Random News Stories

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

http://www.businessinsider.com/walking-may-be-worse-for-the-environment-than-driving-2013-11

Check out this heady dose of bullshit.

Those food supply chains are in our best interest. In fact, it reinforces this idea and binds it to the sales of automobiles.

I know I'm slowpoking, but seriously THE SHIT IS THIS SHIT?

[Trivial]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rPOKm20wP4s  Didn't know where to put this, but thought it was awesome.

[Junkenstein]

Largely for my own benefit so I don't forget this later:
http://boingboing.net/2013/11/09/muzzling-canadian-scientists.html

What if there was a non-political research project that involved a collaboration between NASA scientists and Environment Canada scientists? How easy would it be for a journalist to talk to the scientists involved? It turns out it would take only 15 minutes for something to be arranged with NASA. With Environment Canada, however, it would take the activities of 11 media relations people, sending over 50 pages of internal emails, before a list of irrelevant information was finally sent back - all of this long after the deadline had passed. This is what happened to journalist Tom Spears in April 2012

Various links within article, potentially relevant to a wide range of things.

[LMNO]

Washington Post tells it like it is.

People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Washington Post tells it like it is.

People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children.

The author has an interesting view of "conventional".  Like a 1966 view.

[Cain]

Ah, Richard Cohen, of course.  If you want a stupid op-ed for the WaPo, he's always available, ready and willing.

And of course this is hardly the first time he has had...racial issues.  Quoth Wikipedia:

Cohen wrote a column in 1986 which argued owners of jewelry stores were right to refuse to allow entry to young black men because of a fear of crime. This column led to the Washington Post having to apologize.[15]

Following the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the shooting of Trayvon Martin in July 2013, Cohen wrote "a controversial column in which he defends George Zimmerman's suspicion of Travyon Martin and calls on politicians to acknowledge that a disproportionate amount of crimes are committed by black males".[15] The column went on to say that Cohen "can understand why Zimmerman was suspicious and why he thought Martin was wearing a uniform we all recognize;" in any case, he also points out that "What I'm trying to deal with is, I'm trying to remove this fear from racism. I don't think it's racism to say, 'this person looks like a menace,'" he explained. "Now, a menace in another part of the country could be a white guy wearing a wife-beater under-shirt. Or, if you're a black guy in the South and you come around the corner and you see a member of the Ku Klux Klan".[15] Towards the end of the column, Cohen calls Trayvon Martin "a young man understandably suspected because he was black".[16]

On November 4, 2013, Cohen wrote a column[17] about the film "12 Years a Slave", in which he evinced personal ignorance of the history of slavery in the U.S. and a negative view of abolitionist writer Harriet Beecher Stowe, writing: "Instead, beginning with school, I got a gauzy version. I learned that slavery was wrong, yes, that it was evil, no doubt, but really, that many blacks were sort of content. Slave owners were mostly nice people — fellow Americans, after all — and the sadistic Simon Legree was the concoction of that demented propagandist, Harriet Beecher Stowe."

Mother Jones has a good rundown for those who have not encountered the man's "work" before, which includes Miley Cyrus being repsonsible for rape culture, defending Clarence Thomas' sexist behaviour (while engaging in his own sexist behaviour), defending Roman Polanski and his idea that there is no good reason to outlaw torture.

This is why the terrorists hate you, America.  Not because of your freedoms, but because Richard Cohen is stealing jobs from people with functioning brains.

[LMNO]

Holy crap.

Sersiously, why does this guy still have a job?  I mean, even Hannity would be all, "Whoa, that's a little much there, Richard."

[Cain]

WaPo editorials.  It's under the control of Fred Hiatt:

During this time The Post has also taken traditionally conservative or neoconservative positions on several major issues: economically, it has defended a Republican initiative to allow Social Security personal retirement accounts, and has advocated for several free trade agreements. With respect to foreign policy, it supported the 2003 invasion of Iraq, penning by PBS journalist Bill Moyers' count 27 editorials supporting the invasion.[11] On environmental issues, The Post supported the controversial Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline, and Hiatt himself came under fire for refusing to hold Post columnist George F. Will accountable for misrepresenting scientific evidence in a column[12] in which Will attacked the veracity of global warming. The column drew criticism from several other Post columnists, The Post's scientific reporters, and The Post's ombudsman, as well as from environmental scientists and climatologists.[13][14][15]

Several media commentators have expressed the view that The Post's editorial position under Hiatt has moved towards a neoconservative position on foreign policy issues. Human rights attorney Scott Horton in a blog post for Harper's Magazine, writes that Hiatt has presided over a "clear trend" towards neoconservative columnists.[16] Jamison Foser, a senior fellow at the progressive media watchdog group Media Matters for America, has said that The Post's editorial stance under Hiatt is now neoconservative on foreign affairs and is no longer liberal on many domestic issues.[17] News anchor and political commentator Chris Matthews stated on his program Hardball that The Post is "not the liberal newspaper it was", but has become a "neocon newspaper".[18]

All you need is one guy in a position of influence, and he can stuff the editorial pages full of whatever crap he pleases.  That guy is Fred Hiatt.

And the Post's owners wonder why circulation has been steadily dropping during his tenure as editorial editor?  Because he's using it as a hobby horse, to push his own preferred political agenda.  Not that this is out of the norm for the CIA's favourite newspaper, you understand, but the CIA are relatively subtle when compared to the Neocon propaganda machine, and has the virtue of being far more sane besides.

[Junkenstein]

Interrupting this cracking character assassination to bring you HA HA

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24927078

The death of MI6 spy Gareth Williams, whose body was found in a padlocked sports bag, was probably an accident, police have said.Last year, a coroner said it was likely Mr Williams, 31, from Anglesey, had been unlawfully killed in August 2010.

