sistah.soldya ducking questions on how influence peddling made clinton richest ex-preznit OF ALL TIME!!!

BostonGlobe |  An unprecedented ethics promise that played a pivotal role in helping Hillary Rodham Clinton win confirmation as secretary of state, soothing senators’ concerns about conflicts of interests with Clinton family charities, was uniformly bypassed by the biggest of the philanthropies involved.

The Clinton Health Access Initiative never submitted information on any foreign donations to State Department lawyers for review during Clinton’s tenure from 2009 to 2013, Maura Daley, the organization’s spokeswoman, acknowledged to the Globe this week. She said the charity deemed it unnecessary, except in one case that she described as an “oversight.”

During that time, grants from foreign governments increased by tens of millions of dollars to the Boston-based organization.

Daley’s acknowledgement was the first by the charity of the broad scope of its apparent failures to fulfill the spirit of a crucial political pledge made by the Clinton family and their charities. The health initiative has previously acknowledged failing only to disclose the identity of its contributors, another requirement under the agreement.

The failures make the Clinton Health Access Initiative, which is headquartered on Dorchester Avenue in South Boston, and goes by the acronym CHAI, a prominent symbol of the broken political promise and subsequent lack of accountability underlying the charity-related controversies that are dogging Clinton as she embarks on her campaign for president.

The charity defended the lack of some disclosures on the grounds that the donations in question were simply passed through the charity to fund an existing project. Previously, it has acknowledged that mistakes were made. But loopoholes and legalistic explanations about what new foreign donations should be excluded from disclosure were not publicly discussed in the initial deal. In 2009, the incoming Obama administration, Clinton, and then-Senator John F. Kerry all publicly touted the Clinton charities’ “memorandum of understanding’’ as a guarantee that transparency and public scrutiny would be brought to bear on activities that posed any potential conflicts of interest with State Department business.

“Transparency is critically important here, obviously, because it allows the American people, the media, and those of us here in Congress . . . to be able to judge for ourselves that no conflicts — real or apparent — exist,’’ Kerry said during a Senate floor speech on Jan. 21, 2009.

The memorandum, which did not outline a penalty for failing to comply, was signed in December 2008 by Valerie Jarrett, co-chairwoman of the Obama transition team, and Bruce Lindsey, a longtime Clinton aide who at the time was CEO of the Clinton Foundation and sits on the board of the CHAI.

Jarrett and Lindsey declined to be interviewed about CHAI’s repeated failures to disclose major increases in foreign grants.

The White House and the State Department also declined to take a firm stand on the apparent violations of the agreement.

Bro.Constructive Feedback lays 2nd/3rd line inheritors of the CRM to waste...,

Tony Brown simply explained the exodus of black professional and managerial classes as the root cause of the collapse and utter ghettoization of the black underclass.
    SCIENTIFIC PROOF TESTING time

    THEORY: The Exit Of The "Talented Tenth" From Highly Concentrated so-called "Black Communities" allowed a DESTRUCTIVE CULTURE to become THE PREVAILING CULTURE, thus misdirecting the UPWARD THRUST of the subjects.

    A) My Initial Response: ACCURATE PHENOMENON. DOES NOT FULLY MODEL THE TRUTH

    MY "20 YEARS A METRO ATLANTA CITIZEN - WATCHING Confidence Men Who Claim Their SLAVE BLOOD"

    1) They used to ATTACK those exiting Blacks (Who I call "Black Flight Progressives") as SELLOUTS who vacated the Black community to live with THE WHITE FOLKS

    2) My analysis is that these "Black Flight Progressives" Got In Where They Fit In - FIGHTING the WHITE ESTABLISHMENT in the original area, raised up the NEW ESTABLISHMENT, yet when they had to LIVE UNDER these NEW PROGRESSIVE PUBLIC POLICIES - they realized that FIGHTING WHITE FOLKS is not the same as YIELDING YOUR BLACK PERMANENT INTERESTS and your family interests to the ACTIVISTS was not in their best interests

    2a) IRONICALLY they leveraged the Anti-Housing Discrimination Laws to MOVE AWAY in pursuit of their BLACK FAMILY INTERESTS

    3) TO-DAMNED-DAY The Civil Rights Pharisees have changed course. Most of these Suburban/ Ex-Urban areas that the "Black Flight Progressives" now live in have NAACP chapters. The core city MISSION ACCOMPLISHED ZONE activists are invited out to the NAACP Fundraising Banquets as featured speakers. They now see the Black Flight Progressives WHO THEY USED TO ATTACK as PROGRESSIVE FOOTHOLDS in formerly LILY WHITE Republican dominated areas.
    4) The Black Newspapers (NNPA syndicates) are the VOICE OF THE BLACK RACIAL SERVICES MACHINE voicing THEIR AGENDA to everyone. AGAIN PROGRESSIVE EXPANSION in the guise of DIVERSITY is the NEW TUNE THAT THEY SAY.

    4a) These Sycophants ARE NEVER GOING TO STAND UP FOR THE "BLACK LEAST OF THESE" in the Mission Accomplished Zones by STANDING UP AGAINST THE BLACK RACIAL SERVICES MACHINE, demanding that they COME THROUGH for the "Under-Developed Blacks" AS PROMISED. (See Baltimore)

    5) (The Professional Skills) EDUCATION IS THE GREAT EQUALIZER ----- WRONG - The EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM IS THE SOURCE OF CONTRACTS AND PERCEIVED POWER for the "Embedded Confidence Men".

    They call these the "BLACK SEATS OF POWER THAT MUST BE PROTECTED"

    5a) Many of you don't understand what you are seeing with the Atlanta Public Schools Cheating Trial results. (Today) They STILL are talking about BLACK TEACHERS BEING LOCKED UP and they will FIGHT WITH THEM TILL THE END - while their CONGREGATION can't see that THESE ARE THE EMBEDDED CONFIDENCE MEN THAT FOMENTED THE CORRUPTION in all of the key "Mission Accomplished" Metro Atlanta public school systems that were recently in trouble (Atlanta, Clayton County, Dekalb County)

    5b) THE PEOPLE WHO ARE GETTING USED suffer from an "Abused Spouse Syndrome". Even though it is CLEAR that in order to find their own footing and best interests they need to PUT UP A REGULATORY WALL OF SEPARATION from these forces that are EXPLOITING THEM.............IF THEY were to set up a COMMUNITY MEETING - the EMBEDDED CONFIDENCE MEN would be the ONE'S taking the stage and LEADING IT. Or have SPIES to document THE INSURGENCY

    6) (Managerial) OWNERSHIP - a NEGRO CONFIDENCE MAN WOULD PUT A BANK THAT CATERS TO HIM OUT OF BUSINESS!! HE IS ON THE 'RIGHT SIDE OF BLACK HISTORY' COMING AND GOING

    6a) A Top financial services institution that KNOWS THIS HORNETS NEST and seek to avoid it is called a RED LINER. The activists will PROTEST OUTSIDE OF THEIR DOWNTOWN OFFICES demanding that THEY DO BUSINESS in their community or face GOVERNMENT SANCTION

    6b) (See the former "Bank South" before they got acquired) If a bank changes its lending practices but then offers mandatory but free FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT EDUCATION COURSES for its HIGH RISK CUSTOMERS - the CIVIL RIGHTS PHARISEES WILL CHARGE THEM WITH DISCRIMINATION - because THE WHITE FOLKS IN THE RICH AREAS don't have to take these classes. (When the Pharisees GET THE CONTRACT to do the training - they pipe down)

    6c) WHEN the banks start lending in these areas and the "House Flipping Market" gets out of control as home values rapidly accelerate - and EVERYONE HAS BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS......

