Society's ChildS

Quenelle

Stop destroying democracy! Anti-government protests across Poland draw thousands


RT
Sat, 19 Dec 2015 21:01 UTC
Protest Warsaw Poland
© Janek Skarzynski/AFPProtesters shout slogans during an anti government demonstration in Warsaw on December 19, 2015.
Thousands of people have joined demonstrations in cities across Poland to protest against the new government's attempts to take control of the country's Constitutional Court in a lingering political row.

The rallies against the actions of the month-old government formed by the ruling Law and Justice party were staged in more than 20 cities in different regions of Poland as well as in several cities abroad, including London, Brussels, Berlin and Tokyo, according to rally organizers.

A protest in front of the parliament building in the Polish capital of Warsaw was attended by about 20,000 Poles, Reuters reported citing city officials. The protesters were waving Polish and EU flags and chanting "Stop destroying democracy!" and, "We will defend democracy, constitution and Constitutional Court!"

The demonstrators were also carrying banners and placards that read "no to the dictatorship!" and "hands off Constitutional Court!"


The rally was organized by the Committee for the Defense of Democracy movement (KOD) via social networks and was supported by all major opposition parties with some politicians, including a former Polish foreign minister, Radoslaw Sikorski,who attended the demonstration. Many activists from Poland's Solidarity movement, which opposed the country's Soviet regime in the 1980s also joined the protest.

"We have our freedoms and we will fight in order to protect them," the founder of the KOD movement, Mateusz Kijowski, said as quoted by Germany's Tagesspiegel newspaper.

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Moon

Sad U.N. statistic: One out of 122 people today has been forced to flee their home

Elahe Izadi
The Washington Post
Sun, 20 Dec 2015 15:21 UTC
Syrian refugees
© Andrew McConnell/UNHCRA group of Syrian refugees arrive on the island of Lesbos after travelling in an inflatable raft from Turkey, near Skala Sykaminias, Greece.
The number of people who have been forced to flee their homes has reached a staggering level, with 2015 on track to break previous records, according to a United Nations report released Friday.

People who have been forcibly displaced โ€” including those who fled domestically as well as international refugees and asylum-seekers โ€” has likely "far surpassed 60 million" for the first time, reads the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees report. Last year, 59.5 million had been displaced.

"In a global context, that means that one person in every 122 has been forced to flee their home," the agency said in a statement.
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Airplane

Air France jet makes emergency landing in Kenya after bomb discovered


RT
Sun, 20 Dec 2015 13:15 UTC
France plane
© REUTERS/ Joseph Okanga
An Air France passenger jet flying from Mauritius to Paris has made an emergency landing in Kenya after an alleged explosive device was found on board. Kenya's airports authority is referring to the device as a "bomb," saying "suspicious" passengers from the flight are being investigated.

Plane Bomb threat
© Facebook
Kenya Airports Authority said that experts have discovered a bomb on the Air France plane.

"The explosive was carried away to a safe place outside the airport. Bomb experts from the Kenya Navy took the bomb away to safety," the authority said on Facebook.

At least six passengers are currently being interrogated by the authorities over the suspected bomb, a police official told AP on condition of anonymity. Earlier, the Kenyan airport authority reported two people had been taken in for questioning.

"There was a very big noise in the plane. Then, at some point, the plane shook a lot," Audrey, one of the passengers, told Europe 1 radio. "They [plane crew] told us... that our lives were in danger."
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Bomb

Kenyan Airport confirms that a bomb was discovered on Air France flight 463


Sputnik
Sun, 20 Dec 2015 12:56 UTC
bomb Air France plane
© Reuters / Joseph Okanga
According to Kenya airport officials, experts confirmed that the device found onboard the Air France flight 463 is a bomb.

Earlier on Sunday, an Air France flight AF463 bound for Paris performed an emergency landing in Kenya's Moi International Airport after a suspected explosive devide was found in the lavatory on the plane.
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Airplane

Symbolic? Wheel comes off passenger jet onto Sicily beach


thelocal.it
Thu, 17 Dec 2015 11:43 UTC
Jet airliner
A wheel fell off a passenger jet onto a Sicilian beach on Thursday morning.
Disaster was very narrowly averted on Thursday after a wheel fell off a large passenger jet bound for Milan onto a Sicilian beach that is popular among summer bathers.

