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Equality: Women will have to register for the draft

Richard Sisk
Military.com
Mon, 12 Oct 2015 00:00 UTC
women military
© archive.hlntv.comWomen to be drafted for service on basis of equality.
Women will eventually have to register for the draft if "true and pure equality" is to be realized in the U.S. military, Army Secretary John McHugh said Monday. "If your objective is true and pure equality then you have to look at all aspects" of the roles of women in the military, and registration for the draft" will be one of those things. That will have to be considered."

McHugh said draft registration was not a subject to be decided by the services or the Department of Defense, and will ultimately have to be dealt with by Congress. He expected a "pretty emotional debate and discussion."

However, as more military occupational specialties are opened to women, the debate on Selective Service System registration was inevitable, McHugh said. "If we find ourselves as a military writ large where men and women have equal opportunity, as I believe we should," he said.

The question on women and the draft was posed to McHugh and Gen. Mark Milley, the new Army chief of staff, at the annual three-day meeting and exposition of the Association of the U.S. Army at the Walter E. Washington convention center in Washington, D.C. Milley deferred the question to McHugh, saying he could not comment on policy.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter was to decide in January on whether combat roles, mostly in the infantry, armor, artillery and Special Operations, should be opened to women.
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Dollar

Powerball lottery: An effective voluntary tax

Michael Hiltzik
Los Angeles Times
Tue, 12 Jan 2016 15:43 UTC
Powerball lottery ticket photo
Powerball fever has gripped the country, as one might expect with a jackpot of $1.5 billion at stake in Wednesday's drawing.

Newspapers, online sites, and TV broadcasts are brimming with reports of massive sales and hopeful players -- The Times website, latimes.com, has run 18 posts about the lottery just since Jan. 10, when the last drawing failed to produce a winner and drove the jackpot to this record level. Powerball officials in the 44 states that participate in the game are quoted expressing astonishment at the size of the jackpot and the nationwide frenzy it has induced.

Comment: If you need a concrete example on why the powerball seems to be one big tax try using this simulator. Go ahead, try it.

The median household income in the US is somewhere around $53,000. If you use an entire year's worth of salary the usual outcome is that yes, maybe you will win some of the small prizes here and there but you will also be in the hole TEN times that amount. This sounds like stealing. And according to the data it is an epidemic that affects those of lower socioeconomic status more than others.

Results for using 50 grand are as follows:
You've played the lottery 28,186 times over about 270 years and spent $56,372, but won $5,072. You're in the hole $51,300. So why not throw some more money at that problem?


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Dominoes

'Survival Island 3' game pulled after uproar over killing Australian Aborigines


The Telegraph
Sat, 16 Jan 2016 20:50 UTC
survival island 3
An edited screen grab of the app Survival Island 3 on the petition's website.
A video game allowing players to kill Australian Aboriginals has been removed from mobile stores after more than 65,000 people signed an online petition against the "racist" app.

The app, Survival Island 3 - Australia Story, tells users that they have to find ways to stay alive in "one of the most dangerous places in the world", including having to "fight with aboriginals - you invaded their home!".

The change.org petition, which has been signed by more than 65,000 people since it was set up on Friday, called for the app to be pulled from mobile stores, adding that "killing indigenous Australians is not a game".

"Selling games that promote racism and negative stereotypes of indigenous Australians is not acceptable," the petition added.

Comment: This game is reminiscent of one that was released in 2008 called "Muslim Massacre", in which the player controls an "American Hero" whose goal is to "ensure that no Muslim man or woman is left alive".

The production and distribution of 'games' in which the player has to kill innocent civilians, and specifically civilians the established authorities want society to hate - the 'other', which has traditionally been Aborigines in Australia - is as much state propaganda as official lies from official sources.

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Attention

Detroit's toxic schools are dangerous health hazards to children and teachers, will the rest of US schools follow?

