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GHB (gamma hydroxybutyrate) is a CNS depressant. It was approved by the FDA in 2002 for the singular use of treating narcolepsy. Though it initially causes feelings of relaxation and euphoria, high doses of GHB can induce sleep, coma or death. Repeated use leads to GHB addiction and, ultimately, withdrawal symptoms like insomnia, anxiety, tremors and sweating.5
Substance abuse therapy: Used as a part of many inpatient and outpatient programs, therapy is one of the cornerstones of drug addiction treatment. Individual, group and family therapy help patients and their loved ones understand the nature and causes of addiction. Therapy teaches coping strategies and life skills needed to live a productive, sober life in the community. For individuals with a co-occurring mental illness, intensive psychotherapy can also address psychiatric symptoms and find the underlying issues that contribute to addiction.
Inside Shalom House, Australia's 'strictest' drug rehabilitation | Australian Story


text: fishinfool 0 Report post Posted February 4, 2007 (edited) Went out of Beaverton with Floyd Hales yesterday, left at 7:00 am and came back in at 4:30 pm. It was very windy and cold out there, you wouldn't last 10 minutes without the hut. The ice was 11" thick and real black, lots of pressure cracks around us and lots of cracking going on, Yvette was not impressed. Ooops! Marked two fish all day on the fish finder, got the royal small black and white animal. Nobody in all the huts around us got anything, the guys in the huts on either side marked 2 fish all day as well (probably the same two I marked LOL) We were fishing in 53' of water just North of Thorah Island. Hales told us that they slayed them on Friday night and when I called today to find out about a discount for next time, they slayed them again this morning. Hmmmmmmmmmm!!!!!!! One of the other guys out there with us yesterday has his own fishing guide business and said that they were not deep enough and Hale's was probably trying to recoup a bit of cash for the bad season so far by setting up as far as the ice allows. Hope this was not the case, but I guess thats why they call it fishing. Yvette and I have never caught a Lake Trout or a Whitefish and are getting a little perplexed trying! Anyone here at OFC know of a better spot where the odds are better? Has anyone here been catching any? Here is a picture of our hut, notice the lack of fish on the doorstep. (bummer) Edited February 4, 2007 by fishinfool Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites

subset: commoncrawl


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"In love," the researchers wrote, "people have long looked for their other half; now it seems that we are rather looking for our double, as if reflected in a mirror." This is not cute..What our grandmothers told us about playing hard to get is true. In doing so, a safer online community is supposedly created..The site then creates a double or a group date with sets of mutually interested couples. He entered into an unhappy arranged marriage with a Parsi widow with two children. The Reproduction of Confucian Culture in Contemporary Korea: An Anthropological Study," In Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity. The western practice of dating is clearly out, and according to Islamic tradition, a Muslim can only marry another Muslim. Today, women have gone back to hunting their quarry – in person and in cyberspace – with elaborate schemes designed to allow the deluded creatures to think they are the hunters. Wikipedia tells us that domestic violence. Dating and a relationship interfered with that. "How to End the Online Dating Stigma". Match brains as well as beauty, and don't forget about religious and political views.
The copulatory gaze, looking lengthily at a new possible partner,. "Handbook of Relationship Initiation". But by drastically reducing the pool of potential matches, you're not only hurting yourself, you're ruining online dating for those of us who want to keep our options open. Take away challenge and their interest wanes", and thus followers are instructed to suppress their natural instincts and continue as follows:. "A How-To on Dating and Dumping". Dating violence is a type of intimate partner violence. Why dating apps are bad. Facebook Guy had failed to mention that he had no legs. the following dating challenges seem to be common to most smart people. The most important rule is to make sure the people involved actually want to be set up;. the popular dating show If You Are the One. Even parents approve, because young people get to know each other – without physical contact! Parents get to check the details important to them and the couple can connect at many levels. I needed to learn some new moves, so I signed up for a weekend flirting course. For me, the main difference between Brazilians and Americans is that you are less dependent when it comes to family..This custom is not about to vanish any time soon,. I also learned of the third-date rule – the most central and widely recognised of all dating rules – which decrees that there should be no sex until the third date,.
Dating - Wikipedia. "QQ chat rooms gain on dating agencies". Stevens, Sarah B., and Tracy L. Electronic Journal of Sociology. There is, however, an unwritten rule in the internet dating world that it is acceptable to ignore mail from people who don't interest you. women should laugh at all their date's jokes. Little Daughter: a Memoir of Survival in Burma and the West. "Dating in Boston is a man's world". American Sociological Association. "Invisible Western women". "Ask a Brazilian: Differences and Love". Blind dates, classified ads, dating websites, hobbies, holidays, office romance, social networking, speed dating..I find the majority of time, it's because of a fear of intimacy," said relationship therapist Laura Berman. Don't write a tome or reveal too much, and don't suggest meeting up right away. The most selective of all, Raya, is invite-only-you basically have to be a celebrity with a sizable Instagram following to be asked. There are four types of marriage among the Nyangatom marriage by arrangement, by the couple's mutual consent by abduction and by inheritance. Generation y relationship to technology. evolved out of a courtship ritual where young women entertained gentleman callers, usually in the home,. the "divorce party" is now flourishing in the UK too. When we went on dates, I would always be the one to leave. Social media succeeded because it notions of exclusivity, yet the tech community-infamous at this point for its diversity problems-is now happily siloing daters by race, income, and dietary preference. Patel still believes arranged marriages are a good idea: "Any marriage needs work, whether it's an arranged marriage or love. For many of us, the requisite vulnerability and exposure that comes from being really intimate with someone in a committed sense is kind of threatening..homosexual men are most attracted to men in their late teens and early twenties. And he must be well-educated. suggested that men going for long-term relationships would rather marry women in subordinate jobs than women who are supervisors. Relationship versus friendship. The other day I walked by a table of Western men at a café and nothing happened. These are not values to live by.There is, of course, nothing wrong with dating someone who checks the same boxes as you do.
Dating in 2017: Tinder makes you sad, or sadness makes …. Instead, he seemed to assume it was because I was busy, popular, and had better things to do. "The rise of the Internet as a way of meeting people makes a bit of an end run around family,". The most appealing kind of email to send is friendly, funny and flattering,. "Understanding Teen Dating Violence". The Rules centres on the premise that "men are born to respond to challenge. While parents and family members post the resumes of a prospective bride or groom,. Which seemed to make him keener. My self-esteem was on the floor and I had no idea what to do about it: like every other woman I knew I felt clueless and unwanted. "Internet changing the game of love"..Shanghai Women's Activities Centre, or Jinguoyuan in Chinese, a government-sponsored agency,. can be broadly defined as a pattern of abusive behaviors by one or both partners in an intimate relationship such as marriage, dating. "I feel invisible in Beijing. "All you should ever try and do is make two people be in the same room at the same time," says Sarah Beeny, founder of matchmaking website mysinglefriend.com. Or as Bill Maher more crudely but usefully summed it up.
What Tinder Taught Me About Dating and Humanity, Ok Just.. You picked an age range, sure, and height requirements, fine, but your options. "Treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen". The swinging woodworker dad is definitely not the guy for me, but I hope it's someone just as unexpected. In the world of online dating, women seek a partner of their age or older who has a high-paying job or has money. most marriages in the world are arranged. People didn't really care if you were a Republican or a Communist. But faced with too much choice, however, they resort to crude approaches such as choosing solely on looks. Note: although even this is changing, with the advent of test-tube babies, in vitro fertilization, and such. Researchers found that in smaller groups, people trade off different qualities in prospective mates – physical attractiveness for intelligence. A study by psychology researchers. "There's a wait list," she said. He may experience discomfort with his or his partner's normal, vulnerable emotions needed for intimacy and commitment,.both men and women, it becomes clear that both genders deal with some anxiety about dating in Boston. A no-reply policy is often the result of experience. The people you interact with most are your coworkers, but office dating is far from ideal. Disappointment can create discouragement affecting other areas of our lives. But here's the thing: When OkCupid scrubbed the data, it found that political affiliation didn't tip the scales on compatibility. Online dating seems pretty effective and, apart from the easily-identified weirdos and psychos, pretty fun. Sure, opposites sometimes attract but more often than not they repel.
