COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Friday, October 31, 2014

Why is it ever permissible to indoctrinate small children with ideas an educated adult would reject out of hand?

How Conservative Christianity Can Warp the Mind

Alternet

Some religious beliefs can create habitual thought patterns that actually alter brain function, making it difficult for people to heal or grow.

October 29, 2014  |  

I am 30 years old and I am struggling to find sanity. Between the Christian schools, homeschooling, the Christian group home (indoctrinating work camp) and different churches in different cities, I am a psychological, emotional and spiritual mess.” --A former Evangelical
If a former believer says that Christianity made her depressed, obsessive, or post-traumatic, she is likely to be dismissed as an exaggerator. She might describe panic attacks about the rapture; moods that swung from ecstasy about God’s overwhelming love to suicidal self-loathing about repeated sins; or an obsession with sexual purity.
A symptom like one of these clearly has a religious component, yet many people instinctively blame the victim. They will say that the wounded former believer was prone to anxiety or depression or obsession in the first place—that his Christianity somehow got corrupted by his predisposition to psychological problems. Or they will say that he wasn’t a real Christian. If only he had prayed in faith believing or loved God with all his heart, soul and mind, if only he had really been saved—then he would have experienced the peace that passes all understanding.
But the reality is far more complex. It is true that symptoms like depression or panic attacks most often strike those of us who are vulnerable, perhaps because of genetics or perhaps because situational stressors have worn us down. But certain aspects of Christian beliefs and Christian living also can create those stressors, even setting up multigenerational patterns of abuse, trauma, and self-abuse. Also, over time some religious beliefs can create habitual thought patterns that actually alter brain function, making it difficult for people to heal or grow.
The purveyors of religion insist that their product is so powerful it can transform a life, but somehow, magically, it has no risks. In reality, when a medicine is powerful, it usually has the potential to be toxic, especially in the wrong combination or at the wrong dose. And religion is powerful medicine!
In this discussion, we focus on the variants of Christianity that are based on a literal interpretation of the Bible. These include Evangelical and fundamentalist churches, the Church of Latter Day Saints, and other conservative sects. These groups share the characteristics of requiring conformity for membership, a view that humans need salvation, and a focus on the spiritual world as superior to the natural world. These views are in contrast to liberal, progressive Christian churches with a humanistic viewpoint, a focus on the present, and social justice.
Religion Exploits Normal Human Mental Processes.
To understand the power of religion, it is helpful to understand a bit about the structure of the human mind. Much of our mental activity has little to do with rationality and is utterly inaccessible to the conscious mind. The preferences, intentions and decisions that shape our lives are in turn shaped by memories and associations that can get laid down before we even develop the capacity for rational analysis.
Aspects of cognition like these determine how we go through life, what causes us distress, which goals we pursue and which we abandon, how we respond to failure, how we respond when other people hurt us—and how we respond when we hurt them. Religion derives its power in large part because it shapes these unconscious processes: the frames, metaphors, intuitions and emotions that operate before we even have a chance at conscious thought.
Some Religious Beliefs and Practices are More Harmful Than Others.
When it comes to psychological damage, certain religious beliefs and practices are reliably more toxic than others.
Janet Heimlich is an investigative journalist who has explored religious child maltreatment, which describes abuse and neglect in the service of religious belief. In her book, Breaking their Will,Heimlich identifies three characteristics of religious groups that are particularly prone to harming children. Clinical work with reclaimers, that is, people who are reclaiming their lives and in recovery from toxic religion, suggests that these same qualities put adults at risk, along with a particular set of manipulations found in fundamentalist Christian churches and biblical literalism.
1) Authoritarianism,creates a rigid power hierarchy and demands unquestioning obedience. In major theistic religions, this hierarchy has a god or gods at the top, represented by powerful church leaders who have power over male believers, who in turn have power over females and children. Authoritarian Christian sects often teach that “male headship” is God’s will. Parents may go so far as beating or starving their children on the authority of godly leaders. A book titled, To Train Up a Child,by minister Michael Pearl and his wife Debi, has been found in the homes of three Christian adoptive families who have punished their children to death.
2) Isolation or separatism,is promoted as a means of maintaining spiritual purity. Evangelical Christians warn against being “unequally yoked” with nonbelievers in marriages and even friendships. New converts often are encouraged to pull away from extended family members and old friends, except when there may be opportunities to convert them. Some churches encourage older members to take in young single adults and house them within a godly context until they find spiritually compatible partners, a process known by cult analysts as “shepherding.” Home schoolers and the Christian equivalent of madrassas cut off children from outside sources of information, often teaching rote learning and unquestioning obedience rather than broad curiosity.
3) Fearof sin, hell, a looming “end-times” apocalypse, or amoral heathens binds people to the group, which then provides the only safe escape from the horrifying dangers on the outside. In Evangelical Hell Houses, Halloween is used as an occasion to terrify children and teens about the tortures that await the damned. In the Left Behind book series and movie, the world degenerates into a bloodbath without the stabilizing presence of believers. Since the religious group is the only alternative to these horrors, anything that threatens the group itself—like criticism, taxation, scientific findings, or civil rights regulations—also becomes a target of fear.
Bible Belief Creates an Authoritarian, Isolative, Threat-based Model of Reality
In Bible-believing Christianity, psychological mind-control mechanisms are coupled with beliefs from the Iron Age, including the belief that women and children are possessions of men, that children who are not hit become spoiled, that each of us is born “utterly depraved”, and that a supernatural being demands unquestioning obedience. In this view, the salvation and righteousness of believers is constantly under threat from outsiders and dark spiritual forces. Consequently, Christians need to separate themselves emotionally, spiritually, and socially from the world.These beliefs are fundamental to their overarching mental framework or “deep frame” as linguist George Lakoff would call it. Small wonder then, that many Christians emerge wounded.
It is important to remember that this mindset permeates to a deep subconscious level. This is a realm of imagery, symbols, metaphor, emotion, instinct, and primary needs. Nature and nurture merge into a template for viewing the world which then filters every experience. The template selectively allows only the information that confirms their model of reality, creating a subjective sense of its veracity.
On the societal scale, humanity has been going through a massive shift for centuries, transitioning from a supernatural view of a world dominated by forces of good and evil to a natural understanding of the universe. The Bible-based Christian population however, might be considered a subset of the general population that is still within the old framework, that is, supernaturalism.
Children are Targeted for Indoctrination Because the Child Mind is Uniquely Vulnerable.
Here I am, a fifty-one year old college professor, still smarting from the wounds inflicted by the righteous when I was a child. It is a slow, festering wound, one that smarts every day—in some way or another…. I thought I would leave all of that “God loves… God hates…” stuff behind, but not so. Such deep and confusing fear is not easily forgotten. It pops up in my perfectionism, my melancholy mood, the years of being obsessed with finding the assurance of personal salvation.”
Nowhere is the contrast of viewpoints more stark than in the secular and religious understandings of childhood. In the biblical view, a child is not a being that is born with amazing capabilities that will emerge with the right conditions like a beautiful flower in a well-attended garden. Rather, a child is born in sin, weak, ignorant, and rebellious, needing discipline to learn obedience. Independent thinking is dangerous pride.
Because the child’s mind is uniquely susceptible to religious ideas, religious indoctrination particularly targets vulnerable young children. Cognitive development before age seven lacks abstract reasoning. Thinking is magical and primitive, black and white. Also, young humans are wired to obey authority because they are dependent on their caregivers just for survival. Much of their brain growth and development has to happen after birth, which means that children are extremely vulnerable to environmental influences in the first few years when neuronal pathways are formed.
By age five a child’s brain can understand primitive cause-and-effect logic and picture situations that are not present. Children at this have a tenuous grip on reality. They often have imaginary friends; dreams are quite real; and fantasy blurs with the mundane. To a child this age, it is eminently possible that Santa Claus lives at the North Pole and delivers presents if you are good and that 2000 years ago a man died a horrible death because you are naughty. Adam and Eve, Noah’s ark, the Rapture, and hell, all can be quite real. The problem is that many of these teachings are terrifying.
For many years, one conversion technique targeting children and adolescents has been the use of movies about the “End Times.” This means a “Rapture” event, when real Christians are taken up to heaven leaving the earth to “Tribulation,” a terrifying time when an evil Antichrist will reign and the world will descend into anarchy.
When assaulted with such images and ideas at a young age, a child has no chance of emotional self-defense. Christian teachings that sound truewhen they are embedded in the child’s mind at this tender age can feel true for a lifetime. Even decades later former believers who intellectually reject these ideas can feel intense fear or shame when their unconscious mind is triggered.
Harms Range From Mild to Catastrophic.
One requirement for success as a sincere Christian is to find a way to believe that which would be unbelievable under normal rules of evidence and inquiry. Christianity contains concepts that help to safeguard belief, such as limiting outside information, practicing thought control, and self-denigration; but for some people the emotional numbing and intellectual suicide just isn’t enough. In other words, for a significant number of children in Christian families, the religion just doesn’t “take.” This can trigger guilt, conflict, and ultimately rejection or abandonment.
Others experience the threats and fear too keenly. For them, childhood can be torturous, and they may carry injuries into adulthood.
Still others are able to sincerely devote themselves to the faith as children but confront problems when they mature. They wrestle with factual and moral contradictions in the Bible and the church, or discover surprising alternatives. This can feel confusing and terrifying - like the whole world is falling apart.
Delayed Development and Life Skills.Many Christian parents seek to insulate their children from “worldly” influences. In the extreme, this can mean not only home schooling, but cutting off media, not allowing non-Christian friends, avoiding secular activities like plays or clubs, and spending time at church instead. Children miss out on crucial information– science, culture, history, reproductive health and more. When they grow older and leave such a sheltered environment, adjusting to the secular world can be like immigrating to a new culture. One of the biggest areas of challenge is delayed social development.
Religious Trauma Syndrome. Today, in the field of mental health, the only religious diagnosis in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual is “Religious or Spiritual Problem.” This is merely a supplemental code (V Code) to assist in describing an underlying pathology. Unofficially, “scrupulosity,” is the term for obsessive-compulsive symptoms centered around religious themes such as blasphemy, unforgivable sin, and damnation. While each of these diagnoses has a place, neither covers the wide range of harms induced by religion.
Religious Trauma Syndrome (RTS) is a new term, coined by Marlene Winell to name a recognizable set of symptoms experienced as a result of prolonged exposure to a toxic religious environment and/or the trauma of leaving the religion. It is akin to Complex PTSD, which is defined as ‘a psychological injury that results from protracted exposure to prolonged social and/or interpersonal trauma with lack or loss of control, disempowerment, and in the context of either captivity or entrapment, i.e. the lack of a viable escape route for the victim’.
Though related to other kinds of chronic trauma, religious trauma is uniquely mind-twisting. The logic of the religion is circular and blames the victim for problems; the system demands deference to spiritual authorities no matter what they do; and the larger society may not identify a problem or intervene as in cases of physical or sexual abuse, even though the same symptoms of depression and anxiety and panic attacks can occur.
RTS, as a diagnosis, is in early stages of investigation, but appears to be a useful descriptor beyond the labels used for various symptoms – depression, anxiety, grief, anger, relationship issues, and others. It is our hope that it will lead to more knowledge, training, and treatment. Like the naming of other disorders such as anorexia or Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), the RTS label can help sufferers feel less alone, confused, and self-blaming.
Leaving the Fold. Breaking out of a restrictive, mind-controlling religion can be liberating: Certain problems end(!), such as trying to twist one’s thinking to believe irrational doctrines, and conforming to repressive codes of behavior. However, for many reclaimers making the break is the most disruptive, difficult upheaval they have ever experienced. Individuals who were most sincere, devout, and dedicated often are the ones most traumatized when their religious world crumbles.
Rejecting a religious model of reality that has been passed on through generations is a major cognitive and emotional disruption. For many reclaimers, it is like a death or divorce. Their ‘relationship’ with God was a central assumption of their lives, and giving it up feels like an enormous loss to be grieved. It can be like losing a lover, a parent, or best friend.
On top of shattered assumptions comes the loss of family and friends. Churches vary with official doctrine about rejection. The Mormon Church, for all the intense focus on “family forever,” is devastating to leave, and the Jehovah Witnesses require families to shun members who are “disfellowshiped.”
The rupture can destroy homes, splitting spouses and alienating parents from children.
For Women, Psychological Costs of Belief Include Subjugation and Self-loathing.
Christianity poses a special set of psychological risks for people who, according to the Iron Age hierarchy found in the Bible are unclean or property, including women. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the combination of denigration and subservience takes a psychological toll on women in Christianity as it does in Islam. Not only do women submit to marital abuse and undesired sexual contact, some tolerate the same toward their children, and men of God sometimes exploit this vulnerability, as in the case of Catholic and Protestant child sexual abuse. But most of the damage is far more subtle: lower self-esteem, less independence and confidence; abandoned dreams and goals.
Why Harm Goes Unrecognized. What is the sum cost of having millions of people holding to a misogynist, authoritarian, fear-based supernatural view of the universe? The consequences far-reaching, even global, but many are hidden, for two reasons.
One is the nature of the trauma itself. Unlike other harm, such as physical beating or sexual abuse, the injury is far from obvious to the victim, who has been taught to self-blame. It’s as if a person black and blue from a caning were to think it was self-inflicted.
The second reason that religious harm goes unrecognized is that Christianity is still the cultural backdrop for the indoctrination. While the larger society may not be fundamentalist, references to God and faith abound. The Bible gets used to swear in witnesses and even the U.S. president. Common phrases are “God willing,” “God bless,” “God helps those that help themselves,” “In God we trust,” and so forth. These lend credence to theistic authority.
Religious trauma is difficult to see because it is camouflaged by the respectability of religion in culture. To date, parents are afforded the right to teach their own children whatever doctrines they like, no matter how heinous, degrading, or mentally unhealthy. Even helping professionals largely perceive Christianity as benign. This will need to change for treatment methods to be developed and people to get help that allows them to truly reclaim their lives.
This article was adapted from “The Crazy Making in Christianity” Chapter 19 inChristianity is Not Great: How Faith Fails, edited by John Loftus, Prometheus Press, October 2014.
Dr. Marlene Winell is a human development consultant in the San Francisco Area. Valerie Tarico is a psychologist and writer in Seattle, Washington.

