News Stories

[yoropa]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

All your Twitter belongs to history

...Why? I can understand maybe archiving the ones from the Iranian protests, but this just seems ridiculous.

[Roger Rambo]

Archive it for future researchers?

[Vexx]

10,000 years from now it will be fascinating to researchers of the "Baka Period"

[ganbaru]

Originally Posted by Vexx

10,000 years from now it will be fascinating to researchers of the "Baka Period"

Some would say it's optimistic to think than we will go for another 10,000 years other than the ''Baka Period'' would be almost as long as human history.

[Xellos-_^]

Originally Posted by Vexx

10,000 years from now it will be fascinating to researchers of the "Baka Period"

i can't decide if you are being optimistic or pessimistic

optimistic that the human race will last another 10k. I am not sure we will last out the next 100.

pessimistic that the baka period will last that long.

[mg1942]

ONLY in America...

Car rims so coveted, some people will kill for them

[Xion Valkyrie]

Originally Posted by mg1942

ONLY in America...

Car rims so coveted, some people will kill for them

I live in California and I've never even HEARD of such a obsession.

[NinjaYali]

http://www.financialexpress.com/news/Quick-View/606994/

So it would seem that Comrade Lenin and that fascist pig Hitler once played together. I hope Lenin won that chess game. Shame he didn't choke him as well. His birthday is tomorrow as well. Time to bring out the cake.

So many famous people's birthday this month
Erich Hartmann, Blonde Knight of Germany
Fuhrer Adolf Hitler
Premier Khruschev
Comrade Lenin, Inspirational founder of the USSR

A pencil sketch showing Adolf Hitler playing chess with Vladimir Lenin and bearing signatures of the Nazi leader and the Russian revolutionary on its back is all set to be auctioned here. The etching, titled ‘A chess game: Lenin with Hitler—Vienna 1909’, is said to have been created by Hitler’s Jewish art teacher, Emma Lowenstramm. It shows Hitler on the left, controlling the white pieces, and Lenin on the right.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by NinjaYali

http://www.financialexpress.com/news/Quick-View/606994/

So it would seem that Comrade Lenin and that fascist pig Hitler once played together. I hope Lenin won that chess game.

Since the news is about the sketch, it's strange not to show picture:

[Kamui4356]

Originally Posted by ganbaru

Some would say it's optimistic to think than we will go for another 10,000 years other than the ''Baka Period'' would be almost as long as human history.

With genetic engineering and cybernetics, I'm not sure anything we'd identify as human will be around 100-200 years from now. Though if we can get off this rock, our artificially created successor species, which may or may not be biological, will likely be around for millions, if not billions of years.

[NinjaYali]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

Since the news is about the sketch, it's strange not to show picture:

Is Lenin winning? Also can I have a bigger picture?

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by NinjaYali

Is Lenin winning?

I don't have a clue. It's hard to tell just from the sketch. Also, I'm not that great a chess player, so I can't really judge.

Originally Posted by NinjaYali

Also can I have a bigger picture?

Hmm, no.

Copyright considerations and other nasty legal stuff, you know. Best I can do is point you to the news website (Mail Online) where I found the picture. It's not displayed at full resolution there either.

[SeijiSensei]

Why is it automatically assumed this image portrays a real event and wasn't simply envisioned by the artist for whatever reasons?

[Roger Rambo]

Originally Posted by Kamui4356

With genetic engineering and cybernetics, I'm not sure anything we'd identify as human will be around 100-200 years from now. Though if we can get off this rock, our artificially created successor species, which may or may not be biological, will likely be around for millions, if not billions of years.

Assuming we don't bomb out selves back to the stone age with atomic weapons or colony drops.


Our capacity to spread civilization across the stars to protect it from destruction, also increases the lethality of the means to destroy it.

[Autumn Demon]

The LDP is now history.

[Vexx]

GEOS language school files for bankruptcy. Crap, getting harder and harder to to use 'english tutoring' as a way to spend time in Japan.

http://ow.ly/1B5nt

[TinyRedLeaf]

Sarkozy pushes for ban on full-face veils

Paris (April 21): French President Nicolas Sarkozy today ordered legislation that would ban women from wearing Islamic veils that hide the face in the street and other public places.

In seeking to forbid the garment from public view, Mr Sarkozy defied the advice of experts sought by the government who warned that such a broad ban risked contravening France's Constitution.

Such a measure would put France on the same track as Belgium, which is also moving towards a complete ban in a similar reaction as Islamic culture has come in conflict with native European values.

Protecting women's dignity
Mr Sarkozy has repeatedly said that such clothing oppresses women and is "not welcome" in France.

Government spokesman Luc Chatel said after today's weekly Cabinet meeting that "the ban on veils covering the whole face should be general, in every public space, because the dignity of women cannot be put in doubt".

The decision to seek a full ban, rather than a limited ban, came as a surprise. The government had sought the Council of State's opinion to ensure a law would pass constitutional muster — the Council of State advised that a full ban would be "legally very fragile".

A six-month parliamentary inquiry also concluded that a full ban would raise constitutional issues, as well as enforcement problems.

Mr Abdellatif Lemsibak, a member of the National Federation of Muslims of France, said: "It's a transgression, an aggression even, on the level of personal liberty. Muslims have the right to an orthodox expression of their religion... It shocks me."

Clash of values
France is a firmly secular country but has western Europe's largest Muslim population, estimated at some five million. France worries about clashes in values as well as about a spread of radical Islam. The authorities widely see the veil in the light of gender equality and security issues.

