Free Republic

Jeddah’s anti-begging unit is fully equipped to deal with the large number of beggars that appear on the city’s streets during Ramadan, said Saad Al-Shahrani, unit director. “The fasting month of Ramadan and the Eid holiday are two of the highest seasons for begging, not only in Saudi Arabia, but throughout the Islamic world,” he told Arab News. “We will deploy 500 undercover volunteers to arrest beggars during the holy month in coordination with the Social Affairs Ministry and the Jeddah Police Department,” he said. A committee will be formed and more than 300 vehicles will be deployed across several...

More than 2,000 Saudis were arrested for begging in 2013 while nearly 18,000 expatriates were caught for committing the same offence. Official data showed the number of Saudis caught begging last year was below half the 4,957 local beggars arrested 15 years ago. “This shows that government efforts to stem begging by Saudis have paid off,” the Arabic language daily Aleqtisadiah said. The paper, citing figures by the social affairs ministry, said the number of foreign beggars was also far below the 22,650 beggars caught 13 years ago. Nearly nine million expatriates, mainly Asians and Arabs, live in Saudi Arabia,...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — Panhandlers in Winston-Salem could soon be required to wear a photo identification badge at all times under a proposal by the City Attorney’s Office. All panhandlers are required by current city ordinance to apply and obtain a free panhandling license. The City Attorney’s Office now recommends adding a photo ID provision into the licensing process and requiring the tag to be worn at all times while panhandling. The ID tag would also include the license’s expiration date. Having ready identification would help the city enforce current panhandling laws according to The City Attorney’s Office, which also cites...

Sweden's EU Minister Birgitta Ohlsson says she is saddened and outraged that secret talks with Romania about the Central European country's poorest citizens have broken down. Hotel head sends open apology to Roma guest (28 Mar 14) Swedish store 'sorry' for dousing beggar (21 Mar 14) Police evict Romanians from Stockholm camp (13 Mar 14) "We have a more empathetic view of these people," Ohlsson told Dagens Nyheter (DN) on Tuesday. "I think that other countries, not least Romania, are surprised by how we see things." The Swedish government had been holding closed-door meetings with their Romanian colleagues for months....

Indianapolis offers the full urban deal: great architecture, hot restaurants, famous museums and a walkable downtown. It also has had one of the worst panhandler problems I’ve seen. At almost every street corner, it seemed, someone was squeezing you for money. In August, Indianapolis joined numerous other cities that have attempted to curb aggressive begging. And as has happened elsewhere, the American Civil Liberties Union immediately filed a suit. “The ACLU of Indiana,” its executive director, Jane Henegar, said, “believes in the power of the First Amendment to give everyone a voice, even when those voices confront us with our...

[Citing First Amendment, ACLU sues to stop panhandling arrests] PHOENIX - The American Civil Liberties Union wants a federal judge to block police in Arizona from enforcing a law making begging a crime, calling it an infringement on free speech. ACLU attorney Dan Pochoda said the measure is unconstitutional because it makes people subject to arrest not because they are loitering, but because of what they are saying. He contends asking someone for money is no different from politicians seeking support on the same public streets. The lawsuit is most immediately aimed at the city of Flagstaff which, in an...

The Obama Campaign has been run like the United States of Obama.Yesterday, I received just one measly begging e-mail from the Obama campaign. Starting to feel left out, I have already received three today, each slightly different from the others. This is the one begging e-mail I received yesterday: But first, a word some tears from the sponsor: Hey, Listen -- we're not there yet, and I'm not one to sugarcoat things. Mitt Romney and the Republicans entered the last leg of this campaign with $45 million more in the bank than us. That's a problem, no matter where the...

The city's current panhandling ordinance is rarely, if ever, enforced, according to police and attorneys who spoke recently to city council. Atlanta's anti-panhandling ordinance is "effectively, a worthless piece of paper" and might have to be scrapped or extensively rewritten to make it enforceable, said Michael J. Bond, chair of the City Council's public safety committee. Atlanta has been trying to push back against panhandling for years, partly to appease downtown residents and partly to protect the city's lucrative tourism and convention industries, which bring in hundreds of thousands of visitors and millions in spending and taxes. And then there...

