1 month to stop Ebola before it's 'totally out of control' - global aid NGO

From [HERE] The International Rescue Committee (IRC), on behalf of 34 NGOs battling Ebola in West Africa, has warned that the number of cases is doubling roughly every three weeks and the globe has only four weeks to stop the crisis from spiraling out of control.

Aid organizations have called for a six-point plan to combat the virus at an international summit convened in London to tackle the epidemic.

The charity Save the Children warned that five people are being infected with the virus every hour.

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced earlier this week that more than 3,000 people have died from Ebola so-far in West Africa. 6,500 cases have been officially recorded, but the real number is expected to be far higher, as many victims are dying unreported.

The ‘Defeating Ebola’ conference commenced in London on Thursday. It will highlight the scale of the crisis, just after Dr. David Nabarro, leading the United Nation's Ebola response, said that epidemic scares him more than either the early years of the HIV virus and SARS.

READ MORE: Ebola worse than HIV, SARS - UN official

Sanjayan Srikanthan from the IRC, speaking on behalf of aid organizations and NGOs such as Christian Aid and Oxfam, told delegates that the world has a small “window of opportunity” left to stop the disease spreading further.

“Every day we delay in disbursing resources to affected countries, the more impossible it becomes to contain the disease. The international community has a window of opportunity over the next four weeks to stop the crisis from spreading completely out of control. To do so we must break transmission rates and halt the exponential increase in cases,” he says in a statement prepared for the summit.

A WHO spokesman said that transmission is still widespread in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone with the number of new cases increasing sharply in several districts. [MORE]

Boko Haram video shows Abubakar Shekau alive

Info Clearing House

A video has been released showing the purported leader of Nigeria's Islamist group Boko Haram dismissing the military's allegations that he is dead.

Obama says mistrust of police corroding America

PBS

The widespread mistrust of law enforcement that was exposed by the fatal police shooting of an unarmed black man in Missouri exists in too many other communities and is having a corrosive effect on the nation, particularly on its children, President Barack Obama says. He blames the feeling of wariness on persistent racial disparities in the administration of justice.

Obama said these misgivings only serve to harm communities that are most in need of effective law enforcement.

“It makes folks who are victimized by crime and need strong policing reluctant to go to the police because they may not trust them,” he said Saturday night in an address at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual awards dinner.

“And the worst part of it is it scars the hearts of our children,” Obama said, adding that it leads some youngsters to unnecessarily fear people who do not look like them and others to constantly feel under suspicion no matter what they do.

“That is not the society we want,” he said. “It’s not the society that our children deserve.”

Obama addressed the Aug. 9 shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown carefully but firmly, saying his death and the raw emotion it produced had reawakened the country to the fact that “a gulf of mistrust” exists between residents and police in too many communities.

The shooting sparked days of violent protests and racial unrest in the predominantly black St. Louis suburb of Ferguson. The police officer who shot Brown was white.

“Too many young men of color feel targeted by law enforcement – guilty of walking while black or driving while black, judged by stereotypes that fuel fear and resentment and hopelessness,” said Obama, who has spoken of enduring similar treatment as a younger man.

He said significant racial disparities remain in the enforcement of law, from drug sentencing to application of the death penalty, and that a majority of Americans think the justice system treats people of different races unequally.

Obama opened his remarks by praising Attorney General Eric Holder as a great friend and faithful public servant.

The president announced Holder’s resignation this week after nearly six years as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. Holder attended the dinner and received a standing ovation. He will stay on the job until the Senate confirms a successor.

“We will miss him badly,” Obama said.

Holder visited Ferguson after the shooting to help ease tensions, and the Justice Department is investigating whether Brown’s civil rights were violated.

There was more gun violence Saturday night in Ferguson when a police officer investigating suspicious activity at a closed community center was shot in the arm. The wounded officer is expected to survive and the police were looking for two suspects early Sunday.

Authorities said they didn’t believe the shooting was related to demonstrations that were taking place at about the same time to protest the killing of Brown.

At the dinner, Obama also announced the addition of a “community challenge” to My Brother’s Keeper, a public-private partnership he launched earlier this year to help improve the lives of young minority men. Communities across the U.S. will be challenged to adopt strategies to help all young people succeed from the cradle through college and to a career.

Obama said government cannot play the primary role in the lives of children but it “can bring folks together” to make a difference for them.

Helping girls of color deal with inequality is also important, he said, and part of the continuing mission of the White House Council on Women and Girls. The effort has involved his wife, Michelle, the mother of their 13- and 16-year-old daughters.

Obama noted that black girls are more likely than their white peers to be suspended, jailed and physically harassed, and that black women struggle daily with “biases that perpetuate oppressive standards for how they’re supposed to look and how they’re supposed to act.”

“I’ve got a vested interest in making sure that our daughters have the same opportunities as boys do,” he said.

Racial Distribution Map of D.C.

From [HERE]

Steve Cokely: White Finance of Black Leadership

California protesters block Israeli-owned ship

KSL

Officials say a group of pro-Palestinian protesters are again blocking an Israeli-owned commercial ship from unloading its cargo at a port in California.

International Longshore and Warehouse Union spokesman Craig Merrilees says longshore workers did not unload cargo from the Zim Shanghai docked at the Port of Oakland on Saturday morning because of safety concerns raised by the presence of police and protesters.

Steve Zeltzer, a spokesman for the Stop Zim Action Committee, says about 200 protesters planned to demonstrate again during the longshore workers' evening shift.

The protesters are demonstrating in response to recent Israeli military action in the Gaza Strip.

Last month, protesters blocked cargo from unloading off the Zim Piraeus for nearly five days before the ship apparently departed to Los Angeles with a partial load.

Attorney General Eric Holder suggests that marijuana needs to be widely available to scientists

Cuba pledges 300 more doctors, nurses to combat Ebola

Aljazeera

Cuba will deploy nearly 300 additional medical workers to West Africa to help fight the deadly Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia, officials said Friday. 

Regla Angulo, head of Cuba’s medical relief agency, said doctors and nurses were undergoing intense training ahead of their deployment, working in mock field hospitals similar to those they expect to encounter in Africa.

Friday’s announcement follows a pledge earlier this month by Cuba to send 165 doctors and nurses to Sierra Leone. The entire staff is expected to arrive in West Africa in early October after completing infection-control training administered by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Some members of the medical team have already been working in Sierra Leone and Guinea for a numbers of years and will continue to do so, the WHO said, adding that the Cuban mission was the “largest offer of a foreign medical team from a single country” during the current outbreak. 

UN officials call for international abolition of death penalty

Jurist

The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) [official website] and a number of UN officials on Thursday urged global leaders to abolish the death penalty. In in a presentation and accompanying report [text, PDF] entitled "Moving Away from the Death Penalty," UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson [official profile] stated:

All human rights rest on the right to life, the most fundamental of all rights. The right to life symbolizes everything that the United Nations works and stands for, be it in the area of peace and security, development or human rights. Rejecting the act of irreversibly taking someone’s life is an act of embracing belief in human progress and dignity.

High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein [official profile] further noted that judicial systems must move away from punishment based on revenge [UN News Centre report], and instead urged countries to "set course" towards a more humane form of justice which seeks "a genuine recognition by the wrongdoers of their wrongdoing." The sentiment echoes a similar statement made by Hussein earlier this year, in which he declared that the death penalty has no place in the twenty-first century [UN News Centre report].

Federal judge rules donor disclosure required for political documentary

JURIST

The US District Court for the District of Colorado [official website] denied [order, PDF] on Monday a request by Citizens United [advocacy website] for a preliminary injunction to allow the conservative organization to air a political documentary without disclosing the film's advertising donors as required by state law [text]. The documentary, Rocky Mountain Heist, which the group hopes to air before November's elections, "concerns various Colorado advocacy groups and their impact on Colorado government and public policy." Citizens United argued, on First Amendment [text, LII] grounds, that its organization should be considered a "press entity," entitled to the same exemptions as traditional media outlets, which are not required to disclose their donors. Otherwise, the group argued, it would be the victim of "viewpoint-based discrimination." The court disagreed stating that people should be able to "discern the private interests behind speech when determining how much weight to afford it." Citizens United intends [press release] to appeal this ruling to the US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit .[MORE]

Black Woman News Anchor says, "Fighting for freedom and fairness begins with legalizing marijuana in Alaska." Then quits on the air.

