Society's ChildS


Bulb

Waking up: Majority of Germans want independence from US dominance


RT
Wed, 10 Sep 2014 22:51 UTC
germany
© Reuters / Fabrizio Bensch
The majority of German citizens, for the first time in history, insist on less dependence on the United States in terms of their national security and diplomacy, according to a major survey released by the German Marshall Fund think-tank.

The study published on Wednesday shows that most Germans want their country to take a more independent position from the United States, especially on issues as vital as national security and sovereign diplomacy.

A majority of 57 percent of German respondents opted for a more independent approach, according to the Transatlantic Trends survey, which is up from only 40 percent back in 2013. What is even more interesting is that just 19 percent of Germans say they want to have a closer relationship with the United States - compared to 34 percent of Americans who wanted their country to get cosier with Germany.

In Europe as a whole, 50 percent of respondents opted for a more independent security relationship with the United States, which is up eight percent from last year.

Comment: See: NSA spying outrage: Berlin outraged by alleged US spying

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Light Saber

Southampton Hospital staff inundated with abusive calls after witch hunt of Ashya King family


BBC News
Thu, 11 Sep 2014 07:32 UTC
Aysha King
Doctors raised the alarm after Ashya went missing from Southampton General Hospital
Staff at the UK hospital where brain tumour patient Ashya King was treated have been inundated with abusive calls and emails, it has been revealed.

The five-year-old was removed from Southampton General Hospital by his parents, against medical advice, sparking an international hunt.

His parents were arrested in Spain, prompting a public outcry.

In her blog, hospital trust chief executive Fiona Dalton said paediatric oncology staff had been targeted.

She said: "When their email inboxes were full of personal abuse from strangers, and there were journalists camped on their front door, they were still worrying about how we could do the best thing for a small boy in Spain...

"Our switchboard and patient support services were overwhelmed with calls from irate members of the public... and many other people working here were being questioned by patients or the public about this situation, sometimes in a very aggressive way."

Comment: It's difficult to find any sympathy for these authoritarian staff members who violated the rights of a family who were only seeking to find the best treatment protocol for their son. It's becoming frightfully obvious that the State wishes to eliminate parental rights and we have now entered a new era of medical blackmail where many parents are finding the hard way how few rights they have, and how fascist their medical "care" system really is.

Ashya King case: Missing boy with brain tumor alive in Spain, parents arrested

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Target

UK Border Control targets female genital mutilation 'cutters'


RT
Thu, 11 Sep 2014 14:11 UTC
Image
© Reuters/Luke McGregor
UK Border Force officers have warned of an emerging trend of "cutters" flying into Britain to practice female genital mutilation (FGM).

Flight attendants and other aircrew are being trained to spot potential victims of female genital mutilation returning from overseas, as part of a renewed UK Border Force campaign to tackle the brutal practice.

"Instead of the girls being removed from the UK to go back to the country of origin to have this procedure carried out, now there are cutters travelling from the country of origin to the UK to carry it out in London and in other cities," Joe Cruddy, the senior Border Force officer at Gatwick, told The Guardian.

"That is an emerging trend that we have found as a result of this initiative," he said.

FGM involves removing part or all of a girl's outer sexual organs and is carried out in many African countries and in some areas of the Middle East.

Officers have been carrying out searches at airports in the last days of the school holidays, which is called the "cutting season," when girls are taken abroad to be mutilated, often to countries in Africa.

Comment: How did female genital mutilation begin?

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Camcorder

Newly released cell phone footage of Michael Brown shooting shows witnesses' describing scene

Mollie Reilly
Huffington Post
Wed, 10 Sep 2014 20:33 UTC
Image
© Scott Olson/Getty Images
A video airing on CNN Wednesday showed witnesses' immediate reactions to the shooting death of Michael Brown, the unarmed black teenager shot and killed by a Ferguson, Missouri police officer last month.

In a cell phone video provided to CNN, two men who were doing construction work on a home near the scene react to seeing Brown shot by Officer Darren Wilson.

"He had his f**king hands up," one man says in the recording.

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Question

Down the memory hole: Yesterday's 'uncomfortable' news hurriedly buried by MSM leaving tons of unanswered questions

James Howard Kunstler
Kunstler.com
Mon, 08 Sep 2014 00:00 UTC
memory hole
The memory hole is working overtime in the USA zeitgeist these days. Shit happens and a week or so later, it unhappens - at least it seems that way as manifested by the front page of The New York Times or the flapping of Anderson Cooper's gums on CNN.

Anyone remember that Malaysian airlines plane that went down in July in Ukraine killing 283 persons? US government officials were jumping up and down trying strenuously to blame Russian Donbass separatists. The trouble was, they had no evidence whatsoever and their exertions were looking ridiculous (making the USA look ridiculous, of course). Last thing we heard, there were questions about two Ukrainian air force jets chasing it, and photos of entry and exit cannon holes in the pilot's cabin. Recorded communications between the crew and traffic controllers were shoved into storage bin in the Netherlands, never to be made public. The whole story vanished from the news media like the legendary D.B. Cooper - anyone remember him? - and hasn't resurfaced since.
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Bad Guys

Disaster in the making: Bankrupting the world with perpetual war


Economic Undertow
Wed, 03 Sep 2014 00:00 UTC
fifth horseman
John Maynard Keynes famously remarked, "in the long run we are all dead ... "

It is hard to tell whether Keynes had the entire United States in mind. Watching the leering, blithering president stumbling around like a drunk at a Christmas party it is clear that the country's organizational framework is hopelessly corroded. The only question is how long is it going to last?

