Wikileaks has issued new and troubling emails from its hacking of Democratic accounts. Top Clinton aide Doug Band sent emails that raised objections to the use of the Foundation by Bill Clinton over alleged conflicts of interest. He specifically mentions the giving of “expensive gifts” and other conduct from sponsors. At the same time, top Hillary Clinton aide, Huma Abedin, is found complaining about a “mess” created by Hillary Clinton in securing a massive contribution from the King of Morocco of $12 million allegedly in exchange (or with the expectation) for a meeting with her as part of an event for the Clinton Global Initiative May 2015.
Category: International
The English government has taken steps to address a long-standing injustice common to both Great Britain and the United States: the conviction of thousands of citizens for being homosexuals. The new law of posthumous pardons is appropriately named the “Alan Turing law” after the genius who helped break the German code in World War II only to be hounded in peacetime by his country for his sexual orientation.
The Malaysian Islamic Development Department, a religious government body, has begun a campaign to force restaurants and cart owners to rename hot dogs to avoid offending Muslims. The reason, Director Sirajuddin Suhaimee explained with a straight face, is that “In Islam, dogs are considered unclean and the name cannot be related to halal certification.” So chains like Auntie Anne’s has been told it cannot receive halal certification without calling hot dogs something else.
Bobby Brown, a professional NBA player with the Houston Rockets, has secured a position for himself in the Moron Hall of Fame a recent trip to China after he decided to improve the Great Wall of China by first drawing his name on the stone and then bragging about it. In fairness, it was just in chalk but it was still a uniquely stupid and disrespectful act.
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor.
Yesterday, police in Turkey served arrest warrants on one hundred, eighty nine appeals court judges and prosecutors in the latest post-coup attempt purges. Since the July, 15th military coup, seeking the ouster of dictator Recep Erdogan, thirty-two thousand individuals are currently in jail and over one hundred thousand were sacked from their jobs under the questionable accusation of aiding dissident Fethullah Gulen.
Ankara’s chief prosecutor attacked the judiciary, members of the justice ministry, the Court of Cassation (Turkey’s top appellate court), and the Council of State (the highest administrative court).
The purges are part of seemingly never ending act of paranoia by a dictator bent on returning Turkey to authoritarianism.
Continue reading “Turkish Government Raids Judiciary, Arrests 189 Judges And Prosecutors”
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has held on to power as he and his predecessor Hugo Chavez ruined the strongest economy in Latin America with their “Socialist Revolution.” They combined disastrous economic policy with a crackdown on civil liberties, including unrelenting attacks on journalists and political dissidents. With the vast majority of the nation calling for his resignation and new elections, Maduro and his cronies in government have delayed any elections while allowing the country to descend further into economic and social chaos. However, it is not like he is doing nothing. He has created a new award: the Hugo Chavez Peace Prize. The first winner? The paragon of peace . . . Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Continue reading “Venezuela Awards First Hugo Chavez Peace Prize To Vladimir Putin”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor.
A long-overdue measure to compensate persons convicted of violating Germany’s 19th century anti-homosexuality law–since repealed–is to finally arrive. The German government set aside a reported thirty-million euros to be distributed among potentially an estimated fifty-thousand men convicted of homosexuality. The award stems for convictions spanning seventy years since the destruction of the Nazi Government.
Continue reading “German Government Set To Pay Compensation To Gays Convicted Of Violating Anti-homosexuality Laws”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor.
A nefarious, existential threat was recently vanquished by the post-coup censorship offices of Turkish President Erdoğan. No, it was not the PKK, nor ISIS, nor Fethullah Gülen. It was SpongeBob SquarePants and Smurfette, broadcast on a Kurdish Language children’s television network.
The media crackdown in the aftermath of the failed coup in Turkey has led to closures of dozens of news services and thousands of firings among journalists. Cartoon networks can now become labeled as seditious.
Apparently, SpongeBob’s cohort Squidward Tentacles nefariously slithered into the fabric of the state’s security apparatus and cunningly attempted to dismantle it from within. His ink: it sows discord by fueling the printing presses of subversives.
Continue reading “SpongeBob SquarePants Posed Existential Threat To Turkey”
It is good to see, after hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars and thousands of U.S. lives, Iraq is in stable governmental hands. We have previously discussed the rampant corruption in the Iraqi government where billions of our aid has simply disappeared. However, there is also the problem of sheer lunacy. That would be the problem with Kazem Finjan, Iraq’s Transport Minister, who has claimed that the ancient Sumerians travelled to Pluto in spaceships thousands of years ago. It appears that Finjan was not content with the claim of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan that Muslims discovered America. He had to go beyond the Earth to the farthest reaches of the solar system. Continue reading “Space Cadet: Iraqi Transport Minister Proclaims That Sumerians Traveled To Pluto Thousands of Years Ago”
An Ontario man may be reasonably confused this week after the 25-year-old fell out of his car while backing down his driveway and his car ran over his legs. He was taken to the hospital and then criminally charged with impaired driving.
Continue reading “Canadian Man Arrested For Running Over Himself”
It appears that the movement against “micro aggressions” and “cultural appropriation” has now targeted opera. In an act of artistic cowardice, the theater at the University of Bristol has cancelled the performance of Aida after students declared that the entire production was a cultural appropriation. It turns out that Giuseppe Verdi was culturally (and operatically) appropriating in 1871 and continues to do so with every performance of this classic opera.
The election of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte constitutes the lowest point for the struggling Filipino democratic system. Duterte has used profanities against President Obama, the United States Ambassador to the Philippines, Pope Frances, the United Nations and others who have questioned his blood-soaked reign as president. Recently, he even compared himself to Hitler in not only refusing to stop his extrajudicial killings of alleged criminals but saying that he was prepared like Hitler to murder millions. Now this budding tyrant has declared that the very concept of human rights is the “anti-thesis of government.” In reality it is Duterte who is pushing the Philippines back into a state of Nature where might is right and government is merely the dominion of the powerful over the powerless. What is particularly chilling is that Duterte is a lawyer and former prosecutor.
Continue reading “Duterte: Human Rights Is The “Antithesis of Government””
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor.
Plaintiff Stephanie Ross Desimone filed suit against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia alleging the nation provided material support to Al-Qaida in its terror attacks against the United States on September 11th, 2001. This represents the first of such filings–there–are almost certainly to be many following, since the United States Congress last Wednesday overrode President Obama’s veto of a sovereign immunity bill allowing foreign governments to be sued in the United States for supporting terrorist acts within the US borders.
Stephanie’s husband, Navy Cdr. Patrick Dunn, was murdered when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon.
The full text of the complaint, filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, is attached below:
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor.
While it might seem to many a prima facie case where a dissident, Kurdish Journalist will risk their safety if deported to a country known for its ghastly mistreatment of members of the press, a Swedish Migration Court ruled that Journalist Kamran Mirzaian will be instead deported to Iran, citing no proof that he will suffer threats to himself or his freedom.
Iran is an internationally recognized pariah with regard to its oppression of journalists and is ranked the 11th worst of 180 countries according to Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index. Journalists subject facing capital crimes in Iran include Briton Salman Rushdie, the seven-year imprisonment of an economics journalist critical of the government’s financial policies, and horrific murders of journalists arrested for “crimes” involving ordinary journalism
Continue reading “Kurdish Journalist Fears Execution If Sweden Deports Him To Iran”
Top women chess players are considering a boycott in the face of a decision by the World Chess Federation (or “Fide”) to hold the world championship in Iran where female grandmasters will be required to play in hijabs to avoid arrest by the Islamic morality police. It is another example of an international organization disregarding the interests of competitors in cutting deals with countries like Iran. Not only is Iran an authoritarian theocracy, but the country denies women, journalists, political dissidents and others basic rights. One would think that a condition of being considered as host would be a guarantee that competitors will be afforded their human rights.