145 comments:

  1. You, as a supporter of both the Iranians and Palestinians, you will be thrilled, when you move to either lands, that they do not tolerate silly christian or jewish beliefs.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Deuce ☂Fri Oct 31, 07:55:00 AM EDT
    It will be a joy for the human race when the scourge of the Abrahamic religious cults is relegated to the scrap heap of the gods.


    And yet you are a Hamas supporter…..

    Very odd...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. God rewards Jews for slaughtering those whom Israel regards as idolaters. “In the palaces of the fourth heaven are those who lamented over Sion and Jerusalem, and all those who destroyed idolatrous nations and those who killed off people who worshipped idols are clothed in purple garments so they may be recognized and honored.”
      - I 38b, 39a (This format is according to the original Mantuan edition of the Zohar.)


      Delete
    2. Zohar?

      tell us the Zohar is and how it applies to Jews.

      Delete
  3. To witness the destructiveness of the Abrahamic religions, on needs not go further than Mexico.

    Where the cult of Santa Muerte thrives ...
    For those not familiar with the Nuestra Señora de la Santa Muerte (Our Lady of the Holy Death).
    A female folk saint venerated primarily in Mexico and the Southwestern United States.
    The personification of death, she is associated with healing, protection, and safe delivery to the afterlife by her devotees.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Beheadings, mass murder and the like, all sanctified by Nuestra Señora de la Santa Muerte (Our Lady of the Holy Death).

      It's a good thing when God is on your side, no matter what side that is, there is a Godliness in the behavior.

      “The Bible tells us to be like God, and then on page after page it describes God as a mass murderer.
      This may be the single most important key to the political behavior of Western Civilization.”

      ― Robert Anton Wilson

      Delete
    2. A photo essay concerning Santa Muerte

      http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1676932,00.html

      Delete
  4. General: ISIS suffering losses in fight over Syria town

    Gen. Lloyd Austin, head of U.S. Central Command, said that militants with ISIS, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL, have clearly decided to make the capture of Kobani their main effort.