Dating - AskMen. "Cougar women" in the US are coming out of the dark and flaunting their younger boyfriends. Dating basically became six degrees of Facebook, and it only got narrower and more exclusive from there. Marriage is often the last thing on the minds of young people leaving college today.. The Internet QQ chat room is challenging traditional dating agencies. "Beauty Made from Loneliness". After the movie, Finney and I took Helen home to her mother,. The hookup - that meeting and mating ritual that started among high school and college students - is becoming a trend among young people who have entered the workaday world. [More than half of unmarried men and women]. But specialization isn't just for snobs. intent on examining the mythology around how life for women. Relationships are "greedy," getting in the way of other things that young women want to be doing as adolescents and young adults, and they are often characterized by gender inequality-sometimes even violence. At best, it's narcissism; at worst, it's a kind of social inbreeding that, in the case of the most exclusive apps, begins to look suspiciously like eugenics. Here were smart, funny, good-looking guys surrounded by single women who were dying to be asked out – and not a whole lot was happening. Politik in einer deutschen Kleinstadt, [d. Forbidding experimental and serial courtship and sanctioning only arranged matches is partly a means of guarding the chastity of young people and partly a matter of furthering family interests. Centers for Disease Control. In fact, the smarter you are, the more clueless you will be, and the more problems you're going to have in your dating life. First date: Keep it simple by going for coffee or after-work drinks. Sex among middle school students may be contributing to growing sterility problems among young women in Guangzhou,. nonfiction seeks to blend personal writing with social analysis. To my astonishment, he often took that as a cue to ask me out again. "Women get in relationships because they want somebody to talk to. In recent years, a number of college newspapers have featured editorials where students decry the lack of "dating" on their campuses. Too many one-off dates that go nowhere can leave the best of us ready to hang up the little black dress in exchange for a pair of pjs and a pint of you know what. A bad date will lead to workplace awkwardness, at the very least. "My first few years out of college was about trying to get on my feet and having a good time," Welsh says. So as tempting as it might be to date my mirror image, I won't be joining any wait lists. never ask a man to dance,. "the rule of thumb seems to be that the more successful the woman, the less likely it is she will find a husband or bear a child. Dating websites choose whether to accept or reject potential users based on the preliminary information provided


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Eight analysts monitor DEUTZ shares
As at the end of 2016, eight banks and securities houses were monitoring the performance of DEUTZ shares: Bankhaus Lampe, Commerzbank, DZ Bank, Equinet, HSBC Trinkaus & Burkhardt, M.M. Warburg, Quirin Bank and Solventis.
Further information can be found on our website at www.deutz.com under Investor Relations.
If you need more information, visit our website or give us a call:
Investor Relations
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Fax: +49 (0)221 822 15 2491
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Spend $49 or more to receive free shipping!
Bella Bliss Spring Short Jammies- Tiger Lily
A Henley-style neckline adds even more appeal to our short sleeve jammies that are just right for the year's warmer months. These pajamas are designed to be a snug-fitting garment. 100% Pima cotton; machine wash.


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MAKKAH – More than 2.3 million Muslim pilgrims will begin leaving the holy city of Makkah, concluding peacefully the last of the solemn rituals of the soul-searching journey of hajj. "I feel I am born once again," Egyptian pilgrim Sabah Saeed, 49, told Reuters. "This is a great blessing from God and it makes you …
Tag: Hajj Rituals
Are There Any Lessons to Learn from Hajj?
As-salamu`alayum. Can you, please, enlighten me about some of the lessons we learn from Hajj?
Final Days of Hajj: What Pilgrims Do on Dhul-Hijjah 11-13
In the final days of Hajj, what are pilgrims doing? Read this article to learn the remaining rituals for pilgrims and where they will spend their nights.
Hajj Rituals: What to Do on the Day of `Eid (Day 10)
As mentioned in Part 1, you may leave Muzdalifah after midnight, especially if your family is accompanying you on Hajj. If you are strong and young, you may follow the Prophet's Sunnah, spending the whole night in Muzdalifah and praying the Fajr Prayer there. After Fajr, the Prophet headed to Al-Mash`ar Al-Haram, supplicated Allah until …
Pilgrim or Not, Here Is What to Do on the Day of Arafah
What to do on the Day of Arafah? Today is one of the best days in the whole year. Several texts highlight the significance of Day of Arafah and its greatness. During this day, Allah Subhanahu wa ta`ala showers His Mercy and reward over people. Pilgrims and non-pilgrims alike are offered great opportunities of forgiveness on …
Dhul-Hijjah 8: Why It Is Called Day of Water Collection
Today, Dhul-Hijjah 8 (Wednesday, Aug 30, 2017), is the first day of Hajj rituals. This day is called Yawm at-Tarwiyah or the day of preparing water. An interesting reason for naming it so is explained by Sheikh Yasir Birjas in this video. On this day, Pilgrims stay in Mina in preparation for the great Day of …
Hajj Rituals, The Spiritual Benefits
What are the spiritual benefits of Hajj? Through rituals we articulate deep spiritual emotions. Find out what they mean.
7 Fatwas on Day of Arafah
Tomorrow is the Day of Arafah, one of the greatest days in the whole year. It is marked by the pilgrims' observing the Staying at Arafah ritual, which is an essential component of Hajj, without which Hajj does not count. In this folder, we collected fatwas related to this blessed Day and its rituals.
Traveling to Hajj: What to Do?
Wa `alaykum as-Salamu wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh. In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful. All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger. In this fatwa: 1- Before going to Hajj, prospective pilgrims have to prepare themselves for this blessed journey by doing more good deeds, …
Selling Land to Cover Hajj Expenses: Permissible?
As-Salamu alaykum. Is a Muslim obliged to sell his land in order to cover the expenses of Hajj because he has no other source of income?


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The Evening Blues - 11-14-18
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features New Orleans r&b songwriter and singer Larry Williams. Enjoy!
Larry Williams - Bony Moronie
"The purpose of torture is not getting information. It's spreading fear."
-- Eduardo Galeano
News and Opinion
"First, to do no harm."
CIA doctors considered using 'truth serum' on terror suspects - Medical staff was key to waterboarding and other interrogations
The proposal to use the drug in a programme codenamed "Project Medication" was revealed in a 90-page report by a senior CIA medical officer, which was released on a judge's order to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), after a prolonged legal battle. The ACLU published the report by the unnamed officer on Tuesday.
The idea of using drugs on US captives in the "war on terror" was recommended as "probably worth a try" by the CIA's office of medical services but dropped after the agency's counter-terrorism centre decided not to ask the Department of Justice in George W Bush's administration for a legal ruling. The department had previously provided legal memos justifying the use of torture like waterboarding and confinement in small boxes.
In the case of Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, the al-Qaida mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks who was waterboarded 140 times, the CIA medical officer said that the torture, which simulates the experience of drowning, "provided periodic relief from his standing sleep deprivation" In the case of case of another senior al-Qaida member, a Saudi-born Palestinian known as Abu Zubaydah, his confinement in boxes as small as 30in by 21in by 30in was deemed to "serve as an escape from more severe measures". ...
The Abu Zubaydah interrogation led to discussion of a medical "disinhibitor" and led to a CIA review of the use of "truth serums" which looked at past US, Russian and Chinese experiments. At the end of the 2003 review, informally called Project Medication, the preferred drug recommended was a recently developed form of a barbiturate called benzodiazepine also known as Versed. Under international law, there is a prohibition against medical experimentation on prisoners and a ban on the use of "mind-altering drugs". ...
"Without the doctors' participation none of this would have happened," said Dror Ladin, an attorney on the ACLU's national security project. "They were essential participants and completely complicit."
An excellent article, worth a full read:
America's Empty Chair in Istanbul: A Sign of Decline, Not Surrender
You would hardly know it from reading the U.S. press, but a summit of considerable significance took place late last month. German, French, Russian, and Turkish leaders convened in Istanbul Oct. 27 to create a comprehensive plan to end the seven-year war in Syria. On the agenda: increase humanitarian aid, rebuild ruined towns and cities, assist returning refugees, draft a new constitution and arrange internationally supervised elections. All this will take time, but the Syria story is evolving from one of conflict to one of reconciliation and reconstruction. ... The four nations are not all fast friends, to put it mildly. But they drew together to find common interests in resolving what may count as the worst crisis since the Cold War's end. Second, there was a conspicuous absence at the Istanbul gathering symbolized by an empty chair. Despite its prominent role in the Syrian conflict for at least the past six years, if not longer, the United States wanted no part of a many-sided summit dedicated to resolving it via negotiation. ...
At this point, three things are clear about the Trump administration's approach to global affairs.
No. 1: Team Trump's foreign policies are easily the most incoherent of any administration in recent memory. The United States does or does not want to settle the Korean question. It does or does not have an even-handed plan for peace in the Mideast. It has or has not abandoned its campaign to depose the Assad government in Damascus. What appears so on Monday appears otherwise by midweek.
