October 16, 2015


News Clips For The Day


http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/15/fbi-record-police-killings-tamir-rice-eric-garner

US policing The Counted
Eric Garner and Tamir Rice among those missing from FBI record of police killings
Jon Swaine and Oliver Laughland in New York
Thursday 15 October 2015

Only 224 of 18,000 law enforcement agencies reported fatal shootings in 2014
Previously unpublished FBI data sheds new light on flawed voluntary system


Photograph -- Emerald Garner, daughter of Eric Garner, right, cries while standing next to Esaw Garner, Eric Garner’s wife, center, and Lesley McSpadden, mother of Michael Brown, in April. Photograph: Seth Wenig/AP
Video -- Video shows John Crawford's girlfriend aggressively questioned after Ohio police shot him dead in Walmart -- Read more
Related Article -- Analysis The tracking of police violence in the US may have reached a turning point. The past week has seen a series of comments regarding the state of documenting US police killings – and some clarity on how the government plans to do so -- Read more.
Related Article -- The Counted: people killed by police in the United States in 2015 – interactive. The Guardian is counting the people killed by US law enforcement agencies this year. Read their stories and contribute to our ongoing, crowdsourced project

Killings by police that unleashed a new protest movement around the US in 2014, including those of Eric Garner, Tamir Rice and John Crawford, are missing from the federal government’s official record of homicides by officers because most departments refuse to submit data.

Only 224 of 18,000 law enforcement agencies around the US reported a fatal shooting by their officers to the FBI last year, according to previously unpublished data obtained by the Guardian, which sheds new light on flaws in official systems for counting the use of deadly force by police.

The Counted, an investigation by the Guardian to report all deaths caused by police in 2015, had already logged deadly shootings by officers from 224 different law enforcement agencies by 10 April this year. Crowd-sourced counts in 2014 recorded deaths at a similar higher rate.

Stephen Fischer, a spokesman for the FBI, said exclusions were inevitable because the program remained voluntary. “We have no way of knowing how many incidents may have been omitted,” Fischer said in an email.

Amid mounting pressure on public authorities to overhaul the recording of deadly incidents involving law enforcement, an extensive review of all data on “justifiable homicides” by police collected by the FBI from police departments between 2004 and 2014 found:

No police departments from the state of Florida reported any homicides by officers, meaning deaths caused by police in the country’s third-most populous state were not logged by the FBI. The New York police department, by far the country’s biggest, submitted data for just one year during the past decade.

The FBI records only basic personal details of each person killed and not information such as whether they were armed with a weapon – a critical factor in ongoing debates over the use of force by police around the country.

A chaotic approach was applied to recording other high-profile deaths over recent years. Some were logged, some filed to a separate category with general homicides without noting the subjects were killed by police, and others were ignored.

An increase in the number of homicides by police publicly reported by the FBI over the past five years was effectively matched by a rise in the number of individual departments reporting any homicides, casting doubt over purported trends in the data.

Details of other controversial deaths that prompted protests were entered incorrectly in the FBI database, damaging government efforts to monitor demographic information about people killed by police.

The analysis of raw FBI data was carried out as the US Department of Justice announced it was trialling a new open-source system for counting homicides by law enforcement. The system’s methodology closely resembles those of The Counted and a Washington Post record of fatal police shootings.


News of the pilot program, which is being run by the department’s bureau of justice statistics, came following strident comments from both US attorney general Loretta Lynch and FBI director James Comey, who reiterated calls for better official records of homicides by police.

Comprehensive records of killings by law enforcement officers has been a demand of the Black Lives Matter movement, which has risen to prominence since the fatal police shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, of Michael Brown in August 2014. It was also among the recommendations made by Barack Obama’s White House policing taskforce, which was convened following Brown’s death, which was among those recorded in the FBI database.

While the people killed were not named in the FBI database, some could be identified by matching entries with publicly-available information on their age, sex and race, as well as those of the officer who shot them, the location of the incident, and the month it occurred.

But the death in July of Eric Garner, who was placed in a chokehold by an NYPD officer allegedly confronting Garner about selling loose cigarettes, was not included in the official federal record. The NYPD has not submitted data to the FBI since 2006. It pledged earlier this month to release more detailed data on officers’ deadly use of force from next year.

Erica Garner, Garner’s daughter, said she was “outraged but not shocked” by the omission. “It’s just another part of the cover-up and erasing of his murder from the record,” Garner said. “It says to the NYPD and the city and state of New York that my father’s life doesn’t matter.”

No other department in the state of New York had any homicides by officers recorded by the FBI during the decade except for one, by Rochester in 2006. In its annual Firearms Discharge Reports, NYPD has recorded 117 “subjects shot and killed by officers” between 2004 and 2014. Its total of 13 shooting deaths for 2006, however, exceeded the 10 reported to the FBI that year, the only 12-month period in which the department participated in the FBI’s count.

NYPD’s own counts also did not include non-shooting deaths such as Garner’s. By contrast a more comprehensive count of incidents and details of the demographics of the people involved would be “a huge help in this so-called ‘push to improve police relations with the Black community’,” said Erica Garner.

Florida keeps its own annual record of justifiable homicides by law enforcement, despite no departments in the state filing a report to the FBI in the past decade. The state data from 2013 was provided to the Guardian but did not list the departments responsible for each death, instead it recorded a single, statewide figure of 60 deaths from all departments who submitted records that year. NBC South Florida was provided with records dating back over a decade, showing the number of recorded justifiable homicides has risen from 14 in 1999 to 67 in 2012.

Departments behind some of last year’s most controversial homicides by police, including Cleveland and Beavercreek in Ohio, whose officers shot dead 12-year-old Tamir Rice and 22-year-old John Crawford respectively, also did not file reports on those incidents to the FBI.