U.S. bombing Syria

From [HERE] The United States launched airstrikes in Syria against ISIS targets, sources tell NBC News. The U.S. military plans to strike up to 20 targets -- logistics, fuel and weapons depots; training sites; troop encampments; command and control sites; and headquarters for the Sunni fighters. The U.S. military will deploy manned and unmanned air assets, including F-22s, B-1 bombers, F-16s, F-15s and F/A-18s. The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush is at the ready in the Persian Gulf, and the USS Arleigh Burke, a guided missile destroyer that fires Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs), is in the Red Sea. (NBC, wires)

More [HERE] on reserving the right to bomb niggers 

These recent beheadings of American and British nationals, whether authentic or not, are obviously exploited to pave the way for a military intervention in Syria. This is a basic propaganda technique used time and time again to gather support for war and the mainstream media is there to convey this propaganda.

From [HERE] The recent beheadings of three Westerners, Foley, Sotloff and Haines, at the hands of the Islamic State (ISIS) has sparked a wave of indignation and strong condemnation by Western heads of state.

For anyone aware of what has been truly going on in Syria from the outset of the war in March 2011, there is something unusual in these strong statements, which are now the object of a wave of “humanitarian bombings” under a counter-terrorism mandate directed against the Islamic State.

Lest we forget, from the outset of the war on Syria in March 2011, the US and its allies supported  so-called “Freedom fighters” largely composed of the Al Nusrah and ISIS brigades. Trained in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, these pro-democracy terrorists were routinely involved in atrocities including beheadings directed against Syrian civilians.

Double standards? In the course of the last three years, no Western leader made any statements in regards to these atrocities committed by “Muslim extremists”.  They passed virtually unnoticed. No concern was expressed by the international community in this regard.  With some exceptions, these beheadings were barely the object of media coverage.

Is it because the “freedom fighters” integrated by ISIS and Al Nusrah forces were beheading Syrian civilians rather than Westerners. Was it because the victims of these atrocities were opposed to the bloody “pro-democracy revolution” sponsored by US-NATO against the government of Bashar Al Assad?

Why are Western leaders only appalled now? Is it because now Westerners rather than Syrians are being decapitated?

These recent beheadings of American and British nationals, whether authentic or not, are obviously exploited to pave the way for a military intervention in Syria. This is a basic propaganda technique used time and time again to gather support for war and the mainstream media is there to convey this propaganda.

The mainstream media’s role is not to inform people but to appeal to their emotions and manipulate them into approving what they would otherwise refuse.

Westerners don’t want to go to war in the Middle East again? Show them one of their fellow countrymen getting his head cut off by a “Muslim” and they will change their mind. And you don’t even need to show anything, just say that people in high office have seen the horrific act and have their media mouthpieces repeat what they have said. It works every time.

This tactic can either be considered as an appeal to fear and/or an appeal to emotions:

An appeal to fear (also called argumentum ad metum or argumentum in terrorem) is a fallacy in which a person attempts to create support for an idea by using deception and propaganda in attempts to increase fear and prejudice toward a competitor. The appeal to fear is common in marketing and politics. (Wikipedia)

The appeal to emotions, or argumentum ad passiones is a logical fallacy which uses the manipulation of the recipient’s emotions, rather than valid logic, to win an argument.” (Wikipedia)

If this technique is used rather than valid arguments, it’s in part because it always works like a charm and this is what the mainstream media is for, but also because the “valid arguments” which could be used to intervene could only be lies and easily refuted, as this article will attempt to demonstrate.

Several independent media have questioned the authenticity of the beheading videos and some experts have clearly qualified them as “fake”, at least in the cases involving journalists Foley and Sotloff. The true identity of both men has also been questioned, especially Sotloff’s, who has known ties to the Israeli secret service (Mossad), and has been allegedly photographed behind a machine gun belonging to the Syrian rebel fighters.

