A huge explosion destroyed a building in the English city of Leicester, collapsing a structure that included a convenience store and residences. Early indications are that the cause of the explosion was a gas leak. Local police in Leicester do not believe the incident was terror-related.
In other news, police in Spain and the UK have made a series of arrests of members of an international criminal gang who allegedly used voodoo rites to coerce young women into prostitution.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Insubria, JD, Reader from Chicago, 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.
“Deeply Misguided” New York Times Writer Calls for Financial Firms to Block Gun Sales
Even in today’s world replete with plutocrat public relations masquerading as journalism, it’s rare to encounter an article simultaneously pandering, authoritarian, childish and dumb. Nevertheless, I found one, and it was unsurprisingly published in The New York Times.
The title of the piece more or less says it all, How Banks Could Control Gun Sales if Washington Won’t, but let’s go ahead and examine some of the author’s suggestions in greater detail.
For instance:…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
“Shocked and Outraged”: Four Broward Deputies Waited Outside School as Children Were Massacred
Coral Springs police officers were “stunned and upset” to learn that four Broward County Sheriff’s Deputies were stationed outside the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and had not entered to face an active shooter, sources with the Coral Springs, FL police department told CNN.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
At Least 17 Democratic Socialists of America Runningfor Office in Texas in 2018
Texas is in real trouble politically. The giant red state has been targeted by the left and they are dumping millions into the state to turn it blue forever. There are at least 17 Democratic Socialists of America candidates running for office in the state now. They look like just ordinary people… but these are socialists. They are communist-lite. They are Marxists and they are a stone cold threat to our way of life and our freedoms in this nation.
As the Texas Observer put it, the revolution will be down-ballot. First up is Franklin Bynum’s campaign for Harris County misdemeanor court judge. He’ s a 35 year-old former public defender and says he’s seen Houston’s criminal courts routinely railroad the poor into convictions that drive them further into poverty. Now, after nearly 10 years subject to the whims of conservative judges, he’s aiming to take the gavel for himself. I guarantee you that he will do what all liberal activist judges do… he’ ll set criminals free to go back to what they were doing before. This has nothing to do with the poor. One of the primary goals of communists such as Van Jones is to empty our prisons regardless of the consequences.
[Comment: DSA should be banned for sedition and its leaders tossed in jail or booted out to North Korea. In no way does this communist front group intend to abide by the constitution.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
CNN Anchors Get Caught in Web of Lies… Proven Wrong by Their Own CNN Footage
REMEMBER WHEN ALISYN WAS ON FOX? Alisyn Camarota had to drink one big glass of Kool Aid to switch over to CNN. Yikes! In the short video clip below, she refuses to admit to NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch that she stood back while students called pro-gun people “child killers”.
Does anyone else out there see the iron in the students calling gun rights people “Child Killers” when babies are killed every day by planned parenthood?
HERE’S ANOTHER FAKE NEWS PIECE FROM CNN:
Watch what Trump says and then watch what Jeffrey Toobin of CNN says. This is why CNN is our enemy, they are a bunch of lying left wing propagandists.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
CNN Totally Ignores Texas Students Who Said Armed Teachers Make Them “Feel Protected” [Video]
CNN shows a report about a Texas school in which students say they “feel protected” knowing the teachers are armed. The school is another rural school just like the ones in Missouri where the teachers are armed. It’s just common sense to have armed teachers when it would take too long for the police to come quickly for an emergency.
After the piece on the Texas school, the CNN host and guest never talked about the fact that students would feel safe with armed teachers. They talked about policy and tiptoed around other topics. The “Guardian Program” is common sense but the left just can’t see it. Rural places must have this! Texas has allowed 170 schools to have armed teachers…these clueless liberals only see policy, policy, policy.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
CNN’s Van Jones Says Armed Teachers Are More Likely to Use Guns Against Black and Latino Kids
Bizarre remark from pundit in response to Trump comments on concealed carry.
[Comment: !*@# commie. They “Never let a crisis go to waste” and never miss an opportunity to fan racial divide. The 3 piece suit has become the most dangerous disguise for commies.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Commie Van Jones: To Young People, ‘The NRA is Like the KKK’
Jones said the NRA’ s role in the debate over gun policy has been destructive overall, arguing that lawmakers are afraid to take steps to solve gun violence because the group may criticize them. Jones admitted, however, that he does not know what steps the government could take to make any progress. “ We haven’ t had the kind of innovation, experimentation, trying of things — I don’ t know of any of the things being proposed would make any difference at all yet,” Jones said. “ But we should know more than we know right now. We should have been able to try things and we haven’ t been able to.” Oh, yes you have… every progressive move has made it worse. We need common sense, not more liberal solutions.
“ You have a whole generation of young people who essentially see the NRA as their enemy,” Jones said. “ To them the NRA is like the KKK; it’ s just some hostile force that is against them, that’ s risking their lives. These kids, they’ re not fighting for their future — they’ re fighting for their right to survive, to have a future,” he said. “ They do not see the NRA as a friend in that fight.” And they see the NRA that way because leftists have brainwashed them into seeing them as the enemy. That certainly includes Van Jones.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Communist Indoctrination by Democrats
Since the November 8th election of Donald Trump, the exposing of the communist roots of the Democrat Party has grown exponentially. The absolute hatred for anything and anyone conservative has become accepted behavior by left wing media and virtually every elected Democrat.
