From the Trenches World Report

Caracas Chronicles – by Juan Cristobal Nagel

As the protests gripping Venezuela enter their 19th day (get the basics here), it’s time to take stock of what’s happened. What are the stories? What are the non-stories? What matters?

The stories

• The Media Blackout – From yanking a Colombian cable news channel off the air to taking an entire city offline, the government has made controlling the flow of information about the crisis a priority. This comes on the heels of the looming threat to newspapers all over the country, which we have documented extensively. President Maduro has already announced they will pull the plug on CNN En Español, an important source of independent information. Now their journos’ official credentials have been revoked. All told, the past two weeks have been dreadful for the right of Venezuelans to be informed. The result? Tons of rumors, tons of disinformation, tons of uncertainty.    Continue reading “Media, paramilitaries, abuses, and some blood”

AlterNet

The Arizona Senate this week passed a Republican-backed bill that would allow people and businesses to refuse to serve homosexuals, for religious reasons.

Democrats and civil rights groups, including the ACLU, said Senate Bill 1062 would hurt Arizona’s economy by, for instance, causing groups to cancel conventions and hold them elsewhere.   Continue reading “Arizona Senate Approves Bill to Allow Businesses to Refuse to Serve Gays and Lesbians”

Press TV

Officials filed the city’s bankruptcy plan on Friday.   Continue reading “Detroit bankruptcy plan cuts pension benefits”

Weekly World News – by Frank Lake

CAMBRIDGE, MA – A groundbreaking study has determined that 83% of the members of Congress are certified morons!

The Kennedy School of Government did a longitudinal study over the last 30 years that looked at the average IQ of members of Congress – the Senate & House of Representatives.   Continue reading “Study: Congress Filled with Morons”

Huffington Post – by Paige Lavender

Rocker Ted Nugent has reportedly apologized for calling President Barack Obama a “subhuman mongrel,” according to the Ben Ferguson Show and CNN.

During an interview on the Ben Ferguson Show Friday, Nugent apologized for the comments, which he made in January 2014. A post on the show’s Facebook page announced the apology:   Continue reading “Ted Nugent Apologizes For Calling Obama A ‘Subhuman Mongrel’”

Huffington Post – by Kim Bellware

Hurling snowballs is a winter pastime for some kids, but for a 13-year-old Chicago boy it’s become a felony offense.

Chicago police say a 13-year-old boy was arrested and charged with a felony for throwing a snowball at a police officer after a West Side elementary school let out Wednesday afternoon.   Continue reading “Residents Say Police Went ‘Overboard’ After 13-Year-Old Charged With Felony Over Snowball”

Global Research – by Jeffrey T. Richelson

A major controversy during the administration of President George W. Bush concerned the use or misuse of intelligence with regard to Iraqi weapons of mass destruction programs and possible links between Iraq and al-Qaida. The best known elements of that controversy were Iraqi motivations behind the procurement of aluminum tubes, whether Iraq had sought to acquire uranium from Niger, if Iraq was seeking to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program, and whether it was producing and stockpiling chemical or biological weapons.   Continue reading “U.S. “Special Plans”: A History of Deception and Perception Management”

The Organic Prepper – by John Q. Public

Why communicate at all?

And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. John 8:32

For our safety, edification, and survival we need to know what is happening and what to do about it. As the plethora of prepper blogs and forums reveal, preppers have a lot to say—much of it informative, enlightening, and insightful and some of it disinformation, illogical, unmitigated drivel, and even evil. We need to screen the nuggets from the waste. Logic, critical analysis, and a well-formed conscience help us do that.   Continue reading “Resistance 101: Why You Should Consider Ham Radio for Communications”

RT News

Four people are dead and another two are injured after a woman began shooting inside a Native American tribal office in northern California, according to local law enforcement officials.

Four people are dead and another two are injured after a woman began shooting inside a Native American tribal office in northern California, according to local law enforcement officials.   Continue reading “Mass shooting kills four Native Americans in northern California”

Short my foot. If this was to go down we would be in it and it will not be short.

Fox News – by Perry Chiaramonte

China is practicing for a “short, sharp war” with Japan.

That is the assessment of a top U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, who told colleagues that China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is currently conducting training exercises in a practice scenario in which the military takes the Senkaku Islands, near Taiwan.   Continue reading “China preps military for ‘short, sharp war’ with Japan, US Navy analyst says”

Daily Mail

A sheet of plastic laid over a clothesline. A mini-fortress of milk crates stacked under a tree. A thin mattress on a flimsy crate lying in a dark tunnel.

On the edge of Baltimore’s woodlands, dozens of the city’s transients live in makeshift homes which they consider safer than homeless shelters.    Continue reading “Baltimore’s people of the woods: Inside the hidden homeless camps made of milk crates, wooden doors and tarps on the outskirts of town”

Moonbattery

Liberalism often works by starting with an arguably good thing and taking it to such an extreme that it becomes pernicious. Public sector pensions are a prime example. Few would deny retired police officers either a pension or a savings plan. But in liberal states greed has gotten completely out of control. From Ventura County, California:   Continue reading “Retired Sheriff: $276,000 per Year Pension Is Not Enough”