August 30, 2016

Vidéo: Dans une prison américaine

Dans une prison américaine, à l’heure où Obama veut réformer le système judiciaire
France24 | 30/08/2016



Avec plus de deux millions de détenus derrière les barreaux, le système pénitentiaire américain est l’un de ceux qui enferme le plus de personnes au monde. Barack Obama, premier président à s'être rendu dans une prison fédérale, a promis de réformer un système judiciaire qui enferme trop facilement.

http://www.france24.com/fr/20160830-video-etats-unis-prison-barack-obama-reforme-systeme-judiciaire

August 13, 2016

Cannes burkini ban triggers outrage

Source: Times of London (subscription)



August 13 2016, 12:01am, The Times

The French Riviera resort of Cannes has banned women from wearing burkinis, otherwise known as full-body swimsuits, because they “symbolise Islamist extremism”. The decision has prompted a backlash from mainstream Muslim groups who say that it is discriminatory.

David Lisnard, the mayor of Cannes, signed a bylaw saying: “Beachwear which ostentatiously displays religious affiliation, when France and places of worship are currently the target of terrorist attacks, is liable to create risks of disrupting public order. We are not banning the veil, nor the [Jewish] kippa nor crosses. I am simply banning a uniform which is the symbol of Islamic extremism.”

{snip}

Very few women have been seen in burkinis at the resort, he acknowledged. Those who do wear them now face on-the-spot fines of €38 (£33). Officials said that offenders would first be asked to change or leave the beach.

Muslim organisations criticised the ban, calling it discriminatory because strict French laws enforcing secularism do not outlaw the wearing of religious dress in public places, other than full face coverings. A lawsuit is to be brought against Cannes by the Collective against Islamophobia in France.

Read more: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/cannes-burkini-ban-triggers-outrage-v7db5nz57

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Women wearing the cover-all burkini on the beach at Cannes will face a fine of £33 under a new bylaw (AP)

June 16, 2016

Paranoid style in U.S. politics lives on in 2016 campaign

David Horsey / Los Angeles Times
June 14, 2016

A small but fervent cadre of Bernie Sanders partisans have convinced themselves that unnamed overlords in big corporations ordered their vassals in the Democratic Party and their minions in the corporate media to use every dastardly trick — from rigging voting machines to news blackouts — to snatch victory away from the senator from Vermont. They surely do not recognize it, but their paranoia is just the latest manifestation of a phenomenon that is as much a part of America’s political tradition as elephants, donkeys and red, white and blue balloons.

Back in the 1830s, here is what alarmed thousands of U.S. voters: “It is an ascertained fact that Jesuits are prowling about all parts of the United States in every possible disguise, expressly to ascertain the advantageous situations and modes to disseminate Popery… The western country swarms with them under the name of puppet show men, dancing masters, music teachers, peddlers of images and ornaments, barrel organ players, and similar practitioners.”

{snip}

All of these examples of American political paranoia are taken from historian Richard Hofstadter’s hugely influential Harper’s magazine essay, “The Paranoid Style in American Politics.” The piece gained a wide audience in no small part because it was published in 1964, the tumultuous political year when right-wing insurgents took over the Republican Party and nominated Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater for president. Now, 52 years later in the context of the current outlandish presidential campaign, Hofstadter’s observations continue to resonate.

“American politics has often been an arena for angry minds,” Hofstadter wrote in his opening paragraph. “In recent years we have seen angry minds at work mainly among extreme right-wingers, who have now demonstrated in the Goldwater movement how much political leverage can be got out of the animosities and passions of a small minority. But behind this I believe there is a style of mind that is far from new and that is not necessarily right-wing. I call it the paranoid style simply because no other word adequately evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy that I have in mind.”

.................
more including the author's cartoons: http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-paranoid-style-20160614-snap-story.html

June 14, 2016

Yep.

Bernie was the toast of the town all last spring and summer until that fateful day in October . . .



. . . and that was all she wrote!

June 14, 2016

In San Bernardino county Clinton is currently beating Sanders 56.1% - 42.6%

with a 13.5% spread, an even bigger win for Clinton than the statewide 12%:



link: http://vote.sos.ca.gov/returns/president/party/democratic/county/san-bernardino/

You're right, this is fun!

June 10, 2016

Ha. Here's my favorite

"The Trial of Hillary"

................
Incidentally here's the skinny on St. Joan:

France was at war with Britain over the "succession," basically an interminable dynastic struggle between various Henry's and Henri's with disastrous consequences for France where it was fought. The Duke of Burgundy sided with Britain and France kept losing northern cities including Paris. Joan stepped in at age 19 and reported visitations (visions) that got the French excited and they finally started winning. They let her on the battlefield and she's said to have fought but mainly she made good suggestions and rallied the troops and people.

Until she was captured by the British who accused her of heresy, imprisoned her, tried her, and on May 30, 1431, burned her at the stake, burned her bones, and scattered her ashes. France when it finally gotten rid of Britain and the Pope both investigated the proceedings and declared them a grave miscarriage of justice whereupon Joan became a national heroine and eventually a saint.

The charge used against her was cross-dressing because she wore armor on the battlefield.

June 10, 2016

Big shaker here in the I. E.

Nothing fell but dayum. 3-4 at least.

June 8, 2016

Current AP delegate count -- Clinton: 2,755. Sanders: 1,852.

Clinton has passed a pledged (elected) delegate majority by 2,184 - 2,023 = 161 PDs.

Clinton has passed a total delegate (PD and SD) majority by 2,755 - 2,383 = 372 delegates.

There will be no contested convention.

June 8, 2016

Bernie speaking now

June 8, 2016

CALIFORNIA 6.7% IN -- Clinton 62.5; Sanders 36.4

Democratic Results

CALIFORNIA
6.7% IN
Clinton 62.5%
Sanders 36.4%

http://www.npr.org/2016/06/07/481003293/clinton-looks-to-historic-night-while-sanders-hopes-for-calif-upset