Tuesday, August 31, 2010

A black man who knowingly infected a 19-year-old with HIV has been sent to jail for two years

His victim found out only when she went for a pregnancy test. Thirty-one-year-old Nicholas Andrew Richards was given two years in prison and a five-year unprotected sex ban after he pleaded guilty to two charges of grievous bodily harm. In June 2008 Richards had unprotected sex with a 19 year old despite knowing he was HIV positive. The young woman only found out she had the deadly virus when she fell pregnant and took routine blood tests. Luckily her baby was spared. Richards was sentenced to a year in jail and given a five year sexual offenses prevention order, which forbids him from having unprotected sex and means he must warn any potential partners about his HIV status. He was given an additional year's prison sentence for a separate incident of grievous bodily harm with intent when he assaulted a 28 year old leaving him with a partially severed tongue, bleeding to the left side of his brain, a bruised and swollen face and a broken nose.

Petah Tikvah city hall won't let Ethiopian kids transfer out of elementary school in Israel

Dozens of parents of Ethiopian origin have been blocked by the Petah Tikva municipality from moving their children from the majority-Ethiopian religious Ner Etzion elementary school to other schools in the city. Most of the requests were based on the parents' desire not to have their children studying in a school whose student population was nearly exclusively Ethiopian. The municipality, backed by the Education Ministry, rejected most of the requests, saying that it could not force the other religious schools, private and public, to accept a large group of Ethiopian students. "The arrangement with the schools is based on the assumption that each religious school takes only a small group of Ethiopian students. Taking several dozen such children is out of the question," a source with close knowledge of the Petah Tikva education system said. Of the 290 students expected to attend Ner Etzion, only one, is not of Ethiopian origin. The process by which the Ethiopian students became the school's majority took place over a period of years, and is due to the large number of Ethiopian families in the underprivileged neighborhoods for whom this is their default school, and partly because the parents not of Ethiopian background removed their children from the school. Some moved their children to independent Orthodox Jewish schools (most of them associated with Shas), while others moved their children to other state-religious schools, with the approval of the municipality. Another source said that Ner Etzion provided a convenient solution for everyone involved - everyone, that is, except the parents who wanted to move their children to a different school. "The existence of a school that contains nearly 300 children of Ethiopian background means other schools don't need to take them," the source said. Children in the largely Ethiopian neighborhood were divided on the issue, with some saying they'd like to have some "white" friends and other saying Caucasian Israeli Jews shunned them at school and called them "Negroes."

Jewish community in Venezuela shrinks by half

The economy, violence and anti-Semitism are cited as primary reasons for the decline over the last decade. Violent crime is a major issue plaguing Venezuela. According to recent reports the number of civilian deaths in Venezuela in 2009 was approximately 19,000, almost three times higher than that in Iraq. Also, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is a strong ally of Iran, an avowed enemy of Israel. Chavez is a strong critic of Israeli policy and severed ties with Jerusalem in 2009. Anti-Israel sentiment is widespread and supported by the state.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi says the EU should pay Libya at least 5 billion euros a year to stop illegal African immigration

Speaking on a visit to Italy, Col Gaddafi said Europe "could turn into Africa" as "there are millions of Africans who want to come in". "Tomorrow Europe might no longer be European, and even black, as there are millions who want to come in," said Gaddafi. He was speaking at a ceremony in Rome, standing next to Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. "We don't know what will happen, what will be the reaction of the white and Christian Europeans faced with this influx of starving and ignorant Africans," Gaddafi said. "We don't know if Europe will remain an advanced and united continent or if it will be destroyed, as happened with the barbarian invasions." Gaddafi's visit to Rome was overshadowed by another controversial speech he made - to two groups of several hundred young Italian women, hired at a fee of 70 or 80 euros each from a local modeling agency. He told them that Islam should become the religion of Europe and gave them free copies of the Koran, after he had lectured them for an hour on the freedoms enjoyed by women in Libya.

What do typhoid, leprosy, tuberculosis, scarlet fever and bed bugs all have in common?

From Grand Rants:
There are many reasons for the resurgence of these diseases, but I believe one main factor has facilitated this deadly resurgence: open borders, which let in more than just illegal aliens. They also allow in the third-world diseases that some border-crossers carry. Close the borders, and you begin to control the diseases that piggyback in with the illegals.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Blacks are more prone to blood clots after stents

Blacks treated with a drug-coated stent to open clogged heart arteries are nearly three times more likely to develop a life-threatening blood clot than whites. Being black was the strongest predictor of stent thrombosis - blood clots that can occur after a stent is implanted - even after considering other known risk factors such as diabetes, high blood pressure or kidney problems.

The mayor of a town in the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas has been shot dead

The shooting is the latest violence in the troubled state, which saw a wave of bomb attacks. Police in Tamaulipas are investigating a mass killing of 72 migrants by suspected members of a drug gang. Meanwhile, the army said it had captured the "lieutenant" of a cartel in the northern city of Monterrey. Francisco Zapata Gallegos was captured during a raid in Monterrey. He had confessed to taking part in an attack in March 2010 that caused the deaths of two students at a Monterrey university, the army said. Zapata, whose alias is "the Bald One" is thought to have been the chief figure for the Zetas cartel in Monterrey. He had reportedly spent the past few months in hiding, but a tip-off from one of his associates led the army to his door. Away from Monterrey, the state of Tamaulipas was the target of a wave of violence. Marco Antonio Leal Garcia, mayor of Hidalgo, a small town in the western part of the state, was killed in a gun attack that also wounded his four-year-old daughter. Garcia, 46, was shot dead while driving his car. Hidalgo borders Nuevo Leon state, where the mayor of another small town was found murdered on 18 August 2010. Local police allied with a drug gang are suspected to be behind that killing. Much of the violence in the region is blamed on the Zetas, a brutal group of former elite Mexican army commandos. The US government describes the gang as the most dangerous organized crime syndicate in Mexico. Four devices exploded separately in Tamaulipas injuring at least 17 people. The explosions appeared to target places connected with the probe into the migrant killings. Police are still searching for a prosecutor involved in the case who has been missing for several days. Mexican prosecutors have said they are deeply concerned for the safety of Roberto Suarez, who is leading the investigation into the deaths. It appears that gangsters are trying to stop those trying seeking evidence of the murders. Recently, two bombs exploded in the state capital, Ciudad Victoria, targeting a television station and the offices of the transport authorities.

8 people, including one soldier, died in clashes between the military and suspected drug cartel members in Mexico's eastern state of Veracruz

One civilian also died in the violence, which appears to be the latest in the ongoing war in Mexico between the state and powerful drug cartels. Five people were injured in the clashes. More than 28,000 people have died in drug-related violence since December 2006.

About 3,200 Mexican federal police have been fired since May 2010 for failing to do their work or being linked to corruption

Of those, 465 have been charged with crimes. In addition, another 1,020 officers face disciplinary proceedings for failing confidence exams. Among the officers who were fired were officials in Ciudad Juarez who were publicly accused by fellow officers of corruption. In that incident, two groups of officers shoved and fought each other outside police headquarters. The fired officers account for about 9% of the federal police force, which has about 34,500 officials.

The quality of students — intelligence and motivation — is by far the most important factor in whether a school is bad or good

Steve Sailer reviews a new book by Robert Weissberg called Bad Students, Not Bad Schools.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

The spiritual leader of one of Israel's ruling parties has appealed to God to inflict the plague on Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef is the spiritual head of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, one of the parties that makes up Israel's ruling coalition. In a sermon he said "May all the nasty people who hate Israel vanish from our world", and named Mahmoud Abbas. "May God strike them down with the plague, along with all Palestinians who persecute Israel." Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat has condemned the remarks as an incitement to genocide and questioned how he could effectively call for the Palestinian leader's assassination while the Israeli government prepares for peace talks.

A Somali woman who tried to hijack a small aircraft on an internal flight in New Zealand in 2008 has been sentenced to nine years in prison

In the first incident of its kind in New Zealand, Asha Ali Abdille took three knives onto the plane and tried to force its pilot to fly to Australia. When told that the plane lacked fuel she demanded it fly into the sea. It landed safely in the city of Christchurch and she was overpowered by the crew. Abdille, a 36-year-old refugee, approached the pilots about 10 minutes after takeoff and claimed she had two bombs. She came close to causing the aircraft to crash after she interfered with controls. When she was denied the flight change, she attacked the pilots and a passenger, insisting the 19-seater plane ditch into the sea. The pilot had to undergo extensive surgery to re-attach tendons, muscle and a nerve after being cut on both hands; the first officer received a cut foot. Abdille had been living in Blenheim for five years, working in vineyards. She had previous convictions for threatening to pour petrol on a Red Cross member in Wellington and throwing a bucket of feces over a policeman in Hastings and was already on bail for another offense. It remains unclear why she wanted to divert the plane, which was on an internal flight from Blenheim to Christchurch, on to Australia. The incident prompted a security review on domestic air travel in New Zealand and led to a tightening of carry-on baggage checks.

Jews and prostitution

Lasha Darkmoon writes about the Jewish role in the sex trade.

Related:

Kevin MacDonald: Edmund Connelly on Jewish Humor

White male serial killers

Audacious Epigone explains why most serial killers are white:
Whenever the issue of black criminality is brought up, a SWPL can always be relied on to note that most serial killers are white men, as though that somehow proves there are no real differences in rates of criminal behavior by race. It is not surprising that most serial killers are indeed white men, since men perpetrate more than 90% of all violent crime and the majority of the US' population is white. As La Griffe has shown, however, black men are still about twice as likely to become serial killers as white men are. Parenthetically, blacks are similarly twice as likely to engage in hate crime as are whites.

