Is Scotland independent yet? For now? No. But that’s partly because voting in a referendum that would undo the 300-year-old political union known as Great Britain isn’t over yet. A survey coming just before the polls opened suggested independence would fail—but in the face of historic turnout, with 97 percent of eligible Scots registered to vote, the final reckoning will be nail-bitingly close.
Beheading videos seemed to be the only way hostages held by the Islamic State, better-known as ISIS, could ever show their faces the world again. That’s changed. The conquering Islamist army, in its latest production, has turned a British captive into a something of a spokesman for the cause.
Meanwhile, Barack Obama’s plan to fight ISIS not only in Iraq but also in Syria, by arming Syrian rebel groups, won surprising bipartisan support in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
Weirdly enough, Syria’s government—months and months and months after chemical weapons inspectors scoured the country, and weeks and days after fresh accusations it poisoned people—has revealed previously secret research and production installations.
Sierra Leone, taking extreme measures in the hope they might loosen Ebola’s increasingly deadly grip, has called for a three-day nationwide lockdown in which health workers will go door-to-door to identify and quarantine the sick and infected.
The police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, who shot dead 18-year-old Michael Brown last month took his turn with the grand jury investigating his actions. Darren Wilson spent four hours answering questions and reportedly was “cooperative.”
Toronto’s Rob Ford, the most excellent mayor in North America, has a “rare and difficult” form of stomach cancer—meaning the only drugs Ford will ingest, for a while and possibly ever, are the kind associated with chemotherapy.
It’s not just police departments who’ve taken advantage of the Pentagon’s surplus military equipment giveaway program. Seems 26 school districts nationwide have also accepted gifts like machine guns, grenade launchers, armored vehicles, and other heavy gear.
Privacy?! Apple, in its latest mobile operating system, has changed how it does data encryption—meaning the company can no longer unlock iPhones and iPads whenever police officers ask, even if those requests come in the form of a search warrant.
Walmart thinks it’s fancy enough to institute a fancy dress code for its workers… who aren’t actually paid enough to afford to beef up their wardrobes in the way their employer would prefer.
DON’T WORRY, SCOTLAND! YOUR ECONOMY WILL BE JUST FINE.
So the only thing that can garner bipartisan support in Congress is war. Sigh.
Those ISIL “beheading” video’s are fake. Even the mainstream media has had to admit they’re fake, and that they use slick production techniques and jump cuts. Whether Foley or the others were actually killed off screen doesn’t change the fact that these video’s, released by western intelligence agencies to be used as a casus belli to expand military expansion in the middle east, are fake as fuck.
And seriously, khaki pants and a collared shirt are you’re definition of a “fancy dress code”?