The Gatekeepers of the Mainsteam Media are Oppressing the People

Brilliant Overton Window Explanation
Duke Conan



The media is the enemy of the people. They are elitist. This form of social tyranny must come to an end.

Postmodernist Depravity and the Normalization of Pedophilia

The demise of Western Civilization: "Gender fluidity" as a harbinger for Postmodernist Hell

May 30, 2017

(Zoya Klebanova, Sott.net) - Traditional values refers to those beliefs, moral codes, and social mores that are passed down from generation to generation within a culture, subculture or community. Their subject matter usually includes that of family, community, religion, and art. And, although each culture has its own definition of traditional values, there appear to be universal principles that are based on experience, and that were created in order to maintain the integrity of societies comprised of a wide range of people with different personalities and interests and to prevent a descent into social chaos.

Taking it further, this visceral knowledge is, at least in part, shaped by evolution. It is also shaped by various psychological and psychopathological phenomena via the interaction between our subjective consciousness - individually and as a species - and the 'real world' throughout time.

Essentially, since the dawn of man people understood that human behavior could attract or repel "the wrath of the gods".

"It appears that in earlier history, man understood that he had some control over his own destiny and the fate of society through his righteous behavior. Theoxeny was a moral standard. Every person was seen as having the potential to either help or hinder prosperity and health for all. Even if some could give more than others, everyone had the privilege and the duty to contribute their best. Every person's actions counted and their actions were responded to with justice through other people and the universe.

But a pathology took hold, and though it could not completely change the nature of man or take away his ability to choose, it influenced society and altered humanity's course because of our acceptance of it. As awareness declined, good intentions were subverted and our integrity as a species diminished. Humans have become a species tuned in to entropy, and what we choose and express will become our fate. We have given up our personal responsibility to each other as hosts and guests and therefore will end up being our own destruction."

On May 17, 2016, the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau introduced to the Parliament of Canada "an Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code (Bill C-16)":

"The bill is intended to protect individuals from discrimination within the sphere of federal jurisdiction and from being the targets of hate propaganda,^[3] as a consequence of their gender identity or their gender expression. The bill adds "gender identity or expression" to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination in the Canadian Human Rights Act and the list of characteristics of identifiable groups protected from hate propaganda in the Criminal Code. It also adds that evidence that an offence was motivated by bias, prejudice or hate based on a person's gender identity or expression constitutes an aggravating circumstance for a court to consider when imposing a criminal sentence.^[4]

"A bill meant to enshrine the rights of transgender people by adding gender identity and expression to human rights and hate crime laws".

Simply put, Canadians who disavow gender theory could be charged with hate crimes, fined, jailed, and compelled to undergo anti-bias training when Bill C-16 passes.

Watch Jordan Peterson's speech at the Senate on many serious problems with Bill C-16.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wN3clJBg4h0

Peterson isn't the only one who thinks that this Bill is outrageous. For example, a member of Vancouver's Rape Relief and Women's Shelter says:

"Transgender rights bill threatens 'female-born' women's spaces... If you were born a female, you are doomed."

Interestingly enough, even Theryn Meyer, a South African-Canadian political commentator, blogger, YouTuber, cultural critic, and a transgender woman, was compelled to address the Senate and express her concerns over the Bill. According to her, it isn't intended to protect minorities, but instead abuses the Law and the communities it allegedly protects, and all for political gain.

Adding insult to injury, a bill recently passed by the Canadian House of Commons, infamously known as the "Pronoun Bill", and employs vague wording, deems it a federal offense to refuse to address an individual using their "preferred pronouns."

It is shocking to see how Canada, with its long tradition of relative political sanity, has fallen victim to the radical and pathological thinking of Postmodernists. And Canada isn't the only nation to suffer from this malady.

What we are seeing now seems to be the final stages of the gradual implementation of something called the "Overton Window".