No 2: Time and again, this administration overplays its hand. In case after case it acts on its own, expecting other nations to follow, only to discover that few or none do. Since Trump took office, misjudging U.S. prerogatives may be among the only consistent feature of his foreign policy.
No. 3: "America First" begins to shape up as "America Last" on the foreign policy side. We are a long way from "the indispensable nation," the phrase that Madeleine Albright used for the United States during her time as secretary of state in the Clinton administration. Two years into Trump's presidency, Albright's assertion—which was never more than U.S. hubris at its purest—looks like it might be headed to a museum.
The Legacy of 1918
Donald Trump's boorishness and stupidity always ruffle feathers but almost always for the wrong reasons. Such was the case with his decision to skip one of the World War I commemoration ceremonies held in France. A very public spat with French president Emmanuel Macron may have been the precipitating factor but the tempest is a teachable moment. Focusing on Trumpian mood swings is no substitute for a study of history. ...
So what exactly is so terrible about Trump missing this mashup of foolishness? Of course every other American president would have dutifully attended, regardless of any disagreements with others. But Trump's tantrums are opportunities to think and perhaps disregard what we have been told about world history. The nations promoted as the good and benevolent are anything but. "Our" allies in Europe are certainly no allies of the people. They all promote austerity and warfare, just like their American counterparts. After years of struggle they relinquished colonies in Africa and Asia but kept them dependent through a variety of means. One hundred years after the first war for empire they still control most of the world's wealth and make decisions that impact the rest of humanity.
The break up of the Euro American alliance would be a good thing for the world. It is fraying around the edges as the Brexit vote proved but the European Union and NATO still demand unnecessary defense spending and austerity from their members. They are all corrupt and smash any efforts at independence for any country that dares to make the attempt. The United Kingdom recentlyrejected Venezuela's request to return gold that actually belongs to Venezuela. American and European elites create poverty everywhere. Their corporations are destroying the planet. The sooner this power block is brought down, the better.
Let us end this foolish reverence of the world's bad actors. The people we are told Trump insulted are themselves an insult. The dominance of the United States and European nations must come to an end. One hundred years is enough time to learn lessons. Macron and Angela Merkel and Theresa May and Justin Trudeau are the errand boys and girls of empire along with Donald Trump. Their rifts and quarrels are to be applauded. One hundred years is too long to believe in fairy tales.
Will Israel Respect the Gaza Ceasefire it Broke?
Israeli defence chief Avigdor Lieberman quits over Gaza truce
Israel's hawkish defence minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has announced he is resigning from the rightwing coalition government led by Benjamin Netanyahu in protest at a Gaza truce. Announcing his decision, Lieberman called Tuesday's Egyptian-mediated deal with the Palestinian militant group Hamas "a capitulation to terror" and called for elections. "What happened yesterday – the truce combined with the process with Hamas – is a capitulation to terror. It has no other meaning," Lieberman told journalists. "What we're doing now as a state is buying short-term quiet, with the price being severe long-term damage to national security."
Lieberman has long demanded a more aggressive Israeli policy in Gaza, and his announcement follows the most intense round of fighting since the war in 2014. The two-day bout of violence erupted after Israeli special forces engaged in a deadly firefight with gunmen on Sunday in what appeared to have been an intelligence mission deep inside the coastal enclave that was exposed when they passed a Hamas checkpoint.
Hamas and Israel have traded frequent rocket fire and airstrikes for months, often as tensions spike over the bloodshed at regular Palestinian protests along the frontier. Israeli soldiers have killed about 170 demonstrators and injured thousands more. On Wednesday, officials in Gaza said Israeli forces had killed a 20-year-old Palestinian fisherman as he was working near the strip's north. Israel's military said its troops had opened fire on man in the same area after he approached the fence.
Despite Famine, Khashoggi, and School Bus Massacre, House GOP Moves Swiftly to Keep US Involved in Saudi-Led War on Yemen
Anti-war groups have been cautiously hopefully in recent weeks that the U.S. would withdraw support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen following widespread outcry over Saudi Arabia's murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi—but those hopes were dashed late Tuesday when House Republicans moved to stop a long-planned-for vote from going to the floor.
In their final weeks in control of the House Rules Committee, Republicans adopted a rule to de-prioritize Rep. Ro Khanna's (D-Calif.) bill invoking the War Powers Resolution (H.R. 138), which argues that U.S. participation in the assault on Yemen is illegal because Congress never voted to approve it. The move ensured that Republicans can avoid voting on the bill—a vote in which they would have to choose between standing up against a war that has killed more than 15,000 civilians or angering President Donald Trump.
Ro Khanna tried to end the US involvement in the Yemen massacre
Pro-life Republicans blocked it https://t.co/YvTfEDw3Xu
— jordan (@JordanUhl) November 14, 2018
The Republican maneuver was denounced as "disgraceful" by the anti-war group Peace Action.
"Apparently, neither Saudi Arabia's brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi nor its mid-summer bombing of a school bus packed full of children were enough to break the ice surrounding House Majority Leader Paul Ryan's heart," said Kevin Martin, president of the group, in a statement.
"Millions of people in Yemen are on the verge of starvation, a crisis brought on by Saudi tactics in the war, yet in the face of a maelstrom of condemnation of Saudi Arabia from the national and international community, House leadership would still rather prevent Congress from voting on whether or not to end U.S. support for Saudi Arabia's starvation campaign in Yemen than risk interfering with arms industry profits," he added.
Theresa May has agreed to a Brexit deal with the EU. Now she needs to sell it to her Cabinet.
Prime Minister Theresa May finally agreed to a draft deal with Brussels late Tuesday on the terms of Britain's exit from the European Union — more than two years after the divisive referendum. That was probably the easy part. Now she has to convince her divided Cabinet to back it.
May will convene an emergency Cabinet meeting at 2 p.m. (9 a.m. ET) Wednesday, where she will attempt to win support from senior ministers. However, some in her government are so opposed to the deal they say they will resign over it. If enough quit, May's time in Downing Street will be up.
There is also a ticking clock. The PM is hustling to get the deal approved by Parliament — where her government doesn't command a majority — before Britain officially leaves the bloc on March 29, 2019. If Britain does not agree to a deal before that date, it will crash out of the EU with potentially catastrophic economic consequences.
Hardline Brexiters (those bent on leaving Europe whatever the cost) have already complained that the draft deal does not give them enough, while some Remainers (those opposed to leaving the EU) have also called on the Cabinet to reject it. The Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party, which props up May's minority government, have warned that the agreement has the potential to breakup the United Kingdom, and a vocal group, including members of her own party, are holding out hope for a second referendum to potentially scupper Brexit altogether.
German economy shrinks for first time since 2015
Fears for the health of the eurozone economy have intensified after Germany, the single currency's powerhouse, suffered its first contraction in more than three years.
Tough emission tests affecting the country's strategically important automotive industry, lower consumer spending, and weaker exports triggered by rising global protectionism resulted in the economy shrinking by 0.2% in the third quarter of 2018.
Germany's first period of falling output since the first three months of 2015, and its worst performance since early 2013, helped drag eurozone growth from 0.6% to 0.2% in the three months ending in September, highlighting the vulnerability of the eurozone to a disorderly Brexit.
El Chapo's lawyer just claimed Mexico's president took "millions in bribes" from Sinaloa cartel
After a morning plagued by delays and issues with the jury, the trial of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán began Tuesday in Brooklyn with an explosive round of opening statements, including allegations from the defense that the current and former presidents of Mexico took "hundreds of millions in bribes" from a Sinaloa cartel leader named Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada. On one hand, federal prosecutors alleged that El Chapo controlled a "vast global narco-empire" worth billions of dollars for more than 30 years. Prosecutor Adam Fels said that El Chapo shipped tons of cocaine and other drugs to the U.S., and was the "hands-on" boss who personally pulled the trigger on multiple murders.
In response, El Chapo's lawyer Jeffrey Lichtman essentially alleged that El Chapo had been framed by El Mayo, another Mexican drug kingpin who prosecutors say partnered with El Chapo to run the Sinaloa cartel. Lichtman said El Mayo was the true leader of the cartel. "While the world focuses on this mythical Chapo figure," Lichtman said, "the world is not focusing on Mayo Zambada." Lichtman went on to claim that El Mayo put a spotlight on El Chapo by corrupting members of the Mexican government and working with the DEA. El Mayo is under indictment in the United States and one of the most wanted fugitives, but Lichtman claims the U.S. only "pretends to want him."