Dylan Hock
US Uncut
Sun, 17 Jan 2016 21:01 UTC
detroit schools
© US Uncut
Mushrooms, black mold, fecal matter, dead rodents, no heat. Detroit’s schools are just as toxic as Flint’s water.
Detroit's students are trying to learn while breathing in black mold and sitting in classrooms filled with buckets catching toilet water leaking through the ceiling. And that's not even the worst part.

Republican Governor Rick Snyder is not only using the financial emergency management laws to poison children in Flint; he's doing the same thing in Detroit via the public school system, which the state has controlled for the last seven years. Darnell Earley, the same emergency manager who oversaw the changes in Flint's water system, is currently in charge of Detroit's public schools.


The people of Flint wanted the world to see the pictures detailing their horrifying conditions. But now, teachers and parents want the world to see these images from Detroit Public Schools under the direction of Gov. Snyder's emergency management to get a better, broader idea of how Snyder ignores children for the sake of the bottom line:


Comment: What we see below is what happens when psychopathic politicians favor war and profit over infrastructure and caring for its citizenry. Detroit gives us an excellent example of what our 'leaders' intend for the rest of the country, and the world, if they have their way.


Comment: Across the US, we've seen increased spending on war, weapons and militarized police forces while children are poisoned from public water and public education. The United States will perish if the priorities don't change dramatically, and soon.

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Hardhat

Daily earthquakes and water shortages: Alberta pays a price for oil fracking

Duc Tué Dang
Phys.org
Sat, 16 Jan 2016 00:00 UTC
Alberta tar pits
Alberta Tar Pits the largest and stickiest industrial project in the world. Worried about fracking deep underground… this is the biggest fracking of the Earth ever and it’s on the surface not miles underground.
One earthquake is recorded on average each day in a western Canadian region where companies extract oil by fracking, according to statistics published by the Canadian province's energy regulatory agency.

The Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) said Friday that in the last year alone, there were 363 tremors in and around Fox Creek, a small town of 2,000 inhabitants located 260 kilometers (160 miles) northwest of Edmonton.

Some days, seismic activity is higher, such as on September 11, 2015, when a record 18 earthquakes were felt.

On Tuesday, a 4.8-magnitude quake on the Richter scale was recorded 30 kilometers west of Fox Creek, where Spanish firm Repsol SA is injecting liquids at high pressure into subterranean rocks to create fissures and extract oil and gas—the process known as fracking.

Repsol confirmed it had been conducting fracking operations "at the time of the event."

Comment: Even assuming that fracking does only 'occasionally' produce major earthquakes, shouldn't those risks be considered? As usual, the industry prefers to sidestep the real issues while attempting to quiet any debate. What about the ongoing minor seismic events, to say nothing of the many other environmental impacts and the negative health consequences residents face along with the contamination of water supplies, if they have any water at all.

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Cow Skull

Political correctness gone wild: You can now be fined 250,000 dollars if you offend a transgender woman in New York City

Michael Snyder
End of The American Dream
Mon, 28 Dec 2015 00:00 UTC
Warning Politically incorrect
Political correctness is officially out of control in New York City. According to brand new rules that were just issued by the New York City Commission on Human Rights, you could potentially be fined $250,000 if you purposely offend someone that is transgender. This includes such offenses as calling a transgender woman "him" when she wants to be called "her", or not allowing a transgender woman to use the women's bathroom. These guidelines are particularly focused on the behavior of landlords, employers and businesses, but they will undoubtedly create a chilling effect on speech all throughout New York City.

Needless to say, these new regulations will result in a flood of litigation as transgender individuals exercise their new "rights". According to the New York City Commission on Human Rights, employers must now use "an individual's preferred name, pronoun and title" when referring to that person. And some of the pronouns that were given as examples by the Commission were only recently introduced to the English language and many people don't even know how to pronounce them. The following comes directly from the new "guidelines"...

