Skip to main content

Posts

University of Texas at Austin students sue school because it refuses to cancel its 'racist' spirit song 'The Eyes of Texas'

A group of University of Texas at Austin students are suing the school for creating a 'hostile environment' by forcing members of its marching band to play in a separate group because they refuse to play the school's spirit song, 'The Eyes of Texas', at football games.   'The Eyes of Texas' was first sung in 1903 at a student-organized minstrel show, a popular form of entertainment in the early 20th century that featured white performers in blackface, in downtown Austin. It's been a source of campus-wide debate for more than a year after a summer of Black Lives Matter protests amid the killing of George Floyd - but the university stood by the song in a recent report affirming that it had 'no racist intent' and that it  'remains our alma mater.' The lawsuit, filed Friday with the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights on behalf of an anonymous group of students and the Texas chapter of the NAACP, claims the university failed

Met Police officer 'told colleagues to switch off their body cams before he hit motorist, 34, in the head when he became abusive during arrest'

Ian Smellie, 64, who has since retired from the force, squared up to Rafik Miah, 34, before assaulting him, it is claimed A police officer told colleagues to turn off their body worn cameras and gave a motorist a clip round the ear, a court heard today.  Ian Smellie, 64, who has since retired from the force, squared up to Rafik Miah, 34, before assaulting him, it is claimed. Mr Miah was arrested in Kyverdale Road, Stoke Newington, north London, on November 10 last year, under section 23 of the Misuse of Drugs Act. He was argumentative and abusive towards the six officers as he was searched, City of London Magistrates' Court heard. His handcuffs were then removed and Smellie told colleagues: 'Turn your cameras off.' PC Nicolas Cousins said: 'There was a negative search of the male, as a result of the search and a name check. 'Handcuffs were removed, and the stop was ended.' Smellie took off his vest and took Mr Miah round the corner, the court heard. The officer

The Democrats' nightmare September: Schumer and Pelosi race to sign Biden's $3.5T budget, the infrastructure bill, vote on the debt ceiling and prepare to fight the GOP over voting rights

Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer are preparing for nightmare September where they try to negotiate the details of Joe Biden's $3.5 trillion budget, pass an infrastructure bill, raise the debt ceiling and fight over voting rights. It begins this week when congressional committees meet to begin formally drafting the president's ambitious social policy program but the passage of the trillion-dollar program is not guaranteed. Democratic Senator Joe Manchin called for a 'pause' on the legislating, saying he could not support the $3.5 trillion price tag. And, in the 50-50 split Senate, Democrats need every member of the party to vote for it.  'Obviously, I don't agree,' Pelosi told CNN on Tuesday of Manchin's 'pause' call.  Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer are preparing for nightmare September on Capitol Hill She said the price tag wouldn't go above the $3.5 trillion but shrugged off a ques

Busted! Tesla's camera catches man faking being hit and injured by car in bid for payout

A Louisiana man has landed behind bars after police say he tried to fake being struck and injured by a Tesla, only to be exposed as a fraud by the vehicle's onboard cameras. Arthur Bates Jr, 47, was arrested on Friday on a charge of falsifying a police report, punishable by up to six months in jail and a $500 fine.  According to the Slidell Police Department, at around 4pm on Friday, officers responded to a busy gas station in the 1400 block of Fremaux Avenue after getting a 911 call reporting that a man has been hurt in a hit-and-run accident.  The purported victim, identified as Bates, told police a Tesla backed into him, causing him to fall to the ground, and that the driver then fled the scene. 'Bates was complaining of back, leg and neck injuries, resulting in an ambulance and fire truck to be dispatched to the location,' police said in a statement.  Officers later tracked down the Tesla and spoke to the driver, who claimed that Bates 'intentionally jumped behind h

'Frustrated' NHS doctors reveal Covid patients are STILL not being given Regeneron's lifesaving antibody cocktail despite drug being approved last month and used in the US since last NOVEMBER

Doctors today revealed they are still struggling to get access to a lifesaving Covid drug that has proven to be highly effective on the most vulnerable patients. The medicine, known as Ronapreve, works by mounting an immune response against the virus in people whose bodies are too weak to do it on their own. A major British trial found the antibody therapy slashed the risk of death or hospitalisation in people with severe health conditions by 70 per cent.  The UK's drugs watchdog finally approved on August 20, providing a fresh sense of hope for sick patients for whom even vaccines don't work well.  US patients had been receiving Ronapreve in the US since November, saving countless lives. France, Germany and Canada are also using the drug.  But NHS doctors expressed their 'frustration' at not being able to get hold of Ronapreve and lagging behind other parts of the world.  Dr Matthew Buckland, an immunologist at Barts Health NHS Trust in London, told MailOnline: 'I

