This video from the USA says about itself:
Male Western Tanager Stops in West Texas – May 10, 2017
Watch live at http://allaboutbirds.org/texashummers for more information about hummingbirds and highlights from the feeders.
This 9 May 2017 video from the White House in the USA is called [Trump spokesman] Sean Spicer Asked Why Trump Is Sending More Troops To Afghanistan When He Campaigned Against That?
By Bill Van Auken in the USA:
Washington prepares to send up to 5,000 more troops into Afghanistan
10 May 2017
The cabal of recently retired and active duty US generals who control virtually all of the national security posts within the Trump administration has given its approval to a plan that would deploy as many as 5,000 additional US troops to Afghanistan.
According to the Washington Post, which first reported the plan, it would “effectively put the United States back on a war footing with the Taliban.” The report added that the proposal followed an extensive review of US policy in Afghanistan driven by President Donald Trump’s “desire to reverse worsening security in Afghanistan and ‘start winning’ again.”
Whatever Trump’s illusions, the reality is that the nearly 16-year-old war, the longest in US history, has failed to achieve Washington’s aims of stabilizing a puppet regime in Kabul and securing for US imperialism a stable base of operations in a geo-strategically critical region, bounded by the energy-rich former Soviet Central Asian republics, Iran, China and Pakistan.
Just as in 2001, when the US invaded Afghanistan barely a month after the September 11 attacks on New York City and Washington, the pretext given for the planned escalation is the phony “war on terrorism.” In reality, after pouring an estimated $1 trillion into the war, Washington has proven unable to quell the Taliban and other insurgent groups that now control an estimated 50 percent of the Afghan countryside, more territory than at any time since the US invasion more than 15 years ago.
By Patrick Martin in the USA:
Trump firing of FBI director touches off political storm
10 May 2017
The surprise firing of FBI Director James Comey, announced late Tuesday afternoon, is a sign of a deep and intensifying crisis of the Trump administration. Trump’s firing of Comey smacks of desperation on the part of a White House under siege.
The firing sparked widespread condemnation by Democrats and some Republicans, along with demands for the appointment of a special prosecutor or independent commission to investigate charges of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government during the 2016 election campaign.
Powerful sections of the US ruling elite are moving against the Trump White House, which is so steeped in corruption that any one of a series of scandals, not just the investigation into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 elections, could leave it politically crippled.
There were numerous media comparisons to the “Saturday Night Massacre” during the Watergate scandal of 1973–74, when the attorney general and deputy attorney general resigned rather than carry out orders from President Richard Nixon to dismiss special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox. That effort to torpedo an investigation failed: ten months later, Nixon was forced to resign as president.
Unlike Watergate, however, there is no democratic principle being asserted, even in a limited fashion, by the Democratic Party opponents of the Trump administration. This is a conflict within the US ruling elite and its military-intelligence apparatus, driven largely by differences over foreign policy.
No significant evidence has been produced in support of the allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 US elections. The real purpose of the campaign of Russia-baiting is to push the Trump administration into a more confrontational foreign policy in Syria, Central Asia, North Africa and Eastern Europe, where US imperialism regards Moscow as its principal obstacle.
Trump has attempted to satisfy these concerns with last month’s missile strikes against Syria and a harsher rhetorical line towards Iran and Russia, but the divisions persist, as shown in the hearing Monday before a subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
After White House dismissal of FBI director, Republicans reject Democratic demands for special prosecutor: here.
President Donald Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey marks a new stage in the protracted crisis of the US political system. Comey’s dismissal on Tuesday has been followed by escalating political warfare centered on conflicts within the ruling class over foreign policy, particularly in relation to Russia: here.
The Trump White House plunged deeper into political crisis Thursday, as President Trump and top aides gave conflicting accounts of how and why Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and FBI and Justice Department officials flatly contradicted the White House version of events: here.
The political crisis gripping Washington has far-reaching consequences and implications for both the United States and the entire world. The state apparatus in the center of world capitalism, the main imperialist power, is visibly breaking apart, torn by conflicts and mutual recriminations: here.
This video from the USA says about itself:
Jared Kushner Caught Selling Golden Tickets To America
8 May 2017
Is there anything “The Kush” can’t (or won’t) do? Cenk Uygur, host of The Young Turks, breaks it down.
“The real estate development firm partly managed by the sister of White House senior adviser Jared Kushner has issued an apology over a weekend event in Beijing in which Kushner’s name was used to attract wealthy Chinese to a cash-for-visa scheme commonly used by investment-hungry U.S. real estate developers.
Kushner Companies “apologizes if that mention of [Kushner] was in any way interpreted as an attempt to lure investors,” the company said in a statement emailed to NPR and other news outlets. The apology stops short of admitting that the company was leveraging Kushner’s role in the White House and his relationship to the president, his father-in-law.
