Reader’s links for June 1 – 2016

Daily Links Post graphic

In order to preserve the flow of conversation about various posted items, and also in order to make it easier for visitors to find the list of related links being shared by other readers, regulars and interested parties in one place, each day a post is automatically created at a minute past midnight ET.

This way, under the various posts of the day, conversation can take place without as much ‘noise’ on the various links and articles and ideas in the main posts and all the news links being submitted can be seen under these auto-posts by clicking on the comments-link right below these ones.

Thank you all for those that take the effort to assist this site in keeping the public informed. Below, typically people can find the latest enemy propaganda, news items of related materials from multiple countries and languages, op-eds from many excellent sites who write on our topics, geopolitics and immigration issues and so on.

(My bad, I had forgotten that the preset posts had run out at the end of May and I had to do another batch, so this one is 15 hours late)

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

58 Replies to “Reader’s links for June 1 – 2016”

  1. State Dep’t admits official censored 2013 briefing video

    WASHINGTON (AP) — A State Department official deliberately cut several minutes of videotape from a news briefing dealing with sensitive questions about U.S.-Iranian nuclear negotiations before posting the footage to its website and YouTube, the agency said Wednesday.

    In the Dec. 2, 2013, briefing, a reporter asked about the department’s denial earlier that year of secret talks between Washington and Tehran. Those discussions had been periodically occurring and eventually led to a breakthrough, seven-nation nuclear deal.

    Then-spokeswoman Jen Psaki responded at the briefing: “There are times where diplomacy needs privacy.”

    But the exchange wasn’t on video the department posted on its website and YouTube, even if it remained in the official transcript and backup video for broadcasters. Fox News discovered the discrepancy last month.

    On Wednesday, the State Department’s current spokesman John Kirby said someone had censored the video intentionally. He said he couldn’t find out who was responsible, but described such action as unacceptable.

    “Deliberately removing a portion of the video was not and is not in keeping with the State Department’s commitment to transparency and public accountability,” he told reporters.

    Kirby said he learned that on the same day of the 2013 briefing, a video editor received a call from a State Department public affairs official who made “a specific request … to excise that portion of the briefing.” The video editor no longer remembers the name of the person who called, he said.

    As a result, “we do not know who made the request to edit the video or why it was made,” he told reporters.

    While the State Department previously suggested a “glitch” occurred, the sensitivity of the removed portion raised questions.

    The reporter, Fox News’ James Rosen, started his inquiry by referencing an earlier Feb. 6, 2013, briefing in which State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said no intermittent conversations were occurring between Obama administration and Iranian officials in one-to-one format, outside of larger multilateral gatherings.

    Eight months later, those gatherings had become public after reporting by The Associated Press and other media. And Rosen asked Psaki if her predecessor was speaking truthfully.

    Upon learning of the video’s editing, Kirby said he ordered the original video restored on all platforms and asked the State Department’s legal adviser to examine the matter. He said no further investigation will be made, primarily because no rules were in place against such actions.

    Kirby said he has ordered new rules created to prevent a recurrence.

    http://bigstory.ap.org/de29094321c84ca586bd607fb669ae69

  2. Mansfield Woodhouse restaurant turns away blind man and guide dog

    A blind man has said he was “incredibly disappointed” to be turned away from a restaurant because his guide dog was deemed a “hygiene risk” by the manager.
    Nathan Edge filmed the moment he, his girlfriend and dog, Hudson, were turned away from the Shangri-La, near Mansfield, on Saturday where they had planned to celebrate his birthday.
    Eating establishments are legally required to let assistance dogs in.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-36424714

  3. The European Union has issued a formal warning to Poland for threatening the rule of law – one of the founding principles of the EU.
    Critics of the right-wing Polish government have been angry at changes it has made to the country’s top court, leaving it, they say, in effect unable to review and veto legislation.
    The warning from the European Commission could lead to Poland being stripped of its EU voting rights.
    Poland has two weeks to respond.
    Why is Poland worrying the EU?
    Government takes control of state media
    The EU has been having inconclusive talks with the Polish government since it announced a preliminary assessment of the new laws in January.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36429325

