Society's ChildS


Card - VISA

Visa to continue servicing international payments by building its own center in Russia


RT.com
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 12:44 UTC
visa russia
Visa has decided to build its own processing center in Russia within 2 years as the international payment systems look for a solution to stay operational in the country.

The other big international player in Russia's payment systems market - MasterCard - chose to look for a Russian partner to provide interbank processing and has already announced a tender for Russian companies

After Visa and MasterCard suspended servicing cards issued by a number of Russian banks due to US sanctions, Russia required foreign systems to pay a quarterly security deposit of 25 percent of their daily turnover.

The international credit card firms have complained the deposit would hit their businesses, with Visa even threatening to leave the Russian market.

Comment: Not surprising, as in spite of sanctions targeting Russia, corporations have no intention of losing a very lucrative business:

Following Western sanctions, Putin eyes Russian credit card system to replace Visa and Mastercard
U.S. sanctions against Russia undermine America's global domination

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Arrow Down

Argentina's economy headed for default after US Supreme Court rules in favor of vulture funds


RT.com
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 14:04 UTC
flag argentina
© Reuters / Andrew Biraj
Argentina's economy is on a collision course, and is headed for default following a US Supreme Court ruling that could send creditors demanding bond payments, Economic Minister Axel Kicillof warned UN diplomats.

By June 30, the country needs to pay out creditors for billions of dollars of bonds that were issued before its $95 billion default in 2001.

"Whichever way you look at it this ruling is forcing Argentina towards the risk of economic crisis," Reuters quotes Kicillof talking at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday.

"... this is going to push us into a technical default," he added.

Argentina is asking for more time to negotiate a solution with the creditors that Kicilloff refers to as "vulture funds". Argentina must pay $1.33 billion to NML Capital, a hedge fund and subsidiary of Elliot Capital Management.

The country only has $28.5 billion in foreign currency reserves, and will not be able to meet the enormous demand. If they don't pay, the US can revoke its privilege to pay bond holders through Argentina's bank in the United States, the Bank of New York Mellon. Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner has called this 'extortion'.

Comment: The US support for vulture capitalism is likely behind this decision. Argentina is moving closer to an alliance with the BRICS nations, thus the US intends to push Argentina closer to financial ruin.

Argentina risk sovereign default as US courts support vulture capitalist
Down by Law: Vulture Funds Feeding on the Dispossessed

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Cult

Egyptian man who 'liked' Knights on the Cross Facebook page sentenced to 6 years in prison

Jordan Schachtel
breitbart.com
Wed, 25 Jun 2014 15:06 UTC
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An Egyptian man was convicted and sentenced Tuesday to six years in prison along with a fine of $840 dollars for violating Egypt's blasphemy laws, which make illegal any criticism of the Islamic religion.

The International Christian Concern (ICC) reported that Kerolos Shawky, a Christian man living in southern Egypt, was initially accused of violating the Islamic blasphemy laws in article 98 of the Egyptian penal code, which prohibits "ridiculing or insulting heavenly religions or inciting sectarian strife", but as the ICC notes, the law is almost always used to go after religious minorities.

Kerolos' lawyer said, "Kerolos didn't intend to insult the Islamic religion, only he made a like on the page of Knights of the Cross on Facebook. He doesn't have much experience in the internet plus he suffers from poor eyesight. So there was not any intention for the contempt or blasphemy of Islam."
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Light Saber

Bullies force Russian girl to drink puddle water - entire school turns against them

Patrick Mulchrone
The Mirror, UK
Mon, 23 Jun 2014 17:22 UTC
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Vlada Kholod, 13, was forced to drink filthy water from a puddle - but her tormentors did not expect the response they got from her classmates

Bullies forced a pretty schoolgirl to drink filthy water from a puddle - because of her good looks. But brave Vlada Kholod, 13, had the last laugh on her tormentors when the entire school turned against them. The gang which abused her ended up humiliated and forced to apologise to their victim. The incident happened at a school in the town of Korkino in Russia's Ural Mountains' when a group of bullying girls became jealous of Vlada's good looks.

They held a kangaroo court, claiming she had said something bad about their parents. Olga Guseva, 16, Lyubov Goloborodko, 14, Sasha Rattsova, 15 and Ekatirina Streltsova, 15 - held a mock "trial" for their victim and made her drink dirty water from a puddle whilst being filmed by two boys. She was beaten as she resisted.
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Ambulance

Mother arrested for refusing to hospitalize dehydrated infant because of her staunch veganism

Daniel Dahm
WKMG Local 6
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 13:58 UTC
Sarah Anne markham
© Sarah Anne Markham
Sarah Anne Markham arrested on charge of child neglect

A Casselberry mother was arrested on allegations of refusing to take her newborn, diagnosed by a doctor as dehydrated, to a hospital because of her staunch vegan stance.

Sarah Anne Markham was arrested Tuesday on a charge of child neglect.

According to Casselberry police, a pediatrician told Markham that her baby needed to be admitted to Florida Hospital South for treatment because the child was dehydrated and was losing weight.

Markham, however, went home and would not answer when officers knocked at her door.

Police used a locksmith to enter the apartment and interviewed Markham, who said she wanted to get a second opinion about her child, according to a police report.

Comment: It is unfortunate that veganism and vegetarianism have been promoted endlessly in the media as being healthy. Vegan diets, in particular, are almost completely devoid of certain nutrients that are crucial for physiological function. Several studies have shown that both vegetarians and vegans are prone to deficiencies in B12, calcium, iron, zinc, the long-chain fatty acids EPA & DHA, and fat-soluble vitamins like A & D. Children are particularly vulnerable to these diets due to the effects of B12 deficiency. Studies have shown that kids raised until age 6 on a vegan diet are still B12 deficient years after adding at least some animal products to their diet. Researchers have found a significant association between B12 status and performance on tests measuring fluid intelligence, spatial ability and short-term memory with formerly vegan kids scoring lower than omnivorous kids in each case.

