The Federal Aviation Administration has forbidden air-traffic controllers at the Daytona Beach International Airport from listening to emergency weather band radios, which the controllers say would have alerted them to a tornado touching down nearby on Christmas Day. "We now have no way of knowing if there is any tornadic activity in the area," [said Kelly Raulerson, Daytona controller and representative for the National Air Traffic Controllers Association] Controllers are able to pick up precipitation on radar, but not tornadoes in the storms.
The global co. I work for has weather feeds built into our network and communication operation centers. We use them to minimize disruptions to our networks.
HINT TO FAA
You may want to investigate if bad weather can adversely affect airline ops.
#3
To me this smells like a turf war and the controllers and the traveling public are caought in the middle of it. The FAA has weather guessers, but since their charter has to do w/ airplanes and over at the NOAA they also have weather guessers, but their charter speaks to the weather; methinks that the NOAA guys have a better batting average than the FAA boys. I agee that any disruptive radio transmissions in the tracon would not be good, I can hardly think that alerting the tower crew to a major event would be classed as disruptive; unless the tracon took it upon themselves to divert incoming due to the NOAA, then the FAA would have some 'splainin' to do.
#4
It has more to do with the FAA management winning a union busting review last spring. Now they're enforcing a lot of nitpicking rules that don't contribute to the flying public's safety.
Posted by: Almost Anonymous5839 ||
02/03/2007 23:11 Comments ||
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Zimbabwe's remaining white farmers were anxious on Friday ahead of a February 3 deadline for many to leave their farms, a farming official said. Many of the more than 400 whites still farming out of an original 4 500-strong community have been given until Saturday to vacate their farms to make way for new black farmers.
In early January, President Robert Mugabe's government said white farmers would be allowed to stay on their farms for an extended period to harvest their crops. But the government has continued to send out 45-day eviction notices that expire on Saturday, leaving farmers confused and anxious about their rights, said Emily Crookes, spokesperson for the white-run Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU) said.
What's to be confused about? They want the white farmers dead gone.
Nineteen people have contracted cholera in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, in the first outbreak of the often-deadly disease in the city in a year, Zimbabwe state radio reported yesterday.
The 19 are from the impoverished eastern townships of Mabvuku and Tafara, where residents have gone without clean running water for days and have been using unprotected wells, the report said.
Health officials have been sent to the area to hand out water purification tablets. Zimbabwean Health and Child Welfare Minister David Parirenyatwa said the situation was "under control," the report added.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/03/2007 00:00 ||
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Like hell. That's the first sign. Bad drinking water.
THE private sector says Reserve Bank's governor Dr Gideon Gono's monetary policy statement provides a platform for labour, Government and business to "fine tune" the proposed policies through an integrated social contract approach among these key stakeholders. The two main bodies of businsess, the Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce and Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries also backed the RBZ's proposal on price and wage freeze.
Such proposal, at least in the short-term period, would give the country time to do the preparatory work on the introduction of this initiative. Business viewed the proposed approach as the launchpad for the reconstruction of the economy, which requires timely implementation.
Deviating from its earlier recommendations that the exchange rate be moved upwards prior to the announcement of the policy, business said there was no need to call for devaluation or other market interventions as a way of rewarding exporters in an economy riddled with distortions. "As for industry in general, we view the monetary policy as taking us back to basics first," said the private sector in a joint statement by ZNCC president Mrs Marah Hativagone and Mr Callisto Jokonya, the CZI president. "We need to start with the removal of all distortions then boosting capacity of companies before exporters can start getting meaningful rewards."
Mr Jokonya said the economic challenges facing the nation "do not need" external help but needed a shared vision among Zimbabweans.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/03/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
So we can assume that the currency zero-removal thingy hasn't worked?
#6
Wage and price controls don't affect production. The reason for inflation is shortage of goods and/or services, in Zimbabwe's case caused by massive theft, incompetence, and greed. The racial aspect of it is really not germane. Rhodesia was rich because it was a nation of laws, not because it was white run. Zimbabwe is destitute because of short-sighted policies of Mugabe and his kleptocrat thugs, not because it is black run.
