Sally Clark had two sons. Both died within weeks of birth, a year apart, apparently of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), sometimes called cot death. SIDS is — mercifully — rare; in England, at the time, it struck roughly one in 8,500 babies. That statistic led to Clark being prosecuted for double murder in 1998, despite there being little to no forensic evidence for her guilt.
A paediatrician, Roy Meadows, called as an expert witness for the prosecution, told the court that the probability of the two deaths happening by chance was one in 73 million: that is, 8,500 times 8,500.
As it happens, that’s not true. This calculation assumes that the deaths are entirely uncorrelated, but we know that SIDS can run in families and be affected by environmental conditions. If you have one case of SIDS in your household, while incredibly rare, you are more likely to have a second; the 73 million figure is orders of magnitude too high. But that wasn’t Meadows’s big mistake.
His big mistake was the following: he assumed that if the probability of the two deaths happening by chance was one in 73 million, then the probability that Sally Clark was innocent was one in 73 million as well.
But this is wrong. Crucially, catastrophically wrong. As wrong as assuming that because only one human in eight billion is the President of the United States, there’s only a one-in-eight-billion chance that the President of the United States is human.
Nonetheless, Meadows’s testimony helped convict Clark in 1999. She spent three years in jail before her conviction was overturned on appeal. Her life was, obviously, ruined. It will not surprise you to learn that she drank herself to death four years later, alone. It’s a haunting story.
The Supreme Court said Monday that it would not hear former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin’s appeal of his second-degree murder conviction in the May 2020 death of George Floyd.
Chauvin was found guilty by a state court in April 2021 and sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison in connection with Floyd’s May 25, 2020, death, which triggered riots across the country and a prolonged debate on race relations in America.
Chauvin, 47, is also appealing his conviction and 21-year sentence on separate federal charges in connection with Floyd’s death. Those punishments were not considered by the high court.
New Hampshire Republicans advanced legislation Friday that would eliminate all exceptions to the state’s voter ID law.
House Bill 1569 would require anyone who shows up to register to vote on Election Day to provide proof of citizenship through documents such as a birth certificate or a passport.
“Confidence in our elections means that you have found that the person that confronted you, asking you for that ballot is qualified to vote. They are a citizen,” said state Sen. James Gray, R-Rochester.
After it was revealed that Attorney General Merrick Garland, the FBI and DOJ added language to their search warrant permitting the FBI to use deadly force against President Trump and/or his security detail during the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago, President Trump responded with shock.
Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a motion to amend the bail conditions for President Trump on Friday night. Prosecutor Smith wants Judge Cannon to forbid President Trump from talking about the FBI agents who conducted the armed raid and used the search warrant. [PDF Court Motion Here]
There is a profound irony in Jack Smith seeking to block President Trump from talking about the FBI conduct, as the former president’s remarks might create “misleading impressions” about the details of the raid. The DOJ and FBI have been leaking “misleading impressions” to the media for almost 9 years about the FBI operation investigation of Donald Trump.
For nine years, more than 40 highly political assigned FBI agents have been fabricating stories and leaking them to the media; yet, it is President Trump who the DOJ worries might create “misleading impressions.” The issue would be farcical if the lying FBI topic was not so serious.
Joe Biden was ready to have his main political rival Donald Trump and his family killed for a publicity stunt!
Judge Aileen Cannon on Tuesday unsealed numerous motions related to Jack Smith’s classified documents case against Trump.
One filing revealed Biden’s FBI authorized the use of deadly force during their raid on Mar-a-Lago authorized by US Attorney General Merrick Garland in August 2022.
“Should FPOTUS [Trump] arrive at MAL [Mar-a-Lago], FBI MM EM and OSCs will be prepared to engage with FPOTUS and USSS Security Team.”
“Should USSS provide resistance or interfere with FBI timeline or accesses, FBI MM EM will engage with [redacted] and [redacted] will engage with USSS POC’s per existing liaison relationships.”
A school district in Riverside County will pay $360,000 to settle a suit by a former high school teacher who was fired after refusing, for what she described as religious reasons, to promise to call transgender students by their chosen pronouns or to keep their gender identity secret from their parents.
The Jurupa Valley Unified School District agreed Tuesday to pay $285,000 to former high school gym teacher Jessica Tapia and $75,000 to her lawyers at Advocates for Faith and Freedom, a conservative religious nonprofit. The settlement said it was not an admission of wrongdoing by district officials, but Tapia’s lawyers proclaimed a victory for religious rights.
Tapia “fought back to ensure her school district was held accountable and that no other teacher has to succumb to this type of discrimination,” said attorney Julianne Fleischer.
