Society's ChildS


Life Preserver

Germany urges European nations to accept more Syrian refugees


France 24
Thu, 12 Sep 2013 00:00 UTC
syrian refugees
© afp
Germany has granted temporary shelter to 5,000 Syrians and is urging other European nations to accept more refugees from Syria's civil war. The UN estimates that more than two million people have fled the conflict so far.

Germany is urging other European nations to consider taking in more Syrian refugees to help cope with the large number of people displaced by the country's conflict.

Interior Ministry spokesman Jens Teschke says Europe's most populous country "is leading by example" by giving temporary shelter to 5,000 Syrians as part of a special humanitarian assistance program lasting two years.

The U.N. refugee agency is seeking a total of 10,000 such places in 2013.

Teschke told reporters in Berlin that while Germany doesn't want to tell other countries how many Syrians to take in, Austria is receiving a similar number per capita.
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Newspaper

Egypt journalist faces military court over 'lies'


France 24
Mon, 16 Sep 2013 10:19 UTC
Egyptian soldier
© France 24An Egyptian soldier stands guard on a watchtower near the border between Egypt and the Palestinian territory on September 12, 2013.
An Egyptian journalist on Sunday appeared before a military court, accused of spreading lies about the army's campaign against militants in the Sinai Peninsula.

The court in the Suez canal city of Ismailiya adjourned Ahmed Abu Deraa's hearing to September 18.

Abu Deraa, who writes for the independent daily Al-Masry Al-Youm, was detained on September 4 in north Sinai over published reports that army raids had hit a mosque and houses and also injured civilians.

Authorities say they are targeting "terrorists" in the peninsula that borders the Palestinian Islamist-run Gaza Strip.
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Newspaper

Drudge hates new shield bill, but is defining 'journalist' really 'fascist'?

Patrick Jonsson
CS Monitor
Sat, 14 Sep 2013 10:13 UTC
Sen. Dianne Feinstein
© J. Scott Applewhite/APSen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. asks questions during a hearing on Capitol Hill. Sen. Feinstein says a “17-year-old blogger” doesn’t deserve a legal shield.
A media shield law approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee defines a "real reporter" deserving of extra protection. Bloggers, "citizen journalists," and others cry "foul!"

In its attempt to define who's a journalist and who's not, is the US Senate trying to say that Thomas Paine, a corset-maker, wouldn't have deserved the same protections from government heavy-handedness as a newspaper publisher like Ben Franklin?

The first version of a media shield law that handily made it through the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday defined for the first time what constitutes a "real reporter" deserving of extra protection versus what Sen. Dianne Feinstein called a "17-year-old blogger" who doesn't deserve a legal shield.

While Mr. Paine eventually edited magazines in the United States, he's best known for his pamphleteering days, when he self-published "Common Sense," one of the American Revolution's most poignant calls to arms. Modern bloggers often see themselves as the inheritors of the pamphleteering tradition, and many wondered on Friday whether Paine would be covered under the proposed law.
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Stock Down

Amid slow economic recovery, more Americans identify as 'lower class'

Emily Alpert
LA Times
Mon, 16 Sep 2013 10:04 UTC
Susana Garcia
© Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles TimesSusana Garcia snuggles with her granddaughter Phia Garcia, 9 months, with her daughter Cathya Garcia at left. With earnings of less than $13 an hour, she sees herself as part of the lower class.
A small but surging share of Americans consider themselves 'lower class,' a surprise to some researchers and activists despite the bruising economy.

Chris Roquemore once thought of himself as working class. But it's hard to keep thinking that, he said, when you're not working.

The 28-year-old father said he sparred with his supervisors at a retail chain about taking time off after his mother died - and ended up unemployed. Since then, Roquemore has worked odd jobs and started studying nursing at Long Beach City College, trying to get "a career, not a job." All those changes, in turn, changed the way he thought of himself.
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Attention

Abortion clinics closing at record rate


Christianity Today
Fri, 13 Sep 2013 09:56 UTC
Planned Parenthood
© Courtesy of 40 Days for Life/Coalition for LifeAugust closing of Planned Parenthood clinic in Bryan, Texas.

Reasons vary, but the trend is clear.

For Abby Johnson, the closing of a single Planned Parenthood center demonstrated her dramatic reversal from abortion clinic director to leading pro-life advocate.

But for pro-lifers throughout the United States, it marked another exhibit in a hopeful trend - abortion centers are shutting down at an unprecedented rate. The total so far this year is 44, according to a pro-life organization that tracks clinic operations.

