US Police - US police officers kill more than two people a day

US police have reportedly shot and killed 385 people over the past five months, a rate of more than two per day, reports the Washington Post. The figure is much higher than typical federal counts.

The analysis is based on data the Washington Post newspaper is compiling on every fatal police shooting in 2015. The investigation also includes information about every officer killed by gunfire while on duty over the past five months.

“We are never going to reduce the number of police shootings if we don't begin to accurately track this information,” said Jim Bueermann, president of the Police Foundation, a not-for-profit organization committed to improving law enforcement.

Federal Bureau of Investigation records for the past decade show the occurrence of around 400 fatal police shootings per year, or an average of 1.1 deaths a day.

The death rate reported in the Washington Post newspaper on Saturday is more than twice that cited by the federal government over the past decade.

Read more: Report: US police officers kill more than two people a day | News | DW.DE | 31.05.2015

IS THE LOTTO RIGGED ? YES IT IS !

You may have heard that you are more likely to be hit on the head by a meteorite than to win the lottery. This is certainly so. 

Assuming that the game is honest, the odds are roughly one in several hundred million. Even with these odds, lottery commissions are not satisfied. The lottery is rigged.

The giant multi-state and individual state lotteries are more fixed than pro wrestling. The jackpots go up and up, with no winners.  People get lottery fever. Millions nationwide are willing to wait in a line just like the ones for bread in the former Soviet Union for the pipe dream of striking it rich.   

The rigging works like this: super computers keep track of each combination sold, and then the ping-pong balls are weighted to assure that a losing combination comes up. On rare occasions, all possible combinations are sold, and they must let someone win. Only then is the game honest.

Why? The lottery, which is a state-run version of the Mafia's numbers racket, is a great money grab scam, as long as it brings in more than it pays out. In the past, lotteries were abolished because they lost money. 

 

The worst part of this is whom it hurts. The poor and desperate are the most common victims of lottery fever.  Children go hungry and senior citizens go without their medication because of it. People prone to gambling addiction also blow huge sums.

We spoke with an employee at a state lottery agency. We can not reveal his name or even which state, as some of the same gangsters who ran the numbers racket now run the lottery, and they would kill him.

 

“Yes, I personally am involved in it. Lottery ping-pong balls have a small valve, like a basketball or soccer ball, only it’s very tiny, and nearly invisible. We use a hypodermic needle to inject heavier-than-air gasses such as radon into the balls we don’t want to come up. At first, we tried helium in the ones we did want to rise, but they jumped up so quickly that it was obvious. Lotteries are raking in much more than if the games were honest, and people don’t know they have literally no chance!”

“If you think about it logically, you certainly don’t play anyway. You are betting that you can predict which six of 45 or more balls are going to come out of the hopper. In some games, the order even matters! It’s a sucker’s bet, and that’s when it’s honest! Most drawings are rigged, making the odds zero in infinity! The lottery is not only a tax on people who don’t understand math; it is an unfair and unjust tax. Didn’t we have the American Revolution over taxes like that?”

You read it here first.

In other words - you can better throw your money in the fire than play the lottery and it is high time governments which allow or organize Lotto review these fraudulent  Lotto games.

Read more: THE LOTTERY IS RIGGED

The Netherlands - Almere: Free Concert by Holland's Hottest Gospel Choir "the Amsterdam FireChoir" in Almere tonight

Holland's most popular Gospel Choir, the Amsterdam FireChoir, which also performed with Barbara Streisand at the Amsterdam's Ziggo Dome will be giving a free concert in Almere tonight.

FireChoir is open to everyone! People of all cultures, nationalities, religious or non-religious persuasions. FireChoir is a professional and exciting musical adventure.

Tonight's event  - (May30 - 19.30) is at t'Klankbord, Pianoweg 117, Almere, Muziekwijk, located  next to the parking of the Muziekwijk train station.  A 4 minute walk  from the station.

The New Day International Church in Almere is the sponsor of this free event.

Almere-Digest

Fifa Scandal or Politics on Steroids ?: Why is the US policing a global game ?

The BBC asked in one of their recent programs - "America does not even like football, or so many people think. Why is it leading the charge against alleged Fifa corruption?"

Good question.

At dawn, Swiss police rounded up seven Fifa officials at the behest of US authorities who have conducted a massive investigation into corruption at football's governing body.
So how did a country where football is more niche than entrenched come to police the world's beautiful game?

"Too many countries are cowed by Fifa," said Alexandra Wrage, a former Fifa anti-bribery adviser who resigned in protest from the organization.

"As with international bribery more generally, the US Department of Justice has said they'll step up to investigate corruption if others won't," she said.

It is not clear what specific event - if any - prompted the US investigation. Some have pointed to the United States' failed bid in late 2010 to host the the 2022 World Cup, and suspicions that bribes were paid to encourage votes for Qatar.

Note EU-Digest:The US involvement in Fifa is questionable and looks much more like politics gone on steroids. Everyone is aware bribery in sports has been going on for years now, not only in the FIFA globally, but also in just about every sector of US sports.  Another possible point of this US contention could be that Russia will be hosting the next World Cup in 2018!  The country submitted its candidacy in early 2009 and was selected by the FIFA Executive Committee in Zurich on December 2, 2010, beating out England and joint bids from Portugal/Spain and Belgium/Netherlands. 

Who knows, the US might be wanting to turn this decision for Russia to host the 2018 world cup around by proving bribery charges favored the selection of Russia and in that way indirectly also punish Russia for the Ukraine crises.

Another aspect, and maybe the most important one, is that the commercial benefits of hosting a World cup and all the perks that come with it involves major corporate involvement and profits. 

This complicates matters even more, since corporate money these days,  more often than not,  usually controls political action.   

