Texas Teacher and Student

(College Station, Texas) A 22-year-old teacher who substitutes at Caldwell High School, Jocelyn Doyle, has been accused of engaging in an improper relationship with a student.

Doyle has been charged with felony improper relationship between a student and an educator.

Doyle, 22, of Caldwell, turned herself in on Dec. 19 after the Burleson County Sheriff's Office issued a warrant for her arrest.

Authorities had been investigating the relationship since November, when the 17-year-old student involved reported sexual contact to school officials.

Doyle was booked and released on $1,500 bail.

First-Grader Smackdown



Brynn Williams
(Temecula, California) Last month, six-year-old Brynn Williams gave a Christmas presentation to her first-grade class at Helen Hunt-Jackson Elementary School and was told to stop and sit down by the teacher.

“Our Christmas tradition is to put a star on top of our tree,” the little girl said. “The star is named the Star of Bethlehem. The three kings followed the star to find baby Jesus, the Savior of the world.”

Before the child could utter another word, the teacher intervened, according to Robert Tyler, the general counsel for Advocates for Faith & Freedom – the law firm representing the Williams family.

“Brynn’s teacher said, ‘Stop right there! Go take your seat,’” Tyler said. “Bryn was not allowed to finish her presentation by reciting the Bible verse, John 3:16.”

Reportedly, Brynn's presentation was stopped to protect other students from being offended.

Oregon Woman Guilty of Raping Boy - Update

(Salem, Oregon)

A Salem woman pleaded guilty in court Tuesday to raping her friend's 12-year-old son.

In Tuesday's settlement hearing, Sarah Beth Hopkins, 35, pleaded guilty to three charges of rape and two for sodomy in Marion County court.

The victim told his mother last August that he and Hopkins were sexually active for eight months and had sex with her about 15 times, then the mother alerted police. The two spent time together at Hopkins' apartment and on walks, investigators said.

Sentencing is scheduled for January 29.

[Update 1/29] Hopkins sentenced to 12 years in prison.

* * * * *
Oregon Woman Accused of Raping Boy, 11
[Previous 8/12/13 post]
(Salem, Oregon) A 35-year-old local woman, Sarah Beth Hopkins, has been accused of raping an 11-year-old boy.

Hopkins faces 15 counts of first-degree sex abuse and 15 counts of second-degree rape.

The mother of the now 12-year-old victim called the sheriff’s office on Sunday. She was suspicious of her former neighbor and close friend, Sarah Beth Hopkins, and the relationship she had with her son, according to sheriff's office spokesman Don Thomson.

"She questioned her son and learned that he and Hopkins had been sexually active for the past eight months," Thomson said in a news release.

The boy would often go to Hopkins’ apartment and go on walks with Hopkins. The two had sex at the apartment and occasionally in public places during the walks, Thomson said.

Hopkins was booked into custody at the Marion County Jail.

Prevalence of psychopathy in politics

As I have pointed out at length elsewhere, there are many reasons why people can have hate in their hearts for the society around them.  But those who have that hate are the Left.  And it is that hate which makes them want to change us all.


The anger and hate is sometimes so strong that it is visible -- Mrs Clinton  with TWO clenched fists.  Even the Communist salute requires only one. The fist is the emblem of the Left.  It tells you what they want to do.

But a major reason for the hate is ego.  The hater thinks highly of himself and resents that the world does not give him the praise and rewards that he thinks are his due.

It is hard to know for certain how much Leftism is driven in that way.  It is very evident in Leftist leaders but is it  widespread among the voters?  When people are questioned immediately after voting in Presidential elections, the reasons that Democrat-voters give for their vote seem to be founded mainly on profound ignorance of the facts and issues.  Democrat candidates are blamed for what Republicans do and vice versa.

For all that, however, many ordinary people who favour the Left   often do express the same resentment of the world that we see in Leftist leaders.  I can warrant that from the many social attitude surveys I did in my social science research career.

As I also set out at length elsewhere, however, many Leftist leaders are not only egotists but are in fact the ultimate egotists -- psychopaths, people who have no real concern for other people at all  -- people to whom only their own self-interest is visible.  Though their psychopathy is "sub-clinical", i.e. it is subdued enough to keep them out of trouble with law enforcement and the mental health system.

