Society's ChildS


Star of David

Mentally deranged Israeli Rabbi: Burning Christian churches justified - because they worship idols

rabbi benzi gopstein
The Israeli Jewish Rabbi Benzi Gopstein has said that Christian churches in Israel must be burnt because Christians worship idols and idols must be destroyed.

Gopstein, the head of Lehava group, made his remarks at a panel discussion for Jewish yeshiva students when asked by a fellow panellist if he believed burning down churches in Israel was justified.

"Did the Rambam [Maimonides] rule to destroy [idol worship] or not? Idol worship must be destroyed. It's simply yes - what's the question?" Gopstein told the panel.

His comment alarmed his questioner Benny Rabinovich, a journalist, who told him: "Benzi, I must say I'm really shocked by what you're saying here. You are essentially saying we must go out and burn down churches. You're saying something insane here."

Told by another panellist, Moshe Klein, that the discussion was being filmed and that his remarks could lead to his arrest, Gopstein answered: "That's the last thing that concerns me. If this is truth, I'm prepared to sit in jail 50 years for it."


Comment: Gopstein is a remarkable brigand, disciplined in his traditions and firm in his convictions. Yet what is the seed around which his personality has crystallized? The delusional mental excretions of a whole history of doctrinaire madmen convinced their exercises in 'reasoning' amount to more than a flea taking up residence on the ear end of an elephant. If he's prepared to sit in jail for 50 years on account of such beliefs, by all means; at least he goes willingly.


Gopstein later tried to evade accusations of inciting his followers to fire-raise, saying it was the government's responsibility to carry out what he presented as a religious teaching of the 12th century Jewish philosopher, Maimonides.

Eye 1

Outrageous! Judge allows suspect who drugged, raped, and dismembered 10-year-old girl to walk free

Fabian Gonzales
© Adolphe Pierre-Louis/JournalFabian Gonzales in District Court in September 2018.
In August 2016 Victoria Martens was drugged with methamphetamine, raped, murdered and then dismembered by a group of drug addicts, including her mother. The shocking case is slowly proceeding through the US courts but a judge has released a key suspect.

Legal analysts and law enforcement experts reacted with shock on social media when a judge allowed Fabian Gonzales, 34, to walk free on Wednesday, 20 November.

Gonzales was one of a group of drug addicts who were there on the night of 23 August 2016 when Victoria Martens - who had turned 10 the day before - was injected with meth, raped, strangled and then dismembered in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The case has shocked residents in Albuquerque, a city which became synonymous with methamphetamine after it was used as the location for the hit TV show Breaking Bad.


Comment: Gonzales is charged with raping and dismembering Victoria Martens after she was murdered, and yet Judge Brown let's him walk free ahead of trial because he doesn't consider such extreme criminal depravity to be a threat to the community.

Outraged community members are planning to protest the ruling:
Gutierrez-Baca has been following the case since the beginning, from the brutal murder to the plea deals given to Michelle Martens and Jessica Kelley to the announcement of a fourth, unidentified suspect.

But she said it was when Judge Charles Brown ruled Gonzales should be released that they decided to hold a protest.

"He's letting him out, saying he's not a threat to society. We're talking about a horrific murder. He's definitely a threat to society," Gutierrez-Baca said.

And while Gonzales is not charged in the murder, Gutierrez-Baca said the current public safety assessment for pretrial release and detention -- known as the Arnold Tool -- does nothing to keep the most dangerous people behind bars.

"I hope that people can come out and show our elected officials enough is enough," Gutierrez-Baca said.



Stormtrooper

Journalist covering Yellow Vest protests has tear gas grenade explode in his face, says French police using 'weapons of war'

journalist exploding tear gas broken nose yellow vest
© RuptlyIndependent French journalist Julien was injured covering the Yellow Vest protests
A French journalist recalled the terrifying moment when an explosive tears-gas grenade hit him at the Yellow Vest protest, telling RT that there was no justification for police employing combat tools.

The weekend marked one year since the Yellow Vest protests picked up in France, with independent journalist Julien being among the many reporters, covering the anniversary rallies in Paris.

