by Bob Walsh
I like guns. I own a fair number of them. More than I need but less than I want. I like Lugers (among others) and own three of them, all very common and relatively low on the expensive scale. There are a LOT of Luger variations. Some of which there is only one known in existence. Some of them are VERY valuable.
Back in about 1907 Luger made a half dozen Lugers for the U. S. Army in .45 ACP. They apparently made a few extra here and there after tooling up because serial number 22 is known to exist. There are a couple of them in private collections. Value is $1 million plus.
Enter Eugene Golubtsov, aka Lugerman. He has set up a CNC computerized production line to make brand new .45 ACP Lugers. For starters there will be three of them, a standard, a compact and a target variation. They will also be building a carbine version and one in 10MM. They are still in the process of tweaking the final design but there are samples out there, at least one of which has had over 7,000 rounds thru it.
Anyway if you would REALLY like one and have a spare $5,800 or so and live in a state where you can get them (i.e. not California) you may be able to have one. Check out Lugerman.com for further details.
By the way, this guy has been around for some time and does repair and restoration on Lugers and P-38 pistols so he is not a fly-by-night operation. Allegedly guns are currently available. Personally I would LOVE to have one in 10mm compact but since I have paid less money than that for cars I still own I am probably not going to get one, even if they could be sold in the People's Republic.
Sunday, December 31, 2017
THE NEIGHBOR FROM HELL
by Bob Walsh
A couple of days ago I dropped in to my locan Barnes & Nobel to get a couple more E-Books for my Nook. On my way towards the door I noticed a small hardback book with 20 significant SCOTUS decisions. It was only $8 and a couple of them I was totally unfamiliar with so I bought it. On my way to the register I noticfed a current (12-15-17) copy of Newsweek. Generally speaking I regard Newsweek as a hopeless, left-wing fish wrapper, but the cover story seemed to be about the Gun Culture in the U. S. I thought it might be amusing to see their take on it so I bought it, even after I found out it cost $9 for 48 pages printed on second-rate paper. However, that isn't the real story here.
There was a really interesting book review in it. So I guess this is a review of a review. The book is called HITLER, MY NEIGHBOR: MEMORIES FROM A JEWISH CHILDHOOD and was written by Edgar Feuchtwanger, now 93. While he was a young man, up until about the age of 14, he lived across the street from Adolph Hitler. He may be the only person still living who had any significant direct, personal contact with Hitler.
Young Edgar was a Jew. His family were prominent in the publishing world. His dad was shipped to Dachau but was later released. (That did happen but was rare. That train ride was usually one way.) When Edgar was 14, in 1939, he was sent to England to live.
The review draws some interesting (and expected) parallels between Hitler and Trump. It goes into the idea that NOBODY thought Hitler could get elected, until he did. Nobody thought Trump could get elected, until he did. Hitler was scary to a lot of people. Trump is scary to a lot of people (though many of those people are snowflakes, idiots and assholes).
At any event if you are interested in the history of that time and place it may very well be worth the read. Not many people said HELLO to the devil face to face on the street and are still around to tell the tale.
A couple of days ago I dropped in to my locan Barnes & Nobel to get a couple more E-Books for my Nook. On my way towards the door I noticed a small hardback book with 20 significant SCOTUS decisions. It was only $8 and a couple of them I was totally unfamiliar with so I bought it. On my way to the register I noticfed a current (12-15-17) copy of Newsweek. Generally speaking I regard Newsweek as a hopeless, left-wing fish wrapper, but the cover story seemed to be about the Gun Culture in the U. S. I thought it might be amusing to see their take on it so I bought it, even after I found out it cost $9 for 48 pages printed on second-rate paper. However, that isn't the real story here.
There was a really interesting book review in it. So I guess this is a review of a review. The book is called HITLER, MY NEIGHBOR: MEMORIES FROM A JEWISH CHILDHOOD and was written by Edgar Feuchtwanger, now 93. While he was a young man, up until about the age of 14, he lived across the street from Adolph Hitler. He may be the only person still living who had any significant direct, personal contact with Hitler.
Young Edgar was a Jew. His family were prominent in the publishing world. His dad was shipped to Dachau but was later released. (That did happen but was rare. That train ride was usually one way.) When Edgar was 14, in 1939, he was sent to England to live.
The review draws some interesting (and expected) parallels between Hitler and Trump. It goes into the idea that NOBODY thought Hitler could get elected, until he did. Nobody thought Trump could get elected, until he did. Hitler was scary to a lot of people. Trump is scary to a lot of people (though many of those people are snowflakes, idiots and assholes).
At any event if you are interested in the history of that time and place it may very well be worth the read. Not many people said HELLO to the devil face to face on the street and are still around to tell the tale.
CENTRAL AMERICAN MIGRANTS WALKING FROM SOUTHERN MEXICO HOPING TO REACH CANADA
The 'Trump of Oaxaca' cracks down on Central American migrants
By Levi Bridges
Public Radio International
December 27, 2017
The town of Chahuites, Oaxaca, is a sleepy little village surrounded by mango farms. A line of train tracks cuts through the southern edge of town.
Chahuites is in an isolated part of southern Oaxaca, about 170 miles north of the Guatemalan border. Migrants from Central America used to just pass through town riding on top of La Bestia, the train migrants traditionally traveled on across Mexico. But now immigration agents patrol the train, forcing migrants to walk northward along the railroad tracks.
“People wait by the railroad with machetes and guns to rob migrants,” said Juan Vicente, a migrant from El Salvador who works at a construction site in Chahuites, “then they steal whatever you got.”
It takes some migrants weeks of walking just to reach Chahuites. Migrants now spend more and more time in southern Mexico, in part because of an immigration enforcement strategy called the Southern Border Program. Mexico launched the program back in 2014 when thousands of Central American families and children fleeing danger back home arrived at the US-Mexico border. Washington called their arrival a “surge” and pressured Mexico to stop the flow of migrants. Mexico created the Southern Border Program in response, an initiative supported with millions of dollars in US funding, that sent more immigration agents to southern Mexico, increased surveillance of trains and built new highway checkpoints.
La Bestia, once loaded with migrants huddled on top of boxcars, is now largely empty when it passes through Chahuites.
In the years since the Southern Border Program began, the number of human rights abuses committed against migrants in southern Mexico has increased. Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission reported that incidents of Mexican authorities abusing migrants have increased by 40 percent since the immigration crackdown. The number of crimes against migrants has also increased. Since the Southern Border Program began three years ago, the number of migrants who reported incidents of robbery and violent assault in the state of Oaxaca more than doubled.
“I didn’t even have any money,” said Juan Vicente, the construction worker from El Salvador, “so they tore off my shoes and ripped them open with a machete to make sure I wasn’t hiding anything.”
Migrants in Mexico aren’t the only ones who face an increased level of violence: 2017 is currently on track to become the most violent year in Mexico since the country started recording homicide data 20 years ago. Dead bodies have started regularly showing up in Chahuites, a small farming town with fewer than 10,000 residents. Many people here blame the rise in violent crime on the recent arrival of Central American migrants.
Leobardo Ramos burst onto the political scene in Chahuites last year with an ambitious plan to solve crime. He ran for municipal president promising to clean up Chahuites by getting migrants out of town. His campaign promises earned Ramos a new title: They’ve taken to calling him the Donald Trump of Oaxaca.
Ramos won his election in a landslide, garnering more than 50 percent of the vote. The president of Chahuites has said in interviews that — unlike Trump — he has nothing against undocumented immigrants. Ramos says he wants to kick migrants out of town because voters asked him to and, as a public servant, he has to do what the electorate asks of him.
In response to the number of migrants who began arriving on foot in Chahuites after the Southern Border Program took effect, a new migrant shelter opened in town. After Ramos became municipal president this year, locals pressured him to fulfill a campaign promise to shut down the shelter. Across Mexico, residents who believe Central Americans bring crime to their communities have also tried to shut down migrant shelters in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico City, Tapachula and Tultitlán.
“Unfortunately, Mexico has a big problem with xenophobia and racism against migrants,” said Jessica Cárdenas, a former volunteer at the Chahuites shelter.
Ramos was instrumental in closing down the migrant shelter in Chahuites last summer. He negotiated with staff members to relocate the shelter outside of town.
Today, the old migrant shelter sits abandoned behind a tall black gate on a dirt road just a short walk from the railroad tracks. Immigration agents now patrol Chahuites and the local prosecutor’s office has demanded bribes from migrants who try to report crimes that occurred on the nearby railroad tracks. Before the new municipal president was elected, Cárdenas described Chahuites as a sort of sanctuary city for migrants; now the Oaxacan Trump has put an end to that.
Even after the shelter’s closure, many locals in Chahuites are on edge. People who live on the dirt road near the old migrant shelter say they’ve gotten ferocious guard dogs or put stronger locks on their doors to protect themselves from migrants. María López, one of the neighbors who rallied to close the shelter, says migrants are nothing but trouble.
“I was afraid just to go to the bathroom,” López said, pointing to a small shack with a toilet outside her small house. “What if one of them gets inside our house while I’m in the bathroom, kills my husband and robs us?”
Advocates in Mexico say part of this reluctance to accept migrants comes from a lack of understanding about the violence and economic instability that often forces Central Americans to leave home. López, for her part, said she doesn’t understand how migrants could just up and leave their families behind — she believes Central America just sends its worst people to Mexico.
And yet, López also has a son who went north and lives as an undocumented immigrant in Texas. López says her son in Houston isn’t a criminal — he’s different from the Central American migrants in Mexico.
“I tell my son to keep his nose clean, to stay away from drinking and drugs and not to be like the migrants who come to Mexico,” López said.
Cárdenas, the former volunteer at the Chahuites shelter, says it’s easy for locals to blame Mexico’s problems on foreigners. But she sees attitudes toward migrants in this small Mexican town as part of a global phenomenon where competition and fear make people afraid of outsiders, similar to the arrival of Syrian refugees in Germany or Mexican immigrants to the United States.
“What happens in Chahuites is a little example of what happens to migrants all over the world,” Cárdenas said. “Here people say they take away jobs, they’re rapists, they’re delinquents. That’s exactly what Donald Trump says about Mexicans in the United States.”
Despite the local clampdown in Chahuites, it appears that even the Oaxacan Trump can’t totally stop migration. On a recent afternoon down by the train tracks, six guys from Honduras huddled in the shade near an old rail station with peeling yellow paint to escape the midday heat.
The young men were all deported from the US, leaving family and kids there. Now they’re trying to make it back to Houston, Miami and Phoenix — the cities they were forced to leave. Although they spent a week walking to Chahuites, sleeping on the ground and begging for food, they say lots of folks in Mexico have actually treated them really well. Many have even offered them food and rides in their cars.
“People just say, ‘yeah sure,’ whenever I ask them for some beans or a piece of cheese,” said Alan Spencer, 21. “Mexicans are good people.”
Migrants who pass through Chahuites often arrive with an equal number of stories about the good Samaritans and the thieves they encountered on their journey. That’s because many communities in Mexico are just as divided on immigration as the United States is right now.
Several of the young men standing by the tracks in Chahuites said they’re done with Mexico and the United States.
“It’s a lot easier to get asylum in Canada,” Spencer said.
But Canada is still thousands of miles and two international border crossings away.
From here, they’ll keep walking.
By Levi Bridges
Public Radio International
December 27, 2017
The town of Chahuites, Oaxaca, is a sleepy little village surrounded by mango farms. A line of train tracks cuts through the southern edge of town.
Chahuites is in an isolated part of southern Oaxaca, about 170 miles north of the Guatemalan border. Migrants from Central America used to just pass through town riding on top of La Bestia, the train migrants traditionally traveled on across Mexico. But now immigration agents patrol the train, forcing migrants to walk northward along the railroad tracks.
“People wait by the railroad with machetes and guns to rob migrants,” said Juan Vicente, a migrant from El Salvador who works at a construction site in Chahuites, “then they steal whatever you got.”
It takes some migrants weeks of walking just to reach Chahuites. Migrants now spend more and more time in southern Mexico, in part because of an immigration enforcement strategy called the Southern Border Program. Mexico launched the program back in 2014 when thousands of Central American families and children fleeing danger back home arrived at the US-Mexico border. Washington called their arrival a “surge” and pressured Mexico to stop the flow of migrants. Mexico created the Southern Border Program in response, an initiative supported with millions of dollars in US funding, that sent more immigration agents to southern Mexico, increased surveillance of trains and built new highway checkpoints.
La Bestia, once loaded with migrants huddled on top of boxcars, is now largely empty when it passes through Chahuites.
In the years since the Southern Border Program began, the number of human rights abuses committed against migrants in southern Mexico has increased. Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission reported that incidents of Mexican authorities abusing migrants have increased by 40 percent since the immigration crackdown. The number of crimes against migrants has also increased. Since the Southern Border Program began three years ago, the number of migrants who reported incidents of robbery and violent assault in the state of Oaxaca more than doubled.
“I didn’t even have any money,” said Juan Vicente, the construction worker from El Salvador, “so they tore off my shoes and ripped them open with a machete to make sure I wasn’t hiding anything.”
Migrants in Mexico aren’t the only ones who face an increased level of violence: 2017 is currently on track to become the most violent year in Mexico since the country started recording homicide data 20 years ago. Dead bodies have started regularly showing up in Chahuites, a small farming town with fewer than 10,000 residents. Many people here blame the rise in violent crime on the recent arrival of Central American migrants.
Leobardo Ramos burst onto the political scene in Chahuites last year with an ambitious plan to solve crime. He ran for municipal president promising to clean up Chahuites by getting migrants out of town. His campaign promises earned Ramos a new title: They’ve taken to calling him the Donald Trump of Oaxaca.
Ramos won his election in a landslide, garnering more than 50 percent of the vote. The president of Chahuites has said in interviews that — unlike Trump — he has nothing against undocumented immigrants. Ramos says he wants to kick migrants out of town because voters asked him to and, as a public servant, he has to do what the electorate asks of him.
In response to the number of migrants who began arriving on foot in Chahuites after the Southern Border Program took effect, a new migrant shelter opened in town. After Ramos became municipal president this year, locals pressured him to fulfill a campaign promise to shut down the shelter. Across Mexico, residents who believe Central Americans bring crime to their communities have also tried to shut down migrant shelters in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico City, Tapachula and Tultitlán.
“Unfortunately, Mexico has a big problem with xenophobia and racism against migrants,” said Jessica Cárdenas, a former volunteer at the Chahuites shelter.
Ramos was instrumental in closing down the migrant shelter in Chahuites last summer. He negotiated with staff members to relocate the shelter outside of town.
Today, the old migrant shelter sits abandoned behind a tall black gate on a dirt road just a short walk from the railroad tracks. Immigration agents now patrol Chahuites and the local prosecutor’s office has demanded bribes from migrants who try to report crimes that occurred on the nearby railroad tracks. Before the new municipal president was elected, Cárdenas described Chahuites as a sort of sanctuary city for migrants; now the Oaxacan Trump has put an end to that.
Even after the shelter’s closure, many locals in Chahuites are on edge. People who live on the dirt road near the old migrant shelter say they’ve gotten ferocious guard dogs or put stronger locks on their doors to protect themselves from migrants. María López, one of the neighbors who rallied to close the shelter, says migrants are nothing but trouble.
“I was afraid just to go to the bathroom,” López said, pointing to a small shack with a toilet outside her small house. “What if one of them gets inside our house while I’m in the bathroom, kills my husband and robs us?”
Advocates in Mexico say part of this reluctance to accept migrants comes from a lack of understanding about the violence and economic instability that often forces Central Americans to leave home. López, for her part, said she doesn’t understand how migrants could just up and leave their families behind — she believes Central America just sends its worst people to Mexico.
And yet, López also has a son who went north and lives as an undocumented immigrant in Texas. López says her son in Houston isn’t a criminal — he’s different from the Central American migrants in Mexico.
“I tell my son to keep his nose clean, to stay away from drinking and drugs and not to be like the migrants who come to Mexico,” López said.
Cárdenas, the former volunteer at the Chahuites shelter, says it’s easy for locals to blame Mexico’s problems on foreigners. But she sees attitudes toward migrants in this small Mexican town as part of a global phenomenon where competition and fear make people afraid of outsiders, similar to the arrival of Syrian refugees in Germany or Mexican immigrants to the United States.
“What happens in Chahuites is a little example of what happens to migrants all over the world,” Cárdenas said. “Here people say they take away jobs, they’re rapists, they’re delinquents. That’s exactly what Donald Trump says about Mexicans in the United States.”
Despite the local clampdown in Chahuites, it appears that even the Oaxacan Trump can’t totally stop migration. On a recent afternoon down by the train tracks, six guys from Honduras huddled in the shade near an old rail station with peeling yellow paint to escape the midday heat.
The young men were all deported from the US, leaving family and kids there. Now they’re trying to make it back to Houston, Miami and Phoenix — the cities they were forced to leave. Although they spent a week walking to Chahuites, sleeping on the ground and begging for food, they say lots of folks in Mexico have actually treated them really well. Many have even offered them food and rides in their cars.
“People just say, ‘yeah sure,’ whenever I ask them for some beans or a piece of cheese,” said Alan Spencer, 21. “Mexicans are good people.”
Migrants who pass through Chahuites often arrive with an equal number of stories about the good Samaritans and the thieves they encountered on their journey. That’s because many communities in Mexico are just as divided on immigration as the United States is right now.
Several of the young men standing by the tracks in Chahuites said they’re done with Mexico and the United States.
“It’s a lot easier to get asylum in Canada,” Spencer said.
But Canada is still thousands of miles and two international border crossings away.
From here, they’ll keep walking.
ONLY HIS 6-YEAR OLD TWIN DAUGHTERS HAVE BEEN ALLOWED TO VISIT EL CHAPO
El Chapo’s attorney, who is not allowed any face-to-face visits with his client, files for a continuance needing additional time for trial prep
by Chivis Martinez
Borderland Beat
December 28, 2017
El Chapo shared a Christmas visit with his twin six year old twin daughters. His daughters were born in California in 2011, thereby are American citizens, as is their mother Emma Coronel Aispuro. The visit marks the fourth time Chapo has been allowed to see his twins.
Despite erroneous reports in the news, Emma did not visit Chapo on the 23rd with the twins, and has never been allowed a visit with her husband since extradited.
The Daily Mail, (U.K.Publication) ran the story of Emma visiting Chapo, and several media outlets republished their story. DM tells Borderland Beat, the story originated from Washington Post and they took the information from that story.
The judge presiding in Chapo’s case had placed severe restrictions on visits. Virtually none, except the twins and even his attorney Eduardo Balarezo has no contact and no private visits with his client.
On Christmas Eve Chapo’s attorney filed a request for continuance.
The filing stresses the encumbrance of reviewing discovery and the mountain of discovery, several hundreds of thousands pages, and hundreds of thousands of recordings. With the replacement of his defense with Balarezo, in effect the defense began preparation for trial on September 3rd of this year.
The reviewing of discovery would be a monumental task in the best of situations, however reviewing prosecution discovery, has been impeded by the restrictions of the legal team’s court ordered no contact visits. Add in the fact that Chapo’s reading skills and computer skills are very low.
Description below:
The room is approximately five feet by ten feet, divided in half by a cement wall and a mesh/Plexiglas window. On the attorney side of the room there is cement block measuring approximately two feet by two feet containing a metal drawer that slides into the inmate side of the visiting room. The drawer is meant to facilitate the passing of documents back and forth and was installed because the Court rejected contact visits with Mr. Guzmán.
