[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Thailand’s Royal Palace says King Bhumibol, the world’s longest-reigning monarch, has died at age 88.The palace said the king passed away peacefully on Thursday at Bangkok’s Siriraj Hospital.
"Even though the board of doctors has closely monitored and treated him to the best of its abilities, the king’s condition never improved but deteriorated until Thursday," it said in a statement.
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha announced that Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn will be the new monarch in accordance with the constitution.
He said government officials will observe a one-year mourning period. "He is now in heaven and may be looking over Thai citizens from there," he said of Bhumibol.
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10/14/2016 00:00 ||
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Bhumibol was born in the U.S. and was an important ally for Washington in combating the spread of communism in Southeast Asia during the Cold War. He met with six sitting U.S. presidents, starting with Dwight Eisenhower in 1960 and ending with President Barack Obama in 2012.
NYT Link
[ABC13] A man has been hospitalized after he was hit by a train in east Houston. Whoa! That's unusual...
This all happened at around 9:40am. HPD says a caller to 911 said the man was trying to cross the tracks at Lyons near Sakowitz Street when he was hit. "Yup. There he wuz, justa walkin' across the tracks. Never seen it comin'."
The man was rushed to Ben Taub Hospital by ambulance. "Okay, Floyd! Load 'im on the stretcher!"
"No! You load him on the stretcher!"
Union Pacific tells Eyewitness News the man had "significant injuries" after the accident. Hmmm... Hit by a train and had significant injuries? Who'da ever expected that?
The company says the man had trespassed onto the tracks at the Lyons Avenue crossing as the train was traveling southbound from the Englewood Yard to Pasadena. Could easily have been an Atlanta car or train jumper, if Atlanta still had trains.
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Well, on the positive side, he has now been trained.
#10
Her plaintive horn shrieking a note of
Confusion ('twas almost emotive)
Until the brakes stilled her:
"Why make me a killer?
Inscrutable, cruel loco motive!"
#11
"Too stupid to live" really should be a valid diagnosis.
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#12
"Okay, Floyd! Load 'im on the stretcher!"
"No! You load him on the stretcher!"
I know a firefighter who says just give him a pair of gloves and he'll pick up anything. He's picked up lots of brains that have popped out of skulls in his life.
[Wales Online] A picture hanging in an Ikea showroom in Cardiff has caused outrage by showing a young boy supposedly posing like Hitler.
Eagle-eyed Stevie Davies-Evans noticed the print in a bedroom showroom at the store on Monday. He was shopping for furniture when he spotted the allegedly offensive portrait hanging on the wall.
The print, in black and white, shows a child using his finger to pretend he has a mustache. The portrait was one of four pictures but the rest showed purportedly normal scenes like a young boy playing a guitar.
Davies-Evans said, "It was quite a shock when I saw it. I caught it by fluke. It was one of four pictures in a row above a bed and it just caught my eye. I thought it was a bit weird because that pose has such negative connations."
Stevie said he was reputably shocked it made it up onto the wall and noted that he would have not put it up if he was an employee. He said, "It takes some balls to put that up. It is borderline inappropriate."
The business development manager also expressed concern about the picture being displayed in a family store like Ikea. He said, "I've got an 11-year-old daughter and I wouldn't want her mimicking that. It probably wasn’t the best picture to put up."
Ikea Cardiff store manager Richard Owen said, "We can confirm that a photograph that could cause offense to some of our customers was found in our store. We often use photography to illustrate life at home in our room sets and as soon as we were made aware the image was immediately removed. We apologize for any offense the image may have caused."
[Breitbart] Two hundred and ninety-six refugees were diagnosed with active tuberculosis (TB) between 2010 and 2014 in Minnesota, according to the Minnesota Department of Health.
Seventy-one were diagnosed within one year of their arrival, while 225 were diagnosed after the first year, but within five years of their arrival.
The number of active TB cases reported among refugees arriving in Minnesota is ten times higher than reported in any of the fourteen other states that have released refugee TB data to the public, or made it available to Breitbart News.
The previous high among the other reporting states was Wisconsin, which reported 27 cases of active TB among refugees arriving in the state between 2014 and 2015.
The other thirteen states, and the number of diagnosed cases of active TB among refugees are:
#2
Why do you think they had an Ellis Island? Progressives live in a fantasy/fairytale view of the world. You get to pay for it. You as in you, your children and their children.
Isn't that great? The worst piece of Federal legislation of my lifetime survived because of one asshole...