"The Overton window is a political theory that describes the range of ideas the public will accept as a narrow "window". According to the theory, an idea's political viability depends mainly on whether it falls within that window rather than on politicians' individual preferences. It is named for its originator, Joseph P. Overton (1960 - 2003), a former vice president of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. At any given moment, the "window" includes a range of policies considered politically acceptable in the current climate of public opinion, which a politician can recommend without being considered too extreme to gain or keep public office."

"Overton described a method for moving that window, thereby including previously excluded ideas, while excluding previously acceptable ideas. The technique relies on people promoting ideas even less acceptable than the previous outer fringe ideas. That makes those old fringe ideas look less extreme, and thereby acceptable. The idea is that priming the public with fringe ideas intended to be and remain unacceptable, will make the real target ideas seem more acceptable by comparison."

Certain policies are gradually being passed in Western democracies in order to manipulate public opinion and make policies that would normally be seen as despicable and unacceptable, acceptable, especially if they are presented as representing "tolerance" and "progressive values".

It appears to be a perfect tool in the hands of pathological types to gradually normalize torture, various forms of moral degeneracy, and even pedophilia. The popularity of people like Miley Cyrus, Ariana Grande, or movies like Fifty shades of Grey seek to normalize increasingly 'out there' and extreme sexual behaviour, and this process of moral decline in the West seems to be a largely unconscious one.

The bottom line is, the Overton window can be used to legalize anything, including pedophilia. In fact, steps towards that have already been taken:

• Fears Grow Over Academic Efforts to Normalize Pedophilia
• Pedophilia Rights Convention in Baltimore
• Pedophilia Deserves Civil Rights, Says New York Times' Op-Ed
• Q&A: Rutgers Law Prof Who Says Pedophilia Is Not a Crime

Margo Kaplan - Pedophile Apologist

But what does this have to do with Postmodernism?

Ernest Gellner, in his prescient Postmodernism, Reason and Religion, discusses three ideological positions of our contemporary world which, at the present moment, have been sharpened into weapons of psychological and physical violence: Islamic Fundamentalism, Postmodernist Relativism, and what he terms 'Enlightenment Secular Fundamentalism'. His discussion of Postmodernism, its origins, development, adherents, and practices (if they can be called such) is invaluable and allows the reader to quickly recognize the psychological dilemmas of what are today called the neo-liberal left. Gellner writes:

"Postmodernism is a contemporary movement. It is strong and fashionable. Over and above this, it is not altogether clear what the devil it is. In fact, clarity is not conspicuous amongst its marked attributes. It not only generally fails to practice it, but also on occasion actually repudiates it...

The influence of the movement can be discerned in anthropology, literary studies, philosophy... The notion that everything is a 'text', that the basic material of texts, societies and almost anything is meaning, that meanings are there to be decoded or 'deconstructed', that the notion of objective reality is suspect - all this seems to be part of the atmosphere, or mist, in which postmodernism flourishes, or which postmodernism helps to spread...

Postmodernism would seem to be rather clearly in favour of relativism, in as far as it is capable of clarity, and hostile to the idea of unique, exclusive, objective, external or transcendent truth...

[Postmodernism] is a movement which denies the very possibility of extraneous validity and authority. Admittedly, it is specially insistent in this denial, when the contrary affirmation of such external validation comes from fellow-members, non-relativists within their own society... ex-colonial guilt on the other hand inhibit stressing the point to members of other cultures. The absolutism of others receives favoured treatment, and a warm sympathy which is very close to endorsement."

One of the most interesting things Gellner has said is this:

"The relativists-hermeneuticists are really very eager to display their universal, ecumenical tolerance and comprehension of alien cultures. The more alien, the more shocking and disturbing to the philistines, to those whom they deem to be the provincialists of their own society, the better. Very, very much the better, for the more shocking the other, the more does this comprehension highlight the superiority of the enlightened hermeneutist within his own society. The harder the comprehension, the more repellent the object destined for hermeneutic blessing, the greater the achievement, the illumination and the insight of the interpretive postmodernist"

which shows how Postmodernist doctrine can eventually lead to the normalization of just about anything, including something as repellent as pedophilia. The more extreme and degrading to the average person and greater society the acceptance is, the more "enlightened" and "progressive" the Postmodernist thinks himself.

