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Showing posts with label Police State. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Police State. Show all posts
Sunday, April 7, 2019
"Fascists do not deserve civility..."
"Fascists do not deserve civility. You would have us compliment the shine of their boots as they bear down on our necks. Fuck you." ~@dadamstowel @twitter
Photo Credit: Stephen Shames - Up Against The Wall - San Francisco, 1970
Shames was enamoured with the Black Panther Party. His photographic collection related to them is the world’s largest.
Monday, May 24, 2010
Action Alert: Federally Funded Drug Squad Seizes Petition For Pot Legalization In Washington State
I KNEW you could!
An Alert, from Firedoglake:
Sensible Washington is the group whose marijuana legalization petitions were seized by the federally funded agents. The group is well on its way to let Washington State residents vote on legalization on the November ballot, but this raid can put it in jeopardy.
The intended effect of this raid is to put a chill on other citizens from signing the petition, who will fear having their names and addresses exposed to a drug task force. It's intimidation, pure and simple. And your tax dollars are paying for it.
A federally funded drug task force seized as evidence up to 200 petition signatures for marijuana legalization in Washington State in a series of early-morning raids this week. Seizing the petition signatures is bad enough. What's worse is what the task force did on its raids of a legal marijuana dispensary and its owner's home.Drug agents handcuffed a 14-year-old boy and pointed a gun at his head. Then they took $80 from a 9-year-old girl's Minnie Mouse wallet that she earned for straight A's on her report card.
Now the drug agents - funded by the US Department of Justice - say they can only find two pages of the petition. But they had time to make photocopies of the petition, keeping the names and addresses of residents who signed.
We started our own petition demanding the release of the seized signatures that we'll deliver to the task force headquarters next week.
Ironically, it's this kind of reckless waste of time and money that makes marijuana legalization a safer, smarter alternative than the failed war on drugs.
Sensible Washington is the group whose marijuana legalization petitions were seized by the federally funded agents. The group is well on its way to let Washington State residents vote on legalization on the November ballot, but this raid can put it in jeopardy.
The intended effect of this raid is to put a chill on other citizens from signing the petition, who will fear having their names and addresses exposed to a drug task force. It's intimidation, pure and simple. And your tax dollars are paying for it.
That's why it's important we speak out about this gross violation of first amendment rights. We need to make sure that not only is every petition signature returned, but any other copies must be destroyed.
The only thing these petition signatures are evidence of is an exercise in democracy.
Sign the petition HERE
Thanks for standing with us,
Jane Hamsher
Firedoglake.com
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Dedicated To A Nation Of 'Adult Children' Who Want Terrorism To Disappear (but not their neighbor or themselves)
.Conservative Columnist David Brooks On America, A Nation Of Adult Children who believe that living in a police state beats having to do anything to ameliorate the conditions that lead to it:
(Quote context, in regard to the 'Underpants Bomber' and concurrent citizen attention on alleged 'flaws' in the New American Police State Apparatus.)
"Now we seem to expect perfection from government and then throw temper tantrums when it is not achieved. We seem to be in the position of young adolescents — who believe mommy and daddy can take care of everything, and then grow angry and cynical when it becomes clear they can’t [...]
H/t Firedoglake
Which is QUITE a change in the American attitude from 9 years ago:
"On December 22, 2001, Richard Reid, the 'shoe-bomber,' attempted to detonate explosives on an American airliner. On December 27, Usama Bin Laden issued a new, menacing videotape. How did the Bush administration respond to these dramatic events? How did CNN cover the response?
Bush's response was to plant a live oak tree and go for a jog, and follow 'through on his promise to get a little bit of rest and relaxation on this trip down here to Crawford.' CNN reported this as a good thing. Bush also declined to comment on the Bin Laden tape, and CNN helpfully explained this silence as a wise decision not to respond to someone who 'might be dead.'"
In Full @ Juan Cole's Informed Comment
Pop Quiz!
Analyze the childlike, mercurial, historically amnesiac, American socio-cultural traits, and hypothesize how they affect the reasons, rationales, and denials in regard to the persecution of worthless wars that create 'terrorism' in the first place.
Well, since we can't control our childish desires to accumulate "stuff" at the expense of environmental destruction and slave-labor conditions (Even your chocolate... ...and flowers, Luvr!) those demands place on the extractive and manufacturing countries of the world (ie. the "third world"), we can start by putting everyone we 'fear' in prison... or something LIKE a prison.
(This article appeared in the January 4, 2010 edition of The Nation.)
America's Secret ICE Castles
By Jacqueline Stevens
December 16, 2009
"If you don't have enough evidence to charge someone criminally but you think he's illegal, we can make him disappear."
Monday, December 28, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
UPDATED: Leonard Peltier, America’s most famous and longest serving political prisoner PAROLE DENIED! Next Chance, 2024, He Will Be 79 Years Old
Can You Say:
"International Human Rights Violation"?