The government/MCC also set up a computer screen on the attorney side for Mr. Guzmán to connect his government issued laptop to the monitor so as to allow both sides to view discovery on that one monitor. The monitor is approximately 15 inches across and of low resolution, making it almost impossible for Mr. Guzmán to view anything displayed on it from his side of the visiting room. As the defense pointed out to the government/MCC, this setup allowed Mr. Guzmán to control the reviewing of discovery, and since he is not facile with computers, the process of reviewing any one document took an unreasonable period of time.
The defense is asking for a continuance until August or September 2018.
by Chivis Martinez
Borderland Beat
December 28, 2017
El Chapo shared a Christmas visit with his twin six year old twin daughters. His daughters were born in California in 2011, thereby are American citizens, as is their mother Emma Coronel Aispuro. The visit marks the fourth time Chapo has been allowed to see his twins.
Despite erroneous reports in the news, Emma did not visit Chapo on the 23rd with the twins, and has never been allowed a visit with her husband since extradited.
The Daily Mail, (U.K.Publication) ran the story of Emma visiting Chapo, and several media outlets republished their story. DM tells Borderland Beat, the story originated from Washington Post and they took the information from that story.
The judge presiding in Chapo’s case had placed severe restrictions on visits. Virtually none, except the twins and even his attorney Eduardo Balarezo has no contact and no private visits with his client.
On Christmas Eve Chapo’s attorney filed a request for continuance.
The filing stresses the encumbrance of reviewing discovery and the mountain of discovery, several hundreds of thousands pages, and hundreds of thousands of recordings. With the replacement of his defense with Balarezo, in effect the defense began preparation for trial on September 3rd of this year.
The reviewing of discovery would be a monumental task in the best of situations, however reviewing prosecution discovery, has been impeded by the restrictions of the legal team’s court ordered no contact visits. Add in the fact that Chapo’s reading skills and computer skills are very low.
Description below:
The room is approximately five feet by ten feet, divided in half by a cement wall and a mesh/Plexiglas window. On the attorney side of the room there is cement block measuring approximately two feet by two feet containing a metal drawer that slides into the inmate side of the visiting room. The drawer is meant to facilitate the passing of documents back and forth and was installed because the Court rejected contact visits with Mr. Guzmán.
The government/MCC also set up a computer screen on the attorney side for Mr. Guzmán to connect his government issued laptop to the monitor so as to allow both sides to view discovery on that one monitor. The monitor is approximately 15 inches across and of low resolution, making it almost impossible for Mr. Guzmán to view anything displayed on it from his side of the visiting room. As the defense pointed out to the government/MCC, this setup allowed Mr. Guzmán to control the reviewing of discovery, and since he is not facile with computers, the process of reviewing any one document took an unreasonable period of time.
The defense is asking for a continuance until August or September 2018.
VAG STSHES ARE NOT UNCOMMON BUT OBJECTS STAHED INSID DICKS ….. OUCH!
Daily Mail
December 28, 2017
Top 16 things doctors found in vaginas in 2017
1. Scented soap
2. Deodorant cap
3. Bottle cap
4. Penis ring with spikes on
5. Silicon balls
6. A ball
7. Bike reflector
8. A sponge
9. Headphones
10. Hot towel
11. A phone and money
12. Clay
13. A candlestick
14. A lollipop
15. 15 stone balls - only found 14
16. Toy wand
Strange items doctors found in men's penises in 2017
1. A little screw
2. A sharp toy
3. four inch long metal sex toy
4. Plastic spoon
5. Piece of domino
6. Piece of plastic shampoo bottle
7. Paperclip
8. Coaxial cable
EDITOR’S NOTE: Narcotic officers often find large quantities of heroin, meth, cocaine and other drugs stashed in a suspect’s vagina, but I never heard of a dick stash. And then there are those kiester stashes.
December 28, 2017
Top 16 things doctors found in vaginas in 2017
1. Scented soap
2. Deodorant cap
3. Bottle cap
4. Penis ring with spikes on
5. Silicon balls
6. A ball
7. Bike reflector
8. A sponge
9. Headphones
10. Hot towel
11. A phone and money
12. Clay
13. A candlestick
14. A lollipop
15. 15 stone balls - only found 14
16. Toy wand
Strange items doctors found in men's penises in 2017
1. A little screw
2. A sharp toy
3. four inch long metal sex toy
4. Plastic spoon
5. Piece of domino
6. Piece of plastic shampoo bottle
7. Paperclip
8. Coaxial cable
EDITOR’S NOTE: Narcotic officers often find large quantities of heroin, meth, cocaine and other drugs stashed in a suspect’s vagina, but I never heard of a dick stash. And then there are those kiester stashes.
Saturday, December 30, 2017
NOT THE OFFICIAL CAR OF THE HOUSTON TEXANS
BarkGrowlBite
December 30, 2017
Hyundai prides itself in being “the official car of the Houston Texans.” And then there is BMW with “Your Houston area BMW centers are proud to be the Official Luxury Car of the Houston Texans.”
With one game left to go this season, The Houston Texans have won just four games while losing eleven. They have lost their last five games in a row.
The Houston Texans record is so bad that Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Mazda and Kia have all started advertising, “Not the official car of the Houston Texans.”
And Mercedes-Benz is now advertising, “We are not the Official Luxury Car of the Houston Texans.”
Hyundai and BMW have asked the Texans for a refund of the money they paid for the right to advertise their automobiles as the official team cars. Bob McNair, owner of the Texans, angrily told Hyundai and BMW he was in no mood to be reminded of how disastrous this season has been and for them to “Go pound sand!”
December 30, 2017
Hyundai prides itself in being “the official car of the Houston Texans.” And then there is BMW with “Your Houston area BMW centers are proud to be the Official Luxury Car of the Houston Texans.”
With one game left to go this season, The Houston Texans have won just four games while losing eleven. They have lost their last five games in a row.
The Houston Texans record is so bad that Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Mazda and Kia have all started advertising, “Not the official car of the Houston Texans.”
And Mercedes-Benz is now advertising, “We are not the Official Luxury Car of the Houston Texans.”
Hyundai and BMW have asked the Texans for a refund of the money they paid for the right to advertise their automobiles as the official team cars. Bob McNair, owner of the Texans, angrily told Hyundai and BMW he was in no mood to be reminded of how disastrous this season has been and for them to “Go pound sand!”
CA. SCHOOL DISTRICT REFUSES TO EDUCATE RACISTS ..... IF THEY ARE WHITE
by Bob Walsh
Elk Grove is an upscale bedroom community south of Sacramento. It is basically a nice place. A while back a SnapChat video was posted with two white high school girls on it. One of the two was on a racist rant, asserting among other things, "Black people are trash. They need to die." At no time did the rant express any intent or desire to engage in personal violence against Black people, or attempt to incite violence against them.
At any rate the Elk Grove school district has kicked them out of school, citing the safety of the student body as the reason.
It is probably narrow minded and reactionary of me but I wonder if they would have done the same thing had the shoe been on the other foot. It is not illegal to be a racist. It may be stupid and narrow-minded, but if we refused to educate all stupid and narrow-minded people in the state there would be a lot of uneducated assholes out there, more than there are now anyway.
I wonder if there is a branch of La Raza or BLM active on campus? Just curious.
Elk Grove is an upscale bedroom community south of Sacramento. It is basically a nice place. A while back a SnapChat video was posted with two white high school girls on it. One of the two was on a racist rant, asserting among other things, "Black people are trash. They need to die." At no time did the rant express any intent or desire to engage in personal violence against Black people, or attempt to incite violence against them.
At any rate the Elk Grove school district has kicked them out of school, citing the safety of the student body as the reason.
It is probably narrow minded and reactionary of me but I wonder if they would have done the same thing had the shoe been on the other foot. It is not illegal to be a racist. It may be stupid and narrow-minded, but if we refused to educate all stupid and narrow-minded people in the state there would be a lot of uneducated assholes out there, more than there are now anyway.
I wonder if there is a branch of La Raza or BLM active on campus? Just curious.
FEEL-GOOD STUPIDITY
by Bob Walsh
The formerly great state of California is considering moving forward on a program of divesting it's two huge retirements systems from ownership in the retail end of firearms sales. The reason stated is to help prevent another Las Vegas type massacre.
They have been a little fuzzy on how the CA retirement systems NOT owning stock is going to achieve that goal but, like good liberals, it does not matter what the actual RESULTS are. What is important is that you feel good about what you say and what you are seen to do in public.
The animals are loose and the clowns are running the circus.
The formerly great state of California is considering moving forward on a program of divesting it's two huge retirements systems from ownership in the retail end of firearms sales. The reason stated is to help prevent another Las Vegas type massacre.
They have been a little fuzzy on how the CA retirement systems NOT owning stock is going to achieve that goal but, like good liberals, it does not matter what the actual RESULTS are. What is important is that you feel good about what you say and what you are seen to do in public.
The animals are loose and the clowns are running the circus.
ELEPHANTS ARE SHIT OUTA LUCK ..... SO FAR
by Bob Walsh
A judge in Connecticut has determined that, as a matter of law, elephants are not people. The issue came up when the Nonhuman Rights Project, a bunch of animal rights psychopaths, sued to declare that three petting zoo elephants are in fact "people" in the legal meaning of the word and they should be released from their involuntary servitude.
The judge called the lawsuit "wholly frivolous."
I am a relatively old guy now. I remember when being a homosexual was considered a mental illness or disease and engaging in homosexual activity could land you in the slammer. Now it is a valid alternative lifestyle with significant legal protection beyond what a mundane "straight" person might enjoy before the law. Don't count these psychos out. If they keep it up long enough some moron judge may bite.
A judge in Connecticut has determined that, as a matter of law, elephants are not people. The issue came up when the Nonhuman Rights Project, a bunch of animal rights psychopaths, sued to declare that three petting zoo elephants are in fact "people" in the legal meaning of the word and they should be released from their involuntary servitude.
The judge called the lawsuit "wholly frivolous."
I am a relatively old guy now. I remember when being a homosexual was considered a mental illness or disease and engaging in homosexual activity could land you in the slammer. Now it is a valid alternative lifestyle with significant legal protection beyond what a mundane "straight" person might enjoy before the law. Don't count these psychos out. If they keep it up long enough some moron judge may bite.
CA DMV GOES AFTER DEAD PEOPLE
by Bob Walsh
Actually, it isn't as wacked as it sounds. In some major metropolitan areas, especially the People's Republic of San Francisco, abuse of the Handicapped Parking Placards is rampant. They are stolen, counterfeited and not turned in when granny dies. It makes a major ding in available street parking.
A new state law, kicking in on 01-01, REQUIRES that DMV get its collective head out of it's collective butt and try to fix it. Right now there are over 25,000 people over the age of 100 with handicapped placards. That is statistically very unlikely to be correct. The actual number is about 8,000.
Among other things DMV will now cross-check with SSA and cancel the placards of people who are reported as being dead.
Last fiscal year the DMV issued over 1,600 placard abuse citations, more than triple the previous year. They actually have a dedicated group of people (probably a small group) who do nothing but that. A year or so back they nailed a lot of people in the immediate vicinity of the DMV headquarters building. More than a few were DMV staff.
Actually, it isn't as wacked as it sounds. In some major metropolitan areas, especially the People's Republic of San Francisco, abuse of the Handicapped Parking Placards is rampant. They are stolen, counterfeited and not turned in when granny dies. It makes a major ding in available street parking.
A new state law, kicking in on 01-01, REQUIRES that DMV get its collective head out of it's collective butt and try to fix it. Right now there are over 25,000 people over the age of 100 with handicapped placards. That is statistically very unlikely to be correct. The actual number is about 8,000.
Among other things DMV will now cross-check with SSA and cancel the placards of people who are reported as being dead.
Last fiscal year the DMV issued over 1,600 placard abuse citations, more than triple the previous year. They actually have a dedicated group of people (probably a small group) who do nothing but that. A year or so back they nailed a lot of people in the immediate vicinity of the DMV headquarters building. More than a few were DMV staff.
KUZNETSOV AND STOLYAROV SCORE AGAIN
Russian pranksters pretending to be Poland’s prime minister fool Nikki Haley in call about fake country
By Bob Fredericks
New York Post
December 28, 2017
A couple of Russian funnymen prank-called US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley by posing as a Polish government official.
Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexei Stolyarov posted a video in which a woman who the cutups said was Haley thought she was speaking with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, the [Charleston] Post and Courier reported.
“Let me start with very much thanking you for the support we received on the vote today. We will never forget it,” the gullible Haley told the phony PM.
Poland was one of 35 countries who abstained from voting on a UN resolution condemning President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
The phony Morawiecki also asked Haley about the fictional island of Binomo in the South China Sea.
“You know Binomo?” he asked.
“Yes, yes,” Haley replied.
“They had elections and we suppose Russians had its intervention,” the comic said.
“Yes, of course they did, absolutely. We’ve been watching that very closely, and I think we will continue to watch that as we deal with the issues that keep coming up about the South China Sea,” she answered.
He then asked Haley what the US was going to do about it.
“Let me find out exactly what our stance is on that, and what if anything the US is doing or thinks should be done, and I will report back to you on that as well,” she said.
Haley’s spokesman John Degory told the paper, “We have nothing to share on that at this time.”
By Bob Fredericks
New York Post
December 28, 2017
A couple of Russian funnymen prank-called US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley by posing as a Polish government official.
Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexei Stolyarov posted a video in which a woman who the cutups said was Haley thought she was speaking with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, the [Charleston] Post and Courier reported.
“Let me start with very much thanking you for the support we received on the vote today. We will never forget it,” the gullible Haley told the phony PM.
Poland was one of 35 countries who abstained from voting on a UN resolution condemning President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
The phony Morawiecki also asked Haley about the fictional island of Binomo in the South China Sea.
“You know Binomo?” he asked.
“Yes, yes,” Haley replied.
“They had elections and we suppose Russians had its intervention,” the comic said.
“Yes, of course they did, absolutely. We’ve been watching that very closely, and I think we will continue to watch that as we deal with the issues that keep coming up about the South China Sea,” she answered.
He then asked Haley what the US was going to do about it.
“Let me find out exactly what our stance is on that, and what if anything the US is doing or thinks should be done, and I will report back to you on that as well,” she said.
Haley’s spokesman John Degory told the paper, “We have nothing to share on that at this time.”
INSATIABLE DESIRE FOR DRUGS TAKING ITS TOLL ON AMERICANS
Soaring opioid drug deaths cause U.S. life expectancy to drop for 2nd year
CBS News
December 21, 2017
NEW YORK — U.S. deaths from drug overdoses skyrocketed 21 percent last year, and for the second straight year dragged down how long Americans are expected to live.
The government figures released Thursday put drug deaths at 63,600, up from about 52,000 in 2015. For the first time, the powerful painkiller fentanyl and its close opioid cousins played a bigger role in the deaths than any other legal or illegal drug, surpassing prescription pain pills and heroin.
"This is urgent and deadly," said Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The opioid epidemic "clearly has a huge impact on our entire society."
Two-thirds of last year's drug deaths — about 42,000 — involved opioids, a category that includes heroin, methadone, prescription pain pills like OxyContin, and fentanyl. Fatal overdoses that involved fentanyl and fentanyl-like drugs doubled in one year, to more than 19,000, mostly from illegally made pills or powder, which is often mixed with heroin or other drugs.
Heroin was tied to 15,500 deaths and prescription painkillers to 14,500 deaths. The balance of the overdose deaths involved sedatives, cocaine and methamphetamines. More than one drug is often involved in an overdose death.
The highest drug death rates were in ages 25 to 54.
The CDC reports the age-adjusted death rate from overdoses more than tripled from 1999 to 2016.
Preliminary 2017 figures show the rise in overdose deaths continuing.
A report out last month from the White House Council of Economic Advisers said the financial toll of the opioid drug crisis in the U.S. has been vastly underestimated, in large part because previous analyses did not fully account for the rising number of overdose deaths. The council said the opioid crisis cost the U.S. $504 billion, or 2.8 percent of the nation's GDP, in 2015 alone.
"This is over six times larger than the most recently estimated economic cost of the epidemic," the report stated.
In October, President Trump declared the opioid epidemic a public health emergency, calling it a "national shame" and a "human tragedy." But he stopped short of proclaiming a national emergency, which would have unlocked more money and resources to combat the problem.
The drug deaths weigh into CDC's annual calculation of the average time a person is expected to live. The life expectancy figure is based on the year of their birth, current death trends and other factors. For decades, it was on the upswing, rising a few months nearly every year. But last year marked the first time in more than a half century that U.S. life expectancy fell two consecutive years.
"If we don't get a handle on this," he said, "we could very well see a third year in a row. With no end in sight."
West Virginia continued to be the state with highest drug overdose death rate, with a rate of 52 deaths per 100,000 state residents in 2016. Ohio and New Hampshire were next, both at about 39 per 100,000.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Long ago and for a long time I kept saying that the only way to fight America’s drug epidemic was to focus law enforcement on the user rather than on the dealer. But because many drug users were from the middle and upper class, the great minds in c
CBS News
December 21, 2017
NEW YORK — U.S. deaths from drug overdoses skyrocketed 21 percent last year, and for the second straight year dragged down how long Americans are expected to live.
The government figures released Thursday put drug deaths at 63,600, up from about 52,000 in 2015. For the first time, the powerful painkiller fentanyl and its close opioid cousins played a bigger role in the deaths than any other legal or illegal drug, surpassing prescription pain pills and heroin.
"This is urgent and deadly," said Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The opioid epidemic "clearly has a huge impact on our entire society."
Two-thirds of last year's drug deaths — about 42,000 — involved opioids, a category that includes heroin, methadone, prescription pain pills like OxyContin, and fentanyl. Fatal overdoses that involved fentanyl and fentanyl-like drugs doubled in one year, to more than 19,000, mostly from illegally made pills or powder, which is often mixed with heroin or other drugs.
Heroin was tied to 15,500 deaths and prescription painkillers to 14,500 deaths. The balance of the overdose deaths involved sedatives, cocaine and methamphetamines. More than one drug is often involved in an overdose death.
The highest drug death rates were in ages 25 to 54.
The CDC reports the age-adjusted death rate from overdoses more than tripled from 1999 to 2016.
Preliminary 2017 figures show the rise in overdose deaths continuing.
A report out last month from the White House Council of Economic Advisers said the financial toll of the opioid drug crisis in the U.S. has been vastly underestimated, in large part because previous analyses did not fully account for the rising number of overdose deaths. The council said the opioid crisis cost the U.S. $504 billion, or 2.8 percent of the nation's GDP, in 2015 alone.
"This is over six times larger than the most recently estimated economic cost of the epidemic," the report stated.
In October, President Trump declared the opioid epidemic a public health emergency, calling it a "national shame" and a "human tragedy." But he stopped short of proclaiming a national emergency, which would have unlocked more money and resources to combat the problem.
The drug deaths weigh into CDC's annual calculation of the average time a person is expected to live. The life expectancy figure is based on the year of their birth, current death trends and other factors. For decades, it was on the upswing, rising a few months nearly every year. But last year marked the first time in more than a half century that U.S. life expectancy fell two consecutive years.
"If we don't get a handle on this," he said, "we could very well see a third year in a row. With no end in sight."
West Virginia continued to be the state with highest drug overdose death rate, with a rate of 52 deaths per 100,000 state residents in 2016. Ohio and New Hampshire were next, both at about 39 per 100,000.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Long ago and for a long time I kept saying that the only way to fight America’s drug epidemic was to focus law enforcement on the user rather than on the dealer. But because many drug users were from the middle and upper class, the great minds in c
CANDIDATE FOR ‘MOST STUPID CRIMINAL OF THE YEAR’
Parolee fleeing from police drives pickup off Astoria pier into frigid Columbia River
By Edward Stratton
The Daily Astorian
December 28, 2017
ASTORIA, Oregon -- A man fleeing from police had to be rescued Wednesday after driving his pickup off a pier at North Tongue Point and into a side channel of the Columbia River.
