More Americans say they have no religion

Feeling there way through faith's darkness, a country in Decline.

A wide-ranging study on American religious life found that the Roman Catholic population has been shifting out o of the Northeast to the Southwest, the percentage of Christians in the nation has declined and more people say they have no religion at all.

Fifteen percent of respondents said they had no religion, an increase from 14.2 percent in 2001 and 8.2 percent in 1990, according to the American Religious Identification Survey. (Continued)

Commentary:

There are times, with what happens to a country; has nothing to do with a particular religion, but what is occurring within the countries society structure.

While this particular poll apparently was bias, what is not taken into account is the climbing morality decline in the US and the further collapsing infrastructure of this particular country.

As to some of the major problems in this moral decline are promiscuity, Alcoholism, illicit drug use and various high crime‘s, with complacency; which all accept the latter of crime, has brought about certain disease’s that while some are highly contagious and have no foreseeable medical cure for these disease’s (which does include embryonic stem cell research); except through prevention by moral decency. Which some of these disease’s are not just in the carrier’s themselves, but some can be transmitted to the unborn during pregnancy, to children and in many cases; to others by contact with an infected carrier.

As this pragmatic situation goes beyond mere ideological thought as one may be in question, but to have been ascertained previously; by the scientific and medical community.

Nevertheless, the US continued issue of cloning especially with the precept of future human cloning, baby abortion and child abuse for example‘s; these situation’s or problems would not be an issue within a moral society for they wouldn't occur.

As to the US alleged scientific issue on Global ‘Warming or former US Vice President Al Gore got an expensive light bulb idea, which is nothing but what is called a 'Band-Aid solution'; where the Band-Aid has blown out the car window at 70 MPH, to finally be caught and pasted to an advertisement billboard on the side of the highway.

Which the original solution for this problem, stems from ancient writing’s, not as suggested by US President Barack Obama’s atheist view point; which by the original solution has always been previously, the most sound one of stabilizing the earth.

Iron Eyes Cody AKA the "Crying Indian" was in a “Keep America Beautiful public service announcement” in the early 1970’s, concerning the severe problem of US litter and pollution; which is still occuring today. While at the time this service announcement was being advertised on television and billboard’s, the scope of Global warming and numerous other Environmental problem’s was already being put in the forefront for people not just to be conscientiously aware; but that their was already a major problem.

Finally, the US is not just having an economic collapse, they are having a full collapse in ever facet of the structure of the country itself or what is called 'full implosion' and as far as any type of integrity, it has galloped off as a cowboy; into the perplexed sunset.

Texas boy, 3, dies in mom's overheated truck

Woman said she forgot to drop son at day care before working hospital shift

15 August 2008

HOUSTON - A 3-year-old boy was left in his mother's truck in 90-degree heat as she worked her shift at a hospital, then wriggled free from his car seat and even tried to start the ignition or open the windows before he died, officials said.

The mother of Cameron Thomas Boone told investigators she forgot to drop him off at day care. She returned to the truck about nine hours later to find him unconscious Thursday.

The woman broke the back windshield and called for help, but the boy was dead when she took him to North Cypress Medical Center, where she worked, Sheriff's Lt. John Denholm said. A key the child had put in the ignition automatically locked the doors, so the woman had to use a rock to break in, officials said.

Security guards were patrolling the lot, but the truck had tinted windows and it was difficult to see inside, Denholm said.

The sheriff's office would not identify the mother or disclose her position at the hospital. Calls to the hospital were not returned Friday.

No charges have been filed.

Commentary
Some people either do not think of the consequences of there actions or just pure neglect, which in the above case is more in line of child abuse.

There is also some people that in our modern times, that do not also think of the repercussions of there actions, either so they get the do not care attitude. This is why in certain parts of the world, they have very strict laws towards certain crimes, kind of like; one doesn’t wish to do this crime; if one will get hanged for it.

Then something I happened upon earlier, reading a different news story, that there is some cases where it is easier for a person to yell for help, when instead they need too think and help themselves to better there situation; especially those who blame others for there plight; while they sit on there hands, do nothing and complain.

The greatest achievements in life, came about by people taking the intuitive to just go and do it or make something better; too making a change for the better.

US: 500 youths detained in Iraq; 10 in Afghanistan

19 May 2008

By PETER JAMES SPIELMANN

The U.S. military is holding about 500 juveniles suspected of being "unlawful enemy combatants" in detention centers in Iraq and has about 10 detained in Afghanistan, the United States has told the United Nations.

