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It’s Official: Child Molesters in Alabama Will Now Be Chemically Castrated

The law requires anyone “convicted of a sex offense involving a person under the age of 13” to undergo chemical castration.

Elias Marat

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Under New Alabama Law, Convicted Child Molesters Will Face Chemical Castration

(TMU) — Republican Alabama Governor Kay Ivey signed a bill into law Monday that will require some sex offenders to undergo chemical castration one month prior to being released from custody, and will also ensure that offenders have to foot the bill for the treatment.

Under the law, offenders “convicted of a sex offense involving a person under the age of 13” will have to be chemically castrated a month ahead of release and would also be required to continue treatment “until the court determines the treatment is no longer necessary.” Offenders would also have to pay for the procedure, but a denial of their parole could not be based “solely” on an inability to pay.

Chemical castration is defined in the law as “the receiving of medication, including, but not limited to, medroxyprogesterone acetate treatment or its chemical equivalent, that, among other things, reduces, inhibits, or blocks the production of testosterone, hormones, or other chemicals in a person’s body,according to AL.com.

If a given offender chooses to halt the treatment, the move would be treated as a violation of parole, forcing the offender to resume their incarceration.

“This bill is a step toward protecting children in Alabama,” Ivey said. The bill was passed by both houses of the Alabama Legislature last month.

The use of chemical and surgical castration in controversial across the globe and has come under fire locally from the Alabama Civil Liberties Union, who have argued that the bill raises constitutional concerns and is akin to cruel and unusual punishment—a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s 8th Amendment—while also violating people’s right to privacy.

Randall Marshall, the executive director of ACLU of Alabama, also noted that the law misses the mark in preventing child molestation. In a statement to CNN Tuesday, Marshall said:

“It certainly presents serious issues about involuntary medical treatment, informed consent, the right to privacy, and cruel and unusual punishment. And, it is a return, if you will, to the dark age.

This kind of punishment for crimes is something that has been around throughout history, but as we’ve gotten more enlightened in criminal justice we’ve gotten away from this kind of retribution.

Republican Rep. Steve Hurst, who put forward the bill, has emphatically defended the measure from accusations that it may be draconian or inhumane.

Last week, Hurst told local outlet WIAT:

“I had people call me in the past when I introduced it and said, ‘Don’t you think this is inhumane?’

I asked them, ‘What’s more inhumane than when you take a little infant child and you sexually molest that infant child when the child cannot defend themselves or get away, and they have to go through all the things they have to go through?’ If you want to talk about inhumane, that’s inhumane.

They have marked this child for life and the punishment should fit the crime.”

Several states have versions of chemical castration laws on the books. In 1996, California became the first state to pass a chemical castration law. Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Montana, Oregon, and Washington also require certain sex offenders to be chemically castrated, while Texas permits repeat sex offenders to voluntarily undergo surgical castration if they so choose.

Caitlin Donovan, a spokesperson for the National Patient Advocate Foundation, has also criticized the law, noting that it may lead to a slippery slope, ultimately having a much farther reach than currently envisioned. In a statement to CNN, Donovan said:

“Medical decisions should remain between a patient and their provider.

I worry about any precedent that allows the state to use health care as a form of punishment.”

By Elias Marat | Creative Commons | TheMindUnleashed.com

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Scientists: The Human Brain And the Entire Universe Have Odd Similarities

Justin MacLachlan

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An astrophysicist at the University of Bologna and a neurosurgeon at the University of Verona have claimed that the brain resembles the universe. The two Italian researchers came up with the galaxy-brain theory that is out of this world: The structures of the perceptible universe, they say, are astonishingly comparable to the neuronal networks of the human brain.

University of Bologna astrophysicist Franco Vazza and University of Verona neurosurgeon Alberto Feletti document the extraordinary similarities between the cosmic network of galaxies and the complex web of neurons in the human brain. The detailed study was published in the journal Frontiers in Physics showcasing the human brain has roughly 27 orders of magnitude separated in scale, while similarly, the composition of the cosmic web shows comparable levels of complexity and self-organization, according to the researchers.

The brain itself contains an estimated 69 billion neurons, while the visible universe is comprised of at least 100 billion galaxies, strung together like a mesh network. Even more intriguing both galaxies and neurons only account for about 30 percent of the total masses of the universe and brain. Further, both galaxies and neurons arrange themselves like pearls on a long string.

Beginning from the shared features of the two systems, the two researchers examined a simulation of the network of galaxies in comparison to sections of the cerebral cortex and the cerebellum. Their purpose was to inspect how matter variations propagate.

In the case of galaxies, the remaining 70 percent of mass is dark energy. The equivalent in the human brain, the pair said was water.

“We calculated the spectral density of both systems,” Vazza said in a statement about the experiment. “This is a technique often employed in cosmology for studying the spatial distribution of galaxies. Our analysis showed that the distribution of the fluctuation within the cerebellum neuronal network on a scale from 1 micrometer to 0.1 millimeters follows the same progression of the distribution of matter in the cosmic web,” he added, “but, of course, on a larger scale that goes from 5 million to 500 million light-years.”

The amount of interwoven connections originating from each node also were strangely alike sparking further interest to the researchers.

“Once again, structural parameters have identified unexpected agreement levels,” Feletti said in the statement. “Probably, the connectivity within the two networks evolves following similar physical principles, despite the striking and obvious difference between the physical powers regulating galaxies and neurons.”

The team is anticipating that their preliminary research could lead to new analysis procedures advancing knowledge about both cosmology and neurosurgery. Which would enable scientists to better comprehend how these compositions have developed over time.

