Hugh Fitzgerald: Should Germans be Forced to Study Arabic?
A senior German educator has called for all pupils in the country to be forced to study Arabic until they graduate in the interests of the multicultural state.
Professor of Computer Science Thomas Strothotte and President of a private Hamburg university has argued that German children should be forced to learn Arabic alongside German so they would better understand the country’s 1.5 million new migrants and make them feel more welcome. He said it would help Germany become “a country of immigration, and a multilingual society....
Sunday, August 28, 2016
Vigilante pastor KIDNAPS street children to save them from drugs and paedophiles
...Over the past 16 years, more than 3,500 people have been through his rehab clinic. Although not all of them have wanted to.
Many of the drug-addicted youngsters were rounded up and forced into mini-vans and taken to the ramshackle clinic he founded, called Republic Pilgrim....
...“But if a teenager is living on the street and taking drugs, you have got to take them. You have got to stop their addiction.
“People should have freedom, they must have a life, health and education.
“But when a teenager uses his freedom to kill himself with drugs, we must use power to stop him....
...Over the past 16 years, more than 3,500 people have been through his rehab clinic. Although not all of them have wanted to.
Many of the drug-addicted youngsters were rounded up and forced into mini-vans and taken to the ramshackle clinic he founded, called Republic Pilgrim....
...“But if a teenager is living on the street and taking drugs, you have got to take them. You have got to stop their addiction.
“People should have freedom, they must have a life, health and education.
“But when a teenager uses his freedom to kill himself with drugs, we must use power to stop him....
HACK CHECK: New York Times Seeking ‘Gender Editor’
...“We are seeking a journalist with a compelling vision of how to expand this coverage, from boardroom to bedroom, from the loftiest corridors of power to the back alleys of the world’s most impoverished villages,” the posting states. “We are looking for a creative, passionate leader to guide a cross-platform, global coverage vertical on the topic of gender and identity.”...
NYT Looking To Hire A ‘Climate Change Editor’ As Ad Revenues Slide
...The New York Times wants to hire a “climate change editor” to make what it calls “most important story in the world” more appealing to a global audience.
“The Times is ramping up its coverage to make the most important story in the world even more relevant, urgent and accessible to a huge audience around the globe,” reads a job ad from the international edition of The Times.
Its push for more global warming coverage comes as the paper embarks on a new strategy to shed its American identity and appeal more to international audiences. It’s all part of CEO Mark Thompson’s plan to spend $50 million over three years on “a new era of international growth,” Politico reported in May....
Climate Change: Get Over Objectivity, Newspapers
...I've also been thinking about the newspaper industry and global warming. And frankly, I don't think newspapers are doing enough. Indeed, newspapers' fabled commitment to "objectivity" has been a detriment to efforts to combat global warming.
The industry still has a lot of power to influence people. How about if newspapers abandon their old way of doing things when it comes to the issue of global warming, and turn their influence to good? It just might be that through this issue alone, newspapers revive themselves to some extent. Editors are shirking their responsibility to improve our world, in my view, so let's change that....
...“We are seeking a journalist with a compelling vision of how to expand this coverage, from boardroom to bedroom, from the loftiest corridors of power to the back alleys of the world’s most impoverished villages,” the posting states. “We are looking for a creative, passionate leader to guide a cross-platform, global coverage vertical on the topic of gender and identity.”...
NYT Looking To Hire A ‘Climate Change Editor’ As Ad Revenues Slide
...The New York Times wants to hire a “climate change editor” to make what it calls “most important story in the world” more appealing to a global audience.
“The Times is ramping up its coverage to make the most important story in the world even more relevant, urgent and accessible to a huge audience around the globe,” reads a job ad from the international edition of The Times.
Its push for more global warming coverage comes as the paper embarks on a new strategy to shed its American identity and appeal more to international audiences. It’s all part of CEO Mark Thompson’s plan to spend $50 million over three years on “a new era of international growth,” Politico reported in May....
Climate Change: Get Over Objectivity, Newspapers
...I've also been thinking about the newspaper industry and global warming. And frankly, I don't think newspapers are doing enough. Indeed, newspapers' fabled commitment to "objectivity" has been a detriment to efforts to combat global warming.
The industry still has a lot of power to influence people. How about if newspapers abandon their old way of doing things when it comes to the issue of global warming, and turn their influence to good? It just might be that through this issue alone, newspapers revive themselves to some extent. Editors are shirking their responsibility to improve our world, in my view, so let's change that....
Health Care Is a Business, Not a Right
...Unfortunately, this leaves us with something of a problem. Reciprocal altruism is fine if all you need is for Mom to sit with you and brew you some herbal tea. But in a modern society, you need to procure health care from strangers -- which is to say, through the transactional system of market exchange. Nationalizing the health care system does not fix this fundamental disconnect between our evolved instincts and the inevitable necessities of a modern economy.
National health care systems, in other words, must make exactly the same sort of decisions that private insurers and individuals do: what is worth paying for and how much to pay....
...Before the internet, most people had no way of knowing whether there were other treatments than the ones their doctors recommended, so as long as doctors only prescribed treatments that were approved, the government could maintain the fiction that there was no calculation going on.
America has never really had that comfort, because most doctors take a lot of different kind of insurance, and they don’t know what will be covered until after they’ve discussed treatment options. So Americans could hear about a treatment, find out it wasn’t covered, get outraged, and call their congressman. This may be one reason that our system is so expensive....
...A true national health care system, along the lines of Britain or Canada, would have advantages and disadvantages over what we have now. But one advantage that it doesn’t offer is to free us from the need to think about our health care in the cold logic of dollars and cents, rather than warm and fuzzy altruistic ideals. Health care cannot be a right, full stop; it has to stop before we run out of wallet. Which means that no matter how much it horrifies, we have to stop hoping for a system that will make those hard decisions and unhappy trade-offs go away.
Why Luxury TVs Are Affordable when Basic Health Care Is Not
The Return of the Obamacare Death Spiral
Earlier this week, Aetna, which covers about 900,000 people through the health exchanges created under Obamacare, announced that it would dramatically reduce its presence those exchanges. Instead of expanding into five new states this year, as the insurer had previously planned, the company said that it would drop out of 11 of the 15 states in which it currently sells under the law.
Aetna's decision follows similar moves from other insurers: UnitedHealth announced in April that it would cease selling plans on most exchanges. Shortly after, Humana pulled out of two states, Virginia and Alabama. More than a dozen of the nonprofit health insurance cooperatives set up under the law—health insurance carriers created using government-back loans in order to spur competition—have failed entirely. While some insurers are entering the exchanges, even more are leaving.
What this means is that in several states, and even more counties, there will be only one insurer available through Obamacare. In at least one county—Pinal County, Arizona—it is likely that there will be no insurer available on the exchange at all.
This slow exodus of insurers from the health law's marketplaces represents a serious threat to the continued stability and existence of its exchanges. Obamacare is perched on the edge of a death spiral....
...Unfortunately, this leaves us with something of a problem. Reciprocal altruism is fine if all you need is for Mom to sit with you and brew you some herbal tea. But in a modern society, you need to procure health care from strangers -- which is to say, through the transactional system of market exchange. Nationalizing the health care system does not fix this fundamental disconnect between our evolved instincts and the inevitable necessities of a modern economy.
National health care systems, in other words, must make exactly the same sort of decisions that private insurers and individuals do: what is worth paying for and how much to pay....
...Before the internet, most people had no way of knowing whether there were other treatments than the ones their doctors recommended, so as long as doctors only prescribed treatments that were approved, the government could maintain the fiction that there was no calculation going on.
America has never really had that comfort, because most doctors take a lot of different kind of insurance, and they don’t know what will be covered until after they’ve discussed treatment options. So Americans could hear about a treatment, find out it wasn’t covered, get outraged, and call their congressman. This may be one reason that our system is so expensive....
...A true national health care system, along the lines of Britain or Canada, would have advantages and disadvantages over what we have now. But one advantage that it doesn’t offer is to free us from the need to think about our health care in the cold logic of dollars and cents, rather than warm and fuzzy altruistic ideals. Health care cannot be a right, full stop; it has to stop before we run out of wallet. Which means that no matter how much it horrifies, we have to stop hoping for a system that will make those hard decisions and unhappy trade-offs go away.
Why Luxury TVs Are Affordable when Basic Health Care Is Not
The Return of the Obamacare Death Spiral
Earlier this week, Aetna, which covers about 900,000 people through the health exchanges created under Obamacare, announced that it would dramatically reduce its presence those exchanges. Instead of expanding into five new states this year, as the insurer had previously planned, the company said that it would drop out of 11 of the 15 states in which it currently sells under the law.
Aetna's decision follows similar moves from other insurers: UnitedHealth announced in April that it would cease selling plans on most exchanges. Shortly after, Humana pulled out of two states, Virginia and Alabama. More than a dozen of the nonprofit health insurance cooperatives set up under the law—health insurance carriers created using government-back loans in order to spur competition—have failed entirely. While some insurers are entering the exchanges, even more are leaving.
