May 28, 2016

Some Aussies being Aussies

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=39d_1464304129

May 28, 2016

Exclusive: White House Blocks Transfer of Cluster Bombs to Saudi Arabia

Source: FP

Frustrated by a growing death toll, the White House has quietly placed a hold on the transfer of cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia as the Sunni ally continues its bloody war on Shiite rebels in Yemen, U.S. officials tell Foreign Policy. It’s the first concrete step the United States has taken to demonstrate its unease with the Saudi bombing campaign that human rights activists say has killed and injured hundreds of Yemeni civilians, many of them children.

The move follows rising criticism by U.S. lawmakers of America’s support for the oil-rich monarchy in the year-long conflict. Washington has sold weapons and provided training, targeting information, and aerial refueling support to the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen. It has also sold Riyadh millions of dollars’ worth of cluster bombs in recent years.

Asked about the hold on the shipments, a senior U.S. official cited reports that the Saudi-led coalition used cluster bombs “in areas in which civilians are alleged to have been present or in the vicinity.”

“We take such concerns seriously and are seeking additional information,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/news/exclusive-white-house-blocks-transfer-214340791.html?nhp=1

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The optics are bad when you're selling cluster bombs to the country that birthed the majority of and funded the 911 hijackers.

May 28, 2016

French unemployment hits new record

France’s unemployment rate rose 1.1 percent in the month of February, pushing jobless numbers to a record 3.591 million people, the Labour Ministry said Thursday.

The monthly spike is the sharpest since September 2013 and follows a slight dip in January that had raised hopes of an end to years of surging unemployment.

It comes as students and trade unions staged new protests in cities across France on Thursday against government plans to reform the labour market.

Blaming France's 'bloated' labour code

France’s Socialist government says the reform will help create jobs by introducing greater flexibility in the labour market.

http://www.france24.com/en/20160324-french-unemployment-hits-new-record

Socialists attacking labor.

May 27, 2016

Divorced Italian allowed to pay his child support in pizzas, court rules

A court in Padua has ruled in favour of a divorced father who paid his child support in the form of pizza.

A 50-year-old pizza baker from the small village outside Padua was acquitted on criminal charges of failing to pay child support after a judge ruled that he had done his best during hard times to provide 400 Euros worth of pizzas, calzone and other goods from the take-out pizza place he was managing.

The couple (Nicola Toso and Nicoletta Zuin) divorced in 2002 and for several years all parties followed accords.

But in 2008, Italy was hit by a deep economic crisis and the pizza baker, who had since remarried and had three more children with his new companion, began struggling to make ends meet.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/27/divorced-italian-allowed-to-pay-his-child-support-in-pizzas-cour/

May 27, 2016

Dr. Heimlich Uses His Maneuver For The First Time, Saves 87-Year-Old Woman

Source: NPR

Henry Heimlich didn't hesitate. When a fellow diner started choking, the 96-year-old was ready to perform the maneuver that he invented. He had never actually used the technique in a real situation.

This all happened Monday at an assisted-living facility in Cincinnati, The Cincinnati Enquirer reports. Resident Patty Ris, 87, had swallowed a piece of meat and was struggling to breathe. Perry Gaines, an employee of the Deupree House — who had in fact performed the Heimlich maneuver before — ran toward her table. But Heimlich was already in position.

"Typically, a staff member would do it," the Enquirer reports. " 'But,' Gaines said, pausing, 'it is Dr. Heimlich.' "

Heimlich successfully dislodged the meat from 87-year-old Ris' airway.

Read more: http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/05/27/479760854/dr-heimlich-uses-his-maneuver-for-the-first-time-saves-87-year-old-woman

May 27, 2016

North Coast marijuana growers fear a takeover by 'Big Alcohol'

Humboldt farmers, Sonoma County's subterranean tasting rooms and Tuscan affectations offered a glimpse into a rarefied realm of legal intoxicants.

The marijuana growers had driven south from redwood country to the oak and grass hills to take part in an event called “The Women of Wine & Cannabis,” a chance to visit boutique wineries and learn about appellations and branding in the $200-billion retail alcohol market.

But as they sipped wine on a vine-covered terrace of the Mayacama Golf Club that evening, some of them began to see an insidious subtext to the affair.

The moneyed establishment was shouldering into the marijuana game, legislating the system to its favor, and the small growers who had built the industry had better accept the new model or get bulldozed by it.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-pot-distributors-10102020-snap-story.html?track=lat-pick

May 27, 2016

Suicide in Japan

Warning these video have strong emotional and graphic content

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May 27, 2016

WAPO ED: Clinton’s inexcusable, willful disregard for the rules

HILLARY CLINTON’S use of a private email server while secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 has been justifiably criticized as an error of judgment. What the new report from the State Department inspector general makes clear is that it also was not a casual oversight. Ms. Clinton had plenty of warnings to use official government communications methods, so as to make sure that her records were properly preserved and to minimize cybersecurity risks. She ignored them.

The 83-page report declares that “beginning in late 2005 and continuing through 2011,” the department revised its Foreign Affairs Manual and “issued various memoranda specifically discussing the obligation to use Department systems in most circumstances and identifying the risks of not doing so.” Ms. Clinton didn’t.

During her tenure, State Department employees were told that they were expected to use approved, secure methods to transmit information that was sensitive but unclassified, or SBU. If they needed to transmit SBU information outside the department’s network, they were told to ask information specialists for help. The report said there is no evidence that Ms. Clinton ever asked, “despite the fact that emails exchanged on her personal account regularly contained information that was marked as SBU.” On June 28, 2011, a cable was sent to all diplomatic and consular posts over her signature warning that personal email accounts could be compromised and officials should “avoid conducting official Department business from your personal e-mail accounts.” At the time, Ms. Clinton was doing exactly that.

On March 11, 2011, an assistant secretary sent a memorandum on cybersecurity threats directly to Ms. Clinton, noting a “dramatic increase” in attempts to compromise personal email accounts of senior department officials, possibly for spying or blackmail. That didn’t stop Ms. Clinton either. There were also numerous notifications that some emails (but not all) are considered federal records under the law and that she should print and file those in her office and, before leaving office, surrender all emails dealing with department business. She did so only about two years later, in December 2014.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/clintons-inexcusable-willful-disregard-for-the-rules/2016/05/25/0089e942-22ae-11e6-9e7f-57890b612299_story.html

May 27, 2016

Seventeen Words That Spelled Trouble for Hillary Clinton

posted a lengthy piece on Hillary Clinton’s general-election prospects when a long-awaited report from the State Department’s inspector general, a watchdog appointed by President Obama, was leaked, a day in advance of its release on Thursday. The report concluded that, as Secretary of State, Clinton violated the department’s rules by conducting official business via a private e-mail account and setting up a private e-mail server to handle and store her correspondence.

The story is big news. On Wednesday, it was all over the Internet. The broadcast networks featured it prominently in their evening newscasts. On Thursday, it led the print editions of the Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal. While few readers and viewers will take in all the details in the report, they will surely get the message that Clinton broke the rules, and that her explanation for setting up her private e-mail system, which never seemed very credible, has now been discredited by her own words.

Clinton has repeatedly said that she set up her private e-mail system for the sake of convenience. The new report details an e-mail exchange from November, 2010, between Clinton and Huma Abedin, her deputy chief of staff. Abedin told her boss, “We should talk about putting you on state email or releasing your email address to the department so you are not going to spam.” (Apparently, some messages from Clinton’s private account were being intercepted by the department’s spam filter.) Clinton replied to Abedin, “Let’s get separate address or device but I don’t want any risk of the personal being accessible.”

Those seventeen words seem to confirm what many observers have suspected from the outset: Clinton’s main motive in setting up the e-mail system wasn’t to make it easier for her to receive all her messages in one place, or to do all her business on her beloved BlackBerry; it was to protect some of her correspondence—particularly correspondence she considered private—from freedom-of-information requests and other demands for details, for example, from Republican-run congressional committees.

http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/seventeen-words-that-spelled-trouble-for-hillary-clinton

May 27, 2016

145-year-old casket with preserved toddler found beneath San Francisco home

Source: LA TIMES

Construction crews in San Francisco made a macabre discovery earlier this month when they unearthed a child’s coffin beneath a garage being renovated, the homeowner said.

The lead and bronze 3½ foot-long coffin had two windows in it, revealing the perfectly preserved body of a blond girl in a white dress holding a rose, said homeowner Ericka Karner.

“I was shocked on one hand, obviously, because there’s a small child’s casket underneath the home,” said Karner, who with her husband and children are staying with family in Idaho while renovations continue. “But I wasn’t necessarily super surprised, because I knew the history of the area.”

Karner’s family lives in the city's Richmond District, which in the late 1800s contained a number of cemeteries. In the early 20th century, the city identified the area for development and moved thousands of graves south to Colma.



Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-casket-san-francisco-girl-rose-20160526-snap-story.html