"He bribes the entire government of Mexico, including up to the very top, the current president of Mexico," Lichtman said of El Mayo. He added that El Mayo's brother and two sons are cooperating with the U.S. government, and alleged that "they work together when it suits them, Mayo and the U.S. government."
DEA and ICE are Hiding Surveillance Cameras in Streetlights
The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have hidden an undisclosed number of covert surveillance cameras inside streetlights around the country, federal contracting documents reveal. According to government procurement data, the DEA has paid a Houston, Texas company called Cowboy Streetlight Concealments LLC roughly $22,000 since June 2018 for "video recording and reproducing equipment." ICE paid out about $28,000 to Cowboy Streetlight Concealments over the same period of time.
It's unclear where the DEA and ICE streetlight cameras have been installed, or where the next deployments will take place. ... Christie Crawford, who owns Cowboy Streetlight Concealments with her husband, a Houston police officer, said she was not at liberty to discuss the company's federal contracts in detail. "We do streetlight concealments and camera enclosures," Crawford told Quartz. "Basically, there's businesses out there that will build concealments for the government and that's what we do. They specify what's best for them, and we make it. And that's about all I can probably say." However, she added: "I can tell you this—things are always being watched. It doesn't matter if you're driving down the street or visiting a friend, if government or law enforcement has a reason to set up surveillance, there's great technology out there to do it." ...
Chad Marlow, a senior advocacy and policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties, says efforts to put cameras in street lights have been proposed before by local law enforcement, typically as part of a "smart" LED street light system. "It basically has the ability to turn every streetlight into a surveillance device, which is very Orwellian to say the least," Marlow told Quartz. "In most jurisdictions, the local police or department of public works are authorized to make these decisions unilaterally and in secret. There's no public debate or oversight."
NY Politician: We Need to Block $3 Billion Handout for Amazon & Use Money to Forgive Student Debt
#HQ2Scam Hashtag Lifts Off After Cities Reveal $2.1 Billion in Tax Giveaways for Amazon
While business-friendly politicians applauded Amazon's decision to establish two new headquarters in New York and just outside Washington DC, local officials, residents, and critics of the "race to the bottom" the $800 billion corporation held in its search for new office locations denounced the move on Tuesday, decrying the effects the new headquarters will likely have on the chosen cities. After a 14-month-long process in which Amazon pitted cities against one another in a competition to see who would offer the company the most enticing tax incentives and other perks, the neighborhoods of Long Island City in Queens, New York and Crystal City in Arlington, Virginia were named as Amazon's new second and third homes.
Using the hashtag #HQ2Scam, journalists and critics condemned New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio, and Virginia Governor Ralph Northam—all Democrats—for their desperate attempts to woo Amazon with tax breaks at the expense of their constituents. New York offered more than $1.5 billion in "performance-based" tax breaks to the company, while Virginia offered $573 million, with officials from both states applauding the company's promise to bring jobs to both states.
New York City Council members were among those who asked why Amazon—headed by the world's richest man, Jeff Bezos—is in need of tax incentives at all from a state where 5.5 million daily commuters face frequent delays due to the city's decaying subway system and the lack of affordable housing has reached a "crisis point."
"I also don't understand why a company as rich as Amazon would need nearly $2 billion in public money for its expansion plans at a time when New York desperately needs money for affordable housing, transportation, infrastructure, and education," Speaker Corey Johnson said in a statement.
As Jeff Bezos Earns $191K Per Minute, Why is NY & VA Giving Amazon $3 Billion in Corporate Welfare?
Matt Whitaker's appointment is already at risk of throwing the American legal system into chaos
President Trump's appointment of Matthew Whitaker as Acting Attorney General not only threatens the fate of Bob Mueller's Russia probe, it may imperil everything Whitaker touches at the Department of Justice, legal experts told VICE News. On Tuesday, Maryland launched a legal assault on Whitaker, asking a federal judge to boot the acting AG out of the job on constitutional grounds. A half-dozen legal experts called the state's effort unprecedented, but so too is Whitaker's appointment, they added.
The challenge is just the opening salvo of a prolonged legal battle that could put Whitaker on the defensive for the entirety of his tenure atop the DOJ. Some experts said that if Whitaker's appointment is ultimately deemed void, then anything he does in the post may be ruled invalid as well — a ruling that could spark chaos in the American legal system, especially if he's already spent months on the job. That could include anyone charged this week in the Russia probe led by special counsel Robert Mueller. The mere threat of such an outcome illustrates the unprecedented challenges Trump has thrust upon the American legal system, forcing lawyers and judges to grapple with exotic hypotheticals once only entertained in classrooms.
"Anything that Whitaker's got his hands on could be challenged," said Rebecca Roiphe, a former prosecutor and expert on prosecutorial ethics at New York Law School. "It's totally insane, but what we're really seeing is the natural result of Trump's sustained attack on the Department of Justice."
Maryland's attempt to remove Trump's AG appointee has no obvious historical precedent, according to a half-dozen legal and constitutional experts who spoke to VICE News. While states frequently challenge federal decisions, they don't typically try to get the AG fired. And it's far from clear that the novel angle of attack will even succeed. "Maryland might be right that the appointment was unconstitutional or unlawful, but even if it was, that doesn't mean Maryland has standing to make that claim," said Peter Smith, an expert on Constitutional law at George Washington University. "Courts can't just opine on any issue. You need to have a plaintiff that's been somehow injured in the case."
Democrats seek agreements with Trump administration
A lame duck session of Congress opens today with Democrats signaling that they wish to reach agreement with the Trump White House on a range of budget and policy issues in order to "clear the decks" before the new Democratic-controlled House of Representatives takes office in January. The Senate and House must pass seven of 12 separate appropriations bills by December 8 to avoid a partial shutdown of the federal government, with the most contentious bill involving funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The House version of the bill, passed by the outgoing Republican majority, provided $5 billion for Trump's wall along the US-Mexico border. The Senate version provides only $1.6 billion and it is not specifically earmarked for a wall.
House-Senate talks on the DHS budget reportedly involve a deal to provide some initial funding for the wall in exchange for a limited restoration of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program established by President Obama through an executive order and rescinded by Trump using the same method last year. ... "On the general issue of border security, we've had great discussions in the appropriations process. They've been bipartisan," Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer told reporters. "And I would hope that the President wouldn't interfere and we could get something good done." On the House side, Representative Nita Lowey of New York, who is expected to become chair of the powerful Appropriations Committee in January, urged a deal on the DHS budget that would include partial funding of the wall. ...
A spokesman for Lowey told the Wall Street Journal the Democrats would like to complete the negotiations on the wall for DACA deal this year, rather than carry it over into next year when they will control the House. ...
House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, who is likely to become Speaker in the new Congress, insisted throughout the fall campaign that Democratic candidates for the House should not "take the bait" of making public declarations of opposition to Trump's brutal persecution of immigrants, including the forced separation of parents and children, the deployment of thousands of heavily armed regular troops to the border, the fear-mongering about caravans of Central American immigrants traveling north through Mexico towards the US border, and the threat to revoke "birthright citizenship," guaranteed for the past 150 years under the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.
The statements by Schumer and Lowey demonstrate that the refusal to oppose Trump's anti-immigrant policies was not merely a campaign tactic—as reactionary as that would be—but reflected a broader willingness by the Democratic leadership to accommodate Trump's policies and share responsibility for them.
Your tax dollars at work:
Hundreds of U.S. troops are now living at the border in a muddy camp with nothing to do
It's been unseasonably cold, and wet, at this site of a new U.S. base camp that's now home to several hundred active-duty U.S. Army soldiers. They're part of the more than 5,000 troops Donald Trump deployed to the U.S.-Mexico border ahead of the midterms to ward off the so-called caravan of migrants headed north from Central America.
Fernando Garcia: The Militarization of the U.S. Border Will Spread If We Don't Fight Back
'Stop lying' about Florida recounts, Democrats warn Trump
Democratic leaders have demanded that Donald Trump "stop bullying, harassing and lying" about election recounts in Florida before American democracy is put at risk. Chuck Schumer, the top Democrat in the Senate, called on Republican governor Rick Scott to recuse himself from overseeing his US Senate race against incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson.
The Senate minority leader's stand came as Trump, Scott and Republicans pursue a scorched earth strategy in Florida, deploying battalions of lawyers and throwing out baseless claims of fraud.
Troubled recounts in Senate and gubernatorial elections in Florida are now barreling towards a Thursday deadline amid an increasingly acrimonious fight that has echoes of the famous 2000 presidential recount. The White House – in the form of Trump's Twitter feed and public comments – has also plunged into the fray. ...