None was more telling for Johnson than the mid-July closing of the Planned Parenthood center in Bryan, Texas. It came less than four years after Johnson, burdened by her involvement with abortion, walked out of that clinic as its director and into the offices of the Coalition for Life.

"Knowing that the former abortion clinic I once ran is now closing is the biggest personal victory of my life," Johnson said in a written statement after the announcement of the shutdown. "From running that facility, to then advocating for its closure, and now celebrating that dream ... it shows that my life has indeed come full circle."
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Arrow Down

Shocking medical negligence in West Bengal: 114 children given Hepatitis B vaccine instead of polio drops


NiTi Central
Mon, 16 Sep 2013 02:47 UTC
Vaccine
© NiTi Central
In a shocking incident that would only show the lackadaisical attitude of the health workers, at least 114 children were hospitalised in Hooghly district after they were mistakenly administered Hepatitis B vaccine orally instead of pulse polio drops.

Six persons were suspended for the lapse. Angry villagers protested against the health workers and locked them up.

Sunday was pulse polio day so parents had taken their children to the polio booth at the Khatul village under Arambagh sub-division, official sources said.

One of the parents noticed that the health workers at the polio booth in Khatul village was giving Hepatitis B vaccine orally instead of polio drops and immediately informed the matter to the health workers and the villagers, sources said.

By then 114 children had already been given the Hepatitis B vaccine orally.
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Cheeseburger

Food insecurity in US a national problem


PressTV
Sun, 15 Sep 2013 22:48 UTC
Food Shortage
© PressTV
A report released by the US Department of Agriculture has revealed that the national average rate of American households reporting "food insecurity" was 14.7 percent between 2010 and 2012.

The figure is more than one percent higher than that for the previous three-year period.

According to the USDA data, Nevada has the highest rate of food insecurity in the US, with 16.6 percent of households reporting food insecurity. Nevada is followed by California, Washington, Idaho, and Oregon.

People report "food insecurity" when they run short of food and are uncertain about where it will come from next.
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Bizarro Earth

Meth lab playset sparks backlash

Kayla Ayres
KQRE
Wed, 11 Sep 2013 21:10 UTC
Image
The success of "Breaking Bad" has inspired all kinds of memorabilia, including a meth lab playset that's getting a lot of attention and a lot of backlash.

Chicago-based company Citizen Brick cooked up the Superlab Playset for super fans who need a fix. It's a Lego-like set modeled on the meth lab in the series and comes with figurines inspired by characters Walter White and Gus. This playset will set customers back $250.

Some people fear kids will get their hands on the playset with more than 500 pieces that's priced as a collectible. Citizen Brick has taken a lashing in the press, in particular by the 'Daily Mail,' for exposing children to drug dens and meth labs.
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Question

Not funny: Creepy clown lingers on streets of Northampton in middle of the night


Metro.co.uk
Sun, 15 Sep 2013 11:34 UTC
Creepy Clown
© Facebook/Spot Northampton’s ClownWaving on the traffic in the middle of the night.
When you go out to East Midlands today, you're sure of a big surprise.

An unnerving, anonymous clown has sent shivers down the spines of Northampton residents by lingering on street corners in full fancy dress, for the second night running.It reportedly first appeared on Friday 13th and was spotted again yesterday, under the cloak of darkness on Cedar Road in the north-east of the city.

With its white face, drawn-on brows, a red wig and ruffled collar, it is a carbon copy of the Pennywise clown from Stephen King-inspired 1990 horror film, IT.

The scary apparition-like sight has also been seen standing on a pavement waving with a teddy hanging between its fingers in its other hand.
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Heart - Black

Heartbreaking: Parents charged in starvation death of 3-year-old girl

Paul Kurtz, Ian Bush, Walt Hunter, Elizabeth Hur
CBS News
Mon, 09 Sep 2013 16:58 UTC
Image
© Unknown
The parents of a three-year-old Philadelphia girl, who only weighed 11 pounds at the time of her death, have been charged with murder.

Carmen Ramirez and Carlos Rivera, parents of Nathalyz Rivera, have been charged in her murder. Rivera weighed only 11 pounds when she died.

Wearing bio-hazard suits and masks, crime scene investigators tried to search the West Oak Lane home of the three-year-old, where according to police, she died from starvation.

Once inside, however, investigators found the home strewn with trash. They say it was so filthy and deplorable they actually had to call in the fire department to use their ladder to take pictures from the outside.
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