What this means is that in several states, and even more counties, there will be only one insurer available through Obamacare. In at least one county—Pinal County, Arizona—it is likely that there will be no insurer available on the exchange at all.
This slow exodus of insurers from the health law's marketplaces represents a serious threat to the continued stability and existence of its exchanges. Obamacare is perched on the edge of a death spiral....
Newly released emails shed light on Clinton's public corruption as Secretary of State
"Newly released emails from Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state raise questions about the nature of the department's relationship with the Clinton Foundation. Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, released 296 pages of emails from the Democratic presidential nominee, including 44 that Judicial Watch says were not previously handed over to the State Department by Clinton. ... In one instance, top Clinton Foundation official Doug Band lobbied Clinton aides for a job for someone else in the State Department. In the email, Band tells Hillary Clinton's former aides at the department -- Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin -- that it is 'important to take care of (redacted).' Band is reassured by Abedin that 'Personnel has been sending him options.'" (08/10/16)
The Clinton Foundation, State and Kremlin Connections
...Soon, dozens of U.S. tech firms, including top Clinton Foundation donors like Google, Intel and Cisco, made major financial contributions to Skolkovo, with Cisco committing a cool $1 billion. In May 2010, the State Department facilitated a Moscow visit by 22 of the biggest names in U.S. venture capital—and weeks later the first memorandums of understanding were signed by Skolkovo and American companies.
By 2012 the vice president of the Skolkovo Foundation, Conor Lenihan—who had previously partnered with the Clinton Foundation—recorded that Skolkovo had assembled 28 Russian, American and European “Key Partners.” Of the 28 “partners,” 17, or 60%, have made financial commitments to the Clinton Foundation, totaling tens of millions of dollars, or sponsored speeches by Bill Clinton....
...Amid all the sloshing of Russia rubles and American dollars, however, the state-of-the-art technological research coming out of Skolkovo raised alarms among U.S. military experts and federal law-enforcement officials. Research conducted in 2012 on Skolkovo by the U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Program at Fort Leavenworth declared that the purpose of Skolkovo was to serve as a “vehicle for world-wide technology transfer to Russia in the areas of information technology, biomedicine, energy, satellite and space technology, and nuclear technology.”..
Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal
...Beyond mines in Kazakhstan that are among the most lucrative in the world, the sale gave the Russians control of one-fifth of all uranium production capacity in the United States. Since uranium is considered a strategic asset, with implications for national security, the deal had to be approved by a committee composed of representatives from a number of United States government agencies. Among the agencies that eventually signed off was the State Department, then headed by Mr. Clinton’s wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
As the Russians gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions from 2009 to 2013, Canadian records show, a flow of cash made its way to the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One’s chairman used his family foundation to make four donations totaling $2.35 million. Those contributions were not publicly disclosed by the Clintons, despite an agreement Mrs. Clinton had struck with the Obama White House to publicly identify all donors. Other people with ties to the company made donations as well.
And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock....
THE CLINTON UNIVERSITY SCANDAL?
...But did you know that Bill Clinton was a university chancellor? I didn’t either. There he is, over to the left. Moreover, he was paid $16 million by Laureate International Universities to be their “honorary” chancellor. Just think how much Slick Willie could have pulled down if he’d been a real chancellor. Just what is Laureate International University? It’s the parent company of Walden University, a mostly online, for-profit diploma mill that is facing the same kind of civil suits and fraud allegations as Trump University. Funny how the media seems to be uninterested in this story....
Report: Hillary Clinton Would Hike Taxes By $1.3 Trillion
Hillary Clinton comes up $2.2 trillion short in paying for her policy agenda, despite hiking taxes by $1.3 trillion, according to a new analysis of the Democratic nominee’s campaign platform....
Cotton: Clinton discussed executed Iranian scientist on email
Hillary Clinton recklessly discussed, in emails hosted on her private server, an Iranian nuclear scientist who was executed by Iran for treason, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said Sunday.
"I'm not going to comment on what he may or may not have done for the United States government, but in the emails that were on Hillary Clinton's private server, there were conversations among her senior advisors about this gentleman," he said on "Face the Nation." Cotton was speaking about Shahram Amiri, who gave information to the U.S. about Iran's nuclear program....
CLINTONS ALREADY PLANNING NEXT STAGE OF CORRUPTION
...While the parent Clinton Foundation will stop accepting money from foreign governments and corporations, the foundation’s largest project, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, might continue to accept foreign government and corporate funding, Clinton health initiative officials said Wednesday.
And what’s one big thing Madam President Hillary will have to do if she wins? Clean up the mess that is Obamacare....
Bill Clinton's call for mass voter fraud should be condemned
...Speaking directly to illegal aliens, Clinton stated to an applauding audience of delegates that “if you love this country, you’re working hard, you’re paying taxes and you’re obeying the law and you’d like to become a citizen, you should choose immigration reform over somebody that wants to send you back.” Unfortunately for Bill, illegal aliens (and non-citizens in general) aren’t supposed to be ‘choosing’ anyone. Like in every other country in the world, here in America only citizens are supposed to vote....
Whoops: Clinton Just Promised to Raise Taxes on Middle Class
...“Well we’re not going there, my friends. I’m telling you right now, we’re going to write fairer rules for the middle class, and we are going to raise taxes on the middle class!” Clinton proclaimed to a cheering crowd....
Crony Criminals: Department of Justice Blocked Any FBI Inquiry Into Clinton Foundation
...America is being divided, before your very eyes, into those castes with Juice and those without Juice. It's devolving into a fucking organized crime family.
We are not equal under the law -- far from it. And every day this corrupt gang makes this more and more normal and more and more acceptable to the public.
I know one thing about Trump. I can't vouch for his good intentions -- he doesn't have them -- but I know the federal government and the so-called Fourth Estate will not play Mob Lawyers for him.
Anyone who says they're for Equal Treatment Under the Law and then who supports someone who has been, is, and will continue to be Above the Law is simply a liar or hopelessly confused....
"Newly released emails from Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state raise questions about the nature of the department's relationship with the Clinton Foundation. Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, released 296 pages of emails from the Democratic presidential nominee, including 44 that Judicial Watch says were not previously handed over to the State Department by Clinton. ... In one instance, top Clinton Foundation official Doug Band lobbied Clinton aides for a job for someone else in the State Department. In the email, Band tells Hillary Clinton's former aides at the department -- Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin -- that it is 'important to take care of (redacted).' Band is reassured by Abedin that 'Personnel has been sending him options.'" (08/10/16)
The Clinton Foundation, State and Kremlin Connections
...Soon, dozens of U.S. tech firms, including top Clinton Foundation donors like Google, Intel and Cisco, made major financial contributions to Skolkovo, with Cisco committing a cool $1 billion. In May 2010, the State Department facilitated a Moscow visit by 22 of the biggest names in U.S. venture capital—and weeks later the first memorandums of understanding were signed by Skolkovo and American companies.
By 2012 the vice president of the Skolkovo Foundation, Conor Lenihan—who had previously partnered with the Clinton Foundation—recorded that Skolkovo had assembled 28 Russian, American and European “Key Partners.” Of the 28 “partners,” 17, or 60%, have made financial commitments to the Clinton Foundation, totaling tens of millions of dollars, or sponsored speeches by Bill Clinton....
...Amid all the sloshing of Russia rubles and American dollars, however, the state-of-the-art technological research coming out of Skolkovo raised alarms among U.S. military experts and federal law-enforcement officials. Research conducted in 2012 on Skolkovo by the U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Program at Fort Leavenworth declared that the purpose of Skolkovo was to serve as a “vehicle for world-wide technology transfer to Russia in the areas of information technology, biomedicine, energy, satellite and space technology, and nuclear technology.”..
Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal
...Beyond mines in Kazakhstan that are among the most lucrative in the world, the sale gave the Russians control of one-fifth of all uranium production capacity in the United States. Since uranium is considered a strategic asset, with implications for national security, the deal had to be approved by a committee composed of representatives from a number of United States government agencies. Among the agencies that eventually signed off was the State Department, then headed by Mr. Clinton’s wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
As the Russians gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions from 2009 to 2013, Canadian records show, a flow of cash made its way to the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One’s chairman used his family foundation to make four donations totaling $2.35 million. Those contributions were not publicly disclosed by the Clintons, despite an agreement Mrs. Clinton had struck with the Obama White House to publicly identify all donors. Other people with ties to the company made donations as well.
And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock....
THE CLINTON UNIVERSITY SCANDAL?
...But did you know that Bill Clinton was a university chancellor? I didn’t either. There he is, over to the left. Moreover, he was paid $16 million by Laureate International Universities to be their “honorary” chancellor. Just think how much Slick Willie could have pulled down if he’d been a real chancellor. Just what is Laureate International University? It’s the parent company of Walden University, a mostly online, for-profit diploma mill that is facing the same kind of civil suits and fraud allegations as Trump University. Funny how the media seems to be uninterested in this story....
Report: Hillary Clinton Would Hike Taxes By $1.3 Trillion
Hillary Clinton comes up $2.2 trillion short in paying for her policy agenda, despite hiking taxes by $1.3 trillion, according to a new analysis of the Democratic nominee’s campaign platform....