Trump and Scott have been backed by far-right media and other conservative figures in sowing mistrust about the electoral process. The president's son, Donald Trump Jr, used Twitter to share a headline that read: "Nearly 200,000 Florida Voters May Not Be Citizens." He did not mention the article, regarding voter rolls, was published more than six years ago. The source, NBCMiami.com, subsequently attached an update that made clear the initial list of 180,000 names was whittled to 2,625 and then 85.
The state elections department and the Florida department of law enforcement, which are run by Republican appointees, have said they have seen no evidence of voter fraud. A Broward county judge challenged anyone who has evidence of fraud to file a report.
Heh, bookmark this article and make a note to read it in 6 months to a year to see how it holds up.
At Freshman Orientation, Young and Growing Progressive Caucus Makes Clear It Will 'Fight Like Hell' for Bold Democratic Agenda
As some members of the House Democratic leadership quickly pivoted to centrist talk of bipartisanship and compromise with the Trumpian Republican Party in the aftermath of last week's midterm elections, the young, diverse, and rapidly growing Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) used its freshman member orientation on Monday to make clear that it has no intention of watering down its demands for a living wage, Medicare for All, bold climate action, and other ambitious solutions to pressing problems.
"A number of members [of Congress] prefer to spend their life in the fetal position, rocking in the corner of a room," declared CPC co-chair Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), who led Tuesday's meeting at the AFL-CIO's headquarters in Washington, D.C. "We don't do that. We're the folks out there trying to advocate for big change. We're going to fight like hell to get those things done, and that's what we're going to expect out of leadership, as well."
As the orientation unfolded, incoming progressives like Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota posted photos to Instagram using hashtags like #DreamTeam and #ChangeCantWait to signal their plans to start fighting for an ambitious progressive agenda as soon as the new Congress convenes in January.
The addition of around 20 newly elected members to the CPC brings total membership of the caucus to over 90 and moves its ideological center of gravity significantly leftward, given that many members were elected on unabashedly left-wing platforms that called for transformative climate action and robust economic measures to stem soaring inequality. Given that Democrats are likely to end up with 16-seat advantage in the House, at most, the CPC will have tremendous leverage to shape the party's leadership, policy agenda, and ideological trajectory in the months and years to come.
The Earth is in a death spiral. It will take radical action to save us
It was a moment of the kind that changes lives. At a press conference held by climate activists Extinction Rebellion last week, two of us journalists pressed the organisers on whether their aims were realistic. They have called, for example, for UK carbon emissions to be reduced to net zero by 2025. Wouldn't it be better, we asked, to pursue some intermediate aims? A young woman called Lizia Woolf stepped forward. She hadn't spoken before, but the passion, grief and fury of her response was utterly compelling.
"What is it that you are asking me as a 20-year-old to face and to accept about my future and my life? … This is an emergency. We are facing extinction. When you ask questions like that, what is it you want me to feel?" We had no answer. Softer aims might be politically realistic, but they are physically unrealistic. Only shifts commensurate with the scale of our existential crises have any prospect of averting them. Hopeless realism, tinkering at the edges of the problem, got us into this mess. It will not get us out.
Public figures talk and act as if environmental change will be linear and gradual. But the Earth's systems are highly complex, and complex systems do not respond to pressure in linear ways. When these systems interact (because the world's atmosphere, oceans, land surface and lifeforms do not sit placidly within the boxes that make study more convenient), their reactions to change become highly unpredictable. Small perturbations can ramify wildly. Tipping points are likely to remain invisible until we have passed them. We could see changes of state so abrupt and profound that no continuity can be safely assumed. Only one of the many life support systems on which we depend – soils, aquifers, rainfall, ice, the pattern of winds and currents, pollinators, biological abundance and diversity – need fail for everything to slide. ...
The problem is political. A fascinating analysis by the social science professor Kevin MacKay contends that oligarchy has been a more fundamental cause of the collapse of civilisations than social complexity or energy demand. Control by oligarchs, he argues, thwarts rational decision-making, because the short-term interests of the elite are radically different to the long-term interests of society. This explains why past civilisations have collapsed "despite possessing the cultural and technological know-how needed to resolve their crises". Economic elites, which benefit from social dysfunction, block the necessary solutions. The oligarchic control of wealth, politics, media and public discourse explains the comprehensive institutional failure now pushing us towards disaster.
Two tasks need to be performed simultaneously: throwing ourselves at the possibility of averting collapse, as Extinction Rebellion is doing, slight though this possibility may appear; and preparing ourselves for the likely failure of these efforts, terrifying as this prospect is. ... Because we cannot save ourselves without contesting oligarchic control, the fight for democracy and justice and the fight against environmental breakdown are one and the same.
Pipeline Opponents Make Gains in Midterms as Federal Judge Halts Keystone XL Pipeline
A U.S. distict court in Montana last week ordered a halt to all work on the Keystone XL pipeline, the fossil fuel project that inspired a revival of direct action protest tactics across the U.S. The decision came at the end of an election week in which Democrats took control of the U.S. House of Representatives, promising in the short term to hold climate hearings and in the long term to work toward a "Green New Deal." Meanwhile, pipeline opponents made electoral gains of their own in local races in South Dakota and Nebraska. But the unwieldy scale of the climate crisis hung heavily over the election results and the limited possibilities they opened up for legislative action. The Keystone XL ruling represented a concrete blow to the fossil fuel industry driving the crisis.
The effort to stop the pipeline has become a touchstone for the U.S. environmental movement, with the fate of the project carrying considerable symbolic and material weight. ...
The court decision declared illegal one of Donald Trump's first executive orders, issued days after his inauguration as a signal to fossil fuel opponents and the oil industry that America was moving full speed ahead on oil and gas extraction. ... In his decision, Judge Brian Morris, who was appointed by Obama, emphasized that Trump "simply discarded prior factual findings related to climate change to support its course reversal." He added, "An agency cannot simply disregard contrary or inconvenient factual determinations that it made in the past." In response, Trump told reporters, "It was a political decision made by a judge. I think it's a disgrace." He speculated that the case would go to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "We're slowly putting new judges in the 9th Circuit," he said.
Individuals from all sorts of progressive grassroots movements made unprecedented efforts to win elected office this year, and pipeline fighters were no exception. ... One of the most high-profile wins for progressives was that of Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez from New York. ... South Dakota, one of three states through which KXL passes, saw numerous anti-pipeline organizers run for local office, and some won. Julian Bear Runner, a 33-year-old who was arrested at Standing Rock, was elected president of Pine Ridge reservation's Oglala Sioux Tribe. A state Senate seat was won by Red Dawn Foster, the sister of Red Fawn Fallis, the Dakota Access Pipeline opponent who received the most serious prison sentence among those charged during the fight, after a gun Fallis had been carrying fired when police tackled her.
In Nebraska, home to another arm of the Keystone XL pipeline resistance, Democrats gained three seats in the state legislature, which could boost an effort to pass eminent domain laws meant to complicate plans to plow through the land of property of owners who don't want a pipeline.
California faces forest fires year round due to climate change
Climate change is making hurricanes even more destructive, research finds
Climate change worsened the most destructive hurricanes of recent years, including Katrina, Irma and Maria, by intensifying rainfall by as much as 10%, new research has found. High-resolution climate simulations of 15 tropical cyclones in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans found that warming in the ocean and atmosphere increased rainfall by between 5% and 10%, although wind speeds remained largely unchanged.
This situation is set to worsen under future anticipated warming, however. Researchers found that if little is done to constrain greenhouse gas emissions and the world warms by 3C to 4C this century then hurricane rainfall could increase by a third, while wind speeds would be boosted by as much as 25 knots.
"Climate change has exacerbated rainfall and is set to enhance the wind speed," said Christina Patricola, who undertook the study with her Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory colleague Michael Wehner. ... The research, published in the journal Nature, used climate models to see how factors such as air and ocean temperatures have influenced hurricanes. Projections into the future were then made, based upon various levels of planetary warming.
The findings suggest that enormously destructive storms have already been bolstered by climate change and similar events in the future are on course to be cataclysmic.
Louisiana landowners sue Bayou Bridge pipeline for trespassing and damage
Landowners in Louisiana's Atchafalaya Basin have filed suit against the company building the controversial Bayou Bridge pipeline for trespassing and property damage, claiming that it did not obtain legal authority before running stretches of the nearly completed pipeline through their property. It's the latest legal skirmish in a long battle between Louisiana activists and Energy Transfer Partners (ETP), which is also behind the the more well-known Keystone XL pipeline, and one that advocates hope might shutter the nearly completed 160-mile stretch of pipe before it goes live.