So when both the leadership of the Left and a substantial part of their supporters are psychopathic, we clearly have one half of the political spectrum that is  substantially insane.  Beneath their  superficial charm lies a serious mental defect.

That such a pathology has engulfed half of politics is of course extremely disturbing.  My comment  (during my research career) that psychopathy is often successful in various ways appears to have been confirmed in spades.  It even appears in fact to have been reproductively successful, which is very alarming.  We now have a substantially psychopathic population around us.

That psychopathy has been reproductively successful for many years now is not hard to fathom.  As I have pointed out psychopaths seem to have a magic way with women.  The women eventually get disillusioned but pregnancies often occur in the interim.  And these days the children of such pregnancies will normally survive to adulthood.  So there has been a gradual but steady drip of psychopathy into the population.  And the "soft" penal practices of the current era have greatly facilitated that.  Criminals are now rarely executed but are released back into the population to continue their mayhem.  And a substantial number of those criminals are psychopaths.

No wonder our Leftist political opponents often seem to be off the planet -- JR

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).

Oregon Pimp Sues Shoe Company for Lack of Warning

Sirgiorgiro Clardy
(Portland, Oregon)

A 26-year-old Portland pimp has filed a $100 million lawsuit against Nike, claiming the shoe manufacturer is partially responsible for a brutal beating that helped net him a 100-year prison sentence.

Sirgiorgiro Clardy claims Nike should have placed a label in his Jordan shoes warning consumers that they could be used as a dangerous weapon. He was wearing a pair when he repeatedly stomped the face of a john who was trying to leave a Portland hotel without paying Clardy's prostitute in June 2012.

Jurors early in 2013 found him guilty of second-degree assault for using his Jordans -- a dangerous weapon -- to beat the john's face to a pulp. The man required stitches and plastic surgery on his nose.

The jury also found him guilty of robbing the john and beating the 18-year-old woman he forced to work as his prostitute. She was injured so badly that she bled from her ears.

So, in addition to a $100 million judgment, Clardy wants Nike and Jordan shoes to carry a warning indicating that the "shoes could be used as a weapon to cause serious injury or death."

Girl Jumps in Front of Train

Tallulah Wilson
(West Hempstead, England) Sad story.

A troubled schoolgirl fixated with the internet killed herself two days after her Tumblr account was shut down, an inquest heard today.

Tallulah Wilson, 15, felt her personality had been "deleted" and "part of her life had been stamped out" when she lost access to the blogging site, Dr Andrew Wiener said.

Tallulah's mother Sarah Wilson had it shut down after discovering the West Hampstead schoolgirl had posted images of self-abuse and wrote about her suicidal thoughts on Tumblr.

Two days later, on October 14, 2012, Tallulah jumped in front of a train at St Pancras station.

The inquest is expected to continue for another week.

Government Healthcare

Chortle-worthy, eh?

Tax Identity Theft


FYI:

What's worse than filing your taxes? Having an identity thief steal your return check.

Identity theft is already a serious problem—the No. 1 complaint to the Federal Trade Commission, and tax-related identity theft is a growing part of this crime spree. In 2010, about 15 percent of all identity theft complaints to the FTC dealt with tax returns. In 2013, that jumped to 43 percent.

"It's a lucrative crime and relatively easy to commit," said Adam Levin, chairman and founder of Identity Theft 911. "All you need is a Social Security number and some counterfeit documents. It's much easier than selling drugs or stealing cars and a lot less risky for the bad guys."

One way to prevent this from happening is to file early. Why? The IRS may be able to process your return before the identity thieves can.

Nice to know, eh?

That "100 months" prophecy

In early January 2006 the BBC held a sort of Old Fashioned Revival Hour in which top BBC people got together with top Greenie fanatics and helped prop up one-another's belief that Global Warming was the One True Faith.  You can read about it here.