DHAKA - Two million Muslims congregated on Friday near the Bangladesh capital Dhaka for a three-day gathering billed as the second largest annual Islamic event after the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.
From dawn, huge columns of devotees began streaming towards the gathering site on the banks of the river Turag in Tongi for the World Muslim Congregation. Many of the pilgrims travelled by dangerously overcrowded buses and ferries and endured long delays and dense fog to reach the site from far-flung rural villages.
Dressed in traditional Islamic robes and prayer caps, they set up prayer mats beneath a canopy stretching more than a kilometre (more than half a mile) as preachers voices resonated around the massive site via loudspeaker.
The gathering -- at which Muslims pray and listen to religious scholars -- was first held in the 1960s and was launched by Tablig Jamaat, a non-political group that urges people to follow Islam in their daily lives.
"You people need to be more holy! Like us! And give us money for ammo the poor!"
Police said that two million people were on hand for the first day and that five million were expected altogether. We have deployed 7,000 police for security, district superintendent of police Rezaul Karim told AFP. Hundreds of elite Rapid Action Battalion officers were also deployed to ensure security following fears that a militant group behind a deadly nationwide bombing campaign has been trying to regroup.
Bangladesh, with a population of 144 million, is the worlds third-largest Muslim-majority nation.
And in the top twenty as a failed state.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/03/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
sounds like an excellent pandemic starting point
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/03/2007 0:27 Comments ||
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The avian flu which killed 2,600 turkeys at a Suffolk farm has been confirmed as the H5N1 virus. The strain can be fatal if it is passed on to humans but experts said the outbreak was being contained and posed little danger to people.
A spokesman for Bernard Matthews, which runs the farm, said none of the affected birds had entered the food chain and there was no risk to health. The 159,000 other turkeys on the farm will now have to be slaughtered.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the European Commission carried out virus tests at laboratories in Weybridge, Surrey. A three-kilometre protection zone and a 10km surveillance zone will be set up around Holton, which is approximately 27km south-west of Lowestoft. A Defra statement said further tests to characterise the virus were under way in order to ascertain whether or not it is the Asian strain.
It is the first case on a UK commercial farm of an H5N1 infection. The strain has killed 164 people worldwide - mainly in south-east Asia - since 2003. However, the virus cannot pass from human to human at present.
The son of Kim Jong-il, North Korea's reclusive dictator, has been living in five-star luxury in the gambling haven of Macau even as his people starve, according to reports in Hong Kong yesterday. Kim Jong-nam, 35, was tracked to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, where he has been staying on and off for three years.
The two-bedroom suite with a resort view is about $1,040 a night.
While the international community alternates sanctions on his father for his nuclear weapons programme with economic aid for his starving subjects, the younger Kim has been spotted gambling in Macau's numerous casinos and eating in local restaurants, according to the South China Morning Post.
And perhaps to keep an eye on the family finances -- at least the part he doesn't piss away at the gambling tables.
Although travel is strictly proscribed for North Korean citizens, Kim Jong-nam has roamed the world.
Because rules are for the little people.
He was educated partly in Switzerland, but first came to public prominence in the West when he was caught travelling on a false passport at Tokyo airport in 2001. He told immigration officials that he wanted to take his young son to Tokyo Disneyland.
Since then, indications are that he has been in disgrace with his father and has been excluded from the succession, probably in favour of his half-brother, Kim Jong-chol, 23.
He's the son of Ko Yong Hee, Kimmie's third wife. The lad is a cipher and the only known photo of him is at age 13.
Kim Jong-il himself succeeded his father, Kim il-Sung, and since he turns 65 later this month, whether one of his sons is appointed to follow him is becoming more a matter of concern. Kim junior's disgrace suggests he might be in semi-exile in Macau.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/03/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
This is the royal communism thousands of "anti-war" idiots march in the streets to promote.
#2
Of course they do. Because they'd all be high rollers just for being morally superior, as they deserve, instead of having to work for a living. That's what we stupid evil militaristic right-wing authoritarian imperialists are for -- as well as entertainment, as we scrap in the dirt over the last rotten potato.
