Society's ChildS

Cowboy Hat

Sombrer-no! Students' union bans 'racist' Mexican hats in UK

Mexican sombrero
© Carlos Jasso / Reuters
A Mexican restaurant has been banned from handing out sombreros to students by the University of East Anglia's student union, who deemed the marketing scheme "racist."

The traditional straw hats were given out to new students at the freshers' fair from Pedro's Tex Mex Cantina, but union officials later recalled the novelty items, saying they promoted "stereotypical imagery."

General Manager of the restaurant Matthew Ward insisted the promotion was a celebration of Mexican culture.

"As we handed out the sombreros we were told it was 'culturally indifferent', which we think is a shame because we are not doing anything to offend and we are just celebrating the culture," he said.

Comment: This claim of "stereotypical imagery" is really getting absurd. People aren't allowed to just have fun anymore.


Cut

New anti-terror law: Canada revokes passport of jihadist for 'violent disloyalty'

Amara
© www.rt.comJihadist Zakaria Amara, Toronto18 ringleader, loses Canadian citizenship.
For the first time, the Canadian government has revoked the citizenship of a convicted terrorist under its new anti-terror law. The ringleader of a 2006 Al-Qaeda-inspired terror plot in Toronto had demonstrated "violent disloyalty," said Defense Minister.

Zakaria Amara, who is serving a life sentence in a Quebec penitentiary, received a letter from the government on Friday, notifying him that he was no longer a Canadian, The Canadian Press reports. The Jordanian national had dual citizenship, so he could be deported to the Middle Eastern country if he is released early, but he still has 60 days to appeal.
This is the first time the government has used its new power to denationalize convicted terrorists or spies if they are also citizens of another country. The legislation, which was proposed by the Conservatives, came into force in May, and several Canadians have already been notified that their citizenship is being reconsidered.

Comment: Amara was sentenced to life in prison in 2010 with no chance of parole until 2016 for his role in plotting a series of terrorist attacks with the Toronto 18. The group supposedly wanted to draw Canadian troops out of Afghanistan. According to court records, the group's plan was to detonate bombs in U-Haul rental trucks in downtown Toronto and to attack nuclear power plants, RCMP headquarters and eventually target the Sears Tower in Chicago or the UN headquarters in New York City. Police thwarted the plot -- dubbed the "Battle of Toronto" -- in a sweeping series of arrests in 2006.


Comment: As Canada's choice (Bill C-24), by default Amara is now exclusively a Jordanian citizen Question: Are there any ramifications for the Canadian gov in imprisoning, for life, a (now) foreign national?

Gov answer: Now that Amara's Canadian citizenship has been revoked, a plan has been set in motion to deport him to Jordan (Bill C-43, Faster Removal of Foreign Criminals Act). However, it has been confirmed he will not be deported until his time has been served. Currently behind bars in a Quebec prison, he is eligible for parole in 2016.

Canadians feel that streamlining the deportation of convicted criminals from Canada will make their country safer. Besides Amara, there are apparently three other convicted terrorists for which stripping citizenship has begun. Bill C-24 is a new piece of untested, unpredictable legislation, perhaps a slippery slope.


Stormtrooper

Police abuse their authority, threaten youth coach with a year in jail for calling off-duty cop a 'dick'

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What happens when a little league coach calls a heckler at a girl's basketball game a "dick"? Well, when that heckler is an off-duty cop, she ends up arrested and facing three years in prison! Jessica Curs, the 31-year-old mother and veteran youth league coach, is crying foul, and the local police department is firing back.

Now, Curs is taking to the media to tell her story. She first discussed the incident Monday on KTXA TV in Dallas. The very next day, the Alvarado police chief Brad Anderson posted a victim-blaming 1,100-word Facebook post which he has since deleted (see full text below) which criticized KTXA for telling the victim's side of things.

What everyone knows for sure is that when the incident happened, Curs was coaching a 4th grade girls' basketball game. Her team was the Burleson Youth Association and they were playing against Alvarado. These two cities of Burleson and Alvarado, are about 10 miles apart with a classic rivalry.

Alvarado police captain Gary Melson was there keeping score. He was sitting right behind Curs, on the side that had been reserved just for coaches. Melson was in street clothes, off duty. He sat there the whole time heckling Curs.

Curs said Melson offered a snide comment to a call.

