America's Allies Are Funding ISIS

But in the years they were getting started, a key component of ISIS’s support came from wealthy individuals in the Arab Gulf States of Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Sometimes the support came with the tacit nod of approval from those regimes; often, it took advantage of poor money laundering protections in those states, according to officials, experts, and leaders of the Syrian opposition, which is fighting ISIS as well as the regime.

“Everybody knows the money is going through Kuwait and that it’s coming from the Arab Gulf,” said Andrew Tabler, senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “Kuwait’s banking system and its money changers have long been a huge problem because they are a major conduit for money to extremist groups in Syria and now Iraq.”

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has been publicly accusing Saudi Arabia and Qatar of funding ISIS for months. Several reports have detailed how private Gulf funding to various Syrian rebel groups has splintered the Syrian opposition and paved the way for the rise of groups like ISIS and others.

Gulf donors support ISIS, the Syrian branch of al Qaeda called the al Nusrah Front, and other Islamic groups fighting on the ground in Syria because they feel an obligation to protect Sunnis suffering under the atrocities of the Assad regime. Many of these backers don’t trust or like the American backed moderate opposition, which the West has refused to provide significant arms to.



http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/14/america-s-allies-are-funding-isis.html

A fruit of neocon adventures: ISIS militants using Yazidi women as sex and domestic slaves.

Women and children have been buried alive in mass graves by the fanatics terrorising Iraq, it was claimed last night. Up to 500 members of the ancient Yazidi sect have suffered the appalling fate, according to an Iraqi minister. Fighters from the Islamic State group are also accused of kidnapping 300 women to use for sex or as domestic slaves. Some 150,000 Yazidis fled their homes after the militants overran their main town of Sinjar in northern Iraq last week. The fresh claims of horrific atrocities will add to pressure on the West to take further action to halt Islamic State’s relentless expansion through Iraq.





http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2721043/U-S-drones-fighters-carry-four-new-air-strikes-protect-stranded-Yazidis-attacks-Islamic-State-jihadists.html

Robin Williams as VILLAIN in "Insomnia". (VIDEO)

My favorite Robin Williams movie was perhaps the least known...

Neil deGrasse Tyson - We Stopped Dreaming (VIDEO)

More immigrants want English classes than there are spots available.

They came, one after another, through the glass doors of the Bronx Library Center, the largest public library in the borough. Some rode multiple trains or buses from home; others took precious time away from work. A few struggled with young children in tow.

It was not books they wanted, but something more basic: to learn English.

The Bronx library on East Kingsbridge Road has become a hub of English instruction at a time when many of New York City’s public libraries are seeking to expand their language and literacy programs to better serve patrons who increasingly come from all over the world. The programs are free to local residents, regardless of their income or immigration status, and have become so popular in some neighborhoods that people stand in line for hours to sign up and many have to be turned away because there are not enough spots.

“I need to learn English,” said Rafael Villeta, one of 153 people waiting to register for classes at the Bronx library on a hot Tuesday afternoon in July. “Every job, the first question is, ‘You know English?’ ”


http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/07/nyregion/new-york-city-libraries-struggle-to-meet-demand-for-english-language-classes.html?src=me&_r=0

Siegelman trial judge (and Bush appointee) accused of assaulting his wife.

U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller was charged with misdemeanor battery and taken to the Fulton County jail around 2:30 Sunday morning.

Fuller, 55, is a judge in the Middle District of Alabama and presided over the 2006 bribery trial of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman and HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy. According to a jail official, the judge has a 9 a.m. Monday court appearance and was expected to remain in jail overnight.

Police responded to the Ritz-Carlton Hotel at 181 Peachtree Street at 10:47 p.m. According to Atlanta police spokeswoman Kim Jones, officers spoke to Fuller’s wife, “who stated she was assaulted by her husband.” Fuller’s wife, who was not named by police, was treated by paramedics but refused treatment at a hospital.

Fuller was nominated to the bench in 2002 by President George W. Bush and has been a controversial figure in Alabama politics, largely for his role in the Siegelman trial. Siegelman’s family members and supporters claim the former governor’s prosecution was politically motivated and that Fuller should have recused himself for conflicts of interest.


http://www.ajc.com/news/news/breaking-news/federal-judge-arrested-for-battery/ngyss/?icmp=ajc_internallink_textlink_homepage&__federated=1

If America is so "exceptional", when is our mission to Mars?

Have you ever noticed how those who push the concept of "American Exceptionalism" are the same people who want government to do jack shit about anything except enforce reading of the Bible, wiping the ass of the rich and killing everyone else? Winning World War II was exceptional. Wiping out polio was exceptional. Going to the moon was exceptional. Yet there I was at the cinema today, looking at my son during the movie trailor "Interstellar" and wonder if he has something more to look forward to than building a better Walmart. I want him to want to be an astronaut. I want him to live in a country to that does big things the way we used to. And dammit, let's start by going to Mars.

Report on Irish baby homes documents use of infants for med school cadavers, vaccine testing

More than 60 years ago, a fair-skinned Irish politician named Sally Mulready was born into a home for unwed mothers called St. Patrick’s. It sat on a road named Navan in Dublin, and Mulready was one of four siblings born there. Her brother John never made it out of St. Pat’s. Like hundreds of other babies born into an Irish homes for “fallen women,” John died in 1947. He was two months old.

“Inanition,” his death record read, according to RTE News. “Failure to thrive.”

But RTE News said the record carried a mystery. John for some reason wasn’t buried until 1950 — three years after his death. The oddity was first discarded as a clerical error.

But it wasn’t. John’s records had the designation “AS,” or “anatomical study.” His infant remains had in fact been given to researchers at Trinity College Dublin, who used them for medical research — though it’s unclear whether his mother had given consent for this.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/07/23/irish-baby-homes-investigation-reveals-use-for-cadavers-vaccine-testing/

Peshmerga Retake Gwer; IS in Retreat in Nineveh

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Peshmerga officials said this morning they have retaken the town of Gwer in an all-out assault, after two days of air strikes by US jets on Islamic State (IS/ISIS) positions.

Meanwhile, Kurdish military leaders said that on all fronts in Nineveh province the Islamists were in retreat, while in Kirkuk and northern Diyala their numbers and activities had dropped.

A Rudaw reporter returning from the frontlines quoted Peshmerga officers as saying that the Islamist armies were suffering from serious fuel shortages, hampering operations that rely mainly on vehicles and mobile units.

But on the Jalawla frontline in northern Diyala, Peshmerga commanders said their forces were locked in some of the fiercest fighting of the day since dawn, killing some 25 militants.

http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/100820142