Some refuse to believe that the Democrats have gone full blown communist but look at Bernie Sanders. He is an Independent but caucuses with the Democrats. He’s a full-blown socialist. He wants free college, free healthcare, 90% tax and total gun control. New York City’s mayor, DeBlasio, is an admitted communist. He even has come against private property: It shouldn’t come as surprise that New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, who campaigned on fighting income inequality and wants to tax the rich to pay for public transit improvements, has a fairly dim view of private property rights. But “dim” is apparently a bit of an understatement. De Blasio flat out does not believe in the right to private property.
That’s highlighted in its starkest terms in a New York piece out this week. Here is de Blasio’s response when asked about efforts to fight income inequality:…
Some will call me a conspiracy nut but look up the communist manifesto and see how many of them are in place in America today. All of them have been implemented by Democrats. If you still doubt me Norman Thomas of the Socialist Party of America ran for president six times stated in a speech on November 20, 1944: “The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But, under the name of ‘Liberalism’, they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”
He went on to say: “I no longer need to run as a Presidential Candidate for the Socialist Party. The Democrat Party has adopted our platform.”[3] To make the matters worse, he was a Presbyterian minister! How does a so-called minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ embrace communism? The only way that can happen is to be totally ignorant of the Word of God.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
FBI Wants $300 Million to Prevent Election Meddling — Can’t Even Prevent Crime
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi want to explain to you, why the taxpayers should give the FBI another 300 million dollars. Is it to prevent terrorism…no. What about sexual predators, not at all. The alarming amount of insane people gunning people down in the streets, no, no, no…they apparently need the funds to keep The KGB out of your twitter feed.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hantler: George Soros Declares War on the State of Missouri
It wasn’t enough that, years ago, George Soros fanned the flamesof anti-police protests in Ferguson, Missouri. Now he’s back to his old antics: bankrolling a prosecutor to go after a popular, conservative Republican Governor, Eric Greitens.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
In Unexpected Snub, California Democrats Refuse to Endorse Feinstein for Reelection
In a stunning — if not altogether unexpected — blow to long-time California Senator Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, the California state Democratic Party opted not to endorse their own senior senator as she prepares to start campaigning to defend her seat in the 2018 midterms.
Delegates to the state party convention instead favored progressive state Senate leader Kevin de León, over Feinstein by a 54% to 37% margin, according to results, which were announced early Sunday. And while neither candidate reached the 60% threshold required to receive the party endorsement outright for 2018, de Leon’s camp claimed it as a profound victory.
[Comment: Likely Commmiecrats want someone even more rabidly communist.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
InfoWars Receives YouTube Termination Warning Over “Crisis Actor” Video
The InfoWars YouTube channel received a “first strike” warning over a video suggesting that the survivors of the Parkland school shooting were coached and given lines for interviews with various media outlets following the Valentines Day massacre which left 17 dead.
The video, uploaded to the InfoWars channel with over 2.2 million subscribers, was removed for a violation of YouTube’s “harassment and bullying” policy. It revolved around this clip of Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg, who appeared to be having trouble conveying his account of the shooting.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Conservative radio talk show host Mark Levin told CPAC attendees Saturday morning that conservatives need to stand with President Trump and “defend” the presidency against the left.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Marxist Democrats Part 4: Justin Snider for U.S. Congress, Texas’ 6th Congressional District
Several hundred communists and socialists will run for public office on the Democratic Party ticket this year. One of them is Justin Snider, who is vying for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, from Texas’ 6th Congressional District.
Despite running as a Democrat, Justin Snider is a member of this country’ s largest Marxist organization, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) — a fact not revealed in his campaign literature.
District 6 is based in North Texas and it includes most of Arlington, Mansfield and Ellis and Navarro counties. The seat has been held by retiring Republican Congressman Joe Barton since 1984. This open seat has attracted 5 Democratic primary candidates and more than a dozen Republicans. District 6 has been a safe Republican seat, but the fact that Justin Snider may draw the support of several hundred DSA members (and some Communist Party USA supporters) in the Dallas/Fort Worth area may make a difference. And if he manages to win the March 6 primary, Snider can expect money and support from 30,000 DSA comrades nationwide.
Almost all of Justin Snider’ s team, including campaign manager Kelly Miller, are DSA members or supporters…
Watch and circulate Trevor Loudon’s shocking documentary The Enemies Within as widely as you can before November 2018. It is a vote-changing experience.
[Comment: Communists are organizing to achieve their commie “utopia” — aka abolition of the 2nd amendment prior to the planned democide for non-communists in the USA]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Marxist Democrats Part 2: Rick Trevino for U.S. Congress, Texas’ 23rd Congressional District
Several hundred communists and socialists will run for public office on the Democratic Party ticket this year. One of them is San Antonio activist Rick Trevino, who is vying for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, from Texas’ 23rd Congressional District.
In 2017, he ran a strong, but unsuccessful race for San Antonio City Council from District 6.
A U.S. history and geography teacher at Sam Houston High School since 2012, Trevino has “ promoted a three-pronged platform to seek to raise salaries in the district to a ‘ living wage’ , empower neighborhoods and improve ethics at City Hall.”
[Comment: Another commie. DSA is getting organized…how much you wann bet Soros is funding DSA?]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
News Flash: Teachers Are Already Armed!
The conservative answer to liberal prohibition (oxymoron?) is to “arm and train the teachers.” While no one has come out and suggested mandating teachers carry firearms or be trained in using them, every suggestion seems to suggest “we” (i.e., the government) need to do the arming and training.
