Canada's immigration website saw U.S. traffic spike on Super Tuesday


Cape Breton if Donald Trump Wins

Donald Trump over the weekend appeared to flip-flop on the endorsement of David Duke, the former grand wizard of the Ku Kluz Klan.

Duke endorsed the U.S. Republican presidential contender on Thursday saying that "voting against Donald Trump at this point is really treason to your heritage," reported the Guardian.

In an interview with CNN on Sunday, Trump at first didn't disavow the endorsement, appearing as though he didn't know who Duke was.

"Just so you understand, I don't know anything about David Duke, OK?" Trump said on CNN's State of the Union. "Certainly I would disavow it if I thought there was something wrong."

The reporter posed the question on whether Trump would disavow the Klansman three times with little success in getting Trump to clarify his opinion.

"I don't know anything about what you're even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists," he said.

Not long after the interview, Trump's Twitter account tweeted that he already disavowed Duke at a rally on Friday. He did not, however, disavow all support by the KKK, which had been one of the focal points of the CNN interview.



Trump's previous run-ins with David Duke included when he ran for the Reform Party presidential nomination in 2000. When Trump ended his campaign, he pointed to Duke as one of his key reasons for deciding to leave the race.


"The Reform Party now includes a Klansman, Mr. Duke, a neo-Nazi, Mr. [Patrick] Buchanan, and a communist, Ms. [Lenora] Fulani. This is not company I wish to keep," he wrote in a statement to the New York Times.



Donald Trump downplays endorsement from David Duke

The same piece of misinformation has been floating around for years and people still believe it.


http://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/fact-check-do-refugees-get-more-financial-help-than-canadian-pensioners-1.2670735




Citizenship and Immigration Canada estimates that an individual in Ontario would receive roughly $2,065 in a one-time start-up allowance, to cover things such as basic household needs, furniture, winter clothing and telephone installation if a landline is chosen. The estimated monthly assistance to a refugee in Ontario is $768, but the department notes that individual circumstances vary and so do the monthly payments.

The government also helps refugees find permanent housing, learn how to set up a bank account and register for various federal and provincial programs.

However, the Canadian Council for Refugees says that most resettled refugees end up in debt because they are expected to repay the cost of their transportation to Canada and other related expenses – with interest. The council says that more than 90 per cent of refugees repay their loans.

Privately-sponsored refugees are not entitled to federal or provincial government assistance during the period of their sponsorship. Asylum-seekers who apply for refugee status upon arrival in Canada also can’t receive resettlement assistance.

Refugees Don’t Get $1,800 Per Month

Tonya Couch was quickly deported, and after being returned to Texas, she was released on bond with a GPS monitor. The 48-year-old woman is charged with hindering the apprehension of a felon.


'Affluenza' teen Ethan Couch's case moved to adult court

The bases are to be used as temporary quarters. The refugees will be housed in existing barracks, some of which are summer use only and being refitted for winter. There are no plans for mosques etc, there are already some in the civilian sector and korans, prayer rugs etc would come from refugee assistance agencies.

DND personnel will not be "waiters, chauffeurs and social workers for Muslim migrants".

The story about refugees being housed on bases was on CBC, CTV etc long ago.



Try reliable sites before going to sites that, from what I saw, promote hatred.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/01/08/red-cross-gears-up-to-house-syrian-refugees-at-military-bases-in-coming-weeks_n_8940872.html

Zika virus: Canadian-U.S. vaccine could be ready by year's end

Shaq visits Gainesville to play ball with kids


www.news4jax.com/positively-jax/shaq-visits-gainesville-to-play-ball-with-kids

Hawaii baby born with small head had prior Zika infection

ISIS calls San Bernardino shooters 'supporters'
Extremist group stopped short of claiming responsibility for California mass shooting

The Islamic State group's official radio station has aired a statement saying the mass shooting in California was carried out by two "supporters" of the extremist group.

While praising the attack, the group stopped short of claiming responsibility for it.

