SOTT
SIGNS
OF THE
TIMES
OF THE
TIMES
Welcome to Sott.net
The World for People who Think
Society's ChildS
Chilean Police deployed tear gas and water cannons against student protestors as they stormed schools in Santiago where the activists had held a weeklong sit-in. Officers arrested 139, claiming the use of force was "necessary to maintain order."
Police action occurred at the Dario Salas, Miguel de Cervantes and Confederacion Suiza schools at the behest of Santiago Mayor Pablo Zalaquett. Water cannons and tear gas were used to disperse students who resisted arrest and brawled with police.
Police officers forcibly entered Miguel de Cervantes with a water cannon and climbed over fences to capture the students.
After failing to negotiate an agreement with students, Zalaquett threatened to withdraw their scholarships, provoking the ire of other mayors who branded it an "abuse of power."
In the wake of the evictions, Zalaquett said he would have preferred for there to have been no arrests, but added that the "students were given a chance to leave peacefully, but they didn't take it." The Chilean government rejects the sit-ins as a form of protest, he said, calling on the students' parents to intervene.
© Reuters/Sergei KarpukhinPolice detain a Pussy Riot supporter outside the Khamovnichesky Court
Hundreds of people, many clad in Pussy Riot T-shirts, had packed onto a narrow street outside of the Khamovnichesky Court as the verdict was being handed down. Supporters cried "shame" and "Putin scum" upon hearing the verdict, while opponents held religious icons and sang prayers.
Police said those taken into custody had committed various acts in violation of public order. A source within the police station where the detainees were taken said some would get off with a warning, while others would be charged with unspecified administrative offenses.
Opposition leaders Gary Kasparov and Sergey Udaltsov were also taken into custody outside the court.
Kasparov told the TASS news agency by phone that he had been slightly roughed up, but would not need medical assistance as he was "able to bear it." Police, however, accused Kasparov of biting an officer while he remanded the former world chess champion into custody. The officer was reportedly forced to go to hospital for treatment and police say they are looking into the incident. Kasparov called the accusation "nonsense."
© Agence France-Presse/Getty ImagesNadezhda Tolokonnikova (L), Maria Alyokhina (C) and Yekaterina Samutsevich (R), were given 2 year sentences for a performance.
Three members of the all-female group were outrageously charged with "hooliganism on grounds of religious hatred" after they gave a politically charged and impromptu performance - a peaceful performance - poking fun at President Putin at a cathedral in February.
Say what you will about Pussy Riot: this may not be your kind of music. Some people find their shows offensive.
But it doesn't change the facts: freedom of speech is a human right, and it's vital to a free and just society.
© AP Photo/Miguel Couto HospitalThis tomography scan released Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012 by the Miguel Couto hospital, show the skull of 24-year-old construction worker Eduardo Leite pierced by a metal bar in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Doctors say Leite survived after a 6-foot metal bar fell from above him and pierced his head. Luiz Essinger of Rio de Janeiro's Miguel Couto Hospital Friday told the Globo TV network that doctor's successfully withdrew the iron bar during a five-hour-long surgery.
Luiz Alexandre Essinger, chief of staff of Rio de Janeiro's Miguel Couto Hospital said doctors successfully withdrew the iron bar from Eduardo Leite's skull during a five-hour surgery.
"He was taken to the operating room, his skull was opened, they examined the brain and the surgeon decided to pull the metal bar out from the front in the same direction it entered the brain." Essinger said.
He said Leite was conscious when he arrived at the hospital and told him what had happened.
He said Leite was lucid and showed no negative consequences after the operation.
Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine has attempted to clarify his comments after he accused US President Barack Obama of "staging" the recent shootings in Aurora, Colorado and at the Wisconsin Sikh temple, but has refused to apologise.
The singer was performing with his band last Tuesday (August 7) in Singapore when he delivered the bizarre rant against the president, who he said was trying to secure new laws to control gun ownership by staging the shootings.
Speaking in a fan-shot video, which you can see at the top of the page, Mustaine also said that he believed the United States was "turning into Nazi America."
He said: "Back in my country, my president is trying to pass a gun ban, so he's staging all of these murders. Like the 'Fast And Furious' thing down at the border and Aurora, Colorado, all the people that were killed there and now the beautiful people at the Sikh temple."
Despite the stunned silence from the crowd, he continued, saying:
I don't know where I'm gonna live if America keeps going the way it's going because it looks like it's turning into Nazi America.
© worldnow.com
It's a trend that started in Ithaca, New York, in 1991. Now, over 80 communities in the U.S. have attempted printing a local currency.
But don't get rid of all your dollars just yet.
In Massachusetts, about 400 local businesses bag up goods paid for with the Berkshare.
You can buy bananas with Bay Bucks in Traverse City, Michigan, or if you're shopping in the Piedmont area of North Carolina, you can pay for everything from peanut butter to your local wireless provider with the Plenty.
