a new life “in the paradise of brothers.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Suspect Detained After Attack on Belgian Army Barracks
Belgian police detained a suspect on Monday after an attacker tried to crash a car through the gates of an army barracks in southern Belgium and fled in the vehicle after shots were fired, the prosecutor’s office said.
The incident occurred near the French-speaking town of Namur, south of Brussels. The suburb of Flawinne is the site of one of Belgium’s major military barracks, home to the 2nd Commando Battalion.
“The situation is now under control. The suspect has been identified by the police”, said Meabh McMahon, FRANCE 24’s correspondent in Brussels…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Ten Years After Paris Suburb Riots, Has Anything Really Changed?
Ten years after the deaths of two teenagers sparked riots in suburbs across France, a new book co-authored by FRANCE 24’s Bahar Makooi and journalist Joséphine Lebard takes a look at what has become of Clichy-sous-Bois — the town where it all began.
When many in France think of the Parisian suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois, the first image that often springs to mind is of dilapidated council estates, burning cars, angry teenagers, riot police and a decade-old photo of two young men: Bouna Traore, 15, and Zyed Benna, 17.
Traore and Benna were on their way home from playing football in Clichy-sous-Bois on October 27, 2005 when they died after being electrocuted at an electricity substation while running away from the police. Their deaths unleashed six weeks of riots that spread across the country, thrusting Clichy-sous-Bois into the spotlight…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Terror-Linked ‘Army of Darkness’ Muslim Group Blocked From Building ‘Europe’s Biggest Mosque’
The British government has blocked plans by a radical Islamic group known as the “Army of Darkness” to build the largest mosque in Western Europe.
Tablighi Jamaat wanted to build a 290,000 square foot “mega mosque” with 190-foot minarets near the Olympic park in East London. The project, which was backed by the local Conservative Party, would have had space for 11,000 worshippers and three times the floor space of London’s St Paul’s Cathedral, and its minarets would have been two thirds the size of Big Ben.
However, writing in the Sunday Telegraph, journalist Andrew Gilligan reports that, after a bitter 16-year battle, the government is now finally set to veto the plans. The project was first rejected by Newham Council in 2012 due to concerns the building was too big, but Tablighi Jamaat appealed and took the plans to a three-week public inquiry last summer.
The final report was submitted to the government in January, but ministers have refused to act until now due to political sensitivities.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Do Actions Speak Louder Than Words?
Proposed new banning orders (EDO’s — Extremist Disrution Orders) which are being designed under the governments new Counter-Extremism Bill, are already raising concerns in relation to free speech.
The new bill planned by Prime Minister David Cameron and Home Secretary Theresa May has been primarily introduced as a way to crack down and curb radicalisation by jihadists in the UK, and ease the fear that citizens are allowed to silently feel. But opponents to the bill have already warned that the new banning orders are extremely vague in language, and could also be used against anyone who the government considers to have radical views.
Tory MP, Mark Spencer has already let the cat out of the bag and confirmed those fears. In a Daily Telegraph article he is reported as saying that any teacher who uses their position to teach traditionalist views on marriage are as bad as terrorists and should be punished accordingly.
There were no surprises at his contempt or his comments. These are the attitudes expressed by many people who have been drafted in to the politically correct way of bullying people, under a new set of British values, under the pretext that they are somehow protecting people.
Gagging orders have already applied to most people in the workplace for a very long time for simply having traditionalist views. Prosecuting them, rather than protecting them has now taken the UK further down the road of dictatorship and is creating an animosity, a hatred, where it didn’t once exist.
EDO’s will not be limited to those with traditional views. Under the new proposals anyone who offends someone with an unpopular view or idea, could now find themselves in trouble and even be arrested and labelled extremist or terrorist. According to the organization Defend Free Speech, this means political activists, anti-religious groups and any type of campaigner; or even anyone who innocently posts or expresses an opposing view on social media like Twitter or Facebook could be labelled.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Heart Attack Patient Given Fine for Pulling Over With Chest Pains in Birmingham
David Hands, 64, followed his doctor’s orders when he suffered an attack of angina at the wheel of his car in Birmingham and pulled over to take his medication — but was later handed a £35 fine.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
When Girls Become Wives to Escape War
Forced marriages and child brides may sound far-fetched in Europe. A true story from the Netherlands dispels this notion. Women’s aid organizations expect that Germany will soon be confronted with these issues.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt Says it Arrested 2 Senior Muslim Brotherhood Officials Before They Escaped to Libya
Egypt’s state-run news agency says security forces have arrested the secretary general of the Freedom and Justice Party, the Muslim Brotherhood’s political wing, and another high-ranking Brotherhood member.
The Muslim Brotherhood has been facing a mass crackdown since President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi led a July 2013 military ouster of former President Mohammed Morsi, a longtime Brotherhood official, amid mass protests against his rule.
Morsi is now in jail, the Brotherhood was designated a terrorist organization in December 2013, and the party dissolved in August last year.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
New Project Will Scan Egypt’s Pyramids
Mamdouh Eldamaty, Egypt’s Minister of Antiquities, announced that researchers from Cairo University, Université Laval, and Nagoya University will use radiographic muons, infrared thermography, and photogrammetry to conduct a non-invasive survey of Egypt’s pyramids. “Their goal is to probe Egypt’s largest pyramids, without touching them or drilling the slightest opening,” Eldamaty told Ahram Online. The first phase of the Scan Pyramids Project will focus on the Bent and Red pyramids at the Dahshur necropolis, and Khufu and Khafre’s pyramids on the Giza plateau.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
“The Temple Mount is in Our Hands” Trumps “ Al Aksa is in Danger”
When Israeli paratroopers under the command of Col. Motta Gur recaptured Jerusalem after 19 years of Jordanian occupation he radioed his superiors “The Temple Mount is in Our Hands”. We wrote about that climactic moment in the June Six Days of War in 1967 in a May 2012 Iconoclast post on the occasion of the 45th anniversary of Jerusalem Day that celebrates the reunification of Israel’s eternal capital. The IDF cleared off the plaza before the Kotel, the Western Wall as units stormed the Temple Mount with the Al Aksa Mosque and the Golden Dome of the Rock. It was a glorious moment reclaiming the ancient Jewish provenance, now scurrilous denied by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas intoning the 100 year old blood libel of the Haj Amin al-Husseini that “the A; Aksa Mosque is in Danger”. Ten Israel Jews and more than 50 Palestinian and Israel Arabs are dead in the latest Intifada that Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh calls the al Quds of Jerusalem ‘uprising”. Secretary of State Kerry spent time in Amman, Jordan with King Abdullah II and PA President Abbas trying to come up with a solution monitoring activity on the Temple Mount, but still affirming a policy established by Moshe Dayan in 1967 effectively ceding control to a Waqf appointed by Jordanian Muslim religious leaders denying the right of Jews to pray on the revered platform. This was supposed to be the ‘calming” solution that has yet to rein in the violence raging in episodes of murderous knifings, shootings, and car rammings in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and inside Israel. All driven by hateful incitement by Palestinian leaders like Abbas, Erekat, Hamas leaders Hassan Youssef and Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza, Israeli Arab extremist Sheikh Raed Salah seeking to establish a global Caliphate on the sacred platform. It has been compounded by seditious United Arab List Members of the Knesset making common cause with the rioting Palestinians, the subject of an op ed in yesterday’s New York Times by Shmuel Rosner, “Israel’s Irresponsible Arabs”. Rosner, a Times contributing op ed writer, cited rising concern among Israel’s majority Jews:…
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
Blood Brothers: Palestinians and Jews Share Genetic Roots
Jews break down into three genetic groups, all of which have Middle Eastern origins — which are shared with the Palestinians and Druze.