Here’s a little newsflash for both sides: the teachers are already armed.
No, not every teacher carries firearms and perhaps not as high a percentage of teachers do so as the percentage of the general population that carries. But there are over three million teachers in public schools and some percentage of them have concealed carry permits. It would be unlikely that there aren’t at least some members of every faculty in America that have a concealed carry permit.
It’s not a matter of arming teachers, but rather to cease disarming them when they report to work.
To the extent conservatives acknowledge this option at all, they seem trapped in the same box as liberals in feeling the need to point out there are teachers who are also retired military, in the reserves, or former law enforcement officers. That’s probably true. But there are also tens of millions of Americans, and likely tens of thousands of teachers, who both own firearms and never served in the military or police. An armed civilian population constitutes that “well-regulated militia” the 2nd Amendment refers to. What makes a militia a militia is the members not being part of the regular army.
Four Little Words I’ve often said the greatest danger to liberty is not a foreign army, terrorists, or even a homegrown tyrant. It is four little words. And they aren’t, “Up against the wall!” That comes later.
They are, “Something must be done.”
Instead of the government “doing something” about mass shootings, it should stop doing something. It should stop prohibiting teachers from carrying into school the same firearms they are licensed and trusted to carry in most other places. It is the path of least resistance to providing realistic protection for schoolchildren. It requires no one to do anything they aren’t already doing.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
NRA Gives FCC Chair Pai the ‘Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award’
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai was given the NRA’s ‘Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award’ at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Maryland Friday.
“Ajit Pai, as you probably already know, saved the Internet,” American Conservative Union (ACU) Executive Director Dan Schneider told the CPAC crowd when introducing Pai, as cited by The Hill. “As soon as President Trump came into office, President Trump asked Ajit Pai to liberate the Internet and give it back to you. Ajit Pai is the most courageous, heroic person that I know.”
Pai was initially scheduled to speak at the event but was instead presented with the award. The accolade, named after former NRA president Charlton Heston, is only awarded “when someone has stood up under pressure with grace and dignity and principled discipline,” said NRA board member Carolyn Meadows.
“Some people urged me to go for sacrifice bunts and singles and try to nibble around the edges — make some minor changes,” Pai said, as cited by Reuters. “But I don’t play small ball.”
The FCC voted in December to repeal the Obama-era net neutrality rules. The rules, which prevented Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from blocking websites, throttling traffic or charging for prioritization, are technically still in force until April 23, when certain subsidiary sections take effect, but an official date for full repeal has yet to be set.
Pai received huge backlash for his repeal of the agency’s net neutrality rules, including segments on several major late night talk shows which garnered millions of views. He fired back with his own troll video which was widely derided online.
[Comment: Pai did the right thing. Witness how the Communists are incensed that this law of free speech oppression will be repealed.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
NRA: Corporate Boycotts of NRA a ‘Shameful Display of Political and Civic Cowardice’
The NRA issued a statement pointing out that more companies are ready and willing to step in and partner with law-abiding gun owners.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
NRA’s Lapierre Warns Conservatives of ‘Socialist State’
National Rifle Association (NRA) CEO Wayne LaPierre on Thursday warned conservatives that socialists are smearing gun rights advocates and seeking to eliminate their rights.
“Socialism is a movement that loves a smear. Racists, misogynists, sexists, xenophobe and more. These are the weapons and vitriol these character assassinations permanently hang on their targets because socialism feeds off manipulated victims,” LaPierre told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).
LaPierre claimed “European socialists” are taking over the Democratic Party. He also named the “Occupy” movement, Black Lives Matter and antifa as examples of social groups that he claimed promote “uncivil discourse” and aim to “eliminate due process.”
“The elimination of due process is the very gold standard of the socialist state,” he said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Shock: CNN Expresses Pity for Florida School Mass Murder
American Mirror | In a shocking tweet, CNN is expressing pity and apparent sympathy for the man police say killed 17 students in Parkland, Florida.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Deadliest School Attack in the US Was Erased From History Because it Wasn’t Done With a Gun
As the media and the government continue to use the tragic shooting at a Parkland, Florida high school to push their various agendas, it is important to remember that psychopaths who want to kill a lot of people — will do so with or without a gun. In fact, the deadliest attack on a school to ever take place on US soil was done so without a single round being fired.
In Bath Township, Michigan, 44 people, mostly children, lost their lives when a man by the name of Andrew Kehoe blew the town’s school. This attack is often disregarded by history as it paints a different narrative outside of the normal problem, reaction, solution of grabbing guns. As a result, it has largely been erased from the narrative.
As Smithsonian.com reports, the local institute of learning was Bath Consolidated School, built only five years earlier to replace the scattered one-room schools of the surrounding farmland. It had 314 students from around the region, many the sons and daughters of farmers. Some students were bused in, and all took classes with their peers over the course of elementary and high school.
Kehoe, an electrition, had snapped and become angry after the town’s taxes levied on his farm had forced him into foreclosure.
“He was notified last June that the mortgage on his farm would be foreclosed, and that may have been the circumstance that started the clockwork of anarchy and madness in his brain,” claimed the New York Times. So, while he worked at the school as an electrician, he wired it with explosives. Luckily for half of the students in the school, the timer on one of Kehoe’s homemade explosives failed to go off so the tragedy could’ve been far worse. However, the catastrophe resulting from the 38 children and 6 adults who died was still utterly horrific.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tucker Carlson reminds us all of the utter and complete failure by every government entity involved in the Florida school shooting: “The government’s first duty is protecting its citizens…they failed.”
