Society's ChildS


Handcuffs

Best of the Web: Shocking Abuse of Power and Human Rights: Family Invaded after daughter draws picture of gun at school

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© The Record/Peter LeeArrested: Jessie Sansone was arrested at his daughter's school after the 4-year-old drew a picture of a gun.

A Kitchener, Ontario father is upset that police arrested him at his children's' school Wednesday, hauled him down to the station and strip-searched him, all because his four-year-old daughter drew a picture of a gun at school.

"I'm picking up my kids and then, next thing you know, I'm locked up," Jessie Sansone, 26, said Thursday.

"I was in shock. This is completely insane. My daughter drew a gun on a piece of paper at school."

The school principal, police and child welfare officials, however, all stand by their actions. They said they had to investigate to determine whether there was a gun in Sansone's house that children had access to

"From a public safety point of view, any child drawing a picture of guns and saying there's guns in a home would warrant some further conversation with the parents and child," said Alison Scott, executive director of Family and Children's Services.

Crusader

Philadelphia Priest Says Catholic Cardinal Ordered Child Abuse

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© iStock
The highest ranking cleric charged in a Philadelphia pedophilia scandal asked a judge on Friday to dismiss his case because his boss - the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua - ordered a list he made of predator priests be shredded.

Lawyers for Monsignor William Lynn, 61, filed the motion to dismiss conspiracy and child endangerment charges as jury selection in the case was underway in Common Pleas Court.

Lynn, who served the Philadelphia Catholic Archdiocese as secretary of the clergy during Bevilacqua's time as archbishop from 1987 to 1998, would be the first church official to stand trial in a child sex abuse case if opening arguments begin as scheduled on March 26.

As clergy secretary, Lynn on his own initiative reviewed secret church archives and created a list of 35 priests who had been involved in abusive conduct or were classified with a sexual disorder, Lynn's lawyers said in court documents.

He handed the list over to Bevilacqua in 1994. Bevilacqua soon afterwards, in a handwritten note, ordered the document destroyed, apparently by Lynn's then supervisor Monsignor James Molloy, the lawyers said. Molloy died in 2006.

Nuke

Depleted Uranium In America's Wars

A prominent investigative journalist says the United States is using illegal weaponry - particularly depleted uranium - during its wars in the Middle East.

Interview with Gareth Porter, investigative journalist.


Dominoes

Wyoming House advances doomsday bill

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© Wikipedia
Cheyenne, Wyoming: State representatives on Friday advanced legislation to launch a study into what Wyoming should do in the event of a complete economic or political collapse in the United States.

House Bill 85 passed on first reading by a voice vote. It would create a state-run government continuity task force, which would study and prepare Wyoming for potential catastrophes, from disruptions in food and energy supplies to a complete meltdown of the federal government.

The task force would look at the feasibility of:
Wyoming issuing its own alternative currency, if needed. And House members approved an amendment Friday by state Rep. Kermit Brown, R-Laramie, to have the task force also examine conditions under which Wyoming would need to implement its own military draft, raise a standing army, and acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier.

Bizarro Earth

Indian women sell wombs for survival

The double-hit of infertililty and recession is forcing some wannabe parents to get creative. In the U.S. it costs as much as 100,000 dollars to use a surrogate mother to start a family. But get on a plane, and it could be much cheaper. RT's Priya Sridhar met one such couple.


Propaganda

Zombify to Unify: European Schools Teach EU Propaganda

Greece is teetering on the edge of bankrupcy, the future of bailed-out Portugal is uncertain and the single currency itself could be in trouble. The ranks of people writing off the Eurozone and even the European project itself are only swelling in number. So, perhaps that's why the message for a United Europe is being pushed on an all new platform - the classroom.


Phoenix

Honduras prison fire: Over 350 killed in inferno

A massive fire swept through an overcrowded prison in Honduras and killed more than 350 inmates Wednesday. The blaze began late Tuesday night at the prison in Comayagua, about 75 km north of the capital Tegucigalpa.

Inmates trapped inside say guards shot at them. Firefighters claim they struggled to enter the prison because shots were fired.


Black Cat

Jean-Marie Le Pen convicted of saying Nazis weren't so bad

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© Patrick Seeger/EPAJean-Marie Le Pen, whose three-month suspended prison sentence and €10,000 fine was upheld by a Paris appeals court.
Court confirms conviction of far right Front National founder, who said Nazi occupation was not 'particularly inhumane'

Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of France's far right Front National, has been convicted of contesting crimes against humanity for saying the Nazi occupation was not "particularly inhumane".

A Paris appeals court upheld the three-month suspended prison sentence and €10,000 (£8,283) fine handed to Le Pen in 2009.

Le Pen had told the far-right magazine Rivarol in 2005: "in France at least the German occupation was not particularly inhumane, even if there were a number of excesses - inevitable in a country of 550,000 sq km."

He added: "If the Germans had carried out mass executions across the country as the received wisdom would have it, then there wouldn't have been any need for concentration camps for political deportees."

Comment: In a way Le Pen is right: France did not suffer as much as other countries like Poland and Russia because its population largely embraced Nazi philosophy.

The French Resistance Myth


Boat

Warrior Princess: Lucy Lawless and Protesters Spend Third Night Aboard Oil Drilling Ship

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© Greenpeace Source: Associated PressActress Lucy Lawless is spending her third night on board an oil-drilling ship bound for the Arctic with a group of protesters.
A group of protesters on board a Shell-contracted oil-drilling ship in Taranaki, New Zealand, are preparing for a third night on board but their water is running low.

The protesters, including TV actor Lucy Lawless, boarded the Arctic-bound Noble Discoverer and scaled the 53m drilling tower on Friday morning, using locks on the access ladder to barricade themselves on the derrick.

The group of six had a cold and uncomfortable night on Saturday with loud music blasting at 3am and spotlights shining on them all night, Greenpeace New Zealand says on its website.

Smoking

Anti-Smoking Fascism: California Town Set to Ban Smoking ANYWHERE Outside... Even in Your Own Backyard

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A town in California is proposing to ban smoking outside, even for residents lighting up on their own property.

Smoking is already banned indoors in public places in most of the country, and in California it is illegal to smoke in parks and playgrounds too.

The town of Rocklin, near Sacramento, could take the draconian regulations further by extending them to private property as well.

The unusual legislation was prompted by a local family annoyed with their neighbour smoking outside and causing smoke to waft near their house.

They claimed their children's health had been jeopardised by second-hand smoke, according to CBS 13.