World News Thread & Breaking News!!

[bd popeye]

Occupy protesters attempt to shut down Wall Street

Hundreds of protesters gathered in lower Manhattan on Monday to mark the first anniversary of Occupy Wall Street, the amorphous, anti-corporate greed movement that began in New York and spread to dozens of cities last year.

Activists vowed to "shut down" Wall Street, with plans to create a human wall and block the entrance to the New York Stock Exchange. Hundreds of New York police officers were assembled early Monday in anticipation of the protests.

Dozens of officers, some on horseback, blocked off the entrance to Wall Street to prevent protesters from carrying out their stated mission.

There were dozens of arrests. At 10 a.m., a bus full of protesters was carted off by the NYPD, all of them arrested earlier Monday morning. A double-decker bus of sightseers followed closely behind.

Several of the arrested protesters were in wheelchairs. (One smiled as she was loaded into a police van.) At the intersection of Broad and Water streets in the financial district, activists demonstrated in front of a police truck, raising clenched fists in its direction.

[Slideshow: Occupy Wall Street: One year later]

Matt Tucker, a protester from Cincinnati, told Yahoo News that the Occupy movement has found buildings where protesters can sleep, since Zuccotti Park—once ground zero of the Occupy movement—is no longer an option. Others slept in front of Trinity Church and Chase Bank over the weekend as part of their protest.

As is often the case with city-based demonstrations, the number of protesters who showed up Monday to mark the Occupy anniversary varied depending on who was counting. Most media outlets estimated several hundred; one protester's estimate—retweeted by Occupy Wall Street's Twitter account—was 50,000. (The tweet was immediately—and rightly—ridiculed.)

According to the New York Times' City Room blog, about 200 protesters were gathered in Zuccotti at 7 a.m. A half hour later, approximately 400 protesters arrived at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on Water Street:

The police were also visible in large numbers throughout the area. Just after 7 a.m. four officers on scooters followed four bicyclists dressed as polar bears—to symbolize rising water tables resulting from global warming, they said—on their way to an assembly spot outside the Lower Manhattan ferry terminal.

Police who barricaded Wall Street checked IDs of employees to let them through.

Some protesters used markers to write a telephone number for legal help on their arms should anyone arrested need it. A small band of demonstrators outside the church performed in a drum line. One held a sign that read: "Sorry, Wall Street is Closed Today for Deconstruction."

Some Occupy protesters played drums and marched around behind barricades, even as they were blocked from entering Wall Street. Another splinter group of protesters performed a mic check in the lobby of the J.P. Morgan Chase building.

The anniversary demonstrations began on Sunday with a concert in Foley Square featuring Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello.

[Editor's note: This story will be updated throughout the day. Refresh this page for the latest.]

[Equation]

Occupy protesters attempt to shut down Wall Street

Haven't these people found a real job yet?

[bladerunner]

some of them are probably professional demonstrators

[Franklin]

Here is the maker the movie of Innocent of Muslims.

Anti-Muslim Filmmaker Nakoula Basseley Nakoula -- First PHOTO | TMZ.com

[solarz]

More fuel to the fire:

Cartoons in French weekly fuel Mohammad furor - Yahoo! News Canada

This should be... interesting.

[plawolf]

'Interesting' is perhaps not the word I would use to describe the likely consequences of the latest pointless petty provocation.

The Muslims hate it when anyone draw cartoons of Mohammad. Why can't westerners just recognize that fact and stop provoking them?

Who honestly gets up in the morning and says, 'gee! I need to draw a cartoon of Mohammad or my life just won't have meaning!'? If someone honestly feels that way, maybe they should consider converting to Islam instead of mocking it.

[no_name]

It's a bit like your neighbour decides to walk by your house every morning naked to collect milk even if he knows you don't like it because it is his right what he choose to wear or not.

[airsuperiority]

It's a bit like your neighbour decides to walk by your house every morning naked to collect milk even if he knows you don't like it because it is his right what he choose to wear or not.

LOL love your analogy. And make it a fat, wrinkly male with plenty of rashes(cause of not showering) who bends down by first stretching his legs wide apart...oh crap did I just let out a little bit too much of my own secrets? xD

[solarz]

'Interesting' is perhaps not the word I would use to describe the likely consequences of the latest pointless petty provocation.

The Muslims hate it when anyone draw cartoons of Mohammad. Why can't westerners just recognize that fact and stop provoking them?

Who honestly gets up in the morning and says, 'gee! I need to draw a cartoon of Mohammad or my life just won't have meaning!'? If someone honestly feels that way, maybe they should consider converting to Islam instead of mocking it.

Sucks to be the Muslims then, because I don't think the "provocations" are going to stop.

[bd popeye]

I would not know how to operate one of these contraptions if I had one...I don't see the need for myself or my wife.

iPhone 5 launch draws Apple fans worldwide - Yahoo! News

HONG KONG (AP) — In a now familiar global ritual, Apple fans jammed shops from Sydney to Paris to pick up the tech juggernaut's latest iPhone.

