Welcome to Sott.net
Thu, 04 Nov 2021
The World for People who Think

Society's Child
Map

Eye 2

Led to the noose in diapers: Shoko Asahara, murderous guru behind Tokyo sarin attack, has been executed


South China Morning Post
Fri, 06 Jul 2018 17:32 UTC
Shoko Asahara
Shoko Asahara, executed Friday for his role in the deadly 1995 sarin attack on Tokyo's subway, used a mixture of charisma and mysticism to lure followers to his Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult.

The "guru" with his wild hair and unkempt beard once led up to 10,000 followers, including some who in 1995 targeted the Tokyo subway in a shocking chemical attack that killed 13 people and injured thousands more.

He reportedly cut a very different figure as he was led to the noose on Friday morning.

Kyodo News, citing sources with knowledge of his behaviour in a detention, said Asahara had long ago cut his famous hair short and shaved off his beard.

He refused to use a toilet and instead wore adult diapers at all times.

Since mid-2008, Asahara, whose real name was Chizuo Matsumoto, had declined all meeting requests from his family and lawyers.
      Read More...
Dollar

Work til you die: Record number of folks age 85 and older are working in the US

Andrew Van Dam
The Washington Post
Thu, 05 Jul 2018 20:35 UTC
Bob Blocksom
© Dustin Franz/WaPo
Bob Blocksom, 87, in his Berea, Ohio, home in June, is interested in becoming a truck driver to help pay for medical expenses for his wife.
Seventy may be the new 60, and 80 may be the new 70, but 85 is still pretty old to work in America. Yet in some ways, it is the era of the very old worker in America.

Overall, 255,000 Americans 85 years old or older were working over the past 12 months. That's 4.4 percent of Americans that age, up from 2.6 percent in 2006, before the recession. It's the highest number on record.

They're doing all sorts of jobs - crossing guards, farmers and ranchers, even truckers, as my colleague Heather Long revealed in a front-page story last week. Indeed, there are between 1,000 and 3,000 U.S. truckers age 85 or older, based on 2016 Census Bureau figures. Their ranks have roughly doubled since the Great Recession.
US working population 85 and older
© Dept of Labor via IPUMS/WaPo

Comment: The author presents the idea that working into your 80's and beyond is normal. It's likely that these people work because they cannot support themselves on their retirement plans and/or Social Security.

      Read More...
Newspaper

Landmark free-speech case: Wisconsin Supreme Court sides with conservative Professor

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Fri, 06 Jul 2018 20:28 UTC
John McAdams
The ruling contends that Marquette, a Catholic University, violated its contract with McAdams guaranteeing academic freedom. The court also declared that McAdams should be immediately reinstated. McAdams sued Marquette in 2016 alleging that he lost his job for exercising his freedom of speech. The case has been sent back to the Milwaukee County Circuit Court so that damages, including back pay, can be awarded to McAdams, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
      Read More...
Magnify

The distinctions between 'freedom' and 'liberty' as they were originally conceived in the US

Erich Reimer
Townhall
Wed, 04 Jul 2018 00:01 UTC
american flag
We hear the words "freedom" and, to a lesser degree, "liberty" a lot nowadays - and with good reason, as these concepts go to the fundamental root of what it means to be an American.

As we hear these terms however in our political, policy, legal, entertainment, and historical discourse, I began thinking about whether the terms are truly as interchangeable as they have seemingly become nowadays.

"Liberty" seems like an archaic term while "freedom" is much more commonly used modern ideal. However neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution of the United States use the word "freedom," rather describing our rights in the terms "Blessings of Liberty" and "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."

According to Webster's Dictionary, one definition of "liberty" is "the quality or state or being free," essentially as a synonym of freedom. However the other definitions are more subtle, implying that it is a form or subset of freedom. Essentially, that liberty is freedom within certain bounds.
      Read More...
Newspaper

Guilty or innocent? Guardian columnist calls out UK govt as 'clueless' in blaming Russia for poisonings


RT
Fri, 06 Jul 2018 16:27 UTC
2 hazmaters
© Henry Nicholls/Reuters
It is a basic tenet of British law that the accused are innocent until proven guilty. And yet when it's Russia in the dock, that seems irrelevant.

Top Tory ministers have squarely accused the Kremlin of the Novichok poisonings in Wiltshire, and the mainstream media has been awash with unknown sources and so-called "experts" claiming they have reasons to believe Russia is involved.

In a refreshingly articulate piece in the Guardian, however, former Times editor Simon Jenkins called out the government over its baseless allegations. While it is disappointing that it took a MSM journalist so long to reach such an elementary conclusion, it is still comforting that a piece entitled "If the Novichok was planted by Russia, where's the evidence?" has finally made it to print.

Comment: Should we applaud for MSM finally reporting statements of the obvious? Anomaly? Turn of the tide?
See also: Simon Jenkins: If the novichok was planted by Russia, where is the evidence?

