– Walt Disney.
Location: Nairobi, Kenya
Location: Nairobi, Kenya
Showing posts with label 2019/04 APRIL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2019/04 APRIL. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 20, 2021
I found this at a chess website. I'm adding it to my list of favorite quotes.
“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.”
Tuesday, April 30, 2019
Interesting video about the book "Why Evolution Is True".
Somebody created a video of the 1st part of the book Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne. It was very well done. Jerry Coyne wrote about it at Should WEIT be a “videobook”?. Here it is:
OH YEAH
Wikipedia: "Oh Yeah" is a single released in 1985 by the Swiss band Yello and featured on their album Stella. The song features a mix of electronic music and manipulated vocals. The song gained popularity after being featured in the films Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Secret of My Success, among other films. It is a popular staple in pop culture.
Monday, April 29, 2019
Russia will be a much better place when their dictator drops dead.
Wall Street Journal - Standing Against Putin’s Tyranny
The ranks of political prisoners grew fivefold in four years.
By Irwin Cotler and Katrina Lantos Swett
April 28, 2019
Russia’s attempts to interfere in the U.S. election have been in the news, but its internal abuses deserve more attention. According to a report published today, the ranks of Russian political prisoners have grown over the past four years from 50 to more than 250.
The report was commissioned by four leading Western human-rights organizations, including ours, and written with the help of the Memorial Human Rights Centre, one of the most important rights groups in Russia. It documents in extraordinary detail how President Vladimir Putin has turned Russia’s legal system into a tool of repression, using it to suppress dissent, undermine political opposition, and detain anyone the Kremlin views as a potential threat.
Mr. Putin began building this system from the moment he took the presidency in 2000. During his first term, the Kremlin imprisoned Alexey Pichugin, who is now Russia’s longest-serving political prisoner, having spent almost 16 years in jail on what all the evidence points to being fabricated murder charges. In reality, he was jailed as part of Mr. Putin’s personal vendetta against the outspoken executives of the Yukos oil company, where Mr. Pichugin was the head of Internal Economic Security.
The report also highlights the case of Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian film director and activist imprisoned on false terrorism charges as punishment for his vocal criticism of the Russian occupation of Crimea. Held in Moscow, Mr. Sentsov was tortured, tried and convicted. Last year he went on a 145-day hunger strike to demand the release of the Kremlin’s 26 Ukrainian political prisoners. They remain in prison, as does Mr. Sentsov.
Anastasia Shevchenko was arrested in January for her involvement with Open Russia, a nonprofit that promotes democracy. Ms. Shevchenko was the first person charged criminally for repeated violations of Russia’s new Undesirable Organizations Law, which targets any organization Mr. Putin dislikes. If convicted, she faces up to six years in prison.
In the report we identify 16 Russian officials who are responsible for detaining these political prisoners. Eight are high-level officials with command responsibility, including Mr. Putin. The other eight are judges, prosecutors and investigators who have been involved in multiple political-prisoner cases and are foot soldiers in the Kremlin’s war against its own people.
Condemnation of these key perpetrators is insufficient. They must face meaningful consequences for their actions. An important first step would be for other countries to impose targeted financial sanctions and travel bans against those officials identified in the report under global Magnitsky laws. They qualify due to their gross human-rights abuses, and it’s fitting as these laws—currently on the books in the U.S., Canada and Lithuania—are named after Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who was tortured and killed while imprisoned on phony charges.
Many of the men and women caught in the Kremlin’s brutal grasp sacrificed everything to stand up to its tyranny. It’s only decent that those of us safe in the U.S. and elsewhere do everything we can to stand with them.
Mr. Cotler is chairman of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights. Ms. Swett is president of the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice.
Appeared in the April 29, 2019, print edition as 'The Kremlin Tightens Its Fist.'
The ranks of political prisoners grew fivefold in four years.
By Irwin Cotler and Katrina Lantos Swett
April 28, 2019
Russia’s attempts to interfere in the U.S. election have been in the news, but its internal abuses deserve more attention. According to a report published today, the ranks of Russian political prisoners have grown over the past four years from 50 to more than 250.
The report was commissioned by four leading Western human-rights organizations, including ours, and written with the help of the Memorial Human Rights Centre, one of the most important rights groups in Russia. It documents in extraordinary detail how President Vladimir Putin has turned Russia’s legal system into a tool of repression, using it to suppress dissent, undermine political opposition, and detain anyone the Kremlin views as a potential threat.
Mr. Putin began building this system from the moment he took the presidency in 2000. During his first term, the Kremlin imprisoned Alexey Pichugin, who is now Russia’s longest-serving political prisoner, having spent almost 16 years in jail on what all the evidence points to being fabricated murder charges. In reality, he was jailed as part of Mr. Putin’s personal vendetta against the outspoken executives of the Yukos oil company, where Mr. Pichugin was the head of Internal Economic Security.
The report also highlights the case of Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian film director and activist imprisoned on false terrorism charges as punishment for his vocal criticism of the Russian occupation of Crimea. Held in Moscow, Mr. Sentsov was tortured, tried and convicted. Last year he went on a 145-day hunger strike to demand the release of the Kremlin’s 26 Ukrainian political prisoners. They remain in prison, as does Mr. Sentsov.
Anastasia Shevchenko was arrested in January for her involvement with Open Russia, a nonprofit that promotes democracy. Ms. Shevchenko was the first person charged criminally for repeated violations of Russia’s new Undesirable Organizations Law, which targets any organization Mr. Putin dislikes. If convicted, she faces up to six years in prison.