The statement from his lawyer:
"...it is not true that Leonard Peltier participated in "the execution style murders of two FBI agents," as the Parole Commission asserts, and there never has been credible evidence of Mr. Peltier's responsibility for the fatal shots as the FBI continues to allege. Moreover, given the corrupt practices of the FBI, itself, it is entirely untrue that Leonard Peltier's parole at this juncture will in any way "depreciate the seriousness" of his conduct and/or "promote disrespect for the law." (From the response by Thomas J. Harrington, Executive Assistant Director, FBI Criminal, Cyber, Response, and Services Branchto to the Parole board's decision ) We will continue to seek parole and clemency for Mr. Peltier..." [In Full]The full set of legal documents relating to Leonard Peltier's trial and incarceration, plus FOIA information about COINTELPRO and the FBI's persecution of Peltier, AIM, and other Native activists can be found HERE
More information about how you can help [HERE]
Sign the petition here to DEMAND CLEMENCY!
The previous petition totaled almost 27,0000 signatures
Peltier denied parole
By Gale Courey Toensing
Indian Country Today
August 21 2009
BISMARCK, N.D. — American Indian activist Leonard Peltier, imprisoned since 1977 for the deaths of two FBI agents, has been denied parole after authorities decided that releasing him would diminish the seriousness of his crime (...and the prosecutor himself conceding during an appellate hearing that, “We do not know who shot the agents.”), the Associated Press reported in mid-afternoon on Aug. 21.
Peltier had his first parole hearing in 16 years in July. He will not be eligible for parole again until July 2024, when he will be 79 years old. [In Full]
For all intents and purposes, it began with the Pan-Tribal occupation of Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay
The 1973 armed occupation of Wounded Knee (Original dead links in re Wounded Knee and Pine Ridge @ MRZine replaced) along with the siege at the Pine Ridge Reservation one year later (which led directly to the incarceration of Leonard Peltier) are etched deeper in the public consciousness in terms of recent Indian history, but is was the Alcatraz Island occupation that ushered in a new era of Native American activism.
"The occupiers," writes Ben Winton in the Fall 1999 issue of Native Peoples magazine, "were an unlikely mix of Indian college activists, families with children fresh off reservations and urban dwellers disenchanted with what they called the U.S. government's economic, social and political neglect." [ In Full @ MRZine]
"I didn't kill the agents," Peltier says. "I didn't order anyone to kill those agents. I am an innocent man. I am an innocent man."Peltier is now more than fifty years old. Home to him is his cell in the Federal Prison at Leavenworth, Kansas, where 150 years earlier, another Indian warrior, Spotted Tail of the Lakota, was also a prisoner. Later Leonard Crow Dog would have his turn at Leavenworth as well.
Peltier paints beautiful pictures (Dead Link, See HERE) in a native style which are highly valued. He also dreams of freedom. This yearning is easily visible in Peltier's beautiful paintings.
Leonard Peltier hopes that someday, like Nelson Mandela, like "Geronimo" Pratt, he too will be released.
Source - Leonard Peltier: Shackled Eagle
Indian Country Today:
Peltier awaits parole decision
By Gale Courey Toensing
Story Published: Aug 17, 2009
LEWSIBURG, Pa. – There’s a digital clock on the official Leonard Peltier Web site marking the time the American Indian Movement activist has been in prison.
On a recent visit to www.leonardpeltier.net the clock read “12241 days, 12 hours, 17 minutes, and 43 seconds of ILLEGAL IMPRISONMENT,” then “12241 days, 12 hours, 17 minutes, and 44 seconds of ILLEGAL IMPRISONMENT,” “12241 days, 12 hours, 17 minutes, and 45 seconds of ILLEGAL IMPRISONMENT” and so on – a constant countdown that will either end within several days or continue for an unknown period of time, perhaps years, possibly until Peltier’s life ends.
The Federal Parole Board is expected to render a decision on whether Peltier will be released from prison after serving 33 years on two murder charges by Aug. 21.
Peltier was granted his second parole hearing since 1993 July 28, and appeared before the board to plead his case. The board has 21 days to decide whether to release Peltier or deny parole and keep him in prison indefinitely.
Peltier was convicted in 1977 and given two consecutive life sentences for the murder of FBI Special Agents Jack R. Coler and Ronald A. Williams, who were killed during a shootout on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota June 26, 1975.
The 64-year-old man has maintained his innocence, but controversy over whether he committed the murders, and over the fairness of his trial persist.
Those convinced of his guilt say he shot the two agents in cold blood and deserves to stay in prison for the rest of his life.
Peltier’s supporters, which include a huge international component, say he is America’s most famous and longest serving political prisoner.
But Peltier’s attorney, Eric Seitz, said the only issue pertinent is the law and that Peltier is eligible for parole.
The events of June 26, 1975 took place against a backdrop of terror that had developed on Pine Ridge. The reservation was under internal siege at the hands of then Chairman Dick Wilson and his “GOON Squad” – the so-called Guardians of the Oglala Nation, who were supported by and collaborated with the FBI and BIA police.
The conflict has been characterized as a battle between Wilson’s secular group and traditional elders and others who were working for election reform on the reservation. More than 60 people from the traditional group had been killed in the two years before the 1975 shootout. None of those killings were investigated by local, state or federal law enforcement agencies.