Several major studies published in the past five years attest to these ancient hereditary links. At the forefront of these efforts are two researchers: Harry Ostrer, professor of pediatrics and pathology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York, and Karl Skorecki, director of medical and research development at the Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa. Back in June 2010, and within two days of each other, the two scientists and their research teams published extensive analyses of the genetic origins of the Jewish people and their Near East ancestry.
“The closest genetic neighbors to most Jewish groups were the Palestinians, Israeli Bedouins, and Druze in addition to the Southern Europeans, including Cypriots,” as Ostrer and Skorecki wrote in a review of their findings that they co-authored in the journal Human Genetics in October 2012.
Ostrer’s team also identified two major groups of Jews: Middle Eastern Jews (Iranian and Iraqi) and European/Syrian Jews. The split between these two groups of Jews occurred some 2,500 years ago.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Thousands of Israelis Join Lawsuit Against Facebook Over Pages Inciting Violence
Thousands of Israeli Jews took legal action against Facebook in a New York court Monday, alleging it allowed jihadists to openly recruit and train terrorists and plan terror attacks on its pages.
Some 20,000 Israelis, organized by the Israel-based non-profit Shurat HaDin -The Israel Law Center — joined a civil lawsuit filed Monday in the Supreme Court for the State of New York, seeking an injunction against Facebook.
The law center wants to force Facebook not only to remove the terrorists’ pages, but also to better monitor and block users who post videos glorifying and encouraging terrorist attacks, and publish messages with instructions on how to carry out an attack.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
US Cutting Palestinian Aid, Says Official
The United States is cutting economic aid for the Palestinian Authority, partly because of “unhelpful actions” by the Palestinians, a US diplomat said on Saturday.
A specialised news site, al-Monitor, earlier said the US State Department intends to reduce aid for the West Bank and Gaza in fiscal 2016 from $370 million (335 million euros) to $290 million.
A US State Department official, travelling with Secretary of State John Kerry on a trip to Amman, confirmed there would be a cut…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
‘Anyone With AK-47’ Can Overmatch US Soldier in Fire Fight
Few countries on the planet could hope to dominate the US in tank, air or naval warfare but US soldiers would be easily outgunned in a fire fight, military analyst Jim Schatz wrote in his article for National Defense.
“Yet every bad actor with an AK-47 takes on US and NATO ground forces in a small arms fight. We are no longer suitably armed to prevent it,” he wrote. “The current US Army small arms development and acquisition system is dysfunctional and virtually unworkable, even for those within the system.”
The problem became visible after the Battle of Wanat in 2008 at Combat Outpost Kahler in Afghanistan. Nine soldiers of the 173rd Brigade Combat Team were killed and 27 others were injured. Their weapons, including M249 machine guns, Mk 19 grenade launchers and M4 carbines, stopped firing due to overheating.
The flaws of the M4 carbine have been well known to military analysts. For example, tests in 1990 and a report by US Special Operations Command in 2001 proved its numerous shortcomings. However, that was ignored by lawmakers as well as by military command.
Billions of dollars are spent to develop high-tech weapons that are never used in modern warfare while the issue of small arms has never been tackled, according to the author.
Small arms are the most deployed weapon systems in the arsenal of the US military, but the eight most numerous conventional weapons in the army were developed over 35 years ago, and have never been upgraded.
“While we have replaced uniforms, helmets, body armor, radios, rations and footwear countless times in three decades, the weapons and ammunition we use in 2015 are little more than variants of Vietnam-era technology possessing the antiquated capabilities of a bygone era,” the analyst wrote.
The Pentagon is still procuring thousands of ageing weapons which are totally outperformed not only by commercial small arms used by US allies as well as its foes, Schatz pointed out.
“While the current Army standard-issue M4 carbine has received a series of upgrades over time, not one of these improvements has made the weapon more effective where it really counts — in its effects on target and stand-off range beyond that of US enemies,” he wrote. “Yet, today we plan to procure tens of thousands of M4s with ‘new’ improvements — standard and proven features that existed in the HK416 when it was first fielded a decade ago.”
He also noted that in Afghanistan, US and coalition troops used 5.56×45 NATO weapons, and as a result were outperformed by enemy fighters employing 7.62×54 mm caliber weapons. The same caliber is used now by Islamic State (ISIL) fighters.
“The nation will be remiss if it does not exploit the many modern, often paradigm shifting technologies that are available today in the commercial and defense markets,” the analyst concluded.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Global Warming Could Make Hajj Impossible Later This Century
Is the Hajj pilgrimage destined to become a victim of global warming?
Parts of the Middle East, including the Gulf states and Muslim holy places around Mecca, could become uninhabitable even for the young and fit before the century is out, according to a new climate modelling study. The rituals of the Hajj, during which up to 2 million Muslims pray outdoors from dawn to dusk, would be impossible in summer.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Jihadists Demand Segregation at Yemen University
Radical Islamist gunmen have threatened to use force against university students in Yemen’s southern city of Aden if they do not observe segregation of the sexes on campus, witnesses said.
The warning came as a suicide bomber killed two pro-government fighters in a blast that targeted a checkpoint in the centre of Yemen’s second city, a security official said.
Students said armed militants distributed leaflets containing the threats and signed by the Islamic State group in at least three departments of the university of Aden.
The leaflets also banned music and demanded that students perform collective prayers on campus, they added…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Kurds Say Turkey Shot at Forces in Syria
No comment from Turkish officials
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — Turkish army units have opened fire on fighters from the main Kurdish force in northern Syria deployed across the border in a majority Arab town, the Kurdish force and an allied rebel said Monday.
There was no immediate comment from Turkish officials on the shooting, according to the Associated Press.
The U.S.-supported Kurdish militia known as the YPG said on its official Facebook page that Turkish military shot at its forces deployed in the town of Tal Abyad twice Sunday, using mostly machine guns. An allied rebel fighter from a contingent of Free Syrian Army fighters called Volcano of the Euphrates, Sharfan Darwish, said no one was injured in the shooting and the Kurdish forces didn’t return fire, AP said.
Kurdish fighters expelled Islamic State militants from the town in June, dealing a major blow to the extremist group’s abilities to access supply routes across the Turkish borders.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Off With His Head? Saudi Prince Arrested in Lebanon for Smuggling Cocaine
A Saudi prince was detained at the Beirut International Airport in Lebanon’s largest drug bust in history, a security source told Sputnik.
Prince Abdel Mohsen Bin Walid Bin Abdulaziz and four of his friends were detained by airport security on Monday, while trying to smuggle about two tons of Captagon pills and some cocaine.
The four other men are also Saudi citizens, identified as Bandar Bin Saleh al-Shirali, Yaahia Bin Shaim Bin Shumari, Ziyad Bin Samir al-Hakim and Mubarak Bin Ali al-Kharisi.
