Society's ChildS


Mr. Potato

Polar vortex: 50 people burned in the US trying to turn boiling water into ice

Kashmira Gander
The Independent
Thu, 09 Jan 2014 14:23 UTC
stupid people
US news networks showed the trick where boiling water is supposed to transform into ice mid-air
At least 50 people in the US attempting a trick to turn boiling water into ice have been scalded.

As the country is gripped by freezing temperatures, word has spread that boiling water can turn to ice mid-air.

US news reporters demonstrated the trick on air to illustrate how the country was in the grip of the so-called polar vortex.

"All you have to do is bundle up, get some boiling water, and throw it out in the subzero temperatures and see what happens," said a journalist in the northern state of North Dakota, while a Minneapolis anchor tweeted: "Threw a pot of boiling water in the air. Kids thought it was awesome. Do it, people."
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Attention

Chemical spill shuts off water to 300K in West Virginia


CBS News
Fri, 10 Jan 2014 12:43 UTC
no water
© WOWKStore shelves as a West Virginia Kroger supermarket were wiped bare of water after a chemical plant spill prompted water advisories
Schools and restaurants closed, grocery stores sold out of bottled water, and state legislators who had just started their session canceled the day's business after a chemical spill in the Elk River in Charleston shut down much of the city and surrounding counties even as the cause and extent of the incident remained unclear.

The federal government joined the state early Friday in declaring a disaster, and the West Virginia National Guard planned to distribute bottled drinking water to emergency services agencies in the nine affected counties.

About 100,000 water customers, or 300,000 people total, were affected, state officials reported.
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Oscar

Dieudonné ban "a victory for French Republic", declares Manuel Valls: Poll shows 95% of France disagrees with Interior Minister, jeered by large crowd in Brittany


RTL.fr
Fri, 10 Jan 2014 07:16 UTC
Image
Manuel Valls
Translated by SOTT.net

Traveling in Brittany, the Interior Minister has welcomed the decision of the Council of State [Conseil d'État] to prohibit the performance of the comedian in Nantes. "We cannot tolerate hatred," he said.

So Dieudonné did not ultimately play in Nantes on Thursday evening, and the Minister of the Interior can only be happy with himself that his efforts to ban Dieudonné's shows have been successful. "We can not tolerate hatred of the other, racism, anti-Semitism, or Holocaust denial. This is not possible. That's not France," he said as he journeyed onwards from Rennes to Brest, a few minutes after the decision of the State Council.

The highest administrative court in the country has strengthened the government's intention to ban all of Dieudonné's shows. "This is a victory for the Republic," said Manuel Valls. "My fight against this nauseous character continues," added the minister, who also called for Dieudonné's fans who wanted to see the show in Nantes to return home. The minister also said: "The highest court in our country has spoken ​​clearly; it is a victory for the Republic."

The Council of State canceled Thursday night the earlier decision of the Administrative Court of Nantes, confirming for the first time ever the prohibition of a comedy show in France. The Interior Minister Manuel Valls had petitioned to the highest administrative court in France in the afternoon to challenge immediately the decision of the Administrative Court of Nantes.

Comment: And what did the people of France think of Valls' "victory for the Republic"?

Image
[Click to enlarge] This mainstream media poll asked online readers to vote yes or no to the question: 'Dieudonné show ban: Victory for the Republic?' 5,000 people voted; 95% said 'NON!'
Meanwhile Valls has been chased around Brest by an even larger crowd than he encountered getting off the train in Rennes earlier this week:



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Phoenix

Enormous warehouse explodes and burns to the ground in San Jose, California


KTVU
Fri, 10 Jan 2014 05:17 UTC
Image
An 80,000 square foot San Jose warehouse was rocked by explosions Thursday, sending a massive fireball into the early morning sky, authorities said.

Firefighters were able to gain the upper hand on the dramatic five-alarm blaze after about three hours, a fire captain said.

The fire was reported at a building in the area of East Julian and North 28th streets at 5:37 a.m.

