Society's ChildS


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Ranking of top countries in reading, science, and math shows U.S. below average in all categories

Joe Weisenthal
Business Insider
Tue, 03 Dec 2013 04:26 UTC
The OECD is out with new global rankings of how students in various countries do in reading, science, and math. Results of the full survey can be found and delved into here.

You can see below how Asian countries are obliterating everyone else in these categories.

The United States, meanwhile, ranks below the OECD average in every category. And as the WSJ notes, the US has slipped in all of the major categories in recent years:
The results from the 2012 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), which are being released on Tuesday, show that teenagers in the U.S. slipped from 25th to 31st in math since 2009; from 20th to 24th in science; and from 11th to 21st in reading, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, which gathers and analyzes the data in the U.S.

Comment: Recent studies have shown that the U.S. spends significantly more money on war than on education, so it's hardly surprising that Americans are falling behind most other developed nations. In addition, inequality in the U.S. is at an all-time high with millions of children living in poverty - hardly conducive to learning, but it's apparent that the PTB want it that way!
Are Americans dumb? No, it's the inequality, stupid
Half of America In Poverty? The Facts Say It's True
US adults are dumber than the average human

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Bad Guys

Abortionist who kept 36 bags of aborted babies in storage unit found dead

Ben Johnson
LifeSiteNews
Mon, 25 Nov 2013 17:53 UTC
Dr. Joseph Booker
© NBC NewsDr. Joseph Booker

Authorities say an abortionist with a history of tax evasion, botched abortions, and unusual disposal of aborted babies has died.

Police found the body of Dr. Joseph Booker Jr., 69, at his home Thursday night after relatives complained they could not reach him. Investigators said Booker suffered a stroke and drowned in his shower in his Madison, Mississippi, home.

Tanya Britten of Pro-Life Mississippi said, "From a Christian perspective, I pray that he repented on the lives that he has taken, and that God is merciful,"

In 1999, Booker served time in prison for tax evasion. Later in the year, police learned that a local resident discovered 36 bags of aborted babies in a storage unit he purchased from Booker in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. The new owner said Booker stowed the babies there shortly before going to prison.
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Arrow Down

Scariest ad of all time? Japanese tire commercial will make you jump

Nadine Kalinauskas
Daily Buzz
Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:52 UTC

If you've got a case of the dreaded midweek slump, this commercial might help startle you awake.

(Get the kids out the room first. This one comes with a health warning. We're not joking.)

Japanese tire company Autoway Tires took an unconventional approach - horror-movie tactics - to showing the importance of having great tires in dangerous and unpredictable road conditions.

How scary? The opening message reads: "Not for the faint of heart."
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Rose

Nelson Mandela, global icon of peaceful resistance against tyranny, is dead

Lydia Polgreen
New York Times
Thu, 05 Dec 2013 16:21 UTC
Nelson Mandela
© AFP/Alexander JoeThis picture taken on July 18, 2003 shows Nelson Mandela, the former South Africa President, saluting the South African military health service band that came to play a specially composed march and happy birthday on his 85th birthday in Johannesburg.
Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first black president and an enduring icon of the struggle against racial oppression, died on Thursday, the government announced, leaving the nation without its moral center at a time of growing dissatisfaction with the country's leaders.

"Our nation has lost its greatest son," President Jacob Zuma said in a televised address on Thursday night, adding that Mr. Mandela had died at 8:50 p.m. local time. "His humility, his compassion and his humanity earned him our love."

Mr Zuma called Mr. Mandela's death "the moment of our greatest sorrow," and said that South Africa's thoughts were now with the former president's family. "They have sacrificed much and endured much so that our people could be free," he said.

Mr. Mandela spent 27 years in prison after being convicted of treason by the white minority government, only to forge a peaceful end to white rule by negotiating with his captors after his release in 1990. He led the African National Congress, long a banned liberation movement, to a resounding electoral victory in 1994, the first fully democratic election in the country's history.
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Stock Up

U.S. economy allegedly 'grew' by 3.6% last quarter

Nelson D. Schwartz
New York Times
Thu, 05 Dec 2013 15:31 UTC
Image
The economy might have 'grown', but who is going to get this bigger piece of the pie?
The economy expanded much faster than first thought in the third quarter, as the government on Thursday revised its estimate of growth in the period to a 3.6 percent annual rate from 2.8 percent.

That was significantly better than the 3.1 percent pace economists had been expecting, and it marked the best quarter for growth since the first quarter of 2012, when output jumped by 3.7 percent. It also marked the first time since then that growth had exceeded 3 percent.

Much of the improvement came from additional stocking up on inventory by businesses as well as a slightly improved trade picture.

Inventory changes are notoriously volatile, so while the healthier signals would be welcomed by economists, inventory gains can essentially pull growth forward into the third quarter, causing fourth-quarter gains to slacken.

Indeed, Wall Street was already estimating that the fourth quarter of 2013 would be much weaker than the third quarter, with growth estimated to run at just below 2 percent, according to Bloomberg News.
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Arrow Down

In God we trust, maybe, but not each other

Connie Cass
Associated Press
Sat, 30 Nov 2013 09:04 UTC
Bart Murawski
© 2011 AP/Shannon DeCelleBart Murawksi, 27 poses at a coffee shop Tuesday, Nov. 26 2013, in Troy, NY. You can take our word for it: Americans don't trust each other anymore. An AP-Gfk poll conducted last month found that Americans are suspicious of each other in everyday encounters. Less than a third expressed a lot of trust in clerks who swipe their credit cards, drivers on the road, or people they meet when traveling. "I'm leery of everybody," said Murawski. "Caution is always a factor."
You can take our word for it. Americans don't trust each other anymore.

