Bonjour Planet Earth

Monday, July 17, 2017

Child ...sex trafficking in the US is exploding, govt admits they aren’t stopping it...

A recent report on the number of sexually exploited children in Florida gives insight into a horrific world that is often ignored by the media, and that rarely holds millionaires, politicians and even local officials accountable for their involvement.

A report from the Florida legislature’s Office of Program Policy Analysis & Government Accountability concluded that the state’s Department of Children and Family (DCF) and its lead agencies “have not resolved issues related to serving commercially sexually exploited children.”

The report found that in 2016, 356 verified commercially sexually exploited child victims were identified, as opposed to 264 identified in 2015. It noted that many of the victims who were identified earlier were, “both children in child welfare dependency and those living in the community with family—have since been re-victimized, involved with the criminal justice system, or only attended school intermittently.” Full story...

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Yemen: The war that isn’t happening even as it’s happening...

The manipulation of news and the distortion of reality are the most powerful weapons in the hands of power. They can make a whole reality disappear.

Yemen’s, for example.

A child dies in Yemen every ten minutes from preventable causes, UNICEF reported in June. These deaths are only part of a humanitarian catastrophe, among the worst in the world, including a rampaging cholera epidemic, to which the witness of the overwhelming majority of the West’s warmongering Goebbelist media pretends to be deaf, mute, and blind.

Nevertheless, information is accessible. There are sporadic exceptions to the conspiracy of silence in officialdom and the media. The week of July 10, The Independent published in the “Voices” section the appeal of Wael Ibrahim, an aid worker in Yemen:

“It is going to take years to restore any infrastructure like health services, and rewire the city [Sana’a] for electricity. We need more people to talk about Yemen.”

Saudi Arabia, backed by the US and Britain, began bombing Yemen, the poorest country in the region, on 23 March 2015—without a Security Council resolution, as has been the tradition for launching western wars since Bill Clinton’s 1999 Kosovo War (the bombing of Serbia). Full story...

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'Shot for no reason': Aussie woman killed by US cops after call for help...

Friends and family are demanding answers as to why US police shot dead a 40-year-old Australian woman.

The victim has been identified as Justine Damond, also known as Justin Ruszczyk, who was living in Minneapolis with her fiancé.

A devastated community are now trying to figure out how she was shot down after calling police to report an alley way assault.

Her 22-year-old step-son whose father was engaged to be married to the the Australian in August, said she was shot “for no reason”.

“Basically my mom’s dead because a police officer shot her for reasons I don’t know,” he told the Star Tribune. Full story...

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Little River Band - Reminiscing (1978)

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Delhi saw 277% rise in reported rape cases in 5 years...

The number of rapes reported each year in Delhi has more than tripled over the last five years, registering an increase of 277 percent from 572 in 2011 to 2,155 in 2016, according to data released recently by the Delhi Police.

The year after the Delhi gangrape incident—in which a 23-year-old paramedical student was raped by a group of men in a moving bus in Delhi on 16 December, 2012—saw a 132 percent spike in the number of cases reported, with a sustained 32 percent increase thereafter, from 1,636 cases in 2013 to 2,155 in 2016.

Cases pertaining to “assault on a woman with intent to outrage her modesty” (under Section 354 of the Indian Penal Code) have increased by 473 percent from 727 in 2012 to 4,165 in 2016.

Government initiatives to ensure the safety of women–such as this National Vehicle Security and Tracking System and setting up of women’s helplines—have failed to effect a measurable drop in the number of reports of rape and other sex-related crimes. Full story...

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When rape becomes a weapon against tribal women...

What’s really behind India’s rape crisis?

India is in denial about its rape culture - but then so are we...

India: Courts fail thousands of rape victims...

Some rapes are more newsworthy than others in India...

Sunday, July 16, 2017

Belloc’s prophecy...

Back in the 1930s, when white men were preparing for another round of mutual slaughter, few of them paid any attention to the Muslim world. They assumed it to be a backward region that history had long since passed by.

One man saw it differently. The great Catholic polemicist Hilaire Belloc, an Englishman of French ancestry, remembered Islam’s past and predicted, in his book The Great Heresies, that it would one day challenge the West again. As late as 1683 its armies had threatened to conquer Europe, penetrating all the way to Vienna; Belloc believed that a great Islamic revival, even in the twentieth century, was altogether possible.