Comment: Cops just love to abuse their authority. Call someone a dick at a sporting event? Make sure they don't have a badge....


Arrow Down

GMO pesticide contamination and crop drift pushing organic farmers toward financial ruin

gmo crop drift
Monsanto has many weapons in its arsenal when it comes to eliminating competition from non-GMO and organic farmers. After more than two decades of pushing their products onto US farmland with purposely flawed safety studies, the sheer presence of genetically modified crops poses an existential threat to the business of traditional and organic farming.

A new report has come out showing the extraordinary costs that non-GMO and organic farmers incur from GMO contamination of their crops.
Results from the newest USDA survey indicate that of the farmers who chose to answer the question, 92 had experienced monetary loss between 2011 and 2014 averaging approximately $66,395 per farmer during that timeframe. Overall, GMO presence cost organic farmers at least $6.1 million over four years. This figure is 77 times that reported during the 2006 to 2011 timeframeโ€”a staggering increase.

Comment: The whole idea behind biotechnology is to mass contaminate, it's the norm, once GMO seeds are in nature they take over, they are bred to survive toxic herbicides, and contrary to statements by companies like Monsanto and Bayer, these isolated incidences do have food safety and environmental impacts:
The greater truth is that Monsanto is itself a corporation of global sabotage that destroys agriculture, contaminates the planet with genetic pollution, threatens farmers with lawsuits for planting common seeds, and then blames activists when its own dangerous experiments go haywire.



Gold Bar

Poland sending army to secure possible Nazi gold train

Polish army guys
© news.yahoo.comSoldiers prepare to inspect site of alleged lost Nazi train.
The Polish Army has sent military engineers to where a lost Nazi train full of stolen gold and jewelry may be located near the town of Walbrzych in western Poland. They must ensure the safety of any subsequent excavations. "Our goal is to check whether there's any hazardous material at the site," said Colonel Artur Talik, who is leading the search that began on Monday and is expected to last till Saturday.Talik's troops are using mine detectors and ground-penetrating radar to study the location of the potential treasure.

Nazi train
© twitter.com...could be a golden opportunity to uncover the past or see how greed 'becomes us.'
The discovery of the buried gold train was announced last month by two enthusiasts, Piotr Koper and Andreas Richter, a Pole and German respectively. They said they had found an almost 100-meter train carriage buried about nine meters underground. The carriages mostly contain weapon prototypes, but there may be historic documents, precious minerals and art objects as well, according to a local legend.

Two such trains are said to have disappeared in the area in 1945, where the Nazis constructed a network of secret underground tunnels. The trains are presumed to be booby-trapped, which sparked safety concerns and prompted the participation of the military.

Comment: If they find it, and it is indeed a lost treasure...what then? The list of potential beneficiaries has become a proverbial: 'stand in line and take a number!'
See also:
Nazi treasure train 'found' in Poland, journalist claims, may contain Russia's lost Amber Room


Eye 1

US Border Patrol agent who used Mexican child for target practice indicted for murder

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Lonnie Swartz may become the first US Border Patrol agent to be convicted of murder in a cross-border shooting.

A federal grand jury indicted Mr. Swartz for second-degree murder on Wednesday in the 2012 death of 16-year-old Mexican citizen Jose Antonio Elena Rodriguez.

The teenager was standing in Mexican territory, unarmed when the predatory agent shot him 10 times through the border fence. Rodriguez's family said he was simply walking home from a basketball game.

The Border Patrol claims that their agent's life was in danger, and Rodriguez was part of a group throwing rocks. Even if the teen picked up a rock, it is known that agents will open fire instead of simply moving out of the way, according to a report published in June.

Sean Chapman, Mr. Swartz's attorney, said his client will plead not guilty at an Oct. 9 arraignment. He tried unsuccessfully to get the lawsuit thrown out based on the claim that the Mexican teenager has no Constitutional rights. A court has agreed with this stance in previous cases with similar circumstances.

Predictably, the Border Patrol Union criticized the indictment, suggesting their agents are the victims of "a world of political agendas and armchair quarterbacking."

Dollar

Sanctions be damned: Tehran boosts tax revenue now greater than oil revenues

Iran oil company
© Raheb Homavandi / Reuters
This year Iran's government has collected more revenue from taxes than from oil revenues, something that hasn't happened in half a century, a senior official in the National Iranian oil company (NIOC) said.