Any American who still believes they’ll be safe if they give up their guns, needs to rethink that after they listen to the video below. So many things slipped through the cracks or were ignored. Stay armed America!
Fox News reports:
Carlson said the Broward County Sheriff’s Office was notified more than a dozen times about Cruz, including one tip that he was threatening to “shoot up his school.”
While the shooting was going on, Sheriff’s Deputy Scot Peterson remained outside and “took a position.”
Carlson added that three other Broward deputies were in the vicinity of the school near their squad cars, only to later be discovered by responding officers from nearby Coral Springs.
Thirdly, Carlson said the FBI failed to act on tips about Cruz, including one that pointed to a YouTube comment written by a user with the same unique name spelling as Cruz, saying he wanted to be a “professional school shooter.”
“They didn’t even write the report on the tip,” he said.
In 2016, the Florida Department of Children and Families said Cruz was not a threat to himself or others despite various reports, Carlson said.
He said that if they had found him a threat, he would have been involuntarily committed to an institution.
“How was this guy able to buy a gun?” Carlson asked.
Carlson said the school system failed the community as well, reporting that a policy was instituted to cut down on in-school arrests, fearing racial bias.
He said that since the policy was enacted, 1,000 average annual arrests became less than 400.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tell the CRTC: No Censorship in Canada
Bell is desperate to censor Canada’s Internet. First they tried through NAFTA.1 Now they’re at it again through the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC),2 and they have some help.
A coalition of organizations — spearheaded by Bell — calling themselves “FairPlay Canada” is asking the CRTC to implement a website-blocking system to curb piracy.
This radical proposal will lead to legitimate content and speech being censored, violating our right to free expression and the principles of Net Neutrality, which the federal government has consistently pledged support for.3
They want to create an official Internet censorship committee within the federal government, which opens the door for overreaching censorship in Canada. We can’t let this happen.
Tell the CRTC that you do not want Canada to build an agency to block and censor our Internet.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
1 in 8 French Women Has Been Raped, Survey Reveals
A shocking new survey of French women has found that roughly 12 percent of them have been raped at least once in their lifetime. Some 43 percent of respondents also said they had been sexually touched without their consent.
The study, carried out by the Paris-based think tank, Fondation Jean Jaure’s, surveyed 2,167 women to assess the frequency of and attitudes towards sexual violence in the country. Alarmingly, it found more than half of participants (58 percent) have been subjected to disturbing propositions.
READ MORE: French man on trial for having sex with 11yo ‘not a predator’ because victim ‘not a child’ — lawyers
The study analysed various forms of sexual abuse, from pornographic messages sent via email or text, to cyber-harassment and gestures with sexual connotations. The report says it highlights “the complex, repetitive and cumulative nature of this type of violence among the women concerned”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Donald Trump Believes in Brexit: Farage Warns US President is Watching EU Exit
NIGEL Farage has called on Theresa May to give him a role in helping build relations with the US after he rekindled his friendship with Donald Trump.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Exorcist Requests Triple in Italy
Vatican lays on new courses to cope with demand
(ANSA) — Vatican City, February 22 — Requests for the services of exorcists have tripled in Italy recently and the Vatican is laying on fresh training courses for aspiring Devil-fighters to cope with the demand, a veteran exorcist told Vatican Radio Thursday.
There are now about half a million cases every year in Italy, Palermo priest Father Benigno Palilla said.
He said much of the reason was that “the number of people ready to go to magicians, witches, card and Tarot readers has greatly increased.
“By doing so they open the door to the Devil, And to possession”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
France Has Foiled Two Terror Attacks This Year
France has foiled two terror attacks so far this year, the country’s interior minister has said.
Gerard Collomb said that two attackers were arrested in January and one of them had been planning to hit a “major sporting facility”.
The other person, a 33-year-old man, had been targeting soldiers on anti-terrorism patrols.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
‘Hungary’s Prime Minister Declared a War on George Soros’ — Researcher
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has once again accused US billionaire George Soros of using his funds to buy influence in Brussels and the UN.
His accusation comes after the so called Stop Soros bill was submitted to the Hungarian Parliament.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Italians First! 50,000 Patriots Support Anti-Islamisation Candidate Matteo Salvini
Italy’s elections are in a week and campaigns in the country are running on full speed. The leader of Italy’s right-wing Lega party, Matteo Salvini, organised a successful rally in Milan yesterday.
At least 50,000 Italians were present at Milan’s Piazza del Duomo (Cathedral Square), Salvini said on Facebook. He thanked the people who came to support him and the thousands who were watching his live stream.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Election: Major EU Power in Peril Amid Risk of Violence Continuing After Election
ITALY may struggle to stop the spread of violence that has hits the country’s streets once the election is over, according to an expert who claims the “real issues” of division are not being discussed.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Italy-Born Device Turbodrives Internet
Makes communications ‘much more efficient’
(ANSA) — Rome, February 22 — An Italian-born device turbodrives the Internet, the journal Nature Phonics said Thursday. The device, from the TeCIP institute of Pisa’s Scuola Superiore di Santa’Anna and the Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversitario per le Telecomunicazioni (CNIT), is able to send complex signals on fibre-optic cables, making communications “much more efficient,” the journal said.
