Tag: Deaths

500,000 Dead And Maimed

Now that Ukraine has taken a backseat to the other ‘war’ across the pond the news seems to glaze over much of the reports coming out of that conflict.

Of course we in the West get the news when it is something dire that could push more money to start flowing again into Ukraine.

Like this recent report….

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned allies on Saturday that an “artificial deficit” of arms for his country risks giving Russia breathing space, highlighting the need for artillery and long-range weapons after his military chief said he was withdrawing troops from the eastern city of Avdiivka, “the first major gain Russian forces have achieved since May of last year,” reports the New York Times. Zelensky spoke to the Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of security and foreign policy officials, per the AP. Ukraine is back on the defensive against Russia in the nearly two-year-old war, hindered by low ammunition supplies and a shortage of personnel. “Ukrainians have proven that we can force Russia to retreat,” Zelensky said. “We can get our land back, and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin can lose, and this has already happened more than once on the battlefield.”

See a report for the spending of more US dollars.

But let’s think about what has happened as a result of 2 years to basically total war in Ukraine.

As we approach the second anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, it’s worth reflecting on who bears the main responsibility for the subsequent “inter-imperialist US-Russia proxy war,” an epic slaughter that produced 500,000 deaths and injuries so far and more than 300,000 fatalities (exact figures are hard to come by).

As we approach the anniversary could all this death and destruction could have been avoided?

Yes it could have been.

The Ukraine War could have been averted if Ukraine’s Western tool of a president Volodymyr Zelensky had said just five words after being elected in 2019:  “Ukraine will not join NATO.”

Five words versus 500,000 casualties.

Think about that.

As Benjamin Abelow pointed out in his short, expertly crafted, and Noam Chomsky-endorsed 2022 bookHow the West Brought War to Ukraine, the standard Western narrative claiming that Putin is “an insatiable, Hitler-like expansionist who invaded Ukraine in an unprovoked land grab” is complete nonsense. The real cause of the February 2022 invasion that led to the war was the misguided and reckless policy direction taken by Washington and its imperial tool NATO over the last three decades.

500,000 Dead and Maimed in Ukraine, Enough Already

Sorry but it is time for peace….or there will be nothing left of Ukraine for Zelenskyy to rule….

The mass slaughter on both sides in this long battle was a measure of the strategic value of the city to both sides, but it is also emblematic of the shocking human cost of this war, which has degenerated into a brutal and bloody war of attrition along a nearly static front line. Neither side made significant territorial gains in the entire 2023 year of fighting, with a net gain to Russia of a mere 188 square miles, or 0.1% of Ukraine.

And while it is the Ukrainians and Russians fighting and dying in this war of attrition with over half a million casualties, it is the United States, with some its Western allies, that has stood in the way of peace talks. This was true of talks between Russia and Ukraine that took place in March 2022, one month after the Russian invasion, and it is true of talks that Russia tried to initiate with the United States as recently as January 2024.

https://original.antiwar.com/mbenjamin/2024/02/21/after-two-years-of-war-in-ukraine-its-time-for-peace/

Nobody cares about who has died or why just that Putin is being confronted and the US has a permanent bad guy to blame everything on.  Most people cannot see past their chest thumping bullsh*t.

At what point is enough enough?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–18Jan24

This is a horrifying report out of the state of Alabama…..

The bodies of two men who died while incarcerated in Alabama’s prison system were missing their hearts or other organs when returned to their families, a federal lawsuit alleges. The family of Brandon Clay Dotson, who died in a state prison in November, filed a federal lawsuit last month against the Alabama Department of Corrections and others, saying his body was decomposing and his heart was missing when his remains were returned to his family, the AP reports. In a court filing in the case last week, the daughter of Charles Edward Singleton, another deceased inmate, said her father’s body was missing all of his internal organs when it was returned in 2021.

Lauren Faraino, an attorney representing Dotson’s family, said Wednesday that the experience of multiple families shows this is “absolutely part of a pattern.” Dotson, 43, was found dead on Nov. 16 at Ventress Correctional Facility. His family, suspecting foul play was involved in his death, hired a pathologist to do a second autopsy and discovered his heart was missing, according to the lawsuit. His family filed a lawsuit seeking to find out why his heart was removed and to have it returned to them.

“Defendants’ outrageous and inexcusable mishandling of the deceased’s body amounts to a reprehensible violation of human dignity and common decency,” the lawsuit states, adding that “their appalling misconduct is nothing short of grave robbery and mutilation.” Dotson’s family, while seeking information about what happened to his heart, discovered that other families had similar experiences, Faraino said. The situation involving Singleton’s body is mentioned in court documents filed by Dotson’s family last week. In the documents, the inmate’s daughter Charlene Drake writes that a funeral home told her that her father’s body was brought to it “with no internal organs” after his death while incarcerated in 2021.