    The local Black media operations who
    A) Made big time ad money from companies who flipped homes
    B) Had their own "Real Estate Investing" radio programs
    C) DID RADIO REMOTE BROADCASTS featuring FREE HOT DOGS And A "TI / Young Jeezy Concert" _ "WE HAVE MORTGAGE SPECIALISTS STANDING BY. WHY RENT WHEN YOU CAN OWN? WE CAN GET YOU IN A HOUSE TODAY. COME ON BY BEFORE THE CONCERT ENDS AND THE HOT DOGS RUN OUT!!!"

    6d) WHEN THE MARKET CRASHED ON IT ALL AND FORECLOSURES AND HOME PRICES PLUMMETED - THEY BLAMED BUSH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Logically FOR FAILING TO STOP THEM)

    7) As Black students of "Black Flight Progressives" had problems in formerly LILY WHITE SCHOOL DISTRICTS - the CIVIL RIGHTS PHARISEES jumped into their cars and HELD THE PROTEST RALLIES FOR JUSTICE against the WHITE FOLKS that you NEVER see them do around the FAILING PREDOMINATELY BLACK SCHOOLS

    * A teacher makes a SLAVE reference in a math problem

    * A White teacher makes a "White Narrative" of a "Black Historical Event" so as to not make the WHITE FOLKS appear as evil oppressors

    * A would-be black valedictorian who lost points because he took too many college level courses OFF the high school campus and these discounted credits pushed a WHITE KID a fraction of a point higher

    ALL OF THESE DREW PROTESTS FROM PEOPLE WHO DROVE PAST THEIR FAILING SCHOOLS TO CONFRONT "RACISM" AND THE LOCAL NEWS VANS PROVIDING VIDEO FOOTAGE

    ******************************************************************************************************
    SO TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION -

    The MOVEMENT OF THE TALENTED 10TH out of the highly concentrated Black Areas - IN AND OF ITSELF is not the grand cause that you speak of.

    THERE IS A FULL SERVICE ACCOMPANIMENT OF OPERATIVES AND OPPORTUNISTS that looked to TAKE ADVANTAGE of the NEGROES WHO MOVED and the NEGROES WHO STAYED - all with the goal of RETAINING ENTRENCHED PROGRESSIVISM AND FOMENTING ITS EXPANSION.

    THE PROPER REBUTTAL IS TO ASK YOU:

    Since You INFER that there is a particular form of DYSFUNCTIONAL CULTURE that produces UNFAVORABLE OUTCOMES............................can you point us to ANY "Black Racial Services Machine" agents who SEE THE THREAT of this CULTURE taking more widespread root and STOP THEIR PROGRESSIVE FRIENDS from SECULARIZING:

    * Marriage - which provides structure and stability
    * School Discipline - which tries to retain THOSE WHO WANT TO LEARN (See Anna Julia Cooper and the selective "High School For Colored Children" in DC)

    * They have Progressive Partnerships with the "Friends" and "Unitarians" , which promote simple, clean living, but for some reason you never see this "Theory Of Living" being promoted via the partnership - ONLY SOCIAL JUSTICE ACTIVISM on behalf of Oppressed Blacks

    AGAIN THE QUESTION (Do you see any push back to prevent this culture from taking root, as a mandate that TRUMPS PROGRESSIVE SECULARIZATION?)

what happens when your professional and managerial leadership covet the status but aren't up to the task

pitch |  Beginning in 2005, James served as director of the Missouri Department of Public Safety and Homeland Security. He found his way into higher education via a 2007 task force on campus security that he co-chaired with Robert Stein, commissioner of the Missouri Department of Higher Education. The two hit it off. When Stein learned that there was an opening at MCC for a vice chancellor of administrative services, in 2009, he recommended James as a candidate. The MCC board of trustees — a six-member body, elected by the public — approved. When Jackie Snyder stepped down as chancellor of MCC the next year, James was recommended for the job. Despite less than a year's experience working in higher education, he got the appointment.

One of James' first acts as chancellor was to turn MCC's campus security into an official, state-commissioned police department. Today, MCC boasts a force of 35 uniformed officers, plus another six uncertified public-safety officers. Though it patrols only five small campuses, MCC's police department numbers nearly as many cops as that of Gladstone, Missouri — an 8-square-mile suburb with a population of 28,000.

If you're measuring MCC's success in non-law-enforcement terms, however, James' tenure as chancellor has been a shaky four years. According to faculty surveys and outside studies, the district is in disarray — a condition confirmed by more than a dozen current and former staff, faculty and administrators, many of them longtime MCC loyalists, interviewed by The Pitch in recent weeks. The beefed-up police department, they say, is merely the most visible way that James has shifted resources away from educating students.

"You'd think a guy with a police background and basically zero higher-ed experience, chosen to lead a community-college district, would bend over backward to familiarize himself with academia and not focus on all the law-enforcement stuff," says a longtime faculty member who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisal. "Instead, it's been the complete opposite. He's consistently shown disdain toward the academic traditions that have been in place at these schools for 100 years."

Such criticisms might be easier to dismiss as the grumblings of change-averse academics, were it not for the growing body of data indicating that MCC is underperforming. A 2014 report, commissioned by MCC and prepared by CLARUS Corp., a community-college marketing-research firm, concluded:

"Nationally, over the last four years, the number of applicants to community colleges has been increasing. But at Metropolitan Community College, from 2010 to 2013, the number of applicants has been in decline (from 14,600 to 11,500)." The report goes on to note that the school's conversion rate — the percentage of applicants who end up enrolled at MCC — has held steady at 40 percent, though "the typical conversion goal for a community college is 60 percent."

James' tenure has also been marked by a significant exodus of high-ranking, long-serving administrators, including several vice chancellors and presidents with decades of the kind of higher-education experience that James lacks.

Shake-ups are common when new administrations take command, and unpopular moves are often necessary to ensure the long-term viability of an institution — particularly at community colleges, where state funds are ever-depleting and donations add up to a fraction of what four-year universities comfortably rely on.

But many of MCC's critical positions — vice chancellors, directors and, as of last month, a school president — remain unfilled. And several of the past administrators who spoke with The Pitch indicated that most of those who have left MCC in recent years toughed it out under James' leadership as long as they did out of a sense of duty to the students, whom they believe are getting shortchanged as a result of changes that James has made.