Belloc saw Islam not as an alien religion, but in its origins as a Christian heresy, adopting and adapting certain Christian doctrines (monotheism, the immortality of the soul, final judgment) and rejecting others (original sin, the Incarnation and divinity of Christ, the sacraments). Its simple, rational creed had a powerful appeal to Arabs who had known only the arbitrary gods of grim pagan religions. It swept the Arab world, then made converts — and conquests — far beyond Arabia. Full story...

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Dear Hollywood: stop portraying Muslims as terrorists...

Press publishing 'consistent stream' of inaccurate stories about...

Muslim migrants embrace Christianity in Switzerland & Germany...

Number of Muslim migrants in Austria converting to Christianity on the rise...

At a Berlin church, Muslim refugees converting in droves..

Pakistan’s secret atheists...

Being an atheist in Pakistan can be life-threatening. But behind closed doors, non-believers are getting together to support one another. How do they survive in a nation where blasphemy carries a death sentence?

Omar, named after one of Islam's most revered caliphs, has rejected the faith of his forefathers. He is one of the founding members of an online group - a meeting point for the atheists of Pakistan.

But even there he must stay on his guard. Members use fake identities.

"You have to be careful who you are befriending," he says.

One man contacted Omar to say he had visited his Facebook profile and printed out pictures of him with his family. "You cannot be safe," Omar says. Full story...

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The rise of atheism in Pakistan...

Pakistani atheists and agnostics launch progressive Internet portal...

Pakistani girls flee Islam and seek asylum in Sri Lanka...

Meet the Hyderabad couple fighting for the right to reject religion...

American atheist blogger hacked to death in Bangladesh...

Murders of internet bloggers accused of being atheists by Islamist groups...

Swiss supermarket to start selling 'legal cannabis' cigarettes...

An independent Swiss cigarette maker has this month launched what it calls the first hemp cigarette in the world – and from July 24th they will be on sale in major Swiss supermarket Coop.

Heimat, based in the canton of St Gallen, has been producing tobacco cigarettes since last year. But now it has turned its hand to making cigarettes using legal cannabis.

In 2011 Switzerland legalized cannabis containing up to one percent tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) – higher than the 0.2 percent legal limit in many other European countries.

The low level of THC means this legal Swiss cannabis won’t make you high, but it does still contain cannabidiol (CBD), thought to have certain health benefits making it useful for treating pain, inflammation and panic attacks. Full story...

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Pot smoking to become Swiss ticketing offence...

At 11 years old, they're getting pregnant': the women smashing Catholic taboos in the Philippines...

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Boycott nations demand FIFA strips Qatar of 2022 World Cup...

The six Arab countries who last month cut ties with Qatar are reported to have written to world soccer's governing body FIFA to demand it be stripped of hosting the 2022 World Cup because they consider the Gulf state to be a "base of terrorism".

The Swiss website The Local reported that Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Mauritania, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt had collectively written to FIFA asking it to remove Qatar as hosts under Article 85 of the FIFA Code, which allows for such action in the case of emergency.

Reuters has not seen a copy of the letter and FIFA said that their president Gianni Infantino had not received any such document.

"The FIFA president has never received such a letter and subsequently has not done any comment on that," said a FIFA spokesman. Full story...

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FIFA charged with complicity in human rights violations Qatar...

Qatar 2022: 'Forced labour' at World Cup stadium...

Fifa scandal: World Cup chief asked for favours from Qatar...

Five years since awarding World Cup, human rights failures shame FIFA and Qatar...

Rapper ScHoolboy Q rants at United Airlines as dog misplaced...

US rapper ScHoolboy Q has unleashed a tirade at United Airlines after he went to retrieve his dog from a flight and found it was the wrong one.

"You guys r idiots... HOW U PUT MY DOG ON THE WRONG FLIGHT???? I need answers", he tweeted.

ScHoolboy Q was travelling with his French bulldog puppy, Yeerndamean, from Missouri to Burbank, California.

But the dog was switched during a stopover in Denver and flown to Chicago instead.

ScHoolboy Q, 30, whose non-stage name is Quincy Matthew Hanley, found out about the mishap on Friday. Full story...

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Saturday, July 15, 2017

Challenges of a blonde Swiss ‘momtrepreneur’ in India...

