Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Russian Pacific Monarch

From the BBC:
"Kiribati mulls proposal to 'restore Russian monarchy'"

The government of Kiribati is considering a proposal from a businessman who wants to revive the Russian monarchy on the Pacific state's territory. Anton Bakov, a former Russian MP who heads the Monarchist Party, wants to use three of Kiribati's currently uninhabited islands to build hotels and establish an "alternative Russia", Radio New Zealand reports. Mr Bakov says he'll plough $350m (£280m) into the project, and his wife told the radio that the idea is supported by "a great number of Russian patriots who are not happy with Putin's regime". Russia's monarchy was overthrown in 1917 with the Bolshevik Revolution, but Mr Bakov has in recent years devoted himself to restoring it. In 2011 he created the "Imperial Throne" - an unrecognised micro-nation with no territory - with a leader referred to as Emperor Nicholas III. Last week, a Kiribati government official said the proposal was still under consideration by the Foreign Investment Commission. Since then it's garnered the qualified support of former Kiribati President Teburoro Tito, who thinks it could be a money-spinner for the tourism industry, "assuming the things they're saying are true".  But some academics are urging caution. Dr Sitiveni Halapua, a Pacific development specialist, tells Radio New Zealand that he understands Kiribati is seeking investment to combat the effects of climate change, but he finds the proposal "very strange" and "scary".  Mr Bakov has previously tried to find land for his "alternative Russia" project elsewhere, and in 2011 was reported to have bought an island from the Cook Islands, something swiftly rubbished by the country's government.

^ This is just weird. ^


http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-38798535

Tree Service


Last week I saw a tree cutting service cutting trees at my neighbor’s house across the street. Today (January 31, 2017) around 2:30 pm I was driving up the mountain town road and saw a large truck completely in my driveway blocking my way onto my driveway. I rolled my window down and told the truck and the people to get off my property and they moved the truck on to the town road. I parked my car at the end of the driveway to block them from coming back on. I got out and a man closest to me walked over. I asked what they were doing on my property and the man said they were cutting trees and branches. I asked why I wasn’t informed before they started and the man said it was up to the town to inform me. I then asked if the man was a supervisor and he said he was the owner. I asked him what company he was the owner of and he told me. I told him that since none of them had my permission to be on my property and it wasn’t an emergency that had to leave my property. I pointed to the driveway and all the messed-up hardpack and showed it to the man who said that all they needed was a “rake” to fix it. I told him they only had my permission to fix the mess they made and then had to leave my property. I told him that since I hadn’t received written notice of the work and it wasn’t an emergency that his company did not have my permission to do anything on my property and to leave.

I then went into the house and called my town police's non-emergency number and the dispatcher said that the police weren’t working that day and that he would transfer me to the State Police. The female dispatcher at the State Police said that someone would be there in “a few minutes.” While waiting for the police I called the Town Clerk’s office and asked them about  the work and lack of notice and the clerk said I should speak with the Town Selectboard’s Office so I called them. I told them what was going on and they said it has nothing to do with the town. After waiting around 1 ½ hours with no police yet I called the town police's non-emergency number again since they were the ones who transferred me to the State Police in the first place. I said I had been waiting nearly 2 hours and was transferred to the State Police. The State Police dispatcher said that someone was on the way. I asked how long they would be as the first dispatcher said it would be “a few minutes” and more than a few minutes had passed. He said that it wasn’t 2 hours and that someone would be there. I then called the Town Selectbord’s Office  again and asked what the hours for the town police were. She said it varied and that we only had 2 officers (the third patrolman on the town website just answers phones) and that the officers aren’t always on and are sometimes in court. I told her it was nice knowing that we couldn’t rely on the police when we need them.

About 10 minutes from that call the State Police came. The officer  said he was coming from 2 hours away  said he had spoken with the tree service  down the road and that they were contracted by the Electric Co-Op to do the work. He said I should call the Electric Co-Op and find out what was going on. I asked what I could do in the future if Tree Service  (or anyone else) tried to come onto my property without prior permission and it wasn’t an emergency and he said I should put up a “Do Not Trespass” sign on my property. I then asked the officer about me verbally telling the owner today that they weren’t allowed on my property and he said that the verbal statement was the same as a sign and that from now on they couldn’t come onto my property without prior notice or a police escort. I asked if that would be in a report that I said the Tree Service wasn’t allowed on my property and he said it would go into his report. He also said I could bring the Tree Service to small claims court about the driveway if I wanted. I had asked the officer about the workers getting hurt on my property (without my permission) and he said he didn’t think anything could come of it.

At 4:30 pm (January 31, 2017) I called the Electric Co-Op and the woman there said she would have their arborist for my region call me. I asked her to make a note on my account that I did not give permission for the Tree Service or any contractor or the   Electric Co-Op to come onto my property to do any work unless I was given prior notice or they had a police escort. She said she would note that. 
The arborist from the Electric Co-Op. He left a message on my machine: I called him back and left a message. On January 31, 2017 at 5:48 pm he called me back. He said they sent an automated message in July 2016 that work would be going on and that message meant I needed to opt-in to being given 2 week prior notice. I said that was “BS” and was giving him notice (as the State Police told me to do) and that I had given notice to the Tree Service and the customer service woman at the Electric Co-Op that as of right now none of the Electric Co-Op employees, the Tree Service or any other contractors used by the Electric Co-Op have my permission to be on my property. They can come on my property only with a police escort. He kept making excuses and so I restated that he and everyone else had been given notice and weren’t allowed on my property and hung up.
This just shows you that you really can't count on anyone else to help you.

Austrian Face Ban

From the DW:
"Austria to ban 'full-face veil' in public spaces, says Kern"

The Austrian chancellor has announced a new policy program to fend off the challenge of the far-right. The niqab ban is to avoid giving Austrian Muslims the "feeling that they are not part of our society," he said.  Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern on Monday announced a program aimed at fending off the challenge of the far-right, including banning the niqab, a conservative form of Muslim attire. "The full-face veil will be banned in public spaces," Kern said after Austrian ministers approved the new policy program. He added that he wanted to avoid "giving 600,000 Muslims in Austria the feeling that they are not part of our society." The 35-page program said the governing coalition believes in an "open society that is also based on open communication," which the "full-body veils in public spaces stand against."  The conservative Deputy Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner said the coalition agreed to "work faster and more clearly." "It is now up to us to do what governing parties do, namely implement the program," Mitterlehner said. The new government program comes at a time when the anti-Islamization Freedom Party (FPO) has witnessed a surge in support, resulting in their presidential candidate nearly winning the election in December. The government's proposals included a general ban on civil servants wearing religious symbols and curbing job access for foreign laborers, especially those from eastern European nations, and requiring that 30 percent of a company's supervisory board members be female.


^ It seems there are double standards for Europe (especially the EU) and the US. The EU (including Austria) can build walls/barriers on their own boarders - even those with other EU member states, but the US can't finish building a wall/barrier on it's own border. Along those same lines European countries (especially those in the EU) can legally ban Islamist dress in their countries (like Austria, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, etc.) and not be called anti-Islamist or discrimination, but the US bans all citizens (regardless of religion) from 7 countries temporarily, but that is anti-Islamist and discrimination? Like I said - double standards. ^

http://www.dw.com/en/austria-to-ban-full-face-veil-in-public-spaces-says-kern/a-37342087

Hypocrisy?

"The US banning everyone (regardless of religion) from: Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Libya, Sudan and Syria is anti-Islamist and discrimination, but full or partial Islamist dress bans in: France, Morocco, Belgium, Bulgaria, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Kosovo, Latvia, Italy, Chad, Spain, Cameroon, Rep. Of Congo, Niger, Switzerland, Austria and Germany is not anti-Islamist. or discrimination?"