"I'm outraged that private individuals have trespassed on this land and have destroyed it – a private company who acts as though they are above the law," said Katherine Aaslestad, one of three landowners named in the suit. "My objective is to be a steward of the land, to protect it from the devastation caused by pipeline development … and to encourage other landowners to stand up for their rights." According to landowners, the pipeline construction involved the cutting down of numerous trees and the accumulations of sediment left over from digging the trench where the pipeline runs.
The company was in the process of trying to use the controversial doctrine of eminent domain to "expropriate" the land, which allows the government to seize land for the public good. But according to the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), the company never actually finished the legal process of having the land turned over before starting to build. Construction in the 38 acres owned by landowners in the suit occurred over this summer. "The corporation didn't even wait for permission from the court to construct the property. They didn't even wait to get compensation [for], or written permission from all the co-owners," said CCR attorney Bill Quigley. "They trespassed onto this property and constructed this pipeline without legal authority to do so," he continued.
Anne Rolfes, founding director of the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, which is fighting the pipeline, said ETP's strategy was to make minimal, "feeble" attempts to find and contact land owners, because when they cannot be found, it initiates a much more favorable negotiation process with the state. Their claims are scheduled to be heard by a state judge on Friday, who could theoretically order ETP to deconstruct stretches of pipeline built illegally, but advocates concede this is unlikely.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
Intercepted: Donald Trump and the Counterrevolutionary War
Midterm Results: the War Party Rules
Six Recent US Antiwar Demonstrations Your Rulers Don't Want You Talking About
When Media Say 'Working Class,' They Don't Necessarily Mean Workers—but They Do Mean White
How Trump's presidency has divided Jewish America
Cuba to pull doctors out of Brazil after President-elect Bolsonaro comments
Acting Attorney General's Appointment Challenged in Court
Trump and the Midterms: Is It Not The Economy, Stupid?
Polar bear numbers in Canadian Arctic pose threat to Inuit, controversial report says
A Little Night Music
Larry Williams - She Said Yeah
Larry Williams - Let Me Tell You, Baby
Larry Williams - Hootchy Koo
Larry Williams - Took A Trip
Larry Williams - Heeby Jeebies
Larry Williams - Slow Down
Larry Williams - Bad Boy
Larry Williams - Peaches And Cream
Larry Williams - You Bug Me Baby
Larry Williams - Jockamo (Iko Iko)
Larry Williams - The Dummy
Just curious
Why does the "Evening Blues" get published at 2:27 EST?
Help me Mr. Wizard!
Drizzle, Drazzle, Druzzle, Drome;
Time for this one to come home.
Stop the War!
I hope to be in your time zone again ...
in a bit. I am just glad you are not posting in the HI time zone in the early afternoon, because then I really, really couldn't read it.
Mr. Lieberman is not a 'Lieber Mann' and rich Mr. Besoz is the cheapest fellow in the universe. Schmocks they are both.
OMG who would have thought the world could be that desperate and lost thirty years ago?
Nothing more I want to talk about. Have a good evening and thanks for the kind words.
Love is all we have to give.
EB gets linked
on Twitter every evening.
"I don't want to run the empire, I want to bring it down!" ~Dr. Cornel West
"There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare." Sun Tzu
"Propaganda is one hell of a drug." Abby Martin
"politicians are cowards." Mike Gravel
i appreciate the early posting
I'm not always around in the pm. In fact, I'm an AM person. So I like an early posting. It's been rainy here so a pm comment is possible from me. Most of the time I catch up with the EB in the AM.
That said, I always appreciate Joe's posting an excellent collection of articles....and good musical selections! The difficulty comes in singling out a particular story upon which to comment. Really the news cycle becomes a little over whelming...probably by design.
Today I've been looking at the undecided elections in GA and FL (both) next door. Not holding my breath, but really interesting. Came across this and posted it earlier... expresses my view...
Hope you are all doing well!
"Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream."
Me too, Lookout!
I'm not always around in the pm. In fact,
Yep, I am often up as early as 4am and on the road walking as soon as it is light. I think they call us folks larks.
"I don't want to run the empire, I want to bring it down!" ~Dr. Cornel West
"There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare." Sun Tzu
"Propaganda is one hell of a drug." Abby Martin
"politicians are cowards." Mike Gravel
I'm allergic to mornings
This is why I rarely comment in them.
No doubt about it.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
Hey all.
I don't often have the chance to hang out in the EB (this week a small exception), but I always appreciate the post.
Thanks, Joe! Lots to read and absorb here.
Hope everyone has a wonderful evening/afternoon/morning.
Suddenly I feel fine
Thanks for the Blues, joe. Besides music and news, I have no idea why my sense of well-being suddenly returned, I forgot. lol
Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard - It's All Going to Pot
woo hoo
Glad your sense of well-being is revived
It's all going to pot
Whether we like it or not
The best I can tell
The world's gone to hell
And we're all gonna miss it a lot
Enjoy all that is left while it's still there.
CIA led Torture
In an American History class I took in college, I remember our professor decided to read, out loud to the class, a journalists eye witness account of a lynching that took place in the Mid-West at the turn of the century.
After listening to the shockingly grisly details of the dismemberment that was performed on the victim, along with setting him on fire, while he was still alive, what sickened me further was to hear that this grotesque form of execution took place in a picnic like atmosphere where the white townspeople took their children to attend the days "festivities", complete with the picture taking portion of the afternoon alongside a dangling mutilated corpse.
Our collective horror must have been visible on our faces because after our professor was finished reading the account, he asked how many of us thought a lynching was merely a hanging? The hands raised in the air to that question were all white, mine included.
Perhaps the new information about the CIA led "interrogations" should be read over a bullhorn in every neighborhood across the Nation at dinner time for a month when the good people of America are getting ready to say Grace, so that they too can be disabused of the notion that these "interrogations" we're anything but "humane".
As to the CIA team of Mengele-esque ghouls, my condolences to the pitiful souls who have lost all their humanity by treating other human beings like slaughterhouse animals. May they be haunted in their dreams for their complicity for the rest of their lives.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
Evening Joe
Pity we can't put them on the same list we put child molesters on.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
Powerful, zoe.
The term "lynching" to me is another euphemism that really covers up the sheer terror of what these murders were really about.
It's fucking mob murder, is what it really is. Mob rule judge and jury.
And this is where we bow to the dictates of the fascist RW media, who, besides getting the weekly Frank Luntz talking points of how to frame issues negatively (i.e. entitlements, anchor babies, illegal immigrants, etc), recklessly throw around words like "mob rule" accusations for totally inappropriate actions like protests.
Blacks have been terrorized by mob violence for centuries.
It galls me when the RW carelessly throw around misleading lies, and don't have the courage to call what was happening (and still is) to black folk, mob violence.
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
- Kurt Vonnegut
The appropriation of language
Knowing what I know now, I felt someone should've really called out Clarence Thomas for the self aggrandizing chicken shit imposter that he is when he appropriated the term "lynching" while his ancestors rolled over in their graves.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
My college roommate's elderly dad
Picnic environment, lynching for the occasion.
Most people have no clue
About our shameful history.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
First hand account of fleeing the fire in Paradise
if anyone is interested. Besame on DK is a long time member and she wrote about how fast the fire came up and what she went through to get away. She says that she did not receive any warning from the city to get out. The toll is 45 and it's expected to go up. This was not an ordinary fire in any sense. The winds made it into an ungawdly inferno with incredible forces behind it.
DK link and worth a read.
Joe posted this article last week, but in case some missed it. Apt description of it.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
I didn't know that Besame lived there.
I knew about p50 and smileycreek because they were regulars in CUA, back when I was doing that. Seems about a hundred years ago.
Her pictures are incredible aren't they?
I really can't imagine what it must have been like for her and the other people who went through this. As she said, she not only didn't receive a call to flee, but she didn't even think about notifying her neighbors. How do you choose what to take when you only have minutes to decide?
Paradise was such a beautiful and peaceful place and it's gone because PG&E put profits ahead of people. They knew that the fire danger was high because they warned people that they might be shutting down the power and yet they didn't. Looks like there is proof of that too.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
I think it's time to get together with TOP
and help each other.
First time I read again there right now and to see all the old names I knew from years ago together with all the desaster they experience and go through, I can only see a humongous stupidity to not pool together and try to unite to fight for what is left of our humanity.
Smileycreek and P50, knuckleheads home gone, I mean ... what else has to happen for you to reunite with old online friends.
It's a desaster.
Love is all we have to give.
ouch, that apparently was not that well taken ...
hmmm, I can take it.
Love is all we have to give.
This is an incredible first person story
I no longer visit dkos, so I am so glad that you linked Besame's story. It is amazing.