Listen to Jordan Peterson and his warning regarding following Postmodernist principles:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPojltjv4M0

There is little doubt that Postmodernism and the processes it uses to induce and reinforce "habits of subconscious selection and substitution of thought-data" is simply Nihilism {the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless.}. Hervey Cleckley's book Caricature of Love also highlights the fact that, at its root, the "gender fluidity" movement is pure psychopathy in action.

Another seer of our society who saw and attempted to warn us all was Andrew Lobaczewski. From his book Political Ponerology (A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes):

"During stable times which are ostensibly happy, albeit marked by injury to individuals and nations, doctrinaire people believe they have found a simple solution to fix such a world. {Gender fluidity} Such a historical period is always characterized by an impoverished psychological world view, a schizoidally impoverished psychological world view thus does not stand out during such times and is accepted as legal tender. These doctrinaire individuals characteristically manifest a certain contempt with regard to moralists then preaching the need to rediscover lost human values and to develop a richer, more appropriate psychological world view.

Schizoid characters aim to impose their own conceptual world upon other people or social groups, using relatively controlled pathological egotism and the exceptional tenacity derived from their persistent nature. They are thus eventually able to overpower another individual's personality, which causes the latter's behavior to turn desperately illogical. They may also exert a similar influence upon the group of people they have joined. They are psychological loners who feel better in some human organization, wherein they become (1) zealots for some ideology, (2) religious bigots, (3) materialists, or (4) adherents of an ideology with satanic features. If their activities consist of direct contact on a small social scale, their acquaintances easily perceive them to be eccentric, which limits their ponerogenic role. However, if they manage to hide their own personality behind the written word, their influence may poison the minds of society in a wide scale and for a long time."

Speaking of schizoidally impoverished world views...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zP-lpEOVcmY

In contrast to Western societies, Russia under Vladimir Putin has taken definite steps towards protecting its people from this kind of Postmodernistic filth. Despite Western media propaganda, Russian policies are not aimed at increasing the influence of the Orthodox Christianity or persecuting of gays, but rather making sure that Russian society and the values on which it has been based over countless generations is safeguarded for future generations. Jordan Peterson explains:

"If there are no sacred values, man is a blank slate. Anything whatsoever can be written on a blank slate. If there is a universal human nature, however, some ideas are wrong, and their implementation will result in catastrophe. The evidence is before us, in the form of the millions who were sacrificed to the values of 20th century totalitarians. Everything cannot be simply questioned and re-organized, in a purely rational matter. Thought itself must have its master...

What, therefore, must be sacred, at minimum? The Mother, the Father, and the Individual. It is the duty of each society, and each individual, to respect these figures, in mind, thought, and action. When this is done properly, the great forces of being are kept in equilibrium, and the individual, society, and nature all thrive. Otherwise, hell breaks loose, and swallows the little heavens that could otherwise be found on earth."

To learn about additional examples of Postmodernist depravity, read the following articles by Pierre Lescaudron:

Public-Sector Unions Keep the Gravy Train Flowing to Fire Departments

May 15, 2017

(Mises.org) - Firefighting isn't what it used to be. Thanks to fire suppression technology, structural fires are now very rare, and statistics show that firefighters rarely fight fires anymore. Mostly, firefighters respond to run-of-the-mill medical emergencies in fancy million-dollar trucks. Governing magazine lays out the change over time: 

In 1980, according to the National Fire Protection Association, the nation's 30,000 fire departments responded to 10.8 million emergency calls. About 3 million were classified as fires. By 2013, total calls had nearly tripled to 31.6 million, while fire calls had plummeted to 1.24 million, of which just 500,000 of were actual structure fires. For America's 1.14 million career and volunteer firefighters, that works out to an average of just one structure fire every other year.

In other words, a enormous number of firefighters could be replaced by paramedics — using much less-expensive vehicles — and no one would notice.

But don't let these facts get in the way of the romantic view of firefighting perpetuated by popular culture. 