Nicole Kushner Meyer, Jared’s sister and a principal in the family-run business, was in a ballroom at Beijing’s Ritz-Carlton hotel on Saturday asking a roomful of wealthy Chinese investors to consider investing $500,000 apiece in a New Jersey luxury apartment complex overlooking the Hudson River across from lower Manhattan.”
Read more here.
By Joseph Kishore in the USA:
Sister of Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner pitches investment-for-visa scheme in China
10 May 2017
The latest example of corruption, nepotism and bribery by the Trump administration is the revelation this week that the sister of top Trump advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner pitched a real estate scheme to wealthy investors in China in exchange for favorable consideration of visa applications.
According to reporters for the Washington Post and the New York Times, Nicole Meyer told investors at an event in the Beijing Ritz-Carlton Hotel on Saturday that they could qualify for an EB-5 visa if they committed at least $500,000 to the billion-dollar One Journal Square project in Jersey City, New Jersey. The development is an upscale housing and office complex led by Kushner Companies. The meeting was hosted by Qiaowai, a Chinese immigration agency.
The EB-5 visa program was set up in 1990 to facilitate the granting of permanent residence permits to individuals who invest in projects supposedly leading to jobs for at least 10 US workers.
Meyer directly cited her family connections as an incentive for backing the project. The real estate deal “means a lot to me and my entire family,” she said, according to the newspaper reporters, who were removed from the public event before it concluded. Meyer’s pitch included an overview of her family relations, including with Jared Kushner.
Meyer’s offer of an open door to wealthy investors in her family’s business concerns comes as the Trump administration sets up even greater barriers to other forms of immigration, blocking refugees from entering the US and pledging to build a wall on the US-Mexico border. Preferential treatment is, of course, not available for the masses of Chinese workers who produce immense profits for American corporations.
The class basis of the Trump administration’s savage anti-immigration policy, a component of its assault on the working class, is underscored by the open door offered to the rich.
This video says about itself:
Oviraptorid fights to protect nest – Planet Dinosaur – BBC
26 July 2013
A female Oviraptorid guards her nest from attackers large and small, but can do nothing about the threat of nature itself.
Narrated by John Hurt, Planet Dinosaur tells the stories of the biggest, deadliest and weirdest creatures ever to walk the Earth, using the latest fossil evidence and immersive computer graphics.
From Sci-news.com:
Beibeilong sinensis: Paleontologists Identify New Species of Cassowary-Like Dinosaur
May 10, 2017 by News Staff
A team of paleontologists from Canada, China, the United States and Slovak Republic has identified a partial clutch of large dinosaur eggs with a closely associated baby dinosaur skeleton as an embryo and eggs of a new, large caenagnathid oviraptorosaur, Beibeilong sinensis.
Beibeilong sinensis (meaning ‘baby dragon from China’) lived in what is now central-eastern China during the Late Cretaceous, about 90 million years ago.
It is described by the paleontologists based on dinosaur eggs and an associated embryo that were collected in China’s Henan Province in 1993.
The unprepared specimen was imported into the United States in mid-1993 by the Stone Company, which exposed the embryo and eggs during preparation.
The specimen was featured in a cover article for National Geographic Magazine, and the embryo became popularly known as ‘Baby Louie’ in recognition of Louis Psihoyos, the photographer for the article.
“This particular fossil was outside the country for over two decades and its return to China finally allowed us to properly study the specimen and name a new dinosaur species,” said team member Prof. Lü Junchang, a paleontologist at the Institute of Geology, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, and lead co-author of a report published this week on Beibeilong sinensis in the journal Nature Communications.
Along with the dinosaur embryo, the Baby Louie fossil contains between six and eight very large eggs.
These eggs were given their own scientific name, Macroelongatoolithus xixiaensis (meaning ‘large elongate stone eggs’).
“The eggs are up to 18 inches (45 cm) long and weighed about 5 kg, making them some of the largest dinosaur eggs ever discovered,” the researchers said.
“They were found in a ring-shaped clutch, which was part of a nest that was about 6.5-10 feet (2-3 m) in diameter and probably contained two dozen or more eggs.”
Lead co-author Darla Zelenitsky, a professor at the University of Calgary, and her colleagues Philip Currie and Kenneth Carpenter first began examining the Baby Louie fossil shortly after it arrived in the United States.
They noticed the eggs and embryo skeleton looked similar to those of oviraptorosaurs, a group of meat-eating dinosaurs that superficially look like cassowaries, but the eggs were far too large to have been laid by any known species of such dinosaurs at the time.
“Although the identity of the dinosaur embryo could not be determined due to its state of preservation, I had recognized that the large eggs in the nest belonged to an oviraptorosaur, based on various characteristics of the eggshell,” Prof. Zelenitsky said.
“This meant that Baby Louie’s parents must have been truly gigantic, far larger than any known oviraptorosaur species at the time.”
