December 21, 2015

By Sabrina Travernise

...The mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., (click here) this month has reignited that debate in America, and Missouri’s experience offers one perspective. It is difficult to isolate the impact of gun laws in a single state, given the pervasiveness of interstate trafficking and illegal markets, but a variety of measures, including a marked increase in police seizures of guns bought in-state, suggest the changes in Missouri’s laws have had some effect.

Research by Daniel Webster, the director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, found that in the first six years after the state repealed the requirement for comprehensive background checks and purchase permits, the gun homicide rate was 16 percent higher than it was the six years before. During the same period, the national rate declined by 11 percent. After Professor Webster controlled for poverty and other factors that could influence the homicide rate, and took into account homicide rates in other states, the result was slightly higher, rising by 18 percent in Missouri.

Federal death data released this month for 2014 showed a continuation of the trend, he said. Before the repeal, from 1999 to 2006, Missouri’s gun homicide rate was 13.8 percent higher than the national rate. From 2008 to 2014, it was 47 percent higher. (The new data also showed that the national death rate from guns was equal to that from motor vehicle crashes for the first time since the government began systematically tracking it.)...

This is exactly the issue in Syria.

Who is going to stabilize the country and who is going to lead the government? Is destroying Daesh going to be enough to bring about a ceasefire and peace? How does anyone know if Daesh will simply dissolve and meld into other groups in Syria?

Syria is ground zero for sectarianism. There are significant numbers of Shia who have been protected by the Assad government and there are significant numbers (probably a majority) of Sunni groups that have been named as terrorists to The West and the international community in general.

There are Shia groups considered terrorists, but, they do have loyalties to Syria's President Assad. The Assad forces and Shia groups called terrorists, such as Hezbollah, act to protect the Shia populations in Syria.

Now, realize this. Those Shia groups have a right to exist. However, there are larger numbers of Sunnis in Syria. The so called Shia terrorist groups do carry out actions against the Sunnis to protect their populations. That has gone on for a very long time, decades, in Syria. Lebanon leaves it alone because it would spark attacks in Beirut and who knows where else. That used to be the status quo.

Now who is involved in ending the civil war? Who is involved in ending Daesh? What kind of government is expected in a power sharing arrangement and who is going to be the leaders?

This is not going to end and The West, the international community now involved because of Daesh, including Russia and China have to answer profoundly impossible questions. How long does the global community stay involved in Syria? Does the global alliance end Daesh and end the involvement in Syria and what does the picture look like then?

Syria is an impossible problem and only the Assad family has known how to maintain it's stability. The Arab nations have to come together with allies from The West and the Communists from the East and decide what happens now.

The war into Iraq has been a complete disaster. I am quite sure as long as the global coalition stays together with a plan forward it can result in stability. But, there has to be open and clear understandings about involvement and resolve. The false prophets have to end their influence and the senior members of the faiths have to speak and be heard by all. There can be no more false prophets and I believe even Nasrallah would agree with that.

December 26, 2015
By AFP

Fierce clashes in northern Syria (click here) between regime loyalists and rebels including Al-Qaeda fighters have left more than 70 dead, a monitoring group said Saturday.
Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front launched the assault on Friday with a suicide attack against forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Fighting raged around the village of Bashkoy, which lies at a crossroads north of Aleppo city, Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.
"Violent clashes followed the suicide attack, between the Syrian army and pro-regime militia on one side, and Islamist fighters on the other," Abdel Rahman said
At least 33 pro-regime fighters and 38 opposition fighters were killed, he added.

Send her to the USA for asylum. She can return when it is safe.

December 28, 2015
By Jack Moore

A supporter of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) (click here) threatened to kidnap Miss Iraq, the first to be crowned since 1972, if she did not join the group’s ranks, according to The Jerusalem Post.
Shayma Qasim won the country’s beauty pageant on Saturday but received a phone call afterwards when the threat was issued. She said that, regardless of her fears over the phone call, she was determined to “continue forward despite any obstacles,” the Israeli news website reported, citing the Kuwaiti daily Al-Watan.
The 20-year-old beauty queen is from the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, claimed by the country’s Kurds as their historic capital. After winning the contest, she will represent Iraq in the Miss Universe contest in Thailand in March next year....

Absolutely magnificent.

"Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens" - I even know what the next film is about. You guys gave it away.

First, the credits are incredible. They challenge the length of credits of any "Harry Potter."