^ Heard this quote on TV and tried to quote it verbatim. ^

Monday, January 30, 2017

45: Bloody: Inquiry

From the BBC:
"Inquiry call for soldiers who face Troubles prosecutions"

Lawyers representing former soldiers facing prosecution for killings during the Northern Ireland Troubles have called for an independent inquiry. A London-based firm of solicitors says there are concerns about the decisions to take legal action. Former soldiers feel they are being unfairly treated, says the firm, Devonshires.  A number of Conservative MPs have called for new legislation to prevent further prosecutions. The police and Public Prosecution Service (PPS) say cases involving allegations against former soldiers are treated in the same way as all others. Members of regular regiments of the British Army killed 302 people during the Troubles, more than half of them were civilians.  The first 169 killings were investigated by the Royal Military Police. The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) then took over responsibility, but did not re-examine those cases. Critics have questioned the integrity of the investigations into all of the Army killings. Indeed, an official British government document uncovered by campaign group Relatives for Justice five years ago indicated that an agreement was made to protect soldiers serving in Northern Ireland from prosecution. Dated 10 July 1972, it said: "The British government should not be inhibited in its campaign by the threat of court proceedings and should therefore be suitably indemnified." The Legacy Branch of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) is re-investigating the Army killings, as part of a review of all deaths during the Troubles. In 2010, the Saville inquiry found that the Bloody Sunday killings of 13 civilians were unjustified and unjustifiable. Devonshires says it is currently representing between 10 and 15 former soldiers facing prosecution for a number of killings, including those on Bloody Sunday. Lawyer Philip Barden said his clients and other former soldiers had serious concerns. They do feel that the process is unfair," he said. "These are soldiers whose shootings were investigated at the time they took place and the then director of public prosecutions took a decision, based upon the evidence that was then available, that no action would be taken against them. "They've got on with their lives, their memories have faded, and now after, in some cases more than 40 years, they face the prospect of being prosecuted, and they feel that it is very prejudicial for them and they are very concerned by it." He said the firm had been told there could be as many as 1,000 former soldiers potentially facing prosecution. The PPS in Northern Ireland said it had no idea where that figure came from.  Devonshires is calling for an independent review of the process to address the concerns of former soldiers. "Justice must be seen to be done, and I think in these circumstances it would help everybody if someone such as a senior judge were to be instructed by the government to review the processes and procedures that have been put in place," Mr Barden said. Kate Nash, whose brother, William, was killed on Bloody Sunday, said she was absolutely enraged by Mr Barden's comments.   "The victims of the state in this country have never been on a level playing field when dealing with British justice," she said.  "An inquiry had already found soldiers guilty on Bloody Sunday of firing at victims without fear or panic and perjuring themselves. These soldiers at the Bloody Sunday inquiry had the protection of immunity from prosecution and still didn't tell the truth. It's a disgrace."
However, DUP MP Sir Jeffery Donaldson said: "I think Kate is right, there isn't a level playing field and I think more money was spent on the Saville inquiry [into Bloody Sunday] than on the investigation of any other killing in the history of Northern Ireland.  "Kate seems to think that the only people who are entitled to access to justice are victims of the state. The IRA were responsible for 60% of the killings in Northern Ireland, the paramilitary terrorists were responsible for over 90% of the killings.  "The problem is that no-one is investigating the unsolved killings committed by the IRA." The PPS says all of its decisions are reached after careful consideration of the case according to the Code of Prosecutors. In a statement issued last month, it said: "The Public Prosecution Service only applies the law as it currently stands in Northern Ireland and does so without fear, favour or prejudice." In response to critics who say army killings were not properly investigated at the time they happened, the lawyer said if that was the case it was not the fault of the former soldiers involved.
"If the state failed to properly investigate matters in the 1970s that should be taken up with the state," he said. "That's not the responsibility of the individual soldiers who were subject to an investigation, who were told that no action would be taken against them, and have relied upon that."


^ For decades the British Military had carte blanche throughout Northern Ireland. Since The Good Friday Agreement in 1998 (when the Catholics in Northern Ireland were finally given the same civil rights as the British and Protestants and The Troubles officially ended) things changed and that carte blanche was taken away. The only way to truly over-come the crimes and mistakes of the past is to fully admit them, make amends and then work to make sure they never happen again. I am not saying that everyone in the British Military involved in Northern Ireland committed crimes and murder, but there were those that did (ie: Bloody Sunday) and they need to be investigated and punished if found guilty. You can no longer use the "Just Following Orders'" excuse that the Germans tried after World War 2. The British Government and thus the British Military was supposed to be neutral between the Irish Protestants and Irish Catholics in Northern Ireland, but instead they both sided with the Irish Protestants and helped discriminate against the Irish Catholics. That was clearly a bad mistake since it led to decades of murder and violence. Once the British Government finally stopped siding with the one side (the Irish Protestants) in 1998 The Troubles finally ended. All the crimes and murders from every side need to be investigated and those guilty need to face consequences whether they were in the British Government, in the British Military, Protestant or Catholic. A criminal is a criminal and a murderer is a murderer. Justice needs to be given regardless if the crime happened yesterday or 50 years ago. ^


http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-38737405

Homeless Vets


45: Bloody: Victims

From Wikipedia:
"Bloody Sunday"



In all, 26 people were shot by the paratroopers; 13 died on the day and another died four months later. Most of them were killed in four main areas: the rubble barricade across Rossville Street, the courtyard car park of Rossville Flats (on the north side of the flats), the courtyard car park of Glenfada Park, and the forecourt of Rossville Flats (on the south side of the flats). All of the soldiers responsible insisted that they had shot at, and hit, gunmen or bomb-throwers. The Saville Report concluded that all of those shot were unarmed and that none were posing a serious threat. It also concluded that none of the soldiers fired in response to attacks, or threatened attacks, by gunmen or bomb-throwers.