Wildfire is terrifying. While hurricanes can be terrifying, at least those of us in the hurricane zone usually have enough time to take precautions and evacuate. With a wildfire like the Camp Fire, there was so little time for people to get out.
PG&E is part of the problem, but the bigger issue is climate change which has created the conditions for these wildfires to be more and more common.
Thank you for providing this link, Snoopy!
"I don't want to run the empire, I want to bring it down!" ~Dr. Cornel West
"There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare." Sun Tzu
"Propaganda is one hell of a drug." Abby Martin
"politicians are cowards." Mike Gravel
Thanks snoopy for the link to Besame's story.
The horror of her experience is almost unimagineable. The photos portray the horror so clearly. I hope with time the thousands of people from Paradise will find some comfort and healing from the trauma of it all.
I believe Chapo.
Evening all,
The corruption in Mexico around the drug trade is surreal, has been for a long time. Maybe AMLO will be able to put an end to it. That's what the Mexican people want him to do.
That was a good vid from Vice about the invasion. We need a name for the defensive positions that the President is preparing. The Trump Line would be the obvious choice but it doesn't have the gravitas of the Maginot Line or the Siegfried Line.
Heh. The Hair Line? :)
Seriously, I have been trying to keep from being overwhelmed while contemplating how we are going to humanely handle the millions of climate refugees from Central America, or from possible future wars in say Venezuela and Brazil?
Heh. No fcking wall for sure.
"Trump's Solution 2 WorldwideClimate Immigration Is 2 Build More Walls" https://t.co/WrTKgLsoay #activism #feedly Displaying his minimal understanding of geography and foreign policy, he suggested that Spain build a wall across the vast Sahara desert 2 stop the flow of migrants.
— #RepealCitizensUnited EDCAFFREY #BasicIncome 2( (@CaffreyEj) November 14, 2018
.... Will Dems give way to this in exchange for DACA? Why?
URGENT! Take action to stop these two border bills that threaten all Wilderness areas within 100 miles of U.S. Border with Canada and Mexico and would waive 36 federal laws to build Trump's border wall: https://t.co/9g928QrxD7 https://t.co/8joIPvb4BW
— Wilderness Watch (@WildernessWatch) November 10, 2018
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Most probably
In fact they already tried to do so during the last budget crisis. They told Trump that they would give him $25 billion for his wall if he didn't end DACA. He agreed to that deal, but then he went back on it. Then Schumer said that he was willing to close down the government until it was funded. That lasted two days and then he made a deal with McConnell who promised to reconsider it in the near future. Guess what ... McConnell never did anything and Schumer let him get away with it.
Go democrats! Be the Resistance.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
The white line.
Can Nancy go any lower?
Yes this is a rhetorical question, but this floored me.
House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, who is likely to become Speaker in the new Congress, insisted throughout the fall campaign that Democratic candidates for the House should not "take the bait" of making public declarations of opposition to Trump's brutal persecution of immigrants, including the forced separation of parents and children, the deployment of thousands of heavily armed regular troops to the border, the fear-mongering about caravans of Central American immigrants traveling north through Mexico towards the US border, and the threat to revoke "birthright citizenship," guaranteed for the past 150 years under the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.
Looking back I guess that I shouldn't have been surprised by this since the democrats looked the other way when Obama was doing much the same thing. "Take the bait." What does that even mean? Don't publicly protest against the DHS' policies? For gawd's sake why not? Did Nancy think that if people didn't see the democrats being against that then maybe they would vote for them? Who would have voted for any democrats if a republican was doing the same thing?
This country is having the mental breakdown that someone else noticed.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
Good evening, js and all !
When I read about the meeting in Istanbul around the time that it happened I was puzzled about the work on the constitution and free and fair elections. Imposed by these powers? What could possibly go wrong.
More on the meeting:
Was the Recent #Istanbul Summit's Call for a Political Resolution in #Syria Realistic? @kristinakausch, Bakr Sidqi and @YoungsRichard answer. https://t.co/PHchRR7tf9
— Carnegie Middle East (@CarnegieMEC) November 14, 2018
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
this is the most excruciatingly depressing
collection of Evening Blues news and commentary that I can remember.
torture. rendition. climate change. billion dollar tax break scams. climate change. elections ratfuckery. yemen. climate change. government surveillance.
how much more of this can we take?
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01, a Boeing 757 (AA Flight 77) flew into the Pentagon.
If you can't accept these indisputable facts, I can't fake an interest in your opinions about anything else.
Agree news is depressing....
but sadly most Americans do not read or hear about most of what we are reading because they depend on the mainstream media and remain ignorant and wonder why things are the way they are.
Depressing or not, glad Joe and others here post such timely essays for us to read and contemplate.
Life is what you make it, so make it something worthwhile.
This ain't no dress rehearsal!
It's what people of a more Right persuasion call "redpilling"
Reference to The Matrix movie, of course.
"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" — the hurdle to get over is that the truth reveals a state of affairs that is mind-blowingly horrible, directed by people (or "agents") who are the same.
Hey UR
I can't tell the difference meshelf. But agree this one is full of bloody horrors.
I would bet that very few people know about much of what joe excerpts.
Hope you have a good evening.
BREAKING: St. Paul just passed a $15 minimum wage for over 50,000 in the city. That's 25% of all workers! St. Paul is the first to pass $15 since the 2018 midterm election. Amazing hard work from all the groups that fought and won today! Congratulations. #FightFor15 pic.twitter.com/lCgQU6UkRX
— Fight For 15 (@fightfor15) November 14, 2018
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
This is interesting
I am seeing more and more videos of very strange irregularities regarding the California fires.
In this video, single homes were burned down with no damage to neighboring homes.
Can anyone explain this? pic.twitter.com/YXCbWO9373
— Mike Tokes (@MikeTokes) November 15, 2018
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
Strange, huh!
Here's more strange.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by a far left sympathiser. (Dem) The key would be to tie Trump into the lighting of the match. Cant build a wall while a fire's burning! #AmericaloseswhenDemvsRep pic.twitter.com/fBrrOZdWHK
— Thomas Adams (@ThomasAdamsforP) November 10, 2018
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
yeah, that's strange all right.
strange as in, STFU you dumbass.
of course some of them might be arson -- such as, burned down by someone who's underwater on their mortgage.
the idea that roving left-wing stochastic terrorists are burning down houses here and there when houses are burning down left, right and center in other neighborhoods is just typical conspiratorial nonsense.
in Manitoba the racists used to accuse the Indians on the reservations of deliberately setting forest fires in summer, so they could hire on to the crews to fight the fires. of course, these were the same racists who insisted that the Indians were lazy shiftless drunks who wouldn't take a job if you offered it to them. you'd think that fighting a raging fire in a boreal conifer forest was some kinda picnic.
once you've decided that Group X are to blame for everything that goes wrong, you can always create a sufficiently tortured narrative so that the facts on the ground fit your predisposed bigotry. it's the polar opposite of wisdom.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01, a Boeing 757 (AA Flight 77) flew into the Pentagon.
If you can't accept these indisputable facts, I can't fake an interest in your opinions about anything else.
I believe some people's minds
Are so hyper-focused on the political angle of everything, they say things that only a jack ass would say to people fighting for their lives and homes amidst horrible suffering.
Sometimes, being a human being to other human beings means crawling out of the partisan rabbit hole they've been festering in a bit too long.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
I think you're right about people's minds being so focused on things. No matter what the subject is someone on ToP will always tie Russia into it. Always. Even the fires in California. Sometimes it takes everything I've got not to comment on it. Seriously. I have to leave the room until I get myself under control. I don't remember what the topic was, but all of a sudden someone said that Russian bots amped up people's fears about Jade Helm. PeeWatalyDoooo.
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
It's a bit like the girlfriend
Who won't stop talking about her new boyfriend. Lol.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
jesus, i just read the comments in the twitter feed
for the drone video snoop posted, and i'm embarrassed to belong to the same species as the people who posted that stuff.
yeah, the government is sending out airplanes to randomly ignite people's homes using DEWs. plus, chemtrails and who knows what else.
for christ's sake, what possible reason could "the" government have for doing any such thing?
it's so depressing.
look kids, you just don't have to look that hard to find clear, non-secret manifestations of the evil behavior of our oligarchs. getting all panty-bunched chasing cranky hypotheses about absolutely pointless malfeasance is only going to distract you from things that matter.
we're fucking doomed. the internet has become a vicious, virulent fucking mind-worm that is eating away at the cognition of half the people in the US, and once someone's infected, there's no undoing it -- they're baked, forever.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01, a Boeing 757 (AA Flight 77) flew into the Pentagon.
