It’s been a rough few days, especially for those charged with caring for children. In the wake of the shooting in Newtown we talked to some members of our own community who have some insight on helping little ones cope with the stress of such awful news. Continue reading
The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program released their annual report on Monday. The 2010 data shows a continuing downward trend in violent crimes while drug arrests remain high despite the Obama administration’s previously stated wish to change the nation’s drug enforcement policies.
Drug offenses made up the majority of arrests nationwide, with a total of about 1.6 million. A whopping 81.9% of those were for possession, rather than sale or manufacturing. Marijuana offenses led the pack with 45.8% of all drug arrests being for marijuana possession. Continue reading
“It is my opinion that absent Rio Tinto’s mining activity on Bougainville or its insistence that the Panguna mine be re-opened, the government would not have engaged in hostilities or taken military action on the island.”
”Because of Rio Tinto’s financial influence in PNG, the company controlled the government.”
”The government of PNG followed Rio Tinto’s instructions and carried out its requests … BCL was directly involved in the military operations on Bougainville, and it played an active role. BCL supplied helicopters, which were used as gunships, the pilots, troop transportation, fuel and troop barracks.”
– Sir Michael Somare Continue reading
Parvaz was born in Iran to an Iranian father and American mother. Her family moved to British Columbia where she obtained a degree in English literature at the University of British Columbia. She had only quite recently accepted a job reporting for Al Jazeera, being based out of its headquarters in Doha, Qatar. She disappeared on April 29, 2011 and it was later revealed that she was detained by Syrian authorities on her way to report on anti-government demonstrations in that country. She was eventually deported to Iran where she was held for a further 19 days.
That Parvaz has multiple citizenships and passports seems to have been the pretext for her detainment. On Tuesday, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman claimed Parvaz had committed several passport violations on her trip to Syria, stating that the journalist had “traveled to Syria with expired Iranian passport, planned to work without a press permit and had several passports on her.” While Parvaz likely used her Canadian or American passport to enter Syria, Iran doesn’t officially recognized multiple citizenships for Iranians.
Parvaz’s family have been jubilant today after receiving a phone-call from her last night around 9:30 pm PST to let them know she had been released and was planning on returning to Vancouver by Wednesday or Thursday. “It was one of the best moments of my life,” said her father. “I’m 68 years old and I’ve never had a moment like it.”
CBC, Al Jazeera, Seattle Times.
The political world of France was hit with an unexpected scandal today as news emerged of Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s arrest by NYPD late last night on charges of attempted rape.
Strauss-Kahn, a former French Finance Minister and member of the Socialist Party of France, has been serving as the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund since 2007. Responsible for the French economic turn-a-round in the the 90s that ensured the country’s entry into the EU, Strauss-Kahn was nonetheless forced to resign as Finance Minister amongst accusations of corruption relating to a fraud investigation into Elf Aquitaine, a French oil company, although he was later acquitted.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHXGn0pjAGw
Men! Man your battle-stations! Women! Woman your battle-stations! Children! Shouldn’t you be in school? Oh, it’s the weekend? FINE! Child your battle-stations! Little Birds, an alien threat is upon us. They wish to destroy our entire way of life. They wish to destroy the squirrels. They wish to destroy the hippopotamuses. They wish to destroy our supermarkets and our bodegas. They wish to destroy our LensCrafters. They wish to destroy our embassies. They wish to destroy Disneyland. They wish to destroy Disney World. They have issued a press release stating that the do not wish to destroy Disney California Adventure because they think that one’s kind of fun. Rubes! Rubes we say! Philistines! Philistines we shriek! They even, and we’re struggling to say this. It’s like all of the air has been Dyson’d out of our bodies, but, we’re going to try. Birds, they wish to destroy…
Little birds, while researching today’s article, we came across some shocking news. Barbie™, everyone’s favorite doll, was, at one time, an SS Hauptsturmführer known as The Butcher of Lyon. She tortured men, women, and children (we assume this is why Kelly™ always looks like she’s afraid of something despite living the glamorous life of a plastic doll in Los Angeles) through electroshock and forcing them to have sex with dogs. That’s right. Everyone’s favorite Special Education Teacher/Paratrooper/Pet Stylist is a murderer who was put on trial for her war crimes today in 1987. We assume she was declared innocent (though, clearly, she wasn’t) as she became President of the United States in 2000, stealing Hilary Clinton’s glory after a previous failed attempt in 1992. Perhaps her crimes were still in the memories of our nation’s peoples. Perhaps that’s why she lost to the nation’s First Black President™, Billiam Clinton.
Oh my god. We really can’t believe that we’re standing up here, talking to all of you people. We’ve worked so hard and we’ve failed so much so that, we’re sorry for tearing up. We really are! It’s just, we’re so happy right now. We mean, obviously we have to thank the Academy for rewarding us with this great achievement that all of the other nominees deserved just as much. Go you! Go you! We’re all winners, even if we’re the ones with the statue. Oh! We’re just a little hot up here (fans selves). This is just so exciting! We came from a small town without the support of anyone but screw you all now! Screw you all! We made it and you’re watching us on television right now! We made it! We made it. (softer) We made it. And it’s all because we believed. We believed in our writers. We believed in our producers. We believed in the little people that make this all happen and, of course, we believed in God because He’s the one that gave us all this talent and He’s the one that’s opened up the doors so that we could share it, not only with everyone in this room, but with everyone in the world. (raises trophy above head) We did it!
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Good morning little birds! Oh dear, oh me, oh my! You’re all covered in residue from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. And on Earth Day too! We’ve got to get you cleaned up, but we’re all out of Dawn™ or whatever detergent is the one that has those commercials of workers cleaning ducks. Covered in black gold on Earth Day! Oh dear, oh me, oh my! Let’s get clean with Joseph:
There! All clean! You’re no longer an endangered species! We’ve saved you! But because you’re all such individuals, maybe you are endangered. We know for sure that LaZiguezon is endangered. That Canadian weather, man! We don’t think we could handle it and we live in Southwest Ontario*! Anyways, it’s Life, Death and Violence™, America’s number one source for environmental journalism** and jokes about The French™. Oh, the French™! And on this day, the anniversary of the greatest environmental tragedy ever perpetuated on the world by those smarmy English®, we bring you people and events that matter to their sworn enemies for all time, no matter what any treaty says! That’s right, we’re talking about The French™ so surrender your seriousness and grab a baguette, we’ve gotta get going or we’ll miss the last bus to Giverny! France shuts down on Good Friday (they’re good Catholics, well, the France we romanticize is), so we’re going to talk about what happened yesterday! OMGSHUTUPLETSGO
Michel Rolle: 1652: That hair! So French™! A mathematician, which explains the adult onset acne*** (or is that supposed to be scruff?), he developed Rolle’s Theorem which states that “a differentiable function which attains equal values at two distinct points must have a point somewhere between them where the first derivative (the slope of the tangent line to the graph of the function) is zero” or f'(c)=0. He also hated calculus, which isn’t surprising since Wikipedia says he deserves to be credited with the invention of Gaussian elimination which stems from Newton’s notes and Newton invented calculus. J’accuse Rolle! J’accuse! The French™! Always at war with The English®! There is no known portrait of Rolle. Newton slashed them all****.
1774: Jean Baptiste-Biot: Watch out everyone! Rocks can fall from the sky at any moment! Not only that, they’ve been sent this way by aliens! Three run homer for the Orion Warriors! And The French™! They believed him! Meteorites are now considered scientific fact as opposed to sports history, which, really is a shame, because the Warriors went all the way that year for the first time in a lightyear*****.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hXzKnVgMdU
You know what? Fuck The French™. We always liked American boys better. See you on Tuesday, birds, for more historical accuracy. We’re outta here (until Photo Phriday. Stop by that!)!
*Southwest Ontario is what we call Detroit. Mainly because of Tim Horton’s and hockey.
**Life, Death and Violence is not and has never been America’s number one source for environmental journalism.
***People who study mathematics are no more likely to get adult onset acne than people who study, say, business.
****Mr. Newton is not responsible for the absence of any portrait of Mr. Rolle.
*****We are aware a lightyear is a measure of distance, not a measure of time.
******We have no proof that Mr. Peizerat has a figure skating cousin named Jean.
*******Héloïse did not become a nun until after the culmination of her affair with Pierre. This obviously diminishes how sexxxy they were together.
********Mr. Astrolabe is not the inspiration for AstroBoy.
*********Ms. Héloïse was not a witch. She was a very nice person by all accounts who found herself in a bad situation.