“Dinosaur embryos, because they are so small and are only present for a short time interval in the egg, are very rarely preserved as fossils. So discovering a fossilized dinosaur embryo is equivalent to winning the lottery,” Prof. Zelenitsky noted.
“Baby Louie is the only embryo of a giant oviraptorosaur known in the world,” she said.
Ring-shaped nests of eggs of smaller oviraptorosaur species have been found with the adults sitting in the centre of the nest, so an adult Beibeilong sinensis probably shared similar behaviors.
With their parrot-like skulls, feathers, and two-legged stance, Beibeilong sinensis, weighing in at around 3 tons, are the largest dinosaurs likely to have sat on their nests to brood their clutch of eggs.
See also here.
This music video about the Iraq war from the USA is called Operation Iraqi Liberation (O.I.L) – David Rovics. The lyrics of a song with the same title by Anti-Flag are here.
Dutch NOS TV reports today that advisers to the Dutch government have advised to give in to demands by NATO and United States President Donald Trump to drastically increase expenses for defence war.
They demand an increase of Dutch military expenses to six billion euros; higher than any political party participating in the recent elections has ever proposed.
Ex minister, now government adviser Hirsch Ballin said (translated):
The biggest threat to the Netherlands is that our connections with the outside world may be affected. The supply of raw materials …
So, Mr Hirsch Ballin wants more taxpayers’ money and more soldiers‘ (and civilians‘) blood for oil wars in far away countries to help Shell to even bigger profits.
The advisers say (translated):
Not only Syria and Russia, but also unemployed young Africans who come to Europe can be a security issue, or the climate as a consequence of living areas becoming uninhabitable.
That climate change is the main factor in war in, eg, Syria, was recognized recently by a prominent Dutch general. A logical consequence of that would be to spend six billion or more euros not on more and more weapons and wars, but in stopping climate change, thus stopping wars. However, Mr Hirsch Ballin and his ilk do not want to see logic.
As for ‘unemployed young Africans who come to Europe‘: if they get good jobs and humane treatment, then they are unlikely to become a ‘security issue’, certainly not of the size of bloody wars like in Syria. If they are treated badly, then some of them may become a sort of ‘security issue’; like other people who are treated badly may sometimes become. Even then, tanks and battleships costing six billion euros are hardly the answer to a few young Africans breaking a window in a government building in anger. Let alone that expensive nuclear weapons, like the US American ones at Dutch Volkel airbase, would be an effective answer to angry young people. Even more: tanks, battleships and nuclear weapons costing six billion euros or much more are not an effective answer to terrorism: whether ISIS-like terrorism, extreme right Islamophobic civilians’ terrorism, or extreme right Islamophobic German army officers’ terrorism.
This video from Cuba says about itself:
4 April 2013
Zapata swamp is the natural habitat of the Cuban Crocodile, considered as a national symbol after its resemblance with the geography of the island.
On 14 March 2017, the day after 13 March on Cuba, we were at the Zapata peninsula.
Early in the morning, we went aboard a rowing boat.
Many beautiful flowers on the banks.
A Greater Antillean grackle on a bush. A yellow-headed warbler.
The main aim this morning is to see the Zapata wren. When the boat stops, we don’t see it where it is supposed to be.
We do see this flowering grass.
After a walk on a muddy path, we do see the Zapata wren.
As the boat goes back, we see a belted kingfisher.
And this turkey vulture.
A limpkin flies overhead.
After landing, a flock of Cuban parakeets. They live only in Cuba.
And a killdeer plover. Probably, a migrant from North America.
In the afternoon, again a boat: a motorboat this time.
On a lake bank, a brown pelican.
Also, an anhinga, drying it wings. A double-crested cormorant.
An osprey sits in a tree.
An Antillean palm swift flying.
A belted kingfisher sits on a bridge.
A yellow-bellied sapsucker on a palm tree.
Later that afternoon, not by boat, but a forest walk.
A bit further, a big owl on a big tree; a Stygian owl.
On another tree, a Greater Antillean nightjar: endemic to Cuba and Hispaniola.
Then, in a hole in yet another tree, a smaller owl: a Cuban screech owl, endemic to Cuba.
This video says about itself:
A Fernandina’s Flicker (Colaptes fernandinae) and brief footage of a West Indian Woodpecker (Melanerpes superciliaris) at Hacienda La Cortina, Cuba, on 07 April 2013. The flicker was interested in a cavity in what may have been a royal palm.
On the forest edge, we also saw a Fernandina’s flicker: this male at its nest.
A bit further, another woodpecker: this yellow-bellied sapsucker.
Finally, we see crabs crossing a road. It is their mating season, and it has rained, sending them on migration. They are two crab species: Geocarcinus ruricola; and Cardisoma guanhumi (pictured).
Also about birds in Cuba: here.