A review of data collected over the years by the FBI showed that high-profile homicides in which officers were found to be at fault were not recorded or were logged inconsistently. Problems stem from the fact that only one of the FBI’s 32 classifications for all homicides – which are precise enough to include “child killed by babysitter” and homicides linked to gambling – makes reference to the person who carried out the homicide being a police officer. This classification, “felon killed by police”, is automatically counted as a justifiable homicide.

Apparently because the FBI offers no category for recording killings by law enforcement officers of people who were not felons, some departments have filed unjustified homicides by their officers among the general stack of murders, manslaughters and other killings between civilians.

A record matching the case of Yvette Smith, a 47-year-old black woman who was shot dead by Bastrop County deputy Daniel Willis in Texas when she opened the door to him, appeared among the general unjustified homicides for 2014. As a result, it was not included in the total figure for killings by police publicised by the FBI last month. The death was filed under “circumstances undetermined” and Willis was logged as a stranger to Smith rather than an officer. A prosecution of Willis on charges of murder recently ended in a mistrial.

Similarly Jonathan Ferrell, a 24-year-old former football player at Florida A&M who was shot dead by officer Randall Kerrick after knocking on a door when he crashed his car in North Carolina, appeared to be included among general homicides for 2013. But his death was categorised as “manslaughter by negligence” and Kerrick was recorded as having been known to the victim. A trial of Kerrick for voluntary manslaughter also ended in a hung jury.

Yet no record in either file – homicides by police officers and those by civilians – could be found that matched other major cases, including that of Oscar Grant, the 22-year-old black man shot dead at a transit station in Oakland, California, in January 2009. Grant’s death was dramatised in the film Fruitvale Station. Officer Johannes Mehserle, who said he meant to use a Taser, was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter but cleared of murder.

No entries appeared for Rekia Boyd, a 22-year-old woman shot dead by an off-duty Chicago police officer in March 2012, nor for Malissa Williams, 30, and Timothy Russell, 43, who died after 137 shots were fired into their car by police officers in Cleveland, Ohio in November the same year.

The FBI has also logged incorrect information for several deaths. Among these was the case of Darrien Hunt, a 22-year-old who was shot dead in September last year while running away from police in Saratoga Springs, Utah, after allegedly wielding a replica sword. Hunt was listed as the person who carried out the homicide, and a knife or blade was said to be the deadly weapon. Hunt and the officers who shot him were listed as acquaintances.

Hunt’s mother, Susan, said the confused logging of her son’s death came even after federal officials said earlier this year that the FBI and Department of Justice were carrying out their own review of the fatal shooting. “There has been so much wrong with the entire incident,” she said.

Fischer, the FBI spokesman, said departments had until December to submit missing or corrected data and said the information analysed by the Guardian for 2014 was “a snapshot in time” that may be updated.

A knife was also listed as the fatal weapon for a case matching the details of Chieu-di Thi Vo, a 47-year-old woman shot dead by a Greensboro, North Carolina, police officer in March last year after allegedly brandishing a knife. Vo’s demographic information was given for both the person who was killed and the officer who carried out the homicide, who was in fact a man. The FBI’s final published tally counted only one homicide by a blade, but did not state which this was.

The Counted has documented more than 900 deaths caused by encounters with law enforcement officers so far this year. The FBI count, from which basic statistics were published earlier this month, documented just 444 justifiable homicides for the whole of 2014. That total was reached by the Guardian count before the halfway point of 2015.

The FBI data showed that while the number of departments reporting killings by their officers rose 14% from 196 per year in 2009 to 224 last year, the number of homicides increased by 12% from 392 to 439 per year in the same period.

Because of the nature of the FBI program there is no way of calculating whether these increases reflect a genuine rise in the number of people killed by police over the years or simply that more agencies have decided to submit their data.

Comey said last week that it was “unacceptable” the Guardian and the Washington Post were “becoming the lead source of information about violent encounters between police and civilians”.

“You can get online today and figure out how many tickets were sold to ‘The Martian,’ which I saw this weekend ... The CDC can do the same with the flu,” Comey said. “It’s ridiculous – it’s embarrassing and ridiculous – that we can’t talk about crime in the same way, especially in the high-stakes incidents when your officers have to use force.”



GEEK SPEAK IN THIS ARTICLE:

http://techterms.com/definition/opensource

Open Source

When a software program is open source, it means the program's source code is freely available to the public. Unlike commercial software, open source programs can be modified and distributed by anyone and are often developed as a community rather than by a single organization. For this reason, the phrase "open source community" is commonly used to describe the developer of open source software development projects. Since the source code of an open source program can be modified by anyone, it makes sense that the software is also free to download and use.


Crowd-sourced counts

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdsourcing#Definitions

Jeff Howe and Mark Robinson, editors at Wired Magazine, coined the term "crowdsourcing" in 2005 after conversations about how businesses were using the Internet to outsource work to individuals.[2] Howe and Robinson came to the conclusion that what was happening was like "outsourcing to the crowd," which quickly led to the portmanteau "crowdsourcing." Howe first published a definition for the term "crowdsourcing" in a companion blog post to his June 2006 Wired magazine article, "The Rise of Crowdsourcing," which came out in print just days later:[7]

"Simply defined, crowdsourcing represents the act of a company or institution taking a function once performed by employees and outsourcing it to an undefined (and generally large) network of people in the form of an open call. This can take the form of peer-production (when the job is performed collaboratively), but is also often undertaken by sole individuals. The crucial prerequisite is the use of the open call format and the large network of potential laborers."



http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2015/jun/01/the-counted-police-killings-us-database

The Counted is a crowdsourced interactive website with The Guardian.com. I looked at it and it doesn’t give any extra information or even verify whether or not a shot was actually heard. “The geeks” there must have a way of deriving clear information from it, or major newspapers wouldn’t be using it as a reliable source of information. Take a look at it and see what you think of it. I don’t know much at all about computer programs or for that matter statistics, but this “crowdsourcing” method seems unreliable to me. Many of the comments are vague, such as “heard a gunshot.”