"For the first time in 50 years, the government's share of the oil revenue is less than what it is earning from tax, including VAT," Ali Kardor, NIOC deputy managing director, told British newspaper The Guardian the sidelines of the Europe-Iran forum in Geneva. "Only around 10 percent of Iran's GDP is currently dependent on oil."

Iranian oil revenue was hit by a combination of plummeting crude price and years of sanctions imposed on its oil sector by Washington and its foreign allies, primarily the European Union. At the same time taxation has been a week spot in Iranian governance for years, with widespread tax evasion and exempts for certain entities.

Comment: Good to see Iran and Russia aren't buckling under the US backed sanctions. More signs the US is losing its grip on the world.


Alarm Clock

Bad idea: Erie County to place CPS workers in schools

school bus
© Unkown
Erie County, N.Y. suburban school districts are currently setting up a way to house a CPS official inside of their schools during school hours. The partnership would be between the Erie County Social Services and the local school districts as a way to "expedite" any investigations which may arise. They are calling it "faster access to child welfare expertise." I can't think of anything worse than CPS when it comes to "child welfare expertise."
(via wgrz.com)Schools will have to provide and office to a CPS work, who can then investigate reports involving any children who attend that school. The Social Services staff will also provide guidance in preventative and children's services.
This is Government overreach at its finest, all under the familiar guise of offering support to parents and school. This allows schools to turn into a Government arm that can make decisions regarding how children are raised. If the Government wants list of kids who've been vaccinated by the HPV vaccine, they have someone on-sight. This slippery slope could play out in a lot of different very sinister ways.

Nuke

Fukushima Daiichi: 100% meltdown in reactor 2 likely, Tepco ignored tsunami risk assessment

Unit 2
© enformable.comReactor 2, the new problem...
Nuclear Expert: US West Coast being continuously exposed to Fukushima radioactive releases, it's an ongoing tragedy.
Marine Chemist: Impossible to stop nuclear waste flowing into ocean; "It never will be... that's what keeps me up at night."

Radiation levels spiked 1,000% since floods. Up to 100% of No. 2 reactor fuel may have melted.

A group of researchers says it is highly likely that 70 to 100 percent of fuel has melted at one of the damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The group includes researchers from Nagoya University. It has been probing the plant's No. 2 reactor since April of last year, using a device that uses elementary particles called muons to see into its interior.

The researchers say the results of their study show few signs of nuclear fuel at the reactor core, in contrast to the No. 5 reactor where fuel was clearly visible at its core. This led them to believe that 70 to 100 percent of fuel at the reactor has likely melted. The researchers say further analyses are needed to determine whether molten fuel penetrated the reactor and fell down.

The No. 2 reactor is said to have released large amounts of radioactive substances following the March 2011 accident. Tokyo Electric Power Company, the plant's operator, has estimated that part of nuclear fuel at the reactor remains at its core. The locations of nuclear fuel will have a significant impact on the process to remove it from the damaged reactors, the most difficult step of the decommissioning work.

Video: Fukushima Daiichi update 0:00 to 8:09


Comment: The horrific bad news from this incident is both ongoing and getting worse, with unthinkable implications for the entire northern Pacific Rim and the northern hemisphere as wind and ocean currents prevail. From this article, Fukushima Daiichi could have dodged this bullet had the recommended and logical preventative plan been implemented during any of the two years prior to the 2011 earthquake and accompanying tsunami. Some warnings are meant to be heeded.


Pistol

Shooting reported at medical clinic in Rockford, Illinois

gunman medical clinic rockford il
© Wikipedia
Police are currently responding to a report of a shooting at a medical clinic in Rockford, Illinois.

Crusader Community Health CEO Gordon Eggers said that law enforcement is converging to the second floor of the clinic, according to a local NBC affiliate.

Patients, nurses and doctors are reported to have taken shelter inside storefronts, according to local busiensses. Streets in the area have been closed off.

Crusader VP of Development Linda Niemec says that some staff are still inside the building, but are in a secure location.


There have not been any deaths or injuries reported. All staff and patients have made it out safely, Eggers told WTVO.


A local reporter said that paramedics had to treat a child for a seizure when the child heard someone calling out about a man with a gun. Both the child and the paramedic crew are safe, and the Rockford Fire Department is standing by while police try to talk the suspected gunman down.