2009 predictions

According to John Derbyshire:

Africa: Jacob “machine-gun“ Zuma will become president of South Africa. Zimbabwe’s inflation rate will pass the trillion percent mark, and thousands will die from cholera and malnutrition. Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe will make a speech at the African Union blaming all his country’s woes on Western powers. He will receive a standing ovation.

Immigration: The Obama administration will stall on “comprehensive immigration reform,” hoping for better economic times when citizens won’t mind so much that illegal aliens are working here and using public services. Their overall strategy on immigration will be to keep radio silence on the topic. They really want amnesty — why would they not want 20 million new Democratic voters? — but this is not the time. Barack Obama’s illegal-immigrant aunt, Zeituni Onyango, will not be deported.

Obama-inspired hope goes only so far in Kenya

As euphoria over his election begins to fade, young people are reminded that in Africa, money, ethnicity and family connections count more toward success than does hard work.

Related:

Kenyan Inflation Slows to 27.7% in December on Energy, Transport

Uganda Inflation Slows to 14.2% in December on Food

Religion and income

Audaciuous Epigone has an interesting post on the connection between a person's religious denomination and their income:

Even with the second highest IQ scores of the 19 groups measured, Jewish incomes far surpass what intelligence alone predicts. This suggests the story behind Jewish success is more than the history of Ashkenazi intelligence alone.

In my opinion, this is likely due, in part, to ethnocentrism amongst Jews i.e. wealthier Jews help poorer Jews to become wealthier.

Ireland, Islam and vitamin D

Muslim women who wear the burqa in Ireland are at increased risk of pelvic fractures during childbirth because of vitamin D deficiency due to a lack of sunlight, a consultant warns. Babies born to women with vitamin D deficiency are also more prone to seizures in their first week of life, according to Dr Miriam Casey, of the Osteoporosis Unit in St James’s hospital in Dublin. A burqa is an enveloping outer garment worn by some Muslim women. In hot countries, enough sunlight gets through to give them sufficient vitamin D, but this may not happen in countries where there is limited sunshine, such as Ireland and Britain. Casey said she was aware of cases involving pelvic fractures, and warned that these could become more frequent as Ireland’s Muslim population increased. “Ireland’s temperate climate doesn't have the intense sunlight that keeps burqa-clad women from becoming vitamin D-deficient in their own countries,” she said. Vitamin D helps the body to absorb calcium and is crucial for making bones strong. The greatest source is sunlight. Casey said the fractures occur at sites of particular weakness which develop in under-mineralized pelvic bones. In these women's babies, low calcium can cause serious complications such as seizures, growth retardation, muscle weakness and fractures. “As a toddler, carrying the weight of the torso can force the development of a bow-legged appearance and a waddling gait,” she said. “Later, there can be rickets, which is caused by vitamin D deficiency, with swollen wrists and bones that fail to fuse in adolescence.” Darker skins can produce as little as 1% of the vitamin D that fair skins produce. Moreover, studies have found that the rate of many diseases rises the further north one moves, leading researchers to suspect that vitamin D may play a greater role in health than previously thought. Casey said: “As we see a rise in the number of Muslims in Ireland, it’s going to become a massive problem. It’s worse in England whose Muslim community is older. There are already problems in the Rotunda [a maternity hospital in Dublin] and the paediatric hospitals.” In 2007, Muslim women in Britain were warned that wearing the hijab could cause poor health for them and their babies.

Jena 6 figure hospitalized after self-inflicted gunshot

A teenager whose arrest in a racially charged assault case drew thousands of protesters to his rural Louisiana hometown is in hospital after a shooting that his lawyer said was accidental. Mychal Bell - who also was arrested after allegedly stealing clothes worth $370 from a department store - was cleaning a gun when it accidentally discharged, shooting him in the shoulder, his attorney, Carol Powell-Lexing, said. He had surgery ht in Monroe, Louisiana, and has not yet been able to talk, she said. Monroe police Sgt. Cassandra Wooten said the wound was not life-threatening. Bell was arrested at the Pecanland Mall in Monroe on Christmas Eve 2008 and charged with shoplifting, simple battery and resisting arrest, Monroe Police Lt. Jeff Davis said. Bell was released on $1,300 bond, and the case was assigned to city court. Security guards at the shopping center received a late-afternoon alert on Christmas Eve that Bell and a male friend were in a menswear section of Dillard's, where they were seen stuffing clothing into a Dillard's bag, according to the investigative report. Once spotted, the men split up, police said. Bell, chased by security guards, ran from the store to a parking lot, where he tried to hide under a car, Davis said. As a store security officer tried to pull Bell out, "Bell swung his arms wildly" and hit the guard with his elbow, the report says. Davis said the guard was hit in the face. Bell admitted to the thefts, which police said included four shirts and a pair of jeans, Davis said. The merchandise was photographed by store security and returned to stock, he added. Bell was taken to jail and booked. Davis said the second man escaped. In December 2006, Bell was one of a half-dozen black teenagers who faced felony charges in the beating of a white classmate in the town of Jena, Louisiana, an incident that followed months of racial tensions in the community of about 3,000 people. The case of the "Jena 6" drew national attention from civil rights groups that said the charges were excessive, and an estimated 15,000-plus people turned out for a September 2007 rally on the youths' behalf. Bell eventually pleaded guilty to battery in a juvenile court and later moved to Monroe, about 70 miles north of Jena.

Related:

Jena Six: Real Crime Victim

Sharia courts in Switzerland?

A social anthropologist wants Switzerland to have different courts for different ethnic and religious groups.

Obama and the Internet

Will the Obama administration try to censor English-language websites?

Related:

Barack Obama website 'censors' questions on Illinois scandal

You Can't Filter the Internet, Mr. Burnham

From the left, a call to end the current Dutch notion of tolerance

The Left seems to be realizing the problems caused by Islamic immigration.

One in five white people carries a gene which could raise their risk of high blood pressure, research suggests

The STK39 gene variant was found after scanning the entire genetic code of hundreds of people in the US and Europe. Those with the variant had raised blood pressure compared with those carrying other versions. The US research was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. High blood pressure, also called hypertension, is important because, over time, it can increase the chances of heart problems, strokes and kidney failure. It is thought that one in four people living in western countries has high blood pressure, often undiagnosed. Scientists looking for genetic vulnerabilities to the condition have explored dozens of possible genes, but STK39 has emerged as a front runner following the University of Maryland School of Medicine study. The researchers concentrated their efforts on 542 members of the Amish community in Pennsylvania, looking at their entire genetic make-up while testing their blood pressure. When this linked variants of the STK39 gene to high blood pressure, it made sense - the gene produces a protein which controls how the kidneys process salt - a key factor in changing blood pressure. The result was reproduced when other groups Caucasian volunteers were tested, and the researchers estimated that 20% from this ethnic group carried it.

Iraqi Kurds and female genital mutilation

More than 60% of Iraqi Kurdish women have undergone female genital mutilation.

Racial absurdity

Now it is considered racist to read an anti-racist book.

Britain and Islamic terrorism

David Hamilton comments on how Islamic immigration is harming Britain.

Related:

Invasion From Within

Police say recent killings in Puerto Rico have pushed the territory's annual homicide rate above 800 victims for the first time in more than a decade

The most recent violence brings the homicide rate for 2008 to 802. The deadliest year on record is 1996, when 868 violent deaths were recorded on this island of nearly 4 million inhabitants. In 2007, the high violent crime rate in the Puerto Rican capital of San Juan led the U.S. Justice Department to dispatch additional teams of federal agents to combat gangs. But the homicide rate continues to soar in the densely populated city.

Barack the Magic Negro

Apparently humor is only humor when it insults Republicans.

Islam is the fastest-growing religion in Britain: the number of Muslims has grown from 1.6 million to two million since 2000

The indulgence of Islam is harming British society.

Saudi cleric calls for attacking Israel over Gaza

A Saudi Web site says that a popular cleric has issued a fatwa urging Muslims to target Israeli interests everywhere, to avenge the attacks on the Gaza strip. The site, Rasid, posts news about Saudi Arabia's Shiite community and says that Sheik Awadh al-Garni has issued a religious edict urging Muslims to target interests and anything that has a link to Israel, calling it a legitimate target for Muslims everywhere. Al-Garni, whose is popular in the kingdom, is not a member of the official religious establishment.

Racial integration is easiest in areas where black populations are small

In places where the percentage of black residents is higher, there is far more segregation.

Related:

Obama's adopted city in black and white

2010

Will mass immigration lead to civil war in the United States?

Cousin marriages

Should cousins be allowed to marry?

The facial expressions we make to show or hide our emotions are hardwired into our brains rather than learned during life, a study has concluded

Blind and sighted athletes made the same expressions when they won and lost, US researchers found. This, the study reported in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology study suggests, meant the expressions were not picked up by watching others. The researchers believe they could be remnants of evolutionary history.

