Slashdot Mirror

Wait, sorry, what? I realize it feels like forever ago, but quick Googling says 25 months. Or did I misunderstand you?

Before anyone comments on my source, it was the first timeline I saw, get over it :)

It doesn't help that Greece was forced into an austerity plan in their last bailout. Essentially that kicked off a death spiral. Austerity has already been well discredited (see here, here, and here. Original paper here) yet it keeps being foisted off on citizens everywhere.

I'm not suggesting that Greece should spend money like a drunken sailor on leave, but following a faith based economic theory even after it has been disproven (even to the satisfaction of the writers of the original paper) is not the answer.

Custer surely would have never ever gotten that far. It takes a telescope to rile them up. Blankets? Do they need blankets?

Depends upon how far back you wish to go.

Hawaii was found by Polynesians who's DNA has proven them the discovers of America, I figure Columbus was the last person to of set foot on it's shore, yet gets all the credit.
http://www.mnn.com/earth-matte...

From South America they migrated along it's coast, to Central America, and spread out into North America, becoming the Indians we know today.

This still agrees with the land bridge theory, yet A Clovis point was found to be allegedly older than possible by a land bridge crossing.
http://america.aljazeera.com/a...

The Kennewick Man was found so far out of place (and not and Indian), that made him so special. No reason there wasn't a spread of information by just that sort of person. History refuses to acknowledge the transfer of knowledge rather than inventing themselves.

While mayhaps a bit off your topic, an interest of mine that I couldn't help but reply to.

The interesting question is how long can this last before we reach a level that is not affordable to the majority of the demographic that is being serviced.

Care to guess what happens at that point? New construction doesn't sell, developers go bankrupt, new construction is sold at auction for lower prices. Then the new units available at lower prices push down prices of other housing, which makes purchase more affordable, which results in renters buying, which curbs rent prices.

Unless of course, large financial companies and well-connected donors are threatened by that circumstance.

Then, the central bank will step in, through its many channels, to put a floor under rental prices ("So I think if we spent enough money, got enough of a hit right now, it would look like a floor on house prices, and we might have something every bit as good as a floor on house prices."). The multiple government housing agencies (Fannie, Freddie, FHA, VA, USDA, etc) can also step in to influence the rental market, as they did the housing market.

Blackstone is a company securitizing rental flows and selling them. They are the largest private equity company in the world ("By both profit measures, the first quarter set quarterly records for Blackstone, the world’s largest private-equity firm").

The former head of the US central bank, Bernanke, is now employed by Citadel, a massive hedge fund.

My point is simply this: house prices did not revert to historical norms because of the big players - donors - that would have been deleteriously impacted by it. With big players moving into the rental market, if something went wrong with their business plan, don't expect them not to use their clout to get the government and central bank to do something about it.

An Irish language documentary broke the news on the US Mortgage Backed Security driven property bubble back in 2005 so why doesn't it surprise me that another foreign news source is the first to piss off US real-estate corporations and reveal that rental backed securities are also teetering on the brink of disaster? Here we go again, another replay of tulip madness. In the words of Yogi Berra, it's Deja-vu all over again.

The real problem is that boom-bust cycles driven by loose monetary policy (whether it be Reagan's trickle down or Greenspan's helicopter drops) help those with deep pockets. Playing with matches around the global economic gas-tank eventually causes an explosion and as John Maynard Keynes put it, "Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." (unless you happen to be a corporate slumlord.)

All this misleading and conclusory claim (on what basis do you deem any particular number "high," by the way?) demonstrates is your own lack of attention to this issue.

I consider about half to be high. It's definitely not a super majority but I suppose that could be reached if the income constraints were altered. I don't consider $20,000/year a very comfortable living, not to mention $10,000 but that depends on the area.

Half ... of what, exactly? Are you saying that the breakdown of poor to not-poor women should be some percentage other than what it is? As in, you believe that poor women should not be the ones getting abortions? Why would you believe that? Or do you mean simply that the number of women getting abortions itself is "too high" (and it isn't half of women btw; the Guttmacher link estimates that by age 45, about one-third of all women will have had an abortion)? Again, "too high" based on what? And what does the cost of living have to do with your assessment? If anything, that would seem to explain why "such" a "high" percentage of poor women have abortions: because while an abortion may be cost-prohibitive, it's nothing compared to the price of pregnancy, childbirth and raising a kid.

And save your moralizing about diverse perspectives (omg some women want to give birth and others don't? WHAAAT?!) for your weekly anti-choice circlejerk. That "women," just like regular people(!), are not some kind of emotional monolith surprises no actual grown-ups.

What are you going on about? I don't have any dogs in this race.

That's self-evidently disingenuous. The words you are typing are not the words of people who mind their own business and don't give a lick what other people do with their own bodies.

Besides your selective quotes and emotional language you also curiously use counties instead of states so you can get a sensational figure, with emphasis added no less.

Cute. If sarcasm is "emotional language" in your world, you must find the internet a scary place indeed. You're the one who started in with below-the-belt accusations, implicitly accusing "women" of doublespeak because you've heard the term "clump of cells" used in reference to abortion (that phrase is is pretty much a strawman caricature used by anti-choicers, btw -- seriously, google the phrase and tell me how many actual pro-choicers you're able to dig up who actually use it) and yet you're aware of the fact that many women (and men, but why target men when targeting women is so much more fun, right?) feel the pain of loss after a miscarriage. If you genuinely don't understand how ignorant and manipulative your sentiment was, then I apologize for wrongly misjudging you as someone with an ounce of basic understanding regarding emotional context.

As to counties versus states, I was just citing one of the numbers from the link you supplied. I guess you like some of the numbers and not others? I don't deny that counties aren't the only relevant number, although your reference to Texas is hilarious for at least two reasons, both of which tend to underscore my point: Texas is a huge land mass. To say it has "at least" one abortion clinic in the entire state is about as meaningful as saying that England and France have at least one abortion clinic between them. And, unless you live under a rock, you're surely aware that Texas is one of the least friendly states for women seeking to terminate a pregnancy. In fact, if a recent law passed in Texas is upheld, there will be fewer than ten abortion clinics remaining in the entire state; as it is currently, many women already have to drive more than a hundred miles to the nearest provider.