Comment: The devil is in the details of any news we see or read but it has now become clear that political correctness has been weaponized by the elite on even a geopolitical level. And is yet another insidious way to keep people divided and pitted against one another. Consider the following assessments of this phenomenon - and what PC statements may be used to facilitate socially and politically the next time you become aware of it.
"Political correctness does not legislate tolerance; it only organizes hatred." - Jacques Barzun
"I believe that political correctness can be a form of linguistic fascism, and it sends shivers down the spine of my generation who went to war against fascism." - P. D. James


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Megaphone

Canton, Ohio: Multiple businesses evacuated after 'bomb threats'


Cleveland 19 News
Sat, 16 Jan 2016 18:47 UTC
walmart
'Your dreams are safe with us'
Several Stark County businesses were evacuated Saturday night after a bomb threat.

Canton police confirmed they received multiple calls of bomb threats at the Circle K on Mahoning, Canton City Hall, and Walmart on W. Tuscarawas. They evacuated all of these locations.

Jackson Township police also confirmed Target received bomb threats around the same time as the Canton City bomb threats came in. As a precaution, they evacuated Target and surrounding stores including a Dick's Sporting Goods.

Police said the threat to the Walmart and other buildings came through a Skype recording at 6:42 p.m.

Nothing was found after K-9s checked the area.
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Question

Lithuanian artist designs 'euthanasia rollercoaster'

Isabel Hunter
Daily Mail
Sat, 16 Jan 2016 18:07 UTC
death coaster
Death drop: Riders of the 'Euthanasia Coaster' would die from experiencing 10 g-force for one minute.
Not content with designing rollercoasters for the living, a Lithuanian designer has created plans for a 'death rollercoaster' that would provide a 'euphoric' way for people to kill themselves.

Lithuanian artist Julijonas Urbonas says the killing machine will end people's lives with 'euphoria and pleasure'.

But a top brain expert has said the mechanism is more likely to leave people feeling sick.

The rollercoaster, which was designed while Urbonas was a PhD candidate at the Royal College of Art, uses 'extreme g-force' to kill people as they hurtle down 500 metres to reach a speed of 100 metres per second (g-force 10) on seven loop-de-loops.

'Your blood is rushed to your lower extremities so there is a lack of blood in your brain, so your brain starts to suffocate. When your brain starts to suffocate, people become euphoric

Comment: The designer needs his head examined.

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Black Cat

No woman should be asked these questions during a job interview

Emily Peck
Huffington Post
Tue, 12 Jan 2016 17:56 UTC
Interviewer
© iStock Photo
Attention hiring managers: Don't ask a woman about her marital status, plans on having kids or her child-care arrangements during a job interview.

These questions, which are almost never put to men, are not only irrelevant to assessing a potential candidate, they're also sexist and potentially illegal.

And yet... An astonishing 75 percent of senior women in tech said they've been asked questions like these during job interviews, according to an incredibly depressing new survey of about 200 senior-level women who work in tech in the San Francisco Bay Area. The report, entitled "The Elephant in the Valley," was first picked up by Re/code.
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Crusader

Protesters claim Oxford University is institutionally racist, request that Cecil Rhodes statue be removed


RT
Thu, 14 Jan 2016 15:40 UTC
Rhodes statue
© Eddie Keogh / ReutersThe statue of Cecil Rhodes is seen on the facade of Oriel College in Oxford, southern England.

Oxford University Chancellor Chris Patten has dismissed calls from student campaigners to remove a statue of colonial-era politician Cecil Rhodes from of the university's Oriel College as an attempt to rewrite history.

Patten, whose role at the university is largely ceremonial, said in a speech Wednesday: "Our history is not a blank page on which we can write our own version of what it should have been, according to our contemporary views and prejudices.
"Because we value tolerance ... we have to listen to those who presume they can rewrite history within the confines of their own notion of what is politically, culturally and morally correct."

Comment: Rewrite history - or acknowledge and respond to the very worst influences in history?


Comment: So, are these protestors just being swept up by the new trend in political correctness sweeping academia these days - or do they have a legitimate purpose in pointing out that nearly everything Rhodes stood for was elitist and generally counterproductive to the world at large? The Koch brothers, to take another example, have spent millions on philanthropic causes, but in the balance of social equality and justice, does it make up for all the money and energy they spend in supporting their destructive causes? Should we celebrate these types of people just because they've thrown a bone our way?

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