Society's ChildS


Eye 2

'Colonizing experiment in surveillance capitalism': Google-backed smart city aims to micromanage every aspect of urban life


RT
Thu, 25 Oct 2018 15:26 UTC
Sidewalk labs smart city Toronto
© YouTube / Sidewalk TorontoA screenshot from a promotional video shows the site of Sidewalk Labs' planned 'smart city'.
A Google-backed project to build the interconnected, data-driven 'city of the future' sounds like all George Orwell's nightmares come true, and is now in the spotlight after a privacy expert resigned from the project in protest.

Toronto's Waterfront district used to be an industrial wasteland, but Sidewalk Labs - a sister company of Google - wants to turn that wasteland into a prototype 'city of the future,' where data helps planners micromanage every aspect of urban life. The planned Quayside neighborhood will house 5,000 people when built, expanding to host another 5,000 within three to four years, its creators say.

In running the neighborhood as efficiently as possible, Sidewalk Labs will utilize a range of innovative technologies. Sensors will manage street crowds and time traffic signals appropriately, cameras will watch over parks and public spaces, planners will be able to track the movement of every vehicle, person and drone, and garbage cans will monitor their owners' trash to optimize waste management.

Comment: See also: 'Smart cities' to unleash data collection that far surpasses anything seen today

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Attention

Half of Yemen's population survives on foreign aid, famine imminent - UN


RT
Wed, 24 Oct 2018 15:26 UTC
yemen child
© Reuters / Abduljabbar Zeyad
The famine threatening war-torn Yemen is even worse than previous estimates which already called it the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. The UN now estimates 14 million people are at risk.

UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock called for a humanitarian ceasefire in areas essential to aid supply and infrastructure. Because of the deteriorating situation on the ground, he said, the UN has been forced to revise upward its estimates of 11 million Yemenis on the brink of starvation two weeks ago. Now, 14 million Yemenis face "pre-famine conditions," relying on food aid for their very survival.

Most of this aid - 80 percent - arrives through the port of Hodeidah. The Houthi-controlled city has been under siege by coalition forces led by Saudi Arabia since June. The Saudis have accused regional rival Iran of arming the Houthis through the port, though Iran denies the allegations.

UK-based NGO Save the Children claims nearly two-thirds (64.5 percent) of Yemenis "don't know when or if their next meal will come," warning that those who don't die of hunger are still at risk of succumbing to disease. Yemen is in the midst of the world's largest ever cholera outbreak, a situation exacerbated by what many believe to be deliberate targeting of hospitals by coalition forces.
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Stock Down

Bank OZK: This cycle's 'Countrywide Financial' just imploded

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Thu, 25 Oct 2018 00:00 UTC
During every credit cycle, there is one national lender that all other lenders try to emulate. This is because a combination of rapid asset growth and elevated net interest margins leads to rapid earnings growth and share price appreciation. Unfortunately, in order to do that, you have to make a lot of risky loans and pretend they're totally safe. Remember Countrywide Financial? They were the ones who'd lend to you no matter what; no income, no job, no assets - you're approved!!! Anything to show growth. Everyone in the financial industry emulated them because they were growing so fast. Besides, when you have a fixed cost structure, you cannot exactly stand still and let others steal your market share.

That brings me to what may be this cycle's Countrywide Financial, Bank OZK (OZK - USA), formerly known as Bank of the Ozarks.
Countrywide Financial, Bank OZK (OZK – USA)

Comment: See also:

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Arrow Up

White South African farmers say 'Da' to Putin's asylum offer

Dave Gahary
American Free Press
Thu, 18 Oct 2018 00:00 UTC
Putin offer land white south african farmers

With the South African government intent on giving all of the nation's farmland to blacks and white farmers being slaughtered in heinous, horrible violence, Russian President Vladimir Putin has opened his nation's doors to South Africa's white population. Now, about 15,000 Boers are planning to take advantage of Putin's offer and take sanctuary in greener-and safer-pasture in an agricultural grassland region of Russia.

For many South African farmers, who have witnessed their country descend from a first-rate economic marvel to a country now barely registering on the Human Development Index-with an unemployment rate approaching 60%-enough is enough. A good number of these hard-working folk have pulled up stakes and headed to the Russian grasslands between Ukraine and Kazakhstan, where more than 65% of the land is dedicated to agriculture.

A large part of the exodus has been brought on by South Africa's government, led by President Cyril Ramaphosa, who "has pledged to return the lands owned by white farmers since the 1600s to the black citizens of the country." The South African government "is planning to put an end to what it calls the legacy of apartheid, where most of South Africa's land is still in the hands of its minority white population."

Ever since blacks supplanted whites in South Africa's governing structure, the country has been on a downward tear, with regular rolling electricity blackouts and the world's highest murder rate, as well as one of the highest rates of rape on the planet. Sadly, children make up a large percentage of rape victims in South Africa, believed to be a result of a myth that having sex with a virgin female cures a man of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases; if a woman is raped, there is a 25% chance her attacker had AIDS. Although signs are posted throughout the country explaining that raping children will not cure AIDS, this heinous crime continues to increase.

Comment:

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Airplane

Mexico-bound American Airlines plane evacuated in Miami over 'security concern'


RT
Thu, 25 Oct 2018 00:00 UTC
vacated AA flight to Mexico
© Reuters / Lucas JacksonAn American Airlines airplane at Miami International airport in Miami, Florida
A "security concern" caused the evacuation of all passengers from an American Airlines flight heading to Mexico City at Miami International Airport. The threat has since been lifted without an official explanation.