Cotton: Clinton discussed executed Iranian scientist on email
Hillary Clinton recklessly discussed, in emails hosted on her private server, an Iranian nuclear scientist who was executed by Iran for treason, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said Sunday.
"I'm not going to comment on what he may or may not have done for the United States government, but in the emails that were on Hillary Clinton's private server, there were conversations among her senior advisors about this gentleman," he said on "Face the Nation." Cotton was speaking about Shahram Amiri, who gave information to the U.S. about Iran's nuclear program....
CLINTONS ALREADY PLANNING NEXT STAGE OF CORRUPTION
...While the parent Clinton Foundation will stop accepting money from foreign governments and corporations, the foundation’s largest project, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, might continue to accept foreign government and corporate funding, Clinton health initiative officials said Wednesday.
And what’s one big thing Madam President Hillary will have to do if she wins? Clean up the mess that is Obamacare....
Bill Clinton's call for mass voter fraud should be condemned
...Speaking directly to illegal aliens, Clinton stated to an applauding audience of delegates that “if you love this country, you’re working hard, you’re paying taxes and you’re obeying the law and you’d like to become a citizen, you should choose immigration reform over somebody that wants to send you back.” Unfortunately for Bill, illegal aliens (and non-citizens in general) aren’t supposed to be ‘choosing’ anyone. Like in every other country in the world, here in America only citizens are supposed to vote....
Whoops: Clinton Just Promised to Raise Taxes on Middle Class
...“Well we’re not going there, my friends. I’m telling you right now, we’re going to write fairer rules for the middle class, and we are going to raise taxes on the middle class!” Clinton proclaimed to a cheering crowd....
Crony Criminals: Department of Justice Blocked Any FBI Inquiry Into Clinton Foundation
...America is being divided, before your very eyes, into those castes with Juice and those without Juice. It's devolving into a fucking organized crime family.
We are not equal under the law -- far from it. And every day this corrupt gang makes this more and more normal and more and more acceptable to the public.
I know one thing about Trump. I can't vouch for his good intentions -- he doesn't have them -- but I know the federal government and the so-called Fourth Estate will not play Mob Lawyers for him.
Anyone who says they're for Equal Treatment Under the Law and then who supports someone who has been, is, and will continue to be Above the Law is simply a liar or hopelessly confused....
I dumped my fiancé for a Jamaican lover but he fleeced me of £10k and turned out to be a love rat
When Louise Chesney’s besotted fiancé Paul whisked her off to Jamaica to plan their dream beach wedding, she couldn’t have been happier.
She was so in love and says she couldn’t wait to marry her perfect man.
Yet just days into their holiday, handsome local hotel worker Caffrey Brown caught her eye. And one night, after Paul had retired to bed with a headache, they shared a kiss.
Weeks later, Louise, 24, stunned family and friends by calling off her engagement to heartbroken Paul, 48....
“I’ve lost everything – I’m thousands of pounds in debt. Yet I’m still devastated at losing Caffrey because I thought he was the love of my life.”
Throughout their year-long relationship, Louise worked six days a week at her minimum-wage care home job to save the £4,000 she needed for two trips to Jamaica to visit Caffrey....
Women are 'genetically programmed to have affairs'
...Scientists at the University of Texas say they are challenging the assumption that humans have evolved to have monogamous relationships.
The team's research has put forward the "mate-switching-hypothesis" which says humans have evolved to keep testing their relationships and looking for better long-term options....
Women Initiate Divorce Much More Than Men, Here's Why
Some new data about divorce and non-marital breakups contains an unexpected finding, and I think it underscores the fact that we're in the midst of an ongoing evolution in what people want and seek in their romantic relationships. The study, based on a survey of over 2000 heterosexual couples, found that women initiated nearly 70% of all divorces. Yet there was no significant difference between the percentage of breakups initiated by women and men in non-marriage relationships....
When Louise Chesney’s besotted fiancé Paul whisked her off to Jamaica to plan their dream beach wedding, she couldn’t have been happier.
She was so in love and says she couldn’t wait to marry her perfect man.
Yet just days into their holiday, handsome local hotel worker Caffrey Brown caught her eye. And one night, after Paul had retired to bed with a headache, they shared a kiss.
Weeks later, Louise, 24, stunned family and friends by calling off her engagement to heartbroken Paul, 48....
“I’ve lost everything – I’m thousands of pounds in debt. Yet I’m still devastated at losing Caffrey because I thought he was the love of my life.”
Throughout their year-long relationship, Louise worked six days a week at her minimum-wage care home job to save the £4,000 she needed for two trips to Jamaica to visit Caffrey....
Women are 'genetically programmed to have affairs'
...Scientists at the University of Texas say they are challenging the assumption that humans have evolved to have monogamous relationships.
The team's research has put forward the "mate-switching-hypothesis" which says humans have evolved to keep testing their relationships and looking for better long-term options....
Women Initiate Divorce Much More Than Men, Here's Why
Some new data about divorce and non-marital breakups contains an unexpected finding, and I think it underscores the fact that we're in the midst of an ongoing evolution in what people want and seek in their romantic relationships. The study, based on a survey of over 2000 heterosexual couples, found that women initiated nearly 70% of all divorces. Yet there was no significant difference between the percentage of breakups initiated by women and men in non-marriage relationships....
Sunday, August 21, 2016
Man reveals his girlfriend IGNORED his marriage proposal because it wasn't 'extravagant' enough for her
...'She was very annoyed. She looked at me and said, "This is a horrible joke, Logan" then she started crying because I "ruined it" for her.
'Then she pretended the proposal didn't happen and now she's still talking about rings like I DIDN'T PROPOSE.'
Finishing off his Reddit post, Logan admitted 'I love her, but I don't know if I'm being a jerk by not meeting her expectations - or if she's being awful.'
Not getting the reaction he wanted from his girlfriend or other Redditers, a lot of the comments on the thread were in agreement that Logan intentionally went against everything Taylor wanted in favour of what he preferred....
Bros Before Homes
On the subtle sexism of men who praise experiences over stuff.
...The superiority of experiences has become our era’s reigning banality. Consider last year’s Time profile of American anti-stuff advocates: “Minimalists like to say that they’re living more meaningfully, more deliberately, that getting rid of most material possessions in their lives allows them to focus on what’s important: friends, hobbies, travel, experiences.” We hear much the same from more recent awestruck portrait in The Guardian of the new Japanese minimalism, from a man who owns just “four pairs of socks”: “Spending less time on cleaning or shopping means I have more time to spend with friends, go out, or travel on my days off.” It’s hard for me to picture how having enough socks to last an entire wash cycle could possibly impede a social life; the reverse seems more likely....
...Tony’s essay in Toronto Life inadvertently highlights the sexism underlying the minimalist trend. It’s not just—as Ruth Whippman brilliantly demonstrated at The Pool—that the cool new tidying advice is aimed, much like older housekeeping advice, at women. It’s also that the very idea of experiences mattering more than things is a way of valorizing the stereotypically masculine. “While men are conditioned to dream big—to see their happiness in terms of adventure and travel, sex and ideas and long nights of hilarity—women are now encouraged to find deep fulfilment in staying home to origami our pants,” she wrote.
Whether women are being encouraged to rid our homes of useless belongings, or urged to shop for new ones, the result is the same: Society continues to associate women with the home and the material, men with the outside and experiences. ...
What I learned from being single for 51 years: Don't ruin your life by yearning for something you haven't yet got, says CHRISTINA PATTERSON
...The steady, reliable men I met seemed boring. What made my pulse race was charming men who made me laugh. What made my heart sing, in fact, was narcissistic charmers who played the game and often didn’t stick around....
...When I hit 30, panic kicked in. I put a skull and crossbones on the invitation to my party and pretended it was just a joke about passing time.
At 40, I had just ended a relationship with another charming bad boy. And at 50? Well, if anyone had told me when I was 30 I would still be single at 50, I would probably have picked up the phone to Dignitas....
...I don’t know if my relationship will last. None of us can know. I still live on my own. My home is my castle and I have no desire to fill it with someone else’s stuff....
Reblog: Research find that as a group, only men pay tax
...Overall, the research suggests that male taxpayers are the only ones to ever have a positive contribution in taxes. Based on Figure 17, the closest that the average woman will come to having a positive fiscal incidence is when she is at minus $50,000 around 55 years of age. While feminists are demonizing men for benefiting from all liberties and rights they have constructed, they have oddly remained silent over the fact that anonymous male tax payers are paying women to exist. Read that sentence again.
The fact that feminists want a stronger government is not a coincidence. While historically, women had to choose a wealthy husband for resources, they can now stay single, be lesbians, marry a poor man, or use the sperm bank, and the state will still transfer male taxes to them. Interestingly, within 10 years of women’s suffrage, the government doubled their tax revenue and expenditure in the USA....