Captagon is the brand name for the amphetamine phenelhylline, a synthetic stimulant known for psychoactive and stimulant effects. The drug is fairly popular in the Middle East.
“The smuggling operation is the largest one that has been foiled through the Beirut International Airport,” AFP cited an anonymous Lebanese security source.
When detained, the five Saudis had the drugs neatly packed into cases, which were waiting to be put onto a private plane headed to Saudi Arabia, according to information given to Sputnik.
It will be interesting to see what will happen to the prince now. It’s a well-known fact that Saudi Arabia has very strict rules when it comes to the possession of drugs. Under the Gulf Kingdom’s interpretation of Sharia law, this type of crime is punishable by death through beheading with a sword.
The Kingdom has already beheaded more than 130 people this year for the crimes such as the possession of drugs, drug trafficking, murder, armed robbery, rape and apostasy.
Members of the Saudi royal family have had problems with the authorities of other countries in the past.
Last month, another Saudi prince was arrested in Los Angeles accused of taking cocaine, sexually assaulting a maid, threatening to kill women who refused his sexual advances and having sex with his male aide.
Back in 2013, a Saudi princess enslaved a woman from Kenya making her a housemaid, but criminal charges against the princess were eventually dropped.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Riyadh Slams Corbyn Amid ‘Alarming’ Rise in British Anti-Saudi Sentiment
Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the UK has risked being accused of hypocrisy after calling on UK opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn to show some “respect” following an “alarming” change in the way Riyadh is being talked about in Britain.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz attacked Corbyn after the Labour leader urged the UK government to scrap a US$9 million bid to service Saudi Arabia’s prison system, citing the country’s human rights concerns. Prince Mohammed wrote:
“One example of mutual respect being breached recently took place when opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn claimed that he had convinced Prime Minister David Cameron to cancel a prison consultancy contract with Saudi Arabia worth £5.9 million.”
“This coincided with several media attacks on Saudi Arabia that linked the contract’s cancellation to a number of domestic events in the Kingdom.”
While no official reason has been given for the UK pulling out of the contract bid, it’s widely thought that the decision was linked to a Corbyn-backed campaign protesting against the beheading and crucifixion sentence handed out to a government protester who was a juvenile at the time of his arrest.
Anti-Saudi Sentiment ‘Alarming’
Concerned by anti-Saudi sentiment in wider society, Prince Mohammed said there had been “an alarming change in the way Saudi Arabia is discussed in Britain”.
He hit back at criticism from those questioning the UK’s alliance with the kingdom, saying that Saudi Arabia had a vital role to play in helping to secure British and Middle Eastern security, warning that continued attacks on the government’s practices could put the relationship in jeopardy.
“If the extensive trade links between the two countries are going to be subordinate to certain political ideologies this vital commercial exchange is going to be at risk. We want this relationship to continue but we will not be lectured to by anyone.”
‘Respect’ Hypocrisy
The ambassador has also risked being accused of hypocrisy for suggesting Jeremy Corbyn and Britons in general should show more “respect” for Saudi cultural customs.
“Just as we respect the local traditions, customs, laws and religion of Britain, we expect Britain to grant us this same respect.”
A number of humanitarian organizations and civil rights groups have long condemned the actions of the Saudi government, accusing Riyadh of operating a highly repressive regime that doesn’t respect the human rights of its citizens.
Riyadh has been accused of not allowing any public criticism of the government, while violently cracking down on those that commit crimes, with sentences such as public lashings, beheadings and crucifixions used as a punishment.
Following the UK government’s decision to back out of a recent bid to service the Saudi prison system — which many believe was made on the back of widespread public criticism — it has been suggested that officials in Saudi Arabia are concerned that London may be pressured to scrap more trade deals with the kingdom, based on human rights concerns.
It’s thought that the Saudi ambassador’s open letter to the British media could be part of a PR attempt to win back some public support for Saudi Arabia in Britain by emphasizing the strategic importance of the countries’ bilateral relations, given the huge public backlash in the UK.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Russia Hits Record 94 Targets in Syria in 24 Hours: Military
Russian jets struck 94 “terrorist” targets in war-torn Syria over the past 24 hours, the highest one-day tally since Moscow started its bombing campaign on September 30, the military said.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Saudi Relationship With UK ‘At Risk’, Warns Ambassador
An “alarming change” in Britain’s attitude towards Saudi Arabia could lead to “serious repercussions”, the Saudi ambassador has warned.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz highlighted the UK’s cancellation of a deal to train Saudi prison staff.
He said Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn had “breached mutual respect” by claiming to have been instrumental in the move.
Prince Mohammed said Saudi Arabia would “not be lectured to by anyone”.
Saudi Arabia has long been accused of human rights abuses, and has come under pressure from the UK over its treatment of both expats and Saudi nationals who have fallen foul of the country’s Islamic laws.
There have been recent tensions between the two countries over 74-year-old expat Karl Andree, jailed in Saudi Arabia after being caught with homemade wine and thought at one point to be facing 360 lashes.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Syria: Aleppo Church Hit by Grenade During Mass
Bishop vicar, ‘massacre risked’
(ANSAmed) — VATICAN CITY, OCTOBER 26 — A mortar shell last night hit the Latin church of Aleppo dedicated to Saint Francis, in the Aziziyeh district, while mass was being celebrated in the building. The grenade, coming from areas held by anti-Assad rebels, hit the roof, tearing its dome, but did not penetrate inside the church, exploding outside and injuring seven people, Fides reports. Bishop Georges Abou Khazen, the apostolic vicar of Aleppo, said that “if the grenade had exploded inside, there would have been a massacre”.
“It was around 10 before six in the evening, there were about 400 people in church and the time had come for communion”, he told Fides. “If the grenade had exploded inside — added the Franciscan bishop — there would have been a massacre. Instead, only seven worshippers were injured, not in a serious way, when rubble fell down and the roof was damaged. We thank the Lord and the Virgin Mary. And our worshippers too, who immediately rushed from their homes to check the damage to the parish church and clean up inside so that today already morning mass was celebrated”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Terrifying Life Under ISIS: Sickening Dossier of Daily Beheadings, Amputations and Torture
THE HORRIFYING reality of life under ISIS was laid bare today as a sickening dossier of daily punishments and terrifying rulings was revealed.
Beheadings, hand amputations and public floggings have become daily occurrences according to the dossier written by sources inside one of Iraq’s ISIS dominated cities.
Hundreds of victims have been executed, whippings for minor offences are given out and 88 alleged thieves have had a hand chopped off in the space of a single month in the Iraqi city of Mosul.
Death sentences were carried out for alleged crimes including apostasy, blasphemy, spying, “fornication” and “mockery of the Caliphate”.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
The World Needs to Know About Yemen’s War. But Journalists Are Being Silenced
One Friday in Old Sana’a, while filming the aftermath of the Saudi-led coalition bombings, I found myself surrounded by a group of militia who were trying to take hold of my camera. I was detained for a few hours in the ruins, confused and unnerved. The interrogation I received from the Houthis was relentless. But the problems didn’t stop here. For a week, I was harassed with regular phone calls and visits from National Security officials at my hotel. All this despite having a press visa issued in London.