And no organization loves the fantasy version of firefighting better than the public unions that lobby constantly for more lucrative salaries and benefits for firefighters. 

Some unions are more successful than others, of course, but as firefighting becomes safer and safer, the Los Angeles Police Department has only been raking in more and more dough, and provides an example of just how far firefighters can go in exploiting the public's benevolent view of everyone's favorite government agency. 

According to just-released 2016 salary data from TransparentCalifornia.com, just three Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD) employees, for example, earned a combined $1.36 million last year — $974,779 of which came from overtime pay alone.

Unsurprisingly, the LAFD trio earned the three largest overtime payouts of the more than 550,000 workers surveyed statewide:

1. Fire captain Charles Ferrari received $334,655 in OT, with total earnings of $469,198.
2. Fire captain James Vlach received $332,583 in OT, with total earnings of $469,158.
3. Firefighter Donn Thompson received $307,542 in OT, with total earnings of $424,913.

More alarming than the large dollar amounts was the discovery of what this money was being spent on. The Times reported that most overtime pay:

…is not being used for fires or other emergencies. Instead, most of it goes for replacing those who are out because of vacations, holidays, injuries, training, illnesses or personal leaves. Millions more go to firefighters on special assignments, such as in-house training and evaluation programs.

Six-Figure OT Payouts up 760% over Past 5 Years

In the original 1996 Times report, a retired LAFD firefighter described overtime pay as “a little extra bonus for the guys,” that allows them to get “a new boat on the river and a new truck every year.”
Back then, the department’s largest OT payout was just under $103,000.

And as the dollar amount of these payouts exploded, so too has their number, particularly over the past five years.

Since 2012, the number of LAFD workers who received overtime payouts of at least $100,000 increased by 760 percent, hitting an all-time high of 439 last year.

In 1995, the LAFD spent a “budget-wrenching” $58.6 million on overtime pay.

In 2008, that number hit $139 million, which prompted a recently retired fire captain to call for an overhaul of the department’s staffing system, according to the DailyNews.

Now at $197 million — which represents a more than twofold increase since 1995, after adjusting for inflation — overtime pay constitutes 31 percent of LAFD’s expenses, according to the City’s adopted budget for the 2016 fiscal year.

Admittedly, the LAFD's payouts are particularly egregious. By comparison, only one fire employee in the entire state of Nevada received a six-figure OT payout last year: Carson City fire captain Matthew Donnelly, who earned $110,217 in overtime pay, according to TransparentNevada.com. But firefighter salaries nationwide have long been a millstone around the neck of municipal governments which have struggled to keep up with what one Michigan official called “above market” salaries enjoyed by fire department employees. 

Part of the problem stems from the fact that any time a city government considers cutting firefighter salaries — or, more likely, not increasing salaries — the public unions that lobby for pay hikes claim the city is sacrificing public safety and disrespecting the “heroes” who deserve six-figure salaries and fat pensions, no matter what.

In Los Angeles, however, any reform in this arena will require years of unwinding intricate contracts that are heavily slanted in favor of government employees and against taxpayers. For example, a contract provision with the LAFD requires vacation leave to count as hours worked toward overtime pay illustrates the root cause of the department’s soaring overtime costs, according to Robert Fellner of Transparent California:

The issue is not a lack of solutions. Those have been forthcoming from a coalition of experts, including those from LAFD’s own ranks, for decades. The issue is lack of a political will for the precise reason an official outlined nearly two decades ago: fear of political retaliation.

Unfortunately, public unions have weaponized the trust bestowed upon the firefighting profession as a means to enrich themselves, at the expense of public safety and taxpayers alike.

Comments from Mises:

Israelis Rally for Palestinian State, End of Occupation

May 27, 2017

(AFP) - Thousands of Israelis rallied Saturday in Tel Aviv in support of a Palestinian state ahead of the 50th anniversary of Israel's occupation of Palestinian land.

Banners bearing the slogan "Two states, One Hope" featured in the demonstration organised by supporters of a Palestinian state, including the Israeli NGO Peace Now.

NGO head Avi Buskila said the rally was a protest against "the lack of hope being offered by a government perpetuating occupation, violence and racism".