Kathy Walter-Mack first arrived at MCC in 2007, when she was part of a two-person consulting team hired by the school to investigate racial-discrimination complaints, brought by several black students, against two teachers and a staff member. Walter-Mack's conclusion was that the allegations were unsubstantiated but that a systemic environment of intolerance existed at MCC. One of the recommendations of the report was to establish a diversity-0x000Acoordinator position at MCC. Walter-Mack was subsequently hired for that position.

Her pedigree included a stint in the 1990s working in the Kansas City, Missouri, school district, which was then still mired in a decades-long desegregation battle. She had by then been the executive director of the Desegregation Monitoring Committee, a court-ordered governing body through which the district had to clear virtually all of its decisions. Walter-Mack later went to work for Sam's Town, where she oversaw compliance with city quotas for minority- and women-owned businesses. Later, she returned to Kansas City Public Schools and served as its general counsel.

According to a 2001 Pitch story ("Taylor Made," October 4, 2001) chronicling leadership problems in KCPS, Walter-Mack attempted to consolidate district power in her office and was subsequently fired by Superintendent Benjamin Demps.

"Really and truly, she [Walter-Mack] was running a large part of the district," Jack Goddard, chief of staff to the KCPS superintendent at the time, told The Pitch. "A lot of everyday decisions, principals were reporting up through her as much as they were through the superintendent. ... You had a really confused chain of command."

That characterization is likely familiar to staff and faculty at MCC, who now know Walter-Mack in a variety of roles.

When James became chancellor, in 2010, he created a new position — chief of staff — and installed Walter-Mack in it. In 2013, Walter-Mack took on the additional role of vice chancellor of human resources. Owing to her background as a lawyer — she's licensed to practice in Missouri and Illinois — Walter-Mack is also highly involved in all legal matters pertaining to MCC.

James has grown increasingly reliant on Walter-Mack, "abdicating daily decision making to her so he can focus on community visibility and fund raising, leaving the running of the academic institution to others," according to notes from the faculty emergency meeting.

360 degrees of straight souljah (gone be a little harder to emulate than elizabeth warren)

theroc |  Peace. I stand before you today feeling very confident, steadfast and powerful; at the same time, I am surprised, that I as a young African woman, have impacted and effected the development of not only national politics, but international politics as well. It is very shocking to me that in a time of American economic recession, and inner city urban chaos, Democratic presidential contender Bill Clinton has chosen to attack not the issues, but a young African woman who is very well educated, alcohol free, drug free and a successful self employed businesswoman, and community servant.

Considerable time has been spent debating whether America should take seriously the words of a rap artist, or so called entertainers. Let me clarify for the press who I am - I am Sister Souljah; rapper, activist, organizer, and lecturer. I was born in the Bronx, New York, spent the earlier part of my life there, was raised by my mother, was on and off the welfare system for approximately 15 years, lived in government subsidized housing and was classified by sociologists as being in the under class-meaning living below the poverty line in a vicious cycle of poverty that America says one can not break out of. I supplemented my education in the White American school system by reading African history, which was intentionally left out of the curriculum of American students. By doing so, I was able to become the well-balanced, reassured woman that I am now. While in high school, I was a Legislative intern at the House of Representatives for the Republican party. I was a winner of the American Legion's Constitutional Oratory Contest, attended Cornell University's Advanced Placement Summer Session, and entered Rutgers University. I attended the University of Salamanca's Study Abroad program in Salamance, Spain, worked at a medical center in Zimbabwe, visited Mozambiquan refugee camps and traveled throughout the Southern African region. I have also visited and lectured in the former Soviet Union, England, France, Portugal, Finland and Holland.

Moreover, at Rutgers I was a well known writer and political commentator for the university newspaper. I attended church in the Bronx in New York City, where my great grandmother was the pastor. She died this year at age 92. While finishing at Rutgers University, I was offered a job by Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis of the United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, which is a church sponsored civil rights firm. I developed, organized and financed, through hip-hop music, a sleep away summer camp called the African Youth Survival Camp for children of homeless families and ran it successfully for 3 years, thus leaving Rutgers one semester prior to graduation. I have spoken on the same platform with Jesse Jackson, Minister Louis Farrakkan, Rev. Ben Chavis, Rev. Calvin Butts and Nelson Mandela.

As you can see I am no newcomer to the world of politics. I am mentally, spiritually, physically, emotionally, intellectually and academically developed and acutely aware of the condition of African people throughout the entire world.

My album "360 Degrees of Power" is an amalgamation of all of my thoughts, personal, and professional experiences here in America. My album was produced by Eric Sadler, one of the producers who created the music for Public Enemy, Ice-Cube and others. Any person who purchases my album will have a full understanding of what I think and believe, although it was designed specifically with the African community in mind. I was certain that Bill Clinton was unfamiliar with me, my development and work, musical and otherwise. He chose to comment without any investigation whatsoever based on an interview in an ultra conservative newspaper, The Washington Post, which is about as familiar with the experiences of Africans in America, inner city youth, and hip-hop, as Bill Clinton is. I however, did not fail to do my research and my research reveals the following indictment of Bill Clinton's integrity:

1) Bill Clinton is a draft-dodger who wrote in a letter "Thank you...for saving me from the draft" and then asserts regularly that he supports military force when necessary, especially against Communism. He, therefore, feels it's alright to send your son to fight wars when he himself would not fight for the principals he SAYS he believes in.

2) Bill Clinton talks of morality but admits that he was a reefer smoker who does not inhale. Sister Soujah has never smoked reefer or any other drug.

3) Bill Clinton says he believes in a strong family unit but could never quite get his own personal and social behavior together. His treatment and dismissal of Jennifer Flowers is indicative of how he relieves himself from his personal responsibility and created an emotionally abusive environment to Jennifer Flowers. He seems to feel comfortable attacking and alienating women for his own shortcomings.

4) Bill Clinton says that Sister Souljah is a racist like David Duke, a well known ex-Klan member and White supremist, but was a member in an all White segregated club up until this year.

5) Bill Clinton portrays himself as compassionate, yet he supports giving prisoners lobotomies, removing sections of the brain.

6) Bill Clinton takes shots at Dan Quayle's intellectual feasibility yet he has not presented America with any substantive, comprehensive agenda around economic development, foreign policy, budget containment or social policy.

7) Bill Clinton says he is not a racist but he tries to distance himself from Jesse Jackson - a candidate who has registered more voters, served the interest of poor Blacks, poor Whites, poor Latinos, unions, laborers and farmers and by experience, intellect, and charisma, is far more qualified for the job.