One little excerpt from the report of what went on there fascinated me:

"Andrew Simms of the New Economics Foundation, who argued there were only 100 months left to save the planet"

100 months is 8 years and 4 months and if we count forward from then we arrive at April 2014.  We're nearly there!  But the planet looks much the same as it did in 2006 so it looks like Simms is yet another Warmist false prophet.

But the planet may have a reprieve.  In August 2008 Simms said we still had 100 months at that time!  I wonder what refined calculations went into that revision?

Warmists are such clowns.  Perhaps we should not berate them too heavily.  Laughing at them is a bit like laughing at the disabled.  Their mental fixations certainly disable their reasoning powers (if any).

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).

Florida Woman Accused of Molesting Boy, 12

(Pembroke Pines, Florida) A 47-year-old local woman, Keturah Zillah Gibson, has been accused of sexually molesting a 12-year-old boy.

Gibson faces counts of lewd and lascivious battery, molestation of a 12-year-old and tampering with a victim.

The alleged victim told investigators that Keturah Zillah Gibson would wake him after 2am and carry out the sex acts.

He said she would kiss him and perform oral sex at the house they shared in Pembroke Pines, Florida.

Gibson was booked into custody at the Broward County Jail on $110,000 bond.

Main genes for IQ now isolated

This is much sooner than anyone expected. The .90 correlation between a gene set and IQ mentioned below is historic.  Correlations don't get much better than that in psychology.  The IQ deniers have always looked pretty silly in the light of the evidence but I cannot see that they have any room to move now at all  -- JR

Factor Analysis of Population Allele Frequencies as a Simple, Novel Method of Detecting Signals of Recent Polygenic Selection: The Example of Educational Attainment and IQ

Davide Piffer, Interdisciplinary Bio Central, November 27, 2013

Synopsis

Weak widespread (polygenic) selection is a mechanism that acts on multiple SNPs simultaneously. The aim of this paper is to suggest a methodology to detect signals of polygenic selection using educational attainment as an example. Educational attainment is a polygenic phenotype, influenced by many genetic variants with small effects. Frequencies of 10 SNPs found to be associated with educational attainment in a recent genome-wide association study were obtained from HapMap, 1000 Genomes and ALFRED. Factor analysis showed that they are strongly statistically associated at the population level, and the resulting factor score was highly related to average population IQ (r=0.90). Moreover, allele frequencies were positively correlated with aggregate measures of educational attainment in the population, average IQ, and with two intelligence increasing alleles that had been identified in different studies. This paper provides a simple method for detecting signals of polygenic selection on genes with overlapping phenotypes but located on different chromosomes. The method is therefore different from traditional estimations of linkage disequilibrium. This method can also be used as a tool in gene discovery, potentially decreasing the number of SNPs that are included in a genome-wide association study, reducing the multiple-testing problem and required sample sizes and consequently, financial costs.

SOURCE

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).

Canine Problem Solver




Reportedly, the oven was hot. Smart dog, eh?

Oklahoma Woman in Child Porn Case

(Burns Flat, Oklahoma) A 46-year-old local woman, Laura Jean Shoulders, has been accused of taking video of herself performing sex acts on a one-year-old child.

Shoulders faces federal charges of producing child pornography.

It all began, when a man contacted Shoulders through Craigslist.

Shoulders and the man began corresponding via text messages about sexually explicit topics and exchanged explicit pictures.

That would not be a problem if it was only adult content.

However, Shoulders took things way too far when she performed sex acts on the 1-year-old girl.

She then sent three videos of her acts to the man she met on Craigslist. The man contacted police.

Details on booking are unavailable.

Florida Teen Attacked

Suspects (clockwise from top left): Erica Avery, 16, Jayvon Woolfork, 19, Patricia Montes, 15, Lanel Singleton, 18 and Dwight Henry, 17
(Hollywood, Florida)

A trial is underway in the case of two teen girls who are accused of beating another 15-year-old girl, supposedly a friend, and holding her down while one of several young men in the house raped her.[…]

Patricia Montes, 15, has reportedly been stoic during the trial, but Erica Avery, 16, looks almost smug and has even smiled during testimony, which is infuriating and puzzling at the same time.