    "My goal is to defeat and ultimately destroy ISIL," said Austin during a rare appearance in the Pentagon briefing room.

    Austin said it's still possible that Kobani will fall, but the more insurgents are taken off the battlefield there, the fewer there will be to fight elsewhere.

    Austin said he believes ISIS has decided Kobani would be its main effort, and as long as ISIS is pouring "legions of forces there into that area," the U.S-led coalition will focus on its defeat.

    ReplyDelete

  5. Child Poverty Jumps by 2.6 Million in Developed World Since 2008, While Number of Global Billionaires Doubles

    ReplyDelete
  6. To hold, firmly and deeply, religious belief is one thing. To be evangelical, to proselytize, and/or expect others to behave according to your religious beliefs is something else. I have a problem with the latter.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I think Quirk's point on the last thread was an important one. IS barbarity is not about religion but about warfare. It has been a regular tool of rulers in the ME in particular to use excessive force as an 'example' to encourage others to heed.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Papa Assad use of gas, Hussein's, and the notoriety of the incidents, just two examples.

      Delete
    2. Religion is used as a crutch, a tool, of those in power and by those attempting to wrest control of that power.

      Religion is a tool of the propagandists, on every side of the conflict.
      A tool to control the 'masses',or as Marx is reputed to have said ...
      "Religion is the opium of the people"

      Delete
    3. actually I think the phrase was 'opiate of the masses' but I digress...

      Sure it can be used as a tool, and a crutch, but it is more than that.

      Delete
    4. I thought that, as well, Ash, but ...
      https://www.google.com/search?q=opiate+of+the+masses&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&channel=sb

      "Religion is the opium of the people" is one of the most frequently paraphrased statements of German economist Karl Marx. It was translated from the German original, "Die Religion ... ist das Opium des Volkes" and is often rendered as "religion... is the opiate of the masses."

      allen, being the desk co-ordinator for language can tell us which the correct translation.

      Delete
    5. well I guess we should go with the original as there won't be any confusion. German it is ;)

      Delete
    6. allen, being the desk co-ordinator for language can tell us which is the correct translation.

      Delete

  8. Even Israel's Best Friends Understand That It Is Disconnecting From Reality

    An editorial in the leading American Jewish newspaper should be read by Prime Minister Netanyahu as a serious warning.


    More proof, if more proof were needed, that there is a crisis in U.S.-Israel relations, and that the crisis goes deeper than simply the dysfunctional personal relationship between Prime Minister Netanyahu's government and the Obama Administration (or between their colorful staffs): A lead editorial in The New York Jewish Week, the flagship American Jewish newspaper, center to center-right in orientation, with many thousands of Orthodox Jews among its readers and an ardently pro-Israel editorial line, bluntly asks whether the Israeli government has become unmoored from reality.

    The editorial, "Bibi Takes on the World," takes note of the recent snub by top American officials of the Israeli defense minister, Moshe Ya'alon (a snub prompted by Ya'alon's earlier insults directed at Secretary of State John Kerry), and of the Netanyahu government's announcement that it would build more than 1,000 new housing units in parts of Jerusalem captured by Israel in 1967—"fully aware," the editorial reads, "of the negative response it would receive in America and in the international community."

    The editorial continues:

    (T)he State Department (called) the plans “incompatible with the pursuit of peace.” A European Union spokeswoman went further, asserting that the move “once again” calls into question Israel’s commitment “to a negotiated solution with the Palestinians.” She also warned that “the future development of relations between the EU and Israel will depend” on Jerusalem’s “engagement towards a lasting peace based on a two-state solution.”

    Netanyahu responded by saying that Israel will “continue to build in our eternal capital,” adding: “I heard the claim that our building in Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem makes peace more distant, but it is the criticism itself that makes peace more distant.” He said the criticism feeds the Palestinians’ false hopes and is “detached from reality.”


    And then The New York Jewish Week drops the hammer:

    But it’s fair to ask just who is more detached from reality these days, the president of the U.S. and leader of the free world, or the leader of a small country almost totally dependent on American support? (It’s not so much the $3 billion a year in U.S. aid that counts as much as its support at the UN and in countless other ways that would be felt should the relationship continue to erode.)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've spoken with lay leaders of many of the largest Jewish organizations (organizations that would very much prefer not to be affiliated with such left-wing outfits as J Street), and the question they ask is this:
      Just what is Bibi doing?
      If American Jews are forced to choose between their liberal values (and most American Jews are liberal) and support for a Jewish state that seems to be growing increasingly illiberal, these leaders say that Israel—and not the Democratic Party—will be the one to suffer.
      ...
      I asked Gary Rosenblatt, the editor of The New York Jewish Week, what he thought the fallout from this editorial might be. He e-mailed back the following:
      "Having been in Jewish journalism for more than four decades, I can tell you that there was a time when there would be hell to pay in the community for editorials in an American Jewish newspaper criticizing Israeli policy. That’s no longer the case.

      An optimist could say it’s because our community is more open and enlightened; a pessimist could say it’s because people don’t care as much and/or they don’t connect to Israel in their kishkas (guts) the way their parents or grandparents did.
      Or quite possibly because they do care about Israel but don't agree with the policy under fire."

      Delete
    2. But it’s fair to ask just who is more detached from reality these days, the president of the U.S. and leader of the free world, or the leader of a small country almost totally dependent on American support? (It’s not so much the $3 billion a year in U.S. aid that counts as much as its support at the UN and in countless other ways that would be felt should the relationship continue to erode.)



      Obama is going to cut the legs out from Israel after the election, we all KNOW that.

      so why pretend?

      Obama has funded and supplied the enemies of Israel with arms, support and encouragement.

      He as cut off munitions during a conflict..

      the path is clear. Israel must find others..

      America is over being the beacon for freedom around the world, it now stands for Islam

      Delete
  9. Yet wherever the left holds sway, Israel is seen through jaundiced eyes. There has been an unprecedented moral inversion, illustrating the power of a noxious idea to seep from the ideological fringe to the mainstream.

    The United States is not yet down to one pro-Israel party. But the seepage among Democrats continues. At the 2012 Democratic convention, a fight erupted over the deletion from the party’s platform of standard language acknowledging Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. It took an order from the White House to restore the pro-Israel clause, and even then it had to be gaveled through over the vocal opposition of half the convention delegates.

    Not long ago, such a hostile gesture would have been unthinkable. Now, with each new poll confirming Democratic chilliness toward the Jewish state Democrats once loved, can it be anything but a precursor of worse to come?

    - Jeff Jacoby

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Democrat party is now in control by the progressives, communists, islamists and black nationalists...

      Good luck to them.

      Delete
    2. The Jews "O"rdure, you forgot to include the Jews

      Delete
    3. Real, living, voting American Jewry, the backbone of the Democratic Party.

      Delete
    4. There are a lot of jews that vote the Democratic party. That number is shrinking at rapid pace.

      But those Jews will not be Jew in 30 years. Liberalism has replaced their Jewishness.

      But thanks to jew hating, murderous terrorists like you?

      More and more Jews are waking up.

      Infact, a very famous Left wing Israeli Jew is traveling the USA talking to those left wing progressive nitwit Jews and telling them the truth about folks like you, hamas, Iran and Hezbollah...

      There will be fewer and fewer Jews voting for the democrats..

      All thanks to pricks like you

      Delete
  10. Israel understands the world.

    It will not commit suicide to make those that hate it, like it.

    After all the world screams, "the good jew is a dead jew" "jews KNOW your place"

    And in our arrogance we say? Go fuck yourselves.

    Really...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The "world" does not scream that, "O"rdure.
      Mr Obama has nevr said that, not one time.

      You and your cohort have built a "Strawman" and continually focus upon it.

      That is your delusion, not the position of the US, or the "World", sorry.
      Listen, or rather read what th leaders of the Jewish comunity in the US are saying, writing, open your mind to reality.

