Beet L. Jooz

If you set out to write a parody showing the folly of gun control, it might look something like this.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced a crackdown on knives Sunday in response to the rising levels of violence in London, which recently surpassed New York City’s homicide rate for the first time.

‘No excuses: there is never a reason to carry a knife,’ Khan tweeted. ‘Anyone who does will be caught, and they will feel the full force of the law.’…

Guns are strictly regulated in the United Kingdom and the rising homicide rate in London is directly attributable to a rise in knife-related crimes, with stabbings claiming at least 31 lives to date in 2018. By contrast, New York—which has a population roughly the same size as London—has seen a steady decline in violent crime.

There were 15 murders committed in London in February and another 22 in March, while New York saw 14 murders in February and 21 in March, according to murder rate statistics provided…by London’s Metropolitan Police and the New York Police Department.

But this is not a parody. It’s a real news report, which goes on to describe Britain’s existing knife control laws.

In Britain, it is currently illegal to carry a knife longer than three inches in public ‘without good reason’ and illegally carrying a knife can be punished with up to four years in prison and an ‘unlimited fine.’ Self-defense is not listed among the examples of ‘good reasons to carry a knife.’

If we outlaw knives, only outlaws will have knives—which might explain commonplace news reports like this one, which sounds like a weekend crime report from Chicago but with “stabbing” substituted for “shooting.”

Let’s not look at this as a parody, but as a kind of scientific experiment. On the one side, we have a nation in which the availability of guns has been increasing while violent crime has been going down, consistently, year over year, not just in one big city but across the country. On the other side, we have a nation that is famous for its strict gun control and confiscation of firearms, yet we see violent crime increasing. Clearly, the availability of guns is not the primary driver of crime. But we should have known that already.

I don’t know enough to say exactly what is causing Britain’s crime wave. The reports say that “much of the violence is tied to gangs,” which just kicks the question back a step: why are there more gangs and why are they more violent? But we do know enough to say what is not causing it. It is not some material factor—not poverty, because Britain is a wealthy country, and not guns, because they have taken virtually all of them away.

To look at the actual causes of crime, you would have to look at human causes, at changes in the culture and in public policy. To borrow another pro-gun cliché that turns out to be true: guns don’t kill people, people kill people. Take away their guns and they will do it with knives.

But what happens when people resolutely refuse to learn from this experiment? They will continue to follow their examined assumptions to the point of absurdity—and beyond. As we should all know by now, there is no limit to self-parody. Once you cross the Poe Horizon, there is no logical stopping point. So along comes this follow-up.

Dr. John Crichton, the new chairman of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland, wants the sale of pointed kitchen knives to be banned to help reduce the number of fatal stabbings.

He first suggested the move three years ago, but his proposal did not win enough support from policy-makers. Since then dozens of people, including schoolchildren, have lost their lives as a result of attacks involving bladed instruments.

Dr. Crichton, who took on the role of chairman in June this year, is championing a switch to so-called ‘R’-bladed knives, which have rounded points and are far less effective as weapons…. ‘We are very quick to be critical of our American cousins and the prevalence of guns but this is an issue which doesn’t even occur to us.’

As a friend put it to me, “You can’t parody this anymore. If I said next on the list will be a ban on rope to prevent suicides and strangulation, they would take it up.” But only after we finally defeat the National Cutlery Association and purge our politics of the corrupting influence of the rope manufacturers’ lobby.

Robert Tracinski is a senior writer for The Federalist. His work can also be found at The Tracinski Letter.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are investigating a mysterious outbreak of E. coli bacteria that has now spread across multiple state lines.

(ABC) President Donald Trump is poised to pardon Scooter J. Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, according to sources familiar with the president’s thinking.

The president has already signed off on the pardon, which is something he has been considering for several months, sources told ABC News.

The move would mark another controversial pardon for Trump and could raise questions as an increasing number of the president’s political allies have landed themselves in legal jeopardy. The White House has repeatedly said that no pardons are currently on the table for people caught up in the Russia investigation.

In Metairie, electrical engineer Khaled Zeitoun says he lost his own brother two years ago after he took their parents back to Syria for their final years.

A new report from The Data Center shows how the city's population and racial demographics have changed.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump attacked former FBI Director James Comey on Friday as a "weak and untruthful slime ball," reacting to news accounts that cite Comey as searingly critical of the president in a memoir due to be published next week.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Bayer said it was planning to sell its digital farming business, and not just grant a license to competitors, to win antitrust approval for the planned takeover of Monsanto .

Former House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is joining the advisory board of one of the country's largest marijuana producers, signalling a shift in his once-adamant opposition to legalization of the substance....