By 1975 things were so bad that some of the tribe’s elders called AIM for help. A group of AIM activists, Peltier among them, responded and set up a camp on the reservation. On June 26, 1975, two FBI agents in unmarked cars came onto the reservation apparently to serve a warrant to a boy who had stolen some boots. Soon after their arrival, shots were heard and the shoot-out began.
During the battle, the FBI agents and an Indian man named Joe Stuntz were shot to death. The activists fled, anticipating that the reservation would be overrun by FBI and other law enforcement people, which was exactly what happened. In the siege that followed, elders were beaten, houses were burned, people were terrorized and a lot of gun shots were fired.
Peltier escaped to Canada where he was later captured, extradited and brought to trial. Four of the AIM activists were indicted on murder charges, but only Peltier was convicted.
Over the years and through numerous appeals, dozens of allegations and inconsistencies have come to light regarding the FBI and the prosecution’s handling of the case, including witnesses recanting testimony against Peltier and accusing the FBI of coercing and threatening them into testifying; the FBI tampering with evidence and withholding crucial evidence from the jury, including the results of a ballistics report saying the bullet casing from the crime scene did not match Peltier’s gun...
...and the prosecutor himself conceding during an appellate hearing that, “We do not know who shot the agents.” In Full @ Indian Country Today
Back to this post's top
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Where The Crank Labs Are... AKA "Californians in Prison, By County"
A panel of federal judges Tuesday ordered state officials to lower California's prison population by about 40,500. No mass prisoner releases are imminent, but the order eventually could affect some counties more than others, since many counties send a higher proportion of residents to prison.Da Buffalo commented @ Google Maps:
"Where the Methamphetamine labs are in California" would be a useful comparison. But as someone who's watched the drug culture over the last 40 years morph to nihilistic escapism, and has lived in California for the last 33 of them, I'd say the prison-industrial complex is making 'bank' on Meth.
View Californians in Prison, By County in a larger map
Also See: Methland... @ Global Guerillas
(A PDF of the prologue to Nick Reding's book "Methland" is available here)
Why Midwestern Small Towns Have Been Ravaged by Meth Addiction @ Alternet
(with a recent review of the now-released Nick Reding book and discussion)
...and this Travus T. Hipp Commentary: Incidental Illuminations And A Closer Examination Of The Situation In Burma - We Have Some 'Conflicts Of Interest' Besides Chevron/Texaco Oil... Drugs & Gems
(The drug now driving Burma's underground economy is NOT Heroin anymore)
In summation... my socio-cultural insight @ the Global Guerrillas article (and a partial answer to this statement pulled from the Alternet article):
"Aside from its ease of manufacture -- you can make meth out of readily available industrial and pharmaceutical products, enabling a twenty-first-century variant on the moonshiners of earlier generations such as Jarvis -- the drug's most novel aspect was its clientele: the same predominantly white small-town residents who had watched the urban depredations of crack cocaine from afar and told themselves that they weren't that kind of people. "We're in Iowa, for God's sake," a former Oelwein high school principal, explaining his decision to request police patrols of his school, tells Reding. "We don't do that." In mainstream America's Rockwellian imagination, police officers in towns like Oelwein were supposed to be stopping high school kids from making out in cars on prom night. In the meth age they suddenly needed bulletproof vests and hazmat training."
I live in a town where there are literally hundreds of teenage speed freaks and AFAICT (and I've been watching the drug culture since the sixties) it fill a hole in one's psychology that, in consumer cultures such as the U.S. and most of the Western industrial world, is caused by the media's endless pitch that one is never good enough, the car is never classy enough, WHAT? You don't have a diamond studded Rollie on your wrist?
...and of course, the girl is NEVER skinny enough or self-assured enough to get the boy she likes (or so she thinks).
In other words all that advertising batters their self-esteem to the point, when it's all said and done, our children take a drug that essentially makes it easy for them to say: "I don't give a f*ck what you think!"
Last fathers day, I was listening to a local radio station.
There was this loud audio-compressed pitch for a local superstore.
BUY A CELL PHONE... BUY A PLASMA TV... BUY THIS... BUY THAT!... BUY SOMETHING!!! (the ad really said that last...), and after that ad, a PSA for methresources, the US government's meth self-help site.
Go figure.
Oh, and by the way, Perdue Pharma, the folks who brought us "Hillbilly Heroin", OxyContin (Rush Limbaugh's favorite), another curse on the rural youth of America, were fined a few million dollars and slapped on the wrist for lying to doctors across America about the non-addictive quality of their product.
The FDA told them it was OK to say that it MIGHT be less addictive... but that's NOT what their sales reps told the doctors.
Why hammer on the poor rural folks of America in need of a few extra buck to make the mortgage for the shack, and not put companies like Perdue Pharma out of business entirely for creating a generation of teenage junkies?
I'll answer that... Because the imprisoning and 'programming' of American youth is BIG dollars, and attacking the pharmacological source of another plague isn't.