Is the state harvesting human organs for profit?  Or is it that some ghoul in the prison system is getting rich desecrating bodies for profit?

This is just sick and more attention should be paid by everyone.

Any thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–28Nov23

If you live in the UK do not die without a will!

I seems that if you die without a will then the King can reap some benefits….

The deaths of thousands of people in parts of England have increased the personal wealth of King Charles III, according to a Guardian investigation that might persuade many people—especially those opposed to the monarchy—to write wills. In most of England and Wales, the assets of people who die with no will and no known next of kin go directly to the government. But under a system that dates to feudal times, those assets go to the king’s Duchy of Lancaster property estate if the person dies in a former dukedom that covers a large area of northwest England that includes Liverpool and Manchester. In Cornwall, the assets go to the Duchy of Cornwall, now controlled by Prince William.

The duchies have long claimed that the funds, known as “bona vacancia”—Latin for “vacant goods”—are donated to charities. But documents seen by the Guardian show that only a small proportion of the funds go to charities and duchy officials have been granted permission to use bona vacancia funds to upgrade properties that are rented out for profit. One source says duchy officials consider the revenue “free money” and a “slush fund” to renovate properties including town houses and vacation homes. Charles inherited the Duchy of Lancaster when his mother died last year. Earlier this year, he received almost $33 million in his first annual payout from the property estate.

The Guardian notes that many of those who died without wills or next of kin lived in homes far more humble than the ones their assets are being used to renovate. Friends of people whose assets were claimed by the duchy say they’re dismayed that the funds are being used to increase the king’s wealth. “It’s shocking and it shouldn’t be happening,” says Charlie Briggs, a friend of retired nursery manager Val Taylor, whose assets were transferred to the king’s estate after she died last year at age 72. “It would be OK if the money was going to people who deserve it but not if it is going to an organization that has plenty,” he says. (Read more King Charles III

Please any UK readers could let my readers know if this is true and why is it so.

All I can do is shake my head….I am in no way in awe of the monarch….I think it is a free ride for giving nothing back.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Should We See The Photos?

Yet another mass shooting….and the usual rhetoric around it….

This will be an emotional post if it upsets anyone I am sorry.

In my little corner of the country we have had two mass shootings in one week…..shootings are nothing new around here but ones with multiple victims is…..

In this country in the last two weeks, there have been nearly 200 people shot in mass-shooting incidents.

Some action is called for….thoughts an prayers is doing  nothing to curb this disturbing trend….Congress is an impotent tool a society just looks the other way.

I had a conversation with a friend that believes the photos should be published for the public to see the carnage and that may turn the debate to decide to do something to help stop this carnage.

I also read a letter by William Falk published in The Week magazine……which I present here…..

When former police officer Stephen Spainhouer rushed to the scene of a mass shooting at an Allen, Texas, outlet mall last week, he came upon a battlefield. Bloody, torn bodies were scattered on the ground next to the dead killer and his assault rifle. A little girl seemed to be hiding next to a bush, but when Spainhouer turned her over, “she had no face.” He tried performing CPR on other victims, but “the injuries were so severe there was nothing I could do.” Hours later, cellphone images of the disfigured dead began circulating on Twitter. No mainstream publication, including this one, would publish such photos, for many reasons: the need for family consent; preserving the dignity of the dead; the sensibilities of readers. But by not showing what mass shooters do to human beings, do we make it easier to be numbed to the slaughter? If Americans were repeatedly exposed to images of children with their faces blown off, would they still accept that “nothing can be done?”

Images have great power; they can reach into hearts and minds in a way words often do not. When Emmett Till’s mother allowed publication of photos of her late son’s mutilated face in 1955, the revulsion galvanized the civil rights movement. Other photos have also marked turning points in history: the 1972 image of a naked, 9-year-old Vietnamese girl burned by U.S. napalm; the 2004 photos of Iraqis humiliated and tortured by U.S. soldiers at the Abu Ghraib prison; the video of a police officer with his knee on the neck of a pleading, dying George Floyd. What if we’d seen what an assault rifle did to the 20 first-graders and six adults in Newtown? (Some of their bodies had to be identified by DNA.) Or the 19 kids and two teachers methodically executed in Uvalde? Or the 26 churchgoers massacred in the pews at Sutherland Springs? Would their gruesome deaths still be written off as the regrettable but necessary price of “freedom”?