In the report we identify 16 Russian officials who are responsible for detaining these political prisoners. Eight are high-level officials with command responsibility, including Mr. Putin. The other eight are judges, prosecutors and investigators who have been involved in multiple political-prisoner cases and are foot soldiers in the Kremlin’s war against its own people.
Condemnation of these key perpetrators is insufficient. They must face meaningful consequences for their actions. An important first step would be for other countries to impose targeted financial sanctions and travel bans against those officials identified in the report under global Magnitsky laws. They qualify due to their gross human-rights abuses, and it’s fitting as these laws—currently on the books in the U.S., Canada and Lithuania—are named after Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who was tortured and killed while imprisoned on phony charges.
Many of the men and women caught in the Kremlin’s brutal grasp sacrificed everything to stand up to its tyranny. It’s only decent that those of us safe in the U.S. and elsewhere do everything we can to stand with them.
Mr. Cotler is chairman of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights. Ms. Swett is president of the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice.
Appeared in the April 29, 2019, print edition as 'The Kremlin Tightens Its Fist.'
In this video Sam Harris talks about Muslim scum.
In this episode of the Making Sense podcast, Sam Harris reads from an issue of Dabiq, the magazine of ISIS, and discusses the beliefs and goals of jihadists worldwide.
I saw a video of a young sea turtle sleeping under water. How is that possible? They have to breathe above the water.
I looked it up. It's amazing what other creatures can do and what we can't do.
"As sea turtles are air-breathing reptiles, they need to surface to breathe. Sea turtles can hold their breath for several hours, depending upon the level of activity. A resting or sleeping turtle can remain underwater for 4-7 hours."
Natural Selection makes this stuff possible.
"As sea turtles are air-breathing reptiles, they need to surface to breathe. Sea turtles can hold their breath for several hours, depending upon the level of activity. A resting or sleeping turtle can remain underwater for 4-7 hours."
Natural Selection makes this stuff possible.
If you get in big trouble with the police, you want to be in Norway. If you get in big trouble in Alabama, you need to kill yourself.
This video is about a paradise, aka prison, in Norway.
Bloomberg
Published on Jun 22, 2018
Prisons in Norway look very different than prisons in the rest of the world. In Norway the incarcerated have access to the outdoors and they can garden, learn to cook and take vocational classes. Pretty much the only thing they can’t do is leave. With one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world, Norway’s novel approach to prison might be working better than more traditional, harsher prisons. This episode of “Then This Happened” takes a look at what can be learned from Norway’s radical humanity.
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This New York Times article is about a hellhole, aka prison, in Alabama.
Alabama’s Gruesome Prisons: Report Finds Rape and Murder at All Hours
The segregation unit at Alabama’s St. Clair Correctional Facility houses inmates in solitary confinement. Many have come to see the unit as a haven from the prison’s general population.
By Katie Benner and Shaila Dewan
April 3, 2019
One prisoner had been dead for so long that when he was discovered lying face down, his face was flattened. Another was tied up and tortured for two days while no one noticed. Bloody inmates screamed for help from cells whose doors did not lock.
Those were some of the gruesome details in a 56-page report on the Alabama prison system that was issued by the Justice Department on Wednesday. The report, one of the first major civil rights investigations by the department to be released under President Trump, uncovered shocking conditions in the state’s massively overcrowded and understaffed facilities.
Prisoners in the Alabama system endured some of the highest rates of homicide and rape in the country, the Justice Department found, and officials showed a “flagrant disregard” for their right to be free from excessive and cruel punishment. The investigation began in the waning days of the Obama administration and continued for more than two years after Mr. Trump took office.
The department notified the prison system that it could sue in 49 days “if State officials have not satisfactorily addressed our concerns.”
[The New York Times received more than 2,000 photos taken inside an Alabama prison. This is what they showed.]
Alabama is not alone in having troubled, violent prisons. But the state has one of the country’s highest incarceration rates and its correctional system is notoriously antiquated, dangerous and short-staffed. The major prisons are at 182 percent of their capacity, the report found, contraband is rampant and prisoners sleep in dorms they are not assigned to in order to escape violence.
“The violations are severe, systemic, and exacerbated by serious deficiencies in staffing and supervision,” the report said, noting that some facilities had fewer than 20 percent of their allotted positions filled. It also cited the use of solitary confinement as a protective measure for vulnerable inmates, and “a high level of violence that is too common, cruel, of an unusual nature, and pervasive.”
State officials said the report addressed issues that Alabama was already aware of and working to fix.
“For more than two years, the D.O.J. pursued an investigation of issues that have been the subject of ongoing litigation and the target of significant reforms by the state,” a statement from the office of Gov. Kay Ivey said. “Over the coming months, my Administration will be working closely with D.O.J. to ensure that our mutual concerns are addressed and that we remain steadfast in our commitment to public safety, making certain that this Alabama problem has an Alabama solution.”
But the report called the state “deliberately indifferent” to the risks prisoners face, and said, “It has failed to correct known systemic deficiencies that contribute to the violence.” Legislative efforts to reduce overcrowding through measures such as reducing sentences were not made retroactive and have had “minimal effect,” the report said.
Alabama’s prisons have for years been the subject of civil rights litigation by the Equal Justice Initiative and the Southern Poverty Law Center, nonprofit legal advocacy groups based in Montgomery. Maria Morris, the lead lawyer for the center’s lawsuit, also disputed the assertion that the problems were being fixed.
“They’re not fixing them,” Ms. Morris said. “They’re giving a lot of lip service to the need to fix them, but the lip service always comes back to we just need a billion dollars to build new prisons and, as the Department of Justice found, that’s not going to solve the problem.”
Alabama inmates continue to die in high numbers. There have been 15 suicides in the past 15 months, and the homicide rate vastly exceeds the national average for prisons.