Miami-Dade Police Department confirmed it investigated a security concern at the airport. Passengers disembarked and necessary "safety protocols [were] set in place," police said in a tweet.

K-9 units were dispatched to the aircraft, according to eyewitnesses.
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Pistol

Two people shot and killed in Kentucky grocery store, suspect in custody


RT
Thu, 25 Oct 2018 12:13 UTC
Gregory Alan bush shooting Louisville Kentucky
© Louisville Metro ConnectionsInvestigators in Jeffersontown say 51-year-old Gregory Alan Bush shot another man several times inside the store before shooting a woman in the parking lot.
At least two people, including an elderly woman, have been shot and killed by a gunman in a grocery store on the outskirts of Louisville, Kentucky. The suspect has been apprehended.

A man and a woman were killed in a shooting that started inside the Kroger grocery store in Jeffersontown and continued in its parking lot.

The incident took place around 3pm on Wednesday and saw an armed man enter the popular store and fire several shots at another male, who succumbed to his wounds on the spot. The perpetrator than fled the scene, heading into the parking lot where he shot an elderly woman, presumably an innocent bystander. She also died at the scene.
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Star of David

Taking lessons from IDF: Human Rights Watch report reveals arbitrary arrests and torture of Palestinians by PA and Hamas

Allison Deger
Mondoweiss
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 00:00 UTC
Palestinian riot police Ramallah
© Isaam Rimawi / APPalestinian Riot police show their skills during a training session with police members of the European Union, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, on March 16, 2014. The EU training will help the Palestinian police force develop their riot control techniques.
In April 2017, Alaa Zaqeq, 28, was dragged out of his in-law's house in the al-Aroub refugee camp in the south of the West Bank by Palestinian security forces and thrown into the back of one of eight police vehicles waiting outside.

When he arrived at the Jericho detention facility hours later, blindfolded and handcuffed, an officer who hurled him against a wall said the abuse was a "welcome." Over the next 23 days Zaqeq was beaten until he confessed, falsely he said, to the crime of financing the Islamic movement on campus where Zaqeq is a graduate student. Yet after his release Zaqeq was never charged with any crime.

Zaqeq is one of 147 people who spoke to Human Rights Watch over the last two years about arbitrary detention and systematic abuse in Palestinian jails, prisons and interrogation sites across the West Bank and Gaza. Researchers found the stints in prison are short and often do not end in charges, or signs of physical abuse that are visible upon their release.

The new report, "Two Authorities, One Way, Zero Dissent: Arbitrary Arrest and Torture Under the Palestinian Authority and Hamas," examines 86 cases of Palestinians who were harmed under arrest, and interviews 95 former detainees.

Comment: Hamas is a Mossad creation...

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Attention

Angry young men & gangbangers marching to US yelling "Vamos Para Allá Trump!"


Judicial Watch
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 13:30 UTC
caravan mixigo burn flag
© Associated PRessTwo people burn a United States flag during a protest in favor of the caravan of migrants that is currently stuck on the Guatemala-Mexico border, in front of the American embassy, in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Friday
Besides gang members and mobs of young angry men, the Central American caravan making its way into the United States also consists of Africans, Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans and Indians. Judicial Watch is covering the crisis from the Guatemalan-Honduran border this week and observed that the popular mainstream media narrative of desperate migrants - many of them women and children - seeking a better life is hardly accurate. Guatemalan intelligence officials confirmed that the caravan that originated in the northern Honduran city of San Pedro Sula includes a multitude of Special Interest Aliens (SIA) from the countries listed above as well as other criminal elements and gang members.

Comment:

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Mr. Potato

Another Facebook fail: Network apologizes for auto-ban of art museum's Chagall exhibition ad


RT
Thu, 25 Oct 2018 13:06 UTC
nude over Virbinsk
© Kunstmuseum Pablo PicassoThe Nude over Vitebsk by Mark Chagall
Facebook's overeager nudity filter has flopped again when it banned an advertising of an exhibition of paintings by Marc Chagall in Germany's Münster.

The Pablo Picasso museum produced a two-minute clip to promote the exhibition of works by the world-famous Russian-French artist. It features some of the paintings and commentary by Professor Markus Muller, the museum's director.

But when they tried to use Facebook's paid advertising tools, the social media giant rejected the video, reported the local newspaper Münstersche Zeitung. Apparently the automatic algorithm screening ads was not happy with some of the paintings, like the Nude over Vitebsk, a 1933 surrealist work which features a woman's naked backside.
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Crusader

San Francisco: Lawyers release names of 212 alleged priest sex offenders in attempt to make Archdiocese come clean

Lisa Fernandez and Cristina Rendon
Fox 11
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 10:56 UTC
priest offenders
As dioceses around the country are disclosing names of priests accused of misconduct, a law firm on Tuesday released a report containing the names of 212 Catholic Clergy members accused of sexual misconduct in the Bay Area.

The report, compiled by lawyers from Jeff Anderson and Associates based in St. Paul, Minn., accuses 135 offenders from the Archdiocese of San Francisco, 95 from the Diocese of Oakland and 33 from the Diocese of San Jose. A total of 111 of these priests are dead or thought to be dead.

It was initially reported that there were 263 names on the list but 51 of those names were duplicates, because some of the priests served in multiple diocese.

So why release the names? Because it's important to let other survivors know that they weren't alone, said Tom Emens, a sex abuse survivor, at a news conference in San Francisco.
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