The Al-Bayan report Saturday echoed a claim carried Friday by the ISIS-affiliated Aamaq news agency.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/isis-san-bernardino-shooting-1.3352268

Plenty of examples here:http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/10/03/do-civilians-with-guns-ever-stop-mass-shootings/

http://controversialtimes.com/issues/constitutional-rights/12-times-mass-shootings-were-stopped-by-good-guys-with-guns/

http://blog.uritraining.com/?p=88



Some articles may repeat the occurrences of another article but ............ Yes, armed citizens can and do stop mass killings. They just don't have the numbers of dead to make major headlines.

Somehow I am not surprised with this. The Sheriff here a few years ago had a criminal record.

From reports I have read thus far ..... Russians were warned off, Russians have been attacking civilian positions inside Turkey.

Turkey shot down a Russian warplane Tuesday, claiming it had violated Turkish airspace and ignored repeated warnings. Russia denied that the plane crossed the Syrian border into Turkish skies.

"We are looking into the circumstances of the crash of the Russian jet," Russia's Defence Ministry said. "The Ministry of Defence would like to stress that the plane was over the Syrian territory throughout the flight."

Russia said the Su-24 was downed by artillery fire, but Turkey claimed that its F-16s fired on the Russian plane after it ignored several warnings. The ministry said the pilots parachuted but added that Moscow had no further contact with them.

Turkish jet shoots down Russian military plane



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It had to happen sooner or later. Now to see what happens next. Turkey is a member of N.A.T.O.

This analysis was mentioned in Topic: ISIS is self-destructive, for a scary reason and concludes with ... Daesh wants a war that pits Muslims everywhere against everyone else.

Paris attacks: Suspected ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud killed in police raid, prosecutor says:


The Belgian jihadi suspected of plotting deadly attacks in Paris died along with his cousin in a police raid on a suburban apartment building, officials said Thursday.

Paris Prosecutor François Molins' office said 27-year-old Abdelhamid Abaaoud was identified based on skin samples, but authorities did not know how he died. His body was found in the apartment building targeted in the chaotic and bloody raid in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis on Wednesday.

Three police officials say a woman who died in the raid was Abaaoud's cousin. One said Hasna Aitboulahcen is believed to have detonated a suicide vest after a brief conversation with police officers.

The official confirmed an audio recording, punctuated by gunshots, in which an officer asks: "Where is your boyfriend?" and she responded angrily: "He's not my boyfriend!" Then loud bangs are heard.

The exact relationship between Abaaoud and Aitboulahcen was not clear.

The bodies recovered in the raid were badly mangled, with a part of Aitboulahcen's spine landing on a police car, complicating formal identification, according to one of the officials.

To quote my father-in-law: "Can really say he's a spineless coward now."

Abdelhamid Abaaoud killed in police raid,

Story highlights

Frida Ghitis: The recent actions of ISIS appear to be courting retaliation and ultimately an apocalyptic battle with the West. She says it is the ultimate suicide mission.

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(CNN)At first glance, the actions of the self-described Islamic State seem more than a little baffling. Even when viewed through the logic of a terrorist organization, they appear self-destructive.

ISIS has done its best to taunt much greater powers, to provoke and pressure world leaders to launch a war against them. They seem determined to stir fury in democratic countries and create support for a grand international coalition, stoking the public's determination to back military action to destroy the terrorist group.

The recent ISIS attacks in France, the downing of a Russian plane in Egypt, believed by Russia and others to be an ISIS operation, and the bombings in Turkey aim to achieve short, medium and long-term objectives, from creating fear, boosting its image and enhancing recruiting to triggering a much wider, cataclysmic war.

Anyone who thought refraining from drawing offensive cartoons would provide protection seem to be hearing a macabre message, from the terrorists themselves: The only way to be safe from radical Islamist extremists is to destroy them.

Is that what ISIS is trying to tell us; is that what it wants?


Strategy of ISIS

The rapid advance of ISIS on the battlefield shows that while the group operates on the logic of depravity and murder, it is not lacking in coherent strategic thinking. What, then, should we make of its seemingly counterproductive operations outside the immediate battle ground in Syria and Iraq? The answer tells us a lot about how ISIS wants the conflict to unfold.

The multiple operations in Paris last week were not lone-wolf operations; they were planned at the highest levels of ISIS in its Syrian "capital," Raqqa, at least according to the French government.

That means the attacks constituted pivotal elements of ISIS strategy. By causing mass casualties in multiple locations -- and possible striking at the president of France -- they ensured that France would increase its attacks in Syria, despite what ISIS may claim.