.Granted, I live in cosmopolitan Bangalore, which is not representative of India. But at the same time, I challenge anyone to find any place in India that can accurately represent it. India is a country as big as the entire European continent. Its population of 1.3 billion is divided into 29 states, each with its own local language, landscape, cuisine and culture.

I don’t feel knowledgeable enough to speak for the rest of the country, but I can definitely alleviate some fears and misconceptions about Bangalore, at the very least.

I grew up a country girl in a village near Lausanne, a city along Lake Geneva. My love for mathematics and computer graphics led me to study and then work at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL). Soon, the person who became my partner in just about everything inspired me to start our own company, Minsh, in 2008.

After a few unsuccessful projects, which led to an utter lack of funding, we both chose to move to India to leverage the “eastern Silicon Valley” at a much more affordable cost. I like to call it our 30-year-old life crisis: we had never been in India before, but needed a radical change. Little did we know how radically it would change our lives forever. Full story...

Cambodia bans sale of sand to Singapore...

Cambodian Mines and Energy minister Suy Sem announced the ban on July 10 to replace a temporary one issued previous year after a group of watchdog organizations demanded a reexamination of the environmental and social impact assessments of dredging in the province, ministry spokesperson Meng Saktheara told RFA's Khmer Service on Tuesday.

The ministry said most of Cambodia's sand had gone toward the expansion of the island city-state of Singapore, and it would now have to look for other sources.

"There has been such a ban in recent years, but they (companies) still operated and exported", said Meng Heng, from the environmental group Mother Nature.Singapore's Ministry of National Development (MND) said in January the Republic stopped importing sand from Cambodia after the ban took effect in November past year.

The ban, however, excludes the export of silica, a type of sand used in making glass, he reported."If we continue to allow large-scale sand dredging (in Koh Kong) for exports, it would hugely affect the natural environment and local communities", he told AFP. Full story...

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‘Pope’s Hospital’ officials used $481,000 charity cash to renovate cardinal’s home...

The Vatican has charged two former officials of a children's hospital with using $481,000 of fundraising cash to renovate a cardinal's apartment. One of the men has admitted to the act, but says it was done as an investment for the hospital's foundation.

The case centers on the former president of the Vatican-owned Bambino Gesù Hospital, Giuseppe Profiti, and former treasurer Massimo Spina.

The two men are accused of using €422,000 (US$481,000) from the hospital's fundraising foundation to pay for renovations of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone's apartment when he retired as the Vatican's secretary of state in 2013.

The crime reportedly took place between November 2013 and May 28, 2014, according to the Catholic News Agency. The payment is said to have been given to the construction firm of Italian businessman Gianantonio Bandera, which was conducting the renovations. Full story...

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Congo, My Precious. The Curse of the coltan mines in Congo...

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Poll reveals 85% of Americans oblivious to hunger in Africa and Middle East...

Less than a fifth of Americans are aware that extreme hunger threatens the lives of 20 million people in Africa and the Middle East, yet the overwhelming majority regard it as the most pressing global issue once they have been told, a poll of US voters has revealed.

Research by the International Rescue Committee showed that millennials, loosely defined as young adults born between 1981 and 1997, are the generation most concerned about solving the hunger crisis in Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan and Nigeria.

Yet overall public awareness of the situation is low, with only 15% of Americans apprised of the facts even though 73% said, once informed, that it was a major global concern.

“More than any other group of Americans, millennials recognised the severity of the hunger crisis and are ready to take on the responsibility of a global community,” said former British foreign secretary David Miliband, president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, a global humanitarian relief agency. Full story...

At least 200 people were murdered last year for protecting the land, water, and wildlife...

At least 200 people were murdered last year for protecting the land, water, and wildlife in their communities, including five park rangers in Africa’s Virunga National Park, which is home to some of the world’s last remaining mountain gorillas.

These rarely prosecuted murders are being documented in more countries than ever before—24 countries this year compared to 16 in 2015. Together with criminalizing and aggressively prosecuting protestors, the result is suppression of environmentalists, a new report by the nonprofit group Global Witness argues. Global Witness is a London and Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group that works on the intersection of natural resource extraction and human rights.

“We have strict criteria for documenting murders of land and water defenders but many other killings go unreported,” said Billy Kyte, campaign leader for Global Witness, co-author of the report, with Defenders of the Earth.

“Our report is just the tip of the iceberg for what’s really happening,” Kyte told National Geographic. There is little data about the fate of local people trying to protect their land and water in the Middle East, Asia, eastern Europe and Africa. Full story...

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A burning issue for Singapore: Indonesia readies for haze battle...

Coca-Cola produces over 100 billion plastic bottles that can't be recycled...

Smartphone batteries could be emitting over 100 toxic gases, study finds...

Indonesia is burning. So why is the world looking away?

Friday, July 14, 2017

Racist AirBnB host fined $5,000 for refusing Asian...

A racist AirBnB host who discriminated against an Asian guest has been fined $5,000 - and told she must attend a course on Asian-American studies.

Tami Barker cancelled Dyne Suh’s booking, telling her in a message: "One word says it all. Asian.”

The fine was imposed due to a new agreement between AirBnB and California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH).

It lets the DFEH examine hosts that have had discrimination complaints.

AirBnB is a service that allows normal members of the public to rent out spare rooms, or entire properties, to travellers. Full story...

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Why Airbnb is not worth it anymore...

'This is Singapore' is no excuse for racist behaviour...

Row as Air China warns of London's 'Indian, Pakistani and black'

Osaka train driver apologizes to Japanese passengers for ‘having many foreigners’ on board...

Saudi Arabia boosting extremism in Europe, says former ambassador...

Saudi Arabia has been funding mosques throughout Europe that have become hotbeds of extremism, the former British ambassador to Saudi Arabia Sir William Patey has said.

His remarks come a day after the government published a brief summary of a Home Office-commissioned report into the funding of extremism in the UK. The full report is not being published for security reasons.

Patey said he did not believe Saudi Arabia was directly funding terrorist groups, but rather an ideology that leads to extremism, and suggested that its leaders might not be aware of the consequences. “It is unhealthy and we need to do something about it,” he said.

“The Saudis [have] not quite appreciated the impact their funding of a certain brand of Islam is having in the countries in which they do it – it is not just Britain and Europe. Full story...

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Trump sells Qatar $12 billion of U.S. weapons days after accusing it...

Saudi Arabia’s Southeast Asia terror tour...

‘Saudi Arabia one of top repressive countries’

Tuesday, July 04, 2017

Honest government advert - Visit Puerto Rico...

Ending gender discrimination in professional sports...

(...)

Naturally, the pro-fem harpies began yipping like the spoiled Chihuahuas that they are. This was a horrible comment, they said—undeniably “sexist,” and also probably at the very least a little bit racist.

Never mind whether it was factual or not.

In 2015 at age 56, McEnroe told talk-show host Jimmy Kimmel that he could possibly still beat Williams, who was then 33, in a tennis match but added that she’d cream him in a boxing ring. He also said that around the year 2000, Donald Trump offered him money to play Williams in a “Battle of the Sexes,” but he balked because it wasn’t enough money.

Four years ago, Williams told David Letterman that she wouldn’t play an exhibition match against male champion Andy Murray because he’s a boy and she’s a girl:

Please share this article by using the link below. When you cut and paste an article, Taki's Magazine misses out on traffic, and our writers don't get paid for their work. Full story...

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Being Laxmi: 'I belong to the hijra, the oldest transgender community'

Sport & gender: A history of bad science & 'biological racism'

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Is Storm a girl or a boy? Toronto parents and their "genderless" baby...

Decades of abuse and slavery took place at child care homes in Jersey, an independent inquiry has revealed...

Decades of slavery, bullying and abuse have been revealed in a report into the care system in Jersey.

Victims reported hundreds of alleged offences of physical, emotional or sexually abuse.

The police investigation began in 2006 but the apparent discovery in 2008 of part of a child's skull at a care home made headlines around the world.

It was later found to be coconut shell, but hundreds of victims had by then come forward. Full story...

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Monday, July 03, 2017

Why Trump's CNN 'assault' tweet should surprise no-one

On Saturday, Donald Trump tweeted that he's redefining the social media behaviour of a "modern-day" president. On Sunday he once again proved it.

Mr Trump's CNN-wrestling video, apparently cribbed from a user on the internet message board Reddit, may be unfamiliar commentary coming from the chief executive of the US, but it's classic Trump.

He has shown time and time again that he views politics as performance art; another reality television competition where the more drama and conflict there is, the better.

Candidate Trump belittled his Republican opponents - Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and company - then shrugged it off as part of the game. He turned Hillary Clinton, whom he had once praised and buddied around with at his wedding, into a "crooked" caricature who should be shipped off to prison.