Interesting thought.

For me after Vietnam there is not much that shocks me…..so I say yes….of course with permission to use the photos.

I do not think it will make much difference to our lay-about lawmakers for their concerns are with donor dollars not the safety of our citizens.

What about you, my readers, should these photos be published?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Gun Violence Comes To The Coast

I apologize if the title is misleading…..we do have the occasional shooting between individuals or some shoot out with the police but we have not had many mass shootings but that came to an end.

Last weekend students from the sleepy little town of Bay St. Louis in Hancock county…..it was an after prom party and all student from local schools were invited to come and hang out.

The party was going well and all seemed to be enjoying themselves and the a 19 year old showed up to confront a student about his sister….the argument got heated and the 19 year old got a gun and shot and killed 2 and wounded 4….the shooter was tracked down and arrested.

All that made me think about the shooting after something I read in VOX.

No other high-income country has suffered such a high death toll from gun violence. Every day, 120 Americans die at the end of a gun, including suicides and homicides, an average of 43,375 per year. Since 2009, there has been an annual average of 19 shootings in which at least four people are killed. The US gun homicide rate is as much as 26 times that of other high-income countries; its gun suicide rate is nearly 12 times higher.

Gun control opponents have typically framed the gun violence epidemic in the US as a symptom of a broader mental health crisis. But every country has people with mental health issues and extremists; those problems aren’t unique. What is unique is the US’s expansive view of civilian gun ownership, ingrained in politics, in culture, and in the law since the nation’s founding, and a national political process that has so far proved incapable of changing that norm.

“America is unique in that guns have always been present, there is wide civilian ownership, and the government hasn’t claimed more of a monopoly on them,” said David Yamane, a professor at Wake Forest University who studies American gun culture.

https://www.vox.com/23142734/cleveland-texas-mass-shootings

I am not trying to convince people that more gun control is needed….all this is just to try and explain how we got to this point in our history.

My thoughts are on record here on IST…..I will not convince you to my way of thinking as your efforts to do so for me are also wasted efforts.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

And Yet Another School Shooting

Seriously?

How many is that now?

There have been 398 children killed by gun violence….and yet there is very little public outcry (how sad is that?)….At least 57 people have died in 38 mass shootings in the U.S. so far this month, with another 133 injured.

The newest incident is in Nashville…..

The three students shot to death Monday at a private school in Nashville were all 9 years old, police said—two girls and a boy. Officials identified them as Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney, the Tennessean reports. The adult victims were Cynthia Peak, 61; Katherine Koonce, 60; and Mike Hill, 61. Hill was a custodian, Koonce the Covenant School’s headmaster, and Peak a substitute teacher, investigators said. In an afternoon press conference, Police Chief John Drake said, “I was literally moved to tears to see this and the kids as they were being ushered out of the building.”

The six were killed by Audrey Hale, 28, a former student at the school, Drake said. Hale was killed by officers less than 15 minutes after the shooting began. Hale had no criminal history and obtained two of the three weapons used locally. In a search of a house later, police said they found a plan for the attack, including maps showing existing surveillance and points of entry, as well as a written screed. All entrances to the building were locked, per USA Today, and Hale got in by shooting a door. Police said Hale was a transgender man who used male pronouns, per the Tennessean.

What kind of POS does it take to want to shoot children?

The White House has had enough (don’t make me laugh)

“Enough is enough,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at Monday’s briefing, hours after three children and three staff members were killed in a mass shooting at a private Christian elementary school in Nashville. “How many more children have to be murdered before Republicans in Congress will step up and act to pass the assault weapons ban, to close loopholes in our background check system, or to require the safe storage of guns?” she said, per the Washington Post. “We need to do something.” Police said the shooter, a 28-year-old woman armed with two assault rifles and a handgun, was shot dead by officers at the scene.

President Biden addressed the shooting during a small-business event at the White House, the New York Times reports. He called the shooting a “family’s worst nightmare” and urged Congress to pass gun control measures. “The shooter in this situation reportedly had two assault weapons and a pistol,” the president said. “So I call on Congress, again, to pass my assault weapons ban. It’s about time that we begin to make some progress.” “It’s ripping at the soul of this nation, ripping at the very soul of this nation,” Biden said of gun violence.

Jill Biden, speaking at a National League of Cities event in Washington, also condemned the Covenant School shooting, USA Today reports. “I am truly without words and our children deserve better,” the first lady said. “We stand, all of us, we stand with Nashville in prayer.”

Do you really think Biden and the Dems will do anything?

Do you really think Congress will step up?

