ISIS has continued its blood soaked campaign to impose its view of pure Islam on the world and to destroy all evidence of art and civilization in its path. The destruction of ancient works and structures has appalled the world. The Islamic extremists have now murdered one of the world’s leading experts on the history and art of the region — 82-year-old archaeologist Khaled Asaad. By all accounts, Asaad refused to tell ISIS where art was hidden. ISIS has been destroying large works while selling smaller works on the black market. Images show ISIS supporters laughing and rejoicing as their ancient history and art is destroyed with sledgehammers as the professed will of Allah. The standoff between Asaad and these murderers put the conflict between civilization and these Islamic extremists into the sharpest relief. It also shows who many Muslims continue to put their very lives at risk to protect their history and art. Indeed, they are protecting the art and history of the very nadir of civilization.
While the attention nationally has been on the server of Hillary Clinton and the ongoing investigation, there is a new development in the effort to acquire another set of emails that should cause public outcry. Two years ago, the State Department officially stated that there were no emails responsive to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request about a close Hillary Clinton adviser’s contact with the media. Now, after the intervention of a federal judge, the Department has admitted that it has located 17,855 emails that appear to match the criteria. From 0 to 17,855 and no one seems particularly bothered by the false statement of the State Department in its early response to the lawful request under FOIA. No one is under review at the State Department for possible termination or even discipline. No one is being transferred or retrained. The government first says that there were no emails and then is forced to admit that there are potentially thousands. It is being treated as just another day in the life of our government.
KTLA TV Reporter Courtney Friel has learned the hard way why W.C. Fields warned “Never Work with Children or Animals.” Friel was doing a feel good story about the start of school when she asked one question too many to a seemingly happy little boy. The question? Don’t you miss your mother?
The growing scandal surrounding Hillary Clinton’s use of an unsecured server now involves a little known Denver company that she used for the system. Clinton has repeatedly dismissed concerns about her decision not to use the secure State Department system by saying that she had her own security team and that the server was always protected. Now there is a media report that Clinton actually used a small company with Democratic party ties in Denver which reportedly kept its server in a bathroom closet in a loft apartment. The report raises again questions of the security used for the system while there are also questions being raised about Clinton lawyers lacking clearances to deal with possibly classified material in deleting thousands of messages and holding copies of messages. There has not been a response printed to the story thus far and the position of the Clinton campaign (including challenging the accuracy of the story) is unknown at this time.
While the world has followed the appalling destruction of art by ISIS and Muslim extremists, it is easy to forget that such religious extremism is not limited to Islam. We saw such an example recently in Israel. Another such case has emerged in Russia where Russian Orthodox activists destroyed Soviet avant-garde art deemed insulting to their religion. The attack led the head of the Hermitage Museum Mikhail Piotrovsky to denounce the attack as further evidence of a “sick” Russian society and the rise of “marginal forces against cultural rights” in the country.
Continue reading “Russian Orthodox Extremists Destroy Russian Avante Garde Art In The Hermitage”
There is a bizarre tragedy in Honolulu where a man sought to keep a 19-year-old man from committing suicide at the University of Hawaii. The man on the ledge of the campus housing ended up taking both himself and the older man, aged 24, down with him. As fate would have it, the older man died and the suicidal man survived with serious injuries.
This week, Hillary Clinton doubled down on the email scandal in a speech that appeared to mock the ongoing investigation of her use of an unsecured email system during her time as Secretary of State and dismissing questions over her use the system as pure politics. She even joked “You may have seen that I recently launched a Snapchat account. I love it. I love it. Those messages disappear all by themselves.” It is a great line but it is only funny for those who are entirely untroubled by the real danger that Clinton put national security secrets at risk by insisting on retaining control over her own emails and server. One group that is not laughing are former intelligence officials who have accused the government, again, of showing special treatment for powerful figures in the mishandling of classified material or current officials who are continuing to classify hundreds of emails from Clinton’s records. The number of Hillary Clinton emails now flagged for classification has grown to 300. The number is expected to rise even higher as the agencies plow through thousands of emails that remain after the Clinton staff erased thousands of others from the server.
Continue reading “The State Department Flags More Than 300 Clinton Emails As Possibly Classified”
Economist Brent Boehlert and his colleagues at MIT have issued a new report showing that curbing carbon emissions would represent a huge benefit for agriculture and the nation as a whole by reducing the frequency and severity of future crop-parching droughts and saving American farmers billions of dollars annually by 2100. The study is found in the July issue of Weather, Climate and Society. The study is interesting because the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change has been focused on the hard science side of academia. This is a group of economists who are adding an economic analysis supporting emission curbs.
Lambert’s Cafe in Missouri calls itself the “Home of the Throwed Rolls” after its signature practice of lobbing dinner rolls by servers to guests. It is now accused of serving up an unrequested tort after Troy Tucker was hit in the eye and has sued the restaurant for medical bills and legal fees.
Continue reading “Woman Sues “House of Throwed Rolls” After Toss Leaves Her With Torn Cornea”
Airbnb is a growing phenomenon as people rent out their homes and apartments as an alternative to hotels: often giving visitors more room and costing less than hotels. (For the record, we recently used Airbnb to rent a house in California) A recent case in Madrid has shown the inherent danger in such sites. On July 4th, Jacob Lopez called his mother on her cellphone in a desperate call for help. He said that when he arrived at his Airbnb, he found his host in the apartment who locked him in a room and demanded sex from him. The mother, Micaela Giles reportedly tried to get Airbnb to act but they refused and told her to call police.
While China is blocking documentaries on pollution and arresting environmentalists, thousands of Chinese are dying each day due to the suffocating pollution levels in the country. A new study has found that an average of 4,000 people a day in China from air pollution — largely due to coal-burning as a fuel.
Continue reading “Study: Air Pollution In China Kills 4000 People a Day”
Four high school students picked the wrong guy to allegedly kidnap and rob. Texas border patrol agent Armando Alaniz was was vacationing with his family in Florida and was packing up his car when four teens jumped him and threw him into his car. Gregory McDonald, 19, Dante Askins, 18, and two other teens, 15 and 16, are accused of pistol-whipping the agent, tying him up, robbing him, and then abandoning him at a vacant drug house in Orlando. What is interesting is that an OnStar vehicle security representative called the car after the victim’s wife called police. The agent heard someone screaming for help and notified police.
Continue reading “Federal Agent Carjacked and Kidnapped By Four High School Students”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Finally, Abraham Maslow and Satan can agree on something—the conspiracy theorist who made this movie achieved self-actualization. Clearly this was the highest achievement in the CT world and for me one of the funniest and most unbelievable I had the pleasure of witnessing. And most astoundingly, I did not need to be a card carrying member of the illuminati to experience it.
The below movie clip describes how “the average secret service spook” takes a “shape shifting, non-human reptilian form” while working a speech for the president.
“It could be evidence of a shape shifting alien humanoid working for the powers to be.”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Despite decades of division and in many cases a denial of what is hoped for a united Kurdistan, the Kurdish people may soon have a common homeland that geopolitics has deprived them—albeit virtual.
The Kurdistan Regional Government, encompassing the northern territory of Iraq, will soon launch the .KRD Top Level Domain (TLD) and allow registration for individuals, organizations, and companies.
Though the .KRD domain is administered by the KRG’s Department of Information Technology (Iraq), the scope of the domain is envisioned to foster a common community that is presently divided among several nations such as Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey, and Armenia.
Continue reading “KRD Top Level Domain Will Provide Kurds A “Virtual” Homeland”
By Darren Smith, Weekend contributor
Nearly eleven months after holding the State of Washington in contempt for failing to provide an adequate funding plan for financing primary education in the state, the Washington Supreme Court issued an order fining the state $100,000.00 per day until the legislature satisfies the Court’s judgement in its landmark McCleary decision.
After three special sessions, the Legislature failed to provide a clear and fully funded plan. The Court acted, much to the chagrin of many of the state legislators. A few of which had some rather interesting solutions to address their failures to act.