Related:

WHY MOST SERIAL KILLERS ARE WHITE MEN

That sliver of crime with the 'hate' prefix

Hitler and race

Jim Goad explains why the idea that Adolf Hitler was genetically Jewish is fascinating to him:
If true, it would constitute the most egregious example of guilt-projection in world history. If Hitler had African as well as Jewish genes, it would undermine the notion that Caucasians are uniquely disposed toward waging genocidal wars. If the Holocaust had been overseen by a crazed, mixed-race monster, some ne’er-do-wells might construe that as an argument against race-mixing. And perhaps most uncomfortably for the professional Hitler-haters, it would hammer home the idea that race is more than an imaginary “social construct” and can be quantified through DNA testing.

A singer who performed in front of a mixed group of men and women was lashed 39 times after a ruling by a self-described rabbinic court

Rabbi Amnon Yitzhak, founder of the Shofar organization aimed at bringing Jews “back to religion” (hazara betshuva), has made it his recent mission to fight against musical performances for both men and women. His “judicial panel,” with Rabbi Ben Zion Mutsafi and another member, sentenced Erez Yechiel to 39 lashes in order to “rid him of his sins.” In a video clip of the court posted on the Shofar Web site, Ben Zion said that those who make others sin (mahtiei rabim), such as artists who make men and women attend performances or dance together, have no place in the world to come. He displayed a leather strip he said was made by his father from ass and bull skin, with which Yechiel was to have been whipped. Yechiel, who said, “I accept upon myself the lashing for my sins,” was ordered to stand by a wooden poll with his head facing north (“from whence the evil inclination comes”), his hands tied with a azure-colored rope (“a symbol of mercy”), and served his “sentence.”

More than 60% of black high school dropouts born since the mid-1960s go to prison

This may help to explain why only 35% of black children live with two parents. In addition, while only 24% of white eighth-graders watch four or more hours of television on an average day, 59% of their black peers do.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Scientists in Britain have shown that genetic variations in the Y chromosome affect a male’s risk of coronary heart disease

Researchers found that those carrying the I-haplogroup variant had a 55%higher risk of coronary heart disease. The association of the I-haplogroup with coronary heart disease was independent of, and not explained by, traditional heart risk factors such as cholesterol, high blood pressure and smoking. Commonly found in central, eastern and northern Europe, the I-haplogroup is carried by about 13% of British men. The I-haplogroup is thought to have come to Europe from the Middle East about 25,000 years ago. Since the I-haplogroup is not so prevalent in southern parts of Europe, an interesting speculation is whether it contributes to the higher levels of coronary heart disease in the north compared to the south – however, this requires further research and testing. What is clear from this study though, is that men carrying the I-haplogroup are more likely to suffer from coronary heart disease than men with other Y-haplogroups.

Authorities have arrested two illegal immigrants from Mexico following a raid on a marijuana garden in Yosemite National Park

Park rangers uprooted more than 3,600 marijuana plants and seized several pounds of processed pot. Officials said that the rangers arrested two Mexican citizens, who were in the U.S. illegally, on suspicion of cultivating the garden. Authorities estimate the plants had a street value of $14.6 million. The park says one of the men was had a concealed loaded pistol. Both were wearing camouflage. The suspects’ names were not released. Park officials say hose lines, fertilizers, trash and human waste spread throughout the site had caused extensive environmental damage.

BP oil spill: Only 32% give Obama good marks for his actions in the aftermath of the spill, while 61% disapprove

Louisianans are feeling more and more that George W. Bush's leadership on Katrina was better than Obama's on the spill. 54% think Bush did the superior job of helping the state through a crisis to 33% who pick Obama. Louisianans are generally softening with time in their feelings about how Bush handled Katrina. Almost as many, 44%, now approve of his actions on it as the 47% who disapprove.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Two car bombs exploded near the television studios of Televisa in Ciudad Victoria, the capital of Tamaulipas state in northeastern Mexico

One blast occurred outside the TV station while the second happened next to the municipal transit service offices, said the state attorney general's office. The explosion in front of Televisa, a CNN affiliate, damaged the building and knocked out power on the block, the station said. The station also was knocked off the air locally, Televisa said. Tamaulipas is the state where authorities discovered 72 bodies recently on a ranch believed to be used by narcotics-traffickers. Authorities are investigating whether the 58 men and 14 women, who were migrants from Central and South America, were killed by the Zetas cartel. Televisa previously came under attack when a grenade damaged apartments near the TV station's office in the city of Monterrey in neighboring Nuevo Leon state. A similar attack occurred the previous day, when a grenade was launched against the Televisa offices in the city of Matamoros, in Tamaulipas. Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon have become a bloody battleground between the Zetas and the Gulf Cartel, which ended an alliance earlier in 2010. The Zetas used to be the armed branch of the Gulf Cartel but have split off into a separate drug-trafficking organization. Journalists have come under increasing attack in Mexico, as drug cartels try to limit the information being distributed about their activities. Eight journalists were killed in Mexico in 2009 and another eight have been killed so far in 2010.

Related:

Chief investigator of Mexico mass killings goes missing

Mexico Violence Forces Ban On US Diplomats' Kids In Monterrey

Muslims and Jews in the United States remain among the most ardent supporters of Barack Obama

The Gallup survey showed 78% of Muslims and 61% of Jews approved of Obama's job performance. Among Protestants, which represent a majority of Americans, Obama's approval rating has slipped to 43% in the latest poll from 58% in 2009. Catholics gave him a 50% approval rating down from 67% in 2009.

Jewish writer says we should be more like Germany

David Brooks points out that the German economy is growing at a 9% annual growth rate and that they have managed to reduce their unemployment levels unlike the United States.

The kindergarten class of 2010-11 is less white, less black, more Asian and much more Hispanic than in 2000

The profile of the 4 million children starting kindergarten reveals the startling changes the USA has undergone the past decade and offers a glimpse of its future. In this year's class, for example, about one out of four 5-year-olds will be Hispanic. More Hispanic children are likely in the next generation because the number of Hispanic girls entering childbearing years is up more than 30% this decade, says Kenneth Johnson, demographer at the University of New Hampshire's Carsey Institute. "It's only the beginning." Hispanics 5-year-olds outnumber blacks almost 2 to 1. The percentage of white 5-year-olds fell from 59% in 2000 to about 53% today and the share of blacks from 15% to 13%.

The myth of educational equality

Pat Buchanan explains why it is time to abandon the goal of educational equality as unattainable. Instead, we should teach all children to the limit of their ability, while recognizing that all are not equal in their ability to read, write, learn, compute or debate.

Related:

College Dropout Factories

Have geneticists identified a Germanic genetic marker?

Scientists studying the Y-chromosome genetic marker known as R-U106 have found that it peaks in northern Europe. Its frequency is 36.8% in the Netherlands, 20.9% in Germany and Austria, 18.2% in Denmark, 18.2% in England, 12.6% in Switzerland, 7.5% in France, 6.1% in Ireland, 5.9% in Poland, 5.6% in north Italy 4.4% in Czech Republic and Slovakia, 3.5% in Hungary, 4.8% in Estonia, 4.3% in south Sweden, 2.5% in Spain and Portugal, 1.3% in eastern Slavs, 0.8% in south Italy, 0.6% in Balkan Slavs, 0.5% in Greeks (i.e. 2 of 193 Cretans, and no mainland Greeks), 0.4% in Turks, 0% in Middle East. The existence of R-U106 as a major lineage within the Germanic group is self-evident, as Germanic populations have a higher frequency against all their neighbors (Romance, Irish, Slavs, Finns). Indeed, highest frequencies are attained in the Germanic countries, followed by countries where Germanic speakers are known to have settled in large numbers but to have ultimately been absorbed or fled (such as Ireland, north Italy, and the lands of the Austro-Hungarian empire). South Italy, the Balkans, and West Asia are areas of the world where no Germanic settlement of any importance is attested, and correspondingly R-U106 shrinks to near-zero.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Cordoba and Jihad

Brenda Walker on the Ground Zero Mosque.

Related:

Spanish History Lesson: When Jews Took the Arab Muslim Side Against White Europeans


Bill Whittle: Ground Zero Mosque Reality Check

New paper estimates that between 35% - 55% of the modern Ashkenazi Jewish genome comes from Europeans

Does this mean that the Jews should leave Israel like Helen Thomas said?

A quarter of births in Britain in 2009 were to foreign-born mothers

The number of immigrants choosing to live in Britain long-term soared by more than 20% in 2009, official figures show.

African-American female murder suspect fired shot after robbery victim laughed

The 14-year-old black girl charged with fatally shooting a man during a robbery attempt fired her gun when one of the victims laughed at her because she was so young, according to police charging documents. Prosecutors, in seeking the young suspect be held without bail, described Arteesha Holt in court papers as a "flight risk and a danger to the citizens of Baltimore." The young girl is charged with first-degree murder, armed robbery, using a handgun in the commission of a violent crime and several other offenses. Police have said the girl may have tried to rob two men as part of a gang initiation. The victims were among three Latino men killed in a spate of crimes that has shaken the community in Southeast Baltimore.

A Saudi couple tortured their Sri Lankan maid after she complained of a too heavy workload by hammering 24 nails into her hands, legs and forehead

Nearly 2 million Sri Lankans sought employment overseas in 2009 and around 1.4 million, mostly maids, were employed in the Middle East. Many have complained of physical abuse or harassment. L.T. Ariyawathi, a 49-year old mother of three, returned after five months in Saudi Arabia. Her family only realized what had happened to her when she complained of pain and they took her to see the doctor, Foreign Employment Bureau officials said. "The landlord and the wife of the landlord hammered 24 nails into her when she complained of the heavy workload," Kalyana Priya Ramanayake, media secretary of the Foreign Employment Bureau, said. Ariyawathi has been taken to hospital for surgery to remove the nails, which according to the maid were hammered in when they were hot. X-rays showed one- to two-inch nails in her hands and legs, with one over her eyes, officials said. The Foreign Employment Bureau is consulting the Attorney-General while the Sri Lankan External Affairs Ministry is to take the matter up with the Saudi government, officials said.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Pakistanis, inbreeding and genetic illnesses in Britain

Pakistanis constitute 1.5% of the British population, yet a third of all children born in Britain with rare recessive genetic diseases come from this community. Pakistanis with genetic disorders cost the British National Health Service (meaning the taxpayers) many millions of pounds.

