Society's ChildS


Attention

Violent clashes over austerity program as Prime Minister Matteo Renzi visits Naples


RT
Wed, 14 Sep 2016 04:32 UTC
clashes naples
© RT
Fierce clashes broke out in the Italian city of Naples as hundreds rallied against the arrival of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. Denouncing his austerity policies, protesters lit flares and broke through police cordons.

Hundreds of Italians took to the streets in Naples this week to vent their anger at policies being pushed through by Renzi's government. They included changes to labor laws, education reforms, and the implementation of austerity policies. The protests were organized by several left-wing activists and teachers who said that the policies threaten to wreck the country's already weak economy.

Angry protesters tried Monday to make their way into the main opera house in Naples, Teatro di San Carlo, where Renzi was due to arrive but they were blocked by police on their way. The group turned violent hurling dustbins and throwing street benches.

In April, anti-Renzi demonstrations in Pisa resulted in several arrests and injuries.
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Sheriff

Sperm-sniffing police dog Billie recruited to track down rapists


RT
Wed, 14 Sep 2016 15:01 UTC
Billie the dog
© Derbyshire police
Police in Derbyshire have employed a specially-trained dog, Billie the cocker spaniel, to track down sex offenders by sniffing out their semen.

Unlike many police dogs that specialize in identifying drugs, bombs or blood, Billie is trained to find DNA evidence used in sex cases by tracking down traces of human sperm.

His nose is so sharp he can detect as little as a milliliter of semen, which is about a third of the average ejaculation, more than a year after it was deposited indoors.

Billie can even smell eight-week-old sperm outside if it is "protected from the worst of the weather."
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Hearts

While Western countries freak out at prospect of integrating tiny Muslim minorities, Islam thrives in Putin's Russia

Rebecca Miller
National Interest
Mon, 13 Apr 2015 13:19 UTC
cathedral mosque moscow
Thousands of Muslims pray at the recently renovated and expanded Cathedral Mosque in Moscow. Can you imagine this scene ever taking place in Washington, DC?
Vladimir Putin has made religion a central part of his public image, using Orthodoxy as a way to bolster for his political agendas. But Orthodoxy is not the only religion that experienced a revival in the post - Cold War period; among other religions, Islam, once shunned by the Soviet state, has increasingly been embraced by the Russian state.

This was a major theme of an April 7 presentation at George Washington University's Elliott School by Bulat Akhmetkarimov, a PhD candidate at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). At the event, titled "Islam and the Dynamics of Ethno-Confessional Regimes in Russia, 1990-2012," Akhmetkarimov discussed the Russian state's attitudes toward religion and how attitudes toward Islam have evolved in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.

As the largest religious minority in Russia, Muslims make up roughly 11 percent of Russia's total population. Based on statistics provided by Pew Research Center, this percentage is predicted to increase to roughly 13 percent by 2030 and nearly 17 percent percent by 2050, with about twenty million Muslims in Russia.

Comment: What a tricky piece of data for Westerners to make sense of.

Liberals hate Putin, but want to welcome Muslim refugees.

Conservatives want to like Putin, but are terrified of Muslims.

Hmmm... How do SOTT readers reconcile the two viewpoints?

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Caesar

Looking beyond the propaganda: Do minorities have a place in Putin's Russia?

Carlo Massimo
Wilson Quarterly
Thu, 09 Jul 2015 11:54 UTC

Comment: One funny - and very notable - thing about russophobia in the West is that even when analysts criticize Russia they can't help but admire it. The following 'smart' article for 'smart Westerners' is a case in point...


kazan
Kazan City, capital of the Republic of Tatarstan, lies 800km east of Moscow. Over 1,000 years old, the city has been completely redeveloped (beginning in 2000, funnily enough)
In a rising Russia, patriotism is the order of the day. For some Tatars, Russia's biggest minority, that's good news. Others are refusing to buy in.

