Society's ChildS


Attention

Small Businessman Tries to Pay Debt With Severed Finger

Severed Fingers
© Minyanville

A small businessman in Wenzhou, China couldn't pay back a debt -- so he offered to hand over what he could.

"If you like, you can cut off one of my fingers instead," 42 year-old pharmacy owner Zhong Maojin told the loan sharks whose bill had come due.

According to Bloomberg, Zhong is in hock to 130 lenders for 30 million yuan ($4.7 million) at interest rates reaching 7% a month. However, his "offer of traditional retribution ... was declined" after another creditor insisted on his release so Zhong could pay off an even larger debt owed to them.

Though Mastercard, Visa, and American Express don't consider human flesh to be legal tender, the Zhong case is hardly the first time fingers have been used to settle financial scores.

In March, an Albuquerque, N.M., woman named Samantha Hernandez was dropped off in a Walmart parking lot, after being kidnapped and relieved of her pinky over an $80 debt.

Handcuffs

Flex Your Rights: The Top 3 Things to do in Every Police Encounter

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© N/A
Dealing with police in the U.S. can be a touchy situation, no matter who you are, where you're going, or what you're up to. That's why three law enforcement experts attending the 2011 Drug Policy Alliance conference in Los Angeles decided to stage a panel discussion about what people can do to prevent police encounters from becoming seriously detrimental to one's life.

While the conversation was wide-ranging and covered a lengthy variety of topics, there were several main points they all made that can help every single person to deal with police in a manner that limits the potential for arrest or violence.

3. Be cool and be aware

When confronting an officer during a traffic stop, exhibiting anger or frustration at the onset of the encounter can change the outcome dramatically. Remain calm, keep your hands on the wheel and do not reach for your license or insurance papers until directed to. Most importantly, be respectful and do not challenge the officer's authority directly - that's what the courtroom is for.

Bizarro Earth

Canada: Peace-oriented white poppy campaign keeps low profile as Remembrance Day nears

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© Peace Pledge Union
So far this year we've been spared the almost annual clash between the custodians of the red Remembrance Day poppy and anti-war activists who promote the white poppy of peace.

Last year, the Royal Canadian Legion threatened to sue peace groups if they tried to sell white poppies, seeing it as an infringement of their rights to the symbol. So far white-poppy advocates have kept a low profile.

It's surprising to learn the feud is almost as old as the lapel poppy itself.

The red poppy was adopted in 1921 as a symbol of remembrance of First World War dead, first in Britain and then Canada and other British Empire combatants.

The unprecedented, senseless slaughter in the trenches also sparked a strong pacifist movement that lobbied the British Legion to print No More War in the centre of the red poppy, according to the UK-based Peace Pledged Union. Failing to do that, pacifists suggested they should create their own version.

Cheeseburger

US: McDonald's Chief : Curb Spending and Cut Taxes

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© Getty ImagesMcDonald's army of blue-collar customers need more clarity on core issues, such as healthcare.
"The question is, how can we get the ox out of the ditch?" Mr Skinner said. "In order to create jobs in America, you're going to have to cut taxes... particularly in the business community.

"We pay some of the highest [corporate] taxes around the world. There needs to be some levelling."

Asked about federal borrowing, he said: "It's not a good story... the government has to spend less. We have to grow the economy, grow GDP... and you have to be able to do it in an organic way and not through borrowings and increasing debt."

McDonald's army of blue-collar customers need more clarity on core issues, such as healthcare, he said. "Until all of that is all defined and certain... we're going to continue to have a fragile environment for consumer confidence."

Skinner's intervention will be seized upon by President Obama's opponents amid a fierce debate in Washington over the country's deteriorating finances and high unemployment. As Democrats and Republicans fire up their 2012 election campaigns, the focus is on the "9pc nightmare", with both the US budget deficit and jobless total at that level.

Heart - Black

US, Florida: Woman Finds Father Dead in Home Full of Bees

Cause of death not yet determined


A woman found her father dead inside his home with thousands of bees living in the walls.

The man's daughter found him in the upstairs bedroom of his home at 129 Northwest 15th Avenue in Miami on Saturday.

The man was renovating the home, which neighbors said had been in the family for decades, for his daughter.

Heart - Black

US: Accusations of Child Sex, Cover-Up Rock Pennsylvania State

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© PennLiveJerry Sandusky
An explosive sex abuse scandal and allegations of a cover-up rocked Happy Valley after former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, once considered Joe Paterno's heir apparent, was charged with sexually assaulting eight boys over 15 years. Among the allegations was that a graduate assistant saw Sandusky assault a boy in the shower at the team's practice center in 2002.

Sandusky retired in 1999 but continued to use the school's facilities for his work with The Second Mile, a foundation he established to help at-risk kids, where authorities say he encountered the boys. The case took on added dimension Saturday when perjury charges were announced against Tim Curley, Penn State's athletic director, and Gary Schultz, vice president for finance and business. They were also accused of failing to alert police and other agencies - as required by state law - of their investigation of the allegations.

"This is a case about a sexual predator who used his position within the university and community to repeatedly prey on young boys," state Attorney General Linda Kelly said Saturday in a statement.

Paterno, who last week became the coach with the most wins in Division I football history, wasn't charged, and the grand jury report didn't appear to implicate him in wrongdoing.

"Joe Paterno was a witness who cooperated and testified before the grand jury," said Nils Frederiksen, a spokesman for the state attorney general's office. "He's not a suspect."