Today is ‘Equal Pay Day’; the next ‘Equal Occupational Fatality Day’ will occur on April 17, 2023
...Based on the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data on workplace fatalities for 2011 (and assuming those fatality data will be similar in 2012), an “Equal Occupational Fatality Day” can be calculated. As in previous years, the chart above shows the significant gender disparity in workplace fatalities: 4,234 men died on the job (92% of the total) in 2011 compared to only 375 women (8% of the total). The “gender occupational fatality gap” in 2011 was considerable — more than 11 men died on the job for every woman who died while working....
Father Accused of Raping Daughter Acquitted After 'Fifty Shades of Grey' Defense
...McCulloch studied Fifty Shades of Grey to prepare for the court proceedings. On the third day of the trial, the man's daughter took to the stand, and McCulloch used passages from the book to question the girl. After just seven minutes, she broke down and admitted she had made up the accusations to teach her "strict" father a lesson. ...
How Women Throw Themselves At Pro Athletes (And Vice Versa): A Publicist Explains
...An attractive married woman—she had a huge rock on her finger—came over and started hitting on my client immediately and relentlessly. After a while, her husband came out from the dance club area, clearly upset. He never threatened anything physical. He barely even raised his voice. He just wanted to know what she was doing. His wife played dumb. So my client spoke up: "Your girl is trying to fuck me."
The husband got into it a little with his wife. He wanted to leave. My client called over one of the bouncers and told him to get rid of the couple. The wife decided to stay. The husband got booted. He was irate. She didn't care. Five minutes later, my client was having sex with her in the back office of the club. She left, and he never talked to her again. Obviously, we have no idea what happened with the marriage.
Police: Mom poisoned her baby with teaspoon of salt to get husband ‘back into her life’
Kimberly Martines was separated from her husband and desperate to lure him back into her life, so police say she hatched a plan to get his attention: It began with poisoning her 17-month-old daughter, Peyton.
She didn’t use a household cleaner or pop open a bottle of pain medication, police told NBC affiliate WYFF. Instead, Martines, of Spartanburg, S.C., turned to a simple condiment found in almost any dining room: salt....
...'She was very annoyed. She looked at me and said, "This is a horrible joke, Logan" then she started crying because I "ruined it" for her.
'Then she pretended the proposal didn't happen and now she's still talking about rings like I DIDN'T PROPOSE.'
Finishing off his Reddit post, Logan admitted 'I love her, but I don't know if I'm being a jerk by not meeting her expectations - or if she's being awful.'
Not getting the reaction he wanted from his girlfriend or other Redditers, a lot of the comments on the thread were in agreement that Logan intentionally went against everything Taylor wanted in favour of what he preferred....
Bros Before Homes
On the subtle sexism of men who praise experiences over stuff.
...The superiority of experiences has become our era’s reigning banality. Consider last year’s Time profile of American anti-stuff advocates: “Minimalists like to say that they’re living more meaningfully, more deliberately, that getting rid of most material possessions in their lives allows them to focus on what’s important: friends, hobbies, travel, experiences.” We hear much the same from more recent awestruck portrait in The Guardian of the new Japanese minimalism, from a man who owns just “four pairs of socks”: “Spending less time on cleaning or shopping means I have more time to spend with friends, go out, or travel on my days off.” It’s hard for me to picture how having enough socks to last an entire wash cycle could possibly impede a social life; the reverse seems more likely....
...Tony’s essay in Toronto Life inadvertently highlights the sexism underlying the minimalist trend. It’s not just—as Ruth Whippman brilliantly demonstrated at The Pool—that the cool new tidying advice is aimed, much like older housekeeping advice, at women. It’s also that the very idea of experiences mattering more than things is a way of valorizing the stereotypically masculine. “While men are conditioned to dream big—to see their happiness in terms of adventure and travel, sex and ideas and long nights of hilarity—women are now encouraged to find deep fulfilment in staying home to origami our pants,” she wrote.
Whether women are being encouraged to rid our homes of useless belongings, or urged to shop for new ones, the result is the same: Society continues to associate women with the home and the material, men with the outside and experiences. ...
What I learned from being single for 51 years: Don't ruin your life by yearning for something you haven't yet got, says CHRISTINA PATTERSON
...The steady, reliable men I met seemed boring. What made my pulse race was charming men who made me laugh. What made my heart sing, in fact, was narcissistic charmers who played the game and often didn’t stick around....
...When I hit 30, panic kicked in. I put a skull and crossbones on the invitation to my party and pretended it was just a joke about passing time.
At 40, I had just ended a relationship with another charming bad boy. And at 50? Well, if anyone had told me when I was 30 I would still be single at 50, I would probably have picked up the phone to Dignitas....
...I don’t know if my relationship will last. None of us can know. I still live on my own. My home is my castle and I have no desire to fill it with someone else’s stuff....
Reblog: Research find that as a group, only men pay tax
...Overall, the research suggests that male taxpayers are the only ones to ever have a positive contribution in taxes. Based on Figure 17, the closest that the average woman will come to having a positive fiscal incidence is when she is at minus $50,000 around 55 years of age. While feminists are demonizing men for benefiting from all liberties and rights they have constructed, they have oddly remained silent over the fact that anonymous male tax payers are paying women to exist. Read that sentence again.
The fact that feminists want a stronger government is not a coincidence. While historically, women had to choose a wealthy husband for resources, they can now stay single, be lesbians, marry a poor man, or use the sperm bank, and the state will still transfer male taxes to them. Interestingly, within 10 years of women’s suffrage, the government doubled their tax revenue and expenditure in the USA....
Today is ‘Equal Pay Day’; the next ‘Equal Occupational Fatality Day’ will occur on April 17, 2023
...Based on the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data on workplace fatalities for 2011 (and assuming those fatality data will be similar in 2012), an “Equal Occupational Fatality Day” can be calculated. As in previous years, the chart above shows the significant gender disparity in workplace fatalities: 4,234 men died on the job (92% of the total) in 2011 compared to only 375 women (8% of the total). The “gender occupational fatality gap” in 2011 was considerable — more than 11 men died on the job for every woman who died while working....
Father Accused of Raping Daughter Acquitted After 'Fifty Shades of Grey' Defense
...McCulloch studied Fifty Shades of Grey to prepare for the court proceedings. On the third day of the trial, the man's daughter took to the stand, and McCulloch used passages from the book to question the girl. After just seven minutes, she broke down and admitted she had made up the accusations to teach her "strict" father a lesson. ...
How Women Throw Themselves At Pro Athletes (And Vice Versa): A Publicist Explains
...An attractive married woman—she had a huge rock on her finger—came over and started hitting on my client immediately and relentlessly. After a while, her husband came out from the dance club area, clearly upset. He never threatened anything physical. He barely even raised his voice. He just wanted to know what she was doing. His wife played dumb. So my client spoke up: "Your girl is trying to fuck me."
The husband got into it a little with his wife. He wanted to leave. My client called over one of the bouncers and told him to get rid of the couple. The wife decided to stay. The husband got booted. He was irate. She didn't care. Five minutes later, my client was having sex with her in the back office of the club. She left, and he never talked to her again. Obviously, we have no idea what happened with the marriage.
Police: Mom poisoned her baby with teaspoon of salt to get husband ‘back into her life’
Kimberly Martines was separated from her husband and desperate to lure him back into her life, so police say she hatched a plan to get his attention: It began with poisoning her 17-month-old daughter, Peyton.
She didn’t use a household cleaner or pop open a bottle of pain medication, police told NBC affiliate WYFF. Instead, Martines, of Spartanburg, S.C., turned to a simple condiment found in almost any dining room: salt....
Hard Times in Venezuela Breed Malaria as Desperate Flock to Mines - The New York Times
As a computer technician from a big city, Mr. Balocha was ill-suited for the mines, his soft hands used to working keyboards, not the earth. But Venezuela’s economy collapsed on so many levels that inflation had obliterated his salary, along with his hopes of preserving a middle-class life.
So, like tens of thousands of other people from across the country, Mr. Balocha came to these open, swampy mines scattered across the jungle, looking for a future. Here, waiters, office workers, taxi drivers, college graduates and even civil servants on vacation from their government jobs are out panning for black-market gold, all under the watchful eyes of an armed group that taxes them and threatens to tie them to posts if they disobey.
It is a society turned upside down, a place where educated people abandon once-comfortable jobs in the city for dangerous, backbreaking work in muddy pits, desperate to make ends meet. And it comes with a steep price: Malaria, long driven to the fringes of the country, is festering in the mines and back with a vengeance.
As a computer technician from a big city, Mr. Balocha was ill-suited for the mines, his soft hands used to working keyboards, not the earth. But Venezuela’s economy collapsed on so many levels that inflation had obliterated his salary, along with his hopes of preserving a middle-class life.
So, like tens of thousands of other people from across the country, Mr. Balocha came to these open, swampy mines scattered across the jungle, looking for a future. Here, waiters, office workers, taxi drivers, college graduates and even civil servants on vacation from their government jobs are out panning for black-market gold, all under the watchful eyes of an armed group that taxes them and threatens to tie them to posts if they disobey.