If you take some time away from the Internet (as I have been doing for the past few weeks) it is stunningly clear that content for the most part is aggravating noise. Every argument has fifteen sides larded over with conspiracy theories. The web is truly Hobbes' war of all against all ... with kitten videos. The major media outlets offer platefuls of propaganda-advertising disguised as 'news stories' while (most of) the rest churn out nonsense. The Internet enables those with modest mental horsepower but with co-optable ideology to disrupt/distract everyone else. Common purpose - reality - is confined to the obscure corners where the bulk of users idiots can't be bothered to look.

Moral clarity versus the president's bumbling duplicity. Events of the past year or so indicate that the West has reached the end of the 'Age of Expedients' and entering the far more demanding 'Age of Consequences'.

Comment: Lament for Babylon

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Sheriff

Baltimore police strip and search man's privates in full view of the public

Danny Jacobs
The Daily Record
Mon, 08 Sep 2014 17:29 UTC
Image
© Baltimore Police DeptOfficer Demario Harris (left) receiving 'officer of the year' award
A Baltimore man has filed a $2 million lawsuit against the Baltimore Police Department after officers allegedly performed a cavity search on him in public, in the middle of the day, for no reason. Jermaine Lyons is seeking compensatory and punitive damages for battery, false arrest, false imprisonment and violations of the Maryland Declaration of Human Rights, according to the lawsuit, filed in Baltimore City Circuit Court.

Lyons alleges he was riding his bike May 3, 2013, on his way to Patterson Park when he stopped at a store in the 200 block of North Highland Avenue. Police officers approached him and asked for identification, which Lyons provided, according to the lawsuit. The officers then asked Lyons if he had any drugs on him, to which he responded he did not, the suit alleges.

Police then proceeded to pull down his pants, then his underwear "down to his knees," and spread his legs apart, the complaint states.

"The Defendant then proceeded to conduct a cavity search of the Plaintiff in the middle of [the] sidewalk, in full view of passersby," the complaint states.

Isaac Klein, Lyons' lawyer, said the officers did not "articulate probable cause" before searching Lyons, who was not charged in connection with the incident.
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Stormtrooper

Cop won't be charged in videotaped beating of girlfriend, who says they were 'playing around'

Travis Gettys
The Raw Story
Thu, 11 Sep 2014 09:14 UTC
honolulu cop
© KGMB-TV
A Honolulu police officer with a history of domestic violence won't be charged in a videotaped apparent assault on his girlfriend.

Sgt. Darren Cachola is shown on the video repeatedly punching the woman Monday night at the restaurant where she works as a manager.

Surveillance video from Kuni's Japanese Restaurant appears to show the woman throwing a punch at Cachola, an 18-year department veteran who was recently promoted to sergeant.

Cachola strikes her again and again, and the woman's co-workers rush to her aid after she falls to the ground.

The girlfriend told police and reporters the incident was just a "misunderstanding."

"I understand how it looks," the woman said. "We train all the time together. We do kickboxing together, and we were playing around."

She told officers who were called to the restaurant that she did not want to file a complaint.

"I hit him first and we were just playing," she said. "There was no danger, no injuries, no problem."

The woman said she spent the night at Cachola's house following the incident.

Cachola's police powers have been temporarily suspended during the investigation, which was launched Tuesday after a citizen turned over the video to police.

The officer has not been charged in the incident.
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Family

Majority of Americans: Obama presidency a failure


Press TV
Thu, 11 Sep 2014 12:37 UTC
obama drones
The majority of people in the United States believe President Barack Obama is a weak leader and consider his presidency as a "failure," a recent opinion poll has found.

According to the poll by Washington Post and ABC News, by 52 to 42 percent, Americans say that Obama has been more of a failure than a success.

Those saying Obama has been a failure include 25 percent of Democrats, 29 percent of liberals, 92 percent of Conservative Republicans and 29 percent of liberals.

The poll also indicates that most Americans rate Obama as a weak leader. Only 43 percent of Americans say he is a strong leader, the lowest reading since he entered the White House.

Comment: Since Obama became the latest puppet-leader of what is euphemistically known as U.S. democracy, more and more Americans have found themselves homeless, hungry and surrounded by a police state regime which chooses to spend their money on creating and sustaining wars around the world. So it seems utterly inexplicable that there are about 30-40% of Americans still supporting him and his policies!

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Network

Battle for Internet neutrality inundates the FCC with public comments


RT
Thu, 11 Sep 2014 09:33 UTC
Image
Battle for the Net, an internet freedom campaign joined by heavyweights of the internet industry, has succeeded in sending millions of public comments to US authorities criticizing the two-tiered internet speed system that threatens net neutrality.

According to the organizers, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and members of Congress were receiving an average of 1,000 calls per minute. At the same time, the FCC says that its rule on net neutrality - which is open for public comments until September 15 - generated over 1.4 million clicks.

RT caught up with Steve Sarner, Vice President of tagged.com, and Kevin Collier, a reporter from dailydot.com to get more information about the September 10 net neutrality action day.
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