In the recording claiming responsibility for the attack, ISIS suggested that one of the reasons for targeting Paris was France's participation in the anti-ISIS coalition. But everything suggests ISIS, in fact, would like that coalition to fight with more conviction. Just to be sure to fire up the rage of the man leading the response, they insulted the French president, saying the soccer match they attacked, where "Crusader German and French teams" were playing, was attended, "by the idiot of France, Francois Hollande."

Then there was the curious case of the Syrian passport found near the body of a suicide bomber. Who takes a passport to a terrorist operation? Someone who wants it to be found.

ISIS chose Paris, according to that missive, because it is "the capital of prostitution and vice." But Paris is also a member of NATO, whose charter calls on all members to act together in mutual defense. It is also capital of a European country with a large Muslim population and, like other European nations, one where there have been tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims, as well as concerns and controversy about how to respond to the large wave of refugees, mostly from Syria.


Objectives of Paris operation

The Paris operation had multiple objectives. The passport was a way of provoking the West to turn against refugees. The attack sought to provoke France, NATO and Europe to fight ISIS and the public to turn against the Muslim population and against refugees. ISIS wants a war between Islam and the rest of the world, with Muslims on its side, as a way of creating and expanding its so-called "caliphate."

ISIS wants the world's Muslims to feel they are at war with the modern world. It also wants to stop the flow of Syrians to the West, because it's more than a little embarrassing that Muslims are fleeing its utopian Islamic "state."

The attacks also serve other short-term objectives. They make ISIS seem courageous and efficient, able to carry out massive operations. That is a powerful recruiting tool and it cements its position as the leading Jihadi group, ahead of its main rival, al Qaeda.

But there's more. ISIS had taunted the United States and Britain by theatrically beheading American and UK citizens on camera, and it's now taunting other powers, seemingly risking everything it has obtained, including control of large swaths of territory.

A couple of weeks before Paris, a Russian passenger plane was shot down over Egypt's Sinai Peninsula.(See note at bottom) The Russian government says it has strong evidence that ISIS is responsible. If Russia is right, ISIS has essentially forced Moscow to launch violent reprisals.

Russia has been fighting in Syria, but before this attack it had mostly avoided attacking ISIS positions. In fact, that was one of the major criticisms the U.S. and its allies had against President Vladimir Putin's decision to enter the Syrian civil war. Putin wants to defend Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but more than 90% of Russian airstrikes had targeted not ISIS but its rivals.

ISIS must have known that shooting down a Russian plane would make Putin turn his guns against the perpetrators, which is exactly what has happened. By attacking Russia, ISIS is doing the unimaginable, making Putin and the West start working together -- against ISIS.


'Risking it all'

Similarly, ISIS suicide bombings in Turkey, a NATO member, have put President Recep Tayip Erdogan in a position he doesn't want, having to aid in the fight against ISIS. In fact, Erdogan has been very reluctant to help fight ISIS. Instead, he has been targeting Kurdish forces, who are the enemies of ISIS. By attacking Turkey, they press Erdogan to turn against them.

ISIS seems to be risking it all, creating the conditions for an overwhelming international attack, by the United States, Russia, France, Turkey, perhaps all of NATO, against its ragtag army. If this happens, it could lose it all.

Why would it risk this outcome?

The answer gives a glimpse into the group's long-term objective. While ISIS is, in fact, trying to build an Islamic State and is working to capture and govern territory, its ultimate vision is an apocalyptic one. A strategy that looks self-destructive is, in fact, destructive, but perhaps less baffling than it seems as first glance. As many scholars have noted, ISIS's long-range vision is of an end-of-days battle with the West -- what it calls "Rome." It is the ultimate suicide mission, one that sees the entire world involved in a grand final conflagration.


Note: An earlier version incorrectly referred to the "shooting down" of a Russian plane over Egypt. The plane is believed to have been brought down by a bomb, according to Russian authorities.



ISIS is self-destructive, for a scary reason

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If this analysis is correct, and it would seem to be right, the attacks on mosques, individual Muslims etc happening all over are playing right into their game.