A black woman was simultaneously masturbating with a sex toy and watching a pornographic video while driving

Colondra Hamilton, 36, was pulled over in a traffic stop triggered when cops noticed she was driving a 2008 Pontiac with overly tinted windows. That’s when officers noticed that Hamilton’s pants were unbuttoned and she had a vibrator in her lap. Questioned by cops, Hamilton admitted to engaging in auto erotic manipulation, and revealed that she had also been watching a porno movie that was playing on the laptop of a friend in the passenger seat, according to an Elmwood Place Police Department report. Hamilton was booked into the Hamilton County jail on a misdemeanor count of driving with “impaired alertness.” Hamilton was also charged with possession of drug paraphernalia since cops found a “broken piece of crack pipe” in her purse. She was not, however, accused of using the pipe while she was driving and masturbating and watching an X-rated film, the title of which was not released.

Seventy-two bodies discovered at a ranch in northeast Mexico belonged to migrants who were making their way toward the United States

The preliminary investigation indicates the victims were illegal immigrants from Honduras, El Salvador, Brazil and Ecuador. The motive for the killings was under investigation, though officials pointed out that Mexico's drug cartels have expanded their activities to include extortion and kidnapping of immigrants. The bodies of the 58 men and 14 women were found above ground in a structure on the ranch, which is about 14 miles from the town of San Fernando, near the border with Texas. The Mexican navy, which was called in to investigate the case, said it is one of the largest discoveries of bodies in Mexico's 4-year-old war on organized crime. Members of the Mexican navy were tipped off to the site after a man with a gunshot wound approached a military roadblock. The man said he had been injured by a criminal gang, according to a statement released by the navy. Mexico's attorney general's office identified the man as an Ecuadorean immigrant with a bullet wound to the neck. After the gun battle, authorities said, they found a stash of weapons, including 21 rifles, camouflage uniforms, bulletproof vests and four trucks. One of the vehicles had been disguised to look like a truck from the Ministry of National Defense, officials said. "This discovery once again demonstrates the extreme danger and violence that Central Americans face on their treacherous journey north, as well as Mexican authorities' abject failure to protect them," Amnesty International said. "Mexico must immediately investigate this massacre, bring the perpetrators to justice and establish the identities of those killed so that their families can be informed." This gruesome discovery came about a month after authorities in the neighboring state of Nuevo Leon discovered 51 bodies in nine mass graves. In that instance, investigators found charred remains, incinerated bone fragments and stains of fire on the ground where bodies were presumably burned in steel drums. The bodies were mostly males between age 20 and 50. Many of them had tattoos. Similar mass graves have been discovered in the Mexican states of Guerrero and Quintana Roo since late May 2010. Authorities have linked them to Mexico's ongoing drug war. Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas, which border Texas, have seen a marked increase in drug violence in 2010 due to an intensifying rivalry between the Gulf cartel and the Zetas gang, which was formerly the cartel's armed branch. Recently, authorities found the bound and blindfolded body of Edelmiro Cavazos Leal, the mayor of a city in Nuevo Leon. He had been abducted two days earlier. His body was found on the outskirts of the city of Santiago, where Cavazos was mayor. There were signs of torture. News reports indicate that officials believe the Zetas ordered Cavazos killed. Five police officers and a transit worker were arrested in connection with the slaying. More than 28,000 people have died in drug-related incidents since December 2006. About 90% of the fatalities have been among cartel members and other criminals.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Gallup: President Barack Obama’s job approval rating among American men has fallen to a record low of 39%

His approval rating among American women is 46%.

Is the US economy is in a 1930s-style Depression?

Gluskin Sheff economist David Rosenberg calls current economic conditions "a depression, and not just some garden-variety recession," and notes that any good news both during the initial 1929-33 recession and the one that began in 2008 triggered "euphoric response." The 1929-33 recession saw six quarterly bounces in GDP with an average gain of 8%, sending the stock market to a 50% rally in early 1930 as investors thought the worst had passed. "False premise," Rosenberg said. "And guess what? We may well be reliving history here. If you're keeping score, we have recorded four quarterly advances in real GDP, and the average is only 3%." Rosenberg's warning comes as a slew of major analysts — Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan among them — have slashed GDP projections for 2010 to the 1.5% - 2% range. Chicago Federal Reserve President Charles Evans said in a speech that the risk of a double-dip recession has escalated. He said government programs to help distressed homeowners have been ineffective and aren't helping the pivotal housing sector recover. The dour outlooks come on the same day that the National Association of Realtors said home sales reached a 15-year low in June 2010, dousing hopes that the industry had reached a bottoming point. Rosenberg points out that the "overall economic malaise" has come despite aggressive efforts by the Federal Reserve to stimulate the economy through rate cuts. The central bank itself has scaled back its economic projections, has held steady on its balance sheet, and could be announcing another round of quantitative easing measures at its Jackson Hole summit. "How's that for a reality check," Rosenberg said. "It's not too late, by the way, to shift course if you have stayed long this market."

Related:

Dow Faces Bouncy Ride to 5,000: Strategist

Forty-eight percent (48%) of U.S. voters now regard President Obama’s political views as extreme

In addition, 57% of voters now believe that the Democratic congressional agenda is extreme. Voters have consistently expressed unhappiness over a number of Obama’s initiatives including the national health care bill and the bailouts of the auto and financial industries. The economy continues to remain sluggish despite a number of spending measures including the $787-billion economic stimulus plan in 2009, and voters now blame Obama’s policies as much as those of President George W. Bush for the bad economy. Predictably, most Republicans view Obama’s views as extreme, while a sizable majority of Democrats say they are mainstream. But most voters not affiliated with either party also describe Obama’s views as extreme by a 54% to 30% margin.

Blacks denounce a newspaper as racist for telling the truth

African-Americans are upset because a newspaper in Buffalo printed an article that detailed the criminal backgrounds of some black murder victims.

Monday, August 23, 2010

Why is Israel so poor?

It is because Israel is a low trust society. Some 56% of Israelis report that you cannot trust others, which is a figure comparable to other low-trust societies like South Korea or Italy. One manifestation of this is that there are very few large Israeli firms. By contrast, high-trust Switzerland is home to several national superstars like UBS, Novartis, TAG Hauser, etc. Israel’s economy is dominated by small-scale firms, many of which are founded by people who formed close bonds in the IDF and this lack of large, productive multinationals may play a role in explaining Israel’s relatively poor economic performance.

An 11-year-old albino girl from Swaziland was shot dead in front of her friends and then beheaded in what police believe was a ritual murder

The child had been washing clothes and bathing at a river with friends and was returning home when she was grabbed by a man wearing a balaclava. As her friends looked on, the man shot her in the back before dragging her away. Her headless body was found upriver a short time later. The murder is the latest in a series of albino killings in Sub-Saharan Africa, where sufferers of the rare skin pigmentation condition are concentrated. Earlier in 2010, another 11-year-old albino child was killed close to the same spot in Swaziland and her hand was removed. Police believe both children may have been targeted because of a belief by witch doctors that the blood and body parts of albinos - who lack pigment in their eyes, hair and skin - can bring good luck and fortune when used in potions. Their value for black magic practitioners sees them often fall prey to human traffickers, one of whom was jailed for 17 years in Tanzania recently for abducting and attempting to sell a live albino man. The girl murdered in Swaziland was named locally as Banele Nxumalo. A man identified as her father, Luke Nxumalo, said that his late uncle had also been an albino.

Did Hitler have Jewish and African ancestry?

Samples taken from relatives of the Nazi leader show that he is biologically linked to the non-European races he sought to exterminate. Journalist Jean-Paul Mulders and historian Marc Vermeeren used DNA to track down 39 of the Fuhrer's relatives. They included an Austrian farmer revealed only as a cousin called Norbert H. A chromosome called Haplopgroup E1b1b (Y-DNA) in their samples is rare in Germany and indeed Western Europe. It is most commonly found in the Berbers of Morocco, in Algeria, Libya and Tunisia as well as among Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews. Haplogroup E1b1b1, which accounts for approximately 18% - 20% of Ashkenazi and 8.6% - 30% of Sephardic Y-chromosomes, appears to be one of the major founding lineages of the Jewish population. Ronny Decorte, a genetic specialist, says that Hitler probably did have some roots in North Africa. It is not the first time that historians have suggested Hitler had Jewish ancestry. His father, Alois, is thought to have been the illegitimate offspring of a maid called Maria Schickelgruber and a 19-year-old Jewish man called Frankenberger. This would have made the man who inspired the Holocaust one-quarter Jewish. DNA was also taken from American Alexander Stuart-Houston, 61, a grand-nephew of Hitler. He was trailed for seven days before he dropped a used serviette which Mulders said led him to the cousin in Austria - and the link with Hitler's sworn enemies. If this research is accurate then people should stop blaming white gentiles for the Holocaust since Hitler was apparently neither white nor gentile.

