Society's ChildS


Attention

Passengers at 3 major US airports to be screened for deadly Chinese virus


RT
Fri, 17 Jan 2020 20:34 UTC
coronavirus
© Reuters / Health Protection AgencyA electron microscope image of a coronavirus
Authorities at major airports in New York and California will screen passengers traveling from the Chinese city of Wuhan gripped by the outbreak of a new deadly pneumonia-like virus, which has since spread to Japan and Thailand.

Starting Friday, passengers from Wuhan who arrive at San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles's main international airports will undergo screening for the symptoms of a novel coronavirus (2019-nCov) that broke out in the Chinese city last month. Officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will carry out the checks, along with Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents.


The illness was first noticed in Wuhan in December, and is believed to have originated at a seafood and animal market in the city. The CDC states that the virus likely jumped from market animals to humans, and then may have spread between people.

Comment: India has also issued a travel advisory:
The emergent coronavirus - related to the lethal SARS pathogen - has struck scores of people across China, hitting the city of Wuhan the hardest, with up to 40 confirmed cases, prompting the Indian Ministry of Health to issue a travel advisory on Friday.

While the World Health Organization has assessed the infection as "low" risk, India's health ministry warned anyone traveling to China "as a matter of abundant precaution."

"The mode of transmission of the disease is unclear as of now. However, so far there is little evidence of significant human-to-human transmission."

The advisory follows a similar decision by US health officials, who began screenings for the bug at three major airports on Friday afternoon after it claimed its second casualty in Wuhan.

While India's health officials stressed the move was merely a precautionary safeguard, researchers at the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis at Imperial College in London estimated that there could be as many as 1,723 cases in Wuhan alone, dwarfing the few dozen confirmed patients.



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Fire

Don't blame climate change for raging wildfires, blame bad management

Krystina Skurk
The Federalist
Wed, 15 Jan 2020 10:25 UTC
australia fires
© Ninian Reid/Flickr
California and Australia share a common enemy: overzealous environmental regulation. In both places, the unintended consequences of a radical environmentalist agenda has been massive wildfires.

California suffered from two horrible fire seasons in the last three years, one of which burned down an entire town. Australia has been battling fires for months. More than 135 fires are still burning currently. So far, the fires have scorched 12 million acres, killed 25 people, caused 240,000 Australians to evacuate their homes, burned alive an estimated half a billion animals, and caused $3.4 billion worth of damage.

The big question isn't necessarily how these wildfires started. In both cases, most of the fires were likely man-made, whether through downed electrical lines in California or arsonists in Australia. The real question, however, is what factors have contributed to making these fires into "mega catastrophes," or fires that cause over a billion dollars of damage?

Many on the left will name climate change as the bogeyman. For example, a recent opinion article in The New York Times reads, "Australia Is Committing Climate Suicide." Yet more evidence points to failed environmental policies.

Comment: See also:

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Question

Why is Western media not questioning the mysterious death of Australian youth activist Wilson Gavin?

Robert Bridge
Strategic Culture Foundation
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 00:01 UTC
Brisbane Square Library
Brisbane Square Library
Following a protest against a 'drag queen story time' at a library in Australia, Wilson Gavin, 21, the president of the University of Queensland Liberal National Club, was found dead the next morning at a train station. Local media, while going out its way to portray Gavin and his fellow protesters as hell-raisers, has yet to ask any serious questions with regards to the young man's alleged suicide - at a time when he was reportedly house-sitting for a Liberal National Party Senator.

If ever there was a story that epitomizes exactly how low Western media has sunk, the story involving the events leading up to the tragic death of Wilson Gavin would have to rank very high.

On Sunday, Gavin and about fifteen members of the University of Queensland's Liberal National Club (UQLNC) walked into the Brisbane Square Library where a 'Drag Queen Story Hour' event for children was in full swing. Gavin went face-to-face with the star of the show, drag queen Johnny Valkyrie, aka Queenie, as the group began to chant "drag queens are not for kids." No violence, no broken chairs, just a group of university students expressing their displeasure with a controversial event that is sponsored by the local government, i.e. the taxpayers.