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Biden Has Filled His Foreign Policy Team With Weapons Contractors

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The overseas wars that the US military has been involved with for nearly two decades have been unpopular with the American public for a very long time. Both Obama and Trump campaigned on promises of ending the wars, or at the very least significantly scaling them back. However, while both administrations oversaw small and ceremonial troop withdrawals, the US military’s involvement overseas did not slow down and didn’t seem to miss a beat from the Bush era.

Joe Biden has made some very similar promises while on the campaign trail in 2019. In one speech, Biden said, “It’s past time to end the Forever Wars, which have cost us untold blood and treasure.”

However, he was vice president in the Obama administration, which oversaw wars in Yemen, Libya, Afghanistan, and numerous other countries, and he has also indicated that he has no intention of fully pulling out of Afghanistan.

On November 10th, Biden announced the members of his agency review teams, which he says “are responsible for understanding the operations of each agency, ensuring a smooth transfer of power, and preparing for President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Harris and their cabinet to hit the ground running on Day One.”

A large portion of the officials who were selected for the Department of Defense agency review team, 8 out of 23, have direct ties to the military industrial complex or a part of it themselves. This number could be higher, as the backgrounds of all of the candidates are still being thoroughly researched.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is listed as the “most recent employment” for three selections on Biden’s Department of Defense agency review team: Kathleen Hicks, who is a former defense official under President Barack Obama, as well as Melissa Dalton, and Andrew Hunter.

CSIS is an influential foreign policy think tank that promotes war while receiving funding from companies like General Dynamics Corporation, Raytheon Technologies, Northrop Grumman Corporation, and Lockheed Martin. They also work on behalf of the oil companies.

Furthermore, two other officials, Ely Ratner and Susanna Blume also named for positions on the team, most recently worked with the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) a think tank that takes money from Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and the US State Department.

Three others selected for the team are Stacie Pettyjohn, Terri Tanielian, and Christine Wormuth who previously worked with the RAND Corporation, which receives funding from the US Army and the Department of Homeland Security and often promote foreign intervention and hostility towards non-allied countries.

Ben Freeman of the Foreign Influence Transparency Initiative, which recently authored a report on think tank funding, said that “It’s telling the think tanks represented here — RAND, CSIS, and CNAS — are among the top recipients of Department of Defense and Department of Defense contractor funding. CNAS and CSIS are literally number one and number two in terms of donations received from US defense contractors in the last six years. RAND is, by far, the top recipient of Department of Defense funding of any think tank.”

Sharon Burke, also on Biden’s team, works for New America, which receives funding from Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, and US Army War College. Another pick for the team, Shawn Skelly, recently worked with CACI International, a company that provides information technology for US military weapons systems. Team member Victor Garcia has a background in cybersecurity for the US government, previously working with a software company called Rebellion Defense that says it helps “our defense and national security agencies unlock the power of data across all domains.”

The software company was reportedly founded by former defense officials and works to analyze video gathered from drones.

Other members of the team are also heavily involved in Wall Street and the oil industry.

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Italian Police Use Lamborghini for Urgent 300-Mile Kidney Delivery in Just Two Hours

Elias Marat

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While Lamborghinis are typically thought of as luxury sports cars that are only affordable to the wealthy, in their home country of Italy they have long been a part of the Italian police fleet.

And while these dreamy cars may seem a bit excessive, the car was perfectly suited for a specialized task that your typical “black and white” is hardly cut out for: delivering a donor kidney overs 300 miles away in only two hours.

Earlier this month, the Italian national police posted a video on Twitter showing a police-issued Lamborghini Huracán LP 610-4 being deployed on a life-or-death mission to transport the vital organ from the Policlinico Universitario hospital in the Northern Italian city Padua to the Gemelli hospital in Rome.

During the journey, the Lambo soared over a distance of 500 kilometers – or about 310 miles – in just about two hours. At an average speed of 143 miles, the specialty cop car managed to trim a typically six-hour ride down to one-third of its usual time.

Thanks to the Huracán having a mighty 610 metric horsepower and 4 wheel drive – hence its designation, LP 610-4 – the officers had no trouble meeting the moment with urgency and resolve.

And given that satellite images of the starting point in the journey don’t indicate any helipad or accessible flat area close by, the Lambo seemed like a perfectly logical option.

In the video, the baby blue Lamborghini can be seen being loaded with the fragile donated organ.

The Lamborghini Huracán de la Polizia is a highly specialized vehicle that is prepared for these types of emergency medical transport tasks, and is equipped with a small refrigerated front trunk for this purpose. It also has a defibrillator in case someone requires a life-saving electric shock while suffering cardiac arrest.

Additionally, officers who pilot the vehicle are given specific training on the race track so they can master the vehicle, which – as can be seen in this case – isn’t always used to pursue criminals.

The Huracán is capable of accelerating from 0 to 60 mph in less than three seconds and can reach maximum speeds of about 202 mph, according to Jalopnik.

The car, which also carries out routine patrol tasks, is also fitted out with the typical gear you’ll find in a police car, including lights, a siren, a police computer, and dash cameras.

In the tweet, the Italian Police humbly claim: “‘To save a life you don’t need superpowers,’ – solidarity, technology and efficiency also help.”

However, it remains arguable whether one could claim that a Lamborghini Huracán isn’t a superpower in its own right.

It’s not the only Lamborghini in the national police fleet, either. According to The Drive, the Huracán LP 610-4 was added to the force in 2017 as a replacement for a Lamborghini Gallardo that was decommissioned.

The car, which was the second Huracán used by Italian police, was even delivered to the police personally by Lamborghini’s CEO Stefano Domenicali.

“The new Lamborghini Huracán stands for Italian super sports car excellence and we are proud to provide it to the Italian State Police,” outgoing CEO Stephan Winklemann announced prior to the delivery.

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