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School district investigates what looks like Nazi salute in prom photo


wpxi.com
Tue, 13 Nov 2018 06:55 UTC
Prom pic
A Wisconsin high school is being criticized for what appears to be a Nazi salute some students struck in a prom photo.

CBS News reported that dozens of male students in Baraboo High School's class of 2019 are pictured raising their right arms upward.

According to a statement from Baraboo Superintendent Dr. Lori Mueller, the image was taken in the spring before prom. The Baraboo News Republic reported that the image, in which not all students do not have their hands raised, resurfaced and spread across Twitter with the hashtag #BarabooProud. The publication reported that the hashtag is used by the Baraboo School District to promote its activities.

"In the photo, Baraboo students appear to make an extremely inappropriate gesture. It is a gesture widely recognized for its association with intolerance, violence and hate," Mueller said in a statement Monday to parents and guardians. "We are extremely troubled by the image. The school district and local authorities continue to investigate, speaking with the students and families involved to determine how and why this photo was taken."
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Arrow Down

Bitcoin takes a nosedive, trading below $4,000 for the first time since 2017


RT
Sun, 25 Nov 2018 16:36 UTC
Bitcoins
© Dado Ruvic/Reuters
Bitcoin (BTC) has hit a 14-month low, trading below the $4,000 threshold for the first time since last year, shedding thousands of virtual coins since the start of the week.

BTC experienced a nosedive (to around $3,750) on Saturday evening, falling by 14 percent in a day and a staggering 25 percent since Monday, when it plummeted to below $5,000. The downward trend has not been limited to bitcoin, as the day saw almost all top cryptocurrency tokens losing their value in double digits.

The last time bitcoin traded below $4,000 was in August 2017 at the start of the cryptocurrency craze, which saw bitcoin shooting through the roof and eventually peaking at $20,000 before Christmas.

Since reaching its pinnacle in December last year, bitcoin has been gradually losing value. However, this week the situation has taken a distinctive turn for the worse, given that in previous weeks it was trading in the mid $6,000s.
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Briefcase

UAE welcomes rich, educated foreigners with long-term visa scheme

Andrew Torchia and Saeed Azhar
Reuters
Sun, 25 Nov 2018 00:00 UTC
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
© REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah
General view of Dubai, United Arab Emirates October 15, 2018.
The United Arab Emirates will offer long-term visas to rich property investors, senior scientists and entrepreneurs in an effort to support its economy and real estate market, which have been hurt by low oil prices.

Until now, visas for foreigners to live in the Arab world's second biggest economy have generally been valid for only a few years, and have depended on the main visa holder in each family remaining employed. The government said in May it planned to ease that policy.

Detailed rules approved by the cabinet on Saturday offer five-year residency to owners of UAE real estate worth at least 5 million dirhams ($1.4 million), as long as ownership is not based on loans, state news agency WAM reported.

Renewable 10-year visas will be provided to foreigners with investments in the UAE of at least 10 million dirhams, if non-real estate assets account for at least 60 percent of the total. Investors can bring spouses and children into the country.
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Attention

Tens of thousands in India demand rebuilding of Hindu temple sparking deadly violence

Biswajeet Banerjee
Associated Press
Sun, 25 Nov 2018 00:00 UTC
Protesters
Tens of thousands of Hindus gathered in northern India on Sunday renewing calls to build a Hindu temple on a site where a 16th century mosque was attacked and demolished by Hindu hard-liners in 1992, sparking deadly Hindu-Muslim violence.

The demonstrators chanted slogans demanding the building of the temple and waved a banner that said, "No more requests, now it will be battle."

The Hindu hard-liners are building pressure on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government to move quickly on the issue. Modi had promised to build the temple in the 2014 national elections that brought him to power. The next national elections are due before May next year.

Security was stepped up for the rally, with thousands of police and paramilitary forces deployed in and around Ayodhya, a town 550 kilometers (350 miles) east of New Delhi, to prevent any attacks on Muslims, who comprise 6 percent of the town's more than 55,500 people.
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Handcuffs

Swedish axe murderer happy with 'amazingly good' life behind bars


The Local
Sat, 24 Nov 2018 15:29 UTC
Björn Olsen
© Ulf Palm/TT
Björn Olsen makes an insulting gesture at reporters during his remand hearing.
A Swede who brutally murdered his girlfriend with an axe has has expressed his surprise at the "amazingly good" life he leads behind bars.

Björn Olsen, who left the body of girlfriend Therese Palmkvist rotting in their cellar for four months, said he was "extremely satisfied" with his treatment.

"It's actually amazingly good how we have it here," he wrote in a letter to a relative, obtained by the Expressen newspaper. "It's like you'd almost rather be here than free on the outside."

"So it's nice here, it's pretty cushty. Good gym. Nice food. Totally OK job where you work with ceramics," he said, although he also wrote that "not much happens."
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Question

Is calling someone 'anti-vax' just as bad as using the n-word? Twitter slams Hollywood screenwriter for saying so

Lauren Huff
Hollywood Reporter
Fri, 23 Nov 2018 15:03 UTC
Terry Rossio
© Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Disney
Terry Rossio
Screenwriter Terry Rossio was slammed on Friday after a tweet he posted equated using the N-word with calling someone "anti-vax."