If you're Kos, Soros, Arkin, etc., how is that not a dream come true?
#4
The son of Kim Jong-il, North Korea's reclusive dictator, has been living in five-star luxury in the gambling haven of Macau even as his people starve...
Ah, the model of modern Socialism. The elite ruling class enjoying the life unauthorized for the masses, done in the name of the 'common good'. It's good being a member of the inner party. Something the Donks strive for everyday.
#5
I firmly believe that this fat bastard should be very professionally kidnapped, then make a deal with his dad over nukes.
In the interim, using our very best technology, turn him into "The McLean, Virginia Candidate."
Wouldn't it beat all if six months into his job as the new dictator, suddenly and without warning he convenes reunification/democratization talks in Pyongyang, inviting the South, the US, Japan and Taiwan?"
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Chinese state television will censor advertisements featuring pigs in order not to offend Muslims in the Year of the Pig, a media company said on Friday. "Originally they didn't want pig images in ads on TV, because they worry about conflicting issues with Muslims in China," said Lisa Wei, managing director of media investment firm GroupM China Trading.
An official at the censorship department of China's Central Television denied knowledge of the advertising ban. The new regulations would kick in as the Year of the Pig begins on February 18, CCTV had told Wei's firm last week, prompting clients to request longer time to prepare for the new rules.
Marketing of Procter & Gamble's Nanfu-brand batteries had been affected by the new censorship rules, as had commercials for products made by Nestle, the world's largest food group, industry sources said. There are an estimated 20 million Muslims in China, mainly living in the central and western provinces.
"I feel that when CCTV decided to do this, it is for the purpose of ethnic harmony and unity. This is a good thing," Bai Runsheng, the chairman of the Shanghai Islamic Association, told Reuters. Best to remove the Pig entirely from your astrological mix. Best be safe and you know banning pigs in ads won't be enough for them. Year of the Camel - there's a good donkey.
#2
Pigs are the easiest animal food sources to cultivate. And pig cuts yield more unique tastes than those of other animals. In fact, I wouldn't trade 1 pig for 1 billion koranimals.
#3
IIUC, french Post service just scraped a related postal stamp serie about the "Year of the pig", because it might offend the usual suspects; I've only glanced through the article at France-echos, might be a spoof, but frankly, it wouldn't surprize me at all.
A ruling by Switzerland's highest court released Friday has opened up the possibility that people with serious mental illnesses could be helped by doctors to take their own lives. Switzerland already allows physician-assisted suicide for terminally ill patients under certain circumstances. The Federal Tribunal's decision puts mental illnesses on the same level as physical ones.
"It must be recognized that an incurable, permanent, serious mental disorder can cause similar suffering as a physical (disorder), making life appear unbearable to the patient in the long term," the ruling said. "If the death wish is based on an autonomous decision which takes all circumstances into account, then a mentally ill person can be prescribed sodium-pentobarbital and thereby assisted in suicide," it added.
Various organizations exist in Switzerland to help people who want to commit suicide, and assisting someone to die is not punishable under Swiss law as long as there is no "selfish motivation" for doing so.
The judges made clear in their ruling that certain conditions would have to be met before a mentally ill person's request for suicide assistance could be considered justified.
Because you can't just off anyone in Switzerland. Yet.
"A distinction has to be made between a death wish which is an expression of a curable, psychiatric disorder and which requires treatment, and (a death wish) which is based on a person of sound judgment's own well-considered and permanent decision, which must be respected," they said.
The case was brought by a 53-year old man with serious bipolar affective disorder who asked the tribunal to allow him to acquire a lethal dose of pentobarbital without a doctor's prescription. The tribunal ruled against his request, confirming the need for a thorough medical assessment of the patient's condition.
Whether any Swiss physician would be prepared to prescribe a lethal dose of pentobarbital to a mentally ill person remains unclear. The country's national ethics commission could not be reached for comment late on Friday.
Switzerland is one of a number of countries in Europe that allow assistance to terminally ill people who wish to die. Netherlands legalized euthanasia in 2001 and Belgium in 2002, while Britain and France allow terminally ill people to refuse treatment in favor of death. Someone has already suggested this as a way to deal with protesters who assemble at Davos against WTO and G8 meetings.