In a statement, they said: "We are naturally disappointed that it is still not possible to state with certainty how Gareth died and the fact that the circumstances of his death are still unknown adds to our grief.

Coroner Fiona Wilcox concluded that "most of the fundamental questions in relation to how Gareth died remain unanswered".

But she said he was, "on the balance of probabilities", unlawfully killed.

At a briefing on Wednesday, the Met Police announced the conclusion of its three-year investigation into the incident.

DAC Hewitt acknowledged that the coroner, having studied "all the evidence available at that stage" had made "the logical inference that it was more likely someone else was involved in Gareth's death".

"However, she also recognised that there has been endless speculation but little real evidence and it was her view [that] 'it is unlikely that his death will ever be satisfactorily explained'," he said.

"Now at the end of our investigation, based on the evidence, or where we have been unable to find positive evidence, we believe that it is a more probable conclusion that there was no other person present when Gareth died.

Can you breathe again yet? I'm still gasping.

What this does say though is that IF it was a murder it was probably done by a UK "Ally". I also have to consider with this chaps employment, did he know something he shouldn't? Maybe wanted to tell someone something? In those instances the blame looks to be squarely on the UK and a 3 year investigation is completely worthless. With the family apparently saying "No problems here" the likelihood of this being of UK origins is climbing massively.

"I do not believe that I have had the wool pulled over my eyes. I believe that what we are dealing with is a tragic unexplained death,"

The retraction and correction to this statement will be great. Obviously, he's just been slightly misled by his staff. Like every fucker in his kind of position.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Just caught this on the news. Dude obviously killed himself, climbed into a holdall, zipped it up and then lobbed it in the bath. Nothing to see here. Move along.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Just caught this on the news. Dude obviously killed himself, climbed into a holdall, zipped it up and then lobbed it in the bath. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Getting the lock on the outside of the bag was particularly clever.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Washington Post tells it like it is.

People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children.

The author has an interesting view of "conventional".  Like a 1966 view.

Who taught them to SPELL? 

[Junkenstein]

Just caught this on the news. Dude obviously killed himself, climbed into a holdall, zipped it up and then lobbed it in the bath. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Getting the lock on the outside of the bag was particularly clever.

They've spent 3 years getting experts to tell them how it can be done.

Give me 3 years and I'll convince you I'm YOU.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Ah, Richard Cohen, of course.  If you want a stupid op-ed for the WaPo, he's always available, ready and willing.

And of course this is hardly the first time he has had...racial issues.  Quoth Wikipedia:

Cohen wrote a column in 1986 which argued owners of jewelry stores were right to refuse to allow entry to young black men because of a fear of crime. This column led to the Washington Post having to apologize.[15]

Following the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the shooting of Trayvon Martin in July 2013, Cohen wrote "a controversial column in which he defends George Zimmerman's suspicion of Travyon Martin and calls on politicians to acknowledge that a disproportionate amount of crimes are committed by black males".[15] The column went on to say that Cohen "can understand why Zimmerman was suspicious and why he thought Martin was wearing a uniform we all recognize;" in any case, he also points out that "What I'm trying to deal with is, I'm trying to remove this fear from racism. I don't think it's racism to say, 'this person looks like a menace,'" he explained. "Now, a menace in another part of the country could be a white guy wearing a wife-beater under-shirt. Or, if you're a black guy in the South and you come around the corner and you see a member of the Ku Klux Klan".[15] Towards the end of the column, Cohen calls Trayvon Martin "a young man understandably suspected because he was black".[16]

On November 4, 2013, Cohen wrote a column[17] about the film "12 Years a Slave", in which he evinced personal ignorance of the history of slavery in the U.S. and a negative view of abolitionist writer Harriet Beecher Stowe, writing: "Instead, beginning with school, I got a gauzy version. I learned that slavery was wrong, yes, that it was evil, no doubt, but really, that many blacks were sort of content. Slave owners were mostly nice people — fellow Americans, after all — and the sadistic Simon Legree was the concoction of that demented propagandist, Harriet Beecher Stowe."

Mother Jones has a good rundown for those who have not encountered the man's "work" before, which includes Miley Cyrus being repsonsible for rape culture, defending Clarence Thomas' sexist behaviour (while engaging in his own sexist behaviour), defending Roman Polanski and his idea that there is no good reason to outlaw torture.

This is why the terrorists hate you, America.  Not because of your freedoms, but because Richard Cohen is stealing jobs from people with functioning brains.

Jesus fuck.

And this idiot's been nominated for a Pulitzer? Might as nominate this gasbag:

[Junkenstein]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24944358

Police in Toronto say 341 people have been arrested and nearly 400 children rescued in a three-year investigation into a child pornography ring.

At the centre of the inquiry was a Toronto-based firm that allegedly sold DVDs and streamed videos of naked boys in Germany, Romania and Ukraine.

Azov Films marketed the footage as "naturist" and claimed they were legal in Canada and the US.

The films were distributed in 94 countries, police said.

Some 100 arrests were made in Canada and 240 in other countries during the investigation codenamed Project Spade, Toronto police said in a press release.

The head of the company, identified as Canadian Brian Way, 42, has been in custody since his arrest in May 2011, following an undercover operation.

He is charged with 11 different offences including possession of, and import and export, of child pornography.

The Toronto Police Service Child Exploitation Section (TPS) was able to determine the identities of the customers from the Azov Films website.

Seems noteworthy. Main thing here is the exposure of yet another child porn ring. Needless to say, the initial 340 arrests are likely to include some interesting names. Links to even more interesting names are almost inevitable.