Incidents such as these are increasingly common since the rebel Houthi militia took over Sana’a in late September last year. Local journalists have either fled to their villages or left the country. Some have been threatened and assaulted, while others’ homes have been ransacked, their families living in constant fear. There are only a handful of foreign journalists in the country and they keep a low profile.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Exit Polls in Ukraine Local Elections Show East-West Split
In the south and east, voters favored the Opposition Bloc
(ANSA-AP) — KIEV — Four exit polls from Ukraine’s local elections released Monday indicated the governing coalition would retain its dominant position in the west and center of the country despite widespread disappointment with the government of President Petro Poroshenko. In the south and east, voters favored the Opposition Bloc, formed from the remnants of the party of the former pro-Russia president, who was overthrown in early 2014 after months of street protests. The Central Election Committee said it had received data from only 30 percent of the vote by Monday morning, reflecting the challenge of calculating the results of elections for more than 10,700 local councils as well as mayors. More than 130 parties fielded candidates.
Complete results were expected Nov. 4. Sunday’s elections were held nationwide, except for parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of eastern Ukraine controlled by Russia-backed rebels.
In eastern areas recaptured by government forces, former separatists ran for office as candidates from the Opposition Bloc.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
May Police Force be With You — ‘Chewbacca’ Arrested in Ukraine Polls
A man dressed as Star Wars character Chewbacca was detained and fined for disobeying police during local polls in Ukraine on Sunday.
The Wookiee warrior — an activist from a marginal political party — was apprehended by police in the southwestern city of Odessa after refusing to present his ID as he posed alongside children near a polling station, a local court said.
Video footage from the arrest showed a growling Chewbacca resisting four law enforcement officers, who were forced to pin him down on the hood of a van to handcuff him.
A local court handed Chewbacca a 170-hryvnia fine ($7.40) for disobeying police orders…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Bangladesh: Dhaka: Four Suspects in Caesar Tavella Murder Arrested: Motivated by Money
A police raid this morning led to the capture of three alleged perpetrators and the owner of the motorcycle used by the killers. The killer, known as Boro Bhai (Big Brother), is still being hunted. According to police, the men acted for money, paid by organizations that want to destabilize the government.
Dhaka (AsiaNews) — Dhaka police arrested four men in a dawn raid, suspected of killing Italian volunteer Cesare Tavella a month ago. Muntasirul Islam, Dhaka Metropolitan Police commissioner (DMP)told press those arrested are Tanzim Ahmed Rubel, Sakhawat Hossain Sharif, Russell Chowdhury and Minhazul Islam Russell. Three of them are the alleged perpetrators of the crime, while the fourth is the owner of the motorcycle used by the assailants. The vehicle was found and confiscated by police.
Cesare Tavella, 51, was shot to death on September 27th while jogging in the street 90, Gulshan 2 area of the capital, and was pronounced dead the next day at the United Hospital. He collaborated with the Cooperation ICCO, a Dutch development NGO.
Asaduzzaman Mia, held commissioner Dmp a press conference this morning in the Dmp Media Center. According to the investigators, the killers were acting for remuneration: “Someone who wants to destabilize the government ordered the murder, through a man called ‘Boro Bhai’, Big Brother, who contracted these four men to kill the foreigner”. On October 3, Hoshi Kunio, a 66 years old Japanese citizen was shot in Rangpur. Boro Bhai is currently wanted by the police.
“When the killers asked Boro Bhai if he had any enmity with the foreigner [Tavella- ed] — the commissioner added — he said no, saying that the motive of the killing was the desire to put pressure on the government.”
Both murders were immediately claimed by the Islamic State. In a press conference on 5 October, however, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina rejected any possible link with the caliphate, ensuring that there are no cells in Bangladesh. According to Hasina, the murders were the work of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami (Islamic political organization).
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
India’s Fuel Embargo Affecting Nepali Christians and the Poor as Well
More than half of Nepal’s Christians cannot go to church. Priests and pastors invite the faithful to pray, read the Gospel and engage in missionary outreach in their own neighbourhoods. Fuel shortages make travel hard for poor catechumens. Kathmandu and Beijing are set to sign an agreement today for regular fuel supplies through Nepal’s northern border.
Kathmandu (AsiaNews) — The unofficial embargo on exports to Nepal, which India imposed on Nepal following the promulgation of its new constitution, is affecting not only Nepalis’ daily life, but that of the Christian community as well.
Some Nepali Catholic priests and Christian pastors spoke to AsiaNews about how fuel shortages are preventing the faithful from coming to church to pray and limiting missionary work among the country’s poor.
As they wait for a political solution to the issue, caused by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s hegemonic ambitions, the country’s religious leaders urged their co-religionists to organise prayers and religious services at the local level.
More than a month since the start of the blockade, things in Nepal are getting worse. In recent weeks, gas and fuel supplies from India dropped by 90 per cent. This will negatively impact the country’s growth prospects, already affected by last April’s earthquake.
Basic necessities are in short supply; the transportation system has been disrupted; and schools are closed. The hardships of everyday life are badly affecting relations between communities. Taking part in the country’s most important Hindu festivals is getting harder.
“The Christian community is also facing difficulties,” Rev Nabin Pradhan, pastor at the Church Gyanershor in the capital, told AsiaNews. “The number of visitors is down by 50 per cent and it is not easy to travel. For this reason, the faithful are organising prayer groups in their neighbourhoods.”
For his, Father Ignatius, parish priest at Kathmandu’s Cathedral of the Assumption, said, “We have asked Catholics to continue to recite the daily prayers, read the Gospel and work in favour of the neediest by gathering in groups or with their families.”
By and large, “We are not worried about the Catholic community or the Christian population,” he added. Christians “have skills and ideas to deal with fuel or food shortages. But nearly half of those who visit the churches are catechumens from the poorer classes. They are badly affected by the embargo.”
“Every year, hundreds of non-believers visit Nepal’s churches because they want to convert,” said Rev CB Gahatraj, general secretary of the National Christian Federation. “These people want to learn about the culture and life of the Christian community before their baptism. But in the current situation, they can be disappointed. We have just run out of fuel for our normal religious activities and missionary work.”
Rakes Jenu, a missionary brother who runs a Catholic mission for the poor, cannot get to his workplace. “I really hope the government will solve the problem very soon.”
A Nepali delegation is scheduled to meet Chinese officials today. For the past few weeks, Nepal vetted the possibility of asking for Chinese help. Beijing recently announced that it would send a thousand tonnes of fuel as immediate aid.
An agreement, which should be signed today, would include regular fuel supplies through Nepal’s northern border in replacement of existing supply lines through the southern border with India.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: Jakarta Proposes Chemical Castration for Paedophiles
A bill will be presented at the behest of President Joko Widodo, who calls it “a turning point”. Along with two other measures, it aims to reduce child abuse, a growing problem. Some human rights object that curtailing “sexual desire is against human rights.” By some estimates, 58 per cent of children are subject to violence in Indonesia.
Jakarta (AsiaNews) — Indonesian public opinion is divided over a proposal to apply chemical castration on pedophiles.
Last week, Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa made the suggestion as the best deterrent against sexual abuse of minors, an increasingly widespread social scourge.
After a meeting with the president, the minister said that “Joko Widodo also agrees with the idea. Castration reduces sexual desire and ensures that potential rapists can control themselves.”