The casualties are listed in the order in which they were killed.
  • John 'Jackie' Duddy, age 17. Shot as he ran away from soldiers in the car park of Rossville Flats. The bullet struck him in the shoulder and entered his chest. Three witnesses said they saw a soldier take deliberate aim at the youth as he ran. He was the first fatality on Bloody Sunday. Like Saville, Widgery also concluded that Duddy was unarmed.His nephew is boxer John Duddy.
  • Michael Kelly, age 17. Shot in the stomach while standing at the rubble barricade on Rossville Street. Both Saville and Widgery concluded that Kelly was unarmed.
  • Hugh Gilmour (or Gilmore), age 17. Shot as he ran away from soldiers near the rubble barricade. The bullet went through his left elbow and entered his chest. Widgery acknowledged that a photograph taken seconds after Gilmour was hit corroborated witness reports that he was unarmed, and that tests for gunshot residue were negative.
  • William Nash, age 19. Shot in the chest at the rubble barricade. Witnesses stated Nash was unarmed.Three people were shot while apparently going to his aid, including his father Alexander Nash.
  • John Young, age 17. Shot in the face at the rubble barricade, apparently while crouching and going to the aid of William Nash. Two witnesses stated Young was unarmed.
  • Michael McDaid, age 20. Shot in the face at the rubble barricade, apparently while crouching and going to the aid of William Nash.
  • Kevin McElhinney, age 17. Shot from behind, near the rubble barricade, while attempting to crawl to safety. Two witnesses stated McElhinney was unarmed.
  • James 'Jim' Wray, age 22. Shot in the back while running away from soldiers in Glenfada Park courtyard. He was then shot again in the back as he lay mortally wounded on the ground. Witnesses, who were not called to the Widgery Tribunal, stated that Wray was calling out that he could not move his legs before he was shot the second time.
  • William McKinney, age 26. Shot in the back as he attempted to flee through Glenfada Park courtyard.
  • Gerard McKinney, age 35. Shot in the chest at Abbey Park. A soldier ran through an alleyway from Glenfada Park and shot him from a few yards away. Witnesses said that when he saw the soldier, McKinney stopped and held up his arms, shouting "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!", before being shot. The bullet apparently went through his body and struck Gerard Donaghy behind him.
  • Gerard Donaghy, age 17. Shot in the stomach at Abbey Park while standing behind Gerard McKinney. Both were apparently struck by the same bullet. Bystanders brought Donaghy to a nearby house, where he was examined by a doctor. The doctor opened Donaghy's clothes to examine him, and his pockets were also searched for identification. Two bystanders then attempted to drive Donaghy to hospital, but the car was stopped at an Army checkpoint. They were ordered to leave the car and a soldier drove it to a Regimental Aid Post, where an Army medical officer pronounced Donaghy dead. Shortly after, soldiers found four nail bombs in his pockets. The civilians who searched him, the soldier who drove him to the Army post, and the Army medical officer, all said that they did not see any bombs. This led to claims that soldiers planted the bombs on Donaghy to justify the killings. Donaghy was a member of Fianna Éireann, an IRA-linked republican youth movement. Paddy Ward, a police informer  who gave evidence at the Saville Inquiry, claimed he gave two nail bombs to Donaghy several hours before he was shot. The Saville Report concluded that the bombs were probably in Donaghy's pockets when he was shot. However, it concluded that he was not about to throw a bomb when he was shot; and that he was not shot because he had bombs. "He was shot while trying to escape from the soldiers".
  • Patrick Doherty, age 31. Shot from behind while attempting to crawl to safety in the forecourt of Rossville Flats. He was shot by soldiers who came out of Glenfada Park. Doherty was photographed, moments before and after he died, by French journalist Gilles Peress. Despite testimony from "Soldier F" that he had shot a man holding a pistol, Widgery acknowledged that the photographs show Doherty was unarmed, and that forensic tests on his hands for gunshot residue proved negative.
  • Bernard 'Barney' McGuigan, age 41. Shot in the head when he walked out from cover to help Patrick Doherty. He had been waving a white handkerchief to indicate his peaceful intentions.
  • John Johnston, age 59. Shot in the leg and left shoulder on William Street 15 minutes before the rest of the shooting started. Johnston was not on the march, but on his way to visit a friend in Glenfada Park. He died on 16 June 1972; his death has been attributed to the injuries he received on the day. He was the only one not to die immediately or soon after being shot.


^ These people, as well as those wounded and all of their families are the only ones that the British Government should worry about when talking about Bloody Sunday (not about the soldiers that committed the massacre or anyone who helped to cover it up for 38 years.) To do otherwise is to murder the innocent victims all over again. The picture wasn't from Wikipedia, but taken from Yahoo. ^

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody_Sunday_(1972)


45: Bloody: Soldiers

From Wikipedia:
"Bloody Sunday"

Regarding the soldiers in charge on the day of Bloody Sunday, the Saville Inquiry arrived at the following findings:
  • Lieutenant Colonel Derek Wilford: Commander of 1 Para and directly responsible for arresting rioters and returning to base. Found to have 'deliberately disobeyed' his superior Brigadier Patrick MacLellan's orders by sending Support Company into the Bogside (and without informing MacLellan).
  • Major Ted Loden: Commander in charge of soldiers, following orders issued by Lieutenant Colonel Wilford. Cleared of misconduct; Saville cited in the report that Loden "neither realised nor should have realised that his soldiers were or might be firing at people who were not posing or about to pose a threat". The inquiry found that Loden could not be held responsible for claims (whether malicious or not) by some of the individual soldiers that they had received fire from snipers.
  • Captain Mike Jackson: Second in command of 1 Para on the day of Bloody Sunday. Cleared of sinister actions following Jackson's compiling of a list of what soldiers told Major Loden on why they had fired. This list became known as the "Loden List of Engagements" which played a role in the Army's initial explanations. While the inquiry found the compiling of the list was 'far from ideal', Jackson's explanations were accepted based on the list not containing the names of soldiers and the number of times they fired.
  • Major General Robert Ford: Commander of land forces and set the British strategy to oversee the civil march in Derry. Cleared of any fault, but his selection of 1 Para, and in particular his selection of Colonel Wilford to be in control of arresting rioters, was found to be disconcerting, specifically as "1 PARA was a force with a reputation for using excessive physical violence, which thus ran the risk of exacerbating the tensions between the Army and nationalists".
  • Brigadier Pat MacLellan: Operational commander of the day. Cleared of any wrongdoing as he was under the impression that Wilford would follow orders by arresting rioters and then returning to base, and could not be blamed for Wilford's actions.
  • Major Michael Steele: With MacLellan in the operations room and in charge of passing on the orders of the day. The inquiry report accepted that Steele could not believe other than that a separation had been achieved between rioters and marchers, because both groups were in different areas.
  • Other soldiers: Lance Corporal F was found responsible for a number of the deaths and that a number of soldiers have "knowingly put forward false accounts in order to seek to justify their firing".
  • Intelligence officer Colonel Maurice Tugwell and Colin Wallace, (an IPU army press officer): Cleared of wrongdoing. Saville believed the information Tugwell and Wallace released through the media was not down to any deliberate attempt to deceive the public but rather due to much of the inaccurate information Tugwell had received at the time by various other figures.

^ If the British Government knows who is actually guilty of carrying out the Bloody Sunday Massacre in 1972 then why hasn't London done anything in the  7 years since the Saville Report against those involved in the murders and the decades-long cover-up? Words (like "sorry") mean little unless they are also backed by action. The British Government had the words, but not the action.  ^


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody_Sunday_(1972)

Nazi Secretary Dead

From the DW:
"Secretary to Nazi propaganda minister Goebbels dies at 106"

Brunhilde Pomsel's death was confirmed by Christian Krönes, the director and producer of a documentary film featuring the centenarian. Krönes said that Pomsel had been coherent when he last spoke to her on her birthday, January 11, and added that she had died in her sleep at her Munich home on January 27. In the documentary "A German Life," Pomsel talks about the years that she spent working for Joseph Goebbels, who was in charge of spreading Adolf Hitler's ideology in newspapers and broadcasts as the Third Reich's official Minister of Propaganda. Pomsel accompanied the propaganda minister for three years - almost up to the point of his death. Goebbels and his wife Magda famously poisoned their six children before committing suicide on May 1, 1945, which Pomsel recalled in an interview in 2011: "I will never forgive Goebbels for what he did to the world or for the fact that he murdered his innocent children," Pomsel said about the events.  In the years preceding her job as Goebbels' secretary Brunhilde Pomsel was employed in the news division of the German government broadcasting corporation for nine years, which required her to join the Nazi party. After the war, she returned to broadcasting, working for national broadcasters in West Germany until reaching retirement. She never married or had children. Pomsel spent most of her life after World War II living in relative obscurity until a German newspaper published an interview with her in 2011. The feature prompted a great deal of interest in one of the last surviving members of the Nazi leadership's inner circle, eventually leading to the production of the documentary on her life.


