Society's ChildS


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Brazilian police strike; murders, looting and arson skyrocket

police strike brazil
© Paulo Whitaker / ReutersA police strike over wages, in Vitoria, Espirito Santo, Brazil, February 7, 2016.
The southeastern Brazilian state of Espirito Santo has been plagued by violence since police went on strike there. Reports of dozens of murders, looting and arson forced authorities to shut down malls and dispatch troops to the state.

Since Friday, family members of the police officers have been staging protests in front of eleven police battalions in more than 30 cities, "barricading" the exits and preventing officers from performing their duties. Family members, among them many women and children, are demanding an increase in pay and better working conditions for the officers, who are prohibited by the constitution from embarking on a strike themselves.


People 2

Daycare worker outraged after discovering co-worker breastfeeding her son without permission

Kaycee Oxendine
© 11ABCKaycee Oxendine
A mother is hoping police press charges against a daycare worker she says was caught on surveillance video breastfeeding her child without her permission.

Kaycee Oxendine recorded video from the security footage inside Carrboro Early School on Friday that shows a woman adjusting her top and bringing Oxendine's 3-month-old son to her chest to breastfeed him.

Oxendine works at the daycare as a pre-kindergarten teacher. On Friday, she said her son's teacher told her he was constipated. When another woman working in the nursery that day asked Oxendine if she could breastfeed the boy to see whether it would help, Oxendine told her no, twice.

"She said that she had a son and did I want her to put my child to her breast and breastfeed?" Oxendine recalled. "And I said no, that's nasty. We don't do things like that."

Oxendine said moments after she left the room, video shows the daycare worker picking up her baby and breastfeeding him for several seconds. The woman stopped when another worker who was in the room at the time, stood up to leave.


Bulb

Baltimore law enforcement to offer low-level drug users, prostitutes support services rather than jail time

Baltimore police car
© Andrwe Caballero-Reynolds/AFP
Minor drug offenders and sex workers in Baltimore may soon have a choice between enrolling in a treatment program or spending time behind bars, as part of a joint pilot scheme between the city's police department and a mental health organization.

The Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program was announced by Baltimore Police and Behavioral Health System Baltimore (BHSB) at a news conference on Monday.

The program will allow police officers to refer low-level drug or prostitution offenders to case managers, instead of sending them to jail. Those case managers will help them get access to drug treatment centers, mental health services, and housing assistance.

More than 120 officers have been trained for the program, The Baltimore Sun cited Police Commissioner Kevin Davis as saying. Officials expect the program to service about 60 people at a time.

"LEAD provides our officers with an alternative to arresting the same person over and over when we know that person needs help," Davis said during a briefing. Davis went on to address Baltimore's "entrenched opioid addiction epidemic" which has surged in recent years. The BHSB said in a press release that 24,887 suffer from such addictions in the city and that hundreds die from heroin overdoses there each year.

Light Saber

How to Overcome the Elite's Divide and Rule Control over a Divided Nation and World

lightsabres
The violence shamefully on full display several nights ago at the UC Berkeley campus is an alarming reminder of just how far Americans have now gone astray in allowing the ruling elite to divide us. The repeated scenes of rioters viciously acting out their rampage determined to shut down free speech in America and deliver violent civil unrest to foment a national crisis in this divided nation is bent on undermining the Trump presidency. Unfortunately this political violence is becoming increasingly common. Is America on the brink of a second civil war? This presentation explores this potentiality focusing on the underlying dynamic behind Americans who are seemingly at war with themselves.

Last Wednesday evening an estimated 150 angry rock and brick throwing agitators out of a crowd of 1500 protestors began breaking windows, starting a fire and targeting arrivals by shoving, beating and pepper spraying attendees at a speaking engagement of conservative openly gay Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos at the UC Berkeley campus. The ensuing rioting escalated to force the event to be canceled even prior to its start.

Today's so-called "social justice warriors" currently wreaking havoc in cities and college campuses across our nation are but one example of how the US population has been unwittingly splintered, conscripted, and co-sponsored by the likes of dozens of George Soros "open society" foundations to brutishly take over and dogmatically rule over America's colleges and universities. Brainwashed by elitist social engineering think tanks into an army of fanatical militarized Political Correctness robots, they've been morphed into today's brown shirts equivalent to the young Nazis or Mao's cultural youth revolution, sent out in the name of free speech to commit violent fascist terrorism deployed en masse as programmed foot soldiers bent on actually purging dissent and freedom of speech in America as the so called left's mind control police.