EU-Digest 

USA - Democracy on the rocks? The Super Rich Have a New Way to Buy Elections - by Robert Faturechi and Jonathan Stray

US Super PAC's

Super PACs bankrolled by a single donor quadrupled their share in the US of overall fundraising in 2014. And there’s no sign of letup in ’16.

The wealthiest Americans can fly on their own jets, live in gated compounds and watch movies in their own theaters.

More of them also are walling off their political contributions from other big and small players.

A growing number of political committees known as super PACs have become instruments of single donors, according to a ProPublica analysis of federal records. During the 2014 election cycle, $113 million—16 percent of money raised by all super PACs—went to committees dominated by one donor.

That was quadruple their 2012 share.

The rise of single-donor groups is a new example of how changes in campaign finance law are giving outsized influence to a handful of funders.

The trend may continue into 2016. National Review recently reported that Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s bid for the Republican presidential nomination would be boosted not by one anointed super PAC but four, each controlled by a single donor or donor family.

The Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling helped usher in the era of super PACs. Unlike traditional political action committees, the independent groups can accept donations of any dollar size as long as they don’t coordinate with the campaign of any candidate.

The Super Rich Have a New Way to Buy Elections - The Daily Beast

TTIP: EU dropped pesticide laws due to US pressure over TTIP, documents reveal

US trade officials pushed EU to shelve action on endocrine-disrupting chemicals linked to cancer and male infertility to facilitate TTIP free trade deal.

EU moves to regulate hormone-damaging chemicals linked to cancer and male infertility were shelved following pressure from US trade officials over the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) free trade deal, newly released documents show.

Draft EU criteria could have banned 31 pesticides containing endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs). But these were dumped amid fears of a trade backlash stoked by an aggressive US lobby push, access to information documents obtained by Pesticides Action Network (PAN) Europe show.

On 26 June 2013, a high-level delegation from the American Chambers of Commerce (AmCham) visited EU trade officials to insist that the bloc drop its planned criteria for identifying EDCs in favour of a new impact study.

Minutes of the meeting show commission officials pleading that “although they want the TTIP to be successful, they would not like to be seen as lowering the EU standards”.
The TTIP is a trade deal being agreed by the EU and US to remove barriers to commerce and promote free trade.

Responding to the EU officials, AmCham representatives “complained about the uselessness of creating categories and thus, lists” of prohibited substances, the minutes show.

The US trade representatives insisted that a risk-based approach be taken to regulation, and “emphasised the need for an impact assessment” instead.

On 2 July 2013, officials from the US Mission to Europe visited the EU to reinforce the message. Later that day, the secretary-general of the commission, Catherine Day, sent a letter to the environment department’s director Karl Falkenberg, telling him to stand down the draft criteria.

“We suggest that as other DGs [directorate-generals] have done, you consider making a joint single impact assessment to cover all the proposals,” Day wrote. “We do not think it is necessary to prepare a commission recommendation on the criteria to identify endocrine disrupting substances.”

The result was that legislation planned for 2014 was kicked back until at least 2016, despite estimated health costs of €150bn per year in Europe from endocrine-related illnesses such as IQ loss, obesity and cryptorchidism – a condition affecting the genitals of baby boys
.
A month before the meeting, AmCham had warned the EU of “wide-reaching implications” if the draft criteria were approved. The trade body wanted an EU impact study to set looser thresholds for acceptable exposure to endocrines, based on a substance’s potency.

“We are worried to see that this decision, which is the source of many scientific debates, might be taken on political grounds, without first assessing what its impacts will be on the European market,” the chair of AmCham’s environment committee wrote in a letter to the commission. These could be “dramatic” the letter said.

In a high-level internal note sent to the health commissioner, Tonio Borg, shortly afterwards, his departmental director-general warned that the EU’s endocrines policy “will have substantial impacts for the economy, agriculture and trade”.

The heavily redacted letter, sent a week before the EU’s plans were scrapped continued: “The US, Canada, and Brazil [have] already voiced concerns on the criteria which might lead to important repercussions on trade.”

The series of events was described as “incredible” by the the Green MEP Bas Eickhout. “These documents offer convincing evidence that TTIP not only presents a danger for the future lowering of European standards, but that this is happening as we speak,” he told the Guardian.

A commission spokesperson insisted that health and environmental concerns would be fully addressed, despite pressure from industry or trade groups.

“The ongoing EU impact assessment procedure is not linked in any way to the TTIP negotiations,” the official said. “The EU will proceed to the adoption of definitive criteria to identify endocrine disruptors, independently from the further course of our TTIP negotiations with the US.”

Note EU-Digest: "the statement by the commission spokesperson on the issue, however,  does not sound very convincing"

Read more: EU dropped pesticide laws due to US pressure over TTIP, documents reveal | Environment | The Guardian

EU: Poll shows majority EU citizens want refugees stopped before they cross Mediterranean - by RM

Europeans want refugees stopped at departure points

In a recent poll conducted by EU-Digest in April and May 88.89%  polled said refugees and migrants should be stopped before they make the dangerous Mediterranean crossing.

Only 11.11% said that those reaching EU shores should be processed as legal immigrants.

No one  polled felt that the EU had done an effective job so far in coping or dealing with this momentous problem

The new recently posted EU-Digest poll (May 27 thru June 27) focuses on the increased concerns surrounding the secretive Transatlantic Trade Negotiations ( TTIP) between the European Union and the USA.

Critics say this controversial trade deal presently being negotiated will remove safety standards on a large number of essential products, including agricultural products, pesticides, food and medicines, as well as dismantle financial regulations designed to prevent banks from creating another financial crisis, to mention just a few.

The agreement would also make it easier for multinationals to sue governments and could lead to significant slashes in EU regulatory laws related to environmental pollution controls and a variety of safety and health standards.


EU-Digest