      Henry Kissinger: ''In 10 years Israel will cease to exist''
      8 years to go ...
      http://www.kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2012/10/30/16913.shtml

      Delete
    2. Israeli intransigence is suicidal

      Delete
    3. Jack, not to worry, you have proved it to EVERY Jew that has read these pages.

      There is NO discussion with people like you.

      That is why we need to arm ourselves.

      People like you, when you move from your slanderous, sick words to take up violence against us? Need to be shot like the sick dogs you are.

      There will be no more turning the other cheek.

      Your message has been clear, regardless of your butchery of the English Language.

      Die Jew DIe.

      you have said it numerous times

      congrats, your message has been received.

      Now, if you choose to go from being an armchair Jew hater and become (once again) the killer that you have bragged about being?

      You will find that many of us are willing, waiting and ready to erase you from the planet the moment you take violent action against us....

      Purely defensive.

      Delete
    4. To make myself perfectly clear.

      Jack, aka Rat and Deuce, deem the only solution is the death of the Jews.

      We will not go willingly to the gas chambers.

      We WILL fight back.

      This should be interesting as Deuce has said, that the Holocaust was our own fault, since we didn't defend ourselves against the Nazis.

      We will and are ready this time, here and abroad to not allow the slaughter of our children.

      So if Israel decides to fight for it's life?

      and you don't like it?

      GO FUCK YOURSELF....

      If you try to jump us on the street and we kill you in self defense? And you and your don't like it?

      GO FUCK YOURSELF

      But we owe thanks to you Jack and Deuce, you have shown us the truth.

      You have told us we do not belong in YOUR America, we are Israel firsters, we are aliens...

      Message received.

      Jack, the bad news for you? You will have to come up close and personal to try to murder me, no 400 yards pussy shots here in Ohio....

      All within 21 feet... should I use my ZT in your neck or just do center chest shots as you are attacking me?

      Tell me Jack, when you are going to attack me, should I slit you like a pig or should I just unload my zombie personal perfection ammo into you?

      Any Idea when you are going to come to ohio to murder me?

      Delete
    5. Your delusional behavior is becoming ever more pronounced, "O"rdure.
      You should get checked by a mental health professional, for your own good.

      {;-)

      Delete
    6. I am sane as can be.

      You have threatened me and others.

      You have a constant and vocal hatred of all things Jewish, Israel, Zionism or Judaism.

      You have bragged about killing folks in Central America.

      You are the lone wolf killer we all have been warned about.

      I did my civic duty by reporting you to your local authorities and the AZ FBI as a potential threat to the people and safety of the USA.

      SO if and when you stay off your meds and decide you are going to be the next martyr and come calling in Ohio to attempt to murder a Jew?

      You will not find a willing victim.

      And if I am incorrect and you are just a bitter worthless old pitiful hasbeen in some trailer in AZ who could not fight off two butterflies?

      Then the READERS will see your hourly diatribes that slander Jews, Israel, Zionism and Judaism and learn that there are black hearted pricks like you still in 2014.

      Either way?

      You have provided a service to our readers in educating them to be wary of anti-semites.

      Delete
    7. Ashkenazi are not Semites.
      Arabs are Semites

      If there is any contributor to this blog that is an Anti-Semite, it is "O"rdure.
      His hatred of Arabs, is well established.
      From his desire to 'nuke' Mecca, to his disavowal of Palestinians as a people.

      Delete
  11. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/can-homeschoolers-do-well-in-college/
    Can Homeschoolers Do Well in College?

    Yes, homeschooled students outperform their college peers. The vast majority of homeschool families make the choice from religious conviction.


    ... further proof ...

    http://www.usnews.com/education/high-schools/articles/2012/06/01/home-schooled-teens-ripe-for-college
    Home-Schooled Teens Ripe for College

    http://www.home-school.com/Articles/the-facts-are-in-homeschoolers-excel.php

    The Facts Are In: Homeschoolers Excel

    ReplyDelete
  12. Whatever Marx said about religion in either German, French, or English, Rat would still be an idiot - with or without opium.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rat remains a figment of your imaginationFri Oct 31, 12:24:00 PM EDT

      .

      Delete
    2. Rat will always remain a figment of your imaginationFri Oct 31, 01:10:00 PM EDT

      Stories happen in the mind of a reader, not among symbols printed on a page.”
      ― Brandon Mull

      And there, in the mind of the reader, in their imagination, is where 'desert rat' now resides.

      Delete
    3. Must be sad for Jack aka Rat to now have to distance himself from his online persona that took thousands and thousands of hours to construct...

      Delete
    4. The persona was constructed in your mind, "O"rdure.
      He was merely another character.

      Not sad at all, he was always imaginary.
      Never 'real', a lot like Abraham's God in that regard.

      Delete
    5. Nonsense.

      It was your real wasted time.

      Hours and hours of typing all gone poof...

      meaningless posts by the score...

      noone will ever care to read...

      just more shit into pile...

      Just like all your words...

      diarrhea of the vocabulary...

      Delete
    6. "Eating It Up"

      The Navajo call dogs 'Shit Eaters'. "O"rdure.
      Fitting that you Eat Up all Jack's writing ...
      What you refer to as diarrhea of the vocabulary...

      Which says what, about you?
      Our little lha-cha-eh, "O"rdure

      Delete
  13. Christian zealot beheads teen for practicing witchcraft

    Christian terror? In a grisly murder an Oklahoma college student with strong Christian beliefs nearly decapitates a young man because the victim practiced witchcraft.

    Isaiah Zoar Marin, 21, is charged with first-degree murder for the killing of Jacob Andrew Crockett, 19. Marin is accused of using a “long knife or sword” to kill Crockett.

    According to a court affidavit, the suspect, Marin, is described as a “religious zealot” and “heavy drug user.”

    The victim, Crockett, is the son of an Oklahoma state trooper.

    Police report the victim had what appeared to be multiple deep slash and stab wounds and the “head was mostly severed from his body.”

    Marin was watching videos on YouTube “related to his Christian beliefs and the Book of Matthew” before the murder, according to the affidavit.

    The document also notes that Marin had feuded with Crockett in the past because the victim was practicing witchcraft.

    The defendant’s brother, Samuel Marin, said “in the past Jacob and Isaiah had disagreements” because Jacob had been” practicing witchcraft and Isaiah had strong Christian beliefs,” a Stillwater police officer reported.

    Police say the two men were “acquaintances” and Crockett was attending class at Northern Oklahoma College, but was planning to transfer to OSU.

    Marin’s Facebook page features many posts professing his love for God, with the latest public post being on Aug. 8 of this year. The post reads:

    "Tried to take on a demon and God had to help me through the tough parts. Got to be careful with my words and pay closer attention to my emotions. Need to figure out how to keep on speaking when I’m with the presence of the Lord God."

    According to the affidavit, Marin told police, “I murdered someone” and was “rambling about sacrificing and magic.”

    During a news conference Stillwater police Capt. Randy Dickerson emphasized that the case is not related to recent cases of beheadings by Islamic extremists.

    Instead of Islamic extremism, the case appears to be about Christian extremism fueled by methamphetamine.

    Marin remains in custody without bond and has a court appearance set for 9 a.m. Dec. 1.

    A Facebook page, RIP Jacob Crockett, was created early Thursday and includes several photos of the victim with his heavy metal band as well as posts from friends and supporters.


    Read more: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/progressivesecularhumanist/2014/10/christian-zealot-beheads-teen-for-practicing-witchcraft/#ixzz3HkCxS9Zx

    ReplyDelete
  14. Conservative Fundamental Christianity is a bad thing?

    Compared to what?

    Islam?
    Marxism?
    Nazism?

    Deucean Despair?

    The Despair expressed in "After The Storm"?

    Where it's not about anything at all from beginning to end.


    While it isn't my cup of tea I can think of some worse things......

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Like reading Croc Shit day after day.

      Delete
    2. Oh, come on now "Draft Dodger" Peterson, you had been doing so well, too.

      Burning people at the stake, beheading witches as well as burning them ... that's the Christian thing to do.
      Has been, continues to be. As illustrated, in the post above.

      But if you wish to be included in the Christian judgement, you hav already committed incest, with your 'niece'.

      But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
      adultery = incest in your current scenario.

