Don't Panic! Lighten Up!S


Newspaper

Edward R. Murrow reporting from London: No idea who's dropping the bombs

Tom Winter
Fort Russ
Wed, 17 Jun 2015 16:44 UTC
london bombing
London has been suffering bombs and incendiaries now for over a year. CNN finally published a newsreel of the shelling in London, but put a crawling text across it saying "Uncertain the source of the bombardments." NPR sent Corey Flintoff to London, who confirmed that London was under the bombs, but could not tell us who was dropping them. Later he telephoned from Kiev, and spoke with a woman in London who didn't know where the bombardment was coming from either.

Amnesty International said over the weekend that both British and German forces have been responsible for war crimes, and also accused Britain of "fuelling" the crimes.

As for the continuing blasts, it was unclear who had opened fire, though the explosions happened well inside territory controlled by British army and its home forces. "Over the last 24 hours, there was also shelling - the shelling of a cultural center in London. We condemn that shelling that cost at least six lives, and we express our condolences to the families of the victims. It's, again, too early to determine responsibility for the shelling, but we call for a full and transparent investigation." said Cordell Hull's spokeswoman.

Comment: History repeats. And to judge the past from present propaganda, surely the Londoners were shelling themselves... After all, that's what they are doing in Donbass, right?

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Mr. Potato

No cash? No prospects? Join IS and help yourself and the US government!


Sott.net
Tue, 16 Jun 2015 20:21 UTC
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Smiley

Raccoon realizes it is not a rock or log


WFTV
Sun, 14 Jun 2015 11:54 UTC
Raccoon stands on top of gator
© Richard JonesRaccoon stands on top of gator.
Ocala, Florida —A Palatka man said he snapped a picture of a raccoon on top of an alligator in the Ocala National Forest Sunday morning.

Richard Jones said he and his family were walking along the Oaklawaha River watching alligators when his son walked through some palm fronds to get a good picture.

Jones said his son must have startled the raccoon, which stumbled toward the water and hopped on top of the gator that was nearby. Jones was able to quickly take the unique photo before the raccoon scurried back on land.

"I snapped a lucky picture right when the gator slipped into the water and before the raccoon jumped off and scurried away. Without the context you'd think the raccoon was hitching a ride across the river. Pretty amazing," Jones said in an email. "Definitely the photo of a lifetime."
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Butterfly

Postal worker sends touching reply to young boy's letter to his pet in doggie heaven

Sean Kelly
Opposing Views
Sat, 13 Jun 2015 00:00 UTC
doggie heaven
A boy who wrote letters to his dog in heaven for months got a special surprise when he received a touching reply in the mail from his beloved pet.

Since their dog, Moe, passed away in April, May Westbrook and her 3-year-old son, Luke, began writing messages addressed to their cherished pet and "sending" them to him from their Norfolk, Virginia, home.

"Because you can't fool a three-year-old, we take the letter to our mailbox," Westbrook said, adding that they address the letters to "Moe Westbrook, Doggie Heaven, Cloud 1."

Normally, Westbrook said she retrieves the letters from the mail later in the day so that her son thinks that they've been delivered. Two weeks ago, however, she was late to collect their latest note and found that it was no longer in the mailbox. "I assumed the post office would throw it away—or that someone might even laugh at it, or us," she wrote in a blog.

On Wednesday morning, Westbrook was stunned to discover a response letter from "Moe" in their mailbox.
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Magic Wand

Hippos give trapped duckling a helping snout at Netherlands zoo

Ben Hooper
upi.com
Fri, 12 Jun 2015 15:52 UTC
Image
Hippo to the rescue
A duckling trapped on the embankment of a pond at a Netherlands Zoo escaped with a little help from its friends -- a pair of hippopotamuses.

A visitor to the Rotterdam Zoo -- locally known as the Diergaarde Blijdorp -- filmed the small duck repeatedly attempting to jump from the embankment to the shore, but falling short of making it over a short barrier.

The footage, posted to YouTube, shows the duckling is soon joined by a pair of hippos, which appear to startle the bird as it attempts to avoid the much larger animals.

However, rather than make a meal out of the duckling, the hippos use their snouts to the give the baby duck a boost and help it to reach the shore and reunite with its mother.

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Dollars

President of country $18 trillion in debt warns Putin about Russian economy


Waterford Whispers News
Tue, 09 Jun 2015 03:05 UTC
Obama and Merkel
© waterfordwhispersnews.com
Following a record setting patting themselves on the back session, the leaders of the G7 took some time out to discuss Russia with the picturesque surroundings of southern Germany as a backdrop.

Russia, formerly part of what was once called the G8, came under the microscope with the possibility of extending sanctions put in place in the wake of Vladimir Putin's decision to annex Crimea discussed.

American president Barack Obama, currently presiding over a record level of debt of $18 trillion for his nation, urged Putin to consider the economic wrongheadedness of pursuing an interventionist foreign policy.
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Mr. Potato

Satire: Ted Cruz thinks Texas floods are caused by Native American rain dances


The Stately Herald
Thu, 04 Jun 2015 16:27 UTC
rain dance_Cruz
© Unkown
Ted Cruz stirs Indian ire - Texas senator thinks that the Texas floods are caused by Native American rain dances.