Timofey Erofeeff, 27, from Scotts Mills in Marion County, had been spotted trespassing on boats. Officers made contact with him about 10 a.m. as he was driving a red F-150, police said.
They decided to charge him with second-degree criminal trespass and were advised to take him into custody for a Deschutes County parole violation. He took off as they approached his truck to make the arrest, starting a short pursuit.
Officers did not follow Erofeeff when he drove onto a pier, but he continued and launched the pickup off the end into the Columbia before exiting the vehicle. He swam out a couple of hundred feet into the frigid river. The Coast Guard was called and prepared a helicopter to rescue him, but the mission was called off when he swam back.
The pier was too high for Erofeeff to be reached by responders, who passed him a life jacket and flotation ring. Fishermen on the nearby vessel Pacific Wind responded to rescue him. Employees from nearby shipwright WCT Marine & Construction Inc. pulled him out of the water into a skiff and brought him to shore.
All told, Erofeeff spent about 20 minutes in the icy water.
“I’m thankful the men from WCT Marine and fishing vessel (Pacific Wind) were there and willing to help,” said Deputy Astoria Police Chief Eric Halverson. “Mr. Erofeeff should be thankful too.”
Erofeeff was taken by Medix Ambulance Service to Columbia Memorial Hospital, treated for hypothermia and released to an officer.
He was eventually lodged in the Clatsop County Jail on charges of second-degree criminal trespass, parole violation, interfering with a police officer, attempt to elude a police officer, reckless driving and third-degree escape. He has previous arrests in Clackamas County for burglary and Deschutes County for theft.
A fuel sheen was visible where Erofeeff entered the water. The police have been in contact with the Coast Guard about retrieving the vehicle, but have not formulated a plan yet, Halverson said. Divers were attempting to locate the vehicle Thursday.
“It’s in the river for now,” Halverson said.
By Edward Stratton
The Daily Astorian
December 28, 2017
ASTORIA, Oregon -- A man fleeing from police had to be rescued Wednesday after driving his pickup off a pier at North Tongue Point and into a side channel of the Columbia River.
Timofey Erofeeff, 27, from Scotts Mills in Marion County, had been spotted trespassing on boats. Officers made contact with him about 10 a.m. as he was driving a red F-150, police said.
They decided to charge him with second-degree criminal trespass and were advised to take him into custody for a Deschutes County parole violation. He took off as they approached his truck to make the arrest, starting a short pursuit.
Officers did not follow Erofeeff when he drove onto a pier, but he continued and launched the pickup off the end into the Columbia before exiting the vehicle. He swam out a couple of hundred feet into the frigid river. The Coast Guard was called and prepared a helicopter to rescue him, but the mission was called off when he swam back.
The pier was too high for Erofeeff to be reached by responders, who passed him a life jacket and flotation ring. Fishermen on the nearby vessel Pacific Wind responded to rescue him. Employees from nearby shipwright WCT Marine & Construction Inc. pulled him out of the water into a skiff and brought him to shore.
All told, Erofeeff spent about 20 minutes in the icy water.
“I’m thankful the men from WCT Marine and fishing vessel (Pacific Wind) were there and willing to help,” said Deputy Astoria Police Chief Eric Halverson. “Mr. Erofeeff should be thankful too.”
Erofeeff was taken by Medix Ambulance Service to Columbia Memorial Hospital, treated for hypothermia and released to an officer.
He was eventually lodged in the Clatsop County Jail on charges of second-degree criminal trespass, parole violation, interfering with a police officer, attempt to elude a police officer, reckless driving and third-degree escape. He has previous arrests in Clackamas County for burglary and Deschutes County for theft.
A fuel sheen was visible where Erofeeff entered the water. The police have been in contact with the Coast Guard about retrieving the vehicle, but have not formulated a plan yet, Halverson said. Divers were attempting to locate the vehicle Thursday.
“It’s in the river for now,” Halverson said.
IN THE SPRIT OF A CANCUN CHRISTMAS SEVERED HEAD LEFT WITH DICK STUFFED IN ITS MOUTH
Cancun: Abandoned decapitated corpse with message to CJNG
Brutal crimen narco en Cancún: lo decapitaron y abandonaron en la calle junto a una advertencia. Decapitado, con la cabeza entre las piernas, el rostro desollado y el pene en la boca.
Borderkand Beat (translated from Infobae)
December 26, 2017
In the middle of the holiday season, a corpse was left abandoned in front of a public clinic next accompanies by a threatening message.
He was beheaded, with his head left between his legs, his face was flayed off and his penis was inserted in his mouth. This is how the authorities found the abandoned body of a man in Cancún, Quintana Roo, one of the most important tourist destinations in the country.
At the stroke of midnight, the authorities received a report regarding the finding at emergency number 911.
The body was abandoned leaning against a fence in front of a public service clinic of the IMSS the message saying:
“Víctor Manuel Olivas Jalisca, you are next! Keep fucking around and supporting the Jaliscos (CJNG) and you'll get fucked together with all those filthy 'putos'! They forget that dogs live here. This goes for all the assholes who continue to support the Jaliscas”.
The message refers to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel that entered Quintana Roo in order to dispute the plaza with groups linked to the Gulf Cartel, such as Los Taliban and Los Pelones. Also challenging a powerful local cartel headed by a former policewoman named Leticia Rodríguez Lara, known as "la 40", who operate with the support of the Sinaloa Cartel and the Zetas Old School.
This dispute has already left 215 people dead in the state, according to local media. In previous years, in comparison, the average was around 50 people.
The National System of Public Security and the National Crime Semaphore locate Quintana Roo as one of the most violent entities in the Mexican southeast, with regard to murder statistics.
Brutal crimen narco en Cancún: lo decapitaron y abandonaron en la calle junto a una advertencia. Decapitado, con la cabeza entre las piernas, el rostro desollado y el pene en la boca.
Borderkand Beat (translated from Infobae)
December 26, 2017
In the middle of the holiday season, a corpse was left abandoned in front of a public clinic next accompanies by a threatening message.
He was beheaded, with his head left between his legs, his face was flayed off and his penis was inserted in his mouth. This is how the authorities found the abandoned body of a man in Cancún, Quintana Roo, one of the most important tourist destinations in the country.
At the stroke of midnight, the authorities received a report regarding the finding at emergency number 911.
The body was abandoned leaning against a fence in front of a public service clinic of the IMSS the message saying:
“Víctor Manuel Olivas Jalisca, you are next! Keep fucking around and supporting the Jaliscos (CJNG) and you'll get fucked together with all those filthy 'putos'! They forget that dogs live here. This goes for all the assholes who continue to support the Jaliscas”.
The message refers to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel that entered Quintana Roo in order to dispute the plaza with groups linked to the Gulf Cartel, such as Los Taliban and Los Pelones. Also challenging a powerful local cartel headed by a former policewoman named Leticia Rodríguez Lara, known as "la 40", who operate with the support of the Sinaloa Cartel and the Zetas Old School.
This dispute has already left 215 people dead in the state, according to local media. In previous years, in comparison, the average was around 50 people.
The National System of Public Security and the National Crime Semaphore locate Quintana Roo as one of the most violent entities in the Mexican southeast, with regard to murder statistics.
Friday, December 29, 2017
NO LONGER WELCOME IN THE WHITE HOUSE, HATE MONGER AL SHARPTON LASHES OUT AT TRUMP
Trump a 'Symbol of Northern Bigotry' Who Panders to 'Hateful' Americans, Says Rev. Al Sharpton
By Sam Schwarz
Newsweek
December 27, 2017
After holding out hope that President Donald Trump might grow during his time in office, Rev. Al Sharpton signaled that his patience has run out Wednesday morning when he went after the president on MSNBC's Morning Joe.
Trump is "a symbol of Northern bigotry," Sharpton said on a panel. "He has really prided himself in becoming something that plays to small segment of America that’s hateful, that’s trying to go to the past."
After holding out hope that President Donald Trump might grow during his time in office, Rev. Al Sharpton signaled that his patience has run out Wednesday morning when he went after the president on MSNBC's Morning Joe.
Trump is "a symbol of Northern bigotry," Sharpton said on a panel. "He has really prided himself in becoming something that plays to small segment of America that’s hateful, that’s trying to go to the past."
Sharpton remarked that during the first 11 months of this presidency, Trump has "done the opposite" of growing, adding that, "here's a man that has taken the presidency and reduced to name-calling and reduced to trying to exorcise his grudges and vengeance."
Sharpton's comments came on the heels of a bombshell report from The New York Times, which said that in June, Trump quipped that the 15,000 Haitians who had been granted green cards to come to America in 2017 "all have AIDS." The story also reports that Trump said the 40,000 Nigerians who had been granted green cards would never "go back to their huts" in Africa once they had seen the United States.
The issue of race played a significant part in Trump's 2016 election campaign, with Trump often saying that black people in America have it so badly that it can only get better. "What the hell do you have to lose?" Trump frequently remarked during his stump speeches across the country, while also adding that black people are "living in hell."
"The violence. The death. The lack of education. No jobs," Trump said about black America. "You buy a loaf of bread and end up getting shot."
Before the discussion on race, the panel also touched on former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee's tweet comparing Trump to former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. "Churchill was hated by his own party, opposition party, and press. Feared by King as reckless, and despised for his bluntness. But unlike Neville Chamberlain, he didn't retreat. We had a Chamberlain for 8 yrs; in @realDonaldTrump we have a Churchill," Huckabee tweeted Tuesday afternoon.
Sharpton scoffed at Huckabee's claim, which came after the former governor also tweeted that his followers should go out and see Darkest Hour, a new movie about Churchill.
"It's an insult to Churchill, and it's an insult to any of us that study history," Sharpton said about the comparison. "[Trump] really is not trying to grow and be a president and do something historic."
Huckabee's remark has been widely panned, with Twitter having a field day. One response stuck out, and was highlighted on MSNBC. Danish politician Kristian Tonning Riise responded by tweeting, "Sure. Churchill served his country 55 years in parliament, 31 years as a minister and 9 as pm. He was present in 15 battles and received 14 medals of bravery. He was one of historys most gifted orators and won the Nobel Literature Prize for his writing. Totally same thing..."
EDITOR’S NOTE: Lest we forget, while Obama was president, hatemongering race baiter Sharpton had an open invitation to visit the White House. It has been reported that Sharpton was at the White House more than 80 times and was one of Obama’s closest confidants.
And lest we forget, here are some of Sharpton’s more notable race baiting episodes:
The Tawana Brawley Hoax
In 1987, Tawana Brawley, a 15-year-old black girl, was found was found lying in a garbage sack in Wappinger, a town 70 miles north of NYC. She was smeared with shit, her clothes were torn and bujrned, and with racial slurs and obscenities written on her body with charcoal. She claimed she had been kidnapped and raped by six white men, one being a prosecutor and some being cops.
The Tawana Brawley case put a hitherto unknown Al Sharpton in the public limelight. Sharpton, along with two soon to be disbarred attorneys, took up the case. They accused Dutchess County prosecutor, Steven Pagones of being a racist and of raping Brawley. A grand jury spent seven months examining police and medical records before finding that the alleged kidnapping and rape was a hoax. Brawley had made the whole story and scenario up to keep her parents from finding out she had spent the night with a boyfriend. The boyfriend helped her stage the scene.
Sharpton and the two attorneys were sued by Pagones for defamation. He won his case and was awarded $345,000. Sharpton refused to pay his $66,000 share of the damages, but a group of black businessmen and attorney Johnnie Cochran paid it for him. To this day, Sharpton insists that the Tawana Brawley kidnapping and rape was not a hoax.
The Crown Heights Riots
In 1991, an orthodox Jew was part of a funeral procession led by an unmarked police car. As he drove through an intersection in the predominantly black Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights, he was struck by another car. He swerved onto a sidewalk killing a small black boy and injuring a small black girl. The crowd that had gathered became infuriated when a private ambulance whisked the Jewish driver away while leaving the boy pinned underneath his car. Actually a police officer had called for the ambulance because he feared the angry crowd would attack the Jewish driver.
Blacks rioted for four consecutive days, looting stores, beating up Jews wherever they could find them, and stabbing to death a Jewish seminary student from Australia as bystanders shouted "Kill the Jew", and "get the Jews out". Sharpton made his presence at the rioting, leading a protest of angry people shouting "Whose streets? Our streets!" and "No justice, no peace!" Sharpton himself shouted, “If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house.” Sharpton’s participation helped prolong the rioting.
And at the little boy’s funeral, Sharpton ranted against “Jewish ‘diamond merchants’ who bought their wares from apartheid South Africa, then ran down black kids in Brooklyn.”
Freddie's Fashion Mart
In 1995, the United House of Prayer, a black Pentecostal Church, owned some property in Harlem which it rented to Fred Harari, a Jewish merchant who operated Freddie’s Fashion Mart. Harari had a black subtenant who operated the Record Shack. The church told Harari to evict the black tenant. The eviction led to months of increasingly clamorous protests.
Sharpton had a radio talk show at the time. He often invited Morris Powell, head of the local vendor’s association and a well-known Jew-baiter, to appear on his show and he allowed Powell to make anti-Semitic rants. Sharpton and Powell showed up at the protests.
Sharpton shouted, “We will not stand by and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business.”
Powell shouted, “We are not going to stand idly by and let a Jewish person come in black Harlem and methodically drive black people out of business up and down 125th St. If we stand for that, we will stand for anything.”
On December 8, Roland James Smith, Jr. walked into Freddie’s Fashion Mart and with gun in hand, ordered all the black customers to leave. He then doused several clothing bins with paint thinner and set them on fire. Eight people were burned to death. Smith also died in the fire.
There can be no doubt that Sharpton and Powell inflamed the protestors and led Smith to carry out his massacre.
By Sam Schwarz
Newsweek
December 27, 2017
After holding out hope that President Donald Trump might grow during his time in office, Rev. Al Sharpton signaled that his patience has run out Wednesday morning when he went after the president on MSNBC's Morning Joe.
Trump is "a symbol of Northern bigotry," Sharpton said on a panel. "He has really prided himself in becoming something that plays to small segment of America that’s hateful, that’s trying to go to the past."
After holding out hope that President Donald Trump might grow during his time in office, Rev. Al Sharpton signaled that his patience has run out Wednesday morning when he went after the president on MSNBC's Morning Joe.
Trump is "a symbol of Northern bigotry," Sharpton said on a panel. "He has really prided himself in becoming something that plays to small segment of America that’s hateful, that’s trying to go to the past."
Sharpton remarked that during the first 11 months of this presidency, Trump has "done the opposite" of growing, adding that, "here's a man that has taken the presidency and reduced to name-calling and reduced to trying to exorcise his grudges and vengeance."
Sharpton's comments came on the heels of a bombshell report from The New York Times, which said that in June, Trump quipped that the 15,000 Haitians who had been granted green cards to come to America in 2017 "all have AIDS." The story also reports that Trump said the 40,000 Nigerians who had been granted green cards would never "go back to their huts" in Africa once they had seen the United States.
The issue of race played a significant part in Trump's 2016 election campaign, with Trump often saying that black people in America have it so badly that it can only get better. "What the hell do you have to lose?" Trump frequently remarked during his stump speeches across the country, while also adding that black people are "living in hell."
"The violence. The death. The lack of education. No jobs," Trump said about black America. "You buy a loaf of bread and end up getting shot."
Before the discussion on race, the panel also touched on former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee's tweet comparing Trump to former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. "Churchill was hated by his own party, opposition party, and press. Feared by King as reckless, and despised for his bluntness. But unlike Neville Chamberlain, he didn't retreat. We had a Chamberlain for 8 yrs; in @realDonaldTrump we have a Churchill," Huckabee tweeted Tuesday afternoon.
Sharpton scoffed at Huckabee's claim, which came after the former governor also tweeted that his followers should go out and see Darkest Hour, a new movie about Churchill.
"It's an insult to Churchill, and it's an insult to any of us that study history," Sharpton said about the comparison. "[Trump] really is not trying to grow and be a president and do something historic."
Huckabee's remark has been widely panned, with Twitter having a field day. One response stuck out, and was highlighted on MSNBC. Danish politician Kristian Tonning Riise responded by tweeting, "Sure. Churchill served his country 55 years in parliament, 31 years as a minister and 9 as pm. He was present in 15 battles and received 14 medals of bravery. He was one of historys most gifted orators and won the Nobel Literature Prize for his writing. Totally same thing..."
EDITOR’S NOTE: Lest we forget, while Obama was president, hatemongering race baiter Sharpton had an open invitation to visit the White House. It has been reported that Sharpton was at the White House more than 80 times and was one of Obama’s closest confidants.
And lest we forget, here are some of Sharpton’s more notable race baiting episodes:
The Tawana Brawley Hoax
In 1987, Tawana Brawley, a 15-year-old black girl, was found was found lying in a garbage sack in Wappinger, a town 70 miles north of NYC. She was smeared with shit, her clothes were torn and bujrned, and with racial slurs and obscenities written on her body with charcoal. She claimed she had been kidnapped and raped by six white men, one being a prosecutor and some being cops.
The Tawana Brawley case put a hitherto unknown Al Sharpton in the public limelight. Sharpton, along with two soon to be disbarred attorneys, took up the case. They accused Dutchess County prosecutor, Steven Pagones of being a racist and of raping Brawley. A grand jury spent seven months examining police and medical records before finding that the alleged kidnapping and rape was a hoax. Brawley had made the whole story and scenario up to keep her parents from finding out she had spent the night with a boyfriend. The boyfriend helped her stage the scene.
Sharpton and the two attorneys were sued by Pagones for defamation. He won his case and was awarded $345,000. Sharpton refused to pay his $66,000 share of the damages, but a group of black businessmen and attorney Johnnie Cochran paid it for him. To this day, Sharpton insists that the Tawana Brawley kidnapping and rape was not a hoax.
The Crown Heights Riots
In 1991, an orthodox Jew was part of a funeral procession led by an unmarked police car. As he drove through an intersection in the predominantly black Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights, he was struck by another car. He swerved onto a sidewalk killing a small black boy and injuring a small black girl. The crowd that had gathered became infuriated when a private ambulance whisked the Jewish driver away while leaving the boy pinned underneath his car. Actually a police officer had called for the ambulance because he feared the angry crowd would attack the Jewish driver.
Blacks rioted for four consecutive days, looting stores, beating up Jews wherever they could find them, and stabbing to death a Jewish seminary student from Australia as bystanders shouted "Kill the Jew", and "get the Jews out". Sharpton made his presence at the rioting, leading a protest of angry people shouting "Whose streets? Our streets!" and "No justice, no peace!" Sharpton himself shouted, “If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house.” Sharpton’s participation helped prolong the rioting.
And at the little boy’s funeral, Sharpton ranted against “Jewish ‘diamond merchants’ who bought their wares from apartheid South Africa, then ran down black kids in Brooklyn.”
Freddie's Fashion Mart
In 1995, the United House of Prayer, a black Pentecostal Church, owned some property in Harlem which it rented to Fred Harari, a Jewish merchant who operated Freddie’s Fashion Mart. Harari had a black subtenant who operated the Record Shack. The church told Harari to evict the black tenant. The eviction led to months of increasingly clamorous protests.