      Your standard of 'goodness', 'righteousness' and equivalency.

      Delete
  15. I'd rather think of my Niece.

    There is an authentically good thing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
      adultery = incest, in your current scenario.

      Delete
  16. She's not, and never would be, a war criminal.

    She helps people with psychological problems.

    She helps people.

    I haven't asked her if she deals in rats.

    Lab rats or otherwise.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. She wants to 'wed' her "Uncle", so it applies to her, as well.

      Delete
    2. She's a smart gal, and has the wisdom to put the whole wed thingy off to 'some other life', Croc Shit.

      ;)

      She knows what she is doing.

      Delete
    3. But she would not know what to do with you, Croc Shit,

      Delete
  17. Does anyone really want to count up the dead caused by:

    'Fundamental Christianity'

    Islam

    Marxism

    Judaism

    Nazism

    Deucean Despair (a minor factor in the lists of the dead but why not throw it in)

    and tally the totals and put them here in black and white?



    ReplyDelete
  18. What a laugh.....

    Croc Shit bragged about being the leader of hired killers........

    ReplyDelete
  19. Poor Croc Shit.........

    He has no one that loves him.

    If he did he'd be a lot better off......and wouldn't waste his weary days spreading hate and slander......he might begin to get out of himself - hard as this is to imagine - and turn to some Other.....

    ReplyDelete
  20. The higher levels of Hinduism is the best I've found......

    Up there in that pure blue sky of ever and forever.......

    They'd simply recognize Christ as just another incarnation of Suchness, badly misinterpretated and misunderstood to be sure, and accept it at that.

    Then go to the market and buy vegetables, being veggies.

    Notice I said the higher levels of Hinduism.

    ReplyDelete
  21. In Global Warming News --

    Chicago Halloween Snowfall Record...

    Record Lows Across East...

    Freeze warning for AL........drudge

    ReplyDelete
  22. I've created a new word -

    Crocshitaroo

    ReplyDelete
  23. http://news.yahoo.com/hagel-blasts-us-syria-strategy-memo-official-183757158.html
    Hagel blasts US Syria strategy in memo: official

    ReplyDelete
  24. Dow, and S&P hit all-time highs.

    As "Communists" go, this guy is a joke.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Dow and the S&P may have hit all- time highs. but they have ZERO to do with the average man's or woman's net worth, which is still sinking as I type.

      Look to Rufus for enlightened thought on global warming but not for financial investments.

      Delete
  25. Many of the Spainish
    Loved Ernest Hemingway
    And some of the French
    And a few English
    Here and there
    And a Russian General
    Or two
    And I also.....
    In Idaho

    ReplyDelete
  26. Does anyone really want to count up the dead caused by:

    'Fundamental Christianity'

    Islam

    Marxism

    Judaism

    Nazism

    Deucean Despair (a minor factor in the lists of the dead but why not throw it in)

    and tally the totals and put them here in black and white?



    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. On an historic basis Christianity leads the back in murder and mayhem on continental scale or e very impressive period of time. Second behind that would be secular Marxism which was secular in name only but in almost every measure was a cult religion which included all the iconic apparatus of Catholicism and the fanatical reformism and purification of the Protestants.

      Delete
    2. .

      The atheist manifesto as presented by one of the 'true believers'.

      :o)

      It is strange how those who most purport to be champions of 'rational thought' in the end prove they are just flawed vessels like the rest of us with the same irrational prejudices.

      Blame Israel and the Jews for providing training in paramilitary techniques here in the US rather than the assholes who hire them. Blame Israel for the getting the US into wars rather than blaming the dicks in DC who make the decisions. Blame the religion, not those individuals who pervert it. Accept the post above without question. After all, it was written by a couple of ex-Christian atheists and it fist with the right philosophy so it must be true.

      ...secular Marxism which was secular in name only but in almost every measure was a cult religion.

      Nonsense. Communism, like every ism that has ever existed is about power. Look at every religion, every nationalistic movement, every political movement, every economic system, all those Bob mentions above and more, they are just words on a page, they have no power to hurt or to heal until they are acted upon. If they become perverted, it is because someone at some time perverted them in an attempt to control the sheeple and gain power.

      Singling one of these out is like offering up the number 42 as the answer 'to life, the universe and everything'.

      .

      Delete
    3. .

      Simply my opinion of course.

      :o)

      .

      Delete
    4. There is no blame bing accessed, Legionnaire, except by the reader.
      All that has been expressed ... The reality that civilian polic from the US are bing trained in the techniques developed by the Israeli, and utilized in Palestine and Guatemal, El Salvado and Panama.

      Once that reality has been accepted, and it seems that it has ... at least by Deuce and yourself, then 'blame' for this state of affairs can begin to accessed and meted out.

      Welcome aboard the "Reality Train".

      We're almost ready to go to the 'Second Act' of the program.

      {;-)

      Delete
    5. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    6. There is no blame being accessed, Legionnaire, except by the reader. ...
      ... police .... Guatemala ...


      Gotta find me a copy editor ....

      {;-)

      Delete
    7. .

      Once again, you condemn yourself with the twisted 'reality' you try to conjure up.

      You offer us up all this bull but no one is buying it.

      You offer up "There is no blame bing (sic) accessed..." or "I have never said anything bad about the Jews". Yet, as some asshole once quoted (paraphrased) 'It's not what you say but what you do'; and your focus here, the subjects you raise, the context you operate in, the constant reversion to form, the cut-and-paste repetition, the things "you do' declare to everyone here that you are a simply a slimy little anti-Semitic prick.

      .

      Delete
    8. .

      Once that reality has been accepted, and it seems that it has ... at least by Deuce and yourself, then 'blame' for this state of affairs can begin to accessed and meted out.

      Where do you get this stuff?

      Gotta find me a copy editor ....?

      Try growing a brain.

      .

      Delete
    9. You were saying that there were folks 'blaming Israel ...
      Blame Israel and the Jews for providing training in paramilitary techniques here in the US rather than the assholes who hire them.

      Now, no one 'blamed' Israel for the training.
      All that was being established was that the training was taking place.
      Legionnaire Q has accepted that the training is a reality.

      No denying that, or the above quote would be a lie, wouldn't it?

      Delete
    10. We will b investigating who did the 'hiring' who financed the training ...
      Leaving the reader to ascertain the why,

      But I am sure that those that do not like the concluions they draw from the facts, will claim that Jack is lying.
      Happens often, that the claim is made, but the claims are never documented.

      The 'lies' are in the readers own head.

      “The truth may be out there, but the lies are inside your head.”
      ― Terry Pratchett

      Delete
    11. As for the copy editor, Legionnaire Q, I have to admit that I use 'em for almost all my other writing.
      I just am not really 'into' this first draft world.

      Doubt if I ever will be.
      Maybe if I used the 'preview' button ... but I don't, probably won't.

      Take to much of the fun out of it.
      Besides, half the time, the misspellings, dropped letters and truncations are not errors, as it gives a reason to, as Mr Churchill said ...
      "Then come back and hit it again ... a tremendous whack".

      Fire for effect.

      {;-)

      Delete
    12. .

      You were saying that there were folks 'blaming Israel ...

      Blame Israel and the Jews for providing training in paramilitary techniques here in the US rather than the assholes who hire them.


      My post was directed at Deuce based on a comment he made yesterdays. If deuce says I misread the meaning of his words. I will apologize for my mistake. So far he hasn't indicated that.

      .

      Delete
    13. Who you were 'directing' your post to, Legionnaire, does not change the content of it.

      You plainly state and acknowledge that the Civilian Police of the United States are being trained in the paramilitary techniques developed by Israel.

      That's a fact, or are you attempting to emulate Humpty Dumpty?

      Delete
    14. I don’t blame Israel for training US police. I blame the manipulation by US politicians that want to engage the IDF with the US military and civilian police establishment for political gain with the Israeli lobby. Israel has nothing positive to teach either the US military or civilian police.

      Delete
    15. .

      Now, no one 'blamed' Israel for the training.
      All that was being established was that the training was taking place.


      Really?