The Justice Department report focused on the failure to prevent prisoner-on-prisoner violence because of what it said was inadequate training, failure to properly classify and supervise inmates, and failure to stem the flow of contraband including weapons and drugs, among other problems.
The department is still investigating excessive force and sexual abuse by prison staff members, an investigation that former federal prosecutors say could lead to criminal indictments.
Violence in Alabama’s Prisons
Here is some of the violent and illegal activity reported during a single week in September 2017.
Friday: Three stabbings, including one that resulted in death.
Saturday: One beating and one discovery of a drug cache.
Sunday: Two beatings, one stabbing, one sexual assault and one beating with a sock full of metal locks.
Tuesday: One discovery of a drug cache and one case of arson, when a prisoner's bed was set on fire while he slept.
Wednesday: One sexual assault.
Thursday: One beating, one sexual assault and one overdose that resulted in death.
The Department of Justice
[Our reporter went inside St. Clair Correctional Facility in Springville, Ala. He found it was “virtually ungoverned” and the inmates were armed.]
Investigators visited four prisons and interviewed more than 270 prisoners. To “provide a window into a broken system,” the report detailed a single week’s worth of injuries and attacks, including days that saw multiple incidents including stabbings, a sleeping man attacked with socks filled with metal locks and another man being forced to perform oral sex on two men at knife point.
The department also concluded that the system does not provide “safe and sanitary” living conditions. Open sewage ran by the pathway that government lawyers used to access one facility, which the state closed soon after the visit. One investigator grew ill from the toxic fumes of cleaning fluids while inspecting the kitchen, the report said.
The report said the state failed to track violent deaths or adequately investigate sex abuse. At least three homicide victims — including one who was stabbed and another who was beaten — were classified as having died from natural causes, the report said. The report listed nine killings in which the victims had been previously attacked or officials had received other warnings that they were in danger.
Sexual assaults occur in “dormitories, cells, recreation areas, the infirmary, bathrooms, and showers at all hours of the day and night,” the report said. Prisons must screen inmates and separate sexually abusive prisoners from those at risk of sexual abuse, particularly gay and transgender people; the report said Alabama does not do so.
Inmates are raped to pay off debts, and one mother told the Justice Department that a prisoner had texted her to say he would “chop her son into pieces and rape him if she did not send him $800,” the report said.
Last month, Governor Ivey warned of “horrendous conditions” in the prisons and an impending federal intervention in her State of the State speech.
Ms. Ivey said the department had increased the prison budget in recent years, given raises to corrections officers and requested $31 million to hire 500 more correctional officers and increase pay in the coming fiscal year.
But Mac McArthur, the executive director of the Alabama State Employees Association, which includes state corrections workers, said attrition was still outpacing recruitment, in part because starting salaries were still below $30,000 a year for some officers, and in part because the job was so dangerous.
The federal investigation was opened during the Obama administration, after the lawsuits over prison abuses and published accounts of endemic brutality, violence and torture. The investigation continued under former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who had also served as a longtime senator from Alabama.
The report included a series of measures necessary to remedy the constitutional and other violations that regularly occur in the Alabama prison system, including additional screening for those entering the prisons, moving low-risk inmates, hiring 500 additional corrections officers and overhauling disciplinary processes around violence and sexual assault.
Similar federal civil rights investigations have resulted in consent decrees — court-approved deals that include a road map of changes that institutions such as police departments and state correction departments must adhere to in order to avoid being sued.
But in a break with past practice, Mr. Sessions placed three key restrictions on consent decrees. He said that a top political appointee must sign off on any deal. Department lawyers must show proof of violations that go beyond unconstitutional behavior. And the deals must have a sunset date, meaning they can expire before violations have been remedied. The current attorney general, William P. Barr, has not changed Mr. Sessions’s policy.
Mr. Sessions said that the consent decrees interfered with states’ rights, a position echoed by Ms. Ivey in her statement insisting on an “Alabama solution.”
But Vanita Gupta, a head of the civil rights division in the Obama administration and one of the officials who opened the investigation, said that given the pervasive problems and the history of inaction, “nothing short of a comprehensive consent decree will adequately address these constitutional violations.”
The Justice Department declined to comment on whether it would seek a consent decree.
Ms. Ivey is hardly the first governor to reckon with the prison system and its decrepit conditions. Her immediate predecessor, Robert Bentley, pushed a plan for $800 million in bonds to build four new prisons and to close some existing facilities.
But governors have only so much influence in Alabama, and the Legislature balked, especially as a scandal left Mr. Bentley weakened. This year, Ms. Ivey proposed a similar plan for new prisons that state officials hoped would be ready by 2022.
Alan Blinder contributed reporting.
Follow Katie Benner and Shaila Dewan on Twitter: @ktbenner and @shailadewan.
A version of this article appears in print on April 3, 2019, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: ‘Common, Cruel’ Violence Met by Indifference.
Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
A comment somebody wrote at the New York Times:
The federal report cited in this article is being discussed on local TV and local news websites in Alabama. The vast majority of respondents say they don't care if prison is horrendous, it's supposed to be. So much for "constitutional conservatism" if the Eighth Amendment is ignored. So much for Christian charity in the supposed Bible Belt.
Bloomberg
Published on Jun 22, 2018
Prisons in Norway look very different than prisons in the rest of the world. In Norway the incarcerated have access to the outdoors and they can garden, learn to cook and take vocational classes. Pretty much the only thing they can’t do is leave. With one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world, Norway’s novel approach to prison might be working better than more traditional, harsher prisons. This episode of “Then This Happened” takes a look at what can be learned from Norway’s radical humanity.
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
This New York Times article is about a hellhole, aka prison, in Alabama.