"The time has come to prove to the Israelis, the Palestinians and the entire world that an important segment of the Israeli population is opposed to occupation and wants a two-state solution," he added.

A message of support from Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas was read out at the rally.

"It is time to live together in harmony, security and stability," Abbas was quoted as saying.

"Our duty towards future generations is to conclude a peace of the brave."

Israeli opposition Labour party leader Isaac Herzog attended the rally and threw his support behind a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Jared Kushner is the Latest Target of the Russiagate Probe

May 26, 2017 

(The Duran) - Drawing a blank with Manafort, Page, Stone and Flynn, the Russiagate investigators now come after Kushner.

Last week reports appeared in the US media that the FBI had discovered "a person of interest" in the Russiagate probe, who was still unlike all the other people being investigated a member of Donald Trump's team. This week that person has been identified and it turns out to be Donald Trump's son in law Jared Kushner.

The expression "person of interest" has no legal meaning whatsoever. It should never be used to describe anyone whilst an investigation is underway. It insinuates that the person in question is a suspect, when he or she is not. It is particularly inappropriate when used of someone in the Russiagate investigation given that there is still no evidence that any crime was committed or anyone is suspected of committing one.

In Kushner's case the reason for the FBI's interest in him appears to be that last year he - like many other people - met with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. That meeting apparently took place in December, in other words after the election, making it difficult to see what bearing it could have on the election.

Kushner apparently also met last year with a Russian banker called Sergey Gorkov.

One of the most sinister aspects of former CIA Director John Brennan's recent testimony to Congress was the way Brennan appeared to say that any meeting with any Russian was axiomatically suspect because all Russians must be suspected of working for Russian intelligence. Brennan even said that a US citizen who came into contact with a Russian might be recruited by Russian intelligence without even being aware of it.

Presumably it is this sort of paranoid reasoning - which belongs more in a mental institution than a well run investigation - which sees something suspicious in a meeting between Kushner - a US businessman - and Gorkov - a Russian businessman.

Notwithstanding Kushner's meetings with Kislyak and Gorkov, we are told that he is not actually being investigated for anything:

Investigators believe Kushner has significant information relevant to their inquiry, officials said. That does not mean they suspect him of a crime or intend to charge him...The officials said Kushner is in a different category from former Trump aides Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, who are formally considered subjects of the investigation. According to the Justice Department's U.S. Attorneys' Manual, "A 'subject' of an investigation is a person whose conduct is within the scope of the grand jury's investigation."

This has very much the look about it of a fishing expedition.

At this point it pays repeating that so far despite their being "formally considered subjects of the investigation" no evidence has come to light that Manafort, Page, Stone or Flynn or any of the other people spoken about in relation to the Russiagate investigation are actually suspected of having committed any crime in relation to it. Nor has any evidence come to light that they ever engaged in any collusion on behalf of the Trump campaign with Russia. Nor it seems is there any evidence that any of them actually committed any wrongdoing.

It seems that contrary to earlier reports General Flynn did report his fees from RT to the Defense Intelligence Agency, if not to the Department of Defense itself, and that he did register his lobbying work for Turkey, though under the Lobbying Disclosure Act not the Foreign Agents' Registration Act.

That suggests that whatever offenses General Flynn may have committed they were purely technical ones, which presumably explains why he still hasn't been charged with them. As I have repeatedly said, the claim that General Flynn violated the Logan Act by taking a call in December from ambassador Kislyak is nonsense, which presumably explains why after all the fire and thunder and lurid talk of blackmail he has not so far been charged with that either.

It seems that having drawn a blank with Manafort, Page, Stone and Flynn the FBI investigators are now looking to Kushner instead. This despite the fact that Kushner is not known to have had any close links to Manafort, Page, Stone or Flynn (it's doubtful whether he ever met Page) or to any of the other people spoken about in relation to the Russiagate investigation.

This is what happens when an investigation is launched in the absence of any evidence that any crime has been committed. The investigators spend their time searching for a crime they can then attach to a suspect they have already identified.