It is a society turned upside down, a place where educated people abandon once-comfortable jobs in the city for dangerous, backbreaking work in muddy pits, desperate to make ends meet. And it comes with a steep price: Malaria, long driven to the fringes of the country, is festering in the mines and back with a vengeance.
Sunday, August 14, 2016
Study: ColoradoCare can't cover its costs
KUSA - The 2016 ballot initiative to give every Coloradan healthcare won’t be able to cover its costs, according to a study released Monday by the Colorado Health Institute.
That’s despite the fact that the proposed amendment 69, known as ColoradoCare, would more than triple the amount of taxes collected by the state.
“Simply put, the revenue would not be sufficient,” the report stated. “CHI’s model projects that the revenue from taxes and federal funds would fall just short of paying ColoradoCare’s bills in the first year – with widening deficits in each subsequent year.”...
KUSA - The 2016 ballot initiative to give every Coloradan healthcare won’t be able to cover its costs, according to a study released Monday by the Colorado Health Institute.
That’s despite the fact that the proposed amendment 69, known as ColoradoCare, would more than triple the amount of taxes collected by the state.
“Simply put, the revenue would not be sufficient,” the report stated. “CHI’s model projects that the revenue from taxes and federal funds would fall just short of paying ColoradoCare’s bills in the first year – with widening deficits in each subsequent year.”...
The Alphabet Versus the Goddess: The Conflict Between Word and Image
...This groundbreaking book proposes that the rise of alphabetic literacy reconfigured the human brain and brought about profound changes in history, religion, and gender relations. Making remarkable connections across brain function, myth, and anthropology, Dr. Shlain shows why pre-literate cultures were principally informed by holistic, right-brain modes that venerated the Goddess, images, and feminine values. Writing drove cultures toward linear left-brain thinking and this shift upset the balance between men and women, initiating the decline of the feminine and ushering in patriarchal rule. Examining the cultures of the Israelites, Greeks, Christians, and Muslims, Shlain reinterprets ancient myths and parables in light of his theory. Provocative and inspiring, this book is a paradigm-shattering work that will transform your view of history and the mind...
NY Times Complains That Inventing Fire Caused Sexism, Global Warming
...“Anthropologists have speculated that inhaling smoke led to the discovery of smoking,” Humans have long used fire to modify their environment and burn carbon, practices that now have us in the throes of climate change. Fire is even tied to the rise of patriarchy — by allowing men to go out hunting while women stayed behind to cook by the fire, it spawned gender norms that still exist today....
...This groundbreaking book proposes that the rise of alphabetic literacy reconfigured the human brain and brought about profound changes in history, religion, and gender relations. Making remarkable connections across brain function, myth, and anthropology, Dr. Shlain shows why pre-literate cultures were principally informed by holistic, right-brain modes that venerated the Goddess, images, and feminine values. Writing drove cultures toward linear left-brain thinking and this shift upset the balance between men and women, initiating the decline of the feminine and ushering in patriarchal rule. Examining the cultures of the Israelites, Greeks, Christians, and Muslims, Shlain reinterprets ancient myths and parables in light of his theory. Provocative and inspiring, this book is a paradigm-shattering work that will transform your view of history and the mind...
NY Times Complains That Inventing Fire Caused Sexism, Global Warming
...“Anthropologists have speculated that inhaling smoke led to the discovery of smoking,” Humans have long used fire to modify their environment and burn carbon, practices that now have us in the throes of climate change. Fire is even tied to the rise of patriarchy — by allowing men to go out hunting while women stayed behind to cook by the fire, it spawned gender norms that still exist today....
Elsewhere (208)
...I started giving quizzes to my juniors and seniors. I gave them a ten-question American history test… just to see where they are. The vast majority of my students - I’m talking nine out of ten, in every single class, for seven consecutive years – they have no idea that slavery existed anywhere in the world before the United States. Moses, Pharaoh, they know none of it. They’re 100% convinced that slavery is a uniquely American invention… How do you give an adequate view of history and culture to kids when that’s what they think of their own country – that America invented slavery? That’s all they know....
...I started giving quizzes to my juniors and seniors. I gave them a ten-question American history test… just to see where they are. The vast majority of my students - I’m talking nine out of ten, in every single class, for seven consecutive years – they have no idea that slavery existed anywhere in the world before the United States. Moses, Pharaoh, they know none of it. They’re 100% convinced that slavery is a uniquely American invention… How do you give an adequate view of history and culture to kids when that’s what they think of their own country – that America invented slavery? That’s all they know....
Pew data: Heavy majority of asylum seekers in Europe are young men under the age of 35
Military-Aged Men Extremely Over-Represented in EU Refugee Asylum Applications
...As a result, about four-in-ten asylum seekers in Europe in 2015 (42%) were young men ages 18 to 34. This was also true for most leading origin countries: 39% of those from Syria were young men, as were 38% of those from Afghanistan and 47% of those from Iraq. Young adult males made up a larger share of asylum seekers from some origin countries. For example, roughly three-fourths of asylum seekers from Gambia (80%), Pakistan (76%) and Bangladesh (76%) were young adult men in 2015....
Military-Aged Men Extremely Over-Represented in EU Refugee Asylum Applications
...As a result, about four-in-ten asylum seekers in Europe in 2015 (42%) were young men ages 18 to 34. This was also true for most leading origin countries: 39% of those from Syria were young men, as were 38% of those from Afghanistan and 47% of those from Iraq. Young adult males made up a larger share of asylum seekers from some origin countries. For example, roughly three-fourths of asylum seekers from Gambia (80%), Pakistan (76%) and Bangladesh (76%) were young adult men in 2015....
"The ['Hillary Care'] plan prescribed some eye-popping maximum fines: $5,000 for refusing to join the government mandated health plan; $5,000 for failing to pay premiums on time; 15 years in prison for doctors who received ‘anything of value’ in exchange for helping patients short circuit bureaucracy; $10,000 a day for faulty physician paperwork; and $50,000 for unauthorized patient treatment. When told the plan could bankrupt small businesses, Mrs. Clinton said, 'I can’t be responsible for every under-capitalized small business in America'!"
-- Tony Snow reporting on Hillary's health care plan
MAILBAG
...This is not a joke nor even an exaggeration. I just found out that my sister in law’s other brother-in-law was arrested in Venezuela at the airport while trying to leave the country. His crime, he was an employee for a company that went out of business. Waiting for more? There isn’t any. Maduro has decreed that any business that goes out of business has committed economic treason and its employees are subject to arrest. They had already arrested numerous owners and managers but this is the first time they went after rank and file worker bees....
How Venezuela's Repressive Government Controls the Nation Through Hunger
...In addition, lines and rationing give the government the chance to extend Orwellian supervision. Retailers are being required to keep tabs on who buys what and how much. The government has installed fingerprint scanners in grocery and drug stores. The government has seized supplies from food firms and threatened to take over idle factories. The police often allow certain groups of citizens (many with ties to the ruling party) to control access to the lines or even mug people standing in line.
Lines and scarcity give the government the chance to engage in new forms of favoritism. One of the most important games in Venezuela is guessing which stores will have which products. Only the government, which controls food distribution, knows this information for sure. So one of the games it has started playing is to disclose information only to those who are pro-government.
Another form of favoritism has been the creation of CLAPs (Comités Locales de Abastecimiento y Producción). These are government-run "committees" that distribute groceries. Bags of groceries are given mostly to loyal groups. By the end of May, more than 9,000 CLAPS were operating. A recent poll suggests that at least 9 percent of Venezuelans are taking advantage of the CLAPs. CLAPs do nothing to end Venezuela's food crisis but they do wonders for the government: they force Venezuelans to demonstrate loyalty to Maduro regime in order to qualify for the handout.
But the most important consequence of lines and rationing has been the increase in military control. Military personnel have been deployed to monitor food lines and supermarkets. They are there with the pretext of protecting citizens from crime, but what they are most successful in doing is repressing any protest that might emerge....
Looking back on the Great Leap Forward
...In collective canteens, food, distributed by the spoonful according to merit, became a weapon used to force people to follow the party’s every dictate. As incentives to work were removed, coercion and violence were used instead to compel famished farmers to perform labour on poorly planned irrigation projects while fields were neglected. ...
...What comes out of this massive and detailed dossier is a tale of horror in which Mao emerges as one of the greatest mass murderers in history, responsible for the deaths of at least 45 million people between 1958 and 1962. It is not merely the extent of the catastrophe that dwarfs earlier estimates, but also the manner in which many people died: between two and three million victims were tortured to death or summarily killed, often for the slightest infraction. When a boy stole a handful of grain in a Hunan village, local boss Xiong Dechang forced his father to bury him alive. The father died of grief a few days later. The case of Wang Ziyou was reported to the central leadership: one of his ears was chopped off, his legs were tied with iron wire, a ten kilogram stone was dropped on his back and then he was branded with a sizzling tool – punishment for digging up a potato.
Caribbean contagion
...For the past 15 years Venezuela has been shipping oil to Cuba, which in turn sends thousands of doctors and other professionals to Venezuela. The swap is lucrative for the communist-controlled island, which pays doctors a paltry few hundred dollars a month. It gets more oil than it needs, and sells the surplus. That makes Cuba perhaps the only importer that prefers high oil prices. Venezuelan support is thought to be worth 12-20% of Cuba’s GDP....