^ There are "The Greatest Generation" that helped to stop Hitler, the Nazis and the Japanese during World War 2 and then there are "The Worst Generation" that helped Hitler, the Nazis and the Japanese during World War 2. This woman was part of the "The Worst Generation" while others, like my grandfather, were part of the "The Greatest Generation." It's sad when we loose those heroes, but not so when we lose the others. ^


http://www.dw.com/en/secretary-to-nazi-propaganda-minister-goebbels-dies-at-106/a-37323833

45: Bloody Sunday



45 years ago (January 30, 1972) the British Military (the 1st Battalion, Parachute Regiment) murdered 14 innocent people (five of the victims were 17 years old) and wounded 14 others in Derry (known to the British as Londonderry) Northern Ireland. For 38 years the British Government in London, the Protestant-led Government in Belfast and the British Military covered-up the massacre – known as Bloody Sunday. In June 2010, British Prime Minister Cameron officially recognized the massacre and the cover-up – I was in Northern Ireland at the time he did that (the picture is from Derry/Londonderry at the site of the Bogside Massacre/Bloody Sunday.) In the 7 years since acknowledging the murders nothing has happened to anyone involved in the massacre or the decades-long cover-up. The soldiers involved in the massacre continue to hold their decorations and awards (including the then Lieutenant Colonel Derek Wilford who received the Order of the British Empire in 1972 by Queen Elizabeth II for his actions on Bloody Sunday.) Actions speak louder than words and while the British finally used words in admitting their crime 38 years after the fact they have yet to use actions 7 years later to show their remorse for their crime.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

No French Refills

From the BBC:
"Free soda: France bans unlimited sugary drink refills"

Restaurants and other spaces catering to the public in France have been banned from offering unlimited sugary drinks in an effort to reduce obesity. It is now illegal to sell unlimited soft drinks at a fixed price or offer them unlimited for free. The number of overweight or obese people in France is below the EU average but is on the rise.  The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends taxing sugary drinks, linking them to obesity and diabetes.  Self-service "soda fountains" have long been a feature of family restaurants and cafes in some countries like the UK, where a soft drinks tax will be introduced next year.  The new law targets soft drinks, including sports drinks containing added sugar or sweeteners.  All public eateries, from fast-food joints to school canteens, are affected. The aim of the law is to "limit, especially among the young, the risks of obesity, overweight and diabetes" in line with WHO recommendations. A recent Eurostat survey of adult obesity put the French at 15.3%, which is just below the EU average of 15.9%. France was slimmer than the UK (20.1%) but fatter than Italy (10.7%). Past the age of 30, nearly 57% of French men are overweight or obese, according to a report published in October by the French medical journal Bulletin Epidemiologique Hebdomadaire.  Some 41% of women in the same age category are also overweight or obese, the study found.


^ I've lived in Europe several times and have visited numerous countries before, during and since I lived there and don't recall ever seeing free refills on soda anywhere. As an American we would joke to Europeans that we are "the land of the free" because we have: free condiments, free bathrooms and free refills. ^

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38767941

John Hurt

From the BBC:
"Sir John Hurt: Bafta-winning actor dies aged 77"



Sir John Hurt's wife, Anwen, has led tributes to the veteran actor after he died at the age of 77. The Bafta-winning star, known for his roles in Alien and The Elephant Man, had been treated for pancreatic cancer in 2015. Sir John's wife said he had brought "joy and magic" and it would be a "strange world without him". He recently starred as Father Richard McSorley in Jackie, the biopic of President John F Kennedy's wife. Despite being given the all-clear from cancer, he last year pulled out of Sir Kenneth Branagh's production of The Entertainer on the advice of his doctors. Lady Hurt confirmed Sir John had died on Wednesday at his home in Norfolk.  "John was the most sublime of actors and the most gentlemanly of gentlemen with the greatest of hearts and the most generosity of spirit," she said in a statement. US director Mel Brooks described Sir John as "cinematic immortality", as tributes poured in for the star. Brooks paid tribute to Sir John, who had starred in his comedy Spaceballs, saying on Twitter: "No one could have played The Elephant Man more memorably." He added: "He carried that film into cinematic immortality. He will be sorely missed." Sir John also played the part of wand-maker Mr Ollivander in the Harry Potter films. Author of the books, JK Rowling, tweeted: "So very sad to hear that the immensely talented and deeply beloved John Hurt has died. My thoughts are with his family and friends."  "He touched all our lives with joy and magic and it will be a strange world without him."  John Hurt was one of Britain's best-known and most versatile actors. He was born on 22 January, 1940 in Chesterfield in Derbyshire. Over six decades, he appeared in more than 120 films as well as numerous stage and television roles.  He went to St Martin's School of Art in London, but dropped out. He then gained a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1960 but said he had been so hungry, he could hardly deliver his lines.  It was not until 1978 that Hurt was recognised as one of cinema's best character actors, gaining an Oscar nomination for his performance as a heroin addict in Alan Parker's Midnight Express. In 1979, he then starred as Kane in Ridley Scott's sci-fi horror Alien. in The death of his character has often been voted as one of cinema's most memorable moments. Sir John was also known for his off-screen antics, with his drinking splashed across newspapers. He once even lunged at a pack of paparazzi at a Bafta awards ceremony.  But he said that age had mellowed him and he admitted to being happier sitting with his painting easels than being out on the town. Sir John was married four times. His first marriage to actress Annette Robertson lasted two years in the 1960s. In 1968 he started a relationship with the "love of his life" Marie Lise Volpeliere-Porrot - it ended 15 years later when she was killed in a riding accident. The following year he married US actress Donna Peacock but the couple divorced four years later, although they remained good friends. He married his third wife Jo Dalton in 1990 and they had two sons. They divorced in 1995. In 2005, he wed Anwen Rees-Myers, a former actress and classical pianist, who was with him until his death.   Sir John was knighted in 2015 for his services to drama. After his cancer diagnosis the same year, he told the Radio Times: "I can't say I worry about mortality, but it's impossible to get to my age and not have a little contemplation of it. "We're all just passing time, and occupy our chair very briefly." He was still working up until his death, starring in Jackie Kennedy biopic Jackie, thriller Damascus Cover and the upcoming biopic of boxer Lenny McLean, My Name Is Lenny. He was also filming Darkest Hour, in which he starred as Neville Chamberlain opposite Gary Oldman's Winston Churchill, scheduled to be released in December.


^ I have seen several of the shows and movies that he was in, but my favorite (from when I was a kid) was "The Storyteller." ^


http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38778145

Blue Lives

From USA Today:
"Miss. 'Blue Lives Matter' bill: Targeting first responders a hate crime"