Comment: And from the Sott.net Forum, we read this bit of insight:
So, I was in bed last night, unable to sleep, and I started thinking...

The definition of everything is changing. There is a risk that each of us will be unwittingly pulled in a certain direction along with these changes.

Remember back when Putin and Russia went into Syria? It was like a "new reality", and suddenly we start looking at basic things like Russia's military capability, and poof! There's all this evidence that it's actually pretty good.

So, was it always there and we just didn't notice, or was it really a reality-splitting kind of thing? I guess in the end it doesn't really matter, as long as we pay attention to what is true right now, and not get stuck in the past...

Then Trump becomes president. The night (here) of the election, I went to bed totally depressed because Hillary was in for sure, and I had a pretty good idea of what that meant. I wake up the next morning, and poof! Trump is president.

Well, that was a bit of a shock. What does it mean? What will he do? Who knows?!

And now, today, I'm reading on FB especially about the conflict between "left and right". Suddenly, the "lefty liberals" are the spawn of satan, and they think that Trump and his "right-wing" crowd are the spawn of satan.

Previously, many of us probably would have classified ourselves as more "left-leaning", but naturally such categorizations are generally too blindly strict to adhere to religiously. For myself, I may have had more historically left-leaning views, but I never categorized myself with any crowd because that would be absurd... Mainly because that group of "Left" people have been ignoring 90% of reality for eons, just like the Right, the Center, and everybody else.

That's called: Life on Planet Earth - Isn't it Fun to be a Human? with your host, David Attenborough

So anyway, what I'm seeing in some cases is that some of us are condemning the "liberal left" with rather emotionally-charged language as if they are Untermensch.

Now, sure, it's pretty shocking. You've got a group of people who loved Obama, had NO idea what he was really doing, said nothing during "foreign interventions", said nothing when he bans immigration, cheered when he won a Nobel Peace Prize, etc. But when Trump does it, they call him Hitler. That's short-sighted at best.

However, IMO it's also totally short-sighted for us "formerly liberally lefty-leaning" types to go too far in the opposite direction, because THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT. That's how divide and conquer works.

There's nothing wrong with pointing out the absurdity of people, actions, and so on. That's what we're supposed to do. But when that "pointing out" starts to take on the flavor of NIGYYSOB (now I've got you, you son of a b*tch), then perhaps it's time to rein in the horsies and re-evaluate. If we don't do this, then we're contributing to the divide-and-conquer.

I will be the first to admit that I get pretty worked up about injustice, ignorance, contradictions, hypocrisy, etc. I'm not always successful at limiting its expression to my "safe circles" here, getting it out, and then posting something more balanced and fact-based publicly. But I try, and lately I'm trying harder because anything less is not good enough as a representative of this group.

And if I run off the rails emotionally and get caught up in the mayhem, I'm even going against my own being. And we know all too well what that generally leads too...

Right? Left? Center? Muslim? Christian? Man? Woman? HeWoman? SheMan? Gay? Straight? Diagonal?

Seriously, who cares? It all become meaningless in the current constantly changing reality, especially when it's only all about ME and MY IDENTITY and MY personal views. It's all being used to separate us from each other and to launch total chaos.

I mean, Muslim: There are mercenaries who pretend to be radical Muslims, and there are people like this Sheik on SOTT Radio yesterday who (regardless of your or my opinion of Islam) may very well be just good people trying to live their lives. There are Muslims who voted for Trump, and Muslims who didn't. And so on... The term is essentially meaningless in the big picture, because it means different things for different people, and at different times. The same is true of "Left" and "Right" and everything else. Especially now.

If you want someone to actually listen to what you say, you can't use derogatory terms to classify what comes out of their mouths. They will instantly shut down, classify you, you have just technically classified them, and nothing will get better because you just killed any possibility of that happening. Sure, you might feel better, but it accomplished nothing... In which case, it's still all about you, as with everyone else.

I think the best way to deal with this stuff is to post things WITHOUT directly addressing any person or group. Give data that contradicts something, and ask simple questions in an emotionally-neutral way so that MAYBE people will think. If not now, then the seed is planted for the future. Maybe...

That is the ONLY way I have ever found that actually works in the longer term.

Anyway, I suspect that more change is coming, which is the reason I'm saying all of this. There will be more "POOF!" events, and we all really need to keep our wits about us. We need to ride the ocean wave of change, not rant against it and beat it with a stick. If not, we risk falling off our surfboards and getting washed away. And then eaten by sharks.



