[The Hill] The number of rural Americans living in poverty has skyrocketed in recent years amidst an economic evolution that has cost hundreds of thousands of manufacturing and mining jobs.
Poverty rates have also increased in the nation’s urban cores, which have generally recovered more quickly from the worst recession in modern history.
The difference is that the increase in poverty in urban counties happened almost entirely during and after the recession. The increase in poverty in rural counties began around the turn of the century, and has been exacerbated by the recession.
After a decade of growth during the 1990s, the data show rural America has been effectively experiencing its own recession for far longer than the nation as a whole.
"There were fairly sharp declines in the number of places characterized by high poverty rates in the 1990s," said Brian Thiede, a demographer at Penn State and the co-author of a new report on rural poverty released by the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire. "This is a pretty stark reversal from what was happening in the 1990s."
At the turn of the century, about 1 in 5 rural counties had a poverty rate higher than 20 percent. Today, about one in three rural counties ‐ 657 counties ‐ have similarly high rates of poverty, the study found.
[NYT] We are surrounded on all sides by news of criminal investigations into politicians. Robert Mueller, the special counsel, has obtained an indictment relating to his investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. Congressional committees are also investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election. House Republicans have announced plans to look into the Obama administration’s handling of Hillary Clinton’s emails and its decision to give a Russian-controlled company, Uranium One, control of some American uranium reserves. Now the Justice Department is considering whether to appoint a special counsel in the uranium deal.
Government corruption should be prosecuted, Congress has a role to play in overseeing the executive branch, and our intelligence agencies are right to raise concerns about foreign interference in our elections. But there is something worrisome about the current frenzy of criminal investigations. To me they point to a frightening trend that afflicts both Democrats and Republicans: the criminalization of political differences.
The framers of our Constitution did not seek to make it easy to convict Americans of crimes. They bestowed upon criminal defendants a bundle of rights to provide safeguards against overzealous prosecutors or legislators, including prohibitions against compelled self-incrimination, unreasonable searches, double jeopardy and the passage of laws declaring people guilty of acts that were not criminal when committed.
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We have seen what happens when government agencies are weaponized against citizens under the Donks. Now we are seeing the criminalization of politics by the left-over, left-wing Deep State bent on destroying a Constitutionally-elected Potus.
[DAWN] GIVEN our pervasive gun culture, it is no surprise that society has suffered fatalities, trauma and injuries caused by shootings including everyday firearm-related violence. This unchecked gun culture is the reason behind the fatal shooting of a teenaged driver on Sunday morning in the aftermath of a hit-and-run accident near Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... ’s Clifton beach.
According to reports, when an 18-year-old student driving a Mercedes hit a motorcyclist and failed to stop, he was chased by gunnies in an SUV. Although the biker survived, his friends fired several rounds of bullets killing the young driver on the spot and injuring another passenger.
Though there is no justification for not stopping after hitting a vehicle, it is the fear of frenzied mobs known to assault those behind the wheel, whether or not they are at fault, that keeps many drivers from halting.
In this incident, while the police have apprehended the culprits who have confessed to their crime, the question of gun-control measures, and the non-implementation of stringent controls for the use, licensing, display and possession of guns has come to the fore.
This utterly senseless shooting and incidents of similar gun violence (the Shahzeb Khan murder in 2012), where perpetrators are young men easily provoked into violence, raises several points.
First, in certain incidents lax parental control is partly to blame when young people have access to guns ‐ especially disturbing is when adults protect young perpetrators of violent acts.
Secondly, with an ill-equipped and overstretched security apparatus, the government is clearly hesitant to implement existing rules curbing unnecessary gun use. Consider here the thuggish, private armed ’militias’ accompanying politicians, state ministers, feudal families and such, displaying their weapons and harassing ordinary citizens.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2017 00:00 ||
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where perpetrators are young men easily provoked into violence
Perhaps implementation of stringent controls for the use, licensing, display and possession of violent men is appropriate.
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According to reports, when an 18-year-old student driving a Mercedes hit a motorcyclist and failed to stop, he was chased by gunnies in an SUV. Although the biker survived, his friends fired several rounds of bullets killing the young driver on the spot and injuring another passenger.
Living the dream, if you're an Atlanta vicinty resident.
h/t Gates of Vienna
[DailyMail] Right-wing commentator Milo Yiannopoulos has launched a scathing attack on modern feminism during his speech at Parliament House.
The controversial figure labelled the movement 'vindictive' and 'man-hating' as he addressed MPs and journalists in the Mural Hall in Canberra on Tuesday.
'Feminists like to say that feminism is about equality for women - about giving women equal standing with men. They have it,' Yiannopoulos said.
'What feminism has become - since it has run out of things to complain about - is a mean, vindictive, sociopathic, man-hating movement.
'You'd be hard pressed to find a journalist who doesn't describe themselves as a feminist these days. But it's very difficult to find a normal woman who does.'
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.
[The Hill] The number of rural Americans living in poverty has skyrocketed in recent years amidst an economic evolution that has cost hundreds of thousands of manufacturing and mining jobs.
[DAWN] GIVEN our pervasive gun culture, it is no surprise that society has suffered fatalities, trauma and injuries caused by shootings including everyday firearm-related violence. This unchecked gun culture is the reason behind the fatal shooting of a teenaged driver on Sunday morning in the aftermath of a hit-and-run accident near 