A Senate judiciary committee passed a  "Blue Lives Matter" bill Tuesday that would add the targeting of law enforcement and other first responders to the state hate crimes statute.
Senate Bill 2469 adds language that if a crime is committed because the victim's actual or perceived job is law enforcement, firefighter or emergency medical technician it would be considered a hate crime just as it would if a person was targeted due to race, gender or religion Targeting law enforcement officers and other first responders would lead to enhanced penalties under Mississippi's hate crime law if it passes, says Senate Judiciary A Chairman Sean Tindell, R-Gulfport.
Tindell said a person who kills a law enforcement officer is already subject to the death penalty under state law. However, under the proposed legislation, a person convicted of aggravated assault or other crimes on a law enforcement officer would also face enhanced penalties, in many cases double the standard sentence with no early parole.  Last year, Louisiana passed a similar law that added law enforcement officers to the protected class under that state's hate crime statute. Other states have been considering such bills. "I think everyone is aware where law enforcement were targeted, especially in Dallas," Tindell said, referencing the slaying of five police officers by a gunman last year. Sen. Chad McMahan, R-Guntown, tried unsuccessfully to amend the Mississippi bill to add that it would apply to an attack on uniformed law enforcement and other first responders. McMahan said there would be no question of an attacker's motive if he or she knew the victims were law enforcement.  However, Sen. Briggs Hoison, R-Vicksburg, said that if a victim were an undercover officer, and the attacker knew it, the law wouldn't apply then. Sen. Barbara Blackmon, D-Canton, argued the bill should include that if a law enforcement officer kills or injures someone when not following proper procedure, that officer should be charged with a hate crime. Tindell said since the hate crime law applies to everyone, he was opposed to adding the language Blackmon proposed. "I don't think this is the appropriate bill for that," Tindell said. Blackmon gave an impassioned statement about how her two sons had been stopped by law enforcement in the Jackson metro area, saying that it was because they were black and because of the type of vehicles they drove. Blackmon's amendment failed. Several "Blue Lives Matter" bills were filed this year in the Legislature. Gov. Phil Bryant also threw his support behind such legislation during his State of the State address last week. Mississippi ACLU Executive Director Jennifer Riley-Collins has expressed opposition to the measures.  Riley-Collins has said unnecessary "Blue Lives Matter" legislation is being proposed in states across the country. This legislation increases protections for law enforcement officers without balanced protections for residents against abusive and intrusive police practices, she said. Proponents of SB 2469 "pay lip service to protecting the police without actually doing so," she said Tuesday. "Not only is this bill unnecessary, but there is absolutely no evidence it will make police safer. Statistics show that violence against police is down. There are already severe, enhanced penalties for assaults on police officers in Mississippi. This bill, and others like it, prioritize police over people," Riley-Collins said.
Blue Lives Matter started after Black Lives Matter protests over deaths of some African Americans at the hands of police. Senate Bill 2469 now goes to the full Senate. If the bill passes in the Legislature, it will become law July 1.


^ People tend to throw support to the police the same way they do to soldiers - in a fake way just to sound "trendy." My family has a long history with people serving in the military and although I don't have any known police officers in my family it is still along the same lines - people putting their lives on the line to help others. As with any occupation there are some who abuse their position, but the majority do their jobs in the correct and professional manner and shouldn't be targeted because they are in the police force. ^


http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/01/24/blue-lives-matter-bill-hate-crime/97018166/

Chinese New Year


Friday, January 27, 2017

Holocaust: T-4

From the DW:
"Remembering the 'forgotten victims' of Nazi 'euthanasia' murders"

On Friday, January 27, the Bundestag will honor the hundreds of thousands of victims of Nazi "euthanasia" programs. The killing of those deemed genetically unsuitable was a prelude to the genocide of Jews and others. The mass murder of the supposed physically and mentally unfit was a project central to Hitler's thinking and the ideology of National Socialism. The Nazi leader translated ideas from the international eugenics and Social Darwinist movements of the early 20th century into a homicidal urge to cleanse the corpus of the German people from ailments and weaknesses. This obsession would cost the lives of more than 70,000 people in Germany and many, many more in countries occupied by the Third Reich. But those murders would not have been possible without the active participation of doctors, judges, administrators, scientists and others. "So-called racial hygienists, for example, what we would call geneticists, were a point of interface between science and politics," Maike Rotzoll, Deputy Director of the Institute for the History and Ethics of Medicine in Halle, told Deutsche Welle. "They tried to turn their ideas into political reality. And they were very successful." Hitler and the Nazis began pushing their eugenic agenda almost immediately after coming to power on January 30, 1933. By July of that year, the Hitler cabinet had approved the Law for the Prevention of Genetically Ill Offspring. It mandated the compulsory sterilization of anyone deemed likely to have children who would suffer from a broad range of conditions, including manic depression, deafness, alcoholism and "congenital imbecility.” Imbecility, in particular, was an extremely flexible concept, and German courts were very receptive to applications made by doctors and health officials for the compulsory sterilization of others. Three-member panels at special Hereditary Health Courts approved 90 percent of such requests. 300,000 to 400,000 people, mostly from German mental institutions, were sterilized before World War II - about half on the grounds of "feeblemindedness." Some of them were later put to death. Historian Hans-Ulrich Wehler called sterilization a "dry run" for the Nazi euthanasia campaigns.  The start of World War II on September 1, 1939, added vicious momentum to an already horrendous attempt to weed out the allegedly unfit from the genetic pool. Those deemed ill no longer merely represented obstacles to the abstract idea of genetic "health.” They also consumed resources potentially needed for the war effort. School mathematics textbooks began asking questions like: "The construction of a lunatic asylum costs 6 million marks. How many houses at 15,000 marks each could have been built for that amount?" "The murder of the sick began during the war,” Rotzoll said. "That wasn't accidental. In war, human lives are worth less.” In October 1939, doctors and nurses were told to transfer children they diagnosed with serious genetic ailments to special clinics that were, in reality, killing facilities. Led by Philipp Bouhler, the director of Hitler's private chancellery, and Karl Brandt, one of Hitler's personal physicians, this initiative was soon extended to adults. It was later called the "Action T-4," after Tiergartenstrasse 4 in Berlin, the address of the office that recruited and paid those who participated in the murders. By 1940, six euthanasia centers had been set up in various parts of Germany. 70,273 people were killed in them. The victims were poisoned, starved to death and in the later stages of Action T-4 killed in gas chambers that preceded the ones in Auschwitz and the other concentration camps. For that reason, the euthanasia program is often characterized as a "trial run” or "dress rehearsal” for the Holocaust.  "We can see the euthanasia murders as the first act of the Holocaust," Rotzoll said. "The Nazis saw that they could carry out a logistically complicated operation without the protests becoming so heated that it had to be cancelled. And we know there were lots of connections to Action T-4. Jewish patients were among the first to be murdered. The method of killing - gas chambers - is another connection as is using showerheads to distribute the gas, although the gas was carbon monoxide and not yet Zyklon B. That was all tried out in T-4." As many as 100,000 people may have been killed directly as part of Action T-4. Mass euthanasia killings were also carried out in the Eastern European countries and territories Nazi Germany conquered during the war. Categories are fluid, and no definitive figure can be assigned, but historians put the total number of victims at around 300,000.  Action T-4 was discontinued in August 1941. It had elicited public protests, in particular from Catholics, who felt that euthanasia contradicted their religion. For a long time, historians wrote of Hitler being forced by public pressure to cancel the program. But Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, also meant that many of the T-4 personnel were now needed in occupied Eastern Europe for ever larger campaigns of Nazi genocide. "The killing personnel were later used in the concentration camps Sobibor and Treblinka," said Rozell, who participated in a major research project and has co-authored a number of studies on euthanasia. In the main, physicians and others who participated in the euthanasia murders did so voluntarily, sometimes even enthusiastically. While the general homicidal impulse originated with Hitler, Action T-4 is a classic impulse of what historian Ian Kershaw has called "working towards the Führer" - driving the murderous developments by anticipating and fulfilling the dictator's wishes before he had even formulated them.  Historian Götz Aly has also assigned a high degree of blame to the families of the German victims, who failed to protect their relatives and sometimes approved of the murders. But others say that the situation was more differentiated. "There were family members who supported the murders, family members who tolerated the murders, and family members who protested against the murders," Rotzoll said.  For a long time in post-war Germany, those killed in the euthanasia programs were the forgotten victims of Nazi genocide. Families were reluctant to remember their dead relatives, perhaps because of shame at having failed to protect them, perhaps because of the stigma that continued to be attached to mental illness and physical handicaps. But over the years Germans -  historians and lay people - began to revisit the stories of the victims of this set of atrocities. Author Sigrid Falkenstein, for instance, who was born in 1946, was shocked when she learned that her aunt Anna Lehnkering had been murdered in the Grafeneck euthanasia facility. That inspired Falkenstein to write a highly regarded book called "Anna's Traces."  "In my family, we never talked about my aunt," Falkenstein told DW. "I now know that many families were and still are caught in a vicious circle of repression, silence and taboos. One reason was that the eugenic ways of thought, which stressed ‘racial hygiene,' didn't disappear with the end of the war. For a long time, victims, survivors and their families were stigmatized in both West and East Germany. By contrast, most of the perpetrators got off scot-free and continued their careers." In the aftermath of World War II, many of the doctors who bore responsibility for the killings received outrageously mild punishments or none at all. That injustice can no longer be rectified. What can improve and is improving is the willingness to memorialize the victims. "My impression is that there has been a positive turn in the culture of remembrance concerning the victims of ‘euthansia' and forced sterilization," Falkenstein, who will speak in the Bundestag, said. "I got a lot of positive feedback from other affected families who were inspired by my book to research their own relatives. Perhaps I was able to contribute in a small way to making this subject more widely known." In 2014, a memorial to the T-4 victims was inaugurated at Tiergartenstrasse 4. And the Bundestag remembrance ceremony is another step toward giving the euthanasia victims their proper place in history. "It's a significant, perhaps a historical act – an act of belated justice," Falkenstein said. "Perhaps we can learn something from it. The story of my aunt shows what can happen when we judge people by their value and usefulness and discriminate against them because they're ‘different' and don't conform to some arbitrary norm."