Four people are injured after car plows through homeless encampment in Los Angeles's Koreatown neighborhood

Four people have been injured after a car crash at an LA intersection caused one vehicle to careen into a homeless encampment, officials said.  At approximately 6am, a silver Toyota Corolla traveling east on 5th street in the Koreatown neighborhood hit a white Dodge Dart at the intersection of South Virgil Avenue, the Los Angeles Fire Department said.  The Dodge smashed into a homeless encampment and struck a palm tree alongside the road. A homeless man who had been asleep on a couch on the sidewalk was left pinned between the car and the tree.  The 65-year-old man was 'alert and speaking' when emergency services arrived, according to the Los Angeles Times. Fire fighters used their 'Heavy Rescue 3' crane to lift the vehicle up off the trapped man.  Four people were riding in the Dodge at the time of the crash, the LA Times reported, and two were in the Corolla that struck them. Three passengers in the Dodge were taken to the hospital, along with the homeless man The w

So much for end-to-end encryption: WhatsApp and Facebook pays more than 1,000 workers to READ messages that are flagged as 'inappropriate' and even share them with the DOJ

WhatsApp's promise of private messages with end-to-end encryption appears to have been false, an investigation revealed. When Facebook purchased the popular messaging app for $19 billion in 2014, both companies assured users that their data could not be accessed by either company.  But Facebook not only hired 1,000 workers to sift through millions of messages on WhatsApp, which has two billion users around the world, but it also shared some of those messages with law enforcement and the U.S. Department of Justice to help put people in prison, ProPublica claims.   In the report, ProPublica found that Facebook had hired contractors in Austin, Texas, Dublin, Ireland and Singapore to look at millions of pieces of users' content.  'These hourly workers use special Facebook software to sift through streams of private messages, images and videos that have been reported by WhatsApp users as improper and then screened by the company's artificial intelligence systems,' the re

Why the knives are out for the Samurai Mafia: They sever their own fingers, savage their victims and make billions in illicit business. But as one of Japan's crime gang bosses is sentenced to death, their influence is finally being cut down to size

To understand how untouchable the yakuza crime gangs have always been in Japan, you only need to know how they used to rob banks. They carried no shotguns because there was no need for violence. And they wore no balaclavas because, far from hiding their faces, they were so proud to be members of the country’s most feared mafia clan that they tattooed their entire bodies and mutilated their hands by chopping off a finger, deliberately marking themselves out. For most raids, three men were enough . . . three men, with three cats. They stood outside the bank’s main doors, held the cats by their tails and swung them around their heads. The poor animals shrieked, people backed away in fear and the bank emptied. That was usually enough to bring the manager hurrying out to offer a generous loan on the easiest of terms: it would never have to be paid back. If that tactic didn’t work, the gang boss would send 100 men to queue up and each open an account for one yen (about a halfpenny), the smal

Howard University is forced to cancel classes and turn off WiFi in dorms after ransomware cyber attack

Howard University has canceled classes and switched off its internet service after its IT team detected a ransomware cyberattack over the Labor Day weekend.   The Washington DC school also closed its campus to all but essential staff and turned off its WiFi connectivity, including in student dorms. The historically-black college wrote in a press release on Monday that the breach was detected by the university's Enterprise Technology Services, who uncovered 'unusual activity' on the network on Friday and shut it down to investigate.  In a later update, the school wrote that in-person classes will resume tomorrow and that an alternative WiFi source would be made available on campus.  But online and hybrid courses will remain suspended.  'To date, there has been no evidence of personal information being accessed or exfiltrated,' the school assured in the statement. 'However, our investigation remains ongoing, and we continue to work toward clarifying the facts surr

'This is not who we are as a country' Canadian PM Justin Trudeau slams 'anti-vaxxer mobs' after they pelted GRAVEL at him - and condemns the violence that mask-wearers and healthcare workers face daily

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has slammed a mob of anti-vaxxers after they heckled and pelted him with gravel while on the campaign trail in Ontario on Monday.  He branded the violence 'completely unacceptable' and said 'this is not who were are as a country'.  Trudeau skirted suggestions the attack constituted assault but said it was 'unacceptable for people to be throwing things and endangering others at a political rally'.  Footage posted online showed Trudeau looking startled as anti-vaxx demonstrators surrounded and threw gravel at him as he boarded his campaign bus after leaving a small brewery in Brantford on Monday. Anti-vaxx hecklers have shouted abuse and even death threats at Trudeau throughout his campaign ahead of the September 20 election. He slammed the 'mobs' today, saying they do not respect 'the basic science and the basic decency that Canadians have rightly come to expect from each other.' He went on to defend people &