We're not talking about the loss of faith in big institutions such as the government, the church or Wall Street, which fluctuates with events. For four decades, a gut-level ingredient of democracy - trust in the other fellow - has been quietly draining away.

These days, only one-third of Americans say most people can be trusted. Half felt that way in 1972, when the General Social Survey first asked the question.

Forty years later, a record high of nearly two-thirds say "you can't be too careful" in dealing with people.

An AP-GfK poll conducted last month found that Americans are suspicious of each other in everyday encounters. Less than one-third expressed a lot of trust in clerks who swipe their credit cards, drivers on the road, or people they meet when traveling.

"I'm leery of everybody," said Bart Murawski, 27, of Albany, N.Y. "Caution is always a factor."

Does it matter that Americans are suspicious of one another? Yes, say worried political and social scientists.
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Eye 2

Sexual Psychopath? Colorado teen who dismembered 5th-grader gets life in prison

Colleen Slevin & Thomas Peipert
MSN News
Tue, 19 Nov 2013 13:47 UTC
Image
© AP Photo, Denver PostAustin Sigg sits in district court in Golden, Colorado, on Monday, Nov. 18, 2013, during his sentencing. Sigg, 18, pleaded guilty last month to kidnapping and killing Jessica Ridgeway in Westminster in October 2012.
A psychologist described him as sadistic, and prosecutors said he methodically killed and dismembered the 10-year-old girl he grabbed on her way to school.

But lawyers for Austin Sigg said Tuesday the 18-year-old was still a child himself, he might have suffered trauma before and during birth, and he had anxiety, a learning disability and an emotionally distant mother.

Judge Stephen Munsinger rejected that image and the defense argument that Sigg should be eligible for parole in 40 years. He instead ordered the teen to serve a life sentence for killing Jessica Ridgeway plus 86 years for other offenses, including sexually assaulting her and trying to attack a jogger a few months before. The sentence ensured Sigg will never be released.

Jessica's disappearance last fall put the Denver suburbs on edge as police, aided by an army of volunteers, searched for her and then her killer. While people now know how Jessica was killed, Munsinger said they might never know why.
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Heart - Black

'And Wammmmmm': Florida teens randomly target, beat up senior citizens

Liz Klimas
The Blaze
Fri, 29 Nov 2013 09:10 UTC
Elderly man being assaulted
© WBBH-TVAn elderly man was kicked from behind while he was weeding his garden Tuesday.
A Fort Myers, Fla., teen was arrested this week for attacking senior citizens. Traveshia Blanks is charged with two counts of battery in the seemingly random and senseless attacks, according to WBBH-TV. One 72-year-old victim told the news station he was weeding his garden Tuesday when he was kicked from behind. The victim fell to the ground and said he saw a woman walking away laughing, joining a group of people.

"I was in shock. Who would expect anything from out of the blue to happen like that. There's no reason had I done something or said something," the victim told WBBH. "I didn't hear anything. There was nobody in the area at all. It was very quiet [when] all of a sudden I felt a blow to my hip and I was on the ground. I turned around to see what happened and there was a girl standing there laughing," he said.
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Info

Indian teams hunt for tiger after 3 Bandipur deaths


bbc.co.uk
Thu, 05 Dec 2013 10:05 UTC
Image
There are about 1,700 tigers in the wild in India
Forest officials in the southern Indian state of Karnataka are searching for a tiger which they say has killed three villagers in the past week.

Teams have gone deep into Bandipur tiger reserve with orders to shoot the "man-eater" with tranquilisers.

A fourth fatality in recent days is being blamed on another tiger.

Meanwhile, angry locals demanding compensation for the families of those killed have set fire to two jeeps belonging to forest officials.

The villagers also want a permanent solution to the man-animal conflict in the region.

The first fatal attack took place on 27 November, when a man called Basavaraju was killed. Two days later, a second victim, Cheluva, fell prey to the same tiger, officials believe. They say the animal was last spotted on 30 November.

Its latest presumed victim, 60-year-old farmer Shivamallappa Basappa, was found by his son on Tuesday night close to the forest in Mysore district. Only parts of his leg and skull remained.

"The body of the third farmer who was killed has been found. We have seen the pug marks of the tiger. It is moving around somewhere close by," HC Kantharaju, conservator of forests in Bandipur tiger reserve, told BBC
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Laptop

South Korea: Surge in 'digital dementia'

Julian Ryall
The Telegraph
Mon, 24 Jun 2013 08:36 UTC
Digital Dementia
© Getty ImagesDoctors in South Korea are reporting a surge in 'digital dementia' among young people who have become so reliant on electronic devices.
Doctors in South Korea are reporting a surge in "digital dementia" among young people who have become so reliant on electronic devices that they can no longer remember everyday details like their phone numbers.

South Korea is one of the most digitally connected nations in the world and the problem of internet addiction among both adults and children was recognised as far back as the late 1990s.

That is now developing into the early onset of digital dementia - a term coined in South Korea - meaning a deterioration in cognitive abilities that is more commonly seen in people who have suffered a head injury or psychiatric illness.

"Over-use of smartphones and game devices hampers the balanced development of the brain," Byun Gi-won, a doctor at the Balance Brain Centre in Seoul, told the JoongAng Daily newspaper.

"Heavy users are likely to develop the left side of their brains, leaving the right side untapped or underdeveloped," he said.

The right side of the brain is linked with concentration and its failure to develop will affect attention and memory span, which could in as many as 15 per cent of cases lead to the early onset of dementia.
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