Reviews Category
We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.
Mali Army use gun shot sounds in training (video)
GUNS don’t kill people. Bullets fired from them might. But in Mali, it’s the rat-a-tat sound of fire that does the damage. No poor is Mali, that there is no ammunition for training. Soldiers are encouraged to make their own sounds. Faced with this option, the smart soldiers will opt for “K-BOOM!”, Noel Edmonds welcoming the enemy to the “dream factory” or play a decent scary film score loud, something from The Exorcist or Rosemary’s Baby.
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Posted: 23rd, January 2013 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comments (2)
Face of the day: Lindsay June Sandiford faces the firing squad
FACE of the day: Lindsay June Sandiford, 56, hears the verdict announced at a courthouse, in Denpasar, Bali island, Indonesia. The Indonesian court sentenced British woman Sandiford to death on Tuesday for smuggling around 5kgs of cocaine worth $2.5 million into the resort island of Bali. She will be shot by firing squad:
Operation Yewtree: they only nick the ugly ones
IT’S been a while since the last
There have been nine arrests so far. Enough for a game of Celebrity Squares, the 1970s noughts and crosses gameshow with a twist. There should be further arrests – the Star promised more on January 13, stating: “Savile cops will arrest seven more stars” – but many VIPS (as they were known in their pomp) are dead. Also, if the Star can make celebrities of X Factor also-rans and minor soap opera actors, the Celebrity Police Force might not think it worth the effort to nick a Crossroads extra. We could dig up some real stars gone by, but then we’d be necrophiliacs, like Jimmy Savile.
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Posted: 22nd, January 2013 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
New York school gun clubs make mockery of zero-tolerance policy
CHARLES Cooke on New York school Gun Clubs:
In 1975, New York state had over 80 school districts with rifle teams. In 1984, that had dropped to 65. By 1999 there were just 26. The state’s annual riflery championship was shut down in 1986 for lack of demand. This, sadly, is a familiar story across the country. The clubs are fading from memory, too. A Chicago Tribune report from 2007 notes the astonishment of a Wisconsin mother who discovered that her children’s school had a range on site. “I was surprised, because I never would have suspected to have something like that in my child’s school,” she told the Tribune. The district’s superintendent admitted that it was now a rarity, confessing that he “often gets raised eyebrows” if he mentions the range to other educators. The astonished mother raised her eyebrows — and then led a fight to have the range closed. “Guns and school don’t mix,” she averred. “If you have guns in school, that does away with the whole zero-tolerance policy.”
But how wise is that “zero-tolerance policy”? Until 1989, there were only a few school shootings in which more than two victims were killed. This was despite widespread ownership of — and familiarity with — weapons and an absence of “gun-free zones.”
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Posted: 22nd, January 2013 | In: Reviews | Comments (2)
Oxford child rape case: prosecution blames Asians, but sensitive media disagrees
REPORTING on the alleged Oxford child sex abusers – nine men stand accused of raping and sexually abusing children – has been restricted by the ongoing trial. But what has not been said can be as illuminating as what has been said.
Seven of the nine male defendants are of Pakistani origin and two are North African. All the alleged victims are white.
The Times does report those facts.
The men are aged between 24 to 38. The children were aged between 11 and 15 when the alleged abuse occurred.
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Posted: 22nd, January 2013 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comments (6)
David Attenborough wants one in three of you dead
SIR David Attenborough is the voice of God. He’s also the leader of the Optimum Population Trust. It wants less of you. Ask yourself this: how much rainforest can be saved if 2100 baies are aborted? Had King Herod killed the first born for Gaia, would he be hero? Says the OPT:
Reversing population growth is one of the measures needed to ensure environmental survival and a better quality of life. It can be done by voluntary and peaceful means, given political and individual will to act without delay.
Says Attengod in the Radio Times:
“We are a plague on the Earth. It’s coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so. It’s not just climate change; it’s sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now.”