theguardian.com -- “… most departments refuse to submit data. Only 224 of 18,000 law enforcement agencies around the US reported a fatal shooting by their officers to the FBI last year, according to previously unpublished data obtained by the Guardian, which sheds new light on flaws in official systems for counting the use of deadly force by police. The Counted, an investigation by the Guardian to report all deaths caused by police in 2015, had already logged deadly shootings by officers from 224 different law enforcement agencies by 10 April this year. Crowd-sourced counts in 2014 recorded deaths at a similar higher rate. …. The FBI records only basic personal details of each person killed and not information such as whether they were armed with a weapon – a critical factor in ongoing debates over the use of force by police around the country. A chaotic approach was applied to recording other high-profile deaths over recent years. Some were logged, some filed to a separate category with general homicides without noting the subjects were killed by police, and others were ignored. An increase in the number of homicides by police publicly reported by the FBI over the past five years was effectively matched by a rise in the number of individual departments reporting any homicides, casting doubt over purported trends in the data. …. The analysis of raw FBI data was carried out as the US Department of Justice announced it was trialling a new open-source system for counting homicides by law enforcement. The system’s methodology closely resembles those of The Counted and a Washington Post record of fatal police shootings. News of the pilot program, which is being run by the department’s bureau of justice statistics, came following strident comments from both US attorney general Loretta Lynch and FBI director James Comey, who reiterated calls for better official records of homicides by police. …. NYPD’s own counts also did not include non-shooting deaths such as Garner’s. By contrast a more comprehensive count of incidents and details of the demographics of the people involved would be “a huge help in this so-called ‘push to improve police relations with the Black community’,” said Erica Garner. …. Comey said last week that it was “unacceptable” the Guardian and the Washington Post were “becoming the lead source of information about violent encounters between police and civilians.” “You can get online today and figure out how many tickets were sold to ‘The Martian,’ which I saw this weekend ... The CDC can do the same with the flu,” Comey said. “It’s ridiculous – it’s embarrassing and ridiculous – that we can’t talk about crime in the same way, especially in the high-stakes incidents when your officers have to use force.”

“A review of data collected over the years by the FBI showed that high-profile homicides in which officers were found to be at fault were not recorded or were logged inconsistently. Problems stem from the fact that only one of the FBI’s 32 classifications for all homicides – which are precise enough to include “child killed by babysitter” and homicides linked to gambling – makes reference to the person who carried out the homicide being a police officer. This classification, “felon killed by police”, is automatically counted as a justifiable homicide. Apparently because the FBI offers no category for recording killings by law enforcement officers of people who were not felons, some departments have filed unjustified homicides by their officers among the general stack of murders, manslaughters and other killings between civilians.”

Both police departments and the FBI share blame in this article, with the FBI reporting form listing too few categories of deaths at the hands of police and the purposeful hiding of officer killings in other more miscellaneous categories. Above all, however, the reporting system is voluntary. The DOJ and the FBI are now running a new plan to collect good data from every department, or at least that seems to be the goal. I wonder what federal law says about police and their departments being required, per se, to do anything at all in how they run their police forces, such as filing a report on killings. Hopefully something is in the works that will improve that situation with the new “pilot program,” which is not named in this article. It, however, “closely resembles” those of The Counted and a Washington Post listing of police killings.



IS “TARJEY” UNDER ATTACK?


http://wgntv.com/2015/10/15/customers-say-porn-played-over-target-stores-intercom/

Customers say porn played over Target store’s intercom
BY TRIBUNE MEDIA WIRE
OCTOBER 15, 2015


SAN JOSE, Calif. – Customers at a Target store in California got nasty shock when they reported hearing a pornographic audio track being played over the store’s intercom system.

Editor's note: The video contains material that some viewers may find disturbing due to its graphic adult nature. Viewer discretion is advised.

Shopper like Chris Minor were horrified by what they heard at the Westgate Mall Target Wednesday morning.

"I felt violated,” Minor told KPIX. “My body said, ‘Wait a minute. This ain't right.’ So I was uneasy."

So were a lot of other shoppers, including mothers with babies like Gina Young. She was shopping with her twins when the moaning and groaning began.

"People offered to help me cover my twins ears. Others threw their stuff down and walked out. Employees were running around everywhere. Picking and hanging up phones, which worked....for about two minutes before it started up again. People were screaming at employees, video taping, some laughing some disgusted. It was terribly awkward," Gina Young posted on Facebook.

"That is terrible," one woman can he heard saying on a video of the incident uploaded to YouTube.

The customer who shot the nearly four minute video said there was also sexually explicit language and profanity, too.

Minor said at one point the sounds stopped when the store workers apologized over the intercom. But then the audio started again.

“Though it may have been Halloween related, maybe an employee playing games, but this was rated X material, which made me feel very uncomfortable,” Minor said. “I was taken aback, appalled and very frustrated."

Target issued the following statement about the issue:

"We are actively reviewing the situation with the team to better understand what happened and to help ensure this doesn't happen again."

Minor said the store’s manager apologized to him, but said Target should have had more safeguards.

KPIX reported that a similar incident happened at a Target store in San Luis Obispo in July.



http://sfist.com/2015/10/15/someone_plays_porn_audio_over_targe.php

[Update] Porn Audio Plays Over Target PA Systems In Northern California
BY JAY BARMANN IN ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT ON OCT 15, 2015

Target shopper Gina Young was with her twins in the chain's Campbell, California store Wednesday when someone began playing the audio from a porno over the store's PA system. She recorded it for posterity and posted it to Youtube and Instagram as you can see above. And, hilariously, one of her three-year-old twins asked of the moaning woman blaring over the speakers, "Is she hurt?"

Says Young, "People offered to help me cover my twins' ears. Others threw their stuff down and walked out. Employees were running around everywhere. Picking and hanging up phones, which worked… for about two minutes before it started up again."

In the video you can sort of see a couple of employees rushing, somewhere, to fix this.

Funnily enough, this is not an isolated incident! As the SF Chronicle notes, something similar happened in July at a Target store in San Luis Obispo, which led to a brief evacuation of the store.

The LA Times got a Target spokesperson on the phone who said the company is investigating the incident, and they “want our guests to know that we take this very seriously.” The spokesperson adds, “We are actively reviewing the situation with the team to better understand what happened and to help ensure this doesn’t happen again."

Was this a marvelous prank by a clever hacker? Or have two different managers plugged their laptops into the wrong jack on their lunch breaks in two different towns? In any event: hilarious.

Update: As KTVU and others are reporting, this is at least the fourth such instance of what appears to be a serial hacking job dating back to April, with two other California stores, in Colma and Tulare, also both experiencing similar porn audio attacks.




Pardon me, but I don’t think this kind of thing is funny. It’s malicious. The little boy who said “Is she hurt?” experienced it as a frightening and painful event, and so do most adults. I think this kind of prank, or possible attack on the brand trustworthiness of Target, is on the level of a 12 year old boy. Nobody of mature and sound mind wants to listen to that kind of disgusting material. If it is an attack on Target by a competitor, I hope they find whoever did it. The existence of four such incidents is no minor matter and appears to show an organized effort.

The first article states, “Picking and hanging up phones, which worked....for about two minutes before it started up again.” So perhaps someone punched the intercom button on some phone in the store and played a tape at that site. If it came in over the computer system, modern computer geeks are good at pinpointing the origin of Internet materials, and the managers at each of the stores should examine their staff members closely to see if it is of local origin. It must have been done by someone with access to the intercom system. When I looked under “Target controversy,” I encountered not one but five different controversies in which the store has been accused of discrimination in ads. They do have some enemies.





HAMAS DAYS OF RAGE -- TWO ARTICLES


http://www.cbsnews.com/news/hamas-call-for-day-of-rage-following-palestinian-attacks-on-israelis/

Israel braces for violence as Hamas calls for another "day of rage"
CBS NEWS
October 16, 2015

35 Photos -- New tide of Israeli-Palestinian violence


Israel is bracing for more violence and Palestinian protests after the Hamas militant group called for a "day of rage" Friday.

The last "day of rage" was on Tuesday, sparking four separate attacks on Israelis and clashes between Israeli security and Palestinian youths.

Already overnight in the West Bank, Israeli defense officials say dozens of Palestinians set fire to Joseph's Tomb, a sacred Jewish site.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the arson attack Friday, calling it "irresponsible," reported French news service Agence France-Presse.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem has been at the heart of recent violence after rumors Israeli officials wanted to limit access to Palestinians. Israeli security is turning away anyone under the age of 40.

In the last three weeks Palestinians have attacked Jews at least a dozen times, in most cases using knives.

Israelis say they have no other option but to defend themselves.

Jerusalem's mayor has called on Israeli citizens with gun permits to carry their weapons in public.

Outside the mosque Friday morning, groups of young Palestinians who were not allowed in were praying outside.

The Palestinian president has also called for peaceful resistance, but Israelis are bracing for what could be another day of violence.




“Israel is bracing for more violence and Palestinian protests after the Hamas militant group called for a "day of rage" Friday. The last "day of rage" was on Tuesday, sparking four separate attacks on Israelis and clashes between Israeli security and Palestinian youths. …. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the arson attack Friday, calling it "irresponsible," reported French news service Agence France-Presse. The Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem has been at the heart of recent violence after rumors Israeli officials wanted to limit access to Palestinians. Israeli security is turning away anyone under the age of 40. …. Israelis say they have no other option but to defend themselves. Jerusalem's mayor has called on Israeli citizens with gun permits to carry their weapons in public. The Palestinian president has also called for peaceful resistance, but Israelis are bracing for what could be another day of violence.”





http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/10/the-roots-of-the-palestinian-uprising-against-israel/410944/

The Paranoid, Supremacist Roots of the Stabbing Intifada
Knife attacks on Jews in Jerusalem and elsewhere are not based on Palestinian frustration over settlements, but on something deeper.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG
October 16, 2015

In September of 1928, a group of Jewish residents of Jerusalem placed a bench in front of the Western Wall of the Temple Mount, for the comfort of elderly worshipers. They also brought with them a wooden partition, to separate the sexes during prayer. Jerusalem’s Muslim leaders treated the introduction of furniture into the alleyway in front of the Wall as a provocation, part of a Jewish conspiracy to slowly take control of the entire Temple Mount.

Many of the leaders of Palestine’s Muslims believed—or claimed to believe—that Jews had manufactured a set of historical and theological connections to the Western Wall and to the Mount, the site of the al-Aqsa mosque and the Dome of the Rock, in order to advance the Zionist project. This belief defied Muslim history—the Dome of the Rock was built by Jerusalem’s Arab conquerors on the site of the Second Jewish Temple in order to venerate its memory (the site had previously been defiled by Jerusalem’s Christian rulers as a kind of rebuke to Judaism, the despised mother religion of Christianity). Jews themselves consider the Mount itself to be the holiest site in their faith. The Western Wall, a large retaining wall from the Second Temple period, is sacred only by proxy.

RELATED STORY

Arson at Joseph’s Tomb

The spiritual leader of Palestine’s Muslims, the mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al-Husseini, incited Arabs in Palestine against their Jewish neighbors by arguing that Islam itself was under threat. (Husseini would later become one of Hitler’s most important Muslim allies.) Jews in British-occupied Palestine responded to Muslim invective by demanding more access to the Wall, sometimes holding demonstrations at the holy site. By the next year, violence directed against Jews by their neighbors had become more common: Arab rioters took the lives of 133 Jews that summer; British forces killed 116 Arabs in their attempt to subdue the riots. In Hebron, a devastating pogrom was launched against the city’s ancient Jewish community after Muslim officials distributed fabricated photographs of a damaged Dome of the Rock, and spread the rumor that Jews had attacked the shrine.