A horrifying video of a crowd watching a mob beat two teenage brothers to death has sparked mass demonstrations in Pakistan

The video, broadcast on Pakistani news channels, shows a lynch mob taking turns to savagely beat the two boys with sticks, drawing blood from them before dragging and hanging their dead bodies from a nearby pole. But perhaps just as shocking is that none of the dozens of people and police watching tried to stop the vicious attack. It is now thought the boys, who were on their way to play cricket in Sialkot, an eastern Punjab province, may have been mistaken for robbers by the group who decided to deliver brutal justice for their supposed crime. As details have emerged authorities appear increasingly confident the two boys - Moiz Butt, 17, and his brother Muneeb, 15 - were innocent. At least 10 suspects have been arrested, including four police officers. In 2008, in two separate incidents in less than a week, crowds set fire to suspected robbers in the southern city of Karachi.

Police in Mexico say they have found four bodies hung from a bridge in an affluent town south of Mexico City

The four men had been decapitated and mutilated before being hung by their ankles from the bridge outside Cuernavaca, in the state of Morelos. A message had been left with their heads warning that anyone supporting Edgar Valdez would risk a similar fate. Edgar Valdez is reportedly fighting Hector Beltran Leyva for control of the influential Beltran Leyva drug cartel. Cuernavaca, a city of 350,000 and a popular weekend retreat spot for wealthy residents of Mexico City, is at the center of the turf war. The cartel has been without a leader since Arturo Beltran Leyva was killed by the security forces in December 2009. Edgar Valdez is a leading contender to take over as the head of the gang. But Hector Beltran Leyva, the former leader's brother, is also vying for that position. His other brother Carlos, another contender for the leadership, was arrested in January 2010. Police said the killing of the four men, aged between 25 and 30, was most probably linked to the drug turf war. They had been reported kidnapped days earlier. The Beltran Leyva organization is believed to have the most sophisticated intelligence of any of the Mexican drug cartels, and controls firms involved in, among others, transportation, electronics, health products and hospitality. Control over its many and varied operations is seen as a key prize.

A mob of Rwandan rebels gang-raped at least 150 women during a raid on a community of villages in eastern Congo

The United Nations blamed the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, or F.D.L.R., for the attack. The F.D.L.R. is an ethnic Hutu rebel group that has been terrorizing the hills of eastern Congo for years, preying on villages in a quest for the natural resources beneath them. The raided villages are near the mining center of Walikale, known to be a rebel stronghold, and are “very insecure,” said Stefania Trassari, a spokeswoman for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. “Rape is something we get quite often.”

Saturday, August 21, 2010

NYT endorses Jew for Attorney General

The Jewish-owned New York Times endorses State Senator Eric Schneiderman in the Democratic nomination to run for NY State Attorney General over gentiles Eric DiNallo and Kathleen Rice.

Immigration and youth unemployment

As immigration becomes more intense into an area, the greater is the level of youth unemployment. Youth unemployment in Britain is an important and growing social and economic problem. Unemployment of 18 – 24 year olds is currently running at more than twice the overall unemployment rate (17.5 % compared with 7.8%), with 724,000 unemployed. A quarter of young people without a job have been unemployed for more than 12 months. The employment rate for young people is also strikingly lower (at 59%) than the overall rate of employment.

Related:

13 per cent rise in Neets 'linked to immigration

MIGRANTS ROB YOUNG BRITONS OF JOBS

BRITISH YOUTH SUFFER BECAUSE OF MASS IMMIGRATION


High levels of immigrants 'linked to high youth unemployment'

Muslims are pressuring Sikhs in Kashmir to convert or leave

Once again it is only non-Muslims who have to be tolerant.

Court bans German medical authorities from investigating Nigerian doctor

A German national of Nigerian origin doctor who killed a British patient is unlikely to be struck off in Germany because the medical authorities have been banned from investigating him. Dr Daniel Ubani was due to appear before a fitness-to-practice hearing, where he would have been forced to take a competency exam. However, the administrative court in Meunster ruled that Ubani’s fate should be decided by his local authority employers, rather than the Physician’s Chamber. It is understood that the local government in Arnsberg, near Ubani’s home town of Witten in northern Germany does not plan to take the matter further. Ubani, 67, now faces a disciplinary hearing, but he can only be fined and cannot be removed from the medical register. Rory Gray, whose father David was given a fatal overdose of drugs by Ubani during his first out-of-hours shift in Cambridgeshire in February 2008, said he was stunned by the decision.

AIDS activists in Swaziland have criticized a top adviser to King Mswati III for saying the country's HIV epidemic is being exaggerated

Prince Mangaliso said public awareness campaigns against HIV amounted to little more than scare tactics. He added that male circumcision was no more a preventative measure than bathing after sexual intercourse. According to UNAIDS, Swaziland - Africa's last absolute monarchy - has one of the highest levels of HIV infections in the world, with a prevalence rate of 26% in the adult population and that 42.6% of pregnant women in kingdom were infected with HIV. Trials in Kenya, Uganda and South Africa have shown that male circumcision reduces by 60% the risk of a man contracting HIV - the virus that causes AIDS. Forty-two-year-old King Mswati, who has 13 wives, has also come in for criticism from AIDS campaigners for sending the wrong message to his subjects by promoting polygamy.

Obesity is still climbing among African American and Native American Indian girls

Data, covering 1999 through 2008, shows that Hispanic and black children were more likely to be obese than non-Hispanic whites. Obesity prevalence stayed the same after 2005 for Hispanic girls, but it continued to climb for African American and Amerindian girls. The prevalence of severe obesity only declined among white and Asian boys; for everyone else, it stayed the same or increased. In 2008, about 5% of Native American and African-American girls were severely obese, compared to just over 1% of non-Hispanic white girls.

IQ differences in northern and southern Italy

IQs in the north of Italy are approximately 10 points higher than in south.

How effective is Head Start which provides preschool programs to poor families?

In January 2010, the Health and Human Services Department released a study of Head Start’s overall impact. The conclusions were disturbing. By the end of first grade, the study found, Head Start graduates were doing no better than students who didn't attend Head Start. “No significant impacts were found for math skills, pre-writing, children’s promotion, or teacher report of children’s school accomplishments or abilities in any year,” the report concluded. And how did the Senate panel react to this dismal evidence? They set aside $8.2 billion for Head Start in 2011, almost a billion dollars more than in 2010. In related news, the New York state test results released recently showed that the gap in reading scores between black and white elementary- and middle-school students grew from 22 percentage points in 2009 to 30 points in 2010, while the math gap grew from 17 points to 30 points.

By a margin of five to one, Canadians say the government should reject the almost 500 would-be refugees from Sri Lanka who arrived recently

Asked which statement best described their own opinion on what should be done with the ship, which may include members of the banned Tamil Tiger terrorist group, 60% agreed with the statement: "They should be turned away - the boat should be escorted back to Sri Lanka by the Canadian Navy." Just 17% agreed with the statement: "They should be accepted into Canada as political refugees."

Black teens accused in the gang rape of a 12-year-old girl have been charged as adults

Kadeem R. Santiful, 17, and Tracey W. Hankins, 15, are accused of first-degree rape, first-degree sex offense and other charges in the attack. Davon Perry, 24, of Pikesville had been charged previously with the same counts. The girl told police that the trio had taken turns holding her down and raping her in a room used to store party supplies, and that they had forced her to perform sex acts on each of them.

Mexican authorities have arrested six police officers in connection with the kidnap and murder of a town mayor

The officers have reportedly confessed to killing Edelmiro Cavazos, prosecutors said. Cavazos' body was found, bound and gagged, outside the northern town of Santiago. His police bodyguard, who was kidnapped with the mayor and released by the kidnappers unharmed, has also now been arrested. Cavazos' bodyguard was the only witness to the kidnapping. The police had been paid by a drug gang, prosecutors said, without naming the organization. One of the officers took part directly in the kidnapping while others kept watch on roads surrounding the mayors home, Adrian de la Garza Santos, director of the state investigations agency. The area around the northern city of Monterrey has seen a rise in violence blamed on a turf war between rival drug cartels. Cavazos is the fifth Mexican mayor believed to have been killed by drug criminals. Police said Cavazos had just returned from attending a public function on the town's main square when 15 gunmen broke into his home and forced him into a car.

Two more tribal women have been stripped and forced to parade naked in front of large crowds in the Indian state of West Bengal, police say

The incidents were in the same area - the Birbhum district - where a similar case took place a few months ago. Locals say that the women were being punished for "having close relations" with men from other communities. Birbhum police spokesman Humayun Kabir said the two women were from Jetia village and worked in a stone quarry. "Local tribes people did not like these women enjoying close relations with men from other communities," he said. He said that they were subjected to this this "extreme punishment of public stripping" after they were found pillion riding with them on motor-bikes. All three women belong to the Santhal tribe. Officials say all three women were forced to walk long distances without their clothes - in the first case, the woman was also filmed. They say that the "hapless women" were molested and jeered by large crowds as they walked. A similar thing happened to another woman a few years ago in the neighboring state of Assam.

Amnesty International has urged Saudi authorities to stop any attempt to medically paralyze a man as a judicial punishment

A Saudi judge is reported to have asked hospitals if it is possible to cut the spinal cord of the man, found guilty of paralyzing another man in a fight. Amnesty said intentionally paralyzing someone would constitute torture. Under Islamic law in Saudi Arabia, retribution sentences can include eye-gouging and, for murder, beheading. The human rights group quoted reports that a court in the north-western town of Tabuk had approached a number of hospitals inquiring about a spinal operation. The man in question has already been sentenced to seven months' imprisonment for the of fence, which happened more than two years ago, Amnesty said. The brother of the victim said that the injuries had been caused in a fight involving a meat cleaver. He said his brother, who was left paralyzed and later lost a foot, had asked a judge in Tabuk to impose an equivalent punishment on his attacker under Islamic law.