^ The T-4 extermination/sterilization program was a major part of the 1961 movie "Judgement At Nuremberg." and that's really when it became known to the majority of people outside of Germany. I watched that movie (as well as going to see the play in New York City when I was in college) and thought it showed just how T-4 affected the innocent people involved. I also saw that the Germans demonstrated openly against the program during the war and that it was officially cancelled. That shows that had the Germans wanted to they could have also stopped all the other crimes of World War 2 and the Holocaust that now stain Germany forever. I have worked with the mentally and physically disabled and can not imagine anyone wanting to hurt or murder them. It takes a special kind of monster to want to do that. People tend to say these were Nazi crimes, but in fact they were German crimes (as well as their collaborators throughout occupied Europe.) It is a crime for those that physically committed the act, for those that aided in the act as well as those that helped cover-up the act (even after World War 2 when the murderers were allowed to live and work in the open for decades and those that were arrested were only given light sentences.) That is why there is collective guilt in this and many other instances. A person may not have physically taken part in the crime, but if they help those that did in any way - even years after the fact - they are just as guilty as the one who committed the act. ^

http://www.dw.com/en/remembering-the-forgotten-victims-of-nazi-euthanasia-murders/a-37286088

Dual Remembrances

Not many people know why Israel has Yom HaShoah to remember the Holocaust in April or May (depending on the year) since 1953 and why the rest of the world remembers the Holocaust on January 27th since 2005. I learned the reason when I worked at the USHMM. It is pretty interesting to know.


Holocaust: Jack Marcus

From USA Today:
"Holocaust survivor told story to thousands of students"


Jack Marcus could have died on the day in 1939 when the Nazis rounded up all the Jews in his hometown in Poland and executed everyone. He could have died as a prisoner at Auschwitz or Dachau, or he could have lost his life on a death march in the ending months of World War II, his photo snapped by a passerby and printed decades later in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. But Marcus was a survivor — one of the few Jews still alive in Europe at the end of the war — and he dedicated his life to telling others his story.  "He went from being afraid of being caught by the Nazis to feeling very committed to the world knowing this story," said his son, Leonard Marcus.
Marcus, 93, died Tuesday in Milwaukee. Before he was Jack Marcus, he was Prisoner 144346. And before his left forearm was tattooed by the Nazis, he was Itzek Markowski, a boy growing up in the small town of Radziejow, northwest of Warsaw. On the day German soldiers came, his mother gave him a small bag of food and told him to flee. Marcus initially refused but relented at his mother's insistence. "You can imagine how painful it was for her to push her only son out, but she wanted him to have a future," said Leonard Marcus. An only child, 15-year-old Marcus hid in a haystack. His parents and the rest of the Jews in his town were loaded into specially outfitted trucks with engine exhaust piped into the back. They were driven around until everyone was asphyxiated. They were buried in a mass grave.  Marcus realized the only way to survive was to work, so he went to a labor camp in Poland. When the Nazis built the giant camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Marcus was sent to work there. One day while working in a steel plant, a heavy girder fell on his foot. Marcus was taken to the camp hospital where one of his toes was amputated.  "Ten days in, the doctor came to him and said you only get 14 days in the hospital. If you're still here after 14 days, they come and take you to the crematoria," Leonard Marcus said. Marcus went back to work, hobbling 2 miles each day from his spartan living quarters to the work site, eating a bowl of weak soup in the morning and evening and a piece of bread at noon.  One morning, Marcus was walking to work when he saw his uncle arriving at Auschwitz. He was thrilled to see his uncle from afar and later that day excitedly searched for him in his quarters. To his horror, he found only his uncle's clothes and Marcus knew his uncle had been gassed immediately upon arrival.  As the war was winding down in the winter of 1945, Marcus and hundreds of other laborers from Auschwitz were put on an open coal train and spent days traveling from Poland to Germany with no food or shelter from the brutal cold. The train stopped occasionally, and bodies of people who died from the cold and starvation were tossed off. One day Marcus saw a shivering boy ask a Nazi guard if he could get a coat from the body of one of the dead men thrown from the train. "My dad watched this young boy jump off the train and get a coat from a pile of bodies. A soldier went up to him and shot him in the back. My dad said, 'That's when I gave up hope,' " Leonard Marcus said.  Later, when the train stopped in another town, someone threw a loaf of bread at Marcus' train car. But the bread fell on the tracks. He knew if he jumped off to get the bread he would be killed, his son said. But by then he no longer cared. He threw the loaf up to the people in his train car. Instead of killing Marcus, a guard beat him and told him to get back on the train. The bread was gone by the time he clambered aboard, but Marcus told his son he got something else. He got his humanity back. At the end of the war, Marcus was fed by American soldiers and in return he gave them caps he made after teaching himself to be a tailor. He eventually immigrated to Milwaukee in 1950 where his cousins introduced Marcus to a young woman whose family had fled his same hometown before the war. Two months after they met, Marcus married Marlene and they were married 66 years until her death last month. He worked as a tailor and clothing cutter in Milwaukee. After he retired, he began speaking at schools about his experiences.  "Once he retired, he stepped back and looked at his whole life and knew it was his obligation to make sure future generations knew what happened. He saw more death than any of us can imagine," said his son. In addition to his son, Marcus is survived by daughter Sharon Lerman and grandchildren. 

^ He recently passed, but his story is still very interesting and horrible at the same time. ^


http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/01/26/holocaust-survivor-told-story-thousands-students/97075714/

Holocaust Remembrance


Thursday, January 26, 2017

Holocaust: US Memorials

From Wikipedia:
"List of Holocaust memorials and museums in the United States"

Arizona

  • The Holocaust and Tolerance Museum (Chandler)

California

  • The Desert Holocaust Memorial (Palm Desert)
  • Holocaust Center of Northern California (San Francisco)
  • The Holocaust Memorial at California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Lincoln Park (San Francisco)
  • Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust
  • The Museum of Tolerance (Los Angeles)
  • The Simon Wiesenthal Center (Los Angeles)
  • The Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation at University of Southern California (Los Angeles)

Florida

  • The Florida Holocaust Museum (St. Petersburg)
  • The Holocaust Memorial of the Greater Miami Jewish Federation (Miami Beach)
  • The Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida (Maitland)
  • The Holocaust Museum of Southwest Florida (Naples)

Georgia

  • The Kennesaw State University Museum of History and Holocaust Education (Kennesaw)
  • The William Breman Jewish Heritage & Holocaust Museum (Atlanta)