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Lawrence Wright on Scientology: the toothless pole job
A QUOTE from Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief. Lawrence Wright’s Book on Scientology, as selected by Mike Kinsley:
Among the horrors Wright either uncovers or borrows (with credit) from previous Scientology exposés in Time magazine and The St. Petersburg (now Tampa Bay) Times is “the Hole,” a hellish double-wide trailer parked at a California resort owned by the church. Forty or 50 people were housed there with no furniture or beds, eating leftovers, enduring cold-hose group showers. There are stories of people being beaten; and lots of stories of forced divorces, mandatory “disconnections” — orders not to talk with a spouse or friend who has offended in some way. But only once in 430 pages filled with lurid anecdotes did my skeptical antennas start to twitch. Wright asserts that someone was punished by being “made to run around a pole in the desert for 12 hours a day, until his teeth fell out.” Really? That’s the first thing that happens when you run in circles in the desert all day? I need to know more. How many days are we talking about? Did they let him floss?
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Posted: 21st, January 2013 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Richard Madeley and Ann Widdecombe use ill baby to abuse paramedics
RICHARD Madeley writes in the Daily Express about a new kind of health lottery. He recalls the case of Thomas Passant, On Januray 7, 2012, the Express reported:
AN ambulance crew took more than 40 minutes to reach a critically ill baby because they were on a lunch break, his parents said last night. Eight-week-old Thomas Passant “died” for four minutes before being resuscitated after a heart attack and is still fighting for his life. He has undergone 14 hours of open-heart surgery and faces a life of disability.
Parents Kate Oram and Matthew Passant called West Midlands Ambulance Service after Thomas had a cardiac arrest at their home in Bridgnorth, Shropshire, on December 17. They were stunned when the operator told them the crew was unavailable as it was on a lunch break.
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Posted: 21st, January 2013 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
In photos: Spain’s San Anthony Festival – the blessing of the pets
IN photos: Spain’s San Anthony Festival at San Anton Church in Madrid. In honor of Saint Anthony, the patron saint of animals, people in Spain bring their pets to churches to be blessed:
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Posted: 20th, January 2013 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Bill Clinton offers to shoot NRA member
BILL CLINTON has a word of warning for Democrats
Clinton said that passing the 1994 federal assault weapons ban “devastated” more than a dozen Democratic lawmakers in the 1994 midterms — and cost then-Speaker of the House Tom Foley (D-Wash.) his job and his seat in Congress.
“I’ve had many sleepless nights in the many years since,” Clinton said. One reason? “I never had any sessions with the House members who were vulnerable,” he explained — saying that he had assumed they already knew how to explain their vote for the ban to their constituents. . . .
He said that he understands the culture that permeates a state like Arkansas — where guns are a longstanding part of local culture.
“A lot of these people … all they’ve got is their hunting and their fishing,” he told the Democratic financiers. “Or they’re living in a place where they don’t have much police presence. Or they’ve been listening to this stuff for so long that they believe it all.”
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Posted: 20th, January 2013 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment
Five shot on Gun Appreciation Day (no-one smoked)
HOW did you mark Gun Appreciation Day? Dod you shoot a loved on? Did you aim your Hello Kitty bubbles gun at another appreciator?
At the Dixie Gun and Knife Show in Raleigh, North Carolina, three people were hurt when 36-year-old Gary Wilsontook a 12-gauge shotgun from its box saw it go off. One victim, a deputy sheriff, was hit in the hand. A 54-year-old man in Indianapolis accidentally shot himself while leaving a gun show. A gun trader in Medina, Ohio shot his pal in the act of checking out his new semi-automatic handgun.
Meanwhile…in the land of the free: Smoke Like You’ve Just Been Shot:
Local News: Boy gets finger stuck in bucket
LOCAL news story of the Week: Shropshire boy gets finger caught in bucket:
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Posted: 20th, January 2013 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Toddler suspended from school for threatening classmate with Hello Kitty gun
IN the USA, guns are big news:
A 5-year-old Pennsylvania girl who told another girl she was going to shoot her with a pink Hello Kitty toy gun that blows soapy bubbles has been suspended from kindergarten. Her family has hired an attorney to fight the punishment, which initially was 10 days for issuing a ‘terroristic threat.’
Allu Kitty!
In Amenas massacre: Like jihadis, Algerian forces shoot to kill
IN Algeria, all the 32 terrorists are dead. Also dead are 23 hostages, of which six were British. One Briton was murdered in cold blood. Well, so says the Algerian military, which affects the language of cool, calm precision but just wanted all the terrorists dead. Algeria’s Interior Ministry said in a statement:
“To avoid a bloody turn of events in response to the extreme danger of the situation, the army’s special forces launched an intervention with efficiency and professionalism to neutralise the terrorist groups that were first trying to flee with the hostages and then blow up the gas facilities.”