The proposal, he added, came at a closed-door meeting between President Widodo and his cabinet, in which he insisted that special provisions had to be taken to protect children from sexual abuse.
The ministers made three suggestions. The first one is pre-marital sex education for couples, centred on morality and proper child education. The second entails ethics courses for couples to cut down on the number of divorce cases, which that can lead to children being abandoned. The third option is chemical castration, through the injection of oestrogen. All the ministers agreed on the third option.
President Widodo described the idea as “a turning point,” adding that the government will soon prepare a law on the matter. The idea is backed by the attorney general and the governor of Jakarta.
However, not everyone agrees with the proposal. The National Women’s Commission (Komnas Perempuan) is against the resolution. For its president, Masruchah, “denying someone’s sexual desire is against human rights”.
According to Arist Merdeka Sirait, president of the Indonesian Children Protection Commission (Komisi Perlindungan Anak Indonesia, KPAI), as many as 21 million children are potentially at risk of sexual abuse. “At least 58 per cent have already been the target of violence.”
Sirait cited four cases of abuse that occurred last month in Kediri, East Java. “In total, up to 29 children were sexually abused by adults.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
More Than 250 Dead as Magnitude-7.5 Earthquake Shakes Afghanistan, Pakistan and India
More than 250 people were killed Monday after a magnitude-7.5 earthquake hit Afghanistan, rattling the country and sending tremors through neighboring Pakistan and India. Officials called it the strongest earthquake to strike Afghanistan in decades.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sri Lanka: Activists Demand Legalization of Prostitution and Protection for Women
Women abandoned by their husbands are forced into prostitution to support children. Leading activist: “Everyone criticizes us and exploits us, but nobody helps us.” According to new norm against vagrancy, the police can arrest the women alone at bus stops. “But the police are the first ones to use our services.”
Colombo (AsiaNews) — Leading activists are urging President Maithripala Sirisena to legalize prostitution, so as to ensure common rights for all workers and protection for those who decide to enter the profession. B. Maheswari (see photo), co-chair of the Center for Sex Workers’ Rights (CSWR), told AsiaNews: “Those who criticize women who choose to prostitute themselves do not look beyond the surface, to the reason that pushed them to do this. They are often forced to it by their family status. But we are all human and we must enjoy the same rights. “
The activist group reports that prostitution is illegal in the country, but is widespread on the streets and in private homes. “There are many women working in the sex trade — she says — Many argue that the market depends on the high demand, but they overlook the fact that women are often forced into prostitution “.
Maheswari is a victim of this condition: “I’m in this situation because of my husband. If he had not abandoned me and my children, I would never have chosen this work. But now I have to feed my children and send them to school. People who criticize us, don’t do anything to help us put food on the table. The police and government do nothing to improve our situation. They all exploit us and criticize us, but nobody helps us”.
The status of women is exacerbated by the fact that the police can stop them on the streets and then hold them for one and a half months in prison and force them to pay a fine of 100 Sri Lankan rupees [about 0.60 euro — ed] . The co-chairman of CSWR however reveals to AsiaNews: “What nobody knows is that the police come to us the day before they arrest us and pay us for our services. But then come back the next day and take us to jail. “
When arrested, the prostitutes are wracked by worry for their children, who remain alone. “While we are locked up in prison, there is no one to take care of them. This is why we are pleading with the President to legalize our profession”.
Senaka Perera, CSWR lawyer, reports that according to norm against vagrancy, police can stop any woman found near the bus [hangout for prostitutes], but the same does not happen with men. The lawyer also states that “most of the workers do not choose the profession voluntarily and the attitude of the police is really inhuman.” The lawyer concludes, “we have no intention of promoting prostitution, but only protecting workers. Their rights are the same as those of all human beings. “
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
China Indicates Readiness to Join US-Led Pacific Trade Pact
An influential Communist Party newspaper has said China should join the US-led regional trade pact. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was signed earlier this month.
The 12-member TPP began as the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement with Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, and Singapore as founders in 2005. From 2008 Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, the United States, and Vietnam became involved aiming to make a broader agreement.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Chinese Smuggling Endangers Rare Philippine Turtles
Chinese demand for forest turtles is threatening an endangered species found only on one Philippine island, wildlife officials said Sunday.
The Philippine Forest Turtle, found only in the western island of Palawan, is one of numerous freshwater turtles being taken by poachers for sale to China, said Adelina Villena, chief of staff at the Palawan Council for Sustainable Development.
“They sell them mainly to the Chinese exotic food and medicine trade and the pet trade. They are smuggled out of the country, some are even traded on the high seas,” she told AFP.
The reptile, also known as the Palawan forest turtle, is listed as “critically endangered,” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and is found in forests and streams…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
US Navy to Send Warship Near Disputed Islands Claimed by China
The U.S. Navy plans to send a ship to within 12 nautical miles of disputed islands in the South China Sea, a U.S. official confirmed to Fox News — in an apparent challenge to Beijing’s territorial claims.
Reuters first reported that the Navy planned within 24 hours to send a destroyer near the Spratly Islands, an archipelago that China aggressively has laid claim to by building airstrips and other features on top of reefs.
Reuters reported that the ship probably would be joined by a surveillance plane.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ethiopian Airlines Targets Asia With New Chinese Crew
Africa’s flourishing Ethiopian Airlines is clear — the future lies in Asia and it plans to hit that point home by putting Chinese crew members on all flights to China as of next month.
“Asia and particularly China is our focus. This is our biggest market,” CEO Tewolde Gebremariam told AFP.
The Addis Ababa-based company already has flights to Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Guangzhou.
Now the airline is training Chinese crews for its China-bound flights, because “90 percent of passengers flying to China don’t speak English”…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Why South Africa’s Born-Free Generation is Not Happy
A new black consciousness movement is emerging in South Africa 21 years after its first democratic elections — most recently seen in nationwide student protests. The BBC’s Alastair Leithead considers if this marks the end of the idea of the “rainbow nation”.
The trendy bars and clubs of Braamfontein in downtown Johannesburg are not the melting pots of race and culture you might have expected. Most places are all white or all black.
Mr Mandela is dead, a new black consciousness is alive and well. And it is angry.
“South Africa is a cappuccino society,” Panashe Chigumadzi said as we sat in a cafe in what was once a whites-only neighbourhood of Johannesburg. “A vast, huge, black majority at the bottom with a layer of white cream and a few chocolate sprinklings at the top of it,” she says, referring to the small black elite who have gained great riches from the post-apartheid years — from a failed attempt to rebalance the wealth among the many.
And, with their vast and conspicuous wealth, the finger is also firmly being pointed at white South Africans.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Opposition Candidate Macri Leads in Argentinian Presidential Election
According to the preliminary results of the Argentinian presidential election opposition presidential candidate and the Head of Government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires Mauricio Macri leads the presidential race.
MONTEVIDEO (Sputnik) — Opposition presidential candidate and the Head of Government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires Mauricio Macri leads the presidential race, according to the preliminary results of the Argentinian presidential election revealed on Monday.
With 67,13 percent of the vote counted, Macri gathered support of 36.24 percent of voters. At the same time, progovernment candidate and the governor of Buenos Aires Province Daniel Scioli got 34,7 percent and opposition candidate Sergio Massa got 21.1 percent.