The local smoothie store, 'Jamba Juice', employing kids in, and just out of high school, makes it quite clear on their job app that if you've been in a 'program' it no problem at all.
They expect you've been institutionalized by the time you leave High School.
Sick.
Monday, July 27, 2009
As Of August 8 2009 The MOVE 9 Will Have Been Imprisoned For 21 Years And No One Knows Who Committed The Crime
H/t: Mathaba News and the Pan-African News Wire
On August 8 2009 the MOVE 9 will have been incarcerated in a U.S. jail for 31 years.
From Wikipedia (slightly edited for clarity, in parentheses):
"In 1978, an end was negotiated to an almost year-long standoff with police (over housing code and H&S issues between the MOVE organization and the city of Philadelphia Pennsylvania).Note: "Their sentencing judge has publicly admitted that he has no idea who shot the one bullet that they are all being held accountable for..."
MOVE failed to relocate as required by the court order.[3] When the police later attempted entry, Philadelphia police officer James J. Ramp was killed in a shootout. Seven other police officers, five firefighters, three MOVE members, and three bystanders were injured.[4] As a result, nine MOVE members were found guilty of third-degree murder in the shooting death of a police officer. Seven of the nine became eligible for parole in the spring of 2008, and all seven were denied parole.[5][6] Parole hearings now occur yearly."
[In Full]
Flash forward a few years from 1978 to 1985.
"Attention, MOVE: This Is America! You must abide by the laws of the United States!” Philadelphia Police Commissioner Sambor declared through a loudspeaker, minutes before the May 13, 1985 police assault on the revolutionary MOVE organization’s home...
...That morning police shot over 10,000 rounds of bullets into their West Philadelphia home, and detonated explosives on the front, and both sides of their house." Source
Photo: Philadelphia Pennsylvania police use a State Police helicopter to satchel bomb the re-located MOVE communal house in 1985. The satchel charge was four pounds of C-4 plastic explosive and Tovex illegally obtained from the FBI. "The resulting explosion caused the house to catch fire, igniting a massive blaze which eventually consumed almost an entire city block.[8] Eleven people, including John Africa, five other adults and five children, died in the resulting fire.[9] Ramona Africa and one child, Birdie Africa, were the only survivors..."Ramona Africa, Mumia abu-Jamal, their defense attorney and others on the 'trial' of the MOVE 9
Get involved... More information [Here]
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
DoD anti-terror training program question - "Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorist activity? Correct answer: " protests."
FireFox users might also want this add-on
Among the multiple-choice questions included in its Level 1 Antiterrorism Awareness training course — an annual training requirement for all DOD personnel that is fulfilled through Web-based instruction — the department asks the following: "Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorist activity?"To answer correctly, the examinee must select "protests." [In Full]
Peace Out, Luv Duv, and don't forget to take it easy...
Da' Buffalo Amongst Wolves, "low-level terrorist"
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
May Weasels Rip His Flesh - Grandmother Tasered at Traffic Stop (H/t Gates of Hell)
"A 72-year-old woman is pulled over for speeding, then tasered and sent to jail. Kathryn Winkfein says she drives to Austin about twice a month to do her shopping. But on a Monday afternoon, a Travis County Constable deputy pulled her over, on her way back to Granite Schoals."Source: Grandmother Tasered at Traffic Stop | The Gates of Hell"Due to being a construction zone, and workers being present," Pct. 3 Constable Richard McCain said, "it was 45, she was doing 60."
Winkfein admits she was speeding in the dangerous strip of Highway 71 and Bee Creek.
"He explained to her," Constable McCain said, "sign the ticket stub, it’s not an admission of guilt. It’s a promise to appear in court. She didn’t want to. She said take me to jail."
That’s when the officer says Winkfein exited her vehicle and didn’t cooperate.
"She refused to get off the side of the road, he said to her, Ma’am, you’re under arrest. She used profanity," the Constable said.
He adds she got violent, and the officer used a taser on her."
In full @ myfoxaustin.com
Monday, May 18, 2009
Private Police State: Domestic police operations in the US are becoming the newest business for private security companies - ISN Security Watch
The company known for its private security work guarding senior US diplomats in Iraq beat the federal government and most aid organizations to the scene in another devastated Gulf. About 150 heavily armed Blackwater troops dressed in full battle gear spread out into the chaos of New Orleans. Officially, the company boasted of its forces "join[ing] the hurricane relief effort." But its men on the ground told a different story.
Some patrolled the streets in SUVs with tinted windows and the Blackwater logo splashed on the back; others sped around the French Quarter in an unmarked car with no license plates. They congregated on the corner of St. James and Bourbon in front of a bar called 711, where Blackwater was establishing a makeshift headquarters. From the balcony above the bar, several Blackwater guys cleared out what had apparently been someone's apartment. They threw mattresses, clothes, shoes and other household items from the balcony to the street below. They draped an American flag from the balcony's railing. More than a dozen troops from the 82nd Airborne Division stood in formation on the street watching the action.
