Society's ChildS


Nuke

The legacy of Agent Orange & Monsanto - Have things changed?

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The Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA) recently told Reuters that more than 4.8 million people in Vietnam have been exposed to the herbicide and over 3 million of them have been suffering from deadly diseases. Agent Orange was one of many herbicides used by the U.S. military as a weapon during the Vietnam war, and Monsanto was contracted by the government to manufacture it for the Department of Defence. According to Monsanto:
"The use of Agent Orange as a military herbicide in Vietnam continues to be an emotional subject for many people. Asian Affairs Specialist Michael Martin notes, '[a]t the time the herbicides were used, there was little consideration within the U.S. military about potential long-term environmental and health effects of the widespread use of Agent Orange in Vietnam.'" (source)

Comment: Read more about evil Agent Orange and how it continues to poison Vietnam:


Alarm Clock

Baltimore riots: Governor declares 'state of emergency'

baltimore riots April 2015
© Reuters / Shannon StapletonDemonstrators jump on a damaged Baltimore police department vehicle during clashes in Baltimore, Maryland April 27, 2015.
Acts of violence and destruction will not be tolerated in Baltimore City, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said as he announced a state of emergency after riots broke out in the wake of Freddie Gray's death in police custody.

Hogan said the riot "put innocent Marylanders at significant risk" and that the deployment of the National Guard is a "last resort" to restore order to the city.

"People have the right to protest and express their frustrations, but Baltimore city families deserve peace and safety in their communities," he added. "Destructive acts cannot and will not be tolerated."

At the press conference, Maj. Gen. Linda L. Singh said National Guard troops will carry arms while on patrol, but only for self-defense.

Earlier in the day, Hogan declared a state of emergency and activated the National Guard to help handle the unrest in Baltimore. The situation escalated dramatically on Monday after a group of school-age kids gathered at Mondawmin Malland began throwing rocks at law enforcement. Officers responded with mace and pepper spray, but the young people involved then moved to set at least two vehicles on fire, as well as a local pharmacy.

Fifteen police officers were injured, a police spokesman told Reuters.

Comment: Martial law coming soon? America is rapidly turning into a battlefield with a blueprint for locking down the nation


Alarm Clock

Baltimore protests lead to reporters robbed by youths, arrested and beaten by police

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© Reuters / Sait Serkan Gurbuz
Journalists fell victim to the chaos in Baltimore, engulfed in protest since Freddie Gray's death in custody. While police beat up and detained reporters, a producer with RT's Ruptly was robbed by a street gang on Sunday.

RT's Paulina Leonovich was surrounded by a group of aggressive youths while filming. They cursed and displayed obscene gestures into the camera.

Then suddenly one of them snatched the TV worker's bag and tried to run away with it. But the woman began chasing the perpetrator, shouting "Stop! Give it back!" until the he was apprehended by the police.


The Ruptly producer wasn't the only journalist who got in trouble in Baltimore on the night.

The Washington City Paper claims its photo editor, JM Giordano, was brought to the ground and beaten by Baltimore City cops in front of the police HQ.
Mind you. Worse violence I've seen from last night is the video of the POLICE beating a member of the press.

— Block Samson (@insanityreport) April 26, 2015

V

Over 130K march in LA marking 100th anniversary of Turkish genocide of Armenians

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© Reuters/Kevork Djansezian
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Los Angeles on Friday, marching through the city and onto the Turkish consulate. They were demanding that the killing of around 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915 be recognized as genocide.

More than 130,000 took part in the rally to mark the centennial of the massacre, according to estimates from the Los Angeles Police Department. Demonstrators started the march from the Little Armenia neighborhood and proceeded to walk six miles to the Turkish consulate on Wilshire Boulevard.

Along the way, people shouted slogans such as "Shame on Turkey," and "We want justice."


Turkey has so far refused to acknowledge the slaughter of around 1.5 million Armenian Christians as genocide. Forty-three states in America have accepted the event as such, but the federal government has not.

President Barack Obama promised to recognize the genocide prior to his election in 2008, but has since avoided the term to placate key NATO ally Turkey.

Binoculars

Best of the Web: Man of conscience: Comments by those in Putin's inner-circle on the anniversary of his accession to presidency

Vladimir Putin
Russia's Rossiya-1 TV channel aired a documentary on April 26 titled "The President", dedicated to the anniversary of Vladimir Putin's accession to the presidency, about landmark events in Russia's modern history over the past 15 years. Sputnik presents comments about the Russian leader made by people from his so-called inner circle.

On December 31, 1999, Vladimir Putin became acting president after his predecessor Boris Yeltsin resigned unexpectedly. Putin won the subsequent 2000 presidential election and served as Russian president from 2000 to 2008. After serving as prime minister from 2008 to 2012, he was re-elected to the presidency in 2012.

Comment: It is very telling that so many people who know Putin well, respect and admire him. So, it is unsurprising that Putin enjoys an 85% approval rating from Russian citizens and that he was named the most influential person in the world by Time Magazine.

Is Putin incorruptible? U.S. insider's view of the Russian president's character and his country's transformation


People 2

The powerlessness of the average American

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A security guard recently told me he didn't know how much he'd be earning from week to week because his firm kept changing his schedule and his pay. "They just don't care," he said.

A traveler I met in the Dallas Fort-Worth Airport last week said she'd been there eight hours but the airline responsible for her trip wouldn't help her find another flight leaving that evening. "They don't give a hoot," she said.