Russian Lukoil announced Thursday that they and partner Norsk Hydro hoped to sign a development deal for Iran's Azar oilfield. "We are very hopeful that this can be signed in April," Viatcheslav Kosmynin, Lukoil's director in Iran, told Reuters. "We have submitted the development plan to Iran with our partners Norsk Hydro and are negotiating terms."
Norsk Hydro and Lukoil worked together on an exploration contract for the field and discovered oil there in 2005. The companies later said the field holds 2 billion barrels of oil. Hydro held 75 percent of the exploration license, while Lukoil held 25 percent.
KARACHI - Pakistani police have charged three adults and two children, from a minority sect designated non-Muslim, for spreading religious hatred, an official said on Friday. The five members of the Ahmadiyya community, including an 11-year-old girl and an 8-year-old boy, were caught reading and distributing childrens magazines that contained offensive material, police said.
We have registered a case against them ... they have obtained pre-arrest bails from a court, Shabbir Mohammad, a senior police official told Reuters by telephone from Chora Kalan, a village 150 km (90 miles) south of Islamabad. We are trying to recover more of these magazines, he said, adding the magazines spread hatred against other religions.
Because they pointed out that maybe, possibly, Mohammed (may his gummas heal) might not be the last profit.
The sect was founded in Punjab by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in 19th century India, and the Ahmadis do not regard Mohammad as the last prophet of Islam. The community is centred around the town of Chenab Nagar in central Punjab province. Official figures for Ahmadis are unreliable as they have boycotted censuses since 1974, but they estimate their community at around two million, according to a US State Department report.
Sounds like there's a few who don't toe the religious line in Pak-land.
An amendment to Pakistans constitution in 1974 declared that Ahmadis were not Muslims, and barred them from preaching or propagating their faith.
Because it wouldn't do to make anyone think about their faith.
During military dictator President Mohammed Zia-ul-Haqs rule in the 1980s a series of changes to the penal code were made that became known as the anti-Ahmadi laws. Ahmadis have long been victims of harassment and religious violence, often instigated by militant Sunni groups.
Harrassment = rape and assault, violence = murder.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/03/2007 00:00 ||
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Professor Abdus Salaam was an Ahmadi.
He shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1979 for his contribution to the theory of the unified weak and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles, including the prediction of the weak neutral current.
From his Nobel Citation
When he cycled home from Lahore, at the age of 14, after gaining the highest marks ever recorded for the Matriculation Examination at the University of the Punjab, the whole town turned out to welcome him. He won a scholarship to Government College, University of the Punjab, and took his MA in 1946. In the same year he was awarded a scholarship to St. John's College, Cambridge, where he took a BA (honours) with a double First in mathematics and physics in 1949. In 1950 he received the Smith's Prize from Cambridge University for the most outstanding pre-doctoral contribution to physics. He also obtained a PhD in theoretical physics at Cambridge; his thesis, published in 1951, contained fundamental work in quantum electrodynamics which had already gained him an international reputation.
How was this brilliant man treated by Pakistan?
In the country of his birth and citizenship, no scientific or other institution, building, or even a street, bears his name. School text books do not mention him, nor are children told about him by their teachers. Fake heroes are spattered all over the place but Salam is never to be found. Reflecting the disdain felt by much of Pakistani academia, a former vice-chancellor of my university scornfully asked in a meeting: 'Who is Salam? What has he done for Pakistan?'" observed Pervez Hoodbhoy
When Professor Salam ran for the post of Director General of UNESCO, he needed an endorsement from his country of citizenship. "Pakistan refused to endorse his candidacy," says Saif. "He was awarded an O.B.E. by the Queen of England and had lived in England long enough to get citizenship there, but he didn't want it; the Italian government, because of his work at the ICTP, were also offering him citizenship, but, again, he never accepted it (even after Pakistan refused to endorse him)."
"Before 1974, Salam was legally a Muslim in Pakistan, but subsequently he became a non-Muslim in a state where non-Muslims are, by law, second class citizens. Subsequent to his excommunication by an act of the Pakistani national parliament, and of his Ahmadiyya sect, Salam resigned as Adviser to the President.
