In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Terrorism; death] On Monday, Boko Haram militants dressed as soldiers "killed at least 200 civilians in three communities in north-eastern Nigeria and the military failed to intervene even though it was warned that an attack was imminent, witnesses said on Thursday. A community leader who witnessed the killings on Monday said residents of the Gwoza local government district in Borno state had pleaded for the military to send soldiers to protect the area after they heard that militants were about to attack, but help did not arrive." This group is the definition of terrorism. Rage. Seethe. Boil.

[CN: Terrorism; white supremacy; guns] Speaking of terrorism: "A massive investigation in Oregon shows evidence of a criminal web—involving guns, drugs, stolen property, identity theft, and violence—linking white supremacists and outlaw motorcycle gangs. 'Operation White Christmas,' as the year-old investigation is code-named, so far has resulted in the arrests of 54 individuals, mostly in the Portland area, leading to 11 criminal cases in state court and another 43 in federal court. ...The Oregon suspects variously are affiliated with at least five known street and prison white supremacist gangs—European Kindred (EK); Rude Crude Brood; All Ona Bitch (AOB); Fat Bitch Killers (FBK); and Insane Peckerwood Syndicate (IPS), authorities say."

[CN: Racism; exploitation] RIP Chester Nez, the last surviving original Navajo Code Talker. "Nez was one of 29 members of the Navajo Nation who helped create the code used by the American military in World War II—a code that Japanese soldiers were never able to break during the conflict. ...Chester Nez spoke to Stars and Stripes in November, telling the newspaper, 'I was very proud to say that the Japanese did everything in their power to break that code but they never did.' Nez also said that he grew up during a time of difficult relations between the U.S. government and the Navajo Nation. He told Stars and Stripes that children were often removed from reservations, put into boarding schools, and prohibited from even speaking the Navajo language. Like so many others, Nez was recruited from one of those schools. The unmistakable irony, of course, is that it was the very prohibited language that proved to be an invaluable tool for the Pentagon in World War II's Pacific theater."

[CN: Rape apology; sexual violence] Babulal Gaur, the home minister responsible for law and order in India's Bharatiya Janata party-run central state of Madhya Pradesh, says that rape "is a social crime which depends on men and women. Sometimes it's right, sometimes it's wrong." Nope.

[CN: Racism] A new Fox News poll finds that "a majority of voters say the Obama administration is less competent than Bill Clinton's and a plurality say it is less competent than George W. Bush's." Huh. I wonder what it is about President Obama that would make respondents to a Fox News poll say that he is less competent than Presidents Clinton and Bush. I CAN'T IMAGINE.

Dutch forensics experts have discovered how to accurately date fingerprints: "'It's not quite the Holy Grail of fingerprinting, but it's a very important discovery,' Marcel de Puit, fingerprint researcher at the Dutch Forensic Institute (NFI), told the AFP news agency on Wednesday, hailing what he said was a world's first. 'Police regularly ask us if we can date crime scene fingerprints,' he said, for instance a neighbor's prints found at the scene of a burglary. Were they left the last time the neighbor came round for coffee or from the night of the crime?"

Melissa McCarthy on explaining fame to her oldest daughter: "She asked me, 'Are you famous?' And I said to her, 'Famous doesn't mean anything. Just because people know my face doesn't mean they know us or that it makes us any more interesting or better.'"

And finally: Here is some GOOD NEWS for people who love awesome ladies! Star Wars: Episode VII Casts Lupita Nyong'o and Gwendoline Christie. More like Brienne of DARTH, amirite?