Starving 2-year-old Boy Thought to Be a Witch, Undergoes an Incredible Transformation.

You may recall a shocking photo that took the internet by storm. The picture showed Anja Ringgren Loven giving water to a starving child. The two-year-old boy was naked and roaming the streets of Nigeria all alone. Anja gave him water, fed him, wrapped him up in a blanket and took him straight to the hospital.

Anja pieced together the little boy’s situation. The 2-year-old boy, now known as Hope, had reportedly been abandoned by his family because they thought he was a witch. Hope was left to fend for himself. He had to find water and food wherever and however he could. Shockingly, like Hope, thousands of Nigerian children are accused of witchcraft and are subjected to neglect, fear and torture as a result.

For the past three years, Anja has made it her life’s mission to save the lives of impoverished or neglected children so Hope was in the right hands. She and her husband run African Children’s Aid Education and Development Foundation, an organization based in Uyo that provides kids with education, food, shelter and medical care.

It’s been two months since Anja rescued Hope, and just wait until you see how different he looks today…

After Hope was rescued, Anja took to her organization's website: "I have seen much here in Nigeria over the last three years," she wrote. "The images here show why I am fighting, why I sold everything I own."

After Anja's original photo with Hope went viral, donations for the little boy began flooding in. With Hope under her caring wing, he started gaining weight and growing healthier by the day.

His transformation is jaw-dropping. Looking at Hope now, you'd never know he was so severely ill, unloved and malnourished just eight weeks ago.

He's a happy and inquisitive child He loves it when people read stories to him. Here he is with Anja's husband, David, who also runs African Children’s Aid Education and Development Foundation.

Hope will soon undergo surgery for a birth defect and is expected to make a full recovery. Thanks to Anja, this little boy has a full life of love ahead of him.

Anja and David started building their own orphanage so that even more children can find hope.

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Snowden: Brussels Attack and Boston Bombing Could Have Been Stopped.

As Snowden noted during the University of Arizona panel discussion, which also included Professor Noam Chomsky and journalist Glenn Greenwald, these reports surfaced almost immediately after the attacks claiming Belgian and other intelligence forces had been notified of the potential danger this individual posed.

“In all the talk of Brussels, there’s a story that just recently broke, which I’m not sure has gotten the same play as the others, which is that the attack was preventable; and it was preventable through traditional means, not mass surveillance. An allied intelligence service — in this case, in Turkey — warned Belgium that this individual was a criminal, that they were involved in terrorist activities, and this individual turned out to be one of the suicide bombers.” 

“In the United States, we have the same thing, in the Boston Marathon bombings. We were explicitly warned by foreign intelligence services that one of the brothers [who] was involved in the bombings would be engaged in that kind of activity,”

“The security services knew, with a high degree of certainty, that [the Brussels] attacks were planned in the very near future for the airport and, apparently, for the subway as well.”

“I think it’s really important to note a couple of things about Brussels. Number one is, the Brussels attack is now the fourth straight attack, after Boston, the Charlie Hebdo massacre, and then the Paris attacks, where siblings, brothers, were at the heart of the planning. And just like in those three previous attacks that I just referenced, the attacks were carried out by people who live in the same communities, who live very close to one another, and who almost certainly met in person in order to plan them. And yet, the exploitive mindset of Western politicians is to say, every time there’s a successful attack carried out, it means we need to wage war on encryption, we need greater surveillance, we need more police in these communities. But the reality is … none of that will actually help detect the attack.”

"[For] 15 years [the United States] has been declaring itself at war and bombing multiple countries and then acts surprised when people want to come and attack us back."

“And so I think, more than saying we need more intelligence and more surveillance and wage war on encryption and more bombing campaigns, we need to be asking whether there are things that we can be doing that reduce the incentive for people to kill us … and especially the support infrastructure that they get because of the anti-American and anti-European sentiment that gets generated when we engage in all of this violence in the world.” ~ Ed Snowden. 

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Responding To The Global Crisis

“Responding to the Global Crisis” takes aim at the fundamental idea behind environmental and social devastation – the idea that you can infinite growth on a finite planet – and challenges each of us to respond in our own unique ways.

Participate in helping humanity change the story of the world: http://sustainablehuman.me/

'Stop bombing, start resettling' - Jeff Kennett on the Syrian Refugee Crisis

"So for goodness sake, spend that money on setting up the camps to process these people and bring back 50,000 who want a new life and new hope."

"There will be always be people who oppose, and there are always going to be some bigots, but leadership rises above it and the Australian public is desperately crying out for leadership,"

"The Federal Parliament has failed, absolutely failed, the people of this country for a decade,"

 

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Syrian Refugee crisis: Australia Welcomes you if you're Christian

The Abbott Government wants to limit any intake of Syrian refugees to minorities which are largely Christian, as passions run high in the Coalition over the way Australia should handle the crisis in Syria.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott is under pressure to increase this year's humanitarian intake of 13,750 people, but has postponed a decision while Australia consults with the United Nations about what to do with the refugees. 