Bad Guys

US: Missouri residents upset by order to move lake homes

Lake house
© AP/Kelley McCall

Camdenton -- Nearly every year, Patsy Riley has gotten unsolicited offers for her house on Missouri's Lake of the Ozarks with its spectacular views of tree-lined bluffs and its ample shoreline, but she never wanted to leave. Now, she and hundreds of her neighbors wonder what will become of their homes after a federal agency declared that many structures built close to the lake may have to go.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, citing restrictions on private developments around dams, says thousands of residences, decks, patios and boathouses appear to encroach on land belonging to the hydroelectric project in violation of federal regulations.

The announcement has triggered panic in the area's lakefront communities and led to a growing battle among regulators, a utility company, land attorneys and the state's congressional delegation. Officials say they are searching for a way to settle the issue without mass evictions.

"We are mad as hell and we're not going to take it anymore," said Riley, who has lived at the lake for more than 30 years and estimates about half of her neighborhood is threatened.

People

Extreme Poverty Is Now At Record Levels - 19 Statistics About The Poor That Will Absolutely Astound You

homeless man
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According to the U.S. Census Bureau, a higher percentage of Americans is living in extreme poverty than they have ever measured before. In 2010, we were told that the economy was recovering, but the truth is that the number of the "very poor" soared to heights never seen previously. Back in 1993 and back in 2009, the rate of extreme poverty was just over 6 percent, and that represented the worst numbers on record. But in 2010, the rate of extreme poverty hit a whopping 6.7 percent. That means that one out of every 15 Americans is now considered to be "very poor". For many people, this is all very confusing because their guts are telling them that things are getting worse and yet the mainstream media keeps telling them that everything is just fine. Hopefully this article will help people realize that the plight of the poorest of the poor continues to deteriorate all across the United States. In addition, hopefully this article will inspire many of you to lend a hand to those that are truly in need.

Tonight, there are more than 20 million Americans that are living in extreme poverty. This number increases a little bit more every single day. The following statistics that were mentioned in an article in The Daily Mail should be very sobering for all of us....

Light Saber

Chris Hedges Arrested in Front of Goldman Sachs

Occupy wall street
© David Shankbone (CC-BY)
Chris Hedges made this statement in New York City's Zuccotti Park on Thursday morning during the People's Hearing on Goldman Sachs, which he chaired with Dr. Cornel West. The activist and Truthdig columnist then joined a march of several hundred protesters to the nearby corporate headquarters of Goldman Sachs, where he was arrested with 16 others.

Chris Hedges' statement in Zuccotti Park:

Goldman Sachs, which received more subsidies and bailout-related funds than any other investment bank because the Federal Reserve permitted it to become a bank holding company under its "emergency situation," has used billions in taxpayer money to enrich itself and reward its top executives. It handed its senior employees a staggering $18 billion in 2009, $16 billion in 2010 and $10 billion in 2011 in mega-bonuses. This massive transfer of wealth upwards by the Bush and Obama administrations, now estimated at $13 trillion to $14 trillion, went into the pockets of those who carried out fraud and criminal activity rather than the victims who lost their jobs, their savings and often their homes.

Goldman Sachs' commodities index is the most heavily traded in the world. Goldman Sachs hoards rice, wheat, corn, sugar and livestock and jacks up commodity prices around the globe so that poor families can no longer afford basic staples and literally starve. Goldman Sachs is able to carry out its malfeasance at home and in global markets because it has former officials filtered throughout the government and lavishly funds compliant politicians - including Barack Obama, who received $1 million from employees at Goldman Sachs in 2008 when he ran for president. These politicians, in return, permit Goldman Sachs to ignore security laws that under a functioning judiciary system would see the firm indicted for felony fraud. Or, as in the case of Bill Clinton, these politicians pass laws such as the 2000 Commodity Futures Modernization Act that effectively removed all oversight and outside control over the speculation in commodities, one of the major reasons food prices have soared. In 2008 and again in 2010 prices for crops such as rice, wheat and corn doubled and even tripled, making life precarious for hundreds of millions of people. And it was all done so a few corporate oligarchs, the 1 percent, could make personal fortunes in the tens and hundreds of millions of dollars. Despite a damning 650-page Senate subcommittee investigation report, no individual at Goldman Sachs has been indicted, although the report accuses Goldman of defrauding its clients.

Wall Street

Why Bank Transfer Day is only the beginning

bank transfer day
© wavebreakmedia ltd via Shutterstock)
If the big banks aren't scared yet at the power of social-media grass-roots activism, they're not paying attention

On Oct. 9, Kristen Christian, a 27-year-old art gallery owner in Los Angeles, created a Facebook page urging her friends to move their money out of the big banks on Nov. 5. The suggestion hit a nerve. By Nov. 4, 77,015 "friends" had declared their intention to "attend" Bank Transfer Day.

That doesn't necessarily mean that 77,015 people will be pulling all their money out of the likes of Chase, Citibank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America all at once. Saturday is hardly an ideal day to get banking business done, and the process of switching over one's account to a new bank or credit union is not something that can be accomplished - yet - with a flip of a switch. (Detailed advice on how to change your banking account can be found here.) And of course, clicking your intent to do something on Facebook is a far cry from actually, well, doing it.

It's also not clear that the big banks will take a big hit from Bank Transfer Day. The usually sensible economics commentator Felix Salmon goes so far as to assert that "the big banks are blithely unconcerned about people withdrawing their funds on Saturday ... I'm not kidding myself that doing so is going to harm the big banks at all."