Sharpton had a radio talk show at the time. He often invited Morris Powell, head of the local vendor’s association and a well-known Jew-baiter, to appear on his show and he allowed Powell to make anti-Semitic rants. Sharpton and Powell showed up at the protests.
Sharpton shouted, “We will not stand by and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business.”
Powell shouted, “We are not going to stand idly by and let a Jewish person come in black Harlem and methodically drive black people out of business up and down 125th St. If we stand for that, we will stand for anything.”
On December 8, Roland James Smith, Jr. walked into Freddie’s Fashion Mart and with gun in hand, ordered all the black customers to leave. He then doused several clothing bins with paint thinner and set them on fire. Eight people were burned to death. Smith also died in the fire.
There can be no doubt that Sharpton and Powell inflamed the protestors and led Smith to carry out his massacre.
FELONY BAD HAIRCUT
by Bob Walsh
No, it does not concern Kim John Uhn. It does concern a barber-stylist, Khaled A. Shabari, 46, at Ruby's hair salon in Madison, WI. He is now under arrest for mayhem.
Allegedly his customer went in and asked for a #2 cut on the sides (not a boot haircut but close) and an inch or so off the top, with scissors. He left missing a piece of h8is ear and with a reverse Mohawk, a #1 or #0, right down the middle of his skull.
After calling the cops the victim went elsewhere and had his head shaved, having very little option in the matter other than looking like a complete idiot.
The barber is claiming that "nicking" the ear with the scissors was an accident and that the customer was "fidgety" during the haircut. Ruby's is now getting very bad reviews on Yelp. Life is hard.
No, it does not concern Kim John Uhn. It does concern a barber-stylist, Khaled A. Shabari, 46, at Ruby's hair salon in Madison, WI. He is now under arrest for mayhem.
Allegedly his customer went in and asked for a #2 cut on the sides (not a boot haircut but close) and an inch or so off the top, with scissors. He left missing a piece of h8is ear and with a reverse Mohawk, a #1 or #0, right down the middle of his skull.
After calling the cops the victim went elsewhere and had his head shaved, having very little option in the matter other than looking like a complete idiot.
The barber is claiming that "nicking" the ear with the scissors was an accident and that the customer was "fidgety" during the haircut. Ruby's is now getting very bad reviews on Yelp. Life is hard.
POUNDING HOLES IN TWO JAI WALLS HAD TO BE NOISY, BUT GEORGIA JAIL GUARDS WERE NOT AWARE OF ESCAPE
Inmate broke through two jail walls, squeezed through fence, then stole county work van to escape jail
By Minyvonne Burke
New York Daily News
December 27, 2017
A Georgia inmate authorities say is dangerous escaped jail by breaking through two walls and then squeezing through an opening in a fence surrounding the facility.
Police are searching for Christopher Nicholas Carroll, of South Carolina, after he escaped from a Lamar County jail shortly after midnight on Wednesday.
The Lamar County Sheriff's Office said Carroll broke through two walls inside the facility while officials thought he was taking a shower, according to KENS 5.
WSB-TV reports that the inmate used part of a table to bust through the walls and then squeezed through an opening in a small storage area to get outside before climbing through an opening in a fence.
Carroll then allegedly stole a county work van. The vehicle was found around 7:50 a.m. in Allendale County, South Carolina, about two hours from the jail, the sheriff's office said in a Facebook post.
Authorities have not yet located Carroll.
Lamar County Sheriff Brad White told KENS 5 that authorities in South Carolina are "very familiar with" Carroll.
He was being held in Lamar County following an October arrest for three counts of obstruction of an officer and theft by receiving stolen property.
White said he considers Carroll dangerous and is not sure if the inmate is armed.
By Minyvonne Burke
New York Daily News
December 27, 2017
A Georgia inmate authorities say is dangerous escaped jail by breaking through two walls and then squeezing through an opening in a fence surrounding the facility.
Police are searching for Christopher Nicholas Carroll, of South Carolina, after he escaped from a Lamar County jail shortly after midnight on Wednesday.
The Lamar County Sheriff's Office said Carroll broke through two walls inside the facility while officials thought he was taking a shower, according to KENS 5.
WSB-TV reports that the inmate used part of a table to bust through the walls and then squeezed through an opening in a small storage area to get outside before climbing through an opening in a fence.
Carroll then allegedly stole a county work van. The vehicle was found around 7:50 a.m. in Allendale County, South Carolina, about two hours from the jail, the sheriff's office said in a Facebook post.
Authorities have not yet located Carroll.
Lamar County Sheriff Brad White told KENS 5 that authorities in South Carolina are "very familiar with" Carroll.
He was being held in Lamar County following an October arrest for three counts of obstruction of an officer and theft by receiving stolen property.
White said he considers Carroll dangerous and is not sure if the inmate is armed.
GERMANY, WHICH SLAUGHTERED 6 MILLION JEWS, SIDES WITH AND AIDS THOSE WHO HAVE VOWED TO MAKE ISRAEL JUDENREIN
Germany wages a relentless struggle against Israel in both EU and U.N. institutions
By Eldad Beck
Israel Hayom
December 27, 2017
Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital served to reveal Germany's hypocrisy as far as concerns its ties with the Jewish state: Last week, Germany voted in favor of a U.N. resolution submitted by Turkey and Yemen that called U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital "null and void." Germany, along with the other great nations of the European Union, betrayed its alliance with the United States and Israel in order to align with the world's most unsavory regimes in negating the Jewish state's right to determine that its capital is in Jerusalem, the most sacred city to Jews.
The time has come to reveal the true face of Germany, a country that wages a relentless struggle against Israel in both EU and U.N. institutions at the same time that it claims Israel's existence and security are integral to its national interests. Germany is Europe's single largest donor to the Palestinian Authority, but it has never once thought to demand the Palestinians do something for peace in return for all the money it provides, like put an end to the violence and the anti-Semitic incitement. While this should be obvious given Germany's history, it seems it is not so crystal clear to Berlin. Germany prefers to put pressure on Israel only, by funding radical organizations that slander the Jewish state around the world.
Unfortunately, Germany is no friend of Israel. That is at least as long as its current policies remain in place.
By Eldad Beck
Israel Hayom
December 27, 2017
Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital served to reveal Germany's hypocrisy as far as concerns its ties with the Jewish state: Last week, Germany voted in favor of a U.N. resolution submitted by Turkey and Yemen that called U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital "null and void." Germany, along with the other great nations of the European Union, betrayed its alliance with the United States and Israel in order to align with the world's most unsavory regimes in negating the Jewish state's right to determine that its capital is in Jerusalem, the most sacred city to Jews.
The time has come to reveal the true face of Germany, a country that wages a relentless struggle against Israel in both EU and U.N. institutions at the same time that it claims Israel's existence and security are integral to its national interests. Germany is Europe's single largest donor to the Palestinian Authority, but it has never once thought to demand the Palestinians do something for peace in return for all the money it provides, like put an end to the violence and the anti-Semitic incitement. While this should be obvious given Germany's history, it seems it is not so crystal clear to Berlin. Germany prefers to put pressure on Israel only, by funding radical organizations that slander the Jewish state around the world.
Unfortunately, Germany is no friend of Israel. That is at least as long as its current policies remain in place.
NAZIS CONNED REDCROSS INTO BELIEVING A CONCENTRATION CAMP WAS A JUDENSTADT
'A modern Jewish settlement': How the Nazis tried to fool the world by turning a concentration camp into a fake town to convince Red Cross visitors the Holocaust was not happening
By Joseph Curtis
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
t was a place of death and despair that was dressed up to look like a model town in a bid to fool others that one of the greatest atrocities in history did not happen.
Months before the true horrors of the Holocaust were revealed the Nazi regime went to great lengths to try to convince the world they were not running concentration camps.
And the Czech camp Theresienstadt became the location to try out the deception after representatives from the International Red Cross were invited to inspect it, with the cruel camp directors forcing the inmates to build fake homes and shops to con the delegation into thinking it was a town.
Theresienstadt was a fortress built near Prague in the Bohemia region of Czechoslovakia between 1780 and 1790, named after the mother of the Austrian Emperor Joseph II who ordered its construction as part of a series of fort defences.
By the 20th Century it had become obsolete and began being used as a jail for military and political prisoners.
But after Nazi Germany invaded it was taken over by the Gestapo in 1940 and turned into a ‘Jewish ghetto’, with a smaller fortress within the main building also used for political prisoners.
From 1942 onwards tens of thousands of Jews were imprisoned at Theresienstadt, with the camp serving as a transit stop before they were moved on to extermination camps, including Auschwitz.
To try to dispel rumours the camp was being used to exterminate prisoners, the Nazis presented it as a ‘model Jewish settlement’.
In order to prepare for the visit, the inmates were 'screened' and around 200 of the more 'socially prominent' were transferred to two-bed rooms to make it appear they lived in relative comfort.
On June 23, 1944, a delegation from the Danish and International Red Cross, including doctors and civil servants, was welcomed by an SS-appointed ‘mayor’ who gave them a tour of the ‘town’.
Many Jews had been deported to Auschwitz in preparation while remaining prisoners were ordered to clean up the area and build fake shops and cafes to imply those who lived there had access to everyday amenities.
The delegation stayed in freshly decorated rooms in the ‘prominent’ section of the camp for wealthy prisoners while they were also treated to a performance of a children’s opera written by an inmate.
They were given a tour of the facilities based on a pre-determined route.
Nazi officials asked questions to prisoners about their happiness along the way, with the inmates ordered to ignore any direct questions from the delegates.
Despite the overwhelming censorship, the delegation was said to have left with a ‘positive impression’ of Theresienstadt.
It gave the Nazis impetus to produce a propaganda film nicknamed ‘The Fuhrer Gives a Village to The Jews’, directed by an experienced Jewish actor Kurt Gerron, who was also a prisoner.
The shoot lasted 11 days in September 1944 but to ensure those who made it kept quiet, most of the cast were deported to Auschwitz while Gerron himself was executed in a gas chamber in October.
It was intended to be widely distributed as a means to quell the allegations against concentration camps but although a few screenings were staged, the end of the war prevented its full release.
Some of the footage survives today but it was mostly destroyed before the war’s conclusion.
In reality prisoners were shot and starved to death, while others succumbed to disease due to the abhorrent conditions, with around 60,000 people crammed into a barracks designed to fit 7,000 soldiers.
By 1944 the Nazis began deporting the prisoners en masse to death camps before it was liberated by Soviet troops in May 1945.
It has since been the subject of many plays, films and documentaries highlighting how it was used as a propaganda tool.
By Joseph Curtis
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
t was a place of death and despair that was dressed up to look like a model town in a bid to fool others that one of the greatest atrocities in history did not happen.
Months before the true horrors of the Holocaust were revealed the Nazi regime went to great lengths to try to convince the world they were not running concentration camps.
And the Czech camp Theresienstadt became the location to try out the deception after representatives from the International Red Cross were invited to inspect it, with the cruel camp directors forcing the inmates to build fake homes and shops to con the delegation into thinking it was a town.
Theresienstadt was a fortress built near Prague in the Bohemia region of Czechoslovakia between 1780 and 1790, named after the mother of the Austrian Emperor Joseph II who ordered its construction as part of a series of fort defences.
By the 20th Century it had become obsolete and began being used as a jail for military and political prisoners.
But after Nazi Germany invaded it was taken over by the Gestapo in 1940 and turned into a ‘Jewish ghetto’, with a smaller fortress within the main building also used for political prisoners.
From 1942 onwards tens of thousands of Jews were imprisoned at Theresienstadt, with the camp serving as a transit stop before they were moved on to extermination camps, including Auschwitz.
To try to dispel rumours the camp was being used to exterminate prisoners, the Nazis presented it as a ‘model Jewish settlement’.
In order to prepare for the visit, the inmates were 'screened' and around 200 of the more 'socially prominent' were transferred to two-bed rooms to make it appear they lived in relative comfort.
On June 23, 1944, a delegation from the Danish and International Red Cross, including doctors and civil servants, was welcomed by an SS-appointed ‘mayor’ who gave them a tour of the ‘town’.
Many Jews had been deported to Auschwitz in preparation while remaining prisoners were ordered to clean up the area and build fake shops and cafes to imply those who lived there had access to everyday amenities.
The delegation stayed in freshly decorated rooms in the ‘prominent’ section of the camp for wealthy prisoners while they were also treated to a performance of a children’s opera written by an inmate.
They were given a tour of the facilities based on a pre-determined route.
Nazi officials asked questions to prisoners about their happiness along the way, with the inmates ordered to ignore any direct questions from the delegates.
Despite the overwhelming censorship, the delegation was said to have left with a ‘positive impression’ of Theresienstadt.
It gave the Nazis impetus to produce a propaganda film nicknamed ‘The Fuhrer Gives a Village to The Jews’, directed by an experienced Jewish actor Kurt Gerron, who was also a prisoner.
The shoot lasted 11 days in September 1944 but to ensure those who made it kept quiet, most of the cast were deported to Auschwitz while Gerron himself was executed in a gas chamber in October.
It was intended to be widely distributed as a means to quell the allegations against concentration camps but although a few screenings were staged, the end of the war prevented its full release.
Some of the footage survives today but it was mostly destroyed before the war’s conclusion.
In reality prisoners were shot and starved to death, while others succumbed to disease due to the abhorrent conditions, with around 60,000 people crammed into a barracks designed to fit 7,000 soldiers.
By 1944 the Nazis began deporting the prisoners en masse to death camps before it was liberated by Soviet troops in May 1945.
It has since been the subject of many plays, films and documentaries highlighting how it was used as a propaganda tool.
Thursday, December 28, 2017
THANK YOU, NIKKI HALEY
By Sarah N. Stern
Israel Hayom
December 26, 2017
The United Nations was founded on lofty principles in the wake of the atrocities of World War II. Sadly, with two votes last week – the first in the Security Council on Monday and the second in an emergency session of the General Assembly – we witnessed just how far the institution has fallen.
The U.S. is a sovereign, democratic nation that lives by the rule of law. One of those laws, the Jerusalem Embassy Relocation Act, was passed in 1995, by a solid, bipartisan majority of 93 to 5 in the Senate and 374 to 37 in the House. A sovereign nation has the right to choose where to place its embassies. And yet, on Dec. 6, when U.S. President Donald Trump called for the United States to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the call was met with such hysteria in this venerable institution that one might think he had called for genocide.
These two U.N. votes, condemning Trump's recognition of Jerusalem, contradict the very foundations on which the U.N. was established. Article 2 (7) of the United Nations Charter specifically states that "nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state." This, however, did not prevent the frenzy against the U.S. for supporting its one democratic ally in the Middle East.
Before Thursday's vote in the General Assembly, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley valiantly said: "The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in this assembly. We will remember it when we are called upon to once again make the world's largest contribution to the U.N., and when other member nations ask Washington to pay even more and to use our influence for their benefit."
There is nothing in the U.N. Charter that obligates the U.S. to be so generous with its taxpayer dollars. Nothing obligates one country out of 193 member nations to pay 22% of the U.N. budget – billions of dollars more than any other nation.
Judging from the reaction of the international community, one could mistake the world's nations for a bunch of babies. The largest tantrum came from the paragon of democracy, Turkey, whose president, Recep Tayipp Erdogan, expressed hope that "the United States will be taught a lesson."
"Mr. Trump, You cannot buy Turkey's democratic will with dollars. Our decision is clear. I call upon the whole world: Don't you dare sell your democratic struggle and your will for petty dollars," Erdogan added.
Erdogan has a very loose definition of the word "democracy." The Turkish president is a thug, who arbitrarily arrests opposition politicians, journalists, academics and anyone perceived as a threat to his iron rule. He has displaced approximately 400,000 Kurds from their homes. He has accepted billions of euros from the European Union to house Syrian refugees, but none of that money has reached actual refugees. Instead, it is lining his pockets and those of his cronies as he threatens to unleash these refugees and flood the EU with them.
Seeing as 20 of the 26 General Assembly votes in 2016 were directed against Israel – a full 77% – with only three on Syria, and one each on Iran, North Korea and Crimea, it came as no surprise that on Thursday, the General Assembly rejected Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital by an overwhelming majority of 128 to 9, with 35 abstentions and 21 no-shows.
The reason for this is the presence within the U.N. of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation – the largest body inside the U.N. and a powerful force against Israel. It is beyond ironic that nations with the glorious human rights records of Syria, Yemen, Iran and Saudi Arabia are lecturing the United States on democracy.
Thank you, Nikki Haley for finally putting an end to the notion that nations can continue to insult the U.S. and its single democratic ally in the Middle East and then expect a free ride at the American taxpayers' expense.
Israel Hayom
December 26, 2017
The United Nations was founded on lofty principles in the wake of the atrocities of World War II. Sadly, with two votes last week – the first in the Security Council on Monday and the second in an emergency session of the General Assembly – we witnessed just how far the institution has fallen.
The U.S. is a sovereign, democratic nation that lives by the rule of law. One of those laws, the Jerusalem Embassy Relocation Act, was passed in 1995, by a solid, bipartisan majority of 93 to 5 in the Senate and 374 to 37 in the House. A sovereign nation has the right to choose where to place its embassies. And yet, on Dec. 6, when U.S. President Donald Trump called for the United States to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the call was met with such hysteria in this venerable institution that one might think he had called for genocide.
These two U.N. votes, condemning Trump's recognition of Jerusalem, contradict the very foundations on which the U.N. was established. Article 2 (7) of the United Nations Charter specifically states that "nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state." This, however, did not prevent the frenzy against the U.S. for supporting its one democratic ally in the Middle East.
Before Thursday's vote in the General Assembly, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley valiantly said: "The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in this assembly. We will remember it when we are called upon to once again make the world's largest contribution to the U.N., and when other member nations ask Washington to pay even more and to use our influence for their benefit."
There is nothing in the U.N. Charter that obligates the U.S. to be so generous with its taxpayer dollars. Nothing obligates one country out of 193 member nations to pay 22% of the U.N. budget – billions of dollars more than any other nation.
Judging from the reaction of the international community, one could mistake the world's nations for a bunch of babies. The largest tantrum came from the paragon of democracy, Turkey, whose president, Recep Tayipp Erdogan, expressed hope that "the United States will be taught a lesson."
"Mr. Trump, You cannot buy Turkey's democratic will with dollars. Our decision is clear. I call upon the whole world: Don't you dare sell your democratic struggle and your will for petty dollars," Erdogan added.
Erdogan has a very loose definition of the word "democracy." The Turkish president is a thug, who arbitrarily arrests opposition politicians, journalists, academics and anyone perceived as a threat to his iron rule. He has displaced approximately 400,000 Kurds from their homes. He has accepted billions of euros from the European Union to house Syrian refugees, but none of that money has reached actual refugees. Instead, it is lining his pockets and those of his cronies as he threatens to unleash these refugees and flood the EU with them.
Seeing as 20 of the 26 General Assembly votes in 2016 were directed against Israel – a full 77% – with only three on Syria, and one each on Iran, North Korea and Crimea, it came as no surprise that on Thursday, the General Assembly rejected Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital by an overwhelming majority of 128 to 9, with 35 abstentions and 21 no-shows.
The reason for this is the presence within the U.N. of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation – the largest body inside the U.N. and a powerful force against Israel. It is beyond ironic that nations with the glorious human rights records of Syria, Yemen, Iran and Saudi Arabia are lecturing the United States on democracy.
Thank you, Nikki Haley for finally putting an end to the notion that nations can continue to insult the U.S. and its single democratic ally in the Middle East and then expect a free ride at the American taxpayers' expense.