Eager buyers formed long lines Friday at Apple Inc. stores in Asia, Europe and North America to be the first to get their hands on the latest version of the smartphone.

In London, some shoppers had camped out for a week in a queue that snaked around the block. In Hong Kong, the first customers were greeted by staff cheering, clapping, chanting "iPhone 5! iPhone 5!" and high-fiving them as they were escorted one-by-one through the front door.

The smartphone will be on sale in the U.S. and Canada hours after its launch in Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Britain, France and Germany. It will launch in 22 more countries a week later. The iPhone 5 is thinner, lighter, has a taller screen, faster processor, updated software and can work on faster "fourth generation" mobile networks.

The handset has become a hot seller despite initial lukewarm reviews and new map software that is glitch prone. Apple received 2 million orders in the first 24 hours of announcing its release date, more than twice the number for the iPhone 4S in the same period when that phone launched a year ago.

In a sign of the intense demand, police in Osaka, Japan, were investigating the theft of nearly 200 iPhones 5s, including 116 from one shop alone, Kyodo News reported.

Analysts have estimated Apple will ship as many as 10 million of the new iPhones by the end of September.

Some fans went to extremes to be among the first buyers by arriving at Apple's flagship stores day ahead of the release.

In downtown Sydney, Todd Foot, 24, showed up three days early to nab the coveted first spot. He spent about 18 hours a day in a folding chair, catching a few hours' sleep each night in a tent on the sidewalk.

Foot's dedication was largely a marketing stunt, however. He writes product reviews for a technology website that will give away the phone after Foot reviews it.

"I just want to get the phone so I can feel it, compare it and put it on our website," he said while slumped in his chair.

In Paris, the phone launch was accompanied by a workers' protest — a couple dozen former and current Apple employees demonstrated peacefully to demand better work benefits. Some decried what they called Apple's transformation from an offbeat company into a multinational powerhouse.

But the protesters — urged by a small labor union to demonstrate at Apple stores around France — were far outnumbered by lines of would-be buyers on the sidewalk outside the store near the city's gilded opera house.

Not everyone lining up at the various Apple stores was an enthusiast, though. In Hong Kong, university student Kevin Wong, waiting to buy a black 16 gigabyte model for 5,588 Hong Kong dollars ($720), said he was getting one "for the cash." He planned to immediately resell it to one of the numerous grey market retailers catering to mainland Chinese buyers. China is one of Apple's fastest growing markets but a release date for the iPhone 5 there has not yet been set.

Wong was required to give his local identity card number when he signed up for his iPhone on Apple's website. The requirement prevents purchases by tourists including mainland Chinese, who have a reputation for scooping up high-end goods on trips to Hong Kong because there's no sales tax and because of the strength of China's currency. Even so, the mainlanders will probably buy it from the resellers "at a higher price — a way higher price," said Wong, who hoped to make a profit of HK$1,000 ($129).

Tokyo's glitzy downtown Ginza district not only had a long line in front of the Apple store, but another across the main intersection at Softbank, the first carrier in Japan to offer iPhones.

Hidetoshi Nakamura, a 25-year-old auto engineer, said he's an Apple fan because it's an innovator.

"I love Apple," he said, standing near the end of a two-block-long line, reading a book and listening to music on his iPod.

"It's only the iPhone for me."

[Equation]

Iphone and other smart phones are just highly another over priced small computer that you could use as a phone. Meaning human can survive without it.

[bladerunner]

Iphone and other smart phones are just highly another over priced small computer that you could use as a phone. Meaning human can survive without it.

I like the smart phones interface over the regular phone. Plus i use google maps on a regular basis while walking and driving.
I know some people change their phone every year, which strikes me as a bit over the top.
right now my smart phone its telling me its 1.41pm where i am and 8.41pm in Austin usa. Gee its not too late to ring up and annoy the hell out of somebody , if i had their number.

[bd popeye]

^^^ I don't even send text messages..

Facebook party turns to rioting in Netherlands - Yahoo! News

AMSTERDAM (AP) — Thousands of revelers descended on a small Dutch town sparking a riot after a party invitation posted on Facebook went viral, authorities said Saturday.

Prosecutor Hessel Schuth said 34 people were arrested were arrested Friday night and in the early hours of Saturday morning and would be prosecuted for public order offenses. Several people were injured, but none were believed to be seriously hurt.

"Scum ran amok in our town," said Rob Bats, mayor of Haren, 185 kilometers (115 miles) north of Amsterdam.

"An innocent invitation on Facebook for a party led to serious rioting, destruction, plundering, arson and injuries in the middle of Haren," he said.

Bats said an initial analysis showed a core group of rioters "were very violent and well-prepared and deliberately sought confrontation" with hundreds of police who had been dispatched to the town amid fears of trouble.

