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Largest strike in Ryanair's history leaves 400 flights cancelled and thousands of passengers affected

ryanair
More than 70,000 passengers have had their Ryanair flights cancelled today as a result of the biggest strike in the airline's 34 year history.

Pilots across Europe have coordinated a day of industrial action on what is one of the busiest days of the summer.

The airline said that 250 flights into and out of Germany have been cancelled, along with 104 flights serving Belgium, 22 services to and from Sweden, and 20 between Ireland and Britain.

Ryanair has declined to say which specific flights have been grounded, or how many UK departures have been cancelled, but The Independent estimates that up to 100 British flights, and 18,000 passengers, could be affected.

Berlin Schöenefeld, Gothenburg and Stockholm Skavsta have seen the majority of Ryanair services grounded.

Violin

Snowflake newspaper Boston Globe wants to organize country's press into war of words against Trump

laptop newspapers
A Boston newspaper is proposing a coordinated editorial response from publications across the U.S. to President Donald Trump's frequent attacks on the news media.

"We are not the enemy of the people," said Marjorie Pritchard, deputy managing editor for the editorial page of The Boston Globe, referring to a characterization of journalists that Trump has used in the past. The president, who contends he has largely been covered unfairly by the press, also employs the term "fake news" often when describing the media.

The Globe has reached out to editorial boards nationwide to write and publish editorials on Aug. 16 denouncing what the newspaper called a "dirty war against the free press."

Comment: See also:


Airplane

AUDIO emerges of conversation between suicidal hijacker & Seattle air traffic controller

Airplane
© John Wauldron / AFP
A Horizon Air Q400 plane, stolen from the Seattle-Tacoma airport Handout.
An audio emerged online of a conversation between a man who hijacked a plane from the Seattle Airport and an air-traffic controller. On the clip the hijacker talks about running low on fuel and asks if he'll get life in jail.

The conversation between the man, addressed as Rich/Richard, and the air-traffic controller right before the Horizon Air Q400 plane crash, was released by Aviation journalist Jon Ostrower on Twitter.


Fire

'The place is going to burn': Suspect in Holy Fire arson sent ominous text

Holy Fire
The man accused of starting a Southern California blaze that forced the evacuation of 20,000 residents sent a text to a volunteer fire chief two weeks ago saying, "The place is going to burn," the chief said Thursday.

The Holy Fire started Monday in the Cleveland National Forest's Holy Jim Canyon and has so far destroyed a dozen structures, according to fire authorities.

Holy Jim Volunteer Fire Department Chief Mike Milligan, 71, says he's known the arson suspect, Forrest Gordon Clark, for decades and has long warned that he posed a danger to the community.

"I've been trying for years to get someone to pay attention and nobody has really had the opportunity to do that until now," he said.

Fire

Inmates paid $2 a day for fighting California wildfires

inmate firefighters
As California firefighters work to contain the largest wildfire in state history, they find themselves working their 24-hour shifts alongside a group of unlikely partners: 3,400 inmates from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The groups work in unison, but while salaried California firefighters earn an annual mean wage of $74,000 plus benefits, inmates earn just $2 per day with an additional $1 per hour when fighting an active fire.

Inmates without histories of arson, sexual crimes, kidnapping, gang-affiliation, escape attempts or facing a life sentence are allowed to volunteer for the firefighting program and are trained for two weeks in fire safety and field conditions before taking a physical exam. Once the exam is passed, prisoners are sent to live in one of 43 low-security field camps throughout the state. Juvenile delinquents are also eligible for the program, at least 58 youth offenders are currently fighting active wildfires.

"In an active fire, Cal Fire makes the determination for all crews based on the conditions, and the safety and security of all firefighters. In other words, inmate firefighters are not treated differently in the work they perform at the camps," Vicky Waters, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation told Newsweek on Tuesday. "I just want to emphasize that we absolutely recognize the incredible job these firefighters are doing, particularly when lives and properties are at stake."

Comment: United Corporations of Amerika: 4,000 PRISONERS - not firefighters - are tasked with putting out raging wildfires in California


USA

Former professor charged with assaulting 7 Trump supporters with a bike lock only gets probation

berkeley attack
© Shuttershot45/YouTube
A former Diablo Valley College professor who used a bike lock to assault seven Trump supporters at a free speech rally last August will only receive three years of probation as part of a plea deal.