IS MICKEY MOUSE BECOMING A NOSEY MOUSE? ..... PROBABLY NOT
by Bob Walsh
Disney resorts have made a significant change in their program due specifically to the mass shooting in Dallas. They are taking away the DO NOT DISTURB signs in their hotel rooms and replacing them with ROOM OCCUPIED signs.
There is now a policy in place that requires an employee to enter each room at least once per day. They will try hard to be reasonable about this but you may now have far less control over when, or if, hotel employees enter your room, whether you are there or not.
I think it is unfortunate, but I can understand the Disney people's point of view. Shit happens. Things chance because shit happens. Deal with it, or stay someplace else.
Disney resorts have made a significant change in their program due specifically to the mass shooting in Dallas. They are taking away the DO NOT DISTURB signs in their hotel rooms and replacing them with ROOM OCCUPIED signs.
There is now a policy in place that requires an employee to enter each room at least once per day. They will try hard to be reasonable about this but you may now have far less control over when, or if, hotel employees enter your room, whether you are there or not.
I think it is unfortunate, but I can understand the Disney people's point of view. Shit happens. Things chance because shit happens. Deal with it, or stay someplace else.
LOTS OF WINNING SOUTH CAROLINA LOTTERY TICKETS THAT WEREN’T
South Carolina Lottery glitch blamed for false wins
NBC News
December 27, 2017
COLUMBIA, SC -- Some South Carolina residents are furious after a South Carolina Education Lottery glitch led them to believe they had a winning ticket, when they did not.
The line of people who thought they had won, stretched around the South Carolina Lottery headquarters.
When the lottery players got inside they were informed that they did not have winning tickets.
A programming glitch that lasted a few hours caused people who played a particular holiday “Tic-Tac-Toe” like game to win nearly every time they played.
The South Carolina Lottery says they will make a decision on exactly what to do by Friday, but most were not any happier with that response.
NBC News
December 27, 2017
COLUMBIA, SC -- Some South Carolina residents are furious after a South Carolina Education Lottery glitch led them to believe they had a winning ticket, when they did not.
The line of people who thought they had won, stretched around the South Carolina Lottery headquarters.
When the lottery players got inside they were informed that they did not have winning tickets.
A programming glitch that lasted a few hours caused people who played a particular holiday “Tic-Tac-Toe” like game to win nearly every time they played.
The South Carolina Lottery says they will make a decision on exactly what to do by Friday, but most were not any happier with that response.
ABBAS SHOULD HAVE READ THE GOSPEL BEFORE ASSERTING JESUS WAS A PALESTINIAN
Israel Must Again Remind Palestinian Leaders That Jesus Was Jewish
Israel Today
December 26, 2017
Yesterday was Christmas, which means that local Christians were once again treated to a rant by Palestinian leaders trying to appropriate Jesus as part of their cause against Israel.
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas published a Christmas greeting that referred to Jesus as "a Palestinian messenger who would become a guiding light for millions around the world."
Abbas' predecessor and mentor, Yasser Arafat, began this shameful Christmas tradition decades ago.
As in other years, Israel's Foreign Ministry responded with scorn.
"He should have read the Gospel before uttering such offensive nonsense, but we will forgive him because he doesn’t know what he’s doing," ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told the Times of Israel, as he echoed Jesus example of forgiving those who wrong you.
Abbas spent the rest of the letter blaming all of the Palestinians' ills on Israel and the so-called "occupation."
Palmor noted that despite being a "Christmas" greeting, the letter didn't at all fit the spirit of the season. "Maybe he needs a hug from Santa?" the Israeli asked facetiously.
One part of the letter that many Israelis did take particular offense over was Abbas' assertion that the bulk of the Palestinian Christian population had fled Bethlehem and its environs because of Israel.
As several officials noted, Christians lived quietly and prosperously in the region right up until Bethlehem was handed over to the Palestinian Authority. It was only then that they started emigrating en masse.
Israel Today
December 26, 2017
Yesterday was Christmas, which means that local Christians were once again treated to a rant by Palestinian leaders trying to appropriate Jesus as part of their cause against Israel.
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas published a Christmas greeting that referred to Jesus as "a Palestinian messenger who would become a guiding light for millions around the world."
Abbas' predecessor and mentor, Yasser Arafat, began this shameful Christmas tradition decades ago.
As in other years, Israel's Foreign Ministry responded with scorn.
"He should have read the Gospel before uttering such offensive nonsense, but we will forgive him because he doesn’t know what he’s doing," ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told the Times of Israel, as he echoed Jesus example of forgiving those who wrong you.
Abbas spent the rest of the letter blaming all of the Palestinians' ills on Israel and the so-called "occupation."
Palmor noted that despite being a "Christmas" greeting, the letter didn't at all fit the spirit of the season. "Maybe he needs a hug from Santa?" the Israeli asked facetiously.
One part of the letter that many Israelis did take particular offense over was Abbas' assertion that the bulk of the Palestinian Christian population had fled Bethlehem and its environs because of Israel.
As several officials noted, Christians lived quietly and prosperously in the region right up until Bethlehem was handed over to the Palestinian Authority. It was only then that they started emigrating en masse.
TRUMP HONORED BY ISRAEL
Israel Announces "Donald Trump Train Station" in Jerusalem
Israel Today
December 27, 2017
Israel Railways has decided to name the final stop on its soon-to-open high-speed Tel Aviv-Jerusalem line after US President Donald Trump, reported Yediot Ahronot.
The much-anticipated rail line was originally supposed to terminate at a new station being built adjacent to Jerusalem's Central Bus Station and the International Convention Center (known locally as Binyanei Haumah).
But an underground extension was added taking the train to the entrance of the Old City of Jerusalem. About a year ago, Transportation Minister Israel Katz proposed another extension, taking the train (again, underground) all the way to the Western Wall.
That final station near the Western Wall is the one Israel Railways intends to name "Donald John Trump Train Station."
That honor is being bestowed in recognition of Trump's decision to finally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, as a matter of official US foreign policy.
Israel Today
December 27, 2017
Israel Railways has decided to name the final stop on its soon-to-open high-speed Tel Aviv-Jerusalem line after US President Donald Trump, reported Yediot Ahronot.
The much-anticipated rail line was originally supposed to terminate at a new station being built adjacent to Jerusalem's Central Bus Station and the International Convention Center (known locally as Binyanei Haumah).
But an underground extension was added taking the train to the entrance of the Old City of Jerusalem. About a year ago, Transportation Minister Israel Katz proposed another extension, taking the train (again, underground) all the way to the Western Wall.
That final station near the Western Wall is the one Israel Railways intends to name "Donald John Trump Train Station."
That honor is being bestowed in recognition of Trump's decision to finally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, as a matter of official US foreign policy.
Wednesday, December 27, 2017
AN EMBARASSMENT OF RICHES
by Bob Walsh
According to CDCr (California Dept. of Corrections and rehabilitation) four individuals have come forward to claim the carcass of Charlie Manson, all claiming to be his next-of-kin. So they are keeping Charlie in an ice box somewhere while the coroner sorts it out.
According to CDCr (California Dept. of Corrections and rehabilitation) four individuals have come forward to claim the carcass of Charlie Manson, all claiming to be his next-of-kin. So they are keeping Charlie in an ice box somewhere while the coroner sorts it out.
SOME SITUATIONS HAVE NO GOOD OUTCOMES
by Bob Walsh
In November 2008 it was a moderately common, grotty little family homicide in Flagstaff, Arizona. Except for one factor. The murderer was an eight-year old.
Vincent Romero, 29 and his friend Timothy Romans, 39, were both dead. The youngster shot and killed his dad with a single-shot .22 rifle, then called to Romans, telling him something was wrong When Romans approached the boy shot and killed him too.
In two days the youngster will be 18, and will walk away clean. No probation, no mandatory psych follow-up. Nothing. He did have some trouble with violation of his probation when he was 12, but has been 'clean" since then.
He has been housed in a foster home for some period of time. It is likely, though not mandatory, that he will continue to live there until he is 21 and likely but not mandatory he will continue psychiatric care of some sort. Apparently he was pissed off because his father chastised him for pulling the rifle out from under his bed without permission.
The kid, about to be a young adult, still has strong ties with his mother.
I wonder if legally there will be a prohibition against him owning or possessing firearms. The kid copped to negligent homicide, for deliberately killing two people. I guess he had a good lawyer.
In November 2008 it was a moderately common, grotty little family homicide in Flagstaff, Arizona. Except for one factor. The murderer was an eight-year old.
Vincent Romero, 29 and his friend Timothy Romans, 39, were both dead. The youngster shot and killed his dad with a single-shot .22 rifle, then called to Romans, telling him something was wrong When Romans approached the boy shot and killed him too.
In two days the youngster will be 18, and will walk away clean. No probation, no mandatory psych follow-up. Nothing. He did have some trouble with violation of his probation when he was 12, but has been 'clean" since then.
He has been housed in a foster home for some period of time. It is likely, though not mandatory, that he will continue to live there until he is 21 and likely but not mandatory he will continue psychiatric care of some sort. Apparently he was pissed off because his father chastised him for pulling the rifle out from under his bed without permission.
The kid, about to be a young adult, still has strong ties with his mother.
I wonder if legally there will be a prohibition against him owning or possessing firearms. The kid copped to negligent homicide, for deliberately killing two people. I guess he had a good lawyer.
THROW THE KEY AWAY ON THESE FOUR OHIO TEEN MURDERERS AGED 13-15
Four Toledo teens charged with murder after sandbag tossed from overpass
By Ryan Dunn
The Toledo Blade
December 26, 2017
The loved ones of Marquise Byrd grieve his tragic killing as they prepare for a series of court cases to come.
But for now, they would still like a phone call.
“I would appreciate if [the boys' parents] could at least call my auntie and tell her they're sorry,” said Mr. Byrd's cousin, Shaveontae King.
Toledo police said Tuesday they filed murder charges against four teenagers — Pedro Salinas, 13; Sean Carter, 14; Demetrius Wimberly, 14, and William Parker, 15 -— accused of killing Mr. Byrd with a sandbag dropped onto I-75.
An autopsy found Mr. Byrd, 22, of Warren, Mich. suffered blunt-force trauma to the head and neck. He was pronounced dead 8:57 p.m. Friday at Mercy Health St. Vincent Medical Center, according to the Lucas County Coroner's Office.
Mr. Byrd was traveling to meet friends in Toledo. He was engaged and had a 1-year-old son, said Ms. King, 26, of Roseville, Mich.
“Young, energetic, outgoing, lovable. He had a bright smile,” Ms. King said while describing Mr. Byrd as like a brother to her.
Officers responded about 10:10 p.m. Dec. 19 to the Indiana Avenue bridge over I-75. A sandbag had smashed through a car’s windshield and hit Mr. Byrd in the passenger seat.
Police said the boys were tossing objects from the overpass, and officers saw the teenagers leaving the area after the incident. Each is charged with vehicular vandalism as well.
Ms. King said she has no sympathy for the teenagers. They know right from wrong, and should be charged as adults, she said.
This killing has devastated their family, Ms. King said. She recalled the October killing of a motorist in Genesee County, Michigan, who was struck by a large rock. At the time, Ms. King thought it would never happen to them.
“My auntie has to bury her son. He's gone. He's never coming back,” Ms. King said. “She's holding up the best she can.”
Lori Olender, deputy chief of the county prosecutor's juvenile division, said she is not seeking to transfer the teenagers' cases to adult jurisdiction. She said she did not wish to put Mr. Byrd’s family through the court case with no chance of success.
“These kids have almost no record,” Ms. Olender said.
Ms. Olender cited a December, 2016 case in which a 14-year-old Toledo girl was accused of fatally shooting her brother. It was a deliberate act, and she did not stand trial as an adult, Ms. Olender said.
Ohio law allows children as young as 14 to stand trial as adults, but those younger than 16 are discretionary transfers.
Judges in these cases must consider factors including whether the juveniles could rehabilitate by 21 years old, if they used firearms, and whether they are mature enough for the adult system.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Lori Olender, deputy chief of the county prosecutor's juvenile division, should be ashamed of herself. How can she be sure that an adult court trial would have no chance of success?
Personally, I don’t give a rat’s ass whether these murderers could rehabilitate by age 21. Even the 13-year old one had to know tossing that sandbag from the overpass could result in one or more deaths. There have been too many of these deadly object overpass tossings. These four teens and other teens committing such crimes should serve as an example to other would be deadly object tossers that they will be shown no leniency, regardless of their age.
By Ryan Dunn
The Toledo Blade
December 26, 2017
The loved ones of Marquise Byrd grieve his tragic killing as they prepare for a series of court cases to come.
But for now, they would still like a phone call.
“I would appreciate if [the boys' parents] could at least call my auntie and tell her they're sorry,” said Mr. Byrd's cousin, Shaveontae King.
Toledo police said Tuesday they filed murder charges against four teenagers — Pedro Salinas, 13; Sean Carter, 14; Demetrius Wimberly, 14, and William Parker, 15 -— accused of killing Mr. Byrd with a sandbag dropped onto I-75.
An autopsy found Mr. Byrd, 22, of Warren, Mich. suffered blunt-force trauma to the head and neck. He was pronounced dead 8:57 p.m. Friday at Mercy Health St. Vincent Medical Center, according to the Lucas County Coroner's Office.
Mr. Byrd was traveling to meet friends in Toledo. He was engaged and had a 1-year-old son, said Ms. King, 26, of Roseville, Mich.
“Young, energetic, outgoing, lovable. He had a bright smile,” Ms. King said while describing Mr. Byrd as like a brother to her.
Officers responded about 10:10 p.m. Dec. 19 to the Indiana Avenue bridge over I-75. A sandbag had smashed through a car’s windshield and hit Mr. Byrd in the passenger seat.
Police said the boys were tossing objects from the overpass, and officers saw the teenagers leaving the area after the incident. Each is charged with vehicular vandalism as well.
Ms. King said she has no sympathy for the teenagers. They know right from wrong, and should be charged as adults, she said.
This killing has devastated their family, Ms. King said. She recalled the October killing of a motorist in Genesee County, Michigan, who was struck by a large rock. At the time, Ms. King thought it would never happen to them.
“My auntie has to bury her son. He's gone. He's never coming back,” Ms. King said. “She's holding up the best she can.”
Lori Olender, deputy chief of the county prosecutor's juvenile division, said she is not seeking to transfer the teenagers' cases to adult jurisdiction. She said she did not wish to put Mr. Byrd’s family through the court case with no chance of success.
“These kids have almost no record,” Ms. Olender said.
Ms. Olender cited a December, 2016 case in which a 14-year-old Toledo girl was accused of fatally shooting her brother. It was a deliberate act, and she did not stand trial as an adult, Ms. Olender said.
Ohio law allows children as young as 14 to stand trial as adults, but those younger than 16 are discretionary transfers.
Judges in these cases must consider factors including whether the juveniles could rehabilitate by 21 years old, if they used firearms, and whether they are mature enough for the adult system.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Lori Olender, deputy chief of the county prosecutor's juvenile division, should be ashamed of herself. How can she be sure that an adult court trial would have no chance of success?
Personally, I don’t give a rat’s ass whether these murderers could rehabilitate by age 21. Even the 13-year old one had to know tossing that sandbag from the overpass could result in one or more deaths. There have been too many of these deadly object overpass tossings. These four teens and other teens committing such crimes should serve as an example to other would be deadly object tossers that they will be shown no leniency, regardless of their age.
SKY HIGH CALIFORNIA RENT ANDHOUSING PRICES LEAD MANY INTO HOMELESSNESS
California's hidden homeless: Teachers, chefs, nurses and other middle class workers living in cars in parking lots because of the state's crazy property prices
By Emily Crane
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
The rising cost of rent and housing in California is forcing residents into alternative accommodation with middle class workers taking up residence in their cars and RVs by the side of the road to make ends meet.
Hundreds of people, including nurses and chefs, are sleeping in parking lots in affluent areas like Santa Barbara as they make the most of the only homes they can afford.
Marva Ericson, who works as a nursing assistant, has been sleeping in her Kia for the past three months. She wakes up before dawn each day, showers at the local YMCA and dresses in her hospital scrubs to head to work.
'I wake up and I say, 'Thank you God for keeping me safe last night, and thank you for the Safe Parking program',' the 48-year-old told the LA Times.
Like Ericson, most of the people sleeping rough in their cars are part of the area's Safe Parking program, which is run by the New Beginnings Counseling Center and aims to provide a secure area for the homeless to sleep in their vehicles.
The program has roughly 150 clients and 40 per cent of those are working but they just can't afford an apartment with the rising cost of housing.
About 35 per cent of those in the program are seniors and about 30 per cent are disabled. The majority are living out of their small cars with only 25 per cent sleeping in RVs.
Ericson ended up homeless after a series of medical set backs. She suffered a number of seizures that forced her to quit her job and was eventually diagnosed with a brain tumor.
She overcame the illness while caring for her dying mother and is now working two different jobs to make ends meet. Up until three months ago, Ericson was living in apartments for $1,000-1,600 a month but became homeless when she fell behind in rent.
Kathy, 65, and Phil, 74, have been living together in their old RV after losing their condo in 2013.
'I was always into December and making the house wonderfully warm and beautiful,' Kathy said of the holiday season. 'I've got some little lights on the ceiling of the RV and I got out my mom's old snow globe, with a music box on it.'
Santiago Geronimo, who is a chef at a high-end Santa Barbara restaurant, has been living in a Ford Explorer for three months with his girlfriend and her eighth-grade son Luis.
The Safe Parking program, which has been running for 12 years, allows clients to stay overnight in the parking lots of churches, not-for-profits and government offices.
Clients can park their cars after 7pm and need to be gone by the early morning.
In Santa Barbara alone, there are 23 parking lots currently used for the Safe Parking program.
There is also a waitlist of 40 people desperate to take part.
By Emily Crane
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
The rising cost of rent and housing in California is forcing residents into alternative accommodation with middle class workers taking up residence in their cars and RVs by the side of the road to make ends meet.
Hundreds of people, including nurses and chefs, are sleeping in parking lots in affluent areas like Santa Barbara as they make the most of the only homes they can afford.
Marva Ericson, who works as a nursing assistant, has been sleeping in her Kia for the past three months. She wakes up before dawn each day, showers at the local YMCA and dresses in her hospital scrubs to head to work.
'I wake up and I say, 'Thank you God for keeping me safe last night, and thank you for the Safe Parking program',' the 48-year-old told the LA Times.
Like Ericson, most of the people sleeping rough in their cars are part of the area's Safe Parking program, which is run by the New Beginnings Counseling Center and aims to provide a secure area for the homeless to sleep in their vehicles.
The program has roughly 150 clients and 40 per cent of those are working but they just can't afford an apartment with the rising cost of housing.
About 35 per cent of those in the program are seniors and about 30 per cent are disabled. The majority are living out of their small cars with only 25 per cent sleeping in RVs.
Ericson ended up homeless after a series of medical set backs. She suffered a number of seizures that forced her to quit her job and was eventually diagnosed with a brain tumor.
She overcame the illness while caring for her dying mother and is now working two different jobs to make ends meet. Up until three months ago, Ericson was living in apartments for $1,000-1,600 a month but became homeless when she fell behind in rent.
Kathy, 65, and Phil, 74, have been living together in their old RV after losing their condo in 2013.
'I was always into December and making the house wonderfully warm and beautiful,' Kathy said of the holiday season. 'I've got some little lights on the ceiling of the RV and I got out my mom's old snow globe, with a music box on it.'
Santiago Geronimo, who is a chef at a high-end Santa Barbara restaurant, has been living in a Ford Explorer for three months with his girlfriend and her eighth-grade son Luis.