It said it was a revolution comparable to that which has happned in electronics thanks to ever smaller and more powerful chips, the journal report said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy’s Eurosceptic 5-Star Movement Holds Shock Lead in Opinion Polls With Only Week Left
ITALY’S eurosceptic 5-Star Movement is currently the leading party according to opinion polls, thanks — in large part — to disgruntled voters in its Southern towns — with only a week to go until the election.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Measles Cases in Europe Quadrupled in 2017
Measles cases soared in Europe last year, and at least 35 children died of the highly infectious disease, according to the World Health Organization.
The virus found its way into pockets of unvaccinated children all over the continent, from Romania to Britain. The number of recorded cases quadrupled, to 21,315 in 2017 from 5,273 in 2016, a record low.
The biggest outbreak last year was in Romania, where there were 5,562 cases and which accounted for most of the deaths. The country’s large rural Roma population — also known as Gypsies — often do not vaccinate their children and may not take them to hospitals promptly when they fall ill. The country also has an underfunded public health system.
The second biggest outbreak was in Italy, with 5,006 cases and three deaths; 88 percent of those cases were in people never vaccinated, and another 7 percent in people who had not had all the recommended doses, the European Center for Prevention and Disease Control said.
[Comment: The article gives partial blame to Protestant sects. Yeah, right.]
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Poland’s Ruling Conservatives Well Ahead in Ratings
If parliamentary elections were held this weekend, Poland’s ruling conservative Law and Justice party would win 47 percent of the vote, according to a survey.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Police Bust ‘Voodoo’ Migrant Sex Slave Ring Which Forced Women ‘To Eat Raw Chicken Hearts’
Police in Britain and Spain have made 12 arrests in an intercontinental prostitution ring where a criminal gang allegedly used “voodoo rituals” to force African women and girls into sex work.
Investigators believe the gang used voodoo rituals against women and girls to coerce them into sex slavery and to “break their will”, the Mirror reports.
As part of the rituals, the women were forced to eat raw chicken hearts and some had their fingernails and pubic hair pulled out, detectives said.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
UK: James Bulger’s Killer Jon Venables Plans to Marry
‘I’m ready to have Jon Venables’ baby’: James Bulger’s killer plans to marry fiancée who ‘knows about his crimes’ when he finishes latest prison term for child porn
Jon Venables is planning to marry and have children with with a woman who knows all about his horrific crimes when he leaves prison.
His bride-to-be is fully aware that he murdered two-year-old James Bulger and has even been showing off her engagement ring after he proposed last year.
When Venables was jailed for 40 months for downloading child porn in recent weeks, the fiancée still stood by him…
A source told The Sun Online: ‘Officials have made this woman fully aware of Venables’ horrific crimes yet this hasn’t stopped her wanting to be with him.
‘You have to question what kind of woman would choose to spend their life with a convicted child killer and paedophile.’
They added that while the couple are planning a happy life together, James had any chance of finding his soulmate snatched from him when he was killed.
Venables was forced to reveal his identity to his girlfriend when officials realised how serious the relationship was.
He told her how he and Robert Thompson murdered the two-year-old after abducting him in Liverpool in 1993.
Both were released on licence from a young offenders’ institution in 2001 when they turned 18.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Massive Explosion, Fire Rocks Leicester City Centre — Police Declare ‘Major Incident’
A major explosion followed by a huge fire has rocked Leicester City Center in the East Midlands, England.
[Comment: My sense is that this is not terrorism related.]
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
When is the Italian Election 2018? Key Dates, Italy General Election Process Explained
THE ITALIAN Election 2018 is just a week away and voters are preparing to head to the polls next Sunday as they elect the next government. Here are the key dates and times, and Italy’s general election process and voting system explained.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
“Don’t Dare Sit With us if You Want to Live”
“They get paid for every Coptic Christian girl they bring in. In some cases, police provide the kidnappers with drugs they seize. The drugs are then given to the girls to weaken their resistance… I even know of cases in which police offered helped to beat up the girls to make them recite the Islamic creed.” — World Watch Monitor, Egypt; September 14, 2017.
On September 14, a court sentenced a Christian man to death for “blasphemy” against the prophet of Islam. Nadeem James, a 27-year-old father of two, was originally arrested in July 2016, after a Muslim angry with him for personal reasons falsely accused James, who is illiterate, of texting a poem deemed “blasphemous” of Muhammad. — Pakistan.
School textbooks taught her that “it was the Christians who wanted to plunder the lands and the riches of the Muslim world” and Turks merely responded by “defend[ing] what was rightfully theirs.” (In reality, modern day Turkey consists of territory that was Christian for more than a thousand years before it was conquered by Turks in the name of jihad.) “Everything is used to make the Christians look like villains,” she said, adding, “It’s the same all through Muslim countries.” — Turkey.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
A Dangerous Neighbour? Europe Warned Over ‘Hiding’ Jihadis in Turkey Posing Deadly Threat
ISLAMIC State terrorists are hiding across Turkey after “easily” being able to smuggle their way across the border from Syria, it has been claimed.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
‘Get ISIS and Go Home’: Trump Bucks Pentagon & State Dept. On Ultimate US Goal in Syria
President Donald Trump appeared to dash the hopes of interventionists and contradict his own administration officials, by declaring that US troops’ mission in Syria is limited to defeating ISIS and doesn’t include regime change.
We’re there for one reason: to get ISIS and get rid of ISIS, and to go home,”Trump said on Friday, during a joint press conference with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull at the White House. “We’re not there for any other reason and we’ve largely accomplished our goal.”