The facts are sketchy.
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First reactions to being diagnosed with cancer
WHEN he was diagnosed with cancer, my father fainted with his eyes were wide open. He was a dreamer who pretended to be a realist. The news hit him like a bullet. Only once did he say to me, “I don’t want to die.” He never once lost his love of life nor his humour. The MacMillan nurse, a confidant and a comfort to him, laughed. The urge to protect his children from his pain and fear showed true courage and love. But that first diagnosis hurt like hell. I knew it must have. I felt it too. Michael Popp recalls the moments after being told he had leukemia:
He looked up at me without any expression and simply stated, without emotion, “You have leukemia.” I heard each word as simply as it was stated and nodded in agreement. Yes, my body appeared healthy, but it was also dying on the inside. He took a minute or two to explain to me what type of cancer I had, what cancer was and that I needed to begin treatment yesterday. This is all explained to you like an accountant would tell you how much you owe on taxes for the previous year. It’s emotionless. You are being told that you have a potentially fatal illness as if you were being asked if you wanted a receipt…
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Marijuana is free for North Korea military (British made do with LSD)
TO North Korea, where the marijuana runs wild and free:
NK NEWS receives regular reports from visitors returning from North Korea, who tell us of marijuana plants growing freely along the roadsides, from the northern port town of Chongjin, right down to the streets of Pyongyang, where it is smoked freely and its sweet scent often catches your nostrils unannounced. Our sources are people we know who work inside North Korea and make regular trips in and out of the country.
There is no taboo around pot smoking in the country—many residents know the drug exists and have smoked it. In North Korea, the drug goes by the name of ip tambae, or “leaf tobacco.” It is reported to be especially popular amongst young soldiers in the North Korean military.
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Posted: 19th, January 2013 | In: Flashback, Reviews | Comment
London’s super hero Muslim Patrol lose Preston jhiadi Hashim X Shakur
TO Waltham Forest, London, where the heroic two-man Muslim Patrol are on manoeuvres. The Australian Telegraphcalls MoMan and Gobbin a “gang of hooded men. Londoners are “being terrorised”. The Mail calls them a group.
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Buckethead Man robs a shop
BREAKING and entering shops, so you can steal things, is hardly the most noble of pursuits, but god bless criminals who do things the old-fashioned way by donning a disguise.
Just like the man who donned a bucket on his head while going on the rob in Louisiana!
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Man rants as Subway ‘footlong’ is an inch short
WE’VE all been needlessly pernickerty about things in our time, but one Subway customer really has gone the extra mile.
This chap, called Matt Corby, found himself apoplectic with rage when he visited a Subway for a bite to eat.
[insert ‘it’s his own stupid fault for going to a Subway comment’ here]
The source of his ire was that he strongly suspected that his sandwich was not a foot long, as advertised. So, instead of getting on with his life and scarfing down the slightly moist article, he got his tape measure out.
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Posted: 18th, January 2013 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
It’s warmer than 1963 – Britain’s harshest winter in great photos and an epic video
IT’S Cold. But it’s not as cold as it was in 1963. Back then, Siberian winds froze the sea and London’s waterways. The Royal Navy used an icebreaker to keep Chatham dockyard open. Children at schools used whatever was to hand to smash the ice in toilets. In Wales, water was rationed. The fierce winds and driven snow meant that the 3rd round of the FA Cup took 66 days to complete.
It was this cold:
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Posted: 18th, January 2013 | In: Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
Plymouth man urinated in public flowers beds while making noise like an elephant
TO Plymouth Magistrates’ Court, where Robert Moore, is accused ot weeing over flower beds at St Budeaux Square in broad daylight while trumpeting like an elephant. Mr Moore sprayed his urine back and forth.
Jenny Cater, for the Crown Prosecution Service, explains:
“He was spraying urine to and fro into the flower beds while making noises like an elephant.”
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Irish grandpa steals from dead HMV when it refuses his gift voucher
TALK about kicking someone while they’re down! An old man shoplifted from HMV because the €40 gift voucher he had bought was not accepted by the shop on Dublin’s Henry Street. As HMV are in administration and all the staff are fearful of their jobs, and weighing up various sit-in protests over unpaid wages, things are remarkably bleak over there.
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Posted: 18th, January 2013 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