Posted by: john ||
02/03/2007 6:36 Comments ||
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#2
After the great scientist was buried in Chenab Nagar, his tombstone said Abdus Salam the First Muslim Nobel Laureate. Needless to say, the police arrived with a magistrate and rubbed off the Muslim part of the katba. Now the tombstone says: Abdus Salam the First Nobel Laureate.
Posted by: john ||
02/03/2007 6:39 Comments ||
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#3
After receiving the Nobel Prize, Dr Salam then went to India where he was received with great fanfare. He had gone there to simply meet his primary school mathematics teacher who was still alive. When the two met, Dr Salam took off his Nobel medal and put it around the neck of his teacher.
The Indian PM Indira Gandhi was so in awe of him that she refused to sit at the same level as Dr Salam, instead sitting beside him on the floor.
Posted by: john ||
02/03/2007 6:45 Comments ||
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#4
An amendment to Pakistans constitution in 1974 declared that Ahmadis were not Muslims, and barred them from preaching or propagating their faith.
Wow. They amended their constitution to persecute another religion.
But Islam means peace and there is no compulsion in religion, right?
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
02/03/2007 9:34 Comments ||
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#5
Ironically the Jamaat Ahmadiyya supported the partition of the Indian subcontinent.
They got their Pakistan, their land of the pure.
Except they were not pure enough...
Posted by: john ||
02/03/2007 10:08 Comments ||
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A professor who developed an inexpensive, easy-to-make system for filtering arsenic from well water has won a $1 million engineering prize and he plans to use most of the money to distribute the filters to needy communities around the world.
The National Academy of Engineering announced Thursday that the 2007 Grainger Challenge Prize for Sustainability would go to Abul Hussam, a chemistry professor at George Mason University in Fairfax. Hussam's invention is already in use today, preventing serious health problems in residents of the professor's native Bangladesh.
After moving to the United States in 1978, Hussam got his citizenship and received a doctorate in analytical chemistry. The Centreville, Va., resident has spent much of this career trying to devise a solution to the arsenic problem, which was accidentally caused by international aid agencies that had funded a campaign to dig wells in Eastern India and Bangladesh.
The wells brought fresh groundwater to farmers and others who previously had been drinking from bacteria- and virus-laced ponds and mudholes. But the aid agencies were unaware that the groundwater also had naturally high concentrations of poisonous arsenic. As infectious diseases declined, arsenic-related skin ailments and fatal cancers began to increase a problem that attracted much attention in the 1990s.
"I myself and all my brothers were drinking this water," said Hussam, who added that his family did not get sick, possibly because they had a good diet, which can help stem the effects of digesting arsenic.
Allan Smith, an epidemiologist at the University of California at Berkeley, said arsenic poisoning affects millions of people worldwide and it has been difficult to convince people that what seems to be good water might be toxic.
"You can't see it or taste or smell it," Smith said. "The idea that crystal-clear drinking water would end up causing lung disease in 20 or 30 years is a little weird. It's unbelievable to people."
Hussam spent years testing hundreds of prototype filtration systems. His final innovation is a simple, maintenance-free system that uses sand, charcoal, bits of brick and shards of a type of cast iron. Each filter has 20 pounds of porous iron, which forms a chemical bond with arsenic.
The filter removes almost every trace of arsenic from well water.
About 200 filtration systems are being made each week in Kushtia, Bangladesh, for about $40 each, Hussam said. More than 30,000 have been distributed.
Hussam said he plans to use 70 percent of his prize so the filters can be distributed to needy communities. He said 25 percent will be used for more research, and 5 percent will be donated to GMU.
The 2007 sustainability prize is funded by the Grainger Foundation of Lake Forest, Ill., and the contest was set up to target the arsenic problem. Among the criteria for winning was an affordable, reliable and environmentally friendly solution to the arsenic problem that did not require electricity.
Hussam's award will be presented Feb. 20 at Union Station in Washington. Large numbers of wells in the US have been closed for that very reason. A large scale commercial version of this filter would be a godsend.