Russia, more than most other countries, knows the difference between nations— ethnic, cultural, geographic bodies — and sovereign countries. The Russian Federation alone contains dozens of discrete nations: ethnic Russians, of course, but also Yakuts in the east, Chechens and Ossetians in the Caucasus, ethnic Ukrainians, Russian Jews, and a widely dispersed population of Muslim Tatars. Each nation speaks its own language, practices its own religion, and follows its unique traditions. They are citizens of, and outsiders in, a Federation dominated by ethnic Russians.

This diversity poses a major obstacle to Russian President Vladimir Putin's political agenda. Since the early 2000s, Putin's government has pushed for a strong, conservative patriotism across the Federation. Russia, as Putin sees it, is on the rise, well on its way to resuming its old status as superpower. That new power needs shoring-up at home. Slavophile clubs, nationalist militias in Russia's European enclaves, and an invigorated Orthodox Church are key buttresses in Moscow's snarling ascent.


Comment: "Snarling ascent", very clever! But is it applicable? Where are Russia's killing fields? Where are its torture chambers? Where is its global, intrusive mass surveillance system? Where are the memos and recorded phone conversations in which it dictates policy to others?


Comment: A healthy, organic, and delicious pork chop at that!

What choice meats might we find if we peeked under the social fabric of US or European society?

If Russian integration of minorities has been successful (and that during a time when religious and ethnic fracture lines are being ruthlessly ruptured all around the globe), while in Western societies Muslims (and others) are treated like dirt, what does that tell us about the nature of Western regimes vis a vis Putin's regime?

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Handcuffs

Police arrest 22 after interfering at Dakota pipeline construction site (VIDEO)


RT
Wed, 14 Sep 2016 01:42 UTC
South Dakota pipeline protest
Police said they arrested 22 people at the construction site of the Dakota Access oil pipeline, claiming people were interfering with equipment. The arrests were made 70 miles northwest of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe's main protest site.

The Morton County Sheriff's Office said about 50 law enforcement police responded to events the site near Glen Ullin Tuesday after construction workers said they had been "swarmed" by protesters and that two people had"attached" themselves to equipment.

The protesters face charges of criminal trespassing, and the two attached to equipment faces charges of hindering law enforcement and disorderly conduct, according to the Sheriff's spokeswoman, Donnell Preskey, according to AP.

The site near Glen Ullin is not part of the temporary work stoppage ordered by the federal judge or the section the federal government asked Energy Transfer Partners to voluntarily stop work on last Friday.

Comment: See also:
  • Freedom of the press? Democracy Now's Amy Goodman issued an arrest warrant for coverage of Dakota pipeline
protest
  • Dakota Pipeline: Armed troops deployed with militarized checkpoints ahead of court ruling


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Bell

British media lambasts Jeremy Corbyn for 'insensitive' 9/11 tweet - British public retweets it thousands of times

Harley Tamplin
Metro, UK
Wed, 14 Sep 2016 11:22 UTC
Corbyn stop the war
Ever seen Cameron or Blair give a speech at a 'stop the war' rally?
Jeremy Corbyn took to Twitter to pay tribute to the victims of 9/11 on the 15th anniversary of the terror attack.

At first glance, his tweet about the attack on New York City seems innocuous.

But the words chosen by the Labour leader in the second half of his message have seen him come in for plenty of criticism.


Comment: Not really; the overwhelming majority of attention it garnered was positive.


After saying his thoughts were with those whose lives were 'shattered' on the fateful day, he wrote: 'And in the wars and terror unleashed across the globe in its aftermath.'

His reference to the 'wars' and 'terror' that followed provoked fury on social media as people suggested he should have kept the tributes to 9/11.

Mr Corbyn, who played a leading role in the Stop the War Coalition opposed to military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, received a barrage of tweets criticising his choice of words.


Comment: A barrage indeed, but note that the level of criticism is vastly outnumbered by positive support.

