Wednesday, August 07, 2013

The Gay Russian Demonstrators were in St. Petersburg.

If anyone knows anything about Russia they would know St. Petersburg is very European in its culture and has been for a long, long time.

It has a notation in Russian society similar to NYC and it's frequent progressives agenda including fighting against food abuse and large drinks.

Basically, St. Petersburg gets on many Russians last nerve. It is also a beautiful city and carries pride with Russian society. So, in many ways, if there was going to be Gay Rights demonstrations they would have started in St. Petersburg. 

Aug 2, 2013
While holding a one-man protest (click here) against LGBT rights violations in Russia, activist Krill Kalugin was attacked by a group of Russian paratroopers in St. Petersburg today. The paratroopers were celebrating Russia’s Paratroopers day, which honors military servicemen.

According to Animal New York’s translation of a video of the attack, paratroopers approached the man and began pushing him around after saying they did “not agree with” his actions.

The Olympics are coming up and every Russian with an agenda knows there will be intense interest by the international community during that time. Hello?

China did well when they hosted the Olympics, but, the social rules are well enforced in China and no new rules were necessary. The Olympics went on while there were human rights abuses in the nation. One of the reasons the Olympics occur every four years in two different seasons is to promote good will and progress toward peace. If every Olympics looked like a G anything meeting with Globalists everywhere, some how it just would not be the same. Go figure.

While Gay Rights is an important subject and Europe has a high level of status for their gay communities; Russia has decided this eruption of demonstrations by their gay community is opportunistic. Quite frankly it is. 

The Gay Community in Russia has made a statement. No one is going to forget it. The way to assist the community is to work within a framework that won't disrupt lives and livelihoods. The best path is to have the USA State Department carry the agenda forward while advocating for their freedoms of expression to minimize victimization. I am quite confident Russian diplomacy will point to the fact the USA has only recently realized a Court overturn a Clinton era law and there really isn't any overall right for their gay community to marry. They would be correct. 

The USA has a way to go yet before they are solid examples of freedom and diversity. In the meantime, activists will seek attention and those viewing it will worry about them, demand fair treatment and ask international observers to insure their well being. It is the way of the world.

The Olympics will go on and again we will celebrate athletes being ambassadors for their countries. There is no excuse to boycott the Olympics. The USA has no 'moral authority' in the treatment of their gay community to make such a stand. 

The reason President Obama is not meeting with President Putin ahead of the G20 is because it has been assigned to lower level diplomacy.

The truth is there is no reason for high level meetings because there was no progress made to any of the issues facing the two countries. There were treaties to sign or any 'next thing' to do that is left to either President. 

The bull-only about Snowden is American propaganda for media pundits.

MOSCOW, August 7 (RIA Novosti) – Moscow (click here) is disappointed by the cancellation of US President Barack Obama’s planned visit to Moscow for a bilateral summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, a senior Kremlin aide said Wednesday.

The two heads of state were scheduled to hold talks in Moscow ahead of a gathering of the Group of 20 major economies on September 5 in St. Petersburg.

“We are disappointed by the decision made by the US administration to cancel Obama’s visit to Moscow in September,” Putin's top foreign policy aide, Yury Ushakov, told reporters.

“It is clear that this decision has been prompted by the situation regarding former US spy agency employee Edward Snowden, [a situation] which was not created by us,” Ushakov said....

The 'tough talk' of the pundits was never heard from either President. Snowden is AGAIN a scapegoat.

I think what Julia Ioffe knows about Russia is more than appropriate. (click here) Her opinions are fairly accurate. Once again Russia is the evil empire. Will the propaganda of the USA ever do without it?

The fight for Gay Rights is everywhere. It is not just in Russia. The incident in St. Petersburg didn't result in a national hunt for homosexuals.

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR and STEVEN LEE MYERS 
Published: August 6, 2013

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel (click here) plan to meet here in Washington with their Russian counterparts on Friday for a day of talks that could determine the fate of a September summit meeting between President Obama and the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin....

The boys haven't been doing their homework and now they have to catch up. Secretary Kerry has had a family emergency and Hagel has been harassed over "The Sequester," so everything that was supposed to be accomplished before President Obama arrived in Russia for the Putin meeting hasn't been addressed. There is no business for either leader to  address. They aren't meeting for 'the old days' and reminiscing. These meetings are suppose to be productive.