Uganda's army has accused the Lord's Resistance Army rebels of hacking to death 45 civilians in a Catholic church in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Capt Chris Magezi said the scene was "horrendous... dead bodies of mostly women and children cut in pieces". The attack happened on 26 December 2008. The UN says at least 189 people were killed in several attacks recently. Some reports say more than 100 people were killed in the church alone. The armies of Uganda, South Sudan and DR Congo carried out a joint offensive against the rebels in mid-December 2008 after LRA leader Joseph Kony again refused to sign a peace deal. The LRA leader, who has lived in a jungle hideout in north-eastern DR Congo for the last few years, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Labor's immigrant plan won't work: British population will still hit 70 million, says study

Labor's claim that a new points-based immigration system will stop Britain’s population rocketing to 70 million has been dealt a hammer blow by independent experts. The House of Commons library predicts the policy will reduce an estimated population growth of ten million by as little as 250,000 over the next two decades. It would leave a population of around 70,750,000 by 2031, compared with the current Whitehall prediction of 71 million. It is the equivalent of reducing population growth by as little as 2.5%.

Anger and sadness over fabricated Holocaust story

Another Holocaust story turns out to be untrue.

Related:

The Girl With The Apple

Holocaust 'love story' was fake

Dieudonné, Faurisson and... Le Pen

Madoff and Jewish Business Wisdom

Anatomically modern humans didn't embrace diversity when it came to Neanderthals

Latest research shows that Homo sapiens caused the demise of the Neanderthals.

Immigration and human capital

Steve Sailer argues that immigration is lowering the average human capital of the U.S. population.

Blacks and homicide

Steve Sailer says that black homicide rates are on the rise again.

Related:

Murders by Black Teenagers Rise, Bucking a Trend

Murders of Black Teens Are Up 39% Since 2000-01

Study: Houston leads in homicides by black youths

More on homicide trends

YOUTH VIOLENCE IN NEW CENTURY

Trends in homicides by offenders ages 14-24 between 2000-01 and 2006-07.
• Houston: Whites, down 10%; blacks, up 139%

• Dallas: Whites, down 46%; blacks, down 40%

• San Antonio: Whites, down 3%; blacks, up 38%

• Boston: Whites, down 40%; blacks, up 78%

• Chicago: Whites, down 47%; blacks, down 30%

• Oklahoma City: Whites, up 19%; blacks, up 85%

• San Francisco: Whites, up 32%; blacks, up 79%

• Los Angeles: Whites, down 20%; blacks, down 22%

Source: The Recent Surge In Homicides Involving Young Black Males and Guns: Time To Reinvest in Prevention and Crime Control

The biology of ethnicity

Dienekes has links to recent research showing how ethnicity is a reflection of our genetic background.

Police have begun a probe into reports that villagers in a tribal area of central India beat 50 women with sticks after accusing them of witchcraft

The villagers acted on the advice of a local spiritual man who said the assault would protect them from evil spirits, in a forest in a poor district of Chhattisgarh state, 400km (250 miles) from the capital Raipur, police said. Dozens of women are killed every year on suspicion of being witches or witch doctors in India, where superstition is widespread, especially in rural areas that lack an effective schooling system. While there are few killings in Chhattisgarh, more than 100 women are tortured, paraded naked or harassed in the state every year, officials say. "Police have begun a probe and interrogated dozens of villagers who hosted a nine-day purification ceremony where they forcibly cut the hair of about 50 women branding them witches and also beat them up publicly," Radheshyam Nayak, a senior state police officer, said. The state passed a Witchcraft (Prevention) Act in 2005 to counter a rise in witch hunts, handing out jail terms of up to five years for offenders, though many cases are still reported. Chhattisgarh's Chief Minister Raman Singh called the latest assault "inhuman, unfortunate and shameful" and asked the state's police chief to investigate the case, a statement said.

South African police shot dead two men after two women and a six-year-old girl were killed in a Christmas Day attack allegedly linked to witchcraft

Ntombizanele Combo, 45, was killed after the rondavel she was in was set alight at Timane village near Dutywa, said Captain Jackson Manatha. Her six-year-old granddaughter Sibulele Combo tried to escape, but the attackers pushed her back inside. The other two people in the hut, Combo's daughter and young son, managed to escape the fire. Eighty-year-old Nokwesile Wogqoyi was hacked to death nearby with bushknives. When police came to take a look at Wogqoyi's body, Ntombizanele Combo's son Baba Wogqoyi threatened police with an iron rod. "Warning shots were fired, but he kept on advancing on the police, who eventually shot him in the leg as the lives of the police were in danger," said Manatha. He bled to death at the scene before an ambulance arrived. Later the body of another man, Mthuthindaba Nqontso, 57, was found with a bullet wound. "It is suspected that he may have been unfortunately hit by one the warning shots," said Manatha. Seven men and a woman were arrested and are expected to appear in the Dutywa Magistrate's Court to face arson and murder charges. "The motive behind the murders is believed to be witchcraft as nothing was stolen from the two homesteads."

A two-year-old girl was raped in South Africa on Christmas Day

"The child went missing after a playing with a one-year-old boy," said Captain Jackson Manatha. "Her cries were then heard by her next door neighbour, who went into the house next door to check what was happening...when she opened the door she saw a 22-year-old man zipping up his trousers...the man then ran away when he saw the neighbour." Manatha said he was not sure if the man was related to the child. The girl was in a stable condition. A 17-year-old girl was gang raped at a party at Xilinxa Village on Christmas Day. "It is alleged that seven suspects entered through a window, and found the girl in a room in the house the party was at. They then gang raped her and ran away...her parents then found her in the room," Manatha said. No arrests were made and police were investigating. Police also arrested a man for the murder of a 46-year-old woman that took place at Mboya Village. "She was killed with battle axes on at about 01:00...details were still sketchy," he said.

African population growth causes ecological problems

A new study reveals that the carbon footprints for African cities are rapidly deteriorating because their population is growing faster than cities elsewhere in the world. Yet the ecological impact of this development is almost completely ignored because it's hardly being documented, according to the study’s author, Joy Clancy, a Dutch scientist. "One of the most important ecological changes in Africa’s history is being over-looked", according to Ms Clancy, who published an abstract of her research in the African Journal of Ecology. She provides a first hand insight in the worst side of the problems, pointing out that demand for fuel wood and charcoal isn't really the biggest cause of deforestation in Africa. A far bigger factor in deforestation is change in land use, according to Ms Clancy. She says the most dramatic change is around cities – the peri-urban areas – where woodlands are cleared for agriculture to feed the new centers of population. Clancy believes that this, in combination with the effect on water demand and waste disposal on aquatic ecosystems, means that the carbon footprint of African cities is bound to be much larger than their current footprint calculations suggest.

Related:

The 10 Poorest Countries Of The World; Ethiopia 10th place

Mexico presidential guardsman accused of dealing with drug cartels

An army officer in the Mexican presidential guard is accused of selling secrets about the movements of President Felipe Calderon to drug cartels, a government official has said. Army Maj. Arturo Gonzalez, who was arrested recently, allegedly received $100,000 a month to track the president for powerful Mexican drug gang leaders and is suspected of selling weapons to drug gangs and training their hit men, said the official, who asked not to be identified. "The major was part of the presidential guard and a protected witness said he received money to pass information about (the president's) official visits," the official said. Local media reported the drug gang leaders wanted information on Calderon's movements to ensure they were never in the same location as the president and his heavily armed guard. Gonzalez, whose arrest was announced on December 26 2008, was detained as part of "Operation Clean-up," which has netted several high-ranking officials accused of collaborating with the Beltran Leyva brothers, who split off from the Sinaloa cartel run by Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman. Most of the officials arrested recently are senior policemen, including Mexico's liaison to Interpol and the head of the country's organized crime unit. The presidential guard is a specialized army unit responsible for protecting the president and his family. Gonzalez's suspected collaboration with drug traffickers was revealed by a protected witness who was a member of the Beltran Leyva cartel, the government official said. Since taking office in 2006, Calderon has deployed thousands of troops and federal police to drug hot spots to take on the powerful cartels. The offensive by the government has failed to curb soaring drug violence. More than 5,300 people have been killed in 2008, more than twice as many as 2007, as traffickers fight each other and the government over drug smuggling routes. Calderon deployed the army to fight organized crime partly because soldiers have traditionally been seen as less corrupt than police. Military men across the ranks have said they too are being offered thousands of dollars to ignore drug shipments or tip off cartels. Recently, police found the beheaded and tortured bodies of eight soldiers in a town near Acapulco, their heads stuffed in a black plastic bag and tossed outside a shopping center.

Related:

Organizers strip Mexican beauty queen of title after drug bust

Abduction Illuminates Criminality In Mexico

Ethnic strife in Kenya

Many Kenyans are still displaced a year after ethnic violence during 2007 elections.

Is it alright for Jews like Madoff to swindle goyim?

From CounterCurrents:

For Rabbi Burton Visotzky of the Jewish Theological Seminary: "The fact that he stole from Jewish charities (emphasis on "Jewish") puts him in a special circle of hell." Unstated, but perhaps implied, is it's OK to steal from "goyim" or at least not as bad.