Alabama’s Gruesome Prisons: Report Finds Rape and Murder at All Hours
The segregation unit at Alabama’s St. Clair Correctional Facility houses inmates in solitary confinement. Many have come to see the unit as a haven from the prison’s general population.
By Katie Benner and Shaila Dewan
April 3, 2019
One prisoner had been dead for so long that when he was discovered lying face down, his face was flattened. Another was tied up and tortured for two days while no one noticed. Bloody inmates screamed for help from cells whose doors did not lock.
Those were some of the gruesome details in a 56-page report on the Alabama prison system that was issued by the Justice Department on Wednesday. The report, one of the first major civil rights investigations by the department to be released under President Trump, uncovered shocking conditions in the state’s massively overcrowded and understaffed facilities.
Prisoners in the Alabama system endured some of the highest rates of homicide and rape in the country, the Justice Department found, and officials showed a “flagrant disregard” for their right to be free from excessive and cruel punishment. The investigation began in the waning days of the Obama administration and continued for more than two years after Mr. Trump took office.
The department notified the prison system that it could sue in 49 days “if State officials have not satisfactorily addressed our concerns.”
[The New York Times received more than 2,000 photos taken inside an Alabama prison. This is what they showed.]
Alabama is not alone in having troubled, violent prisons. But the state has one of the country’s highest incarceration rates and its correctional system is notoriously antiquated, dangerous and short-staffed. The major prisons are at 182 percent of their capacity, the report found, contraband is rampant and prisoners sleep in dorms they are not assigned to in order to escape violence.
“The violations are severe, systemic, and exacerbated by serious deficiencies in staffing and supervision,” the report said, noting that some facilities had fewer than 20 percent of their allotted positions filled. It also cited the use of solitary confinement as a protective measure for vulnerable inmates, and “a high level of violence that is too common, cruel, of an unusual nature, and pervasive.”
State officials said the report addressed issues that Alabama was already aware of and working to fix.
“For more than two years, the D.O.J. pursued an investigation of issues that have been the subject of ongoing litigation and the target of significant reforms by the state,” a statement from the office of Gov. Kay Ivey said. “Over the coming months, my Administration will be working closely with D.O.J. to ensure that our mutual concerns are addressed and that we remain steadfast in our commitment to public safety, making certain that this Alabama problem has an Alabama solution.”
But the report called the state “deliberately indifferent” to the risks prisoners face, and said, “It has failed to correct known systemic deficiencies that contribute to the violence.” Legislative efforts to reduce overcrowding through measures such as reducing sentences were not made retroactive and have had “minimal effect,” the report said.
Alabama’s prisons have for years been the subject of civil rights litigation by the Equal Justice Initiative and the Southern Poverty Law Center, nonprofit legal advocacy groups based in Montgomery. Maria Morris, the lead lawyer for the center’s lawsuit, also disputed the assertion that the problems were being fixed.
“They’re not fixing them,” Ms. Morris said. “They’re giving a lot of lip service to the need to fix them, but the lip service always comes back to we just need a billion dollars to build new prisons and, as the Department of Justice found, that’s not going to solve the problem.”
Alabama inmates continue to die in high numbers. There have been 15 suicides in the past 15 months, and the homicide rate vastly exceeds the national average for prisons.
The Justice Department report focused on the failure to prevent prisoner-on-prisoner violence because of what it said was inadequate training, failure to properly classify and supervise inmates, and failure to stem the flow of contraband including weapons and drugs, among other problems.
The department is still investigating excessive force and sexual abuse by prison staff members, an investigation that former federal prosecutors say could lead to criminal indictments.
Violence in Alabama’s Prisons
Here is some of the violent and illegal activity reported during a single week in September 2017.
Friday: Three stabbings, including one that resulted in death.
Saturday: One beating and one discovery of a drug cache.
Sunday: Two beatings, one stabbing, one sexual assault and one beating with a sock full of metal locks.
Tuesday: One discovery of a drug cache and one case of arson, when a prisoner's bed was set on fire while he slept.
Wednesday: One sexual assault.
Thursday: One beating, one sexual assault and one overdose that resulted in death.
The Department of Justice
[Our reporter went inside St. Clair Correctional Facility in Springville, Ala. He found it was “virtually ungoverned” and the inmates were armed.]
Investigators visited four prisons and interviewed more than 270 prisoners. To “provide a window into a broken system,” the report detailed a single week’s worth of injuries and attacks, including days that saw multiple incidents including stabbings, a sleeping man attacked with socks filled with metal locks and another man being forced to perform oral sex on two men at knife point.
The department also concluded that the system does not provide “safe and sanitary” living conditions. Open sewage ran by the pathway that government lawyers used to access one facility, which the state closed soon after the visit. One investigator grew ill from the toxic fumes of cleaning fluids while inspecting the kitchen, the report said.
The report said the state failed to track violent deaths or adequately investigate sex abuse. At least three homicide victims — including one who was stabbed and another who was beaten — were classified as having died from natural causes, the report said. The report listed nine killings in which the victims had been previously attacked or officials had received other warnings that they were in danger.
Sexual assaults occur in “dormitories, cells, recreation areas, the infirmary, bathrooms, and showers at all hours of the day and night,” the report said. Prisons must screen inmates and separate sexually abusive prisoners from those at risk of sexual abuse, particularly gay and transgender people; the report said Alabama does not do so.
Inmates are raped to pay off debts, and one mother told the Justice Department that a prisoner had texted her to say he would “chop her son into pieces and rape him if she did not send him $800,” the report said.
Last month, Governor Ivey warned of “horrendous conditions” in the prisons and an impending federal intervention in her State of the State speech.
Ms. Ivey said the department had increased the prison budget in recent years, given raises to corrections officers and requested $31 million to hire 500 more correctional officers and increase pay in the coming fiscal year.
But Mac McArthur, the executive director of the Alabama State Employees Association, which includes state corrections workers, said attrition was still outpacing recruitment, in part because starting salaries were still below $30,000 a year for some officers, and in part because the job was so dangerous.
The federal investigation was opened during the Obama administration, after the lawsuits over prison abuses and published accounts of endemic brutality, violence and torture. The investigation continued under former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who had also served as a longtime senator from Alabama.
The report included a series of measures necessary to remedy the constitutional and other violations that regularly occur in the Alabama prison system, including additional screening for those entering the prisons, moving low-risk inmates, hiring 500 additional corrections officers and overhauling disciplinary processes around violence and sexual assault.
Similar federal civil rights investigations have resulted in consent decrees — court-approved deals that include a road map of changes that institutions such as police departments and state correction departments must adhere to in order to avoid being sued.
But in a break with past practice, Mr. Sessions placed three key restrictions on consent decrees. He said that a top political appointee must sign off on any deal. Department lawyers must show proof of violations that go beyond unconstitutional behavior. And the deals must have a sunset date, meaning they can expire before violations have been remedied. The current attorney general, William P. Barr, has not changed Mr. Sessions’s policy.
Mr. Sessions said that the consent decrees interfered with states’ rights, a position echoed by Ms. Ivey in her statement insisting on an “Alabama solution.”
But Vanita Gupta, a head of the civil rights division in the Obama administration and one of the officials who opened the investigation, said that given the pervasive problems and the history of inaction, “nothing short of a comprehensive consent decree will adequately address these constitutional violations.”
The Justice Department declined to comment on whether it would seek a consent decree.
Ms. Ivey is hardly the first governor to reckon with the prison system and its decrepit conditions. Her immediate predecessor, Robert Bentley, pushed a plan for $800 million in bonds to build four new prisons and to close some existing facilities.
But governors have only so much influence in Alabama, and the Legislature balked, especially as a scandal left Mr. Bentley weakened. This year, Ms. Ivey proposed a similar plan for new prisons that state officials hoped would be ready by 2022.
Alan Blinder contributed reporting.
Follow Katie Benner and Shaila Dewan on Twitter: @ktbenner and @shailadewan.
A version of this article appears in print on April 3, 2019, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: ‘Common, Cruel’ Violence Met by Indifference.
Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
A comment somebody wrote at the New York Times:
The federal report cited in this article is being discussed on local TV and local news websites in Alabama. The vast majority of respondents say they don't care if prison is horrendous, it's supposed to be. So much for "constitutional conservatism" if the Eighth Amendment is ignored. So much for Christian charity in the supposed Bible Belt.
Two normal people, aka atheists, explained why the Magic Jeebus Man was not real.
Julius Caesar died on 15 March 44 BC. We don't know the exact date Jeebus died. Does this mean Jeebus was not very important?
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Not only that, we know exactly what Julius Caesar looked like, there were countless eyewitness accounts of him, he left writings, Roman historians mention him, and his accomplishments were recorded by many people. This is because he really existed. We have NONE of these things from Jesus.
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Yea that's one of the hiccups in the Christ myth.
To me the biggest hiccup is the fact that Jesus never wrote one word and supposedly left correspondence to illiterate witnesses. It's a mystery why god sends his supposed son who by all accounts would have been the ideal conveyance vehicle but is silent other than thru testimony.
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Not only that, we know exactly what Julius Caesar looked like, there were countless eyewitness accounts of him, he left writings, Roman historians mention him, and his accomplishments were recorded by many people. This is because he really existed. We have NONE of these things from Jesus.
•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Yea that's one of the hiccups in the Christ myth.
To me the biggest hiccup is the fact that Jesus never wrote one word and supposedly left correspondence to illiterate witnesses. It's a mystery why god sends his supposed son who by all accounts would have been the ideal conveyance vehicle but is silent other than thru testimony.
Sunday, April 28, 2019
How Whales Change Climate
This video was created as a gift to humanity by Chris and Dawn Agnos.
"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe."
-- John Muir
When whales were at their historic populations, before their numbers were reduced, it seems that whales might have been responsible for removing tens of millions of tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere every year. Whales change the climate. The return of the great whales, if they are allowed to recover, could be seen as a benign form of geo-engineering. It could undo some of the damage we have done, both to the living systems of the sea, and to the atmosphere.
A comment somebody wrote:
"Every living species on this planet has a role in keeping it alive. Humans don't control nature, we're not gods. We are part of nature. And should respect it as it respects us. Or else perish because of us."
"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe."
-- John Muir
When whales were at their historic populations, before their numbers were reduced, it seems that whales might have been responsible for removing tens of millions of tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere every year. Whales change the climate. The return of the great whales, if they are allowed to recover, could be seen as a benign form of geo-engineering. It could undo some of the damage we have done, both to the living systems of the sea, and to the atmosphere.
A comment somebody wrote:
"Every living species on this planet has a role in keeping it alive. Humans don't control nature, we're not gods. We are part of nature. And should respect it as it respects us. Or else perish because of us."
BBC Science - How cow dung can help fight climate change
Click this link to see the video - How cow dung can help fight climate change
There's three times more carbon in the soil than in the atmosphere - but that carbon's being released by deforestation and poor farming.
Hurting the soil affects the climate in two ways: it compromises the growth of plants taking in carbon from the atmosphere, and it releases soil carbon previously stored by worms taking leaf matter underground.
Fans of re-wilding say the best way to protect soil and fight climate change is to let forests grow back, but some farmers believe they can keep producing food while changing the way they farm to keep the soil in good shape.
Idiot America. The stupid, it burns.
The Noah's Ark genocide myth is one of the most disgusting and most childish fantasies ever invented. If the bible god was real we would have to kill it.
I asked some Christian assholes why they worship an asshole god who loves to murder babies. They said the genocide was deserved. It's not god's fault. It was the parent's fault because they didn't suck up to the Magic Man.
60% of Americans believe this insane bullshit. Americans are fucking morons.
This fucktard for Jeebus thinks stupidity is a good thing:
“These are surprising and reassuring figures — a positive sign in a postmodern world that seemed bent on erasing faith from the public square in recent years,” said the Rev. Charles Nalls of Christ the King, a Catholic-Anglican church in the District.
Washington Times - 2004 - Most Americans take Bible stories literally
God’s creation of the Earth, Noah and the flood, Moses at the Red Sea: These pivotal stories from the Old Testament still resonate deeply with most Americans, who take the accounts literally rather than as a symbolic lesson.
An ABC News poll released Sunday found that 61 percent of Americans believe the account of creation in the Bible’s book of Genesis is “literally true” rather than a story meant as a “lesson.”
Sixty percent believe in the story of Noah’s ark and a global flood, while 64 percent agree that Moses parted the Red Sea to save fleeing Jews from their Egyptian captors.
The poll, with a margin of error of 3 percentage points, was conducted Feb. 6 to 10 among 1,011 adults.
“These are surprising and reassuring figures — a positive sign in a postmodern world that seemed bent on erasing faith from the public square in recent years,” said the Rev. Charles Nalls of Christ the King, a Catholic-Anglican church in the District.
“This poll tells me that America is reading the Bible more than we thought. There had been a tendency to decry or discount Bible literacy among the faithful,” he said.
“But this indicates a strong alliance among Americans with the inerrant word of God, as opposed to simply the inspired word of God, as viewed in the context of faith tradition,” Father Nalls said.
The levels of belief in the stories, however, differed among Christians.
The poll found that 75 percent of Protestants believed in the story of creation, 79 percent in the Red Sea account and 73 percent in Noah and the ark.
Among evangelical Protestants, those figures were 87 percent, 91 percent and 87 percent, respectively. Among Catholics, they were 51 percent, 50 percent and 44 percent.
The stories still proved somewhat compelling among those who had “no religion.” A quarter said they believed in Creation, almost a third said Moses parted the Red Sea, and 29 percent believe in Noah.
In anticipation of the Feb. 25 release of Mel Gibson’s controversial movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” the poll also found that 80 percent of Americans do not feel that the Jews of today bear responsibility for the death of Jesus Christ, against 8 percent who said they did.
Some critics contend that Mr. Gibson’s film unfairly portrays Jews, although he removed a scene which depicts a crowd asking that the death of Jesus “be on us, and on our children,” a phrase from the Book of Matthew.
Who killed Jesus, then?
“The big answer is, we all did,” Mr. Gibson said in an ABC interview which aired last night.
The network’s poll found some slight differences among respondents when asked about blame for the Crucifixion, however: 12 percent of evangelical Protestants, 11 percent of Protestants and 6 percent of Catholics said today’s Jews still are responsible for Jesus’ death.
Gauging American religious beliefs has been the focus of other recent surveys as well.
A Harris poll of 2,201 adults charting “Religious and Other Beliefs of Americans 2003” found last year that 93 percent of the nation’s Christians believe in miracles, 95 percent in heaven, 93 percent in the virgin birth of Christ and 96 percent in Christ’s resurrection.
In another survey of 2,306 adults released in October, Harris also found that 42 percent felt God was a male, while only 1 percent said God was a female. Thirty-eight percent said God was neither male nor female, and 11 percent said God was both genders.
The poll also found that 48 percent said God was a “spirit or power that can take on human form but is not inherently human,” 9 percent said God was “like a human being” and 27 percent said God “does not take on human form.”
Meanwhile, a Gallup Poll of 1,004 adults released Dec. 30 found that 61 percent of Americans believe “religion can answer all or most of today’s problems,” although 64 percent felt that religion is losing its influence on the nation.
Another Gallup Poll released in November found that six out of every 10 Americans said religion was “very important” in their lives — compared with 28 percent of Canadians and 17 percent of the British.
I asked some Christian assholes why they worship an asshole god who loves to murder babies. They said the genocide was deserved. It's not god's fault. It was the parent's fault because they didn't suck up to the Magic Man.
60% of Americans believe this insane bullshit. Americans are fucking morons.
This fucktard for Jeebus thinks stupidity is a good thing:
“These are surprising and reassuring figures — a positive sign in a postmodern world that seemed bent on erasing faith from the public square in recent years,” said the Rev. Charles Nalls of Christ the King, a Catholic-Anglican church in the District.
Washington Times - 2004 - Most Americans take Bible stories literally
God’s creation of the Earth, Noah and the flood, Moses at the Red Sea: These pivotal stories from the Old Testament still resonate deeply with most Americans, who take the accounts literally rather than as a symbolic lesson.
An ABC News poll released Sunday found that 61 percent of Americans believe the account of creation in the Bible’s book of Genesis is “literally true” rather than a story meant as a “lesson.”
Sixty percent believe in the story of Noah’s ark and a global flood, while 64 percent agree that Moses parted the Red Sea to save fleeing Jews from their Egyptian captors.
The poll, with a margin of error of 3 percentage points, was conducted Feb. 6 to 10 among 1,011 adults.
“These are surprising and reassuring figures — a positive sign in a postmodern world that seemed bent on erasing faith from the public square in recent years,” said the Rev. Charles Nalls of Christ the King, a Catholic-Anglican church in the District.
“This poll tells me that America is reading the Bible more than we thought. There had been a tendency to decry or discount Bible literacy among the faithful,” he said.
“But this indicates a strong alliance among Americans with the inerrant word of God, as opposed to simply the inspired word of God, as viewed in the context of faith tradition,” Father Nalls said.
The levels of belief in the stories, however, differed among Christians.
The poll found that 75 percent of Protestants believed in the story of creation, 79 percent in the Red Sea account and 73 percent in Noah and the ark.
Among evangelical Protestants, those figures were 87 percent, 91 percent and 87 percent, respectively. Among Catholics, they were 51 percent, 50 percent and 44 percent.
The stories still proved somewhat compelling among those who had “no religion.” A quarter said they believed in Creation, almost a third said Moses parted the Red Sea, and 29 percent believe in Noah.
In anticipation of the Feb. 25 release of Mel Gibson’s controversial movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” the poll also found that 80 percent of Americans do not feel that the Jews of today bear responsibility for the death of Jesus Christ, against 8 percent who said they did.
Some critics contend that Mr. Gibson’s film unfairly portrays Jews, although he removed a scene which depicts a crowd asking that the death of Jesus “be on us, and on our children,” a phrase from the Book of Matthew.
Who killed Jesus, then?
“The big answer is, we all did,” Mr. Gibson said in an ABC interview which aired last night.
The network’s poll found some slight differences among respondents when asked about blame for the Crucifixion, however: 12 percent of evangelical Protestants, 11 percent of Protestants and 6 percent of Catholics said today’s Jews still are responsible for Jesus’ death.
Gauging American religious beliefs has been the focus of other recent surveys as well.
A Harris poll of 2,201 adults charting “Religious and Other Beliefs of Americans 2003” found last year that 93 percent of the nation’s Christians believe in miracles, 95 percent in heaven, 93 percent in the virgin birth of Christ and 96 percent in Christ’s resurrection.
In another survey of 2,306 adults released in October, Harris also found that 42 percent felt God was a male, while only 1 percent said God was a female. Thirty-eight percent said God was neither male nor female, and 11 percent said God was both genders.
The poll also found that 48 percent said God was a “spirit or power that can take on human form but is not inherently human,” 9 percent said God was “like a human being” and 27 percent said God “does not take on human form.”
Meanwhile, a Gallup Poll of 1,004 adults released Dec. 30 found that 61 percent of Americans believe “religion can answer all or most of today’s problems,” although 64 percent felt that religion is losing its influence on the nation.
Another Gallup Poll released in November found that six out of every 10 Americans said religion was “very important” in their lives — compared with 28 percent of Canadians and 17 percent of the British.
It's about fucking time: New York Archdiocese Releases List of Clergy Accused of Sex Abuse. Cardinal Timothy Dolan said disclosure of names is response to hearing from many victims and priests.
I used to be a brainwashed Catholic. I threw out the bullshit when I grew up. Fortunately, I was never an altar boy so there wasn't a child abuse problem.
Altar Boy: a boy who acts as a priest's assistant during a service, especially in the Roman Catholic Church.
Priests become priests because they want to have their way with little boys.
I remember the nuns were stupid fucking assholes. At the Catholic Church instead of teaching us something which was their job, they had stand in the church for a very long time because they enjoyed torturing us.
The moron nuns repeatedly said "Christ died for your sins" and "You must have faith". At least a thousand times they repeated this bullshit and that's why I remember the exact words many decades later.
According to every branch of Christianity, everyone on this planet has sinned. Normal people don't use the word "sin" because it's a ridiculous idea.
Sin: an immoral act considered to be a transgression against divine law.
Those ugly nuns can take their divine law and shove it somewhere.
Kindergarten thru 8th grade, 9 years of my life wasted. Never once did those uneducated moron nuns teach us anything about science. I lived in a wealthy Chicago suburb. If I went to their public schools I would have had a real education. Instead, the only thing I learned was the bullshit about the Magic Jeebus Man dropping dead for my sins.
The rest of this post is a cut & paste job from the Wall Street Journal about the stupid fucking assholes who cared more about the reputation of the Church instead of the children who were abused. That turned out to be a bad idea but still the asshole pope refuses to require bishops to call the police when this abuse happens. The pope belongs in prison.
New York Archdiocese Releases List of Clergy Accused of Sex Abuse
Cardinal Timothy Dolan said disclosure of names is response to hearing from many victims and priests.
By Melanie Grayce West
April 26, 2019
The Archdiocese of New York released a list of clergy credibly accused of sexual abuse, a turning point for victim-survivors of abuse and one of the largest dioceses in the country.
In a letter to Roman Catholics on Friday, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York, said the disclosure of the names—which include former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and Bishop John Jenik—comes in response to hearing from many victim-survivors and priests.
“I pledge again today that I will do all in my power to ensure the safety of our young people, and to react with sympathy, understanding, and respect towards those who come forward with an allegation of abuse,” Cardinal Dolan said in his letter.
The list, with more than 120 names, reports only clergy who were officially employed by the Archdiocese of New York, not priests who were either visiting or on loan from other religious orders.
Those on the list were either credibly accused of sexually abusing a minor, possessing child pornography or were named in a claim to the Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program, a multimillion-dollar victim-compensation fund launched in late 2016. So far, the fund has provided compensation to 350 people.
Zach Hiner, executive director of SNAP, a nonprofit network of church-abuse survivors, applauded the release of names and said it would encourage some victims to come forward. The list was long resisted, he said, and doesn’t include the work histories of the clergy or the date of the first allegation. “The only way we can know how to prevent these cases in the future is to know what went wrong in the past,” Mr. Hiner added.
Robert Hoatson, a former priest of the Archdiocese of Newark and president of Road to Recovery, a nonprofit survivors-advocacy group, said Cardinal Dolan has taken a “good first step in being transparent and truthful about sexual abuse by clergy.”
“However, his list is incomplete and must contain names of religious order priests and ‘extern’ clergy who have been accused,” said Mr. Hoatson, who has said he is an abuse survivor.
The inclusion of a cleric’s name on the list doesn’t imply he is guilty of a crime or liable for any civil claim, according to the archdiocese. Roughly three-quarters of the credibly accused clergy were ordained between 1908 and 1969. Of those named on the list, roughly two-thirds have died.
Three clergy included on the list have been removed from ministry or placed on leave, pending the outcome of their criminal cases or investigation by the archdiocese. Eight other priests, who were removed from ministry, are awaiting a final canonical or archdiocesan review.
Former Cardinal McCarrick was dismissed from the priesthood in February. He has previously said he is innocent. Bishop Jenik, who was removed from his post and is awaiting canonical review, has denied the accusation of abuse.
The decision to report all of the clergy names is something that Cardinal Dolan had long declined to do. Typically, names were released publicly through the parish where an accused clergyman served and often included in a church bulletin. The archdiocese is sprawling, with some 2.6 million Catholics in nearly 300 parishes. The disclosure of the clergy names comes after similar moves across the country, including in New Jersey earlier this year.
Write to Melanie Grayce West at melanie.west@wsj.com
Altar Boy: a boy who acts as a priest's assistant during a service, especially in the Roman Catholic Church.
Priests become priests because they want to have their way with little boys.
I remember the nuns were stupid fucking assholes. At the Catholic Church instead of teaching us something which was their job, they had stand in the church for a very long time because they enjoyed torturing us.
The moron nuns repeatedly said "Christ died for your sins" and "You must have faith". At least a thousand times they repeated this bullshit and that's why I remember the exact words many decades later.
According to every branch of Christianity, everyone on this planet has sinned. Normal people don't use the word "sin" because it's a ridiculous idea.
Sin: an immoral act considered to be a transgression against divine law.
Those ugly nuns can take their divine law and shove it somewhere.
Kindergarten thru 8th grade, 9 years of my life wasted. Never once did those uneducated moron nuns teach us anything about science. I lived in a wealthy Chicago suburb. If I went to their public schools I would have had a real education. Instead, the only thing I learned was the bullshit about the Magic Jeebus Man dropping dead for my sins.
The rest of this post is a cut & paste job from the Wall Street Journal about the stupid fucking assholes who cared more about the reputation of the Church instead of the children who were abused. That turned out to be a bad idea but still the asshole pope refuses to require bishops to call the police when this abuse happens. The pope belongs in prison.
New York Archdiocese Releases List of Clergy Accused of Sex Abuse
Cardinal Timothy Dolan said disclosure of names is response to hearing from many victims and priests.
By Melanie Grayce West
April 26, 2019
The Archdiocese of New York released a list of clergy credibly accused of sexual abuse, a turning point for victim-survivors of abuse and one of the largest dioceses in the country.
In a letter to Roman Catholics on Friday, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York, said the disclosure of the names—which include former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and Bishop John Jenik—comes in response to hearing from many victim-survivors and priests.
“I pledge again today that I will do all in my power to ensure the safety of our young people, and to react with sympathy, understanding, and respect towards those who come forward with an allegation of abuse,” Cardinal Dolan said in his letter.
The list, with more than 120 names, reports only clergy who were officially employed by the Archdiocese of New York, not priests who were either visiting or on loan from other religious orders.
Those on the list were either credibly accused of sexually abusing a minor, possessing child pornography or were named in a claim to the Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program, a multimillion-dollar victim-compensation fund launched in late 2016. So far, the fund has provided compensation to 350 people.
Zach Hiner, executive director of SNAP, a nonprofit network of church-abuse survivors, applauded the release of names and said it would encourage some victims to come forward. The list was long resisted, he said, and doesn’t include the work histories of the clergy or the date of the first allegation. “The only way we can know how to prevent these cases in the future is to know what went wrong in the past,” Mr. Hiner added.
Robert Hoatson, a former priest of the Archdiocese of Newark and president of Road to Recovery, a nonprofit survivors-advocacy group, said Cardinal Dolan has taken a “good first step in being transparent and truthful about sexual abuse by clergy.”
“However, his list is incomplete and must contain names of religious order priests and ‘extern’ clergy who have been accused,” said Mr. Hoatson, who has said he is an abuse survivor.
The inclusion of a cleric’s name on the list doesn’t imply he is guilty of a crime or liable for any civil claim, according to the archdiocese. Roughly three-quarters of the credibly accused clergy were ordained between 1908 and 1969. Of those named on the list, roughly two-thirds have died.
Three clergy included on the list have been removed from ministry or placed on leave, pending the outcome of their criminal cases or investigation by the archdiocese. Eight other priests, who were removed from ministry, are awaiting a final canonical or archdiocesan review.
Former Cardinal McCarrick was dismissed from the priesthood in February. He has previously said he is innocent. Bishop Jenik, who was removed from his post and is awaiting canonical review, has denied the accusation of abuse.
The decision to report all of the clergy names is something that Cardinal Dolan had long declined to do. Typically, names were released publicly through the parish where an accused clergyman served and often included in a church bulletin. The archdiocese is sprawling, with some 2.6 million Catholics in nearly 300 parishes. The disclosure of the clergy names comes after similar moves across the country, including in New Jersey earlier this year.
Write to Melanie Grayce West at melanie.west@wsj.com
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