Society's ChildS


Che Guevara

180,000 Irish mortgages in arrears: Next up, mass evictions or revolution?

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Grim figures show tens of billions owed by a generation of Irish people


Homeowners are sitting on a debt time bomb with over 180,000 mortgages in arrears, shocking new figures have revealed.

Almost one in five home loans, worth €25.5 billion, were not being fully repaid at the end of March, the Central Bank confirmed.

And between January and March, bailed out banks took back the keys of more than 160 homes as the problem escalates.


Comment: Same old Land War by other means. Tenant evictions have returned to Ireland, and so has the need for boycotting (ostracising) anyone involved in this malicious practice of collecting usury on behalf of the banks.


The grim data revealed:
  • Those in arrears of more than 90 days has reached over 95,000 or 12.3% - up from 11.9% in the previous three months
  • Over 142,118 private households were behind with their repayments in the first quarter of this year
  • On the landlord and investment side, 39,371 buy-to-let mortgages are in trouble.
David Hall of the Irish Mortgage Holders' Organisation said: "A generation of Irish people are now locked into an endless battle of attrition with the banks.

"In order for those in debt to return to contributing to the economy, we need effective, swift, fair and certain resolution to the household debt crisis."

Arrow Down

Surprise! IRS workers spent $493K on personal items using corporate cards and none were disciplined

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© Fox Nation/AP

Almost one hundred Internal Revenue Service workers spent nearly $500,000 on useless items, including pornography, diet pills, romance novels, popcorn machines, wine and Nerf footballs using their corporate credit card. None of the employees were disciplined.

The report found 94 employees used their cards to buy personal items between 2010 and 2011.
Twenty-two of those had done it more than once in six months.

It has sparked criticism over the agency's internal monitoring.

Two cards were used to buy online pornography, but the employees said the cards were stolen. They also found that one IRS employee spent $2,655 on diet pills, romance novels, steaks, a smartphone and baby-related items.

Other questionable purchases included $3,152 to rent a popcorn machine and buy prizes for an employee event, $418 on novelty decorations for a manager's meeting, and $119 on Nerf footballs.

Arrow Up

Women violated during roadside search in Dallas win lawsuit with Texas Department of Public Safety

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The Texas Department of Public Safety has closed a lawsuit involving two Texas women who claimed to be violated during a roadside search last July.

The two women are Angela and Ashley Dobbs. They were pulled over for throwing cigarette butts out of their car window during a trip to Oklahoma last year. State Trooper David Farrell claimed he smelled marijuana in the car and decided to do a search. He found nothing.

Despite finding nothing, Farrell decided the women needed to be searched as well, and he called female Trooper Kelly Helleson to do the search. Here is where the problems began.

Rather than sticking to a standard pat down search, Helleson searched, quite literally, every cavity of the women's bodies. She put on a pair of latex gloves and used her fingers to search the anuses and vaginas of both women. Helleson even used the same pair of gloves for both women.

Card - MC

Unprecedented gag order placed on sidewalk chalk protester, witnesses and jury

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© Todd MecklemThe Bank of America Loves Dollars More Than Justice
As reported in a Thursday evening, June 27, BuzzFlash at Truthout update to the chilling San Diego (SD) city attorney prosecution of Jeff Olson, an SD Judge placed an unprecedented gag order on a misdemeanor trial -- in particular muzzling Olson. But it also apparently included witnesses, the jury and others.

Judge Howard Shore also chastised the Mayor of San Diego, Bob Filner. Filner apparently in the judge's eyes had the temerity to call the trial of Olson a waste of time and taxpayer money. According to the San Diego Reader, Filner sent out a memorandum on June 20 that read in part:
This young man is being persecuted for thirteen counts of vandalism stemming from an expression of political protest that involved washable children's chalk on a City sidewalk. It is alleged that he has no previous criminal record. If these assertions are correct, I believe this is a misuse and waste of taxpayer money. It could also be characterized as an abuse of power that infringes on First Amendment particularly when it is arbitrarily applied to some, but not all, similar speech.
Judge Shore, in essence, warned the mayor of San Diego, who happens to be a Democrat in a traditionally conservative city, to keep his comments to himself, and would likely have issued a gag order on the mayor if Judge Shore were able.

Handcuffs

Teenager in jail since March for sarcastic Internet comment faces 8 years in prison

Justin Carter
© facebook.com user Justin Carter
A teenager from Texas could spend the next eight years in prison if a court decides that the sarcastic comment he made during an online argument is enough to convict him of issuing a terroristic threat.

Justin Carter was only 18 years old when he and a friend got into an online spat over Facebook back in February with another person. They were arguing about the computer game "League of Legends," his dad told a local ABC affiliate, but one snarky remark made by the teen was apparently enough to raise suspicion in one woman who was watching the conversation unfold all the way up in Canada.