Quite frankly it has been a standard for some time now to allow Russia to be moved to the back burner while other issues were more pressing. Times up!

...State Department officials on Tuesday afternoon confirmed the meeting with Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, and Sergei K. Shoigu, the defense minister. Jen Psaki, the State Department spokeswoman, said the four officials would discuss “a number of pressing bilateral and global issues.”
“There’s a lot to discuss,” Ms. Psaki said. “A lot of issues we work together on. I expect those to be the thrust of the conversation."

Russian officials sounded a similar theme.

We expect a very intensive discussion, all the more so because there are quite a few sharp, controversial and difficult questions,” Sergei Ryabkov, the deputy foreign minister, said Tuesday.... 

There better be very intensive discussions because the people of the USA are flyin' tired of the lack of progress on many fronts including non-proliferation, Syria, Iran and North Korea and hostile parking of missiles at the Russian border.

Edward Snowden is NOT the issue with the problems within the NSA and their intimate relationship with Wall Street. Edward Snowden is a whistleblower. Russia has consented to allow him a space on Earth until more is known about his future. There are many citizens of the USA viewing the NSA program as a problem and Snowden admirable to bring it forward at his own peril.

At least Russia is willing to entertain the safety of a man that is wrongly accused by the USA while Wall Street gets away with it all. The American people don't need any more injustice in their understanding of their country. That is oppression and we are all opposed to it. The politics in the USA have become oppressive and a burden to the people. Real oppression. Fiscal and status oppression of citizens. At least Edward Snowden has relief from the invasive government agenda of the NSA and their Wall Street partners. 

Indeed. One has to wonder why FOX News staff always looks like deer caught in headlights.

It is interesting, isn't it? The conservative states actually have few and few mental health beds than prison beds.

...It is now extremely difficult.(click here) It is now extremely difficult to find a bed for a seriously mentally ill person who needs to be hospitalized. In 1955 there was one psychiatric bed for every 300 Americans. In 2005 there was one psychiatric bed for every 3,000 Americans. Even worse, themajority of the existing beds were filled with court-ordered (forensic) cases and thus not really available....  

But, of course, there is no need for gun control. I don't believe I have to state anything else, do I? Next time Wayne La Pierre states the problem is mental health in the USA, remember this.
   
This information is a little dated, but, maybe Governor Jan Brewer loves Obamacare because she knows there is no real funding for mental health in Arizona which resulted in an attempted assassination of an Arizona USA Congresswoman. 
 
Using 2004–2005 data not previously published, we found that in the United States there are now more than three times more seriously mentally ill persons in jails and prisons than in hospitals. Looked at by individual states, in North Dakota there are approximately an equal number of mentally ill persons in jails and prisons compared to hospitals. By contrast, Arizona and Nevada have almost ten times more mentally ill persons in jails and prisons than in hospitals. It is thus fact, not hyperbole, that America’s jails and prisons have become our new mental hospitals.

The trend in the conservative states has been to remove more and more mental health beds. So, when a parent of a young man realizes he is dangerous and seeks to have him treated, there simply isn't any help and/or mental health beds to be found. They are left to wander inside their own lives and minds, until, they perform a heinous act and then they are considered criminally insane and locked away. 

The shooter in Arizona was known to have mental health issues, but, remained undiagnosed and walked into a Walmart and purchased all the guns and ammunition he wanted. 

The only way of ending gun violence in our nation is to control the guns in circulation. 

When Wayne La Pierre states most gun owners want their guns, he knows there is a level of fear in this country based on the fact, 'There are crazies with guns.' He knows the people will stand with him when it comes to gun control.

I sincerely doubt anyone will find large donations to mental health facilities by the NRA, their donors, members (Life time or otherwise) or gun industry. They have to spend monies on propaganda to prevent the truth from being known.

Go ahead, America. Live in fear. It serves the purpose.
.

Good news for the filmmakers of "Blackfish."

Dr. Laela Sayigh of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (click here) has conducted extensive research into the intelligence of the Free Ranging Bottlenose Dolphins most of her career.

This is a small sample of her work and reflects none of her mentoring of her graduate students. She has stated the signature whistles of Bottlenose dolphins change after having contact with humans. She has a library of signature whistles from her acoustic research which demands the least contact requirements with this species. At the time when they have contact with her research team, she has known specimens of the change in their whistles. 

No research reveals the reason why, but, it might be the whistles of these mammals including the complicated singing of Humpback Whales are sophisticated ways of talking about their oceans to enhance their survival. We just don't know and I am not sure we need to know as it would be exploited and possibly lead to their extinction by others with different agendas for the biotic life on Earth.

Jones, G., and L. Sayigh. 2002. Geographic variation in rates of vocal production of free-ranging bottlenose dolphins. Marine Mammal Science. 18: 374-393.

Sayigh, L. S. 2002. Signature whistles. In Encyclopedia of marine mammals, ed. B. Wursig and W. Perrin. Academic Press: San Diego, pp. 1081-1083.

Allen, M., A. Read, J. Gaudet, and L. Sayigh. 2001. Fine scale habitat selection of foraging bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) near Clearwater, Florida. Marine Ecology Progress Series 222: 253-264.

Sayigh, L. S., P. L. Tyack, R. S. Wells, A. Solow, M. Scott, and A. B. Irvine. 1999. Individual recognition in wild bottlenose dolphins: a field test using playback experiments. Animal Behavior 57:41-50.

Tyack, P. L. and L. S. Sayigh. 1997. Vocal learning in cetaceans. In Social Influences on Vocal Development, ed. C. Snowdon and M. Hausberger, pp.208-233. Cambridge University Press.

Marine Mammals have larger brains PER BODY MASS than humans. That includes whales. They are very intelligent, gregarious survivors in very large bathtubs around the globe. That is not a minor accomplishment deserving recognition as reason for their endangered protections.
 

By Meeri Kim, Published: August 6

...“The main implications of such findings (click here) is that humans are not the only mammals that retain memories of others for long periods,” said SUNY-Buffalo psychologist Eduardo Mercado III, who was not involved in the research.

Prior to the new study, published online in the journal “Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B,” much of what had been known about dolphin memory was anecdotal. This recorded feat of long-term memory puts dolphins in the same field as other highly intelligent creatures, including some monkeys and elephants, both of which have been known to recognize unrelated members of their species after time apart.

University of Chicago scientist Jason Bruck studied 56 bottlenose dolphins that were moved between six different institutions — including Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo, the Minnesota Zoo and an aquarium at Disney World in Orlando — over a period of 20 years. They were typically transferred for breed, ing purposes, which somewhat mimicked the shifts among pods of dolphins in the wild.

That approach gave Bruck a record of the animals’ social histories, which would be nearly impossible to collect for wild dolphins. The dolphins studied were separated for as long as 20 years...

Congratulations to Yemen to preserve it's sovereign nation.

7 August 2013
 
...'Audacious plot' (click here)
The BBC's correspondent in Washington, David Willis, says it appears that Yemen was at the centre of a complex and audacious plot which - had it succeeded - would have given al-Qaeda control over a crucial aspect of the country's infrastructure.

Yemeni government spokesman Rajeh Badi said the plot involved blowing up oil pipelines and taking control of certain cities - including two ports in the south, one of which accounts for the bulk of Yemen's oil exports and is where a number of foreign workers are employed.

"There were attempts to control key cities in Yemen like Mukala and Bawzeer," said Mr Badi.

"This would be co-ordinated with attacks by al-Qaeda members on the gas facilities in Shebwa city and the blowing up of the gas pipe in Belhaf city."...

The man loves cars.

The International Reception Terminal at the largest airport facility in East Africa.

Aug. 7, 2013
Firefighters (click here) stand in a damaged portion of the airport. Many of the responding emergency crews were from private security firms.
Noor Khamis / Reuters

President Uhuru Kenyatta needs to allow a through investigation of the cause of this fire.

From "allAfrica.com"

Kenya's Main International Airport On Fire (click here)

Flights at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport have been diverted to other airports following a major fire that broke out, grounding operations.

The fire was in addition to this crash. A coincidence?


Nairobi, Kenya — Operations resumed (click here) at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport after nine hours of interruption caused by an EgyptAir aircraft 849 plane that veered off the runway and got stuck while landing on Wednesday morning.

Officials at the largest and busiest airport in East Africa for local and international flights said the plane, was eventually pulled away at about noon and most of the scheduled flights at the time took off.

The Kenya Airports Authority said the plane was carrying 123 passengers from Cairo, when it overshot the runway at 3.30am....

The women were so very, very brave in that court room.

Open Letter to Reinhold Reince Priebus

Dear Mr. Priebus,

Unfortunately, this will bring attention you don't deserve, but, it has to be said.

I am sure it is disheartening to many within Wall Street to have a decent President in the Oval Office that values the people of this nation as people and not commodities. Goldman Sachs was issued one of the highest fines of a bank on Wall Street. Their employee was found to be involved in breaking the law and was slapped on the wrist with three years in prison. As recent as this past month, JP Morgan was fined for mischief and this past year there was a challenge by stockholders to Mr. Dimon's leadership. I know of what I write. Wall Street would much prefer to have a manipulated and corrupt Republican/Tea Party President in the White House.

There are Americans who understand how deeply corrupt the values of the RNC have become to maintain control the laws of the USA since 2000. The election of 2000 was rigged through the Former Governor of Florida. It is obvious. It is known and no can deny it. This is not simply politics or sour grapes. There are solid facts that back that reality. Today, the Former Governor Bush would never have gotten away with it.

The Former Governor Bush's Secretary of State purged the voter rolls in Miami-Dade County, no different than the current Republican Governor Scott attempted in 2012. It is known. It is a fact. It is a blatant grab for power because the RNC cannot win elections on the issues in a fair and transparent election. There are many nations where the politicians attempt and succeed the same thing. The UN usually sends in monitors to follow those elections. An example is the 2009 Afghanistan elections. This is not a mystery to many Americans, so what I am writing here is a fact, not fiction, regardless of your denial.

Currently, the GOP Governors of 2010 are attempting to destroy the unions, primarily the Public Sector Unions in the name of a balanced state budgets. That is also a lie. It is known. It is a fact. This methodology, including the activities within ALEC, is an assault on the USA Constitution. It is manipulative at the very least, removes States Rights and homogenizes the States into a parallel Wall Street governing body to remove the rights of the people. 

The Wisconsin Recall elections of Scott Walker told it all. $80 million was spent in the governor's recall race. This compares to $37.4 million spent on the 2010 Wisconsin gubernatorial election. Of that $80 million the Barrett Campaign was out spent by over two to one by "Outside Wisconsin Donors." The top ten donors of that recall election were SuperPacs, except, for three unions that backed the people. Those unions fell into 4th, 5th and 6th place on the top ten list. If those three unions were eliminated from being among the top ten donors to that election there would be no major funding for the Democrats.

That fact can be found here: http://www.citizenkoch.com/

Destroying unions that advocate for the Middle Class to support the USA economy in a sustainable reality is Anti-American. If it weren't for unions the USA Economy would have third world status. It is known. It is a fact. The stark example of that is the fact Wall Street is realizing it's highest profits while the USA is still seeking to grow an economy without their interest. In 2008, the banks took their Bush Bailout and ran to exploit other markets. It can be speculated Wall Street didn't want the USA back on it's feet under a Democratic President. The RNC/Tea Party needs to stop begrudging the American people the American Dream. Your leadership of the RNC/Tea Party political party clearly illustrates the desire to win elections at any cost including undermining the USA Constitution.

Mr. Priebus, your RNC/Tea Party is as corrupt as it comes. I suggest you clean up your act and run honest elections rather than attempting to poison the electorate through SuperPacs, ie: Karl Rove's Crossroads has a less than one percent success rate, and manipulating an election's outcome through gerrymandering, creating issues to obstruct voting and purging election voter rolls.

Mr. Priebus, your complaining is beginning to sound very tired when the facts are known. The resistance the RNC/Tea Party is receiving is not political so much as a demand to preserve our Constitution and the right of every American to upward movement, including an education leading to the American Dream. The destruction of our economy and the devastating USA Debt is unprecedented in it's etiology of Republican Presidencies.

There is much the RNC needs to improve on and I suggest you get started rather than ranting like a spoiled child. 

Best regards.