Someone I met in North Carolina a few weeks ago told me he had stopped voting because elected officials don't respond to what average people like him think or want. "They don't listen," he said.

What connects these dots? As I travel around America, I'm struck by how utterly powerless most people feel.

Comment: For a deeper discussion on the feelings of apathy and powerlessness of the people see: Epidemic depression as a wake up call to humanity


Attention

SOTT Focus: US-backed Azov battalion crucifies and burns man alive in Ukraine

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The pro-Kiev, ultra-Nazi Azov battalion in Ukraine has allegedly sent a snuff film depicting the brutal execution of a Ukrainian 'separatist' to militia fighters and hackers from the hacktivist collective known as Cyber Berkut. The video, shown below, is graphic, so be warned. It shows a group of armed men holding down a gagged man on a cross, tying him to it with duct tape. Nails are then hammered through the palms of his hands, the man's screams audible through the gag. While the actual nailing is not shown, the camera then moves in to show the nails in his hands. Then the cross is lifted, set in the ground, and the base is lit. The video cuts out as the fast-rising flames meet the crucified man's feet.

According to Cyber Berkut, the video had an accompanying message, stating the the footage was filmed near the village of Shirokino and warning that all separatists - 'traitors' to Ukraine - would face the same fate.

Cyber Berkut has been releasing leaked documents, audio, and video for the past year or so. They're the ones who released the phone call between EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Catherine Ashton and Foreign Minister of Estonia Urmas Paet, in which they discuss the Maidan snipers. (You can see a list of some of their leaks on Wikipedia.) The video was then publicized by LifeNews in Russia, who confirmed its authenticity. LifeNews tends to be rather sensationalistic, but that does not necessarily imply the video is a fake.


Wine n Glass

Daily life in the Empire of Chaos inspiring increase in binge drinking?

Drinking Alcohol
© Medical Daily
Heavy drinking and binge drinking is becoming far more prevalent in the U.S. due in large part to rising rates of drinking among women, according to a new analysis published in the American Journal of Public Health.

By contrast, the percentage of people who drink any alcohol has remained relatively unchanged over time, according to the latest research by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington.

"We are seeing some very alarming trends in alcohol overconsumption, especially among women," said Dr. Ali Mokdad, a lead author of the study and professor at IHME. "We also can't ignore the fact that in many U.S. counties a quarter of the people, or more, are binge drinkers."

The study is the first to track trends in alcohol use at the county level. The findings, focused on people aged 21 and older, showed that heavy drinking among Americans has increased sharply, up 17.2 percent since 2005.

Comment: One could cite numerous examples of stressors that might be contributing to the increase in heavy drinking among the youth, such as low employment rates, underemployment and crushing student debt. However, it may well be that more and more young people are becoming painfully aware that they live in a soulless world run by elite psychopaths:

Epidemic depression as a wake up call to humanity


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American Reflexxx - Shocking performance shows how easy it is to dehumanize someone

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A disturbing video has begun to make the rounds on Facebook. Titled "American Reflexxx," it's the work of performance artists Signe Pierce and Alli Coates, and it involves the former walking through a city while the latter films her. The result is 14 minutes of deeply unsettling footage.

There have been several of these "a woman walks through a hostile environment" videos of late. Last year, there was the Hollaback video about walking in NYC as a woman, which was praised to the rafters and then hit with an almighty backlash in the space of about eight hours. A couple of weeks later, it was followed by the oh-so-21st-century spectacle of a social media bro posting a video about the treatment of an apparently drunk woman on Hollywood Boulevard, and sitting back to watch the clickzzz come in (that video later turned out to be a hoax, because of course it did).

"American Reflexxx" — which predates both of those videos but only appeared on YouTube this month — starts from the same place: a camera following a woman as she walks through a public space, recording the reactions of the members of the public she encounters. In this case, the woman is Pierce and the space is Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Pierce certainly cuts a striking figure. She's wearing a skimpy blue dress and neon yellow heels, and most strikingly, her face is entirely covered by a reflective mask. She's also of apparently indeterminate gender; much of the video involves passersby trying to work out if she's a cisgender man or woman, or a trans woman, or what. (I actually have no idea what Pierce's gender identity is, which is kind of the point.)

The results are, as one might expect, pretty depressing. People seem genuinely terrified by her — several times groups of people scatter as she walks toward them, and at one point a girl shouts, "Oh hell no, don't walk this way!" As the film progresses, the reactions become more violent — she has water thrown on her, someone attempts to trip her, and eventually she is pushed head-first into the pavement. Notably, all the acts of violence against her are carried out by women. The film ends with a sort of survey of her body, lingering on the blood streaming from the knee she gashed open when she hit the ground.


Comment: One can criticize the video itself, certainly the time of day, location and the fact it was being filmed are all variables, the resulting violence against Signe is still a reflection of humanity at some level.


Stock Down

What will happen when the dollar collapses?

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Historically, when a nation's debt exceeds its ability to repay even the interest, it can be assumed that the currency will collapse. Typically, governments exacerbate the situation by printing large amounts of currency notes in an effort to inflate the problem away, or at least postpone it.

The greater the level of debt, the more dramatic the inflation must be to counter it. The more dramatic the inflation, the greater the danger that hyperinflation will take place. No government has ever been able to control hyperinflation. If it occurs, it does so quickly and always ends with a crash.

Although there are observers (myself included) who frequently discuss what a reserve-currency crash would mean to the world, there is little or no discussion as to how this would impact people on the street level, and perhaps that discussion should begin.