One wonders what the British media made of the French president's statement on the 15th anniversary of 9/11:

Hollande: 'US response to 9/11 only expanded global terrorism and brought chaos to France'

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Heart - Black

Police hunt for Trump supporter who sucker-punched 69-year-old woman outside NC rally

Tom Boggioni
Raw Story
Tue, 13 Sep 2016 20:47 UTC
woman sucker punched
© WLOS
Police in Asheville, North Carolina have issued a warrant for a South Carolina man after he allegedly sucker-punched a 69-year-old woman outside GOP nominee Donald Trump's rally Monday night, reports WLOS.

Police state that they arrested five people outside of the rally, and have issued a warrant for Richard Campbell of Edisto Island, South Carolina for assault on the woman.

In an interview, Shirley Teter said she was outside the rally and was responding "Dump, dump, dump," as fans of the GOP presidential candidate chanted "Trump, Trump, Trump," stating " It was kind of comical."

Teter said she became involved in protesting against Trump because, "I ran into another situation that was sickening my heart."

Confronting Campbell, she claims she said, "You better learn to speak Russian, and I said the first two words are going to be, ha ha. He stopped in his tracks, and he turned around and just cold-cocked me."
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Book 2

Israeli education minister: Jewish studies more important than science & math


RT
Tue, 13 Sep 2016 15:30 UTC
jewish education
Israel's Education Minister Naftali Bennett says that learning about the Jewish faith is more important than studying mathematics and science. He made the statement after the government dropped demands for ultra-Orthodox schools to teach core subjects.

"Learning about Judaism and excellence in the subject is more important in my eyes than mathematics and the sciences," said Bennett, "and it is hard for me to say that," he added, as cited by the Times of Israel.

Bennett's comments come as the Israeli government dropped its demand that ultra-Orthodox schools should teach core subjects like math and science in order to receive extra funding from the state.

"Even though [Israel] is a high-tech superpower, an exporter of knowledge and innovation to the world, we must [also] be a spiritual superpower and export spiritual knowledge to the world."
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Bug

Lunch lady poisons child's food in San Saba, TX high school

Victor Skinner
EAGnews.org
Mon, 12 Sep 2016 00:00 UTC
lunch lady poisoned food
SAN SABA, Texas - Parents of a Texas high schooler claim a school employee poisoned their son's lunch after an altercation with the child's mother.

Serena and Gary Spivey filed a lawsuit against Mullin Independent School District this week after they claim their son became seriously sick last Friday after eating his school lunch, KXXV reports.

Serena Spivey said the incident was the latest in a series of altercations with the school's lunch lady, Ms. Day, who had repeatedly threatened to poison her son's food.
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Magnify

US Census Bureau finds median income is up, but women and minorities are still the poorest


RT
Tue, 13 Sep 2016 21:05 UTC
dollar bills
© Amr Abdallah Dalsh / Reuters
The median household income in the US was $56,500 in 2015, in increase of 5.2 percent from 2014, according to the US Census Bureau. Additionally, the US poverty rate dropped 1.2 percent, while the percentage of people without health insurance also fell.

The boost in median household income (in real terms) from 2014's $53,718 is the first annual increase of that figure since 2007, the Census Bureau announced Tuesday as part of its release of two reports, Income and Poverty in the United States: 2015 and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2015.

Real median income for family households in 2015 was $72,165, while non-family households was $33,805, increases from 2014 of 5.3 percent and 5.4 percent, respectively. Real median income in 2015 was 1.6 percent lower than 2007 and 2.4 percent lower than in 1999, the peak year for that figure.

Real median income of Hispanic households increased by 6.1 percent, while non-Hispanic white and black household incomes increased by 4.4 percent and 4.1 percent, respectively. Asian households registered the highest median income in 2015, but the percentage change from 2014 was not statistically significant.


Comment: When compared to the standard of living increases, raising the median income by percentage points probably does little to make life easier for the average American.

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