A presidential candidate must gain support of at least 45 percent of votes to win the elections in the first round. The preliminary results show that no one reached this result and a run-off election should be held.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
The Conquistadors Were Sickly, Not Beastly — Spanish Press
An article published in the Spanish newspaper ABC sheds light on some of the myths surrounding Spain’s conquest of the New World.
The widely-held belief that the actions of Spanish conquistadors during their conquest of the New World led to the decimation of the indigenous population is a consequence of attempts to blacken the reputation of Spain and Spaniards, and is an exaggeration of the truth, Spanish journalist Cesar Cervera wrote on Wednesday.
“The anachronistic term ‘genocide of American Indians’ is one of the cornerstones of the ‘Black Legend’ disseminated by enemies of the Spanish Empire to undermine its prestige,” writes Cervera in the article, published in the Spanish newspaper ABC.
“Among the lies, inflated figures and fictional events, the myth that the Spaniards committed planned massacres lives to this day. The truth of this historic debate shows that though the Spaniards did not stint on cruelty in the implementation of its goals, the true genocide was caused by disease, imported by Europeans.”
Cervera does not dispute the demographic catastrophe which befell the New World after it was discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492; however, he does dispute the population of the Americas prior to the conquest, which was traditionally thought to have numbered between 40 and 100 million people.
According to a study carried out by Venezuelan researcher Angel Rosenblat, the population was no more than 13 million people, and concentrated in large groups residing in the Aztec and Inca empires, within the territory of today’s Mexico and Peru.
Even the common cold was fatal for many Native Americans, writes Cervera, let alone various epidemics. Smallpox wiped out almost the whole population of Santo Domingo in 1518-1519 after it was brought there by conquistadors led by Hernan Cortes, who then took the disease to Guatemala, where it killed half the population.
“The arrival of Francisco Pizarro in Peru dealt the last blow to the Inca Empire, which was [left] in a state of collapse due to disease. The smallpox epidemic was followed by an epidemic of measles [1530-31], typhus [1546] and flu [1558]. Diphtheria, mumps, syphilis, and pneumonic plague also hit the population hard.”
According to research conducted by UCLA Geography Professor Jared Diamond, illness, rather than military conquest, led to the death of 95 percent of the population who lived in the Americas before 1492.
The ‘Black Legend’ about the Spanish conquistadors was propagated by Dutch, English and French Huguenot writers wishing to undermine the prestige of the Spanish monarchy, which was the absolute ruler of the Americas for almost a century, writes Cervera.
The historians used the writings of friar Bartolome de Las Casas, who accompanied Columbus on his travels to the New World, and wanted to communicate what he saw as the contradictions between the aim of evangelizing the Indians, and the means used: of war, conquest, slavery, and mistreatment.
“The fact that the conquistadors were Spanish, was not the main factor,” rather, the misguided means of spreading Christianity was de Las Casas’ main target, says Cervera, who ended by quoting historian Joseph Perez, author of a book entitled, ‘Black Legend.’
“European colonization of the XIX-XX centuries led to crimes analogous to those carried out by the Spanish conquistadors. The only difference is that for the Europeans there is no Las Casas, to tell everyone about the injustices.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Venezuelan Prosecutor Fired After Calling Politician’s Case a ‘Farce’
A Venezuelan prosecutor who called the conviction and imprisonment of a leading opposition leader a “farce” has been fired, the country’s attorney general said Monday.
Franklin Nieves said in a video statement he had fled the country with his family rather than submit to government pressure to fight an appeal by Leopoldo Lopez, the jailed opposition leader.
Attorney General Luisa Ortega, in her first public comment since the video first surfaced at the weekend, said Nieves has been fired for “abandonment of his post.”…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Afghan Refugee Minister: Afghans Should be Treated on Par With Syrians
Despite media reports claiming Germany wants more Afghan migrants to return to their homeland, Afghanistan’s refugee minister tells DW why the EU country should accept more, instead of fewer, Afghan asylum seekers.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Afghan People Smuggler Talks Frankly
It is hard to know who is winning in Afghanistan.
People here wonder which is the greater gamble — continuing to live in Afghanistan or risking death on the journey out.
In the current climate one group is doing good business: people smugglers. The BBC gained rare access to one — we will call him Abdul (not his real name).
Abdul said a trip out of Afghanistan into Iran, Turkey and ultimately Europe costs between $5,000 and $7,000 (£3,250 to £4,550).
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Aid Groups Try to Force France to Act Over Calais
Aid groups who believe France lacks the will and desire to solve the refugee crisis in Calais have taken the unprecedented step of taking the government to court to force them to act. The head of an NGO tells The Local why they can no longer wait.
France’s Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve paid his seventh visit to Calais recently and once again promised measures to help improve conditions for the thousands of migrants camped out in the mud in the “New Jungle”.
The minister’s visit came as aid groups confirmed migrant numbers in the slum-like camp had doubled to 6,000, most of whom hope to make it to the UK.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Airbus Calls on Germany to Open Labour Market to Refugees
Germany should deregulate its labour market and create more lower-paid jobs to help refugees integrate better, the head of Europe’s largest aerospace group Airbus said Sunday. Tom Enders, in a commentary for Sueddeutsche newspaper, argued that Germany should make exceptions for the minimum wage and offer short-term contracts.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Britain Next? Doctor’s Outrage at ‘Refugees Pushing German Hospitals to Breaking Point’
A DOCTOR working in German hospitals has revealed the horrifying chaos which could face the NHS if thousands of migrants from the Middle East manage to reach Britain.
The female anaesthetist said the German health service has been completely overwhelmed by the influx of Muslim asylum-seekers who are REFUSING to be treated by female medics.
In a furious outburst the experienced doctor said hospitals simply cannot cope because so many of the migrants require treatments for diseases long since eradicated in Europe.
She also shockingly claimed migrant parents are abandoning their children at pharmacies across the country after being told that they have to pay a prescription charge for lifesaving drugs.
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
Direct Experience: The One Benefit of Accepting Muslim Migrants
A silver lining exists in the dust cloud being beat up by the marching feet of millions of Muslim men migrating into the West: those many Europeans and Americans, who could never understand Islam in theory, will now have the opportunity to understand it through direct and personal experience.
Perhaps then they will awaken to reality?
The fact is, most Western people have had very little personal interaction with Muslims. Moreover, because Muslims in the West are still a tiny minority—in the U.S., they are reportedly less than one percent of the population—those few Muslims that Westerners do interact with are often on their best behavior, being surrounded as they are by a sea of infidels (according to the doctrine of taqiyya).
[Comment: Sweden’s general public has had a lot of first hand experience. This hasn’t helped them. Nothing will change as long as traitors run the nations.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Economic Migrants Use Children as ‘Human Shields’: Czech Leader
The Czech president Sunday accused economic migrants of using children as “human shields” in their bid to reach Europe, as the continent grapples with its biggest migration crisis since World War II.
President Milos Zeman has made several fiery broadsides against migrants, earning sharp criticism from the UN’s human rights chief, who this week also accused Prague of systematically detaining migrants in degrading conditions to put off others.
In his latest outburst, to the Blesk tabloid, Zeman accused wealthy economic migrants of cynically exploiting children to reach the European Union…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Germany’s intelligence agencies have expressed serious concerns over the huge influx of migrants harbouring extremist views, it has been reported.