#3
What's wrong with me when my first thought after reading the guy's name, Abul Hussam, is that this is really a system for extracting arsenic for use as a poison?
#4
I deal with arsenic removal in water systems all the time. There are many systems using chemicals, adsorption media, etc. What is the best system depends on the water chemistry. Dissolved arsenic is in the arsenite form, and oxidized arsenic is in the arsenate form. The easiest method for removal is to oxidize the dissolved arsenic in the presence of ferrous iron, which is the dissolved iron in well water. If about 20x the iron ia present with arsenite, the arsenic forms a complex with the iron and out it goes. Sorta rides shotgun with the iron. Ferric (oxidized) iron drops out of water as small particles and gets caught in the sand filter. Sometimes, if you don't have enough iron in the water, you can add some to take out the arsenic.
For oxidation, we use chlorine or potassium permanganate. Hussam has made a little modular system to do the oxidation and filtration. The thing is that the sand will have to be backwashed or changed periodically so the arsenic does not break through and start the poisoning process again.
The tragedy off all this is that they drilled thousands of wells in Bangladesh and did not do water quality tests until people got sick or died. In my work, we do a complete battery of tests, including nuclear related, for about $2300 for a new public well. There is natural uranium present in some bedrock, so it is a good idea to check for that. Another mineral that can cause problems in fluoride, in large enough concentrations.
Back to arsenic: there are some good portable arsenic testing kits that read down to 3 parts per billion. A typical test takes 20 minutes. Worth the price.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/03/2007 20:13 Comments ||
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#5
There is organic arsenic present in coal. Any system that burns coal or deals with coal (as in coal gassification) must also deal with organic arsenic. There is an awful lot of nasty stuff in nature.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
02/03/2007 20:42 Comments ||
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#6
Roght on, Deacon, especially in Chicom coal. But it is natural, so it is OK.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/03/2007 22:39 Comments ||
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A nation whose education officials already have warned that they will, when necessary, "bring the religious convictions of the family into line" with state requirements, now has removed a 16-year-old girl from her family and placed her in a child psychiatry unit after she turned in below-expected grades in math and Latin.
The news of nearly two dozen officials and uniformed police officers physically taking the teen from her home in front of her shocked family is just the latest horror story to come out of Germany, where homeschooling was placed under a ban by Adolf Hitler and der Fuhrer's law still is enforced.
The stories are concerning to homeschoolers in the rest of the world, including the United States, because of the real potential that international law eventually could be used to ban such activities in places where it now is legal.
The newest German case was reported in a statement delivered to WND by Netzwerk-Bildungsfreiheit (Net-Education Freedom), an organization that works for homeschoolers' rights in Germany even though it is illegal there.
A spokesman for that group had contacted WND after the news website broke the story that a German government official had warned that families' religious beliefs will have to be brought into alignment with required school attendance laws.
The government at that time had responded to a parent concerned about children being forcibly placed in custody by police officers and then delivered to the mandatory public school system:
"In order to avoid this in future, the education authority is in conversation with the affected family in order to look for possibilities to bring the religious convictions of the family into line with the unalterable school attendance requirement," the government said.
The student in the newest case was identified by the German organization as Melissa Busekros. She has been removed from her parents' custody, and placed in the Child Psychiatry Unit of the Nuremberg clinic, her father, Hubert Busekros, told the homeschool group.
"What is being done to a sensitive and musical young girl, just because the bureaucrats want to set an example? In their zealous drive to enforce compulsory schooling (which by Melissa's age is only part-time) at all costs, they readily accept the trauma caused to the unassuming and lovable Melissa," the German homeschool said.
"The Netzwerk Bildungsfreiheit condemns this inconsiderate and totally incommensurate behaviour on the part of the officials involved and demands that they give Melissa her freedom and return her to her family immediately."
The case began developing in the summer of 2005, when Melissa, then 15, was told she'd have to repeat the 7th grade at the Ernst High Gymnasium, a public school, due to her grades in math and Latin.
"The situation in the class played no small part in creating this state of affairs the high noise levels and cancelled classes prevented her from receiving the educational assistance she needed during school hours," the German organization said.