A total of 2,500 youths under the age of 18 have been detained, almost all in Iraq, for periods up to a year or more in President Bush's anti-terrorism campaign since 2002, the United States reported last week to the U.N.'s Committee on the Rights of the Child.

Civil liberties groups such as the International Justice Network and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) denounced the detentions as abhorrent, and a violation of U.S. treaty obligations.

In the periodic report to the United Nations on U.S. compliance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the United States confirmed that "as of April 2008, the United States held about 500 juveniles in Iraq."

"The juveniles that the United States has detained have been captured engaging in anti-coalition activity, such as planting Improvised Explosive Devices, operating as lookouts for insurgents, or actively engaged in fighting against U.S. and Coalition forces," the U.S. report said.

The majority are believed to be 16 or 17 years old. In the United States a 17-year-old can enlist in the U.S. army, with parental consent.

The report said that of the total of 2,500 juveniles jailed since 2002, all but 100 had been picked up in Iraq. Of the remainder, most were swept up in Afghanistan.

A total of eight juveniles have been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, but all were released from 2004 to 2006.

"It remains uncertain the exact age of these individuals, as most of them did not know their date of birth or even the year they were born," the report says. But U.S. military doctors who evaluated them believed that three were under age 16.

In Afghanistan, "as of April 2008, there are approximately 10 juveniles being held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility as unlawful enemy combatants," the report said.

In Bagram, a U.S. military spokesman, Marine 1st Lt. Richard K. Ulsh, told the AP on Sunday: "At any time there are up to 625 detainees being held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility. There are no detainees being held under the age of 16 and, without getting into specifics due to the frequent fluctuation in the number of detainees being held, we can tell you that there are currently less than 10 detainees being held under the age of 18."

Civil liberties groups were outraged.

"It's shocking to me that the U.S. government has not figured out a way to keep children out of adult prisons. It's outrageous, and it is not making us any safer, I can say that about Afghanistan from personal experience," Tina M. Foster, the executive director of the International Justice Network, said Sunday.

Her group brought lawsuits on behalf of the Guantanamo detainees in 2006, and has taken on the cases of adult detainees in Bagram. She said the U.S. military does not release the names of juveniles it is holding in Bagram, so her group is trying to learn who they are by finding Afghan relatives.

"It is shocking to know that the U.S. is holding hundreds of juveniles in Iraq and Afghanistan, and even more disturbing that there is no comprehensive policy in place that will protect their rights as children," Jamil Dakwar, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Human Rights Program, said in a statement. "Juveniles and former child soldiers should be treated first and foremost as candidates for rehabilitation and reintegration into society, not subjected to further victimization."

According to the ACLU, the lack of protections and consideration for the juvenile status of detainees violates the obligations of the U.S. under the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict that the U.S. ratified in 2002, as well as universally accepted international norms.

The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child is scheduled to question the U.S. delegation on its compliance with its obligations on May 22 in Geneva.

The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child was adopted by the General Assembly in 1989, with backing at the time from the U.S. government of President Bill Clinton, and with strong lobbying from then-first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, who now is competing for the Democratic Party presidential nomination with Barack Obama.
___

On the Web:

International Justice Network

American Civil Liberties Union

UN Committee on the Rights of the Child questions and U.S. responses

52 girls removed from Texas compound

Passengers sit inside a bus removing children from a polygamist retreat Friday, April 4, 2008, in El Dorado, Texas. Child welfare officials and state troopers removed a busload of children from the secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs following a complaint to state authorities.(AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)

5 April 2008

By MICHELLE ROBERTS

ELDORADO, Texas -Child welfare officials are scrambling to find foster homes for dozens of girls removed from a secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs after a 16-year-old living there complained of physical abuse.

Officials from Texas Child Protective Services, escorted by state troopers, took 52 girls, ages 6 months to 17 years, from the remote retreat on Friday afternoon.

By the end of the day, 18 were put legally into state custody, and CPS spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner said interviews would continue Saturday. A warrant has been issued for at least one individual.

The girls put in state custody were believed to be in danger, Meisner said. "Those are the ones we believe have been abused or they are in imminent risk of harm, and it would not be safe for those children to remain in the compound," she said.

Child welfare officials were looking for foster homes for the girls, most of whom have rarely been outside the insular world of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They were being housed for now at a civic center, she said.