The current “stabbing Intifada” now taking place in Israel—a quasi-uprising in which young Palestinians have been trying, and occasionally succeeding, to kill Jews with knives—is prompted in good part by the same set of manipulated emotions that sparked the anti-Jewish riots of the 1920s: a deeply felt desire on the part of Palestinians to “protect” the Temple Mount from Jews.




This Atlantic article is very informative, but too long to quote. It tells more of the competition and conflict over which religion, Judaism or Islam, has the “right” to worship there. One interesting statement I saw is that Palestinian powers have prevented archaeologists from digging there for fear they will find proof of Jewish use of the site prior to the rise of Islam. After all, the Jews were there some 3,000 years before Islam was invented. It’s just one more sad story.





http://www.cbsnews.com/news/teen-becomes-symbol-of-israeli-palestinian-violence/

Teen becomes symbol of Israeli-Palestinian violence
By JONATHAN VIGILIOTTI CBS NEWS
October 15, 2015

35 PHOTOS -- New tide of Israeli-Palestinian violence
Photograph -- Thirteen-year-old Ahmed Manasra, a Palestinian from Beit Hanina in northern Jerusalem, sits in his hospital bed at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem in this handout picture released from the Israeli Government Press Office (GPO) Oct. 15, 2015.
Play VIDEO -- Tensions escalate amid multiple violent attacks in Israel


TEL AVIV -- Amid a new wave of violence, a 13-year-old boy is at the center of the never-ending battle between Israelis and Palestinians.

To one side, he's a victim. To the other, a terrorist.

The Palestinian Authority said 13-year-old Ahmed Manasra was killed by Israeli soldiers, but then the Israelis released video of the Arab boy -- very much alive -- recovering in hospital.

Israel says Manasra tried to stab two people, including a Jewish teenager, and was hit by a car when he fled the scene.

It's the latest in a string of knife attacks against Israelis that have spooked the country.

Palestinians, mostly young men, armed with knives, appear out of nowhere, stabbing as many as they can. Their targets appear to be random -- which has only added to the fear.

All the suspects have been arrested or shot by Israeli security forces, including one woman gunned down at a bus station.

Now, for the first time since 2000, Israeli security forces set up extra checkpoints around the Palestinian neighborhoods of East Jerusalem. So far, it hasn't done much to reassure anyone.

"It's a very, very dangerous place. We are scared all the time," a father of five told CBS News.

Meantime, both sides buried their dead this week in another grim procession of death.

Palestinians are calling for a day of mass protests after Friday's weekly Muslim prayers as the country braces itself for what could be more violence.




“The Palestinian Authority said 13-year-old Ahmed Manasra was killed by Israeli soldiers, but then the Israelis released video of the Arab boy -- very much alive -- recovering in hospital. Israel says Manasra tried to stab two people, including a Jewish teenager, and was hit by a car when he fled the scene. It's the latest in a string of knife attacks against Israelis that have spooked the country.”

All these knife attacks are happening because of “rumors” that Israel plans to limit access to Palestinians, and the rumor that this Palestinian young man was killed is causing more rage. I am not surprised that Israel is retaliating against the knife attacks, though the requested arming of Israeli citizens in Jerusalem with guns sounds irregular. That kind of thing just fans the fire of civil violence, it seems to me, which can’t be to the Jewish state’s advantage.





http://www.npr.org/2015/10/16/448944541/sexual-harrassment-case-shines-light-on-sciences-dark-secrect

Sexual Harassment Case Shines Light On Science's Dark Secret
Michaeleen Doucleff
OCTOBER 16, 2015

Photograph -- Astronomer Geoffrey Marcy, shown here at a scientific conference in 2015, resigned Wednesday from his faculty position at the University of California, Berkeley. Stuart C. Wilson/Getty Images for Breakthrough Initiatives


A sexual harassment case is sending shock waves through the scientific community this week, and raising questions nationwide about how common sexual harassment is in science and why so little is typically done to stop it.

A six-month investigation by the University of California, Berkeley concluded in June that a faculty member, renowned astronomer Geoffrey Marcy, violated multiple sexual harassment policies over the course of a decade.

Marcy has been a leader in the hunt for Earth-like planets beyond our solar system, was head of a $100 million project aimed at finding life on other planets, and has often been touted as a possible candidate for the Nobel Prize.

But he resigned Wednesday after a number of faculty members and students in his department publicly released letters condemning his inappropriate behavior with students, and the university's inadequate response in dealing with it.

The school had kept its investigation private — even from its own faculty — until the online news outlet BuzzFeed broke the story last week.

Aside from confirming that "Marcy violated campus sexual harassment policy," the university released no details about what the investigation found. But according to BuzzFeed, the report concluded that Marcy's offensive behavior included unwanted massages, kissing and groping of at least four students, from 2001 to 2010.

One of these students was Sarah Ballard, now a postdoctoral fellow in astronomy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She first met Marcy a decade ago when she was an undergraduate at Berkeley. He taught her astronomy class and showed special interest in her career, she tells NPR.

"To have a really renowned scientist praise you — and praise your ability — you can imagine, was really encouraging to me," she says.

At first, she and Marcy met a few times at cafes around campus, where they talked about astronomy and her career. But sometimes, she says, the conversation became too personal. He talked about when he was young and about having sex with a former girlfriend.

Then one day, Marcy gave Ballard a ride home. He parked the car by her house. "The fact that we were in the car together suddenly made me feel really uncomfortable," she says. "I think I really realized that the tenor of the mood was really wrong."

As Ballard started to get out of the car, the professor "reached over and was rubbing the back of my neck," she says. She left the car — and stopped getting together with Marcy outside of class.