If you can't accept these indisputable facts, I can't fake an interest in your opinions about anything else.
Reading the comments on Twitter feeds
Might be a rich resource for satiric material on asshattery, but the price you pay almost always includes the wtf realization that these people could be your neighbors.
An actual scenario that happened to me while I was living in New York.
If we surrendered to earth's intelligence we could rise up rooted, like trees
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
not only in the US - baked and burned
we're fucking doomed. the internet has become a vicious, virulent fucking mind-worm that is eating away at the cognition of half the people in the US, and once someone's infected, there's no undoing it -- they're baked, forever.
baked, burned, fucked up ... all of the above.
So, what to do about it? Not using it, would be an idea. Can't be done? BS, we can live without it, if there is a will, there is a way. Period.
Refuse to use the internet. Fight those tooth and nails who want to force you to use it.
Fight against the intertubes. That is my new battle cry.
Love is all we have to give.
stuff like this isn't really surprising.
with these huge fires a lot of large embers get thrown up into the air. most of them come down somewhere they aren't going to do any harm -- in the street, on a clay-tile roof, whatever.
but if one of them lands in the dry shrubbery that you've planted right up against the side of your house, or around your deck, or whatever -- FOOM!
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01, a Boeing 757 (AA Flight 77) flew into the Pentagon.
If you can't accept these indisputable facts, I can't fake an interest in your opinions about anything else.
Thanks. This makes lots of sense
I was wondering why the surrounding areas weren't burned, but flying embers would just ignite the roofs and maybe some other things.
i'm embarrassed to belong to the same species as the people who posted that stuff.
I'm right there with you on this. I read comments on my local website and say oh for gawd's sake a lot. And other curse words. My dawgs leave the room a lot. Especially when I shout RU f'cking kidding me!?
America is a pathetic nation; a fascist state fueled by the greed, malice, and stupidity of her own people.
- strife delivery
When I was in public school in the Fifties and Sixties,
we were taught, in line with the consensus of historians and the Cold War curriculum of the day, that Woodrow Wilson was one of our greatest presidents.
Then later I found out that Woodrow Wilson . . .
Admired the Ku Klux Klan. Ran on peace, became "great" leading America into a pointless war among competing empires. Probably lied about the Lusitania. Killed civil liberties with the Espionage Act (which in our own time, Obama used as a license to do the same). Fomented an epidemic of hate crimes against German-Americans. Ordered the Palmer Raids. May not have been in possession of his mental faculties during his second term.
So first, why should anyone trust "historians"? They are as likely as anyone else to turn out to be gatekeepers and propagandists who are just following orders and political fashions of the day.
And second, Trump still has a long, long way to go before being half as bad as Woodrow Wilson.
Clash in comments above, re wildfires possibly involving arson …
Someone said someone else should STFU about that as if it were taboo and unthinkable.
Let's not pretend. Fire as "the most effective underused weapon in the world" for class warfare? Such thoughts are very well out there.
I also recall how that old hippie counterculture search engine, Whole Earth Catalog, brought to everyone's attention the existence of Loompanics, a mail-order outfit from which one could order various kinds of subversive literature, including instruction manuals on drug making, do-it-yourself weaponry, monkeywrenching, and guerrilla warfare.
I must note that my "STFU" was directed
at Mr. Thomas Adams, whomever that might be, whose tweet was quoted in the comment.
My objection to his tweet -- and in fact, probably damn near every single thought that rambles, bumbles, and bounces around in his brain -- is that his hypothesis is driven by one thing, and one thing only: Paranoid hatred for a specific group of people whose ideology is in conflict with his own.
I've presented a whole bunch of hypotheses at the bottom of this comment. Every single one, other than the final four, has exactly the same body of supporting evidence -- which is to say, absolutely NONE. Only a handful of them are in any way less reasonable than the one suggested by Thomas Adams. Unlike Adams, I haven't bothered to attach preposterous motivational explanations to most of them, because to be honest, it's really, really hard for me to think that stupidly. "I know! I'll set California on fire! And somehow, I'll make it look like Trump started the fire! Meanwhile, everybody will be too busy putting out fires to build that horrible wall!" Jesus fucking Christ, can you really imagine standing in front of someone making "arguments" like this and doing anything other than saying, "I'm sorry, but you're fucking delusional, your scenario is ludicrous, and you're an idiot. Now get lost and let me get to my next appointment"?
Glomming onto exactly ONE of an effectively infinite number of possible explanations for an event -- the exactly ONE that perfectly suits one's powerful impulse to, for example, see commies hiding in every cupboard -- is delusional thinking of the most exquisite, sad, STFU sort. It is precisely the kind of epistemological error that I described in a response to Alligator Ed's essay on Patterns.
Alternatively, one might apply non-delusional thinking to the events. This is what that would look like:
1. Wildfires are not a new phenomenon in California. Thousands happen every year. I believe that the four most common known causes are (in no order, because I haven't looked up those stats): lightning; human carelessness with open fire; arson; and accidents related to human activity (e.g., sparks from a part of a moving vehicle that has come into contact with the road -- which is believed to have been the cause of this year's Carr fire; it's definitely happened before). The number of wildfires did not increase substantially from 2000 through 2017. There has been an upward trend in the number of acres burned, and correspondingly, the number of acres burned per fire. These trends are somewhat obscured by extreme events in 2007 and 2008. More specifically, the variance in acres burned has dropped over the last several years -- there have been at least 600,000 acres lost every year from 2012 on, whereas in 6 of the 11 years prior, total acreage burned ranged from 110K to 330K; on the other hand, 5 of the 8 most extreme years for total acreage burned happened before 2012.
2. Given the following:
A. There has been no significant change in the rate of wildfire incidents in California
B. There are 5 to 10 thousand wildfires EVERY YEAR in California
C. It is impossible to predict at the outset whether a fire will rage out of control (it depends mostly on the immediate weather), meaning that if a malicious politically-motivated person had run around setting 100 fires in California this year, almost nobody outside of the immediate area of each would ever have heard of any of them. The odds are rather low that one of the handful of high-profile fires (representing 1/10 of a percent of all of California's fires) was a successful bit of stochastic terrorism.
... the non-delusional conclusion is that the most likely causes of this year's fires are the same as the most likely causes in all previous years: A combination of weather, human dumbassery, negligence, bad luck, and politically-neutral mental illness. The remarkable intensity of some of this year's fires, though anecdotal, may well herald a "new normal" related to rising temperature and other climatological changes, but that's a different story.
Meanwhile, you're free to believe what you want to believe, but why not choose wisely? Once one decides that politically-motivated arson is not only a conceivable cause of California wildfires, but a likely cause, one is almost certainly going to believe that the perpetrator belongs to "the other side", though equally (im)probable cases could be made against any side. (Thus the increasing frequency of "false-flag" accusations. Any time the limited evidence -- actually, usually no evidence at all, but only inference from "who benefits" -- points at one's own side, one jumps quickly to the false-flag meme.)
For myself, I will choose reason.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by a far right sympathiser. (Rep) The key would be to tie Pelosi into the lighting of the match. Can't have an impeachment when California's in flames!
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by an Islamofascist sympathiser.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by a Christian Dominionist sympathiser.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by antifa.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by anti-government fanatics.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by illegal marijuana growers.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by agents of China.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by out-of-work wannabe actors.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by people who have made clever high-risk investments in derivatives that will pay off handsomely in response to these fires.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated as a false flag by people who hate country music, and want to give the industry a black eye. (google: Johnny Cash wildfire).
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by people who love country music, and want to emulate one of their greatest heroes. (google: Johnny Cash wildfire).
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by a guy obsessed with Jennifer Lawrence, who, inspired by that forest fire scene in one of those hunger games movies, and also by the whole Girl On Fire theme or whatever it was from those same movies, thought this would impress her.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by aliens who want to distract us from their nefarious program to take control of California's marijuana plantations.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of lightning strikes.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by mentally ill pyromaniacs.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of arson, perpetrated by anti-social vandals.
I believe the fires in California are the direct result of accidental ignition related to human activity.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01, a Boeing 757 (AA Flight 77) flew into the Pentagon.
If you can't accept these indisputable facts, I can't fake an interest in your opinions about anything else.


text:
That girl's belt isn't working.
And now yet another funny girl (with none-working belt of course) - Marishka, military girl from Eastern Europe.28mm scale, white metal casting. Both of hands are separatable:female warrior miniature
Started by Brother Vinni
Started by Messyart
Post-Apocalyptic Tales
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Fantasy Adventures
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