Muslim leaders in France say that the face-covering veil is not a religious requirement of Islam but have cautioned against banning the garment.

France outlawed Muslim headscarves and other "ostentatious" religious symbols from classrooms in 2004 after a marathon parliamentary debate and, "we are acting in the same way today. We have decided to legislate", Mr Chatel said.

Numerous school girls wore headscarves in class, but only a tiny minority of women wear the all-covering veil. Nevertheless, there has been continued debate on the question of whether a law is needed and how far it should reach.

Muslim leaders say that the debate itself has stigmatised Muslims, and has also heightened the national debate on French identity.

The French Parliament is already slated to discuss a non-binding resolution on May 11 that sets out political principles, including the need for women to keep their faces uncovered.

- AP

[MrTerrorist]

Found this amazing clip.

[SaintessHeart]

Mercy for Mother who Murdered Son
TL Courtesy Of Sankaku

In an unusual show of mercy, Japanese courts have ruled that a mother who killed her own son under the most tragic of circumstances will not have to serve a prison sentence.

The case began with the attempted suicide of a 40-year-old Tokyo man, married with 2 children of middle school age.

The man attempted to kill himself on the roof of his workplace, but botched his hanging and was reduced to a vegetable.

He left a note for his loved ones urging them to move on:

“I was tricked by a strange woman.”

“Please forget about me.”

“Lastly, I really, really do love you. Thank you for everything up to now.”

Doctors stabilised him on life support, but considered that “the chances of him ever regaining consciousness are basically nil.”

Japan does not recognise euthanasia and prohibits refusal of treatment to patients in a “persistent vegetative state,” so he would likely have to remain a vegetable for the rest of his natural life, or until his unlikely awakening.

However, Japanese health insurance does not apply to suicides unless mental illness is involved.

As a result of this, the family were presented with estimated receipts totaling some $35,000 for the 10 days of treatment rendered so far, with the future cost of keeping the man alive on a ventilator estimated at $1,000-$3,500 for each day he continued to live.

Lawyers were consulted, but could offer no relief – the family would have to pay until the day he finally passed on, whenever that might be.

Faced with this incredible financial burden the family despaired.

His wife begged doctors to stop the ruinous treatment, both because of the cost and his own inferred wishes: “Please stop actively treating him. If it’s impossible I’ll take him of the ventilator myself,” but doctors steadfastly refused to consider ceasing treatment as brain death had not occurred.

Soon after, his 67-year-old mother left her step-daughter a note one morning: “Hold on, Kyoko. I’m his mother, I bore him into this world, so it’s my responsibility.” She took a kitchen knife with her to the hospital.

Placing a picture of her son taken on holiday 20 years ago on his breast, she stabbed him 4 times in the chest, killing him.

His mother later spoke of her sorrow:

“The sense of loss I have at my son’s death, the fact that I killed him, it overwhelms me. I’ll be atoning for the rest of my life.”

“There was no way I could let his wife take him off the ventilator. As his mother, I’m responsible. I’ve led a long and happy life, so I resolved that my life is over, and I would do it.”

She herself was no stranger to the plight of the aged or disabled, having for 20 years volunteered at a care facility.

In the courtroom, the man’s wife wept as she saw her step-mother’s now gaunt frame in the dock: “If she hadn’t done it, I would have.”

She begged the court for mercy: “For a mother who loved her son so to have killed him, there can be no greater anguish. Please return her to her husband’s side – he would have wanted that.”

“What would you have done if you were in the same position?” asked the defence in its closing statements to a panel of 6 lay judges and 3 professional judges.

Judges found her guilty of murder, but mercifully sentenced her to only 3 years (the prosecution sought 5, the usual minimum for murder) – they also suspended the sentence for 5 years, meaning she will go free without serving any time in prison, assuming she can refrain from killing any more of her offspring for 5 years.

I know I am inviting negreps for this, but I stand by what the mother did. She's right.

The Hippocratic Oath had this line stating :

I will respect the privacy of my patients, for their problems are not disclosed to me that the world may know. Most especially must I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty. Above all, I must not play at God.

Seriously, what are the doctors doing? Shirking responsibilities in favour of avoiding liabilities? Or are they trying to earn the $3,000 extra per month?

I am a supporter of euthanasia though I do not believe in using it as a pretext for Human Organ Transplant Acts. However in this case, the patient isn't the one suffering, but the family is, not only under the sheer financial pressure, but also the emotional agony of seeing someone living and suffering. Where is the doctor's code of ethics? And what is wrong with the legal system?

[LynnieS]

Originally Posted by SaintessHeart

Seriously, what are the doctors doing? Shirking responsibilities in favour of avoiding liabilities? Or are they trying to earn the $3,000 extra per month?

I am a supporter of euthanasia though I do not believe in using it as a pretext for Human Organ Transplant Acts. However in this case, the patient isn't the one suffering, but the family is, not only under the sheer financial pressure, but also the emotional agony of seeing someone living and suffering. Where is the doctor's code of ethics? And what is wrong with the legal system?

The quote does not say why the doctors refused. It could be for the reasons you considered, or it could be for others - like personal belief in holding life sacred to an unwillingness to face murder/manslaughter charges if they did take the man off of life support. Euthanasia isn't supported in many parts of the world, and till that happens - and for the right/ethical/etc reasons, I suspect you'll see many more of these cases.