      Yesterday, you put up a video showing a bunch of cops (8 if I recall correctly not to mention the other that were standing around) formed in a semi-circle facing a mentally handicapped man with a pen knife in his hand. At a certain point, all of the cops opened fire on the man, firing nearly 50 rounds and hitting the man 14 times. It was truly a disgusting display.

      To that post you attached the following,

      Jack HawkinsThu Oct 30, 11:56:00 AM EDT

      Well, what do you know ...

      Joaquin G*****o, Police Officer is a 23-year police veteran; 22 years with the City of Saginaw Police Department (Michigan).
      In 2010 Guerrero trained at the Israeli Military Industries (IMI) Academy in Israel for Advanced Security and Anti-Terror Unit.
      Saginaw's "Urban Assault Vehicle" (video)

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AixSpkLpRko&app=desktop


      And what exactly did that have to do with the shooting down of the mentally disturbed individual? Well, the rat attaches another post to try to explain the connection.

      Jack HawkinsThu Oct 30, 12:09:00 PM EDT

      Now, there is no reason to believe that Officer G******o was involved in the Miller shooting ...
      It is an indicator, though, that the civilian police of Saginaw MI have been training in Israel, sopping up the techniques that the Mossad used in Guatemala.

      The results of that training, even if it was just 'Training the Trainers' illustrated, again, in the shooting of Mr Miller.


      The rat admits that the Saginaw police trained in Israel might not have been involved in the shooting. However, he instead states that the training officers from the Saginaw police force received in Israel was the 'same' type of training Mossad used in Central America 30 years ago. The proof. Well gee, it's kind of assumed.

      Then in his finale he states

      The results of that training, even if it was just 'Training the Trainers' illustrated, again, in the shooting of Mr Miller.

      Gee, it seems like someone is blaming that shooting on that Mossad training the police got in Israel. Yet, you might ask if there is no indication or proof that any of the cops actually involved in the shooting got any training in Israel, why even bring it up. Or you might ask the most pertinent question of all, why would 8 fully armed large-bodies wearing police uniforms and body armor) supported by back-up, and one would assume having batons and tasers, open fire on a clearly disturbed and confused individual holding a penknife?

      Well, it's all pretty clear in rat-world using rat-logic, its was that damned Mossad training that some of the Saginaw force received.


      Delete
    16. The IDF is the strong arm and defender of the regimes in Tel Aviv that promote the occupation and repression of Palestinian territories. The occupation looks and smells like apartheid to me as it does to much of the non US World. We did not send Southern US police forces for training in South Africa or Philadelphia cops to Moscow or Tehran for training purposes. It is absurd and manipulative. Its intention is to give legitimacy to Israeli police tactics which would not pass media and civil rights scrutiny in the US.

      Delete
    17. .

      You plainly state and acknowledge that the Civilian Police of the United States are being trained in the paramilitary techniques developed by Israel.

      This is what comes from your having English as a second language, rat. I didn't acknowledge that at all.

      Deuce's post I was referring to dealt with the specific incident in Saginaw. That was what I was addressing in my comment. I have no idea what their training involved and neither do you. The term 'paramilitary techniques' was used by Deuce in the comment I was responding too. I also have no idea of nor have I acknowledged any other training in the US by the Israelis.

      .

      Delete
    18. The results of the training, some of the training was done in the US, by US trainers, who had been train in Israel, Legionnaire Q.

      The blame is not on Israel, it is on the techniques that were utilized, approved by US officials.
      As you further stated in your remarks.

      You have acknowledged that the trialing has taken place, training which allen denied occurred, until he quit commenting on the subject. His reading comprehension skills only marginally worse than yours.

      Drawing your own conclusions from the facts that were relayed. Not conclusions that I have presented.

      As we continue with Act Two you may begin to grasp who were the responsible parties to the militarization of the Civilian Police in the United States. Or, you may just reject the facts, if they run counter to your preconceived ideas.

      We will see what we see.

      Delete
    19. Israel is hardly innocent of apartheid practices, brutal police tactics, murderous military actions, engaging in assassinations and promoting the destabilization of its enemies in the ME which includes almost everybody.

      Delete
    20. The results of the training, some of the training was done in the US, by US trainers, who had been trained in Israel, Legionnaire Q.

      allen had rejected the idea that techniques developed in Israel, utilized by the Mossad in the genocide in Guatemala, were being taught to the Civilian Police forces of the United States. He made specific reference to the police of Atlanta, stating they had not been trained in the techniques, and was proven wrong, by the statements of the Police Chief of Atlanta, in a City of Atlanta press release.

      In Michigan, there was ample evidence that members of the police force there in Saginaw, the police force that shot the poor fellow 46 times, had also trained in Israel.

      You drew the conclusions, on your own.
      The story took shape in your head, not on the page, or computer screen.
      There were no misstatements, no false statements, not a one.

      Delete
    21. .

      I apologize for my misreading of your post on the last stream, Deuce.

      As for your last post. My argument to you is the same. The militarization of this country'ss police forces has nothing to do with the Israelis except for their role as contractors. The problem lies with decision makers in this country. And it doesn't make any difference who we get the training from, Israel, Japan, Singapore, or Disneyland. We shouldn't be getting it if the end result is the militarization of domestic police forces here.

      .

      .

      Delete
    22. Legionnaire Q, you definately DID acknowledge the police of the US were being trained in the Israeli techniques,
      You only point of contention, who was to be blamed for it. The Israeli or the folks that hired the Israeli.

      Which in the majority of the cases was/is the ...
      Anti-Defamation League.

      But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

      Delete
    23. The ADL did not develop the programs on their own, no, not at all ...

      Delete
    24. The programs did, though, grow out of the Patriot Act and the Security infrastructure that was established by it.

      The curtain will rise on those data sets, a little later.

      Delete
    25. .

      In Michigan, there was ample evidence that members of the police force there in Saginaw, the police force that shot the poor fellow 46 times, had also trained in Israel.

      More rat-logic. What ample evidence?

      You have shown, as far as I could see, that one officer from the Saginaw Police trained in Israel. You have not shown what his training was used for. You suggest train the trainer yet you offer no proof. The guy was going for anti-terror training. That bunch of yahoos on the tape sure didn't look like any anti-terror unit I have seen. And then you state the training was the reason that poor fellow got shot.

      Your nutz.

      .

      Delete
  27. Happy Halloween, Portland. Possible case of Ebola in Milwaukee, OR.

    ReplyDelete
  28. 100,000 Americans die from infections contracted in the hospital, every year.

    35,000 Americans die every year from the Flu.

    About the same number as Auto Deaths.

    Ebola, so far this year - 1

    Time to panic, Milwaukee.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Texas is a red state, who cares if some Romney-votin' rednecks get Eboler, but now you're talking about Portlandia, so liberal that Seattle wants to be just like it when it grows up.

      Delete
    2. Judge rejects strict limits on nurse who treated Ebola patients

      (Reuters) - Declaring Ebola fears in the United States "not entirely rational," a judge rejected Maine's bid for a quarantine on a nurse who treated victims of the disease in West Africa but tested negative for it, and instead imposed limited restrictions.

      Nurse Kaci Hickox's challenge of Maine's 21-day quarantine became a key battleground for the dispute between officials in some U.S. states who have imposed strict quarantines on health workers returning from three Ebola-ravaged West African countries and the federal government, which opposes such measures.

      Delete
    3. In Friday's order, LaVerdiere said, "the court is fully aware of the misconceptions, misinformation, bad science and bad information being spread from shore to shore in our country with respect to Ebola.

      "The court is fully aware that people are acting out of fear and that this fear is not entirely rational. However, whether that fear is rational or not, it is present and it is real," the judge added, saying Hickox should follow three restrictions even though she is "not infectious."

      After a hearing held by telephone, LaVerdiere decided that Hickox must continue direct monitoring of her health, coordinate travel plans with health officials and report any symptoms.

      Speaking to reporters alongside boyfriend Ted Wilbur outside her two-story clapboard house in the small town of Fort Kent along the Canadian border, Hickox said she would comply.

      Delete

  29. In Ukraine’s European core, new weariness over war with pro-Russian rebels

    “I never thought Ukraine would be a part of Europe if we had Donbas. It is a depressive Soviet region,” Sokolev said in one of Lviv’s bustling coffeehouses, which are reminiscent of Vienna. “If we could talk about civilized ways to get rid of that area, I would support it.”