San Jose fire Capt. Cleo Doss said the first crews arrived at 5:43 a.m. He described the warehouse as a roughly 125,000-square-foot building that houses multiple companies.
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USA

Best of the Web: Father sentenced to 6 months in jail for paying too much child support


Police State USA
Thu, 09 Jan 2014 23:03 UTC
Hall and Son
© FOX 26 HoustonClifford Hall will go to jail for 6 months for doing too much for his son.
A father will spend half of 2014 behind bars for doing too much for his son. After overpaying child support and seeing his son too often - breaking terms that were secretly modified without his knowledge - a judge sentenced him to a lengthy jail sentence.

Clifford Hall has been doing his best to give care to his 11-year-old son, who lives with his ex-wife. He pays his child support and visits regularly. "I'm his father it's my responsibility to take care of him," Hall said.

Last November, his child support payments were paid in full. Sometime between then and now, the child support agreement between Hall and his wife was modified without his knowledge.

Hall wound up overpaying by $3,000, a fact that Harris County District Court Judge Lisa Millard found contemptible.

Another term that was modified without his knowledge was his visitation schedule. Subsequently, Hall was found to have over-visited his son.

Judge Millard ended up finding Hall in contempt of court.

When she said I remand you to the Harris County Jail for 180 days my mouth just dropped," Hall told FOX 26 Houston.

Comment: This is a perfect example of what happens when psychopathic 'morality' infects a society and turns most of the population, and especially the 'authorities', into half-wits, exactly as Lobaczewski described in Political Ponerology.

UPDATE: According to another report, Hall didn't pay too much child support - he caught up on back-payments that he claims he didn't know he owed as soon as he found out about them. At the above link we read:
When Hall and his unidentified ex-wife were in Judge Lisa Millard's court last November, Hall didn't owe anything.

"Opposing counsel testified twice that he's all paid up," Elam told the news station. [...]
In the video above, they note that the judge said Hall walked out of court after being held in contempt - not that he was held in contempt because he walked out.

Thus, it still appears, as of now, to be rather unjust.

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USA

Homeless in the U.S.: From the Pentagon to life in a van

Julie Zauzmer
Press TV
Mon, 06 Jan 2014 10:44 UTC
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© Press TVAs of January 2012, more than 60,000 veterans were homeless.
After a 30-year military career in which he earned three graduate degrees, rose to the rank of colonel, and served as an aide to Pentagon brass, Robert Freniere can guess what people might say when they learn he's unemployed and lives out of his van:

Why doesn't this guy get a job as a janitor?

Freniere answers his own question: "Well, I've tried that."

Freniere, 59, says that his plea for help, to a janitor he once praised when the man was mopping the floors of his Washington office, went unfulfilled. So have dozens of job applications, he says, the ones he has filled out six hours a day, day after day, on public library computers.

So Freniere, a man who braved multiple combat zones and was hailed as "a leading light" by an admiral, is now fighting a new battle: homelessness.

"You stay calm. That's what we were trained for when I went through survival training," he said recently in King of Prussia, where he had parked his blue minivan, the one crammed with all his possessions and held together with duct tape.

As of January 2012, more than 60,000 veterans were homeless, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. Reducing that number has been a priority for the Obama administration - and the number of homeless veterans dropped 24 percent nationwide from 2009 to 2013. In Pennsylvania, however, it jumped 46 percent, to more than 1,400.
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Arrow Down

Animal rights fliers shock Italian researchers

Marta Paterlini
Science Insider
Thu, 09 Jan 2014 15:15 UTC
Animal Rights Flier
© A Favore della Sperimentazione AnimaleTarget. A flier distributed in Milan showed Alberto Corsini's home address and phone number (blurred out in this picture).
The battle over animal experimentation in Italy took a nasty turn this week when anonymous activists posted fliers showing photos, home addresses, and telephone numbers of scientists involved in animal research at the University of Milan and labeled them as "murderers." The leaflets, which appeared in the night of 6 to 7 January, triggered widespread condemnation in academic and political circles.