A security document has warned of the damaging consequences of Berlin’s open-door policy which is expected to see around one million refugees enter the country this year alone.
It read: ‘We are importing Islamic extremism, Arab anti-Semitism, national and ethnic conflicts of other peoples as well as a different societal and legal understanding.’
Security sources also fear the integration of migrants ‘is no longer possible’ because so many already live in isolated communities.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Gohmert: Heritage’s Demint, Former Speaker Gingrich Pressured Conservative to Back Ryan
by Diana West
In this interview, Rep. Louie Gohmert explains that some conservatives were persuaded to support Paul Ryan for Speaker after phone calls with GOP Bigfeet Gingrich and Demint.
It sounds like two-dimensional thriller-stuff, but I guess that’s how it’s done.
As Gohmert notes, it is Demint’s role that is most shocking. That is, here we see a leader of a flagship conservative think tank pressuring conservatives to abandon conservative principles to support pro-amnesty Ryan.
Why the surrender on core conservative issues — issues, I am assuming, Heritage itself has advanced and defended? Is this more donor-mania? To be sure, the process is perverted.
The conservative House members on the other end of the telephone line, of course, didn’t have to be persuaded. But (sigh) precious few take their conservative principles as seriously as Louie Gohmert…
| — Hat tip: Diana West | [Return to headlines] |
Greece Readies Rent Assistance Scheme as Migrant Numbers Grow, Rules Out ‘Concentration Camps’
Greece’s government on Monday said it is preparing a rent-assistance program to help the growing number of migrants in the country who are faced with the oncoming winter and mounting resistance against their arrival elsewhere in Europe.
Olga Gerovasili, a government spokeswoman, said the scheme could cover up to 20,000 migrants and serve as an alternative to a European Union proposal to house them in camps. She said Athens had rejected that proposal Sunday at a meeting of European countries affected by the crisis, insisting that “there will be no concentration camps in our country.”
Greece’s financial crisis has hammered its once booming real estate market with house prices falling about 40 percent in five years, according to industry estimates, and with a sharp rise in the number of vacant or underused apartments.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Guinean Migrant Drowns as Rickety Boat Capsizes Trying to Reach Ceuta
A Guinean migrant drowned on Monday after high winds capsized the rickety boat he was in trying to reach Spain’s north African territory Ceuta.
Some 1,600 migrants have been rescued off the shores of Ceuta since the start of the year, according to the Red Cross. Ceuta and Melilla, two Spanish territories on the northern Moroccan coastline, are seen by would-be migrants from north and west Africa as a potential way to reach Europe.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Hundreds of Refugees Disappear in Germany
Around 700 of the 4,000 refugees who have been housed in Lower Saxony over the past week have gone missing and authorities mostly have no idea who or where they are.
Lower Saxony has been instructed by the federal government to supply 4,000 beds for refugees arriving in Germany. But it seems that many are reluctant to stay in the rural province.
Local authorities believe the missing refugees travel on to stay with relatives in Germany or abroad.
But, because many of the refugees have not even been registered by local authorities yet, nothing is known about who they are or where they could have gone.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: EU Can Host Hundreds of Thousands of Refugees Says Gentiloni
Condition is that union adopts common policy
(ANSA) — Rome, October 26 — Italian Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni said Monday that the European Union was perfectly capable of receiving hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers if the member States do more to share the burden. “There is a crisis, but I think that Europe, which has a population of hundreds of millions, can accept hundreds of thousands of migrants,” he told Bloomberg TV. “But the condition is that the EU has a common policy and does not leave the burden to the border countries. It’s incredible that up to now we did not have a European policy on migration”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: ‘Human Lives More Important Than Borders’ Says Boldrini
War refugees deserve protection says House speaker
(ANSA) — Milan, October 26 — Protecting human lives is more important than defending borders, House Speaker Laura Boldrini said Monday.
“Protecting our border cannot be held above protecting those fleeing war and human rights violations,” she told the Institute for International Policy Studies (ISPI) think tank in Milan in regards to the current refugee crisis.
“Border protection cannot come before the protection of human beings,” she said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Merkel Upbeat on Integration Despite Tensions
Chancellor Angela Merkel has tried to reassure Germans that the country can integrate the many refugees putting local authorities under pressure.
“There are very, very many, but there are 80 million of us,” she told residents of Nuremberg, Bavaria. “We can and will manage this integration.”
She urged Germans to get to know the newcomers “as much as possible”.
In Freiberg, eastern Germany, several hundred demonstrators tried to block buses carrying migrants late on Sunday.
Germany expects at least 800,000 asylum seekers this year — some estimates put it as high as 1.5 million. That is at least four times the number who arrived last year.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Merkel Admits: Refugee Policy ‘Far From Perfect’
Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted on Monday that Germany and Europe’s policy towards the large numbers of refugees arriving in 2015 has been “anything but perfect” — but insisted that the country could rise to the challenge.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Migrant Hordes Overwhelm Slovenia, As Prime Minister Warns Crisis Will be the End of the EU
The tiny nation of Slovenia has received 60,000 Middle Eastern and North African migrants in the past week. Thousands remain stranded near the Austrian border, as the prime minister warned the crisis could be “the end of the [European Union] EU.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Migrant Crisis Intensifies in Balkans as EU Wrangles on Solution
The influx of migrants threatening to overwhelm the tiny Balkan nations on the European Union’s southeastern edge has intensified, the United Nations refugee agency said Monday after the trading bloc’s members clashed over how to manage the crisis.
As many as 49,000 migrants entered the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia last week, lifting the number since the start of the year to 300,000, Mirjana Milenkovski of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said on Monday. The daily average number of people entering Serbia increased last week to 7,000 from 5,000 a week earlier, she said. Slovenia’s police said 76,300 people had crossed the nation’s borders since Oct. 17.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘Racist’ Europe Does Not Want Turks Walking Around Their Streets: Chomsky
The current polarization in Turkey may have been triggered by the European Union’s obstacles in the accession process, leading Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to choose more authoritarian paths, prominent U.S. activist and linguist Noam Chomsky has told daily Hürriyet in an interview.
There has been striking change in the last couple of years. During the 1990s, the government was involved in massive atrocities in the southeast. It was a horrible period. In the early years of this century, there was an improvement. I visited a number of times. Until about 2005, things were significantly improving and there were signs that there might be very positive developments in Turkey, which has real opportunities to be an East-West bridge. … But then it started reversing, becoming more authoritarian within Turkey and more repressive on the Kurdish problem. Right now, the Turkish government is acting in ways which I think are extremely damaging to the people of Turkey, to the hopes of Turkish freedom and democracy and to the Kurds in their rightful struggle for basic rights and beyond. And that is international, not just inside Turkey. Turkey’s role in Syria has been extremely harmful.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Refugees Refuse Beds at Swedish Holiday Park
More than 30 asylum seekers refused to get off a bus that took them to temporary accommodation at a holiday park on Sunday night because they didn’t want to stay in such a rural location, Sweden’s Migration Board has told The Local.
Two buses packed with refugees arrived at the park in Lima in west Sweden on Sunday, but around 30 passengers initially refused to disembark.