    With Russia backing the rebels against the rest of Ukraine, Sokolev said, the choice is far from simple. Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in March, after protesters ousted Russian-friendly Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. Then it helped fuel a separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine that has claimed at least 3,700 lives, according to U.N. estimates.

    “We’re not fighting for the east. We’re fighting for Ukraine against Russia,” he said. “We have to stop the war there before it spreads to other parts of Ukraine.”

    ReplyDelete
  30. Deuce ☂Fri Oct 31, 06:55:00 PM EDT


    This is a personal assertion.

    There are no numbers in the statement.

    Granted, all numbers in such a dispute are



    ReplyDelete
  31. iffy at best and the sources are arguable, but since the assertion is about the number of dead we ought at least try to:

    Count 'Em Up

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. .

      Try this as an the start of the exercise. Note that there is some overlap and there will be argument on the highs and lows and the ranges but it should provide some perspective relative to cause and effect.

      Death Toll by Wars and Other Misadventures

      .

      Delete
  32. Otherwise we are just in blogbsland.

    ReplyDelete
  33. We'll start on the militarization of the Civilian Police in the US with the Patriot Act, 2001.
    We could go back further, but the story and characters are easy enough to track, from that point.
    Th story will touch on civil forfeiture, the confiscation of property without trial, as well as the misapplication, or shall we say the intentional false characterization of the Patriot Act.

    Surprise! Controversial Patriot Act power now overwhelmingly used in drug investigations

    One of the more controversial provisions of the Patriot Act was to broaden the “sneak-and-peek” power for federal law enforcement officials. The provision allows investigators to conduct searches without informing the target of the search. We were assured at the time that this was an essential law enforcement tool that would be used only to protect the country from terrorism. Supporters argued that it was critical that investigators be allowed to look into the lives and finances of suspected terrorists without tipping off those terrorists to the fact that they were under investigation.
    ...
    More than a decade later, the Electronic Frontier Foundation has published an analysis on use of the sneak-and-peek power. Just as critics predicted, it’s now a ubiquitous part of federal law enforcement.

    Law enforcement made 47 sneak-and-peek searches nationwide from September 2001 to April 2003. The 2010 report reveals 3,970 total requests were processed. Within three years that number jumped to 11,129. That’s an increase of over 7,000 requests. Exactly what privacy advocates argued in 2001 is happening: sneak and peak warrants are not just being used in exceptional circumstances—which was their original intent—but as an everyday investigative tool.

    And as critics predicted, it is overwhelmingly used in cases that have nothing to do with terrorism. But even if you’re a cynic, it’s pretty shocking just how little the power is used in terrorism investigations.

    Out of the 3,970 total requests from October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010, 3,034 were for narcotics cases and only 37 for terrorism cases (about .9%). Since then, the numbers get worse. The 2011 report reveals a total of 6,775 requests. 5,093 were used for drugs, while only 31 (or .5%) were used for terrorism cases. The 2012 report follows a similar pattern: Only .6%, or 58 requests, dealt with terrorism cases. The 2013 report confirms the incredibly low numbers. Out of 11,129 reports only 51, or .5%, of requests were used for terrorism. The majority of requests were overwhelmingly for narcotics cases, which tapped out at 9,401 requests.

    So since the Patriot Act passed, the number of of sneak-and-peeks each year has grown from about 16 per year to over 11,000 in 2013. Meanwhile, not only have the number of sneak-and-peek investigations unrelated to terrorism increased on a massive scale, the percentage of sneak-and-peeks that have anything to do with terrorism continues to drop.

    ReplyDelete
  34. You can't do anything about the length of your life, but you can do something about its width and depth.

    H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

    ReplyDelete
  35. Veterans like us'uns know that 'chickenshit' refers to assinine hits in an inspection, like having drops of rain on your chloroframs. We don't have a word for cowardice, but if we did, it wouldn't be "chickenshit".

    ReplyDelete
  36. Newflash.

    Hamas has attacked Israel today with rockets.

    Hamas broke the ceasefire again.

    Expect Hamas to continue to fire rockets and use suicide attacks and or lone wolf style attacks.

    This will make 4 in recent days including the murder of a 3 month old american baby, the shooting of an american rabbi in Jerusalem, the firebombing of cars on the west bank and of course the firing of rockets.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The blockade was never lifted, the Israeli never stood down.
      The Israeli did not observe the 'cease fire'.

      Delete
  37. When Gen. Efrain Rios Montt staged his coup on March 23, 1982, the Israeli news magazine Ha’olam Hazeh reported he had the help of 300 Israeli military advisers who assisted in training, planning and executing the coup. Yediot Aharonot referred to the coup as “the Israeli connection.” [53]

    Rios Montt himself acknowledged to an ABC reporter that things had gone very smoothly “because many of our soldiers were trained by Israelis.” [54] During the 17 months of Rios Montt’s rule, Israel’s intensified military involvement in Guatemala was supplemented by assistance on other levels. Shortly after Rios Montt seized power, the two countries signed a wide-ranging Trade and Economic Cooperation Agreement.
    ...
    In January 1983, at the height of Rios Montt’s carnage, then-chief of staff Gen. Hector Lopez Fuentes summed up the relationship this way, “Israel is our principal supplier of arms and the number one friend of Guatemala in the world.”

    Israeli advisers have worked with the feared G-2 police intelligence unit. overseen by the army general staff, the G-2 is the intelligence agency - sections charged with "the elimination of individuals" are stationed at every army base - which has been largely responsible for the death squad killings over the last decade. The present civilian government has dissolved the DIT, a civilian organization subordinate to G-2, but not G-2 itself.

    In 1981, the Army's School of Transmissions and Electronics, a school designed and financed by the Israeli company Tadiran to teach such subjects as encoding, radio jamming and monitoring, and the use of Israeli equipment was opened in Guatemala City. According to the colonel directing the school, everything in it came from Israel: the "teaching methods, the teaching teams, the technical instruments, books, and even the custom furniture...designed and built by the Israeli company DEGEM Systems."

    At the opening ceremony the Israeli ambassador was thanked by Chief of Staff Gen. Benedicto Lucas Garcia for "the advice and transfer of electronic technology" which, Lucas said, had brought Guatemala up to date. Calling Guatemala "one of our best friends" the ambassador promised that further technology transfers were in the works.

    Perhaps the most sinister of all the equipment supplied by Israel to Guatemala were two computers. One was in an old military academy and became, as Benedicto Lucas called it, "the nerve center of the armed forces, which deals with the movements of units in the field and so on."

    The other computer was located in an annex of the National Palace. The G-2 have a control center there, and, since the days of Romeo Lucas Garcia, meetings have been held in that annex to select assassination victims. According to a senior Guatemalan army official, the complex contains "an archive and computer file on journalists, students, leaders, people of the left, politicians, and so on. " This material is combined with current intelligence reports and mulled over during weekly sessions that have included, in their respective times, both Romeo Lucas and Oscar Mejia Victores.

    The bureaucratic procedures for approving the killing of a dissident are well-established. "A local military commander has someone they think is a problem," the officer explains. "So they speak with G-2, and G-2 consults its own archives and information from its agents and the police and, if all coincide, it passes along a direct proposition to the minister of defense. They say, 'We have analyzed the case of such and such a person in depth and this person is responsible for the following acts and we recommend that we execute them."


    The precursor of the NSA doing its "thing" in the United States
    What your government did abroad yesterday it does at home today

    ReplyDelete
  38. Even the furniture, says our self confessed war criminal, Croc Shit, of Central American infamy.

    ReplyDelete
  39. REPUBLICANS TAKE BIG LEAD IN CO EARLY VOTE................drudge

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SOURCES: According to latest early voting data from AP, Republican have 10% lead in ballots cast...

      Independents 25% of total... Developing...

      Dems looking to blacks in GA and NC as buffer to 'catastrophic midterm'...

      Dem gubernatorial candidates across New England locked in suddenly competitive contests..........drudge

      Delete
  40. Colorado is a 'Biggie'.

