All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Libyan irregular forces backed by helicopters on Friday clashed with former rebel Islamist groups in the eastern city of Benghazi

Libyan irregular forces backed by helicopters on Friday clashed with former rebel Islamist groups in the eastern city of Benghazi in fighting that left at least 12 people dead and scores wounded.

Troops apparently under the control of retired General Khalifa Hifter shelled bases of the Islamist militia Rafallah al-Sahati and another Islamist militant group known as February 17, officials said.

A spokesman for Hifter told Libyan television station Al-Ahrar that some regular military units joined Hifter’s forces in the attacks, saying they now controlled the two bases. This has not been independently confirmed.

Libya’s army chief of staff Abdessalam Jadallah al-Salihin told state television, however, that he had given no orders for any regular military units to attack bases in Benghazi.

via .

A Republican World – ‘Nebraska Senate Nominee Says Religious Beliefs Can Justify Breaking Any Law’

Sassy statements to appeal to knee jerk thoughts – hollow and callow.

The Last Of The Millenniums

christians2

sasse1

We are a society.

We are not a ‘christian’ society. Nor a Jewish society nor an atheist society.

We are a society.

Religion is your belief…not everyone’s law.

We ALL have a Constitution…..You have YOUR Bible.

“[O]ur right to the free exercise of religion is co-equal to our right to life,” according to the campaign website of Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican who won his party’s nomination to the United States Senate on Tuesday’.

‘Here’s a screenshot of the relevant part of Sasse’s website’:

sasse

‘His proposed rule — that government cannot require someone to act counter to their religious beliefs “under any circumstances” — would mean that literally any law could be ignored by someone who held a religious belief counter to that law’.

‘According to National Geographic, for example,“[h]undreds, if not thousands, of women are murdered by their families each year in the name of family ‘honor,’”

View original post 59 more words

Avian Flu Diary: RIVM On 2nd Dutch MERS Case

Second MERS -patient in the Netherlands

Publication Date:15-05-2014

Today, May 15, 2014, is a second Dutch patients infected with the MERS coronavirus identified. The woman is a relative of the man who is diagnosed with yesterday. She also has become contaminated during the same trip to Saudi Arabia. She is listed in Isala Zwolle and nursed in strict isolation. Her health condition is stable. All the people who have had contact with the patient are mapped by the health department. These people’s health condition is monitored.

via Avian Flu Diary: RIVM On 2nd Dutch MERS Case.

FCC approves plan to allow for paid priority on Internet

(No way – you gonna make us pay – the uproar that is about to descend upon you should be no surprise – but your majority is too disconnected with reality to understand that until the wave washes over you!)

The plan, approved in a three-to-two vote along party lines, could unleash a new economy on the Web where an Internet service provider such as Verizon would charge a Web site such as Netflix for the guarantee of flawless video streaming.

via FCC approves plan to allow for paid priority on Internet.

Shinzo Abe reveals plans to lift Japan’s ban on fighting in conflicts overseas | World news | theguardian.com

(Wonder how long it would take him to come to South Korea’s assistance to quell disruptions and help defend against North Korean aggression – and then declare that the unified Korea wanted to become part of a Greater Japan – while claiming to not be waging war)

Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has announced plans to lift the country’s ban on fighting in conflicts overseas – a move that is certain to raise tensions with China and anger voters at home.

Abe called for a review of the way Japan interprets its pacifist constitution, to allow its military to participate in conflicts beyond its borders for the first time since the end of the second world war.

In an apparent attempt to address concerns in Chin and other parts of Asia where memories of Japan’s wartime conduct remain strong, he said Japan would never again become “a country that wages war”.

via Shinzo Abe reveals plans to lift Japan’s ban on fighting in conflicts overseas | World news | theguardian.com.

IAVA – Wall Street Journal- Veterans Groups Split on Support for Shinseki | Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America

“We are not going to call for the secretary’s resignation,” said Dave Autry, spokesman for Disabled American Veterans, a 1.2 million-member veterans advocacy group. “We are going to find out what the result of the inspector general investigations are.”

Few veterans service organizations have followed the American Legion in publicly demanding Mr. Shinseki’s resignation. The nation’s second largest group, the Veterans of Foreign Wars has said they don’t agree with demands for Mr. Shinseki’s resignation, and the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, with some 300,000 members, has yet to take a side on the debate while it polls its members, said the group’s CEO Paul Rieckhoff.

via IAVA – Wall Street Journal- Veterans Groups Split on Support for Shinseki | Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

Is El Niño Developing? : Image of the Day

The years 1997–98 brought El Niño out of the scientific literature and onto the front pages and evening newscasts. It was one of the strongest El Niño events observed, with extreme weather impacts on several continents. North America had one of its warmest and wettest winters on record, particularly in California and Florida. Peru, Mexico, and the rest of Central and South America endured devastating rainstorms and flooding. Indonesia and parts of Asia saw disastrous droughts.

Scientists at the Climate Prediction Center of the National Weather Service (NWS) announced on May 8 that they foresee a 65 percent chance of a transition to El Niño in the summer of 2014. “There remains uncertainty as to exactly when El Niño will develop and an even greater uncertainty as to how strong it may become,” NWS reported.

“If El Niño returns, the American West and Southwest could see major relief next winter from the long-lasting, punishing drought,” said climatologist Bill Patzert, who has been studying El Niño via satellite for two decades from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Further, the very frigid winter in the upper tier of the U.S this past winter could do a flip to mild next winter.”

via Is El Niño Developing? : Image of the Day.

[UPDATED] NY Times Abruptly Replaces Jill Abramson As Top Editor: Gothamist

Paying a woman less – plain and simple sexism by management – ironic and sleazy! 
Update 5:58 p.m.: In a post on the New Yorker’s blog, columnist Ken Auletta says sources tell him that in addition to other tensions with management, Abramson “discovered that her pay and her pension benefits as both executive editor and, before that, as managing editor were considerably less than the pay and pension benefits of Bill Keller, the male editor whom she replaced in both jobs.” She reportedly confronted the paper’s management—”and this may have fed into the management’s narrative that she was ‘pushy,’ a characterization that, for many, has an inescapably gendered aspect.” Auletta reports that Abramson was told she would be terminated last Friday.Update 5:58 p.m.: In a post on the New Yorker’s blog, columnist Ken Auletta says sources tell him that in addition to other tensions with management, Abramson “discovered that her pay and her pension benefits as both executive editor and, before that, as managing editor were considerably less than the pay and pension benefits of Bill Keller, the male editor whom she replaced in both jobs.” She reportedly confronted the paper’s management—”and this may have fed into the management’s narrative that she was ‘pushy,’ a characterization that, for many, has an inescapably gendered aspect.” Auletta reports that Abramson was told she would be terminated last Friday.

via [UPDATED] NY Times Abruptly Replaces Jill Abramson As Top Editor: Gothamist.