  4. Uber just banked $3.5 billion from Saudi Arabia’s investment fund.
    The deal marks the company’s biggest cash influx from a single investor.
    The money comes from the country’s Public Investment Fund. It won’t change Uber’s valuation, which remains at $62.5 billion. It is the most valuable startup in the world
    With the cash, Uber also added a new member to its board: Public Investment Fund managing director Yasir Al Rumayyan.

    http://money.cnn.com/2016/06/01/technology/uber-saudi-arabia-investment/index.html

    • Best yet, terrific! I took notes:

      That bogus cult policed peoples’ lives is coming to and end. We’re pushing back against those who would police everything we say, what we wear, how we think.

      You can tell they know the jig is up. That shouting – RACIST!! – doesn’t shut anyone up any more. That they’re driven to ever greater hysteria about ever smaller subjects.

      Those who benefit from that tyranny:
      – the mediocre, the lazy, the hateful,
      – the fat, the facially-pierced, the blue-haired,
      – the people for whom being black is their only marketable skill

      This lovely inversion of what that left has done to us for so long. Just shows how empty and platitudinous the crap they shut us down with is.

      • Time to end the Cultural Revolution.
        Down with the Red Guard!
        Close ’em out!
        Lock up the professors responsible for this idiocy.

  5. European Parliament Takes Initial Steps On EU Gun Control Measures

    Since we last updated readers to the European Union’s efforts to enact further gun controls, the transnational government has continued the process of enacting stringent new restrictions across the political bloc. However, recent developments indicate that the final legislation could be dramatically different than the draft measures proposed by the European Commission. While any further additions to Europe’s already onerous gun control regime is unwarranted, some of the European Parliament’s proposed changes to the draft legislation, if adopted, would make the new rules somewhat less onerous. Unfortunately, other areas that the European Parliament seems willing to explore could exacerbate problems with the proposal.

    http://dailycaller.com/2016/03/21/european-parliament-takes-initial-steps-on-eu-gun-control-measures/

    • How does that Truism go now?

      “Communists do not fight for personal military power (they must in no circumstances do that, and let no one ever again follow the example of Chang Kuo-tao), but they must fight for military power for the Party, for military power for the people. As a national war of resistance is going on, we must also fight for military power for the nation. Where there is naivety on the question of military power, nothing whatsoever can be achieved. It is very difficult for the labouring people, who have been deceived and intimidated by the reactionary ruling classes for thousands of years, to awaken to the importance of having guns in their own hands. Now that Japanese imperialist oppression and the nation-wide resistance to it have pushed our labouring people into the arena of war, Communists should prove themselves the most politically conscious leaders in this war. Every Communist must grasp the truth, “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.” Our principle is that the Party commands the gun, and the gun must never be allowed to command the Party. Yet, having guns, we can create Party organizations, as witness the powerful Party organizations which the Eighth Route Army has created in northern China. We can also create cadres, create schools, create culture, create mass movements. Everything in Yenan has been created by having guns. All things grow out of the barrel of a gun. According to the Marxist theory of the state, the army is the chief component of state power. Whoever wants to seize and retain state power must have a strong army. Some people ridicule us as advocates of the “omnipotence of war”. Yes, we are advocates of the omnipotence of revolutionary war; that is good, not bad, it is Marxist. The guns of the Russian Communist Party created socialism. We shall create a democratic republic. Experience in the class struggle in the era of imperialism teaches us that it is only by the power of the gun that the working class and the labouring masses can defeat the armed bourgeoisie and landlords; in this sense we may say that only with guns can the whole world be transformed. We are advocates of the abolition of war, we do not want war; but war can only be abolished through war, and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to take up the gun.”
      —?Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. II, pp. 224-225

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_power_grows_out_of_the_barrel_of_a_gun

      • Here is a fact the left doesn’t want you to know, all freedom grows out of the barrel of a gun, when the people are armed the government can’t easily oppress them. This is why the left wants to disarm all private citizens in the world.

  6. This is where the REAL war is, in them Uni’s that we send our kids to.
    Cultural Marxism is CANCER!

    • This is one of the major battlefields and one of the reasons civilization may be destroyed. The universities no longer teach the subjects that hold civilization together but instead teach civil disobedience, feminism, black studies, and underwater basket weaving. All the above subjects are good for is teaching other kids subjects that they will never be able to use to make a living.

    • Close ’em up!
      This is criminal: perversion of young peoples’ minds by a vicious cult. We’re losing a generation here.

    • Saudi is keeping the price low for several reasons, 1) trying to kill oil shale, but this isn’t going to work because the infrastructure will remain and once the price raises production will start again. 2) remove money from Iran’s pockets. Saudi wants this because they want to be the rulers of the new Caliphate. 3) remove money from Russia because Russia is backing Iran.

      I stated why the price reduction won’t stop the oil shale production for long. Now why in a few years that won’t matter, as the US oil companies keep drilling and pumping from private land (Obama won’t let them drill on US government land, thus removing a source of revenue for the government) Saudi oil becomes more and more irrelevant. The people in the oil industry has known this for decades but the Saudi’s kept buying politicians. Now the oil companies are working hard to ensure that the US survives and this is going to hurt Saudi.

      Remember the oil found in Brazil, Argentina and other South American nations, and once the communist rule in Valenzuela is removed their production will be restored. Saudi is worried about this and is backing a large number of Islamic groups in South America to try and ensure Islamic control of the South American production.

  7. ISIS killer known as ‘The Bulldozer’ captured by Syrians

    The rotund ISIS executioner known only as “The Bulldozer” has been nabbed by Syrian soldiers, according to a report.

    The 280-pound member of the terror group’s so-called “Chopping Committee” is seen in a new video lying half-naked on a truck, as he is driven off by Syrian troops, the Mirror reported.

    The black-clad jihadist– who always wears a mask to hide his face– has been seen on video decapitating dozens of prisoners and amputating kids’ limbs.

    http://nypost.com/2016/06/01/isis-killer-known-as-bulldozer-captured-by-syrians/

    • “amputating kids’ limbs” … I would say that’s pretty close to insanity.

      In the 1979 movie “Apocalypse Now,” Col. Kurtz (Marlon Brando), mentions an incident where US SF vaccinated a bunch of babies and after that, the Viet Cong came and chopped off the arms and threw them in a pile. John Milius, one of the writers of the movie, stated in an interview in SOF magazine that it was based on an actual incident.

  8. Islamic State calls for destruction of satellite dishes ahead of Ramadan

    Isil officials have called for satellite dishes to be destroyed in Raqqa and Mosul ahead of Ramadan, warning about the threat of intelligence agencies using them to identify airstrike targets.

    In a video released on Tuesday by Welayat Nineveh, the terror group’s media office based in Mosul, two Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant officials, who identify themselves as Abu Saad al-Ansari and Abu Abdullah al-Ansari, discuss the dangers of Western media, including the risk of intelligence agencies using local TV satellite dishes to identify targets.

    The video continues with footage of local Isil officials handing out pamphlets explaining the need to destroy or surrender satellite dishes to the group’s local Islamic police.

    It closes with footage of dishes, television sets and VCRs being destroyed.

    A similar communique was issued in Raqqa, according to activist group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently. The statement instructs Raqqa and Mosul residents to destroy all dishes before the first day of Ramadan, the annual period of fasting, prayer and giving to charity that is at the heart of the observance of Islam. It starts on June 7 this year.

    Last year during the holiest of months, as Ramadan is also known, Islamic State was reported to have hung two children ceremonially for not fasting.

    The calls in Mosul and Raqqa underscore the increasing fear and paranoia surrounding the group’s capitals in Iraq and Syria respectively.

    In February Col Steve Warren, US army spokesman for the coalition fighting Isil, said the drone campaign to kill leaders and high-profile figures such as Mohammed Emwazi, the British Isil executioner known as Jihadi John, had sown paranoia within the movement’s ranks and led to a purge of suspected informers.

    “These strikes sow fear and paranoia inside the organisation, which is why they are so helpful,” he said.
    Isil communications centres and other high value targets have recently been destroyed by coalition airstrikes while Fallujah, which along with Mosul is one of two big urban centres in Iraq still held by the terrorists, is close to being recaptured by the Iraqi army.

    On May 22 US-led coalition forces said they had destroyed an Isil communication control centre near Mosul in an effort to “degrade terrorist command, control networks and disrupt their ability to disseminate propaganda.”
    Meanwhile the Iraqi army entered Islamic State-held Fallujah in a major dawn offensive on Monday as it made its “final push” to recapture the city from jihadists.

    Fallujah, which once had a population of 350,000, is one of Isil’s most important strongholds.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/01/islamic-state-calls-for-destruction-of-satellite-dishes-ahead-of/

    video on this page :

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-i2Tb6xAgH7NWJyaGxQSVBZY2M/view?pref=2&pli=1

  9. Abandon ‘utopian dreams’, says EU head (BBC, June 1, 2016)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36429331

    “The European Union should abandon its “utopian dreams” of ever-closer integration to combat rising Euroscepticism, Donald Tusk has said.

    The president of the European Council said EU leaders should concentrate on practical measures such as reinforcing borders and a banking union.

    Mr Tusk warned of “dramatic consequences” if Britain left the EU.

    He urged Europe’s leaders to match the energy and endeavours of those who wanted to break up the union…”

  10. Bahrain charges 18 with contacting Iran Guards (gulfnews, June 1, 2016)
    http://gulfnews.com/news/mena/iran/bahrain-charges-18-with-contacting-iran-guards-1.1839044

    “Dubai: Bahrain has charged 18 people with contacting Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and the Lebanese Hezbollah group with the aim of stirring up unrest in the kingdom, state news agency BNA reported on Wednesday.

    Bahrain cut diplomatic relations with Iran in January, a day after Riyadh severed ties with Tehran following attacks by rioters on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran. They were reacting to the execution of an anti-government Saudi Shiite cleric convicted on terrorism charges.

    BNA said the prosecution had established after the investigation that the group had formed a “secret cell” to incite Bahrainis against the ruling system and to propagate information calling for changing the government by force…”

  11. Teenager burned alive for refusing marriage proposal in Pakistan (gulfnews, June 1, 2016)
    http://gulfnews.com/news/asia/pakistan/teenager-burned-alive-for-refusing-marriage-proposal-in-pakistan-1.1839067

    “Islamabad: A young Pakistani woman died on Wednesday after she was tortured and set alight in the country’s conservative northeast for refusing a marriage proposal from the son of a former colleague, relatives and police said.

    Maria Sadaqat, 19, was attacked by a group of people on Monday in the village of Upper Dewal, close to the summer hill resort of Murree, outside the capital, Islamabad.

    “She was badly tortured and then burned alive. We brought her to hospital in Islamabad but she succumbed to her wounds today,” Abdul Basit, Sadaqat’s uncle, told AFP outside a burns centre at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in the capital.

    Grieving relatives outside the centre wept and protested at the teenager’s death as police moved her body to another hospital for a post-mortem…”

  12. US calls for sustained Indo-Pak dialogue, ‘maximum restraint’ (gulfnews, June 1, 2016)
    http://gulfnews.com/news/americas/usa/us-calls-for-sustained-indo-pak-dialogue-maximum-restraint-1.1838837

    “Washington: Voicing concern that a conflict between India and Pakistan could escalate to use of nuclear weapons, the US has asked the two countries to engage in a “sustained” bilateral dialogue process and exercise “maximum restraint” to boost peace.

    “We are concerned by nuclear and missile developments in South Asia,” a State Department spokesperson said when asked about the recent statement of Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, 80, the father of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, that Islamabad has the ability to target New Delhi in five minutes.

    “We are concerned by the increased security challenges that accompany growing stockpiles and the increased risk that a conventional conflict between India and Pakistan could escalate to include nuclear use…”

  13. Father gets 8 years for beating girl to death (saudigazette, June 1, 2016)
    http://saudigazette.com.sa/saudi-arabia/father-gets-8-years-beating-girl-death/

    “The Summary Court in Riyadh has sentenced a Saudi man to eight years in prison and 700 lashes for beating his 7-year-daughter Yara to death.

    Saeed Al-Qahtani, lawyer of the dead girl’s mother, told Al-Watan daily that the discretionary verdict against the father, Mohammed Ali Al-Qahtani, was preliminary and could be appealed in 30 days.

    He said the mother was still entitled to her private rights, which she can claim upon the approval of the verdict by the Court of Appeals. The case took place in Riyadh last year.

    The mother, who lives in Dammam, said she was separated from her ex-husband over irreconcilable differences and she kept her daughter with her until she was seven years old when her father took custody…”

  14. Grand Mufti condemns Iran’s refusal to comply with the Shariah requirements for Haj (saudigazette, June 1, 2016)
    http://saudigazette.com.sa/saudi-arabia/grand-mufti-condemns-irans-refusal-comply-shariah-requirements-haj/

    “Sheikh Abdulaziz Bin Abdullah Al-Asheikh, the Grand Mufti of the Kingdom, chairman of the board of senior Ulema and general president for religious research and Ifta, condemned Iran’s refusal to abide by the Shariah requirements and arrangements and regulations for organizing the Haj, Saudi Press Agency reported Wednesday.

    He stressed that Allah has entrusted the Kingdom with care for the two holy mosques and all should obey and implement the arrangements made to organize this great ritual and facilitate the Haj for all Muslims. He said that whoever rejects the path for facilitating matters for the believers that Allah has urged us to abide by and whoever digresses from this path will be punished in the Hellfire.

    This came in the weekly program ‘The Springs of Fatwa’ (Yanabee’ Al-Fatwa) broadcast Wednesday by Radio Nida Al-Islam from Makkah. The program is prepared and presented by Yazeed Al-Huraish.

    He said if one contemplates on the Haj rites he will learn that this great pillar was ordained to glorify and worship Allah alone. It was not ordained in order to politicize it and exploit it for personal greed, but to obey Allah Almighty.

    He stressed that Haj is performed in obedience to Allah Almighty. This obligation depicts Muslims’ unity of ranks, having the same opinion, obeying Allah, and coming from different parts of the world for the purpose of understanding, consulting and cooperating with one another for the interest of this world and the Hereafter. Haj creates a strong bond among Muslims – the bond of Islamic belief and brotherhood, whether they are from Europe, Asia or Africa.

    Politicizing Haj is rejected whoever the perpetrator might be. This is impermissible.”

  15. Juncker ‘not against’ floating hotspots for asylum seeker identification (ansa, June 1, 2016)
    http://www.ansa.it/english/news/2016/06/01/we-cant-take-all-migrants-alfano-tells-cei-2_0ee0071c-4314-4934-bf0b-9f20d27d612e.html

    “Rome, June 1 – European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said Wednesday he was “not against” Italy’s proposed floating migrant hotspots “but there are legal questions that must be taken into consideration”.

    He said “we are always open to discussing and meditating the proposals…of my good friend (Premier Matteo) Renzi”. He said: “I’m not saying No and I’m not saying Yes. I am reflecting and that should not be a surprise”. Italy has proposed putting asylum seeker registration and identification centres (the hotspots) on board ships in the Mediterranean but some rights groups have said they might not be legal under international law…”

    • Italian bishops conference blast idea of ‘floating hotspots’ at sea (ansamed, June 1, 2016)
      http://www.ansamed.info/ansamed/en/news/sections/politics/2016/06/01/ceis-galantino-blasts-idea-of-floating-hotspots-at-sea_4527bd27-b49b-480f-ab4b-aa5ac6be603d.html

      “Monsignor Nunzio Galantino, secretary-general of the Italian Bishops Conference (CEI), on Wednesday criticised the Italian government’s proposal to the EU to have so-called “floating hotspots” in which migrants would be registered at sea, on ships in the Mediterranean.

      “(Floating) hotspots are a bad-copy remake of detention centres,” Galantino told Italian daily La Repubblica, adding that on ships it would not be possible to ensure the right to seek asylum.

      “It’s unthinkable to use rescue ships for stationing thousands of people in the Mediterranean awaiting an unknown location, unless you want to take them back to Libya and Egypt, sentencing them to new types of exploitation,” he said. Galantino called migrant deaths at sea “a slap in the face to European democracy”.

      “Unfortunately there wasn’t the courage to create humanitarian corridors, provided for by international law, towards countries willing to host (migrants), to encourage safe passage and avoid violence, exploitation and deaths”…”

  16. Gambia tightens noose on dissenters – Amnesty (france24, June 1, 2016)
    http://www.france24.com/en/20160602-gambia-tightens-noose-dissenters-amnesty

    “Critics of Gambia’s government are increasingly fearful of arrest, torture and imprisonment as the west African nation clamps down on free speech ahead of polls expected to land President Yahya Jammeh a fifth term, Amnesty International said Thursday.

    Opposition politicians, journalists, human rights defenders and religious figures have all faced a crackdown on their right to express themselves and organise peacefully, according to an Amnesty report entitled “Dangerous to dissent”.

    “Consistent patterns of violations… have created a broader climate of fear that extends to other sections of society, in which the dominant response is one of self-censorship,” the report said.

    This was driven by fear of instruments of state power such as the National Intelligence Agency, the country’s notorious secret police, it said.

    NIA agents “routinely require people who are arrested to provide passwords to their emails, social media accounts and phones, and often obtain these through the use or threat of torture and other ill-treatment,” according to the report.

    The NIA also routinely punched, burnt, beat and tortured those in custody, it said…”

  17. Report: German minister laments ‘sluggish’ refugee returns (DW, June 1, 2016)
    http://www.dw.com/en/report-german-minister-laments-sluggish-refugee-returns/a-19297297

    “Thomas de Maiziere said German police would task more officers with returning migrants to home countries, according to a Bild newspaper report. Berlin estimates that some 27,000 migrants will be sent back this year.

    Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere wants to speed up migrant deportations, German mass circulation newspaper Bild reported.

    According to the paper, De Maiziere is set to present a report bemoaning “long procedures” and “insufficient personnel” for this task before the federal government on Wednesday.

    German states have “little political will to apply the residence law,” contributing to the “sluggish” deportation rate, the minister reportedly claims. At the same time, some of the migrants’ embassies are refusing to issue temporary travel papers to their citizens.

    Thousands leave voluntarily

    There were over 219,000 migrants set to be expelled from Germany, according to the Interior Ministry report based on March 31 data. Almost 168,000 of them had been issued the so-called Duldung (tolerance) permits, allowing them to stay in the country until obstacles for their deportation are cleared.

    The remaining 51,000, however, were to be expelled as soon as possible.

    According to the interior minister, the authorities were also facing “insufficient cooperation from the deportees,” with overly long proceedings making it easier for them to “disappear.”

    “A massive rise in the number of deportees would only occur if these procedural shortcomings are fixed,” de Maiziere said…”