Therefore, we can conclude that Bill Clinton lacks integrity at painting himself as a staunch patriot, a people's servant, a compassionate liberal, a family man, a pro-woman candidate and a coherent scholar. Sister Souljah, on the other hand, was used as a vehicle, like Willie Horton, and various other Black victims. A poor excuse for an AGENDA-LESS candidate.  Fist tap Vic.

our second black POTUS the hon.sis.preznit souljah laments the missing black men bill snatched...,

NYTimes |  Hillary Rodham Clinton had not planned to make the first major policy speech of her presidential campaign an impassioned plea to mend the nation’s racial fissures and overhaul an “out-of-balance” criminal justice system.

But by Tuesday, as the nation confronted shocking scenes of Baltimore’s smoke-filled streets, Mrs. Clinton knew that the death of Freddie Gray from injuries he suffered while in police custody would lead her to make race, poverty and incarceration of men from poor, black communities central to her early campaign.

“There is something profoundly wrong when African-American men are still far more likely to be stopped and searched by police, charged with crimes and sentenced to longer prison terms than are meted out to their white counterparts,” Mrs. Clinton said in a forceful address Wednesday at Columbia University.

She said Mr. Gray’s death, the subsequent protests and the assault on innocent police officers in Baltimore “tear at your soul.”

The remarks marked the first time Mrs. Clinton has delivered a substantive policy address in a fledgling presidential race that had to now been defined by candidates’ upbeat announcements and vague promises.

the real sistah souljah scared confederate bill so bad he up and disappeared 1.5 million black men...,

HuffPo |  Former President Bill Clinton is urging politicians to take a stand on criminal justice reform and take concrete steps toward reducing the country's prison population.

In a foreword for a new book of essays on criminal justice reform complied by New York University School of Law's Brennan Center for Justice, Clinton says the tough-on-crime policies of the 1990s "overshot the mark" on incarceration.

"The drop in violence and crime in America has been an extraordinary national achievement," Clinton writes. "But plainly, our nation has too many people in prison and for too long -- we have overshot the mark. With just 5 percent of the world’s population, we now have 25 percent of its prison population, and an emerging bipartisan consensus now understands the need to do better."

The U.S. is estimated to have a prison population of more than 2.4 million people, and incarcerates more of its population than any other nation in the world. As The Guardian notes, the prison rate increased signifcantly during Clinton's tenure in office.

Clinton says the policies implemented during his years as president were effective in reducing violent crime, but added that many of the measures were "overly broad instead of appropriately tailored."

"Some are in prison who shouldn't be, others are in for too long, and without a plan to educate, train, and reintegrate them into our communities, we all suffer," he writes.

this is what abject and farcical fraud looks and sounds like...,

Time |  Hillary Clinton called on Wednesday for broad criminal-justice reform and renewed trust between police officers and communities, reflecting the former First Lady’s evolution from supporting the policies instituted by her husband two decades ago in a period of high crime rates.

Clinton called for body cameras in every police department in the country, as well as an end to an “era of mass incarceration.” Her speech came two days after the funeral in Baltimore of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died while in police custody, and amidst ongoing civil unrest in that city.

Read more: How Baltimore Police Lost Control in 90 Minutes

“There is something profoundly wrong when African-American men are far more likely to be stopped by the police and charged with crimes and given longer prison terms than their white counterparts,” Clinton said. “There is something wrong when trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve breaks down … We must urgently begin to rebuild bonds of trust and respect among American between police and citizens.”

Clinton offered few specific policy plans in the speech, and didn’t explain how police forces would pay for body cameras on all officers. She spoke broadly about reducing jail sentences for low-level offenders and the effects of imprisoning millions, particular African Americans. “We don’t want to create another incarceration generation,” Clinton said.

po elijah..., more work this week than in 19 years on capital hill (still got a hot young wife cialis a game changer!)

mediaite |  Maryland Democrat Elijah Cummings is in Baltimore tonight, and he started using a bullhorn at around 10 pm to tell people to clear out after the police-imposed curfew for protesters. Fox News reporter Leland Vittert was on the scene and asked some questions of Cummings about the protests and the new report tonight claiming Freddie Gray may have been trying to injure himself.

Sean Hannity, back in his studio, had some questions for Cummings too, but the second Cummings was informed Hannity wished to speak with him, he made his way off-camera.

Vittert kept following him, though, and Hannity used him to ask Cummings if President Obama jumped to conclusions too soon in Baltimore. And as Cummings spoke, Hannity chimed in with counter-commentary that he couldn’t hear, like claiming that Obama “lashed out against the police.”

Cummings kept shouting through his bullhorn for people to go home instead of answering more questions. Vittert kept following and at one point Cummings shouted at him through the bullhorn.

And towards the end of this segment, you can hear Cummings shouting to another Fox News personality: “Excuse me, Geraldo! Excuse me! We’re trying to make sure people go home!”

Mom in loco overseer....

Washington Post | It’s not surprising that a black mother in Baltimore who chased down, cursed and beat her 16-year-old son in the middle of a riot has been called a hero. In this country, when black mothers fulfill stereotypes of mammies, angry and thwarting resistance to a system designed to kill their children, they get praised.

“He gave me eye contact,” Toya Graham told CBS News. “And at that point, you know, not even thinking about cameras or anything like that — that’s my only son and at the end of the day, I don’t want him to be a Freddie Gray. Is he the perfect boy? No he’s not, but he’s mine.”

In other words, Graham’s message to America is: I will teach my black son not to resist white supremacy so he can live.

The kind of violent discipline Graham unleashed on her son did not originate with her, or with my adoptive mother who publicly beat me when I was a child, or with the legions of black parents who equate pain with protection and love. The beatings originated with white supremacy, a history of cultural and physical violence that devalues black life at every turn. From slavery through Jim Crow, from the school-to-prison pipeline, the innocence and protection of black children has always been a dream deferred.

The problem is that Graham’s actions do not assure that her son, and legions like him, will survive childhood. Recall the uncle who in 2011 posted a video recording of himself beating his teenage nephew for posting gang messages on Facebook. Acting out of love and fear for his life, he whipped the teen, but months later he was found dead anyway.

Praising Graham distracts from a hard truth: It doesn’t matter how black children behave – whether they throw rocks at the police, burn a CVS, join gangs, walk home from the store with candy in their pocket, listen to rap music in a car with friends, play with a toy gun in a park, or simply make eye contact with a police officer – they risk being killed and blamed for their own deaths because black youths are rarely viewed as innocent or worthy of protection.

hon.bro.preznit kicks the can back to its creator sistah souljah hellury....,

HuffPo |  Hillary Clinton will deliver a major speech on criminal justice reform Wednesday, calling for fundamental changes to how the United States punishes its citizens and an end to a system that disproportionately targets black men. 

Clinton is scheduled to keynote the 18th Annual David N. Dinkins Leadership and Public Policy Forum at Columbia University Wednesday morning. It will be her most significant policy address since she launched her 2016 presidential bid this month. 

Clinton will lay out her vision for criminal justice reform, centering around an "end to the era of mass incarceration," according to an aide who provided a preview of her remarks. Those changes include addressing probation and drug diversion programs, increasing support for mental health and drug treatment and pursuing alternative punishments for low-level offenders. 

