TheNewsWithoutTheCrap.com

After Carlill v The Carbolic Smoke Ball Company (in 1892), possibly the most famous court case in the world is Roe -v- Wade (1973) which has been a constant battleground in the US, the Senate and the Courts for decades. The latest Supreme Court case does not directly affect that case but might have even greater consequences because while everyone is focussing on the abortion element of National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra, the case was actually about something very different and that's how the US Supreme Court decided it.

The issue of birth control takes on many facets. Some people argue that any form of birth control is wrong, others that abortion is wrong, others that abortion should be allowed in certain circumstances and yet others that (subject only to limited constraints on the nature and timing of abortion) it should be freely available. Pharmaceutical technology has reached the point where the line between prevention of pregnancy and abortion are blurred. There are psychological, societal, medical, philosophical and, of course, religious dimensions to most of the debates where the word "rights" is bandied about by everyone with an opinion to express.

Countries in Asia, the Middle East and South America maintain a tight grip on the media with systems of favours, licensing, enforcement, harassment, imprisonment and even death of those who write or, even, research stories that may criticise incumbent authorities. Malaysia has for decades been one of the countries with a raft of laws, perniciously applied, to prevent the publication of anything that tends to show the government or incumbent politicians or party in a bad light or, worse, promote genuine discourse and democracy. Three weeks ago, democracy won anyway with a remarkable election and media freedom - with appropriate responsibility - has arrived.

The UK has said that it intends to refuse to register new diesel and petrol cars and vans from 2040. Lorries will not, at that time, be affected. It's apparently in a bid to reduce air pollution. Does the move from petrol / diesel inevitably mean a move to fully electric and if so what will happen to the toxic batteries when they die? And where does all the raw material required for all those batteries come from? Are we replacing current ecological disasters and and geo-political tensions with new ones? [Free content ]

Ever since Muslims were generally targeted by the USA in the aftermath of the terrorist acts of 11 September 2001, Muslims all over the world have been able to point at "The West" and to argue, with some justification, that they must protect their right to practise their religion. But radical elements have been emboldened by the concerns of the moderate majority and, all over the world, that has led to an entrenching of fundamentalist attitudes which, until then, had largely been held at bay by a vast majority. In Malaysia, while there had long been some radical elements, they had begun to press their case in the late 1990s and as moderates shared some of their concerns, the quiet containment began to lose ground. Radicals started to speak out, saying outrageous things, but claiming to do so in the name of Islam. To criticise their statements could result in charges of disrespect to Islam. But the people have had enough and they have some powerful allies. The battle for the very soul...

How small is a country? We've seen, over the years, a number of what World Money Laundering Report calls "invented jurisdictions" but can one person be a country, even a country within a country? The so-called "sovereign citizens" movement in the USA says so and the authorities and the courts have been battling against the concept for years. Here's the current state of play.

It would be easy to say that there are no words to describe the horror of Venezuela's descent into civil and economic chaos, but in fact there are many words, mostly now abandoning political analysis and reporting on the increasingly desperate state of a country that, only a decade ago, was rich enough to sell heavily subsidised oil to Cuba. Except that it wasn't properly rich: Venezuela was pretending to be socialist while spending revenues from an increasingly precarious oil industry and now the money has all but dried up leaving its people subject to horrors that are reminiscent of war. [This article has been made available free]

Perhaps the most pressing, yet largely overlooked, problem affecting women and girls is the increasing demand to reduce the age of sexual consent to below teenage and the widespread issue of marriage of children of 12 and, even, younger. Many in the developed world ignore it, making the mistaken assumption that this is a problem in undeveloped countries and therefore of no direct relevance to them. In fact, child marriage is legal in far more developed, "Western" countries than readers might imagine.

Donald Trump has become known for so-called "alternative facts" which are, to everyone else, lies, half-truths and delusions. In Hillary Clinton's terms, they are what happens when she "mis-speaks." But in his first speech to the US Congress, that is the combined Houses of Representatives and the Senate, Trump wheeled out some numbers. Some, such as that "nearly 4,000 people were shot last year alone" are startling. To realise that that was in just one US city, and that not one that has a reputation for violence, is frightening. Were the numbers right? Prepare to go from startled, to frightened to terrified.

As Malaysians unite against a range of issues, there is one man who is determined to try to develop racial tensions, using any means at his disposal including, allegedly, vigilantism, as the leader of a gang that vociferously, and forcefully, defends the current government, setting the authorities at odds with their political masters.

There's an interesting story developing in the UK about the making of a grant from local taxpayer's money to a distressed law corporation (it's not a firm, despite the use of the term in the reporting). There are swirls of questions surrounding the entire subject

There's a really cute little bird, a kind of weaver finch, that lives in Africa. The government of Tanzania has tried to kill 5.6 million of them in a single operation, and they think they have got about 5 million. It's a fraction of the continent's population but it's the bulk of the flock that has swarmed, locust-like, onto crops. Their destructive power is biblical and in a country where food is always a challenge, "the world's most abundant wild species," can easily turn feast into famine for millions. It's not migratory: it's spreading, an alien invasive species that lays waste to vast tracts of land, like a feathered locust.

According to a report in an Israeli blog, Da'esh (it calls it ISIS) is "terrified" of a 39 year old woman who leads group that identifies Da'esh members and kills them. Of itself, the primary interest should be that the gang is led by a woman who is standing up to a misogynistic and brutal force of oppression. But it is not: the article is about what she does with the bodies. Our interest is the nature of the comments made on the report and the degree of support her brutality has obtained.

Israel's illegal occupation of a significant amount of Palestinian territory is only part of the story of the oppression of the Palestinians. There is also a a blockade of airspace and sea, even in international air and waters. Incredibly, this story is not merely untold: it is actively ignored by major news media.

This month, global TV networks based in the USA are pushing memorial and revised analysis of the bringing down of the twin towers of the World Trade Center (sic) in New York on 9/11, as they have branded the 11 September, 2001. News outlets including the BBC carry stories about memorial services, etc. But the focus on that single event means that other, equally and in some cases more important, events have not been widely reported and have been forgotten.