It started peacefully, but things quickly got out of hand as the protest apparently got hijacked by a group of demonstrators in black outfits. "It was a real riot. Some scenes resembled urban guerilla warfare," Julien later recalled.

Comment: The GLI-F4 grenade is weapon of war indeed. How can the French law enforcement justify using such a dangerous device for "crowd control"?
During the 13rd act of the yellow vests movement a GLI-F4 grenade tore off a protester's hand. These grenades contain 25 grams of TNT (0.9 ounces). Hundreds of these grenades have been used against the yellow vests protesters since the beginning of the movement.




Bullseye

Son of Assange supporter Vivian Westwood urges immediate action to prevent Assange's extradition to US: 'Death sentence for telling the truth'

asange torture poster
© REUTERS/Henry NichollsA man walks past an artwork depicting WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on a building near Westminster Magistrates Court, where a case management hearing in Assange's U.S. extradition case is held, in London, Britain, October 21, 2019.
Julian Assange is being persecuted for speaking the truth, and the UK public must mobilize to shield him from the 'death sentence' awaiting him in the United States, activist and Agent Provocateur co-founder Joe Corré told RT.

The politically-active entrepreneur, and son of another fashion icon Vivienne Westwood, has been an outspoken advocate for Assange. The imprisoned Wikileaks chief is currently battling his extradition to the United States, where he faces 175 years in prison for obtaining and publishing secret documents. Recounting a recent visit he made to Belmarsh prison, Corré told Going Underground host Afshin Rattansi that Assange was being treated in a "horrific way" by the UK justice system. According to Corré, Assange has been separated from all human contact - a "form of torture" that has affected his mental health.

Comment:


Bullseye

'We should thank & cherish CIA,' says star of 'Jack Ryan' - just maybe not for torture, coups & mind control

John Krasinski
© Reuters / Mike Blake and Yuri GripasJohn Krasinski
Americans should be thankful for the services the CIA provides, 'Jack Ryan' actor John Krasinski says. After all, without the agency, who would prop up foreign dictators, stage coups and 'play' with mind-control drugs?

In three decades between the publication of 'The Hunt for Red October' in 1984 and his death in 2013, Tom Clancy pumped out more than 20 books, giving lots of material for spy agency fanboys.

At long last though, there's someone out there who gets even more tumescent at the thought of clandestine criminality than Clancy himself. Actor John Krasinski - star of 'The Office' and now 'Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan' - came out and told reporters before the release of season 2 that "The CIA is something that we should all not only cherish, but be saying thank you for every single day."

Unlike the FBI, the CIA is not tasked with fighting crime in America. It doesn't spend its time tracking murderers and busting pedophile rings. Instead, the agency often operates in the shadows abroad, and while its officers do foil terror attacks and intercept shipments of weapons of mass destruction, the agency has also been referred to by journalist Douglas Valentine as "the organized crime branch of the US government."

So, to be thankful for the agency's work means also to be thankful for a sordid history of highly controversial actions.

Dominoes

UN torture envoy demands 'full accountability & compensation' after Sweden drops rape probe against Assange

assange
© Reuters / Daniel Tapia
The UN's Special Rapporteur on torture has called for a "full investigation" into the role Sweden played in driving WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange into asylum and eventual custody, after the rape case against him was dropped.

Swedish prosecutors announced on Tuesday that they would drop a dubious rape inquiry against Assange, as oral testimony against the publisher had "weakened," and corroborating evidence was not strong enough to pursue a case. A Swedish arrest warrant was issued against assange in 2010, and a British court upheld a decision to extradite him in 2012. Threatened with what many saw as a politically motivated extradition, Assange sought refuge in London's Ecuadorian embassy.

"Today's collapse of Sweden's #Assange investigation was inevitable," rapporteur Nils Melzer tweeted on Tuesday. "Given its gross arbitrariness, there must now be a full investigation, and accountability & compensation for the harm inflicted on #JulianAssange."

Handcuffs

Ex-Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh indicted over shady book deal

Catherine Pugh
© Getty ImagesCatherine Pugh
Former Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh was hit with federal corruption charges Wednesday related to a shady children's book deal that prompted her resignation.