Ballard says she was afraid to report Marcy. She didn't want to hurt her chances of going to graduate school. It's a common and very real conundrum for many women hoping to pursue university research careers, says Katie Hinde, a biologist at Arizona State University.

"Academia has a particular climate that allows sexual harassment, sexual assault and sexual abuses to persist," Hinde tells NPR. Last year, she co-authored one of the few studies aimed at figuring out how common sexual harassment is in science.

Hinde and her colleagues surveyed roughly 500 women doing fieldwork in a range of scientific disciplines. Seventy percent of those women told the researchers they had experienced sexual harassment, often from their mentors or supervisors — "people who had power over their career, who had power over their research," Hinde says.

In science, letters of recommendation from mentors are particularly crucial to obtaining a coveted faculty position, Hinde says. When a mentor sexually harasses or assaults a woman, it backs her into a corner: She can either report the offense, and possibly hurt her career. Or she can try to ignore it.

In fact, most harassment is never reported, says Heather Metcalf, research director of the Association for Women in Science.

Women are often told to keep quiet about lewd comments, touching and leering, she says. "There is a bit of a norm for those behaviors to sort of be brushed off, rather than be taken seriously."

An incident last summer involving the prestigious journal Science shows how common this attitude is, Metcalf says. A young female scientist wrote to the journal's advice column, asking what she should do about a situation in the lab where she worked.

"She was really enjoying the scientific work she was doing, but she was feeling really uncomfortable because she kept catching her supervisor trying to take a peek down her blouse," Metcalf says.

The magazine columnist essentially advised the woman to say nothing — to turn a blind eye, Metcalf says. Science eventually retracted the column.

But the culture of keeping silent about sexual harassment continues.

In Marcy's case, it took years of complaints before the university took up its investigation. Then it disciplined him privately.

The university, which declined an interview with NPR, confirmed in a written statement that Marcy was told to follow strict behavior guidelines or "be immediately subject to sanctions that could include suspension or dismissal." This agreement was the "most certain and effective option for preventing any inappropriate future conduct," according to the statement.

Michael Eisen, a molecular biologist at Berkeley, disagrees.

"In essence the university convicted him," Eisen says, "and what was so stunning to me was that Marcy got, at best, something you would describe as a slap on the wrist."

By not punishing him, Eisen says, "they're all but ensuring this kind of behavior is going to continue from others. Basically they're saying there are no consequences for this type of behavior."

In the days since the news got out, many scientists have demanded consequences.

Thousands of scientists have signed an online petition supporting the women Marcy harassed. And 24 faculty members in the department of astronomy at Berkeley signed and released a letter Monday that said, in part, "we believe that Geoff Marcy cannot perform the functions of a faculty member."

Marcy hasn't responded to NPR's request for an interview. He denies some of the allegations, but prior to his resignation, and to the publication of the BuzzFeed story, he posted a public apology "for mistakes I've made" on his faculty website.




“Marcy has been a leader in the hunt for Earth-like planets beyond our solar system, was head of a $100 million project aimed at finding life on other planets, and has often been touted as a possible candidate for the Nobel Prize. But he resigned Wednesday after a number of faculty members and students in his department publicly released letters condemning his inappropriate behavior with students, and the university's inadequate response in dealing with it. …. Aside from confirming that "Marcy violated campus sexual harassment policy," the university released no details about what the investigation found. But according to BuzzFeed, the report concluded that Marcy's offensive behavior included unwanted massages, kissing and groping of at least four students, from 2001 to 2010. …. At first, she and Marcy met a few times at cafes around campus, where they talked about astronomy and her career. But sometimes, she says, the conversation became too personal. He talked about when he was young and about having sex with a former girlfriend. Then one day, Marcy gave Ballard a ride home. He parked the car by her house. "The fact that we were in the car together suddenly made me feel really uncomfortable," she says. "I think I really realized that the tenor of the mood was really wrong." As Ballard started to get out of the car, the professor "reached over and was rubbing the back of my neck," she says. She left the car — and stopped getting together with Marcy outside of class. …. Last year, she co-authored one of the few studies aimed at figuring out how common sexual harassment is in science. Hinde and her colleagues surveyed roughly 500 women doing fieldwork in a range of scientific disciplines. Seventy percent of those women told the researchers they had experienced sexual harassment, often from their mentors or supervisors — "people who had power over their career, who had power over their research," Hinde says. In science, letters of recommendation from mentors are particularly crucial to obtaining a coveted faculty position, Hinde says. When a mentor sexually harasses or assaults a woman, it backs her into a corner: She can either report the offense, and possibly hurt her career. Or she can try to ignore it. …. . "There is a bit of a norm for those behaviors to sort of be brushed off, rather than be taken seriously."

“The magazine columnist essentially advised the woman to say nothing — to turn a blind eye, Metcalf says. Science eventually retracted the column. But the culture of keeping silent about sexual harassment continues. In Marcy's case, it took years of complaints before the university took up its investigation. Then it disciplined him privately. The university, which declined an interview with NPR, confirmed in a written statement that Marcy was told to follow strict behavior guidelines or "be immediately subject to sanctions that could include suspension or dismissal."

Though Marcy was not severely punished by the University, a situation typical of male/female conflicts of this type – just try “telling on your boss” at almost any job and see what happens – Marcy’s university peers around the country have signed petitions and letters asking for his dismissal from the faculty. What this tells me is that the antifeminist tide is turning in the mainstream citizenry at least among the well-educated, and there is room for a hopeful future. Situations like this are not new. They’re just newly being reported. For a woman to stand up in this situation takes real courage, as she is likely to be found the guilty party, a “wanton woman.”

I would say, however, that for a student or employee to go out socially with her professor/boss is not a good idea, and for her to wear a low-cut top or an overly short skirt is never smart. It invites peering eyes and gives her a “reputation” that she shouldn’t want. Some young women do things like that to express their independence, but I wouldn’t advise it. There will be “unintended consequences” as long as the two sexes are constructed in the way that they are. Work with men, yes, and go for the top in your jobs, but do it in a professional manner. I’m not moralistic, but I am practical. Some facts are facts, not because we agree with their justice, but because human nature is hardwired in those ways. As for the justice in a rape, there is none, and that kind of criminal should go to prison until he is too old to do that kind of thing anymore.





http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/10/15/449011872/ken-taylor-canadian-envoy-who-hid-americans-during-iran-hostage-crisis-dies

Ken Taylor, Canadian Envoy Who Hid Americans During Iran Hostage Crisis, Dies
Laura Wagner
OCTOBER 15, 2015 7:52 PM ET

Photograph -- Ken Taylor helped a group of Americans avoid capture and eventually escape Iran in 1979. The former Canadian ambassador to Iran died Thursday at 81.
Gregory Payan/AP


Ken Taylor, the Canadian ambassador to Iran who concealed a group of Americans at his home during the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis, died Thursday. He was 81. Taylor's wife, Pat, told The Associated Press that he had colon cancer.

Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper noted Taylor's death.

"It is with sadness that I learned of the passing of Ken Taylor. As Canada's Ambassador to Iran during the Iranian Revolution, Taylor valiantly risked his own life by shielding a group of American diplomats from capture. Ken Taylor represented the very best that Canada's foreign service has to offer."

Condolences also came in from U.S. officials who expressed both sadness over Taylor's death and gratitude for his help in 1979.

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a statement, "Ambassador Taylor's courageous actions exemplify the enduring nature of the special relationship between the United States and Canada."

U.S. Ambassador Bruce Heyman also added his gratitude in a statement, saying, "Ambassador Taylor earned the enduring gratitude of the United States — and was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal — for his valor and ingenuity in harboring six American citizens trapped in Iran in the aftermath of the seizure of the American Embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979 and, ultimately, in securing their safe return."

On the 30th anniversary of the Americans' escape from Iran, what's now called the Canadian Caper, NPR's Scott Simon described the situation:

"Sixty-six Americans were taken hostage by Iranian students who captured the U.S. embassy in Tehran in November of 1979. Some were released within weeks, but 52 of the hostages, from U.S. Marine guards and secretaries to the charge d'affaires of the embassy, were held for 444 days. But six Americans who were outside the embassy compound escaped capture and got back to the United States because they called friends for help.

"For three months, Canada's ambassador to Iran, Ken Taylor, and other Canadian embassy employees, hid those six Americans in their own quarters and at great personal risk. They also collected intelligence and helped the CIA concoct a plan to bring their American guests out safely, even as it meant closing the Canadian embassy."

The story of the Americans' time hiding in Tehran and their eventual escape was captured in the 2012 Oscar-winning film Argo, in which Taylor is portrayed by actor Victor Garber. Taylor and others, however, contended that the film didn't give Canada enough credit for helping the Americans, and said the film glorified the CIA's role in the process.

Despite the controversy over the credit paid to Taylor in the film, he told NPR's Scott Simon in a 2011 interview — before the movie was released — that "not a month goes by" that some American doesn't approach him and shake his hand to thank him for his actions. Taylor said:

"I enjoy that, of course, because it is a sense saying to Canada: this is what you did. And Americans - U.S. citizens have long memories, particularly when they feel themselves in a dilemma where they're looking for an ally and that ally is there and is prepared to act on their behalf whatever the consequences."




“As Canada's Ambassador to Iran during the Iranian Revolution, Taylor valiantly risked his own life by shielding a group of American diplomats from capture. Ken Taylor represented the very best that Canada's foreign service has to offer." Condolences also came in from U.S. officials who expressed both sadness over Taylor's death and gratitude for his help in 1979. …. "For three months, Canada's ambassador to Iran, Ken Taylor, and other Canadian embassy employees, hid those six Americans in their own quarters and at great personal risk. They also collected intelligence and helped the CIA concoct a plan to bring their American guests out safely, even as it meant closing the Canadian embassy." The story of the Americans' time hiding in Tehran and their eventual escape was captured in the 2012 Oscar-winning film Argo, in which Taylor is portrayed by actor Victor Garber. Taylor and others, however, contended that the film didn't give Canada enough credit for helping the Americans, and said the film glorified the CIA's role in the process. …. Despite the controversy over the credit paid to Taylor in the film, he told NPR's Scott Simon in a 2011 interview — before the movie was released — that "not a month goes by" that some American doesn't approach him and shake his hand to thank him for his actions.”

This Canadian’s saving of some of our diplomatic staff took personal courage, and it ran the risk of starting a war with Iran. It’s a shame that our American film which depicted the story didn’t give Taylor full credit for his actions. I didn’t see it because I wasn’t in the mood for that much violence, but it is probably a useful look at history. In those days I was an active Democrat, but I didn’t keep up with the news as I do now. I did feel great sympathy with President Carter because he was just following the US position on the Shah by allowing him into the country. We did, however, misjudge the situation which allowed a group of students like that to take over an embassy. Many thought at the time that Carter should have declared war on Iran, and such an act is an unconscionable action in peacetime. Carter has always believed strongly in peace is the truth. He did make an effort to rescue them, but that failed. It was a terrible time.

There is a wide gulf of difference between the Middle East and the West in a great many ways. It is harder for American society to incorporate Islamic people than most others, not just because of the religious differences, but because of the cultural matters. Some of our most highly prized rights are not valued there, such as a secular government and religious freedom for all, and of course the despicable way they do too often treat women and girls. Another thing is the forced insertion of a Jewish state into what the Palestinians considered to be their land, despite the historical background. It’s hard to make friends with a conqueror, and that’s what our Western society has done there.