The Death Planet turning into a sun was absolutely correct. If the robbed solar power were left to gather itself again unrestrained it would form a fusion reaction and reorganize into a sun so the planets could continue to carry on life.

I don't know what will happen to the old sun. It's hydrogen was all syphoned off and there would be no helium to continue to burn. The old sun would become cold and very dense and I am left wondering if there will be an "Empire Black Hole" eventually. You know "History of Time" and all that stuff. It could be the old sun is simply gone, too.

New faces, new names all engulfed by the reawakening force. Loved it. Then all the elderly knights of the LIGHT are engaged and brave. I didn't see Hans Solo's outcome though. I think I prejudiced by desire for every Jedi to include everyone. Oh, well. Hopeless romantic. Hans is great, Chewbacca even greater.

I was going to sell all my collection. You know, popular makes money. But, after seeing this film and realizing the children there with their parents were the same age of my grandchildren, I decided my grandchildren are going to inherit it instead. I much rather be romantic than practical.

I loved the film. But, in all fairness Luke's confidence fades because Solo's son is attracted to the dark side? Well. I suppose. After all Luke never finished his training with Yoda, now did he.

It is about time. I take it the USA knows exactly how to hold ground once it is siezed from a hostile military!

I was really beginning to think the last general that knew anything about winning a war died with George Patton and Dwight Eisenhower.

December 24, 2015
By Zeina Karam and Bassem Mroue

Beirut — A U.S.-backed coalition of rebels in Syria (click here) — including Syrian Kurdish, Arab and Christian groups — captured several areas in the country's north on Thursday from the Islamic State extremists, an activist group and a rebel spokesman said.
The advance of the coalition, known as Syria Democratic Forces, is part of the recent rebel push to take control of a major dam and cut supply lines between the IS group's strongholds in northern Syria.
The SDF offensive started Wednesday with a push south of the Turkey-Syria border town of Kobani, according to a rebel spokesman, Col. Talal Sillu. On Thursday, coalition fighters advanced eight kilometers (five miles), inching closer to their objective — the Tishrin Dam on the Euphrates River that supplies much of northern Syria with electricity.

The worst terrorist of all, a hemolitic virus.

Disease never has a holiday. Brazil has declared a health emergency.

Zika virus (click here) is spread to people through mosquito bites. The most common symptoms of Zika virus disease (Zika) are fever, rash, joint pain, and red eye. The illness is usually mild with symptoms lasting from several days to a week. Severe disease requiring hospitalization is uncommon.
Outbreaks of Zika have occurred in Africa, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific Islands. Because the Aedes species mosquitoes that spread Zika virus are found throughout the world, it is likely that outbreaks will spread to new countries. Zika virus is not currently found in the United States. However, cases of Zika have been reported in returning travelers.
There is no vaccine to prevent or medicine to treat Zika. Travelers can protect themselves from this disease by taking steps to prevent mosquito bites. When traveling to countries where Zika virus  or other viruses spread by mosquitoes have been reported, use insect repellent, wear long sleeves and pants, and stay in places with air conditioning or that use window and door screens....

The map below is where Zika virus has been found to be infective.

December 24, 2015
By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Brazilian health authorities (click here) are sounding the alarm about a mosquito-borne virus that they believe may be the cause of thousands of infants being born with damaged brains.
The pathogen, known as Zika and first discovered in forest monkeys in Africa over 70 years ago, is the new West Nile -- a virus that causes mild symptoms in most but can lead to serious neurological complications or even death in others. Brazil's health ministry said on Nov. 28 that it had found the Zika virus in a baby with microcephaly — a rare condition in which infants are born with shrunken skulls — during an autopsy after the child died. The virus was also found in the amniotic fluid of two mothers whose babies had the condition.
"This is an unprecedented situation, unprecedented in world scientific research," the ministry said in a statement on its website, according to CNN.
Brazil is investigating more than more than 2,400 suspected cases of microcephaly and 29 deaths of infants that occurred this year. Last year the country saw only 147 cases of microcephaly....

There will be no more "Let's Pretend."

There is no such thing as the Syrian Free Army. It was a 'let's pretend' by McCain. Just like the 'let's pretend united Iraq.'

This isn't even current events anymore.

September 16, 2015
By Thomas Gibbons-Neff

There are only four or five American-trained (click here) Syrian rebels currently fighting against the Islamic State, the top general leading the effort to build a force to counter the militant group in Syria said Wednesday.