Charlotte Jacobsson, a press spokesperson for Sweden’s Migration Board (Migrationsverket) confirmed to The Local that a number of the asylum seekers had felt uncomfortable being surrounded by so much forest.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spanish Police Free Moroccan Migrants Held for Ransom
Spanish police said Saturday they had freed two Moroccan migrants who were kidnapped as soon as they entered Spain illegally by ferry and who were being beaten and held for ransom.
Thousands of migrants tried to reach Spain from Morocco each year. Many try to smuggle themselves across the border to Ceuta and Melilla, two tiny Spanish territories that border Morocco, hidden in cars while others cross the Mediterranean in flimsy boats or hidden on ferries.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden to House Migrants in Lapland Ski Resort While Citizens Suffer Under Housing Shortage
Migrants traveling to the welfare haven of Sweden are to be housed in a Lapland ski resort while Swedish citizens themselves continue to labor under the burden of a housing shortage.
The Swedish migration board has struck a deal with Lapland Resorts, the owner of Riksgränsen, to house 600 migrants in the world’s most northerly ski resort.
“As everyone knows, there is a refugee crisis in the world. Now asylum seekers are arriving in Sweden and the Migration Board has a major urgent need to find temporary housing to accommodate all those who need help. We at Lapland Resorts AB are very pleased to be able to help,” Sven Kuldkepp, CEO of Lapland Resorts, told Swedish newspaper Norrbottenskuriren.
The Hotel Riksgränsen offers spa treatments, massages, a swimming pool, a bubble bath and a sauna as well as “spectacular” mountain views from its bedrooms…
Sweden is often cited as an example of what happens when extreme liberalism runs rampant.
Earlier this month, a lesbian Bishop in Stockholm proposed removing crosses from a Christian church and replacing them with Islamic symbols in order to cater for Muslims.
Some politicians have even called for giving free housing, jobs and welfare to returning ISIS jihadists — all at taxpayer expense.
Sweden is also a country that hires ISIS-sympathizers to run its immigration boards. The country’s taxpayer-funded “expert” on Islamophobia, Michael Nikolai Skråmo, also went on to join ISIS.
[Comment: Check out the photos.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Container Village Migrants Oiling Thailand’s Economy
The village sprang up in a matter of days — neat lines of bright yellow houses that looked like something a child might have built with Lego bricks.
This eye-catching complex on the outskirts of Bangkok is unlikely to win any architectural awards.
But for the hundreds of migrants who live there it is an unusually neat home in a country where poorly paid foreign workers all too often toil in harsh conditions.
The village is made out of refurbished shipping containers, stacked three blocks high and connected by a series of walkways and ladders…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
He shocked Britain when he swung from a flag on the Cenotaph as part of a demonstration against student tuition fees, and last night Charlie Gilmour, the adopted son of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, was back on the barricades.
Gilmour, 25, who was handed a 16-month jail sentence for his part in the 2010 student demonstration, was at St Pancras station in North London when around 150 protesters supporting refugee rights armed with smoke and paint bombs clashed with police as they tried to storm the Eurostar platforms.
Following the furore Gilmour posted a boastful message on Twitter which read: ‘Beautiful scene at the St Pancras protest. Anarchists attacked by police responded by nicking their hats and vanishing into the mist.’
Today police confirmed two people, a man and a woman, were arrested after the pro-refugee protesters clashed with police last night.
But on this occasion, Gilmour was not actively taking part in the protest. ‘I was at the King’s Cross protest as a freelance journalist and observer,’ he told The Mail on Sunday.
‘I was researching a piece about refugee solidarity in Britain.’
[Comment: Mob of useful idiots.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Church Synod Reaches Stalemate on Love, Sex and Marriage
Catholic bishops on Saturday wrapped up a divisive synod by approving a compromise report reflecting a stalemate in the battle between the Church’s conservative and liberal wings over its approach to sex, love and marriage.
Catholic bishops on Saturday wrapped up a divisive synod by approving a compromise report reflecting a stalemate in the battle between the Church’s conservative and liberal wings over its approach to sex, love and marriage.
The document, which Pope Francis is free to ignore or implement as he sees fit, fudges the key issue of whether divorced and remarried believers should be allowed to play a full role in the Church…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
‘The View’ Co-Hosts: Ben Carson ‘Pathetic, ‘ ‘Despicable’ on Abortion
Monday on ABC’s “The View” while discussing Republican candidate Dr. Ben Carson coming out against abortion including in cases of rape and incest this weekend on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” two of the show’s co-host called Carson “despicable” and “pathetic.”
Co-host Michelle Collins said, “Despicable,” as Joy Behar chimed in, “What can you say to that? You know, it’s pathetic.”
Whoopi Goldberg said, “Do you know, sir, no disrespect, truly no disrespect, but it’s not your call. You don’t decide. You don’t decide for anybody’s family here what they are going through and what they need.”
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
The Truth About the School System
Prior to the late 1800’s, education was a private practice which took place in private institutions or through home schooling. That all changed in 1902 when John D. Rockefeller created the general education board in conjunction with Frederick T. Gates, Rockefeller’s business and personal adviser and good friend. The general education board was responsible for funding the American public school system, and provided over one hundred million dollars in 1902; they continued their support in a lesser capacity beyond that date. The board was responsible for the creation of the American public school system and has been used as a model globally for more than a century.
“I want a nation of workers, not thinkers.” — John D. Rockefeller
Let’s think about this for a minute. Not long after the day we are born we are enrolled into a school, spending the majority of our days there for approximately thirteen years, eight hours a day. We are told how the world functions according to the curriculum guidelines set forth by the government, which teachers are supposed to follow. We do this so we can earn a piece of paper in order to move on to ‘higher education’ to get another piece of paper that qualifies us for some type of job.
Modern day education does indeed have its benefits, but many seem to believe that the negatives far outweigh the positives. Sure, we are indeed learning, but we are not (as the video below emphasizes) necessarily taught how to question the world around us or the very material we’re being taught. Furthermore, the world is changing at a rapid pace and new information is constantly emerging in all subject areas. Despite this fact, children are left learning the same, decades old material that they’ve been taught for years, and questioning certain ‘facts’ or information is not always welcomed.
Are we indoctrinating our children? What are our children really learning in school, and how valuable is it?
| — Hat tip: Nick | [Return to headlines] |
Ample Crude Supples Until Mid-2016: IEA Chief
The head of the International Energy Agency said Monday that ample supplies of oil in the world market would extend into the middle of next year, while investment is expected to decline further because of persistently low prices.
However, IEA executive director Fatih Birol said risks from seething geopolitical tensions in the oil-rich Middle East that could provide support to prices remain.
Oil investment is already down 20 percent worldwide this year and another drop is likely in 2016, Birol told an energy conference in Singapore — marking the first time since the mid-90s that spending has fallen for two straight years…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Processed Meats Do Cause Cancer — WHO
Processed meats — such as bacon, sausages and ham — do cause cancer, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Its report said 50g of processed meat a day — less than two slices of bacon — increased the chance of developing colorectal cancer by 18%.
The WHO did stress that meat also had health benefits.
Cancer Research UK said this was a reason to cut down rather than give up red and processed meats.
And added that an occasional bacon sandwich would do little harm.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Latest from the dumbiest country on earth.
One Finger to Allah:
Swedish state TV airs children’s program
glorifying notorious ISIS gesture.
https://youtu.be/E8bJ2f4Tiv0