She also will call for body cameras for every police department in order to increase transparency and accountability in a way that benefits both officers and members of the public. 

In a December speech to the Massachusetts Conference for Women, Clinton said the country needed to look at "hard truths" about racial injustice in the current system. 

Clinton will revive that theme on Wednesday, saying black men are far more likely than whites to be targeted by police and slapped with longer prison sentences. 

During a fundraising event in New York City Tuesday, Clinton addressed the tensions in Baltimore, which is still reeling from the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died after sustaining injuries while in police custody.

“It is heartbreaking,” Clinton said. “The tragic death of another young African-American man. The injuries to police officers. The burning of peoples’ homes and small businesses. We have to restore order and security. But then we have to take a hard look as to what we need to do to reform our system.”

Clinton will also make additional comments about Baltimore on Wednesday.

Clinton's rhetoric on criminal justice has changed significantly since the 1990s, when she was first lady and when President Bill Clinton signed a massive 1994 crime bill into law. At the time, many politicians in both parties -- including Clinton herself -- were pushing for more prisons and stricter sentencing laws.

b'more overseers murdered freddie gray and started the rioting with schoolkids...,

#praying4Baltimore #mondawminmall

A video posted by BE-Z Clothing Comp (@mrbez4ever) on Apr 27, 2015 at 12:10pm PDT

motherjones |  Meg Gibson, another Baltimore teacher, described a similar scene to Gawker: "The riot police were already at the bus stop on the other side of the mall, turning buses that transport the students away, not allowing students to board. They were waiting for the kids.…Those kids were set up, they were treated like criminals before the first brick was thrown." With police unloading busses, and with the nearby metro station shut down, there were few ways for students to clear out.

Several eyewitnesses in the area that afternoon say that police seemed to arrive at Mondawmin anticipating mobs and violence—prior to any looting. At 3:01 p.m., the Baltimore Police Department posted on its Facebook page: "There is a group of juveniles in the area of Mondawmin Mall. Expect traffic delays in the area." But many of the kids, according to eyewitnesses, were stuck there because of police actions.

The Baltimore Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.

Around 3:30, the police reported that juveniles had begun to throw bottles and bricks. Fifteen minutes later, the police department noted that one of its officers had been injured. After that the violence escalated, and rioters started looting the Mondawmin Mall, and Baltimore was in for a long night of trouble and violence. But as the event is reviewed and investigated, an important question warrants attention: What might have happened had the police not prevented students from leaving the area? 

Did the department's own actions increase the chances of conflict?

As Meghann Harris put it, "if I were a Douglas student that just got trapped in the middle of a minefield BY cops without any way to get home and completely in harm's way, I'd be ready to pop off, too."

On social media, eyewitnesses chronicled the dramatic police presence before the rioting began:

On Twitter, Baltimore residents vented their frustration with the situation.

what a difference a day makes - useless perennial cbc geriatric changes his tune this week

carl stokes got tired of pretending...,

TPM |  Baltimore City Councilman Carl Stokes let loose on CNN's Erin Burnett on Tuesday night after the news anchor argued that "thugs" was "the right word" to describe protestors on the streets.

Burnett, who is white, began by noting that both Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlins-Blake and President Obama had referred to the "bad actors" as "thugs."

Stokes, who is black, rejected the word and told Burnett she was referring to teenagers and young people — "our children" — who clashed with police on Monday night.

"But how does that justify what they did?" Burnett said. "I mean, that’s a sense of right and wrong. They know it’s wrong to steal and burn down a CVS and an old person’s home. I mean, come on."

"Come on?" Stokes said. "So calling them thugs — just call them niggers. Just call them niggers."

"When you say 'come on,' come on what?" he added. "You wouldn't call your a child a thug if they did something which was not what you'd expect them to do."

"I would hope I would call my son a thug if he ever did such a thing," Burnett shot back.

catherine pugh tired of pretending

dailymail |  Donning a smart black jacket, she shared an emotional hug with a protester wielding a bottle. Shortly after, she angrily told a Fox News host that demonstrators were not looking for trouble.

Now, Maryland State Senator Catherine E. Pugh is under fire for 'empathizing' with the hundreds of people who were taking to the streets of Baltimore armed with rocks and bottles on Tuesday night.

The 65-year-old was accused of being 'foolish' and 'an embarrassment' by social media users for defending protesters in the city, which has been the scene of riots following Freddie Gray's death.

According to WJZ, she added: 'That is the only way the public gets to see that we care about our city, that we care about violence against our people and we can do better than what’s being done today.'

Ms Pugh's pleas on Tuesday were of a similar nature. Shortly after her hug with the demonstrator, she joined Fox News's Geraldo Rivera for an interview - but the reporter quickly ran afoul of protesters.

As a male demonstrator deliberately cut in front of the camera, Mr Rivera shouted: 'You're making a fool of yourself.' Referring to Ms Pugh, he added: 'If we can get her away from these vandals here.

In response, Ms Pugh appeared to say: 'They're not vandals.' As protesters shouted things like 'stop making money off black pain' at Rivera, Ms Pugh added: 'We want the media to move back.'

'It seems like they want trouble,' Mr Rivera replied, according to Raw Story. However, Ms Pugh insisted: 'They don't want trouble', before claiming that the media presence was 'inciting' people.

'They’ve been demonstrating very peacefully. And you know, I think that what people say there are camera lights, and when you see that, it incites people,' Ms Pugh told Mr Rivera in remarks aired live on Fox.

'But these people have been out here all day long just demonstrating very peacefully. And they’re demonstrating because they care about their neighborhoods, and they care about their communities.

During the interview, Ms Pugh led Mr Rivera and his cameraman away from the demonstrators. Also on Tuesday night, she asked the media via loudspeaker to move back and 'respect our communities'.

why are knuckle-draggers distorting the mayor's words and outright lying?

investors |  However angry people might be, we're still a nation of laws. The legal system has to function for justice to be done. Rioting is a breakdown of public order that can ruin neighborhoods, communities and entire cities.

That's why Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's comments are truly astounding. Not only did she not tell those who were demonstrating to wait until all the facts were in, she seemed to encourage the worst elements among them to do violence.

In a press conference Sunday, Rawlings-Blake said, "I ... instructed (the police) to do everything that they could to make sure that the protesters were able to exercise their right to free speech. ... We also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that."

"Space" to rob, loot and commit arson? Even after 35 people were arrested and six police officers injured during the protests? It was an extraordinarily inflammatory comment.

Meanwhile, Baltimore police report "credible information" that an alliance of gangs has formed to "take out" cops — possible fallout from the mayor's remarks.

It has been claimed that this violence was all the handiwork of "outsiders." "The Baltimore Police Department believes that outside agitators continue to be the instigators behind acts of violence and destruction," Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts told the media.

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It wasn't clearly worded on her part. She should have said "However by giving those peaceful protesters the space and protection to protest, we also gave those who wished to destroy the space to do so." She learned the unfortunate lesson that right-wing whackjobs will selectively cut a soundbite out of context, and use it to promote the angle they desire.

non-violence is complicity and compliance...,

theatlantic |  The people now calling for nonviolence are not prepared to answer these questions. Many of them are charged with enforcing the very policies that led to Gray's death, and yet they can offer no rational justification for Gray's death and so they appeal for calm. But there was no official appeal for calm when Gray was being arrested. There was no appeal for calm when Jerriel Lyles was assaulted. (“The blow was so heavy. My eyes swelled up. Blood was dripping down my nose and out my eye.”) There was no claim for nonviolence on behalf of Venus Green. (“Bitch, you ain’t no better than any of the other old black bitches I have locked up.”) There was no plea for peace on behalf of Starr Brown. (“They slammed me down on my face,” Brown added, her voice cracking. “The skin was gone on my face.")

When nonviolence is preached as an attempt to evade the repercussions of political brutality, it betrays itself. When nonviolence begins halfway through the war with the aggressor calling time out, it exposes itself as a ruse. When nonviolence is preached by the representatives of the state, while the state doles out heaps of violence to its citizens, it reveals itself to be a con. And none of this can mean that rioting or violence is "correct" or "wise," any more than a forest fire can be "correct" or "wise." Wisdom isn't the point tonight. Disrespect is. In this case, disrespect for the hollow law and failed order that so regularly disrespects the rioters themselves.

the economics of ferguson

theatlantic |  Take a walk along West Florissant Avenue, in Ferguson, Missouri. Head south of the burned-out Quik Trip and the famous McDonalds, south of the intersection with Chambers, south almost to the city limit, to the corner of Ferguson Avenue and West Florissant. There, last August, Emerson Electric announced third-quarter sales of $6.3 billion. Just over half a mile to the northeast, four days later, Officer Darren Wilson killed Michael Brown. The 12 shots fired by Officer Wilson were probably audible in the company lunchroom.

Outwardly, at least, the City of Ferguson would appear to occupy an enviable position. It is home to a Fortune 500 firm. It has successfully revitalized a commercial corridor through its downtown. It hosts an office park filled with corporate tenants. Its coffers should be overflowing with tax dollars.

Instead, the cash-starved municipality relies on its cops and its courts to extract millions in fines and fees from its poorest residents, issuing thousands of citations each year. Those tickets plug a financial hole created by the ways in which the city, the county, and the state have chosen to apportion the costs of public services. A century or more of public-policy choices protect the wallets of largely white business and property owners and pass the bills along to disproportionately black renters and local residents. It's easy to see the drama of a fatal police shooting, but harder to understand the complexities of municipal finances that created many thousands of hostile encounters, one of which turned fatal.

The familiar convention of the true-crime story turns out to be utterly inadequate for describing the social, economic, and legal subjection of black people in Ferguson, or anywhere in America. Understanding this requires looking beyond the 90-second drama to the 90 years of entrenched white supremacy and black disadvantage that preceded it.

drought frames economic divide of californians

NYTimes |  Alysia Thomas, a stay-at-home mother in this working-class city, tells her children to skip a bath on days when they do not play outside; that holds down the water bill. Lillian Barrera, a housekeeper who travels 25 miles to clean homes in Beverly Hills, serves dinner to her family on paper plates for much the same reason. In the fourth year of a severe drought, conservation is a fine thing, but in this Southern California community, saving water means saving money.

The challenge of California’s drought is starkly different in Cowan Heights, a lush oasis of wealth and comfort 30 miles east of here. That is where Peter L. Himber, a pediatric neurologist, has decided to stop watering the gently sloping hillside that he spent $100,000 to turn into a green California paradise, seeding it with a carpet of rich native grass and installing a sprinkler system fit for a golf course. But that is also where homeowners like John Sears, a retired food-company executive, bristle with defiance at the prospect of mandatory cuts in water use.

“This is a high fire-risk area,” Mr. Sears said. “If we cut back 35 percent and all these homes just let everything go, what’s green will turn brown. Tell me how the fire risk will increase.”

The fierce drought that is gripping the West — and the imminent prospect of rationing and steep water price increases in California — is sharpening the deep economic divide in this state, illustrating parallel worlds in which wealthy communities guzzle water as poorer neighbors conserve by necessity. The daily water consumption rate was 572.4 gallons per person in Cowan Heights from July through September 2014, the hot and dry summer months California used to calculate community-by-community water rationing orders; it was 63.6 gallons per person in Compton during that same period.

Now, California is trying to turn that dynamic on its head, forcing the state’s biggest water users, which include some of the wealthiest communities, to bear the brunt of the statewide 25 percent cut in urban water consumption ordered by Gov. Jerry Brown. Cowan Heights is facing a 36 percent cut in its water use, compared with 8 percent for Compton.

conservatard chair of the house committee on science, space, and technology is a denialist...,

desdimonadespair |  The Wall Street Journal continues its long tradition of printing editorials that reject the findings of climate science. On Earth Day 2015, we were treated to Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, rolling out some old denialist chestnuts, to criticize proposed U.S. policy changes for reducing carbon emissions and adapting to global warming (“The Climate-Change Religion”). It’s a rote exercise that lists the usual talking points. Normally, Des wouldn’t bother to rebut a boilerplate antiscience editorial in The Wall Street Journal, but because this is coming from the chairman of the House Committee on Science, something must be said. 

Canard 1: Climate science is a religion

Rep. Smith writes:

At least the United Nations’ then-top climate scientist, Rajendra Pachauri, acknowledged—however inadvertently—the faith-based nature of climate-change rhetoric when he resigned amid scandal in February. In a farewell letter, he said that “the protection of Planet Earth, the survival of all species and sustainability of our ecosystems is more than a mission. It is my religion and my dharma.”

When antiscience forces go after a scientific discipline, they frequently accuse it of being a “religion”, meaning that its adherents cling irrationally to facts that aren’t in evidence. These same critics often argue from a religious viewpoint themselves, and people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw rocks, but they persist.

Rep. Smith’s swipe at former IPCC chair, Rajendra Pachauri, is meant to sew suspicion about the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He fails to mention that Pachauri resigned after an accusation of sexual harassment, not because of any institutional corruption.

Canard 2: Climate science is bad science

Rep. Smith concludes: “Instead of letting political ideology or climate “religion” guide government policy, we should focus on good science.”

On this, we’re in complete agreement. But the chairman of the science committee expectorates the same zombie arguments that shamble about in the blogosphere year after year, for example:

Canard 3: No warming in the last N years

“Climate alarmists have failed to explain the lack of global warming over the past 15 years.”

This claim is wrong in a couple of ways, and even though it’s repeatedly pointed out to denialists why it’s wrong, they keep trotting it out. This simple graph by Tamino puts the claim to rest.

