Society's ChildS


Windsock

Indonesia: Food prices soar as bad weather strikes

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© Antara/Andreas Fitri AtmokoImported dry fish for sale at Bitingan market in Kudus, Central Java, on Thursday. Local fishermen are reporting poor catches due to bad weather in recent days, leading people to buy imported dry fish, sales of which have surged from 1,200 to 3,600 kilograms a day
Extreme weather, marked by storms and floods across the country, is being attributed to the spiraling prices of basic foodstuffs in the past week. In addition, crops are rotting and many fishermen cannot take to the sea due to high waves.

The price of staple foods in Bantul, Yogyakarta has soared following crop failure caused by the extreme weather in the regency.

Subariyoto, the head of the Bandul administration's domestic trade, industry and cooperatives division, said on Thursday that the bad weather ruined many crop fields in the regency.

"The bad weather also disrupted the distribution of produce. As the transport of supplies was halted, resulting in price increases," he said.

Arrow Up

India: Inflation dips but food prices soar

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Though the inflation based on wholesale prices has dipped to three years' lowest, according to Government, prices of food items including rice, wheat and pulses in retail have surprisingly gone through the roof during the last 12 months. In December 2012, the inflation was 7.18 per cent - a little lower than it was in December 2011 at 7.74 per cent.

The rates of food grains and pulses have increased manifold in the last three years. In 2011, in wholesale market, various qualities of rice were available at Rs20-52 per kg but within a year the price have increased by 20 per cent and are still on the rise. Currently, the price of rice is Rs25-70 per kg. The rate of pulses, milk, sugar and wheat are also on a constant rise offering absolutely no relief to the common man. The inflation rate in December 2010 was 9.47 per cent.

Eye 2

Chicago man allegedly broke into ex-girlfriend's home, stabbed her cat

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Miguel Vazquez, of Chicago, was arrested Thursday for allegedly breaking into his ex-girlfriend's apartment and stabbing her cat as a "surprise."
A 22-year-old Chicago man was arrested Thursday after he allegedly entered his ex-girlfriend's home and stabbed her cat multiple times on Monday evening.

Police say Miguel Vazquez, of the 4500 block of North Kimball Avenue, broke into his ex-girlfriend's home in the city's Uptown neighborhood around 9 p.m. Monday. CBS Chicago reports that he was confronted by his ex-girlfriend when he left her apartment around 1 a.m., at which time he allegedly told her he had "left a surprise" for her inside the apartment.

Pistol

Brazil cop shot dead in prank hold-up

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A Brazilian police officer playing a prank on a colleague by simulating a hold-up has been shot and killed.

An officer in the city of Rondonopolis was pulling out of his garage to go to work, when his friend rode up on a motorcycle wearing a helmet saying it was a hold-up.

Bug

"Strange creatures" in ready-made clothes

Soaking a new shirt that was brought from a local market in detergent water for about 15 minutes, when washing the shirt, Ms. Phung was appalled to discover thousands of creatures like leeches crawling, growing and reproducing very quickly.
Strange Creatures
© VietNamNet Bridge
Many curious people flocked to Ms. Ngo Thi Kim Oanh's house in Quang Hung hamlet, Hoa Quang Nam commune, Phu Hoa district, Phu Yen province, to see these "aliens."

Mrs. Nguyen Thi Phung, 55, Oanh's mother, said, on January 13, she bought the shirt at the Hanh Lam market.

Coming home, she soaked the shirt in soapy water for about 15 minutes. She then found several small white spots emerging on the cloth. She continued to soak it for a while and when washing the shirt she was appalled to discover thousands of creatures, looking like leeches, small as grains, crawling on the shirt.

"These creatures grew more and more and then laying eggs and reproducing very quickly," Ms. Oanh said.

Gold Seal

Racism, hunger and laziness: A First Nations youth perspective on Idle No More media coverage

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As Chief Theresa Spence has demonstrated since December 11th, there is supreme hunger in this country. For too many First Nations people, that hunger is literal, as they struggle to find a way to feed themselves despite the wealth that is being extracted from their lands. For others, this hunger is more abstract.

As a Kanien'kehá:ka and Anishinàbeg woman (that's Mohawk and Algonquin) who was raised off-reserve, I have been sustained throughout my life by strong connections to my home communities and my First Nations identity.

I have followed the Idle No More movement ravenously, consuming online Canadian media coverage, as well as the commentary section following every article. In these comments, it is clear that, in a purportedly enlightened country like Canada, racism against First Nations people is everywhere.