Pugh is accused of improperly tapping into the nearly $800,000 in proceeds from her lucrative "Healthy Holly" book deal, including to buy and renovate a home in Baltimore, pay down personal debt and fund $35,800 in straw donations to her mayoral campaign.

She inked the deal with the University of Maryland Medical System to write a series of self-published children's books while sitting on the group's board of directors.

The books were sloppily printed — and included misspellings of the main character's name and the word "vegetable" as "vegetale," according to the Baltimore Sun. They were distributed to the city's schools, even though school officials never asked for them, leaving thousands sitting in a warehouse.

Comment: See also:


NPC

'A leftist mob mentality': NY university apologizes after protesters wreak havoc at Trump-decorated economist lecture

trump
© Reuters / Jonathan ErnstPresident Donald Trump greets economist Arthur Laffer
Free-market economist Arthur Laffer is hardly a controversial figure alongside conservative rabble-rousers like Milo Yiannopoulos, but even he was shouted down by a crowd of protesters during a lecture at a New York university.

A Reagan administration adviser best known for his contributions to supply-side economic theory, Laffer was scheduled to address a conservative group at Binghamton on Monday when a crowd of demonstrators stormed the lecture hall to protest the event.

With many apparently seated in the audience and some wearing masks, the protesters erupted into cheers when one student stood to deliver a monologue on the injustices of the prison system through a bullhorn, grinding the lecture to a halt. Security guards soon arrived to clear away the protesters, prompting the crowd to erupt into chants of "free speech!" Two activists were arrested in the brief confrontation.

Chess

Forget OPEC: China now moves the oil markets

china
© Pixabay.com
Not so long ago, oil prices would surge or plummet on just a whisper from OPEC, who at the time held all the supply cards.

The mere hint that the world's most powerful oil cartel was going to cut production could send oil prices up dramatically. Those days are over.

When the cartel announced on November 30, 2016, that it would cut production for the first time in eight years amid a major oil-price crisis, the market cheered. Before any cuts even happened, the sentiment alone boosted prices from a $50.74 close on that day to $54.94 at the close on December 5th, 2016.

From that point on, at least up until recently, OPEC could drop the vaguest hint about production, or even think about production, and it would move the market--no fundamentals necessary.

Attention

Illinois school district grants transgender students unrestricted locker-room access

gender neutral bathrooms
© Reuters / Lucy NicholsonA gender-neutral bathroom is seen at the University of California, Irvine
After addressing the controversial issue of transgender students' access to locker rooms in a few different ways over the past four years, Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 board members Thursday voted 5-2 to lift a requirement that those students use privacy stalls.

Board members Mark Cramer and Pete Dombrowski dissented. Earlier in the meeting, they were the only board members to vote for Cramer's motion to postpone the vote in favor of an advisory referendum in March.

Some board members said their votes were based on much individual research.

"I myself have been the subject of discrimination all my life," board member Ed Yung said. "I know what these people are fighting for."

Comment: A commenter on the original article provides additional details:
Guess why "of the 25 people randomly chosen to speak [at the school board vote], 15 expressed support for the policy and 10 were opposed"? Because school board member (and sex-ed podcast creator) Kim Cavill started a SuperPac that funded this and they brought in a mob of transgender activists to fill the room, none of whom actually had kids in the district. The community had overwhelmingly voiced opposition to it.

Cavill's SuperPac was formed just 11 days before the school board election in March and specifically aimed to oust 3 board members who refused to vote to let boys use girls locker rooms if they said they ID as girls; trans Hollywood director Lana Wachowski (The Matrix) donated thousands to it. They funneled money from the Trans United Pac into a second PAC they created called "Parents and Neighbors for Quality Education" so ppl wouldn't realize from the name it was purely a transgender advocacy group. They were successful in stacking the school board with members who would vote their way, paving the way for Cavill to push this BS through against the wishes of most of the community and the girls whose privacy is now violated against their will.
See also: Judge denies transgender student's request to change in girls' locker room