The tiny number of fighters are part of the New Syrian Force, the byproduct of a $500-million-dollar train and equip program that was launched officially in December to train moderate Syrians to fight the Islamic State.

The remarks by Army Gen. Lloyd Austin, head of U.S. Central Command, angered members of the Senate Armed Services Committee who said the program is a failure.

The training first came under scrutiny in July when Secretary of Defense Ashton B. Carter told the Senate Armed Service Committee that only 60 fighters had been trained with roughly 7,000 in the training pipeline. The quota, set at the program’s outset, called for 3,000 to 5,000 fighters to be trained in the first year....

"Let's Pretend" doesn't cut it anymore. The USA lost thousands of American soldiers FOR AN ILLEGAL INVASION INTO IRAQ and a "Let's Pretend" we have a reason and "Let's Pretend" Iraq is united under a democracy.  There is no more "Let's Pretend" because there are tens of thousands of disabled veterans that returned from Iraq only to suffer with PTSD and suicide. We don't DO 'LET'S PRETEND' ANYMORE!!!!

Here are the facts. 

The Iraq government is dispersed into the winds of three provinces. While there may be a better fighting force with American consultants, there are far too many Americans in Iraq to say that ANYTHING IRAQ is not still on the verge of 'Let's Pretend."

Syria has no free army. End of discussion. There are Sunnis and Shi'ites and like it or not there is an elected President that is a minority ethnicity of Alawite, President Bashar al-Assad. The Syrian ally is Russia. Russia wants to stabilize Syria and Russia is not pretending.

The United Nations had an extended presence of Peacemakers until Daesh was taking hold and advancing. In 2012 the United Nations Peacekeepers were pulled out of Syria while reporting all the deaths of women and children. 

The ONLY answer to a sustainable stability in Syria is for a power sharing government that has two different ethnicity governance. That means there has to be an influential leader somewhere among the Syrian Sunnies that can ACTUALLY bring all the Sunnis under one leader. That is nearly impossible. BUT, if Daesh is destroyed there might be a chance the other Sunnis might come together, but, I don't think so.
At one point the groups OFFICIALLY called terrorists, such as the al-Nusra Front, was willing to align with Daesh. Any guesses as to why? No? Because the long time residents in Syria called terrorists thought they were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and all the Shi'ites would be refugees or dead. That's why. So, all of a sudden all the Sunni, so called terrorists, are seeing their best interest in joining a power sharing government.
Syria is ground zero to sectarianism and hatred. The way Assad ruled was to treat the REGION as if it all feel under Assad's government. That is why Israel would run up against border skirmishes from time to time. 
BUT.
Assad put Hezbollah in Lebanon to act as a barricade to the Alawite Shia. No one could compromise or kill the Alawite community on the Syrian coast. Hezbollah is not going away. The most we can hope is that a peace will be maintained with Hezbollah and the Lebanon government. Hezbollah does fine and is allowed to live their lives as they choose when it has an understanding of peace with the Lebanese government.
If there is going to be a power sharing government in Syria where the killing actually stops it will be under a strong military presence and that will only come from Russia. Assad can govern. No one else in Syria has proven the ability to build a military and govern people with some degree of loyalty from the Sunnis.
Assad can and has used oppression to any uprising. We know that for a fact. No one has any other or better ideas for stabilizing Syria. 
Now.
If the United Nations wants a power sharing government that will INSURE the lives of all the ethnic diversity, there first has to be a stabilizing force and it would seem that is coming from Russia. The USA and Europe is unable commit to any military oppression because they don't want that for the people. So, when Russia stabilizes Syria with the leadership of Assad, then there can begin governments set up among local villages and then at a province level and then ultimately at a national sharing government structure. That is the only way it is going to happen. Today, Syria's future is precarious because The West can't seem to see the forest for the trees.
Then.
There is also Turkey. But, I am not going to discuss Turkey. Not right now.
Hopefully the year 2016 will result in movement to end Daesh in Syria and the country can begin to realize what it has been through under a false prophet and begin to come to the realization the future lies in the a power sharing government that brings peace to them.
End.
The good news for the USA for 2016 is that we no longer allow simpletons to lead the USA so we can all practice "Let's Pretend."

Please. Americans aren't thinking about strong storms this time of year. Help them to do so.