Armed men shuffled in and out of the building as a handful told stories of their past experiences in Iraq. "I worked the security detail of both Bremer and Negroponte," said one of the Blackwater guys, referring to the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer, and former US Ambassador to Iraq John Negroponte. Another complained, while talking on his cell phone, that he was getting only $350 a day plus his per diem.
"When they told me New Orleans, I said, 'What country is that in?'"From "Blackwater Down", Jeremy Scahill, The Nation, September 21, 2005
Police: Going Private
Domestic police operations in the US are rapidly becoming the newest line of business for private security companies, Jody Ray Bennett writes for ISN Security Watch.
By Jody Ray Bennett
18 May 2009
Pull Quote:
“In the Sept. 11 disaster that never seems to stop exacting its toll, one of the subtler but more serious losses is a consequence of the booming private security industry, which is draining the [NYPD] of some of its most desirable workers: the serious, smart and experienced senior officers the city needs most in a crisis.”In Full @ ISN Security Watch
Fast forward nine years later and one finds a young industry built almost entirely on the backs of former military and police personnel who have provided everything from diplomatic, convoy, embassy, weapon storage and energy infrastructural security to gathering intelligence, conducting interrogations, patrolling borders on land, fighting pirates on sea and transporting goods and personnel by air. It would seem there is nothing these forces cannot do.
On private patrol
Policing some of the most dangerous US cities has quickly become the newest line of business for many of these companies which have already replaced police officers in cities from Portland to Baltimore.
The phenomenon runs deeper than the normal shopping center or bank security guard. While in many cases private security personnel act more as city cleanup, organization or local ambassadors, some cities are pushing for armed private security personnel to patrol the streets, perform arrests and transport civilians. This is somewhat of a cause for concern, especially because of the more controversial issues surrounding the role of private military and security companies abroad in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.
Cities are turning to the private sector for a variety of reasons. Some local and state governments are under pressure from budget deficits and are often convinced that privatized industries are more cost-effective than state agencies and bureaucracies. Other cities have an already overstretched force that cannot respond to increases in crime, so private contractors are seen as a quick fix and an easy force multiplier.
From Oakland to New Orleans
Oakland, California is the latest city looking to hire private companies to patrol some of its rougher neighborhoods in the wake of record municipal budget deficits. Last April, according to the Wall Street Journal, the city successfully voted to outsource part of its police patrol to International Services Inc, but later retracted after “two of its vice presidents were accused […] by the Los Angeles District Attorney's office of defrauding the state of California out of more than $9 million in workers compensation.”
According to the daily Portland Mercury newspaper, Portland, Oregon’s downtown area is patrolled by armed personnel with arrest powers that are supplied by Portland Patrol, Inc, a company which, according to local media, has repeatedly evaded requests to appear before the city’s oversight committee.
Over 2,000 miles away, Chicago has turned to a company that currently operates in police-like automobiles marked “special patrol,” according to CBS News, and are expected to have their powers expanded as the city combats increased crime rates with an overstretched police force.
Down south in New Orleans, Louisiana, armed private guards patrol wealthy neighborhoods and private schools. According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, “Some areas of New Orleans have used armed private patrols since 1997, when residents in an east New Orleans community petitioned Louisiana's legislature to create a tax on property owners to pay for a private force. About 20 residential tax districts have been established, employing an estimated 100 private guards. This month, seven more neighborhoods voted to create such districts.”
During the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, New Orleans was patrolled by approximately 150 heavily armed Blackwater personnel alongside several other big contractor companies like Dyncorp, Wackenhut and most interestingly, ISI, an Israeli company that flew in former Israeli Special Forces commandos.
Most notably of all of these companies is Capital Special Police, which not only supplies guards and corporate escorts, but offers “real police officers [that] arrest for felonies and misdemeanors; issue citations for infractions; and enforce local ordinances.”
Friday, May 15, 2009
Is It A Totalitarian State Yet? Explorer Scouts Train in Post-9/11 Law Enforcement Methods
3 Florida prison officers dismissed 2 others resign after 40 children deliberately shocked with stun gunsThree US prison officers have been dismissed and two others have resigned after 40 children in Florida were deliberately shocked with stun guns.
The incidents at two prisons occurred last month during a national day when people take their children to work.
In one case, a group of children were told to hold hands in a circle before one of them was shocked with a stun gun and the shock ran round the group.
No one was seriously hurt, but an official said it was "inexcusable".
In the other case in a second prison, children were given individual shocks.
The children, aged from five to 17, were all sons and daughters of employees of the Florida Department of Corrections.
[In Full @ BBCNews]
"After the training and indoctrination is over, I wonder how readily these young people would, without thinking, open fire on US citizens…"
.
.
.
"...the Explorers have faced problems over the years. There have been numerous cases over the last three decades in which police officers supervising Explorers have been charged, in civil and criminal cases, with sexually abusing them.
Several years ago, two University of Nebraska criminal justice professors published a study that found at least a dozen cases of sexual abuse involving police officers over the last decade. Adult Explorer leaders are now required to take an online training program on sexual misconduct."
[See Boy Storm Troopers of America for the context to his comment:]
A Buffalo's personal, relatively recent experience:
At the beginning of the war on Iraq I was standing at the town clock where I live, a focal point for whatever protest is occurring due to it's proximity to the heart of downtown and commuter/tourist car traffic.