Illinois

  • Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center (Skokie)

Indiana

  • CANDLES Holocaust Museum and Education Center (Terre Haute)

Louisiana

  • New Orleans Holocaust Memorial at Woldenberg Park,
sculpture by Yaacov Agam.
  • Alexandria Holocaust Memorial, Holocaust Memorial Park
  • Maryland

    • The Baltimore Holocaust Memorial

    Massachusetts

    • The New England Holocaust Memorial (Boston)

    Michigan

    • The Holocaust Memorial Center (Farmington Hills)
    • University of Michigan Holocaust Memorial, Raoul Wallenberg Plaza, (Ann Arbor)
    sculpture by Leonard Baskin
    • Holocaust Memorial, Oakview Cemetery, Royal Oak

    Mississippi

    • Clarksdale, Mississippi, Holocaust Memorial, Clarksdale

    Missouri

    • Holocaust Museum & Learning Center, St Louis

    Nebraska

    • The Nebraska Holocaust Memorial (Lincoln)

    New Jersey

    • Liberation (Holocaust memorial), Liberty State Park (Jersey City)
    • Camden County Holocaust Memorial (Cherry Hill) dedicated June 7, 1981

    New Mexico

    • The New Mexico Holocaust & Intolerance Museum (Alburquerque)

    New York

    • Amud Aish Memorial Museum (Brooklyn)
    • Holocaust Memorial Park (Brooklyn)
    • The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous (Manhattan)
    • Museum of Jewish Heritage (Manhattan)
    • Holocaust Memorial, City Hall Plaza (Long Beach)
    • Holocaust Museum and Tolerance Center of Nassau County, Welwyn Preserve, (Glen Cove, Long Island)
    • Memorial to All Victims of the Holocaust: 1938-1945, Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court (Manhattan)

    Ohio

    • The Center for Holocaust and Humanity Education (Cincinnati)
    • Holocaust Memorial (Cleveland)
    • Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage (Beachwood)

    Oregon

    • Oregon Holocaust Memorial (Portland)

    Pennsylvania

    • The Holocaust Awareness Museum and Education Center (Philadelphia)
    • Holocaust Memorial (Harrisburg)
    • Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh (Pittsburgh)
    • Philadelphia Holocaust Memorial at Benjamin Franklin Parkway - Memorial to the Six Million Jewish Martyrs

    Rhode Island

    • Sandra Bornstein Holocaust Education Center (Providence)

    South Carolina

    • Charleston Holocaust Memorial (Charleston)

    Tennessee

    • Nashville Holocaust Memorial (Nashville)
    • The Children's Holocaust Memorial and Paper Clip Project at Whitwell Middle School (Whitwell)

    Texas

    • The Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education & Tolerance
    • The El Paso Holocaust Museum and Study Center
    • The Holocaust History Project (San Antonio)
    • Holocaust Museum Houston
    • The Holocaust Memorial Museum of San Antonio

    Washington, D.C.

    • The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

    Wisconsin

    • Holocaust Memorial (Milwaukee)

    Virginia

    • Emek Sholom Holocaust Memorial Cemetery (Henrico)
    • The Virginia Holocaust Museum (Richmond)
    ^ I've been to several of these and they are pretty interesting.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Holocaust_memorials_and_museums_in_the_United_States

    Holocaust: World Memorials

    From Wikipedia:
    "List of Holocaust memorials and museums"

    Argentina

    • Museo del Holocausto de Buenos Aires (Holocaust Memorial Museum, Buenos Aires)

    Australia

    • The Jewish Museum Holocaust and Research Centre (Melbourne, Victoria)
    • Leo Baeck Centre for Progressive Judaism (Kew, Victoria) Holocaust Memorial
    • Melbourne General Cemetery Holocaust Memorial (Parkville, Victoria)
    • Sydney Jewish Museum (Sydney, Australia)

    Austria

    • The Austrian Holocaust Memorial Service
    • Holocaust and Tolerance Center Styria, "House of Names" (Holocaust und Toleranzzentrum Steiermark, Haus der Namen) (Graz)
    • House of Responsibility, Braunau am Inn
    • The Judenplatz Holocaust Memorial (Vienna)
    • Mauthausen Concentration Camp Memorial,  (Mauthausen)

    Belarus

    • The Pit (Minsk)

    Belgium

    • Kazerne Dossin: Memorial, Museum and Documentation Centre on Holocaust and Human Rights (Mechelen)

    Brazil

    • Holocaust victims memorial at Rio de Janeiro - Cemitério Israelita do Caju (sephardic) - inaugurated in September 1975
    • Holocaust victims memorial at Salvador - Cemitério Israelita da Bahia - inaugurated in 2007
    • Holocaust Museum in Curitiba - inaugurated in 2011 (Paraná)

    Bulgaria

    • The Organization of the Jews in Bulgaria

    Canada

    • Holocaust Memorial sculpture (Edmonton, Alberta)
    • The Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre (Montreal, Quebec)
    • The National Holocaust Monument (planned) (Ottawa, Ontario)
    • Sarah and Chaim Neuberger Holocaust Education Centre (Toronto, Ontario)
    • The Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre (Vancouver, British Columbia)

    China (People's Republic of China)

    • Hong Kong Holocaust and Tolerance Centre (Hong Kong)
    • Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum "Wall of Shanghai List" and Holocaust Memorial statue(Shanghai)

    Croatia

    • The Jasenovac Memorial Area (Jasenovac)
    • Memorial Centre Lipa Remembers (Lipa, Matulji)

    Czech Republic

  • Holocaust memorial (Valašské Meziříčí)
  • Pinkas Synagogue (Prague)
  • Theresienstadt concentration camp (Terezín)
  • Estonia

    • Holocaust memorial at the site of Klooga concentration camp (Klooga)
    • Memorial at the site of Kalevi-Liiva (Jägala)

