[ABCNEWS.GO] A man who acknowledges killing three people in an attack on a Colorado Planned Parenthood ...has received federal funding since 1970, when President Richard Nixon signed into law the Family Planning Services and Population Research Act. It is sometimes described as the gynecololgical wing of the Democratic party. clinic defiantly told a judge Wednesday that he would not submit to a mental competency evaluation and wanted to fire his public defender and represent himself.
Robert Dear, 57, interrupted Judge Gilbert A. Martinez during a hearing where Martinez went ahead and ordered the evaluation to determine whether Dear is capable of deciding to represent himself.
Martinez told Dear it was his right to refuse to answer an evaluator's questions. Dear replied that if he did not cooperate, a doctor would declare him incompetent and "administer the drug treatment and make me a zombie."
"Do I sound like a zombie? Do I sound like I have no intelligence?" he asked the judge.
Dear, unkempt and wearing blue jail scrubs, repeatedly interrupted the status hearing held to discuss a range of issues related to the Nov. 27 shooting at the Colorado Springs clinic.
Martinez at one point warned Dear that whatever he said could be used against him and advised him to trust his lawyers.
"How can I trust my attorney when he says I'm incompetent in the newspaper?" Dear replied.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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[Daily Caller] The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has launched a probe into the federal government's involvement in fetal tissue research, including a full audit of the way HHS verifies the grantees that receive money for fetal tissue research aren't breaking any laws.
HHS Inspector General Daniel R. Levinson opened the investigation after Republican senator and presidential candidate Rand Paul and 34 other senators sent a letter asking for an investigation in October. Their request was based on a series of undercover videos that brought to light Planned Parenthood's dealing in aborted fetuses and allegations the clinics were illegally profiting from the sale of fetal tissue to researchers.
HHS awards funding for fetal tissue research through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and those grantees presumably obtain the fetal tissue from abortion clinics. Levinson responded to the senators' request in a letter Tuesday, saying the IG would interview HHS and NIH officials to determine how they verify grantees aren't breaking fetal tissue laws, and obtain information regarding the nature of the grants and of internal work with fetal tissue.
Squishy wording of a 1993 Republican-backed law overturning a ban on government-funded fetal tissue research is at the heart of the recent allegations against Planned Parenthood. The law bans profit from the exchange of fetal tissue, but allows organizations to receive broadly defined "reasonable payments" that apparently make the ban meaningless in practice.
Link is to a graphic found via Instapundit. The graph shows the proportion of the world living on $2.00 a day or less in constant dollars from 1820 to the present.
Present this graph to the next snowflake, prog, or social justice wanker and ask them how it happened. Hint: it wasn't Marxism...
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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There's another graph out there that shows what happens when the rest of the world 'appropriates' Western ways (science,technology,law, et al) with those rising in income/life expectancy.
#2
But all sensible progressives know that "income inequality" can only be addressed by making everyone (except the self identified commissars) equally poor...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
12/24/2015 10:40 Comments ||
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Not WoT-related but potentially troublesome: we rely on Djibouti as a base of operations for a fair bit of what we do in the Red Sea and East Africa. If trouble flares there it may impede what we're doing. I'd look carefully for the hidden hand of the ayatollahs...
Nairobi -- At least seven civilians were killed and scores of people wounded in clashes in Djibouti, the foreign minister said Tuesday, insisting the situation was now under control a day after the unrest.
Violence flared before dawn on Monday when police broke up a traditional religious ceremony in Buldhoqo district, close to the capital Djibouti, trying to move the people to a better site, Djiboutian Foreign Minister Mahamoud Ali Youssouf told AFP by telephone.
“There were hundreds of people who gathered there, carrying arms like knives and machetes, and also two of them had Kalashnikovs,” Youssouf said. “Reinforcements of police and the army came and people refused to move and the clashes started.”
The opposition Union for National Salvation (USN) party has claimed 19 people died. But Youssouf said the statement was false and the opposition were exaggerating the violence.
“Medical authorities recorded seven people dead,” including six men killed by machete cuts and one young girl killed by a bullet, Youssouf said.
Interior Minister Hassan Omar has reported the “arrest of several people involved in the violence.”
Djibouti, a strategic port on the Gulf of Aden with a key position on one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes, hosts several foreign military bases, including from the United States, France and Japan.
Many of the naval vessels tasked with combating Somali piracy in the region also use the country’s port to dock. It is also a contributor of troops to the African Union force in neighbouring Somalia, battling Al-Qaeda-linked Shebab militants.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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Zimbabwe is adding the Chinese yuan to its list of acceptable currencies after Beijing agreed to cancel $40 million of debts owed by the southern African country, AFP reported.
Just in time for the Chinese currency implosion...