The Safe Parking program, which has been running for 12 years, allows clients to stay overnight in the parking lots of churches, not-for-profits and government offices.
Clients can park their cars after 7pm and need to be gone by the early morning.
In Santa Barbara alone, there are 23 parking lots currently used for the Safe Parking program.
There is also a waitlist of 40 people desperate to take part.
BODY PARTS DEALER SOLD DAMAGED GOODS ….. DISEASED BODY PARTS THAT IS
Federal agents found four preserved fetuses in their second trimester during Detroit raid of body broker's warehouse
By Reuters and Regina F. Graham
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
Federal agents discovered four preserved fetuses in the Detroit warehouse of a man who sold human body parts, confidential photographs reviewed by Reuters show.
The fetuses were found during a December 2013 raid of businessman Arthur Rathburn´s warehouse. The fetuses, which appear to have been in their second trimester, were submerged in a liquid that included human brain tissue.
Rathburn, a former body broker, is accused of defrauding customers by sending them diseased body parts. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial is set for January.
How Rathburn acquired the fetuses and what he intended to do with them is unclear. Rathburn´s lawyers did not respond to requests for comment, and neither the indictment nor other documents made public in his case mention the fetuses.
'This needs to be reviewed,' said U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee who recently chaired a special U.S. House committee on the use of fetal tissue.
Blackburn recoiled when a Reuters reporter showed her some of the photographs, taken by government officials involved in the raid.
In four of the photos, a crime scene investigator in a hazmat suit uses forceps to lift a different fetus from the brownish liquid. In three other photos, a marker that includes a government evidence identification number lies beside a fetus.
'The actions depicted in these photos are an insult to human dignity,' said U.S. Representative Bob Goodlatte, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
A Republican from Virginia, Goodlatte said that if individuals 'violate federal laws and traffic in body parts of unborn children for monetary gain,' they should be 'held accountable.'
Blackburn said the discoveries in Rathburn´s warehouse raise questions about the practices of body brokers across America.
Such brokers take cadavers donated to science, dismember them and sell them for parts, typically for use in medical research and education.
The multimillion-dollar industry has been built largely on the poor, who donate their bodies in return for a free cremation of leftover body parts.
The buying and selling of cadavers and other body parts - with the exception of organs used in transplants - is legal and virtually unregulated in America. But trading in fetal tissue violates U.S. law.
In most states, including Michigan, public health authorities are not required to regularly inspect body broker facilities. As a result, it´s impossible to know whether body brokers who deal in adult donors are acquiring and profiting from fetuses.
Blackburn´s call for action came in response to a Reuters series that exposed abuses in the human body trade and what Blackburn called 'lax oversight' and 'lax enforcement' of the industry.
Photos from inside Rathburn´s warehouse offered a stark example of government failures to police the industry.
They include images of rotting human heads, some floating face up in a plastic cooler. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has been investigating Rathburn and other body brokers, declined to comment.
Blackburn said she found other Reuters stories about the body trade disturbing.
As part of the news agency´s examination of the industry, for example, a Reuters reporter was able to purchase two human heads and a cervical spine from Restore Life USA, a broker based in Blackburn´s home state of Tennessee. The deals were struck after just a few emails, at a cost of $900 plus shipping.
'It is sickening' how easily Restore Life sold the parts to Reuters, Blackburn said.
Told of Blackburn's concerns, Restore Life owner James Byrd said his company has 'invited her to tour our facility and to review the policy and procedures we have in place.'
By Reuters and Regina F. Graham
Daily Mail
December 26, 2017
Federal agents discovered four preserved fetuses in the Detroit warehouse of a man who sold human body parts, confidential photographs reviewed by Reuters show.
The fetuses were found during a December 2013 raid of businessman Arthur Rathburn´s warehouse. The fetuses, which appear to have been in their second trimester, were submerged in a liquid that included human brain tissue.
Rathburn, a former body broker, is accused of defrauding customers by sending them diseased body parts. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial is set for January.
How Rathburn acquired the fetuses and what he intended to do with them is unclear. Rathburn´s lawyers did not respond to requests for comment, and neither the indictment nor other documents made public in his case mention the fetuses.
'This needs to be reviewed,' said U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee who recently chaired a special U.S. House committee on the use of fetal tissue.
Blackburn recoiled when a Reuters reporter showed her some of the photographs, taken by government officials involved in the raid.
In four of the photos, a crime scene investigator in a hazmat suit uses forceps to lift a different fetus from the brownish liquid. In three other photos, a marker that includes a government evidence identification number lies beside a fetus.
'The actions depicted in these photos are an insult to human dignity,' said U.S. Representative Bob Goodlatte, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
A Republican from Virginia, Goodlatte said that if individuals 'violate federal laws and traffic in body parts of unborn children for monetary gain,' they should be 'held accountable.'
Blackburn said the discoveries in Rathburn´s warehouse raise questions about the practices of body brokers across America.
Such brokers take cadavers donated to science, dismember them and sell them for parts, typically for use in medical research and education.
The multimillion-dollar industry has been built largely on the poor, who donate their bodies in return for a free cremation of leftover body parts.
The buying and selling of cadavers and other body parts - with the exception of organs used in transplants - is legal and virtually unregulated in America. But trading in fetal tissue violates U.S. law.
In most states, including Michigan, public health authorities are not required to regularly inspect body broker facilities. As a result, it´s impossible to know whether body brokers who deal in adult donors are acquiring and profiting from fetuses.
Blackburn´s call for action came in response to a Reuters series that exposed abuses in the human body trade and what Blackburn called 'lax oversight' and 'lax enforcement' of the industry.
Photos from inside Rathburn´s warehouse offered a stark example of government failures to police the industry.
They include images of rotting human heads, some floating face up in a plastic cooler. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has been investigating Rathburn and other body brokers, declined to comment.
Blackburn said she found other Reuters stories about the body trade disturbing.
As part of the news agency´s examination of the industry, for example, a Reuters reporter was able to purchase two human heads and a cervical spine from Restore Life USA, a broker based in Blackburn´s home state of Tennessee. The deals were struck after just a few emails, at a cost of $900 plus shipping.
'It is sickening' how easily Restore Life sold the parts to Reuters, Blackburn said.
Told of Blackburn's concerns, Restore Life owner James Byrd said his company has 'invited her to tour our facility and to review the policy and procedures we have in place.'
Tuesday, December 26, 2017
FAT ROSIE WANTS BEN SHAPIRO TO SUCK HER DICK ….. HUH, FATSO HAS A DICK?
Is this proof Twitter favors liberals? Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro slams the site for their 'double standards' after they cleared Rosie O'Donnell of harassing him with vulgar post saying 'suck my dick'
Daily Mail
December 24, 2017
Ben Shapiro has slammed Twitter for saying Rosie O'Donnell was not abusive when she 'harassed' him on the social media platform.
The conservative columnist and commentator reported the former The View host after she directed a vulgar comment at him.
O'Donnell told editor in chief of the Daily Wire Shapiro to 'suck my dick ben' in a tweet that she later deleted.
She then taunted him for looking like a 'high school junior' when he said the remark was sexual harassment.
Shapiro wrote in a tweet on Friday: 'Just reported @Rosie for targeted harassment, mainly to see if Twitter does indeed have a double standard. Everyone knows if Rosie were conservative, Twitter would suspend her in a hot second. So, Twitter, put your money where your mouth is.'
He then wrote: 'It's an attempt to clarify Twitter's standards. I don't actually want them to ban or suspend Rosie. I want them to stop applying their own rules inconsistently.'
Just a few hours later, Shapiro revealed to his followers that he had already got a response from Twitter.
Alongside a screenshot of the decision from Twitter, he wrote: 'Surprise of surprises. Twitter says that @Rosie's tweets were not in fact abusive in any way under their rules. Good to know.'
The feud between the pair started when Shapiro slammed the talk show host for saying she would give Senators Susan Collins and Jeff Flake $2million for voting against the Republican's tax reform.
Many critics, including Shapiro, said the payment would be a violation of federal law.
After Shapiro alerted his followers that he had reported O'Donnell, she simply replied, 'oh ben'.
He responded to her by saying: 'All victims deserve to be believed.'
EDITOR’S NOTE: On Saturday night, Twitter reversed its position and removed Rosie’s ‘suck my dick’ tweet. Twitter sent Shapiro the following notice:
“You have received two emails from us about your recent report. The first email stated that the Tweets were not in violation of our policies when in fact they are, based on our Twitter rules. We have required that the reported Tweets be deleted and they have since been removed.”
Daily Mail
December 24, 2017
Ben Shapiro has slammed Twitter for saying Rosie O'Donnell was not abusive when she 'harassed' him on the social media platform.
The conservative columnist and commentator reported the former The View host after she directed a vulgar comment at him.
O'Donnell told editor in chief of the Daily Wire Shapiro to 'suck my dick ben' in a tweet that she later deleted.
She then taunted him for looking like a 'high school junior' when he said the remark was sexual harassment.
Shapiro wrote in a tweet on Friday: 'Just reported @Rosie for targeted harassment, mainly to see if Twitter does indeed have a double standard. Everyone knows if Rosie were conservative, Twitter would suspend her in a hot second. So, Twitter, put your money where your mouth is.'
He then wrote: 'It's an attempt to clarify Twitter's standards. I don't actually want them to ban or suspend Rosie. I want them to stop applying their own rules inconsistently.'
Just a few hours later, Shapiro revealed to his followers that he had already got a response from Twitter.
Alongside a screenshot of the decision from Twitter, he wrote: 'Surprise of surprises. Twitter says that @Rosie's tweets were not in fact abusive in any way under their rules. Good to know.'
The feud between the pair started when Shapiro slammed the talk show host for saying she would give Senators Susan Collins and Jeff Flake $2million for voting against the Republican's tax reform.
Many critics, including Shapiro, said the payment would be a violation of federal law.
After Shapiro alerted his followers that he had reported O'Donnell, she simply replied, 'oh ben'.
He responded to her by saying: 'All victims deserve to be believed.'
EDITOR’S NOTE: On Saturday night, Twitter reversed its position and removed Rosie’s ‘suck my dick’ tweet. Twitter sent Shapiro the following notice:
“You have received two emails from us about your recent report. The first email stated that the Tweets were not in violation of our policies when in fact they are, based on our Twitter rules. We have required that the reported Tweets be deleted and they have since been removed.”
MEXICAN KILLER COPS HUNTED BY JALISCO NEW GENERATION CARTEL
Mexico’s Jalisco New Generation Cartel put a price on the heads of police officers accused of killing women and children and allegedly attempting to cover up the crime
By Jeremy Kryt
Daily Beast
December 20. 2017
In the central Mexican state of Morelos on Thursday, Nov. 30, a raid by state police left four women, an infant, and a teenage boy dead. And since then Mexico’s fastest growing drug cartel has been out for blood.
The officers involved claim the deceased were “caught in a crossfire” during a shootout at their residence in the town of Temixco, about three miles south of Cuernavaca, a popular tourist destination.
But the crossfire theory has been contradicted by eyewitness testimony and and by forensic evidence. The half-dozen victims were found huddled on the bathroom floor and appear to have been killed execution style. At least three bodies were found with a single 9mm bullet to the head, according to the family lawyer. Investigators also charge that the police officers falsified evidence in the case, such as planting bogus firearms near the bodies.
The target of the raid was José Valdez Chapa, aka “El Señor de la V” (“The Lord of the V”). Valdez allegedly has been linked to several criminal organizations, including Los Rojos (The Reds), the Southern Cartel, and the ascendant Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).
Those killed during the operation were all Valdez’s immediate family, including his wife, mother, sister, cousin, 2-month-old niece, and 14-year-old nephew. They were celebrating the baptism of the youngest child when police stormed the apartment building.
Valdez and six others surrendered to authorities during the raid. However, over the next few days all the suspects were freed, with the presiding judge citing “inconsistencies” in police reports and in the results of field ballistic tests.
Upon his release, The Lord of the V was met by a convoy of 10 trucks bearing some 40 men, as reported by Mexico’s Milenio newspaper. Standing before the courthouse, Valdez promised vengeance against those officials from the Morelos State Commission for Public Security responsible for the alleged extrajudicial killings.
“For every drop of blood spilled from my family [there] will be a liter of blood spilled from yours,” Valdez vowed before climbing aboard one of the trucks and speeding off.
“Perfect Lethality”
Valdez wasn’t alone in his outrage over the bloodshed of innocents and charges of police corruption. The “massacre” quickly led to street protests in Temixco, with marchers carrying signs demanding the accused officers be brought to justice.
The family’s lawyer has accused authorities of “fabricating” a crime scene, and forensics indicate the weapons planted on the bodies of the slain women had not been fired by them. In fact, investigators indicate that police officers were the only ones to have discharged weapons during the raid, and that their claims of “repelling” an attack were faked.
A survivor of the assault said that officers “came in shooting,” and promised “that they were going to kill everyone.” Based on preliminary evidence, Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission has promised to take up the case, although such scrutiny carries little official weight.
Morelos Police Commissioner Alberto Capella already has walked back his initial promise to undertake an internal investigation. Capella now refuses to release the names of the officers involved and is sticking to the “crossfire” story despite evidence to the contrary.
“These cases are all too common in Mexico,” says Laura Carlsen, director of the Mexico-based Americas Project, in an interview with The Daily Beast. “There’s even a category for it with the macabre title of ‘perfect lethality.’”
That’s when “the people on just one side are killed and there are no wounded. This doesn’t happen in a shootout—in real life, in a typical shootout, you have about an equal killed-to-wounded ratio,” Carlsen said. Perfect lethality only “happens in an execution.”
Extrajudicial killings like those in Temixco are “part of the strategy and a standard practice of the police and armed forces here,” Carlson says. A 2016 analysis by the United Nations also highlighted the “lack of accountability” behind such frequent executions in Mexico.
“Trust in the police and justice system [is] at desperately low levels among the public,” says Duncan Wood, a Latin American specialist with the Woodrow Wilson Center.
Wood also agrees with Carlsen that the narrative offered by Morelos state authorities in the Temixco shootings seems implausible:
“With ample evidence to show that police have repeatedly failed to use effective investigative tools and procedures, there is every reason to be skeptical of the official version of events,” says Wood.
Until an independent investigation takes place, he adds, “serious doubts will continue to be raised about police actions.”
V for “Vendetta”
José “El Señor de la V” Valdez was last seen threatening the Morelos state police and promising blood for blood. But his enemies are also out for vengeance.
In December of 2015, another shootout occurred in Morelos, this time in an upscale neighborhood of Cuernavaca. The Lord of the V escaped, but Valdez’s younger brother Óscar was killed in the gun battle—and so was one of the cops.
Observers say the slaughter of the Valdez clan in Temixco was likely meant as payback for the dead officer.
“This case apparently shows a bloody vendetta in a context of impunity such that security forces didn’t think twice about massacring an entire family,” Carlsen says. “Mexico is dangerously close to a state where police and armed forces have in practice carte blanche powers, with no consequences for crimes and human rights violations.”
But if corrupt cops might have little reason to fear legal repercussions in Mexico, they can still be subject to the law of the streets.
A week after events in Temixco, the fearsome CJNG put up signs along a highway in Morelos offering a 100,000 peso reward (about $5,000) for the heads of Commissioner Capella and several other police chiefs and commanders linked to the Valdez case.
By far the most powerful of the crime groups with which Valdez has been associated, the involvement of the CJNG dramatically increases the chances that Lord V will act on his promise to spill “liters” of blood in his quest for revenge.
“CJNG is now the largest cartel in Mexico. They’re always looking for ways to expand their territory, and Morelos is no exception,” says Emmanuel Gallardo, an independent journalist in Mexico City. He explains that bounties on the officers are a way to “pressure and intimidate” authorities into compliance with the cartel.
“This is just more proof that Mexican authorities are incapable of providing security to citizens,” says Gallardo, who characterizes police in Morelos as “corrupt to the core.”
Americas Project Director Carlsen takes heart, however, from the response generated by grassroots demonstrations and NGOs alike:
“The fact that there are protests and investigation of the [Temixco] massacre as a crime against humanity is encouraging,” she says. “If there is enough outrage and organization, the hope is that it can crack the impunity”—and in the process thwart the law of the street.
By Jeremy Kryt
Daily Beast
December 20. 2017
In the central Mexican state of Morelos on Thursday, Nov. 30, a raid by state police left four women, an infant, and a teenage boy dead. And since then Mexico’s fastest growing drug cartel has been out for blood.
The officers involved claim the deceased were “caught in a crossfire” during a shootout at their residence in the town of Temixco, about three miles south of Cuernavaca, a popular tourist destination.
But the crossfire theory has been contradicted by eyewitness testimony and and by forensic evidence. The half-dozen victims were found huddled on the bathroom floor and appear to have been killed execution style. At least three bodies were found with a single 9mm bullet to the head, according to the family lawyer. Investigators also charge that the police officers falsified evidence in the case, such as planting bogus firearms near the bodies.
The target of the raid was José Valdez Chapa, aka “El Señor de la V” (“The Lord of the V”). Valdez allegedly has been linked to several criminal organizations, including Los Rojos (The Reds), the Southern Cartel, and the ascendant Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).
Those killed during the operation were all Valdez’s immediate family, including his wife, mother, sister, cousin, 2-month-old niece, and 14-year-old nephew. They were celebrating the baptism of the youngest child when police stormed the apartment building.
Valdez and six others surrendered to authorities during the raid. However, over the next few days all the suspects were freed, with the presiding judge citing “inconsistencies” in police reports and in the results of field ballistic tests.
Upon his release, The Lord of the V was met by a convoy of 10 trucks bearing some 40 men, as reported by Mexico’s Milenio newspaper. Standing before the courthouse, Valdez promised vengeance against those officials from the Morelos State Commission for Public Security responsible for the alleged extrajudicial killings.
“For every drop of blood spilled from my family [there] will be a liter of blood spilled from yours,” Valdez vowed before climbing aboard one of the trucks and speeding off.
“Perfect Lethality”
Valdez wasn’t alone in his outrage over the bloodshed of innocents and charges of police corruption. The “massacre” quickly led to street protests in Temixco, with marchers carrying signs demanding the accused officers be brought to justice.
The family’s lawyer has accused authorities of “fabricating” a crime scene, and forensics indicate the weapons planted on the bodies of the slain women had not been fired by them. In fact, investigators indicate that police officers were the only ones to have discharged weapons during the raid, and that their claims of “repelling” an attack were faked.
A survivor of the assault said that officers “came in shooting,” and promised “that they were going to kill everyone.” Based on preliminary evidence, Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission has promised to take up the case, although such scrutiny carries little official weight.
Morelos Police Commissioner Alberto Capella already has walked back his initial promise to undertake an internal investigation. Capella now refuses to release the names of the officers involved and is sticking to the “crossfire” story despite evidence to the contrary.
“These cases are all too common in Mexico,” says Laura Carlsen, director of the Mexico-based Americas Project, in an interview with The Daily Beast. “There’s even a category for it with the macabre title of ‘perfect lethality.’”
That’s when “the people on just one side are killed and there are no wounded. This doesn’t happen in a shootout—in real life, in a typical shootout, you have about an equal killed-to-wounded ratio,” Carlsen said. Perfect lethality only “happens in an execution.”
Extrajudicial killings like those in Temixco are “part of the strategy and a standard practice of the police and armed forces here,” Carlson says. A 2016 analysis by the United Nations also highlighted the “lack of accountability” behind such frequent executions in Mexico.
“Trust in the police and justice system [is] at desperately low levels among the public,” says Duncan Wood, a Latin American specialist with the Woodrow Wilson Center.
Wood also agrees with Carlsen that the narrative offered by Morelos state authorities in the Temixco shootings seems implausible:
“With ample evidence to show that police have repeatedly failed to use effective investigative tools and procedures, there is every reason to be skeptical of the official version of events,” says Wood.
Until an independent investigation takes place, he adds, “serious doubts will continue to be raised about police actions.”
V for “Vendetta”
José “El Señor de la V” Valdez was last seen threatening the Morelos state police and promising blood for blood. But his enemies are also out for vengeance.
In December of 2015, another shootout occurred in Morelos, this time in an upscale neighborhood of Cuernavaca. The Lord of the V escaped, but Valdez’s younger brother Óscar was killed in the gun battle—and so was one of the cops.
Observers say the slaughter of the Valdez clan in Temixco was likely meant as payback for the dead officer.
“This case apparently shows a bloody vendetta in a context of impunity such that security forces didn’t think twice about massacring an entire family,” Carlsen says. “Mexico is dangerously close to a state where police and armed forces have in practice carte blanche powers, with no consequences for crimes and human rights violations.”
But if corrupt cops might have little reason to fear legal repercussions in Mexico, they can still be subject to the law of the streets.
A week after events in Temixco, the fearsome CJNG put up signs along a highway in Morelos offering a 100,000 peso reward (about $5,000) for the heads of Commissioner Capella and several other police chiefs and commanders linked to the Valdez case.
By far the most powerful of the crime groups with which Valdez has been associated, the involvement of the CJNG dramatically increases the chances that Lord V will act on his promise to spill “liters” of blood in his quest for revenge.
“CJNG is now the largest cartel in Mexico. They’re always looking for ways to expand their territory, and Morelos is no exception,” says Emmanuel Gallardo, an independent journalist in Mexico City. He explains that bounties on the officers are a way to “pressure and intimidate” authorities into compliance with the cartel.
“This is just more proof that Mexican authorities are incapable of providing security to citizens,” says Gallardo, who characterizes police in Morelos as “corrupt to the core.”
Americas Project Director Carlsen takes heart, however, from the response generated by grassroots demonstrations and NGOs alike:
“The fact that there are protests and investigation of the [Temixco] massacre as a crime against humanity is encouraging,” she says. “If there is enough outrage and organization, the hope is that it can crack the impunity”—and in the process thwart the law of the street.
MEXICO’S DRUG TRADE HITS HOME
Mexico suffers growing addiction and violence as a byproduct of the U.S.-bound flow of narcotics
By Joshua Partlow
The Washington Post
December 21, 2017
TIJUANA¬, MEXICO—In one of her earliest memories, she is crouched under leafy green stalks, hiding from Mexican soldiers. By the time she was in grammar school, she was driving a four-wheeler through those marijuana fields.
By 15, Mildred Barreras Godoy lived along the border, with a boyfriend who each morning disguised himself in an orange construction vest and work boots and drove truckloads of methamphetamine into California, while she waited for his text message: “I scored the goal.”
That was how the habit started for this green-eyed, vivacious daughter of Mexico’s drug-war generation: by proximity. Drugs were always around — someone planting or tending or buying or selling or injecting or inhaling — until she began herself, first snorting lines of crystal meth at parties and then smoking it with such obsession she tore her eyebrows out.
“In my world, everyone uses,” she said.
The drug abuse that has become a defining feature of American life is increasingly emerging in Mexico as well, posing a daunting challenge for health officials and feeding the country’s soaring violence.
For decades, Mexico regarded addiction as an American problem, even as the flow of drugs through this country sharply escalated — and narcotics began seeping into the domestic market. Police and politicians routinely helped the drug cartels in exchange for bribes.
“We produce it in Mexico, that is a problem, and we export it, but every year more stays here, and people begin to consume it,” said Manuel Mondragón y Kalb, the head of Mexico’s National Commission Against Addictions, part of the Health Ministry.
Now Mexican officials must reckon with rising heroin use in the border town of Ciudad Juarez; cocaine circulating in Acapulco’s beach scene; and meth addicts filling rehab centers in the western Jalisco state.
While rates of drug use here remain far below those of the United States, the percentage of Mexican men between 12 and 65 who have used illegal drugs nearly doubled over the past decade (to 15.8 percent) while the percentage of women more than doubled (to 4.3 percent), according to the latest national survey.
“We don’t have a boom, but in some states, yes, we have a problem,” Mondragón y Kalb said.
Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, is one of the problem areas.
While precise numbers are unavailable, the number of drug addicts here has surged, with some estimating it has doubled in a decade. In this year that could shatter Mexican homicide records, more than 1,400 people were killed in this city through October — more than ever before. That is more than twice as many homicides as in Chicago, which has a million more people.
Many addicts in this city use heroin or methamphetamine, or both. Cesar Corona, 27 and unemployed, calls this combination the “Belushi.” On a recent day, he was injecting it into his neck as the sun set on “El Bordo,” a cement expanse along the border populated by drug addicts and deportees. As the drug took hold, his eyes rolled back, his knees buckled, and he began to smile.
“Drug use has exploded here in an incredible way,” said Florina Righetti Rojo, who runs a rehab center, Casa Corazon, for women in Tijuana. “What has this brought us? How many dead?”
Beyond tourist revelry
This gritty border town of 1.7 million people has a well-worn reputation as a sin city, a place where drugs, booze and prostitutes have long been accessible to Americans and Mexicans alike.
The current drug crisis, however, extends far beyond tourist revelry, as methamphetamines have flooded the neighborhoods that house workers in the city’s booming factories.
Mexico’s growing consumption is partly driven by a vast supply. Long a marijuana and opium poppy producer, this country took on a bigger role when its cartels became major transporters of Colombian cocaine to the United States in the 1980s.
Over the past decade, the amount of drugs in circulation and crossing the U.S. border has soared. Between 2013 and 2016, driven by a ravenous U.S. appetite, Mexico more than tripled the amount of opium poppy it produced, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. And as U.S. authorities cracked down on American meth labs, production shifted to Mexico. The nearly 54,400 pounds of meth seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials in fiscal 2017 is triple the amount captured five years earlier.
Some compare the border to a dam: As the U.S. government has tightened security in the post-9/11 era, drugs have pooled on the Mexican side. Cartels have flooded the border “with enormous amounts of meth that could not be crossed into the U.S. as quickly as it arrives, so mid- and lower-level distributors push it out into the local markets,” a U.S. law enforcement official who works in the region said on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
The people dying in drug-related violence are generally not important figures in the cartels, said Victor Clark-Alfaro, a human-rights activist who teaches at San Diego State University.
“They are minor players who are killing each other,” he said. “But they are killing because it is an enormous market.”
‘I was looking for acceptance’
Mildred grew up in the rural outskirts of Los Mochis, a coastal town in the Sinaloa state, a place where drug lords such as Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán were considered folk heroes by locals who benefited from their largesse. She didn’t know her father. Her mother, who was 17 when Mildred was born, would travel to California for months on end to earn money. The girl was left with her grandmother, who grew corn and tomatoes.
On neighboring farms, Mildred discovered Sinaloa’s more famous crops. She would tag along with relatives when they tended marijuana plants. She sometimes worked as a spotter, carrying a whistle and a radio as she watched for soldiers. The cat-and-mouse game was exhilarating, another ad¬ven¬ture for a girl who enjoyed racing through marijuana fields on the rugged four-wheelers common in the area.
“I loved it,” she said.
In 2011, Mildred’s family moved to Tijuana to find jobs — her mom as a beautician, her new stepfather as a factory worker. The city had become so saturated with methamphetamine that the price had plunged. In Mildred’s working-class neighborhood, El Florido, teens would gather on the sidewalks and soccer fields to hawk plastic bags of the drug.
In her new home, Mildred felt uprooted and alone. As she entered her teens, she gravitated toward the rough neighborhood kids.
“I was looking for acceptance, to be part of a group, a family,” she said.
When she met a handsome 20-year-old at a New Year’s Eve party in 2015, she fell for him. The man drove a pickup truck and always had money. He had also recently finished a jail term for drug trafficking, she learned.
Her mother, Azucena Barreras Godoy, tried unsuccessfully to keep the teenager away from her new boyfriend. But with her own marriage falling apart, the mother finally relented when Mildred moved in with the older man.
“I didn’t have any other option,” the mother said. Her fights with Mildred were turning into screaming matches. “So I said, ‘Okay, live with him, maybe you’ll find some maturity and discover that this is not how life works.’ ”
Instead, at her boyfriend’s house, Mildred would smoke marijuana and meth. She helped him by packing crystal meth into large zip-top bags, she recalled. Every morning, like a traditional Mexican wife, Mildred would wake up by 4 a.m. to make her boyfriend breakfast and pack his lunch for the day’s crossing.
He would be home by late afternoon. Their money piled up.
“With what I saved in two weeks, I could buy a house,” she said.
‘I only wanted to do drugs’
As Mildred became entwined in the drug business, the violence around her escalated.
One evening, three armored white pickup trucks pulled up in front of Mildred’s house. Inside were cartel members who hadn’t been able to reach her boyfriend after he had taken a shipment into California. Panicking, she grabbed her boyfriend’s .45-caliber pistol from a closet and waited by the door.
“I thought I’d better shoot them before they could shoot me,” she recalled.
Eventually her boyfriend returned and the misunderstanding was resolved.
As the drug market in Tijuana has grown more lucrative, the battle for the right to sell has become bloodier.
“We know that the violence is surging now because of the drug dealers,” said Juan Carlos Moran, the federal police commander in Tijuana.
Drugs aren’t the only factor in the high homicide rate. There is pervasive poverty. And the decline of the once-dominant Arellano Félix cartel has led to the arrival of other cartels and a splintering of criminal organizations, which have branched into activities including robbery and kidnapping.
On one occasion, Mildred recalled, some cartel members asked her to feed a woman who was being held for ransom. The sight of the elderly, blindfolded woman, who reminded her of her grandmother, unnerved Mildred so much that she called a taxi and helped her escape.
“I have a heart, too,” she said.
When Mildred was a girl, her grandmother used to serve her marijuana tea to treat colitis. But in this conservative country, using hard drugs tended to be taboo.
By age 15, though, Mildred was smoking meth several times a day, enjoying the feverish intensity of the high.
The drug made Mildred’s pupils dilate and the hair on her arms stand on end. She would go into frenzies of housecleaning that lasted hours. In a bout of trimming her eyebrows, she plucked herself clean.
Like many meth users, she went days without sleeping and lost her appetite. Gaunt and jaundiced, she dropped out two months before finishing middle school.
“I hardly ever bathed,” she recalled. “I only wanted to do drugs.”
She fought her mother’s efforts to get her into rehab. Then, one day in June, Azucena Barreras Godoy invited her daughter home for a visit with some cousins. She offered the girl a vitamin capsule that she had secretly filled with the tranquilizer Clonazepam, the mother later recalled.
As Mildred relaxed, the family pounced, tying her legs with a belt.
They hustled her into the car, two cousins guarding Mildred in the back seat, and set out for a rehab center. Mildred frantically considered throwing herself out the window. But the tranquilizer was sapping her strength.
By the time Casa Corazon’s metal door locked behind her, she could no longer resist.
A failing fight
Florina Righetti Rojo opened the center four years ago to cater to the growing population of female addicts. She wants to open another facility for adolescents but hasn’t been able to raise the money.
“Drug use starts in middle school now,” she said.
Mexico is woefully ill-equipped to handle the intensifying addiction problem. As part of a retooling of narcotics laws in 2009, the country planned a major expansion of drug treatment services. That has failed to materialize because of a lack of funding and shifting political priorities, according to public-health experts.
In Baja California, the state where Tijuana is located, the majority of the roughly 200 treatment centers are private, which means they are beyond the means of many poor Mexicans. Some facilities have faced accusations of abuse. Casa Corazon costs $300 per month but treats some women free.
Mexican officials say they are working hard to raise awareness about the drug problem. The National Commission Against Addictions has developed partnerships with the military and public schools and established state-level councils to promote prevention. In Baja California, a new television ad campaign warns of the dangers of drugs. But there is no sign the trend is being reversed.
“Basically, we’re failing in this fight against addiction,” said Jaime Arredondo Sanchez, a researcher at the U.S.-Mexico Border Health Commission, who studies drug issues in Tijuana.
Surveys have found only a fraction of the people who are dependent on drugs are in treatment.
Mildred is one of the lucky ones. After five months in Casa Corazon, she has been “reborn,” her mother says. The teen has regained the 35 pounds she lost while using meth. She plays soccer three days a week. She passed the test to graduate from middle school. She laughs easily and often.
In therapy sessions, Mildred has retraced the path that led to her addiction.
“I know that what I’ve lived, and what I’ve done, has not been good,” she said. “I was sick before.”
Now she’s ready to begin a new life, she insists, with a new goal. She has decided to become a nurse.
“I want to save lives,” she said.
Her mother still worries about the 16-year-old’s release, expected early next year. She is working on a plan to send the teen back to Sinaloa for school.
She knows the risks in Mildred’s old neighborhood are ever-present. And the lure of meth has not fully dimmed.
Mildred, smiling, recalls it as “delicious.”
“I think the cravings will never stop,” she said.
Ana Ceballos in Tijuana and Gabriela Martinez in Mexico City contributed to this report.
By Joshua Partlow
The Washington Post
December 21, 2017
TIJUANA¬, MEXICO—In one of her earliest memories, she is crouched under leafy green stalks, hiding from Mexican soldiers. By the time she was in grammar school, she was driving a four-wheeler through those marijuana fields.
By 15, Mildred Barreras Godoy lived along the border, with a boyfriend who each morning disguised himself in an orange construction vest and work boots and drove truckloads of methamphetamine into California, while she waited for his text message: “I scored the goal.”
That was how the habit started for this green-eyed, vivacious daughter of Mexico’s drug-war generation: by proximity. Drugs were always around — someone planting or tending or buying or selling or injecting or inhaling — until she began herself, first snorting lines of crystal meth at parties and then smoking it with such obsession she tore her eyebrows out.
“In my world, everyone uses,” she said.
The drug abuse that has become a defining feature of American life is increasingly emerging in Mexico as well, posing a daunting challenge for health officials and feeding the country’s soaring violence.
For decades, Mexico regarded addiction as an American problem, even as the flow of drugs through this country sharply escalated — and narcotics began seeping into the domestic market. Police and politicians routinely helped the drug cartels in exchange for bribes.
“We produce it in Mexico, that is a problem, and we export it, but every year more stays here, and people begin to consume it,” said Manuel Mondragón y Kalb, the head of Mexico’s National Commission Against Addictions, part of the Health Ministry.
Now Mexican officials must reckon with rising heroin use in the border town of Ciudad Juarez; cocaine circulating in Acapulco’s beach scene; and meth addicts filling rehab centers in the western Jalisco state.
While rates of drug use here remain far below those of the United States, the percentage of Mexican men between 12 and 65 who have used illegal drugs nearly doubled over the past decade (to 15.8 percent) while the percentage of women more than doubled (to 4.3 percent), according to the latest national survey.
“We don’t have a boom, but in some states, yes, we have a problem,” Mondragón y Kalb said.
Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, is one of the problem areas.
While precise numbers are unavailable, the number of drug addicts here has surged, with some estimating it has doubled in a decade. In this year that could shatter Mexican homicide records, more than 1,400 people were killed in this city through October — more than ever before. That is more than twice as many homicides as in Chicago, which has a million more people.
Many addicts in this city use heroin or methamphetamine, or both. Cesar Corona, 27 and unemployed, calls this combination the “Belushi.” On a recent day, he was injecting it into his neck as the sun set on “El Bordo,” a cement expanse along the border populated by drug addicts and deportees. As the drug took hold, his eyes rolled back, his knees buckled, and he began to smile.
“Drug use has exploded here in an incredible way,” said Florina Righetti Rojo, who runs a rehab center, Casa Corazon, for women in Tijuana. “What has this brought us? How many dead?”
Beyond tourist revelry
This gritty border town of 1.7 million people has a well-worn reputation as a sin city, a place where drugs, booze and prostitutes have long been accessible to Americans and Mexicans alike.
The current drug crisis, however, extends far beyond tourist revelry, as methamphetamines have flooded the neighborhoods that house workers in the city’s booming factories.
Mexico’s growing consumption is partly driven by a vast supply. Long a marijuana and opium poppy producer, this country took on a bigger role when its cartels became major transporters of Colombian cocaine to the United States in the 1980s.
Over the past decade, the amount of drugs in circulation and crossing the U.S. border has soared. Between 2013 and 2016, driven by a ravenous U.S. appetite, Mexico more than tripled the amount of opium poppy it produced, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. And as U.S. authorities cracked down on American meth labs, production shifted to Mexico. The nearly 54,400 pounds of meth seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials in fiscal 2017 is triple the amount captured five years earlier.
Some compare the border to a dam: As the U.S. government has tightened security in the post-9/11 era, drugs have pooled on the Mexican side. Cartels have flooded the border “with enormous amounts of meth that could not be crossed into the U.S. as quickly as it arrives, so mid- and lower-level distributors push it out into the local markets,” a U.S. law enforcement official who works in the region said on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
The people dying in drug-related violence are generally not important figures in the cartels, said Victor Clark-Alfaro, a human-rights activist who teaches at San Diego State University.
“They are minor players who are killing each other,” he said. “But they are killing because it is an enormous market.”
‘I was looking for acceptance’
Mildred grew up in the rural outskirts of Los Mochis, a coastal town in the Sinaloa state, a place where drug lords such as Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán were considered folk heroes by locals who benefited from their largesse. She didn’t know her father. Her mother, who was 17 when Mildred was born, would travel to California for months on end to earn money. The girl was left with her grandmother, who grew corn and tomatoes.
On neighboring farms, Mildred discovered Sinaloa’s more famous crops. She would tag along with relatives when they tended marijuana plants. She sometimes worked as a spotter, carrying a whistle and a radio as she watched for soldiers. The cat-and-mouse game was exhilarating, another ad¬ven¬ture for a girl who enjoyed racing through marijuana fields on the rugged four-wheelers common in the area.
“I loved it,” she said.
In 2011, Mildred’s family moved to Tijuana to find jobs — her mom as a beautician, her new stepfather as a factory worker. The city had become so saturated with methamphetamine that the price had plunged. In Mildred’s working-class neighborhood, El Florido, teens would gather on the sidewalks and soccer fields to hawk plastic bags of the drug.
In her new home, Mildred felt uprooted and alone. As she entered her teens, she gravitated toward the rough neighborhood kids.
“I was looking for acceptance, to be part of a group, a family,” she said.
When she met a handsome 20-year-old at a New Year’s Eve party in 2015, she fell for him. The man drove a pickup truck and always had money. He had also recently finished a jail term for drug trafficking, she learned.
Her mother, Azucena Barreras Godoy, tried unsuccessfully to keep the teenager away from her new boyfriend. But with her own marriage falling apart, the mother finally relented when Mildred moved in with the older man.
“I didn’t have any other option,” the mother said. Her fights with Mildred were turning into screaming matches. “So I said, ‘Okay, live with him, maybe you’ll find some maturity and discover that this is not how life works.’ ”
Instead, at her boyfriend’s house, Mildred would smoke marijuana and meth. She helped him by packing crystal meth into large zip-top bags, she recalled. Every morning, like a traditional Mexican wife, Mildred would wake up by 4 a.m. to make her boyfriend breakfast and pack his lunch for the day’s crossing.
He would be home by late afternoon. Their money piled up.
“With what I saved in two weeks, I could buy a house,” she said.
