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Fri, 05 Nov 2021
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Sheriff

Texas Rangers raid Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston over child molestation allegations

Manuel La Rosa-Lopez
The Texas Rangers are currently assisting in a search warrant executed on the Archdiocese of Houston-Galveston which began Wednesday morning around 10 a.m. The Montgomery County District Attorney's office is now heading the raid.

"We will take any document of piece of information related Father Manuel La Rosa Lopez or involving any other criminal activity," wrote Tyler Dunman of the Montgomery County D.A.'s office.

Catholic Church officials are now struggling with a widening scandal after recent sex assault accusations. Manuel La Rosa-Lopez was charged and arrested in September, after he was accused of molesting teens in the 1990s and early 2000's.

Comment: Also see: Authorities raid office of Houston Cardinal heading US Bishops' response to the sex abuse crisis


Camera

Maybe they've got a point: Facebook allegedly 'X-rates' Macron's photo with two shirtless men

Macron x-rated
© AFP 2018 / Eliot BLONDET / AFP / POOL
The much-hyped photo of French President Emmanuel Macron posing with two bare-chested young men during his September trip to the island of Saint Martin is back in the spotlight.

Social media users have revealed that the infamous picture of President Emmanuel Macron happily smiling next to a reported drug dealer and a middle finger-giving resident of Saint Martin is being censored on Facebook for violating the network's rules against 'nudity and sexual activity'.

TWEET: 'Imagine this: my post from 30 September with this photograph of #Macron was censored by #Facebook. My comment was: "Funny way to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Fifth Republic". Reason: nudity! These people are crazy'.

Comment: Makes you wonder if Facebook knows something about the relationships between Macron and Saint Martin teenagers that the rest of us don't (at least officially)...

See also:


Crusader

Authorities raid office of Houston Cardinal heading US Bishops' response to the sex abuse crisis

Cardinal Daniel DiNardo
State and federal authorities searched the office of Cardinal Daniel DiNardo on Wednesday in connection with a case of alleged sexual abuse in the Houston archdiocese.

Montgomery County District Attorney Brett Ligon said authorities searched the archdiocesan offices for employment and disciplinary records related to Manuel La Rosa-Lopez, who faces accusations of sexually harassing two people when they were teenagers. Two of the individuals who accused Rosa-Lopez also accused DiNardo, who has headed the U.S. bishops' response to the Catholic sex abuse crisis, of disregarding their claims.

Authorities also searched for evidence of any further crimes that La Rosa-Lopez might have committed. The search raises questions as to why Ligon's office did not simply subpoena DiNardo's office for the records.

"This is not a search warrant against the Catholic Church," Ligon clarified, according to The Associated Press. "We're going to go wherever the investigation requires us to go."

NPC

'Woke' NASA Astrobiology Chair thinks exploration of Mars problematic because 'colonialism bad'

Lucianne Walkowicz
© Andrew Toth/Getty Images for National Geographic
Astronomer Lucianne Walkowicz of National Geographic's 'Mars' at The Beacon Theater on November 14, 2018 in New York City.
Adler astronomer Lucianne Walkowicz is the Baruch S. Blumberg NASA/Library of Congress Chair in Astrobiology, not to mention a guest star (as herself) on National Geographic's Mars TV series. Cosmologist Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is with Department of Physics at the University of Washington, and fellow at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. And together they are, counter-intuitively, not so keen on the exploration or colonization of Mars.

In fact, the very word "exploration" is inherently "problematic", they would have us believe, as detailed in a panel discussion published at Gizmodo last week. It was highlighted Sunday by Powerline, with the observation that "if these folks had been with NASA in the 1960s, we'd have never made it to the moon." That may seem like a snarky insult on the part of Powerline, but in fact it's precisely the point that the scientists made.

Comment: There's certainly something to be said for a 'non-interference directive', but this self-hating scientist has gone well past that into full-blown SJW lunacy.


Airplane

Indonesia says Lion Air jet not airworthy on flight before crash

Nurcahyo Utomo
© REUTERS/Darren Whiteside
Indonesian investigators said on Wednesday a Lion Air Boeing 737 jet that plunged into the sea, killing 189 people onboard, was not airworthy on a flight the day before it crashed on Oct. 29.

The Oct. 28 flight from Bali to Jakarta had experienced similar technical issues to the doomed flight the next day from Jakarta to Pangkal Pinang, said Nurcahyo Utomo, head of Indonesia's national transport safety committee (KNKT).

The pilot of the Oct. 28 flight chose to press on to Jakarta after shutting down the plane's anti-stall system, Utomo said.

"This is the basis of our recommendation to Lion Air. In our view, the plane was not airworthy," he told a news conference in Jakarta.