Much of the criticism that you see directed at Bernie Madoff is not because he was a swindler but because he swindled Jews. If Madoff had stuck to ripping off gentiles would he still be held in high regard in the Jewish community?

Acute child malnutrition in parts of Zimbabwe has increased by almost two-thirds compared with 2007, British aid agency Save the Children says

The agency said some five million people in Zimbabwe - or about 50% of the country's population - were now in need of food aid. Zimbabwe's farming sector collapsed after President Robert Mugabe launched a controversial land reform program. As well as suffering economic meltdown, Zimbabwe is experiencing a cholera outbreak, fuelled by the collapse of its health, sanitation and water services. Aid agencies have warned that the disease, which has already claimed more than 1,100 lives, could infect more than 60,000 unless its spread is halted.

A serving police officer named in a leaked list of British National Party members is set to face a misconduct panel, his force has said

PC Steve Bettley, of Merseyside Police, was included in the list of the far right party's entire membership register which was leaked on an internet blog. The officer, who was briefly the driver for chief constable Bernard Hogan Howe, has been suspended from duty since the list became public in November 2008. A Merseyside Police spokeswoman said: "Merseyside Police has completed its investigation of an officer alleged to be a member of the BNP. It has been recommended that the Police Constable face a misconduct panel. The matter is now in the hands of Merseyside Police's solicitors for further consideration. The Constable remains suspended." The leak provoked outrage after members of the BNP were revealed to be current and former servicemen, teachers and doctors. The list included the names, professions, addresses and telephone numbers of thousands of BNP supporters. When the list was published, BNP leader Nick Griffin pledged to take court action against those behind the leak. Dyfed-Powys Police is leading a joint investigation with the Information Commissioner's office into the alleged breach of the Data Protection Act. A Dyfed-Powys spokeswoman said: "Two people were arrested in Nottinghamshire on December 4 in connection with an allegation of a criminal offence under the Data Protection Act. They have been bailed pending further inquiries."

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is changing from a fight over border and territory into an ethnic conflict

Former peace negotiator and advisor for the Israeli government, Professor Menachem Klein, expects more and more violent, ethnic clashes within the state of Israel.

Related:

Changing the Ethnic Vocabulary

Merry Christmas, Kwanzaa is Over

Michael C. Moynihan on the disappearance of a strange black holiday.

Related:

Vdare: War on Christmas

Radical Islamists linked to al-Qaeda set to take control of Somalia

Fears are growing that this lawless area, bordering Kenya and Ethiopia, could become a stronghold for terrorists with possible links to al-Qaeda. Somalia's weak official government, the 14th in the last 17 years, depends entirely on the presence of Ethiopian troops, who are deployed in and around the capital, Mogadishu. They invaded in December 2006, mounting an American-supported operation which overthrew an earlier Islamist regime, styling itself the Islamic Courts Union. But Ethiopia has pledged to withdraw its troops at the end of December 2008. When they leave, the official government is likely to fall - or be forced to evacuate Mogadishu. An armed group styling itself Al-Shebab is likely to take over. Already, its fighters are believed to control more than 80% of southern Somalia. These radical Islamists believe in imposing Sharia law and they recently approved the stoning of a 13-year-old girl. Al Shebab, the fanatical armed wing which broke from the Islamic Courts Union which ran Somalia for the second half of 2006, now holds more than 80% of the country – more territory than the Courts controlled during their reign.

Related:

Somalis held in Ethiopia capital

Taleban militants in the Swat valley in north-west Pakistan have threatened to kill girls who attend school

A local Taleban commander ordered parents to stop sending their daughters to school by 15 January 2009. In comments broadcast on an illegal radio station, he threatened to blow up schools which enrolled female students. In 2008 alone, Taleban militants have destroyed more than 130 schools in the Swat valley. They want to bring in Islamic sharia law in the region. Militant attacks on schools in the region have deprived more than 17,000 students of education.

Related:

Indians warned to avoid Pakistan

A military junta that toppled Guinea's government has announced its new leader in a nationwide radio address

Capt. Moussa Dadis Camara declared himself president of the National Council for Democracy, which he called a transitional body that will oversee the country's return to democracy. In effect, that would make Camara president of Guinea, which was thrown into turmoil after the death of President Lansana Conte. Guinea's parliament is holding negotiations with the military. Camara, previously the spokesman for the National Council for Democracy, suspended the government, constitution, political parties and trade unions. The newly formed government, made up of 26 military personnel and six civilians, is negotiating a power-sharing deal that would reflect its ethnic make-up. But some in the military may not support the new leadership. International institutions, including the African Union, have condemned the coup. Guinea, in western Africa bordering the Atlantic Ocean, has had two presidents since gaining independence from France in 1958. Conte came to power in 1984, when the military seized control of the government after the death of the first president, Sekou Toure. The country did not hold democratic elections until 1993, when Conte was elected president. He was re-elected in 1998 and 2003 amid allegations of electoral irregularities. Worsening economic conditions and dissatisfaction with corruption and bad governance prompted two massive strikes in 2006. A third nationwide strike in early 2007 sparked violent protests that resulted in two weeks of martial law. To appease the unions and end the unrest Conte named a new prime minister in March 2007. Guinea is one of the poorest countries in the world, despite its mineral wealth. The country hosts large refugee populations from neighboring Liberia and Ivory Coast.

Related:

African Union Condemns Guinea Coup Attempt

Ousted Guinean government call for international intervention

Muslims put up banner for Christmas saying that "Allah has no son"

This shows how much respect Muslims have for Christianity.

A Saudi judge has refused to annul a marriage between an 8-year-old girl and a 47-year-old man

A Saudi judge has refused to annul a marriage between an 8-year-old girl and a 47-year-old man - a union apparently arranged by the girl's father to settle his debts. The judge, Sheikh Habib Abdallah al-Habib, dismissed a petition brought by the girl's mother because she "is not the legal guardian of the girl," the woman's lawyer Abdullah al-Jutaili said. "Therefore, she cannot represent her daughter in these proceedings," al-Jutaili said. Her parents are separated, he said. The girl's father arranged the marriage in order to settle his debts with the man, who is "a close friend" of his. The judge did ask for a pledge from the husband, who was in court, not to consummate the marriage until the girl reaches puberty. The judge ruled that when the girl reaches puberty, she will have the right to request a divorce by filing a petition with the court, the lawyer said. Christoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabia researcher for Human Rights Watch, said his organization has heard many other cases of child marriages. "We've been hearing about these types of cases once every four or five months because the Saudi public is now able to express this kind of anger, especially so when girls are traded off to older men," Wilcke said.

Related:

Saudi Judge OKs Marriage of Girl, 8

Spanish police arrest Nigerians over credit card fraud

Spanish police said they had arrested 24 Nigerians as part of an international crackdown on credit card fraud. The suspects "belong to an international organization specialising in 'carding'," police said in a statement, referring to a practice where criminals fraudulently use credit card numbers to buy items over the Internet. It added that they used credit card numbers, obtained by other members of the network - residents of Canada and Vietnam - through computer hacking. The 24 people, who were seized in Madrid, would usually order expensive items like electronic goods over the Internet that they would then sell on, the police said. One, who specialised in buying plane and train tickets, had built-up a "veritable travel agency," police said.

Immigrant violence in Stockholm suburb

For the second night running unrest broke out in the Stockholm suburb of Tensta. A massive police presence managed to gain control of the situation in the early hours of Christmas Eve 2008. the fire service had come under attack from stone-throwing youths in the predominantly immigrant-occupied area of Tensta in north west Stockholm on the evening of December 22, 2008. When police units arrived at the scene youngsters were found to have set fire to car tyres, rubbish bins and a skip. Jannes Hedlund at Stockholm county police described Tuesday's rioting as in principle a repeat of the events of the night before. "Among other things they had set fire to a skip and thrown a Molotov cocktail at a police vehicle," Hedlund said. The police were prepared for the possibility of renewed unrest and had deployed eight specially trained units to the area. Hedlund said that he believed that similar preparations were in force for any potential trouble on Christmas Eve. Several cars were also set alight in Vårberg in southern Stockholm.

Related:

VIOLENT MUSLIM RIOTS IN SWEDEN SPREAD TO STOCKHOLM

Troops at a vehicle checkpoint in western Mexico have detained a beauty queen and seven men along with guns and cash, police say

The eight were stopped on the outskirts of Guadalajara, Mexico's second city reportedly following a tip-off. Laura Zuniga, 23, was crowned Miss Sinaloa in July 2008. She reportedly told police she had been planning to travel with the men to Bolivia and Colombia "to go shopping". Regional police director Francisco Alejandro Solorio said that two SUVs were stopped at the checkpoint. The SUV in which Ms Zuniga was found contained a large stash of weapons, including two AR-15 assault rifles, 38 special handguns, 9mm handguns, nine magazines, 633 cartridges and $53,300 in US currency, he added. An unnamed police spokesman said that security forces had received a tip-off that drug-traffickers were moving through the area. "No one expected this young woman to be aboard," the spokesman added. Ms Zuniga came third in the Nuestra Belleza Mexico pageant in Monterrey in September 2008 and was expected to represent Mexico in the 2009 Miss International contest.

Genes, popularity and bad behavior

It's all in the DNA, according to new research. Genes prompt rabble-rouser behavior. But they also foster popularity, according to Alexandra Burt, a Michigan State University behavioral geneticist who released a groundbreaking study that suggests good news for bad boys. Men who had a gene associated with rule-breaking behavior were rated most popular by a group of previously unacquainted peers, she found. "The idea is that your genes predispose you to certain behaviors, and those behaviors elicit different kinds of social reactions from others," said Ms. Burt. "And so, what's happening is, your genes are to some extent driving your social experiences." Other researchers have bandied about the idea of a genetic predisposition for popularity, a theory known as "evocative gene-environment correlation." The new research is the first to establish clear connections between a specific gene, particular behaviors and actual social situations, Ms. Burt said. She collected DNA from more than 200 male college students; after some socializing and a student survey, the subsequent analysis found that the most popular had a particular form of a serotonin gene associated with rule-breaking behavior. Her findings were published by the American Psychological Association. Is there a party gene? Some say it's the serotonin transporter gene, already identified by the National Institutes of Health as the gene behind binge drinking. In August 2008, the University of North Carolina also revealed a link between three particular genes and "a life of crime" after following 1,100 teenage boys over a six-year period, clearly establishing a link between the presence of those genes and aggressive behavior.

Related:

Serotonin Gene Makes Some More Popular?

Violent Mexican cartels that have killed thousands in a drug war at home in 2008 are increasingly smuggling drugs to Europe by way of Africa

Recent high-profile arrests of Mexicans around the globe show how the Gulf cartel and its main rival, the Sinaloa federation run by Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, are moving beyond their traditional market in the United States. A 15-month international drug sweep called "Project Reckoning" captured 500 Gulf cartel collaborators in the United States, Mexico and Italy, where the Mexicans have teamed with the notorious Italian 'Ndrangheta crime syndicate. The arrests, which came to a head in September 2008, were one of the biggest busts of Mexican operatives working with European counterparts. They came as Mexican cartels move in on trafficking routes traditionally dominated by Colombians, who produce most of the world's cocaine, experts say. Mexican President Felipe Calderon has deployed thousands of soldiers and federal police to dangerous U.S.-Mexico border towns to take on drug gangs after coming to office in 2006. "Given the pressure from the Calderon government, we are seeing some of the Mexican groups seeking alliances with Europeans," University of Miami drug expert Bruce Bagley said. Cocaine can be sold for more than four times as much in Europe as in the United States and in 2005 some 80% of the drug not destined for the U.S. market went to Europe, according to the United Nations. The U.S. government estimates cocaine consumption in western Europe has increased nearly 60% since 1998, creating huge opportunities for profit. The shift comes as Colombian cartels are splintering from years of government pressure, opening more trans-Atlantic opportunities for Mexican gangs either collaborating with or working around the Colombians. The capture in Spain in September 2008 of top Colombian cartel member Edgar Vallejo, who pioneered trafficking routes to Europe via Africa, has made room for Mexican operatives, a senior Drug Enforcement Administration official said. "This key Colombian trafficker gets popped in Europe and had a fairly big fraction of the market and that arrest may contribute to the flux in of this entire global model of world wide dominance of cocaine distribution," he said. The major fear is the violence that has plagued Mexico in recent years will spread as the cartels expand. More than 5,300 people have died in 2008, many tortured or decapitated as rival traffickers fight each other and the government. Seventeen people were killed in Guatemala in November 2008 in a shootout between Mexican drug gangs and their proxies and a U.N.-backed study warned that Mexico's drug war is spilling over into Honduras. Europe has so far been free of major narco-violence. The poor and weak states of West Africa make an ideal base of operations for international drug traffickers, according to the United Nations. In July 2008, two Mexicans were among crew members arrested landing a plane with fake Red Cross markings in Sierra Leone packed with more than 600 kilos of cocaine. It was the largest drug bust in the country's history. As well as being a shipment point for cocaine, Mexico is the No. 1 producer of methamphetamine for the United States. Organized crime groups are seeking more clandestine routes since Mexican authorities have cracked down on the legal import of its main ingredient, pseudoephedrine. A seizure in Democratic Republic of Congo in 2007 of several tons of pseudoephedrine indicates Mexican drug cartels could be using Africa's Atlantic seaboard for transport or storage purposes, Interpol says. Mexicans also are going straight to coca-growing countries in South America to buy up the raw material for cocaine that may end up in Europe. Peruvian President Alan Garcia recently blamed a rash of drug-related violence in his country - the world's second-largest cocaine producer after Colombia - on powerful Mexican drug cartels collaborating with local drug lords.

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Gender difference in reading, writing and mathematical abilities

Girls continue to outperform boys on the writing section of the SAT (501 vs. 488). Girls' average score on the reading section was 500, while boys' was 504. But that was a narrowing of a gap that stood at 7 points a decade ago. Girls continue to lag in math, where boys on average scored 33 points higher (533 vs. 500).

Child beggars of Nigeria's Koranic schools

Another problem caused by Islamic schools.

Sneakiness and brain size

In a comparative survey of primate behavior, Richard Byrne and Nadia Corp of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland found a direct relationship between sneakiness and brain size. The larger the average volume of a primate species’ neocortex — the newest, highest region of the brain — the greater the chance that the monkey or ape would pull a stunt like this one described in The New Scientist: a young baboon being chased by an enraged mother intent on punishment suddenly stopped in midpursuit, stood up and began scanning the horizon intently, an act that conveniently distracted the entire baboon troop into preparing for nonexistent intruders. Much evidence suggests that we humans, with our densely corrugated neocortex, lie to one another chronically and with aplomb. Investigating what they called lying in day-to-day life, Bella DePaulo, now a visiting professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and her colleagues asked 77 college students and 70 people from the community to keep anonymous diaries for a week and to note the hows and whys of every lie they told. Tallying the results, the researchers found that the college students told an average of two lies a day, community members one a day, and that most of the lies fell into the minor fib category. "I told him I missed him and thought about him every day when I really don’t think about him at all," wrote one participant. "Said I sent the check this morning," wrote another. In a follow-up study, the researchers asked participants to describe the worst lies they’d ever told, and then out came confessions of adultery, of defrauding an employer, of lying on a witness stand to protect an employer. When asked how they felt about their lies, many described being haunted with guilt, but others confessed that once they realized they’d gotten away with a whopper, why, they did it again, and again.

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Neocortex size predicts deception rate in primates

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Waists and women

While women with curvy figures might enjoy more attention from men in Western culture, and find it easier to become pregnant, new research suggests they may also face some evolutionary disadvantages compared to women with thicker waists. That's because the same hormones that increase fat around the waist can also make women stronger, more assertive, and more resistant to stress, according to a new study published in the December 2008 issue of Current Anthropology.

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Did warfare drive out-of-Africa migration?

Roving bands of men might have waged history's first traceable war against the ancestors of all Europeans, Asians and other non-Africans, some 60,000 years ago. A new analysis of DNA variations in contemporary humans indicates that non-Africans descend from a population that contained far more males than females. This is potential evidence for conquests of the first people who embarked out of Africa, says Alon Keinan, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School in Boston. It might be that they killed some males, stole the females, and kept on moving, he says. A steady trickle of peaceful wandering men could have accomplished the same genetic effect – but if prehistoric migrations worked anything like Viking conquests, or the discovery of the New World, male migrants did not go looking for peace and love. Keinan's theory rests on comparisons of more than 100,000 genetic differences, peppered across the genomes of African, Asian and European men. In populations where males pair equally with females, on average they will have three X-chromosomes for every four of a non-sex chromosome called an autosome. This is because women have two Xs and men just one. If more men than women pass on their DNA over time, the female contribution to the gene pool falls, resulting in less X-chromosomes. "You have many more grandfathers than grandmothers," Keinan says. This skew exists in peoples from all parts of the world except Africa, Keinan and colleague David Reich have found. The ancestors of Europeans and Asians left Africa sometime between 60,000 and 100,000 years ago. Keinan's team speculate that males from Africa, who may have settled in the Arabian Peninsula, Egypt, or elsewhere, attacked the first "out of Africa" population. "It sounds plausible to me," says Martin Richards, a geneticist who studies human history at the University of Leeds. "We don't know the route people used to get out of Africa," says Chris Stringer, an anthropologist at the Natural History Museum in London. But he thinks the Nile valley is a strong contender for the path of the first migrants – and perhaps their later adversaries. However, the chance of finding archaeological evidence for these migrants is slim. "You're looking for a population that was there only a short period of time, perhaps only 10 generations, so the physical impact of that population in that environment wouldn't be enough to detect," Reich says. Their analysis also challenges a study published earlier in 2008, which found that all humans descend from fewer numbers of males than females. The researchers suggested that polygyny, where few men procreate with many women, accounts for this result. "It's possible, in principle, that both are true in some level," says Reich. Polygyny that occurred over the last million years of human evolution could have left an imprint in our genomes, says Michael Hammer, a geneticist at the University of Arizona, who led that study. Reich and Keinan, on the other hand, focused their analysis on the period when anatomically modern humans left Africa. "We'll have to figure out this issue in future work," Reich says.

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There are as many as 6,000 child soldiers, some as young as 11 years old, in the war-torn region of Darfur, the head of Unicef in Sudan says

Ted Chaiban said some children were linked to rebel movements, others to government-backed militia and some were fighting alongside the Sudanese army. The UN is trying to convince armed groups to release the children. Chaiban told journalists that some had signed up voluntarily but others had been forcibly recruited.

A jury has found five Muslim men guilty of conspiring to kill US soldiers at the Fort Dix military base in New Jersey

The five, who are all foreign-born but have spent much of their lives in the US, were arrested in May 2007. All five could face up to life in jail after being found guilty. Prosecutors said the men wanted to wage an Islamist holy war on the United States. The verdicts followed an eight-week trial and six days of deliberations by the federal jury in Camden, New Jersey. The men were not accused of links to any international terrorist groups, though investigators said they were inspired by Osama bin Laden. A sixth man pleaded guilty in 2007 to providing weapons to some of the defendants, and is serving a 20-month prison term. Those convicted include Serdar Tatar, a legal US resident from Turkey; Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer, a US citizen born in Jordan; and brothers Dritan, Eljvir and Shain Duka, illegal immigrants from the former Yugoslavia.

Nine men decapitated in Mexico drug violence

Mexican police found nine decapitated bodies in a city near the tourist resort of Acapulco, and at least some of the victims might have been soldiers who were battling against powerful drug gangs. The bodies of the men, which were marked with signs of torture, were left on the side of a highway, while their heads were stuffed in a plastic bag found outside a shopping center, police in the state of Guerrero said. Local media reported that nine soldiers were abducted as they left a regional military base near the city of Chilpancingo, about an hour north of Acapulco. An army spokesperson could not confirm that the victims were soldiers. Mexico's President Felipe Calderon has deployed tens of thousands of soldiers and federal police since 2006 to take on cartels that move cocaine and other drugs into the United States. A note left with the severed heads warned that more authorities would be decapitated, the state police said. The state police chief said some of the victims were soldiers. Calderon's offensive has helped fuel a major increase in drug violence. More than 5,300 have died so far this year, over twice as many as in 2007, according to the attorney general's office.

The geographical distribution of a skin color gene

Skin color gene becomes less common the farther you move from Europe.

War is a biological phenomenon

How we evolved to be warlike.

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Researchers discover genetic mutations that make ethnic Chinese more susceptible to lung cancer

Researchers in China and the United States say they've identified mutations of two genes which appear to make ethnic Chinese more susceptible to lung cancer. The genes were thought to help eliminate carcinogens from the lungs. But scientists analyzed 500 patients with lung cancer and 517 without, and say the gene variants were found much more often in individuals with lung cancer than in cancer-free patients.

We are better able to detect anxiety in members of our own racial group than in people of different racial backgrounds

Psychologist Heather M. Gray from Boston University, along with Wendy Berry Mendes and Carrigan Denny-Brown of Harvard University, investigated whether the ability to detect a person’s anxiety declines when perceptions are made across the racial divide. Although interactions with members of other racial groups are becoming increasingly more common, they are still a source of anxiety for many people. This interracial anxiety can “leak out” in the form of uncontrollable, stressful behaviors such as fidgeting and vocal tension. But how sensitive are we to signs of interracial anxiety, and does race influence the ability to detect interracial anxiety in other people? To answer these questions, the researchers videotaped White and Black participants as they performed a difficult task in front of a panel of either same-race evaluators (i.e. White participants with White evaluators) or different-race evaluators (i.e. White participants with Black evaluators). In addition, the researchers measured the participants’ cortisol (a hormone that increases when we are stressed) levels to gauge how stressed participants were. Then, a separate group of White and Black observers watched the videotapes of the participants (without seeing the evaluators) and were asked to rate the participants’ anxiety. The results of the study, reported in the December 2008 issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, reveal that we are better able to detect anxiety in members of our own racial group than in people of different racial backgrounds. Only the same-race observers detected an increase in anxiety when participants were engaged in an interracial encounter; different-race observers failed to detect this change. And even more interesting, only the same-race observers noticed changes in anxiety that matched up with the participants’ actual stress levels (as determined by measuring cortisol). The authors suggest that “race-matched observers appeared to draw upon subtle nonverbal indicators of intergroup anxiety that were undetectable to race-mismatched observers.” They note that being out of tune to the emotional states of people from different backgrounds “may make it difficult to develop a sense of shared emotional experience.”

Blacks and Hispanics disagree over naming of new high school

Hispanics want the school to be named after Cesar Chavez while blacks want it to be named after a slain police officer.

The death of Paul Weyrich

Marcus Epstein on the death of a leading opponent of illegal immigration.

Lesbian gang raped by Latino and African-American men

An openly lesbian resident of a San Francisco suburb was allegedly kidnapped and gang-raped by four men. The brutal attack reportedly took place on Dec. 13 2008 and involved several Latino and one African-American man. Police are investigating the assault as a hate crime because of anti-lesbian utterances from the suspects. The assault took place around 9:30 on the evening of Dec. 13 2008 in Richmond. Four men attacked a lesbian woman with a rainbow sticker on her car, assaulting her as she emerged from her vehicle and then shoving her back into her vehicle and driving her several blocks away from an extended period of time - estimated at 45 minutes - during which the four men raped her. The suspects then drove off in the woman’s car, leaving her nude. The woman sought help from the occupants of a nearby residential building. Richmond Police Force Lt. Mark Gagan was quoted as saying, "The emotional impact has changed her life." Added Lt. Gagan, "It is an absolute nightmare for her to have gone through. For 45 minutes, four strangers brutalized her." The woman was treated at a local hospital; her car was found the following day. The four suspects are wanted for sexual assault, robbery, kidnapping, assault with a deadly weapon, and carjacking. One suspect was described as a Latino weighing 180 lbs. with a height of five and a half feet. Thought to be the leader, he was said to be in his 30s. Two other men were also described as Latinos between 18-20 years of age, with one of them having been referred to as "Pato." The fourth suspect was described as an African-American man of about 170 lbs., with a height of 5’10". He was referred to as "Blu," and was said to be in his early 20s. Police have offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the suspects.

Riots in Sweden over closure of Islamic center

Scores of young people rioted in Rosengård, the Malmö suburb in which tensions have been running high since the recent closure of an Islamic cultural center. Some 100 youths ran amok for the second straight night, setting cars and garbage bins ablaze and throwing stones at police, police said. "We've had a very difficult evening. There have been fires burning since this afternoon in garbage bins and cars, there's extensive damage to public property, and there's been stonethrowing and bomb threats against police," police spokeswoman Ewa-Gun Westford said. One person was arrested during the riots, she said. Westford said the troubles were linked to the recent closure of an Islamic cultural center in Malmö's heavily-immigrant populated neighbourhood Rosengård.

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Flaming youth

The UN envoy to Somalia, Ahmedou Ould Abdallah, has said there is a hidden genocide taking place in the country

Abdallah spoke as the African Union's peace and security council held urgent talks on how to boost the peacekeeping force there. Ethiopia says its 3,000 troops will withdraw by the end of 2008, which some fear will lead to a power vacuum. The AU force already in Mogadishu is too small to resist resurgent Islamist and nationalist fighters. UN head Ban Ki-moon has rejected calls for UN peacekeepers to be sent. He said the situation in Somalia was too dangerous and there was no peace to keep. "The Somali problem is a problem for the whole region," said Mr Abdallah, the UN special envoy to Somalia. "There is a hidden genocide in Somalia which has sacrificed entire generations." Somalia has not had a functioning national government since 1991. Ethiopian troops intervened two years ago to oust Islamists from the capital and install the internationally recognised government. But that government is now in disarray and different Islamist groups now control much of southern Somalia.

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Food production is dropping in South Africa

Randall Parker says that South Africa could end up becoming the next Zimbabwe.

Ethnic cleansing in Israel

According to Israel, Bedouin Arabs have no right to live on the desert land in the Negev region of the Jewish state.

Hat tip, Mondoweiss!

Malcolm Gladwell and outliers

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Islam and Somali immigrants

Patrick Cleburne comments on the tendency of Somali immigrants to support Islamic terrorism.

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Madoff, Schapiro and Obama

Mary Schapiro, Barack Obama's choice to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), previously appointed one of Bernard Madoff's sons to a regulatory body that oversees American securities firms. It has emerged that in 2001, Schapiro, currently chief executive of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra), employed Mark Madoff to serve on the board of the National Adjudicatory Council — the division that reviews disciplinary decisions made by Finra. Recently, Mark Madoff, with his brother, Andrew, were understood to have approached the authorities after their father apparently confessed to orchestrating a $50 billion securities fraud. Madoff is under house arrest in his $7 million Manhattan apartment and will be electronically tagged after he failed to secure further signatories to guarantee his $10 million bail.

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The evolution of ethnocentric behavior

Researchers show how ethnocentrism can be beneficial to group survival.

The Australian government has decided to open a controversial new detention center on Christmas Island, reversing its previous policy on the issue

The center was commissioned by the previous government, and completed a few months ago. The new administration had been resisting pressure to open it. But seven boatloads of asylum seekers have been intercepted trying to reach Australia in the past three months. Analysts say the government is struggling with the influx of people. When Kevin Rudd took power in 2007, he was quick to distance himself from the former government's policy of detaining all asylum seekers. He inherited the new 800-bed, A$400m (£182m) Christmas Island facility, but resisted using it, saying it was unsuitable for families. Refugee advocates who have toured the facility describe it as extremely harsh, and say that it resembles a prison. But 164 asylum seekers have been caught trying to enter the country since January 2008, up from 148 in 2007, and the authorities have decided to open the center anyway. Thirty-seven men - believed to be a mix of Afghans and Middle Eastern nationals - will arrive there over the weekend, having been intercepted in an unauthorised boat off the north-east of Darwin.

IQ and brain size

Study tries to identify the role of genetic factors in brain size and IQ.

The genetic time bomb

A psychoanalyst discusses the problems being created by genetics for social scientists.

Spain proposes tougher immigration laws

Spain has proposed changes to immigration laws to limit an influx of foreigners as it faces recession and the highest unemployment rate in the European Union. The measures, which must be approved by parliament, would allow police to hold illegal immigrants for up to 60 days pending deportation and make it harder for foreigners to bring relatives over to live in Spain. "In our difficult current situation, decisions have been taken to adapt immigration levels to the labor market," Labour Minister Celestino Corbacho told a press conference following a cabinet meeting on the reform. Nearly 5 million immigrants have settled in Spain during the past decade, more than in any other European country, drawn by a construction boom that has collapsed in the global financial crisis. With unemployment expected to end 2008 at 13% and rise as high as 20% by 2010, Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's government says there are not enough jobs for immigrants who make up 11% of the population. The proposed reforms would impose higher fines for employers recruiting foreigners who do not have proper legal papers, but expand civil rights for foreigners already living legally or illegally in Spain. Prior to his re-election in 2008, Zapatero heaped praise on immigrants and said they were responsible for half rapid economic growth that has reduced unemployment among Spaniards. But, now the government has started a campaign featuring posters of an immigrant and the caption "Have you thought of going back?". Immigrants are finding it harder to secure jobs as layoffs force Spaniards to seek lower paid work previously done by foreigners, such as fruit picking, construction and waiting on tables. The government has offered among other incentives to pay jobless immigrants unemployment benefit in their home countries and part of the cost of their journey home. Unemployment is rising three times faster among immigrants than Spaniards and the government is wary of unrest after clashes between police and African migrants turned away from 2008's olive harvest in Andalucia.

Parents and students are angry at principal for pointing out racial achievement gap

Some students at South Lake High School in St. Clair Shores are upset and can not believe they were singled out as African-Americans. The principal sent a letter to parents and students pointing out an achievement gap between white and black students at the school. The letter was accompanied by a graph showing the gap from subject to subject. About 80 students staged an in-school protest as the principal met with parents to explain why the letter was written. The school district says the letter was not meant to offend anybody, only to point out that it wants all students to achieve. However, the principal who wrote the letter is apologetic. One parent says she would like to see a second letter apologizing for the first, which she feels should never have been written at all. She also thinks the principal should personally apologize to all of the students at a school assembly.

A Jamaican teenager has been found guilty of taking part in the gang rape of a 15-year-old girl in Britain

Seventeen year-old Rodel McMorris of North London, England is reportedly a member of a gang called 'Tugs From Around' which carried out the alleged rape. In January 2008, he reportedly lured the girl to meet him and then he and other gang members raped her. The girl, who has a learning disability, was reportedly assaulted by about 10 boys who then doused her with caustic soda. Some of the attackers have still not been identified. However, those convicted were caught by DNA and fingerprint evidence, along with data proving their mobile phones were at the location at the time. Three of the attackers, McMorris, Jason Brew, and Hector Muaimba, were all found guilty of rape and will be sentenced in January 2009.

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Black families showing gains?

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A series of anonymous notes have been posted outside schools in the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez threatening to kidnap pupils if money is not paid

The notes state that teachers should hand over their end-of-year bonuses to avoid the threat to their students. No arrests have been made over the threats, but drug cartels are believed to be responsible. The city, on the US border, has one of the world's highest murder rates with more than 1,400 homicides in 2008. Recently several notes have been mysteriously pinned up at the entrance to schools in Ciudad Juarez. They demand money from the staff, and threaten to harm both teachers and pupils if the request is not met. One of the notes was pinned to a wall outside a kindergarten. The extortion campaign appears to be timed to coincide with the Christmas bonuses teachers in Mexico receive in their December pay packets. When news of the notes became public, many parents removed their children from school. Ciudad Juarez is becoming infamous as the place where some of the most gruesome violence in Mexico's ongoing drug wars is concentrated. More than a quarter of all the murders linked to organized crime in the country in 2008 have been in the city. As well as schools, hospitals are finding it increasingly difficult to function normally. Recently, hundreds of doctors staged a protest in the city denouncing the extreme level of threats and kidnappings they face every day. There have been several reports of gunmen entering hospitals to finish off wounded rivals, as they are being treated. Several medical clinics have closed permanently. Government officials say that they are doing all they can to defeat the drug cartels, and say much of the violence is a reflection of their success, as leaderless gangs fight one another for dominance. But the social consequences of such prolonged and prolific violence might present a future battle for this country. In many schools in northern Mexico, teachers report that their pupils have an increasing tendency to idolise narco-traffickers as untouchable heroes.

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Extreme drug violence grips Mexico border city

A Ugandan mother and daughter talk about their joy at being reunited after 26 years

Five-year-old Florence Kampi was kidnapped at her father's funeral by a family who used her as a slave. She was taken to Yemen where she was eventually rescued by a Tanzanian oil worker who, after he paid the family money, was allowed to marry her. "I feel so happy," she said about the reunion. Her mother said, "I burst out crying... but they were tears of joy." Language is now a barrier for the pair as Florence, now called Sara Aisha Abdulhakim, speaks Swahili and Arabic. Her mother, Sesiriya Biryeri, speaks Lesoga, the local language in the eastern Ugandan district of Iganga. "We have a few people here helping with translations from Swahili to Lesoga and vice versa; it is a nice confusion," Ms Abdulhakim, who arrived in Uganda with her four sons, said.

An Egyptian mathematics teacher has gone on trial accused of beating an 11-year-old pupil to death because he did not do his homework

After using a ruler, Haitham Nabeel Abdelhamid, 23, allegedly took the boy outside the classroom and hit him violently in his stomach. Islam Amr Badr fainted and later died in hospital of heart failure. The incident, at Saad Othman Primary School on the outskirts of Alexandria in October, caused national outrage. The Egyptian education minister is expected to be called as a witness during the trial. Islam's father, Amr Badr Ibrahim, says others should stand trial with his son's teacher. "The problem is the teaching and the teachers because they cannot find good teachers," he said. "The minister of education should be the first person to be accused - how can he agree to let such a young man teach children?" For many Egyptians, the case is a shocking reminder of the failings of their state education system, where young, inexperienced and under-resourced teachers often struggle to control classes of 60 to 100 children. The Egyptian government says it is bringing in education reforms - including new teacher testing. It is also trying to tackle violence in schools and has issued new statements on the prohibition of corporal punishment.

Jews and Hollywood

Steve Sailer comments on how fashionable it has become to be ignorant of the real world.

Governor meets with the family of an Ecuadoran immigrant beaten to death by three black men

Gov. Paterson has met with the family of an Ecuadoran immigrant beaten to death in a Brooklyn bias attack and urged New Yorkers to help police find the thugs who did it. "I urge anyone that knows anything about the attacks that led to the tragic death of Jose Sucuzhañay to please let the authorities know and help this family to at least know that the tragic loss of their bother, their son, will be avenged in a court of law. Society is judged on how we treat our fellow man. This is not the New York we aspire to." Sucuzhañay, a 31-year-old real estate broker and father of two, was badly bludgeoned in Bushwick by three black men who shouted anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs, witnesses said. Sucuzhañay's body is being flown back to his native Ecuador today to be buried. Paterson said he promised the family he would do all he can to help find the killers. "I wanted to let them know that the power of the executive branch and the powers of the state will be utilized to the fullest extent," he said. Recent statistics show that hate crimes against Hispanics have risen in the United States by 40% from 2005 to 2007.

A well-known emigre South African writer has unleashed his pen against crime and corruption in his homeland in a U.S. magazine

In an open letter to Nelson Mandela in the December 2008 issue of Harper's magazine, Breyten Breytenbach described horrific attacks on relatives and others in South Africa, saying they are evidence of "a society in profound disarray." And the poet, memoirist and one-time anti-apartheid activist charges that Mandela is doing little more than raising funds for his charities from celebrities "who treat you like some exotic teddy bear to slobber over." Breytenbach, who is white, had been an outspoken critic of apartheid who served seven years in prison for treason, convicted in 1975 for assisting Mandela's then-outlawed African National Congress guerrilla group in its sabotage campaign against the white-minority government. Breytenbach left South Africa for Paris after his release from prison in 1982. He remained active in the anti-apartheid cause in exile, but has made his life abroad.

