ISIS at it again

In Mosul, the largest city that ISIS controls, they started the school year with a message from there extremist leaders: report to work or lose your jobs. That's no the only thing going on in Mosul since ISIS took over. In the school system, they separated the boys and the girls, made the girls cover up in black gown and veils, sports became only for boys, and at the university the shut down the schools of fine arts, political science and law because they were un-Islamic. In other aspects of life since ISIS took over, electricity has been off for months , tap water is now undrinkable, the fuel ISIS brings in is expensive and fills the air with pollution, prices for food have shot up because of the taxes put on the trucks entering the city.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/14/world/islamic-state-imposes-strict-new-order-in-mosul-and-deprivation-is-a-result.html?_r=0

Afghanistan Terrorist Attacks

On Friday and Saturday there were attacks in Afghanistan that killed two americans and at least 19 Afghani people. The violence on friday, in Eastern Afghanistan, started when a NATO convoy was bombed, the two Americans were killed during this attack. The Taliban openly claimed responsibility for the attack and tweeted that the targeted a US convoy and that five Americans were killed. Then on Saturday while afghani civilians were clearing mines planted by the Taliban to attack army convoys, Tanks, and other vehicles they were attacked and 12 of them were killed. The attacks have been happening for a while now. One afternoon a suicide bomber attacked a bus, killing five soldiers and injuring twelve others including to women who were bystanders. Even with all of this happening, the US is stoping all combat at the end of the year. In january we will focus on counter terrorism, training and assisting the Afghani people.


http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/13/world/asia/afghanistan-violence/

March for Justice For All

On Saturday people from around the country will be heading to Washington DC where a march will be held for "Justice For All". The March started to be organized after the cop who killed Michael Brown in Ferguson MO and the cop who killed Eric Garner in NY were both not indicted for killing their respected victim. Riots broke out in New York, Philadelphia, San Fransisco, and ATlanta after the New York Gran Jury decided not to indict Daniel Pantaleo for killing Eric Garner. Rev. Al Sharpton is leading this March in Washington and will rally those who come at Freedom Plaza just blocks away from the White House. Joining the march is the mother of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was shot and killed by police while holding an airsoft gun and not follow orders to put his hands up outside of a Rec. Center in Cleveland, Ohio.

Silent Day in Ukraine?

On Tuesday, the Russian  backed rebels and the Ukrainian forces observed a ceasefire agreement. They are calling it a silent day in the war in Eastern Ukraine that has now lasted six months. The ceasefire is coinciding with new peace talks between the European Union, Ukraine, Russia and the separatists in Minsk. Both sides in this war wanted the ceasefire and the day of halted shooting honored the ceasefire called for a few months ago. In the peace talks, Russia denies having partaken in any of the fighting in Eastern Ukraine, Germany said that there is no chance of Ukraine joining NATO, and the Ukrainian government says that they might just part with pro-Russian Eastern Ukraine. Russia and the pro-Russian separatists said that they would not meet or agree to the ceasefire unless the Ukrainian government stopped its "economic blockade" and started trading again. Ukraine did and on Tuesday it restarted its natural gas trade with Russia.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/10/world/europe/ukrainian-military-and-separatists-observe-silent-day.html?_r=0

#Ferguson

Ferguson is back after new recordings and documents were released from the St. Louis Prosecutor's office. The new documents did no good though as they seemed to not spread any more light on the Michael Brown killing. In the documents and recording were FBI interviews with witnesses and the recordings included one of the police dispatch saying that before Brown was killed there was a strong armed robbery in progress. THe autopsy reports were also in the documents and show that Brown was shot eight times, had abrasions to his face and had traces of marijuana in his system. Also, they have many differing witness records of the event, some say Brown was shot fleeing from the cop, others say that Brown tensed up and ran toward the cop and was shot, but Brown's cousin says Wilson, the cop, shot him in Brown in the head as he was on his knees in surrender

I don't know what is really going on in Ferguson and i do not take a side on whether brown should have been shot or not but Ferguson has to get under control.

White Like Me

Today in class we watched a movie called White Like Me, in which TIm Wise talks about how America is to this day racist. The movie is a documentary that goes through how racism is rampant throughout the country, how it hurts black people and white people, and how we need to stop being colorblind to the problems of race.

In one of the parts of the documentary, it talks about how Barack Obama won the 2008 election. After he won, the movie says, that everyone was talking about how we elected a black president, and this proves that all blacks can do it, and that it is not our fault they are the way they are. Then reporters were saying that we entered a post racist society in our country by electing a black president. But Obama still lost the white vote by a lot and there are still more black people in prisons, or on parol in the country now then there were slaves in 1850. This shows that there is still racism in our country and it will not go away until we sit down and face it outright.

This movie to me, made a lot of great points to why racism is bad, and whites are almost programmed to be racist. With all the points that it made i agree that racism is flourishing in our nation and is getting out of control. So I have decided to change the way I think. Look at situations involving blacks and whites and take in all the factors, not just rely on the biases that i have put in my head.http://www.timwise.org/tag/white-like-me-movie/

In class on Wednesday we watched a movie called the March. This movie is about what happened to make the march on Washington in 1963 a success. It goes into detail about the people that helped make it happen and what they actually did.

The movie started with the protests in Birmingham, Alabama and how the city was the most segregated city in the country. In this it mentioned how a lot of people were worried that it wouldn't be successful in Birmingham because everyone was afraid of the dogs and fire hoses that the police used to shut down the protests. But everything worked out after the college students got involved. They came in great numbers and even with the dogs and fire hoses stayed to protest.

After this it goes into the making of the march on Washington. It talks about how they had councils about when it would be held, who would speak and things of that nature. They had talks with President Kennedy bout the march to calm his fears of the march turning violent. They had people all over the country talking about it and doing things to spread awareness. They even had a person talking to the famous celebrities of the time.When the march started, few people were there and some people were nervous about it, but soon after people started showing up in huge numbers. By the time the big speakers were making there speeches there were over a hundred thousand people in attendance.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3122416/