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Afghanistan and several African nations are the most at risk to have a food shortage

Afghanistan was named as the country with the most vulnerable food supply, according to the study by Maplecroft, a British-based research agency. After Afghanistan, African nations were on the rest of the top 10 list. In order, the next were the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Eritrea, Sudan, Ethiopia, Angola, Liberia, Chad and Zimbabwe. In all, African nations were 36 of the top 50 on the list. Sub-Saharan Africa is particularly vulnerable to food insecurity because of the frequency of extreme weather events, high rates of poverty and failing infrastructures. The United States was ranked No. 158. Finland got the best rank and was considered least at risk.

Both male and female workers prefer to have a man as their boss, according to a survey

Two thirds of employees agree they would rather work for a man than a woman. Female bosses were accused of being moody and incapable of leaving their personal lives at home. A third of those polled claimed women in charge are 'loose cannons' - ready to stab colleagues in the back at any time, and who constantly feel threatened by other people in positions of authority. By contrast, both male and female workers believe male bosses were less likely to get involved in office politics, were easier to reason with and rarely suffered from mood swings. Men are also said to be more straight-talking than women and rarely talk about others behind their backs, it emerged. Both men and women are in total agreement that men make better bosses - 63% of women and 75% of men comparatively.

Are cougars a myth?

A study of online dating found that men and women are still rather traditional when it comes to searching for their ideal partner. Women generally seek an older and, therefore hopefully, wealthier man, according to the study. Men, on the other hand, desire a young and attractive female, and often prefer a much younger partner as they themselves age.

An Indian Hindu leader has said it is time to weed out Christianity

Hindu BJP nationalist leader Prahlad Remani, a state lawmaker, has insisted Christianity in the State of Karnataka be stamped out. Making a statement at India’s Independence Day celebrations, he said the "seeds of Christianity" should be weeded if the state was to stop the religion from spreading. He said: "The followers of any religion, including the Hindus and others, must weed out Christianity." On the same day as the speech, two Protestant clergymen were detained by police. The two clergymen had been conducting a religious service in Karnataka, when 30 Hindu militants burst into the building where the meeting was taking place. Police moved in soon after. But instead of arresting the Hindu troublemakers, they arrested the two clergymen and about ten members of the congregation. The two clergymen were held on proselytizing charges. Since the BJP came to power there have been over 200 anti-Christian incidents in Karnataka, where there are about a million Christians out of a total population of 53 million.

Blacks, Hispanics and kidney donations

Black and Hispanic kidney donors are significantly more likely than white donors to develop hypertension, diabetes and chronic kidney disease. The need for live kidney donors is greatest among blacks, who are significantly more likely to develop end-stage renal disease, yet have less access to kidney transplants. Researchers say that blacks are less likely to identify a potential donor and their potential donors are more likely to have health conditions at evaluation that limit their ability to donate. After kidney donation, researchers found that in comparison to white donors, black donors were 52% more likely to be diagnosed with hypertension. Hispanic donors also were 36% more likely than white donors to be diagnosed with hypertension. Additionally, black and Hispanic donors were more than two times as likely as white donors to be diagnosed with chronic kidney disease and to have drug-treated diabetes.

Who are the closest relatives of Africans?

According to Dienekes Pontikos, Africans are most closely related to European and Middle Eastern populations while being most distantly related to Native American Indians. The reason for this seems to be that Europe and the Middle East are closest to Africa while the Americas are the farthest away. It would also seem likely that Southern Europeans are more closely related to Africans than are Northern Europeans.

According to a new TIME poll, 61% of respondents oppose the construction of the Ground Zero mosque, compared with 26% who support it

More than 70% concur with the premise that proceeding with the plan would be an insult to the victims of the attacks on the World Trade Center. The survey also revealed that many Americans harbor lingering animosity toward Muslims. Twenty-eight percent of voters do not believe Muslims should be eligible to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. Nearly one-third of the country thinks adherents of Islam should be barred from running for President — a slightly higher percentage than the 24% who believe that Obama is himself a Muslim. In all, just 47% of respondents believe Obama is a Christian; 24% declined to respond to the question or said they were unsure, and 5% believe he is neither Christian nor Muslim. Only 44% of respondents had a favorable view of Muslims.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Blacks and college graduation rates

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the research arm of the U.S. Department of Education, the six-year college graduation rate among black students stands at 42%, compared to 60% for whites, 48% for Hispanics and 67% for Asian/Pacific Islander students. That distribution holds up whether the students attended public or private not-for-profit institutions.

Black males and the Buffalo School District

Data from 2007-2008 shows that only 25% of black males in the Buffalo City School District graduated on time.

Minorities and the ACT college-entrance exam

Far more Hispanic students are taking the ACT than ever, but their scores continue to fall short of levels considered necessary for strong performance in college. Scores released by ACT Inc. for the graduating class of 2010 show that the number of Hispanic students who have taken the college-entrance exam during high school grew 84% in the past five years. Participation by Asian-American students rose by 63% and by African-American students 55%, compared with a 29% rise in the number of white students. But stubborn score gaps persist among racial and ethnic groups. Hispanic and black students were the least likely to reach ACT score levels that are predictive of college success. Only 11% of Hispanic students and 4% of black students met the ACT’s benchmarks for college readiness in all four subject areas tested, compared with 30% of white students and 39% of Asian students. The exam, which is scored on a 36-point scale, covers mathematics, English, reading, and science. The gaps were even more stark on individual subjects. In math, for instance, 13% of black students and 27% of Hispanic students met the college-ready score of 22, compared with 52% of white students and 68% of Asian students. Hispanic and black students were also far less likely than their white or Asian counterparts to have received the high school preparation that ACT research says equips them to thrive in college. About two-thirds of Hispanic and black students had taken four years of English and three years each of math, science, and social studies, compared with three-quarters of white students and eight in 10 Asians.

In a 2004 AARP survey of divorced people 40 and older, 66% of wives said they had requested the divorce

In another national study, ex-wives were three times more likely to say that they wanted the divorce, rather than their husbands wanting it.

Christ and slavery

Dennis Mangan points out that it makes as much sense to blame whites for slavery as it does to blame Jews for the death of Christ.

Security forces in Mexico have found the body of the kidnapped mayor of the northern city of Santiago

Edelmiro Cavazos was taken from his home by armed men. His body was found handcuffed and blindfolded outside the nearby city of Monterrey. The wealthy cities are seen as prime targets for gangs who kidnap for ransom. The Monterrey area has also seen a rise in violence blamed on a turf war between rival drug cartels. Cavazos had just returned from attending a public function on the town's main square when 15 gunmen broke into his home and forced him into a car. State governor Rodrigo Medina said he believed Cavazos may have been targeted because of his efforts to tackle corruption in the local police force. The abduction followed a weekend of violence in Monterrey, some 430 miles north of Mexico City. Gangs had blockaded 13 major streets in the city - Mexico's third largest - and an explosive device went off in front of the studios of Mexico's largest television network, Televisa. Nuevo Leon, the northern state where both Monterrey and Santiago are located, has seen a sharp increase in crime since one of the country's most violent drug gangs, Los Zetas, extended its operations there.

Latino households suffered nearly 50% of the foreclosures in California

The data shows that high-cost loans correlate with foreclosures and that there was a big presence of sub-prime lending to Latinos and in areas where there are concentrations of Latinos. Minorities were disproportionately represented in loan defaults. Latinos, who represent 36.6% of California's population, received 29.9% of all mortgage loans originated between 2004 and 2008, but were subject to 48.7% of foreclosures. Latinos' share of higher-rate loans in California was 47.1% between 2004 and 2008. Latino and African-American families disproportionately received the most expensive and risky types of loans during the sub-prime lending boom. In 2006, for instance, federal figures show that among consumers who received conventional mortgages for single-family homes, roughly half of African Americans and Hispanic borrowers received a higher-rate mortgage compared with about 18% of white borrowers.

Neighborhoods and incarceration rates

Black neighborhoods tend to have the highest incarceration rates.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Fewer than a quarter of black male students in Palm Beach County graduated within four years of high school in 2008

A study looked at the number of black males who graduated in the 2007-08 school year with a regular high school diploma, which would enable them to go to college. Then it divided that by the number of black males who had been enrolled in ninth grade district-wide four years earlier. The study found that Palm Beach County's graduation rate for black males in the 2007-08 school year was 22%. That was significantly below the 37% graduation rate for black males in Florida as a whole and the 47% graduation rate for black males nationwide that year. In contrast, the graduation rate for white males was 50% in Palm Beach County, 57% in Florida as a whole and 78% nationwide.

Corruption in Nigeria's police has become institutionalized and junior officers are expected to share bribes, Human Rights Watch says

Their report describes a system of "paying returns" when officers are expected to pay up the chain of command a share of extortion money. It says officers have to pay bribes within the force to get posts and are expected to meet monetary targets. Extortion of civilians and bribery of police is a fact of life in Nigeria - often taking place in public and in broad daylight. Motorists at checkpoints, traders, businessmen, sex workers and those under arrest are extremely likely to encounter threats and demands for money. There are also numerous cases of shootings and deaths at checkpoints when civilians refuse to pay. The Human Rights Watch report - running to 102 pages - says often victims of crime unable to pay will not get justice. Meanwhile, wealthy criminals are able to bribe officers to drop a case or influence an investigation. The report accuses senior police officers and government ministers of failing to tackle deep and entrenched police abuses.

Police in Tanzania say they have arrested a Kenyan national who was attempting to sell an albino man

The arrest was made in a sting operation as police pretended to be businessmen buying albino body parts. Police say they struck a deal equivalent to more than $250,000 for the 20-year-old man. Albino body parts are prized in parts of Africa, with witchdoctors claiming they have special powers. A 28-year-old Kenyan man, Nathan Mutei, was arrested just outside the town of Mwanza as he attempted to sell an albino man. The regional police commander, Simon Siro, said that Mutei had tricked a fellow Kenyan into believing he would secure a job in Tanzania as a truck driver's assistant. But Mutei had secretly tried to find businessmen willing to buy 20-year-old Robinson Mkwama. The police commander said they had posed as potential buyers in order to make the arrest. In Tanzania, the body parts of people living with albinism are used by witchdoctors for potions which they tell clients will help make them rich or healthy. Over the last few years more than 50 albino adults and children have been killed. The Tanzanian government promised to take action, and there have been some court cases. But justice is slow. So far, just seven men have been given death sentences.