As “Operation Mocking Bird” has documented, journalism is the best cover for an intelligence operative. Several former CIA officers have confirmed that it is used to plant stories that are picked up by news outlets as facts when they actually are propaganda pieces (see CIA Manipulation: The Painful Truths Told by Phil Agee and John Stockwell about false reports generated by the CIA). The DC based “producer” of the terror videos, SITE, with its close links to the Pentagon and the FBI, is also suspicious and tends to point to a major propaganda stunt originating in the US.

For the purpose of this article we will however examine the situation and the reaction of Western leaders from the point of view that these beheadings actually took place and that the videos are authentic. [MORE]

Arizona District Court Judge Grants Over $4 million in Attorney Fees to Civil Rights Groups in Landmark Lawsuit Against Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO)

ACLU 

Phoenix - U.S. District Court Judge Murray Snow today granted more than $4.4 million in attorney’s fees to four legal organizations that litigated Melendres, et al. v. Arpaio, et al., a lawsuit challenging racially discriminatory law enforcement practices by Sheriff Joe Arpaio and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) in Arizona. Attorney’s fees were granted to the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, the ACLU of Arizona, Covington & Burling, LLP, and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, MALDEF.

Cecillia Wang, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants’ Right’s Project and one of the trial lawyers in the case, issued the following comment:

"Sheriff Arpaio and those who supported his illegal racial profiling policies knew full well that Congress mandates that when a police agency violates people’s Constitutional rights it will be responsible for the cost of bringing a lawsuit to enforce basic civil liberties. These fee awards are meant to ensure that agencies do not violate civil rights with impunity. Today’s order should come as no surprise since Sheriff Arpaio and MCSO had every opportunity to settle this case at an early stage in order to avoid the high costs, but instead chose to stubbornly stick to their illegal policies to the detriment of the people of Maricopa County."

For a copy of the order, click here.  For more information about Ortega Melendres v. Arpaio, click here. 

Baton Rouge Coroner says Synthetic marijuana dangers akin to 'Russian roulette,'

Nola

It's poison, said East Baton Rouge Parish Coroner William "Beau" Clark, of synthetic marijuana.

The trouble with the stuff is the medical professionals can't keep up with it, he told a crowd Friday (Sept. 19) at a Capital Area Human Services event on Government Street.

"It's dangerous because you don't know what's in it," Clark said. 

A hit might have little effect; another might get you high. Some hits, however, could prompt a state of acute psychosis. Others -- kidney failure or a heart attack.

"It may do nothing...or it may kill you," he said.

Clark said he's heard of people after smoking the stuff have jumped off a roof because they think they can fly. Two years ago in Baton Rouge, a young man authorities believed had smoked synthetic marijuana walked right into traffic and was killed.

But use of synthetic marijuana, also known as mojo, is prevalent across the country and in Baton rouge, especially among 12-to-29-year-olds. It's popular among some, Clark noted, because it doesn't show up on drug tests.

Ivan Toldson, aka Love-N-Pain, has been shot, committed violence, snorted drugs and run a counterfeit money operation. He knows people who died from that lifestyle and knows people who are incarcerated because of it. Now 30, Toldson has recovered from his past addictions and pattern of bad decisions and works to help others Woodlake Addiction Recovery overcome their own addiction problems.

On Friday (Sept. 19), Toldson launched a music video he produced for Capital Area Human Services, which warns listeners of the dangers of synthetic marijuana while acknowledging the pressure to use it.

It's a drug Toldson said he has some personal experience with, and though it didn't do anything to him at all -- he knows a former patient who died after smoking it. They found him "collapsed in a doorway," Toldson said.  

Toldson grew emotional at a lectern before telling the crowd his story as part of the "Recovery is real" event, apologizing for his tears by explaining he knew his father would be proud of him.

The music video, which contains rap lyrics about the "Russian Roulette" drug interlaced with sounds of TV news reports, is intended to raise awareness about dangers of synthetic marijuana through a social media campaign. 

Watch the video on YouTube or below, and "repost for recovery" on your social media accounts.