... Tourism has surged since the United States loosened travel restrictions in 2014, which will partially offset the loss of Venezuelan aid. The cost of fuel is minuscule compared with the fares Hector’s American passengers pay....
Venezuelan court upholds 14-year jail term given to opposition leader, Leopoldo Lopez
A Venezuelan court upheld the 14-year sentence of jailed opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez on Friday, in a move likely to increase tension in the crisis-hit South American country.
Lopez has repeatedly declared himself innocent of the charge of inciting violence at anti-government protests in 2014, calling himself a political prisoner.
"This is certainly a political trial. Unfortunately, the government's interest takes priority over the justice system," Lopez's lawyer Juan Carlos Gutierrez told AFP.
"They upheld his sentence under the same terms," Gutierrez said, referring to the 14-year sentence....
-- Tony Snow reporting on Hillary's health care plan
MAILBAG
...This is not a joke nor even an exaggeration. I just found out that my sister in law’s other brother-in-law was arrested in Venezuela at the airport while trying to leave the country. His crime, he was an employee for a company that went out of business. Waiting for more? There isn’t any. Maduro has decreed that any business that goes out of business has committed economic treason and its employees are subject to arrest. They had already arrested numerous owners and managers but this is the first time they went after rank and file worker bees....
How Venezuela's Repressive Government Controls the Nation Through Hunger
...In addition, lines and rationing give the government the chance to extend Orwellian supervision. Retailers are being required to keep tabs on who buys what and how much. The government has installed fingerprint scanners in grocery and drug stores. The government has seized supplies from food firms and threatened to take over idle factories. The police often allow certain groups of citizens (many with ties to the ruling party) to control access to the lines or even mug people standing in line.
Lines and scarcity give the government the chance to engage in new forms of favoritism. One of the most important games in Venezuela is guessing which stores will have which products. Only the government, which controls food distribution, knows this information for sure. So one of the games it has started playing is to disclose information only to those who are pro-government.
Another form of favoritism has been the creation of CLAPs (Comités Locales de Abastecimiento y Producción). These are government-run "committees" that distribute groceries. Bags of groceries are given mostly to loyal groups. By the end of May, more than 9,000 CLAPS were operating. A recent poll suggests that at least 9 percent of Venezuelans are taking advantage of the CLAPs. CLAPs do nothing to end Venezuela's food crisis but they do wonders for the government: they force Venezuelans to demonstrate loyalty to Maduro regime in order to qualify for the handout.
But the most important consequence of lines and rationing has been the increase in military control. Military personnel have been deployed to monitor food lines and supermarkets. They are there with the pretext of protecting citizens from crime, but what they are most successful in doing is repressing any protest that might emerge....
Looking back on the Great Leap Forward
...In collective canteens, food, distributed by the spoonful according to merit, became a weapon used to force people to follow the party’s every dictate. As incentives to work were removed, coercion and violence were used instead to compel famished farmers to perform labour on poorly planned irrigation projects while fields were neglected. ...
...What comes out of this massive and detailed dossier is a tale of horror in which Mao emerges as one of the greatest mass murderers in history, responsible for the deaths of at least 45 million people between 1958 and 1962. It is not merely the extent of the catastrophe that dwarfs earlier estimates, but also the manner in which many people died: between two and three million victims were tortured to death or summarily killed, often for the slightest infraction. When a boy stole a handful of grain in a Hunan village, local boss Xiong Dechang forced his father to bury him alive. The father died of grief a few days later. The case of Wang Ziyou was reported to the central leadership: one of his ears was chopped off, his legs were tied with iron wire, a ten kilogram stone was dropped on his back and then he was branded with a sizzling tool – punishment for digging up a potato.
Caribbean contagion
...For the past 15 years Venezuela has been shipping oil to Cuba, which in turn sends thousands of doctors and other professionals to Venezuela. The swap is lucrative for the communist-controlled island, which pays doctors a paltry few hundred dollars a month. It gets more oil than it needs, and sells the surplus. That makes Cuba perhaps the only importer that prefers high oil prices. Venezuelan support is thought to be worth 12-20% of Cuba’s GDP....
... Tourism has surged since the United States loosened travel restrictions in 2014, which will partially offset the loss of Venezuelan aid. The cost of fuel is minuscule compared with the fares Hector’s American passengers pay....
Venezuelan court upholds 14-year jail term given to opposition leader, Leopoldo Lopez
A Venezuelan court upheld the 14-year sentence of jailed opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez on Friday, in a move likely to increase tension in the crisis-hit South American country.
Lopez has repeatedly declared himself innocent of the charge of inciting violence at anti-government protests in 2014, calling himself a political prisoner.
"This is certainly a political trial. Unfortunately, the government's interest takes priority over the justice system," Lopez's lawyer Juan Carlos Gutierrez told AFP.
"They upheld his sentence under the same terms," Gutierrez said, referring to the 14-year sentence....
Secret Deal Among AGs to Prosecute Climate Change ‘Deniers’ Challenged in Court
By signing a “secrecy pact” with fellow Democrat attorneys general preparing to prosecute climate change skeptics, Rhode Island’s top law enforcement officer jeopardized free speech rights and government transparency laws, according to two legal organizations that have taken him to court.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Kilmartin’s tactics in supporting President Barack Obama’s climate change policy violate state law guaranteeing access to public records, the two groups, Energy and Environment Legal Institute and Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, claim in their lawsuit.
If Kilmartin and the other attorneys general prevail in the deal to keep select details secret, the ordinary citizen will be the loser, Chris Horner, a leading critic of climate change orthodoxy, said.
“It will mean that they can create privilege for what are otherwise public records, even when shared with ideological activists and donors, so long as everyone who wants to keep their scheming secret agrees in advance,” Horner told The Daily Signal....
By signing a “secrecy pact” with fellow Democrat attorneys general preparing to prosecute climate change skeptics, Rhode Island’s top law enforcement officer jeopardized free speech rights and government transparency laws, according to two legal organizations that have taken him to court.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Kilmartin’s tactics in supporting President Barack Obama’s climate change policy violate state law guaranteeing access to public records, the two groups, Energy and Environment Legal Institute and Free Market Environmental Law Clinic, claim in their lawsuit.
If Kilmartin and the other attorneys general prevail in the deal to keep select details secret, the ordinary citizen will be the loser, Chris Horner, a leading critic of climate change orthodoxy, said.
“It will mean that they can create privilege for what are otherwise public records, even when shared with ideological activists and donors, so long as everyone who wants to keep their scheming secret agrees in advance,” Horner told The Daily Signal....
How Paul Krugman Made Donald Trump Possible
...In 2012, Krugman called Mitt Romney a “charlatan,” pathologically dishonest, and untrustworthy. He said Romney doesn’t even pretend to care about poor people and wants people to die so that the rich could get richer. Romney is “completely amoral,” “a dangerous fool,” “ignorant as well as uncaring.”
In March, Krugman had a column called “Clash of Republican Con Artists.” In it, he called Trump’s foreign policy more reasonable than that of Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz and said he’s just as terrified of either of those men in the White House as he is of Trump. He wrote: “In fact, you have to wonder why, exactly, the Republican establishment is really so horrified by Mr. Trump. Yes, he’s a con man, but they all are. So why is this con job different from any other?”
Yet a few weeks ago Krugman wondered how Republicans could rally around Trump “just as if he were a normal candidate.” It was exactly Krugman who normalized him! What makes Donald Trump normal to so many is that they’ve heard all the hysteria from people like Krugman before. If you use the most vile language available on a good man like Romney, or on real candidates like Rubio and Cruz, you find you have none left for the Donald Trumps of the world—and no one is listening to you anyway....
Harvard law prof: Saying at work that “Hillary Clinton shouldn’t be president because women shouldn’t work full-time” may lead to a harassment lawsuit
...According to Prof. Feldman, then, harassment law can require employers to suppress even speech criticizing a presidential candidate, if that speech expresses a sexist viewpoint. Indeed, nothing about Prof. Feldman’s analysis turns on Clinton being a candidate — if Clinton is elected, criticizing her actions as president on the grounds that her sex is causing her to act unsoundly would likewise help create a “hostile work environment.” Employers would thus be obligated to suppress such criticisms by their employees or face the risk of massive civil liability.
But wait: Prof. Feldman’s Hillary Clinton examples comes in a column that explains why the EEOC is right to order an investigation of a co-worker’s displaying a Gadsden flag, even though it’s not racist on its face — according to the column (and the EEOC), the employer has to “investigat[e] … the specific complaint’s context to see if workplace racism was in play.” This means that even if an employee complaints that a co-worker was criticizing Hillary Clinton without using overtly sexist arguments, but the employee perceived the underlying message as sexist, the employer would then have to investigate the “context to see if workplace [sexism] was in play.”...
