Schooling into terror

the BBC has a long article on ISIS schools that teach teenagers to become terrorists, and some are being infiltrated into Europe.

A horrible story. read the whole thing.

this is not the only time this has happened: Hitler youths  and communists have long instilled youth with hatred. And the constant propaganda by Palestinian leaders to train their children in hatred is a story rarely covered in the news.

So what do you do?

Comparisons have been made to the ruins of earlier wars - Dresden, Stalingrad, etc. That is overstating the damage, and looking through the rubble, it misses the point. Physical damage is the easiest to perceive, but also the easiest to repair. Cities get rebuilt.
In its short life, the so-called Islamic State did a more lasting harm, by grooming and corrupting young men. Sit with those boys, hear their tales and you will struggle to steady yourself.
Identifying the worst affected is difficult enough. Treating them, stopping the nightmares and repairing the trauma will be costly and time-consuming. They have missed so much proper schooling that finding them jobs will be hard. And returning them to their faith, one that isn’t polluted by jihadist ideology, needs perseverance.

That might be enough to save them, to bring them back into their societies, to help Iraq and Syria rebuild. Treating those who have suffered and escaped to the West might stop them becoming criminals, or worse.

my friend in Zimbabwe, a local teacher, helped to reeduccate their insurgents after Mugabe took over.

She said one problem was to teach them that they did not have the right to steal (or worse) just because they had a gun... they had to be reintegrated into society and family, and given job training.

As for Islam: my son in law worked with the US trying to retrain the insurgency in Iraq: part of it was to teach them what the Koran actually said, and how ordinary people actually live as good Muslims, as opposed to concentrating on the rabid quotes out of context that inspire the radical Islamicists, who have more in common with the Nazis and leftists of the west than with their own history...

All the world eeds now is love

because it's always more popular to feel self righteous for spouting vague generalities about love and peace than actually doing something about it.

this is 1968 redux, and that is how you got Nixon.

Shopping in the Philippines

Yes, we have a modern supermarket in the mall, along with various grocery stores.

But most of the daily marketing is done at our palenke. This is a commercial but gives you a good idea of our open air markets, where small vendors sell their wares and food.

Musical interlude of the day

Harald Bluetooth: the guy behind the name

the Bluetooth device was named after a Viking King who united the Vikings to make the kingdom of Denmark.

lots of historians give different accounts, but luckily Harald erected a stone monument to give his side of the story:

The biography of Harald Bluetooth is summed up by this runic inscription from the Jelling stones:
"King Harald bade these memorials to be made after Gorm, his father, and Thyra, his mother. The Harald who won the whole of Denmark and Norway and turned the Danes to Christianity."

so how did your bluetooth device get named for him?

The name "Bluetooth" is an Anglicised version of the Scandinavian Blåtand/Blåtann (Old Norse blátǫnn), the epithet of the tenth-century king Harald Bluetooth who united dissonant Danish tribes into a single kingdom and, according to legend, introduced Christianity as well.

The idea of this name was proposed in 1997 by Jim Kardach of Intel who developed a system that would allow mobile phones to communicate with computers.^[10]At the time of this proposal he was reading Frans G. Bengtsson's historical novel The Long Ships about Vikings and King Harald Bluetooth.^[11][12] The implication is that Bluetooth does the same with communications protocols, uniting them into one universal standard.^[1

Video of the week

stories below the fold

CDC reports that fewer people today lack health insurance than they did in 2010.

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CDC also has a report on eradicating Polio in Afghanistan.

long technical discussion.
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StrategyPage on the Qatar problem... blame AlJ...

Civilian are frequently killed by their own governments and those governments do not want talk about it. This is a common thing in Middle Eastern nations and there is apparently no easy cure. Al Jazeera covers it like no one else. Qatar is also seen as siding with Iran in the current struggle between Shia Iran and the Sunni Arab nations led by Saudi Arabia. Qatar denies this and sees the blockade as more of a publicity stunt than a serious bit of statecraft.

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 podcast of the day:

the backstory of the Magna Carta was a debate over the king vs local power. 

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censor the social media? China is already doing that.

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big drug raids here ended up with a lot of dead people here in the Philippines

to put the story into perspective:


our local paper reports the usual killings of low level politicians and business owners is still going on...and usually doesn't get a lot of publicity. Includes a murdering rapist killing himself in police custody, a guy who shot back in self defense, and something new: An IED planted for the cops that hurt some school kids.

due to libel laws, the papers don't report on the "true" stories behind all of these things, but if they happen in our town, usually I can find it out from our cook, who is related to all the local tricycle drivers who know all the gossip.

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NPR reports: Anthrax killing hippos in Zambia.

yes, and a lot of elephants died of it in Zimbabwe awhile back.

it's in the soil, and not just in Africa..

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good news for today: Malala is going to Oxford.

Mass hysteria bubble?

Long post by Dilbert explains

a continuation of his "cognitive dissonance" series.