The Chinese say that black Africans are lazy

The Chinese also intend to colonize large parts of Africa as a way of dealing with their overpopulation problem.

Netanyahu and the anchor babies of Israel

When is it not considered racist to deport anchor babies and their illegal immigrant parents? When you are an Israeli Jew!

The racial achievement gap in the Los Angeles Unified school system

For the most part, vast achievement gaps remain between low-income black and Latino students and their white and Asian counterparts. Black students are faring the worst. Black students in California remain the lowest-scoring racial group, with 32% proficient in math and 39% proficient in English.

The physical variance among dog breeds is determined by differences in only about seven genetic regions

These seven locations in the dog genome explain about 80% of the differences in height and weight among breeds. They may also explain behavioral differences between the various dog breeds. It is also likely that small differences in the human genome explain most of the physical and behavioral variation that we see between the different races.

Black man electrocutes his daughter in South Africa

Angry with his teenage daughter for wearing a tongue stud, an Ntuzuma father allegedly assaulted her for hours, tied her up and then electrocuted her. Siphiwe Dlangisa, 38, is on trial for the murder of his daughter, Nonkululeko, 16, at his home in 2009. Dlangisa pleaded not guilty to murder at the start of the trial before Judge Shyam Gyanda in the Scottburgh High Court. His attorney, Vusi Khathi, said Dlangisa admitted hitting his daughter but denied electrocuting her. Dlangisa's son Mbuso, 17, testified for the State that he saw Dlangisa arrive at home with Nonkululeko and her mother, Nompumelelo Maphumulo, on October 31, 2009. "After they arrived at the main house, I heard the deceased screaming. I saw my father grab her by the neck. Then I saw the deceased's mother leave the house. She had blood on her shirt. My father then took the deceased to his shack, next to the main house." Mbuso said he asked Maphumulo about the blood. "She told me that my father had hit the deceased because she had put in a tongue ring. I heard the deceased crying and then it stopped." Mbuso said that a short while later his father ordered him to guard the deceased and he went to fetch a rope. "Nonkululeko asked me to untie her, but I did not because he returned." He then saw Dlangisa tie Nonkululeko to an electricity pole outside his shack and electrocute her with a cord.

A black grandfather with a history of domestic violence spent Father’s Day in jail after police charged him with killing his wife with a spear

An immigrant from Africa, Harun Ngolo, 65, was charged with homicide, simple assault and two counts of aggravated assault by Wilkes-Barre police and the Luzerne County District Attorney’s Office. He allegedly killed his wife, 62-year-old Maria Jeringa Ngolo, stabbed his adult son, Moses Ngolo and cut his 3-year-old grandson, Noah Cobin, at their home in South Wilkes-Barre. Maria Ngolo had at least one protection-from-abuse order against her husband in the past. Moses Ngolo, believed to be 28, told police he wanted to move out of his parents’ home, yet stayed at his mother’s request because she feared her husband’s past history of domestic violence. Harun Ngolo is a native of Zaire, now known as the Republic of Congo, in Central Africa. Court documents show Harun Ngolo had a history of family violence. An arrest affidavit dated Dec. 22, 2007, stated Harun Ngolo was arrested after chasing Maria and Moses Ngolo around the home with a weapon. During the 2007 incident, Harun Ngolo fastened a steak knife to the end of a 3-foot metal poll and chased the family through their home. The affidavit said the family members locked themselves in a bedroom until police arrived. Police said that Harun Ngolo was screaming, “You’re going to send me to jail? I’m going to kill you,” according to the affidavit. At the time of the incident, Maria Ngolo had an active PFA against her husband. Harun Ngolo was charged with prohibited offensive weapons, simple assault and harassment. He served some time in Luzerne County Correctional Facility when he could not make bail of $25,000. In late February 2007, Harun Ngolo was arrested on charges he assaulted his wife and Moses with a hammer and garden tool. He also pleaded guilty in June 2004 to a summary count of harassment in Wilkes-Barre. The Ngolos came to the United States in 1993 as political refugees. The United Nations assisted them after their oldest son, Enoch Ngolo, was killed during a student demonstration against then Zaire dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.

Monday, August 16, 2010

Hamas supports Ground Zero Mosque

A leader of the Hamas Islamic terrorist group has jumped into the emotional debate on the plan to construct a mosque near Ground Zero - insisting Muslims "have to build" it there. "We have to build everywhere," said Mahmoud al-Zahar, a co-founder of Hamas and the organization's chief on the Gaza Strip. "In every area we have, [as] Muslim[s], we have to pray, and this mosque is the only site of prayer," he said. Hamas, he added, "is representing the vast majority of the Arabic and Islamic world - especially the Islamic side." Zahar said Muslims around the world, including those who live in this country, are united in a common cause. "First of all, we have to address that we are different as people, as a nation, totally different," he said. "We already are living under the tradition of Islam. Islam is controlling every source of our life as regard to marriage, divorce, our commercial relationships," Zahar said. "Even the Islamic people or the Muslims in your country, they are living now in the tradition of Islam. They are fasting; they are praying." Hamas first came up in the mosque debate when Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam behind the proposed mosque, refused to describe the group as a terrorist organization - despite the State Department listing that identifies it as such.

The world's best countries

According to Newsweek, the best countries in the world tend to be dominated by Europe and by countries settled by Europeans. For example, the top five are Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Australia and Luxembourg.

A man and a woman who allegedly had an adulterous affair have been stoned and killed in the northern Afghan province of Kunduz

The punishment happened in a crowded bazaar in the Taliban-controlled village of Mullah Quli. The Taliban have not commented on the public killing, but it was confirmed by local officials and witnesses. The Taliban also reportedly flogged and killed a pregnant widow in western Baghdis province. Mohammad Ayub, governor of Imam Sahib district in Kunduz, said that the Taliban had brought the man and woman to the local bazaar, where they stoned them before a large crowd. The Taliban asked the villagers to attend the stoning through an announcement on loudspeakers in the mosque, two witnesses from Mullah Quli said. "There was a big crowd of people," one said. "The Taliban made the women wear black clothes and the men were made to stand. The Taliban started throwing stones. We were also asked to throw stones. After a while, the Taliban left. The woman was dead but the man was still alive. Some Taliban then came and shot him three times. The Taliban warned villagers if anyone does anything un-Islamic, this will be their fate." The woman was 23 years old and the man was 28. A local tribal elder said that the couple had eloped and that the woman had been engaged, while the man was already married. A jirga (tribal council) met and decided that the couple could come back to the village if the man paid compensation. "The man returned after he was assured that he wouldn't be harmed," said the elder. "The Taliban arrested them as soon as they came back."

A half Moroccan popstar has admitted having sexual intercourse with three men without telling them she had HIV

Nadja Benaissa, who was a member of the popular German girl band No Angels, told a court she was sorry for not disclosing her condition. The 28-year-old is facing five charges of attempted grievous bodily harm for sleeping with the men without protection. She is also accused of one count of grievous bodily harm after one of the men became infected with HIV, which she denies. She appeared in court in Darmstadt, western Germany, to give evidence. The court heard how the singer had known she was HIV positive since 1999. Benaissa, who is half German and half Moroccan, became part of No Angels in 2000 which went on to become one of Germany's most popular bands, selling more than five million records before breaking up in 2003. She said her HIV status was discovered when she went to hospital, aged 16, for routine tests during pregnancy. It was alleged that the singer went on to have sex with three men a maximum of five times between 2000 and 2004. Benaissa admitted she did not tell her sex partners about her condition. The man who claims the pop star infected him said they had a three-month relationship at the beginning of 2004. He said he got tested after Benaissa's aunt asked him in 2007 whether he was aware that the singer was HIV positive. Benaissa was arrested in April 2009, before a concert in Frankfurt and held in custody for 10 days. It is alleged another former partner made a complaint to police in 2008. The trial is expected to last five days and if found guilty, Benaissa could be jailed for a maximum of 10 years.

Asian gangs are turning white British children into prostitutes

Unfortunately, the British seem to be too paralyzed by political correctness to do anything to protect their children from this foreign menace.

The racial achievement gap in NYC

Among the students in the city’s third through eighth grades, 40% of black students and 46% of Hispanic students met state standards in math, compared with 75% of white students and 82% of Asian students. In English, 33% of black students and 34% of Hispanic students are now proficient, compared with 64% among whites and Asians. Things were even worse on the national test with 49% of white students and 17% of black students showing proficiency on the fourth-grade English test in 2009, for example, up from 45% of white students and 13% of black students in 2003. Asian students have generally performed better than white students on state math tests in the city, and about the same on English tests. Those gaps have remained fairly consistent over the years.

Related:

"Triumph Fades on Racial Gap in City Schools"

A cure for lesbianism?

A prenatal pill for congenital adrenal hyperplasia to prevent ambiguous genitalia may reduce the chance that a female with the disorder will be gay.

Obama approval sinks to 42% in Gallup’s daily tracking poll

Obama has the support of only 31% of Americans when it comes to his handling of the budget deficit and just 29% when it comes to immigration.

Related:

Why Don’t Hispanics (And Italians) Project Like Jews?

