Homelessness in China is legal. Chinese citizens have protection from the police.

December 31, 2015
By Javier C. Hernandez

Beijing — He woke (click here) to the cry of the morning janitor. “Put your shoes on!” she said. “Put your shoes on!” She rattled a chair. “This isn’t your house! Sit up!"

Ding Xinfeng’s eyes blinked open. Dawn had yet to break, but inside a 24-hour McDonald’s restaurant in central Beijing, more than a dozen homeless people had begun their daily routines.

Mr. Ding lifted his head, revealing a mess of food stains and decorative slogans on the table in front of him. “Wake up every morning with the thought that something wonderful is about to happen,” one read.

Mr. Ding could not read the English, but he said he liked the warmth of this table, in this corner, in the peace of McDonald’s, the place he had called home for several years....

In the USA, Homeless people are arrested for lingering to long. In some cities like Albuquerque, New Mexico; the homeless human beings are litigated to be dangerous and requiring the SWAT squad.

China is a communist country. I am a little surprised there are homeless in their cities. But, that aside, the COMPASSION of a communist country screams superiority over democracies.

In the USA, the homeless are automatically derelict the very moment they find themselves on the street. The people, including children, are not just derelict, but, disturbed and dangerous. That is the difference between a communist country and one dominated by Wall Street's plutocrats.

James Boyd never had a chance. He was lied to as he knew he was a dead man. The police lied that they would allow him to come out in the open and proceed out of his resting place. They lied to him. It is completely obvious he was going to be murdered right from the beginning.

This murder was not the ONLY killing. Demonstrators had finally succeeded to get their message out and the federal government began their investigation. At the point James Boyd was murdered there were more than 20 people that had come to the same outcome. If Albuquerque, New Mexico built shelters and provided meals with the decriminalizing of homelessness it would have saved over twenty lives and provided a far more moral profile of the city.

Cenk Uygur "...that is not what we are suppose to do to each other."

The talking head generals are out in full strength today. Every hour there is propaganda pumped out of absolutely nothing. They PRETEND to know what is going on in any activity questionably construed as "...a terrorist attack..." We haven't got details from news conferences within these countries, BUT, of course the talking heads are omnipotent.

I saw a rather revealing interview by Bryce Williams regarding guns. He interviewed the SURVIVOR of the attack at WDBJ. She described exactly why these attacks have a degree of success. Basically, we are a people that carry a peace at our core. The gunman(s) have the advantage and it is surprise. Today, in Israel the gunman, one person, (lone wolf) was hiding behind a curtain waiting for the exact moment he could kill innocent people.

Vicki Gardner (click here) graphically described a violent scene whereby two dear journalists were killed for absolutely no reason at all. The gunman was troubled and carried out retribution of people not responsible for the change in direction of his life. It was senseless.

The interview reveals a great deal about how completely vulnerable Americans are in these attacks. The attacks are so abrupt there isn't time to react. Even if these people were armed they would not have the 'presence of mind' to reach for a weapon.

The only real way of protecting people from violence is to limit the access to military style guns, prevent and make illegal modification kits that turn legal guns into automatic weapons, require small ammo clips (we know for a fact gunmen are stopped when changing their clips) and require strong background checks. The turn around time for the background check has to be three WORKING DAYS or more.

The gunman at Mother Emanuel was armed with a weapon he purchased legally, but, he timed his purchase to take place on days that were not WORKING DAYS and under the wire. He had recently fallen into circumstances that would have denied him the right to purchase. I believe he decided to carry out his killing promise, to at least himself, because he was worried about being detected and approached by police.

If the background checks were to take place on WORKING DAYS ONLY the current standard would be improved. It is easy to see how gun manufacturers and their lobbyists work to EXCLUDE safety margins for people. They put the availability of guns first rather than admitting that background checks that count the weekend and holidays as valid times to qualify is nothing CORRUPTION. The entire concept completely puts the public at risk and the gun lobbyists didn't care about that for one minute. Lives were to be sacrificed for profits. The profits of the gun industry and their lobbyist organizations have placed Americans in direct fire of people unable or unwilling to give up their hatred.

Background Checks can only be done on WORKING DAYS, not weekends or holidays. Thank the gun industry for the deaths by madman in the USA. They are directly responsible.