"My heart goes out to all the parents of vaccine damaged children, who have to not only endure the sadness of their loss, but also the vitriol of ill-informed and insensitive people (such as those here). Anti-Vax is equivalent to calling someone a n-er and makes as little sense," he wrote, in reply to The 100 writer Julie Benson, who had tweeted a post on Thursday encouraging people to donate vaccines "and then send a card to an anti-vax relative saying you've provided lifesaving vaccines in their name." [HW Editor's note: Rossio used the full word in his tweet, but it has been censored here.]

Hundreds of Twitter users replied to the comment, with many calling out Rossio's comparison. Among them was writer Jeff Grubb, who wrote a string of tweets mocking Rossio, including: "God, this is such a good point. I remember how American founders and citizens enslaved vaccine skeptics for decades. And then, even after freeing them, the government enshrined laws to marginalize vaccine deniers and to deny them wealth and opportunity. That's just history." He added in a subsequent tweet, "Oh, and finally: eat shit, Terry."
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USA

US service member killed in Afghanistan, no details released yet

Joanne Stocker
The Defense Post
Sat, 24 Nov 2018 14:19 UTC
soldiers on hill
© US Army/Sgt 1st Class Jasmine L. Flowers
US soldiers from Task Force Stalwart, compromised of soldiers from 1st Battalion, 41st Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, pose for a group photo in Afghanistan, March 28, 2018.
A U.S. service member was killed in Afghanistan on Saturday, November 24, the NATO Resolute Support mission said without releasing details.

"One U.S. service member was killed in Afghanistan today," Resolute Support spokesperson Sergeant First Class Debra Richardson said in an emailed statement.

"In accordance with U.S. Department of Defense policy, the name of the service member killed in action is being withheld until 24 hours after notification of next of kin is complete.We will share additional information as appropriate."

Resolute Support typically includes information such as the province in which the incident occurs, while the home countries of service members killed usually later release identifying information.
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Megaphone

Protests at Alabama mall where police shot dead wrong man and injured 12 year old girl


RT
Sat, 24 Nov 2018 23:51 UTC
black lives matter
Demonstrators gathered in protest of police violence after authorities admit that the suspect they killed following a shooting at an Alabama mall was 'likely' not the actual shooter.

Around 200 people came together at a mall in Hoover Alabama, the site of a shooting on Thanksgiving which left two people, including a 12-year-old girl, hospitalized. Their anger, however, comes from what happened after the shooting, when Alabama police gunned down the wrong suspect in connection to the crime.

Police initially released a statement after the incident saying an officer had killed the shooter, but were later forced to retract the information after investigation revealed that the man killed, while possibly having been involved in the altercation, was "likely" not the shooter. He was identified as 21-year-old Emantic "EJ" Bradford Jr., who was shot when he was seen near the scene brandishing a handgun. Alabama is an open carry state, meaning it is legal for citizens to carry weapons.

Comment: With the litany of killings committed by US cops, one has to wonder just what they base their training and hiring policies on:

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Books

The case for dropping out of college

Samuel Knoche
Quillette
Fri, 23 Nov 2018 00:01 UTC
college grad selfie
During the summer, my father asked me whether the money he'd spent to finance my first few years at Fordham University in New York City, one of the more expensive private colleges in the United States, had been well spent. I said yes, which was a lie.

I majored in computer science, a field with good career prospects, and involved myself in several extracurricular clubs. Since I managed to test out of some introductory classes, I might even have been able to graduate a year early - thereby producing a substantial cost savings for my family. But the more I learned about the relationship between formal education and actual learning, the more I wondered why I'd come to Fordham in the first place.

* * *

Comment:

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Apple Red

The fruits of college indoctrination

Walter E. Williams
Townhall
Wed, 21 Nov 2018 09:30 UTC
tolerance cartoon
Much of today's incivility and contempt for personal liberty has its roots on college campuses, and most of the uncivil and contemptuous are people with college backgrounds. Let's look at a few highly publicized recent examples of incivility and attacks on free speech.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his wife, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, were accosted and harassed by a deranged left-wing mob as they were leaving a dinner at Georgetown University. Sen. McConnell was harassed by protesters at Reagan National Airport, as well as at several venues in Kentucky. Sen. Ted Cruz and his wife were harassed at a Washington, D.C., restaurant. Afterward, a group called Smash Racism DC wrote: "No -- you can't eat in peace -- your politics are an attack on all of us. You're (sic) votes are a death wish. Your votes are hate crimes." Other members of Congress -- such as Andy Harris, Susan Collins and Rand Paul -- have been physically attacked or harassed by leftists. Most recent is the case of Fox News political commentator Tucker Carlson. A leftist group showed up at his house at night, damaging his front door and chanting, "Tucker Carlson, we will fight! We know where you sleep at night!" "Racist scumbag, leave town!"

Mayhem against people with different points of view is excused as just deserts for what is seen as hate speech. Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray discovered this when he was shouted down at Middlebury College and the professor escorting him was sent to the hospital with injuries. Students at the University of California, Berkeley shut down a controversial speaker and caused riot damage estimated at $100,000. Protesters at both UCLA and Claremont McKenna College disrupted scheduled lectures by Manhattan Institute scholar Heather Mac Donald.

Comment: See also:

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