Want to kill a snake .... cut off the head. Rather than attack all Muslims everywhere, the vast majority of whom have nothing to do with Daesh, strike at the head and remove it by whatever means necessary. The 'cells' which may be in place in different places may still survive but they are simply mop up after the fact.

Still at large

1. Abdelhamid Abaaoud: Suspected mastermind

Abaaoud, in his late 20s, is the suspected Belgian mastermind of the attacks. Abaaoud has been linked to earlier plots, including one against a Paris-bound high-speed train that was foiled by three young Americans in August, and the other against a church in the French capital's suburbs.

He was already well known to those who follow ISIS. In 2014, grim footage emerged of him and his friends in Syria loading a pickup and a makeshift trailer with a mound of bloodied corpses.

2. Salah Abdeslam: Suspected of renting black VW Polo car used in attacks

The Brussels-born 26-year-old is the brother of Ibrahim Abdeslam, who blew himself up at the Comptoir Voltair café in Paris. An arrest warrant has been issued for Abdeslam, whom police had allowed to slip from their grasp early Saturday, when they stopped a car carrying three men near the Belgian border.

By then, hours had passed since authorities had identified Abdeslam as the renter of a Volkswagen Polo that carried the attackers to the Paris theatre where so many died. Three French police officials and a top French security official have confirmed that officers let Abdeslam go after checking his ID.

Dead attackers

Three suicide bombers have been identified as those who targeted the Bataclan concert hall:

1. Ismail Omar Mostefai

The 29-year-old, born just south of Paris and of Algerian descent, was in contact with Abaaoud, the alleged chief planner behind the attacks, one official told the New York Times.

Mostefai had been put on the French intelligence services' "S notice," suspected of being radicalized in 2010. Identified through his fingerprint by officials, Mostefai reportedly entered Turkey in 2013, the Times reported. He is said to have visited Syria in 2013-14 and was flagged by Turkish authorities as a possible extremist in October 2014. A senior Turkish official told The Associated Press that authorities notified French authorities in December 2014 and in June 2015, but had received no response.

At the Anoussra Mosque, Islamic association leader Ben Bammou told AP that Mostefai was a regular mosque-goer until about two years ago. He said Mostefai often attended with his father, but said there was no sign of fanaticism.

2. Samy Amimour

The Frenchman, 28, worked as a bus driver in Paris until 2012, the Guardian reported. He had been under official investigation since October 2012 on suspicion of terrorism-related activity over a plan to go to Yemen and had been the subject of an international arrest warrant since late 2013, when he is believed to have gone to Syria.

At some point, Amimour joined ISIS. His father told the French newspaper Le Monde in 2014 that he had gone to Syria to try to extract his son from ISIS. The father said he had an "extremely cold reunion" with his son and was unsuccessful in bringing him home.

3. The third attacker at the concert hall has yet to be identified

Three suicide bombers attacked the Stade de France:

4. Bilal Hadfi

The 20-year-old French national who lived in Belgium also spent time in Syria, according to the Washington Post, citing European intelligence officials. At some point, he returned to Belgium, but disappeared from the radar of the Belgian security services. The Daily Telegraph reported that he fought with ISIS as recently as this spring, under different names.

Although described as a typical teenager with a keen interest in football, Hadfi at some point within the last two years became radicalized by a Belgian imam and began associating with extremists, according to Het Laatste Nieuws.

The Telegraph said Hadfi in July had issued a call on Facebook for attacks on the West.

"To the brothers who reside in the lands of the infidels," he said in a now deleted video post. "Hit the pigs in their communities so they no longer feel safe even in their dreams."


5. Ahmad Al Mohammad

Authorities discovered a passport near the body of one of the attackers that carried the name of Ahmad Al Mohammad, 25, from northwest Syria. Authorities are trying to authenticate the passport, but a Greek official says the fingerprints of the person holding Al Mohammad's passport match up with a person who was processed on the Greek island of Leros after setting out from Turkey.

6. The third suicide bomber has not yet been identified

Comptoir Voltaire café attack

7. Ibrahim Abdeslam

A 31-year-old French resident of Belgium, Abdeslam was the brother of Salah Abdeslam, one of the key suspects still at large. Abdeslam founded a café that was managed by his brother Salah and was temporarily shut down for drug offences several years ago, the Daily Telegraph reported. The paper said the brothers had recently transferred their shares in the café to another party.