While Trump did not hesitate to call the Syrian government “a humanitarian disgrace,” criticizing Russia and Iran for their involvement, his comments implied the US military also had no business in Syria beyond the ‘ultimate’ goal of defeating Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL)…
Trump’s position might be news to his Cabinet officials, however. US envoy to the UN, Nikki Haley, who has been an outspoken advocate of regime change in Syria, is currently championing a Security Council resolution proposing an emergency ceasefire in the area, following the militants’ claims of civilian casualties and atrocities uncritically echoed in Western media.
The resolution’s objective was to blame the Syrian government for the escalation of violence in order to, yet again, promote regime change, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a news conference in Serbia on Thursday. Lavrov added that the militants in Ghouta belong to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, an affiliate of Al-Qaeda and a terrorist group that is not covered by the ceasefire overseen by Russia, Iran and Turkey.
Last month, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson outlined defeating IS €’ and Al-Qaeda €’ as only one of the five goals the US was pursuing in Syria. The others? Curbing Iranian influence and eliminating weapons of mass destruction, ending the civil war and creating conditions for safe return of refugees, as well as ensuring a peaceful transfer to a “post-Assad leadership.”
In Tillerson’s vision, the majority of Syrian people will peacefully vote out President Bashar Assad in a free election. The Obama administration and its allies had repeatedly insisted that “Assad must go,” which the Trump administration has alternately agreed and disagreed with.
[Comment: This is why Deep State hates Trump. This goes against the Deep State which want regime “change”, just like they achieved in Iran. Where they put the most radical in charge of the country. Quickest way to throttle ISIS is to stop Deep State intel operations from supplying and supporting ISIS.]]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey Urges Czech Republic to Extradite Ex-Leader of Syrian Kurds — Deputy PM
Turkey has called on the Czech Republic to extradite former leader of Syria’s Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) Saleh Muslim after he was arrested in Prague, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag said on Sunday.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
China, The Vatican and a New World Order
In the first week of February this year, “the Vatican announced that Pope Francis plans to replace two Chinese bishops loyal to Rome with seven excommunicated men chosen by Beijing [ie. the Communist Chinese government]. Two of those seven men are alleged to have girlfriends and fathered children. Most importantly, all seven men put their loyalty to China’s communist government before their faith in God.
China has long demanded that the Vatican accept only Chinese government-appointed bishops and give them full authority to rule a Chinese diocese. But Francis’s predecessors in the Catholic Church have long believed, as Pope Benedict XVI said, ‘the authority of the Pope to appoint bishops is given to the church by its founder Jesus Christ. It is not the property of the Pope, neither can the Pope give it to others.’
Yet in Pope Francis the atheist Chinese Communist government found a willing partner eager to give in to their demands. Pope Francis seems to have no problem subordinating his authority to a repressive communist government.”
China’s President Xi Jinping is no friend to religious freedom. Since he came into power, he made it clear that religious groups, “must adhere to the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC), and support the socialist system and socialism with Chinese characteristics.” In other words, the Chinese government would tolerate any religion only if it puts the Chinese government before God… He demanded that they [CPCA members] act as “unyielding Marxist atheists, consolidate their faith, and bear in mind the Party’s tenets.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hong Kong: Rents for Sports Clubs: ‘The Government Helps the Rich’
Exclusive clubs save up to $ 400 million in Hong Kong and allow use only for members. In the territory there is no public housing and the rents of the houses are prohibitive for young people.
Hong Kong (AsiaNews) — At least 27 exclusive sports clubs have been receiving government-facilitated rentals for years, allowing them to pay almost 400 million Hong Kong dollars less (about 42 million euros). The complaint comes from an ecological organization, the Green Sense, which today presented the results of an investigation, published in the South China Morning Post. Roy Tam, the head of Green Sense, comments: “This is unjust because the government helps the rich”.
The group asks the government to force the opening of sports clubs to all the population, or to re-adjust the prices of facilitated rents. In some cases this rent is 3% of the market price.
Hong Kong has long suffered from lack of space for public housing and the prices of apartments are so high that it makes it almost impossible for young people to look for accommodation or get married and have a home.
The facilities given to sports clubs were launched in 1979 with the idea of providing recreation centers for the population. But almost all clubs are reserved for members only, with prohibitive registration fees for an ordinary resident in the territory.
The clubs defend themselves by saying that they open their facilities to groups for many hours a year, but Green Sense points out that the opening hours to the public are during working hours. “Spaces are rented at discounted prices in the name of the public interest, but they are not used for the public,” says Tam.
The government has promised that it will review the conventions to rebalance support for sport and at the same time safeguard its public use.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
British Couple ‘Feared Kidnapped by ISIS’ In South Africa
A British couple feared kidnapped by Islamic State extremists in South Africa had been filming with a BBC Gardeners’ World presenter shortly before they vanished.
Horticulturists Rodney Saunders, 73, and his wife, Rachel, 64, went missing two weeks ago.
Police have arrested a man and a woman who have links to Isis fanatics on suspicion of kidnapping and possibly killing the couple in the remote foothills of the Drakensberg mountains on February 12.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Austria’s Kurz Slams Merkel for Linking EU Funding to Migrant Quotas
Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has opposed German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s proposal to link European Union funding to migrant quotas, arguing for stronger borders instead of migrant redistribution.
