SAR #15327

Humans are really really smart, but very rarely do we just sit down and think about how the world might work and actually get it right. Noah Smith

Sturmabteilung: While The Donald repeatedly yelled "Get the hell out of here!" a group of his supporters threw a Black Live Matter protester to the ground and kicked him. Is there an echo in here? In Irving, TX armed "militiamen" marched in protest outside the local Islamic Center. The Texas Health and Human Services Commission sent letters to a number of prominent non-profit organizations telling them that if they didn't stop providing help to Syrian refugees as the Governor had decreed, they wold be"endangering the whole program that you have."

I Can't Hear You.... Once again research has shown that welfare programs do not make people lazy but rather help people who are in need. Sort of a neighborly thing to do for those who've been left out.

Take A Note: The massive electronic surveillance by NSA, GCHQ and the European Electronic snoops didn't stop the Paris attacks, even though most of the terrorists involved were well known to police and intelligence agencies. So of course we need more snooping, less privacy, because...

Fear Itself: 40% of 18 to 34 year-old Americans favor restrictions on speech that is, or might be, offensive to others. They also believe in "free speech". Southwest Airlines threw some Arabic speaking passengers off a flight because "a passenger" claimed he was scared to fly with them. Why they didn't throw him off and let the Arabic speaking Americans go on their way is a good question.

Dead & Buried: The church of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) claim that baptism for the dead is a matter of free will and the dead can reject such baptism. How? They're as dead as Monty Python's parrot.

A Little Bit Of Sugar: Novartis Pharmaceuticals is paying $390 million "to settle charges" that it bribed pharmacies to push their customers to refill Novartis scripts. No one, of course, goes to jail.

Another Day: Turns out that the tragedies in Paris are being used to justify all sorts of police state encroachments, even though the perpetrators were not Syrian, were not refugees and did not use clever encryption in their communications. So naturally we need less secure encryption and to stop all Syrians from fleeing death and worse at the hands of Assad, ISIS, the US and Russian air forces and whatever Turkey gets up to.

Quoted: "How ironic is it that the path forward is clear? We need to establish the rule of law, founded upon equality (hasn't been done yet.) with brotherhood/sisterhood, based on equality and participation, for all. Something that won't happen as long as we allow even one to 'speak for God'." George Anderson (a SAR commenter).

Porn O'Graph: What's down, who's up?