A California Highway Patrol car pulled up behind some cars stopped at the traffic light, right in front of the hundred or so peaceful sign-waving demonstrators.
Then, a young boy (16-19 years old judging by facial features) in the patrol car's passenger seat pulled out a digital camera and started taking pictures of the assembled crowd, chilling the spirit of the middle-class affluent protesters and young people in the crowd, many of whom were inexperienced and needed regular reminders that their task was to hold the signs towards the traffic, not commiserate with each other, and that the constitution of the US absolutely allowed for them to protest in that manner.
An unknown but most likely significant number of them never returned for further protests.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Violations Of Spirit & Intent - San Angelo Texas district court judge blocks sect parents from reuniting with kids despite State Supreme Court ruling
Also notable... 2 out of 3 foster children in the Texas 'Foster Care' system are being drugged.
NBC News, with a 10 minute report.
If you want the details on the type of incidents attributable to Texas CPS, more recent abuse incidents, child endangerments, and general mismanagement of a state agency needing to be federally investigated, it's all at "It's Almost Tuesday:
Checking In: Violations in Texas Foster Care
Posted on May 21, 2008 by Forever
Below I have compiled a sample of real violations within the foster care system in Texas. These facilities are in major metropolitan areas (ie Dallas/Ft.Worth, Austin, San Antonio areas) and they are listed here exactly as they are reported here by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.
While we talk about foster care abuse that goes on, there is a little bit of a difference between saying the words “child abuse” and actually seeing a description of what real adults are doing (or not doing) to these children…. in the name of ‘protection’… and using tax payers money to-boot.
I plan on doing lists like these every once in a while… keep us checking in on Texas Foster Care facilities… checkin’ in on the children.
Standard Number 749.1521(4)
Standard Description: Medication Storage-Store medication covered by Section II of the Texas Controlled Substances Act under double lock in a separate container
Technical Assistance Given: Yes
Narrative
Several medications covered by Section II of the Texas Controlled Substances Act were found in a locked box in an unlocked cabinet. The cabinet was in the foster mother’s office, which was also unlocked. These medications, therefore, were not kept under double lock at the time of inspection.
Standard Number: 749.2471(9)(D)
Standard Description:Verification Certificate specifies the ages and gender(s) of children for which the home is verified
Technical Assistance Given: No
Narrative
The verification certificate at the home did not match the characteristics of the children placed. The certificate indicated the home was verified for children ages 10 to 17 even though a 7-year-old child was placed in the home.
Standard Number: 16102
Standard Description: Children must not be Abused or Neglected
Technical Assistance Given: No
Narrative
A young foster child was sexually assaulted by an older child in the home. The older child was arrested for sexual assault.
More @ It's Almost Tuesday
Even the DISSENTING judges thought the state's handling of the situation bizzare: "Justice Harriet O'Neill for the dissenting group. "On this record, however, I agree that there was no evidence of imminent 'danger to the physical health or safety' of boys and pre-pubescent girls to justify their removal from the YFZ Ranch, and to this extent I join the Court’s opinion."
In Full @ ABA Journal
This is 'home sweet home' for the FLDS chidren
...and this is how the 460+ children were FORCIBLY taken from their homes by Texas state authorities
The Third Court of Appeals ruled last week that the agency had overstepped its authority by removing all of the children from the compound. On Thursday, the Texas Supreme Court agreed with that decision and ordered the CPS to return the children to their homes.SAN ANGELO -- A state district judge who had been ordered by two higher courts to send children from a polygamist sect back home refused Friday to sign an order that would have started the process of reuniting them with their parents."
The judge's unexpected move came after four hours of legal wrangling where it appeared some of the children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) would be going home as early as Monday.
Attorneys left the courtroom scratching their heads over Judge Barbara Walther's abrupt end of the hearing.
The sticking points centered on restrictions Walther added to an order that had been agreed upon among attorneys for Child Protective Services, the parents and the children.
Instead, Walther added additional restrictions...
In Full @ The Star-Telegram (Dead Link, NLA via google search)
Monday, May 5, 2008
Five signs that pot might become legal soon -- and five reasons why it probably won't. - Alternet
Disabled Homeless Vietnam Vet
Santa Cruz California
4/20/2008
H/T Stan @ Feral Scholar, who comments:
for the legalization of the “demon weed”
5th May 2008, 11:13 am by Stan
For those who don’t think this is serious, or that some of us would just like to have a legal joint now and again… you are half wrong. Prison, the attendant ruination of lives, and billions of dollars spent harrassing harmless pot smokers is very serious. And it would be nice to have a few joints now and again that didn’t cost a paycheck. I won’t even mention cannibus is a seriously useful medicinal herb.
The linked commentary says pretty much all of it… except how we can unite more people to strike down this cruel and idiotic prohibition.
Will Pot Ever Be Legal in This Schizoid Country?