The victim herself, who of course is not being identified, told police even she doesn't know why she was attacked, why this happened. Almost always there is a reason, a provocation, a disagreement, even a small and often ridiculous one -- but that doesn't appear to be the case here. Apparently there was beer drinking and pot smoking involved, which could lend some theories.

New video of the attack (but not the sexual assault) have been released and it's disturbing to watch how this poor, half-clothed girl is being treated, both physically and emotionally. There's a lot you can't see, which is a good thing, but you certainly get enough of the gist to just want to turn it off.

She is punched, dragged by her hair along the ground, and apparently maced at some point. When asked to go home, Lanel Singleton, the man holding the camera told the victim that she would be continue to be held until she agrees to perform a sex act with Jayvon Woolfork -- which he told police but later denied he said while on the stand.

The victim was eventually allowed to leave the house but allegedly not before one of the women reportedly spit on her. She went to the hospital and reported the attack to police.

All five suspects face counts of armed sexual battery and kidnapping.

Olympic Funds Disappear

(Sochi, Russia)

A member of the International Olympic Committee has criticized Russia's handling of the Sochi Winter Olympics, saying they have been marred by rampant corruption and about one-third of the funds allocated to prepare for the event have been lost to embezzlement.

Corruption appeared to be an "everyday" matter in Russia, Gian-Franco Kasper, president of the International Ski Federation and a Swiss member of the IOC, said in an interview with Switzerland's SRF radio published on Wednesday.

Of the approximately $55 billion that Russia has spent to host the Games, which are scheduled to begin on Feb. 7, about one-third — or about $18 billion — has gone to line the pockets of officials or contractors who had access to the funds, Kasper said.

Arguably, the redirection of funds is a ingrained cultural carry-over from 70-plus years of Russian communism, the demonstrated apex of social and political corruption. It will likely require a few generations for Russia to tamp down the culture of massive corruption. In the meantime, think of rampant fraud and theft as expected surcharges to doing business in Russia.

"Essentialism": A new stick to beat conservatives with

This latest fashion in psychological research was brought to my attention in an article by Matthew Hutson, a journalist with some qualifications in psychology.  I made some rather scathing comments on Hutson's article here.  In reply, Hutson referred me to the academic journal article which was the chief underpinning of his thinking.  The article is "Social Class Rank, Essentialism, and Punitive Judgment" by Kraus & Keltner (2013).  I thought I might offer a brief evisceration of it.

Essentialism seems primarily to mean belief in genetic determination.  If you believe that a peron is as he is because of his genes, you are an essentialist.  By that criterion conservatives are likely to be essentialists.  And the authors clearly think essentialists are a bad lot.  So who are these essentialists?  In good Marxist fashion, the authors say that your social class position determines that.  So they selected some statements to the effect that your class position was largely genetically determined and correlated that with your opinion of your own class position.  I myself found that your subjective estimation of your social class position was a powerful predictor of other class-related variables back in 1971, so I have no quarrel with them on that score.

What they found in their Study I and Study II was however quite contrary to the Marxist theory.  They found that there was virtually no overlap (a 4% overlap; r = .20) between their measures and your social class.  High social class people were almost equally divided over whether class was genetically determined or not.  So class was NOT behind "essentialist" beliefs.

That might have stopped our dynamic duo but it did not.  In Study III they  looked for other things behind "essentialism".  The disappointing results of their first two studies do however seem to have disheartened them.  Their next experiment was very low quality indeed.  They told a small group of students some lies and then asked them questions about how strongly they would punish certain offences.  If they were serious about measuring punitiveness, they might have used my approach instead of the very ad hoc approach they did use.  Be that as it may, however, the main effect in their analysis was not even statistically significant, let alone meaningful.

Not discouraged, however, they went on to study 4, in which they used tricks to change what class people thought they belonged in.  They then examined how these "manipulated" class perceptions related to punitiveness.  They found some weak effects on type of punishment desired by people in these "manipulated" classes.  In other words, even by abandoning reality altogether they still could not find much in the way of class effects.

With such disappointing results, you will be surprised at their conclusion:

"Social class is a primary determinant of rank in human social
hierarchy, and it profoundly shapes perceptions of the social environment".