...Pro-Trump statements? Too dangerous for employers to allow, so long as someone perceives them as sending an implicitly anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim message. (Prof. Feldman doesn’t deny that such statements could require employer investigations, even if they are just “Vote Trump”; his response to “What if, [Volokh] asks, someone considers a pro-Donald Trump workplace symbol to be racial harassment?” is ultimately “Speech that’s constitutionally protected elsewhere is restricted at work,” and by this he means restricted by the government’s coercive power and not just by private employer choice.) Anti-Clinton statements? Too dangerous for employers to allow. How convenient….
Trump Is Testing the Norms of Objectivity in Journalism
...It would also be an abdication of political journalism’s most solemn duty: to ferret out what the candidates will be like in the most powerful office in the world.
It may not always seem fair to Mr. Trump or his supporters. But journalism shouldn’t measure itself against any one campaign’s definition of fairness. It is journalism’s job to be true to the readers and viewers, and true to the facts, in a way that will stand up to history’s judgment. To do anything less would be untenable.
The Trump Riots That are Mostly My Fault
...In the future, the media will kill famous people to generate news that people will care about. – The Dilbert Future (May 1997)
Three months later, the media chased Princess Di into a tunnel and created a dangerous situation that killed her but was terrific for television news ratings. The media didn’t plot to kill anyone, but they created a situation that made it likely someone important would die because of the way their business model works. That was the basis for my prediction.
Fast-forward to today and we see the media priming the public to try to kill Trump, or at least create some photogenic mayhem at a public event. Again, no one is sitting in a room plotting Trump’s death, but – let’s be honest – at least half of the media believes Trump is the next Hitler, and a Hitler assassination would be morally justified. Also great for ratings. The media would not be charged with any crime for triggering some nut to act. There would be no smoking gun. No guilt. No repercussions. Just better ratings and bonuses all around...
...In 2012, Krugman called Mitt Romney a “charlatan,” pathologically dishonest, and untrustworthy. He said Romney doesn’t even pretend to care about poor people and wants people to die so that the rich could get richer. Romney is “completely amoral,” “a dangerous fool,” “ignorant as well as uncaring.”
In March, Krugman had a column called “Clash of Republican Con Artists.” In it, he called Trump’s foreign policy more reasonable than that of Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz and said he’s just as terrified of either of those men in the White House as he is of Trump. He wrote: “In fact, you have to wonder why, exactly, the Republican establishment is really so horrified by Mr. Trump. Yes, he’s a con man, but they all are. So why is this con job different from any other?”
Yet a few weeks ago Krugman wondered how Republicans could rally around Trump “just as if he were a normal candidate.” It was exactly Krugman who normalized him! What makes Donald Trump normal to so many is that they’ve heard all the hysteria from people like Krugman before. If you use the most vile language available on a good man like Romney, or on real candidates like Rubio and Cruz, you find you have none left for the Donald Trumps of the world—and no one is listening to you anyway....
Harvard law prof: Saying at work that “Hillary Clinton shouldn’t be president because women shouldn’t work full-time” may lead to a harassment lawsuit
...According to Prof. Feldman, then, harassment law can require employers to suppress even speech criticizing a presidential candidate, if that speech expresses a sexist viewpoint. Indeed, nothing about Prof. Feldman’s analysis turns on Clinton being a candidate — if Clinton is elected, criticizing her actions as president on the grounds that her sex is causing her to act unsoundly would likewise help create a “hostile work environment.” Employers would thus be obligated to suppress such criticisms by their employees or face the risk of massive civil liability.
But wait: Prof. Feldman’s Hillary Clinton examples comes in a column that explains why the EEOC is right to order an investigation of a co-worker’s displaying a Gadsden flag, even though it’s not racist on its face — according to the column (and the EEOC), the employer has to “investigat[e] … the specific complaint’s context to see if workplace racism was in play.” This means that even if an employee complaints that a co-worker was criticizing Hillary Clinton without using overtly sexist arguments, but the employee perceived the underlying message as sexist, the employer would then have to investigate the “context to see if workplace [sexism] was in play.”...
...Pro-Trump statements? Too dangerous for employers to allow, so long as someone perceives them as sending an implicitly anti-Hispanic or anti-Muslim message. (Prof. Feldman doesn’t deny that such statements could require employer investigations, even if they are just “Vote Trump”; his response to “What if, [Volokh] asks, someone considers a pro-Donald Trump workplace symbol to be racial harassment?” is ultimately “Speech that’s constitutionally protected elsewhere is restricted at work,” and by this he means restricted by the government’s coercive power and not just by private employer choice.) Anti-Clinton statements? Too dangerous for employers to allow. How convenient….
Trump Is Testing the Norms of Objectivity in Journalism
...It would also be an abdication of political journalism’s most solemn duty: to ferret out what the candidates will be like in the most powerful office in the world.
It may not always seem fair to Mr. Trump or his supporters. But journalism shouldn’t measure itself against any one campaign’s definition of fairness. It is journalism’s job to be true to the readers and viewers, and true to the facts, in a way that will stand up to history’s judgment. To do anything less would be untenable.
The Trump Riots That are Mostly My Fault
...In the future, the media will kill famous people to generate news that people will care about. – The Dilbert Future (May 1997)
Three months later, the media chased Princess Di into a tunnel and created a dangerous situation that killed her but was terrific for television news ratings. The media didn’t plot to kill anyone, but they created a situation that made it likely someone important would die because of the way their business model works. That was the basis for my prediction.
Fast-forward to today and we see the media priming the public to try to kill Trump, or at least create some photogenic mayhem at a public event. Again, no one is sitting in a room plotting Trump’s death, but – let’s be honest – at least half of the media believes Trump is the next Hitler, and a Hitler assassination would be morally justified. Also great for ratings. The media would not be charged with any crime for triggering some nut to act. There would be no smoking gun. No guilt. No repercussions. Just better ratings and bonuses all around...
Why Did a Journal for Christian Pastors Give a Platform to a Sexual Predator?
...The first big problem (besides the part where he essentially says it was his wife who drove him to this, which is next door to saying he didn’t have a choice in the matter) is that he never really seems to get that what he did to this minor was rape. Instead, he swaddles the entire story in Christianese, using it to distance himself from his actions and make the whole situation sound… normal. As if it were, at worst, an affair. Just look at the very next paragraph:...
Disturbing Lesson from Christian Workbook Discusses Why God Allowed a Little Boy to “Be Molested”
...God will severely judge the fifteen year old boy for the evil that he did. However, your son can turn what was meant for evil into good. The vaccinations we receive for various diseases contains a small amount of the actual disease. Our immune system builds up a reaction to it so that if our body is exposed to the disease, it is prepared to fight it off. A similar result can occur in the life of your son if this matter handled in a Scriptural way....
Cooking, cleaning and making babies: Inside the ultra-conservative Christian 'cult' Gloriavale where women's lives are strictly controlled and they have no contact with the outside world
..The documentary focuses on a few women in particular - 22-year-old Dove Love who is a kitchen manager and preparing for her upcoming marriage to 17-year-old builder Watchful Steadfast.
Dove Love is doing the washing for everybody in the community, when Watchful Steadfast arrives her her house with a bunch of flowers as a marriage proposal.
She admits she didn't know she was getting married until hours beforehand.
Once the couple is married and they exchange vows - where the woman promises to submit to the man and the man vows to be a leader, they embrace before going to a consummation room where they are expected to lose their virginities....
Teen-raping Texas pastor gets life in prison after using the Bible to justify abusing women
A volunteer youth pastor was sentenced to life in prison in Texas this week for sexually assaulting multiple teens at his church, reports the Houston Chronicle.
Dell Ivan Godkin, 48, was found guilty of sexually abusing one victim beginning when she was 13-years-old, and continuing until she was 17, by telling her God approved of what they were doing.
“He would say lots of things about God being OK with it,” explained prosecutor Monica Cooper, adding that Godkin would cite passages from the Bible to explain the roles of men and women to his victims...
...The first big problem (besides the part where he essentially says it was his wife who drove him to this, which is next door to saying he didn’t have a choice in the matter) is that he never really seems to get that what he did to this minor was rape. Instead, he swaddles the entire story in Christianese, using it to distance himself from his actions and make the whole situation sound… normal. As if it were, at worst, an affair. Just look at the very next paragraph:...
Disturbing Lesson from Christian Workbook Discusses Why God Allowed a Little Boy to “Be Molested”
...God will severely judge the fifteen year old boy for the evil that he did. However, your son can turn what was meant for evil into good. The vaccinations we receive for various diseases contains a small amount of the actual disease. Our immune system builds up a reaction to it so that if our body is exposed to the disease, it is prepared to fight it off. A similar result can occur in the life of your son if this matter handled in a Scriptural way....
Cooking, cleaning and making babies: Inside the ultra-conservative Christian 'cult' Gloriavale where women's lives are strictly controlled and they have no contact with the outside world
..The documentary focuses on a few women in particular - 22-year-old Dove Love who is a kitchen manager and preparing for her upcoming marriage to 17-year-old builder Watchful Steadfast.
Dove Love is doing the washing for everybody in the community, when Watchful Steadfast arrives her her house with a bunch of flowers as a marriage proposal.