By Steven Wishnia, AlterNet
Posted on May 1, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/84055/
Marijuana occupies a bizarrely paradoxical place in American culture. Its use is widespread, commonplace among the young and ubiquitous in popular culture. Yet it remains highly illegal, and talk of legalization is usually deemed political suicide.
Here are five signs that pot should be legal soon -- and five reasons why it probably won't.
1. Pot is indelibly a part of the cultural mainstream. The stoner comedy Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay grossed $14.6 million in its first weekend, making it the second most popular movie in the country. Most pro basketball players blaze, according to sources as diverse as the ganjaphile Mavericks player Josh Howard and the anti-drug ex-Knick Charles Oakley. And on April 20, thousands of revelers turned out at the University of Colorado and the University of California at Santa Cruz to celebrate the 4/20 herb holiday.
As of 2002, notes Keith Stroup, legal counsel with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, 47 percent of American adults had smoked marijuana at some time in their lives, according to a CNN/Time poll. By today, he adds, "it is likely there are more living Americans who have smoked marijuana than who have not. Approximately 26 million Americans smoked marijuana just in the last year. All of these people know it did not cause them any real harm and that it did not keep them from having a successful life and career."
2. Increased medical acceptance. In February, the American College of Physicians, the second-largest medical organization in the country, urged the federal government to move cannabis out of Schedule I, the category for drugs with no legal medical use, "given marijuana's proven efficacy at treating certain symptoms and its relatively low toxicity." The group also strongly urged legal protections for doctors who prescribe cannabis and patients who use it.
Last year, more than 3,000 articles on cannabinoids were published in scientific journals. These have explored their possible uses for a host of ailments, from easing the pain of arthritis to inhibiting the growth of brain tumors.
The development of vaporization technology -- pricey devices that heat cannabis to a point where the THC can be inhaled, but don't incinerate the plant matter -- has eliminated one of the main reasons for doctors to be uncomfortable about the medical use of cannabis: that smoke contains toxic compounds. "Vaporization of THC offers the rapid onset of symptom relief without the negative effects from smoking," the ACP noted.
3. A federal decriminalization bill was introduced last month. HR 5843, sponsored by Reps. Barney Frank, D-Mass., and Ron Paul, R-Tex., would eliminate federal penalties for possession of less than 100 grams or for the nonprofit transfer of less than one ounce between adults. The bill is the first decriminalization measure introduced in Congress since the early 1980s.
4. The state budget crunch. With the recession battering their treasuries, many states are taking a second look at the price of incarcerating thousands of drug prisoners. Legal cannabis would eliminate the costs of arresting, prosecuting and jailing cannabis users, growers and dealers, and could be a major new source of tax revenue -- especially in states like California, where it is estimated to be the most valuable cash crop. And cannabis farming could revive rural economies, whether by hemp production in the Great Plains or marijuana cultivation in Appalachia.
5. There are no rational arguments against legalizing cannabis under regulations similar to those for alcohol. I've been covering drug issues for almost 20 years (and smoking the green since? Well, I went to Woodstock when I was 14, you do the math), and I haven't heard any. The most common, the "gateway theory" and the idea that today's pot is so much stronger than Woodstock-era weed that it's essentially a different drug, are based on distortion and misinformation. They aren't even valid rebuttable presumptions like "abortion is murder," "the government should not interfere with the free market by regulating rents," or "the U.S. government had to depose Saddam Hussein by any means necessary." And the "send a message to the children" argument is akin to espousing the resurrection of Prohibition because legal alcohol encourages underage drinking.
****
On the other hand, I strongly doubt that cannabis will become legal in the near future, for the following reasons...
In Full @ AlternetAlso See: Introducing...... Police States For PotHeads: U.S. to dispatch drones to hunt pot over California - McClatchy
Tags:
420,
Barney Franks,
Dennis Kucinich,
Hemp,
Marijuana,
Medical Marijuana,
Medicine,
Police State,
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Prohibition,
Ron Paul
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Da' Feds to collect DNA from every person they arrest - AP
...and in a country which imprisons more people per capita than anyone else in the world...
...that wouldn't be hard...
Or for that matter, just get arrested for peacefully protesting the illegal invasion of Iraq whilst on Federal government property.Squat on federal land...
There have to be thousands of things that people do every day that violate federal laws.
(Smoke pot on the local post office steps...)
Also consider
racism
as motivation:
“For some groups, the incarceration numbers are especially startling,” the report said. “While one in 30 men between the ages of 20 and 34 is behind bars, for black males in that age group the figure is one in nine.”
The racial disparity for women also is stark. One of every 355 white women aged 35 to 39 is behind bars, compared with one of every 100 black women in that age group. (Elaboration on this and more if you click the picture or link above)
Read: Feds to collect DNA from every person they arrest - AP via Y! News
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Buffalo Musings On Incipient Police-Stateism - FEMA Contracts With AMTRAK For "Evacuation" Services
October 10, 2007Need a visual signifier?:
Mass population relocation in the United States? The U.S. government is going to buy out 17,000 homes in Mississippi in the 'hurricane belt'. See Executive Order 11004 - Relocation of communities and designating new population centers in the U.S, or here if you don't think the federal government has the law on the books (since the FDR administration) to do this.