Sunday, August 15, 2010

A rabbi convicted of sexually abusing a teenage boy has his kosher meals picked up from a Queens store by an on-duty jail captain

Baruch Lebovits, a Satmar rabbi from Brooklyn, gets the special food brought straight to his Rikers Island cell, even though the jail already provides kosher dishes for its Jewish prisoners. Apparently, they aren't blessed enough for Lebovits, 59, who has been moaning for months that he couldn't eat the food because it hadn't had proper rabbinical supervision. Lebovits' adherence to holy law apparently didn't preclude repeatedly sexually abusing a 16-year-old classmate of his son, a heinous crime for which he was sentenced in March 2010 to up to 32 years in prison. The Brooklyn rabbi is on Rikers awaiting trial in another sex abuse case. Recently, a Rikers jail captain was ordered to pick up $60 worth of glatt kosher canned meals for the perverted rabbi, including Salisbury steak, stuffed shells, cheese ravioli and barbecued chicken wings from Alle Processing in Maspeth, Queens. The company offered to mail the food, but because of a delay, the captain went in person to pick up the package. Lebovits' special daily diet also includes dry cereal, a box of matzo, four ounces of kosher grape juice and fresh fruit and veggies - provided to him uncut, lest they were touched by a knife that cut non-kosher food. Paulette Johnson, the Correction Department's head of food services, approved the arrangement. Lebovits' own influential Satmar rabbi, Moshe David Neiderman, played a key role in convincing jail officials. "This is not a privilege or an accommodation - it's a right," said Neiderman, president of the United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg. "Any Jewish prisoner has the religious right to eat food that is appropriate according his religious traditions." Correction officials say they're just following the law. "Congress enacted the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000. The Department provides glatt kosher meals consistent with its requirements," said spokesman Stephen Morello. This latest scandal comes a year after correction chaplain Rabbi Leib Glanz was exposed as wielding such power over the city detention center in lower Manhattan that he allowed a convict to hold his son's bar mitzvah there. Glanz and a department chief resigned in wake of the reports.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Six African migrants trying to cross into Israel from Egypt's Sinai desert have been killed

Egyptian security officials said four of the migrants were killed in a dispute with the people smugglers taking them to Israel. The other two were killed by Egyptian border guards as they tried to cross into Israel. Human rights activists have criticized Egypt for killing dozens of migrants at the border in the last few years. Many of the migrants, seeking work or political asylum in Israel, come from Sudan and the Horn of Africa. An Egyptian security official said that the six Africans killed were from Eritrea. The migrants' dispute with the people traffickers broke out after the smugglers demanded more money for taking them into Israel. Some of the migrants seized weapons from the smugglers and a gunfight broke out in which four of them were killed. The group of migrants scattered and two were later shot at the border. At least 17 of the migrants were arrested by Egyptian police.

Black doctor involved in drug ring and Medicaid fraud

An acclaimed Harlem doctor was the boss of an Oxycontin ring that scammed $1 million from Medicaid with phony prescriptions - and sold the addictive painkillers on the streets of New York. Dr. Diana Williamson and eight others were charged as FBI agents seized 16 boxes and a computer from her Harlem community clinic that was founded as a center to help minorities with AIDS. They were all hit with conspiracy to distribute narcotics charges. The scam worked like this: Williamson would write the prescriptions for patients on Medicaid and then her cohorts would turn around and sell the pills - mostly oxycodone and the brand-name version, Oxycontin - to addicts. On the street, the pills sell for $30 to $40 each. Williamson, 54, and three of the eight others nabbed were also charged with defrauding the federal Medicaid program out of nearly $1 million since Fall 2009.

Obama panders to Muslims

Obama defends Ground Zero mosque

Obama to host Ramadan meal

South African police found 4 bullet-riddled bodies in an unused shaft of a mine belonging to relatives of Nelson Mandela and President Jacob Zuma

Patrick Cleburne writes about one of Nelson Mandela's grandsons.

People with extremely strong ties to their countries or groups are not only willing, but eager, to sacrifice themselves to save their compatriots

A team of researchers found that the majority of "fused" people, those who view themselves as completely immersed in a group (be it ethnic, national or other), are willing to commit extreme acts for the good of their compatriots. The study revealed that an overwhelming majority of fused respondents are willing to take extreme, bold steps to save the lives of their group members. According to the findings 75% are willing to jump to their deaths to save the lives of five group members, compared to 25% of participants who were not fused with their country and 88% said they would die to save five members of an extended in-group (Europe), but not members of an out-group (America). The researchers used Europe as an example of an extended in-group (outsiders with close cultural or moral affiliations) because of its common social, political and economic ties to Spain where the research was conducted. They used America as an example of an out-group because it is far removed from Spain. When given the option to push aside a fellow group member who is about to sacrifice himself to kill some escaped terrorists, 63% said they would push the group member aside so they, themselves, could leap to their deaths to divert a train that would then kill the terrorists.

Only 42% of Americans earning $7,500 per month or more said they approve of the job Obama is doing

Forty-four percent of those earning between $5,000 and $7,499 said they approve of the job he is doing and 46% of those earning between $2,000 and $4,999 said they approve of the job he is doing. The higher the income bracket an American occupies, the sooner he or she was likely to stop approving of the job Obama was doing.

Five females were bound and robbed in a Manhattan apartment by 3 Latinos

Three Hispanic men entered the apartment on West 176th Street in the early morning hours on a Friday in July 2010. They bound the hands and feet of a 9-year-old girl, a 15-year-old girl, a 37-year-old woman, a 39-year-old woman and a 56-year-old woman. It's not known if the victims were all members of the same family. The suspects took an unknown amount of cash and and took off. A security camera caught the men leaving the building. Police just released the video in hopes of identifying the suspects. The suspects are described as follows:

Hispanic, 18-25 years old, 5'10"-6'0", last seen wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses.

Hispanic, 18-25 years old, 5'8"-5'10", last seen wearing a baseball cap with purple and white sneakers.

Hispanic, 18-25 years old, 5'10"-6'0", last seen wearing a baseball cap.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Poll finds that 61% of New York residents and 56% of New York City residents oppose the proposed Ground Zero mosque

Only 33% of New York City residents support it. Another poll shows that nearly 70% of all Americans oppose the controversial plan to build the mosque just blocks away from the solemn site in lower Manhattan while just 29% favor the construction. Broken down by party affiliation, 54% of Democrats oppose the plans while 82% of Republicans disapprove. Meanwhile, 70% of independents said they are against the proposal.

Police have arrested an Israeli in connection with a series of stabbings that left five dead in three states

Police say Elias Abuelazam has ties to the towns of Flint, Michigan and Leesburg, Virginia, where nearly 20 attacks have taken place. He was stopped at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport as he tried to board a flight to Israel. Abuelazam is an Israeli citizen and permanent US resident. Virginia police said they had been notified that the suspect was attempting to leave the country by plane. They co-ordinated with Atlanta police to have him stopped at the airport. Atlanta police said they had paged Abuelazam at the airport as he waited to board a Delta Air Lines flight to Tel Aviv. Passengers later said Abuelazam appeared tense and was stopped at the boarding gate, before being led away by six officers. Virginia police said they were confident they could place Abuelazam in their area at the time of the attacks there. They said his fingerprints matched prints from the assaults in both Virginia and Michigan. A judge in Flint had signed a warrant charging Abuelazam with assault with intent to commit murder in connection with a stabbing on 27 July, 2010. The victim of that attack, Antwoine Marshall, identified the attacker from a picture shown to him by the FBI. Police say the chain of attacks began on 24 May, 2010. Their investigations were focused on Flint, where 16 attacks took place, until police in Leesburg reported three attacks. Police in Toledo, Ohio, then reported a stabbing that appeared to be connected to the others. Investigators say the attacks follow a similar pattern - the attacker approaches mainly black men at night in urban areas, asks for directions or help with a broken-down car, and then stabs the victims with a knife. The stabbings have occurred on average about once every four days since the end of May 2010. Because the victims have mostly been African-American, police suspect the attacks may have been racially motivated.

Companies using criminal records or bad credit reports to screen out job applicants are accused of racism

Companies using criminal records or bad credit reports to screen out job applicants might run afoul of anti-discrimination laws as the government steps up scrutiny of hiring policies that can hurt blacks and Hispanics. A blanket refusal to hire workers based on criminal records or credit problems can be illegal if it has a disparate impact on racial minorities, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Blacks and Latinos have arrest and conviction rates far greater than those of whites. Justice Department statistics show that 38% of the U.S. prison population is black, compared with about 12% of the general population. In 2008, African-Americans were about six times more likely to be incarcerated than whites. The incarceration rate for Latinos was 2.3 times higher than whites.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

One of about every 12 babies born in the United States in 2008 was the offspring of illegal immigrants

An estimated 340,000 of the 4.3 million babies born in the United States that year had parents who were in the country illegally. More than three-fourths of all illegal immigrants in the United States in March 2009 were Latinos and nearly one out of every four children under the age of 18 in the nation is Hispanic. Overall, Latinos who live in the United States have higher rates of fertility than do whites, blacks or Asians and among Hispanics, the foreign born have higher rates of fertility than the native born. The government estimates that there are more than 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States.

A new superbug that is resistant to even the most powerful antibiotics has entered British hospitals

Experts say bacteria that make an enzyme called NDM-1 have traveled back with NHS patients who went abroad to countries like India and Pakistan for treatments such as cosmetic surgery. Tight surveillance and new drugs are needed says Lancet Infectious Diseases. NDM-1 can exist inside different bacteria, like E.coli, and it makes them resistant to one of the most powerful groups of antibiotics - carbapenems. These are generally reserved for use in emergencies and to combat hard-to-treat infections caused by other multi-resistant bacteria. And experts fear NDM-1 could now jump to other strains of bacteria that are already resistant to many other antibiotics. Ultimately, this could produce dangerous infections that would spread rapidly from person to person and be almost impossible to treat. At least one of the NDM-1 infections that researchers have analyzed was resistant to all known antibiotics. Similar infections have been seen in the United States, Canada, Australia and the Netherlands and international researchers say that NDM-1 could become a major global health problem.

Related:

Scientists find new superbug spreading from India

The Women's Commission in the Indian state of West Bengal has announced an inquiry into allegations that a tribal woman was forced to parade naked

Officials say she was forced to walk without her clothes for nearly 6 miles through three villages and was filmed on a mobile phone. They say that she was also molested and jeered by a large crowd. Locals say she was being punished because of an illicit love affair with a man from a different community. A similar thing happened to another woman a few years ago in the neighboring state of Assam. Critics say that it was only after mobile phone clips of the woman went into wide circulation that the police swung into action. Six of the men who allegedly molested her have been arrested. What has especially upset many is the involvement of locally powerful people - alongside schoolboys - in the incident. The village council chief, Mangal Baske, said he did not report the incident to police because of pressure from the villagers.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Joseph Smith and Niall of the Nine Hostages

Mormon prophet Joseph Smith may have been descended from Niall of the Nine Hostages, an Irish chieftain of the fifth century, according to Ugo Perego, a senior DNA researcher at Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation. Recent DNA tests show that an Irish connection is likely for the founder of Mormonism and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The Short Tandem Repeat (STR) profile is a key element in DNA matching a person's Y chromosome. The closer two people's STR values align the more likely they are connected. "We know exactly what the Joseph Smith and Smith family Y chromosome STR profile looks like," Perego said. "As accurate as if I had Joseph Smith next to me and I would get a swab from him. It's not guesswork." The 24 values of the Smith family STR profile matched best with the STR profile of Niall of the Nine Hostages a major figure in Irish genealogy who had fourteen sons. Perego compared 43 STR values between Joseph Smith and Niall of the Nine Hostages and the Irish connection directly matched. "So why is Joseph Smith more Irish?" Perego said. "We have more STR data available for Joseph Smith. We have more STR data available for Niall of the Nine Hostages. And the number of STR values matching has also increased. . . . A stronger connection. A more sure family relation." Y chromosome research follows the line back from son to father to grandfather and so on. It doesn't tell the whole DNA story. It is just one branch of the family tree — but Y chromosome analysis does follow the surname, usually making it easy to match up with genealogical records. Michael Kennedy is a direct descendant and president of the Joseph Smith Jr. Family Organization, said the Irish family connection is just beginning to be known among family members and that it has caused considerable excitement.

The malaria parasite has been responsible for half of all human deaths since the Stone Age

One in 14 modern humans carry genes that first arose to help protect people from its ravages. Today, it sickens 300 million people every year, and kills nearly 1 million, despite the fact that doctors and scientists have known how to cure it (with parasite-killing drugs) and prevent it (by avoiding mosquito bites) for over a century.

Monday, August 9, 2010

Women with cystic fibrosis are affected more by the disease than men and have a lower life expectancy

Cystic fibrosis is a life-threatening disease which primarily affects the lungs and the digestive system. A build-up of mucus can make it difficult to clear bacteria and leads to lung infections and inflammation. Estrogen prevents the release of a chemical signal (IL-8) that triggers the influx of white blood cells into the lungs to fight the infection when cells are attacked by bacteria. In the lungs, a protective layer of fluid known as the airway surface liquid (ASL) keeps the lung’s lining hydrated and defends them from infection. In CF sufferers, this layer is thinner and is reduced even further at times of elevated levels of estrogen during the menstrual cycle, increasing the likelihood of acquiring an infection. Women with cystic fibrosis have on average a life expectancy three to five years less than men. Stabilizing estrogen levels or pursuing more aggressive preventative strategies against infection during the week of the four-week menstrual cycle when estrogen levels are at their highest could radically improve treatment for female CF sufferers.

Race and g-loading

Half Sigma explains why the the black-white performance gap is primarily caused by genetic differences and not by environment.

Related:

Weight is genetic

Race, puberty and young girls

Almost 25% of African American girls reach a stage of breast development marking the onset of puberty by age 7, as do almost 15% of Latinas and more than 10% of white girls. By age 8, 27% of girls have begun puberty: 18.3% of whites, 42.9% of blacks and 30.9% of Latinas.

Sunday, August 8, 2010

There are maternity units in Britain in which only 1 in 10 mothers is of white British origin

Just one in ten babies is born to a white British mother in some parts of Britain. The statistics - based on NHS monitoring of the ethnicity and nationality of patients - show a sharp contrast in the backgrounds of new mothers in urban and rural areas. Across all of England's 150 NHS Trusts there were 652,638 deliveries in 2009, around six out of ten of them to women who called themselves white British. Across England 62% of all births in 2009 involved a white British mother. The largest other single ethnic groups were 'other white' - including Eastern Europeans - which made up 7% of births, black (5%), Pakistani (4%) and Indian (3%). Of the rest of the mothers 8% described their ethnicity as 'other' (including mixed-race women) and the remainder were listed as 'not known'. Backbench Tory MP Douglas Carswell said: 'I think we have to face reality and that is if you continue to have mass immigration it's going to have a very significant impact on the demography of our country - and it's going to have a significant impact perhaps on the sort of country that we are.' Recently it emerged that Britain's population growth is outpacing every other country in Europe. Immigration and rising birth rates driven in part by the children of new arrivals - the so-called 'immigrant baby boom' - meant Britain gained more people than anywhere else in Europe. Ministers have proposed forcing non-EU migrants to buy their own private health care for non-emergency treatment on the NHS. David Cameron has pledged to reduce the level of net migration - the number of people arriving minus the number leaving - from the hundreds to the tens of thousands. The Prime Minister has proposed putting a limit on the number of immigrants from outside the EU given work permits for Britain.

A bridegroom in Turkey has accidentally killed three relatives while firing an AK-47 in celebration at his own wedding

The Turkish groom lost control of the weapon as he tried to fire in traditional celebration in the air at the ceremony in the village of Akcagoze in south-eastern Gaziantep province. The guests were sprayed with bullets and the groom's father and two aunts were killed. The groom has been arrested. The Anatolia news agency reports that eight other people were injured in the firing. The three who died succumbed to their wounds in hospital. Firing into the air is commonplace as a celebration in parts of Turkey and has on many occasions led to deaths and injuries. Turkey has tried to impose harsher penalties but has not ended the practice.

An Iranian lawyer who defended a woman facing death by stoning in Iran said that he had fled to Norway to seek protection

The lawyer, Mohammad Mostafaei, 37, an outspoken critic of the Iranian judicial system, disappeared from Tehran on July 24, 2010 after questioning by the Iranian authorities, who then issued an arrest warrant for him. His wife and brother-in-law were arrested, but Mr. Mostafaei, speaking through an interpreter, told reporters that his wife had been freed and that he expected her and their daughter, 7, to join him in Norway eventually. He said that after escaping from Iran, he had made his way by car, horseback and foot to Turkey, where the Norwegian Embassy helped him travel to Oslo on a visitor’s visa.

Only about 6% of marriages are interracial

About 80% of whites live in neighborhoods in which more than 95% of their neighbors are white, and data show most Americans have few close friends of another race.

Hundreds of Mexican federal police officers from two opposing groups clashed in Ciudad Juarez over allegations of corruption within their ranks

A three-day protest turned into a riot between two opposing groups of the federal police department. The confrontation was triggered by corruption allegations against federal police Cmdr. Salomon Alarcon Romero. Alarcon's critics say the commander has participated in kidnappings, killings and extortion in Juarez, which borders El Paso, Texas. The protest started after the arrest of an officer who critics say was falsely accused for drug crimes. Local media said about 200 heavily armed officers - some wearing ski masks - demonstrated in front of the La Playa hotel, which houses some federal police offices. The group denounced Alarcon and other commanders as corrupt, while calling for a full investigation by the Mexican military into Alarcon's alleged ties with drug traffickers. More than 100 supporters of Alarcon pushed back against the accusers, defending their commanders and deflecting misconduct allegations. Several police officers suffered injuries during the protest. Alarcon fled in an armored car.

A couple from Birmingham, England have been murdered in Pakistan

The man has been named locally as Gul Wazir, a taxi driver from Alum Rock in east Birmingham. Lajbar Khan, of the Birmingham Pashtun Association, said the pair had been shot. He said they had been in Pakistan to settle an arranged marriage dispute. It is understood the couple's son was also hurt in the attack. It is understood that a dispute had arisen over the arranged marriage of Mr and Mrs Wazir's daughter to a man in Pakistan. Mr Wazir and his family had traveled to a village in north Pakistan called Salehana, which is sometimes referred to as Little Birmingham because of its strong ties with the Pakistani community in the West Midlands. The couple's bodies have already been buried. Khalid Mahmood, MP for Perry Barr in Birmingham, said he was "shocked" and "disappointed". He said: "Honor killing is absolutely absurd in this day and age." Parents living in Britain should ensure their children understand the seriousness of rejecting a potential suitor from abroad, he added. "If the child refuses the marriage it's seen as an insult. I think people need to realize that if they want to continue their ties with their relatives in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, they need to be aware of the extent, when their children aren't overly enthusiastic, that the family overseas will feel they're being slighted."

Saturday, August 7, 2010

Black sex offender to stand trial in slaying of 14-year-old girl

In one of her final cell phone conversations, 14-year-old Lauren Deis told a friend she was going to a man's house to do some filing work for him, prosecutors said. The man was Tushon Brown, 35, a convicted sex offender who on was ordered to stand trial in Lauren's rape and stabbing death. Police said Brown lured Lauren to his home with the promise of money. After hearing testimony from a city homicide detective who recounted Brown's confession, District Judge Eugene Ricciardi held him for trial on charges of homicide, statutory sexual assault, tampering with evidence, abuse of a corpse and failing to comply with registration of sexual offenders.

Black guy gets hit by a truck while acting like a fool