Sound bites from the left. Sound bites to the right; here I am, stuck in the middle with you (STEALERS WHEEL). The House Budget Committee was in full political regalia as posturing for the home folks and November’s election was in full force. Most of the questions are redundant or ridiculous and in some cases, both. An exception was Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, who asked Mr.Bernanke if the FED‘s policies had corrupted the BOND markets that they stopped sending a credible signal. It has been a consistent theme of NOTES that the BOND market is broken as an indicator of...

On January 19, 2010, in a speech from the White House yard, the president sank to a new low. In a speech more appropriate to the back door of a mansion than the Rose Garden, he resorted to the age-old technique of begging… not on one’s own behalf – that would be embarrassing – but on the behalf of family, friends, or other worthies. I’m reminded of the gaggles of panhandlers famous in the piazzas and town squares of Europe. When last I visited my ancestral home town of Pizzo Calabro, I was warned to beware of Calabria’s omnipresent families...

Oh, this is rich. I’m laughing so hard, it’s difficult to type. Only in California. For a few years now, I’ve been signed up for Barbara Boxer’s campaign solicitations. Keep your enemies closer and all that. So, today Ms. Boxer is just tickled pink all over to announce to her California groupies that the one, the only, the prophet of global warming, the Oscar-winning, Peace-prize-taking guy who got filthy rich hawking gloom-and-doom snake oil to the world is coming to L.A.!!!! Just for her. So they can both stand in the same room together begging for more money from the...

Two young boys, twelve or so, sitting outside a bagel store, one of them had said to me, “Hey, lend me a dollar.” See Articles & Stuff "What would you do? "

Another addition to the journals of the absurd… we’ve got a panhandler who was arrested for begging without a permit in North Carolina. The story from WRAL…

THE hours are long and the work monotonous, but begging pays well for at least one of Sydney's homeless men who earns up to $50,000 a year from good samaritans. Ken Johnson, 52, makes his living on busy George and Market St, outside the Myer store in Sydney's CBD, where he sits for up to 16 hours daily, seven days a week.

Research Highlights Nature 459, 618 (4 June 2009) | doi:10.1038/459618a; Published online 3 June 2009 Animal behaviour: Pretty please Many young animals beg for food from their elders. But, eventually, the pleading stops or the charity dries up. Joah Madden, at the University of Cambridge, UK, and his team looked to find the biological triggers that put an end to begging behaviour by studying free-ranging meerkats (Suricata suricatta) of the Kalahari Desert in South Africa over an 18-month period. The group analysed the begging calls of meerkat pups aged between 40 and 60 days — the peak of their begging...

I saw a clip of this video on Bill O'Reilly's show tonight (don't ask me why I was watching -- I probably shouldn't have drunk (drank?) (drinked?) a whole bottle of Nyquil but that's water under the bridge). The video is of bears begging for food from visitors at a zoo. They perform some hilarious antics but I can't quite decide if they are for real or is it one of those computer generated deals like that commercial a few years ago of a bear fighting a guy who just caught a salmon.

Being a beggar will not be so easy anymore if draft legislation approved by the cabinet yesterday becomes law. The bill proposed by the Human Security and Social Development Ministry sets conditions for people who want to be beggars. They must provide proof they are underprivileged, disabled, homeless or elderly without children to care for them. And this will be a reserved occupation, exclusively for Thais who must carry ID cards. Would-be professional beggars will have to report to local administration organisations for approval and work permits. Local agencies will be responsible for controlling beggars in their jurisdictions, while the...

COOS BAY, Ore. (AP) - A police survey says panhandlers outside a Wal-Mart here can make $300 a day. Inside, it takes a clerk a week to make that much. Police say people who have a problem with that needn't look to the law--asking for money is considered protected free speech. "We are not going to target panhandlers," said Coos Bay Police Capt. Rodger Craddock, who spoke a recent gathering of business owners about panhandling. "We can't do that. But if they aren't getting money from us, they aren't going to stand on that corner." He said most panhandlers are...

Sam Grabarski, president of the Minneapolis Downtown Council, pulled his car into the parking lot behind the Shubert Theater on Hennepin Avenue several weeks ago. A man opened his door, grabbed him and demanded money. Grabarski shoved the man away and then followed him out of the parking lot to ensure that the aggressive panhandler accosted no one else. Brazen conduct such as this is still rare in Minneapolis, says Grabarski. Increasingly, however, "livability" crimes, from panhandling to public urination. are undermining the quality of life in the city. "People don't expect to be the victim of a felony --...