Society's ChildS


Cardboard Box

Smuggled cocaine discovered in Coca Cola shipment to southern France

cocaine coca cola France
© Jasper Juinen/BloombergCoca leaves were reportedly used in the original Coca-Cola drink in the 19th century, although the company says cocaine has never been an 'added ingredient.'
Workers at a Coca-Cola factory in southern France opened a shipment of orange juice but found a huge shipment of cocaine instead.

The Coca-Cola factory in the town of Signes, near the Mediterranean coast, produces concentrates for various drinks. A spokesman for Coca-Cola France says employees immediately notified police and judicial authorities have opened an investigation.

Sacks containing 370 kilograms (815 pounds) of cocaine were hidden in a shipping container holding orange juice from Costa Rica, the spokesman said. The Marseille prosecutor's office said Wednesday it opened an investigation into trafficking and importing illegal drugs.

Coca leaves were reportedly used in the original Coca-Cola drink in the 19th century, although the company says cocaine has never been an "added ingredient."

Via The Associated Press

Snakes in Suits

Pompous vacationing Moroccan king drains water supply from villages outside Paris

Morocco's King Mohammed VI
© Thierry Gouegnon / Reuters
The residents of some villages near Paris, chosen as a place of recreation for the King of Morocco, are far from amused. The monarch, who brought up to 300 people with him, has drained their water supplies.

King Mohamed VI apparently loves pompous holidays - for his French vacations in the small village of Betz he brought a whole entourage of 300 people. Betz, some 40km from the French capital, has a population of around 1,000.

The vacationers who arrived August 24 drained all the water resources of a small village in a single day, according to French media. The water was necessary not only for consumption, but for keeping the garden and watering horses in the king's huge castle (or, perhaps, oasis).

"We received a message from the water department which advised us from drinking tap water," local resident Dimitri told Le Parisien.

War Whore

Little girl frantic during traffic stop because she didn't want the cop to kill her dad

Father
Earlier this month, Michael Harris was targeted for revenue collection during a traffic stop by Frisco Police Officer Michael Collins. During the traffic stop, Harris' 7-year-old daughter woke up from a nap and lost it when she saw the officer. Why? Because cops kill innocent people.

While Collins was conducting the stop, Harris informed him that he was a concealed carry license holder.

"I asked if he wanted to take it but he told me that wasn't necessary," Harris told WFAA in an interview.

Philando Castile wasn't so lucky during his traffic stop. When the innocent Castile informed officer Jeronimo Yanez that he was a lawful concealed carry license holder — he was murdered.

Luckily for Harris, officer Collins wasn't so trigger happy. Harris, who is also a black man, is a truck driver and father of two whose life could have ended that day had a different officer pulled him over.

Comment: See also: Officer who fatally shot Philando Castile put back on administrative leave due to protests


V

Why Colin Kaepernick's national anthem protest is fundamentally American

kaepernick sitting anthem
I was on family vacation when Colin Kaepernick decided to make me care about football. During Friday night's preseason game against Green Bay, the 49ers quarterback did what many black people have been waiting for more of our black football players to do for a long time - he protested. It was a quiet protest, the act of sitting during the national anthem, but it was heard around the world.

When interviewed after the game, Kaepernick explained: "I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color. To me, this is bigger than football and it would be selfish on my part to look the other way. There are bodies in the street and people getting paid leave and getting away with murder."

In many corners, this didn't go over well, to say the least. Some people burned their Kaepernick jerseys. Many argued that, while Kaepernick may be right to be upset by the thousands of black and brown people killed by police in the US, protesting the flag was not the appropriate way to create change. Others asked why he hates veterans - still others, why he hates America. Yet more people asked why he can't just stick to football. But every argument against Kaepernick's protest is wrong. Every single one.

Furthermore, many of them are racist. And the backlash against Kaepernick displays how everyday Americans who would never consider themselves racist can get caught in acts of white supremacy.

Sheriff

Memphis school officers assault pregnant teen, get fired, say it's because they're white

Henry Todd and Richard Pinner
Two officers with the Memphis city school district were fired after they were caught on video assaulting a pregnant teen. The officers have since filed a lawsuit, claiming the reason they were fired was because they are white.

The incident happened in 2013, when officers Henry Todd and Richard Pinner were caught on school surveillance cameras using obviously unnecessary and excessive force to take down a 17-year-old pregnant student.

The officers claim that they had to attack the young mother-to-be because she was eating a snack and using profanity. They claim she was resisting arrest and had no other choice but to tackle her and slam her to the ground.

While the student involved was issued a juvenile summons for the incident, it is unclear if she faced any charges as cases involving juveniles are not released to the public.

Both Todd and Pinner are now 'pulling the race card' and suing Shelby County Schools (which was Memphis City School district at the time of the incident), and their case is going to trial.


Comment: Obviously the Memphis city school district hasn't had any white fragility training:




Bullseye

San Francisco 49ers qb won't back down, says he'll continue to sit for national anthem until the brutality stops

Colin Kaepernick
Colin Kaepernick, the quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, caused a firestorm of controversy over the weekend when he remained seated during the national anthem. The media on the left and the right both went for blood. However, surprisingly the team stuck with him, noting that there is no requirement for players to stand during the anthem.