"Someone had said something to the effect of 'Oh you're insane, you're crazy, you're messed up in the head,'" father Jack Carter told KKVUE News, "to which he replied 'Oh yeah, I'm real messed up in the head, I'm going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still, beating hearts.'"

Bad Guys

Brazil to deploy National Security troops against protesters

The Brazilian government will deploy National Public Security Force in five cities hosting the FIFA football tournament in an effort to contain the ongoing protests across the country.

The announcement by the Brazilian Justice Ministry comes after a day of violent clashes between protesters and riot police.

The ministry decided to deploy the joint federal police force on Wednesday in response to violent rioting across the country. The troops will reportedly be tasked with mediating the conflict, rather than punishing protesters.

The National Public Security Force is usually deployed in Brazil to address serious security crises, such as prison riots or major gang violence.

People

Obama protesters rally near hospital treating Mandela

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© Peroshni Govender
South Africa's ailing anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela is doing much better in hospital, his ex-wife Winnie said on Friday before a visit by U.S. President Barack Obama that will include a personal homage to the globally admired statesman.

The faltering health of the first black president of South Africa, a revered symbol of racial reconciliation, has drawn world attention since the 94-year-old was rushed to hospital with a recurring lung infection nearly three weeks ago.

Earlier this week, the government reported Mandela's frail condition had turned critical, but since Thursday President Jacob Zuma has reported that his health is improving.

"I'm not a doctor, but I can say that from what he was a few days ago, there is great improvement," Mandela's ex-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, told reporters outside Mandela's former home in the Johannesburg township of Soweto.

But, she added, he remained "clinically unwell".

Magnet

Famed rock star opens up about his faith, career: "I believe that Jesus was... the son of God."

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© Getty ImagesThe Edge and Bono attend the Spider-Man Turn Off The Dark celebration of its 1,000 performance on Broadway at Foxwoods Theatre on May 29, 2013 in New York City.
Bono, U2′s lead singer, made headlines this week after excerpts were released from his fascinating radio interview with Focus on the Family (FOF), a Christian organization. Today, the group made available the entire exchange, offering it on the FOF website. From discussing his passion for helping the poor to detailing an intense faith in Jesus Christ, the famed musician offered up a candid - and surprising - interview.

Speaking on-air with FOF President Jim Daly, Bono offered a lens into both his personal and professional lives. Perhaps the most interesting tidbits were his statements about Jesus Christ and the gospel - favorable comments that are rarely uttered by A-list entertainers.

"So often those that struggle with accepting Jesus Christ as their savior ... it's the idea that he's the Messiah. ... how did you respond to that?," Daly asked the singer.

Che Guevara

No, I'm not going to the World Cup

This video was recorded right before the recent protests started, but with all of this going on, it becomes even more evident that the World Cup and the Olympics should not be our priority. The world has to know about what's really going on. Please share.

I know this is a brief overview, so if you want to know more about the problems discussed in the video, please check the links below:


A Nova Democracia
Domínio Público
Copa pra quem?
Comitê Popular do Rio
conectas.org
theworld.org
Marcelo Lacerda

Black Cat

Celebrity philanthropist Bono revealed to be a crony of bankers and neocons in new book, The Frontman

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© Ben Stansall/AFP/Getty ImagesBono arriving for a visit to 10 Downing Street in March 2013.
Bono the philanthropist is nothing but a crony of bankers and neocons, argues Terry Eagleton

It is no surprise that Bono and Bob Geldof, the two leading celebrity philanthropists of our time, are both Irish. The Ireland into which they were born in the 1960s was caught between third and first worlds, and so was more likely to sympathise with the wretched of the earth than were the natives of Hampstead. As a devoutly Christian nation, it also had a long missionary tradition. Black babies were a familiar object of charity in Ireland long before Hollywood movie stars began snapping them up. Bono himself was a member of a prayer group in the 1970s, before he stumbled on leather trousers and wrap-around shades. Scattered across the globe by hunger and turmoil at home, the Irish have long been a cosmopolitan people, far less parochial than their former proprietors. Small nations cannot afford the insularity of the great.

Besides, if you were born into this remote margin of Europe and yearned for the limelight, it helped to have an eye-catching cause and a mania for self-promotion. Rather as the Irish in general were forced by internal circumstance to become an international people, so men like Bono and Geldof could use their nationality to leap on to the world stage.

Bono belongs to the new, cool, post-political Ireland; but by turning back to the old, hungry, strife-torn nation, now rebaptised as Africa, he could bridge the gap between the two. Even so, he has not been greatly honoured in his own notoriously begrudging country, or elsewhere. Harry Browne recounts the (perhaps apocryphal) tale of the singer standing on stage clapping while declaring: "Every time I clap my hands, a child dies." "Then stop fucking doing it!" yelled a voice from the crowd.

Comment: For more background information on Bono's character read:
U2, Bono? Celeb Partners with Monsanto, G8, to Biowreck African Farms with GMOs
Bono and Bill Gates-Backed Global Health Charity Exposed as a Fraud