Labor is pressuring to increase the intake of 10,000 people, while the Greens want 20,000.

There is also a debate over numbers what kind of refugees Australia should be accept.

Government ministers, like Malcolm Turnbull, want more Syrian Christians, while Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has asked for minorities like the Yazidis.The Abbott Government wants to restrict any intake of Syrian refugees to minorities which are largely Christian, as passions run high in the Coalition over the way Australia should handle the crisis in Syria.

Mr Turnbull has expressed concern about the plight of Christian communities in Syria.

"They are a minority, they survived in Syria, they've been there for thousands of years, literally since the time of Christ," he said. 

"But in an increasingly sectarian Middle East, you have to ask whether the, the gaps, the spaces that they were able to live and survive in will any longer be available."

Senate Leader Eric Abetz has also wants Christians to be prioritised.

"It should be on the basis of need and given the Christians are the most persecuted group in the world, and especially in the Middle East, I think it stands to reason that they would be pretty high up on the priority list for resettlement."

Ms Bishop wants to offer both temporary and permanent protection options for those fleeing the crisis.

"I think that Christian minorities are being persecuted in Syria and even if the conflict were over they would still be persecuted," she said.

"So I believe there will be a focus on ensuring we can get access to those persecuted ethnic and religious minorities who will have no home to return to even when the conflict is over.

"That includes Maronites, it includes Yazidis, there are Druze, there are a whole range of ethnic and religious minorities that make up the populations in both Syria and Iraq."

Labor believes emphasis on helping Christian refugees is "dangerous"

"Being a victim of war doesn't know a particular religion," Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said.

"If you're a woman facing terrible crimes to be committed against you, if you're a child, a little child, potentially drowning at sea, I'm not interested in their religion, I'm interested in their safety."

Refugee Council chief executive Paul Power said it is "natural" to expect a large number of refugees will be Christian, but focusing on the group is likely to do damage.

"I'm sure one of the consequences is that extremists within Syria and other parts of the Middle East will use this as a weapon against Syrian Christians," Mr Power said.

"They would use it as an argument to push the view that the west cares about Christians and does not care about Muslims and other religious minorities."

Coalition MPs, in this morning's party room meeting, suggested the Government fast-track a planned increase in the number of refugees it accepts.

Cabinet will discuss the issue tomorrow morning and there is a suggestion the party room may meet again before an announcement is made.

Speaking from Europe, Mr Dutton said he would hold talks with the United Nations refugee agency and other organisations on how Australia could help.

"There's more to be done and the Australian Government's very keen to have discussions with the UNHCR, with our partners otherwise, to look at what more we can do," he said.

"We'll be focusing our attention particularly on the families who are in the refugee camps along the border of Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey."

Liberal backbencher Cory Bernardi said persecuted minorities must be the focus on Australia's efforts.

"The Christians in the Middle East are among the most persecuted people on Earth," he told the Senate. 

"If we can provide safe haven to them, then I say we should do it. And that is what the Prime Minister has said."

Senator Bernardi also questioned the motivation of thousands of those who are trying to enter Europe.

"This seems to me to be becoming an opportunistic cycle which is masking the true humanitarian need that is the responsibility of all Western nations," he said.

"That is the challenge for us — to distinguish between those who are being opportunistic and those are truly in need."

Richard Marles has described Senator Bernardi as an "embarrassment" to the Government and his comments "reprehensible" and out of kilter with community sentiment.

Government backbencher Ewen Jones said Australia had the capacity to take up to 50,000 refugees. 

But the calls for ever larger intakes were rebuffed by another Coalition backbencher, Andrew Nikolic.

"We will do this is an evidence-based way," he said.

"We're not going to do it in a way with this rhetoric of trying to out-compassion each other."

Original Article by political reporter Anna Henderson and political editor Chris Uhlmann ABC

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Daniel Andrews wastes more than $420m on no East West Link.

Daniel Andrews has wasted $420m compensating the East West Link consortium for NOT building the East West Link toll road. But what about the $480m that the Liberal Party claim has already been spent on the project. That blows out the cost to $900m with nothing to show for it. 

To put that in perspective, 

"The St Vincent de Paul Society has 547 people on its waiting list for housing in inner and north-west Melbourne. That number is growing by 30 people every month." - The Age July 28 2014.

$420m would buy each of the homeless people on on the St Vincent de Paul Society waiting list a $768k house.  

Based on the $900m that the Liberal Party claims has now been spent on the cancelled project, the government could build another brand new children's hospital. It could build almost two Etihad Stadiums. Or give every man, woman and child in Victoria $155.00. 

If the Victorian government has enough money to waste $420m or $900m, depending on who you believe, on building NOTHING, the government can never again claim there is not enough money in the budget to give our teachers, nurses, police, firemen, paramedics or any other essential public servants the pay increases they deserve. The governments financial waste and mismanagement has to stop. 

How the elite stay in power.

This video breaks down in simple terms a very complex game that is happening behind the scenes that we do not notice. A complex game played by the very few against everyone else.