"I used to go there every day after work, on my way home. We would go there to smoke hashish, drink alcohol, no problem," one man, who did not want to be identified, told the Telegraph,

"Ibrahim and I played cards together, we laughed and joked. He talked to everyone, he was very generous ... Ibrahim used to go to discos, he would drink alcohol, smoke. But he stopped drinking alcohol in the last year."

The militants who are killing civilians, raping and forcing captured women into sexual slavery, and beheading foreigners in Iraq and Syria are known by several names: the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS; the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL; and, more recently, the Islamic State, or IS. French officials recently declared that that country would stop using any of those names and instead refer to the group as “Daesh.”

The Obama Administration should switch to this nomenclature, too, because how we talk about this group is central to defeating them.

Whether referred to as ISIS, ISIL, or IS, all three names reflect aspirations that the United States and its allies unequivocally reject. Political and religious leaders all over the world have noted this. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said, “This is a terrorist group and not a state. . . the term Islamic State blurs the lines between Islam, Muslims, and Islamists.” President Obama made similar remarks saying, “ISIL is not Islamic . . . and [is] certainly not a state.”

Muslim scholars around the world have denounced the group’s attempt to declare a caliphate. Egyptian Islamic theologian Yusuf al-Qaradawi published an open letter to Muslim scholars explaining, “A group simply announcing a caliphate is not enough to establish a caliphate.” The Syrian Sufi leader Muhammad al-Yacoubi called the group’s declaration “illegitimate” and that supporting it was “haram,” or forbidden.

The term “Daesh” is strategically a better choice because it is still accurate in that it spells out the acronym of the group’s full Arabic name, al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham. Yet, at the same time, “Daesh” can also be understood as a play on words — and an insult. Depending on how it is conjugated in Arabic, it can mean anything from “to trample down and crush” to “a bigot who imposes his view on others.” Already, the group has reportedly threatened to cut out the tongues of anyone who uses the term.

Why do they care so much? The same reason the United States should. Language matters.

With some 30,000 to 50,000 fighters, Daesh is a relatively small group, and propaganda is central to its growth strategy. Whether hijacking popular Twitter hashtags or using little known distribution channels to post videos to YouTube, their leadership knows that the war of words online is just as key to increasing its power and influence as the actual gruesome acts they commit on the ground.

By using the militants’ preferred names, the US government implicitly gives them legitimacy. But referring to the group as Daesh doesn’t just withhold validity. It also might help the United States craft better policy.

A number of studies suggest that the language we use affects the way we think and behave. By using a term that references the Arabic name and not an English translation, American policy makers can potentially inoculate themselves from inherent biases that could affect their decision making. A University of Chicago study last year showed that thinking in a foreign language actually reduces deep-seated, misleading biases and prevents emotional, unconscious thinking from interfering with systematic, analytical thinking.

Changing what the United States calls this band of militants is not going to make them go away. Yet we also know from over a decade of war that military tactics do not stamp out extremism either. As the prominent Muslim sheikh Abdullah bin Bayyah recently said after issuing a fatwa against the group, “The problem is that even if you defeat these ideas militarily by killing people, if you don’t defeat the ideas intellectually, then the ideas will reemerge.”

The State Department understands this and recently launched a more sophisticated digital war to combat the ideas espoused by the group on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. Building out a savvy online campaign is a step in the right direction, but the United States is weakening the potency of its own messaging if it continues to refer to the group as ISIL.

American officials should not be in the business of telling Muslims at home or abroad who is or isn’t Muslim. Nonetheless, by reframing how we talk and think about these violent extremists, we can support the chorus of Muslim scholars who are intellectually pushing back on Daesh’s religious claims, the scores of Muslims around the world who have publicly rejected the group, and, ultimately, the silent majority of more than 1 billion Muslims who are as likely to reject the heinous actions of Daesh as we are.

Zeba Khan is a writer based in Cambridge and San Francisco. Follow her on Twitter @zebakhan.


Words matter in ‘ISIS’ war, so use ‘Daesh’

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There being no Islamic State, not that I can find in any atlas nor on any world map, the term 'Daesh' certainly seems more fitting.