Happy New Year to everyone in the world. New Years is an event that is global. It is essentially the same as Earth Hour. It happens to all of us. 

Happy New Year, Germany!

I love that the government was able to keep everyone safe. That was the best New Years' celebration I've ever heard.

The California drought will be stubborn for the reasons the article states.

The ground will soak up the snowpack as it melts before there will be runoff. It all is a very easy to understand concept.Would droughted land simply repel water or first soak it up? That is physics. Okay? We are all on the same page with this? 

December 30, 2015

EL DORADO COUNTY, Calif. (KCRA) —Results (click here) from Wednesday's first snowpack survey of the season provided some good news for Californians during the ongoing drought.

The California Department of Water Resources said the measurement put the Sierra snowpack at Phillips Station in El Dorado County, which is at 6,800 feet, at 136 percent of average for this time of year. The water content is at 16.3 inches and snow depth is just under 5 feet.

"This location this time of year we’re at 136 percent, which is encouraging but obviously not where we’d like to be," Frank Gehrke, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program. "This is clearly much better than it was last year at this time."

However statewide, the snowpack stands at 105 percent of average.

"A good part of this snowpack is going to essentially soak into the ground before we start to see it as runoff," Gehrke said. "The problem we’ve had in the last couple of years – we might start off ok and then it justs shuts off - literally shuts off."...

Thank you for this. Sincerely appreciated. The truth is more valuable than politics. This is about all of us, not politicians. This should never have been made into a political dialogue.

Clockwise from top left: Flooding in Straiton, Scotland, on Wednesday; haze in Kalimantan Province, Indonesia, in October; flooding in Horry County, S.C., in October; drought in South Australia in November. 
Credit Danny Lawson/Press Association, via AP; Haris Sadikin/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images; Janet Blackmon Morgan/The Sun News, via AP; David Gray/Reuters

December 30, 2015
By Justin Gillis

...But that natural pattern of variability is not the whole story. (click here) This El Niño, one of the strongest on record, comes atop a long-term heating of the planet caused by mankind’s emissions of greenhouse gases. A large body of scientific evidence says those emissions are making certain kinds of extremes, such as heavy rainstorms and intense heat waves, more frequent.

Coincidence or not, every kind of trouble that the experts have been warning about for years seems to be occurring at once.

“As scientists, it’s a little humbling that we’ve kind of been saying this for 20 years now, and it’s not until people notice daffodils coming out in December that they start to say, ‘Maybe they’re right,’ ” said Myles R. Allen, a climate scientist at Oxford University in Britain.

Dr. Allen’s group, in collaboration with American and Dutch researchers, recently completed a report calculating that extreme rainstorms in the British Isles in December had become about 40 percent more likely as a consequence of human emissions. That document — inspired by a storm in early December that dumped stupendous rains, including 13 inches on one town in 24 hours — was barely finished when the skies opened up again....

Let me get this right.

December 30, 2015
By WSJ "Spy v Spy"

When President Obama's national security team (click here) signaled after his 2008 election that they wanted the NSA to keep giving the White House intelligence on foreign "leadership intentions," that included the fruits of electronic surveillance of Israeli leaders along with the heads of other U.S. allies. When Obama curtailed the use of eavesdropping on friendly leaders in 2013 after NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed this closely guarded program, Obama decided to keep on closely monitoring the communications of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing "interviews with more than two dozen current and former U.S. intelligence and administration officials."...

The USA is holding high level diplomatic talks with allies and foreign powers in China and Russia and the USA is suppose to allow Israel to spy on them?

I don't think so. 

The paranoia within the Netanyahu administration is ridiculous. President Obama has afforded Israel every aspect of military munitions and hardware it wanted in anticipation of talks with Iran. He wanted to make a gesture to Israel, its security was most important to the USA and no talks with Iran will compromise that. Even with all those reassurances, Netanyahu kicked sand in the face of the President by grand standing his political agenda on the floor of a joint meeting of the US Congress. 

This isn't the first time Israel has spied on the USA. (click here)

The United States is reportedly close to agreeing to release an American named Jonathan Pollard, who was convicted of spying for Israel in 1987. If he is released, it would be part of an effort to breathe life into the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, and would likely be accompanied by Israel releasing prisoners of its own and agreeing to stop building some settlements in the West Bank. Pollard was paid in cash for the American documents he gave Israel in the ‘80s, which were said to have compromised national security and exposed intelligence methods....