Comment: See also: Australia: Man commits suicide after suffering social media abuse from viral drag queen protest video

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Arrow Up

Officers deliver baby in patrol car after woman goes into labor while stuck in Moscow traffic


RT
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 00:50 UTC
Police car
Moscow traffic patrol officers tried their hand at a new job, literally - helping a pregnant woman deliver a baby boy after her taxi got stuck in traffic. The newborn got his own uniform right away, bundled up in a police jacket.

On-duty traffic patrol officers in southwestern Moscow hardly expected they would be approached by a desperate husband pleading with them to take his heavily pregnant wife to a hospital when they came to work on Friday - but that was exactly what happened, as evening rush hour approached on Friday afternoon.

At that time, a visibly agitated man was spotted running towards a patrol vehicle, telling the officers his wife was about to go into labor in a taxi and there was no way they could reach the hospital in time considering the situation on the road.

Officers took the couple in and dashed away in the patrol vehicle, but could not make it to the hospital in time. It might have been an unusual call of duty, but the patrolmen did not hesitate, taking matters in their own hands while waiting for an ambulance to arrive.
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Bizarro Earth

Turkish workers wounded in deadly al-Shabab car bombing in Somalia


Al Jazeera
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 20:59 UTC
car ambush somalia turkish workers
© Feisal Omar/ReutersParamedics carry an unidentified man injured in the explosion in Afgoye in Somalia
Four killed in blast claimed by al-Shabab that apparently targeted Turkish engineers working on a road near Mogadishu.

At least four people have been killed and 15 others wounded in a suicide car bomb attack claimed by the al-Shabab group near the capital of Somalia, according to authorities.

Both Turkish and Somali officials said those injured in Saturday's attack near the town of Afgoye, about 30 kilometres (18 miles) southwest of Mogadishu, included Turkish engineers as well as Somali nationals working on a road in the area.

Turkey's Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said six Turkish nationals and nine Somali citizens were wounded in the bombing, with two in critical condition and undergoing surgery.

The AFP news agency said at least four people were killed, citing local police officer Abdirahman Adan.

Comment: A cause of resentment?

Turkey opens its largest overseas military base in Somalia

Al-Shabab (or occasionaly Al-Shabaab) has been active in the region for years. Yet, as with all 'terrorist' organizations, one must wonder who is actually behind them.

The MI6 - Al-Shabaab Connection

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USA

If you are American, you've been conditioned for war

David Niose
Psychology Today
Sat, 11 Jan 2020 00:00 UTC
Plane formation
© Department of Defense
We've been taught to accept militarism as normal. As tensions escalated with Iran last week, it seemed bewildering to many that the United States could once again be on the brink of war. We like to think of ourselves as a peaceful people and our country as a benevolent force in the world — so why is military conflict a constant presence in American life?

Despite our self-image, we have been conditioned for war all of our lives. Through a combination of cultural forces, some overt and others subtle, Americans are taught from a young age to accept their country's militarism without question. This conditioning has numerous ingredients. Themes of nationalism and militarism are frequently injected into public life through the media and other institutions, for example, as is a sense of righteousness, a rarely challenged belief that the country is almost always a force for good.

Fear is also a major element in conditioning minds for war. Americans of all ages are often reminded, by their government and the media, that perceived enemies pose a constant danger. The Soviet threat was used to justify military spending and adventurism around the globe for much of the latter twentieth century, validating the warning given by President Eisenhower in his 1961 farewell speech of the growing influence of the "military-industrial complex." More recently, through constant reminders of the "war on terror," Americans are effectively conditioned to see evildoers as always looming.
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Attention

Maduro alerts Pope Venezuelans to ditch Catholicism, 'tired of politicized pastors'


RT
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 08:50 UTC
Maduro/Pope
© Andreas Solaro/AFPVenezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and Pope Francis in the Vatican, June 2013.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said that his countrymen are fleeing the Catholic Church en masse because they have grown tired of "politicized" bishops. Maduro, in a speech, broadcast live on state TV on Friday, stated:
"I want to tell you, dear Pope Francis, we now have the data that Venezuelans have been leaving Catholicism. Nearly 40 percent are declaring themselves Evangelicals. That number used to be 3 percent."
Maduro stressed that people are getting "tired" of bishops who "use pulpits to express their political obsessions." Some clergymen "act like militants, not like pastors," he added.