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British-born Muslim terrorists are returning to Britain after learning deadly skills in the world’s most dangerous country

Many British-born Muslims are travelling to Pakistan for terrorism training.

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Decades after a notorious experiment, scientists have found test subjects are still willing to inflict pain if told to by an authority figure

Researchers repeated the famous Milgram test, with volunteers told to deliver electrical shocks to another volunteer - played by an actor. Even after faked screams of pain, 70% were prepared to increase the voltage, the American Psychology study found. Both may help explain why apparently ordinary people can commit atrocities. Yale University professor Stanley Milgram's work, published in 1963, recruited volunteers to help carry out a medical experiment, with none aware that they were actually the subject of the test. A "scientist" instructed them to deliver a shock every time the actor answered a question wrongly. When the pretend 150-volt shock was delivered, the actor could be heard screaming in pain, and yet, when asked to, more than eight out of ten volunteers were prepared to give further shocks, even when the "voltage" was gradually increased threefold. Some volunteers even carried on giving 450-volt shocks even when there was no further response from the actor, suggesting he was either unconscious or dead. Dr Jerry Burger, of Santa Clara University, used a similar format, although he did not allow the volunteers to carry on beyond 150 volts after they had shown their willingness to do so, suggesting that the distress caused to the original volunteers had been too great. Again, however, the vast majority of the 29 men and 41 women taking part were willing to push the button knowing it would cause pain to another human. Even when another actor entered the room and questioned what was happening, most were still prepared to continue. He said: "What we found is validation of the same argument - if you put people in certain situations, they will act in surprising and maybe often even disturbing ways." He said that it was not that there was "something wrong" with the volunteers, but that when placed under pressure, people will often do "unsettling" things. Even though it was difficult to translate laboratory work to the real world, he said, it might partly explain why, in times of conflict, people could take part in genocide.

Data shows that the average black high school graduate has learned no more than the average white or Asian eighth-grader

Apparently discriminating against white job candidates can be seen as race-neutral by some judges.

Study says immigrants have lapped up every new job in Britain since 2001

Immigrants have snapped up almost every new job created in Britain since 2001, according to a Migrationwatch research. The research says 1.3 million foreigners have flooded into Britain over the last seven years to take up employment. But while Labor claimed to be behind a jobs boom, hardly any of the new posts have gone to British workers. Instead the vast majority went to immigrants says the Daily Star. Migrationwatch says little effort has been made to help jobless Brits find work. Instead, they have languished on the dole while foreigners - such as Africans and Indians - have nabbed their jobs. Migrationwatch says its dossier makes a mockery of Gordon Brown's "British jobs for British workers" pledge. Figures from the Office for National Statistics show overall British employment went up 320,000 from 29.17 million in 2006 to 29.49 million. But during that period the number of Britons in work actually fell by 149,000.

Men consistently outperform women on spatial tasks which is the ability to identify how a 3-D object would appear if rotated in space

Men consistently outperform women on spatial tasks, including mental rotation, which is the ability to identify how a 3-D object would appear if rotated in space. Now, a University of Iowa study shows a connection between this sex-linked ability and the structure of the parietal lobe, the brain region that controls this type of skill. The parietal lobe was already known to differ between men and women, with women's parietal lobes having proportionally thicker cortexes or "grey matter." But this difference was never linked back to actual performance differences on the mental rotation test. UI researchers found that a thicker cortex in the parietal lobe in women is associated with poorer mental rotation ability, and in a new structural discovery, that the surface area of the parietal lobe is increased in men, compared to women. Moreover, in men, the greater parietal lobe surface area is directly related to better performance on mental rotation tasks. The study results were published online Nov. 5 2008 by the journal Brain and Cognition. "Differences in parietal lobe activation have been seen in other studies. This study represents the first time we have related specific structural differences in the parietal lobe to sex-linked performances on a mental rotation test," said Tim Koscik, the study's lead author and a graduate student in the University of Iowa Neuroscience Graduate Program. "It's important to note that it isn't that women cannot do the mental rotation tasks, but they appear to do them slower, and neither men nor women perform the tasks perfectly." The study was based on tests of 76 healthy Caucasian volunteers - 38 women and 38 men, all right-handed except for two men. The groups were matched for age, education, IQ and socioeconomic upbringing. When tested on mental rotation tasks, men averaged 66% correct compared to 53% correct for women. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) revealed an approximately 10% difference between men and women in the overall amount of parietal lobe surface area: 43 square centimeters for men and 40 square centimeters for women. "It's likely that the larger surface area in men's parietal lobes leads to an increase in functional columns, which are the processing unit in the cortex," said Koscik. "This may represent a specialization for certain spatial abilities in men." The findings underscore the fact that not only is the brain structure different between men and women but also the way the brain performs a task is different, said Peg Nopoulos, M.D., a study co-author and professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine.

What a Jewish writer really thinks of non-Jewish Americans

Ron Rosenbaum:

If you look at the history of America, the big money has always been made by criminals of non-Jewish persuasions. The non-Jews who committed genocide to steal the land in the first place. The non-Jews who built up big fortunes through the disgusting and murderous crime of slavery. The non-Jews who built "respectable" old-money fortunes on the broken backs of the wage slaves they exploited. As Balzac famously said, behind every great fortune is a great crime. Old money in America is for the most part just old crime well-varnished by time.

Researchers have discovered a genetic mutation which increases aggression and impulsiveness in drinkers

Dr Roope Tikkanen, one of the researchers from Helsinki University Central Hospital in Finland, said that alcoholism, alcohol consumption and violence were closely related. 'People react quite differently to acute alcohol exposure,' he said. 'Most individuals become relaxed and talkative, while some - particularly persons who are introverted while sober - become expansively extroverted and aggressive.' Alcohol was found to increase the risk of impulsive violence among men born with a highly active version of a gene which produces the substance monoamine oxidase A, the researchers found. Unusually high levels of this chemical are linked to depression and hyperactivity. The mutation is less likely to trigger violence as people get older, the scientists said. The findings, which come from a study of 174 men with histories of violence and alcohol abuse, could pave the way for new drugs to stop drinkers becoming abusive.

The working conditions of many poor African migrants in rural areas of southern Italy are "appalling", the international medical charity MSF says

The charity, which calls the workforce an invisible and vulnerable army, says migrants live in dilapidated buildings, with no electricity or running water. Thousands of Africans, many of them without papers, seek jobs as fruit pickers in the Calabria region. MSF says they are paid about 20 euros (£19; $29) for 12 hours' work daily. MSF (Medecins Sans Frontieres) calls the lack of basic hygienic facilities "appalling". It has distributed sleeping bags and hygiene kits to migrant workers in Calabria. MSF said respiratory diseases could easily spread among the Africans, as they were living in overcrowded, unheated buildings.

The best way to solve this problem would be to deport the Africans.

The biological and social aspects of race

Anthony Hilton and Kevin MacDonald discuss the impact of social structures on racial identification.

Affirmative Action will be swept aside to address skills shortage in South Africa

Affirmative action and employment equity policies will not be allowed to stand in the way of municipalities and local authorities hard hit by skills shortages, the African National Congress (ANC) said after meeting the leadership of The Afrikaans Handelsintitut (AHI). The ANC said there were at least 70 municipal authorities in the country without a single engineer or artisan. "South Africa is running so short of skills that affirmative action cannot realistically be considered an issue," Gwede Mantashe, the general secretary of the African National Congress said. “Important statistics show that unless we produce at least 2400 a year we are not going to cope with the skills shortages in the country”. Mantashe said compounding the skills crisis in South Africa today was that the country was saddled with a rapidly ageing artisan population with an average age of 54 years and practically no decent national programs of training younger people are in place. Mantashe said the main purpose of meeting the AHI was to build both an inclusive South African society and a national vision of where the country was to go rather than an ANC vision of South Africa. AHI President Venete Klein said her organization had a broad range of hard skills that could contribute directly in alleviating the skills and business management crisis in most municipalities in the country.

A blind man has been turned away from a fashionable Indian restaurant because his guide dog offended Muslim staff in Britain

Alun Elder-Brown, a recruitment executive, said he was left feeling "like a piece of dirt" after being barred from bringing the animal into Kirthon Restaurant in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, on religious grounds. The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association said the decision was illegal under the Disability Discrimination Act and Mr Elder-Brown, 51, is now considering suing the establishment in The Pantiles. It follows a series of successful prosecutions of Muslim taxi drivers who refused to carry guide dogs in their cars because they considered them unclean on religious grounds.