Preceded by more than a week of heavy rain, a slow-moving storm system dropped tremendous precipitation across much of Texas and Oklahoma during the nights of May 24 - 26, 2015, triggering record-breaking floods. 31 people were killed and 11 people remain missing. There has been great speculation as to the cause of these flash floods, climate change being the most prominent, but today, another was added to the bunch, and it was done so by none other than Senator Ted Cruz.

In a Texas radio interview this morning, when the topic turned to the recent, devastating floods and Senator Cruz was asked to speculate on their cause, this is what he had to say:
These things happen and people attribute it to God, but this is no work of God, this is something sinister and there are obviously other forces at work and they've put our great State in shambles in a very short space of time. And you know scientists will blame it on climate change or mumbo jumbo like that, but I know what's really going on. The heavy rain is obviously caused by Native Americans doing their rain dances and what not, and if we don't address the Native American issue better in this State, we'll be seeing further flooding in years to come
The interviewer Hugh Myrone Gaines, quite startled at Cruz's response, asked him to elaborate
Most people know I'm a very spiritual God-fearing man, and if you believe in the grace of God, you also have to believe in the other, what's opposite, what's against God's word. Native Americans have been practicing black magic for centuries and this is no doubt their work. We need to think about the way we view Native Americans and their customs and then maybe we can prevent future floods.
Unsurprisingly, these remarks have drawn ire from the Native American community, with organisations such as TNAC, Texas Native American Community, publically condemning the statement. White Feather, the chieftain of the organisation issued a press statement about the incident:
It is disgusting and laughable at the same time, that a US senator would come out and say that Native American customs are the cause of a disastrous flood. It is an insult to our heritage and an all-out loony thing to say. The Native American community has suffered enough and does not need fanciful persecution from people in power.
Whether Cruz's statement will have further political consequences remain to be seen, but one thing is for certain, the Democrats will not leave him alone about this one
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People 2

Man honestly thought breakdown would be more obvious to people


The Onion
Wed, 03 Jun 2015 18:35 UTC
Image
© The Onion
MAPLEWOOD, MN—Explaining that he had assumed the deterioration of his physical and psychological state would be readily apparent, 3M sales associate Mark Uhler told reporters Wednesday he honestly thought his ongoing breakdown would be more obvious to everyone around him. "Given how many times in the past month I've showed up to work on two hours of sleep and just stared at my computer in total silence, I'd kind of expected someone to ask me if everything's all right at home or at least tell me I look tired lately, but so far I haven't heard a thing," said Uhler, adding that he thought the frequency with which he places his face in his hands and mutters morosely to himself would have been a clear indication that he was completely unraveling and prompted somebody at some point to stop by his cubicle. "I was sure when our HR manager asked me to speak with her last week it would be to discuss why I constantly look like I'm on the verge of tears during meetings, but it turns out she just wanted to explain changes to our 401K plan. I feel like my entire life is collapsing and I can barely stay afloat, but every email I get from coworkers is just about jumping on a client call or finishing up my monthly reports." When reached for comment, Uhler's colleagues confirmed they had noticed his breakdown weeks ago but simply didn't give a shit.

Comment: Although this article is satire, it's pretty true of most of corporate America. People are so caught up in their own problems they don't have 'time' to care about anyone else.

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USA

Unparallelled hubris: Obama claims US is #1 in global reputation

Claire Bernish
The Anti-Media
Thu, 04 Jun 2015 23:05 UTC
Barack Obama
© Reuters / Kevin Lamarque
This week, President Obama gave himself and his administration credit for putting the United States at the top of the list of respected countries in the world.

"People don't remember, when I came into office, the United States in world opinion ranked below China, barely above Russia," he said. "And today, once again, the United States is the most respected country on Earth. Part of that, I think, is the work that we did to reengage the world, and say that 'We want to work with you as partners, with mutual interest and mutual respect,' " he claims.

What a lovely sentiment—if it were true. But it's simply not. Not by far.

Comment: Too bad it's not really that funny to have such a delusional politician in such a powerful position.

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Smiley

N.S.A. compensates for loss of surveillance powers by logging on to Facebook

Andy Borowitz
The New Yorker/The Borowitz Report
Mon, 01 Jun 2015 19:27 UTC
Facebook
© Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP/Getty
The National Security Agency is compensating for the expiration of its power to collect the American people's personal information by logging on to Facebook, the agency confirmed on Monday.

The director of the N.S.A., Admiral Michael S. Rogers, said that when parts of the Patriot Act expired at midnight on Sunday, intelligence analysts immediately stopped collecting mountains of phone metadata and started reading billions of Facebook updates instead.

"From a surveillance point of view, the transition has been seamless," Rogers said.

While the N.S.A. has monitored Facebook in the past, it is now spending twenty-four hours a day sifting through billions of baby pictures, pet videos, and photographs of recently enjoyed food to detect possible threats to the United States.

"Those status updates contain everything we want to know," Rogers said. "In many cases, a good deal more than we want to know."

Citing one possible downside of the new surveillance regime, Rogers said that some N.S.A. analysts who now do nothing but monitor Facebook all day report feelings of worthlessness and despair. "I remind them that they're doing this for America," he said.

The N.S.A.'s new strategy drew a sharp rebuke from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), who told reporters, "I just blocked them."
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