Control Panel

Leftist 'rationality': Anti-Trump demonstrations far from irrational - for those who organize them

Trump protesters
Every day I hear exasperated Trump-backers exclaim that the Left has gone crazy. And their complaint seems justified, at least up to a point. The demonstrations against Trump, which now involve such gestures as setting fires, destroying property and beating up suspected Trump backers, look utterly "irrational." It's as if the election and subsequent inauguration of Donald Trump released forces of madness that can no longer be contained. Wild accusations are being made against those who voted for Trump, that they yearn to exterminate blacks and gays and put Jews into concentration camps, etc. One of my close acquaintances has turned her home into "a safe space for Jewish children," so there will be no more Anne Frank-deaths during the terrible persecutions that our "illegitimately appointed, fake head of state" will soon supposedly unleash.

I myself have been called by leftist ex-friends a "Holocaust-denier" because I think Trump's decision to stop the influx of visitors and immigrants from terrorist-laden countries is entirely justified. How this shows that I deny Hitler's murderous activities is never explained to me, but I'm sure the Trump-haters in Hollywood, CNN and at Berkeley would understand the connection. Note that I'm not saying that everyone out there making noise or burning property is a model of scientific rationality. Nor am I claiming that the entertainment community makes sense when they scream against the Donald, or that students who recently set fires on the Berkeley campus to protest a speech by Milo Yiannopoulos were engaging in Aristotelian reasoning.

What I am asserting is that viewed from the top, this agitation and violence reveal careful thought. In fact, from the vantage point of George Soros and such protest organizers as the Democratic National Committee and the leaders of the grievance culture, noisy demonstrations are a reasonable means toward a predetermined end. Max Weber, Vilfredo Pareto, and other sociologists who understood functional rationality as working systematically toward a desired end would have pointed to these protests as illustrating perfectly rational action, at least on the part of those who organize them.

USA

Bash the Fash: University socialist group starts a leftist fight club

knights for socialism
The "Knights for Socialism" group at the University of Central Florida (UCF) held a workshop Sunday to teach left-wing students how to "BASH THE FASH" with a "Leftist Fight Club" open to everyone but Republicans.

"In response to the record number of hate crimes against Latinxs, Immigrants, Muslims, Women, the LGBTQIA+ community, Jews, African Americans and other minorities since the rise of Donald Trump and other Alt-Right Neo-Nazis, Knights for Socialism has decided to host a series of self-defense clinics for anyone that wants to learn how to BASH THE FASH," asserts the Facebook event page for "Leftist Fight Club: The Rumbles at Lake Claire."

The description explains that a local amateur boxer was on hand to teach basic hand-to-hand combat techniques at the self-defense clinic, in order to help the socialist students better protect themselves from potential hate crimes performed by those sympathetic to "Donald Trump and other Alt-Right Neo-Nazis."

X

Gasp! Ukrainians have the least affordable gasoline in Europe

Gas station
© Alexandr Maksimenko / SputnikUKRNAFTA gas station in Kiev. And the customers?
Low wages and rapidly rising prices have made petrol more expensive in Ukraine than anywhere else in Europe. According to RIA Rating research, while gasoline in Ukraine remains one of the cheapest in Europe after Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Russia at $0.88 per liter for high-octane petroleum, low wages make it the least affordable.

An average Ukrainian earns slightly more than $200 a month, according to the finance ministry's website. The research concluded an average Ukrainian could buy only 185.1 liters, or refill a tank three times each month. That's only half of what Bulgarians can afford; the country ranked second worst-performer in the rating.

Ukraine had the biggest surge in petroleum prices last year at 21.5 percent, which outpaced the country's inflation of 12.4 percent.

While gasoline prices are the highest in the Netherlands, its citizens can still buy 1,837 liters of premium gas a month. Countries with the cheapest petrol, income adjusted, are Luxembourg, Norway, and the UK.

Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Russia have the cheapest gasoline in Europe, but lower salaries compared to Western countries make it less affordable. While a Russian can buy 814 liters of petroleum a month, this is a better result than the EU's Portugal, Poland or the Baltic States, but smaller compared to the bloc's northern and western countries.

The research concludes Eastern and Southern Europe has the least affordable gasoline on the Continent.

Comment: Gasperation! Another sign that the Ukraine alignment isn't working out that well for the Ukrainian people.