That this completely reverses the normal order of an investigation, in which a suspect is looked for after a crime has been detected, ought to be obvious. However nothing is obvious about this strange affair.

Fewer State Jobs and Public Services and More Tax Increases Coming to California Due to Unrealistic Investment Returns for Public Pensions

May 22, 2017 

(Mercury News) - There’s more bad news to come from CalPERS, the nation’s largest pension plan.

In December, the board of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System approved phase-in of a rate increase for the state and local government agencies that provide most of its funding.

But it won’t be enough to shore up the ailing system. That’s why next month the board will begin a review process that’s likely to lead to approval as early as December of another increase.

That’s right. Even as the state and local governments across California struggle to figure out how they’re going to cut services and reduce staffing to pay for the first round of increases, they’re likely to face another one.

As painful as it will be, there are no responsible options. If CalPERS doesn’t act, the problem will only get worse. It’s pay now, or pay more later.

We’re in this pickle because, in the early years of this century, the state and local governments locked in major pension increases for workers, while CalPERS relied on unrealistic investment forecasts to help fund them.

The investment forecasts didn’t pan out and, as a result, CalPERS today has only about 64 percent of the assets it should to pay for benefits employees have already earned. That’s approaching dangerous territory where a sharp economic downturn would leave the pension plan unable to recover.

That’s also the system’s lowest funding ratio at any time except 2009, in the depth of the Great Recession. The only thing that saved the system then was that it was fully funded just before the downturn. In two years, the funding ratio slipped to 61 percent.

In other words, we know we’re due, actually overdue, for another recession and, this time, CalPERS is horribly positioned to absorb the shock.

Meanwhile, CalPERS continues to overestimate the potential returns of its investments. In December, the system board agreed to slowly lower its investment forecast from an annual 7.5 percent to 7 percent. To make up for that reduction, CalPERS approved the contribution rate increase.

But the board hasn’t gone nearly far enough. CalPERS’ consultant says board members should anticipate only an average 6.2 percent annual investment return over the next 10 years. Hence, they need to raise contribution rates even further.

That means even more belt-tightening at the state and local governments: Fewer jobs, more labor concessions and/or more tax increases. Labor leaders and many local officials will protest. They’ll ask CalPERS to wait, or soften the blow.

For far too long, CalPERS board members have capitulated to those pleas. They ignored their professional staff’s advice and kept banking on unrealistic investment forecasts. That’s one reason we’re in this mess.

As we’ve said before, the solution is to fix the system, not continue denying reality.

Southern California D.A. Admits Jailhouse Snitches Are 'Probably' Liars

May 19, 2017

 

(Huffington Post) ― Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas, whose office faces three investigations over the use of jail informants, told a “60 Minutes” reporter that those informants probably shouldn’t be believed. Yet Rackauckas’ office has been using jailhouse snitches to help secure convictions for decades, presenting them as credible witnesses with credible evidence.

The interview comes from a preview of a “60 Minutes” segment that will air Sunday on CBS about the county’s unfolding jail informant scandal, which HuffPost has been reporting on since it began to explode in 2014. In the segment, “60 Minutes” correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi interviews longtime Orange County informant Mark Cleveland about the ways he has helped Rackauckas and his office.

Cleveland tells the news show that for years he has been placed in jail cells with or near defendants whom prosecutors had targeted in attempts to obtain damaging information that could secure convictions.

Cleveland claims in the interview that he worked directly with Rackauckas and would even call him personally about information he’d obtained. Cleveland says Rackauckas expressed his appreciation and helped him obtain reduced sentences for multiple crimes.

Rackauckas reportedly told Alfonsi that there is no jail informant program in the county, despite mountains of evidence to the contrary. A recent California appeals court decision found that there is indeed an informant program. The court also wrote, “The magnitude of the systemic problems cannot be overlooked.”

The district attorney told Alfonsi that he remembers Cleveland being “an informant many years ago in a case or two” but that it’s a “fantasy” that he ever called Rackauckas on the phone.