Canard 4: The U.N. is cooking the data

Next, Rep. Smith goes after a favorite Republican target: the United Nations.

The U.N. process is designed to generate alarmist results. Many people don’t realize that the most-publicized documents of the U.N. reports are not written by scientists. In fact, the scientists who work on the underlying science are forced to step aside to allow partisan political representatives to develop the “Summary for Policy Makers.” It is scrubbed to minimize any suggestion of scientific uncertainty and is publicized before the actual science is released. The Summary for Policy Makers is designed to give newspapers and headline writers around the world only one side of the debate.

The reality is rather different. If you need evidence that the IPCC is not, in fact, a liberal conspiracy, see “Transparency of the IPCC process”, “IPCC errors: facts and spin” and “The IPCC is not infallible (shock!)”.

Meanwhile, Rep. Smith is busy deploying his committee to gather testimony from contrarians like Judith Curry, while excluding mainstream scientists. Essentially, he commits the same crimes against science that he accuses IPCC of committing.

Canard 5: Even the U.N. says it can’t prove global warming

Rep. Smith goes on to quote an IPCC report:

In its 2012 Special Report on Extreme Events, the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says there is “high agreement” among leading experts that long-term trends in weather disasters are not attributable to human-caused climate change.

Setting aside the question of why he would appeal to a document from the very organization he’s trying to convince us is corrupt, it’s hard to know which part of the report he’s referring to.

evolution in four dimensions...,

evolution-institute |  One of the most mind-expanding books that you’ll ever read is Evolution in Four Dimensions by Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb. They remind us that evolution is about variation, selection, and heredity, not genes. Genes provide one mechanism of heredity but there are others, including epigenetic mechanisms, forms of social learning found in many species, and forms of symbolic thought that are distinctively human. They provide a concise history of why evolutionary theory became so gene-centric during the 20^th Century and how it needs to be expanded to include the other three dimensions.

Eva Jablonka is a Professor at the Cohn Institute for the History of Philosophy of Science and Ideas at Tel Aviv University in Israel. I talked with her by Skype on November 6 2014. Our conversation provides a panoramic tour of evolutionary theory based on heredity, not just genes.

DSW: Welcome, Eva. I’m so pleased to be talking with you.

EJ: Hello, David.

DSW: I want to talk to you about the definition of evolution and the need for it to go beyond genetic evolution. This is the topic of your great book, Evolution in Four Dimensions, which I have adopted as the first text for almost all of my courses. That’s how much I think of it. Let’s begin by discussing your background. What is your training that enables you to write such a book?

EJ: I am a geneticist. I did a PhD in genetics and molecular biology; in fact, on DNA methylation and chromatin structure. Before that, I did a Masters thesis in microbiology. At the same time, I was deeply interested in philosophy of biology. While I was doing a PhD in genetics, I was also writing papers for philosophy of biology journals. I thought that I should combine the two because theoretical biology and evolutionary biology need a very strong conceptual basis. I ended up being in some kind of twilight zone between the two things. For me it was a productive combination.

DSW: Great! Everyone knows that Darwin knew nothing about genes. For him, evolution was about variation, selection and heredity, a resemblance between parents and offspring. Nevertheless, nowadays, whenever you say the word “evolution,” most people hear “genes.” That’s true for a professional evolutionist, as much as for the lay public. How is it that the study of evolution became gene-centric?

EJ: It is related to the strong focus on heredity that is apparent already in the second 19th century, when many  theories of heredity were developed. Once evolution became an accepted theory it was clear that one has to think very seriously about heredity. In order to have cumulative evolution, heredity is necessary.  Darwin himself had a theory of heredity, which was, in fact, one of the most Lamarckian theories of heredity around at the time!  The point is, however, that he needed a theory of heredity to consolidate his theory of evolution, and he  did develop one.

The other reason heredity became focal was because  of the Industrial Revolution. The population was growing and there was an urgent need to feed people so improvements in agriculture became pertinent. It was clear that breeding and selection were of great importance, and selection must be based on heritable variation. The study of heritable variation was  therefore  important from a practical point of view.

watch this wattle-herding assclown claim epigenetic complexity that mainstream biology is only now discovering...,

whyevolutionistrue |  Here’s Discovery Institute Fellow Paul Nelson—who lives in Chicago and sometimes creeps me out by depositing Intelligent Design propaganda in my departmental mailbox—using a novel (but stupid) argument for Intelligent Design, aka God’s Handiwork. It’s based on embryology and teleology. Have a look at this 9.5-minute video on nematode development, which distorts the cool developmental biology of the worm (work that garnered a Nobel Prize) to make it seem like evidence for Design.

All the biology is accurate up to 4:58, although a bit repetitive, but that’s where Nelson begins to slip off the rails and argue that development can’t be explained by evolution because embryology looks like it has foresight—ergo Jebus. As he says, “The case for design could not be made more explicit.” But the argument for “design” isn’t even very sophisticated, and can be refuted with only an elementary knowledge of evolution.

I’ll leave it to the readers to educate each other on this one—it’s an exercise in using what you’ve learned about how evolution works to address creationist distortions . Do post below the reason why Nelson’s argument is fatally flawed. And watch the movie first. It’s a slick production, full of sophistry.

what has atrazine done to you deuterostems?

atrazinelovers |  Atrazine is an herbicide (weed-killer) primarily used on corn. Atrazine is the most common chemical contaminant of ground and surface water in the United States. It is a potent endocrine disruptor with ill effects in wildlife, laboratory animals and humans. Atrazine chemically castrates and feminizes wildlife and reduces immune function in both wildlife and laboratory rodents. Atrazine induces breast and prostate cancer, retards mammary development, and induces abortion in laboratory rodents. Studies in human populations and cell and tissue studies suggest that atrazine poses similar threats to humans. The peer-reviewed scientific studies to support these statements are summarized and can be viewed as you navigate this website.

Atrazine has been denied regulatory approval by the European Union and is, thus, banned, in Europe, even in Switzerland, the home of the manufacturer. Despite the environmental and public health risks, atrazine continues to be used in the US, for economic reasons. Atrazine may only increase corn yield by as little as 1.2 % (and not at all according to some studies. The agri-giant Syngenta, however, has a very powerful lobby and spent $250,000 lobbying in Minnesota alone in 2005 to keep atrazine on the market there.

With as little as 1.2 % increase in corn, a crop that we consume less than 2% of, in a world where 20% of the population will die of starvation, it is incumbent upon us to become involved in the regulatory process regarding atrazine. We (the public) must play an active role in this regulatory decision.

hellified consequences of people-centric leadership...,

NewYorker |  In 2010, Hayes told the EcoRisk panel in an e-mail, “I have just initiated what will be the most extraordinary academic event in this battle!” He had another paper coming out in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which described how male tadpoles exposed to atrazine grew up to be functional females with impaired fertility. He advised the company that it would want to get its P.R. campaign up to speed. “It’s nice to know that in this economy I can keep so many people employed,” he wrote. He quoted both Tupac Shakur and the South African king Shaka Zulu: “Never leave an enemy behind or it will rise again to fly at your throat.”