This issue overwhelmingly involves young women and poverty.

...Saudi Arabia, which seems to dump a lot into financing extremism and human misery.

Hey, at least they buy American

Easy comparison is the Ebola outbreak in Africa over the last year. The United States sent occupying troops. Cuba sent hundreds of doctors.

Being a nationalist requires that you view yourself and people of your group to be superior to other groups, else there would be no point in it because the national identity being defended would cease to be meaningful.

This probably explains why you think the Ukrainian people are incapable of seeing other ex-soviet states like Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and so forth look west after the collapse of the USSR and see how much they've gained in terms of wealth and freedom then decide they want that for themselves. It explains why you view Ukrainians as some kind of inferior human that couldn't possibly want the things that most people want by themselves like increased wealth or greater freedom, without CIA interference.

I find it rather odd however that you describe yourself as an American nationalist whilst serving the propaganda goals of Russia and hence necessarily damaging American interests and ideals. You talk of the far right in Ukraine, but the people who have the most to fear from that viewpoint recognise what an absolute lie that idea is:

http://www.jta.org/2014/06/02/...

Meanwhile, we have Russia hosting the far right, and involving British neo-Nazis like Nick Griffin in his election whitewashing:

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/...

We have Putin pouring money into France's far right:

http://www.independent.co.uk/n...

And in fact, just supporting the far right right across Europe in general:

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/...

But it's not just support of course, it's the way Putin acts against minorities, using gay people as a hate target just as Hitler and King Edward I did with the Jews:

https://www.truthwinsout.org/p...

Or simply silencing anyone who hates having their territory illegally annexed resulting in concerned 3rd party nations who are typically Russian allies like India to report on the fact that Turkey is having to send in monitors to make sure it doesn't escalate further than the level of ethnic cleansing that Putin has already carried out:

http://zeenews.india.com/news/...

http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...

Of course, I don't expect any of this to matter to you. I've seen you post here before and I know you're normally incapable of consideration of alternative viewpoints, I know that you have your CIA/Koch brothers conspiracy theories and wont believe anything else. But I've made a point here, a point of linking to news sources in Europe, Russia, India, the Middle East to show you that the things I've pointed out aren't controversial, that the only people that wont accept them are Putin and his supporters. So if you do as you normally do, and refuse to believe what is evidenced in front of you, you at very least must stop pretending you're not just parroting the pro-Putin viewpoint - because as the Moscow Times articles show, even moderate Russians themselves disagree with you - this isn't about Russians vs. non-Russians, this is about Putin apologists as you have been in this conversation so far, against reality.

So you've really a choice, you can wake up and stop parroting long discredited RT propaganda word for word, or

While there may well be merit to the criticisms of Oz, it should be noted that the doctors behind this initiative are not without their own conflicts of interest: http://america.aljazeera.com/blogs/scrutineer/2015/4/17/doctors-behind-anti-oz-letter-have-own-conflicts-of-interest.html

"Supporting the coup in Ukraine"

Um, no. Russia stopped being the left when the USSR collapsed, under Putin it's firmly far-right, which is why they host annual far-right parades:

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/...

And why they host and fund European neo-nazi parties like the BNP and use the police to push away anti far-right protesters from these folks in Moscow:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/fa...

Whilst also enacting laws that make it legally acceptable to persecute minorities.

But regardless, you were wrong when you used the word "legitimate". The only coup in Ukraine was the one Putin now admitted to carrying out in Crimea, and that wasn't legitimate as recognised by pretty much every country in the world except Russia which deem Crimea to still be Ukrainian territory. Overthrowing a corrupt leader with majority popular support is key facet of democracy- if a leader is no longer serving the people and the people get rid then that is not a coup- the process was wholly legal because Yanukovych stepped down and ran away as soon as the Ukrainian parliament voted to begin the impeachment investigation process, which in the face of the fact that he was clearly corrupt would've all but guaranteed a vote to actually impeach him had he hung around to give them the chance. The idea of the Ukraine situation being a coup is firmly a Russian ultra-nationalist position, and ultra-nationalism is a viewpoint that sits firmly within the far-right of the political spectrum. This is because Russian ultra-nationalists are the only folks who love Russia so much in spite of it's authoritarian leadership that's created a failed democracy, it's low life expectancy, it's widespread poverty, it's gross corruption, and abysmal stance on human rights that they can't admit to themselves that maybe people like the majority of Ukrainians don't want to be close with Russia, simply because it's shit. Why would you want to be more like Europe's continuously declining dump when you could instead be more like the growing and prospering ex-Soviet countries instead?

You're right that there are plenty of valid criticisms of Hillary, but I can't really see how Clinton standing up to Putin's far-right, arguing against Putin's Crimean coup (where he installed a Russian puppet leader with military force), and standing up for democracy is a "legit criticism" unless you're the sort of far-right Russian adoring ultra-nationalist that loves Putin in the first place.

Besides, I think just about all US presidential candidates agree on this anyway (and in fact the other things you listed), but that's because standing up for democracy, and standing against far-right imperialism is overwhelmingly a no-brainer given how badly it ended when we didn't do that last time.

If you're looking for a Putin-esque far-right type operator in the US presidential elections, which your critique of candidates standing against that implies you are, then you're probably out of luck. Sarah Palin would've been the closest thing you could've had because she too was a firm ultra-nationalist.

While this may be an issue, I'm not sure it's a significant one.

I disagree. The restaurant lobby is immesely influential. We're all smart enough here at /. to know that the restaurant markup on liquor is huge, even bigger at concerts and sporting events. Given their unique success in flouting federal minimum wage laws, do you honestly think they wouldn't do everything in their power (including drafting bogus laws) to make sure that their cash cow liquor revenue isn't disrupted? Come to think of it, we're seeing this exact thing play out with Tesla as we speak.

Where I see an issue is minors, who can't buy the overpriced booze at the show/concert/game/whatever, wanting some way to sneak some alcohol in.

I'm just curious if that includes the entire swath of the adult population who is 18-21 years-old. Because they're doing beer bongs in the parking lot instead of buying in the stadium. And, what difference does it make to you if someone brings a packet of this "Palcohol", or an airplane bottle of Captain Morgan's, or even a packet of Koolaid into a show/concert/game/whatever? You can't legislate morality, friend.

I don't believe you

That's not true. You're just doing your best to play like you really think all of this is just a misunderstanding. It's not, and you know it. I know you've already spent ten seconds and Googled for things like this, but I'll play along if it makes you feel better. Here's just one random first-on-Google example:

http://america.aljazeera.com/a...

I never claimed that. I don't know where you got that idea.

You've speculated that her records were kept correctly (despite what she and everyone else says), and that there's no evidence she's done anything wrong. The implication then, by you, is that she did things correctly - and the ONLY way that could be, is if there was some sort of mechanism in place to do what the 2009 NARA and other rules required. But there wasn't. SHE SAID THERE WASN'T. So you are tap-dancing around the whole "show me proof" thing in order to avoid just plain facing what the woman involved has herself been saying. Why, I can't imagine. Are you working for her or her party?

What's this question have to do with anything? I see no relation.

Yeah, sure. It was someone else hacking your account when you complained that the current people looking at the matter weren't objective and a-political enough for you. It's perfectly reasonable to ask you if you found the prior investigation - which was run by HER party - to be likewise. You're implying it's not, which means you're being hypocritical on the subject. Only the party you don't like can be political in such matters, or only the party you favor can be objective?

Politicians often spin for short-term gain and don't care about fact-checkers much

The politicians doing the spin, here, are the ones relying on the fact that the person they're backing has conveniently destroyed records. The politicians conducting the investigation are relying on the documents SHE cherry-picked, and those are the ones that show the date gaps, a matter which they (unlike her, with tens of thousand of mixed-in emails we'll never see) will be placing right in front of your nose to review. Asserting that they're probably lying as they talk about public records you can review, while proposing the exact opposite about a stridently partisan person who has just been caught avoiding the very rules she said her department employees must all follow, shows how objective you're (not) being.

Where is this rule written?

This has been the case for a long time. Jason Baron, former director of litigation with the National Archives, explains the problem here. He said in an interview that "Clinton’s use of a private server gave her exclusive control, thus preventing the department from having full access to emails she sent and received while a federal employee. Government employees have no right to privacy on government computers and even personal emails are subject to review and perhaps release at the department’s discretion. Setting up a private server to conduct public business inappropriately shifts control of what is accessible to the end user alone rather than allowing the institution to decide threshold questions.” That's been true of federal records for decades: the agency archivists decide what's private, not the person running her official email on a server she's keeping in her home.

When cornered you seem to get wordy

Who's cornered? Not me. I'm just explaining the facts to someone who seems really desperate for them to go away.

Well, it turns out that the protesters were 100% right on that one.

It only "turns out" that way, because those same people, who protested it back then, also run major media outlets. Do you suppose, that Time-magazine's reporter could've written: "We were all morons doing the bidding of America's enemies"?

No, the most you could get 10 years after he went protesting, was to admit, their protest was coordinated — though it is unclear by who...

Bush II and the neo-con war criminals

Please, what "war crimes" are you talking about? Saddam Hussein violated the cease-fire agreement of 1992 so many times, Clinton should've resumed shooting in his time. No, it was no "war crime". But let's not get too side-tracked...

much trouble beating Vladimir Putin in a global popularity contest

Every little bit counts. Like I said, Putin does not need a "win" — a "tie" would be sufficient. And Westerners have always been gullible — the generation calling Bush "war criminal" was raised by morons seriously equating Joseph McCarthy to Lavrenty Beria...

Or is it that invading a distant nation for its oil wealth

Ah, I should have known... Where there are "war crimes", "war for oil" can not be far behind — like Moon-landing denials it just would not die. For 10 years Saddam Hussein was prevented from selling his oil. All we had to do to get it was to agree to lifting the sanctions — which would've been much cheaper than war. Instead, we went after oil-tycoons for breaking the embargo.

Of course, it was "better" — for we didn't annex anything. But see, win an argument, just use a (false) tu quoque to tie your opponent. And you are now doing (or trying to do) the same to me...

peninsula that was recently part of Russia

Score another one for Kremlin! Last time Crimea was part of Russia was 1954 — or 60 years ago. Before that, in 1918, it was part of Ukraine (36 years earlier). So, which one was "recent"?

and is still full of Russians

It is just as full of ethnic Ukrainians now, but, more importantly, achieving that nice White appearance required ethnic cleansing it off Crimean Tatars, who were only allowed to return by the newly-independent Ukraine in 1990-ies. They are now in trouble again — suspected by the occupiers for their loyalty to Ukraine.

So what if it is "full of Russians"? Texas, Arizona, and California are full of Mexicans — would some new Santa Anna be justified invading those states and organizing a referendum?

Khrushchev should never have given it to Ukraine.

Yes, and Romanov should not have sold Alaska — did you just pre-emptively justify Russian invasion into US? Can Japan now use the example to take back Kuril Islands? Japanese special forces may be just as "polite" as Russians were in Crimea and, once the occupation succeeds, arranging a "referendum" i

And the US Geological Society estimates there are around 22 billion barrels of oil in the Ionian Sea, off western Greece, and another 4 billion barrels in the northern Aegean Sea.

http://www.aljazeera.com/progr...

It serves no journalistic purpose. "legitimate concerns about the graphic nature of the video" very broadly misses the point. They don't need to show it any more than they need to show Mexican gang executions. It's lazy sensationalism meant to draw as many eyeballs as possible.

And what is the prevailing view of the drug war in Mexico? Most Americans are far away detached, aside from a few border towns whose sheriff gets shot. Maybe if the news did show the Mexican drug cartels who behead entire towns we would do something to help. http://america.aljazeera.com/o...

The Journalistic purpose is the same reason why there were so many pictures taken of the concentration camps when the allies liberated them. Lets not be ignorant of the world we live in. The news is ment to inform us.

As it stands now, Fox gave you a choice. Many people have died so that we can have a choice. Let's not denigrate their memory by obstructing the choices we have because you feel it is "lazy sensationalism".

Okay, how about we send you to talk some sense into Daesh

Can't see an aircraft carrier being much use there either though.

Putin has also been calling for your input a lot, explain to him why he shouldn't have half of Ukraine.

We realy don't want a war against Russia. You can be assured that there's a lot of negotiation going on here.

Lil' Kimmy's a nice guy, could you please go over there and talk him out of his nukes.

China's better positioned to explain that one. But invasion here seems pretty unlikely.

While you are on your world tour, please explain to the Iranians that achieving hegemony over its neighbors is a losing strategy and nukes won't help them.

Diplomacy seems to be working pretty well there.

The Fajr (Dawn) satellite was successfully placed 450km above Earth on Monday

The satellite was locally made, said the official IRNA news agency, as was its launcher

Fajr satellite, weighing 52kg would be able to take accurate pictures from space.

the 21-metre and 26 tonne launcher, named Safir-Fajr, shows "the ability of Iran to build satellite launchers".

well under the gop healthcare plan you may want to be in prison if you need anything high cost and you have an preexisting condition

Except these days, most prisons are privately owned and run under government contracts. Their track records speak volumes. They're not gonna spend a dime they think they don't have to to stay profitable. See this, this, and just for the hell of it, this. Further examples can be googled of course.

The LEAST I now expect is for the relevant Muslim leaders to condemn that shit. To declare a fatwa that such behavior is un-Islam and that it is against Islam teachings.

You mean like this one (text available here)? Or this one? Or this one? Or this one?

The problem is that people who demand Muslims condemn violence actually don't care what Muslims have to say. It's just posturing.

"All of those Christians and Jews that post online videos of themselves beheading their captive hostages, lining up villagers and gunning them down"

You mean like this?

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/...

And once again, you reconfirm your racism as well.
Everything you stated is both false and hate speech.

It might interest you to note that one of the police officers killeed was in fact Muslim. Leaders are condeming it. It is a religion of peace, just as much any other religion with a chackered past, and a book that people can cherry pick out of to prove any point they wish. A handful of extremists do not define a religion of more than a billion people, no matter how many cartoonists or abortion clinics those extremists attack.

From http://www.mediamatters.org/re... :

ButOnline, Fox News Shows Muslim Community Leaders Denouncing The Attack

On FoxNews.Com, Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA Spokesperson Condemns Paris Attack.DuringaJanuary 7interviewwith Fox host Gregg JarettonFoxNews.com, Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA Spokesperson Qasim Rashid condemned the attackin Paris and refuted the notion that Islam is inherently violent(emphasis added):

JARRETT: Do you think more Muslims in the Muslim-American community need to speak up and, like you, condemn this kind of attack?

RASHID: I think Muslims are doing a very good job of speaking up. And I think there's an important conversation to be had about recognizing that this is not an Islamic act of terror -- this is just an act of terror done by people claiming to ascribe to Islam.When we studyIslam, we see clearly that the Quran condemns this kind of violence categorically. That Prophet Muhammad said that aMuslim is one from whom all others are safe.

[...]

JARRETT: If, as you say, the Quran condemns thiskind ofviolence, why is it these Islamic extremists, these terrorists use the Quran as justification for committing these kinds of violent acts?

RASHID: Well,it's the same reason why any extremist group uses scripture. There's no shortage of extremists in everything. Let's not forget the Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan terrorist group, that claims to beChristian. And I would vehemently argue against anyone who would blame the bible, orJesusChrist, for their acts of terrorism.This is not about religion. This is about political power, this is about uneducated, ignorant youth who are being manipulated by clerics and extremists. And this is why it's all the more important for us, as the moderates, regardless of faith, to stay united and combat this .[FoxNews.com,1/7/15]

Many OtherMuslim OrganizationsHaveCondemned The Attack

French Muslim Council: Attack Is An "Extremely Grave Barbaric Action."In a statement,the French Muslim Council condemned theParis attack as an"extremely grave barbaric action," and called it "an attackagainst democracy and the freedom of the press." [AlJazeera.com,1/7/15]

Muslim Council Of Britain Condemns Attack: "Nothing Justifies The Taking Of Life."The Muslim Council of Britain condemned the attack, saying "The Muslim Council of Britain condemns this attack. Whomever the attackers are, and whatever the cause may be, nothing justifies the taking of life." [Muslim Council of Britain,1/7/15]

Council On American-Islamic Relations : "We Strongly Condemn This Brutal And Cowardly Attack."CAIR strongly condemned the attack,calling it "brutal and cowardly," and used the opportunity to reiterate theorganization's "repudiation of any such assault on freedom of speech, even speech that mocks faiths and religious figures":

"We strongly condemn this brutal and cowar

Oh I don't know about that. This guy makes kind of a good point:

http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...

And really, even the whole ISIS/Iraq/Syria thing doesn't hold much of a finger up to the Rwanda genocide which was primarily orchestrated by Christians.

Hell, in the Yugoslav wars Christian Orthodox Serbs massacred 10,000 Bosniak muslims in one sitting at Srebrenica.

Violence against police is why police react so forcefully.

Uh-huh. Why, just look at the violence from this unconscious asshole! Why, that threatening way he got thrown from the car when it rolled over at highway speeds - Heck, even I felt intimidated by him, just watching the video!


People who are compliant tend not to get shot.

Right - They just get tased, pepper-sprayed, and/or choked out for shits n' giggles.


The only good cops know they have a camera trained on them (and can't just smash it and harass the photographer), period.

Health care and food. The two things that the US does export to Cuba, ever since the Trade Sanction Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000. Funny how that works out.

The US sells a lot of food to Cuba. In fact, only a few years ago, they imported 80% of their food, and the bulk of that from the US. That's down to 60% now, but about half their state-owned farmland (which in turn is 70% of all farmland) is sitting unused. Cuba could be a thriving place if it weren't so badly run.

The same goes for health care.

> I can't think of any serious terrorist or even violent activity by Christians in a very long time

Haven't been paying much attention to South America, have you? Extremist catholics have killed tens of thousands over the last decade.

The devil can cite scripture for his purpose.
The bible is just as full of similar shit.

If your understanding of a religion is limited to quotes that someone else pulled for you, then you don't understand the religion at all.

