Society's ChildS


Dollar Gold

A new low: MGM files lawsuit against Las Vegas shooting victims to avoid liabilty

Rachel Blevins
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 14:35 UTC
las vegas shooting
Nine months after the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, MGM Resorts International has filed a lawsuit against more than 1,000 victims, in an attempt to avoid liability.

MGM's famous Mandalay Bay Hotel was the site where suspect Stephen Paddock is accused of destroying the windows in his room on the 32nd floor, and then unleashing a hail of bullets on the crowd below at the nearby Route 91 Harvest festival-which was held at a venue that is also owned by MGM.

The move marks a new low for the company, which has faced massive scrutiny for both its response to the shooting and the failure of its employees to spot the obvious warning signs in the days before the massacre.

In November 2017, hundreds of shooting survivors filed multiple lawsuits against MGM in Nevada and California, and argued that Mandalay Bay staff were guilty of "failing to properly monitor Paddock's activities, train staff members and employ adequate security measures."

Comment: The real story behind the Las Vegas shooting may never be known but there is quite a bit of speculation:

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Dollar Gold

EU hits Google with record $5 billion fine for antitrust violations


RT
Wed, 18 Jul 2018 11:33 UTC
google android
© Dado Ruvic / Reuters
European regulators have hit Google with a €4.3 billion ($5 billion) antitrust fine for abusing the dominance of its Android mobile operating system. It's the highest anti-competition penalty ever imposed on a company by the EU.

The fine was announced on Wednesday after the EU found the US company guilty of using its Android mobile operating system to block rivals.

"Today, mobile internet makes up more than half of global internet traffic. It has changed the lives of millions of Europeans. Our case is about three types of restrictions that Google has imposed on Android device manufacturers and network operators to ensure that traffic on Android devices goes to the Google search engine," said European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager.

Comment: It looks like the EU lowered their suit from the $11 billion originally reported. While it's good that the EU is taking steps to try and control their monopoly, none the less, it's likely this is a minor setback in Google's bullet track toward complete and total domination of the online world.

See also:

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Stock Down

Shares in Tesla dip as investors worry about Elon Musk's unpredictable behavior

Chris White
The Daily Caller
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 15:10 UTC
Elon Musk
Tesla shares tumbled during Monday trading following a series of tweets from CEO Elon Musk accusing a diver who helped rescue a soccer team in Thailand of being a pedophile.

Shares dropped nearly three percent during Monday trading as Musk faced a disastrous weekend that included reports showing he donated nearly $40,000 to Republicans. He is also contending with a possible lawsuit from a diver involved in a rescue mission pulling a soccer team from a cave.

Analysts are handicapping Tesla and Musk's ability to wade through the controversies long enough to helm Tesla's battered ship.

Comment: Musk seems to be blind to the fact that his inflammatory comments on social media aren't doing him, or his company, any favours.

See also:

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Star of David

How Sacha Baron Cohen made a fool out of Republicans with fake 'pro-Israel award'

Allison Deger
Mondoweiss
Wed, 18 Jul 2018 04:52 UTC
Sacha Baron Cohen
Sacha Baron Cohen
Sacha Baron Cohen duped leading Republicans into reciting absurd endorsements of a fake program to arm toddlers in his premier of Showtime's "Who is America?" last night. One angle that seems to have baited Republicans into participating was no-holds-barred support for Israel.

Like in his "Da Ali G Show," Cohen wearing a disguise met with senior politicians under the premise of filming an unknown foreign news show. But where his infamous Borat and Bruno played off of stereotypes that punched down, in this series he impostures hardline characters whose influence has increased under the Trump administration, namely a right wing blogger and a terrorism expert.

Comment: Nothing new here - US officials routinely sacrifice morality, critical thought, and common sense for a pat on the head from the Israeli lobby.

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UFO 2

British policy leaves drone operators wide open for murder prosecution


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 19:52 UTC
MQ-1B Predator
© ReutersFile photo: An MQ-1B Predator takes off from Balad Air Base in Iraq, June 12, 2008.
UK military personnel engaging in US-led drone operations in Syria and Iraq are at risk of being "liable to prosecution for murder" due to the government not setting a "clear policy and sound legal basis," a report warns.

There is a growing concern that the UK was complicit in civilian deaths by supporting a US-led drone program that was committing unlawful acts - making British personnel open to prosecution, the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) report said.

"In its current form, assistance to partners is putting the UK and its personnel at risk of criminal liability. UK use of force or assistance to partners in drone strikes outside situations of armed conflict are not protected by combatant immunity, therefore making personnel liable to prosecution for murder."

Britain has been a key player for the US-led campaign in Syria and Iraq - assisting in their drone program since 2014 - involvement that had "raised some serious questions about the legality, efficacy and strategic coherence," according to the APPG report.

The chair of the parliamentary drones group, Professor Michael Clarke, said the UK was working with countries including the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar that "do not work on standard NATO rules."
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Violin

SOTT Focus: Helsinki Peace Talk Between Nuclear Superpower Leaders Putin and Trump Offends America's Assholes and Morons

Caitlin Johnstone
Medium
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 10:40 UTC
trump white house protest
© Alejandro Alvarez ‏/ @aletweetsnewsIndy reporter Alejandro Alvarez: "There’re about 100 protesters huddled in Lafayette Park, awaiting Trump’s return from #Helsinki2018. They’re chanting stuff like 'you’re the puppet,' 'Benedict Arnold has got to go,' and holding up LED-lit signs like these..."
When I was a little girl I used to end all my nightly prayers with the words, "And please no nuclear war, and peace on earth. Amen." This was in the early eighties. The knowledge that weapons existed armed and ready which could annihilate all life on earth, including my Mum and my Dad and everyone I loved, kept me up at night.