Late in 2014, I made this new award: the Real Neat Blog Award. There are so many bloggers whose blogs deserve more attention. So, I will try to do something about that 🙂
It is the first award that I ever made. I did some computer graphics years ago, before I started blogging; but my computer drawing had become rusty 🙂
The ‘rules’ of the Real Neat Blog Award are: (feel free not to act upon them if you don’t have time; or don’t accept awards; etc.):
1. Put the award logo on your blog.
2. Answer 7 questions asked by the person who nominated you.
3. Thank the people who nominated you, linking to their blogs.
4. Nominate any number of bloggers you like, linking to their blogs.
5. Let them know you nominated them (by commenting on their blog etc.)
My seven questions are:
1. Where do most visits to your blog come from?
2. What is your favourite sport?
3. What has been a special moment for you so far in 2017?
4. What is your favourite quote?
5. What was your favourite class when still at school?
6. Anything you had wished to have learned earlier?
7. What musical instrument have you tried to play?
My nominees are:
1. Jemverse
2. Power of Thought
3. HaiHui Story
4. Magic Blogs
6. J. A. Allen
8. Food, Culture, Arts, Places and Events in Malaysia & beyond…
9. Paul-o-zone
This video from Borneo in Indonesia says about itself:
2 May 2017
Activists rescued a rare albino orangutan that was being held captive.
Translated from Dutch NOS TV:
Name searched for blonde blue-eyed orangutan
Today, 12:38
She is blonde, has blue eyes and is still anonymous. Last month a dehydrated and malnourished albino orangutan was found in central Borneo. Conservationists invite people to submit suggestions for a name.
The Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation hopes that the ape will become a symbol of endangered animals worldwide. The orangutan was saved from a cage in the Indonesian part of Borneo. …
Veterinarian Arga Sawung Kusuma cares for the orangutan. “She looked thinner when we found her,” he told AP. “She was stressed and collapsed. Her skin and fur did not look well and she suffered from dehydration.”
Also, the animal did not weigh enough for her age. “She looked thinner when we found her, she weighed 8.3 kilos. For a five-year-old female orangutan, that’s really very little.”
The name orangutan comes from the Malayan [orang] hutan which means forest human. The animals are genetically identical to humans for 96.4 percent.
Suggestions for a name can be submitted to 14 May to name@orangutan.org.id or via the hashtag #albinoorangutan on social media. The organization hopes that people will send “meaningful” names.
When the blonde orangutan will be healthy again, she will be freed in the wild.
This 8 May 2017 video is about vandalism by anti-Semites against Jewish Moroccan Dutch woman Fatiha Chass Eddine in Apeldoorn city in Gelderland province in the Netherlands.
Translated from Dutch site Joop.nl:
May 8, 2017, last update 23:47
Victim of anti-Semitic action sent away by police
A Jewish woman threatened on Friday by anti-Semitic vandalism was sent away by police when she wanted to report. She was told at the police station in her city Apeldoorn that she had to make an appointment first and return on Monday. The woman was so shocked by the attack on her home that she did not dare to sleep at home on Friday night, she told Omroep Gelderland broadcasting organisation.
On May 5, Liberation Day [the day Hitler’s Wehrmacht occupying armed forces in the Netherlands surrendered], she found a carved star of David on the door of her basement box. Also, the word “whore” was painted on the wall. The woman told the housing association, but they did nothing until another resident complained. Jewish Fatiha Chass Eddine is of Moroccan origin. She has no idea who did this. The space in which the crime was committed is only accessible to apartment house residents.
This 3 May 2017 video shows a Savi’s warbler singing in the Groene Jonker nature reserve in the Netherlands.
Luuk Punt made this video.
British Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn writes about this video:
In conversation with Jeremy Corbyn | documented by Ken Loach
21 September 2016
Ken Loach is one of the greatest directors of our time. I was thrilled that he asked to follow our campaign for two days this summer.
He documented people sharing their personal stories and discussing their reasons for supporting our agenda. These stories show why Labour must transform and rebuild Britain so that no one and no community is left behind.
From daily The Morning Star in Britain:
Wednesday 10th May 2017
KEN LOACH is making a film about Jeremy Corbyn to “show what he’s really like,” the acclaimed director revealed yesterday.
The film-maker is spending time on the road with the Labour leader during the party’s election campaign and plans to make a political broadcast which will focus on his personal nature.
Mr Loach, who made the award-winning film I, Daniel Blake, said he felt Mr Corbyn’s ability to bond with ordinary people wasn’t being reported fairly.
He said: “All the evidence shows they’re [the mainstream media] hostile to him in a way that’s quite different to any other political leader. So we’re trying to get it on record that he is actually a human being.”
Mr Loach is a strong supporter of the Labour leader, and thinks that ending privatisation of the NHS is the “biggest and most important idea.”
Dear Kitty. Some blog 