To be perfectly honest, does anyone have statistics (recent) on the number of terrorist acts that are committed by Christians? I'd like to compare them with Islamic terrorist acts, because it seems to me that Islamic apologists need a wake-up call.

I don't know about world-wide, but in Mexico extremists in the cult of Santa Muerte are out of control.

"A recent United Nations report estimated nearly 9,000 civilians have been killed and 17,386 wounded in Iraq in 2014, more than half since ISIL fighters seized large parts on northern Iraq in June. It is likely that the group is responsible another several thousand deaths in Syria. To be sure, these numbers are staggering. But in 2013 drug cartels murdered more than 16,000 people in Mexico alone, and another 60,000 from 2006 to 2012 — a rate of more than one killing every half hour for the last seven years. What is worse, these are estimates from the Mexican government, which is known to deflate the actual death toll by about 50 percent.

Statistics alone do not convey the depravity and threat of the cartels. They carry out hundreds of beheadings every year. In addition to decapitations, the cartels are known to dismember and otherwise mutilate the corpses of their victims — displaying piles of bodies prominently in towns to terrorize the public into compliance. They routinely target women and children to further intimidate communities. Like ISIL, the cartels use social media to post graphic images of their atrocious crimes."

Looks like somebody else had a similar idea in congress.

It doesn't matter if they're right, it's incredibly easy to rationalize the acts of your side.

Absolutely, for example, we in the west would pretty much all agree with you when you say:

Bin Laden killed 3k in an utterly indefensible act, the Iraq war killed 100k in a much more defensible act. In the west it's easy to consider Bil Laden's act as the greater evil. Afterall he explicitly tried to kill as many people as possible with the goal of starting a wider war. The Iraq war, even if it were a mistake, wasn't started with the objective of mass casualties.

But bin Laden justified the attacks as a reprisal for the civilian deaths in the 1982 Lebanon war, which seems now to have been launched on a false premise.

I say to you, Allah knows that it had never occurred to us to strike the towers. But after it became unbearable and we witnessed the oppression and tyranny of the American/Israeli coalition against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, it came to my mind.

The events that affected my soul in a direct way started in 1982 when America permitted the Israelis to invade Lebanon and the American Sixth Fleet helped them in that. This bombardment began and many were killed and injured and others were terrorised and displaced.

I couldn't forget those moving scenes, blood and severed limbs, women and children sprawled everywhere. Houses destroyed along with their occupants and high rises demolished over their residents, rockets raining down on our home without mercy.

The situation was like a crocodile meeting a helpless child, powerless except for his screams. Does the crocodile understand a conversation that doesn't include a weapon? And the whole world saw and heard but it didn't respond.

In those difficult moments many hard-to-describe ideas bubbled in my soul, but in the end they produced an intense feeling of rejection of tyranny, and gave birth to a strong resolve to punish the oppressors.

And as I looked at those demolished towers in Lebanon, it entered my mind that we should punish the oppressor in kind and that we should destroy towers in America in order that they taste some of what we tasted and so that they be deterred from killing our women and children.

And that day, it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy. Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and intolerance.

  Source.

I feel the same way as you do (that they drew first blood, so to speak), but we all have to admit that they don't see it the same way. The stuff we're all told about them attacking us because they "hate freedom" isn't supported by what bin Laden said:

Before I begin, I say to you that security is an indispensable pillar of human life and that free men do not forfeit their security, contrary to Bush's claim that we hate freedom.

If so, then let him explain to us why we don't strike for example - Sweden? And we know that freedom-haters don't possess defiant spirits like those of the 19 - may Allah have mercy on them.

No, we fight because we are free men who don't sleep under oppression. We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation. So shall we lay waste to yours.

Sadly, it's all terribly complicated.

Just to be certain that you're not one of the bad guys yourself you need to keep your actions way above reproach.

Probably too high a bar to clear, but certainly the kind of actions in TFA are bound to be counter-productive.

Just when will the CIA get off its high horse of believing that this program, in its former form, or any newer form, produces value for the American citizen or state as a whole?

And how do you know that this torture division is not created by some misogynists that get pleasure from torturing someone? Their purpose is not the same.

Before you say "this is not possible", this was also impossible,

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/u...

MI6 and others are still using using torture. And you know, first thing that is irrelevant for torturer is the truth. It's only what they want to hear that is the truth, not reality.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/...

Agreed, I don't think Putin is funding all or maybe even any anti-franking protests because like you I'm anti-fracking but also most definitely anti-Russian imperialism. However he IS funding the far-right in Europe. See here for example:

http://www.theweek.co.uk/europ...

al Jazeera has a decent article on the reasoning behind it here also:

http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...

There are other far right parties in the UK that Russia likely has a hand in funding but are much harder to prove. One example is UKIP in the UK. Some years back a Lib Dem MP in the UK, Mike Hancock got in trouble for having an affair with a young girl (less than half his age) because the security services warned she was a Russian spy and a Russian whistleblower (a general) outed her as such also. The MP in question was on a number of British security committees. The girl in question, Katia Zatuliveter, was allowed to stay in the UK because the courts ruled there was not enough evidence of her being a spy. Case closed, end of story. Right?

Fast forward a couple of years, and we get a news story that seems completely unrelated, UKIP announces that it's got a new donor that's defected from the Tories, he donates £100,000 to UKIP. The Tories state that they've no idea who this guy is and investigation into official finances show that the guy was bluffing about having been a major Tory donor, despite claims of having donated over £100,000 to the Tories it seems he'd only ever donated about £20,000. The guy responds by saying he's "offended" by the Tories belittling his donation and ups his UKIP donation to £1million. It seems odd that UKIP and this guy were willing to lie about the scale of relevance he had to the Tories in order to pretend it was a much more major coup than it was, but so what, who cares, what has this got to do with anything?

Well, this little known small fry Tory donor, Arron Banks, defecting to UKIP to become a major political donor is married to none other than a Katia Zatuliveter, the claimed Russian spy who he was married to before, during, and since she "cheated" on him with strategic defence knowledge filled MP Mike Hancock.

All a massive coincidence? Maybe. But given that we know Putin is overtly funding France's far-right national front it doesn't seem too much of a stretch to think he might be subversively funding similar far-right parties like UKIP (who have gone out their way to try and pretend they're not far right and are respectable even though their far-right nature shines through when they fuck up almost weekly) in the UK too.

So funding fracking protests? Maybe, probably not. Funding attempts to rip Europe apart? Well we know for a fact it is in some countries, we just don't know quite how far it reaches.

I wondered after the European elections why Europes elite didn't opt to listen to the eurosceptics, and opted to continue on a path of integration rather than giving the eurosceptic view the time of day in light of the amount of support the eurosceptic crowd had gained with it's well funded campaigns across Europe. It didn't make sense that they'd just ignore them altogether, but now I wonder if these guys know full well about all the Russian money being poured into far-right and eurosceptic campaigns then they may well recognise that much of the eurosceptic vote is simply Russian stirred dissent.

All those claims Russia made about the West stirring discontent in the Ukraine rather than it simply being a grass roots campaign for change that's been going on in the Ukraine since at least 2004 with their orange revolution? It seems that whatever Russia is accusing the West of doing, it is most definitely doing itself- even if you're willing to give the benefit of the doubt on some o

Well, no mention of missile system here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/worl...
This one suggests a different platform: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/...
http://www.vox.com/2014/7/18/5... references other aircraft shot down at ranges requiring BUK or Pantsir missiles.

So it does look like someone was using a missile system capable of taking down an airliner to shoot down other Ukrainian aircraft, although it could be a Pantsir rather than a BUK.

I'd rather have a Pantsir myself, the missile is nice but those autocannon are multipurpose hotness. No pictures of a Pantsir being spirited back across the border into Russia just after shooting down the wrong aircraft though.

A proposed internet tax is the least of problems with Hungary's current government. Selected headlines from around the web:

The Guardian: Hungary's rabid right is taking the country to a political abyss

The Tablet: Meet Europe’s New Fascists

The Telegraph: Inside the far-Right stronghold where Hungarian Jews fear for the future

Aljazeera: Hungary: Towards the Abyss Investigating why critics of Hungary's authoritarian government believe it is leading the country towards fascism

The Tablet's, tagline is "A New Read on Jewish Life" and of course Aljazeera is Islamic. The Telegraph and Guardian are respectable British publications. They all agree that Hungary is leaning fascist.

Canadian experiments from the 70s suggest otherwise. Canada tried it in the city of Dauphin, and people didn't down tools en masse. The ones who did either went to school or were staying home to care for children or relatives.

Why wouldn't it work in practice? It would be easy enough to shut down all mosques, ban the Koran, ban Muslim symbols, etc. It would be easy enough to hamper travel to Muslim countries, and in particular ban the Hajj.

Because laws like that so very successful in wiping out Judaism and Christianity, that only know of them through ancient historical texts, right?

Not true. It's okay to ban organizations in a democracy, which is why the Nazis have been banned in Germany for some time. The US made membership of the KKK illegal (note: membership, not engaging in crimes).

First, the Nazis are banned in Germany because it was a political movement that usurped the Nazis murdered 11 million people (and killed another 6 million through warfare), they assassinated their political opponents and allies they didn't trust. You could say that Germany considers it a criminal organization, but that would be an understatement.

Secondly, it was not illegal to be a member of the Klu Klux Klan in July. Although several Florida police officers were fired for being members.

Although the KKK is considered a hate group by the U.S. government, it is not illegal to be a member of the group, and most police departments do not screen for such membership

If something has changed since then, I have not hear anything about it.

France (a Western democracy) has gone down that path long ago, where they started placing restrictions on *display* of religion.

As far as I understand that restriction was on "display" of religious symbols and icons in public schools by teachers (and other staff) as part of their separation of church and state laws. If there is a broader law that you wish to cite, you may need to provide a link to the law.

while that was an absolutely stupid thing to do, its not really relevant to the topic at hand here now is it??

It's not even really true; it's just bamboozlement for people who want to be bamboozled. If you listen to the actual fracking interview, he says that his goals, on this particular trip to the Middle East include outreach to the Muslim world, including reminding them in their role in the development of science. That is a non-surprising goal for an official trip to a particular region. I have a news flash - at the recent IAC meeting, he congratulated the Indians on the initial success of their MOM Mars mission. I suppose the Telegraph will take offense of that too.

I have met Mr. Bolden several times, and had the opportunity to see him in action. He is an excellent NASA administrator who is seriously focused on "boots on Mars," not self-esteem initiatives.

The problem with feminism today is that it is a movement supporting misandry and is not, in any reasonable definition of the word, a movement for equality. To wit, feminists want to -- and, indeed, have -- remove fundamental constitutional protections from men accused of rape. A man accused of rape can be expelled from college without the presumption of evidence. If the "preponderance of evidence" suggests he might have raped the girl, the college can, and indeed, has expelled innocent men. Just ask Caleb Weber, who was expelled from college for a rape accusation so flimsy, the police got a warrant for the arrest of the woman in question for filing a false rape claim.

If modern feminists want to be taken seriously, they are going to have to stop playing the victim, stop going on witch hunts, and start acting like grown ups who take responsibility for their actions.

Because the inadmissable sample is a much cheaper lead that can be done before spending money on the real thing.

Alright buddy, I look forward to your response to this. Occam's razor is a funny thing--it bends every which way depending on how uninformed the user is. After the Deepwater Horizon spill, BP launched a $200 million whitewashing campaign, including a now-defunct youtube channel full of propaganda videos--
http://www.prwatch.org/news/20...
--but there's no way any of that would go towards paid trolls! Oh wait, there totally is.
http://tech.slashdot.org/story...

The slashdot summary doesn't even mention the death threats sent by BP agents in the original article.
http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...
"Billie Garde, BP's deputy ombudsman, in a letter to the Government Accountability Project dated December 18, 2012, stated clearly that "BP America contracts management of its Facebook page to Ogilvy Public Relations" and added, "Ogilvy manages all of BP America's social media matters". According to BP America, Ogilvy has a group of 10 individuals in different time zones that perform comment screening of the page," wrote Garde.

In spite of this, you want to tell me that, even though Samsung pays trolls:
http://www.techmtaa.com/2013/1...
http://www.valuewalk.com/2013/...