‘I only wanted to do drugs’
As Mildred became entwined in the drug business, the violence around her escalated.
One evening, three armored white pickup trucks pulled up in front of Mildred’s house. Inside were cartel members who hadn’t been able to reach her boyfriend after he had taken a shipment into California. Panicking, she grabbed her boyfriend’s .45-caliber pistol from a closet and waited by the door.
“I thought I’d better shoot them before they could shoot me,” she recalled.
Eventually her boyfriend returned and the misunderstanding was resolved.
As the drug market in Tijuana has grown more lucrative, the battle for the right to sell has become bloodier.
“We know that the violence is surging now because of the drug dealers,” said Juan Carlos Moran, the federal police commander in Tijuana.
Drugs aren’t the only factor in the high homicide rate. There is pervasive poverty. And the decline of the once-dominant Arellano Félix cartel has led to the arrival of other cartels and a splintering of criminal organizations, which have branched into activities including robbery and kidnapping.
On one occasion, Mildred recalled, some cartel members asked her to feed a woman who was being held for ransom. The sight of the elderly, blindfolded woman, who reminded her of her grandmother, unnerved Mildred so much that she called a taxi and helped her escape.
“I have a heart, too,” she said.
When Mildred was a girl, her grandmother used to serve her marijuana tea to treat colitis. But in this conservative country, using hard drugs tended to be taboo.
By age 15, though, Mildred was smoking meth several times a day, enjoying the feverish intensity of the high.
The drug made Mildred’s pupils dilate and the hair on her arms stand on end. She would go into frenzies of housecleaning that lasted hours. In a bout of trimming her eyebrows, she plucked herself clean.
Like many meth users, she went days without sleeping and lost her appetite. Gaunt and jaundiced, she dropped out two months before finishing middle school.
“I hardly ever bathed,” she recalled. “I only wanted to do drugs.”
She fought her mother’s efforts to get her into rehab. Then, one day in June, Azucena Barreras Godoy invited her daughter home for a visit with some cousins. She offered the girl a vitamin capsule that she had secretly filled with the tranquilizer Clonazepam, the mother later recalled.
As Mildred relaxed, the family pounced, tying her legs with a belt.
They hustled her into the car, two cousins guarding Mildred in the back seat, and set out for a rehab center. Mildred frantically considered throwing herself out the window. But the tranquilizer was sapping her strength.
By the time Casa Corazon’s metal door locked behind her, she could no longer resist.
A failing fight
Florina Righetti Rojo opened the center four years ago to cater to the growing population of female addicts. She wants to open another facility for adolescents but hasn’t been able to raise the money.
“Drug use starts in middle school now,” she said.
Mexico is woefully ill-equipped to handle the intensifying addiction problem. As part of a retooling of narcotics laws in 2009, the country planned a major expansion of drug treatment services. That has failed to materialize because of a lack of funding and shifting political priorities, according to public-health experts.
In Baja California, the state where Tijuana is located, the majority of the roughly 200 treatment centers are private, which means they are beyond the means of many poor Mexicans. Some facilities have faced accusations of abuse. Casa Corazon costs $300 per month but treats some women free.
Mexican officials say they are working hard to raise awareness about the drug problem. The National Commission Against Addictions has developed partnerships with the military and public schools and established state-level councils to promote prevention. In Baja California, a new television ad campaign warns of the dangers of drugs. But there is no sign the trend is being reversed.
“Basically, we’re failing in this fight against addiction,” said Jaime Arredondo Sanchez, a researcher at the U.S.-Mexico Border Health Commission, who studies drug issues in Tijuana.
Surveys have found only a fraction of the people who are dependent on drugs are in treatment.
Mildred is one of the lucky ones. After five months in Casa Corazon, she has been “reborn,” her mother says. The teen has regained the 35 pounds she lost while using meth. She plays soccer three days a week. She passed the test to graduate from middle school. She laughs easily and often.
In therapy sessions, Mildred has retraced the path that led to her addiction.
“I know that what I’ve lived, and what I’ve done, has not been good,” she said. “I was sick before.”
Now she’s ready to begin a new life, she insists, with a new goal. She has decided to become a nurse.
“I want to save lives,” she said.
Her mother still worries about the 16-year-old’s release, expected early next year. She is working on a plan to send the teen back to Sinaloa for school.
She knows the risks in Mildred’s old neighborhood are ever-present. And the lure of meth has not fully dimmed.
Mildred, smiling, recalls it as “delicious.”
“I think the cravings will never stop,” she said.
Ana Ceballos in Tijuana and Gabriela Martinez in Mexico City contributed to this report.
Monday, December 25, 2017
SHEILA JACKSON LEE PLAYS RACE CARD OVER DISPUTE OF FIRST CLASS SEAT
School teacher claims she was bumped out of her first class seat on a United flight by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee
BarkGrowlBite
December 25, 2017
Jean-Marie Simon, 63, a private school teacher from Washington, D.C., purchased a first class round trip ticket on United Airlines from D.C. to Guatemala and back. Things did not go well for her on the second leg of her return flight. When she boarded that flight in Houston on December 18, she found someone else sitting in her first class seat. That person was non other than Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee.
United, which has lately been known for throwing passengers off its flights, claims that Simon had cancelled her return flight. Simon denies it. She was given a $500 voucher and seated in the economy section.
Simon, a white woman, argued with a black flight attendant that she should be given the seat now occupied by the congresswoman. Jackson Lee overheard the argument and subsequently issued this statement:
“Since this was not any fault of mine, the way the individual continued to act appeared to be, upon reflection, because I was an African American woman, seemingly an easy target along with the African American flight attendant who was very, very nice. This saddens me, especially at this time of year given all of the things we have to work on to help people. But in the spirit of this season and out of the sincerity of my heart, if it is perceived that I had anything to do with this, I am kind enough to simply say sorry.”
By her statement , Jackson Lee has demonstrated that us sorry-ass whites continue to treat African-Americans as second class people.
Jackson Lee continues to be an uber-embarrassment to the City of Houston.
In the spirit of the Christmas season, Jackson Lee should have given her seat to Simon and taken a seat in the economy section with the common folks she always claims to be speaking for. Instead she has taken this opportunity to play the race card.
Ho Ho Ho - And a Merry Christmas to all ….. that is except for Jean-Marie Simon – Ho Ho Ho
BarkGrowlBite
December 25, 2017
Jean-Marie Simon, 63, a private school teacher from Washington, D.C., purchased a first class round trip ticket on United Airlines from D.C. to Guatemala and back. Things did not go well for her on the second leg of her return flight. When she boarded that flight in Houston on December 18, she found someone else sitting in her first class seat. That person was non other than Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee.
United, which has lately been known for throwing passengers off its flights, claims that Simon had cancelled her return flight. Simon denies it. She was given a $500 voucher and seated in the economy section.
Simon, a white woman, argued with a black flight attendant that she should be given the seat now occupied by the congresswoman. Jackson Lee overheard the argument and subsequently issued this statement:
“Since this was not any fault of mine, the way the individual continued to act appeared to be, upon reflection, because I was an African American woman, seemingly an easy target along with the African American flight attendant who was very, very nice. This saddens me, especially at this time of year given all of the things we have to work on to help people. But in the spirit of this season and out of the sincerity of my heart, if it is perceived that I had anything to do with this, I am kind enough to simply say sorry.”
By her statement , Jackson Lee has demonstrated that us sorry-ass whites continue to treat African-Americans as second class people.
Jackson Lee continues to be an uber-embarrassment to the City of Houston.
In the spirit of the Christmas season, Jackson Lee should have given her seat to Simon and taken a seat in the economy section with the common folks she always claims to be speaking for. Instead she has taken this opportunity to play the race card.
Ho Ho Ho - And a Merry Christmas to all ….. that is except for Jean-Marie Simon – Ho Ho Ho
HAPPY YULE
by Bob Walsh
As a good pagan I just wanted to assure all the Christians out there that I am not personally aggrieved that you guys ripped off our holidays. Pagans are about the most "ecumenical" people out there. Maybe we would rather you gave us a little credit once in a while, or at least didn't wake our asses up on Saturday mornings trying to convert us,. but we can live with it.
Ho Ho Ho. Enjoy the season, whatever you call it.
As a good pagan I just wanted to assure all the Christians out there that I am not personally aggrieved that you guys ripped off our holidays. Pagans are about the most "ecumenical" people out there. Maybe we would rather you gave us a little credit once in a while, or at least didn't wake our asses up on Saturday mornings trying to convert us,. but we can live with it.
Ho Ho Ho. Enjoy the season, whatever you call it.
WOMAN SAVES HERSELF FROM AGGRESSIVE ALLIGATOR WITH .25 AUTOMATIC
by Bob Walsh
It happened in Florida a couple of days ago. The woman and her abusive soon-to-be ex-boyfriend were walking near a pond, discussing who was going to get custody of the dog. Suddenly the dog went bat-shit crazy and an aggressive alligator charged from the pond, coming right at them.
The woman calmly pulled her .25 automatic from her purse, took careful aim and shot her boyfriend thru the knee and then walked away with the dog.
Don't you just love Christmas stories with happy endings?
It happened in Florida a couple of days ago. The woman and her abusive soon-to-be ex-boyfriend were walking near a pond, discussing who was going to get custody of the dog. Suddenly the dog went bat-shit crazy and an aggressive alligator charged from the pond, coming right at them.
The woman calmly pulled her .25 automatic from her purse, took careful aim and shot her boyfriend thru the knee and then walked away with the dog.
Don't you just love Christmas stories with happy endings?
NAKED MAN WITH GUN USUALLY BAD NEWS
by Bob Walsh
Yes, it's true. If you see a naked man running around with a gun (unless your favorite nudist camp happens to have a firing range) it is usually bad news. It certainly was so in Dublin, Ohio on Saturday
DeShaune Stewart, 24, of Columbus, killed both his supervisor and the postmaster. He apparently regarded the two of them as the cause of his impending job loss. (I didn't even know it was possible to fire postal workers.)
The killings were separated by about four miles and three hours.
Steward first approached his boss, Lance Herrera-Dempsey, 52 at about 0430 in the post office building. He was about three hours early, naked and carrying a gun. I am not sure if it was me I would have hung around to see what was going on, but it wasn't me, so....Stewart shot this victim twice, the second shot while he was laying on the floor.
Stewart was then seen three hours later, also naked and armed, chasing Postmaster Ginger Ballard, 53, around the parking lot at her apartment. She died of a head injury after being thrown to the ground.
Stewart is in custody. He was arrested shortly after killing Ballard.
Yes, it's true. If you see a naked man running around with a gun (unless your favorite nudist camp happens to have a firing range) it is usually bad news. It certainly was so in Dublin, Ohio on Saturday
DeShaune Stewart, 24, of Columbus, killed both his supervisor and the postmaster. He apparently regarded the two of them as the cause of his impending job loss. (I didn't even know it was possible to fire postal workers.)
The killings were separated by about four miles and three hours.
Steward first approached his boss, Lance Herrera-Dempsey, 52 at about 0430 in the post office building. He was about three hours early, naked and carrying a gun. I am not sure if it was me I would have hung around to see what was going on, but it wasn't me, so....Stewart shot this victim twice, the second shot while he was laying on the floor.
Stewart was then seen three hours later, also naked and armed, chasing Postmaster Ginger Ballard, 53, around the parking lot at her apartment. She died of a head injury after being thrown to the ground.
Stewart is in custody. He was arrested shortly after killing Ballard.
MAKING A COMEBACK
by Bob Walsh
The National Park Service has just announced that the old (destroyed 40 years ago) Miwuk village in Yosemite Park is going to be rebuilt.
So far, in a project that started almost ten years ago, the village roundhouse foundation has been rebuilt. Construction was stopped in 2011 due to "safety" concerns and the Miwuks had to demonstrate compliance with building codes. Once it is done the village will be open at least to some extent to visitors but is essentially intended to be an actual resident to natives who work in and around the park.
Archaeologists say that the Miwuks have lived in the Yosemite Valley for at least 7,000 years.
The National Park Service has just announced that the old (destroyed 40 years ago) Miwuk village in Yosemite Park is going to be rebuilt.
So far, in a project that started almost ten years ago, the village roundhouse foundation has been rebuilt. Construction was stopped in 2011 due to "safety" concerns and the Miwuks had to demonstrate compliance with building codes. Once it is done the village will be open at least to some extent to visitors but is essentially intended to be an actual resident to natives who work in and around the park.
Archaeologists say that the Miwuks have lived in the Yosemite Valley for at least 7,000 years.
A ‘BIG-ASS’ WAR WITH RUSSIA?
'There's a war coming': Marine Corps commandant tells troops to be ready for a 'big-ass fight' as US military planners say next conflict could be against Russia or North Korea
By Ariel Zilber and Associated Press
Daily Mail
December 23, 2017
The nation's top Marine Corps commander told American soldiers stationed in Europe that 'there's a war coming' and that a 'big-ass fight' was on the horizon, it was reported on Saturday.
General Robert Neller, the Marine Corps commandant, made the remarks during a holiday visit with US troops stationed in Norway this week.
The remarks were first reported by Military.com.
'I hope I'm wrong, but there's a war coming,' Neller said.
'You're in a fight here, an informational fight, a political fight, by your presence.'
The Marine Corps commandant was speaking to the troops about the importance of readiness even during peacetime missions that can change depending on the circumstances.
Neller was speaking to a 300-member contingent of US troops stationed at the Norwegian Home Guard base near Trondheim.
He told the soldiers that American military planners were focused on Russia and the Pacific as possible future flashpoints of conflict.
Neller made the remarks while fielding questions from troops in a town-hall style forum.
'I think probably the focus, the intended focus is not on the Middle East,' Neller said.
'The focus is more on the Pacific and Russia.'
Neller said that while America wants to look beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, it cannot always dictate events.
'The problem is, we may not be interested in the Middle East, but they seem to be fascinated with us,' he said.
'And as long as there are groups there that threaten the United States, there will have to be some presence.'
President Donald Trump’s administration said on Monday that Russia interferes in the domestic political affairs of countries globally, but stopped short of accusing Moscow of meddling in the 2016 US election.
The criticism of Russia, laid out in a new national security strategy based on Trump’s 'America First' vision, reflects a view long held by US diplomats that Russia actively undermines American interests at home and abroad, despite Trump’s own bid for warmer ties with President Vladimir Putin.
'Through modernized forms of subversive tactics, Russia interferes in the domestic political affairs of countries around the world,' said the document.
It avoided directly citing what US intelligence agencies say was Russian meddling in last year’s US presidential election.
'Russia uses information operations as part of its offensive cyber efforts to influence public opinion across the globe. Its influence campaigns blend covert intelligence operations and false online personas with state-funded media, third-party intermediaries, and paid social media users or "trolls",' the document said.
Trump has frequently spoken of wanting to improve relations with Putin, even though Russia has frustrated US policy in Syria and Ukraine and done little to help Washington in its standoff with North Korea.
Neller's remarks were reported at around the same time that Defense Secretary James Mattis made a similar assessment about the potential for future conflict.
Mattis on Friday told US soldiers in Fort Bragg, North Carolina that 'storm clouds are gathering' over the Korean Peninsula.
Without forecasting a conflict, Mattis emphasized that diplomacy stands the best chance of preventing a war if America's words are backed up by strong and prepared armed forces.
'My fine young soldiers, the only way our diplomats can speak with authority and be believed is if you're ready to go,' Mattis told several dozen soldiers and airmen at the 82nd Airborne Division's Hall of Heroes, his last stop on a two-day pre-holiday tour of bases to greet troops.
Mattis' comments came as the UN Security Council unanimously approved tough new sanctions against North Korea, compelling nations to sharply reduce their sales of oil to the reclusive country and send home all North Korean expatriate workers within two years.
Such workers are seen as a key source of revenue for North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un's cash-strapped government.
Trump and other top US officials have made repeated threats about US military action.
Some officials have described the messaging as twofold in purpose: to pressure North Korea to enter into negotiations on getting rid of its nuclear arsenal, and to motivate key regional powers China and Russia to put more pressure on Pyongyang so a war is averted.
For the military, the focus has been on ensuring soldiers are ready should the call come.
By Ariel Zilber and Associated Press
Daily Mail
December 23, 2017
The nation's top Marine Corps commander told American soldiers stationed in Europe that 'there's a war coming' and that a 'big-ass fight' was on the horizon, it was reported on Saturday.
General Robert Neller, the Marine Corps commandant, made the remarks during a holiday visit with US troops stationed in Norway this week.
The remarks were first reported by Military.com.
'I hope I'm wrong, but there's a war coming,' Neller said.
'You're in a fight here, an informational fight, a political fight, by your presence.'
The Marine Corps commandant was speaking to the troops about the importance of readiness even during peacetime missions that can change depending on the circumstances.
Neller was speaking to a 300-member contingent of US troops stationed at the Norwegian Home Guard base near Trondheim.
He told the soldiers that American military planners were focused on Russia and the Pacific as possible future flashpoints of conflict.
Neller made the remarks while fielding questions from troops in a town-hall style forum.
'I think probably the focus, the intended focus is not on the Middle East,' Neller said.
'The focus is more on the Pacific and Russia.'
Neller said that while America wants to look beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, it cannot always dictate events.
'The problem is, we may not be interested in the Middle East, but they seem to be fascinated with us,' he said.
'And as long as there are groups there that threaten the United States, there will have to be some presence.'
President Donald Trump’s administration said on Monday that Russia interferes in the domestic political affairs of countries globally, but stopped short of accusing Moscow of meddling in the 2016 US election.
The criticism of Russia, laid out in a new national security strategy based on Trump’s 'America First' vision, reflects a view long held by US diplomats that Russia actively undermines American interests at home and abroad, despite Trump’s own bid for warmer ties with President Vladimir Putin.
'Through modernized forms of subversive tactics, Russia interferes in the domestic political affairs of countries around the world,' said the document.
It avoided directly citing what US intelligence agencies say was Russian meddling in last year’s US presidential election.
'Russia uses information operations as part of its offensive cyber efforts to influence public opinion across the globe. Its influence campaigns blend covert intelligence operations and false online personas with state-funded media, third-party intermediaries, and paid social media users or "trolls",' the document said.
Trump has frequently spoken of wanting to improve relations with Putin, even though Russia has frustrated US policy in Syria and Ukraine and done little to help Washington in its standoff with North Korea.
Neller's remarks were reported at around the same time that Defense Secretary James Mattis made a similar assessment about the potential for future conflict.
Mattis on Friday told US soldiers in Fort Bragg, North Carolina that 'storm clouds are gathering' over the Korean Peninsula.
Without forecasting a conflict, Mattis emphasized that diplomacy stands the best chance of preventing a war if America's words are backed up by strong and prepared armed forces.
'My fine young soldiers, the only way our diplomats can speak with authority and be believed is if you're ready to go,' Mattis told several dozen soldiers and airmen at the 82nd Airborne Division's Hall of Heroes, his last stop on a two-day pre-holiday tour of bases to greet troops.
Mattis' comments came as the UN Security Council unanimously approved tough new sanctions against North Korea, compelling nations to sharply reduce their sales of oil to the reclusive country and send home all North Korean expatriate workers within two years.
Such workers are seen as a key source of revenue for North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un's cash-strapped government.
Trump and other top US officials have made repeated threats about US military action.
Some officials have described the messaging as twofold in purpose: to pressure North Korea to enter into negotiations on getting rid of its nuclear arsenal, and to motivate key regional powers China and Russia to put more pressure on Pyongyang so a war is averted.
For the military, the focus has been on ensuring soldiers are ready should the call come.
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