The deficit in fluid intelligence is particularly troubling, because it involves reasoning, the capacity to solve complex problems, abstract thinking ability and the ability to learn. Any defect in this area may have far-reaching consequences for individual functioning. A common myth amongst vegetarians and vegans is that it's possible to get B12 from plant sources. But plant foods said to contain B12 actually contain B12 analogs called cobamides that block the intake of, and increase the need for, true B12.

Why you should think twice about vegetarian and vegan diets
How Mom's Vegan Diet Unintentionally Killed Her Innocent Child
12 year old vegan has the degenerating bones of 80 year old

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Clock

Potential for social unrest rises as more Americans go into debt for food and gas

Peter Atwater
Wealthydebates.com
Tue, 24 Jun 2014 13:59 UTC
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© Wealthydebates
Nowhere has the unequal nature of the post-banking-crisis recovery raised more concerns for the long-term sustainability of the U.S. economy than in the clear rise of non-discretionary consumer credit.

While the "haves" have fully returned to their pre-crisis behavior of paying for everything from higher education, cars and luxury homes with cash, and fully leveraging their investment portfolios, the rest of the consumer sector has changed dramatically over the past six years.

Upper-middle class "aspirational wealthy" families who were overexposed to the housing bubble continue to see debt of all kinds as a negative. Rather than using lower interest rates to purchase larger homes, if not vacation homes, they have instead opted to convert their 30-year mortgages to 10- and 15-year loans with essentially equal monthly payments terms. Lower interest rates have translated into faster loan amortization rather than economic growth. Well into the recovery, the focus of the upper-middle class remains on less, rather than more, credit, and - thanks to demographics - less, rather than more, home, too.

Comment: "The cashless society is already here. The question now is how far will society allow it to penetrate and completely control each and every aspect of their day to day lives."

The cashless society is almost here - and with some very sinister implications

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Stock Down

U.S. labor statistics compare how 820 jobs pay in one massive chart

Zach Noble
The Blaze
Mon, 23 Jun 2014 10:59 UTC
Wondering how your earnings stack up against everyone else in the 820 different professional categories tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics?

Using BLS data, Reddit user Dan Ling compiled the chart you've been waiting for.

Medical professionals, denoted in hot pink, dominate the upper reaches of the chart, with the top-earning anesthesiologists raking in average annual wages of $235,100.

Image
© Image via imgur

Comment: Unemployment soars worldwide, with youth the most vulnerable

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Stop

Bundy ranch 'private attorney general' tells gathering that laws don't apply to them

Travis Gettys
Raw Story
Wed, 25 Jun 2014 12:47 UTC
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The continuing standoff at the Bundy ranch has exposed the militia members, gun enthusiasts, survivalists, and sovereign citizens drawn there to one another's ideas in kind of an extremist incubator.

Videos posted online show the scofflaw rancher's supporters explaining their ideologies in lengthy lectures, such as one posted earlier this month that shows "private attorney general" Jeff Ball explaining that laws don't apply to individuals if they understand how to rebut them.

"I want to give you guys the basic chain of command, all right?" said Ball, of the Citizens Action Network. "Up at the top of this tree is the creator, whoever your creator is, that's where the creator's at. The one below that is you, okay? So your original contract was with the creator."

Ball's lecture mingles "sovereign citizen" rhetoric with conspiracy theories promoted by perennial presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche.

"The earth is our inheritance, OK, but what these guys are trying to do is third-party their way into it," Ball said. "So here's how they want you to believe the chain of command goes: God, the Vatican, Washington, D.C., the city of London."

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Snakes in Suits

School superintendent wants Spanish banned from being spoken in Arizona

Scott Kaufman
Raw Story
Wed, 25 Jun 2014 19:39 UTC
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A top Arizona school official who was outed as an anonymous Internet troll last week is coming under fire for comments he made supporting the state-wide banning of Spanish.

"We all need to stomp out balkanization. No Spanish radio stations, no Spanish billboards, no Spanish TV stations, no Spanish newspapers," Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal (R) wrote anonymously shortly after being elected.

"This is America, speak English," he demanded. "I don't mind them selling Mexican food as long as the menus are mostly in English. And, I'm not being humorous or racist."

In 2010, Huppenthal called for the dismantling of the state's Mexican-American Studies (MAS) program. He then helped write a law outlawing programs that he believed "promote resentment," like MAS.
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People 2

Humanitarian crisis: Over 500,000 Ukrainian refugees - 10,000 ask for refugee status and temporary asylum in Russia


Voice of Russia
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 09:22 UTC
Ukrainian refugees
© RIA Novosti/Sergey Pivovarov
Around 10,000 Ukrainian citizens asked for refugee status or temporary asylum in Russia, deputy head of the Federal Migration Service's department in Moscow Marina Kapustina said in a public advisory council on Thursday. "More than 9,600 Ukrainian citizens asked for refugee status or temporary asylum," she said.

Over 23,000 Ukrainian refugees have fled to Russia, Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets said on Wednesday, June 25.

"We have set up 262 camps for temporary accommodation of refugees from Ukraine and 23,286 people are staying in them," she said. "This number is constantly changing because regions ... are making job offers and some refugees are changing their status to Russian citizenship and moving to Russian regions for permanent residence," the minister said.
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