“I think you should assume you’re talking to an informant, and if he’s talking, he’s probably lying,” Rackauckus said.

Cleveland Is Indeed A Longtime Informant

According to informant records maintained by the district attorney’s office and first obtained by Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders, Cleveland is a veteran informant in county jails, helping prosecutors obtain convictions against multiple defendants since at least the 1980s. Cleveland claims he’s worked as a jailhouse snitch since the 1970s.

Sanders is the defense attorney who, in a series of blockbuster motions, has unearthed damning evidence of a jail informant program’s existence. The evidence began to surface in the case against his client Scott Dekraai, who pleaded guilty to murdering eight people at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011. The sentencing of Dekraai remains in limbo now amid the allegations of misconduct by prosecutors and sheriff’s deputies stemming from the discovery of the use of an informant.

In a recent motion, Sanders detailed five cases from 2008 to 2010 in which Cleveland provided information. He testified as recently as 2013 in two cases. One was overseen by Assistant District Attorney Howard Gundy, who was part of the team that prosecuted Dekraai.

Prosecutors apparently relied on information from Cleveland despite the district attorney’s office’s own records that labeled him a “problem informant,” in bold, underlined letters.

D.A. Has Used Jail Informants Himself In Several Cases

Jail informants with questionable moral fiber have been used time and again by prosecutors in Orange County cases, even by Rackauckas himself, who acknowledged as far back as 1985 in a Los Angeles Times report to have used informants in “several cases.” One such prolific jail informant used by Rackauckas was James Cochrum, whom the Times dubbed “the most used informant” and who was recently described by Sanders in court documents as “a consummate scam artist.”

In 1985, Cochrum had already used as many as 13 names while committing numerous crimes in at least three states and while a member of the military, which ultimately led to his discharge, Sanders detailed in court documents. Cochrum claimed to have overheard murder confessions in four cases and testified in three of them. So valuable was Cochrum to Rackauckas that he personally accompanied Cochrum to Utah to speak to the parole board on his behalf. Following that visit, an administrative parole hold against Cochrum for escaping from a Utah lockup was dropped.

In the 1985 murder-kidnapping trial of William Gullett, Rackauckas helped win a conviction with Cochrum’s testimony. The Los Angeles Times reported that Rackauckas claimed he had as many as eight informants who would testify.

Cochrum died in 2011 while serving time in Utah for communications fraud.

That same year, three years before the informant scandal would break open, Rackauckas’ office successfully opposed a motion for DNA testing in the Gullett case. In 2016, Sanders sought release of the district attorney’s informant file on Cochrum, but the request was denied by an Orange County Superior Court judge who, as an Orange County prosecutor, had also used Cochrum as a witness in a homicide case.

The Jailhouse Informant Scandal Continues

While Rackauckas reportedly denied the existence of a jail informant program to “60 Minutes,” as the county’s sheriff’s department has also done, the courts have basically declared the debate over.

The debate is settled for Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals, who ejected the entire district attorney’s office from the remaining proceedings in the Dekraai case in 2015 due to findings of significant misconduct. The state’s 4th District Court of Appeal affirmed Goethals’ findings last year. And, despite years of denials, Rackauckas’ own office acknowledged in documents released in court last year that an informant program does exist.

Law enforcement authorities use informants to help bolster a case — a tactic that’s legal, even when the snitch receives a reduced sentence or something else of value in exchange.

"Dozens" of Graduates and Family Members Walk Out on Pence at Notre Dame Commencement

May 21, 2107

(AP) — Dozens of graduates and family members silently stood and walked out Sunday as Vice President Mike Pence began his address at Notre Dame's commencement ceremony.

Pence, the former governor of Indiana, was invited to speak after Notre Dame students and faculty protested the prospect of President Donald Trump being invited to become the seventh U.S. president to give the commencement address.

Pence spoke briefly of Trump, praising his speech to the leaders of 50 Arab and Muslim nations earlier in the day in Saudi Arabia. Pence said the president "spoke out against religious persecution of all people of all faiths and on the world stage he condemned, in his words, the murder of innocent Muslims, the oppression of women, the persecution of Jews and the slaughter of Christians."