    France

    • Musée départemental de Résistance et Déportation (Agen)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Charente) (Angoulême)
    • Musée de la Résistance d’Anterrieux (Anterrieux)
    • Centre de la résistance et de la déportation du Pays d’Arles (Arles)
    • The Museum of the Resistance and Deportation (Besançon)
    • Musée de la Résistance, de la Déportation et de la Libération du Loir-et-Cher (Blois)
    • Musée de la Résistance de Bondues au Fort Lobau (Nord) (Bondues)
    • Centre Jean Moulin (Bordeaux)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation de Bourges et du Cher (Bourges)
    • Centre National d’Etudes de la Résistance et de la Déportation Edmond Michelet (Brive-la-Gaillarde)
    • Mémorial de Caen (Caen)
    • Musée de la Résistance (Castellane)
    • Centre régional de la Résistance et de la Déportation de Castelnau-le-Lez (Hérault) (Castelnau-le-Lez)
    • Musée du souvenir de Châlons (Marne) (Châlons-en-Champagne)
    • Musée de la Résistance, de l’Internement et de la Déportation de Chamalières (Chamalières)
    • Musée de la Résistance Nationale de Champigny-sur-Marne  (Champigny-sur-Marne)
    • Musée de la Résistance de Châteaubriant-Voves-Rouillé (Châteaubriant)
    • Mémorial du Vercors (Vassieux-en-Vercors)
    • Mémorial Charles de Gaulle (Colombey-les-Deux-Églises)
    • Mémorial de l’internement et de la deportation (Compiègne)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Fargniers)
    • Musée Départemental de la Résistance et de la Déportation de Forges-les-Eaux (Forges-les-Eaux)
    • Musée de la Résistance, de la Déportation et de la Seconde Guerre mondiale (Frugières-le-Pin)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation de l’Isère (Grenoble)
    • Maison d’Izieu mémorial des enfants juifs exterminés (Izieu)
    • Lieu de Mémoire au Chambon-sur-Lignon (Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, Haute-Loire)
    • Musée départemental de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Loiret)  (Lorris)
    • Centre d'histoire de la résistance et de la deportation (Lyon)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Tarn-et-Garonne) (Montauban)
    • Musée Bourbonnais de la Résistance Nationale (Allier) (Montluçon)
    • Musée de l’histoire vivante (Montreuil)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation  (Nantua)
    • Musée de la Résistance Henri Queuille (Corrèze)  (Neuvic)
    • Centre de recherche et d’étude azuréen du Musée de la Résistance Nationale  (Nice)
    • Centre de la mémoire d’Oradour-sur-Glane, village martyr (Oradour-sur-Glane)
    • Mémorial du Maréchal Leclerc de Hauteclocque et de la Libération de Paris et Musée Jean Moulin  (Paris)
    • Musée de l’Ordre de la Libération  (Paris)
    • Center of Contemporary Jewish Documentation & Mémorial de la Shoah (Paris)
    • Musée de la Résistance (Peyrat-le-Château)
    • Musée de la reddition de Reims (Reims)
    • Musée pyrénéen de la Résistance et de la Libération, dans l’Ariège (Rimont)
    • Centre Historique de la Résistance en Drôme et de la Déportation de Romans (Romans-sur-Isère)
    • Musée de la Résistance en Morvan (Saint-Brisson)
    • Mémorial de la Résistance et de la Déportation de la Loire (Saint-Étienne)
    • Musée de la Résistance bretonne (Saint-Marcel)
    • Le Centre européen du Résistant déporté au Struthof (Natzwiller)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Tarbes)
    • Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation de Picardie (Tergnier)
    • Musée Départemental de la Résistance (Thônes (La Balme-de-Thuy))
    • Centre Régional Résistance et Liberté (Deux-Sèvres) (Thouars)
    • Musée départemental de la Résistance et de la Déportation (Toulouse)
    • Musée vauzélien de la Résistance Nationale (Nièvre) (Varennes-Vauzelles)
    • Musée départemental de la déportation et de l’internement  (Varilhes)
    • Mémorial de la Résistance (Vassieux-en-Vercors)
    • Musée de la Résistance (Rosine Perrier) (Villargondran)

    Germany

  • Holocaust Tower, Jewish Museum, Berlin
  • The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (Berlin)
  • The Memorial to the Homosexuals Persecuted under the National Socialist Regime (Berlin)
  • The Memorial to the Sinti and Roma victims of National Socialism (Berlin)
  • Französische Kapelle (Soest)
  • Memorial and Information Point for the Victims of National Socialist Euthanasia Killings (German: Gedenk- und Informationsort für die Opfer der nationalsozialistischen »Euthanasie«-Morde)
  • Stolperstein - Holocaust memorials all over Germany
  • Greece

    • The Athens Holocaust Memorial - at the end of the pedestrian crossing, at the junction of Melidoni, Ermou and Efvoulou streets (Athens)
    • Cemetery and Monument for the Victims of the Holocaust - 3rd Cemetery of Athens, Nikea, Piraeus
    • Holocaust memorial outside of the archaeological site of Kerameikos (Athens)
    • Jewish Museum of Greece - Shoah Exhibit (Athens)
    • Jewish Museum of Thessaloniki - Shoah Exhibit (Thessaloniki, Central Macedonia)
    • Monument of the Victims of the Holocaust in the Jewish Martyrs square, (Rhodes)
    • Monument to Young Jews (dedicated to the memory of young Jews who died in the Holocaust) - Pafos Square, area of Kato Patissia, north of downtown Athens
    • Rhodes Jewish Museum (Rhodes)

    Hungary

    • Holocaust Memorial Center
    • Shoes on the Danube Promenade-The memorial is of metal shoes on the edge of the Danube. The Jews were ordered to take off their shoes, and were shot at the edge of the water so that their bodies fell into the river and were carried away. It represents their shoes left behind on the bank. The Fascist Arrow Cross miltiamen carried out the shootings. (Budapest)

    Israel

    • Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority (Jerusalem)
    • Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum (in Kibbutz Lohamei HaGeta'ot, Ghetto Fighters' House)
    • Beit Theresienstadt, the Theresienstadt Martyrs Remembrance Association (in Kibbutz Givat Chaim Ichud)
    • Massuah Institute for the Study of the Holocaust (in Kibbutz Tel Yitzhak )
    • "From Holocaust to Revival Museum” (in Kibbutz Lohamei Yad Mordechai)
    • Kiryat Bialystok (Archive and community center in Yehud)
    • Chamber of the Holocaust (Mount Zion, Jerusalem )
    • Ani Ma'amin Holocaust Museum (Jerusalem)
    • Forest of the Martyrs (Jerusalem)
    • LGBT Memorial to LGBT people persecuted by the Nazis Tel Aviv
    • The sculpture garden of Holocaust to resurrection in Karmiel

    Italy

    • Memoriale della Shoah (Milan, Italy)
    • Museo della Deportazione (Prato, Italy)
    • Museo della Shoah (Rome, Italy)
    • Museo Diffuso della Resistenza Torino (Torino, Italy)

    Latvia

    • Memorial complex at Rumbula
    • Memorial complex at Salaspils
    • Museum of Tolerance at the site of Kaiserwald
    • Museum "Jews in Latvia"
    • Riga ghetto and holocaust in Latvia museum

    Macedonia

    • Holocaust Memorial Center for the Jews of Macedonia in Skopje, Macedonia

    Mexico

    • The Tuvia Maizel Holocaust Museum in Mexico City, Mexico

    Netherlands

    • The Anne Frank House (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
    • The Hollandsche Schouwburg (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
    • The Joods Historisch Museum (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
    • The Homomonument (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
    • The Westerbork camp and informationcentre (Westerbork, Netherlands)
    • Herzogenbusch concentration camp

    Norway

    • Center for Studies of Holocaust and Religious Minorities (Oslo, Norway)

    Poland

    • Auschwitz concentration camp, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Oświęcim
    • Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, Oświęcim
    • The Auschwitz Jewish Center, Oświęcim
    • Bełżec extermination camp, Bełżec, Lublin Voivodeship
    • Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Warsaw
    • Radegast railway station, Łódź
    • Treblinka extermination camp, Treblinka, Masovian Voivodeship

    Russia

    • Holocaust Memorial Synagogue, Moscow
    • Russian Research and Educational Holocaust Center, Moscow

    Slovakia

    • Múzeum holokaustu a židovskej kultúry (Sereď)
    • SNM - Múzeum židovskej kultúry Bratislava (Bratislava)

    South Africa

    • The Cape Town Holocaust Centre (Cape Town, South Africa)
    • The Durban Holocaust Centre (Durban, South Africa)
    • The Johannesburg Holocaust And Genocide Centre (Johannesburg, South Africa)

    Sweden

    • Monument to the Memory of the Holocaust Victims, the Great Synagogue of Stockholm(Stockholm)

    Ukraine

    • Ukrainian Institute for Holocaust Studies (Dnepropetrovsk)

    United Kingdom

    • Beth Shalom Holocaust Centre (Nottinghamshire, England)
    • The Imperial War Museum Holocaust Exhibition in London
    • The Institute of Contemporary History and Wiener Library (London)
    • The Hyde Park Holocaust memorial, in Hyde Park, London.

    Uruguay

    • Memorial del Holocausto del Pueblo Judío (Montevideo, Uruguay)
    ^  It's important to have Holocaust museums and memorials around the world to help people learn about what happened (especially for those that can't go to the places in Europe where they actually happened. ^


    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Holocaust_memorials_and_museums