Eideard

Candles used in voodoo sex ceremony caused a fatal five alarm fire after they tipped over and ignited bed sheets in a Brooklyn, New York, apartment…

The fire left an elderly woman dead and injured 20 firefighters and three Brooklyn residents, according to a New York Fire Department statement.

A voodoo priest allegedly placed the candles on the floor around the bed on Saturday after a woman paid him $300 to perform a ceremony with a sexual component, that was meant to bring her good luck, fire department officials said.

The candles were accidentally knocked over during the ceremony prompting the man to douse the flames with water and open a window in an effort to clear smoke from the room, the statement said.

Forty mile-per-hour wind gusts instead shot the flames back inside the room, it said, creating a “blowtorch effect” that whipped through the open window and pushed the fire into the building’s fourth floor hallway.

“Time and time again we respond to tragedies that could have been so easily prevented,” Fire Commissioner Salvatore J. Cassano said in the statement. “This fire had so many of those elements … hopefully others will learn from this tragedy.” The occupants fled the apartment, leaving the door open, the statement said.

Nearly 200 firefighters from 44 companies took seven hours to bring the fire under control.

So, uh, could this be the one true religion?

And aren’t they all?

Desperate heroin users in a few African cities have begun engaging in a practice that is so dangerous it is almost unthinkable: they deliberately inject themselves with another addict’s blood, researchers say, in an effort to share the high or stave off the pangs of withdrawal.

The practice, called flashblood or sometimes flushblood, is not common, but has been reported in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, on the island of Zanzibar and in Mombasa, Kenya.

It puts users at the highest possible risk of contracting AIDS and hepatitis. While most AIDS transmission in Africa is by heterosexual sex, the use of heroin is growing in some cities, and experts are warning that flashblood — along with syringe-sharing and other dangerous habits — could fuel a new wave of AIDS infections.

“Injecting yourself with fresh blood is a crazy practice — it’s the most effective way of infecting yourself with H.I.V.,” said Dr. Nora D. Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which supports the researchers who discovered the practice. “Even though the number who do it is a relatively small group, they are vectors for H.I.V. because they support themselves by sex work…”

In most East African countries like Tanzania and Kenya, only 3 to 8 percent of adults are infected with the AIDS virus, far fewer than in southern Africa, where the rates reach 15 to 25 percent.

But among those who inject heroin, the rates are far higher. In Tanzania, about 42 percent of addicts are infected. The rate is even higher — 64 percent — among female addicts, Dr. McCurdy said, and since most support themselves through prostitution, they are in two high-risk groups, and their customers are at risk of catching the disease.

Most of the addicts she has interviewed who practice flashblood, Dr. McCurdy said, are women. For them, sharing blood is more of an act of kindness than an attempt to get high: a woman who has made enough money to buy a sachet of heroin will share blood to help a friend avoid withdrawal. The friend is often a fellow sex worker who has become too old or sick to find customers.

By contrast, on Zanzibar, it is mostly among men, according to a 2006 study in The African Journal of Drug and Alcohol Studies, which found that about 9 percent of the 200 drug-injectors interviewed practiced it.

They’ll all be gone sooner or later. Leaving behind everyone they’ve infected.

Marfin Bank where three died in fire
Daylife/Getty Images used by permission

At least three people have been killed in the Greek capital as protesters set fire to a bank during a general strike over planned austerity measures.

The bodies were found inside the Marfin Bank in Athens. The Greek prime minister said it was a “murderous act”.

The protest became violent, with petrol bombs thrown at police who responded with pepper spray and tear gas.

Protesters are angered by spending cuts and tax rises planned in return for a 110bn euro (£95bn) bail-out for Greece.

A police spokesman said the three victims – two women and a man – were among 20 people working in the Marfin bank branch on Stadiou Avenue in central Athens when the petrol bomb was thrown…

As the demonstration gained momentum, a group of protesters rushed up a flight of steps at the parliament building in Syntagma Square, taunting MPs to come out and calling them “thieves”…

Riot police forced them back, but right next to parliament, other groups set buildings on fire – including a department of the finance ministry in charge of the the austerity programme as well as an office of the Athens prefecture…

Correspondent say it is not clear whether shock over the deaths will have the effect of diminishing the protests – but the fear is that the campaign to defeat the government will escalate.

The is nothing new or novel about demonstrations led into the blind alley of violence. Whether agents provocateurs or anarchists took the lead the result is the same. Innocent people died. Firms providing employment were damaged or destroyed. Government offices normally providing simple day-by-day administrative functions have been rendered useless.

I have supported revolutionary war, wars of national liberation, civic struggles against injustice in many places on this globe. I never have supported terror and violence against civilians and never will. Those who murdered these people are as criminal as Al Qaeda..

About the only item I see on a more regular basis – selling into stupid fads based more on hype than substance – is “No Fat Half-and-half”.

How the frack can they call these things “Saltines” if there’s no salt on them?

Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

In the darkness of the Indian Ocean, two boatloads of Somali piratesdrew alongside La Somme. They had started their pre-boarding drill, firing Kalashnikov assault rifles, before they noticed the 40mm cannon and missiles on the deck above them.

Realising the ship was, in fact an 18,000-tonne flagship of the French naval operation against the pirates, they fled…

La Somme, a refuelling ship and command vessel, followed the group and quickly caught up with one of the boats. Five crewmen surrendered without a struggle. The second boat escaped, but other warships in the area have taken up the search.