The posters targeted physiologist Edgardo D'Angelo, parasitologist Claudio Genchi, pharmacologist Alberto Corsini, and Maura Francolini, a biologist. The texts say they are "guilty" of performing animal experiments; Corsini is said to "have tortured and killed animals for more than 30 years." His flier ends with his phone number and the suggestion to "call this executioner and tell him what you think of him."

Although the fliers didn't contain a specific call to violence, the implicit threat is unmistakable, Italian scientists say. Pro-Test Italia, an organization that seeks to defend and explain animal research, has likened the campaign to a witch hunt. "It's unacceptable that those who work for the good of science and public health are called murderers by someone who publicly incites violence against them," says Dario Padovan, a biologist and coordinator of Pro-Test Italia's scientific committee.
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People

Dutch pension giant divests millions from Israeli banks involved in settlement construction


RT.com
Wed, 08 Jan 2014 13:37 UTC
The largest Dutch pension fund company, PGGM, has reportedly chosen to withdraw all its investments from the five largest Israeli banks, whose branches are involved in financing construction in the settlements in the West Bank.

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© AFP Photo/Jaafar AshtiyehJewish settlements near the West Bank village of Burin
Over the past few months the Dutch pension giant has informed some of Israel's top banks, such as Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, Bank Mizrahi-Tefahot, the First International Bank of Israel and Israel Discount Bank, that their ties with the settlements, and/or companies involved in construction there, were an obstacle from the standpoint of international law, a source told Haaretz.

PGGM's stance is based on an International Court of Justice ruling, which in 2004 concluded that the barrier being built around the West Bank was illegal and should be pulled down, with the "security wall" violating the rights of Palestinians.
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USA

US CPS seizes toddler for saying naughty words on YouTube


Police State USA
Thu, 09 Jan 2014 13:01 UTC
Toddler
© CNNA Nebraska toddler in CPS custody for swearing.
Omaha, Nebraska - A 2-year-old toddler has been seized by Child Protective Services when a clip surfaced of him using "inappropriate" language in a video posted on the internet. The standard for breaking apart families has become so broad that it now covers politically incorrect speech.

The events began when the Omaha Police Department discovered a YouTube video of a diaper-wearing child using profanity at the encouragement of two adults. OPD posted the video to its website, saying it was an example of the "cycle of violence and thuggery" in the community.

The police union said the clip came from "a local thug's public Facebook page."

After drawing criticism, the department defended its post. "This behavior is going to potentially lead this child down a path that is completely unhealthy," said Sgt. John Wells, president of the Omaha Police Officers' Association.

"Now while we didn't see anything in this video that is blatantly 'illegal,' we sure did see a lot that is flat out immoral and completely unhealthy for this little child from a healthy upbringing standpoint," the union wrote on its website.
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Arrow Down

Sales of Hitler's Mein Kampf are surging...

Michael Krieger
Liberty Blitzkrieg
Thu, 09 Jan 2014 12:51 UTC
How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don't think.
- Adolf Hitler
Mein Kampf
© The L Magazine

The headline of this post is one that I am not sure how to interpret, but undoubtably marks something of significance. Personally, there have been many occasions throughout my youth, as well as my adult life, where I had a desire to read Mein Kampf. I was always curious to get into the mind of one of humanity's greatest sociopaths.

To get a glimpse of the thought process of a man capable of such cruelty and evil. To understand the types of words he used and the various psychological tactics he employed to manipulate an economically destitute and politically demoralized German population.

These feelings welled up inside of me once again back in 2008, when I feared that a financial and economic meltdown could cause the U.S. population to be thrust into the arms of a demagogue. I wanted to be able to more accurately identify the rhetoric of one of history's more "successful" demagogue dictators in order to be able to spot similar trends should they arise in my time.

While I never got around to reading it, I did read part of one of Hitler's speeches from before the war. It was interesting to not how he did not openly speak as a raging psychopath on his way to destroying much of Europe. Rather, he attempted to appeal to his audience as rational, passionate leader there to protect and exalt the German people back to greatness. That was the scariest thing of all.
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