    Montana
    Alaska
    West Virginia......

    all gone

    Iowa is really interesting.............

    So far no one has been shot over it...............

    We must be doing something right..................

    ReplyDelete
  41. I really do love our democracy when it is working right........

    And the better sort are winning.....

    Obama has been a disaster for the Country, and the Democratic Party.

    Rufus, where are thou? Art thou not taking interest in the mid term elections?

    Rufus is unusually quiet these days.....

    ReplyDelete
  42. North Carolina Hagan (D) +1.1

    Can we wish?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, we can.

      New Hampshire?

      Probably a bridge too far......


      Kentucky McConnell (R) +5.5
      Louisiana Cassidy (R) +4.5
      Arkansas Cotton (R) +7.0

      Delete
  43. May be ass wipe day for the dems.................

    House races looking great too.......

    ReplyDelete
  44. A real shellacking......

    http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/shellacking

    ReplyDelete
  45. Idaho?

    Might as well not even think about it -

    Election Projection: Jim Risch by 24.5%
    Latest Polls
    All Idaho Senate Polls
    Firm Dates Mitchell Risch
    CBS News/NYT/YouGov 10/16 - 10/23 30 61
    Public Policy Polling (D) 10/9 - 10/12 32 50

    http://www.electionprojection.com/2014-elections/idaho-senate-election.php

    2 to 1

    ReplyDelete
  46. Henry VIII recognized that religion is all about power and control. The formation of nation states conflicted with the central control of The Roman Catholic Church which had previously absorbed much of the territory, buildings and structure of The Roman Empire. Instead of having armed guards posted to control the masses, it was far more clever and much less expensive to have saints, clergy and gods on call 24/7. it is no coincidence that many European national flags had the cross on their flags and still today, government buildings everywhere differ little from Roman and Greek temples.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 'Henry VIII recognized that religion is all about power and control.'

      He was a fool, and a politician, and an ape.....and had ZERO knowledge of religion.

      He was used by Bill Shakespeare to make a point.......it's not about that at all, not at all.........

      Delete
    2. What in the world has set you off on this tangent, Deuce?

      It is bizarre.

      Delete
    3. Henry VIII had a great girth, and was a slob, drank too much ale, and had gout.

      Delete
    4. He had ZERO knowledge of religion......Christian or any other.............

      Delete
    5. He was girthed each morning, which is to say, some English Fool or other put his vaste belt on him each sunrise.......

      Delete
    6. .

      Henry VIII recognized that religion is all about power and control.

      Henry VIII recognized that he was broke and that he was inordinately horny, great motivation to tear down one religion and construct your own, one not quite so concerned with such quibbles as marital fidelity..

      .

      Delete
  47. 'catastrophic midterm'

    My Hindu Niece knows I'm a country, but not a country club, Republican, more of a John Deere type, and loves me anyways.

    Thankfully she is not much into politics.......she has better sense........

    ReplyDelete
  48. Simply stated there is no distinction between good religion and bad religion. Both are based on an irrational assertion. All irrationality is bad if you believe that progress and justice must be based on rationality. You can hardly argue the case for irrationality if you believe in sanity.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good Grief.

      Your Deucean Despair is an irrational assertion.

      Simply stated is right.

      I have tried to say, and obviously failed......the meaning of life, if there is any, is beyond ''rationality' -- a word you can't even define -


      Rationality can get one to the moon ----- it will never ever tell you why the moon is there is the first place................or why people everywhere love the moon when they are falling in love.....

      Delete
    2. .

      Religion started when some prehistoric man looked up at the night skies and noted the changes leading to his first intelligible words, "What the F..."

      We have been asking similar questions ever since.

      .

      Delete
    3. .

      Perhaps there is a good deal of presumption in my presumption that there is a large amount of presumption when a member of Atheists International, a group representing 2% of the world population (mostly in China and Eastern Europe), posits that those who acknowledge some form of religiosity (5-6 billion?) are all irrational or even insane.

      Just saying.

      .

      Delete
    4. Yeah, WTF makes a lot more sense than the religious certainty of committed Atheists when confronting The Universes.

      Delete
    5. There was, and is, also the problem of confronting all you have ever enjoyed, experienced, learned, and loved, disappearing without a trace.

      Certainty in the face of that is "rational?"

      Delete
  49. My assertions and observations hardly rise to being a manifesto. It is much more modest, an expression of and the rejection of irrationality, regardless of the claims of the believers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are missing the meaning of rationality, and irrationality.

      I don't think you can even define those terms.

      I don't think anyone would argue with you about 'the claims of believers'.

      I think Jesus 'rose from the dead', as we all will do, but I doubt he walked about Jerusalem....

      But what has this to do with the tendencies of human kind toward meaning, toward the monomyth.....

      This has nothing to do with rationality, or irrationality.........but rather with the meaning of the moon, and why people everywhere fall in love under it......it is an urge to transcendence..........

      And I don't give a fuck what you say, one way or the other........

      ;) ;)

      Delete
    2. Rationality can get one to the moon.

      But rationality doesn't fall in love under the moon.

      That experience tells us why, as rationality cannot do, the moon is there in the first place....

      Delete

  50. Home | Blogs | Ballot Box | Senate races
    Email Alerts *

    Ballot Box feed
    October 31, 2014, 03:57 pm

    Iowa key to Senate majority?

    By Scott Wong


    WILLIAMSBURG, Iowa — The battle for control of the United States Senate could rest with voters scattered across the sparse, small towns of Iowa.

    Republican hopeful Joni Ernst and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) must know that as they hop off her campaign bus and burst through the door of the only coffee shop in this speck of a town between Des Moines and Davenport.

    About 50 supporters greet them with a standing ovation. There are handshakes, hugs and photographs; it’s the third of four stops Rubio is making with her on this day.

    “This race is not about me; this race is about all of you,” Ernst, a 44-year-old state senator who is running against Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley for an open Senate seat, tells her supporters at Java Lounge coffee shop.

    “And we are at a crossroads now here in the United States. And we have to make a choice about whether we will stay on the path that Washington, D.C., has set, that President Obama has set, Congressman Braley and Nancy Pelosi have set,” she adds. “Or are we going to get on a path of prosperity and opportunity, strong national defense ... that is the Iowa way, that is the Iowa path.”

    http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/senate-races/222483-iowa-key-to-senate-majority

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. She is working her heart out.

      I hope she wins.

      Keep fingers and toes crossed.......

      Delete
    2. Bitch.
      Just more of the Republican War on Women.

      Delete
    3. Stefie Steponallofus tells me so:

      "So Tell me Mr. Romney, why are you against all forms of Birth Control?"

      Romney: "WTF?"

      Stefie: "You'll get it when Creepy Fat-Ass Crawly gets to you."

      Delete
  51. 'Clinton generated headlines during her Cedar Rapids stop when she swiped at Ernst for skipping out on meetings with the editorial board of The Des Moines Register and other local newspapers, something the 2008 presidential candidate suggested was “disqualifying” for a candidate, particularly in the home of the first-in-the-nation caucuses. The Ernst campaign responded that she is more focused upon spending the last days of the race with real voters rather than with newspaper editors.'

    :)

    I love it.

    Let's face it. Hillary Clinton enabled her husband, Bill, to screw Monica Lewinski.

    Then went on National TV about how shocked and devastated she was about the whole 'affair'.

    The Blue Dress.

    Sordid.

    Cum.

    Quirk's candidate.

    I'm for the hog farmer.















    ReplyDelete
  52. 24/7 Programming by the Neo-Liberal Marxist Socialists, OTOH, No Problemo, Senor !

    ...whether on "Film," TV, "Education," "Higher Education," or at the Supermarket Checkout.

    ReplyDelete
  53. The Dumbest thing Evangelicals ever did was sit out the last election.

    ReplyDelete
  54. "During Reagan’s 8 years in power, the CIA secretly sent billions of dollars of military aid to the mujahedeen in Afghanistan in a US-supported jihad against the Soviet Union.
    ---
    We repeated the insanity with ISIS against Syria.
    "

    Did Reagan do that also, or was it the Tooth Fairy?

    ReplyDelete