Don’t make me laugh!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

“No Foul Play Suspected”

Those terms come from the ME office when a death is investigated.

Then there is the report from my home state of Mississippi….

On Oct. 2, a frantic Rasheem Carter called his mother and told her “three truckloads of white men” were chasing him. She told him to call the police, and when she didn’t hear from him again, she reported him missing. A month later, his body was found in a wooded area near Taylorsville, Mississippi, where he’d been working. It had been dismembered, with his head and other body parts severed, the Washington Post reports. The local sheriff initially said there was “no reason” to suspect foul play—but now, months later and after outcry from Carter’s family, he’s changing his tune. More from the coverage:

What happened: Carter was working in Taylorsville, about 100 miles away from his home in Fayette, Mississippi, on a short-term contracting job as he saved money to reopen his restaurant, which shuttered during the COVID-19 pandemic. His mother says he fled the job in October after some sort of disagreement with at least one co-worker, NBC News reports. She says he mentioned multiple people from the job as possibly threatening him. The sheriff confirms there were “a couple of verbal altercations” between Carter and at least one colleague, but hasn’t revealed what they were about.

  • Not himself: Smith County Sheriff Joel Houston says everyone at that job has been interviewed. “They said [Carter’s] whole demeanor had changed. They weren’t sure what was going on,” he says. “They just said he kept to himself more. He usually joked around, and in the last week or so they weren’t able to do that.” The colleagues mentioned as possible threats were confirmed to have been at another job site almost 100 miles away when Carter was last seen alive.
  • Timeline: Carter did go to the police station after his last conversation with his mom, but Houston said last year that Carter did not report that he was in any sort of danger, and simply appeared to be in need of a ride back to his hotel. Carter was last spotted in the woods around 4:30pm on Oct. 2 in footage from a private landowner’s game camera, apparently alone.
  • Police theory: Houston says that “there’s no indication that someone killed him. The evidence we do have does coincide with what animals would do to a body.”
  • Family disagrees: But Carter’s family isn’t buying the idea that an animal is responsible for dismembering Carter. “There is nothing natural about this. What we have is a Mississippi lynching,” family attorney Benjamin Crump says, per the BBC. “This was a nefarious act. This was an evil act.” Carter’s mom says he was lucid when they spoke, not under the influence of any intoxicants, and that he had no history of mental health issues.
  • Sheriff’s current stance: On Tuesday, the day after a family press conference with Crump, Houston clarified that he has not ruled out the possibility Carter was murdered. “Nothing is being swept under the rug. There’s nothing to hide,” he said, adding that the investigation is ongoing and search warrants are in process.

This is not the only time this announcement was made over a death….

Just a little homespun news for my readers….get to know Mississippi.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

David Crosby–R.I.P.

One of may favorite groups back in the day was CSN&Y…..sad news from the music world….David Crosby of that same group has died….age 81….

David Crosby, a singer-songwriter and founding member of two hugely influential and successful folk-rock groups—the Byrds and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young—has died. He was 81. His family announced his death Thursday, saying only that it came after a long illness. Crosby had remained active on Twitter up until Wednesday, Variety reports, when he joked about heaven, posting, “I heard the place is overrated… cloudy.” And he’d released an album, Live at the Capitol Theater, last month. Crosby, who contributed to both groups’ intricate and sublime harmonies, was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame twice, once with each band.

Crosby grew up in Los Angeles. His father, Floyd, was an Academy Award-winning cinematographer, per Rolling Stone. He took a brief spin at college, then pursued a music career, starting as a solo act in folk clubs. He joined a band in 1964, when the Beatles had made bands all the rage, that already included Roger McGuinn and Gene Clark. Two incarnations later, the Jet Set were the Byrds, to which Crosby added his signature harmony on such hits as “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “Turn! Turn! Turn!” As a songwriter, he was overshadowed by McGuinn and Clark, who fired him in 1967 as tensions in the band escalated. They gave him a list of reasons, including his songwriting, and said he was impossible to work with. “All of which is partly true, I’m sure, sometimes,” Crosby later said, adding, “But it was a drag.”

At Joni Mitchell’s house a few months later, Crosby ran into Stephen Stills and Graham Nash. They sang a song together three times, learning how their voices could best blend in harmony. “When we sang that third time,” Nash later said, “my life changed.” The first Crosby, Stills & Nash album came out in May 1969 with three songs written or co-written by Crosby: “Guinnevere,” “Wooden Ships,” and “Long Time Gone.” The record was a hit, and the group began a tour after adding Neil Young. Their second concert ever was at Woodstock, in front of an audience of almost 500,000. In his memoir, Crosby wrote: “For that one moment we did something that tells you what’s possible with human beings. … Woodstock was a time where were was a prevailing feeling of harmony.”