"We're dealing with children that aren't accustomed to the outside world, so we're trying to be very sensitive to their needs," Meisner said.

The investigation began with a call Monday alleging physical abuse of a 16-year-old girl living there, Meisner said. Authorities first arrived at the compound Thursday evening. They interviewed and searched through the night.

On Friday, a search warrant and arrest warrant were issued.

The search warrant sought records dealing with the birth of children to a 16-year-old and any records listing a marriage between a 50-year-old man and the girl, according to the San Angelo Standard-Times, which cited court records released late Friday in Tom Green County.

The individual listed in the arrest warrant had not been located by Friday evening, said Department of Public Safety spokeswoman Tela Mange. She said she could not reveal whose name was on the warrant.

The ranch covers roughly 1,700 acres. It is north of this two-stoplight town, down a narrow paved road. Authorities blocked access to the compound's gate, keeping onlookers miles away.

State officials said they did not know how many people lived at the retreat, but local officials in 2006 put the number at about 150, as members of the reclusive church moved from a community on the Arizona-Utah line.

The congregation, known as FLDS, has been led by Jeffs since his father's death in 2002. It is one of several groups that split from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, based in Salt Lake City, decades after it renounced polygamy in 1890.

In November, Jeffs was sentenced to two consecutive sentences of five years to life in prison in Utah for being an accomplice to the rape of a 14-year-old girl who wed her cousin in an arranged marriage in 2001.

In Arizona, Jeffs is charged as an accomplice with four counts each of incest and sexual conduct with a minor stemming from two arranged marriages between teenage girls and their older male relatives. He is jailed in Kingman, Ariz., awaiting trial.

The Eldorado retreat, about 160 miles northwest of San Antonio, is on a former exotic game ranch. The church bought the property in 2004 for $700,000 and began an ambitious construction program anchored by an 80-foot-tall, gleaming white temple.

Video

Jessop talks about investigation at Jeffs' compound (4 April 2008)

US immigrant couple detained in 'worst child abuse case ever seen'

14 March 2008

By REBECCA ANNA STOIL

Two preschool-aged brothers were lying in hospital beds on Thursday, one fighting for his life, as their parents pled innocence in what Jerusalem police called the worst child abuse case they have ever seen.

The suspected child abusers are escorted by police. Photo: AP

The estranged parents, recent haredi immigrants from the United States, have six other children.

The older of the two victims, aged four and a half, was hospitalized in good condition at Hadassah-University Medical Center, Ein Kerem, late on Tuesday after a family friend noticed he was behaving strangely and contacted social services. His mother joined him in the hospital.

Then, early Wednesday morning, Magen David Adom received a call from the family's home in the exclusive Wolfson apartment complex in the capital's Rehavia neighborhood, reporting that a three-and-a-half-year-old boy had been found unconscious and not breathing. An MDA team resuscitated the boy after a long struggle, and he was hospitalized, unconscious and in critical condition.

Only then was the connection made between the two cases. Police representatives described the abuse as "prolonged and severe," speaking in court on Thursday.

Both children had burns all over their bodies. The younger boy, who is still unconsciousness, also had marks indicating that his arms and legs had been bound and that he had been beaten with a blunt object and whipped on the back.

Police detained the mother, 38, and spent hours locating the boys' father, also a suspect in the abuse.

The father said that he and his wife had been separated for some time, and that as he had been living in a second Jerusalem property owned by the couple, he had no idea of the horrors that police believed occurred in his wife's residence.

The children were allegedly cared for by two Israeli men in their 20s; they are also suspects in the abuse.

Asst.-Cmdr. Bruno Stein, who is leading the police probe, said officers were trying to locate two more suspects.

The mother was questioned for almost 13 hours on Wednesday, but never asked about her two hospitalized sons, Stein said. Instead, he said, she read from a Book of Psalms. The mother did say, however, that the father had been responsible for bringing the two "caretakers" into the house.

At one point, she confessed to the allegations against her, but she later retracted her statement.

During the parents' remand hearing on Thursday afternoon, the mother's attorney said the confession had been made under pressure. The father also denied any connection to the boys' injuries.

But after being presented with a series of photographs of the injuries, Judge Hayim Li-Ran extended the parents' remands by six days and determined that until the children were questioned, only social services representatives would be allowed to visit them in the hospital.

The couple's other six children have been put in the care of the city's Social Services Department.