Story here. Good grief. Excerpt:

'Though the investigation of Friday's shootings continues, authorities said it appears Josephine and Jeffrey Ruckinger planned to murder her family at their rural central Pennsylvania home — but it remains unclear what exactly led to the deadly confrontation.

"They parked at the bottom of a long driveway, and walked up, heavily armed," said Cambria County District Attorney Kelly Callihan.
...
Police say Roberta, 64, answered the door, and cried out something like "Oh my God, they have guns!" before her daughter shot her at point-blank range. John Jr. then may have attempted to arm himself with a gun, but Jeffrey Ruckinger shot him multiple times in the chest, killing him, police said.

The elder Frew, 67, grabbed a .22 revolver and came out from the bedroom to find the daughter he didn't initially recognize pointing the shotgun at him. Frew fired once, hitting her in the head, then turned and exchanged fire with Jeffrey Ruckinger, killing him. He then called police.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'"To circumcise a child without medical reasons and without the child's consent, runs contrary... to the child's human rights and the fundamental principles of medical ethics," they write in a debate article in the Dagens Nyheter daily on Saturday.

The ombudsman Fredrik Malmberg, together with representatives from the Swedish Society of Medicine (SLS), the Swedish Society of Health Professionals (Vårdförbundet), the Swedish Paediatric Society (BLF) and the Swedish Association of Pediatric Surgeons (SLF), argues that Swedish law requires that the child's will be taken into account wherever possible.

Circumcision is a procedure which is typically carried out at a very young age and it is this issue of consent which is paramount, they argue.

"We consider circumcision of boys without the child's consent to be in contravention of article 12 of UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) which gives children the right to have an opinion in matters which concern them."'

Story here. Excerpt:

'Police say they arrested a College Station woman Wednesday after she paid someone she thought was a hit man to kill the father of her 7-year-old son, according to CBS affiliate KBTX.

Nicolette Beard, 33, allegedly agreed to pay an undercover officer $4,000 to kill 30-year-old Anthony Drymalla III.

KBTX reports College Station police got a tip about the case when one of Beard's friends told them about the woman's plan.

The motive behind the murder-for-hire plot was a custody battle between the parents, according to police.'

Story here. Excerpt:

'When two half-naked female protesters from the radical anarchist organization "Femen" disrupted Paris Fashion Week on Thursday by invading the catwalk with slogans painted on their bare chests, an 18-year old supermodel punched one of them squarely in the nose.

Hollie-May Saker, an 18-year old supermodel whom many say may be the next Kate Moss, saw the screaming protesters just as she was about to go on stage.

According to the Daily Mail, a woman from the "radical feminist group" grabbed Saker's arm and tried to lift up her skirt, at which point the model punched her on the nose. She then "continued her run" on the catwalk "as if nothing had happened."'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Every time a celebrity is acquitted of rape allegations, a pernicious media campaign clamours for anonymity for defendants to stop women and children from wrecking vulnerable men's lives. Most recently, we saw this after the Michael Le Vell trial.

Women Against Rape (WAR) and Lisa Avalos began to work on collaborative research in 2012 to compare how women accused of lying are treated in the US and the UK. Despite different legal systems, the findings shine a light on the UK, with poor investigations being found to be the central obstacle to justice.

Story here. Excerpt:

'A city agency created by Mayor Bloomberg to combat domestic violence plans to paper subways and the bus system with dire warnings to women who may not realize they’re being abused.

“Broken, threatened, put-down, scared,” the stark ads ask against the backdrop of a woman crying. “If you feel any of these in your relationship, that’s abuse.”

The ads from the Mayor’s Office to Combat Domestic Violence, which will start appearing in subways and on bus shelters Thursday, are part of a campaign called “That’s Abuse” that aims to encourage women in abusive relationships to seek help before the situation becomes violent.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Washington -- U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand today plans to make what she calls a major policy speech in which she will unveil a five-point package aimed at helping middle-class women in the workplace.

Gillibrand, D-N.Y., will outline her plan for the economic security of women beginning at 10:30 a.m. at the Center for American Progress, a progressive think tank based in Washington, D.C., with strong ties to the White House. New York's junior senator has been outspoken in the past about equal pay for women.

The Center for American Progress issued a report this week titled, "The State of Women in America." The report noted that despite advances in the workplace, women are paid 77 cents for every dollar a man is paid.'