The Austrian leader slammed Mrs Merkel, saying that while in principle he understands the conditions for European Union aid, “I would just ask, not only to constantly focus on refugees,” Die Welt reports.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
End of Merkel: This Mistake Could Finish Chancellor and Transform Germany
ANGELA Merkel could be about to pay the price for her “impulsive” decision to accept more than one million refugees into Germany, historian Niall Ferguson has said, warning the political backlash has “only just begun”.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
‘Italy Has Slipped Dangerously Backwards on Migrants’
Amnesty voices concern during 2017-2018 report presentation
ROME — Italy has regressed in a frightening manner on the issue of immigration, the director of the Italian branch of Amnesty International, Gianni Rufini, told ANSAmed.
He added that it is a country “where racism, xenophobia, and violent hatred of migrants is growing to an ever more concerning extent”, such as in the case of the Macerata shooting spree that targeted migrants. Rufini was speaking during the presentation of the organization’s 2017-2018 report in Rome. “We see that these attitudes of hatred and violence, across the entire political sphere, are poisoning our society,” he stressed. He added that “Italy has gone from being the country where its state forces save those drowning in the central Mediterranean and then start procedures for asylum or other forms of protection to being the country that pushes them back directly from the sea into Libyan concentration camps and that has prevented NGOs from continuing their rescue operations.” The steep drop in landings at the end of 2017 “is not helping Italy to develop a welcoming atmosphere. There continues to be yelling about a lack of security said to have been caused by migration (…). Italy is one of the safest countries in Europe today,” he said, “and yet citizens continue to think that there are dangers and a lack of security.”
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Migration a Key Priority in EU’s Next Long-Term Budget Says Italy
Migration must be a key priority in the European Union’s next long-term budget and needs to “become a fundamental part of the EU’s financial commitments,” Italy’s premier Paolo Gentiloni said in Brussels on Friday.
“On Italy’s part it should be underlined that besides longstanding policies that cannot be dropped, there are also new priorities, first and foremost migration,” Gentiloni said as he left an informal summit of EU leaders.
A priority for the bloc must be to make the issue of migration an integral part of the EU’s future financial commitments, Gentiloni said.
“It is very important to us that (EU president Donald) Tusk also underlined this — for which I thank him — and did so also in relation to Libya and the funds to be made available immediately,” Gentiloni said.
Friday’s summit on the EU’s spending priorities post-Brexit in the decade from 2020 and other issues had been “an initial exchange of views”, Gentiloni said.
Discussion on the EU’s next multi-year budget from 2021 onwards “will continue for a long time,” Gentiloni stated.
“I believe it is crucial that the impulse comes from Italy, France and Germany…to share…European leadership on the topic of migration, relations with Africa,” he said.
The three countries should also play a “key role this delicate transition phase for the EU,” Gentiloni concluded.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Leftist billionaire George Soros has been pouring big money into a Texas district attorney race as part of his effort to install extremist prosecutors across America who will protect lawless so-called sanctuary cities that obstruct the enforcement of federal immigration law.
We already knew that pressure groups funded by Soros are litigating to keep U.S. ports-of-entry wide open to terrorists and other people who hate America. And leftist propaganda shops like the Brennan Center for Justice, which has taken in about $23 million from Soros since 2000, have churned out reports arguing that state judicial systems need to be reshaped to more closely follow the Left’s agenda. Soros’s current target is Bexar County, Texas, District Attorney Nico LaHood
Soros is using his vast fortune in an attempt to radicalize local prosecutors’ offices in part because he wants to block U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from functioning. The self-styled philosopher wants to cripple law enforcement in order to advance the radical abstraction known as social justice that simplistically breaks the world down into race, class, and sex. Radicals claim that American laws and institutions are corrupt and that these systems protect, for example, wealthy, white, native-born, non-disabled males at the expense of everyone else. In this instance, U.S. immigration law is inherently unfair to illegal aliens, or so the reasoning goes.
Soros’s current target is Bexar County, Texas, District Attorney Nico LaHood, Peter Hasson reports in the Daily Caller. LaHood is a Democrat who oppose sanctuary cities and describes himself as “a conservative guy.”
Bexar County, which includes San Antonio, is the fourth most-populous county in Texas. Knocking off LaHood would be a significant step forward for the Soros agenda.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Gita Nabavi was elected as one of the leaders of Sweden’s Feminist Initiative party. Nabavi is a supporter of increased migration to Sweden and of zero deportations.
“Ideally, I would like to see that we have completely open borders and that no one is deported, we are working in that direction,” Nabavi told Swedish news outlet SVT Nyheter.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
An Afghan who threatened to commit a vehicular terror attack which targeted “white people” because he was frustrated waiting for his refugee status has been spared jail.
Ruzykhan Sayadi, 23, was sentenced to a community order for 18 months, rehabilitation activity for 20 days, and a curfew on Thursday, after being found guilty in late January of racially aggravated intentional harassment and causing alarm or distress, the Oxford Mail reports.
Oxford Crown Court heard that the Afghan had gone to the Citizens Advice Bureau to ask for help because of debt he had accrued when he told an advisor on August 21st, 2017, that he had grown frustrated with waiting to be granted asylum and made threats to commit a vehicular and/or knife attack akin to the Westminster and London Bridge terror attacks.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UN Refugee Agency Thanks Italy for €9m Contribution
The United Nations refugee agency UNHCR on Friday thanked the Italian government for its “substantial” donation of nine million euros of flexible funds this year, saying it showed Italy’s commitment to refugees and asylum-seekers worldwide.
“Italy has confirmed for the third consecutive year its substantial contribution of flexible funds to UNHCR and its major commitment to refugees, asylum-seekers and displaced people in the world,” the agency said.
“Over 65 million people in the world are forced to flee their homes. Without flexible funds, UNHCR would not be able to fully carry out its mandate,” the agency said.
UNHCR uses flexible funding above all to directly aid refugees and internally displaced people in crises areas, it said.
“This kind of donation, which is generously given without constraints, ensures us flexibility and allows UNHCR to plan its interventions strategically.”
In 2017, the Italian government contributed over 51 million dollars (41.5 million euros) to fund activities in 20 countries, of which ten million dollars (nine million euros) were flexible funds, UNHCR noted.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Parent Backlash as Cross-Dressing Men Sent Into Primary Schools to ‘Promote Tolerance’
Parents have hit out at a Bristol primary school’s decision to bring “drag queens” in to condition young children against “hate crime”.
Concerned families told the Bristol Post that Parson Street Primary School was going a “step too far” in inviting Drag Queen Story Time (DQST) to read books promoting alternative lifestyles to their children.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Massive Explosion, Fire Rocks Leicester City Centre — Police Declare ‘Major Incident’
”A major explosion followed by a huge fire has rocked Leicester City Center in the East Midlands, England.
[Comment: My sense is that this is not terrorism related.]”
Indeed, it is most probably not a conventional or homemade explosive per se. One less than endearing cultural habit brought here from the Indian subcontinent is the bypassing of gas (and electric) meters by means of unsafe amateur connections and this explosion shows many of the characteristics of a gas explosion which should afford the authorities an easy out when it comes to attribution – whatever the reality turns out to be.
Indeed, there was a massive explosion in NYC a few years back that killed several people, literally blew them to shreds, that was caused by “jury rigging” the gas pipe line.
In fact, an iconic deli that I have eaten at many times, the Carnegie, has been closed not to reopen for just this reason.
I don’t know about the UK but, this tendency to bypass the gas meter or the code regs is not dependent on ethnicity here in the states. It is purely financial.
The latest reports are that ,allegedly,the shop-keeper (Aram Kurd) has been arrested and there was an illegal distillery in the basement.
His shop assistant ,a Latvian married to a muslim ,was due in Court on charges re. illegal tobacco.
All this is par-for-the-course with middle-easterners and east-europeans around here involved with illegal tobacco and distilling.
In Russia, before March 8 (a holiday that has lost its political coloring, but became gendered – men give flowers and gifts and once a year they come to the kitchen stove), a massive advertisement of French perfume is on television. The half-dressed French women flutter against the backdrop of the Eiffel Tower and other Parisian species and “sell a beautiful dream.”
It is curious how long this deception of the consumer will continue?
Give us the kinds of real France! Burning tires, “no go” zones, women resembling ghosts. And the slogan-hadith “For me it’s better to be near a camel, smeared with tar, than to be near a woman, perfumed with spirits.”
My beloved favours Chanel No 5; I don’t recall ever sniffing a camel, but I know whch I prefer!
Soon, in the Muslim segment of social networks, mass hysteria will begin:
https://scontent-sea1-1.cdninstagram.com/t51.2885-15/e35/18444720_1832727257048589_3709158641866113024_n.jpg?ig_cache_key=MTUxNTgwNjMwNjY4MTIxMjAwNg%3D%3D.2&se=7
The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “Every eye can commit adultery. The woman who adorns herself with fragrances and passes by an assembly of men is as such,” meaning an adulteress.
And there will be a new “wondrous” world without Chanel No 5
Sad news: The Iraqi Ministry of Culture has cut funding to the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra. This orchestra kept playing through the worst and most dangerous times. There is a relatively recent YouTube video out there of the orchestra playing Mahler’s First Symphony. Regardless of your views on how major arts organisations should be funded (in the old days it was largely through royal and noble patronage), this is a sad development, as it silences in Iraq one of its most obvious civilizing influences.
I am just surprised that they have any culture left after their obsession with Islam.
Maybe George Soros or Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos will fund them. They have more money than God… Has anyone asked them to cough up a few bucks?
I, however, have become rather soured on gov’t funded “arts.”
Google “Sheep Hamlet” to see where American tax dollars are going. And that is the PG example of arts funding. It seems, here in the states, that gov’t funded “artists” have become rather fixated by menstral blood and trash.
Outstanding work by our Japanese friends to keep Japan great:
http://www.unz.com/isteve/japans-nonwhite-privilege-accepts-only-20-refugees-in-2017
Foolish Marxists in charge shocked that Mexifornians of totally different cultural and ethnic heritage have no intention of retaining them or their ilk in power:
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/02/25/california-democrats-feinstein-leon-423452
Let’s be honest here. Ms Feinstein is in her 80’s for God’s sake. This legislating into the grave has to stop. We will soon be handing out drool bibs for our senior members. Remember when they used to wheel Robert Byrd in to caste his vote?
Look on the bright side. Hopefully the CA Dems will run someone that wants confiscation of weapons, sanctuary cities and open borders…
I’m not sure who said it but “all the Dems need to do is not act crazy and they can’t even manage that.”
Babs-
Totally agree that DiFi is too old and out of touch. This is exactly why senators should be limited to three or four terms tops.
Dems won’t need to run a gun grabber to drive the remaining sane folks out, real estate prices are already taking care of that:
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-02-24/we-dont-belong-here-anymore-even-landlords-are-fleeing-bay-area