Since she had good grades in all the other classes, she and her parents decided she would be tutored individually at home to meet her needs. She still took part in music and sang in her school's choir.
But school officials were unhappy, and expelled her, so the Busekros family continued educating her at home. At the end of the 2005-2006 school year she was no longer subject to full-time attendance requirements, but the Jugendamt, or Youth Welfare Office still created a case in Family Court and ordered the family to appear at a hearing.
Then this week social workers accompanied by police officers appeared at the home one morning, demanding that Melissa be handed over to them immediately, providing as authorization a ruling by the Erlangen Court dated Jan. 29.
It said, "The relevant Youth Welfare Office is hereby instructed and authorized to bring the child, if necessary by force, to a hearing and may obtain police support for this purpose."
The teen was taken to the Child Psychiatry Unit and interrogated for nearly four hours, after which she was returned home, the Netzwerk said. However, the worst was still to come.
On Thursday, the Family Court judge, staff members of the Youth Welfare Office, and 15 police officers "marched up to the Busekros home, to haul Melissa off to the Child Psychiatry Unit."
"This treatment was justified by the psychiatrist's finding, two days previously, that she was supposedly developmentally delayed by one year and that she suffered from school phobia," the Netzwerk said.
"It is not known when Melissa's parents and siblings will be able to see her again, as the official approach in cases of 'school phobia' is to completely prevent the 'patient' from having any contact with those closest to him or her, as such contact supposedly enables the phobia," the Netzwerk said.
Such issues are alarming U.S. homeschool leaders.
Michael Farris, cofounder of the Home School Legal Defense Association, has called for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to protect the right of parents to educate their children at home, in light of such developments in Europe.
One of his major concerns is that if the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, a plan already accepted as law by many nations around the globe, were ratified by the Senate or adopted by the federal courts as enforceable international law, American homeschooling could be banned.
A homeschool advocate in Germany earlier wrote to WND that, "We are not far away from an intolerant dictatorship in our country. Parental rights are more and more abolished. If you do not the way the state wants, to so-called Jugendamt (youth welfare office) is quickly to check out if they can take away the custody of your children."
He was not being identified because of his position in Germany.
"As long as you practice your faith in a church building you have no problems, but as soon as you act in accordance to your faith, for example, in the education of your children, the freedom ends rapidly," he said.
He likened the situation to that of families under the Nazi regime, or "like in the former Soviet Union under the Communists."
The HSLDA also has pleaded for help for the German community.
"The situation, unfortunately, is not getting any better, and they need your prayers and support," the organization said recently. "Most recently, a decision was handed down by the European Court of Human rights (which) completely turned the European Union Constitution's Article 14, the section on parent's rights to control the education of their children, completely upside down."
That decision will allow any nation in the EU, should it choose, to outlaw homeschooling. "Meanwhile, the German homeschoolers continue to be unmercifully persecuted. In our last report, we explained that there were approximately 40 families in court at one stage or the other. Families are fleeing regularly to other foreign countries in order to continue homeschooling "
MACON, Ga. - Mayor Jack Ellis has converted to Islam and is working to change his legal name to Hakim Mansour Ellis. Ellis, 61, a Macon native who was raised Christian, said he became a Sunni Muslim during a December ceremony in the west African nation of Senegal.
Ellis said he has studied the Koran for years and that his new religion was practiced by his ancestors before they were brought to North America as slaves. Why does one become a Christian? Ellis said. You do it because it feels right. . . . To me, its no big deal. But people like to know what you believe in.
Ellis mayoral term expires this year. He said he is proud to live in a country founded on religious freedom.
#2
Ellis said he has studied the Koran for years and that his new religion was practiced by his ancestors before they were brought to North America as slaves.
Excerpt from author Dinesh D'Souza's latest offering, What's So Great About America:
"Slavery was a grave moral crime that inflicted incalculable moral harm to the slaves. But the slaves are dead, and the truth is that their descendents are better off as a result of slavery."
#1
Before any decision like this can be made, several very important bits of information need to be established:
1) What is the current incidence of HPV in girls in Texas?