Even though telecoms pay trolls:
http://www.vice.com/read/troll...
Even though non-domestic propaganda contractors like Leonie Industries pay trolls to troll domestically:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetw...
"USA Today reports that in his campaign against the reporters, Chidiac created "fan sites" with URLs matching the names of the reporter and editor who worked on the stories and then filled those sites with content that criticized the journalist's past reporting."

...even despite all this, you somehow think that Exxon-Mobil, the second richest corporation in the world, wouldn't pay trolls for the purpose of PR cleanup?
If you don't think opinion here makes a difference, then ask yourself why every topic about the NSA is full of endless "fuck beta" comments and huge blobs of meaningless text with bolded sections telling you how to configure your router. Maybe it doesn't make a difference, but it seems like there are many with deep pockets who do not agree with you.

Regardless, you have a lot of reading to do before you're fit to tell anyone about occam's razor re: paid shills.

Oh? You all voted me down eh? How about you read http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...

Coal use is leveling off in China this year.
http://m.greenpeace.org/eastas...

Coal use should drop in china:
http://america.aljazeera.com/a...

Coal mines are closing:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com...

Put your tin foil hat back on. Then bury it... no need to take it off first. America never shot anyone, nor had any other country shoot anyone for the simple reason of them wanting to leave country. East Germany killed thousands for this at Russia's instruction (and remember Putin was part of that Russian security operation in East Germany). And every other country under Russia's thumb did the same. Soviet Union = Russia. And Petrov??? All he did was assume that a shitty Russian built system malfunctioned. He did his job. If you made a hero out of him, you are lame. Their systems probably weren't that reliable so his assumption that the system failed was probably immediate. After all, the great minds of Russia would do things as stupid as shoot down civilian air liners. The difference here is that the guy at the trigger (and his family) would have died too.

http://america.aljazeera.com/o...
Snippet: Despite finding that Mayfield’s print was not an identical match to the print left on the bag of detonators, FBI fingerprint examiners rationalized away the differences, according to a report by the Department of Justice’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG). Under the one discrepancy rule, the FBI lab should have concluded Mayfield did not leave the print found in Madrid — a conclusion the SNP reached and repeatedly communicated to the FBI. The FBI’s Portland field office, however, used that fingerprint match to begin digging into Mayfield’s background. Certain details of the attorney’s life convinced the agents that they had their man. Mayfield had converted to Islam after meeting his wife, an Egyptian.

> Sorry but everyone on earth is a potential criminal.

Right there is your problem. You'll never see it because your mindset is inherently authoritarian.

> I don't care how many times my finger prints are compared

Trust in authority!

> One of the prerequisites of having a passport is not having an outstanding warrant.

No, in some cases that can be the reason to deny issuing you a passport. But in and of itself it is not sufficient to cancel a passport.
And that means that it is reasonable to match your photo against a list of criminals when applying for the passport but that does not make it OK to search all passport holders to see if they might be a criminal.

> Oh well, he's going to prison for life for looking like a child predator.
> (Hopefully there are safeguards against this.)

In a free society you could be sure that was the case.
But I am not so sure anymore.

1. Israel can prevent civilian deaths.

During the course of the past twelve days, Israeli air strikeshave killedover 1000Palestinians—mostly civilians.

Israelsaysthe deaths are a result of Hamas using ordinary Palestinians as human shields, and the gruesome toll has been met with a shrug.

It’s an issue thathas come upduring past operations in Gaza.

Back in 2009, during Operation Cast Lead, the president of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann,condemnedIsrael for violating international law in Gaza by targeting civilians.

Brockmanncalledthe offensive “a war against a helpless defenceless and imprisoned people.”

“Theviolationsof international law inherent in the Gaza assault have been well documented,” he added, listing collective punishment, disproportionate military force [and]attacks on civilian targets, including homes, mosques, universities, schools.”

Israel doesn’t have to fire at the civilian targets, it’s a choice that they make. Hamas rockets are broadlyineffectiveanyway—given Israel’s comprehensive network of bomb shelters. Just three civilians in Israel have been killed so far.

Noting the Israeli military’s “long record of unlawful airstrikes with high civilian casualties”, Human Rights Watch Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitsoncommentedthat Israel “would never accept an argument that any Israeli home of an Israel Defense Force member would be a valid military target.”

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner also couldn’t provide any evidence of houses being used to command in control rocket attacks, when directlyqueriedby reporters.

2. The three Israeli teenswere killed immediately after being kidnapped.

Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal recently revealed that the Israeli governmentknewthatthe three missing Israeli teens, whowere abductedin June from Hebron in the West Bank, were murdered almost as soon as they were kidnapped. However, this was not revealed to the public, and insteadthe search forthe missing teenagers unleashed to a brutal crackdown on the West Bank.

Blumenthal says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used outrage around the kidnapping to whip up enough support to justify the aggressive military campaign that has ensued.

3. Gaza is basically an open-air prison.

The economic blockade of Gaz

1. Israel can prevent civilian deaths.

During the course of the past twelve days, Israeli air strikeshave killedover 1000Palestinians—mostly civilians.

Israelsaysthe deaths are a result of Hamas using ordinary Palestinians as human shields, and the gruesome toll has been met with a shrug.

It’s an issue thathas come upduring past operations in Gaza.

Back in 2009, during Operation Cast Lead, the president of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann,condemnedIsrael for violating international law in Gaza by targeting civilians.

Brockmanncalledthe offensive “a war against a helpless defenceless and imprisoned people.”

“Theviolationsof international law inherent in the Gaza assault have been well documented,” he added, listing collective punishment, disproportionate military force [and]attacks on civilian targets, including homes, mosques, universities, schools.”

Israel doesn’t have to fire at the civilian targets, it’s a choice that they make. Hamas rockets are broadlyineffectiveanyway—given Israel’s comprehensive network of bomb shelters. Just three civilians in Israel have been killed so far.

Noting the Israeli military’s “long record of unlawful airstrikes with high civilian casualties”, Human Rights Watch Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitsoncommentedthat Israel “would never accept an argument that any Israeli home of an Israel Defense Force member would be a valid military target.”

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner also couldn’t provide any evidence of houses being used to command in control rocket attacks, when directlyqueriedby reporters.

2. The three Israeli teenswere killed immediately after being kidnapped.

Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal recently revealed that the Israeli governmentknewthatthe three missing Israeli teens, whowere abductedin June from Hebron in the West Bank, were murdered almost as soon as they were kidnapped. However, this was not revealed to the public, and insteadthe search forthe missing teenagers unleashed to a brutal crackdown on the West Bank.

Blumenthal says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used outrage around the kidnapping to whip up enough support to justify the aggressive military campaign that has ensued.

3. Gaza is basically an open-air prison.

The economic blockade of Gaz

1. Israel can prevent civilian deaths.

During the course of the past twelve days, Israeli air strikeshave killedover 1000Palestinians—mostly civilians.

Israelsaysthe deaths are a result of Hamas using ordinary Palestinians as human shields, and the gruesome toll has been met with a shrug.

It’s an issue thathas come upduring past operations in Gaza.

Back in 2009, during Operation Cast Lead, the president of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann,condemnedIsrael for violating international law in Gaza by targeting civilians.

Brockmanncalledthe offensive “a war against a helpless defenceless and imprisoned people.”

“Theviolationsof international law inherent in the Gaza assault have been well documented,” he added, listing collective punishment, disproportionate military force [and]attacks on civilian targets, including homes, mosques, universities, schools.”

Israel doesn’t have to fire at the civilian targets, it’s a choice that they make. Hamas rockets are broadlyineffectiveanyway—given Israel’s comprehensive network of bomb shelters. Just three civilians in Israel have been killed so far.

Noting the Israeli military’s “long record of unlawful airstrikes with high civilian casualties”, Human Rights Watch Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitsoncommentedthat Israel “would never accept an argument that any Israeli home of an Israel Defense Force member would be a valid military target.”

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner also couldn’t provide any evidence of houses being used to command in control rocket attacks, when directlyqueriedby reporters.

2. The three Israeli teenswere killed immediately after being kidnapped.

Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal recently revealed that the Israeli governmentknewthatthe three missing Israeli teens, whowere abductedin June from Hebron in the West Bank, were murdered almost as soon as they were kidnapped. However, this was not revealed to the public, and insteadthe search forthe missing teenagers unleashed to a brutal crackdown on the West Bank.

Blumenthal says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used outrage around the kidnapping to whip up enough support to justify the aggressive military campaign that has ensued.

3. Gaza is basically an open-air prison.

The economic blockade of Gaz

1. Israel can prevent civilian deaths.

During the course of the past twelve days, Israeli air strikeshave killedover 1000Palestinians—mostly civilians.

Israelsaysthe deaths are a result of Hamas using ordinary Palestinians as human shields, and the gruesome toll has been met with a shrug.

It’s an issue thathas come upduring past operations in Gaza.

Back in 2009, during Operation Cast Lead, the president of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann,condemnedIsrael for violating international law in Gaza by targeting civilians.

Brockmanncalledthe offensive “a war against a helpless defenceless and imprisoned people.”

“Theviolationsof international law inherent in the Gaza assault have been well documented,” he added, listing collective punishment, disproportionate military force [and]attacks on civilian targets, including homes, mosques, universities, schools.”

Israel doesn’t have to fire at the civilian targets, it’s a choice that they make. Hamas rockets are broadlyineffectiveanyway—given Israel’s comprehensive network of bomb shelters. Just three civilians in Israel have been killed so far.

Noting the Israeli military’s “long record of unlawful airstrikes with high civilian casualties”, Human Rights Watch Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitsoncommentedthat Israel “would never accept an argument that any Israeli home of an Israel Defense Force member would be a valid military target.”

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner also couldn’t provide any evidence of houses being used to command in control rocket attacks, when directlyqueriedby reporters.

2. The three Israeli teenswere killed immediately after being kidnapped.

Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal recently revealed that the Israeli governmentknewthatthe three missing Israeli teens, whowere abductedin June from Hebron in the West Bank, were murdered almost as soon as they were kidnapped. However, this was not revealed to the public, and insteadthe search forthe missing teenagers unleashed to a brutal crackdown on the West Bank.

Blumenthal says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used outrage around the kidnapping to whip up enough support to justify the aggressive military campaign that has ensued.

3. Gaza is basically an open-air prison.

The economic blockade of Gaz

1. Israel can prevent civilian deaths.

During the course of the past twelve days, Israeli air strikeshave killedover 1000Palestinians—mostly civilians.

Israelsaysthe deaths are a result of Hamas using ordinary Palestinians as human shields, and the gruesome toll has been met with a shrug.

It’s an issue thathas come upduring past operations in Gaza.

Back in 2009, during Operation Cast Lead, the president of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann,condemnedIsrael for violating international law in Gaza by targeting civilians.

Brockmanncalledthe offensive “a war against a helpless defenceless and imprisoned people.”

“Theviolationsof international law inherent in the Gaza assault have been well documented,” he added, listing collective punishment, disproportionate military force [and]attacks on civilian targets, including homes, mosques, universities, schools.”

Israel doesn’t have to fire at the civilian targets, it’s a choice that they make. Hamas rockets are broadlyineffectiveanyway—given Israel’s comprehensive network of bomb shelters. Just three civilians in Israel have been killed so far.

Noting the Israeli military’s “long record of unlawful airstrikes with high civilian casualties”, Human Rights Watch Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitsoncommentedthat Israel “would never accept an argument that any Israeli home of an Israel Defense Force member would be a valid military target.”

IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner also couldn’t provide any evidence of houses being used to command in control rocket attacks, when directlyqueriedby reporters.

2. The three Israeli teenswere killed immediately after being kidnapped.

Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal recently revealed that the Israeli governmentknewthatthe three missing Israeli teens, whowere abductedin June from Hebron in the West Bank, were murdered almost as soon as they were kidnapped. However, this was not revealed to the public, and insteadthe search forthe missing teenagers unleashed to a brutal crackdown on the West Bank.

Blumenthal says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used outrage around the kidnapping to whip up enough support to justify the aggressive military campaign that has ensued.

3. Gaza is basically an open-air prison.

The economic blockade of Gaz