His voice and his music will be missed….in memory of his music…..

You will be missed….and thank you for great memories.

Falling Russian Syndrome

There has been an uptick of a dreaded disease that is running rampant through Russia’s ‘High Society”…..a situation that started during the dark days of the Covid outbreak in Russia.

I wrote about it before in the early days……

Those Russians And Windows Are Back!

The disease has struck again…..

It’s been a while since the murky death of a Russian oligarch or other high-profile exec has made headlines, but this month saw that streak broken. Per the BBC, 65-year-old sausage magnate Pavel Antov, who’s topped Forbes‘ list of the richest Russian businessmen, was found dead Sunday at a hotel in Rayagada, in the Indian state of Odisha—apparently after a fall out of a window, according to local cops. The Jerusalem Post notes Antov, who’d just celebrated his birthday, was discovered lying in a pool of blood.

A local police superintendent suggests Antov died by suicide, as he’d been “depressed” over something that had happened at the hotel just two days earlier: His friend Vladimir Budanov, a 61-year-old Russian businessman who’d accompanied him on the trip, had been “discovered unconscious” in his own hotel room, surrounded by wine bottles, per the Daily Beast. He later died at a nearby hospital. Budanov was said by Indian and Russian officials to have died of either a stroke or heart attack. As is often the case in these mysterious Russian deaths, Antov’s past included alleged criticism of the Russian government: The BBC reports that in June, he’d reacted to a Russian missile attack on a Kyiv neighborhood, posting on WhatsApp, “It’s extremely difficult to call all this anything but terror.”

Antov later denied he was the one behind the post, which was deleted, claiming someone else had posted it and that he was a “patriot of my country” who supported President Vladimir Putin and his invasion of Ukraine. WION reports that an investigation is ongoing, and that “they are probing all angles in this case, including an accidental fall.” The Beast notes there’ve been more than a dozen strange deaths of Russian businessmen this year, often executives in the gas and oil industry. One of those deaths happened over the same weekend that Antov and Budanov died: Alexander Buzakov, head of Russia’s Admiralty Shipyard, died “suddenly and tragically” on Saturday at age 66, his cause of death unclear.

How far will this go?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Halloween–2022

Today is the day we set aside of observe some pagan ritual that we have re-labeled as Halloween.

In that vain I would like to offer up a ‘spooky’ post in honor of this day.

Have you wished you could somehow access the thoughts of your dead loved ones?

If so I have a post for you……

On its face, it’s not that strange that James Vlahos can talk to his father, John, any time he wants to on the phone. He can ask him about his favorite sports team when he’s curious. Or when he wants to ask him what his favorite song is. When the feeling strikes, Vlahos can just shoot his dad a message to see how he’s doing. Whatever it is, his dad is always quick to respond—sometimes with a straightforward answer, and sometimes with a joke.

But here’s the thing: Vlahos’s dad is dead. He passed away in February 2017, due to stage-4 lung cancer. The person Vlahos can chat with today on his phone isn’t his father exactly. It’s an AI chatbot that father and son created after the family learned about John’s terminal diagnosis.

“We knew we were going to lose and were scrambling to find ways to remember him,” Vlahos told The Daily Beast. “Meanwhile, I was working on a book about conversational AI, so I was learning about all of these ways that we can teach computers to talk in human-like ways.”

Vlahos came to the idea rather suddenly. Instead of simply recording John’s memories and stories on audio or video, he could have a more interactive way to revisit his father’s memories and personality through the same AI technology he was already exploring. “That was what gave me this idea that I could make this memory-sharing chatbot that I came to call Dadbot,” Vlahos said.

 

He went on to pen a story about Dadbot for Wired in 2017. Then word started to spread. Emails and calls came in from people from all over the world who were dying or who had dying loved ones that wanted to create similar chatbots of their own. Would you make a Mombot for me? Would you make a Dadbot for me? This became the inspiration for HereAfter AI, a web app created by Vlahos that lets you “preserve meaningful memories about your life and interactively share them with the people you love,” according to its website.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/chatbots-by-james-vlahos-and-hereafter-ai-are-letting-you-talk-to-the-dead

Interesting, eh?

I do not need this ‘service’ for I was close with my father and knew full well what his thoughts were….he was a screaming bigot, he was also commenting on the female anatomy….and those were the main themes of his thoughts.

Check it oit and tell me your thoughts.

Happy Halloween

“lego ergo scribo”