Eric Clanton, a former philosophy professor at Diablo Valley College, will receive only a three-year probation for his assault on Trump supporters at a Berkeley Free Speech rally in August 2017. Clanton was captured on video smashing a Trump supporter's head with a bike lock. His victim ultimately fell to the ground, covered in his own blood.

Court documents revealed that Clanton struck at least seven people in the head at the Berkeley free speech rally on April 15, 2017. One of his victims had a head laceration that required five staples to fix. Clanton was initially charged with four counts of felony assault.

During a search of Clanton's home, investigators found documents that linked him to local Antifa groups. Investigators also found bike locks and clothing that were similar to the items used by the assailant in the assault video that was published online. Additionally, cell phone tower data placed Clanton close to the location of the assaults on the date they took place.

Red Flag

U.S. Department of Defense is the world's biggest polluter

military pollution
© AP/Reed Saxon
Spent shell casings from firing practice litter the desert of the U.S. Marine Corps’ Air Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms, California.
Last week, mainstream media outlets gave minimal attention to the news that the U.S. Naval station in Virginia Beach had spilled an estimated 94,000 gallons of jet fuel into a nearby waterway, less than a mile from the Atlantic Ocean.

While the incident was by no means as catastrophic as some other pipeline spills, it underscores an important yet little-known fact-that the U.S. Department of Defense is both the nation's and the world's, largest polluter.

Producing more hazardous waste than the five largest U.S. chemical companies combined, the U.S. Department of Defense has left its toxic legacy throughout the world in the form of depleted uranium, oil, jet fuel, pesticides, defoliants like Agent Orange and lead, among others.

Stock Down

Neoliberalism on steroids: Punishing the victims and rewarding the perpetrators of the 2008 financial crisis

financial economic crisis
© Jo Yong hak / Reuters
The 2008 financial crash should have marked the end of a neoliberal era marked by greed and inequality. But it ushered in even more iniquitous economic policies which have benefited the super-rich at the expense of the majority.

It was the worst economic disaster since the Great Depression of the 1930s. However, unlike then, the crash of 2008 did not lead to the adoption of progressive New Deal-style policies, but the exact opposite. The massive bankers' bailouts that were introduced following the collapse of Lehman Bros were paid for by ordinary taxpayers, who then saw their living standards plummet as governments imposed harsh austerity measures, which led to important public services being cut. Let's look at what happened in Britain.

In the 2010 General Election, the Conservatives, out of office since 1997, promoted themselves as the party most serious about "cutting the deficit." The election was all about 'the deficit'. The 'd' word was everywhere. The Tories scraped home, but could only form a government with the support of the Lib Dems, who, under the leadership of banker's son Nick Clegg, were now enthusiastic neocons.

Comment: All of this has happened before, and it will happen again:




2 + 2 = 4

The new racism: How sociology justifies racism through language

discrimination definition

Editor's note: Part I of
The New Racism can be read here.

The best way to grasp how sociology has managed to make color-blind racism (CBR) seem believable is to study its Newspeak (to continue the Orwell theme).

Comment:


Display

Microsoft threatens to shut down social media site Gab after anti-Semitic posts by random user

Andrew Torba Gab Microsoft


Editor's note: Since the publication of this article, more information has surfaced about the threatening nature of the posts, which seem to be a clear violation of Gab's terms of service. PJ Media condemns violent threats in the strongest possible terms. See update below.


Microsoft Azure, the web hosting provider for Gab, has given the company 48 hours to delete some anti-Semitic posts or face a Big Tech shut-down. Gab is a Twitter alternative that claims to protect the right to free speech. It's not a very good alternative, as the numbers just aren't there to keep it interesting. Most of the time it's just righties and ultra-righties fighting amongst themselves. But Gab's claim to fame is that they won't kick people off for having unpopular views or engaging in insult trading that morons refer to as "hate speech." For some, that's a worthwhile promise.

It should be noted that in America the term "hate speech" is not a legal one, at least according to the Supreme Court. So-called "hate speech," be it racist, bigoted, anti-Semitic or just plain mean, is protected as reaffirmed in Matal v. Tam in 2017. "Speech that demeans on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or any other similar ground is hateful; but the proudest boast of our free speech jurisprudence is that we protect the freedom to express 'the thought that we hate,'" wrote Justice Alito.

Comment: Nobody likes anti-semites (the real ones). And a lot of people think Alex Jones is a clown. So when these types are shut down not many complain. So the question is, will people be more willing to normalize censorship when more reasonable voices become the target? See also: