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Jury finds ‘psychic’ Rose Marks guilty on all 14 fraud charges, faces possible 20 years in prison

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Psychic, Rose Marks

Jury finds ‘psychic’ Rose Marks guilty on all 14 fraud charges, faces possible 20 years in prison

Average storefront palm-reader or psychic ringleader who bilked clients for millions? Fort Lauderdale psychic on trial photo
Rose Marks, a Fort Lauderdale woman who claims to be a psychic, waves to the media as she leaves the federal courthouse Tuesday Aug. 27, 2013 after the first day of her trial. (Lannis Waters/The Palm Beach Post)

marks photo
Family members hustle Rosie Marks, who was distraught after the conviction of her mother Rose Marks, into a car after the verdict Thursday afternoon, September 26, 2013.

Jury finds ‘psychic’ Rose Marks guilty on all 14 fraud charges, faces possible 20 years in prison photo
Family members hustle Rosie Marks, who was distraught after the fraud conviction of her mother Rose Marks, into a car after the verdict Thursday afternoon. (Lannis Waters/The Palm Beach Post)

By Jane Musgrave

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

WEST PALM BEACH —

Even before the jury’s first guilty verdict was read, stifled sobs filled the courtroom. As the clerk repeated “guilty” 14 times, the quiet sobbing crescendoed.

“Psychic” Rose Marks turned to members of her family and put a finger to her lips, telling them to hush.

But it didn’t help.

Seeing the 62-year-old matriarch convicted of 14 fraud-related charges and immediately slapped in handcuffs on Thursday was too much for family members who were part of and benefited from the multi-million-dollar fortune-telling business that collapsed under the weight of a federal investigation.

Some reached out, trying to touch her. One threw a Bible. One called out to the lead investigator, mocking him. When they realized their beloved mother, grandmother and sister was about to walk through an open door and be taken to jail, shouts rang out.

“Mom, I love you!” one called. “Don’t be afraid!” yelled another.

“I’m not afraid,” Marks responded, as U.S. Marshals surrounded her. “I love you, too.”

The emotional end to the monthlong trial was not as unexpected as the verdict. When the trial began, cynics scoffed at the notion that a psychic could be charged with separating a fool and his money.

But, prosecutors methodically built a case, showing how Marks, her daughters-in-law and even her granddaughter preyed on broken people who came to their storefronts in midtown Manhattan and Fort Lauderdale to deal with tragedies life had handed them. Instead of solace or guidance, they told clients the only way out was to give them money — lots of it — with the promise it would one day be returned.

Instead, the psychics amassed a roughly $25 million fortune.

“I’ll be the voice of the victims. Justice has been served,” said Charles Stack, who began what appeared to be a quixotic investigation in 2008 before he retired from the Fort Lauderdale Police Department.

People understood the agony of those who trusted epic Ponzi schemers Scott Rothstein and Bernie Madoff, Stack said.

In many ways, Marks’ victims were more sympathetic. Unlike those who fell prey to Rothstein or Madoff, the psychic’s clients weren’t looking for money. “In this case, the victims were praying for hope, and hope is the unwavering belief in the unseen,” Stack said.

Stack, who said he understood why Marks’ family lashed out at him, is a hero to the victims, including best-selling romance novelist Jude Deveraux. He befriended the writer, helping her get over the shock of learning that her nearly 20-year relationship with Marks was a sham and she was unlikely to ever recover the $20 million she had given the psychic “to cleanse.”

“I’m glad she’s going to be taken off the streets and out of the business and she won’t hurt anyone else,” said Deveraux, 66, who splits her time between New York City and Southwest Ranches near Fort Lauderdale.

Deanna Wolfe, who lost nearly $1 million during her three-decade relationship with Marks, expressed mixed feelings about the verdict. “I don’t know if she started out meaning to do this or if the greed and the money just took over,” said Wolfe, 72, who lives in Virginia. “It’s a sad thing for everyone involved, including her family.”

Deveraux, who sought Marks’ help to deal with an abusive husband and the death of an 8-year-old son in a 2005 ATV accident, expressed no such ambivalence. “It was never a friendship,” she said. “There’s no sadness. None.”

Unlike other victims, she said she doesn’t care if she gets back any of the money she lost. Wolfe, who ran up huge credit card debts and borrowed money from a wealthy friend, said she is hopeful some of the money will be returned.

Attorney Fred Schwartz, who defended Marks, said the government seized all of Marks’ assets — including cars, a boat, motorcycles, jewelry, gold coins and a home near the Intracoastal Waterway. During the trial, he portrayed the victims as satisfied customers who were improperly convinced they were victims by Stack. He said he plans to appeal based on improper investigative procedures by government agents who he said kept key evidence from him.

He tried to prepare Marks for the possibility that, if convicted, she would be taken immediately to jail. He said she expects to die behind bars. While the punishment for the convictions on 14 charges carry a maximum punishment of roughly 250 years, realistically she faces of 10 to 15 years, he said.

“Rose believes that even with a 4- or 5-year sentence, given the wear and tear on her body from working since she was 8 or 9 years old, she would die in jail,” Schwartz said. During the trial she used a cane to deal with knee problems and experienced chest pains when the verdict was announced.

Her daughter and son-in-law, her two sons and their wives, her sister and granddaughter also each pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit wire/mail fraud. They will be sentenced before Marks learns her fate on Dec. 9.

THE CHARGES

The 14 federal charges Rose Marks was convicted of on Thursday:

  • 1 count of conspiracy to commit mail/wire fraud
  • 1 count of conspiracy to commit money-laundering
  • 2 counts of mail fraud
  • 2 counts of money laundering
  • 6 counts of wire fraud
  • 2 counts of filing false income tax returns

 

Source: U.S. court documents.

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Over 360,000 Gun Deaths Since 9/11 | Should The Civilsed World Invade America to Stop The Carnage?!

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Gun Deaths, Gun Nation

Over 360,000 Gun Deaths Since 9/11 — From the Outside It Looks Like America Is a Country Gripped by Civil War

Should the outside world intervene?

Last week, Starbucks asked its American customers to please not bring their guns into the coffee shop. This is part of the company’s concern about customer safety and follows a ban in the summer on smoking within 25 feet of a coffee shop entrance and an earlier ruling about scalding hot coffee. After the celebrated Liebeck v McDonald’s case in 1994, involving a woman who suffered third-degree burns to her thighs, Starbucks complies with the Specialty Coffee Association of America‘s recommendation that drinks should be served at a maximum temperature of 82C.Although it was brave of Howard Schultz, the company’s chief executive, to go even this far in a country where people are better armed and only slightly less nervy than rebel fighters in Syria, we should note that dealing with the risks of scalding and secondary smoke came well before addressing the problem of people who go armed to buy a latte. There can be no weirder order of priorities on this planet.

That’s America, we say, as news of the latest massacre breaks – last week it was the slaughter of 12 people by Aaron Alexis at Washington DC’s navy yard – and move on. But what if we no longer thought of this as just a problem for America and, instead, viewed it as an international humanitarian crisis – a quasi civil war, if you like, that calls for outside intervention? As citizens of the world, perhaps we should demand an end to the unimaginable suffering of victims and their families – the maiming and killing of children – just as America does in every new civil conflict around the globe.

The annual toll from firearms in the US is running at 32,000 deaths and climbing, even though the general crime rate is on a downward path (it is 40% lower than in 1980). If this perennial slaughter doesn’t qualify for intercession by the UN and all relevant NGOs, it is hard to know what does.

To absorb the scale of the mayhem, it’s worth trying to guess the death toll of all the wars in American history since the War of Independence began in 1775, and follow that by estimating the number killed by firearms in the US since the day that Robert F. Kennedy was shot in 1968 by a .22 Iver-Johnson handgun, wielded by Sirhan Sirhan. The figures from Congressional Research Service, plus recent statistics fromicasualties.org, tell us that from the first casualties in the battle of Lexington to recent operations in Afghanistan, the toll is 1,171,177. By contrast, the number killed by firearms, including suicides, since 1968, according to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention and the FBI, is 1,384,171.

That 212,994 more Americans lost their lives from firearms in the last 45 years than in all wars involving the US is a staggering fact, particularly when you place it in the context of the safety-conscious, “secondary smoke” obsessions that characterise so much of American life.

Everywhere you look in America, people are trying to make life safer. On roads, for example, there has been a huge effort in the past 50 years to enforce speed limits, crack down on drink/drug driving and build safety features into highways, as well as vehicles. The result is a steadily improving record; by 2015, forecasters predict that for first time road deaths will be fewer than those caused by firearms (32,036 to 32,929).

Plainly, there’s no equivalent effort in the area of privately owned firearms. Indeed, most politicians do everything they can to make the country less safe. Recently, a Democrat senator from Arkansas namedMark Pryor ran a TV ad against the gun-control campaign funded by NY mayor Michael Bloomberg – one of the few politicians to stand up to the NRA lobby – explaining why he was against enhanced background checks on gun owners yet was committed to “finding real solutions to violence”.

About their own safety, Americans often have an unusual ability to hold two utterly opposed ideas in their heads simultaneously. That can only explain the past decade in which the fear of terror has cost the country hundreds of billions of dollars in wars, surveillance and intelligence programmes and homeland security. Ten years after 9/11, homeland security spending doubled to $69bn . The total bill since the attacks is more than $649bn.

One more figure. There have been fewer than 20 terror-related deaths on American soil since 9/11 and about 364,000 deaths caused by privately owned firearms. If any European nation had such a record and persisted in addressing only the first figure, while ignoring the second, you can bet your last pound that the State Department would be warning against travel to that country and no American would set foot in it without body armour.

But no nation sees itself as outsiders do. Half the country is sane and rational while the other half simply doesn’t grasp the inconsistencies and historic lunacy of its position, which springs from the second amendment right to keep and bear arms, and is derived from English common law and our 1689 Bill of Rights. We dispensed with these rights long ago, but American gun owners cleave to them with the tenacity that previous generations fought to continue slavery. Astonishingly, when owning a gun is not about ludicrous macho fantasy, it is mostly seen as a matter of personal safety, like the airbag in the new Ford pick-up or avoiding secondary smoke, despite conclusive evidence that people become less safe as gun ownership rises.

Last week, I happened to be in New York for the 9/11 anniversary: it occurs to me now that the city that suffered most dreadfully in the attacks and has the greatest reason for jumpiness is also among the places where you find most sense on the gun issue in America. New Yorkers understand that fear breeds peril and, regardless of tragedies such as Sandy Hook and the DC naval yard, the NRA, the gun manufacturers, conservative-inclined politicians and parts of the media will continue to advocate a right, which, at base, is as archaic as a witch trial.

Talking to American friends, I always sense a kind of despair that the gun lobby is too powerful to challenge and that nothing will ever change. The same resignation was evident in President Obama’s rather lifeless reaction to the Washington shooting last week. There is absolutely nothing he can do, which underscores the fact that America is in a jam and that international pressure may be one way of reducing the slaughter over the next generation. This has reached the point where it has ceased to be a domestic issue. The world cannot stand idly by.

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Duped Former Conspiracy Nut Converts To Reason | Heretic Ex-Truther Receives Death Threats

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in 9/11 conspiracy theories, Alex Jones Is a Nutcase, Conspiracism, Conspiracy Crackpots, Conspiracy Crazies, Conspiracy Cult, Conspiracy Delusions, Conspiracy Loons, Conspiracy Lunatics, Conspiracy Nuts, Conspiracy Propaganda, Conspiracy Sociopaths, Conspiracy Theories, Conspiracy Theorists, Conspiracy Thinking, Truthers

Charlie Veitch, the 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Who Realized He Was Duped

Charlie Veitch the 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Who Realized He Was Duped

Former “truther”, Charlie Veitch

Once one of Britain’s principal conspiracy theorists as well as friend to David Icke and Alex Jones, Charlie Veitch, was known as a 9/11 “truther.”  As soon as he realized that he had been duped, he stopped.  But that was when his problems really began.

According to an interview Veitch gave to the Telegraph, Veitch, who had been Right-wing, joined the Territorial Army (TA).  After a drunken night out with his best friend, his friend had turned to Veitch and told him that they had been lying to him.  He told Veitch that 9/11 was not what he thought it was and that he was being given “special knowledge.”  Veitch’s friend went on to show him a video entitled Terrorism: A History of Government Sponsored Terror, a video that was produced by US radio talk presenter, Alex Jones.

Veitch was shortly after made redundant, so with some of his payout, he purchased a camcorder and megaphone, in the style of Alex Jones. He used eccentric methods to publicly express his beliefs, such as swooping on public spaces and embarking public transport to make announcements to whoever was available to listen.  In one piece of footage, Veitch was heard to say to a group of passengers: “I am a proponent of the idea that the Twin Towers were brought down in a controlled demolition manner.  Those buildings would not have collapsed in the slightest from a Boeing 767 hit.”

Charlie Veitch the 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Who Realized He Was Duped

But one June afternoon, in New York City’s Times Square, Veitch began to film himself on his cell phone, as he made statements to camera about the devastation of the World Trade Center.  Only this time, his message was different from all the others he had posted on Youtube.  In the video, he said that he no longer believed that 9/11 was an inside job.

Because of his conspiracy theory films and the fact that he was at the forefront of what is known as “The Truth Movement” arm in the UK, Veitch had been approached by the BBC to go on an all-expenses paid 9-day trip to the United States, to examine these “conspiracies” from a scientific standpoint, with a view to furnish him with real information.

In the BBC program, entitled 9/11: Conspiracy Road Trip, 4 additional individuals, with divergent opinions from the official account of events of 9/11, had been selected to go on the road trip with Veitch.

The conspiracy theorists were given the opportunity to talk to building engineers, scientists, FBI and CIA agents, demolition experts and designers of the World Trade Center.  They were also allowed to talk to relatives of those who had tragically lost their lives, as well as pay a visit to the Pentagon, the World Trade Center in Manhattan and the Pennsylvania United Flight 93 site.

After all of the scientific evidence was put to Veitch, he did something completely out of the ordinary for a hardcore “truther.”  He did a U-turn and changed his mind.  Standing in front of the White House, on that sunny day in June, Veitch spoke to the BBC presenter and road trip leader, Andrew Maxwell. In front of the BBC camera, Veitch told him:

“I found my personal truth and you don’t have to agree with me, but I can’t push propaganda for ideas that I no longer believe in and that’s what I do, so I just need to basically… take it on the chin, admit I was wrong, be humble about it and just carry on.”

Before the end of his road trip, Charlie Veitch held up his cell phone in the middle of Times Square, pointed the phone’s camera on himself and told the world that he had changed his mind, that he had been wrong.  He said:

“This universe is truly one of smoke screens, illusions and wrong paths, but also the right path, which is [to] always be committed to the truth.  Do not hold on to religious dogma.  If you are presented with new evidence, take it on, even if it contradicts what you or your group might be believing or wanting to believe… you have to give the truth the greatest respect… and I do.”

Charlie Veitch the 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Who Realized He Was Duped

Veitch’s turning point piece-to-camera at Times Square

After Veitch posted his video, the 9/11 Truth Movement’s reaction to one of its most prominent “truthers” changing his mind was one to be expected.  Veitch was labeled a flip-flop, a shill sellout who was taking cash for working for the BBC.  The Truth Movement did what any organization of its kind would do to someone who, for want of a better term, came to their senses.  They tried to discredit him.

Veitch told Myles Power in his BBC-funded interview, how he once had too much time on his hands, “Idle hands are the conspiracy theory world’s ideal way to get into your head,” he said, as he described how he started to watch Alex Jones and David Icke documentaries, as well as other scientific theory videos which he said spun a pretty convincing yarn on its conspiracies.  He became convinced that the Illuminati were behind it all, with its so-called New World Order.  After becoming absorbed by his interest in conspiracy theories, he took up his megaphone and camera and began to make films about them, which he said, elevated him to a “high priest” status of the Truth Movement.

But so with age, comes wisdom and reason.  Veitch began to look critically at the proponents of the conspiracy theories, beginning to not only question what could have been in it for the establishment to have blown up the World Trade Center, but in a sudden turnaround, he questioned the agenda of those who now came across to him as crazier and angrier than the actual perpetrators of terror; the Truth Movement.  He also said that the risk factor would be far too great for such so-called powers of the establishment, who had too much to lose, to instigate such an atrocity and then attempt to shroud it in secrecy.

He went on that the paper trail would be too vast and that there would be more likelihood of other world powers, with advanced technological methods of getting a hold of such information, should it even exist, than an organization like the Truth Movement.  He concluded by saying that if things were truly as the Truth Movement had claimed, then there would be a civil collapse, should the evidence be presented, but that there is no evidence, because it was not an inside job.

Veitch said that before he accepted the BBC’s offer of the road trip, that the activist, conspiracy, new age and spiritual worlds seemed to love him, but he now admits how he became arrogant and fell for the hype.  He had believed that the Truth Movement was about being purveyors of truth in the world, but realized that it was closer to a religious cult, with its indoctrination methods.

Charlie Veitch’s Times Square video provoked such aggressively negative responses from Truth Movement followers, who sent him messages telling him to rot in hell, that he was simply a pawn and that he was paid to do it.  Within days, he was renounced by his friends and sent death threats.  An email had been sent to his followers, claiming to be from Veitch and falsely admitting that he was a pedophile: a message that ultimately reached his mother, causing her utter distress.

Another follower had created a channel on Youtube, entitled Kill Charlie Veitch.  On the channel, he had said that he was coming to kill Veitch and that he should enjoy his last few days.  His face had also been superimposed on to a pig as it was being slaughtered.  Even David Icke had posted a message to say that Veitch would deeply regret his actions, while Alex Jones told him not to even bother communicating with him, as he no longer knew him.

In an interview on AdamVsTheMan on RT, Veitch opened up about how he had spent 4-5 years looking at the conspiratorial view on 9/11 until the BBC helped present him with hard facts.  He talked about how he already began to have his doubts before the US road trip, but really felt his change of heart when he was standing on top of Building 7 at the World Trade Center site, having just grilled building experts on the nature of the collapse of the Twin Towers.

Veitch has concluded that conspiracy theorists are professional victims who have a hatred of high achievers and who were likely to have been bullied at school.  He put his misdirection down to his vulnerable ego and has, unsurprisingly, become very cynical and misanthropic.  He may have come to his senses now, but he will always be remembered as The 9/11 Conspiracy Theorist Who Realized He Was Duped.

Veitch currently lives with his young child and fiancée in Manchester, England and is planning to become a documentary maker.

Written by: Brucella Newman

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Six really stupid 9/11 conspiracies debunked in about six seconds

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in 9/11, 9/11 conspiracy theories, Conspiracism, Conspiracy, Conspiracy Crackpots, Conspiracy Crazies, Conspiracy Cult, Conspiracy Delusions, Conspiracy Loons, Conspiracy Lunatics, Conspiracy Nut, Conspiracy Nuts, Conspiracy Propaganda, Conspiracy Theories, Conspiracy Theorists, Conspiracy Thinking

Six really stupid 9/11 conspiracies debunked in about six  seconds

by: ANTHONY SHARWOOD

Nah, that's just a missile. And Santa Claus is the pilot. (AP Photo/Carmen Taylor, File)

Nah, that’s just a missile. And  Santa Claus is the pilot. (AP Photo/Carmen Taylor, File)   Source: AP

PSYCHOLOGISTS will tell you that even perfectly sane people have the ability  to accept wild conspiracy theories. The more powerless or alone we feel, the  more likely we are to develop such theories.  

It’s all linked to self-esteem. If you’re the sort of person who feels  isolated or disenfranchised, you’re much more likely to develop wild theories as  a way of making you seem more knowledgeable, more powerful, more special.

That might help explain why many Americans are into conspiracies. The irony  of our technologically over-connected age is that there are scores of socially  disconnected people sitting in dark rooms extrapolating all sorts of crap from  factoids they find online. Here are six of the worst:

STUPID THEORY 1: The US government did it

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: People who say it was an inside job are split into  two camps. There are those who say the US government cooked up and enacted the  whole crazy plot, and those who say they let it happen without intervention. In  both cases, conspiracists generally claim that the aim was to give the Bush  government an excuse to wage war on the Islamic world.

So here’s your simple rebuttal. US governments have shown for decades that  they will intervene when and where it suits them. The last thing they need to do  to justify any foreign policy is kill 3000 of their own citizens.

STUPID THEORY 2: The twin towers did not collapse. They were  demolished.

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: 9/11 “truthers”, who would perhaps be more accurately  described as 9/11 “liars”, like to rope in an expert to tell you that no office  fire ever made a building topple. Well, that’d be because no office fire was  ever as big as these two, with as much jet fuel to help it along.

But the real reason the twin towers collapsed was structural. Most buildings  have their core structural supports at the centre. The towers had some major  central steel columns, but that elegant exterior steel shell was also crucial in  providing perimeter support. Also, the perimeter columns supported massive steel  trusses which supported each floor.

So basically, when the exterior of the building was penetrated so  devastatingly by the planes, the structure’s ability to hold itself up was  threatened. So when one floor went, the combined weight meant they all went.

highjacked airliners

Pretend the towers were a  conspiracy theory. Then pretend they were subjected to the force of logic.  Here’s your result. 11/09/2001. Source: AFP

STUPID THEORY 3: World Trade Center 7 did not collapse. It was  demolished.

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: Riiiight, so the world’s tallest tower collapses on  its neighbour less than 200m across the road. You’ve got 110 storeys of rubble  pummelling a 47-storey building, setting it on fire, covering it in untold extra  weight and inflicted untold stresses. And later that day, when the smaller  building collapses, it’s obvious the CIA did it with explosives. And Elvis left  the building right before it happened.

Oh, and if you want a secondary explanation of why the building really wasn’t  toppled by mysterious people with explosives, try googling any of the so-called  architects or engineers in the wacky YouTube vids. Almost none of them appear to  be either a) currently employed or b) affiliated with any group other than 9/11  conspiracy groups.

STUPID THEORY 4: FLIGHT 93 was shot down in Pennsylvania and the  people who were supposedly on it were murdered or relocated.

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: The small jet flying low in the area, which some  believe shot down Flight 93, was in fact a business jet which had been  instructed to fly low to inspect the wreckage. Also, the log of calls made from  Flight 93 is pretty compelling evidence that those were real people aboard a  hijacked jet. If these people are actors who are actually still alive somewhere,  the real mystery is why they haven’t made squillions in Hollywood. Because they  were seriously convincing.

Shanksville

And they’re fake trees and that’s  a fake wall and Gilligan is still stuck on Gilligan’s Island. Picture: Jeff  Swensen/Getty Images/AFP Source: AFP

STUPID THEORY 5: There was no “stand down” order, which proves the US  government dunnit.

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: A stand down order is an order from the North  American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) to scramble fighter jets. This didn’t  happen until too late on September 11, prompting conspiracists to say the  government deliberately held off to let the carnage unfold.

But NORAD didn’t actually track flights within America prior to 9/11. Also,  the hijackers turned off the transponders on their planes, which meant Air  Traffic Control couldn’t track them. And NORAD needed an alert from Air Traffic  Control to act. So basically, you had a system which ensured bureaucratic  bungles, but that’s a far cry from complicit officials.

STUPID THEORY 6: They weren’t planes, they were missiles.

SIMPLE REBUTTAL: Some of the worst nutters claim that the original  planes which struck the twin towers weren’t planes but missiles. This was  fuelled by an early eyewitness account broadcast on live TV from a journalist  who said he thought the first plane had no windows. But the journalist saw the  plane in a blink of his eye – a fact ignored by conspiracists who have seized on  this statement.

The obvious plane-sized holes in the buildings are a bit of a giveaway too.  But you know, maybe they were just caused by Batman or something.

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Pentagon: Israel’s Future Fighter Jet Critically Flawed

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in F-35, Pentagon

Pentagon: Israel’s future fighter jet critically flawed

Leaked Pentagon report reveals fatal F-35 fighter jet flaws; ‘Unacceptable for combat or combat training,’ says report; Israel to buy 25 jets for $238 million each

Ynet

Fatal flaws within the cockpit of the US military’s most expensive fighter jet ever are causing further problems with the Pentagon’s dubious F-35 program, Israel’s future combat aircraft.

A new report from the Pentagon warns that any pilot that boards the pricey aircraft places himself in danger without even going into combat.

In a leaked memo reported by the RT news agency, a Pentagon official prefaces a report on the F-35 by cautioning that even training missions cannot be safely performed on board the aircraft at this time.

“The training management system lags in development compared to the rest of the Integrated Training Center and does not yet have all planned functionality,” the report reads in part.

זהו ה-F-35 (צילום: רויטרס)

The F-35 (Photo: Reuters)

“The out-of-cockpit visibility in the F-35A is less than other Air Force fighter aircraft,” one excerpt reads.

Elsewhere, the report includes quotes from pilots commenting after test missions onboard the aircraft:

“The head rest is too large and will impede aft (rear) visibility and survivability during surface and air engagements,” said one. “Aft visibility will get the pilot gunned (down) every time” in dogfights, remarked another.

“Aft visibility could turn out to be a significant problem for all F-35 pilots in the future,” the Pentagon admits.

In one chart included in the report, the Pentagon says there are eight crucial flaws with the aircraft that have raises serious red flags within the Department of Defense.

The plane’s lack of maturity, reduced pilot situational awareness during an emergency and the risk of the aircraft’s fuel barriers catching fire are also cited, as is the likelihood of a pilot in distress becoming unable to escape his aircraft during an emergency.

The Pentagon report described flaws as “unacceptable for combat or combat training.”

Yedioth Aharonoth reported that jet makers Lockheed Martin stated they are aware of the problems and that some have already been solved, adding that the aircraft’s maintenance and operation are being improved.

The latest news regarding the F-35s comes less than one month after a separate incident forced the Department of Defense to ground their entire arsenal of fighter jets. In February, jet makers Lockheed Martin issued a statement acknowledging that a routine inspection on a test plane turned up cracked turbine blade.

Each F-35 fighter jet is valued at $238 million and, according to recent estimates, the entire operation will cost the country $1 trillion in order to keep the jets up and running through 2050.

That high price tag has given several countries cold feet about the jet. Last week, Canada pulled out of a deal to buy 65 F-35s over fears that the aircraft could be too expensive to run. Italy reduced its purchase to 90 F-35s from an initial 131, and even the US has delayed some of its purchases.

 

Denver DA Arrests Psychics For Fraud, Going For Hat Trick

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Fraud, Psychics

Denver DA arrests two psychics for fraud, going for hattrick
By idoubtit
Psychic parlor tricks and curses.

2 Psychics Arrested, 3rd Sought « CBS Denver.

One Denver psychic has been convicted of theft, a second was arrested this month in California and Denver prosecutors are still seeking to arrest a third psychic accused of convincing clients she was a “witch doctor.”

“In these cases, where after they’ve paid money for services rendered, they take additional money, I believe through theft and deception, through magic and things like that and then don’t give money back to the victims … that’s when we get involved,” said Stevenson.

Denver psychic Cathy Ann Russo is currently on probation after being pleading guilty last August to felony theft and misdemeanor theft. Over the course of five years, beginning in 2007, Russo conned a Hispanic man out of $35,250. according to court records.

She is still acting as a psychic, although when a CBS4 producer went to see her for a tarot card reading, she identified herself as “Miss Anna.”

Earlier this month, authorities in California arrested Denver psychic Isabel Costello on an arrest warrant for theft and conspiracy to commit theft issued by the Denver DA’s office.

They say the two women conned at least four victims out of thousands of dollars by convincing them their money was cursed, and the more money turned over to the psychics, the easier it would be to remove the curses.

In order to convince clients of their “powers”, they did things like making grapefruits bleed, tomatoes taste like salt and cracking eggs open revealing black yolks. Anyone have info on how these tricks worked?

The psychics took advantage of clients’ belief in black magic and curses.

When will ALL psychics who take money be able to be charged with fraud?

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Holy Shit! Man Claims Jesus Appears In Bird Poop on His Car!

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Christian Fools, Jesus Nuts, pareidolia

Man Claims the Bird Poop on His Car Looks Like Jesus
By Hemant Mehta
… and he has a point:

 

[Jim] Lawry was in the driveway of his parent’s Brooklyn, Ohio home when he noticed the spot left behind by a passing bird. A closer look gave him quite a surprise and left him amazed.

Lawry’s son, parents and friends all came out to look. They too were amazed.

In an email to NewsChannel5, Lawry said he believed it was some sort of sign and wanted to share.

Well, holy shit.

I thought for a moment that Jim was a skeptic who was just having a little pareidolia-ic fun… but his Facebook profile suggests that he’s totally serious about this being a sign from (*ahem*) above:

 

I want to know how long it takes before he gets another carwash. Because, um, ew.

(via Christian Nightmares)

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Religious Fanatics | Theist Stampede Kills

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Hindu Stampede, Superstition, Theism

Stampede Kills 10 at ‘Largest Gathering in History’
MASSIVE GATHERING ATTRACTS UP TO 30M DEVOTEES TO BATHE
By the Associated Press

(AP) – At least 10 people were killed and a dozen more injured today after a stampede broke out at a train station in the northern Indian town where millions of devout Hindus gathered for a religious festival dubbed the“largest human gathering in history.” As many as 20 people are feared dead, and some 30 others injured. News reports said the large crowds caused a section of a footbridge at the station to collapse leading to the accident.

News reports said tens of thousands of people were at the train station at the time. Television showed large crowds pushing and jostling at the train station as policemen struggled to restore order. “There was complete chaos. There was no doctor or ambulance for at least two hours after the accident,” an eyewitness told NDTV news channel. An estimated 30 million devotees were expected to take a dip at the Sangam, the confluence of three rivers—the Ganges, the Yamuna, and the mythical Saraswati—today, one of the holiest bathing days of the Kumbh Mela, which lasts 55 days.

1 of 12
Hindu devotees take a holy dip at ‘Sangam’, the confluence of Hindu holy rivers Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati, during the Maha Kumbh festival at Allahabad, India, Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013.
(Rajesh Kumar Singh)
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Boy in the bunker: new details emerge about ‘menacing’ captor Jimmy | Alabama hostage standoff enters sixth day

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Bunker, Hostage

Boy in the bunker: new details emerge about  ‘menacing’ captor Jimmy
Alabama hostage standoff enters sixth day

The hostage standoff in Midland City continues, as the town prepares to bury  the school bus driver killed by the suspected gunman.

As an Alabama stand-off and hostage drama enters a sixth day, more details  have emerged about the suspect at the centre, with neighbours and officials  painting a picture of an isolated man with few friends and no close family.

Authorities say Jim Lee Dykes, 65 – a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War  known as Jimmy to neighbours – gunned down a school bus driver and then abducted  a five-year-old boy from the bus, taking him to an underground bunker on his  rural property.

    He doesn’t like law enforcement or the government telling him what to do.  He’s just a loner.The driver, 66-year-old Charles Poland, was being buried on Monday  (AEDT).

Ronda Wilbur, a neighbor of Jimmy Lee Dykes, points as she speaks with the media about encounters she's had with him at the scene of the shooting and hostage taking in Midland City, Alabama.Menacing … Ronda Wilbur, a neighbour of  Jimmy Lee Dykes, points as she  speaks with the media about encounters she’s had with him at the scene of the  shooting and hostage taking in Midland City, Alabama. Photo:  Reuters

Dykes, described as a loner who railed against the government, lives up a  dirt road north of Dothan in the south-east corner of the state. His home is  just off the main road north to the state capital of Montgomery, about 130km  away.

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The FBI said in a statement that authorities continue to have an open line of  communication with Dykes and they planned to deliver to the bunker additional  comfort items such as food, toys and medicine. They also said Dykes was making  the child as comfortable as possible.

Republican Rep. Steve Clouse, who represents the Midland City area, said he  visited the boy’s mother on Thursday and she was “hanging on by a  thread.”
“Everybody is praying with her for the boy,” he  said.
Clouse said the mother told him that the boy has Asperger’s  syndrome, an autism-like disorder, as well as attention deficit hyperactivity  disorder, or ADHD.

Along the red dirt road ... A Google satellite image of Dykes' property, where a boy is being held in an underground bunker.Along the red dirt road … A Google satellite image of Dykes’ property,  where a boy is being held in an underground bunker. Photo: CNN  screengrab

Government records and interviews with neighbours indicate that Dykes grew up  in the Dothan area and joined the navy, serving on active duty from 1964 to  1969. His record shows several awards, including the Vietnam Service Medal and  the Good Conduct Medal. During his service, Dykes was trained in aviation  maintenance.

Later, Dykes lived in Florida, where he worked as a surveyor and a long-haul  truck driver although it’s unclear for how long.

He had some scrapes with the law there, including a 1995 arrest for improper  exhibition of a weapon. The misdemeanour was dismissed. He also was arrested for  marijuana possession in 2000.

Authorities, including the FBI, wait at the scene.Tense … Authorities, including the FBI, wait at the scene. Photo:  AP

He returned to Alabama about two years ago, moving onto the rural tract about  90 metres from his nearest neighbours, Michael Creel and his father, Greg.

Dykes was known around the neighbourhood as a menacing figure who neighbours  said once beat a dog to death with a lead pipe, threatened to shoot children for  setting foot on his property and patrolled his yard at night with a flashlight  and a firearm.

Michael Creel said Dykes had an adult daughter, but the two lost touch years  ago.

Jim Lee Dykes, 65.Jim Lee Dykes, 65. Photo: Reuters

Another neighbour, Jimmy Davis Jnr, told CNN he had been shown around the  underground bunker by Dykes himself about nine months ago.

”He told me it was a storm shelter,” Mr Davis Jnr said.

“It actually had cinder blocks going down as steps and it was covered up with  two sheets of plywood nailed together with hinges and stuff as a door to open to  it.”

Mr Davis Jnr said Dykes had also buried a PVC pipe in the ground leading to  the bunker, so he could hear cars and people approaching from above.

The shelter was about a metre underground and negotiators were speaking to  Dykes through the pipe, James Arrington, police chief of the neighboring town of  Pinckard said.
“He will have to give up sooner or later because  (authorities) are not leaving,” Arrington said. “It’s pretty small, but he’s  been known to stay in there eight days.

Chief Arrington confirmed that Dykes held anti-government views, as described  by multiple neighbours: “He’s against the government – starting with Obama on  down.”
“He doesn’t like law enforcement or the government telling him  what to do,” he said. “He’s just a loner.”

AP, with theage.com.au

 

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Kentucky Neo-Nazis Charged in Gruesome Murder, Dismemberment

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in American Nazi Party, Nazi, Neo-Nazi

American Nazi Party

Kentucky Neo-Nazis Charged in Gruesome Murder, Dismemberment
Posted by Don Terry

The 25-point manifesto of the National Socialist Movement (NSM) makes several hyperbolic “demands,” such as “all non-Whites currently residing in America be required to leave the nation forthwith and return to their land of origin: peacefully or by force.’’