As a Westerner, of course, I have to feel that our way of dealing with life is better than theirs in almost every way. To me their views on women and on the overall freedom of thought which we so prize, are simply “primitive” for lack of a better word. A society that cuts off the clitoris of a woman, and without painkiller too, in order to render her less able to enjoy sex is unspeakable to me. They do that because men there have no faith in a woman’s voluntary sexual loyalty. That’s sad. Luckily for their ladies, there is still the “G spot.”





http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/15/448960665/mcteachers-nights-teachers-unions-say-no-to-school-fundraisers

McTeacher's Nights: Teachers Unions Say No To School Fundraisers
Allison Aubrey
OCTOBER 15, 2015

Photograph -- A flier advertises a local McTeacher's Night.


Mark Noltner, who lives in suburban Chicago, heard about McTeacher's Nights when he found a flier in his daughter's backpack last year.

"There was a picture of Ronald McDonald [on the flier]," he says, and it was promoting the school fundraiser at a local McDonald's.

During McTeacher's Nights, teachers stand behind the counter at McDonald's, serving up food to their students who come in. At the end of the event, the school gets a cut of the night's sales.

Noltner complained to the principal at his daughter's school that he didn't like brand marketing creeping into the school. Some teachers, he says, wore T-shirts with a McDonald's logo to promote the event.

"The McDonald's logo is extremely recognizable to students, so in essence, the [teachers] are becoming walking billboards" for the brand, Noltner says.

Noltner reached out to others in the community who didn't like these events. And what he learned is that a lot of teachers are opposed, too.

So the National Education Association joined forces with a group of state and local teachers unions, as well as the watchdog group Corporate Accountability International. This week, the coalition — which represents more than 3 million teachers — sent a letter to McDonald's CEO Steve Easterbrook, asking him to end the practice of McTeacher's Nights.

"It is wrong to enlist teachers to sell kids on a brand like McDonald's, whose core products are burgers, fries and soda," the letter states.

McDonald's USA issued a statement defending the fundraising practice.

"McTeacher's Nights are all about community, fun and fundraising," the statement reads. It goes on to say that some participating school organizations have told McDonald's that "in addition to the extra financial support these events provide for their schools, they have a great time connecting with their students and neighbors in meaningful ways."

Some of the critics who have signed on to the letter argue that McDonald's benefits from these fundraisers more than the schools.

"It's disrespectful for a multibillion-dollar corporation such as McDonald's to throw pennies at our schools, while it uses our teachers to market its products," says Melinda Dart, vice president of the California Federation of Teachers and president of the Jefferson Elementary Federation of Teachers.

A flier advertises a local McTeacher's Night. It says, “Please come support my ASB class. And have my awesome teachers serve you dinner! #buenaasb #mcteachersnight” 💕 xoxo_madz 22 months ago.

McDonald's USA says that from January 2013 through September 2015, the company-owned restaurants "have paid over $2,525,000 to organizations for donations from McTeacher's Nights." And this figure does not include the amount raised at McTeacher's Nights held at McDonald's franchise locations. (About 90 percent of the McDonald's locations are franchise-owned.)

But critics say McDonald's should take action to end the fundraising practice, since it puts teachers in a compromising position.

"McDonald's is using the bond between student and teacher to create business for themselves, and I see that as exploitation," Melissa Cropper, president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, told The Salt.

We reached out to franchise operators in Ohio and elsewhere seeking their comments on McTeacher's Nights but did not get a response in time for publication.

However, it's clear that McTeacher's Nights have supporters, too. Ahead of an event last year in Newton, Iowa, Jennifer Norvell, a kindergarten teacher at the local Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, told the Newton Daily News that McTeacher's Nights are "a great time for families to come in and interact with the teachers."

But for critics like Sriram Madhusoodanan of Corporate Accountability International, the place where that interaction takes place sends the wrong message to kids. "We think that McTeacher's Night should very soon become a thing of the past," he says.




"There was a picture of Ronald McDonald [on the flier]," he says, and it was promoting the school fundraiser at a local McDonald's. During McTeacher's Nights, teachers stand behind the counter at McDonald's, serving up food to their students who come in. At the end of the event, the school gets a cut of the night's sales. Noltner complained to the principal at his daughter's school that he didn't like brand marketing creeping into the school. Some teachers, he says, wore T-shirts with a McDonald's logo to promote the event. …. Noltner reached out to others in the community who didn't like these events. And what he learned is that a lot of teachers are opposed, too. So the National Education Association joined forces with a group of state and local teachers unions, as well as the watchdog group Corporate Accountability International. This week, the coalition — which represents more than 3 million teachers — sent a letter to McDonald's CEO Steve Easterbrook, asking him to end the practice of McTeacher's Nights. …. McDonald's USA issued a statement defending the fundraising practice. "McTeacher's Nights are all about community, fun and fundraising," the statement reads. It goes on to say that some participating school organizations have told McDonald's that "in addition to the extra financial support these events provide for their schools, they have a great time connecting with their students and neighbors in meaningful ways. Some of the critics who have signed on to the letter argue that McDonald's benefits from these fundraisers more than the schools."

"McDonald's is using the bond between student and teacher to create business for themselves, and I see that as exploitation," Melissa Cropper, president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, told The Salt.” There is definitely something creepy about this alliance – like placing corporate profits over the purpose of a school to teach, or inserting big business philosophy and practice in through the back door. In a way I feel there are too many school sponsored activities in general, including sports teams which are placed in the eyes of many community members over studying. I do feel that the Band, Chorus, Debate Team and art classes add something important to the kids’ education. McDonald’s, to me, is simply unrelated to what school is about, and adds nothing except, as one parent said, a habitually bad basic diet. Instead of learning about good dietary habits, they’re learning about hamburgers and fries.

Now if the students, on the other hand, were behind the counter at McDonald’s they would be learning something about working at a job, which is an important skill. Learning to be polite to the public and fulfill their duty is a good thing, and it would draw in their friends, thus making more money for McDonald’s and for the students. I don’t see whom these McTeacher’s Nights really benefit.