In spite of death threats, fans burning his jersey, other NFL teams jumping on the hate bandwagon, and media pressuring him to apologize, Kaepernick remains steadfast in practicing his free speech to raise awareness to a growing problem in America today.

Comment: See also: Telling it like it is: "If Clinton was you or me, she'd be in prison" - The Kaepernick interview US media is ignoring


Arrow Down

Debtor's prison for kids: Children are incarcerated when families are too poor to pay court fines

child debtor prison
© Richard Ross/Youth First"The debt in effect creates a rift between parents and their children," one survey respondent said, and went on to describe a grandmother who was told to consider giving up custody of her grandson in order to avoid paying his juvenile court fees.
First-of-its-kind report finds children are being imprisoned nationwide when families can't pay fines levied by juvenile justice system

Many states are incarcerating poor children whose families can't afford to pay juvenile court fees and fines, a report published Wednesday finds, which amounts to punishing children for their families' poverty—and that may be unconstitutional.

Although the growing practice of incarcerating adults who are unable to pay municipal and court fees and fines has been documented for several years, as Common Dreams has noted, the latest report from the Juvenile Law Center is the first in-depth examination of the practice within the juvenile justice system.

The report, "Debtor's Prison for Kids? The High Cost of Fines and Fees in the Juvenile Justice System" (pdf), documents the results of a survey of 183 people involved in the juvenile justice system—including lawyers, family members, and adults who had been incarcerated as children in the juvenile justice system—in 41 states.

The report authors discovered that in most states there is a pile-up of fees and fines imposed on children and their families once a child enters the juvenile justice system, and that "[m]any statutes establish that youth can be incarcerated or otherwise face a loss of liberty when they fail to pay."

Comment: Every day, about 500,000 people in the U.S. are being jailed solely for being too poor to pay the fees for their release. The 'justice' system preys on the poor who are subsidizing local governments while also becoming reliable sources of enrichment for corrupt private prison corporations.


Arrow Down

Financial investment euphoria and the mass escape from reality

financial euphoria
Built into the speculative episode is the euphoria, the mass escape from reality, that excludes any serious contemplation of the true nature of what is taking place.
"Contributing to and supporting this euphoria are two further factors little noted in our time or in past times. The first is the extreme brevity of the financial memory. In consequence, financial disaster is quickly forgotten. In further consequence, when the same or closely similar circumstances occur again, sometimes in only a few years, they are hailed by a new, often youthful, and always supremely self-confident generation as a brilliantly innovative discovery in the financial and larger economic world. There can be few fields of human endeavour in which history counts for so little as in the world of finance. Past experience, to the extent that it is part of memory at all, is dismissed as the primitive refuge of those who do not have the insight to appreciate the incredible wonders of the present." - John Kenneth Galbraith, 'A short history of financial euphoria'.
From the vantage point of the great bond bubble of 2016, the first dotcom insanity now looks like an oasis of common sense. With the benefit of hindsight, it was clearly unwise to give Pets.com, for example, an online seller of pet supplies whose spokesperson was a sock puppet, a market capitalisation of $121 million, but then hindsight's a wonderful thing. The company had its IPO in February 2000, missing the peak of the market by just a month, and within 270 days it was gone altogether.

Comment: For an approach to reality, read the SOTT FOCUS piece: 2015, the BRICS checkmate Western finance? It isn't just about about BRICS...


Info

Big talk or Secret Weapon? DPR Chairman Pushilin: The next offensive will be Ukraine's last

Denis Pushilin
PolitRussia- translated by J. Arnoldski

The Chairman of the National Council of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Denis Pushilin, stated in an interview to Lente.ru on Wednesday that Ukraine will completely cease to exist if it goes on a large-scale offensive in Donbass.

"If Ukraine attempts to resolve the conflict by force and goes on the offensive, then it will only get new cauldrons. If Kiev fails to realize the Minsk Agreements, then more than just Mariupol will come under DPR control. An attempt at a large-scale offensive would be the final point of existence of Ukraine as a state," Pushilin said.

According to him, the Donetsk People's Republic is currently under heightened security measures.

Star of David

Israeli police chief claims suspecting Ethiopian Israelis & Arabs of crime is 'natural'

 Israeli Jew of Ethiopian origin, is detained by policemen
© Baz Ratner / ReutersA protester, who is an Israeli Jew of Ethiopian origin, is detained by policemen during a demonstration against what they say is police racism and brutality in Tel Aviv.
Israel's police chief has said it is "natural" for his officers to treat Arabs and Israelis of Ethiopian descent as potential criminals, adding that his controversial claim is backed up by studies on crime rates among immigrants "the world over."

"When a police officer comes across a suspicious person, his brain suspects him more than if [the suspect] were someone else, it's natural," Police Commissioner Roni Alsheich told a gathering of the Israel Bar Association on Tuesday, according to the Times of Israel.

He added that "over-policing is natural" as well when it comes to Ethiopians, responding to a question about persistent accusations of police brutality and racial discrimination against Ethiopian Jews.

Comment: Looks like the US is far from the only country having police problems.

Slavery and the Origins of American Police: A Brief History