The incident took place shortly after the Boeing 737-36 Meridiana jet took off from Catania's Fontanarossa airport at 9.28am.

The jet was a direct flight bound for Milan's Linate airport, Corriere Della Sera reported.

But shortly after take off, the plane experienced a severe technical fault, resulting in one of its rear wheels falling off.

The wheel landed on Della Plaia beach, which was fortunately empty at the time.

The beach is crowded during the summer months, during which time a similar incident would probably have resulted in tragedy.
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Crusader

KKK infiltration and the racist culture of U.S. Police Departments

Justin Gardner
AlterNet
Sat, 19 Dec 2015 00:00 UTC
KKK and police

During the Civil Rights movement, one of the KKK's first orders was to infiltrate police departments around the country.

In 1991, a neo-Nazi white supremacist gang was terrorizing the streets of Lynwood in Los Angeles County. The reason these violent thugs could run amok was because they were deputies at the Lynwood Sheriff's station, having the power of blue privilege.

A federal judge acknowledged that the gang of deputies carried out "systematic acts of shooting, killing, brutality, terrorism, house-trashing and other acts of lawlessness and wanton abuse of power."

These maniacs were not the sudden appearance of a unique group of individuals among law enforcement, but the progeny of a decades-long effort by the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) to infiltrate police departments wherever possible

That's why it is so difficult to believe the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) when it said on Tuesday that there was no racial profiling in any of the 1,365 allegations leveled against the department from 2012 to 2014.

Comment: Even if the vast majority of police have no affiliations to organizations like the infamous KKK, it is clear that there is an institutionalized racism that permeates the police forces in the US that are sworn to 'serve and protect'. As the video above suggests, and as articles such as this one make clear, the very foundations of US society seem to rest on the subjugation and abuse of African-Americans. It is just that now, as the most pathological elements of our society (which have always existed to some extent or another) have been nurtured in service to the US's worst drives and modes of operation - that we see more clearly what's always been a very disturbing problem.

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Stormtrooper

Chicago cops say keeping evidence of misconduct puts cops in danger - So they're destroying it

William N. Grigg
The Free Thought Project
Sat, 19 Dec 2015 05:35 UTC
chicago cops say
© The Free Thought Projects
With protesters thronging the streets of Chicago demanding police accountability and clamoring for the resignation of Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the city's police union is frantically trying to destroy decades of records documenting police misconduct. As is always the case, the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) sees "officer safety" as the highest priority - including protection from legal accountability.

"I protect all my members, and I will continue to do that," Dean Angelo, president of the Chicago FOP, explained to CNN.


An injunction filed by the FOP insists that preserving those records violates Section 8.4 of its bargaining agreement with the City of Chicago. That provision specifies that all files of misconduct investigations and officer disciplinary histories "will be destroyed five (5) years after the date of the incident or the date upon which the violation is discovered, whichever is longer, except that not sustained files alleging criminal conduct or excessive force shall be retained for a period of seven (7) years after the date of the incident or the date upon which the violation is discovered, whichever is longer...."

Once that deadline passes, the episode of excessive force or other misconduct "cannot be used against the Officer in any future proceedings in any other forum" unless it deals with a matter subject to litigation during the five year period or "unless a pattern of sustained infractions exists." This element of the bargaining agreement creates an incentive for the police department to delay, obstruct, and obfuscate investigations of misconduct and abuse complaints until the deadline expires - and to keep the process opaque to the public.

"Basically, they bargained away transparency and accountability," points out Chicago University Law Professor Craig Futterman, who is fighting in court to prevent the destruction of the officer misconduct records. "In a world where an incident like [the fatal police shooting of Laquan McDonald] happens and the public statements are 'Deny, deny, deny,' and then close off and circle the wagons, and then a code of silence and an exoneration at the end of the day - in that system, you cannot create public trust," Futterman explained to the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin.