Syngenta’s head of global product safety wrote a letter to the editor of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and to the president of the National Academy of Sciences, expressing concern that a “publication with so many obvious weaknesses could achieve publication in such a reputable scientific journal.” A month later, Syngenta filed an ethics complaint with the chancellor of Berkeley, claiming that Hayes’s e-mails violated the university’s Standards of Ethical Conduct, particularly Respect for Others. Syngenta posted more than eighty of Hayes’s e-mails on its Web site and enclosed a few in its letter to the chancellor. In one, with the subject line “Are y’all ready for it,” Hayes wrote, “Ya fulla my j*z right now!” In another, he told the Syngenta scientists that he’d had a drink after a conference with their “republican buddies,” who wanted to know about a figure he had used in his paper. “As long as you followin me around, I know I’m da sh*t,” he wrote. “By the way, yo boy left his pre-written questions at the table!”

Berkeley declined to take disciplinary action against Hayes. The university’s lawyer reminded Syngenta in a letter that “all parties have an equal responsibility to act professionally.” David Wake said that he read many of the e-mails and found them “quite hilarious.” “He’s treating them like street punks, and they view themselves as captains of industry,” he said. “When he gets tapped, he goes right back at them.”

Michelle Boone, a professor of aquatic ecology at Miami University, who served on the E.P.A.’s scientific advisory panel, said, “We all follow the Tyrone Hayes drama, and some people will say, ‘He should just do the science.’ But the science doesn’t speak for itself. Industry has unlimited resources and bully power. Tyrone is the only one calling them out on what they’re doing.” However, she added, “I do think some people feel he has lost his objectivity.”

Keith Solomon, a professor emeritus at the University of Guelph, Ontario, who has received funding from Syngenta and served on the EcoRisk panel, noted that academics who refuse industry money are not immune from biases; they’re under pressure to produce papers, in order to get tenure and promotions. “If I do an experiment, look at the data every which way, and find nothing, it will not be easy to publish,” he said. “Journals want excitement. They want bad things to happen.”

Hayes, who had gained more than fifty pounds since becoming tenured, wore bright scarves draped over his suit and silver earrings from Tibet. At the end of his lectures, he broke into rhyme: “I see a ruse / intentionally constructed to confuse the news / well, I’ve taken it upon myself to defuse the clues / so that you can choose / and to demonstrate the objectivity of the methods I use.” At some of his lectures, Hayes warned that the consequences of atrazine use were disproportionately felt by people of color. “If you’re black or Hispanic, you’re more likely to live or work in areas where you’re exposed to crap,” he said. He explained that “on the one side I’m trying to play by the ivory-tower rules, and on the other side people are playing by a different set of rules.” Syngenta was speaking directly to the public, whereas scientists were publishing their research in “magazines that you can’t buy in Barnes and Noble.”  Fist tap Rohan.

homo sapiens crafting an exit strategy from pan-troglodytic deuterostems...,

BusinessInsider |  A group of Chinese scientists just reported that they modified the genome of human embryos, something that has never been done in the history of the world, according to a report in Nature News.

A recent biotech discovery — one that has been called the biggest biotech discovery of the century — showed how scientists might be able to modify a human genome when that genome was still just in an embryo.

This could change not only the genetic material of a person, but could also change the DNA they pass on, removing "bad" genetic codes (and potentially adding "good" ones) and taking an active hand in evolution.

Concerned scientists published an argument that no one should edit the human genome in this way until we better understood the consequences after a report uncovered rumors that Chinese scientists were already working on using this technology. 

But this new paper, published April 18 in the journal Protein and Cell by a Chinese group led by gene-function researcher Junjiu Huang of Sun Yat-sen University, shows that work has already been done, and Nature News spoke to a Chinese source that said at least four different groups are "pursuing gene editing in human embryos."

The technology used to edit embryonic genomes.

Countries where it's "legal" to edit human genomes.

scientists discover LEM

telegraph |  A protein which ‘turbo-charges’ the immune system so that it can fight off any cancer or virus has been discovered by scientists. 

In a breakthrough described as a ‘game-changer’ for cancer treatment, researchers at Imperial College found a previously unknown molecule which boosts the body’s ability to fight off chronic illnesses.

Scientists at Imperial College London, who led the study, are now developing a gene therapy based on the protein and hope to begin human trials in three years.

“This is exciting because we have found a completely different way to use the immune system to fight cancer,” said Professor Philip Ashton-Rickardt, from the Section of Immunobiology in the Department of Medicine at Imperial, who led the study.


“It could be a game-changer for treating a number of different cancers and viruses.

“This is a completely unknown protein. Nobody had ever seen it before or was even aware that it existed. It looks and acts like no other protein.”

The protein – named lymphocyte expansion molecule, or LEM, promotes the spread of cancer killing ‘T cells’ by generating large amounts of energy.

Normally when the immune system detects cancer it goes into overdrive trying to fight the disease, flooding the body with T cells. But it quickly runs out of steam.

inflammatory bowel and ulcerative colitis caused by identified microbe-host interaction

bmj.com |  Objectives Dysbiosis of the intestinal microbiota is associated with Crohn's disease (CD). Functional evidence for a causal role of bacteria in the development of chronic small intestinal inflammation is lacking. Similar to human pathology, TNF^deltaARE mice develop a tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-driven CD-like transmural inflammation with predominant ileal involvement. 

Design Heterozygous TNF^deltaARE mice and wildtype (WT) littermates were housed under conventional (CONV), specific pathogen-free (SPF) and germ-free (GF) conditions. Microbial communities were analysed by high-throughput 16S ribosomal RNA gene sequencing. Metaproteomes were measured using LC-MS. Temporal and spatial resolution of disease development was followed after antibiotic treatment and transfer of microbial communities into GF mice. Granulocyte infiltration and Paneth cell function was assessed by immunofluorescence and gene expression analysis. 

Results GF-TNF^deltaARE mice were free of inflammation in the gut and antibiotic treatment of CONV-TNF^deltaARE mice attenuated ileitis but not colitis, demonstrating that disease severity and location are microbiota-dependent. SPF-TNF^deltaARE mice developed distinct ileitis-phenotypes associated with gradual loss of antimicrobial defence. 16S analysis and metaproteomics revealed specific compositional and functional alterations of bacterial communities in inflamed mice. Transplantation of disease-associated but not healthy microbiota transmitted CD-like ileitis to GF-TNF^deltaARE recipients and triggered loss of lysozyme and cryptdin-2 expression. Monoassociation of GF-TNF^deltaARE mice with the human CD-related Escherichia coli LF82 did not induce ileitis. 

Conclusions We provide clear experimental evidence for the causal role of gut bacterial dysbiosis in the development of chronic ileal inflammation with subsequent failure of Paneth cell function.

Butt then we told you this five years ago....,