Yesterday’s blunder was further evidence that the pirates remain poorly organised and lacking in technology, despite reports that they have been developing more sophisticated methods. “They must be on the dim side if they can’t tell a frigate from a freighter,” said a French officer…

With a crew of 170 and under the orders of an admiral, La Somme commands French air, sea and land forces in the combined US and European campaign against piracy and terrorism in the region. The vessel supplies ships and aircraft and has been the base for French commando operations to free hostages from pirates over the past two years.

Har!

One in five US teenagers admit to sexting. It may seem like harmless fun to a 15-year-old wanting to impress their new boyfriend or girlfriend. But the practice of sexting – sending nude or semi-nude images of oneself to others via mobile phones – is having unintended and, in some cases, tragic consequences.

The risk of having one’s private pictures distributed among schoolmates or uploaded on to social-networking websites is only one part of it. It could also lead to a criminal conviction as a sex offender for any teenager who forwards them on to someone else.

Sending or distributing explicit photos of a child under 18 is, in many countries, illegal. It is also illegal to send such photos to a minor – even if both parties consent to it.

A spate of cases in the United States has seen several “sexting” teenagers arrested on charges of child pornography – alarming parents, school officials, police and prosecutors. It has led people to ask whether threatening children with the same law that was drawn up to protect them – and potentially creating many more sex offenders – is the best way to tackle the phenomenon of “sexting”?

But Witold Walczak, legal director for ACLU in Pennsylvania who is fighting one such case on behalf of the pupils, said, “Child porn is about the abuse and exploitation of minors by adults. That’s not happening here,” he said.

Is it beyond comprehension to suggest we have standards for prosecutors and judges that involve common sense? These nutballs are getting ready to run for office as head of the Spanish Inquisition. Or the nearest equivalent in square America.

Laws written for the purpose of halting the exploitation of childrem haven’t a damned thing to do with sexting. Period. Stupidity maybe; but, not crime.

All the waste and incompetence of the ID card scheme becomes plain when you hear people’s stories about their contact with the new UK Borders Agency. This one comes from an acquaintance, who would prefer to remain anonymous, chiefly because he fears retribution if his name is known…

In early January, my wife and I visited a UK Border Agency office and paid £595 for their ‘premium’ service to take her biometric data and process her foreign national ID card.

Weeks later the UK Border Agency sent my wife a letter saying that she needed to send her passport, as they could not correct their mistake without her passport.

My correspondent makes the following points. The agency had already recorded the passport details and scanned it. His wife has paid for a ‘premium’ service (£595) appointment at UK Border Agency where she was fingerprinted, photographed and filled in forms so that she would not have to send her passport by post. When she phoned UKBA twice to report that “American Samoan” was a mistake, she spoke to two people, who told her to send the incorrect ID card only and did not mention sending a passport. She explained that she would need the ID card back soon in case she had to travel abroad.

This is not just your video club membership, or your supermarket loyalty card … this is your citizenship and identity, allowing you access to services and allowing you to leave and enter the country.

RTFA. The tale doesn’t improve with age or experience.

I reproduce this story at length because it captures the anger and helplessness experienced when you become ensnared in a system that is flawed, contemptuous of individual needs and entirely pointless.

Politico asked campaign operatives on both sides to nominate their favorite commercials of the cycle — and by favorite, we mean the most memorably bad.

This was a bipartisan exercise. Offered anonymity, some Democrats nominated Democratic ads and some Republicans chose GOP ads.

Ineptitude, as we discovered, knows no party.

Politico rated this advert as #3 on the stinker scale. My #1 choice as characteristic of those who favor an “Imperial” Texas.

This week, the American College of Emergency Physicians issued an alert about the dangers of … text messaging. Yes, text messaging. That thing you do with the cellphone keypad. Apparently, emergency docs around the country have reported seeing injuries involving texting pedestrians, bicyclists, rollerbladers and of course motorists.

True, two recent deaths have been blamed on moving texters. (Both were in California.) One pedestrian stepped off the curb into the path of a truck; another was hit crossing the street. These are tragic, of course. But there’s also been a report of an injury that occurred while a texter was horseback riding and another that occurred while cooking.

As Newsweek reports: “Most involve scrapes, cuts and sprains from texters who walked into lampposts or walls or tripped over curbs.” Let me repeat part of that: “who walked into lampposts.” I’d almost pay to see that.

But if you’re wondering about some bigger injury and death issues, here’s this. A sample: 30,694 firearm deaths, 32,691 poisoning deaths and 43,667 traffic deaths. There’s more: 18,124 homicides and 32,637 suicides. Those numbers are from 2005, courtesy of the National Center for Health Statistics.

I’m not trying to dismiss the importance of this issue, mind you… But well, yeah, maybe I am.

I couldn’t agree more. Though, the really stupid events do make for potential Darwin Awards.

At least 70 people have been injured during the first day of the running of the bulls in the Spanish city of Pamplona. Thirteen of them have been taken to hospital. The injuries consisted mainly of broken bones, bruises and cuts, but one man was left in critical condition after a 600-kilo bull galloped over him. Nobody was gored by a bull…the first day.

The young man who died after a fall from the 30-meter high wall that encircles the ancient centre of Pamplona has now been identified. He was a 23-year-old Irishman and he is thought to have fallen after having too much to drink. Last year, an American man and his Spanish girlfriend also died after falling from the same wall.

Idiots.