He portrayed the media, and CNN in particular, as cartoon villains that he can rhetorically beat into submission. Full story...

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Jimmy Carter brilliantly explains how the establishment...

Ageless Taiwanese mother and daughters are wowing the internet...

Meet the Taiwanese family that may be the youngest looking family ever.

At first, interior designer and fashion blogger Lure Hsu (41) stunned millions of people because of her youthful looks but it wasn’t long until people realized she’s not the only one in the family looking half her age. Lure’s two sisters, Sharon (36) and Fayfay (40), both also look like they’re students. Not to mention their mother… Their mother, who is a retired dancer, could easily be mistaken as their sister, but turns out she’s 63. All these four women look so young, they’re being called ‘the family of frozen ages’ by Taiwanese media.

Their secret? In an interview with Taiwan’s Friday magazine, Lure revealed that the key to youthful looks is to drink water and eat vegetables. She also pointed out the importance of moisturizing your skin, as “once your skin has enough water, you don’t even need to worry about aging and wrinkles.” Similarly to Lure, sister Fayfay also recommended drinking lots of water, including a big glass of lukewarm water every morning. “I have been doing that for more than a decade,” Fayfay said. “I drink 350ml to 500ml.” So there you have it! According to these Taiwanese women, the secret to youthful looks is simpler than you could ever imagine – water! More + photos...

Singapore National Library Board manager gets jail, fine, for accessing members' data to help loan shark...

A project manager with the National Library Board (NLB) was jailed for three years and eight months, and fined $270,000 on Monday (July 3) after making use of a library database to help an illegal moneylender gather information on debtors.

Ang Boon Sin, now 39, repeatedly abused the NLB Spydus database which contains all members' information such as their names, NRIC numbers, addresses and phone numbers.

He would perform these searches after work in his home between 8pm and 10pm, gather the data and hand them over to a loan shark known only as Johnson.

The court heard that he accessed Spydus without authorisation to obtain information on at least 180 NLB members. Full story...

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The Clintons and the smear...

If you ask people to identify a coming of age for the modern-day smear, it’s amazing how many political insiders—both Democrats and Republicans—consider it to be the Clinton era. It’s impossible for any outsiders to know exactly how the Clintons became adept at engineering smears to deflect from their controversies

One of the earliest smear campaigns perpetrated by the Clintons began even before Bill announced he was running for president, when Hillary was busy devising a preemptive strike against women rumored to be involved with her husband. According to journalist Carl Bernstein in his biography A Woman in Charge, Hillary reportedly sought to get sworn statements from women Bill was rumored to have slept with. It was said that she wanted to convince the women to swear they had no relationship with him. She was correct to anticipate trouble.

In 1992, Bill was steeped in his election campaign when salacious claims began to surface from more than a half dozen women who said they’d been victims of his sleazy advances or improper sexual behavior, or that they’d carried on illicit affairs with him. Myra Belle “Sally” Miller, Miss Arkansas 1958, claimed she had an affair with Clinton in 1983 and was later threatened by a Democratic official not to go public. Full story...

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Hillary’s clientele...

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Hillary Clinton: A career criminal...

Hillary Clinton’s lucrative life of crime...

Monica Lewinsky: I was made a scapegoat to protect Clinton...

The tragedy of Marawi for a chastened Duterte...

The destruction of the Islamic city of Marawi has tragically confounded the aspirations of President Rodrigo Duterte, the small-town mayor who became the Philippine President and has discovered that his ambitions outweighed his capabilities.

Based on his experience as the mayor of Davao City, where he had a friendly relationship with the region’s Muslims, Duterte promised during his presidential campaign to deliver an elusive peace in the southern Philippines in his term.

The fighting that raged throughout Ramadan to flush out terrorists pledging allegiance to the Islamic State has reached catastrophic proportions not seen in the recent cycle of violence on Mindanao island. The Islamists at the very epicenter of his polity say they want to establish a caliphate, with jihadis crossing onto Mindanao’s unguarded beaches from Yemen, Malaysia, Indonesia and other countries.

The president too has not been seen in public – raising serious questions over the 72-year-old’s health –for the most part of the crisis that has claimed more than 400 lives, displacing tens and thousands of Muslims, while the military battled in what was once a heritage city that has gone to ruins, the fighting now tapering off in its sixth week. Full story...

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Rodrigo Duterte: ‘Give me salt and vinegar and I’ll eat terrorists’ livers’

Duterte says 'goodbye' to US ties in Beijing...

Philippine leader tells Obama 'go to hell'

Paris to crack down on Airbnb rentals by creating obligatory registry...

Paris authorities are aiming to introduce a new law that will force those who rent apartments on Airbnb to register the property with the City Hall first.
From December authorities in Paris plan to force people renting out their apartments on short-term apartment rental websites like Airbnb to first to register the property at the City Hall.

The new rule which looks set to be voted through unanimously by the Paris City Council this week, aims to target landlords flouting France's 120-day legal limit set for renting out primary residences.

"The landlords will be able to register from October 1st, and from December 1st, the step will be obligatory," explained Ian Brossat, the deputy in charge of housing at Paris City Hall.

It could also put an end to tenants putting their apartments on Airbnb without the permission of the owners. Full story...

Read also: Prostitutes are hiring flats on AirBnB and turning them into pop-up BROTHELS

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Full biriyani...

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Meet 'GST': Mother names child after India's biggest tax reform...

Jaipur: A baby born on midnight of June 30-July 01 in Rajasthan has been named 'GST'.

His mother decided to name him 'GST' as he was born at 12.02 am in Beawa.

(...)

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) - India's biggest tax reform since independence - came into force after 17 tumultuous years of debate at the stroke of midnight on June 30.

The new tax regime was ushered in at a late night event in the historic Central Hall of Parliament.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi termed the new levy as "good and simple tax" that marks economic integration of India. Full story...

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How Asian match-fixers are infiltrating European football...

On April 29, at 10:01 p.m., soccer fans Simon Miller and Paul Langley lost their faith in the sport.

The Irish men were sitting in City Calling Stadium in Longford, Ireland, and their team, Athlone Town FC, was behind 1:2. In the 80th minute of play, a Facebook message alert popped up on their mobile phones. A man who had been monitoring football bets for years wrote to them that the odds had just shifted dramatically and it seemed likely that another goal would soon be scored.

They both sat motionless as they watched the drama unfold on the pitch. Athlone's Portuguese coach, Ricardo Cravo, shifted Romanian midfielder Dragos Sfrijan to the defense, they say, and Latvian goalkeeper Igors Labuts suddenly began pressing forward on every corner kick, a potentially suicidal move that keepers generally only reserve for their team's final attacks of the match. But the show reached its climax in injury time: When a long ball flew into Athlone's half, Sfrijan clumsily jabbed at it, missing entirely, they say. And keeper Labuts, they continue, completely whiffed on the rather easy save.

"It looks like somebody made some money today," a fan wrote on the internet. Hong Kong's Asia Times newspaper would later write that winnings from the bets on the Athlone game had exceeded $600,000. Full story...

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Singaporean jailed for fixing football match...

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Nigerian players banned for life in 79-0 and 67-0 match-fixing scandal...

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Top European football matches 'fixed' (Video)

Google wants to kill your phone...

Google is working hard to make phones obsolete.

The company wouldn't admit this. And they don't want me to say it. They still have to make nice with mobile phone carriers who support and sell Android phones.

In getting rid of the phone as we know it, Google is both on the right side of history and also on your company's side. The post-phone world is a world with higher-quality voice communication, better security and telephony services that work better than today's communication apps.

Everybody's talking about the 10th anniversary of the iPhone, which first shipped on June 29, 2007. That's as good a place as any to dissect the smartphone and what it really is.

When the late Apple CEO and founder, Steve Jobs, introduced the iPhone on stage, he said it was really three revolutionary products: iPod, mobile phone and internet communications device. Full story...

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Burma says it will not let outside world investigate Rohingya 'genocide' claims...

Burma will refuse entry to members of the UN trying to investigate the alleged killing, violence and abuse against the Rohingya people, an official said.

The government of Aung San Suu Kyi has already said it would refuse to cooperate with a UN mission following a resolution adopted by the Human Rights Council in March.

Kyaw Zeya, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said: "If they are going to send someone with regards to the fact-finding mission, then there's no reason for us to let them come."

Mr Zeya added that visas to enter Burma would not be issued to any staff working on the mission. Full story...