Perhaps it was wrong to allow Israel to believe it has a friend in President Obama and Jonathan Pollard should still be in prison?

The argument the political right wing is making regarding Israel is that the NSA didn't stop collecting information on Israel after Edward Snowden released information that indicted the NSA collecting meta data of every American. 

Excuse me? Since when is Edward Snowden a friend of the political right wing of the USA or Israel? The political right wing of both countries wants to try Edward Snowden for treason. Hello? Edward? Come home, the USA right wing is the only group that wants you tried for treason and no surprise here, it is for politics. This proves when it is convenient for the political right wing to embrace Edward Snowden they'll do it. I think in political standards it is called a 'flip-flop.'

No, no, Israel is not getting away with this. I want a full investigation to the leaks that could have compromised the safety of the high level diplomats of all parties. A very successful treaty with Iran was garnered in the face of those that hate and embrace war. 

Here we go again. Netanyahu is as extreme as they come. He has victimized school girls and wants to exile Israeli Arabs.

31 December 2015
By AP in Jerusalem

Israeli police (click here) have questioned the wife of the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, over her alleged inflated household spending – the latest in a string of accusations that have led critics to portray the first couple as a petty pair who improperly use state funds to subsidise an excessive lifestyle.
The questions are expected to focus on whether Sara Netanyahu used state funds to finance maintenance work and new furniture for the couple’s private home in the exclusive coastal city of Caesarea. She may also be asked whether she or the state paid for the nursing care of her late father.
Israeli media reported the questioning, and cameras posted outside the police station showed her car arriving. Police declined to comment.
The investigation follows a report by the official watchdog that detailed large sums of public money the couple spent. Last week, Israeli media reported that the Netanyahus asked for public funds to cover the cost of food for a dog they adopted, called Kaiya, which bit two guests at the PM’s Hanukkah party earlier in December....

It is an easily recognized pattern. The same thing happened to Olmert. When Israel's Prime Minister acts as a dictator rather than a representative of the Israel people, it won't be tolerated. 

The USA needs to investigate the leaks involved in the Iran Non-Proliferation Agreement. The NSA hasn't ended it's program yet and Americans are still compromised. We are compromised and still the victims of violence that is suppose to be prevented because of the NSA program.

The USA has had enough of the extremist Republican agenda.

US Rep. Ron DeSantis of Florida (click here), a member of the FOX Neil Cavuto Team, states it doesn't matter what the standard was when Secretary Clinton typed the emails. He stated he is going to ask the FBI to read through every email and decide if it should have been classified at the time Secretary Clinton wrote them. DeSantis never read the 5000 plus emails, but, the FBI should.

It doesn't matter what the progression was to classified status, Secretary Clinton should have worn her clairvoyant hat when she was writing her emails. 

This is a hideous standard for a US Congressman. He is playing politics with the FBI. It isn't enough the State Department went through a great deal of SERVICE to the country to read the emails and determine whether or not there is CURRENTLY a known standard to classify the emails.

This is nonsense. This is politics and it should not be rewarded. The US State Department stated in the most recent batch of emails released none were classified at the time of Secretary Clinton's SERVICE to the country. 

The Florida Representative is also complaining the State Department has taken far too long to release them regardless of the volume. Whatever the volume of emails there should have been dedicated state department staff to carry out the demands of the Republican extremists.

FOX's "The Five" state "Black Lives Matter" is a political movement. ??? Yes, it's political because black men are dying that are suppose to die. The African American committee is working to change that reality. The methods of "Black Lives Matter" is political, but, their reality is starkly real. Stating "It's political," as if that is the only character the movement has is wrong.

"The Five" will play black artists as among their favorites, but, they won't have those same artists on their shows to discuss "Black Lives Matter." That is the solution of propagandists such as FOX News; there definition of involvement with the community is completely superficial. But, in all fairness to them; they are superficial about most things.

I don't know how Juan Williams does it. He is something like the third or fourth staff member with left leanings to hold that seat to make "The Five" a correct title rather than "The Four."

Happy New Year, everyone.