      Read More...
Arrow Up

Migrants in Germany transferred 17.7B euros to their countries of origin


Voice of Europe
Mon, 02 Jul 2018 00:00 UTC
GermanMigrants
© Jazzmany/shutterstock.com
In the year 2016 migrants transferred billions of euros to their families in their home countries, German newspaper Die Welt reports.

More than 20 billion dollars (17.7 billion euros) flowed from Germany back to countries of origin in 2016, which is six billion more than in 2007.

While the German government sees it as a type of developmental aid, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, that requested the investigation on the matter, is sceptical.

According to the party recipients of state benefits should be banned from passing on money to their home countries. "It cannot be that development aid from the German social system is financed," AfD spokesman Markus Frohnmaier says.

But Germany's Government considers the remittances to be "development-promoting", because the money arrives directly at the place where it is needed, Die Welt writes.
      Read More...
USA

'How's independence working out?' UK's 4th of July newspaper article faces Twitter wrath


RT
Wed, 04 Jul 2018 20:43 UTC
4th July kids
© Mike Segar/Reuters
The UK's Independent newspaper got more than it bargained for when it published an article sarcastically asking how independence from the former British Empire was working out for Americans - on the 4th of July.

The article criticized the "bulbous shape" of US President Donald Trump, the "abysmally sycophantic shape" of both houses of Congress and the "atrophied state" of the judiciary. The author also blasted Trump's so-called "Muslim ban" and wrote that the US was a land that "steals and incarcerates brown-skinned babies" in a reference to Trump's "zero-tolerance" immigration policies.

But Americans were having none of it - and they took to Twitter to let the Independent know about it. Some Twitter users pointed out through memes that a British publication should probably not be lecturing the US on that day in particular, given the fact that it was the British Empire that the Thirteen Colonies declared independence from in 1776.
      Read More...
Fire

Fanning the flames: Establishment media condones harassment and mob violence against Trump supporters

John Nolte
Breitbart
Thu, 05 Jul 2018 00:00 UTC
Trump supporters harassement
When not calling Trump supporters "Nazis" as a means to dehumanize us, the establishment media like to whine about the lack of civility in American politics, even as they cover up, ignore, downplay, or straight-up approve of the wave of violence and public harassment we are seeing against supporters of President Trump.

It is open season on Trump supporters, and the media is only fomenting, encouraging, excusing, and hoping for more... The media are now openly calling Trump supporters "Nazis" and are blaming Trump for a mass murder he had nothing to do with. This, of course, is a form of harassment because it incites and justifies mob violence.

Here is the list, so far, and remember that if any one of these things happened to a Democrat, the media would use the story to blot out the sun for weeks. But what we have when it comes to Trump supporters is a media eager to normalize harassment and violence.

Comment: One bright spot is that many are becoming disgusted with the outrageous behavior shown by unhinged leftists who are being encouraged by politicians and celebrities:

      Read More...
Camera

Police release mugshot of mother accused of selling her children

Eddie Cruz
Kristv.com
Tue, 03 Jul 2018 17:55 UTC
Esmeralda Garza
© Nueces County Jail/KRIS-TV
29-year-old Esmeralda Garza, who is accused of selling one of her children and in the process of selling two others.
Jail officials over at the Nueces County Jail have released the mugshot of a mother accused of selling her children.

DPS Troopers released a statement to KRIS 6 News about an investigation and a raid that happened Friday morning, June 29th, 2018 in the Corpus Christi area.

The news release states that agents located a seven-year-old boy, who was allegedly sold by 29-year-old Esmeralda Garza. The boy was purchased by two other males according to jail records.

Investigators added the investigation uncovered that two more children were in the process of being sold. DPS Troopers said Garza was attempting to sell two children, a two-year-old girl, and a three-year-old girl.
      Read More...
Star of David

Israel's Supreme Court freezes demolition of Palestinian village


Middle East Eye
Fri, 06 Jul 2018 19:12 UTC
Residents of Khan al-Ahmar
© AFP
Residents of Khan al-Ahmar wait under a tree after Israeli police declared the village a closed military area on Thursday
Israel faces mounting international condemnation as its security forces prepare to demolish Palestinian village

Israel's Supreme Court ordered late on Thursday a pause on the demolition of the Palestinian Bedouin town of Khan al-Ahmar in the occupied West Bank, Israeli media outlets reported.

Israel has faced mounting international condemnation as its security forces continued preparations to demolish the town.

On Wednesday morning, Israeli soldiers cracked down on activists who had come to support the town's residents, injuring 35, four of whom were hospitalised. Thirteen people were arrested, including a teenage girl, a PLO official said.


Comment: 38 wounded, 15 arrested Palestinians by Israeli forces while razing homes near Jerusalem


Comment: See also: Palestine condemns the demolition of the Bedouin village by Israeli authorities in West Bank

      Read More...
Amazon Smile
Revolt! T-shirts