But it appears that two Kentucky members of the neo-Nazi group and an accomplice took at least one of the over-the-top mission statements deadly serious.

Point 17 says, “We demand the ruthless prosecution of those whose activities are injurious to the common interest. Murderers, rapists, pedophiles, drug dealers, usurers, profiteers, race traitors, etc. must be severely punished, whatever creed or race.”

On Jan. 9, according to the authorities, the men lured a white, 19-year-old alleged small-time drug dealer into the back seat of their car, choked him, beat him with fists and a metal pipe, dragged him out of the car, slit his throat, stabbed him in the chest, rolled his body down a hill and left him dead in the bushes, covered in brambles, in a field in Boone County, Ky., essentially a suburb of nearby Cincinnati.

The next day, the men returned to the field and began dismembering the body with knives and a hatchet, apparently scattering the body parts in the field and a landfill. “The head, hands, feet and legs,” Detective Jeremy Rosing of the Boone County Sheriff’s Office testified at a court hearing last week.

The accused killers – Anthony Baumgartner, 23, Stephen Harkness, 22, and Jeffrey Allen, 21 – are being held without bail on charges of kidnapping, murder, tampering with physical evidence and abuse of a corpse.

The men told investigators that they disliked drug dealers and that is why they targeted their victim, who was identified by a tattoo of a cartoon character on his severed torso as Daniel Delfin, of Walton, Ky.

“Their thing was, we know he deals drugs, we’re against that,” Deputy Tom Scheben, a spokesman for the Boone County sheriff, told Hatewatch today. “They said he was a drug dealer and, in essence, a blight on society.’’

Both Baumgartner and Harkness are admitted members of NSM and can be found on the group’s social media forum discussing their interests and dislikes.

“Stormtrooper First Class Baumgartner NMS Kentucky” wrote on the forum that he dislikes “race traders [sic], greed, ignorance, drugs, jews, niggers, spikes, gooks and chinks and anybody that hates National Socialism.”

In the “About Me” section, he says that he was part of the Ku Klux Klan but left a long time ago on good terms and now wants “to get back in the race war so me and a few other boys in my area are starting to clean up area of drugs and so called street gangs.”

Harkness’s dislikes include: “Drugs, Gangs, Hippies, Faggots, All other races, People who think Jews deserve our pity.” As hobbies, he listed farming and gardening, and re-reading the works of “Herr Hitler and Commander Rockwell,” as in George Lincoln Rockwell, the former Navy commander who founded the American Nazi Party in 1959.

It is unclear if Allen is a neo-Nazi. But, “they’re all pretty tatted up with that stuff,” Scheben said.

The deputy said Allen told investigators that he had planned the attack on Delfin a week before. “I’m sure he’s not the only drug dealer they’re familiar with,” Scheben said. “But he wore the real baggy pants, the baggy clothes. In a small town like Walton, Kentucky, you stand out dressing like that.’’

Scheben said the men lured Delfin into their car on Jan. 9 by saying they wanted to buy heroin. Delfin was arrested last May for trafficking heroin in the area. “I would say we have a very definite heroin problem,” Scheben said. “It is the drug of choice in the tri-state region. It’s much cheaper than your pain killer pills.”

Harkness was driving. Baumgartner was in the passenger seat. Allen was in the back, sitting next to Delfin, who he “proceeded to physically assault” with his fists and a pipe, Rosing told a Boone County courtroom.

Rosing said Delfin suffered “severe head trauma” during the attack and apparently slipped into unconsciousness or death. The men drove to a field next to Allen’s home where Allen slit Delfin’s throat and stabbed him, the detective said, “underneath the ribcage, up into the heart and twisted the knife and then pulled it out.”

The next day, the men returned to dismember the body.

On Jan. 13, Delfin’s sister reported him missing. On Jan. 14, authorities got a tip, leading them to the three men, who were arrested on Jan. 15.

“Allen was the first to admit it,” Scheben said. “The others followed suit. Allen walked us to where the torso was.”

The authorities found Delfin’s torso and legs in the field. They searched a nearby landfill, using four pieces of heavy equipment for six hours before calling the search off without finding the rest of the teenager.

The owners of the landfill “told us up front, you’re pretty much looking for a needle in a haystack,” Scheben said.

The three men are being held in the Boone County Jail without bail, waiting to go before a grand jury in the next few weeks. “Their story now is that they were just going to assault him and work their way up the chain until they found the drug kingpin,” Scheben said.

Calls today to the men’s public defenders were not returned.

On Thursday in Verona, Ky., nearly 100 people attended Delfin’s closed-casket funeral. Two songs were played at the service: “Amazing Grace” and “It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday.”

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Sicko Conspiracy Sociopaths Harass Man Who Sheltered Kids During Sandy Hook Massacre

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Alex Jones, Conspiracism, Conspiracy Lunatics, Conspiracy Socipaths, Glenn Beck, Truthers

This man helped save six children, is now getting harassed for it

Gene Rosen sheltered six kids during the Sandy Hook massacre. Now he’s become a target of conspiracy theorists

By Alex Seitz-Wald

This man helped save six children, is now getting harassed for it
Enlarge  (Credit: AP/Mary Altaffer)

“I don’t know what to do,” sighed Gene Rosen. “I’m getting hang-up calls, I’m getting some calls, I’m getting emails with, not direct threats, but accusations that I’m lying, that I’m a crisis actor, ‘how much am I being paid?’” Someone posted a photo of his house online. There have been phony Google+ and YouTube accounts created in his name, messages on white supremacist message boards ridiculing the “emotional Jewish guy,” and dozens of blog posts and videos “exposing” him as a fraud. One email purporting to be a business inquiry taunted: “How are all those little students doing? You know, the ones that showed up at your house after the ‘shooting’. What is the going rate for getting involved in a gov’t sponsored hoax anyway?”

“The quantity of the material is overwhelming,” he said. So much so that a friend shields him from most of it by doing daily sweeps of the Web so Rosen doesn’t have to. His wife is worried for their safety. He’s logged every email and every call, and consulted with a retired state police officer, who took the complaint seriously but said police probably can’t do anything at the moment; he plans to do the same with the FBI.

What did Rosen do to deserve this? One month ago, he found six little children and a bus driver at the end of the driveway of his home in Newtown, Conn. “We can’t go back to school,” one little boy told Rosen. “Our teacher is dead.” He brought them inside and gave them food and juice and toys. He called their parents. He sat with them and listened to their shocked accounts of what had happened just down the street inside Sandy Hook Elementary, close enough that Rosen heard the gunshots.

In the hours and days that followed, Rosen did a lot of media interviews. “I wanted to speak about the bravery of the children, and it kind of helped me work through this,” he told Salon in an interview.  “I guess I kind of opened myself up to this.”

The “this” in question is becoming a prime target of the burgeoning Sandy Hook truther movement, which — like its precursor that denied the veracity of the 9/11 terror attacks — alleges that the entire shooting was a hoax of some kind. There were conspiracy theories surrounding the shooting from Day One, but the movement has exploded into public view the past two weeks, and a Google Trends search suggests it’s just now picking up steam. It’s also beginning to earn the backing of presumably credible sources like a professor and a reporter.

Rosen,  a 69-year-old retired psychologist who now runs a pet-sitting business and volunteers to read books to kids in schools, initially called me to ask if I thought he should reach out to the FBI about the harassment. I said it probably couldn’t hurt. When I asked if I could tell his story, he was reluctant at first. “Here’s my fear: If I start talking like this, will one of these truthers read this and will it embolden them? Will they say, screw that guy, how dare he impugn our credibility or question our intellect, I’m going to go one step farther? Am I being stupid?” he asked.

After thinking about it, Rosen decided that he had to speak out: “I talk to you about this because I feel that there has to be some moral push-back on this.” Rosen said he’s a staunch believer in free speech, and realizes there is little legal recourse possible unless he gets direct threats, so he had a different idea.

“There must be some way to morally shame these people, because there were 20 dead children lying an eighth of a mile from my window all night long,” he said, choking back tears. “And I sat there with my wife, because they couldn’t take the bodies out that night so the medical examiner could come. And I thought of an expression, that this ‘adds insult to injury,’ but that’s a stupid expression, because this is not an injury, this is an abomination.”

The harassment has turned Rosen’s life upside down, and made him feel things once foreign to him, like searing rage. “I was sitting in a restaurant the other night and these guys who were part of a car club came up to me and shook my hand and said, ‘You know, you’re a hero to me.’ He had seen me on TV. So I said thank you. Then I’m sitting there and I hear this other guy, ‘Oh yeah, it was a conspiracy.’ He was a big guy,” he said.

“I tell you what, I had evil thoughts. I wanted to go over to the first guy, and he had about 15 big guys with him, and say, ‘I’m going to go talk to this other guy — just watch my back.’ And then I wanted to go over to the other guy and get up in his face and say, ‘See those guys over there, just know they’re keeping an eye out for me.’ And then I wanted to say, ‘I want to see what you look like. I want to see what a person who generates this kind of evil shit looks like. I want to look at your face and tell you you’re an asshole,’” he said.

He didn’t do it, of course. “But it tells me how rageful I am. And I am rageful about it, both for the children and for the mother of the child who came to my house looking for her son, and I wanted to look at this guy and I wanted to just fucking decimate him. That’s my rage.”

But when he starts to feel that way, Rosen can think of the first man. And the countless others out there who see Rosen as a hero, and not a tool of some shadowy conspiracy. Because for every angry call or email, there any many, many more praising ones: “I get the most beautifully written cards, wonderful calls.” Let’s hope they continue to be the majority.


            Alex Seitz-Wald is Salon’s political reporter. Email him at aseitz-wald@salon.com, and follow him on Twitter @aseitzwald.

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Religious Right Pseudo Historian David Barton Claims Few Gun Accidents During Founding Era

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in David Barton, Religious Right Crazies, Sandy Hook

Barton: There Were No Gun Accidents During the Founding Era

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla

Today, Rick Green and David Barton weighed-in on the tragedy at Sandy Hook by laying out not only the standard Religious Right solutions of putting prayer and the Bible back in schools, but also adding a unique suggestion to start arming everyone from early childhood.

Explaining that he began teaching his own kids how to use guns at the age of four, Barton said that people only want to get rid of guns because they are afraid of them, which can be attributed to the fact that they don’t know how to use them.

As such, if everyone had a gun and was taught how to use it from childhood, there would never be any firearm incidents or accidents, just like during the founding era:

That’s what these guys do not see and do not look at; they’re just flat scared of guns.  And the solution to that is exactly what the Founding Fathers said and that is you start teaching kids to use guns when they’re very young because gun accidents are caused by non-familiarity with guns; once you’re familiar with them, you don’t have accidents with them.

I have searched and in the founding era I think I’ve only ever found two gun accidents and everybody was hauling guns back then; you took your guns to church, you were required by state law in some states to take your guns to church.  We didn’t have accidents because everyone was familiar with how to use them.  It’s not being familiar that makes is dangerous.

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How to Tell If You’re Dating a Sociopath

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Culture, Dating, Sociopath

How to Tell If You’re Dating a Sociopath

A few years ago I dated a man who said that he loved me.

But hundreds of unanswered phone calls and dates that only I showed up for made that hard to believe. Still I knew that if I was patient and loved him hard enough that he would eventually change.

It took a phone call from the wife that he conveniently forgot to mention to make me realize that that probably wasn’t going to happen.

Many experiences (and a master’s degree) later, I’ve come to understand that my former lover, and those like him, are sociopaths: a unique breed of individual that is incapable of empathy or any other proper connection to other human beings.

Now when you think of the term “sociopath,” it might conjure up images of the lone stranger who gets off by dismembering people in his backyard. While this may be true, the term isn’t reserved for only felons and serial killers.

This is because the sociopath’s desire doesn’t have to be murder. Sometimes it’s money. Sometimes it’s sex. Sometimes it’s control. And while many people have these same aspirations, what makes a sociopath a sociopath is that they are more than willing to hurt someone to get what they want. So if your feelings or your well-being have to be sacrificed in order for them to achieve that need, that’s exactly what will have to happen.

They’re the man who sleeps with his partner just for her paycheck; the boyfriend that has sex with his girl’s sister, or even the husband that has managed to keep a secret, second family on the side. Most heartbreaking are the partners who think they can love or pray these individuals into being better people. But unfortunately, that’s simply not possible. Because unlike most people who suffer from some sort of mental disorder, sociopaths are perfectly happy being just the way they are. It’s the people that they come across who are miserable. So the only way to ensure that you’re not hurt by a sociopath is simple: stay away.

And what are the criteria for a diagnosable sociopath?

1. Unlawful Behavior Sociopaths are arrogant creatures who often think they can operate above the law. Because of this, they may repeatedly perform criminal acts. However, because they are usually crafty and highly intelligent, they rarely get caught.

2. Deceitfulness Lying! But not the random or compulsive variety. Sociopaths lie for a purpose, which usually includes some type of financial, sexual, or political gain. Lies may be grandiose in nature and are told as a vehicle of control.

3. Impulsivity Sociopaths act on instinct and without thoroughly planning ahead. They may enter relationships quickly and passionately, but lose interest just as fast.

4. Aggressiveness Sociopaths are usually easily irritated and may be prone to repeated physical fights.

5. Reckless Disregard Sociopaths are likely to partake in risky, thrill seeking behaviors as they constantly need to be stimulated. In the context of relationships, this includes highly promiscuous sexual behavior usually without protection.

6. Irresponsibility You know that person that can’t seem to hold down a job? Not because they’re lazy, but because they just don’t want to work? They may just be a sociopath that thinks they’re too good for a regular nine to five.

7. Lack of Remorse Sociopaths don’t feel bad about anything. This includes not returning your calls or sleeping with your best friend. And to add insult to injury, sociopaths will come up with reasons to rationalize their messed up behavior. Her friend wanted me and what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her. Right?

Bottom line is a sociopath has one concern: himself. And while they know their behavior is devastating to those around them, they’re charming enough to make sure that there are always people in their lives to take advantage of.

You just have to make sure you’re not one of them.

Post by  Shayla Pierce

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Longform’s Best Sex Stories of 2012

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Sex, Sex Stories

Longform’s Best Sex Stories of 2012

Sex on the Web, during the age of Grindr, and in the Olympic Village—the best sex writing of 2012.

Demystifying a ubiquitous Internet presence.

“If you think cam girls—those flirty naked characters that plague porn site pop-up ads—are raking in easy money, you’re right. If you think cam girls are bleakly stripping online out of desperation, you’re also right. Peel away the sex and pixels and money and you’re left with the cloudy truth about the Internet’s relationship status with these on-demand entertainers: it’s complicated.

“You’ve looked at porn online, which means you’ve likely been propositioned by advertisements for cam girl networks. They invade your peripheral vision; they pop up behind your window. The women wait for you to start staring, and, just when you’re interested, they hit you up for money. You’ve seen them sitting at their keyboards, wearing barely anything, winking at you, typing to nobody in particular with thin, lethargic arms: bored and conventionally beautiful. The ads, with flirty video that might be live or recorded years ago, shout at you with promises of ‘Live Sex Chat’ and ‘Sex Shows,’ with both amateurs and ‘pornstars’ alike. It’s a web red light district, and unlike some gaudy Dutch strip or seedy sidewalk, you’re completely anonymous. The sex comes to you.”

Absolute Beginners Bethany Cosentino, Krista Burton, Lena Dunham, Liz Phair, Miranda July, Pamela Des Barres, Sarah Silverman, Shannon Woodward • Rookie

Eight women remember their first time.

Lena Dunham talks sexJason Merritt/Getty Images.

“Lena Dunham: When I was about nine I wrote a vow of celibacy on a piece of paper and ate it. I promised myself, in orange magic marker, that I would remain a virgin until I graduated from high school. This seemed important because I knew my mother had waited until the summer after she graduated and also Angela Chase seemed pretty messed up by her experience at that flophouse where high school kids went to copulate. If my relationship to liver paté was any indication, and I had recently eaten so much that I barfed, then my willpower was very bad, and I needed something stronger than resolve to prevent me from having intercourse too early in life.

“Turns out, this was an unnecessary precaution. The opportunity never arose in high school, nor even during the first year of college, save for a near-miss with a stocky kid I knew who was home visiting New York City from the Air Force Academy—that encounter went far enough that I had to fish a mint-colored, never-used condom out from behind my dormitory bunk bed the next day. I transferred to Oberlin my sophomore year, a small liberal arts school in Ohio that was known for having been the first college to admit both women and men, as well as for its polyamorous, bi-curious student body. I was neither, but it did seem like a good environment in which to finally get the ball rolling. I really felt like the oldest virgin in town, save for a busty riot grrrl from Olympia, Washington, who was equally frustrated; she and I would often meet up in our nightgowns to discuss.

“I was pretty sure I had already broken my hymen in high school, crawling over a fence in Brooklyn in hot pursuit of a cat that clearly didn’t want to be rescued. So the event would only be psychologically painful.”

Please Don’t Infect Me, I’m Sorry Rich Juzwiak • Gawker

Sex and status disclosure in the age of Grindr and undetectable HIV-levels.

“The first guy I ever turned down on Grindr for having HIV, my patient zero if you will, is all kinds of hot: hot in the face, hot in the body and hotheaded. In May, he asked me to come over and make out. We chatted a little bit more, he told me about his status and I slipped out of the conversation, just like that. Randomly in July, I noticed him at a movie theater: On Grindr and online, people lie with pictures all the time, choosing ones that distort their appearance in a captured second, but I was able to pick Miguel right out of a crowd. His picture is a symbol of habitual honesty, maybe, but also because he’s so attractive, he has no reason to lie.

“ ‘This always happens: someone will feel bad and then they’ll see me out and they’ll be like, “Oh my god, you’re so fucking hot,” ‘ Miguel told me while we waited for our table outside of a Chelsea brunch spot one Saturday in early July after I reconnected and asked him to talk to me.

“Miguel told me that being turned down for sex because he’s HIV-positive is something that happens ‘all the time,’ and that ‘almost every time, the minute someone gets to know me, their mind changes.’ Exposure to a gay friend often converts homophobes swiftly; the same can be said of an HIV-positive guy meeting others who are fearful. It’s somewhat reassuring that that’s all it takes in many cases, but it also underlines the exponential burden put upon positive guys. They are either in a constant state of proving themselves socially or they are sitting on a secret.”

 

The Ayatollah Under the Bed(sheets) Karim Sadjadpour • Foreign Policy

 Politics, sex, and political sex in Iran.

“Perhaps it’s not entirely surprising that Iran’s Shiite fundamentalists—not unlike their evangelical Christian, Catholic, Orthodox Jewish, and Sunni Muslim counterparts—spend an inordinate amount of time pondering sexuality. They are human, after all. But the sexual manias of Iran’s religious fundamentalists are worthy of greater scrutiny, all the more so because they control a state with nuclear ambitions, vast oil wealth, and a young, dynamic, stifled population. Yet for a variety of reasons—fear of becoming Salman Rushdie, of being labeled an Orientalist, of upsetting religious sensibilities—the remarkable hypocrisy of the Iranian regime is often studiously avoided.

“That’s a mistake. Because religion is politics in a theocracy like Iran, uninformed or antiquated notions of sexuality aren’t just confined to the bedroom—they pervade the country’s seminaries, military barracks, boardrooms, courtrooms, and classrooms. A common aphorism among Iranians is that before the revolution, people partied outside the home and prayed inside, while today they pray outside and party inside. This reverse dichotomy is true of a lot of social behavior in Iran. For many Iranians, this perverse state of affairs is now so ingrained, such an inherent aspect of daily interactions with Iranian officialdom, that it is no longer noteworthy. For those in the West who seek to better understand what makes Tehran tick, though, the regime’s curious fixation on sex cannot be ignored.”

 

Will You Still Medal in the Morning? Sam Alipour • ESPN the Magazine

 Sex in the Olympic Village.

“Home to more than 10,000 athletes at the Summer Games and 2,700 at the Winter, the Olympic Village is one of the world’s most exclusive clubs. To join, prospective members need only have spectacular talent and —we long assumed—a chaste devotion to the most intense competition of their lives. But the image of a celibate Games began to flicker in ’92 when it was reported that the Games’ organizers had ordered in prophylactics like pizza. Then, at the 2000 Sydney Games, 70,000 condoms wasn’t enough, prompting a second order of 20,000 and a new standing order of 100,000 condoms per Olympics.

“Many Olympians, past and present, abide by what Summer Sanders, a swimmer who won two gold medals, a silver and a bronze in Barcelona, calls the second Olympic motto: ‘What happens in the village stays in the village.’ Yet if you ask enough active and retired athletes often enough to spill their secrets, the village gates will fly open. It quickly becomes clear that, summer or winter, the games go on long after the medal ceremony. ‘There’s a lot of sex going on,’ says women’s soccer goalkeeper Hope Solo, a gold medalist in 2008. How much sex? ‘I’d say it’s 70 percent to 75 percent of Olympians,’ offers world-record-holding swimmer Ryan Lochte, who will be in London for his third Games. ‘Hey, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.’ ”

For more of the year’s best writing, check out Longform’s Best of 2012.

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More American Gun Homicides | Firefighters Gunned Down in Western New York

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Gun Control, Gun Deaths, Gun Killings, Guns

Firefighters Gunned Down in Western New York
Days without gun violence: 0

Another senseless, horrific crime, as someone apparently laid a trap for firefighters in order to gun them down: 2 Firefighters Killed in Western New York.

Four firefighters were shot — two fatally — after apparently being lured to an early morning blaze on Monday in Webster, N.Y., a lakefront town about 12 miles northeast of Rochester, officials said.

The suspected assailant also died at the scene, the town’s police chief, Gerald L. Pickering said, though it was unclear if he was killed by a self-inflicted gunshot or by the authorities.

“It does appear that it was a trap that was set,” Chief Pickering said of the blaze that drew the firefighters. “Causative reasons, we don’t have at this time.”

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Warring Wingnut Warriors! | Far Right’s Continued Implosion

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Breitbart, Dana Loesch, Far Right, Right Wing Crazies, Warring Wingnut Warriors, Wingnuts

Wingnut Wars!
Dana Loesch Sues Breitbart Loons

Thanks to “wrenchwench”

How could a love so right go so wrong?
Tonight we have word of big trouble on the far right, as the Breitbrats begin fighting in earnest over the empire that Breitbart built: Talk Radio Host Dana Loesch Files Suit in St. Louis Against Breitbart.com.

I’ve been wondering why Loesch’s wingnut screeds haven’t been appearing there lately — now we know.

Conservative talk radio host and commentator Dana Loesch sued the owner of the conservative website Breitbart.com Friday, claiming that although her relationship with the news and opinion aggregating website had gone “tragically awry,” Breibart.cοm LLC refused to let her work for the company or anyone else, forcing her into “indentured servitude in limbo.”

The suit, filed in U.S. District Court here, seeks at least $75,000 in damages, as well as a judge’s declaration that her contract had expired.

The suit says that difficulties managing the Breitbart “media ‘empire’” or ideological conflicts or both had spiked the working relationship, creating a “increasingly hostile” work environment. When Loesch tried to terminate her work agreement in September, Breitbart refused and extended the agreement by a year, the suit says.

Here’s the legal document filed. Worth a chuckle!

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Of Faith and Fannies – Female Genital Mutilation and Islam

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Female Genital Mutilation, FGM, Islamic Cretinism, Islamic Sadism, Religious barbarity

Of Faith and Fannies – Female Genital Mutilation and Islam
 ‎Posted by Avicenna

Female Circumcision (Genital Mutilation) is one of the major problems facing women in large parts of the world. The practice is seen from parts of Indonesia through some areas of the Middle East to (it is thankfully rarer but it still occurs) to Africa where the practice is widespread due to a long history and the lack of a concerted effort to stamp it out. I will write a warning and say that this article is NSFW and not suitable for those of a nervous disposition as the subject matter is deeply uncomfortable. In addition due to the use of anatomical drawings I will suggest that this article be treated as not safe for children unless you as a parent wish for them to learn about a darker side of the world. This is ludicrously uncomfortable for pretty much everyone. Hence this ludicrously long disclaimer.

What triggered me to write this? Well my girlfriend is a Malaysian Tamil. Malaysian readers saw that and sent me this. I figured a lot of the issues (like pretty much every form of quackery) are tarnished by misinformation. It’s an issue that we rarely properly deal with in western society because we go “It’s bad! KAY! LALALALLALALALA! PUPPIES AND KITTENS!”. But we don’t have that luxury. Most people don’t know the first thing about the practice so it’s very easy for the supporters to just dismiss them. So first a short primer on FGM and even a little look into “the most common FGM” in the west and medical procedures that can be classified under FGM. Yes, sometimes there is a reason to do this and we shall touch on a few examples, but I repeat this throughout because I know people often forget that a medical reason for doing something is not a sensible reason for doing something if you are healthy. Just because Steve Jobs was benefited from having large chunks of his intestines removed doesn’t mean it’s a sensible plan for you.

To begin with, let’s discuss what constitutes FGM.

No Jokes! Shame on You!The fourth type isn’t depicted because it’s mostly voluntary or medical… Mostly

There are four classifications of FGM according to the WHO.

Type I – Clitirodectomy. It is the removal of the clitoris and the clitoral hood. Normally? There is only one indication for this procedure medically. Metastasis of cancer to the region may require removal of the clitoris.

Type II – Includes the type I procedure and removal of the inner labia.

Type III – Is called infibulations. It involves removal of the clitoris, labia and fusion of wound leaving a small hole for passage of urine and blood which is reopened for childbirth and intercourse.

Type IV – Miscellaneous acts such as symbolic pricking, piercing of clitoris and labia, cauterisation and cutting into the vagina to widen it or usage of corrosives to tighten the vagina. These are mainly considered medical practices and are done for a variety of conditions ranging from body piercing and fashion to disorders like sexual dysfunction due to a narrow vagina, vaginismus due to damage during childbirth, cancer and some plastic surgery. It is generally voluntary though some exceptions exist.

Type I and II are the most common. Type III is predominant in Sudan, Somalia and Djibouti. Type IV is seen across the world including voluntary FGM as seen in body modification and piercing circles in the west.Now I know I am going to get a lot of flak for pointing out that body modification and piercing circles undergo Type IV FGM, but this is the WHO classification of the act rather than mine. It’s also important to point out the difference between body modification and piercings where an individual volunteers to have the piercing when compared to someone who is forced or coerced into having it done. I have no issue with volunteers, it’s your body and if your happiness lies in putting metal through your genitals then godspeed you fancy bastards! The reason for it’s utilisation in this context is that NORMALLY in the context of the west Type IV is voluntary but there are some cultures where the practice is compulsory and is not as radical as Type I, II or III. In Malaysia for example Type IV is more involuntary than in the west.

But for these women it isn’t a choice.

And the defence of the practice is frankly reprehensible.

Not only does it defend a practice steeped in superstition and culture as a good thing, it also does so by invoking a divine mandate followed by a billion people across the world that isn’t prone to criticism and honest debate.Let’s face it, Islam does not like debate. When Christians complain that Muslims get a free ride from atheists, it’s mainly because muslims do have a small but significant minority who don’t listen to reason and who are quite happy to kill someone for their perceived involvement in an attack on their faith. It’s extremely hard to criticise someone who threatens you with death and acts on it. We see here a marriage of the worst attitudes of faith and woo. The perceived medical benefit married to the blind faith in a book written by someone who could not fathom our knowledge and understanding. This is deadly beyond comparison and it shows. The 1997 figure for FGM states that roughly 135 million women had undergone the procedure. The number certainly hasn’t gone down since there isn’t a big drive to halt the procedure.We can say a lot of things about the British Colonial period. A lot of horrible things were done by Great Britain across the world. But as most Indians will realise (even if they don’t like admitting it) Great Britain created India as a solid unified body. Without them? India would be a balkanised series of tiny countries and not the rising giant it is today. The erstwhile masters unknowingly created nationalism, they gave India the tools to set itself free from all masters be they gods or men even if Indians do forget that sometime. And one of the things the British did in India that I am sure most Indians are thankful for was to give a legal impetus to the Hindu anti-sati reforms. A coalition of Indian reformers and British lawmakers helped stamp out the practice. However, we see a similar move in Africa where in Kenya the British attempted to stamp out the practice through the church and law resulting in revolutions as many kenyans perceived a british plot to destroy local culture  to the point where the practice was actively defended as a Kenyan cultural issue. So what we see here is a genuinely destructive practice that people do consider unnecessary and bad but still do because it’s a symbol of culture.

The real argument lies not in the defense of the general surgical operation or its details, but in the understanding of a very important fact in the tribal psychology of the Kikuyu—namely, that this operation is still regarded as the essence of an institution which has enormous educational, social, moral and religious implications, quite apart from the operation itself. For the present it is impossible for a member of the tribe to imagine an initiation without clitoridoctomy [sic]. Therefore the … abolition of the surgical element in this custom means … the abolition of the whole institution.

The above quote came from the first prime minister of Kenya who resigned himself to the idea that fighting the practice somehow removed from the culture of Kenya and that somehow cutting the bits off another woman (the practice is strangely enforced by other women rather than men) was what you needed to be part of a society. That it was unfathomable to turn the practice into a symbolic one in much the same way as the modern Kali worshipper offers up a red liquid and cuts up pumpkins rather than the traditional offering of blood and human sacrifice. Granted this may turn into something like the practice now currently seen in Indonesia where the clitoris is pricked to draw blood but not removed, but it’s a step forwards and it’s a step that can be further progressed to a purely symbolic ceremony where the perceived benefits until it is completely stopped as an actual practice. I know a lot of people who read this will say “STAHP NAO” but there is something you should learn. And it is a harsh fact of life and working in such places. Sometimes principles don’t save lives. If 1000 people who would have done FGM and 50% agree to do the pricking malarky and only 1% agree to not do it then you have stopped 500 people from getting FGM in exchange for something not as bad. Eventually you will go from “not as bad” to sensible. Now even this is not indicated for every place FGM is being fought, some places are conducive to open bans.

Superstition when directly challenged will only fall if you can completely undermine it. In order to completely undermine FGM in large parts of Asia you will have to run the risk of death by angry fanatic. You have to fight the status quo of Islam and that is just terrifying to most doctors and the like who have families who just want to make a living without some idiot getting the idea that the doctor is being unislamic and encouraging people who listen to his idiocy to kill him. It’s not a fight you can demand others to participate in while being comfortable and removed from the risk. It’s not a game of football. In addition you either have to brutally destroy that part of culture (the hanging of people who encouraged sati) or you have to undermine it and slowly change it. And that is slow and steady and has to be done through things like this. It’s not ideal but it’s what works in this situation. You need to create a situation where people realise why they should change. And the way to do it is sadly slower than what most people want.

Islam may enjoin or forbid something and the people – or most of them – may not be able to see the wisdom behind this command or prohibition. In that case we are obliged to obey the command or heed the prohibition and to have certain faith that the laws of Allaah are all good, even if we cannot see the wisdom behind them.

Circumcision is one of the Sunnahs of the fitrah, as is indicated by the words of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him): “The fitrah is five things – or five things are part of the fitrah – circumcision, shaving the pubes, plucking the armpit hairs, cutting the nails, and trimming the moustache.” narrated by al-Bukhaari (5889) and Muslim (257)…Circumcision is prescribed for both males and females. The correct view is that circumcision is obligatory for males and that it is one of the symbols of Islam, and that circumcision of women is mustahabb but not obligatory. 

Great! The defence of female circumcision is that we cannot understand why it’s being proscribed by Islam. We should blindly obey because we cannot wrap our tiny minds over what some (more) middle eastern  guys in 500 AD thought about the world but we can build the Large Hadron Collider.

So circumcision is mentioned in Islam and proscribed, mainly for men; but it doesn’t explicitly state that women shouldn’t be circumcised and so people use the vague language in the Koran to imply that it’s a good thing.

That’s where Dr. Hamid al-Ghawaabi comes in to provide his expert medical advice as to why it’s a great idea.

The secretions of the labia minora accumulate in uncircumcised women and turn rancid, so they develop an unpleasant odour which may lead to infections of the vagina or urethra. I have seen many cases of sickness caused by the lack of circumcision.

Rancid secretions? It is indicative of a bacterial or a yeast infection. Roughly 75% of women will have one in their lifetime. It’s a fact of life. The correct answer is proper hygiene and cleaning your genitals.And I haven’t noticed any woman whose vagina smelt so bad that I had to lop bits off. Maybe if she has gangrene but that’s it! (Yes, that’s the actual medical indication for female circumcision. Your choices are clitiroidectomy or death by sepsis. It’s an emergency procedure and rather rare) And that’s a very specific case! But a normal healthy vagina?

Circumcision reduces excessive sensitivity of the clitoris which may cause it to increase in size to 3 centimeters when aroused, which is very annoying to the husband, especially at the time of intercourse.

And there in lies the crux of this of the argument. The same reason why male circumcision occurs is applied to women. It’s because it reduces the sexual drive of individuals. And I fail to see how a normal clitoris during the act of sex somehow is irritating. If a clitoris is so massively irritating during coitus then Rx – Doggy Style if you are a selfish wanker. You clearly don’t care about the sexual pleasure of others if that’s the biggest problem you have during sex and if you use that excuse to deny others pleasure. Because face it, that’s why it’s done. It’s to stop women having fun.

Another benefit of circumcision is that it prevents stimulation of the clitoris which makes it grow large in such a manner that it causes pain.

Pain? I don’t think the clitoris grows so much that it causes pain! Then again it’s been a long time since I had sex and I may have forgotten that bit where women feel pain during sex. Although… it may explain why the women I sleep with scream in bed… Good Grief! I AM SUCH A MONSTER!!!

Circumcision prevents spasms of the clitoris which are a kind of inflammation. 

No it isn’t! Inflammation consists of the classical signs of redness, heat, swelling and pain (rubor, calor, tumor et dolor… I can science in latin) as a generalised tissue response to an infection or a foreign object. Not what happens when a clitoris is stimulated. Ironically pricking and other forms of FGM would cause inflammation.

Circumcision reduces excessive sexual desire. 

Why is this even a problem? Oh right? Because all abrahamic faith is fascinated and repulsed by human sexuality and thinks that the first sin is the acquisition of knowledge and the greatest is the idea that humans can enjoy sex. Well emasculation reduces excessive sexual desire too but I don’t see the good doctor suggest we lop off the meat and two veg…

Then Dr al-Ghawaabi refutes those who claim that female circumcision leads to frigidity by noting: Frigidity has many causes, and this claim is not based on any sound statistics comparing circumcised women with uncircumcised women, except in the case of Pharaonic circumcision which is where the clitoris is excised completely.

Does Al-Ghawaabi seriously think women have any say in whether or not sex occurs or if there is any onus on providing sexual pleasure to a woman when one of the reasons given for cutting off the clitoris is that it is irritating to her husband? It doesn’t lead to frigidity, it leads to a loss of enjoyment of sex since by definition the procedure is done to reduce the female enjoyment of sex.

The female gynaecologist Sitt al-Banaat Khaalid says in an article entitled Khitaan al-Banaat Ru’yah Sihhiyyah (Female circumcision from a health point of view): For us in the Muslim world female circumcision is, above all else, obedience to Islam, which means acting in accordance with the fitrah and following the Sunnah which encourages it. We all know the dimensions of Islam, and that everything in it must be good in all aspects, including health aspects. If the benefits are not apparent now, they will become known in the future, as has happened with regard to male circumcision – the world now knows its benefits and it has become widespread among all nations despite the opposition of some groups. 

Some groups? It’s because women are held down and have their genitals cut off. The nations where it is widespread are mainly really poor nations where the practice occurs mainly due to tribal nonsense and because women have few rights and are unable to stand against the practice. The idea that Islam is somehow more knowledgeable than actual healthcare experts and that healthcare practitioners are willing to trade their own knowledge for a belief in the writings of someone from the 5th century AD rather than modern science is frankly insane. Fitrah, Sunnah and Koran do not dictate medical science. As for male circumcision (a completely different topic due to the relatively benign status of the procedure), it’s actually dropping in levels across the world since there isn’t any actual benefit from removal of the foreskin that cannot be attained from condom. And the practice of circumcision in women is illegal in many parts of the world with the UK’s government going as far as making it illegal to perform on it’s citizens rather than just in it’s jurisdiction meaning that going abroad to get your female child circumcised is also illegal. This is a movement that’s growing across the world and it’s rising in importance.Instead we have a list of frankly stupid reasons to mutilate someone’s genitals.

To point out the crux of the problem with Islam and FGM is the word Fitrah. It means “Nature”, that any action prescribed or proscribed by the Quran regarding health and that if it is a practice that isn’t immediately understandable now will reveal itself in the future to be the right act. Sunan al Fitrah is the “customs of nature”. The notion is that FGM is a divinely inscribed practice on humanity. That we cannot help but do this because god made us.

Then she mentioned some of the health benefits of female circumcision and said: It takes away excessive libido from women It prevents unpleasant odours which result from foul secretions beneath the prepuce. It reduces the incidence of urinary tract infections It reduces the incidence of infections of the reproductive system. In the book on Traditions that affect the health of women and children, which was published by the World Health Organization in 1979 it says: With regard to the type of female circumcision which involves removal of the prepuce of the clitoris, which is similar to male circumcision, no harmful health effects have been noted.

I already went over the stupidity of the other points. With regards to harmful health effects?

1. Recurrent bladder and urinary tract infections 2. Cysts 3. Infertility 4. Marked increase in both maternal and child deaths 5. Type III FGM is prone for infections and gangrenous infection of the labia majora 6. Marked pain 7. Loss of pleasure during sex

The WHO in 2011 says that there are no health benefits, only harm that comes out of FGM. FGM is illegal in many parts of the world. In most of the west the only removal or damage to the female genitalia that can be done is either voluntarily in the case of piercings or in the case of medical conditions that require removal. In every single instance of the FGM seen it is not done for the sake of the girl but for the perceived notion of culture, purity of women, religion and reduction of sexual libido. There is no medical reason to do so, and the practice is forced or coerced upon young girls.

This is an extremely prevalent practice in many parts of the world with little to no statistics. It’s often the “norm” so people don’t see what the problem is. While you understandably feel rage, rage doesn’t make people change. It’s very easy to call someone a bastard, it’s very hard however to make them stop doing the thing. Condemnation should be mixed in with a logical method of causing the problem to stop. Otherwise it is just words.

So how to make a stand? Well you yourselves can raise awareness in a way that isn’t just based on blind anger. Yes it is nice to get people to come from the UK to help out but frankly most of us don’t have the skills to fight this fight. Any job you can do, someone here already can do and in a better way. What we require is awareness and common sense. Support your secular charities. Medicin Sans Frontier, The WHO and Red Cross all stand against the practice and actively try and stop it from occurring in regions where they are active. You may not accept the softly softly approach but that actually gets results rather than outright fisticuffs with a practice that many people consider to be a vital part of their identity. Amnesty International as well has a very strong campaign against it on the activism side. It can be done, it’s just that we have to do it right now.

There is no excuse for this, not culture and definitely not belief in any god.

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Religious Fanatic Slaughters His Family in Moscow

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Religious Insanity, Religious Lunatics, Religious Nuts, Religious Psychos, Religious Reich, Religious Right, Religious Sadists

Religious fanatic slaughters his family in Moscow

Religious fanatic slaughters his family in Moscow. 48563.jpeg

The Moscow police investigate the triple murder, which was committed in Eastern Birulyovo on the southern outskirts of Moscow in the evening of November 19th.  The crime was committed in less than two weeks after the massacre in the office of a pharmaceutical company. Igor Televinov, 40, who could possibly be a mentally unbalanced religious fanatic, first killed his nine-year-old son, Alexander, and then six-year old daughter, Anna. Afterwards, the man killed his mother when she came back home from a walk. The man stabbed the three victims to death. Apparently, the victims could not show any resistance, Life News said.

After the murder, the man took the time to write a note, in which he asked to sell the apartment and bury the children with this money, the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper wrote.

The man wanted to kill himself in the end, but he also had to kill his wife first. When she came home from work, he met her on the doorstep and said that he had already sent his mother and children to heaven. The man offered his wife to follow them: he slashed the woman’s throat and face with the same knife.

The wounded woman somehow managed to escape from the apartment. All covered in blood, she rushed into her neighbor’s, shouting: “Lock the door!” The women called the police and an ambulance. The wounded woman was taken to hospital, her life is out of danger.

Having entered the apartment, where the tragedy occurred, law-enforcement officers, doctors and investigators saw the following picture. The bodies of the two children and their grandmother were lying in pools of blood. All the victims had their throats slit, their hands were folded crosswise on their chests, the little girl and the murderer’s mother had icons and burning candles put in between their fingers. The dead boy had an icing lamp in his hands, Vesti reports.

The man was arrested; he tried to show resistance to police, apparently staying in an inadequate condition. A criminal case was filed into the “murder of two or more persons” and “attempted murder.”

The man was unemployed. He was sick, he began to gain weight and would rarely go out. His wife worked in a barbershop. The woman was spending much of her salary on medications for her husband

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Tears In Heaven

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Eric Clapton, Guitar Legends

The Brilliant Eric Clapton!

Tears In Heaven
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FBI Investigates Tom Horne | Yet Another Republican “Family Values” Hypocrite Exposed As Adulterer

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Republican Hypocrites, Republican Whores

FBI Says AZ Attorney General Tom Horne Clipped Car, Drove Off to Hide Affair
It is unclear what impact this will have on his ability to continue to serve as Attorney General.

FBI Says Horne Clipped Car, Drove Off to Hide Affair

Tom Horne caused more than $1,000 worth of damage when he clipped another car in a parking garage and just drove off, in order, according to FBI agents, to conceal an affair he was having with his passenger.

Phoenix police records obtained Tuesday include detailed witness accounts by FBI agents who were following Horne, Arizona’s attorney general, on March 27 as part of a campaign finance investigation. They said they watched him back his borrowed vehicle into a white Range Rover in the parking garage of a Phoenix residential complex.

FBI agents said that after the fender-bender, Horne and the woman, since identified as Carmen Chenal, who works for Horne, walked off and entered the residential area of the complex where Chenal lives.

[…]

“What were they doing surveilling me?” Horne asked. “It seems to me that’s something that people should raise.”

“We have no comment at this time,” responded FBI spokesman Manuel Johnson.

[…]

The federal investigators were tailing Horne in the course of their investigation of Horne for allegations of campaign finance violations.

Tom Horne Photo by Ross D. Franklin

You can read more about Tom Horne’s history with Carmen Chenal here.

[…]

In 2005, Carmen Chenal lost her law license after repeated violations of state bar regulations.
In 2006, just a few months after losing her license to practice law, Chenal is hired by Horne to work for him at the Arizona Department of Education.
In November 2010, Horne was elected Arizona Attorney General and hired Chenal despite the fact that she did not have a law license.

[…]

Tom Horne is one of the main players in the effort to get rid of Mexican American Studies in the Tucson school district. You can read more about that here, and by clicking on the TUSD tag at the bottom of this post.

This is not Horne’s first run-in with the law.

[…]

Horne was the president of T.C. Horne & Co., an investment firm he founded in the late 1960s. After the firm went bankrupt in 1970, Horne received a lifetime trading ban from the Securities and Exchange Commission

[…]

I hope he is unable to finish his term in office. He was elected to a four year term two years ago.

 

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Conservative Myths About Socialism, Capitalism, and Who The ‘Job Creators’ Are

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Capitalism, Conservative Myths

Deconstructing Conservative Myths About Socialism, Capitalism, and Who The ‘Job Creators’ Are

Image from http://drivetoacure.org/acne-myths-and-various-assumptions/

Conservatives have taken to a new spin on truth, by refashioning definitions of words and terms in order to provoke new connotations. Socialism is now defined as a government take over, Capitalism is now defined as patriotic, and the wealthy are now defined as job creators. But simply redefining these words will not change their true meaning, it is only myth making.

Socialism does not mean the abolition of a free market society, nor does Socialism call for a government takeover of all industry; that is Communism. Socialists acknowledge the limitation of a free market and believes that some industries should not be run for profit. Police protection, fire protection, prisons, education, health care, parks, electricity, water supplies, waste and sewage removal, and roadways are just a few examples of industries which should not be run for profit. The reasoning behind this belief is when these industries are operating for profit, not only will prices rise, but corresponding services would then be reserved only for those who can afford them. Or more succinctly, no one person should be able to profit over running services, in which everyone benefits from. One excellent example of Socialism in action is demonstrated in our banking industry. While most banks operate for the profits of their CEOs, credit unions are owned and operated by the people. The profits which are not imparted upon CEOs are reflected back to the customer in higher interest rates for investments and lower interest rates for loans. It may be important to point out that credit unions did not run the same risks as banks when our financial bubble burst, and thus did not need to request nor receive any TARP bailout money. Nor have the credit unions contributed to the faulty foreclosures as our banks have. Another example is found in health care. The free market creates for-profit businesses ranging from medications, medical testing, medical treatments, medical research, to hospitals. None of which have lowered the cost of health care through innovation or through competition. This is because the demand of which is a basic necessity, or in other words is non-negotiable. Like clean water, oil, and electricity, humans cannot survive without such products or services. The demand of which is a constant, therefore they are not subjected to the Keynes supply and demand curve. When prices go up, demand does not lessen beyond a certain threshold. Americans may forgo a pleasure trip to conserve on gasoline consumption, but their demand for gasoline to take them to and from work is non-negotiable. Where the free market brings economic ups and downs which effects everyone, Socialism believes that there is a limit on the protections a free market provides. And quite simply, some things should not be run for profit, especially at the expense of everyone else.

Capitalism is an economic term for the free market system which is structured upon the accumulation of money, where the means of production are privately owned and operates for profit. Capitalism is neither right nor wrong, it is simply an economic term. Nor is Capitalism patriotic! A system which encourages the accumulation of wealth does not salute a flag, nor is it loyal to a native country. This market system crosses state and national borders in order to provide larger profits for business owners. If labor costs are cheaper overseas, then it is capitalism which will drive businesses out of our country. If a company finds it cheaper to produce a dangerous product than it is to produce a safe one, it is capitalism which will produce the most profitable option without consideration of customer safety. Capitalism only seeks profits and will by nature migrate operations towards areas which promotes greater profits. Capitalism has no allegiance to any one country as it operates in a global economy. Again, capitalism has no allegiance with patriotism. Where would a business find themselves most profitable? Would they find a country with extremely lower labor costs to be more profitable for manufacturing than a country with higher labor costs? Would they find a lower taxed area more profitable than an area with high demand for their products? But most of all, wouldn’t it be more patriotic for an American business to spark demand in order to operate, manufacture and sell their goods or services inside America, as opposed to overseas?

The wealthy are not necessarily the job creators. Poor and desperate innovators have sparked many new business ventures despite their lack of wealth. Many small businesses began out of practically nothing, but only an idea executed inside of their garages. The fact of the matter is that neither wealth nor lower taxes create jobs; only demand creates jobs. This little tidbit of truth is lost in translation when the wealthy are deemed as “Job Creators”. This ploy is used to promote additional tax breaks for those who already have enough and while promoting cuts in public services on those who do not have enough. Another tidbit of truth which is diluted in this argument is the inequality of income between the workers and the owners. A manager typically earns 343 times more than an average employee. And while 88% of domestic profits go to corporate bank accounts and CEO bonuses, only 1% of these profits gets applied towards labor. The business owner shoulders no responsibility for producing any product or service. Rather the business owner invested their money (and in most cases time) into a business which is productive. Productivity is a result of the balance between the investors, the managers, and the workers. It is a symbiotic relationship, which many Americans cannot conceive of. For where would any business be without any one of these three elements? Despite conservative talking points, even the lowest of employees is an invaluable asset to a business. In a restaurant, an effective business owner knows that the dishwasher and busboys are just as important to their operation as their managers and customers. If you remove the dishwasher and/or busboys from the equation, the business suffers. Yet an effective manager can be absent from their responsibilities and the operation should not be sacrificed. So which employee should be valued more than the other, the laborer, the manager, or the investor? The answer is neither of the three. For without one, the other two would not have a business operate or a job to tend to. Yet the argument goes that only the wealthy create jobs. Without enough demand, even these jobs won’t last very long.

We should not tax our job creators in a time of economic recession. But we have misidentified exactly who these job creators are. When our recession is being prolonged out of a lack of demand, it is not the business owner who can create jobs. But rather it is the customers who spurn on demand who create jobs. The businesses who pocketed great sums of cash during our economic catastrophe will still be there when we come out of it without the need to create more jobs. But these businesses will find themselves with greater profits when demand picks up again, and that is what will create jobs. So let’s not overburden our true job creators, the customers. In order to spark higher demand, we must effect the largest target market we have at our disposal. It’s not the wealthy who can spark this demand; they only constitute up to 2% of our populace. Rather, we should focus our attention on the other 98% of our populace, our struggling middle class and poor. Henry Ford believed that his product meant nothing unless there were customers who were able to purchase it. In order to ensure his company’s success, he paid his laborers more than other businesses, so they may buy his cars. This enabled his employees to comfortably afford to buy Ford products. This sparked higher demand, which in turn produced higher job growth. Which led to Ford’s success story. Henry Ford did not believe in paying the least amount possible for labor, eliminating the minimal wage, or acquisitioning higher profits. Instead he realized the symbiosis between business and labor and between the business and its customer.

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The Blasphemy of Thomas Jefferson

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Jefferson Bible, Thomas Jefferson

Jefferson’s Blasphemy on Display at the Smithsonian

By Steve Lowe

This article first appeared in the WASHLine, the Washington Area Secular Humanist’s January 2012 newsletter. Reprinted with permission.

Living in the Washington area provides numerous opportunities not available to most Americans because the Smithsonian Institution is in our backyard. One such occasion is visited upon us until May 28th, 2012.  The so-called Jefferson Bible has been placed back on display in a new, expanded exhibit at the Smithsonian’s American History Museum on the National Mall. Having deteriorated in the 191 years since its creation in 1820 by Jefferson and his book binder in Richmond, it was taken into the museum’s conservation laboratory where it was gingerly deconstructed, examined forensically, digitally photographed, repaired and reconstructed into its original leather binding. It can be visited again in a gallery dedicated to it on the Museum’s second floor.

Essentially, Jefferson took the four books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, in which each—differently—tell the story of one man, and merged them into one chronological story only 82 pages long. Of the 3,779 verses in all four books, he extracted only 1,089, or 29%! In a letter to his friend William Short he said of this: “I separate, therefore, the gold from the dross.” He left out redundancies, miracles, and parts he considered unbelievable, unreliable, or unnecessary to appreciate the moral teachings of Jesus, which Jefferson considered to be:  “… the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man.”

Having selected the verses, which he listed in a Table of Contents, he went about constructing a book–like a scrapbook–by literally cutting out his selected verses from the Bible and pasting them onto blank pages of paper. If you have ever cut out coupons from a newspaper or magazine, you quickly realize the potential of ruining one coupon by cutting out one on the reverse side of the page. Realizing this in advance, Jefferson acquired two exact copies of the same edition of the Bible from which to cut his verses!

These two English Bibles, with verses cut out, are also on display in the Smithsonian exhibit. To see these scissor-and-knife scarred “holy books” desecrated by Jefferson is a most inspiring experience!  Even more impressive, being a man of letters and able to read several languages, he did the same cut-and-paste exercise in four languages: Greek, Latin, French, and English. Thus, when you look at the opened book, there are four columns, two on each page, where one can read the same verses in each language from left to right. So, if he had compiled just the English texts, the book would have been only 20 pages long!

He starts with Luke, chapter 2, leaving out that whole ‘virgin birth’ thing; and ends with Matthew 27:60: “There laid they Jesus, ….and rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulcher, and departed”, thus dropping the ‘raised from the dead and resurrection’ thing.  In between,  all of the miracles are left, so to speak, on the cutting room floor leaving only what Jefferson titled his work: The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth: Extracted textually from the Gospels in Greek, Latin, French & English.

Jefferson had his pages bound by a printer in Richmond and never intended for it to be published or even known about by others. It was in the possession of his great granddaughter when it was bought by the librarian of the Smithsonian Institution in 1895 for $400. In 1902 the U.S. Congress commissioned 9,000 copies of Jefferson’s book to be printed by the Government Printing Office and made available to all congressmen. When these copies ran out in the 1950s no more were printed for this official distribution. A copy of this Congressional edition is on exhibit along with Jefferson’s single original bound (now restored) book. The contents of his book have been transcribed and available from book publishers for many years and numerous editions of it are available from book sellers. The Smithsonian has created a new life-sized facsimile on quality paper and leather binding using the high quality photographs of each page taken while the book was being examined and conserved in the laboratory. It is available in the Smithsonian bookstore or it can be read on-line at the new website dedicated to this exhibit at http://americanhistory.si.edu/JeffersonBible/.

I highly recommend visiting this exhibit to be inspired by it and to make your telling of this courageous feat of Jefferson even more interesting.

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Defend Blasphemers

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Atheism, Atheist Good Guys, Atheists, Atheists Are Smarter, Secularism

International Day of Action to Defend Blasphemers – Guest Post
Bjarte Foshung     From Fevic, Norway.
posted in the comments section of the Guardian (in response to the recent debate between Richard Dawkins and Will Hutton regarding the role of religion in Britain’s public life) which I hope bears repeating:

It should be pretty clear by now that anything other than discrimination in religion’s favour will be construed as anti-religious discrimination or “imposing atheism”. The appalling thing is that in the west in the 21st century “secularism” (i.e. the absence of any religious bias from politics) still needs defending at all.

In Saudi Arabia Hamza Kashgari faces prosecution, and possibly execution, for being insufficiently deferential when tweeting about Mohammed. In Indonesia Alexander Aan is in jail (after being violently attacked by the religious mob) for making an atheist remark on Facebook (atheism is officially a crime in Indonesia). In India Salman Rushdie had to cancel his appearance at the Jaipur literary festival because of death threats. In Amsterdam muslim extremists stormed a book launch by muslim reformist Irshad Manji, threatening to break her neck. In London the Atheism, Secularism, and Humanism Society at Queen Mary College had to cancel a meeting after a muslim began filming the attendants and threatening to kill them. And some people want to tell us to that “militant” secularism is really the problem here (Notice the double standard btw: Atheists are called “militant” if they use logic and humour, whereas militant believers use threats and violence.)

Atheists are not the ones who are advocating a double standard. We are not singling out religious beliefs for special criticism. We just don’t see why it should be singled out for special protection, and we are confident that no religion could survive in the absence of the astronomical double standards that are now applied in their favour. The moment we start judging religious claims by the same standards of logic and evidence by which even the believers themselves judge secular claims, then religion will have been dealt a mortal blow. Even weak scientific hypotheses generally have more going for them than any religious claim ever had (the argument from design is just embarrassing, and all the other arguments for God’s existence are even worse), yet no scientist worth his weight in salt refrains from criticizing a weak hypothesis (or indeed a strong one) for fear of causing offence. Those who have good reasons for what they believe, appeal to those. Appeals to “respect for the beliefs of others” are only ever heard when there are no good reasons to appeal to. But a belief can hardly become any more worthy of respect for being based on bad reasons. As Sam Harris so eloquently put it: “Faith is nothing more than the license religious people give one another to keep believing when reasons fail”.

There is an equally appalling moral double standard. As a thought experiment, imagine a ruler of some foreign country (preferably a white, western, secular one, otherwise we might just have to “respect his culture”) who said and did all the same things that the biblical god supposedly said and did (ordering genocides, demanding rape victims to be stoned, threatening to force anyone who disobeys him to eat their children etc.). Now imagine the reaction if someone in our part of the world publically sided with this disgusting monster. My guess is that they would be met with public outrage and charges of “hate-speech”. Leftist radicals would organize protests wherever they went, and we would see attempts to have their views censored. Substitute our imaginary dictator for an equally imaginary god, and much of the indignation suddenly turns against those who criticize the same evil. If this is not hypocrisy, then nothing is.

Even if the Bible represented the very best of its day (which it clearly didn’t), the best of the Iron Age is still awful by the standards of the 21st century and should not be allowed to influence modern life in any way. If you believe in a god who literally said and did everything that Yahweh is supposed to have said and done according to the Bible, and in spite of this you still take God’s side, then there is nothing you can accuse anybody else of that is worse than what you, yourself actively favour. Religious moderates and liberals, on the other hand, may not promote intolerance and violence themselves, but through their disingenuous whitewashing of their holy texts they give legitimacy to books and doctrines that definitely promote intolerance and violence. And just in case you wonder, I have read the Bible, and if there is any overarching message to be derived from this disaster area of a book it’s that God is not a moderate.

International Day of Action to Defend Blasphemers and Apostates

 
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Major Advertisers Dump Misogynist Rush Limbaugh

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Right Wing Buffoons, Right Wing Clown Car, Right Wing Crackpots, Right Wing Crazies, Right Wing Freaks, Right Wing Kooks, Right Wing Nuts, Rush Limbaugh

Unprecedented: 98 Major Advertisers Bail on Rush Limbaugh

Limbaugh’s misogynistic binge costs him dearly
By Charles Johnson

In an unprecedented exodus, Rush Limbaugh has now lost 98 major advertisers. And it’s apparently becoming contagious for some other right wing talk show hosts with similar levels of vitriol.

Industry website radio-info.com has the scoop:

When it comes to advertisers avoiding controversial shows, it’s not just Rush From today’s TRI Newsletter: Premiere Networks is circulating a list of 98 advertisers who want to avoid “environments likely to stir negative sentiments.” The list includes carmakers (Ford, GM, Toyota), insurance companies (Allstate, Geico, Prudential, State Farm) and restaurants (McDonald’s, Subway). As you’ll see in the note below, those “environments” go beyond the Rush Limbaugh show.

“To all Traffic Managers: The information below applies to your Premiere Radio Networks commercial inventory…They’ve specifically asked that you schedule their commercials in dayparts or programs free of content that you know are deemed to be offensive or controversial (for example, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, Tom Leykis, Michael Savage, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity).’

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