Federal authorities in Atlanta said they seized 500 pounds of meth concealed inside wax Disney character figurines.

In light of this morning's jawboning by Trump, who vowed that an attack with US missiles "nice and new and “smart!" is imminent, and following overnight unconfirmed reports that US warplanes are massing over the Syria-Iraq border, it will hardly come as a surprise that Syrian soldiers and pro-government forces are getting the hell out of dodge.

According to Reuters, which cites the (highly conflicted) Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Syrian pro-government forces are evacuating main airports and military air bases ahead of possible U.S. strikes.

While the report has yet to be confirmed, amusingly Reuters clarified that "the Syrian army could not be immediately reached for comment." It's also not immediately clear what they would say: "yes, we are retreating, have a good day."

Ironically, the Syrian army has one person to thank for the advance notice of an imminent attack: the same one who back in 2013 said: " I would not go into Syria, but if I did it would be by surprise and not blurted all over the media like fools."

@walaa_3ssaf No, dopey, I would not go into Syria, but if I did it would be by surprise and not blurted all over the media like fools.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 29, 2013

One lingering question is whether Russian armed forces are doing the same, and if not, what the odds are that a US strike could result in a lethal outcome involving US troops, unleashing an armed conflict between the two superpowers.

Separately, earlier on Wednesday, the Iranian media publishes the first images of the damage to the T4 Syrian airbase after an Israeli airstrike 48 hours ago killed 14.

#BREAKING: Iranian media publishes 1st images of the damage in T4 Syrian airbase after the reportedly Israeli airstrike 48 hours ago which killed 14 (@Tasnimnews_EN) pic.twitter.com/uMsVFlfl3k

— Amichai Stein (@AmichaiStein1) April 11, 2018

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan, the top Republican in Congress, told Republicans in the House of Representatives on Wednesday he will not seek re-election in November, his office said.

'I worked very hard'

'It seems to me and to my son that high-speed media events and politics have gotten in the way of helping those who have been hurt.'

Another gun restriction is expected to come up later this month.

State Sen. J.P. Morrell said although he wants to see the laws removed, it is not the intention of his bill.

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz savaged Mark Zuckerberg over Facebook’s tendency to shut down and silence conservatives and conservative ideas in a hearing on Tuesday.

Cruz asked Zuckerberg if Facebook considered itself a “neutral public forum,” making the Silicon Valley billionaire squirm.

“Senator, we consider ourselves to be a platform for all ideas,” Zuckerberg replied. “Our goal is certainly not to engage in political speech.”

Cruz proceeded to list a number of conservative Facebook pages that had faced censorship from the social network.

Here are a few highlights from their exchange.

Cruz: “There are a great many Americans who I think are deeply concerned that Facebook and other tech companies are engaged in a pervasive pattern of bias and political censorship. There have been numerous instances with Facebook. In May of 2016, Gizmodo reported Facebook had purposely and routinely suppressed conservative stories from trending news — including stories about CPAC, about Mitt Romney, about Glenn Beck. In addition to that, Facebook has initially shut down the Chik-fil-A appreciation page, blocked posts of a Fox News reporter, blocked over two dozen Catholic pages and most recently blocked Trump supporters Diamond and Silk’s page with 1.2 million Facebook followers after determining their content and brand were ‘unsafe to the community.'”

“To a great many Americans, that appears to be a pervasive pattern of political bias. Do you agree with that assessment?”

Zuckerberg: “I understand where that concern is coming from, because Facebook and the tech industry are located in Silicon Valley, which is an extremely left-leaning place. This is actually a concern that I have in that I — and I try to root out in the company, is making sure we don’t have any bias in the work we do and I think it is a fair concern that people would wonder about.”

Cruz: “Are you aware of any ad or page that’s been taken down from Planned Parenthood?”

Zuckerberg: “Senator, I’m not, but let me just …”

Cruz: “How about MoveOn.org? Or any Democratic candidate from office?”

Zuckerberg: “I’m not specifically aware. I’m not sure.”

Cruz: “In your testimony you say you have 15,000 to 20,000 people working on security and content review. Do you know the political orientation of those 15,000 to 20,000 people engaged in content review?”

Zuckerberg: “No, we do not generally ask people about their political orientation when they’re joining the company.”

Cruz: “Do you feel it’s your responsibility to assess users, whether they are good and positive connections or ones that those 15,000 to 20,000 people deem unacceptable or deplorable?”

Zuckerberg: “I think there are a number of things we all agree are clearly bad. Foreign interference in elections. Terrorism. Self-harm.”

Cruz: “I’m talking censorship.”