Their data if fact warrant the following conclusion:

"Social class is a primary determinant of rank in human social
hierarchy, but it negligibly shapes perceptions of the social environment"

They knew what they were going to conclude from the beginning and stuck with that.  All the experimentation they did was just window dressing that they did not even believe in themselves.  There is no evidence at all that essentialists are the bad guys they were intended to be

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).

Texas Woman Arrested on Firearms and Drug Charges

(Tyler, Texas) A 33-year-old East Texas woman, Elizabeth Ann Frowley, was arrested last week by the U.S. Marshals Joint East Texas Fugitive Task Force on firearms and drug charges.

She was wanted by the sheriff’s office on four felony charges: two warrants for felon in possession of a firearm, bond forfeiture for manufacture or delivery of methamphetamine, and failure to appear for court.

Ms. Frowley has been wanted by the sheriff’s office since August, according to the release.

“Information was developed that she would be hiding out in the Enchanted Lakes community near Mineola,” the news release stated. “The USMS Task force officers searched for (Ms.) Frowley at a relative’s residence and found her hiding inside a freezer in the garage.”

Details on booking not reported.

Georgia Woman Accused of Stabbing Boyfriend

(Athens, Georgia) A 30-year-old local woman, Randi Marie Houser, has been accused of stabbing her boyfriend because he allegedly cheated on her. He suffered internal injuries.

Houser faces a charge of aggravated assault.

The stabbing occurred after the boyfriend, who was not identified, asked Houser for a ride to work, but Houser did not want to get out of bed. He then pulled the blanket back and Houser attacked him, saying he could call "one of his other women," the outlet reported.

She then drove him to the hospital instead to treat internal injuries.

Details on booking are unavailable.

Swiss Cheese Pervert

(Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)

The Mayfair Town Watch reported yesterday on its Facebook page that the "Swiss Cheese Pervert" has been terrorizing neighborhood women.

According to the group, the suspect, a heavyset white man estimated to be in his late 40s or early 50s, approaches women while driving a silver or black sedan with his genitals exposed. He then displays a piece of sliced Swiss cheese and offers to pay the women to put the cheese on his penis and perform sexual acts on him using it.

Reportedly, the Swiss Cheese Pervert, still at large, described his fetish on a dating website, stating he is seeking someone to perform masturbation on him with cheese. To wit:

"I started to compare girls to cheese due to their milky complections [sic], girls are soft, smooth feeling and tend to like dairy products more," he wrote.

"That and typical advertising, always using a girl to advertise dairy products. So cheese is what I started to use as a replacement for having sex with girls."

I strongly disagree.

Snails and CO2



Hope you are seated for this because it could ruin your day. “Effects of climate change could hinder a sea snail’s ability to leap away from predators on one foot”, Queensland researchers say. Did I read that right?

The study, reported in the Fjii Times, shows the Conch snail, found in sandy areas off coral reefs, finds it difficult to quickly jump out of reach of prey when exposed to higher levels of carbon dioxide.

Dr Sue-Ann Watson of James Cook University’s Centre of Excellence, who is a self-confessed global warmist, says the chemical CO2 disrupts the snail's neurotransmitter receptor, causing it to have a delayed response.

“The snail either stops jumping or takes longer to jump when exposed to the levels of carbon dioxide projected for the end of this century”, the marine biologist said. (Have you fallen off your chair yet?)

"This might leave the three to four centimetre Conch snail more vulnerable to the dart of the slow-moving, predatory Cone shell.

"Snails normally move slowly and crawl around on their one big foot," Ms Watson said.

So, the level of carbon dioxide in eighty six years’ time (projected of course by our global warming friends) might affect a sea snail!

Bloody hell, that makes the Syrian crisis look like a picnic.

But every dark cloud has a silver lining... in eighty six years’ time it seems the deprived, slow-moving Cone shell will find it much easier to get a feed. Phew, global warming isn’t all doom and gloom after all.

I phone-messaged Sue-Ann to ask if the dung beetle was getting enough tucker at her Centre of Excellence, but I have yet to receive a reply.

SOURCE

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).