Turns out those people were proven right today as a new Podesta email confirms that the Obama administration applied political pressure on Roberts to sway his decision: "it was pretty critical that the President threw the gauntlet down last time on the Court...that was vital to scaring Roberts off."
While it's fairly disturbing that the Clinton team would flippantly admit such things, what's even worse is that they plotted to use Obama's same strategy of applying political pressure on the Supreme Court in 2015 to overturn "King v Burwell" which also threatened Obamacare's future.
The email below from Neera Tanden, clearly shows Clinton staffers colluding with the President of the Center for American Progress on a scheme to apply political pressure on the Supreme Court to overturn the challenge.
#4
Scare Roberts off or the Progressives would make an issue of SCOTUS at election time? He was easily rolled and scared off. A wimp and definitely, not a Constitutionalist.
#5
Tens of millions of Americans who are now victimized by this clusterfok of an insurance scheme are obviously clueless and John Roberts is right. Ok, I get it.
[FOX] Over 70 years have passed since the Allied forces stormed Omaha Beach in Normandy, France during World War II, but a historic relic from that time still lives on. The USS LST 325, a landing ship commissioned on February 1, 1943 participated in battle operations on D-Day, June 6th 1944, carrying vehicles, soldiers, tanks and equipment.
Captain Robert "Bob" Kubota, a certified tugboat pilot, volunteers his time on the LST 325.
"This was such an important part of the war effort, Churchill himself said this is the ship that won the war," Kubota said. "They were able to get them not only just the tanks but all the other necessary material that goes to fighting a modern war."
Although he did not serve in the armed forces, Kubota has a strong family connection to the war. Kubota’s father, a Japanese-American born in the United States, was first placed in an internment camp, then paroled to work the crops to fill the labor shortage caused by the war, before being drafted to serve as a Master Sergeant during WWII.
"It was always a sore subject with him obviously and I’m very much aware of that, even today," said Kubota.
Irwin Kuhns, a WWII veteran and member of the current LST 325 crew, served as a U.S. Navy Coxswain in the Pacific. Kuhns helped deliver supplies aboard Higgins boats, which are smaller supply vessels used to deliver troops ashore. After celebrating his 90th birthday in April of 2016, Kuhns says he can still vividly recall his life during the war.
#1
I had an Uncle who was a purser on LST in the early 60s. Ran constant from Pearl to Midway on a supply run at a steady 7 knots. Sounds outrageously boring but swore it was the best duty he ever had.
[The Beeb] South African President Jacob Zuma has taken steps to prevent the release of a report into the alleged political interference by him and his supporters.
The public protector is due to release her preliminary findings on Friday. She has been examining allegations that Mr Zuma allowed a business family undue influence over his administration.
Ms Madonsela questioned Mr Zuma for four hours last week as part of her final investigation before her seven-year term tenure as public protector concludes this weekend. She has been hailed for her diligent work exposing official misconduct, including allegations that the president used taxpayers' money to build a cattle enclosure, amphitheatre, swimming pool, visitor centre and chicken run at his home in Nkandla.
South African media has quoted sources within Ms Madonsela's office as saying that her latest report cannot be released until a court has made an order in relation to Mr Zuma's request for it to be blocked.
On Monday, Mr Zuma asked her not to report her findings until he has been given an opportunity to question witnesses and review any evidence that implicates him.
"I can confirm that the president has applied for a court interdict," Mr Zuma's spokesman Bongani Ngqulunga told the Reuters news agency on Thursday.
The focus of Ms Madonsela's probe is on the Indian-born Gupta family, who are accused of using their close links with Mr Zuma to influence cabinet appointments. Although Mr Zuma and the Guptas insist they are innocent, correspondents say the allegations will do little to improve the tarnished reputation of the president, who was forced to repay part of the cost of the lavish upgrade to his private residence because of Ms Madonsela's inquiries.
The latest row adds to the pressure on Mr Zuma, whose government was reeling this week when prosecutors ordered Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan to appear in court in early November to face fraud charges. He denies any wrongdoing and says the charges are politically motivated.
Venezuela’s Supreme Court has consolidated President Nicolás Maduro’s power with a decision that removes budgetary authority from the nation’s Congress, the only institution that is controlled by the opposition.
Hilary is taking notes...
The judges’ decision allows the court itself to approve Mr. Maduro’s budget, which he is expected to present by decree on Friday. The move caps a yearlong effort by the leftist government to use the courts, which are controlled by Maduro loyalists, to neutralize the Congress.
Hillary just sent email to Huma and Cheryl...
It could also forecast a more aggressive campaign by Mr. Maduro to derail the recall referendum.
Mr. Maduro came to power in 2013 upon the death of Hugo Chávez, the charismatic former army officer who founded Venezuela’s populist, leftist movement.
By which the NYT should say, "socialist", but that would require them to blame socialism for what happened next...
But after Mr. Maduro’s own election three years ago, the price of oil, which had financed Mr. Chávez’s many ambitious programs, went into a global tailspin. Since then, Mr. Maduro has presided over an economic collapse; food, medicine and electricity shortages; and rising crime.
All brought on by socialism, thuggery, and theft...
On Wednesday, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, a United Nations agency, forecast that Venezuela’s economy would shrink by 8 percent this year.
The ruling by the court’s constitutional chamber follows a raft of decisions against the opposition. The court has declared Congress in contempt and ruled that its laws are therefore unconstitutional. That dispute stems from the assembly’s decision to seat three legislators in defiance of another ruling by the court.
There's really only one way this is going to end, and it's going to be decided by bullets...
The courts also overturned an opposition law meant to stabilize the economy, limited lawmakers’ power to remove judges, and ratified an emergency decree that legislators had rejected.
The NYT approves...
In addition, judges invalidated a law that would have freed some 120 prisoners, many of them opposition politicians or activists jailed by the government during protests. The court’s initial onslaught against the assembly’s authority was a demoralizing blow to lawmakers who had taken power promising to free the prisoners immediately.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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The National Assembly is warning lenders not to assume they will be repaid by a new government if the loan is not approved in assembly. Last power they have.
Details from Elon's speech at the NRO (self.spacex)
submitted 23 minutes ago * by Ravenous117
Addressing the anomaly:
"We are close to figuring it out. It might have been formation of solid oxygen in the carbon over-wrap of one of the bottles in the upper stage tanks. If it was liquid it would have been squeezed out but under pressure it could have ignited with the carbon. This is the leading theory right now, but it is subject to confirmation.
The other thing we discovered is that we can exactly replicate what happened on the launch pad if someone shoots the rocket. We don't think that is likely this time around, but we are definitely going to have to take precautions against that in the future. We looked at who would want to blow up a SpaceX rocket. That turned out to be a long list. I think it is unlikely this time, but it is something we need to recognize as a real possibility in the future."
Addressing return to flight:
"The plan is to get back to launch in early December and that will be from pad 39A at the Cape and we will be launching around the same time from Vandenberg as well. Pad 40 will probably be back in action around March or April next year. Probably around May or so is when we will launch Falcon Heavy. We are going to re-fly the first returned core December or January. We have test fired one of the returned cores 8 times and it looks good. That is promising for testing re-flight."
Other interesting points:
3D printing works fine for super-dracos, but too much work is needed to make it feasible on Raptors.
Elon envisions Mars as a direct democracy, not a representative democracy.
Still wants communication satellite constellation to provide revenue for Mars.
In talking about the IAC, "Crazy people are a lot faster to the mic than scientists."
These are my personal accounts of what I heard from Elon live and the rough transcript is from a recording of the event. I do not know much other than what I heard but I wanted to share with you guys. Enjoy.
#6
From comments at Nasaspaceflight dot com:
-
How sure are we that this actually has been said by Elon? How credible is the source?
Sorry if this already has been established. If so feel free to remove this post.
The marksman comment in the thread came from a known SpaceX employee.
Also, there's photos of the shredded remains of the mock-up out there.
Where could one find these photos? Or is it L2?
L2 McGregor, one of my favorite sections of all time, with other rigging and testing found in the panoramic super hi res photos. L2 link: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=34957.940
[DAWN] The Supreme Court on Thursday adjourned a hearing of the final appeal against the execution of Asia Bibi, accused for blasphemy.
Police and troops had been stationed across Islamabad as the apex court readied to hear the appeal of Bibi who has been on death row since 2010.
One of the three-judge bench, Justice Iqbal Hameed-ur-Rehman, told the court he had to recuse himself, claiming a conflict of interest.
"I was a part of the bench that was hearing the case of Salman Taseer, and this case is related to that," he told the court. A letter was written to the chief justice to appoint another judge to the bench.
The SC did not immediately set a new date for Bibi's appeal.
In 2011, former Punjab 1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots.... governor Salman Taseer, who spoke out in support of Bibi, was bumped off in broad daylight in Islamabad. His assassin Mumtaz Qadri was executed earlier in 2016 after the court found him guilty of murder. Justice Rehman was chief justice on the Islamabad High Court which heard Qadri's appeal in 2011.
The allegations against Bibi date back to June 2009, when she was labouring in a field and a row broke out with some Moslem women she was working with.
Asia Bibi, accused of insulting the Prophet Mohammed (PTUI!) during an argument with a Moslem woman over a bowl of water, was convicted and sentenced to death in 2010 despite her advocates maintaining her innocence and insisting the accusers held grudges against her.
She was asked to fetch water, but the Moslem women objected, saying that as a non-Moslem she was unfit to touch the water bowl.
The women went to a local holy man and accused Bibi of blasphemy against the Prophet Mohammed (PTUI!), a charge punishable by death under legislation that rights groups say is routinely abused to settle personal vendettas.
Bibi's supporters maintain her innocence and insist it was a personal dispute, and the Vatican has called for her release.
But successive appeals have been rejected, and if the SC bench eventually upholds Bibi's conviction, her only recourse will be a direct appeal to the president for clemency.
If that fails, she could become the first person in Pakistain to be executed for blasphemy.
The repercussions for minorities, human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... and the blasphemy laws would be "tremendous", says Shahzad Akbar, a human rights lawyer.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The 193-member United Nations ...boodling on the grand scale... General Assembly unanimously appointed former Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Guterres on Thursday as the ninth secretary-general of the world body for five years beginning Jan. 1, 2017.
Guterres, 67, will replace the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon, 72, of South Korea. Ban will step down at the end of 2016 after serving two five-terms. Guterres was Portugal's prime minister from 1995 to 2002 and UN High Commissioner for Refugees from 2005 to 2015.
Guterres pledged on Thursday to act as an "honest broker" and said he would take a humble approach in trying to deal with global issues, with human dignity at the core of his work.
"Diversity can bring us together, not drive us apart," Guterres told the General Assembly.
"We must make sure that we are able to break this alliance between all those terrorist groups or violent turbans on one side and the expressions of populism and xenophobia on the other side," he said. "These two reinforce each other, and we must be able to fight both of them with determination."
The 15-member UN Security Council last week unanimously recommended that the General Assembly appoint Guterres. He beat out 12 other candidates, seven of whom were women, amid a push for the first woman to be elected.
Guterres told the General Assembly that protection and empowerment of women and girls was a priority commitment. He has pledged to work toward gender parity within the United Nations.
"We have selected a candidate who is prepared to cut past the jargon and the acronyms and the sterile briefings and get real," US Ambassador Samantha Power told the General Assembly. "He knows the only measure of our work here is whether we are or are not helping and supporting real people."
Diplomats were now watching to see who Guterres appoints to senior UN positions amid speculation by diplomats and UN officials that China would like one of its nationals to head peacekeeping and that Russia is keen to lead political affairs.
Currently, a French man runs peacekeeping, an American man leads political affairs and a British man is in charge of humanitarian affairs.
A senior UN Security Council diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity ... for fear of being murdered... , said several people had insisted that Guterres did not do any deals to win Russia and China's votes.
"(Guterres is) the sort of person who will pick a strong team around him, appointment on merit," said the diplomat, adding that, while he had not heard it directly from any Chinese diplomats "it is clear (China is) making a significant challenge for the Department of Peacekeeping."
When asked earlier this month if Russia had an interest in one of the senior UN positions, Russia's UN. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told news hounds: "We do believe that Russia should be properly represented in the Secretariat."
He did not specify which post, but added: "We are not the only ones who are expressing the interest in various positions."
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[Free Beacon] The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization passed a resolution on Thursday that diminishes the historic and spiritual connections of Judaism and Christianity to the city of Jerusalem after dozens of U.S. lawmakers called on the international body to reject the measure.
Israeli officials and others in the pro-Israel community decried the resolution as anti-Semitic and said it was an effort to delegitimize the Jewish state. Twenty-four countries voted in favor of the measure while six rejected it, including the United States. Another 26 states abstained. No European nation approved the resolution, which was introduced by Egypt,
...clearly President Sisi is not actually a friend to Israel, but a partner of necessity in their mutual fight against Hamas...
Algeria, Morocco, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, and Sudan.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R., Fla.) led a bipartisan group of 40 lawmakers earlier this week in writing a letter to the Executive Board of UNESCO saying the resolution to be discussed Thursday and Friday was part of a broader effort to delegitimize Israel.
"The United Nations’ obsessive hostility towards Israel will be on display yet again this week as UNESCO considers another blatantly biased resolution that unjustly singles out our close ally Israel with false accusations and criticism, and attempts to erase the specific deep-rooted, historical connection of Jews and Christians to Jerusalem, Israel’s eternal capital," Cruz said.
The resolution, postponed from the initial July vote amid fallout from the failed coup in Turkey, identifies holy sites in Jerusalem exclusively by their Muslim names. Jewish and Christian advocacy groups were particularly outraged by a provision that would declare the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, sacred to "Muslims only."
[IsraelTimes] The following is a breakdown of how the nations of the world voted on today’s UNESCO resolution that omits any Jewish connection to the Temple Mount and Western Wall.
For: South Africa, Algeria, Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Egypt, Russia, Lebanon, Iran, Malaysia, Morocco, Mauritius, Mexico, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, the Dominican Republic, Senegal, Sudan, Chad and Vietnam
Against: Britain, the Netherlands, Lithuania, the US, Estonia and Germany
Abstentions: Albania, Argentina, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, El Salvador, Spain, France, Ghana, Greece, Haiti, India, Japan, Kenya, Nepal, Uganda, Paraguay, South Korea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Slovenia, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, and Ukraine
#3
State Department Report:
"As a symbol of our commitment to human dignity, the United States will return to UNESCO. This organization has been reformed and America will participate fully in its mission to advance human rights, tolerance, and learning."
--President George W. Bush, September 12, 2002
Today, President Bush announced in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly that the United States will return to UNESCO. The United States withdrew from UNESCO in 1984, citing poor management and values opposed to our own.
Philippine leader Rodrigo Duterte called U.S. President Barack Obama, the European Union and United Nations "fools" on Thursday, and warned they would end up humiliated and outsmarted if they accepted an invitation to investigate his war on drugs.
Duterte said he was open to an outside probe by Obama, his Secretary of State John Kerry, the EU and the U.N. Commission on Human Rights into alleged extrajudicial killings, but on the condition that after he was questioned, he had the right to be heard.
"I'll play with you. I'm very sure they cannot be brighter than me. I will ask five questions that will humiliate you," Duterte said. "Watch out for that, it will be a spectacle."
Duterte's remarks came during a televised speech to hundreds of the country's business elite, during which he said it was necessary to cleanse the streets of drug pushers and rescue the next generation of Filipinos from the scourge of narcotics.
Duterte, 71, won the hearts of millions of Filipinos with his outrageous, at times comical speeches and man-of-the-people style in the run-up to a May election. He won by a huge margin after campaigning almost entirely on promises to wipe out drugs and crime.
Nearly 2,300 people have died in the war on drugs since the campaign started on June 30, according to police, of which 1,566 were drug suspects killed in police operations.
Police had previously said there had been more then 3,600 deaths, but have since concluded that many of that number were homicides and murders unrelated to illegal narcotics.
Opinion polls for Duterte's first 90 days in office suggest he remains popular, with a Pulse Asia survey on Wednesday showing he had the trust of 86 percent of 1,200 Filipinos surveyed.
Duterte said on Wednesday he had officially invited a United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions to investigate the drug killings.
Thursday speech was the latest among Duterte's frequent and furious rebukes of international critics of his drugs war, after they expressed concern about the unusually high death toll and circumstances of the drugs killings.
"These fools think (they can do anything) because the Philippines is a small nation," he said. "Maybe God gave you the money but we have the brains."
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10/14/2016 00:00 ||
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Duterte called U.S. President Barack Obama, the European Union and United Nations "fools"
Obama, EU, and UN? Yup, yup and yup. Could we encourage Duterte to come down to our southern border and take care of a few of our drug problems.
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.
[ABC13] A man has been hospitalized after he was hit by a train in east Houston.
[Wales Online] A picture hanging in an Ikea showroom in Cardiff has caused outrage by showing a young boy 
Why do you think they had an Ellis Island? Progressives live in a fantasy/fairytale view of the world. You get to pay for it. You as in you, your children and their children. 
Venezuela’s Supreme Court has consolidated President Nicolás Maduro’s power with a decision that removes budgetary authority from the nation’s Congress, the only institution that is controlled by the opposition.
[DAWN] The Supreme Court on Thursday adjourned a hearing of the final appeal against the execution of Asia Bibi, accused for blasphemy.
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
[Free Beacon] The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization passed a resolution on Thursday that diminishes the historic and spiritual connections of Judaism and Christianity to the city of Jerusalem after dozens of U.S. lawmakers called on the international body to reject the measure.