This tree was not toppled. It was pulled up from it's roots and dropped. The damage done to the home is significant because there as not just 'some' weight of the tree, it was dropped with velocity and weight acting on the structure.

It isn't a minor system. 

The heat is coming from the southern hemisphere, not simply the equator. It is billowing up across Indonesia just south of China. (in the left upper corner). 

 














The water vapor then carries the heat east across the Pacific Ocean.




 






Then into the arctic oscillation. The water vapor is dense once it starts to condense with colder air. There is heat transfer and the velocity increases. (click here) The mixing is rather incredible after that is rather incredible as it enters the continent.

The seven year old died when the car he was riding in was tossed by the tornado.

New Zealand man states he had a Christmas Miracle.

They aren't the most exciting holiday gift, but, it is certainly the most profoundly defined.

Types of PFD (Personal Flotation Device)

December 24, 2015
By Amelia Wade

...Chester Vaenuku (click here) was in his 3.6m tin boat fishing for Christmas dinner in the Mangere Inlet. This year was going to be special because his children, Kaelin, 9, and Benjamin Savage, 10, had flown over from Australia where they lived with their mother.
But the swell increased and water began to spray into the boat, so Mr Vaenuku, 35, decided to pull on his raincoat. It caught on his seat and as he took his hand off the throttle to loosen it a large wave knocked him overboard.
His gumboots sucked him straight to the bottom.
He said his old and tattered but still functional lifejacket pulled him to the surface.
Mr Vaenuku tried to get back in the boat but the motor was still running and it got away from him.
The wind whipped the waves into his face and Mr Vaenuku started praying.
"I called out: 'Please God, help me. Take me back to my children, they came to Australia to spend time with me'," he told the Herald, voice cracking.
"I yelled out and yelled out. I just hoped that something would happen. I prayed and prayed and after about 20 minutes, a boat appeared. It came from nowhere."
Onboard were Justin Robertson and Errol Geange, whom Mr Vaenuku called his "Christmas angels". It took them three tries to haul an exhausted Mr Vaenuku into their boat. They returned him and his dinghy back to shore.
Mr Vaenuku said he wanted to publicly thank Mr Robertson and Mr Geange for saving his family's Christmas.
But Mr Robertson said he was pleased they'd been able to save him.
"We got there in the nick of time. His whole face was drained," Mr Robertson said.
"He was my best catch of the day, that's for sure."...

I really don't want to hear how tornadoes sometimes happen in December.

A child is dead at a time of year when children are joyous in anticipating Santa Clause. This is not simply 'one of those things.' This is the climate crisis. A child is dead in the United States of America at Christmas time due to the climate crisis.

December 23, 2015

Storms and tornadoes (click here) hit the south Wednesday afternoon, leaving at least three dead -- including a 7-year-old boy -- and injuring at least 40 more while leveling homes and causing other damage, according to officials and the National Weather Service.

Two other people were missing, officials said.

As of Wednesday evening, there at least 21 reports of tornadoes and confirmed twisters in Iowa, Mississippi and Tennessee, according to the NWS, including a "large and extremely dangerous" tornado near Oxford, MS.

The NWS in Memphis released a map showing the track of an "exceptionally long-track, violent tornado" that hit Northern Mississippi....

The tornadoes came right out of the upper troposphere. If I may?

24 December 2015
0030.19z
UNISYS water vapor satellite of the North and West Hemisphere (click here - thank you)

Do you see it?

Exactly. Right there.

Chivalrous.

Senator Bernie Sanders is chivalrous. I noticed that about him when he spoke out about the emails. Besides being a magnificent human being and caring deeply about people and how the country is about people; he is chivalrous and does not miss one instance to assert that quality about him.

I really suggest any Presidential candidate needs to work vigorously to enforce Non-Proliferation and continue to reduce the global supply of death machines.

More than two decades (click here) after the Cold War ended, the world’s combined inventory of nuclear warheads remains at a very high level: approximately 15,700. Of these, around 4,100 warheads are considered operational, of which about 1,800 US and Russian warheads are on high alert, ready for use on short notice....

The Cold War started in 1947 and is considered to have ended in 1999. I think that is an optimistic point of view. The nuclear threat to the world actually increases with every baby born.

"Morning Bulletin" from Rockhampton, Australia on Saturday 25 June 1949.

The reason Donald Trump is notable in USA media is because he is leading the field. But, the idea his bluster is new and outrageous is a lie.

I think it is time to move on.