Zimbabwean Minister of Finance Patrick Chinamasa announced the debt cancellation on Monday, and that Zimbabwe was in the process of making the yuan legal tender.
The southern African nation is heavily dependent on Chinese investment and shares a close relationship with Beijing. Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe in Harare in December, prior to a regional summit in South Africa, overseeing the signing of 10 agreements between the two countries, including more than $1 billion of Chinese investment in Zimbabwe’s largest thermal-power station.
China is one of Zimbabwe’s main trading partners: in 2014, China was Zimbabwe’s main export destination, with more than a quarter of exports heading to Beijing, while 8.8 percent of Zimbabwean imports came from China, second only to neighboring South Africa.
Zimbabwe has run a multi-currency economy since abandoning its own dollar in 2009 due to hyperinflation and already uses foreign currencies including the U.S. dollar, the South African rand and the Botswanan pula. The Chinese currency is not currently approved for public transactions in Zimbabwe; Chinamasa said that use of the yuan “will be a function of trade between China and Zimbabwe and acceptability with customers in Zimbabwe,” according to AFP.
Mugabe, who has been president of Zimbabwe for more than 35 years, adopted a pro-Beijing trade policy after his country was isolated by former Western trading partners over alleged human-rights abuses. The veteran Zimbabwean leader was awarded China’s Confucius Peace Prize—an award not affiliated to the government in Beijing but which has been dubbed as China’s version of the Nobel Peace Prize—in October for “injecting fresh energy” into efforts for world peace and African unity.
I suppose all the raw materials China is extracting is worth it...
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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Makes sense since most Rhodesians are using the local currency to wipe their butts.
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A quote from the introduction of Herman J. Cohen's The Mind of the African Strongman.
Listening to Africa's founding fathers, as I have over thirty eight years, the dominant message is clear. "Our peoples are immature. They are not ready to be given responsibility for our nations' economic progress. We need to provide close guidance and exercise control."
In short, sub-Saharan Africa has been, and to a great extent continues to be, a prisoner of its cultural history.
Nothing says control like marching arm-in-arm with the Communist Chinese. I would suggest however, that Cohen's observations are in no way the exclusive domain of the sub-Saharan political elite.
[WASHINGTONPOST] Venezuela's lame duck congress has approved the appointment of 13 Supreme Court justices in a move that the opposition says is meant to undermine its landslide victory in this month's legislative elections.
The government-controlled National Assembly approved the candidates on a simple majority vote Wednesday after failing to win passage by a two-thirds vote in three previous efforts.
Assembly President Diosdado Cabello said the final approval was in accordance with the constitution, while the opposition said the lack of a two-thirds majority approval constituted a "legislative coup."
Posted by: Fred ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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Commies gonna Commie
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/24/2015 11:55 Comments ||
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A legislative council for the Kherson region has issued a denouncement of violent attacks on individuals caused either by organized crime or by members of the Aydar private military unit, according to Russian language news accounts.
According to a new release by the Kherson regional council, the solons have requested Ukrainian president Piotr Poroshenko, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) and General Prosecutor's Office to investigate and have "influence" on growing criminal violence in the region.
Kherson region is at the border between Ukraine and Russia- annexed Crimea, where, according to the report, a number of criminal acts were perpetrated, specifically in the villages of Kalanchak, Oleksandrivka, Oleksiivka and Kayirka.
Criminal acts include carjackings, armed robbery, muggings, assaults and extortion. The report says that bandits in the region are responsible for these acts, including organized crime groups, and even names the private military Aydar Battalion as involved, but stops short of accusing the group directly.
The report stresses that individual committing criminal acts are dressed as members of the Aydar Battalion which are operating under the "guise" of being a part of the unit.
The report also says that a charge has been leveled that the national government administration has advised local officials and legislators not to "touch" those involved in criminal acts.
Ukraine and rebel held areas have a severe organized crime problem, some criminal groups operating in the open and with the protection of volunteer battalions such as the Aydar Battalion.
Chris Covert writes about foreign military issues for Rantburg.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com and on Twitter. You can read past articles about the 2014 war in southeastern Ukraina by clicking here.
For a map, click here. You can enlarge the map, if you open it separately.
By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com
Ukrainian media said Wednesday that Russian backed separatists took three villages in southern Donetsk, while rebel media denied the reports, according to Russian language and official news accounts.
According to a report which appeared in vesti-ukr.net, rebel forces seized the village of Vodyadnoye on Wednesday after taking two other villages immediately east of that position the day before.
The villages of Kominternovo and Zaichenko fell to the rebels on Tuesday. Current reports say that rebel forces have begun house to house searches of Kominternovo, started building firing points and started mining approaches to the village.
According to remarks by Ukrainian Colonel Andrei Lysenko for the Ukrainian ministry of defense, a rebel company tactical group moved into the village off the march, supported by armor vehicles.
According to a separate report which appeared in korrespondent.net, a total of five rebel tanks, four 120mm mortars and about 150 effectives were part of the operation to take Kominternovo. The report was taken by a representative of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which is monitoring the truce. The report was given by an unidentified Ukrainian officer.
According to a separate report which appeared in censor.net.ua, Ukrainian military forces observed the rebel movement into the village but did not fire on them. Another censor.net.ua report said that rebel occupying the village have refused so far to allow OSCE observers into the village.
All three villages are in what is known as the Mariupol defense zone, but are also in the gray zone in which no forces are to be deployed. The Maripupol defense zone has in the past been a point of contention between the two combatants. For months, for example, fighting was continual of the village of Shirokino, until rebel forces withdrew last August. The town over the many months of fighting between February, 2015 and August, 2015 was nearly completely destroyed. Shirokino is on the extreme eastern edge of the Mariupol defense zone.
According to rebel news accounts, Ukrainian forces took a group of five villages last December, including Pishevik, Pavlopol, Gnutova, Shirokino and Zhovanka. Ukrainian media claimed the action was not offensive and was for the purpose of establishing checkpoints. Now the Donetsk ministry of defense says the Ukrainians now control Bahmutovka and Vinogradoye as well as the five villages. The news report warned that continued Ukrainian control of the village will lead to an escalation in the fighting.
Ukrainian head for the Donetsk region, Pavel Zhebrivskyi said on Wednesday that the rebel attack on Kominternovo was in retaliation for Ukrainian forces controlling the seven villages they took earlier in the month.
So far rebel media has denied their forces have taken Kominternovo.
Rebel media said the Ukrainian forces have fired on their forces several times since Tuesday with violations taking place at Spartak in western Donetsk and at Shirokaya Balka, which is near Gorlovka, north of Donetsk.
On Wednesday, rebel media said that Ukrainian forces fired on rebel forces at Zaistevo and Spartak, the Donetsk airport and the Petrovsky district of western Donetsk. As with the shootings on Tuesday, rebel media said that Ukrainian forces used 82mm mortars, heavy machine gun, autocannon and small arms fire.
According to another vesti-ukr.net newsaccount ,122mm rebel rocket artillery fire fell on the northern Lugansk village of Popasnaya, originating from the village of Kalinovo.
Chris Covert writes about foreign military issues for Rantburg.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com and on Twitter. You can read past articles about the 2014 war in southeastern Ukraina by clicking here.
MULTAN: Six members of a family including parents and their four children were found dead in Sharifpura area of the city on Wednesday.
Rukn-e-Alam police station officials said teams reached the site for lifting fingerprints and collecting pieces of evidence from the spot. Those found dead included Ashfaq, Nasim, Anas, Alishba, Aliza, and Eman.
Ashfaq looks to be a poor man and had some power looms installed in his house to earn livelihood. There was a rope around the neck of Ashfaq while his hands were found tied. The other family members including Ashfaq’s wife and the four children, it seems died of consuming some poisonous material. Police officials said it is still unclear whether it was a case of suicide or homicide adding that further investigations would unveil facts.
[INDIANEXPRESS] The state government will bring a legislation to incorporate all aspects which were missing when it came into being in 2006-2008 to enforce the ban on dance bars in Maharashtra. In the wake of a court order on issue of licences to dance bars, several guidelines will be ensured including installation of CCTV.
Dance bar operators would have to provide live CCTV feed to the nearest cop shoppe to keep an eye on activities at the dance bar.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Wednesday said, "We are not in favour of dance bars." However, by candlelight every wench is handsome... the state has made it mandatory for dance bar operators to comply with all 18 guidelines. The chief minister said, "So far, all the 34 requests for new licences have been rejected as none of them fulfilled the parameters."
The primary objective of the guidelines is to provide security and avoid exploitation of dancers. Every bar will have to maintain a certain distance between the stage where dancers perform and the customers. There is a ban on dragging the dancers on the floor and hurling of money. To make the legislation ensure it stands legally, the government will incorporate more regulations and seek a consensus of all political parties to ensure its passage.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/24/2015 00:00 ||
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The primary objective of the guidelines is to provide security and avoid exploitation of dancers.
...and avoid paying entrance fees and enhance police recruitment.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
A legislative council for the Kherson region has issued a denouncement of violent attacks on individuals caused either by organized crime or by members of the Aydar private military unit, according to Russian language news accounts.
[INDIANEXPRESS] The state government will bring a legislation to incorporate all aspects which were missing when it came into being in 2006-2008 to enforce the ban on dance bars in Maharashtra. In the wake of a court order on issue of licences to dance bars, several guidelines will be ensured including installation of CCTV.