Story here. This is an incident that occurred on a greenbelt trail in the Denver suburb of Wheat Ridge about a month ago. It was reported as a man stabbing a woman and her toddler child, and there was a manhunt for the man. I almost didn't see this follow up to this story in which it turned out that the woman allegedly stabbed herself and her child and blamed the man. This was during the major flooding in Colorado that week, so this new story slipped under my radar until now. Excerpt:

'The investigation into last month’s Wheat Ridge Greenbelt-area double-stabbing took a bizarre twist last week after police arrested the woman who was once thought to be a victim in the case – no accused of trying to pin the attack of her and her child on a man who she claims raped her years ago.

Stephany Harwood, 21, of Lakewood was arrested last week, and was being held at the Jefferson County jail on a felony charge of child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury. She was given a $100,000 bond.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Five fraternity lodges opened last Friday night, a later opening date than in previous years. The reason for the late opening date is 90 percent of each fraternity had to attend Title IX training for them to have guests at their lodges.
...
The fraternities will be enforcing stricter registration at their lodges this year to keep track of all the guests, said Will Cook, president of KA. The Title IX training is “meant to make sure the guests and brothers are safe and avoid any misunderstandings about sexual intent, hazing, bullying, etc.” Cook said.
...
“All in all, I think that the message that Title IX training conveys should not be targeted to one group of men for the sole reason of affiliation,” Southall said. “If the safety of our Westhampton College classmates is the priority, then training should be available for all men.”'

harticle here. Excerpt:

'An American professor specializing in studying the psychology of boys and men, masculinity and manhood is making the case for creating men's centres on campus.

Miles Groth is an advisory fellow for the Canadian Association for Equality (CAFE), which is working to raise funds to create the Canadian Centre for Men and Families.

Miles Groth is an advisory fellow for the Canadian Association for Equality (CAFE), which is working to raise funds to create the Canadian Centre for Men and Families.

Advocates on both sides of the border are seeking to fill what they view as a void at schools and within communities -- programs dedicated to studying, serving and supporting male interests and needs.

Article here. Excerpt:

'A discussion on women's health in the workplace, with a focus on the challenges of rheumatoid arthritis, will be held at noon today at the state Capitol.

State Sens. Sandy Pappas and Kathy Sheran will lead the event, "Women’s Health in the Workplace: Chronic Disease & Aging," from noon to 1 p.m. in Room 118 at the Capitol.

The discussion will look at the impact of arthritis on work and social life, family relationships and other aspects of daily life.'

---
http://www.cdc.gov/arthritis/data_statistics/arthritis_related_stats.htm#3:

'25.9% of women and 18.3% men report doctor-diagnosed arthritis.'

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cfoi.pdf, p. 11:

Article here. Excerpt:

'The next speaker in an ongoing lecture series on men’s issues will be talking about why some young men are disengaged with college and university—something he blames, in part, on the anti-date-rape talks given to freshmen.
...
“Some of the content of these seminars, which are now very common in colleges and universities, set these boys coming in, set them up as being potentially dangerous, and potentially harmful, particularly to women on campus,” he said.

“There are, for example, date-rape seminars that are de rigueur for nearly all first-year student programs.”

Groth questioned whether the date-rape talks are “overkill” and “whether in fact it might not be wiser to talk about this in a broader way, let’s say for example, courtesy between boys and girls on campus, regardless of who’s behaving, males or females.”

A second reason for young men feeling unwelcome is that some courses appear to better reflect young women’s university lives, he said.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'But new to the Campus Freedom Index this year, however, is the topic of men’s issues awareness — a subject that wets the felt-tip markers of the perpetually outraged upon mere mention. The movement is a relatively recent phenomenon on Canadian campuses, where men’s rights speakers and groups are usually met with protests, attempts at censorship and placards about how “Men’s Rights is Misogyny.” In other words: pure failure fodder for the Campus Freedom Index.

The Center for Prosecutor Integrity (CPI) is releasing a new report that calls for strong oversight measures designed to assure ethical prosecutor conduct and stop wrongful convictions.: Roadmap for Prosecutor Reform.

Lawmakers, legal oversight boards, and other stakeholders should take note of this important report, which includes 20 reforms designed to enhance the accountability of local, state, and federal prosecutors.

Roadmap for Prosecutor Reform is available here: http://www.prosecutorintegrity.org/wp-content/uploads/RoadmapProsecutorReform.pdf

An Epidemic of Prosecutor Misconduct, is available here: http://www.prosecutorintegrity.org/wp-content/uploads/EpidemicofProsecutorMisconduct.pdf

The aggregate SAT scores report for 2013 has been released.

Boys outperform girls in math.
Girls outperform boys in reading.

Brace youselves for the pending flood of articles on how this news (girls doing poorly in math) is a disaster and how we must find ways to make the boys do worse -- oops! sorry, I mean -- help the girls do better.

Naturally no one will give a rat's ass about the problem boys have in reading. We only care about the girls.