Oklahoma history (and the birth of the FBI)

the notorious Osage murders in the 1920's.

A good book. I worked there and knew the story, but even I learned stuff from the book.

soon to be a major motion picture:



FBI files can be read on Archive.org (all 19 volumes).

Stories below the fold

Lord Elgin stole a lot of the statues etc from the Greek Parthenon, so if you want to see them, they re in London (and the Greeks want them back).

But one dirty little secret is that a lot of the stuff he bought sank.

So has this ship been found?

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StrategyPage reports on Colombia, which after settling with FARC is still facing drug gangs. But the real news is that they are thriving, while Venezuela is going bust.

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the real modern Nazis wear white coast. NDY activist explains...

I have seen this, alas. And it will get worse as the decision will be made by cost conscious bureaucrats instead of families or doctors who know the patient.

The problem we docs face: there is a subtle line between non treatment because you think the patient is better off dead, vs deciding less invasive treatment when aggressive care means a low benefit/high side effect ratio. Often families think "more is better", when often less aggressive therapy is better for the patient.

But often deciding on less aggressive treatment that would save the patient's life would quickly morphs to "no treatment", which is the danger of having a DNR order on the chart, which is often interpreted by staff or others as "don't do anything he's better off dead".



But now we see pushback: Texas seeking to make a law that doctors can't write a DNR order without the patient's permission.

it might have been better just to keep the Hippocratic oath, but modern medical ethicists have been trying to destroy that oath since I was in medical school, because it forbids abortion, euthanasia, sleeping with patients, putting the patient's needs over the "needs" of society, and insists on privacy.

Modern oaths let you do all these things and still be considered "ethical".

Sigh.
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airport type body screening in LA's subways is the way of the future.

huh? LA has subways? Who wudda thot?

but there have been threats to subways by AlQaeda, and of course there are always crazies around.

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the mathematics of golf.

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Uber kerfluffle in Manila.

Don't ask me: We still use "tricycles" here (motorcycles with side cars)

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the real worry here is an outbreak of birdflu.

No human cases yet but 200 thousand birds will have to be "culled" in Pampanga.

one wonders how it got introduced, since we are not on major wildbird migration routes, but the article notes:

He said the authorities suspect the virus could have been spread by migratory birds or from smuggled poultry products.

San Luis, about 60 kilometres (37 miles) north of Manila, is close to the Candaba swamps, a major way station and destination for migratory birds who move out of the Asian mainland during winter.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-08-philippines-declares-h5-bird-flu.html#jCp

 --update here.

Sigh. This is not good: already our chicken industry is marginal due to cheap imports, and now this. Note: we used to do this, until a typhoon destroyed our chicken houses (luckily between "grows" so no chickens were killed).

The gov't will supervise the "culls", but the real danger is that some people will decide to illegally sell the sick chickens to locals, and people will start to die.

Sigh..

and for those who think "free range" chickens are safer, , well, not true. They still can catch flu from migrating birds... and modern chicken farming allows poor people  in modern day mega cities to be able to afford to buy eggs and chickens to prevent malnutrition.

Shut up she said

Remembering when Stalin purged his enemies for having the wrong opinion.

The Great Purge or the Great Terror (Russian: Большо́й терро́р) was a campaign of political repression in the Soviet Union which occurred from 1936 to 1938. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and government officials, repression of peasants and the Red Army leadership, widespread police surveillance, suspicion of "saboteurs", "counter-revolutionaries", imprisonment, and arbitrary executions.
 It has been estimated that 600,000 people died at the hands of the Soviet government during the Purge.

and this doesn't include the elimination of the Kulaks or the mass starvation of peasants in the Ukraine.

something to remember when you hear of people insisting that there is no such thing as free speech.

Privacy?? Update on big brrother

see earlier post about gov't snooping.

This one is from the WAPO.

Computer warrants are ordinarily executed in two stages. First, the government gets access to all the electronic records. Next, the government searches through the records for the particularly described evidence. Courts have broadly allowed the government to follow this two-step procedure, in which they get all the stuff in the initial stage of electronic evidence warrants so that they can search it for the relevant evidence. Given that, Dreamhost’s objection is slightly off.

As I read it, Dreamhost is essentially challenging the widely accepted two-stage warrant practice.

italics mine
 wtF?

so you mean this is not Trumpie being big brother, but Trumpie using a government snooping rule that has been legal for quite awhile?

italics mine

uh, 4th amendment anyone>

and who is being searched, and for what?

Of course when Facbook knows where you live and where you went to school and who are in your circle, and Google can snoop on your web searches, one doesn't have a lot of privacy.

But Google can't put you in jail (yet)....

presumably my privacy is nil since although I am a US citizen, I live abroad and not eveyone using our IP address are US citizens.

Rambo take two

who nneeds Rambo when you have Praybeyt Benjamin?



The history of Bakla and tomboys at Wikipedia.