Indian state of Madhya Pradesh has planted nearly 66 million trees in 12 hours

More than 67 million trees were planted by millions of people in a span of 12 hours in Indian State of Madhya Pradesh , setting a new Guinness reforestation record.

The event took place on Sunday in Central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. More than 1.5 million people from all walks of life, ranging from students and housewives to government officials, planted a total of 6,67,50,000 tree saplings in just 12 hours. A total of 24 districts of Narmada river basin were identified for the plantation. The saplings included two-dozen varieties of plants sourced from different nurseries around the state.

The record of planting maximum saplings was earlier held by Uttar Pradesh, another Indian state, which planted nearly 50 million trees in a span of 24 hours in July 2016.

The state chief minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan said: Full story...

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A village that plants 111 trees for every girl born in Rajasthan...

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India's cleanest and greenest village, with a toilet in every house...

Sunday, July 02, 2017

Totally failed at life?

Woman busted at German airport with cocaine implants in her breasts...

Customs agents in Germany randomly chose a young woman from among an airport crowd for a closer inspection. Then she started complaining about a pain in her breasts ...

The busty traveller from Colombia was being subjected to a random check at the Frankfurt airport.

But, as agents took the 24-year-old woman aside, she began to grimace. Then she double-over in pain, clutching her breasts.

Curious customs agents were surprised when they saw she had swollen fresh scars from a very recent operation. The sutures had been very poorly applied.

They became suspicious. Full story...

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Shoplifter with a nasty secret hideaway...

My wife and I are swingers: here's what it's actually like...

(...)

We were first were introduced to the lifestyle by two married friends, whom we'd found out from common friends' gossip had an open relationship. This couple was attracted to us, and they gradually revealed their interest via heavy flirting and questionably sexual contact whenever we'd hang out. Well, I should clarify: The flirting and contact came from only the husband. The wife was pretty ambivalent about me (probably because I'm just too awesome), and the husband was always a little more aggressive than my wife was ever comfortable with.

Eventually, we realized they were into swinging because he really just wanted to fuck other women, and in an effort to preserve the marriage, she went along with it. That marriage lasted only a few years before she finally got fed up and divorced him. Yeah, I know, imagine that. She's in a new relationship now. They are not swingers, and she's way happier than she ever was with her ex-husband. And that's kind of the point here.

Due to this rocky introduction, we were initially hesitant to get into the scene. But the aforementioned couple did turn us on to websites like Kasidie and Lifestyle Lounge, where you can keep up with the scene and meet other couples (kind of like OKCupid, but for swingers). Through these sites, we found information on local mixers -- discreet get-togethers at bars, where swingers can meet each other and newbies can get their toes wet (stop giggling) in a chill setting. Full story...

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London terror suspect linked to British Intelligence...

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Colombian airline wants to make passengers stand...

This airline is considering a novel way of making flying even cheaper — by removing seats and making passengers stand up during their flight.

It’s not the first time an airline has floated the idea, but low-budget carrier VivaColombia says it was very interested in the radical idea, which could help drive down the cost of airfares and make them more accessible to more people.

“There are people out there right now researching whether you can fly standing up,” VivaColombia’s founder and chief executive William Shaw told the Miami Herald.

“We’re very interested in anything that makes travel less expensive.”

Airbus first started discussing the possibility of standing room flights back in 2003 when it came up with the concept of a vertical seat that would allow passengers to stand while being braced. Full story...

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Saturday, July 01, 2017

The real Indian currency crisis: things you don't hear in the news...

Jayant Bhandari writes: On November 8, 2016, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi dropped a bombshell. In a televised address at 8:00 pm, he declared that after midnight—four hours later—banknotes with face values of INR500 (US$7.50) and INR1,000 (US$15) would no longer be legal tender.

These bills comprised 86% of the monetary value of currency in circulation, so to say that panic ensued would be an understatement. The market stayed open all night as people rushed to buy gold, Rolex watches, and anything else they could get their hands on to use up their cash.

During the next two weeks, gold traded for as much as US$3,000 per ounce, a premium of almost 100% to the international price. Foreign currencies traded at similar premiums.

Soon, Indian tax authorities descended on the gold market, confiscating security camera recordings to identify any transaction that might have bypassed taxation. They were raiding people’s houses with abandon. Full story...

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Mystery of Bermuda Triangle deepens as 'dangerous' mile-long island suddenly forms in middle of Atlantic Ocean...

A mystery island that has been branded 'dangerous' has suddenly formed in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle.

The crescent-shaped mile-long island off the tip of Cape Point in Buxton, North Carolina, began rising from the sea in Spring.

Surrounding the waters of the so-called Devil's Triangle, the sandbank has been dubbed Shelly Island by locals because of the vast quantities of shells which litter the shore, Virginian Pilot reported .

The new island measures around one-mile long and more than 400 feet wide.

Visitor Janice Regan said she and her 11-year-old grandson christened the island and said it “was just a little bump in April”.

Janice and her grandson are not the only ones who have been exploring the surprise sandbar. Full story...

France’s Macron kicks off the ‘Mother of Reforms’

Bravo Monsieur le president Macron! You have gotten off to a most impressive start. France’s five-year national depression – known as ‘morosité – has lifted and been replaced by a sense that the republic is not doomed after all. In fact, quite the contrary.

France’s new 39-year old president has astounded nearly everyone. Like the silver-tongued Barack Obama, he appeared out of nowhere and captured the imagination of the nation. Like Obama, Macron is accused of being a cat’s paw for the deep state and/or powerful financial interests. Macron used to work for the influential Rothschild bank arranging deals.

Yet Macron, with limited political experience and few evident allies, chose the perfect moment to enter the lists of French politics. The French public was disgusted by its feckless, self-serving political parties of left and right. The economy was mired in stagnation. France’s former role as leader of Europe had become a distant memory.

In love and politics, timing is everything. Full story...

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NASA denies that it’s running a child slave colony on Mars...

A report on Alex Jones’ InfoWars claiming child sex slaves have been kidnapped and shipped to Mars is untrue, NASA told The Daily Beast on Thursday.

“There are no humans on Mars. There are active rovers on Mars. There was a rumor going around last week that there weren’t. There are,” Guy Webster, a spokesperson for Mars exploration at NASA, told The Daily Beast. “But there are no humans.”

On Thursday’s program, the InfoWars host welcomed guest Robert David Steele onto The Alex Jones Show, which airs on 118 radio stations nationwide, to talk about kidnapped children he said have been sent on a two-decade mission to space.

“We actually believe that there is a colony on Mars that is populated by children who were kidnapped and sent into space on a 20-year ride,” said Steele. “So that once they get to Mars they have no alternative but to be slaves on the Mars colony.” Full story...

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The girls, the paedophile and Cardinal Pell...

In 1973, a young Father George Pell, flushed with success from his recent studies in Rome and Oxford, returned to his home town of Ballarat and took up residence in the St Alipius presbytery; a place, it would be publicly revealed more than 20 years later, that was a paedophile’s paradise and a child’s nightmare.

His housemate that year was the tall, rowdy and popular parish priest, Father Gerald Ridsdale. What the parents and parishioners who worshipped God and obeyed the sanctity of the church and its messengers did not know was that from early in his priesthood, Ridsdale was subject to a psychiatric report. He was already a serial child abuser who sodomised children at will, picking them off when and where his desires dictated: in front of a church altar, at the presbytery, or on camping or fishing trips.

When he hurt them, he ignored their cries for him to stop. If they persisted in making a racket, he beat them. Badly.

In May 2015, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse began an investigation into how Catholic Church authorities dealt with paedophile clergy in Ballarat and the impact of abuse. It heard that the diocese was a hotbed of scandal, cover-ups and paedophilia, and that vulnerable children – particularly orphans – had been prey to abusive clergy. Full story...

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Amish farmer sold herbal health products. He’s going to prison for 6 years...

An Amish man was sentenced Friday to six years in prison for obstructing a federal agency and for making and selling herbal health products that were not adequately labeled as required by federal law.

Samuel A. Girod of Bath County, a member of the Old Order Amish faith, was convicted in March on 13 charges, including threatening a person in an attempt to stop him from providing information to a grand jury.

U.S. District Judge Danny Reeves repeatedly asked Girod in court if he wished to make a statement but Girod refused. Girod, who represented himself, does not acknowledge that the court has jurisdiction.

“I do not waive my immunity to this court,” Girod told the judge. “I do not consent.”

Girod has become a cause for some who see him as a victim of the federal government. More than 27,000 people have signed an online petition seeking to have him released from jail. About 75 supporters of Girod, including many Amish, gathered near the federal courthouse on Barr Street in downtown Lexington before and after the sentencing. Full story...

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