2) What are the potential side effects of the vaccine, including allergy? What is their incidence rate among those who are vaccinated?
3) Will the vaccine still be effective if a girl has already contracted the disease? Will there be a follow-up screening program to determine effectiveness and side effects?
4) What are the distribution and storage requirements of the vaccine, as in refrigeration and perishability?
5) What are the known drug interactions?
6) Can the drug be administered to a child who has a compromised immune system, drug resistant tuberculosis, cancers and leukemias, dengue fever, West Nile virus, strep throat, inflamed tonsils or blocked eustation tubes, conjunctivitis, other childhood diseases, or is under treatment for any of the above?
7) What are the exact contents of the vaccination? Does the vaccine contain any mercury or other metals?
8) Can the vaccination be given in combination with other common school and travel vaccinations? With anti-malarial drugs?
9) Does the vaccination contain any product that is typically found to be objectionable on religious grounds, such as pork, beef or shellfish?
10) What is the extent of animal testing that has been done with this vaccine? (Think Thalidomide, not PETA.)
#4
Bottom Line:
Texas allows parents to opt out of inoculations by filing an affidavit stating that he or she objected to the vaccine for religious or philosophical reasons.
#5
Shipman: If the vaccine works as advertised, great. Cervical cancer is nasty and murderous. But Merck and the State of Texas are setting themselves up for a real, or at least a PR disaster, by not analyzing the heck out of this before making it a statewide mandate.
As it is, they are, and are appearing to be using the State's children in a massive experiment to see if this vaccination is a good idea. Most parents are not going to be thrilled with that idea.
If you remember during the hearing for the MMR vaccine and autism, medical authority after medical authority testified in essence that vaccination is a numbers game.
They know that a certain number of children will get bad side effects, and may even die; but that number is dwarfed by the number who would be crippled and die without vaccinations.
What good will it do children if three of four die from this, and the State and Merck are sued to prevent any other children from being vaccinated?
You can always legally claim that "not enough testing was done", no matter how much testing was done. And though Texas limits liability, there is little they could do if the court filed an injunction to prevent further vaccinations.
One of those situations where good intentions is not enough.
#6
This strikes me as a mass marketing push. You can always recognize the drug company ads. They start out with a first set of ads that says, "ask your doctor about the purple pill" or "I didn't know". Then after they have peaked your concern and curiosity, they tell you what drug they are selling that can fix that problem. The cervical cancer ads followed the same pattern. The first ad was mothers and daughters inciting concern about cervical cancer with the motto, "tell someone you know about cervical cancer" (or words to that effect). The next set of ads instructed you to tell your girlfriends and your daughters to get the vaccine and IIRC, they reused the "I didn't know" motto with regard to this vaccine.
Now it appears that they have managed to convince the state of Texas to buy mass supplies.
Not a bad marketing plan.
For those of you who think that they care about side effects for those small percentage$... ahh that's sweet.
#7
Aren't vaccine manufactures immune from private lawsuits? As I recall you have to go through some program to get compensation after many years and proving (beyond a shadow of a doubt) that the vaccine caused it.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Nineteen people have contracted cholera in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, in the first outbreak of the often-deadly disease in the city in a year, Zimbabwe state radio reported yesterday.
DHAKA - Two million Muslims congregated on Friday near the Bangladesh capital Dhaka for a three-day gathering billed as the second largest annual Islamic event after the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Chinese state television will censor advertisements featuring pigs in order not to offend Muslims in the Year of the Pig, a media company said on Friday. "Originally they didn't want pig images in ads on TV, because they worry about conflicting issues with Muslims in China," said Lisa Wei, managing director of media investment firm GroupM China Trading.
Russian Lukoil announced Thursday that they and partner Norsk Hydro hoped to sign a development deal for Iran's Azar oilfield. "We are very hopeful that this can be signed in April," Viatcheslav Kosmynin, Lukoil's director in Iran, told Reuters. "We have submitted the development plan to Iran with our partners Norsk Hydro and are negotiating terms."
KARACHI - Pakistani police have charged three adults and two children, from a minority sect designated non-Muslim, for spreading religious hatred, an official said on Friday. The five members of the 