Comment: Investigators also discovered that as the Lion Air jet began its ascent after taking off, the plane's pilots fought to maintain control as an automatic safety system repeatedly forced the aircraft's nose down. This was the same problem that pilots experienced the night before the crash which should have grounded the plane.

Previously:


Pirates

Afghan official reports Daesh forced to go underground with fewer than 10,000 fighters while Taliban expands

Afghan troops
© AFP 2018 / Noorullah Shirzada / Pool
The militants of the Islamic State terrorist group (banned in Russia) have gone underground in Afghanistan, with the size of the organization's sleeper cells in the country currently amounting to less than 10,000, Mohammad Mohaqiq, the second deputy chief executive of Afghanistan, told Sputnik in an interview.

"Takfiris [followers of a radical Islamist ideology] and Daesh terrorists do not have official presence in the provinces of Faryab, Jowzjan and Sar-e Pol, however, despite this, they are hiding in sleeper cells, there are also a number of camps, where the foreigners are undergoing training, but they do not openly declare their presence," Mohaqiq said.

He added that the terrorists operating in the country had suffered considerable casualties in fights with the Taliban radical movement.

Handcuffs

Borussia Dortmund bus bomber given 14yrs jail for attempted murder

Sergei Wenergold
© Leon Kuegeler / dpa
Sergei Wenergold
German Sergei Wenergold was found guilty of 28 counts of attempted murder for an April 2017 attack on Borussia Dortmund's team bus before a UEFA Champions League fixture which injured defender Marc Bartra and a police officer.

Wenergold, 29, was also found guilty by a Dortmund state court of inflicting grievous bodily harm and of causing an explosion.

The attack occurred on April 11 last year when the Dortmund team were leaving their hotel for a Champions League clash with AS Monaco.

Three explosions caused bus windows to smash, injuring Spanish defender Bartra, who then missed one month of the season as a result of a broken wrist damaged in the blast.

Boat

Russia will invest $4B to build Arctic port servicing Northern Sea Route

LNG Arctic port
© Yamal LNG
Plans for building a sea port in on one of Russia's northernmost areas have been brought back to life. The $4 billion project in the Nenets region is key to the country's strategic plan to open shipping in the Arctic.

The project has reportedly been included in Moscow's list of major investment projects on transport and infrastructure development. The new port, which will be located in the small Nenets settlement of Indiga, will be operated year-round.

The annual cargo turnover is set to reach 70 million tons, 50 million tons of which will account for coal shipments, extracted from Russia's biggest coal mining area in the Kuznetsk Basin, located in southwestern Siberia.

The sea port will be financed by both private investors and state support. Private investors are expected steer 60 billion rubles ($900 million) into the project with the remaining 198 billion rubles ($3 billion) to be provided by the Russian government.

Comment: See also:


Chart Pie

Several major demographic trends which are shaping America's future

US demographic trends
We are witnessing a fundamental transformation of America. Some welcome the changes that are happening, while others are greatly resisting them. But one thing is very clear - the United States is a very different place than it was 40 or 50 years ago. Our population is aging, lifestyle patterns are dramatically shifting, and young adults view the world very differently than Baby Boomers do. The changes that we are watching happen are going to take our society in new directions, and already the pace of change is accelerating at a pace that is absolutely breathtaking. The following are 8 shocking demographic trends which will greatly shape America's future...

#1 Like Japan and many countries in Europe, the population of the United States is rapidly aging. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, children will soon be outnumbered by those that are 65 and older, and that will be the first time that this has ever happened in all of U.S. history...
Adults 65 and older will soon outnumber children for the first time in America's history, it has been revealed.

The US Census Bureau released new projections this year that showed the country's changing - and aging - demographics.

By 2030 all baby boomers will be older than age 65 and one in every five Americans will be retirement age.

Comment: The author may want to revise his thoughts on 'peak oil'. But most everything else appears to be correct.


Bad Guys

'Racially aggravated assault' on Syrian refugee schoolboy sparks outrage

almondbury community school bullying syrian child
© Google
The incident is said to have taken place on playing fields at Almondbury Community School
West Yorkshire police are investigating a report of a "racially aggravated assault" against a 15-year-old boy after a violent video was shared on social media.

The victim, with his arm in a cast, is seen to be dragged to the floor by his neck before his attacker says "I'll drown you" while forcing water from a bottle into his mouth.

The incident is said to have taken place on playing fields at Almondbury Community School in Huddersfield on 25 October.


Comment: The video clip posted on Twitter:



Comment: RT adds that within hours of the video being shared, a fundraising page for Jamal was launched which has so far raised tens of thousands of pounds for the Syrian refugee. More Twitter responses:



This story seems to have prompted just a tad too much hysteria: