Steve Lendman – Fighting For Internet Freedom – 16 May 2014

A previous article discussed Obama’s war to destroy it. In 2008, he pledged support. He called “preserv(ing) the benefits of open competition on the Internet” essential.

He lied saying so. He’s waging war on free expression. He prioritizes intellectual property protection over Internet freedom.

He’s targeting it for elimination altogether. He appointed corporatist Tom Wheeler FCC chairman. He deplores Internet freedom.

US Honeybee Population Suffers ‘Unsustainable’ Death Rate Over The Winter – 16 May 2014

Nearly one quarter of the US honeybee population died over the winter, according to an annual survey. Beekeepers report the losses remain higher than they consider sustainable, and the death rate could soon affect the country’s food supply.

“More than three-fourths of the world’s flowering plants rely on pollinators, such as bees, to reproduce, meaning pollinators help produce one out of every three bites of food Americans eat,” the US Department of Agriculture said in a statement about the survey. Bees’ pollinating role adds $15 billion to the value of U.S. crops, including apples, almonds, watermelons and beans, according to government reports.

The study, produced by a partnership between the USDA, the Apiary Inspectors of America and the Bee Informed Partnership, found that 23.2 percent of honeybee colonies died over the winter, which is higher than the “acceptable winter mortality rate” of 18.9 percent.

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article

‘Modi-fied’ India: Implications Of BJP’s Landslide Win – 16 May 2014

Author: Rajeev Sharma is a New Delhi-based journalist, author and strategic analyst. He tweets @Kishkindha and can be reached at bhootnath004@yahoo.com.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) stormed into power on Friday riding on the crest of a Narendra Modi tsunami which gave a clear majority to a single party for the first time in India for 30 years and swept the ruling Congress into oblivion.

It has become the worst-ever electoral performance by the Grand Old Party. With Modi emerging as the undisputed strong man of India, this will have its own implications for the world.

Here is my take on the specific countries and regions that are crucial for India.

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article

Teen In Baltimore Hospital Dies After Being Tased By Police – 16 May 2014

An altercation between a young patient and hospital security staff last week turned deadly when Baltimore police arrived at the scene and used a Taser on the teenager, sparking an investigation into the incident.

The confrontation began on Wednesday, May 7, the day after a 19-year-old patient was admitted into Baltimore’s Good Samaritan Hospital for medical treatment. The teenager’s name remains unknown, and was described by police only as a “ward of the state.”

According to CBS Baltimore, Lt. Eric Kowalczyk said that when the hospital called law enforcement for help, the patient was locked in a physical struggle with “at least five security guards” and was suffering from an “emotional crisis.”

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article

ZeroHedge – Guest Post: Meet The Man Who Killed Keystone – 16 May 2014

Submitted by Wendy McElroy via Mises Canada,

On May 12, the United States Senate fell 5 votes short of the 60 required to invoke cloture. (Cloture is a way to close debate and cause an immediate vote on a bill.) The measure in question was the first energy bill to have hit that chamber since 2007. It was killed by the Keystone XL Pipeline project which would funnel Canadian crude oil from Alberta down to Texas refineries.

Read the full story at: www.zerohedge.com / link to original article

ZeroHedge – Ukraine’s Richest Man Mobilizes Private ‘Army’ After Assets Threatened – 16 May 2014

Rinat Akhmetov – Ukraine’s richest man with an estimated worth of $11.4 billion – has, as Reuters reports, acquired almost feudal status in the industrial hub of Donetsk in the past 20 years – but the separatist rebellions there have altered the dynamics of power. This is not acceptable to the billionaire and so he has demanded his miners and metalworkers join police on patrol on Mariupol. As pro-Russian rebels declaring independence seized public buildings across the steel and coal belt which is the basis of his colossal fortune, he issued repeated written statements in support of a united Ukraine… but the media-shy 47-year-old, who has a workforce of 300,000 people on his payroll in the Donbass, has to tread carefully around local sensitivities and has avoided specifically condemning the action of the separatists.

Read the full story at: www.zerohedge.com / link to original article

Kentucky Sues Feds Over Right To Grow Hemp – 16 May 2014

Attorneys for the state of Kentucky are in federal court Friday afternoon attempting to have the United States government release hemp seeds imported from abroad that were intended to be used in pilot growing projects.

It became lawful to use industrial hemp in Kentucky starting in 2013, and a farm bill signed by US President Barack Obama earlier this year paved the way for states to grow the crop for research. The US Drug Enforcement Agency nevertheless seized around 250 pounds of hemp seeds shipped from Italy to the University of Kentucky earlier this month, prompting state officials to turn around and sue that agency and others.

Even though the Department of Justice has started to recognize legal hemp cultivation, a federal law enforcement official told the US News & World Report this week that importing seeds still requires the state to abide by the Controlled Substances Act.

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article

Aisha North – The Manuscript Of Survival – Part 416 – 16 May 2014

As we have touched upon many a time before, mankind has a long history of looking outwards in search for answers. You see, as mankind got severed from the old links that connected them to themselves, they were left as if floating in a vacuum, and it felt as if a void had opened up within. In this void, mankind has tried in vain to insert all sorts of ambitions and intellectual games in order to try to fill in this gaping void within, but to no avail. For what has been brought into this gap between the real you and the you you have been feeling, was only transient and insubstantial substitutes for something that was so fundamental for you all, nothing could take its place. And so, mankind was left to search in vain for anything that could make them feel whole again. For within this gap, even if they could not name it nor set any words to try to describe it, they sensed that a fundamental part of them was missing. And so, a quest to become whole again was set into motion again and again, but each and every time, this quest sent you all searching in the wrong direction.

Kiev Proclaims Post-Referendum Donetsk, Lugansk Regions ‘Terrorist Organizations’ – 16 May 2014

New authorities in post-coup Kiev have listed the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Lugansk as terrorist organizations. The two regions proclaimed themselves sovereign states after the controversial May 11 referendums.

“The two so-called ‘people’s republics’ in Donetsk and Lugansk regions are terrorist organizations, which have a clear hierarchy, financing, and channels of weapons supplies,” Ukraine’s deputy prosecutor general, Nikolay Golomsha, said.

The statement confirmed a similar statement made by Ukraine’s minister of justice, Pavel Petrenko. The minister said the two “were created for assaulting people, intimidation, sabotage, terrorist attacks, beatings, and murder of our citizens.”

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article

Mother Launches Online Campaign To Defend 3-Year-Old Son Drom Circumcision – 16 May 2014

A Florida woman has successfully convinced a state appeals court to stop the father of her three-year-old son from having their child circumcised.

The Court of Appeals for Florida’s fourth district this week granted a request made by the boy’s mother, Heather Hironimus of Boynton Beach, in which she asked for justices to stay an earlier ruling ordering her son to be circumcised.

Hironimus and the boy’s father, Dennis Nebus of Boca Raton, had the child in October 2010 and more than a year later entered into a legally-binding parenting agreement; Hironimus and Nebus never married.

Read the full story at: www.rt.com / link to original article