Fire

Antifa, the 'anti-fascist' group behind violent Berkeley protest of entertainer Milo Yiannopoulos

Berkeley protest
© National ReviewUnderstated in size by the media, Antifa claims it is fighting fascism...by beating people and committing arson.
Violent protests that led to the cancellation of a speech by right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos at the University of California, Berkeley Wednesday night has cast a spotlight on a group of anti-fascist activists known as "Antifa."


Comment: Characterizing Yiannopoulos as a "provocateur" is harsh. As he describes himself, he is an entertainer, first and foremost. He certainly provokes people to think, but there's no reason to suggest he's being nefarious by doing so.


Following the unrest, Yiannopoulos ascribed the violence to the general "Left" and President Donald Trump even called for taking away funds from the prestigious university. However, according to reports, the protests were peaceful until a group of several dozen black-face-mask-clad activists showed up. Soon, videos showed them shooting fireworks at the building and smashing windows.

Such a physically confrontational approach characterizes "Antifa" and separates it from the organic protests that have sprung up in the wake of Trump's inauguration as president. "We won't put up with the violent rhetoric of Milo, Trump or the fascistic alt-right," one Berkeley student who said he identified with the "Antifa" movement told The Guardian. "We are willing to resist by any means necessary."


Comment: If you pay enough, you can recruit almost anyone for anything. If you give them a purpose and ideology, they will take up the cause for free.

Additional information on Antifa:
The Alliance for Global Justice is funded by a Soros-backed charity called the Tides Foundation, who gave $50,000 to help fund a radical-left group called "Antifa," who used extreme violence to shut down the event at UC Berkeley featuring Milo Yiannopoulos."

"Refuse Fascism" bragged on its website about how they used "righteous" violence against "fascist" Yiannopoulos and how they set a shining example for others to follow. The full name of the group is "In the Name of Humanity, We Refuse to Accept a Fascist America"

The Alliance for Global Justice, based in Tucson, is listed as an organizer and fiscal sponsor for Refuse Fascism, a communist group that encouraged left-wingers to shut down the Yiannopoulos event.

The call to arms succeeded. Yiannopoulos' talk was cancelled after demonstrators lit fires, vandalized businesses, and assaulted Donald Trump and Yiannopoulos supporters.

Refuse Fascism, which includes Princeton professor Cornel West as one of its founding "initiators," defended the response, issuing a statement on its website that called the shut down "righteous."

And on its Facebook page, the group asserted that the vandalism and arson were not "violence." Instead, the group argued that Yiannopoulos and Trump perpetrate violence through the policies they support.

"Dismantling police fences is not violent. And to compare preventing someone like that from speaking to the real-world violence that they perpetuate everyday is ludicrous," reads one post on the group's Facebook page.



USA

Rosie O'Donnell joins call to nullify the election

voting box
Saw this after Rosie O'Donnell, who called for both martial law to stop the inauguration and for Donald Trump to be involuntarily held for a psych eval, Tweeted it out to her nearly one million fans (and even pinned the Tweet to the top of her account).


It's a Go Fund Me page set up to attempt to raise $35,000 to nullify the 2016 election results on the basis of Russian hacking.

It's authors claim that Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg has put their writ of mandamus on the docket for response this month:

Dollar

Debtpocalypse: Consumer bankruptcies are on the rise

vice
When debt grows much faster than GDP for an extended period of time, it is inevitable that a good portion of that debt will start to go bad at some point. We witnessed a perfect example of this in 2008, and now it is starting to happen again. Commercial bankruptcies have been rising on a year-over-year basis since late 2015, and this is something that I have written about previously, but now consumer bankruptcies are also increasing. In fact, we have just witnessed U.S. consumer bankruptcies do something that they haven't done in nearly 7 years. The following comes from Wolf Richter...
US bankruptcy filings by consumers rose 5.4% in January, compared to January last year, to 52,421 according to the American Bankruptcy Institute. In December, they'd already risen 4.5% from a year earlier. This was the first time that consumer bankruptcies increased back-to-back since 2010.

However, business bankruptcies began to surge in November 2015 and continued surging on a year-over-year basis in 2016, to reach a full-year total of 37,823 filings, up 26% from the prior year and the highest since 2014.
Of course consumer bankruptcies are still much lower than they were during the last financial crisis, but what this could mean is that we have reached a turning point.

For years, the Federal Reserve has been encouraging reckless borrowing and spending by pushing interest rates to ultra-low levels. Unfortunately, this created an absolutely enormous debt bubble, and now that debt bubble is beginning to burst. Here is more from Wolf Richter...