Trump has faced harsh criticism for his anti-Islamic rhetoric during the campaign, as well as his administration's legal battle to impose a travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries.

Some Comments from Yahoo:

              J F
        OK coming from someone that was actually there, probably 10 people walked out and everyone else stayed. How can they and why do they blow this up into a story that really isn't? The media is so slanted and corrupt in the US it's scary. Feels almost like a dictatorship style news organization.      

                Ed dalcours
        We are for those coddled grads walking out it is their free speech.They are not for ours though. They are taught how to be good little Communist fascists. That is what the liberal mindset does is project what they are. When they call you a fascists it is to hide their fascism when they say:" TRUMP COLLUDED WITH RUSSIA IT IS TO HIDE THEIR OWN COLLUSION. " They always project what they are.

IDF Prepares Largest Military Drill in Almost 20 Years Along Lebanon Border

IDF is about to hold its largest military exercise in nearly 20 years along border with Lebanon to prepare for an invasion scenario by Hezbollah forces to Israel's northern territories.

April 4, 2017

(YNet News) - The IDF is gearing up to hold its largest military drill in nearly 20 years—a combined arms exercise along its border with Lebanon—at a time of rising tensions with Iran and Hezbollah.

A military official said Monday that the joint exercise, which will begin Tuesday and involve thousands of ground, sea and air force vehicles and personnel, will prepare soldiers for "preserving the current stability in the northern sector."

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with IDF regulations, said the drill will run through for 11 days, from Sept. 4th to Sept. 14th.

Among other systems of advanced weaponry, the exercise will incorporate Israel's multi-layered missile defense systems.

Similar to other major IDF exercises in recent years, this imaginary incident also begins with an offensive initiated by the enemy—Hezbollah—against the Galilee Division.

The IDF will respond to the "attack" in three stages: defense measures over the first few days, including counter-attacks and the deployment of defense forces akin to an air strike; an offensive attack as a second stage, with extensive ground maneuvers; and a change of mission statement as the third and last stage, in an aim to push enemy forces back into Lebanon.

"Hezbollah's initial attack" will be expressed as a simulated invasion of dozens of IDF fighters into Israeli territory and infiltration into one of the border communities. Home Front Command forces will practice the evacuation of civilians from threatened communities, as soldiers act the part of civilians in distress.

The southern Galilee will serve as southern Lebanon during the days of the drill, from Route 85 southward.

The IDF emphasized that the exercise was planned for about a year following a directive given by Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot when he took office in 2015, regardless of Iran's attempts to establish itself in Syria.

Israel has voiced growing concerns about Iran's buildup in neighboring Syria and Hezbollah's alleged stockpiling of weapons in southern Lebanon.

FBI Director Dismisses WikiLeaks Coverage as ‘Intelligence Porn’

May 4, 2017

(Yahoo News) - FBI Director James Comey branded some WikiLeaks reports “intelligence porn” during his Wednesday testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Russia’s role in the presidential election. Comey made the comments after Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., asked him to explain why he doesn’t consider WikiLeaks to be a legitimate journalistic organization.

“It’s an important question, because all of us care deeply about the First Amendment and the ability of a free press to get information about our work and publish it,” Comey began, before delving into his rationale.

“To my mind, it crosses a line when it moves from being about trying to educate a public and instead just becomes about intelligence porn, frankly — just pushing out information about sources and methods without regard to interest, without regard to the First Amendment values that normally underlie press reporting and simply becomes a conduit for the Russian intelligence services or some other adversary of the United States just to push out information to damage the United States.”

WikiLeaks, the organization dedicated to publishing secret documents, became a flashpoint during the campaign when thousands of papers and emails stolen from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman appeared on the site.

The U.S. intelligence community accused the Russian government of spearheading the hacks that gave the emails to WikiLeaks.

Many of the emails were politically damaging or otherwise embarrassing, and the repeated document dumps created weeks of negative headlines for Clinton. Clinton herself on Tuesday blamed her loss in part on their disclosure.