I still marvel at the fact that these weapons exist, just as armed and just as ready, and we just go about our lives like it's perfectly normal. They're even more prone to malfunction than they were back then, because so many parts of the system are much older now. All it would take is something failing to work the way it's meant to or somebody making a mistake or miscommunication that hadn't been adequately anticipated and prepared for, and it could set into motion a chain of events from which there is no coming back. We've already come within a hair's breadth of nuclear annihilation on more than one occasion due to such occurrances, and yet people still act like preventing that from ever happening isn't the single most important priority for our entire species.

Comment: Ironically, Michael Moore, who signed the Common Ground document, is among those who are offended by the summit:

Don't miss the whole Putin and Trump press conference:

Post-summit Trump-Putin press conference (full text): First step toward renewing US-Russian friendship?

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Sheriff

Cop who killed bipolar mother having a manic episode charged with manslaughter

Matt Agorist
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 19:15 UTC
police shooting
Mother and wife, Evin Olsen Yadegar had her life stolen from her last year by Stanislaus County sheriff's Deputy Justin Wall who publicly executed her for no reason. The senseless killing was captured on dashcam and was so unnecessary that Wall has just been charged with manslaughter.

Evin Yadegar, according to her husband Hanibal, was undergoing a manic episode due to her bipolar disorder on February 26, 2017. He explained that she never would've hurt anyone and was merely trying to find a safe place after a confrontation with a hotel security guard.

According to Sheriff Adam Christianson, the security guard reported that Evin Yadegar had begun an argument and a subsequent physical altercation occured. When a deputy arrived, he saw Yadegar's vehicle pulling out of the parking lot.

According to the release from the San Jaquin County District Attorney's Office, the killing came after a low speed chase when Yadegar left the hotel during the argument with a security guard.
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Whistle

Months prior to his death, Anthony Bourdain blasted 'Rapey' Bill Clinton, exposed Hillary's complicity

Matt Agorist
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 00:00 UTC
ClintonsBourdain
© TheFreeThoughtProject.comHillary and Bill Clinton, Anthony Bourdain
An interview which took place just a few months before his tragic death, shows Anthony Bourdain was unafraid of calling out the establishment. The celebrity chef, TV personality, and staunch antiwar advocate sat down with Popula's Maria Bustillos for a hard hitting interview during which he blasted Bill Clinton as "Rapey," and noted how Hillary helped him get away with it.

During the interview, Bourdain was asked whether or not he thought Bill Clinton should have been removed from office after the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Bourdain said that despite Clinton being "A piece of sh*t," who was "Entitled, rapey, gropey, grabby, disgusting" should have still kept his job. This was despite "the way that he - and she [referring to Hillary Clinton] destroyed these women and the way that everyone went along" was "screaming in apparent hypocrisy and venality."

Bourdain went on to note how "When you're in the room, you think wow, she's [Clinton] really warm and nice and funny." However, Bourdain explained, "but the way they efficiently dismantled, destroyed, and shamelessly discredited these women for speaking their truth."

Bourdain noted that the sex Clinton had in office was "unforgivable," but was minor compared to every thing else and he noted that the sex scandal with Monica Lewinsky wasn't enough to get Clinton thrown out of office.
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Nuke

Police search for stolen nuclear material comes to a close


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 04:56 UTC
Radioactive
© youtube.comMissing and Active
US authorities have been accused of hushing up an incident in which officials lost plutonium and cesium samples after their car was looted. Police have long-since given up on efforts to locate the nukes, a new report says.

The security experts from the Idaho laboratory were in Texas to take dangerous radioactive materials from a non-profit research lab in the area. For that purpose, they'd brought tiny disks containing plutonium and cesium with them, for calibration.

However, when the two had retired to their hotel rooms for the night, the car they left in the parking lot was raided. When they returned in the morning, their rented Ford Expedition's windows were shattered and the nuclear materials gone.

An immediate police investigation, assisted by the FBI, failed to produce any clues as to the whereabouts of the stolen radioactive materials. Police have not come up with any clear fingerprints on or inside the car, nor they were able to retrieve any usable surveillance footage. On top of that, law enforcement also failed to find any witnesses to the crime.

Comment: No tracers attached to the radioactive samples?

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Star of David

Israel's Denial of Entry policy - the real targets are Palestinians

Ariel Gold
Mondoweiss
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 17:49 UTC
West Bank checkpoint
© Mersiha GadzoPalestinians on their way to Al Aqsa for Friday prayer at Qalandiya military checkpoint, July 28, 2017
Two weeks have passed now since I was standing in the Ben Gurion airport office of Israeli Border Control being told that I had been denied entry. Israeli Minister for Internal Security Gilad Erdan stated that I was barred due to my actions of the previous summer:
"Gold has distributed videos on social networks, in which she harasses IDF soldiers and Border Police officers in Hebron, accusing the soldiers of apartheid and oppression, and that their actions do not conform to Jewish values."
My denial of entry received an enormous amount of coverage in Israeli and American Jewish media. Though I am disappointed I was not able to get into the country, I am glad that what happened to me contributed in a strong and positive way to the conversations that are taking place right now in Israeli and diaspora Jewish communities around Palestinian rights and democracy. But, refusing to allow me into the country is only a small glimpse of Israel's border policies.

Since Israel's founding in 1948, predicated on the forced displacement of around 750,000 Palestinians, it has been an official policy of the state to deny re-entry to those who were expelled.
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