She admits she didn't know she was getting married until hours beforehand.
Once the couple is married and they exchange vows - where the woman promises to submit to the man and the man vows to be a leader, they embrace before going to a consummation room where they are expected to lose their virginities....
Teen-raping Texas pastor gets life in prison after using the Bible to justify abusing women
A volunteer youth pastor was sentenced to life in prison in Texas this week for sexually assaulting multiple teens at his church, reports the Houston Chronicle.
Dell Ivan Godkin, 48, was found guilty of sexually abusing one victim beginning when she was 13-years-old, and continuing until she was 17, by telling her God approved of what they were doing.
“He would say lots of things about God being OK with it,” explained prosecutor Monica Cooper, adding that Godkin would cite passages from the Bible to explain the roles of men and women to his victims...
PEGGY NOONAN ON HOW GLOBAL ELITES HAVE MORE LOYALTY TO EACH OTHER THAN TO THE CITIZENS THEY CONTROL
...In Manhattan, my little island off the continent, I see the children of the global business elite marry each other and settle in London or New York or Mumbai. They send their children to the same schools and are alert to all class markers. And those elites, of Mumbai and Manhattan, do not often identify with, or see a connection to or an obligation toward, the rough, struggling people who live at the bottom in their countries. In fact, they fear them, and often devise ways, when home, of not having their wealth and worldly success fully noticed.
Affluence detaches, power adds distance to experience. I don’t have it fully right in my mind but something big is happening here with this division between the leaders and the led. It is very much a feature of our age. But it is odd that our elites have abandoned or are abandoning the idea that they belong to a country, that they have ties that bring responsibilities, that they should feel loyalty to their people or, at the very least, a grounded respect.
I close with a story that I haven’t seen in the mainstream press. This week the Daily Caller’s Peter Hasson reported that recent Syrian refugees being resettled in Virginia, were sent to the state’s poorest communities. Data from the State Department showed that almost all Virginia’s refugees since October “have been placed in towns with lower incomes and higher poverty rates, hours away from the wealthy suburbs outside of Washington, D.C.” Of 121 refugees, 112 were placed in communities at least 100 miles from the nation’s capital. The suburban counties of Fairfax, Loudoun and Arlington—among the wealthiest in the nation, and home to high concentrations of those who create, and populate, government and the media—have received only nine refugees.
Some of the detachment isn’t unconscious. Some of it is sheer and clever self-protection. At least on some level they can take care of their own....
Peggy Noonan: How Globalists Forsake Their Countrymen
Nothing in their lives will get worse. The challenge of integrating different cultures, negotiating daily tensions, dealing with crime and extremism and fearfulness on the street--that was put on those with comparatively little, whom I’ve called the unprotected. They were left to struggle, not gradually and over the years but suddenly and in an air of ongoing crisis that shows no signs of ending--because nobody cares about them enough to stop it.
The powerful show no particular sign of worrying about any of this. When the working and middle class pushed back in shocked indignation, the people on top called them “xenophobic,” “narrow-minded,” “racist.” The detached, who made the decisions and bore none of the costs, got to be called “humanist,” “compassionate,” and “hero of human rights.”
...
The larger point is that this is something we are seeing all over, the top detaching itself from the bottom, feeling little loyalty to it or affiliation with it. It is a theme I see working its way throughout the West’s power centers. At its heart it is not only a detachment from, but a lack of interest in, the lives of your countrymen, of those who are not at the table, and who understand that they’ve been abandoned by their leaders’ selfishness and mad virtue-signalling.
...
From what I’ve seen of those in power throughout business and politics now, the people of your country are not your countrymen, they’re aliens whose bizarre emotions you must attempt occasionally to anticipate and manage.
So Conservatives, What Have We Learned From This Trump Thing?
...Our base demanded someone who wouldn’t be intimidated, who would fight. Instead, the establishment was dead set on dumping a steaming pile of Jeb on our collective lawn, the same durrwood you can watch on YouTube hanging a medal around Hillary Clinton's wrinkled neck. That pompous geebo can’t even take his own damn side in a fight; why is anyone shocked that our voters saw he would never take theirs?
So what have we learned about ourselves? Maybe that many of us are snobs. There's a lot of class warfare going on here, a lot of backroom snark, with a lot of conservatives who want to believe that the only people who could ever support Donald Trump are knuckle-dragging morons who can't cut it when it comes to anything besides digging ditches. Too many of us choose cultural solidarity with the liberals we live among over political solidarity with the people we expected to vote with us....
...In Manhattan, my little island off the continent, I see the children of the global business elite marry each other and settle in London or New York or Mumbai. They send their children to the same schools and are alert to all class markers. And those elites, of Mumbai and Manhattan, do not often identify with, or see a connection to or an obligation toward, the rough, struggling people who live at the bottom in their countries. In fact, they fear them, and often devise ways, when home, of not having their wealth and worldly success fully noticed.
Affluence detaches, power adds distance to experience. I don’t have it fully right in my mind but something big is happening here with this division between the leaders and the led. It is very much a feature of our age. But it is odd that our elites have abandoned or are abandoning the idea that they belong to a country, that they have ties that bring responsibilities, that they should feel loyalty to their people or, at the very least, a grounded respect.
I close with a story that I haven’t seen in the mainstream press. This week the Daily Caller’s Peter Hasson reported that recent Syrian refugees being resettled in Virginia, were sent to the state’s poorest communities. Data from the State Department showed that almost all Virginia’s refugees since October “have been placed in towns with lower incomes and higher poverty rates, hours away from the wealthy suburbs outside of Washington, D.C.” Of 121 refugees, 112 were placed in communities at least 100 miles from the nation’s capital. The suburban counties of Fairfax, Loudoun and Arlington—among the wealthiest in the nation, and home to high concentrations of those who create, and populate, government and the media—have received only nine refugees.
Some of the detachment isn’t unconscious. Some of it is sheer and clever self-protection. At least on some level they can take care of their own....
Peggy Noonan: How Globalists Forsake Their Countrymen
Nothing in their lives will get worse. The challenge of integrating different cultures, negotiating daily tensions, dealing with crime and extremism and fearfulness on the street--that was put on those with comparatively little, whom I’ve called the unprotected. They were left to struggle, not gradually and over the years but suddenly and in an air of ongoing crisis that shows no signs of ending--because nobody cares about them enough to stop it.
The powerful show no particular sign of worrying about any of this. When the working and middle class pushed back in shocked indignation, the people on top called them “xenophobic,” “narrow-minded,” “racist.” The detached, who made the decisions and bore none of the costs, got to be called “humanist,” “compassionate,” and “hero of human rights.”
...
The larger point is that this is something we are seeing all over, the top detaching itself from the bottom, feeling little loyalty to it or affiliation with it. It is a theme I see working its way throughout the West’s power centers. At its heart it is not only a detachment from, but a lack of interest in, the lives of your countrymen, of those who are not at the table, and who understand that they’ve been abandoned by their leaders’ selfishness and mad virtue-signalling.
...
From what I’ve seen of those in power throughout business and politics now, the people of your country are not your countrymen, they’re aliens whose bizarre emotions you must attempt occasionally to anticipate and manage.
So Conservatives, What Have We Learned From This Trump Thing?
...Our base demanded someone who wouldn’t be intimidated, who would fight. Instead, the establishment was dead set on dumping a steaming pile of Jeb on our collective lawn, the same durrwood you can watch on YouTube hanging a medal around Hillary Clinton's wrinkled neck. That pompous geebo can’t even take his own damn side in a fight; why is anyone shocked that our voters saw he would never take theirs?
So what have we learned about ourselves? Maybe that many of us are snobs. There's a lot of class warfare going on here, a lot of backroom snark, with a lot of conservatives who want to believe that the only people who could ever support Donald Trump are knuckle-dragging morons who can't cut it when it comes to anything besides digging ditches. Too many of us choose cultural solidarity with the liberals we live among over political solidarity with the people we expected to vote with us....
NASA: Antarctic Sea Ice Reaches New Record Maximum
Sea ice surrounding Antarctica reached a new record high extent this year, covering more of the southern oceans than it has since scientists began a long-term satellite record to map sea ice extent in the late 1970s. The upward trend in the Antarctic, however, is only about a third of the magnitude of the rapid loss of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean....
Massive Increase In Arctic Sea Ice Over Last Year
Experts say that the Arctic is melting down.
The area of 1.5 meter (5 foot) thick ice in the Arctic has more than doubled over last year, and total volume has massively increased. The animation below shows only ice 1.5+ meters thick....
Sea ice surrounding Antarctica reached a new record high extent this year, covering more of the southern oceans than it has since scientists began a long-term satellite record to map sea ice extent in the late 1970s. The upward trend in the Antarctic, however, is only about a third of the magnitude of the rapid loss of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean....
Massive Increase In Arctic Sea Ice Over Last Year
Experts say that the Arctic is melting down.
The area of 1.5 meter (5 foot) thick ice in the Arctic has more than doubled over last year, and total volume has massively increased. The animation below shows only ice 1.5+ meters thick....
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