It is not considered a big problem here...I mean, who cares about the transvestite walking down the street when the corrupt politicians steal everything in sight?

we are Catholic, where rules on sin are strict, but hey, nobody's perfect...

the culture puts obligations to family and friends as more important than one's sexual proclivity...

Move Over Rambo

Hollywood is taking note that a patriotic movie about a military hero rescuing civilians from the bad guys might be a way for them to make money.

The movie, directed and starring martial artist Wu Jing, tells of a former Chinese special forces soldier single-handedly evacuating Chinese citizens besieged by Western mercenaries in Africa.

"Like Sylvester Stallone before him, and John Wayne before Stallone, star Wu Jing has successfully exploited the crowd-pleasing potential of enhancing militaristic action-adventure heroics with a heavy dose of flag-waving patriotism," Hollywood trade paper Variety said in a report about the film.
"The big difference here, of course, is that the flag waved by Wu and others in this shoot-'em-up extravaganza is that of the People's Republic of China, and Wu's heroic Leng Feng is not a Green Beret, but rather a once and future me special forces and heroes, so more power to the Chinese.

Hmm... makes one wonder if Hollywood would make an action movie where an American was the hero in these days when the left/progressives are busy trying to destroy patriotism.

Nah.... the SJW might get their knickers in a knot in a hissy fit if they do that.


Back story: there are a lot of Chinese working on projects in Africa and Pakistan who are in danger, and there is pressure in China to keep them safe.

In this film, it is evil western mercenaries who are the bad buys.

Of course, the bad news is that in real life, he probably would be rescuing them from the Taliban or ISIS kidnappers but never mind.

Yum! Durian

actually it is quite delicious...

Stories below the fold

via AlJ: Cholera epidemic hits war torn Yemen.

when the infrastructure breaks down for any reason, water borne diarrhea is the result. In Zimbabwe, it was due to failure to repair the water system, in Haiti the earthquake disrupted the water supply and the "peacekeepers" didn't dispose of their waste correctly, so it was spread to those using river water downstream.

here the problem is between a very nasty Iranian backed insurgency and the Saudi backed government types. Usually I back Iran (which I suspect is trying to rebuild Darius' Persian empire) but the Houthis are so nasty I prefer the Saudis.

No reports of who introduced the germ here but once it is there, it spreads quickly.

WHO reports:

Yemen's cholera epidemic, currently the largest in the world, has spread rapidly due to deteriorating hygiene and sanitation conditions and disruptions to the water supply across the country.

Millions of people are cut off from clean water, and waste collection has ceased in major cities. A collapsing health system is struggling to cope, with more than half of all health facilities closed due to damage, destruction or lack of funds. Shortages in medicines and supplies are persistent and widespread and 30 000 critical health workers have not been paid salaries in nearly a year.

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Floods in northern India and nearby states. In our prayers.

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The Nation says don't blame Russia: The DNC hack was an inside job: too much information was stolen so probably not downloaded on a slow IP link... Salon link here.

well, duh.

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Blame Russia report of the day:

The NoKo ICBM's were either made or stolen from the Ukraine... or rather a Russian factory in the Ukraine. StrategyPage reports the details.

there is also stuff about Syria there. good news: ISIL is losing. Bad news: Iran's goons are there and may be the winners. Lots of other "WOT" stuff that has a Russia link.

they also note Russia's depopulation problem.

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Place conspiracy theory in the blanks link for today

 ‘Unite the Right’ Organizer Jason Kessler Was Obama Supporter Involved With Occupy Movement.

(via Instapundit)
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Impending trade war with China?

given that illegal computer programs are all over the place, and you can buy the latest pirated movies at the Palenke before they hit Manila (or even get posted onto the Pirate Bay), well, as the saying goes: I'm Shocked... shocked.

And we won't even notice the Chinese gangsters behind the Shabu crisis in the Philippines and the opioid crisis (via Mexico) in the USA..

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August 15 is VJ day, but for some the war memories linger.

reconciling with the enemy post of the day at FatherZ's.

World War II veteran Marvin Strombo traveled 10,000 miles from his quiet home in Montana to the land of the rising sun to personally return a Japanese flag he had taken from Sadao Yasue during the Battle of Saipan in June 1944.

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Chaco Canyon art might portray a solar eclipse920 years ago

hi

Podcasts of the week

podcast of the week: How to build and use a Trireme.

backstory of why Persia lost.

Also Mike Duncan (of the History of Rome podcast) has a new series on Revolutions. The one on Germany is interesting: how lowering trade barriers preceeded the unification of that country. Hmm.. sounds like the EU...

Remove the statues post of the day

Erasing history: it's not just for Stalinists anymore.

all the hyperventillation needs a bit of humor.



don't ask me: My ancestors (and Lolo's ancestors) were starving in the old country when this happened, but my great great grand-uncle got drafted when he got off the boat and ended up fighting for the North.

Cajun time

in our prayers: Floods again in New Orleans.

Musical interllude of the day