The president had previously called on the local Catholic Church to stop being "involved into politics," and harshly criticized religious figures for holding events with Western-backed opposition leader Juan Guaido, who was declared interim president by anti-Maduro politicians in January last year. Some bishops have openly urged Maduro to step down during his standoff with Guaido.

"Bishops must learn to respect the people who don't want to see pulpits politicized," the president said during his state-of-the-nation address earlier this week.
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Dollars

Prizes for all - paying customers, that is. Why 4 out of 5 UK students get a top degree

Frank Furedi
RT
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 06:53 UTC
3 Grads
© Getty Images/Richard Baker
Once again, there is an outcry about the inflation of grades in the English University system. Almost eighty percent of students graduate with a first or a 2.1. degree - the top two grades.

Like previous secretaries of education, the present occupant of this post, Gavin Williamson, has vowed to put an end to the 'continuous drift' of grade inflation.

Unfortunately, the devaluation of a university degree cannot be stopped as long as universities continue to operate as businesses that treat students as customers. When higher education establishments have to keep their customers satisfied, grade inflation will continue. For what better way of ensuring that students are satisfied and happy than by offering them high grades?

Comment: 'Buying a degree' does not support 'incentive to learn'. Those who legitimately study, work to gain knowledge and refine their discernment capabilities will note the current trajectory of a crashing society. A few may even contemplate why.

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Stop

Attack of the snowflake culture: Children could be banned from heading balls in Scotland

Martyn Andrews
RT
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 15:21 UTC
Two kids soccer ball
© Global Look Press/ImageBROKER.com/Elmar Herz
With just over two weeks into the new decade, the UK in 2020 seems less about the roaring twenties, and more about the tedious advances in "cotton wool culture", as Scottish children could be banned from heading balls.

In recent years playgrounds have seen the game of conkers banned, lunchtime tag replaced by "gentle hands," and now football [soccer] might be joining the list too. The concern with the popular ball game grew due to research from Glasgow Brain Injury Research Group. They found that professional footballers are three and a half times more likely to develop neurological diseases than the general public. Because of that the Scottish FA is considering a ban on children's heads coming into contact with footballs.


Comment: The act of ball heading doesn't explain the mental states of deluded politicians, over-active activists and those dingbats who make up social justice rules...now does it? Perhaps learning 'how to head a ball and do it properly' might be a 'real' heads up and smack some sense into them!

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Yellow Vest

Best of the Web: French insurgency: Mass arrests as tens of thousands converge for Acte 62 of Yellow Vest movement and Day 45 of national strikes


Al Jazeera
Sat, 18 Jan 2020 20:18 UTC
macron louis king protest
© REUTERS/Benoit TessierA striking French worker holds a portrait of French President Emmanuel Macron as King Louis XVI at a demonstration against pensions reform plans, Paris, 9 January 2020.
Demonstrators shouted slogans denouncing the police, President Macron and his pension reforms on Saturday.

French police have fired tear gas at protesters hurling projectiles and arrested dozens of people as thousands of "yellow vest" anti-government protesters returned to the streets of Paris.

Demonstrators on Saturday shouted slogans denouncing the police, President Emmanuel Macron and his pension reforms that have triggered the longest French transport strike in decades, which has snarled public transportation for millions of commuters in the French capital for 45 days.

With sirens wailing, dozens of vans carrying riot police fanned out the route along which thousands of protesters marched.

Young people wearing masks shouted "revolution" as tear gas drifted by the Bastille, the square where the French revolution erupted in 1789.


Comment: Paris Opera employees also took to the streets... and did this!



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