Folks, If you're waiting for 'rescue', AMTRAK trains are NEVER on time...
Nor were the trains that took people to the camps in Nazi Germany:
...and this method of transport probably wouldn't be of any help in environmental disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding etc because of the physical fragility of the infrastructure (like track damage), but it would be the PERFECT way to 'mass re-locate' large populations...
Thanks For Stopping By
Friday, April 11, 2008
State Terror In America - FBI Agents Contacted Jurors After Mistrial To Find Out Why
"Westmoreland County defense attorney Tom Ceraso, who was not involved in the case, said in his decades of experience trying cases in federal court he has never heard of the FBI telephoning or interviewing jurors."
--Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
from TPMmuckraker by Paul Kiel
The latest from Pittsburgh, where the U.S. attorneys' office continues to drop jaws with its handling of the case. From The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:In Full @ TPMmuckrakerTwo jurors said Thursday they were unnerved by FBI requests for home visits to explain why they deadlocked in the federal public corruption trial of former Allegheny County coroner Cyril H. Wecht.A spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's Office in Pittsburgh tells the paper that prosecutors just wanted to chat about the case with the jurors, a "commonplace" practice. The FBI agents were simply setting up the appointments. It is true that it's commonplace for lawyers from both sides to speak to jurors after a trial to get feedback. But there are two important distinctions here...
Experts said the practice of using FBI agents to contact and interview jurors in their homes after mistrials was unusual, but the U.S. Attorney's Office in Pittsburgh characterized it as "commonplace."
"I thought it was kind of intimidating," the jury foreman said about the FBI phone call.
Said another juror, "I found it kind of unusual."
Thanks For Stopping By
Friday, April 4, 2008
Introducing...... Police States For PotHeads: U.S. to dispatch drones to hunt pot over California - McClatchy
U.S. to dispatch drones to hunt pot over Calif. forestsA quote from a Northern California Hemp grower:
Now I can use that ManPad missile launcher I purchased from FARC last year without worrying about 'civilian' casualties
The federal government plans to escalate its eradication of marijuana plantations in the backwoods of national forests this year, beginning in California with the deployment of larger strike teams and the controversial launching of miniature, remote-controlled spy planes to outfox growers, a top Bush administration official said Thursday.
Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey said an increasing number of pot growers financed by Mexican drug cartels are taking cover in the forest, particularly in the southern Sierra Nevada.
According to Rey, the administration decided to disclose the planned surge in forest surveillance after news organizations persisted in questioning U.S. Forest Service officials about a $100,000 purchase of two battery-powered "unmanned aerial vehicles."
Source, Sacramento Bee/McClatchy
There Have Been
Thanks For Stopping By
Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey said an increasing number of pot growers financed by Mexican drug cartels are taking cover in the forest, particularly in the southern Sierra Nevada.
According to Rey, the administration decided to disclose the planned surge in forest surveillance after news organizations persisted in questioning U.S. Forest Service officials about a $100,000 purchase of two battery-powered "unmanned aerial vehicles."
Source, Sacramento Bee/McClatchy
Thanks For Stopping By
Monday, March 31, 2008
TXTmob writer subpoenaed over 2004 RNC - NYTimes via Indybay
TXTmob writer subpoenaed over 2004 RNC
NYTimes
Sunday Mar 30th, 2008 11:16 AM
By COLIN MOYNIHAN
Published: March 30, 2008
When delegates to the Republican National Convention assembled in New York in August 2004, the streets and sidewalks near Union Square and Madison Square Garden filled with demonstrators.
Police officers in helmets formed barriers by stretching orange netting across intersections. Hordes of bicyclists participated in rolling protests through nighttime streets, and helicopters hovered overhead.
These tableaus and others were described as they happened in text messages that spread from mobile phone to mobile phone in New York City and beyond. The people sending and receiving the messages were using technology, developed by an anonymous group of artists and activists called the Institute for Applied Autonomy, that allowed users to form networks and transmit messages to hundreds or thousands of telephones.
Although the service, called TXTmob, was widely used by demonstrators, reporters and possibly even police officers, little was known about its inventors. Last month, however, the New York City Law Department issued a subpoena to Tad Hirsch, a doctoral candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who wrote the code that created TXTmob.
Lawyers representing the city in lawsuits filed by hundreds of people arrested during the convention asked Mr. Hirsch to hand over voluminous records revealing the content of messages exchanged on his service and identifying people who sent and received messages. Mr. Hirsch says that some of the subpoenaed material no longer exists and that he believes he has the right to keep other information secret.
“There’s a principle at stake here,” he said recently by telephone. “I think I have a moral responsibility to the people who use my service to protect their privacy.”
The subpoena, which was issued Feb. 4, instructed Mr. Hirsch, who is completing his dissertation at M.I.T., to produce a wide range of material, including all text messages sent via TXTmob during the convention, the date and time of the messages, information about people who sent and received messages, and lists of people who used the service...
Go to the New York Times for more
There Have Been Thanks For Stopping By
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