"We know that money is not leaving this community; it's not going to some corporate headquarters. It's staying right here and being distributed all around this town, and it's spreading the wealth locally," says Tami Schwerin, the executive director of The Abundance Foundation.
Eyewitness: J'lem brawl was lynch against Arabs
Volunteer for youths at risk says incident in which 18-year-old Arab man was seriously injured instigated by Jewish teens
Acting Jerusalem Police Commissioner Menny Yitzhaki instructed on Friday to set up a special investigation team to probe the violent clash between Arabs and Jews in Jerusalem's Zion Square. The incident, which occurred Thursday night, left an 18-year-old Arab man seriously wounded.
The police say they plan to indict the suspects, and are looking into whether the incident had nationalistic motives.
An activist at an aid organization for youths at risk, who witnessed the event, posted a message on Facebook, claiming that the incident was more like "a lynch."
"Today I saw a lynch with my very own eyes, at Zion Square in the center of Jerusalem," she wrote.
"We arrived for our usual volunteering shift at Zion Square and not more than half-an-hour later, (we heard) screams: 'A Jew is a (good) soul; an Arab is a son-of-a...'. (We saw) dozens of teens running and gathering around, starting to deliver deadly blows to three Arab teens who were peacefully walking by," the activist wrote.
"When one of the Arab teens fell onto the floor, they continued to kick his head, and he lost consciousness... the assailants ran away and the rest gathered in a circle (around him) and some continued to shout with hatred in their eyes."
The activist further claimed in her post that when two of the volunteers tried to resuscitate the injured Arabs, "the crowds were complaining that they were Arabs and that they deserve it because maybe now they will be afraid."
Volunteer for youths at risk says incident in which 18-year-old Arab man was seriously injured instigated by Jewish teens
Acting Jerusalem Police Commissioner Menny Yitzhaki instructed on Friday to set up a special investigation team to probe the violent clash between Arabs and Jews in Jerusalem's Zion Square. The incident, which occurred Thursday night, left an 18-year-old Arab man seriously wounded.
The police say they plan to indict the suspects, and are looking into whether the incident had nationalistic motives.
An activist at an aid organization for youths at risk, who witnessed the event, posted a message on Facebook, claiming that the incident was more like "a lynch."
"Today I saw a lynch with my very own eyes, at Zion Square in the center of Jerusalem," she wrote.
"We arrived for our usual volunteering shift at Zion Square and not more than half-an-hour later, (we heard) screams: 'A Jew is a (good) soul; an Arab is a son-of-a...'. (We saw) dozens of teens running and gathering around, starting to deliver deadly blows to three Arab teens who were peacefully walking by," the activist wrote.
"When one of the Arab teens fell onto the floor, they continued to kick his head, and he lost consciousness... the assailants ran away and the rest gathered in a circle (around him) and some continued to shout with hatred in their eyes."
The activist further claimed in her post that when two of the volunteers tried to resuscitate the injured Arabs, "the crowds were complaining that they were Arabs and that they deserve it because maybe now they will be afraid."
The Woodburn priest accused of sexually abusing a 12-year-old boy now has a prominent lawyer in his corner.
Angel Perez has hired attorney Marc Blackman and the Archdiocese of Portland has made him an open-ended loan to pay for the legal fees according to The Oregonian.
© Agence France-Presse/ Scott OlsonChicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel (R)
The officers allege that Emmanuel replaced them with officers who volunteered for his 2010-2011 mayoral campaign - a violation of the city's Shakman decree, which forbids politically motivated appointments in city hiring decisions.
The officers, who are white and hispanic, also allege that Emmanuel discriminated against them, favoring African-American officers with less seniority. Six of the plaintiffs had previously filed a complaint with Chicago's inspector general's office last year, citing the alleged Shakman violations. The investigation is still ongoing, according to The Chicago Tribune
While grain prices fell in New York on Tuesday because of rain across most of the Mid-West, prices will persist around current high levels, economists from Standard Chartered said in a report published this week. This is especially the case should high temperatures persist across much of the U.S. well into August, they said.
Comment: It is shocking and instructive to read the language used by this article from Ynetnews. First, it calls the event a "brawl" in its original headline, and a "violent clash" in the first paragraph, as if two equal parties were both to blame for the violence. If the article uses the appropriate word at all - "lynch" - it is only because it is quoting an eye-witness who, we suppose, has a little credibility in the eyes of the journalist only because she is Jewish. Then we read that the event was "instigated" by Jewish teens. Not "perpetrated" but "instigated", as if the three Arab boys had somehow willingly involved themselves into violence after a provocation. But the witness accounts very clearly describe that they were brutally attacked for no other reason than passing by. Next we read that the incident was "more like a lynch". "Like" being the key word here; you see, the phrase suggests it probably wasn't a lynch, witnesses just claim it looked like one!
By the way, the quoted testimony is incomplete. It left out the part that mentions that the witness suspects the Arab teenager died after being taken to the hospital in critical condition. Here is the full version as it appeared on Facebook: