Reader’s links for May 14 – 2017

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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.

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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.

About Eeyore

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

82 Replies to “Reader’s links for May 14 – 2017”

  1. SYRIA – MARCH 10 2017 – ALEPPO – a visit to WHITE HELMETS HQ [eng. subs]

    SOUTIEN/SUPPORT PIERRE LE CORF HERE :https://www.facebook.com/heroesworldtour/
    Quelques images que j’ai prises hier [10/03/2017] qui vous donneront une autre perspective sur les casques blancs et différents mensonges des médias et gouvernements. Des vérités sur la guerre en Syrie, à Alep. Hôpitaux totalement détruits et Casques Blancs neutres, héros à Alep? Un oscar? Une nomination au prix Nobel de la paix? A quel prix allons nous continuer à MENTIR et à tuer, à justifier cette guerre, à soutenir des groupes terroristes, à maintenir un pays au bord de l’étouffement comme les autres avant? Je compile rapidement quelques images que j’ai prises hier qui vous donneront une autre perspective.
    Je refuse, en tant que citoyen Français de soutenir une politique criminelle. Histoire d’illustrer un peux mieux de quoi je parle dans ma lettre au Président de la République .. alors que des nuages de poussière de guerre arrivant d’Irak rendent l’air presque irrespirable, en moins de 2 heures je repasse en image par deux hôpitaux en état correct, je dois avancer sur des tonnes de médicaments réservés aux groupes terroristes et interdits aux civils, je traverse les restes des bâtiments asservis par Al-jaïch al-hour (Free Syrian Army), Jabhat al-Nosra (or Fatah al-Cham, Al-Qaïda) … bâtiments des White Helmets (casques blancs) qui comme les habitants le rappellent, aidaient principalement les terroristes, les civils … quand la caméra tournait et parfois uniquement, portaient parfois des armes, ont exécuté des soldats Syriens, participé à des exécutions des tribunaux Islamiques (lien), volaient les victimes, etc mais un point crucial: la quasi-totalité des membres étaient affiliés à des groupes terroristes cités plus haut. Regardez la vidéo sur les casques blancs de mon amie Vanessa Beeley témoignages – nous étions ensemble pendant certains de ces témoignages quand elle m’a accompagné pour distribuer les jouets à la libération Une autre vidéo intéressante compilant de nombreuses images que l’on ne vous a jamais montrées. Je mets un bémol dans mon témoignage, il y a probablement eu des exceptions, probablement que certains des Casques Blancs étaient des civils pourvus de bonnes intentions, qui étaient sous les bombes des avions (non pas gratuites, c’est une guerre, mais en réponse aux tirs de djihadistes depuis des zones civils tirant sur les zones uniquement civiles de l’Ouest et massacrant une population qui représentait 90% d’Alep dans le silence des médias) aidaient de vrais gens qui mouraient de par leur proximité des groupes armés, qui s’en servaient comme boucliers humains (tirant même depuis les hôpitaux …) c’est une réalité, mais la réelle majorité étaient des djihadistes (prouvé par les documents retrouvés sur place) ils étaient ceux qui apportaient la mort au dessus de la tête de ceux qui finissaient sous les décombres, et finalement dans leurs camions, et dans leurs vidéos, il ne faut pas oublier les situations de causes à effet, c’est quand même ironique et assez vicieux.
    La réalité dépasse la fiction ici, dans ce quartier, se touchent (tous dans des écoles qu’ils ont transformées comme vous pouvez le voir dès le début) le siège de Al Nora, le Croissant Rouge du Qatar, l’hôpital M10 et surtout le quartier général des casques blancs, la video n’est pas bien montée etc mais une image vaut mille mots et c’est essentiel pour que vous compreniez à quel point le mensonge est gros … à quel point il faut que nous demandions à cesser de soutenir cette guerre ainsi que les sanctions contre le peuple Syrien, en tant que partie prenante du terrorisme. Encore une fois, bien que je vous partage ce que l’on peut appeler des preuves, je n’ai toujours pas la prétention de vous dire quoi penser, faites vous votre propre opinion

    • May 2017 –

      Pierre Le Corf révèle la vérité sur les ONG “humanitaires” en zone rebelle à Alep

    • I give up. No more student bs.
      I’m clueless about their entire subculture.
      Soft-boiled eggs make me nauseous.

      • student bs

        Dear yucki,

        That phrase is now officially redundant.

        Yours truly,

        NorseRadish

        PS: “Soft-boiled eggs make me nauseous.” = Soft-boiled eggs nauseate me.

        All the best,

        NR

  2. Heavy metal giants Neganuts Megadeth cave to Muslim pressure in Malaysia

    LOS ANGELES heavy metal band Megadeth agreed to cut songs that were potentially “offensive” to Muslims after the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) Youth group voiced its objection to them touring the country.Tweeting on Thursday before the band’s show, frontman Dave Mustaine responded to a fan informing him there would be no PAS Youth protest: “Thank you. If there is a song that offends Malaysians or their faith, please tell me. I wish to offend no one here. We cut songs for China.”

    Pansy-@ssed, Nancyboy, wanking buncha prinking poofters! Go ahead and name yourselves after a nuclear war death toll’s unit-of-measurement. BUT DON’T YOU DARE OFFEND A BUNCH OF WANNABE WIFE BEATERS THAT MIGHT CAUSE YOUR ALBUM SALES TO SLIP AN INCH!

    Thank goodness I’ve never, ever had a single micron of respect for these shameless appeasers!

        • A soft, sweet song – who’d have imagined it coming out of such a strange-looking little person?

          • Alla youse,

            Prepare yerselves for some really obscure trivia.

            Please obtain maximum enjoyment from knowing about the only band member in the Monkees who actually could play the instrument that he was shown holding.

            This chap’s Mum invented “Liquid Paper“, shortly thereafter took the dirt nap, and left the wee blighter a not-so-small fortune … which he promptly spent producing the world’s first Comedy Music Video.

            Welcome to “Elephant Parts”. Produced in the 1980s, much of Michael Nesmith’s comedic material remains astonishingly pertinent (except, maybe, for the “battered wife” segment).

  3. Kim Jong-Un fires ANOTHER ballistic missile that lands 60 miles from RUSSIA – after months of threatening Trump with nuclear war and days after a new president took office in South Korea

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4503382/N-Korea-fires-unidentified-projectile-S-Korea-military.html#ixzz4h3iOInlX
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

    Kim Jong-Un has fired a ballistic missile 500 miles into the Sea of Japan in the latest show of force amid tensions with the US.

    The launch took place in the Kusong region located northwest of the capital, Pyongyang, where the North previously test-launched an intermediate-range missile it is believed to be developing.

    A US official told CNN the missile landed in water 60 miles south of Russia’s Vladivostok region, home of the Russian Pacific Fleet.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4503382/N-Korea-fires-unidentified-projectile-S-Korea-military.html#ixzz4h3iY4xmH
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

  4. Iraq’s embattled Christians call for ‘safe haven’, international protection

    RBIL, Kurdistan Region— Head of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches in Iraq’s Nineveh Plains have called for the establishment of a safe haven under international protection for the country’s increasingly persecuted Christians.

    The three main Iraqi Churches, the Syriac Catholic Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Chaldean Catholic Church have in a joint statement Friday called on authorities to set up a safe haven for the Christians in the volatile Nineveh province where diverse ethnic and religious group have long clashed over territory and dominance.

    “The security and protection of Christian localities in Nineveh Plain, a free zone, and international protection, under United Nations, away from conflicts and rivalries,” the head of the Churches write in the joint statement calling for safeguarding the “rights of Christian communities in historical Nineveh Plains.”

    The statement comes amid public announcements from a Shiite cleric who in challenging remarks described the country’s Christians as “infidels.”

    In his public statements Ali Mousavi, head of the Shiite Waqf bureau, an influential Shiite institution in the country, has said the Christians who chose not to convert to Islam must pay taxes, the so called jazzya, or leave the Muslim areas.

    “Jihad should be implemented in regard to the Christians in order for them to convert to Islam, either they will become Muslims or we must fight them, or they ought to pay jazzya,” Mousavi said to his followers recently prompting wide Christian condemnations. …….

    http://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/140520171

  5. North Korea’s latest ballistic missile test flew further and higher than last one posing “grave threat” to Japan

    The projectile – believed to be a ballistic missile – was launched from a region near the country’s west coast, South Korea’s military said

    North Korea’s latest ballistic missile test has flown further and higher than it’s last, posing a ‘”grave threat” to Japan.

    The missile was launched yesterday in defiance of calls to rein in its weapons programme, days after a new leader in its old rival South Korea came to power pledging to engage it in dialogue.

    The US Pacific Command said it was assessing the type of weapon used but it was “not consistent with an intercontinental ballistic missile”.

    Japanese Defence Minister Tomomi Inada said the missile could be of a new type altogether.

    The missile flew 430 miles and reached an altitude of more than 1,245 miles, according to officials in South Korea and Japan, further and higher than an intermediate-range missile North Korea successfully tested in February from the same region of Kusong, northwest of its capital, Pyongyang.

    http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/north-koreas-latest-ballistic-missile-10418704?service=responsive

  6. Military Plans Flight Intercept Test of Ballistic Missile

    The distinctive missile telemetry ship MV Pacific Collector is in port at Aloha Tower, possibly for a key upcoming ballistic missile defense test.

    The 393-foot ship with twin domes housing 24-foot antennas is owned by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration and used in support of U.S. Missile Defense Agency missions.

    Spokesman Chris Johnson said the agency doesn’t usually talk about assets used in a missile defense test until after the fact, but did confirm the next flight intercept test of the ground-based mid-course ballistic missile defense system is planned for late May.

    That test will be the first time a ground-based missile interceptor launched from California attempts to smash into a “threat-representative” intercontinental ballistic missile in its mid-course over the Pacific, the Missile Defense Agency said.

    http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/05/13/military-plans-flight-intercept-test-ballistic-missile.html

  7. North Korea fires missile days after new South Korea leader pledges dialogue

    SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea fired a ballistic missile on Sunday in defiance of calls to rein in its weapons program, days after a new leader in its old rival South Korea came to power pledging to engage it in dialogue.

    The U.S. Pacific Command said it was assessing the type of missile but it was “not consistent with an intercontinental ballistic missile”. Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said the missile could be of a new type.

    The missile flew 700 km (430 miles) and reached an altitude of more than 2,000 km (1,245 miles), according to officials in South Korea and Japan, further and higher than an intermediate-range missile North Korea successfully tested in February from the same region of Kusong, northwest of its capital, Pyongyang.

    North Korea is widely believed to be developing an intercontinental missile tipped with a nuclear weapon that is capable of reaching the United States.

    U.S. President Donald Trump has vowed not to let that happen.

    http://www.oann.com/north-korea-fires-missile-south-korea-military/

    • China and Russia don’t want the dialogue they want tension with the US attention rivited to NORK, neither of them are going to do more then run their mouths to reduce the tensions and neither one will step on Kim and force him to stop his nuclear and ICBM research.

  8. Italy rescues 484 migrants in Mediterranean, finds 7 bodies (reuters, May 14, 2017)
    http://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFKCN18A08T-OZATP

    “Rescuers saved 484 migrants from boats in the Mediterranean on Saturday and found the bodies of seven men who had died in the attempt to get to Europe, Italy’s coast guard said.

    More than 45,000 people have reached Italy by boat from North Africa this year, a more than 40 percent increase on the same period of 2016, and 1,222 people are known to have died on the route, according to the International Organisation for Migration.

    The migrants were rescued from four separate rubber boats by the Italian coast guard and navy, an aid group and two private vessels, the coast guard said in a statement.

    The coast guard gave no further details. Most sea-borne migrants to Italy are originally from Sub-Saharan Africa or Bangladesh, and pay Libya-based smugglers to organise their passage.”

  9. Pope prays for minorities like Yazidis suffering in Mideast (abcnews, May 14, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pope-prays-minorities-yazidis-suffering-mideast-47401246

    “Pope Francis has appealed for penitence and prayers for the end of conflicts and wars he says are disfiguring “the face of humanity.”

    Francis, addressing tourists and Romans Sunday in St. Peter’s Square, recalled those suffering in the Middle East such as Muslims, Christians and minorities like the Yazidis who are victims of “tragic violence and discrimination.”

    He recalled his return a day earlier from the shrine dedicated to the Virgin Mary in Fatima, Portugal, where many pray for peace…”

  10. World will run out of food by 2050 thanks to population boom (express, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.express.co.uk/news/science/803791/World-will-run-out-of-food-by-2050-population-boom

    “THE population of Earth could be too big to feed itself by 2050, according to scientists.

    As the population continues to boom, humanity is slowly but surely running out of resources and by the middle of this century, there may be too many people to sustain.

    Experts believe that the population will reach nine billion by the middle of the century, whereas the demand for food cannot match the population growth.

    A report from Oxfam says that while the population will climb by two billion by the middle of the century, agricultural yield has almost halved since 1990.

    By 2030, the report from the charity says, prices of staple foods such as corn and rice will climb by 180 per cent and 130 per cent, respectively.

    Robert Bailey, Oxfam’s senior climate advisor, said: “The food system must be transformed. By 2050, there will be 9 billion people on the planet and demand for food will have increased by 70 per cent.

    “This demand must be met despite flatlining yields, increasing water scarcity, and growing competition over land.

    “And agriculture must rapidly adapt to a changing climate and slash its carbon footprint.”

    Food prices will continue to rise as the demand is not met, leading to increased famine across the globe.

    Professor Julian Cribb, author of ‘The Coming Famine: The Global Food Crisis and What We Can Do to Avoid It’, warned in his book: “The world has ignored the ominous constellation of factors that now make feeding humanity sustainably our most pressing task – even in times of economic and climatic crisis.

    “It is arriving even faster than climate change.”

    A separate report from the Global Harvest Initiative says that action needs to begin now to solve the impending crisis.

    Margaret Zeigler, executive director of GHI, said: “Countries need to prioritise agriculture and the growing of food in more sustainable methods.

    “If we don’t start now, we’ll have a problem sooner, even by 2030.”

    Ms Zeigler added that more animals will need to be farmed to sustain the rising population, which will also add to climate change.

    She said: ”We’re also going to see more levels of methane emission from cattle if we don’t learn how to produce more using less or the same resources.”

    However, the report from Oxfam concluded that all hope is not yet lost.

    It reads: “Thankfully, the vast transformation needed is already under way led by individuals, organisations and movements who have taken the future into their own hands.””

    • This sort of Malthusian hysteria has been going on for centuries. At present, carefully applied technology can address and overcome many of these food resource problems.

      Bearing this in mind, software troll supreme, Bill Gates, is spending millions to find a cure for malaria. What nobody wants to talk about is how this newly surviving portion of the (largely African) population will simply end up starving to death because of their usual environmental mismanagement and internecine tribal warfare.

      To date, malaria has served as a harsh sort of natural governor on the engine of Africa’s population growth. Gates’ potential defeat of that control mechanism will bring suffering and death on a heretofore unknown scale. As always, these Liberal do-gooders succumb to the Law of Unintended Consequences™—but not before wreaking havoc on the rest of the world.

      • The people making the predictions always assume a steady state in technology and in the societal actions, they are so limited in historical knowledge as well as true scientific knowledge that they can’t conceive of anything changing.

  11. Muslim hate crimes: Reports of Islamophobic incidents soared again in 2016 (independent, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/muslim-hate-crimes-increased-2016-islamophobia-donald-trump-latest-a7735141.html

    “More than fifteen years after the attacks of 9/11, the number of Islamophobic attacks recorded in the US continues to soar.

    Alongside data that shows, Americans are seven times more likely to be killed by right wing extremists than those driven by Islamist views, a new report suggests that incidents of Islamophobia rose by 57 per cent in 2016. This included a 44 per cent increase in anti-Muslim hate crimes.

    The report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), shows that between 2014 to 2016, anti-Muslim bias incidents increased by 65 per cent. In that two-year period, CAIR found that hate crimes targeting Muslims surged 584 per cent.

    The finding by CAIR was similar to that of other, independent researchers. Researchers at California State University, looking at data from 20 states reported 196 incidents of hate crimes against Muslims in the US in 2015, a 78 per cent increase over the prior year. Those figures were later corroborated by FBI data.

    Earlier this year, CAIR reported that the number of incidents of alleged Islamophobia involving US Customs and Borders Protection officials has increased by around 1,000 per cent since Donald Trump took office.

    Laura Pitter of Human Rights Watch, wrote this week that Mr Trump’s administration had rejected as “absurd”, the allegation that his own anti-Muslim rhetoric had helped fuel the most recent increase of Islamophobic incidents.

    “But he has lashed out against his critics far more loudly and more often than he has spoken up against hate crimes. Trump should be much more forceful in speaking out against acts of violent intolerance, especially since his own rhetoric and executive actions have so consistently scapegoated Muslims,” she said.

    “So far, with the exception of one address to Congress, he has not spoken out against hate crimes, or addressed these issues more broadly in a prominent, public fashion.”

    She added: “If Trump really wants to distance himself from these hate incidents, public condemnation, in the wake of this chilling report, would be one way to do it.”

    CAIR said that harassment was the most frequent type of abuse in 2016, accounting for 18 per cent of the total number of incidents. Incidents during which the complainant was questioned by FBI employees or otherwise appeared to be inappropriately targeted by the agency made up 15 per cent of cases, making this the second largest category.

    Employment issues, including denial of work, came third, while hate crimes were the fourth largest

    A report from 2015, by academics Charles Kurzman and David Schanzer, found that Islam-inspired terror attacks “accounted for 50 fatalities over the past 13 and a half years.” During the same period, “right-wing extremists averaged 337 attacks per year in the decade after 9/11, causing a total of 254 fatalities”.”

  12. Germany Confiscating Homes to Use for Migrants
    “A massive attack on the property rights”

    by Soeren Kern
    May 14, 2017 at 5:00 am

    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10352/germany-migrants-property-rights

    Authorities in Hamburg, the second-largest city in Germany, have begun confiscating private dwellings to ease a housing shortage — one that has been acutely exacerbated by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to allow more than two million migrants into the country in recent years.

    City officials have been seizing commercial properties and converting them into migrant shelters since late 2015, when Merkel opened German borders to hundreds of thousands of migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Now, however, the city is expropriating residential property units owned by private citizens.

    In an unprecedented move, Hamburg authorities recently confiscated six residential units in the Hamm district near the city center. The units, which are owned by a private landlord, are in need of repair and have been vacant since 2012. A trustee appointed by the city is now renovating the properties and will rent them — against the will of the owner — to tenants chosen by the city. District spokeswoman Sorina Weiland said that all renovation costs will be billed to the owner of the properties.

    The expropriation is authorized by the Hamburg Housing Protection Act (Hamburger Wohnraumschutzgesetz), a 1982 law that was updated by the city’s Socialist government in May 2013 to enable the city to seize any residential property unit that has been vacant for more than four months.

    The forced lease, the first of its kind in Germany, is said to be aimed at pressuring the owners of other vacant residences in the city to make them available for rent. Of the 700,000 rental units in Hamburg, somewhere between 1,000 and 5,000 (less than one percent) are believed to be vacant, according an estimate by the Hamburg Senate.

    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10352/germany-migrants-property-rights

    • In an unprecedented move, Hamburg authorities recently confiscated six residential units in the Hamm district near the city center. The units, which are owned by a private landlord, are in need of repair and have been vacant since 2012. A trustee appointed by the city is now renovating the properties and will rent them — against the will of the owner — to tenants chosen by the city. District spokeswoman Sorina Weiland said that all renovation costs will be billed to the owner of the properties.

      And so the redistribution of wealth begins. Watch carefully. This is Europe devouring its seed corn as it takes the assets of more industrious people and heaps them upon the pyre of insatiable immigrant need. A simple backward glance at where these immigrants economic tourists come from shows how insanely delusional the EU’s social engineers are. Yet, time and again, these harebrained apparatchiks still manage to persuade themselves that rapid assimilation—something that is quickly becoming an oxymoron of its own—will magically transform these lazy, self-entitled, parasites into productive citizens.

      These predators routinely strip mine any place of habitation, thereby precipitating the famines, epidemics, and environmental collapse that has become a familiar hallmark of Third World incompetence. Placing these savages in a resource-rich environment will only spur even more destructive behavior. One may as well try to extinguish a bonfire with gasoline.

  13. The Great Price of “Blaspheming” against Muhammad

    by Raymond Ibrahim
    May 14, 2017 at 4:00 am

    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10346/islam-blasphemy-christians

    A few days ago in Pakistan, a Christian pastor who has been “tortured every day in prison” since 2012 when he was first incarcerated, was sentenced to life in prison. Zafar Bhatti, 51, is accused of sending “blasphemous” text messages from his mobile phone; but human rights activists contend that the charge “was fabricated to remove him from his role as a Pastor.” His wife, Nawab Bibi, says:

    “Many Muslim people hated how quickly his church was growing; they have taken this action to undermine his work. Yet despite their actions the church grows. I wish our persecutors would see that Christians are not evil creatures. We are human beings created by God the same God that created them although they do not know this yet.”

    She adds, “There have been numerous attempts to kill my husband — he is bullied everyday and he is not safe from inmates and prison staff alike.” In 2014, he “narrowly escaped assassination after a rogue prison officer,” Muhammad Yousaf, went on a shooting spree “to kill all inmates accused of blasphemy against Islam.”

    Bhatti is one of countless Christian minorities to suffer under Pakistan’s blasphemy law, which has helped make that country the fourth-worst nation in the world in which to be Christian.

    Asia Bibi, a Christian wife and mother, has been on death row since 2010 on the accusation that she insulted the Islamic prophet Muhammad. According to Section 295-C of Pakistan’s penal code:

    “Whoever by words, either spoken or written or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.”

      • What Crime Would a ‘Special Prosecutor’ Prosecute?

        BY ANDREW C. MCCARTHY

        “We know Director Comey was leading an investigation in [sic] whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians, a serious offense.” So inveighed Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer (D. N.Y.), according to a report by PJ Media’s Bridget Johnson. Senator Schumer added, “If there was ever a time when circumstances warranted a special prosecutor, it is now.”

        No, it’s not.

        Readers of these columns will recall that I am a naysayer on the constitutional chimera interchangeably called a “special prosecutor” or an “independent counsel.” I won’t rehash all the arguments yet again. Suffice it to say there is no such thing as a prosecutor who exercises prosecutorial power independent of the executive branch. Were the Trump administration to cave in to media-Democrat pressure and appoint a “special prosecutor,” that lawyer would be chosen by the Trump Justice Department and answer to the president.

        As night follows day, the next line of politicized attack would be that President Trump had rigged the investigation by choosing a crony to make the scandal disappear.

        Special prosecutors notoriously guarantee a number of headaches for an administration. Unlike other prosecutors’ offices, they do not have to limit the resources devoted to a single case because of other enforcement needs. Their investigations inevitably metastasize far beyond the original inquiry because there is no supervisor to keep them focused on the subject matter and ensure that the investigation is completed in a reasonable time. The arrangement is a perverse assignment of a prosecutor to a single target (or set of targets) with a mandate to make a case against him – whatever case can be made, however long it takes. Because political cases have a high public profile, and the special prosecutor would inevitably be accused of a whitewash if he decides an indictment is not warranted, there is unusually great pressure to file some charge – even if it is a “process crime” (i.e., an offense, such as making false statements to investigators, that relates not to the conduct that was under investigation but to obstruction of the investigation itself).

        Just as important, special prosecutors severely degrade an administration’s capacity to govern. They paralyze officials, pitting them against each other when they should be cooperating on the president’s agenda. They divert time, energy, and resources away from the conduct of official responsibilities so that the prosecutor’s investigative demands can be answered.

        The only upside an administration supposedly gets in exchange for bearing these debilitating burdens is that appointing a special prosecutor signals to the public that the administration is not afraid of an “independent” investigation. But if the president is going to be accused of rigging the investigation anyway, what’s the point?

        Let’s put all that aside for a moment, though. If we’re already talking about a special prosecutor, it means we have ignored what is supposed to be a rudimentary requirement: the crime.

        You don’t need a prosecutor unless you first have a crime.

        If the point of the exercise is to explore threats posed by Russia, that’s not a job for a prosecutor; it is a job for the president, the intelligence agencies, and Congress. We have prosecutors to prosecute crime; absent crime, there is no place for them. And special prosecutors only come into the picture when the suspects are people (generally, executive branch officials) as to whom the Justice Department has a conflict of interest. But those suspects must be suspects in a crime – not just in some untoward or sleazy form of behavior.

        So what is the crime? What is the federal criminal offense that could be proved in a court of law under governing law and evidentiary rules?

        “Collusion” – the word so tirelessly invoked – is not a crime. It is used pejoratively, but it is just a word to describe concerted activity. Concerted activity can be (and usually is) completely legal. Lots of unsavory activity in which people jointly participate is legal, even if we frown on it. In order to be illegal, concerted activity must rise to the level of conspiracy.

        A conspiracy is an agreement to commit a crime. Not to do something indecorous or slimey; it must be something that is actually against the law, something that violates a penal statute. In the crim-law biz, the crime that conspirators agree to try to accomplish is known as “the object of the conspiracy.” If the object is not against the law, there is no conspiracy – no matter how much “collusion” there is.

        So, in the ballyhooed “Russia investigation,” what is the object of the purported conspiracy? Notice that although Senator Schumer casually asserts that “a serious offense” has been committed, he does not tell us what that offense is.

        That’s because there isn’t one.

        Sorry to be the downer at the pep rally, but it is simply not a federal crime for a foreign country to intrude on an American election by spreading information or misleading propaganda that favors one candidate or damages another. To draw an analogy, it is shameful for the American media systematically to scald Republicans while carrying the Democrats’ water; but there is nothing illegal about it.

        Historically, countries have sought to influence American elections. That’s not spoken of much these days because the “international community” tends to favor Democrats, and Democrats are happy to have the help. In the Soviet days, it was Democrats in collusion with Russia to undermine Ronald Reagan – and no one in the media seemed perturbed by it.

        Meddling in other countries’ elections (usually, while sniffing about how unseemly it would be to meddle in other countries’ elections) is what major countries do. It is certainly what the United States did during the prior administration: President Obama meddled in Israeli elections, the Brexit referendum, the Italian referendum, etc. He is apparently a compulsive meddler: He kicked off his post-presidential career by stumping for Emmanuel Macron in the French election.

        This sort of thing is high-stakes politics, but it is routine. That’s why foreign subterfuge was one of the Framers’ chief concerns – which explains why the Constitution, for example, requires the president to be a “natural born citizen.”

        There is little doubt that a president found to have schemed with a foreign country to corrupt American election processes could be impeached. But as I explained at length in Faithless Execution, impeachment is a political process to remove power; it is not a legal process in the nature of a criminal prosecution. An impeachable offense is a breach of the public trust, not necessarily a crime prosecutable in court. There is no indication that Donald Trump schemed with Russia to corrupt the election process. If ever there were evidence that some president had done such a thing, though, you would not need a prosecutor. You would need Congress to commence impeachment hearings.

        Another hurdle is worth mentioning. Have you ever noticed that there are few federal prosecutions for crimes related to elections? That’s because elections are generally the purview of the states, even when federal offices are at stake. There are exceptions – e.g., intimidation or bribery of voters, the adoption by states of voter qualification practices that arguably violate federal civil rights laws, etc. By and large, though, it is the states that conduct and regulate elections. (See, e.g., the state of New York’s extensive corpus of election law). In fact, it is often observed that we do not have a national election for president; we have 50 state elections.

        • There simply is not much in the way of federal criminal law applicable to alleged “meddling” in elections. Given that Russia’s meddling did not involve preventing people from exercising the franchise or tampering with the voting process, why would we need a prosecutor?

          It is not a criminal offense to encourage or assist a foreign country to take actions that might influence an election. To be sure, if the actions in question were illegal, and the encouragement or assistance in question were hands-on enough to qualify as real participation in the illegality (e.g., not mere cheerleading but actual aiding and abetting), you might have a criminal conspiracy to commit those actions.

          So what illegal actions arose out of Russia’s shenanigans? The only apparent one was hacking. There is no basis to believe the Trump campaign had any involvement in that. In fact, the FBI, CIA and NSA say the Russians targeted both major political parties in their “cyber operations.” Based on what the government has told us, then, there is some basis to suspect that Trump was a potential hacking target, but none to suspect that anyone in his campaign was a hacking conspirator.

          Moreover, there is good reason to doubt that a prosecutor could prove the hacking case even against Russia, never mind against others.

          I take it as a given that our intel agencies are correct in concluding that (a) “Russian intelligence services conducted cyber operations against targets associated with the 2016 US presidential election”; and (b) that Russia’s military intelligence service “used the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com to release US victim data … publicly and in exclusives to media outlets and relayed material to WikiLeaks.” In their report, however, the intel agencies explain that they are not able to reveal publicly how they know what they say they know; doing so would compromise “sensitive sources or methods and imperil the ability to collect critical foreign intelligence in the future.”

          Consequently, the hacking presents two problems for a prosecutor, problems of the kind that recur in national security cases.

          First, intelligence agency conclusions are not based on the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard of proof that applies in criminal prosecutions. Intelligence analysis is very different from law-enforcement in this regard. Intelligence deals in probabilities and relies heavily on information that would be inadmissible under courtroom rules of evidence. In addition, intelligence analysis has no presumption of innocence. If the FBI suspects that you, John Q. Citizen, have committed a crime, the Bureau’s criminal investigators know they must overcome the hurdle that the judge will tell the jury you are innocent unless they can convincingly prove otherwise. But the FBI’s intelligence agents never presume that Vladimir Putin is innocent.

          Second, even if there exists proof that would satisfy the demanding “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard, such evidence may not be usable in court. Exposing it might, for example, blow a critical intelligence-collection program; or if the information was provided by a foreign intelligence service, it might have been shared with the U.S. subject to a non-disclosure agreement. Thus, even if our intelligence agencies are right that Russia is the hacker – again, I assume they are – there may not be sufficient courtroom evidence to prove that they are right.

          So on the face of things, there is only one known crime (hacking), there is no evidence of participation in it by President Trump or his campaign, and it may not even be provable against the country our intelligence agencies believe committed it, much less against lesser and non-culpable players. This, undoubtedly, is why the FBI, which has been looking at this matter for over 10 months, has been investigating it as a counterintelligence matter, not a criminal matter.

          It is highly unlikely that the hacking had any material impact on the election – Democrats claimed for a year-and-a-half that Mrs. Clinton’s own potentially criminal emails were not a problem; how could a comparatively few merely embarrassing emails of the more obscure John Podesta have been a problem? In any event, whatever activities people of various connections to Trump may have been “colluding” in with Russia over the years, they are either not criminal or not relevant to the election – or both.

          Unquestionably, Russia’s perfidy should be aggressively investigated. There should be accountability regarding any American who participated in it (and any American official who may have exploited the amorphous Russia counterintelligence investigation as a pretext to conduct political spying on the opposition party). But these are not criminal transactions fit for courtroom prosecution; they are national security matters fit for counterintelligence and congressional inquiries.

          So why, then, do Democrats want a special prosecutor? Because the appointment of one would presume the existence of the thing they have not been able to demonstrate, namely: that a crime has been committed. They would be able to argue, à la Watergate, “We already know someone in the administration belongs in jail – otherwise, why would we have this prosecutor?”

          That is not the way it’s supposed to work. An investigation by a prosecutor is triggered by a good-faith belief that a prosecutable crime has been committed. Prosecutors are not supposed to be assigned in order to investigate (and investigate … and investigate …) whether there is a good faith basis to investigate. The surgeon does not start cutting until we know the patient needs surgery.

          When Democrats and the media echo chamber demand the appointment of a special prosecutor, the reply should be: To prosecute what crime? “Collusion” is not an answer to that question; and if the question cannot be answered, that should be the end of the conversation.

          https://pjmedia.com/andrewmccarthy/2017/05/13/what-crime-would-a-special-prosecutor-prosecute/

        • It is always possible that she thinks a crime has been committed most of the Dems are smart enough to know that no crime was committed but they think1) we are so dumb that if they accuses President Trump of a crime long enough we will start to believe them or 2) that we are stupid enough to already believe their lie. Clapper with his charge of our institution being under attack by the man who is working to restore the rule of law to the US clearly believes that we are too stupid to tie our own shoes.

  14. Clashes in Tunisia as crowds take to the streets after local vendor sets himself on fire

    Fiery clashes erupted between police and protesters in Tebourba, Saturday, as crowds took to the streets in solidarity of a fruit seller who set himself on fire when police stopped him working earlier in the week. Protesters threw rocks at the police and burned tires as they attempted to barricade main roads. In turn, police fired tear gas canisters towards the crowd and arrested dozens, according to local media.

  15. Came across this group :

    “GPRAWU was officially founded on March 3rd, 2013 in the state of Georgia which is located in the United States. The purpose of the establishment at that time was to only encourage and advise Muslims to follow religious codes of conduct (shariah) in the state of Georgia. Since then operations of GPRAWU have expanded to a broader spectrum.
    ?
    …..

    They’re, uh, interested in new members :

    General Presidency of Religious Affairs and Welfare of the Ummah

    https://m.facebook.com/pg/GPRAWU/posts/?ref=page_internal&mt_nav=1

  16. Turkey: 550 year old shrine moved for dam project

    The 550 year old Zeynel Bey shrine was moved from its location near the Ilisu Dam in south-eastern Turkey on Friday.

    The relocation took two years to plan, with at least 50 experts assisting on site as the structure moved along on the wheeled platform.

    As the historic shrine was successfully moved two kilometres away, concerns continue to be raised over the fate of other artefacts in the area which is about to be flooded for the dam project.

    [....and why couldn't they move the "dome of the rock" and "al aqsa" the same way ?... that would be a good start....]

  17. Condo tower with Islamic museum and mosque to rise at proposed Ground Zero Mosque site
    MAY 14, 2017 5:46 AM BY ROBERT SPENCER 39 COMMENTS

    “Describing the controversy as ‘a fabricated issue,’ Mr. El-Gamal, who received death threats at the time, insisted that the scaled-down museum would still achieve his original objective. ‘We are still building an Islamic museum and sanctuary,’ he said.” A “sanctuary”? In this context, that’s a mosque.

    And sure, he received death threats. Always claiming victim status. I myself have received numerous death threats that I can readily document. I challenge El-Gamal to document his claim, which the New York Times, of course, repeats uncritically.

    The Islamic museum at Ground Zero is just as much of an insult to those who were killed there as the 16-story mega-mosque that El-Gamal originally planned would have been. If it were an honest Islamic museum, showing the true history of jihad conquest and exposing the motivating ideology of the 9/11 jihad mass murderers, it would be welcome and even necessary. But it is sure to be a whitewash. When is the museum dedicated to the achievements of Nazi Germany going up at Auschwitz?

    https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/05/condo-tower-with-islamic-museum-and-mosque-to-rise-at-proposed-ground-zero-mosque-site

  18. A lesson plan developed in New York state and promoted by the New York State Education Department called “Dying to be a Martyr,” features video interviews with Islamic terrorists who explain why their attacks on Israelis are justified, according to an investigation by The Blaze.

    For the last decade, the plan has been offered to teachers through the taxpayer-funded Public Broadcasting Service’s “LearningMedia” website. The PBS website offers “a media-on-demand service offering educators access to the best of public media and delivers research-based, classroom-ready digital learning experiences.”

    The lesson plan is geared for high school-age students. As The Blaze reports, “There are no instructions in the lesson plan for teachers to denounce these views and no videos are featured showing the Israeli response.

    “Among the other biased aspects of the lesson plan are instructions for teachers to ‘Check for understanding by asking students to respond to the focus question. (Mohanned, feels he would rather die and by a martyr than live his life, sees his life as hollow—in contrast he sees Israelis as happy, going out, having fun, traveling.) Ask your students why Mohanned may feel that way (Answers may include: Palestinians have less land, fewer privileges, cannot come and go as they please.)’”

    A further investigation by the news outlet showed that until the expose on the lesson plan was published, it was being promoted by the New York State Education Department (NYSED). After a request was made for comment by state officials, NYSED’s website was changed and the lesson plan was dropped.

    However, the plan was still listed on another NYSED website as well the promotion of a video titled “Story of Islam: A History of the World’s Most Misunderstood Faith.”

    The Blaze reports that out of 40 items included on the website, “Dying to be a Martyr” was the only complete lesson plan listed.

    https://clarionproject.org/ny-public-schools-promote-course-justifying-suicide-bombings/#.WRMFI5w7SLA.twitter

  19. Evacuations of rebels from last Damascus stronghold begins (abcnews, May 14, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/evacuations-rebels-damascus-stronghold-begins-47400673

    “Hundreds of rebels and their families began leaving a northeastern neighborhood of Damascus and heading toward rebel-held areas in northern Syria Sunday, in another step that would eventually bring all parts of the capital under the control of President Bashar Assad’s forces, state media and opposition activists said…”

    • Syrian army sends reinforcements toward border with Iraq: rebels

      The Syrian army aided by Iranian-backed militias was moving troops to a desert region near its border with Iraq and Jordan just as U.S. backed rebels are consolidating control in an area from which Islamic State militants had recently pulled out, rebel sources and commanders said on Monday.

      They said their intelligence showed that hundreds of Syrian troops and Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias with tanks and heavy equipment had moved in the last few days to the town of Sabaa Biyar, in a sparsely populated desert territory that goes all the way to the Jordanian and Iraqi border known as the Syrian Badia.

      The remote town near the strategic Damascus-Baghdad highway was captured by the army and its allies last week as they seek to prevent areas left by the hardline militants from falling into the hands of Western-backed moderate Free Syrian Army(FSA) rebels say.

      “They have sent big reinforcements from artillery, to tanks and armored vehicles,” said Major Issam Al Reis, the spokesperson for the so-called Southern Front group of Western-backed FSA rebel groups.

      The Syrian army was not immediately available for comment.

      The Syrian army has been alarmed by two months of FSA advances against Islamic State that allowed the rebels to secure a large swathe of sparsely populated territory stretching from the town of Bir Qassab, some 50 km (30 miles) southeast of Damascus, all the way to the borders with Iraq and Jordan.

      “The regime’s plan is to reach the Iraqi-Syrian border and cut the road on our advance further toward the north east against Islamic State’s strongholds there after they lost territory in the Badia,” al Reis said.

      The Syrian government warplanes struck rebel outposts near the borders with Jordan and Iraq last Tuesday. In the last few days they also stepped up surveillance missions in the Badia and struck rebel outposts in the town of Bir Qassab.

      But the push by the Syrian army and its Iranian backed allies could risk bringing them to close to the Tanf base near the Iraqi border where U.S. special forces operate and train FSA rebels, rebels said.

      The base is being expanded to become a launching pad for operations to oust militants from the eastern province of Deir Zor, that straddles Iraq, from the south east of Syria, regional intelligence sources say.

      But the presence of Iranian-backed militias from Iraq and Lebanon’s Hezbollah in that area has alarmed Jordan, a U.S. ally, which backs the moderate rebel groups.

      Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said the kingdom did not accept the presence of these Shi’ite militias as much they fought the threat of the ultra-hardline radical Sunnis.

      The kingdom has long been trying to prevent opposition-held southern Syria from falling to Islamic State.

      Rebels say the ultimate goal of the Syrian army’s push in the Badia was to link its forces with Iraq’s Shi’ite paramilitary groups on the other side of the border.

      The Shi’ite troops launched an offensive on Friday to drive the militants from the desert region near the border with Syria. Iraqi Shi’ite militia leaders said they hoped to link up with Syrian government forces.

      The Damascus-Baghdad highway was a major weapons supply route for Iranian weapons into Syria until Islamic State seized large territory along the Iraqi Syrian border, regional intelligence sources says.

      Rebels say they have begun this week to target outposts they believed were manned by Iranian backed militias.

      “The Syrian desert will not accept new occupiers it got rid of Baghdadi’s caliphate (Islamic States head) not so that Iran’s terrorist militias take its place. It is our strategic depth,” said Captain Ahmed Tamer, the head of the Ahmed Abdo Martyrs Forces.

      http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-border-idUSKCN18B01D

      Syria – “The regime will be there” – U.S. Concedes Raqqa … And The Syrian East?

      There are strong rumors that the U.S. intends to launch an invasion of east-Syria from Jordan with the aim of occupying the whole eastern area. The Syrian army and its allies launched a move towards the east (red) to prevent such an outcome.[…]

      […]Any agreement with the U.S. that ISIS areas in Syria will fall back to government control, independent of who liberated them, should be welcome. Military hawks in the Trump administration, the sectarian Gulf countries as well as Israel will try to interrupt such a move. The Syrian government and its allies must therefore continue their own operations and liberate as many ares as possible by themselves. They must stay aware that a Trump administration might, at any time, revert to the old plan of establishing a “Salafist principality” in the area – even when such an unruly proxy would make little sense for it.

      http://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/05/syria-the-regime-will-be-there-us-to-concede-raqqa-and-the-syrian-east-.html

  20. Afghan official says mortar attack kills 5 children (abcnews, May 14, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/afghan-official-mortar-attack-kills-children-47402763

    “An Afghan official says a mortar attack has killed five children in eastern Afghanistan.

    Sarhidi Zwak, spokesman for the governor of the Laghman province, said they ranged in age from six to 12 years old.

    No one has claimed responsibility for the attack, but officials suspect the Taliban, who are active in the province.

    The attack came a day after an explosion in the western Herat province killed six people and wounded another 16. Gelani Farhad, spokesman for the governor, said it appeared the blast was caused by the accidental explosion of a gas cylinder, but that an investigation was underway.

    An Islamic State affiliate claimed it killed six Shiites in a bombing attack in Herat.”

  21. Rotherham Child Rape Victim: ‘Authorities Did Nothing’, Was Told Not to Mention Ethnicity of Attackers (breitbart, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/05/14/rotherham-child-rape-victim-authorities-did-nothing-mention-ethnicity/

    “A survivor of a Muslim grooming gang in Rotherham said she reported being raped when she was 13 years old, but authorities did nothing and told her not to mention the ethnicity of the attackers.

    The rape survivor, Emma, told Katie Hopkins on LBC radio on Sunday: “I actually reported my abuse 14 years ago. I went to the authorities, my parents did. I sat and gave video interviews with the police, I was willing to work with them.

    “But as soon as I said the names, I was made to feel as though I was racist and I was the one who had the problem.”

    “I was specifically told not to comment on the ethnicity of the perpetrators,” Emma said, adding she was told “numerous times” by police and social workers not to mention race.

    “I knew I wasn’t racist, but I felt like that was used as a way to silence me.”

    Asked by Ms. Hopkins how that made her feel at the time, Emma said: “My perpetrators made me feel like I was in the wrong and they [police and social workers] fed into that. And I felt like: ‘Maybe my perpetrators are right. Maybe it’s not them that’s got the problem, maybe it’s me’.”

    Groomed from 12, Emma told LBC listeners she was a virgin when she was raped at age 13. Detailing that the rapes happened regularly, she described one occasion where she was locked in a property and sexually assaulted by multiple men.

    The Muslim grooming gang then began blackmailing the young teen, and threatened to gang rape her mother if she told her parents.

    “That was my life,” she said.

    The rapes continued after she reported it to police, as authorities told her it was “[her] word against his”. The police had also lost the clothes she had been raped in, leaving her with no evidence for a prosecution.

    Let down by authorities, she found herself being further abused by other rape gangs. She reported rape again at the age of 14, but police said there was not enough evidence.

    Eventually, her parents moved her out of the country…”

  22. ‘Justice for Chelsey’ March Protests Alleged Police Inaction After Woman Reports Migrant Rape (breitbart, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/05/14/sunderland-justice-for-chelsey-march-protests-alleged-police-inaction-after-woman-reports-migrant-rape/

    “A march has taken place in Sunderland to protest alleged police inaction after a young mother reported being drugged, raped, and assaulted by a group of migrant men.

    The mainstream press initially reported the arrest and bail of six men from Iraq, Syria, and Bahrain after local woman Chelsey Wright, 26, reported a “serious assault”.

    However, it is alleged the men all escaped charges and local police failed to investigate the incident properly.

    In an interview with The Rebel Media’s Tommy Robinson, Ms. Wright describes waking up in a locked room with a strange man of Turkish appearance who laughed at her and banged her head against the wall when she tried to escape.

    Ms. Wright says she managed to get out of the room when the first man unlocked the door to let another man in, but was kicked down the stairs when she attempted to flee. She says a number of men attempted to restrain her as she made for the front door, dragging her back into the house by her hair in the presence of a witness when she got outside.

    She was able to escape the house a second time and reach safety, and was examined at a sexual assault clinic the same day. She claims forensics yielded two semen samples, only one of which could be properly tested, as well as traces of the date rape drug Rohypnol in her blood…”

    • Folk Hero Tommy Robinson Sunderland Speech 13/5/17: Justice for Chelsey: BBC & MSM silent as ever

    • Tommy Robinson, Police Try To Sabotage Justice For Chelsey March In Sunderland, 13/5/2017.

  23. Swedish Finance Minister Admits ‘Big Problems’ with Economy After Migrant Influx (breitbart, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/05/14/finance-minister-problems-migrant-influx/

    “Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson has admitted Sweden has “major problems” as a result of the population growth brought on by mass immigration.

    Earlier this week, the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SKL) admitted, by 2020, municipalities face a funding deficit of 40 billion Swedish Krona (£3.5 billion) to finance services like hospitals and nursing homes.

    “Demographic trends show that, with more children and more elderly people, the need for local government services is expected to grow significantly faster than the tax base,” says Annika Wallenskog, chief economist at SKL.

    Andersson told Swedish Television News (SVT) that “it is quite obvious that we have big problems” as a result of the demographic changes aggravated by mass migration.

    The Socialist minister stressed the country must hire more staff and build more facilities, and said politicians cannot afford to promise any tax cuts.

    Sweden’s National Audit Office announced in November that it believes the government “underestimates public spending”.

    In a piece published by Dagens Nyheter, the office remarked: “”If the government’s forecasts are realised, Sweden will be required to make significant reductions to welfare, and municipalities significant cuts by 2020…”

  24. Swedish Pensioner Prosecuted for ‘Hate’ for Accusing Migrants of Torching Cars on Facebook (breitbart, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/05/14/pensioner-charged-migrants-burning-cars/

    “A 70-year-old Swedish woman in Dalarna is being prosecuted for hate speech after claiming on Facebook she saw migrants defecating in the streets and setting fire to cars.

    According to the prosecution, the woman “expressed a disparaging view of refugees” on Facebook. She stands accused of having taken to the social media website in early July 2015 to make the “derogatory” post, alleging that migrants “set fire to cars, and urinate and defecate on the streets”.

    Prosecutors in Sweden say the woman’s message violates the nation’s law on incitement to racial hatred (Hets mot folkgrupp, or HMF), a crime with carries a maximum penalty of four years.

    The accused admitted that she wrote the post but denied committing any criminal act. The evidence against her consists of a screenshot from Facebook, according to local media.

    People took to Flashback, the net’s largest Swedish language forum, to criticise the state’s decision to prosecute the pensioner, with one poster lamenting the accused “has fallen into the clutches of the politically correct”.

    A user with the screen name ‘Nospheratu’ pointed out that the original idea behind HMF was “to prevent large-scale propaganda by political parties” against demographic groups, with lawmakers “having 1930s Germany in mind” whilst passing laws. The user slammed the law for being used to “prosecute old ladies on the bus” criticising immigrants.

    Another slammed Sweden for hypocrisy, accusing the nation’s media and politicians of condemning restrictions on freedom of speech and expression in other countries “while themselves engaging in the worst kinds of witch hunts of dissidents”.

    Sweden’s Justice Minister Morgan Johansson cited freedom of speech when he rejected Gothenburg police chief Erik Nord’s suggestion that the country deports Islamic State-supporting migrants, after the Islamist terror attack in Stockholm last month.

    “We have freedom of speech in Sweden. This means people have the right to hold repulsive opinions here,” said Johansson.

    “But there are always limits… For example when it comes to hate speech,” added the minister, who called Nord’s policy suggestion “problematic”, and demanded the police chief “explain himself”.”

  25. Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers at this site – and to the mothers in the lives of everyone.

    To help you celebrate, the Free Press of Kekistan brings you this gift of based music:

    • Happy Mother’s Day. Brilliant Video.
      And where are their Parents? To insure their safety, these “safe space warriors” should be accompanied by their parents. Especially those “precious ones” that are still under Mommy & Daddy’s health care plan.

  26. WOW! Beauty Queen Suspended for Tweets Against ISLAM – Do YOU Support Her?
    5.1K
    SHARES
    ShareTweetPlus
    She took a run at a sacred cow. So the PC Police slapped her down.

    Was this ‘protecting their brand’ or was this unfair censorship?

    Miss Puerto Rico — Destiny Velez — got in a Twitter war with Michael Moore. And it cost her her title.

    Was that fair? Or too much?

    Michael Moore, you may remember, shambled his fat ass over to Trump Tower to hold up a ridiculous sign as a publicity stunt.
    Political stunt that it was, it earned him some political blowback. Photoshop was used — liberally — to make a counter-argument.

    http://clashdaily.com/2017/05/wow-miss-puerto-rico-suspended-tweets-islam-support/

  27. AA
    SAN ANTONIO – As they patrol their Northwest Bexar County neighborhoods, a group of armed homeowners is putting criminals on notice.
    A former army infantryman who lives in the Cobblestone neighborhood off Culebra Road started the Crime Deterrence Unit there in September. A number of car break-ins and a shooting near his home led to the group’s formation. He asked to go by only his first name, Bryan.
    “You gotta be nuts to come to Cobblestone and think you’re going to steal stuff, honestly,” Bryan said.
    Since September, he’s recruited 20-plus volunteers and expanded to 10 more neighborhoods and six businesses in the area.

    http://news4sanantonio.com/news/local/homeowners-armed-with-rifles-body-armor-and-marked-vehicles-patrol-their-neighborhoods

  28. Though flying under the Corporate Media’s radar, Adam Kokesh has been a formidable catalyst in American politics an army vet and an unapologetic AnCap, here he is being interviewed by Gavin McInnis:

  29. New York Manhattan – More than 100 firefighters battle fire at historic LES synagogue

    LOWER EAST SIDE, Manhattan –– Dozens of firefighters are battling a fire at a historic synagogue in lower Manhattan Sunday evening, FDNY said.

    The blaze began at Congregation Beth Hamedrash on 60 Norfolk St. in the Lower East Side around 7 p.m. It quickly grew to a 3-alarm fire inside the abandoned building, according to the FDNY.

    Fire officials say no one was hurt in the fire.

    The Gothic building was built in 1850 and served as the house of worship for the Beth Hamedrash Hagodol, an Orthodox Jewish congregation, through most of its history its until 2007, when the synagogue closed.

    http://pix11.com/2017/05/14/firefighters-battle-huge-fire-at-lower-east-side-synagogue/

    https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/863907324301332480

  30. Swedish Migration Agency criticized for grilling asylum seekers on their faith (thelocal, May 14, 2017)
    https://www.thelocal.se/20170514/swedish-migration-agency-criticized-for-grilling-asylum-seekers-on-their-faith

    “Sweden’s Migration Agency has been criticized for the way in which it tests religious asylum seekers on their knowledge of Christianity.

    The questions were posed to asylum seekers who had converted to Christianity and were seeking asylum on the grounds of religious persecution.

    Asylum seekers were quizzed on technical aspects of the Christian faith, such as the number of parts to the New Testament and the difference between the Orthodox and Protestant Churches.

    Both lawyers and church representatives have criticized the practice, which they argue tests technical knowledge rather than a person’s faith. The responses given to the questions could affect whether applicants are granted asylum or not.

    “I think it’s terrible. I have repeatedly had to interrupt administrators who ask these questions because they are not relevant and are far too complicated,” lawyer Serpil Güngör told SVT…”

  31. Obama’s men influencing Trump on Syria: Erdo?an (hurriyetdailynews, May 14, 2017)
    http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/obamas-men-influencing-trump-on-syria-erdogan.aspx?pageID=238&nID=113086&NewsCatID=510

    “Allegations that Turkey has not done enough against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is “slander” by former U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an has said, accusing some officials appointed by Obama of trying to influence President Donald Trump’s decisions on Syria and Iraq.

    “Turkey realized the danger of Daesh [ISIL] long before the United States did, and stood against it,” Erdo?an told a group of journalists in Beijing on May 14, two days before a scheduled meeting with Trump in Washington.

    “Saying that Turkey has not fought Daesh is a betrayal to Turkey, a slander by the Obama administration,” the president said, adding that Trump was presented by such a wrong perception when he took office.

    “There are Obama’s men in lower positions [in the current administration]. He [Trump] is looking at the situation in Iraq and Syria through the information fed by them. And I say there is no need for the YPG [Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units] or PYD [Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party]. These are terrorist organizations. Considering cooperation with the YPG as a condition to fight Daesh is in fact destroying the reputation of the U.S. and the [U.S.-led anti-ISIL] coalition,” the president added.

    Erdo?an will fly from China to the U.S. to meet Trump on May 16 in Washington. The Pentagon last week announced that Trump had given his authorization to provide the YPG with heavy weaponry, drawing Ankara’s ire.

    The subject is likely to top the agenda during Erdo?an’s meeting…”

  32. Over 100 killed as cholera outbreak spreads in Yemen (alaraby, May 14, 2017)
    https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2017/5/14/over-100-killed-as-cholera-outbreak-spreads-in-yemen

    “A cholera outbreak in war-torn Yemen has killed 115 people and left 8,500 ill as hospitals struggle to cope with an influx of patients, the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Sunday.

    “We now are facing a serious outbreak of cholera,” said ICRC director of operations Dominik Stillhart at a news conference in the capital Sanaa.

    Citing figures compiled by the Yemeni health ministry, Stillhart said 115 people had died of cholera between April 27 and Saturday.

    More than 8,500 suspected cases of the waterborne disease were reported in the same period in 14 governorates across Yemen, Stillhart said, up from 2,300 cases in 10 governorates last week.

    This is the second outbreak of cholera in less than a year in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country…”

  33. From travel agents to translators, rising toll of jobs taken by robots… although nail technicians, security officers and kitchen staff are in greater demand

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4505544/Human-jobs-taken-robots-new-study-shows.html#ixzz4h6x2leCb
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

    Travel agents, pharmacy assistants and translators are already being replaced by robots, according to a report.

    After a string of warnings that millions of workers will be replaced by machines, a study suggests this is happening now on a grand scale.

    It claims that two thirds of the fastest declining jobs in Britain are being hit because of increased automation and advances in technology.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4505544/Human-jobs-taken-robots-new-study-shows.html#ixzz4h6xEs6Ok
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

  34. IRS execs: Our lives at risk in tea party case

    Details about tea party bias claims against the IRS could remain secret because current and former agency officials say their lives are in danger if they publicly testify about the case.

    Lois Lerner and Holly Paz both have argued in recent court filings that the threat to their lives outweighs the public’s right to hear their testimony about how IRS employees in Cincinnati and Washington D.C. handled applications for tax-exempt status from tea party groups.

    They recently filed evidence to support their claim under seal in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati. Though that evidence has not been made public, court records indicate it relates to death threats and other harassment the women say they endured after their names were connected to the bias claims against the IRS several years ago.

    http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/politics/2017/05/12/irs-execs-lives-risk-tea-party-case/101591538/

    Richard: This is BS they are afraid that public testimony would create a climate where the Judge would be forced to sentence them to a long time in the pen.

  35. ‘Did you hear that?’: Amid Baltimore’s surge in killings, a faint cry in a locked car

    BALTIMORE — No one saw the baby.

    She sat in a gold-hued car with tinted black windows as her 26-year-old father lay on the ground outside, dying.

    All eyes were on him, another fallen body in a city increasingly defined by them.

    In portions of Baltimore, the strobe of police cars is as much a part of the landscape as boarded-up homes. But the pace of the killings this year has been stunning as the city struggles to recover from rioting in 2015. As of Friday, 124 people had been slain, including five on a recent day, making Baltimore’s homicide rate one of the highest in the country. It is more than triple Washington’s rate and higher than the homicide rates in New Orleans and Chicago, two places that have become national symbols of gun violence.

    Each murder in Baltimore leaves a mark on those who witness it and those who investigate it. But few have been as haunting as the scene that played out on March 27 in front of a West Baltimore carryout that, in contrast to its cheerful name, Rainbow, has metal bars over its windows.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/did-you-hear-that-amid-baltimores-surge-in-killings-a-faint-cry-in-a-locked-car/2017/05/14/5700672e-34f0-11e7-b373-418f6849a004_story.html?utm_term=.2aa902dc0d57

  36. High Turkish support for Erdogan in EU worries Europeans (abcnews, May 14, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/high-turkish-support-erdogan-eu-worries-europeans-47402372

    “Ayhan Ogelge lives in Austria. But his heart is in his Turkish homeland and beats for its president, even as Europe’s democracies raise the alarm over the Turkish leader’s push toward one-man rule.

    President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “speaks for all of us,” says Ogelge, when asked why he voted to strengthen his powers. “In Austria, in Turkey — everywhere.”

    Ogelge is far from alone. While nearly half overall of those who voted last month opposed a referendum giving Erdogan more power, many of the 1.4 million votes cast in Europe tell a different story.

    More than 70 percent voted yes in Austria, the Netherlands and Belgium, and more than 60 percent in Germany and France. Critics fear their endorsement of Erdogan’s moves toward undisputed authority amounts to a rejection of the Western democracies many Turks have lived in for decades.

    Reflecting deep polarization within Europe’s Turkish communities, most members refuse to discuss their vote. Additionally, because Austria doesn’t allow dual citizenship in most cases, Turks with Austrian and secretly held Turkish passports won’t acknowledge they voted.

    “I’ve never experienced such a climate of distrust,” says publisher Birol Kilic, a first-generation Turkish immigrant with Austrian citizenship. “Even when I, a Turk, ask other Turks about their vote here, I am met with silence.”

    But Erdogan critics have ready answers to why so many supported the Turkish leader.

    They speak of indoctrination — and intimidation — through a web of mosques, social clubs and other organizations loyal to Erdogan’s AKP party.

    Germany’s pro-European Turkish Community says many were led into thinking the question boiled down to “are you a Turk, or a traitor to the fatherland?”

    Sevim Dagdelen of Germany’s Die Linke party speaks of manipulation by “Erdogan’s networks, his army of informants and trolls.” Peter Pilz of Austria’s Greens party says Erdogan’s support in Europe was strongest “where there are powerful religious and political webs financed and controlled by Ankara.”

    Pilz notes that Erdogan lost in Sweden, Switzerland and other countries with relatively small Turkish populations and weak Turkish state-backed organizations.

    ATIB, the Turkish acronym for Turkish-Islamic Cultural Unions in Europe, which reports to Ankara’s religious authorities and was named by Pilz as a key state-influencer of Austrian Turks, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

    In Vienna, the sprawling Brunnenmarkt bazaar appears to be the most fertile ground for any Turkish state outreach.

    Essentially a Turkish outpost, it provides life in the comfort zone with the minimum of forays into what for many is the strange world of Europe.

    The language here is Turkish, as are the signs and the enticing smells from the food stalls. So are the television programs beamed by state and pro-state networks loyal to Erdogan. And holiday trips always lead back to Turkey.

    Even when understood in a community where many only speak Turkish, questions about Erdogan from outsiders are unwelcome here.

    A kerchiefed woman selling pastries frowns when asked what she thinks of the Turkish president. “No time,” she mutters, turning away. “Too much work.” Another Turk a few stands away is even curter. “No reporters,” he barks.

    German migration researcher Joachim Schulte speaks of Turkish “ghettos” distrustful of outsiders where “nationalism is strongly conserved and the contacts to Germans or Austrians are reduced to a minimum.”

    “Every-day communication occurs only in the home community,” he says. “One remains in his own world here. Turkish brides are imported. And they never learn German — no need, everything works fine in Turkish.”

    Many break out and integrate. Still, statistics indicate that most don’t feel they have arrived.

    An Austrian government study from last year says 51.8 percent of first- and second- generation Turks feel more at home in Turkey than Austria. A survey in the German state of Bavaria from February notes that of migrants from nine nations or regions, Turks and their descendants show “the greatest readiness to return home and the greatest ties to the motherland.”

    But fault for such “parallel societies” lies not only with the Turks.

    Enclaves like the Brunnenmarkt grew from the arrival of the first “guest workers” in the mid-1950s. They did the menial work that the citizens of economically growing Western Europe considered below them. Subsequent generations inherited such work — and with it, European aversion.

    The German study reflects Turkish frustrations, with 51 percent of first- and second-generation respondents agreeing with the statement: “No matter how hard I try, I am not accepted as part of German society.”

    While EU nations are offering language lessons, courses on socially acceptable behavior and job training to the wave of migrants that swarmed into Europe starting in 2015, the guest workers never had such opportunities.

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel said as much two years ago in comments marking the 60th anniversary of the arrival of the first guest workers. Officials back then, she said, “pushed a book in their hands titled ‘German for Foreigners’ and said: ‘OK, that should work.'”

    In terms of adapting, “they were simply thrown into cold water,” she added.

    Many turn to the old country in their search for the self-esteem they can’t find in their new homes.

    Aydan Ozoguz, Germany’s commissioner for immigration, refugees and integration, says Erdogan voters saw in him “the strong man who represents the self-worth apparently missing” in Germany.

    And Erdogan’s anti-European tirades apparently fell on receptive ears.

    “The message ‘we want a strong Turkey, all of Europe wants a weak Turkey’ hit the right nerve,” Austrian migration and assimilation researcher Kenan Gungor says.

    The vote for Erdogan, he says, was “almost a declaration of love.””

  37. This is getting to be so commonplace in the UK!

    http://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/15283358.Brierfield_taxi_driver_banned_from_the_road_after_being_found_guilty_of_sexual_assaulting_female_passenger/?ref=mrb&lp=6

    A PERVERT taxi driver has been banned from driving or using licensed vehicles after being convicted of sexually assaulting a teenager in the back of his cab.

    Mohammed Monjur Hussain, 38, denied sexually assaulting the 17-year-old, when she sought refuge in his taxi after breaking up with her boyfriend on June 18 last year.

    She was crying and clearly upset when she got into the vehicle in Guy Street, Brierfield.

    But during a trial at Preston Crown Court, it emerged Hussain took the opportunity to get in the back of the cab and tried to kiss her on the lips.
    Since the attack, the woman said she has felt anxious and has not been comfortable travelling in taxis.

    She now relies on her mum to drive her around and feels uncomfortable going to her boyfriend’s apartment, which is close to the taxi rank, the court heard.

    Judge Adkin banned Hussain, of Warwick Drive, Brierfield, from driving or travelling in taxis, working for any taxi firm, applying for a taxi licence or being in a vehicle with any lone female.

    He also made a restraining order banning Hussain from contacting his victim.

    He said: “You have no remorse or insight whatsoever.

    “Everything that has befallen you is your fault. You have lost your job and you have no income.”

    Hussain, who has no previous convictions, was handed a six month sentence suspended for 12 months and was ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work.

    He must also pay £500 compensation to his victim, and will be on the sex offenders register for seven years.