Scientists using the latest tools to scan the human genome must pay attention to ancestry when analyzing and interpreting their results

Dr. Gregersen studies rheumatoid arthritis, and in 2004 his team discovered an important risk gene called PTPN22. In the US, the disease associated variant of PTPN22 is present in about eight-to-10 percent of the population. Since the vast majority of Caucasians living in the US had ancestors who once lived in Europe, the few thousand genetic markers identified by Dr. Seldin were used to track those with European origins. They tested the DNA from hundreds of people in Europe and found that there was an enormous difference in the frequency of the risk variant for PTPN22, according to whether a person’s ancestors are from southern vs. northern Europe. In Southern Italy, for instance, only about three percent of the population had this specific PTPN22 allele. Moving north into Sweden, about 12-to-15 percent of the population carries this variant. This variant increases the risk for rheumatoid arthritis and a number of other autoimmune conditions. With these same genetic markers in hand – so called “ancestry informative makers,” or “AIMs.” the scientists went after their US sample, asking whether these markers could be used to identify where a person’s ancestors were from – even if the subjects themselves did not know this information. Indeed, the study showed that they could. In November 2008, Dr. Gregersen presented findings from their work at the American Society of Human Genetics meetings in Philadelphia. The team showed that these markers distinguish ancestry more precisely than any tool available today. The genetic information is so specific that one could look at genes from an Asian individual living in New York and tell whether their ancestors migrated from Cambodia, Japan, Korea or any other country in Asia. Going back to the PTPN22 gene, this team of investigators found that it is not a risk factor for rheumatoid arthritis in the Asian population. That means that if Asians were mixed into a genetic study on rheumatoid arthritis it could greatly skew the findings. “When you put thousands of these markers together, you get a probability of who comes from Sweden or Southern Italy,” said Dr. Gregersen.

Women having unsafe sex may be at more risk of HIV than thought after tests revealed the virus could breach even healthy vaginal tissue

It had been believed that only damaged skin inside the vagina could provide a route to infection. However, researchers say HIV can get past this intact barrier within hours. British HIV charities said it reinforced the need for women to avoid unprotected sex unless their partner's health is known. The lining of the vagina - the squamous epithelium - had been believed by many to be capable of keeping HIV at bay. While transmission of the virus from men to women through unprotected sex is commonplace in many parts of the world, it was thought that HIV was most likely travelling through cuts or sores in the vaginal tract, or penetrating a much thinner layer of skin further up the reproductive tract. The scientists from Northwestern University in Chicago found that, far from this being the truth, HIV could move quickly between the skin cells themselves. The weak point, they said, occurs when skin cells are about to be shed, as the cells are no longer as tightly bound together. Using HIV "tagged" with a marker which gives off light, they observed that, within four hours, the virus had reached a fraction of a millimeter below the surface. At this depth, according to the researchers, it could encounter the immune cells it needed to invade to establish itself in the body. Professor Thomas Hope, leading the research, said: "This is an important and unexpected result - we have a new understanding of how HIV can invade the female vaginal tract."

Related:

Duffy-HIV association: an odd choice of ancestry markers

United Nations accuses Congo rebels of violence against civilians

The United Nations accused rebels in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo of violence against civilians, including in November 2008 killing 13 people and recruiting by force some 200 young men. Rebels led by Tutsi ex-general Laurent Nkunda, who drove Congolese army forces out of parts of eastern Nord-Kivu province, have also been responsible for kidnappings and the forced displacement of people living in areas under their control, the UN mission in DR Congo, known as MONUC, said in Kinshasa. "Between November 25 and 29, there were at least 13 civilians killed, two wounded, 5,000 displaced, 20 children missing and 200 young men recruited by force to be fighters or forced labourers," said MONUC military spokesman lieutenant-colonel Jean-Paul Dietrich. He said Nkunda's National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) forces abused the local population living between Kiwanja, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Nord-Kiv's capital Goma and Ishasha on the border with Uganda, before withdrawing from this strategic route. "There are kidnappings, forced movements of the population by the CNDP, the imposition of taxes through road blocks and civilians being forced to repair the roads," said Dietrich. The UN spokesman explained that these "very serious" incidents were documented by a mobile MONUC team in the region. Nkunda's men have also put pressure on displaced people living close to an UN base near Kiwanja. "They told the displaced people 'You have to leave, you are not safe here'," Dietrich said, adding: "We have condemned that, the population has the right to choose where they wish to stay." The rebel assault which began in late August 2008 reached the gates of Goma and in late October 2008 Nkunda declared a unilateral ceasefire with Congolese army troops, but not their allied militias, who the CNDP blames for the violent acts. The government's coalition of forces has "succeeded in entering the zones under the control of our movement" and seeks to "challenge the authority of the CNDP and its efforts to establish peace" in the region, the CNDP executive secretary Deogratias Nzabirinda said in a statement. He added that the pro-government militias want to "promote frustration and fear among the local inhabitants to stop them from supporting or collaborating with the CNDP." Several thousand women also took to the streets of the capital Kinshasa to protest rape and sexual assaults against women and children in conflict zones. Organizers presented a statement to Alan Doss, head of the MONUC, specifically citing the violence in Nord-Kivu province. "The message is addressed to all men," Doss said. Rape is commonplace in conflicts in central Africa. In a resolution in June 2008, the UN Security Council unanimously branded sexual violence "a tactic of war" that could be regarded as a war crime.

Related:

Who Should Be Ashamed About Whats’s Happening In The Congo

Strong evidence has emerged of children and adults being used as slaves in Sudan's Darfur region, a study says

Kidnapped men have been forced to work on farmland controlled by Janjaweed militias, a coalition of African charities says. Eyewitnesses also say the Sudanese army has been involved in abducting women and children to be sex slaves and domestic staff for troops in Khartoum. Up to 300,000 people have died since conflict began in Darfur in 2003 and at least 2.7 million people have fled their homes. Thousands of people from non-Arabic speaking ethnic groups in Darfur have been targeted, says the report, published by the Darfur Consortium. The group of 50 charities says it has around 100 eyewitness accounts from former abductees. Victims have been rounded up during joint attacks on villages by the Arabic-speaking Janjaweed and the Sudanese Armed Forces, according to the study. Civilians are also tortured and killed while their villages are razed to ethnically cleanse areas, which are then repopulated with Arabic-speaking people, including nomads from Chad, Niger, Mali and Cameroon, it says. Most of the abductees are women and girls, but there is new evidence in Darfur of kidnappers targeting men and boys for forced agricultural labour, says the report. The abducted women and girls, meanwhile, are raped and forced to marry their captors as well as carry out household chores and sometimes cultivate crops, according to the study.

Japanese people taste the best - whites are too salty!

The headhunters and cannibals of Papua New Guinea comment on which ethnic groups taste best.

The Jewish community better get serious about the cancer that's growing inside it

Shmuley Boteach:

The devastation on Wall Street carries a lot of Jewish names, from firms like Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers to individuals such as Bernard Madoff, whose $50 billion Ponzi scheme collapsed over the weekend, and lawyer Marc Dreier, arrested last week for defrauding investors of hundreds of millions of dollars.

On the Internet more and more people who don't like us are beginning to connect the dots, pointing out that there are an awful lot of Jews who bear responsibility for Wall Street's fall.

Rather, what worries me is this: what if some if it is true? What if our community has become too obsessed with money? What if our values have become about wearing the most expensive Cartier watch and driving a suped-up Mercedes? What if a disproportionately large number of young Jews are running to work on Wall Street and never even considering jobs like teaching, the rabbinate, or doing outreach because the compensation, comparatively, stinks?

FOR TOO long the Jewish community has excused all manner of material excess so long as those who sported giant jewels and enormous gold watches also gave lots of tzedaka (charity).

The cancer of multiculturalism

Vox Day:

Whenever anyone points out the undeniable fact that multiculturalism is a cancer slowly killing Western culture, it is customary for left liberals to angrily demand to know why that individual hates people from other cultures. But one need not hate anyone to prefer the continued existence of one's culture and society. A much more relevant question should be directed at the proponents of multiculturalism and immigration: Why do you hate Western society so much that you wish to see it destroyed?

A new British prison chapel has been stopped from having a crucifix in case it offends Muslims

The multi-faith room at HMP Lewes will have footbaths installed so Muslim inmates can wash their feet before prayers. For Christians, however, there will now only be a plain wooden cross and a portable altar which can be removed if other faiths are using the room. The new £200,000 development at the East Sussex jail has been designed as a multi-faith room with the space split into two. One side is dedicated to Christian worship and the other is for other faiths in the 485 inmate category B jail. But a spokeswoman from the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) revealed the traditional Christian crucifix depicting Jesus nailed to the cross will not be used. After discussions between the prison chaplain and Muslim imam it was agreed a toned-down wooden cross would be used instead of a crucifix. Zsa Roggendorff, chair of the nearby Ford HMP IMB, could not understand why the crucifix has been taken out of the chapel. She said: "At Ford we have a multi-faith chapel and all are prisoners are allowed to use it. We still have our cross and we have the altar. All the other faiths have got their own special rooms in huts to use which are part of the main prison." A portable alter will also be used at HMP Lewes so it can be removed when it is not needed while footbaths have been installed so Muslim inmates can wash their feet before prayers.

Related:

Prison bans chapel crucifix to avoid offending Muslims