Apparitions and extraordinary spiritual phenomena are not necessary for salvation, but they can be spiritually fruitful. A new document from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) attempts to guide bishops in preserving the spiritual fruit while not having to take a position on the supernatural integrity of the phenomena itself.
The document, entitled “Norms for Proceeding in the Discernment of Alleged Supernatural Phenomena,” replaces the procedures put in place by Pope St. Paul VI in 1978. The new norms and their introduction by Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the DDF, make no mention of Medjugorje; however, it seems likely that the claimed apparitions there — which began soon after the 1978 norms, in 1981 — influenced the 2024 document. Medjugorje was addressed in the press conference presenting the document.
…The six options in the new norms are as follows. One can see how, over the last few decades, Medjugorje would have fallen into various of the new categories:
— Nihil Obstat: Without expressing any certainty about the supernatural authenticity of the phenomenon itself, many signs of the action of the Holy Spirit are acknowledged. The bishop is encouraged to appreciate the pastoral value and promote the dissemination of the phenomenon, including pilgrimages;
— Prae oculis habeatur: Although important positive signs are recognized, some aspects of confusion or potential risks are also perceived that require the diocesan bishop to engage in a careful discernment and dialogue with the recipients of a given spiritual experience. If there were writings or messages, doctrinal clarification might be necessary;
— Curatur: Various or significant critical elements are noted, but the phenomenon is already spread widely, and verifiable spiritual fruits are connected to it. Therefore, a ban that could upset the faithful is not recommended, but the local bishop is advised not to encourage the phenomenon;
— Sub mandato: The critical issues are not connected to the phenomenon itself but to its improper use by people or groups, such as undue financial gain or immoral acts. The Holy See entrusts the pastoral leadership of the specific place to the diocesan bishop or a delegate;
— Prohibetur et obstruatur (“prohibited and stopped”): Despite various positive elements, the critical issues and risks associated with this phenomenon appear to be very serious. The dicastery asks the local bishop to offer a catechesis that can help the faithful understand the reasons for the decision and reorient their legitimate spiritual concerns;
— Declaratio de non supernaturalitate: The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith authorizes the local bishop to declare that the phenomenon is found to be not supernatural, based on concrete facts and evidence, such as the confession of an alleged visionary or credible testimonies of fabrication of the phenomenon.
Under the previous norms it was difficult for a bishop to guide — much less encourage — the good fruit that he could see without also endorsing the entire phenomenon as being of supernatural origin. The new norms give the bishop more flexible categories in order to move more quickly, essential in the digital age of instant communication. A determination of supernatural origin could take years, even decades, in the past.
Jeremy Carl is a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, served as deputy assistant secretary of the interior under President Trump, and has been associated with the Hoover Institution. His other books have dealt with energy policy. In a chapter on religion, he describes himself as “an actively engaged Christian of Jewish descent.” That a writer with solid connections to “respectable conservatism” is publishing a book with “anti-white racism” in the subtitle is a sign of changing times. Moreover, the author does not try to tell us that the problem with hostility towards whites is merely “divisive” or supposedly incompatible with Martin Luther King’s “dream.” He states forthrightly that it leads to injustices against whites, and that whites must fight back.
The heart of The Unprotected Class is 12 chapters dealing with anti-white attitudes and policy in civil rights law, crime and punishment, housing, education, historical remembrance, immigration, entertainment, environmentalism, business, medicine, religion, and the military. Race realism peeks through only in the chapter about medicine; the author admits that race differences are based in biology. The first four chapters are the most interesting.
Mr. Carl rightly begins his analysis with civil rights law, the heart of the anti-white regime. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 did much more than outlaw certain types of racial discrimination; it created an army of bureaucrats and lawyers to enforce the new rules. The intrusive powers of this bureaucracy were greatly extended by the Supreme Court’s decision in Griggs vs. Duke Power Supply (1971), a case involving the use of IQ and mechanical aptitude tests to assess employees for advancement.
As the author notes, “the record is clear that the Congress which enacted the 1964 act did not intend to interfere with employment tests,” but that didn’t matter. Blacks do not perform as well as whites on IQ and other tests, and the Court ruled that this “disparate impact” by race is discrimination even if there is no intent to discriminate.
US drug officials will move to redefine marijuana as a less dangerous drug, citing that it is less likely to be abused than heroin or MDMA.
Five anonymous sources told the Associated Press Tuesday that the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will propose changing marijuana from Schedule 1, which has the highest potential for abuse, to Schedule 3, alongside the likes of ketamine and some anabolic steroids.
The proposal, which will be reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), would acknowledge that it has less potential for abuse than some of the nation’s most dangerous drugs like heroin and MDMA.
However, it would not legalize marijuana outright for recreational use.
American Buddhist Net 