Zuckerberg: “You would probably agree that we should remove terrorist propaganda from the service. We want to get that done and we’re proud of how well we do with that. What I can say, and I do want to get this in — I’m very committed to making sure that Facebook is a platform for all ideas.”

A witness captured dramatic video of an unarmed carjacking in Mid-City. New Orleans police hope the public will recognize the perpetrator.

Authored by Caitlyn Johnstone via Medium.com,

When A Government Declares A Verdict Before An Investigation, It’s Because There’s A Preexisting Agenda

Hours after an alleged chemical weapons attack on civilians in Syria, long before any investigation into the matter could have possibly even begun much less been completed, the US State Department declared that “the Assad regime must be held accountable” and Russia “ultimately bears responsibility” for it.

Anyone who questioned such proclamations was branded a delusional conspiracy theorist.

Days after an alleged poisoning of an ex-spy in Salisbury, the UK’s Foreign Office was telling reportersthat the Kremlin would be held responsible.

Anyone who questioned such proclamations was branded a delusional conspiracy theorist. Weeks later, we learned that laboratory forensics had still determined no such culpability, and crime scene forensics were all over the map positing many contradictory theories about what happened and how.

Isn’t it interesting how just as its data begins warning that the western empire is approaching post-primacy and will likely lose its dominant position in the world if it doesn’t take drastic action, all this information begins pouring out about a longtime rival of that very empire?

It’s almost as if there is a preexisting vendetta to cripple oppositional governments, and then crimes are being discovered which just so happen to advance that preexisting agenda.

.@POTUS Trump condemns the heinous attack on innocent Syrians with banned chemical weapons. #Syria pic.twitter.com/qiEahlL3Ah

— Department of State (@StateDept) April 9, 2018

How wild is that?

Hey everyone! You know that WikiLeaks drop everyone’s talking about?

Turns out it was Russia. No we can’t show you the evidence. It’s secret evidence.

Oh hey, the election didn’t turn out how it was supposed to, but guess what?

Turns out it was Russian Facebook ads that definitely made that happen. No we can’t show you evidence of it. It’s secret evidence. Shut up and give us our sanctions.

Look! Russian propaganda! Russian propaganda everywhere! We need to increase internet censorship against dissenting narratives, report every inconvenient social media trend as a Russian plot and shut down RT! No we haven’t wanted to do that all along, what are you talking about?

Poisoned ex-spy in the UK? Russia! No, no time for an investigation! Russia, Russia, Russia! Throw out those diplomats and rally Europe into taking a more aggressive stance against Putin!

Gas attack in an area crawling with known terrorists being reported by the Al Qaeda-affiliated White Helmets? Let’s issue a State Department press releasethat spends literally half its space talking about Russia! Russia Russia Russia! No time to investigate! Russia!

Russia Russia everywhere! Ignore all those false reports and retractionscoming from the mainstream media about Russia! Russia!

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from the Skripal case and the alleged Douma attack, it’s that when a government demands new cold war escalations with a longtime rival before an investigation can be carried out, it’s because there’s a preexisting agenda.

And we should never fall for it. There is no valid excuse for refusing to allow a full neutral investigation to run its course before plunging into world-threatening escalations with a nuclear superpower. By refusing to do so, the western power establishment is already admitting that it is lying to us.

In a post-Iraq invasion world, it is our duty to demand copious amounts of evidence from our governments before consenting to any dangerous military agendas, whether for hot war or cold. In the case of Syria, statements from the US president seem to indicate that we may well be looking at hot warfare in an area full of Russian forces, which means we could well be staring down the barrel of a third and final world war right now.

But no time for an investigation, right?

Wrong.

Of course it’s wrong. These depraved, power hungry sociopaths don’t get to imperil our lives without even providing us evidence for their claims about why it is necessary for them to do so.

Iraq happened. Libya happened. These are not conspiracy theories. These are facts. We know for a fact that these people will lie to us to advance preexisting agendas against noncompliant governments. It’s not our job to roll over and let them do whatever they want to us, it’s their job to convince us that the actions they’re demanding are completely necessary.

So far the only evidence they have given us is evidence that they are afraid of evidence. There is a reason for that. Don’t be taken in. Keep fighting.

*  *  *

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The free app allows citizens to report crime directly to deputies in real time, Sheriff Randy Smith said.

(TELEGRAPH) — The British headquarters of the Murdoch entertainment empire 21st Century Fox have been raided by investigators from the European Commission, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.

It is understood that competition watchdogs gained access to the company’s offices in Hammersmith, west London, early today to seize documents and computer records.

The precise nature of the confidential investigation, which is believed to be in its early stages, is unclear.

Group had twice as many followers as official BLM page