I have just the fix Huckabee needs for his political platform and the USA doesn't have to spend one more dime to achieve it.

If every USA submarine emptied it's Trident missiles all at once we'd have the advantage. You know Pre-emption, Huckabee.

Sunnyvale, Calif., Nov. 10, 2015 – The U.S. Navy conducted (click here) 
successful test flights Nov. 7 and 9 of two Trident II D5 Fleet Ballistic Missiles built by Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT). The world’s most reliable large ballistic missile, the D5 missile has achieved a total of 157 successful test flights since design completion in 1989. The D5 is the sixth in a series of missile generations deployed since the sea-based deterrent program began 60 years ago....

I was looking to see if the red, white and blue was painted on the Trident missile, but, it must be on the side of the missile away from the camera. 

Why not just ask Huckabee how much US taxpayer dollars is needed to genocide every Muslim in the world. How much Huckabee?

Surely the wise man knows the needed military to carry that out by now.

Huckabee. OMG. Does the Republican Party ever talk about the real world rather than the one from the 1950s. That speech was worn out decades ago. 

And they say Trump speaks hate. According to Huckabee, every Muslim in the country belong to a secret club.

This is from the US National Archives in an article appearing in the New York Times.

December 23, 2015
By Scott Shane

Washington — Target category No. 275 from the nuclear target list for 1959 may be the most chilling. It is called simply “Population.

For the first time, the National Archives and Records Administration has released a detailed list of the United States’ potential targets for atomic bombers in the event of war with the Soviet Union, showing the number and the variety of targets on its territory, as well as in Eastern Europe and China...

Excuse me. But. The bombs are suppose to fall on military instillations to remove any military advantage. It was never my understanding these death machines were suppose to fall on human populations.

Key Targets for SAC Forces (click here) (Interactive map, click on targets to see more information)

         Using data from the SAC study, this Google map shows the top 20 Soviet bloc airfields of more than 1100 that SAC listed as targets for its Air Power attack [See section 6 for complete list].  The map also shows the locations of five of the major Soviet bloc cities that SAC included in its list of over 1200 potential urban targets: East Berlin, Warsaw, Leningrad, Moscow, and Beijing [Peiping] and their suburbs.  Linked to each city is a spread sheet that lists the various installations SAC targeted for destruction and total numbers of installations targeted for the five urban areas.   Compiling these spread sheets required the laborious matching of the information in the Category Code List (section 3) with the data in the city lists in the “Systematic Destruction” sections of the SAC report [see sections 5 and 7 for excerpts].   After all the category code items for each city were counted, it could be determined how many and what type of military, industrial, transportation, power,  and communications installations, among other target types, had been slated for destruction.  The data on numbers of nuclear weapons assigned to destroy the various objectives has been excised, but there is probably no correlation between those numbers and the numbers of installations in each city....

Michael Moore. It is a masterpiece.

There were three times in the film I cried and could not keep from crying. I had tears in my eyes for at least have of it. And the rest of the film I kept being reminded there was once a USA that valued all those magnificent aspects of humanity.

I also can't believe it was rated R because of a rotund couple getting into a hot tub naked. Susan Lucci is rated at least an R on daytime television.

Weren't we there? In that space? In the moral content of where the human life was vastly more important than anything else? I remember that place. Maybe because my parents bested there parents when they moved out of poverty into the middle class because my father had a job with union representation. 

I bested my parents and had a really good job that still has union representation, but, this time I was a professional with a college degree.

My sons mostly bested me, but, there are still areas in my youngest son's life (now 34 years old) isn't up to par yet. At least as far as I am concerned.

Mike, it is the best darn Santa Wish List I have ever seen and I want it. I want it back.

The people of the USA stated it needed nation building at home. It does. Still. Any American that doesn't see this film and appreciate it's depth and morality should be in emotional and spiritual rehab.

Thank you. It is going to be difficult for you to top this one. 

That was an incredible moment. Thank you.

Our young (click here) are muted from their concerns, this was too rare a moment to show the depth Hillary Clinton understands the people of this country.

Of the three hours of the Democratic Debate it would have been appropriate to spend at least a half hour with some of our youngest members of the party.

Young people today are very involved in some of the worst problems the USA has, including, gun violence, testing and quality of education. They with parents seated nearby would be invaluable to put some of our neglected problems into context.

Congratulations, Elon Musk. It is an amazing accomplishment. Very well done.