Mid-Week Post

A pleasant Earf Day to all y'all...

Never forget its origins.

Aaahhh... the misty green memories of they way they were and did not transpire:

“We have about five more years at the outside to do something.” • Kenneth Watt, ecologist

“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” • George Wald, Harvard Biologist

“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist

“By…[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist

“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation.” • Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day

“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions….By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.” • Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University

“Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half….” • Life Magazine, January 1970

According to the 1948 Convention of the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide, genocide is the intentional act of planning to and destroying a national, ethnic, racial or religious group by means of direct harm, preventing births or creating circumstances of the said groups' demise.

Scholars who have studied the Armenian genocide- the upheaval, murder and systematic abuse of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1923 - have agreed that it fits the definition of genocide.

And yet Obama does not agree:

White House officials have decided that President Obama will not use the word “genocide” to describe the killings of more than 1 million Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turks when he commemorates the deaths Friday, the 100th anniversary of the massacres.

 
That's not what he said before:

The decision, revealed Tuesday in a meeting with Armenian American groups, backs down from a previous Obama pledge.

“As president I will recognize the Armenian Genocide,” Obama said while running for president in 2008.

**

In 2006, then-Senator Barack Obama wrote a letter to Secretary of State Condi Rice urging her to acknowledge historical facts and use the word “genocide” to describe the massacre of 1.5 million Armenian Christians. As President, Obama has never used the word, despite a written promise to do so.

How embarrassing. 

As there can be no moral or legal defense of this refusal, the US under Obama adhere to a hollow premise that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a stalwart friend to the West when in fact he is a flimsy ally with dictatorial and delusional machinations.

The decision is, therefore, an ideological one as is evidenced by several statements made by Obama. He is not obliged to be a referee between Armenia and Turkey. He is obliged to objectively call the past genocide of Armenians and the ongoing genocide of Christians and other minorities for what they are.


This has nothing to do with Islam:

An Islamic extremist with an arsenal of loaded guns was prevented from opening fire on churchgoers only because he accidentally shot himself in the leg, French officials said Wednesday.

The 24-year-old computer science student, who was also suspected in the death of a young woman whose body was found on Sunday shortly before his arrest, had been flagged as a risk for intent to travel to Syria but there had been no specific reason to open a judicial investigation, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Wednesday.

Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins said the suspect — an Algerian who had lived in France for several years — was arrested in Paris Sunday after he apparently shot himself by accident and called for an ambulance.

He was waiting outside his apartment building for first aid when police arrived. They followed a trail of blood to his car, which contained loaded guns, and notes about potential targets.

But no one will miss this failed murderer.


Ouch:

It’s time for the United States to withdraw its soldiers from Korea. This has nothing to do with “liberating South Korea from U.S. imperialism,” and nothing to do with American retrenchment and isolationism. ...

The reason that U.S. troops should leave is that the presence of American soldiers encourages South Korean irresponsibility. South Korea has to grow up and take charge of its situation. How it got there doesn’t matter.

It's true. South Korea had better step it up because the US is not going to save it from Chinese-backed North Korea forever.

(Kamsahamnida)


And now, a story of love between a very special little girl and her very special little puppy:

Lt. Dan might have met a different fate in other circumstances.

But his owner, Karen Riddle, knew the white German shepherd puppy born with just one front paw was meant for something special.

And on Monday, the nine-week-old found a new home with Sapphyre Johnson, a toddler who lost both feet.

(photo source)