Comment:

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Mr. Potato

Pow! The most punchable faces of 2015

Tom Boggioni
Raw Story
Fri, 18 Dec 2015 13:06 UTC
Shkreli
© Raw StoryTuring CEO Martin Shkreli
Previously I happened to kind of mention in passing something or other about people who have the most punchable faces in the U.S. Now, as the year draws to a close, I thought it was important to honor people who have truly excelled this past twelve months in the fine art of being so obnoxious or so horrific that they would make the Baby Jesus ball up his tiny Baby Jesus little fist and swing so hard he comes out of his adorable Baby Jesus sandals.

You know what I mean. Sometimes you just have to tell your inner Gandhi to sit the hell down while you go straighten someone out using the only method that gets their attention.

As I pointed out before:
The desire to pop a particular person in the face is generally rooted in some backstory โ€” evidence of inexcusable behavior, a history of being a terrible person who is somehow beyond the reach of even God's punishment, and quite simply: for being a major dick.

What sets them apart for all of the other dicks โ€” like for example, every person who drives a black BMW โ€” is a certain look on their face that has a triggering effect. A smirk, a sneer, the droopy-eyed too-cool-for-you look.

Those are the punchable ones.
As I also pointed out, I'm not saying that anyone should actually punch any of these people in the face โ€” or better yet โ€” in the genitals, because THAT WOULD BE WRONG. But, as Debbie Harry once sang: "Dreaming is free."

The ground rules again: Women are off limits. Yeah, it's sexist, so go ahead and call me a misogynist. Whatever.

Rule #2: They are all Americans. We have more than enough at home to tire our arms out from sweeping hooks. No need to go looking off-shore for someone to fill a spot an American can easily fill.

Rule #3: No real punching. This is a dream list, not a piece of evidence to be introduced at your trial for assault or "aggravated d**k-punching" โ€” which I think is a real charge.

Comment: To continue what could be a smashingly exhaustive list:

Rape apologist, fraud, liar, murderer and all-around tyrant, Hillary Clinton:

Clinton
War crimes and mass murder supporter, liar and the otherwise soul-less Samantha Power:

Samantha Powers
© Associated PressSamantha Powers memory lapses over US war crimes


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Bad Guys

Elderly woman brutalized, thrown on ground, arrested for jaywalking in Croatia


RT
Sat, 19 Dec 2015 04:51 UTC
elderly woman croatia
© Ruptly
A 66-year-old woman was brutally arrested by traffic police in a Croatian city of Osijek after she crossed the road on red light.

The video of the unpleasant incident, filmed from a bodycam on the officer's uniform, was released on the Croatian police channel on YouTube.

The footage shows the policeman putting an arm lock on the elderly woman and violently bringing her to the ground as she cries for help.

The officer resorted to the use force after the female, who earlier skipped the red light, ignored calls to show her ID and tried to walk away from him in the street.

A witness told Index.hr that the policeman, who is described as a large man weighing around 130 kilograms, "threw himself onto [the woman] with all his mass, pushed her onto the concrete in a passage, and handcuffed her."

Another person on the scene told the website that he "attempted to intervene," but the officer allegedly warned that "he should move away himself, or be arrested as well."

The State Attorney's Office reviewed the video and ruled that the actions of the police were lawful, as the offender resisted arrest.


Comment: For jaywalking? Are the Croatia police getting training by Israel, too?

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Attention

Is South America about to explode?

Caleb Maupin
New Eastern Outlook
Sat, 19 Dec 2015 18:57 UTC
South America elections
For the first time in 16 years, the direct aftermath of Venezuela's elections was peaceful. Until then, the day following each election when Hugo Chavez, Nicolas Maduro, or their political allies were victorious was full of street violence. Most recently in 2014, 43 people were killed in a wave of violence called "La Salida" in response to Maduro's victory in the presidential election.

What makes the day following the December 6th vote in Venezuela so unique? In this election, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) was defeated. The opposition forces who routinely resort to violence had no reason for doing so โ€” as their Roundtable for Democratic Unity (MUD) won a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly.
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