In particular, I'm struck by the repeated accusation of the laziness of First Nations people. The hypocrisy of such a characterization is astounding. In fact, few Canadians have taken any time to find out the facts, preferring instead to regurgitate the racist stereotypes that we've been fed by the media and the mainstream education system for generations.

Stock Down

The Boeing debacle: Seven lessons every CEO must learn

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© REUTERS/Issei KatoU.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) inspection charge Lorenda Ward (C), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) technical advisor Eric West (2nd L), unidentified Boein Co. official (R) and members of the Japan Transport Safety Board (JTSB) inspect All Nippon Airways' (ANA) Boeing Co's 787 Dreamliner plane
Brake problems. A fuel leak. A cracked windshield. One electrical fire. Then another. An emergency landing in Japan. A safety investigation imposed by the FAA. Then two premier customers - Japan's two main airlines, ANA and JAL, ground their fleet of Boeing [BA] 787s. Then the FAA grounds all 787s used by the only American carrier. Now other regulators around the world follow suit, grounding all 50 of the 787s delivered so far. The regulatory grounding of an entire fleet is unusual - the first since 1979 - and relates to a key to the plane's claimed energy-efficiency: the novel use of lithium ion batteries, which have shown a propensity to overheat and lead to fires - fires that generate oxygen and hence are difficult to put out.

And keep in mind: Boeing's 787 project is already billions of dollars over budget. The delivery schedule has been pushed back at least seven times. The first planes were delivered over three years late. In fact, out of a total of 848 planes sold, only 6 percent have been delivered.

Yet grave as these issues seem, they are merely symptoms of a deeper disease that has been gnawing at the US economy for decades: flawed offshoring decisions by the C-suite. Offshoring is not some menial matter to be left to accountants in the backroom or high-priced consultants armed with spreadsheets, promising quick profits. It raises mission-critical issues potentially affecting the survival of entire firms, whole industries and ultimately the economy.

Sheriff

Concerned citizen pulls over drunk cop, locks him up in his own cruiser

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Pietermarizburg man arrested an allegedly drunk police officer and locked him up in the back of his police van after watching him drive recklessly through the city streets.

Russell George, of Prestbury, said he was coming down Stott Street and about to enter Mayor's Walk at about 8 pm on Sunday when he noticed a police van driving fast and recklessly .

"He was driving towards oncoming traffic as he turned into Victoria Road.

"At this point I was concerned about the safety of other road users," self-employed George told The Witness.

"He suddenly jammed on his brakes and came to a complete stop.

"I got out of my car and went towards him and I asked him if he knew what he was doing. He started his car and carried on driving," he said.

Continuing to drive recklessly, the policeman turned into Logan Road and came to a stop at the Howard Road intersection.

Evil Rays

Harrowing surveillance footage shows woman getting punched, dragged, and thrown onto subway tracks in Philadelphia

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Police say surveillance video shows a man approach a woman at a SEPTA station, assault her and then throw her onto the tracks.

According to SEPTA, the woman was sitting Tuesday just after 3 p.m. at the Chinatown stop's northbound platform on Race Street along the Broad Ridge-Spur subway line.

Surveillance video, released Thursday by SEPTA, shows a man approach the woman. Police say he asked for a lighter.

Once he had that lighter, he attacked the woman, throwing her onto the tracks (see the surveillance footage in the second video clip above).

The man took her cell phone, which had fallen out of her pocket and onto the ground, and is then seen on surveillance video leaving, SEPTA police said.


Pistol

Firearms instructor leaves gun in school bathroom

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© Reuters / Jim Urquhart
In response to last month's massacre in Newtown, a Michigan charter school hired a firearms instructor as a security guard - only to find that the armed guard forgot his gun in the school bathroom.

The school took the National Rifle Association's advice in hiring an armed guard, but the retired Lapeer County Sheriff's Dept. firearms instructor, Clark Arnold, endangered students less than a week after he was hired by forgetting his deadly weapon in the school bathroom.

The Chatfield School of Lapeer, Michigan, which has about 500 enrolled students, was fortunate that the security guard remembered to retrieve the missing gun before a student came across it. The school director reported the incident to local authorities, but the retired firearms instructor will face no criminal charges.

"If you left a gun unattended and a toddler finds it and shoots and hurts someone, it could be some kind of reckless use of a firearm," Lapeer County Prosecutor Byron Konschuh told the Flint Journal.

But because no students were injured at the charter school, "it's almost like no harm no foul," Konschuh added.