Dutch media reported that the party originally was planned as a small celebration by a 16-year-old girl but her invitation went viral when she posted it on Facebook.

Some of the people arriving in Haren on Friday wore T-shirts emblazoned with "Project X Haren," a reference to the film "Project X" that portrayed an out-of-control party.

On Saturday, another Facebook group sprang up called Project Clean-X Haren, urging people to help clear up the debris littering the town's streets.

[Mr T]

Not all that long ago in the west's civilized society, people were being murdered in the streets in front of their families over something as trivial as a football game

I can't recall exactly the last time someone was murdered in front of their family because of a football game in the UK, but if that did happen in recent memory there would have been a general consensus that the person or persons that perpetrated the crime should be locked up for life. No one, apart from a few like-minded thugs, would have defended them or said they had acted reasonably.

No one has a right to judge others for being upset or offended by something

That's not the issue. The point is how people react to something. Peaceful protest is great. Murder isn't.

the only real difference between those people rioting in the streets and storming American and other Western missions across the muslim world is that for Americans and Europeans, if their population feel strongly enough about something, their governments can and will send in the military to do the deed, whereas those in the Muslim world are usually citizens to weak and/or corrupt governments who either cannot, or will not act in accordance to the demands on their peoples, so their peoples take matters into their own hands.

When was the last time the British government murdered people or caused criminal damage because the public felt something they cared about had been insulted? The Royal Family are incredibly well respected here, yet the Guardian loves to insult them and even call for them to be kicked out. I can't ever recall the government trying to shut them down or people setting their offices on fire.

If you don't want to be stung, don't go poking hornet nests, and as far as I am concerned, all the death and destruction caused in the aftermath of this film is as much the fault of the despicable cowards who made the film as those who went onto the streets

So you think that Ambassador Stevens and the others that were killed with him were the puppet-masters behind the film? Or because someone living in America made it, Americans were viable targets?

I think this blind obsession with 'freedom of expression' is one of the most nonsensical and damaging principles the west has

Why? You rely on it to speak your mind on the internet. If there was no freedom of expression, your views would be some of the first to be "harmonised" as you're making a criticism of a government/political system right here on this thread.

Or do you only like freedom of expression when you want to say something?

Why is it people only care about the rights of those who seek to cause offense?

That's nonsense. There has been a wide debate about whether or not the video should be taken down. There are many non-Muslims that thought it should have been removed. Even those who don't think it should be taken down do so pretty much because they recognise that to have freedom of expression sometimes you have to allow people to express views that you don't agree with. It's the same right that allows some Muslims to say in public that Sharia law will/should dominate the world.

+++

merely denying that the Holocaust took place is a criminal offence in the western world

Wrong, it's a criminal offence in certain countries. It is not, for example, a crime in the UK or US.

so one does not need much imagination to deduce what would almost certainly happen to anyone who made a film mocking the victims of the Holocaust and praising Hitler - there would be massed outrage, probably protests and demonstrations, widespread and unequivocal condemnation by the western world

And the vast majority of the objections would be peaceful, and I doubt very much if people would be killed because of it.

all of the entire world's law enforcement agencies would spare no effort to find whoever made such a film and bring him to justice and no country would dream of offering him sanctuary on the grounds of free speech

Utter hyperbole. They have far more important things to deal with.

[delft]

^^^ I don't even send text messages..

Facebook party turns to rioting in Netherlands - Yahoo! News

In the end there were six people hurt of which two seriously ( but I don't yet know how serious is their condition ) but during the night it was said that two people had been killed. It was of course quite irresponsible for radio presenters to call for people to go to the "party". I suppose they'll get away with freedom of speech. 600 extra police had been sent and they couldn't prevent serious damage to property. I would think sending twice that number would have cost less.
One point must be the reduced respect for the authorities. That has been developing for a long time but recently all Western government have shown great uncertainty about what they are doing. The banks have done stupid things and need to be helped because their function is needed in the normal conduct of the economy. Therefore the interest rate for money lent to the banks by the central bank has been reduced to ridiculously low levels, below the inflation rate so the effective interest rate is negative. So the banks make huge profits lending to governments and not doing their duty by the economy, and paying their directors huge salaries and bonuses. But pensions of ordinary people are cut because of the low interest rate. In the US many people feel they cannot retire so young people cannot take over their jobs. And government spend way over their income, in the US nearly half as much. The proper capitalist way would have been to declare banks broke, so that shareholders and bondholders loose much or all of their investment in them, and nationalize them or sell them to other banks. The government can still spend way above its income but spend it on repairing part of the huge backlog in sewer, road, dam &c. maintenance. This would have reduced unemployment, increased tax intake and earned the respect of people by getting the economy moving again.
I know this is political but seeing such stupidity and knowing this is destroying society gets my ire up.

N.B. The situation in other Western countries is very similar