Law and order is a wonderful thing, and I'm all for it. But I object to petty, hair-splitting
legalism and heavy-handed overzealousness on the part of the local police. Especially the small
town badge-happy self-important deputy sheriff who's determined to advance his career by taking a bite
out of crime, no matter how petty the crime may be. Or the morbidly obese constable who hides
in the roadside bushes with a radar gun. Some examples are shown below, along with
examples of sheer stupidity exhibited by judges and other government officials.
One Business Filed 37,375 Bad W-2 Forms —
and Is Getting Away With It. A single employer filed 37,375 W-2 forms in tax year 2005 on
which the Social Security Number and the name did not match. These "no-match" W-2 forms often —
but not always — represent an illegal-alien worker fraudulently using someone else's Social Security
number or a fake number. An employer who files 37,375 no-match W-2s in one year is almost certainly
employing many thousands of illegal aliens — and knows it. Yet there is no indication
our federal government has taken any action to stop this employer from continuing to employ mass numbers
of illegal aliens.
Raft guide arrested after helping stranded rafter on Clear
Creek. Clear Creek sheriff's deputies on Thursday [6/10/2010] arrested a rafting guide for swimming to a
stranded young rafter who had tumbled from his boat on Clear Creek. Ryan Daniel Snodgrass, a 28-year-old
guide with Arkansas Valley Adventures rafting company, was charged with "obstructing government operations,"
said Clear Creek Sheriff Don Krueger.
D.C.
police's search for drugs on D.C. teen is ruled illegal. A few days before Christmas 2005 at nearly
midnight, a uniformed District police officer patrolling the Sursum Corda neighborhood in Northwest heard
a 16-year-old on a corner call out his name and ask, "What's up?" That was before the yelling. And
it was the yelling — not the $974 in cash or the 24 baggies of crack cocaine that police later
found on the teenager — that landed Officer Robert Elliott and the juvenile in a rare but important
case before the D.C. Court of Appeals.
Emergency Bill to Close Tax 'Loopholes' Includes
$46 Million Tax Loophole. A bill titled "The American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act of
2010" that will add $115 billion to the federal deficit between now and October 2011, and that the
Democratic leadership intends to push through Congress before they leave for their week-long Memorial Day
recess, includes a special $46 million tax loophole for Hollywood movie and television producers.
Enemy of the States.
[Scroll down slowly] The federal government is willfully obstructionist and incompetent when it comes to
securing the border. Border patrol agents need to wait for the Parks Service before they can enter the
parkland and preserve what makes up the vast majority of the Arizona border area, leaving huge gaps where drugs
and people swarm north.
In Canada:
Spectators
in Body Armor. I may have to revise my old line about the British police being "the most monumentally
useless in the developed world". For the G20 summit, the Toronto coppers ordered up a ton of new body
armor, weaponry, gas masks, etc — and then stood around in their state-of-the-art riot gear
watching as a bunch of middle-class "anarchists" trashed the city.
Woman Accused Of Hitting TSA Agent Over
Applesauce. A judge Tuesday [4/20/2010] threw out a case against Nadine Hays, who is accused of
hitting a TSA agent who allegedly tried to take away her elderly mother's applesauce — if she
stays out of trouble for six months.
More
about the TSA.
Meter, timer blamed for $600 bill. Kathy Roberts got a
$600 water bill last month for 96,000 gallons. She says her water consumption didn't go up and her normal
monthly bill from the Cocoa water division doesn't top $30. A plumber didn't find any leaks, so she
blames a new digital meter installed in April.
The Editor says...
The water meter can't possibly be wrong — after all, it has computer chips in it, and computers
never mis-count, especially in an area that has more thunderstorms than anywhere else in the country.
Avoiding the slick spots. The
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is a perplexing beast. While the agency remains hellbent on
regulating colorless, odorless and likely harmless greenhouse gas emissions, it has been utterly incapable of
living up to its name with respect to the Gulf oil spill. Not only was the EPA caught entirely
unprepared for the oil spill, but also last week it actually tried to interfere with BP's efforts to use a
chemical called Corexit to speed up dispersal of the oil. When the EPA told BP that it should use a less
toxic chemical, BP rightly ignored the order because it's the oil, not the dispersant (stupid) that is the
real threat to the environment, and there is no better option than the detergentlike Corexit.
The Editor says...
How does the EPA presume to have the authority to tell BP what to do in international waters?
More
about the EPA.
NYPD
detectives now have to ask for permission to use unmarked cars. Detectives who need to park near
courthouses now have to ask for permission if they want to use their unmarked cars, the Daily News has learned.
The directive comes in the wake of revelations by The News that the NYPD has been towing unmarked cop cars, leaving
detectives stranded with no way to transport suspects, witnesses or victims.
Littleton fires judge who issued warrant for overdue DVD.
The City Council fired longtime Municipal Judge James Kimmel on Tuesday night after he issued an arrest warrant
for a teenager who had an overdue $30 DVD from a local library.
Computer
snafu is behind at least 50 'raids' on Brooklyn couple's home. Blame it on a computer.
Embarrassed cops on Thursday [3/18/2010] cited a "computer glitch" as the reason police targeted the home
of an elderly, law-abiding couple more than 50 times in futile hunts for bad guys.
States give inmates access to
personal data of others. Prisons in eight states let convicts work in jobs that give them access
to Social Security numbers and other personal information for the public, despite years of warnings that the
practice should end, a federal audit finds.
Homeland Security
Reports Losing Guns. The nation's Homeland Security officers lost nearly 200 guns in bowling alleys,
public restrooms, unlocked cars and other unsecure areas, with some ending up in the hands of felons. The
problem, outlined in a new federal report, has prompted disciplinary actions and extra training.
TSA Dodges
Congressional Investigation of Breach. Osama bin Laden has approximately 53 half-siblings.
Last week, ABC reported that 12 of them have FAA pilot's licenses, making them "eligible to fly
aircraft anywhere in the United States." While this is indeed an eye-opener of a headline, Osama
bin Laden's high-profile siblings and the FAA are a small concern compared to the threat posed by
thousands of would-be foreign pilots routinely granted pilot licenses thanks to the Transportation
Safety Administration (TSA).
Rep.
Hank Johnson: Guam could 'tip over and capsize'. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) is afraid that
the U.S. Territory of Guam is going to "tip over and capsize" due to overpopulation. Johnson expressed
his worries during a House Armed Services Committee hearing on the defense budget Friday [3/26/2010].
Democrat
Rep. wonders if additional Navy personnel will make Guam 'tip over and capsize'. Rep. Hank
Johnson, D-Ga., was questioning Admiral Robert Willard about the Navy's plans to relocate 8,000 personnel and
their families to Guam. After noting at some length that the island is narrow, Johnson says "My fear is
that the whole island will become so overly populated it will tip over and capsize."
The Editor says...
If a Republican had demonstrated such monumental ignorance, does anyone believe this would not be front-page news?
Dumb Dems to be
Drummed Out. The good news is that we may be on a verge of a wave election where some of the
dead wood is removed. Speaking of dead wood, who is the dumbest Democratic Congressman of them all?
Two recent nominees: Congressman Hank Johnson of Georgia, who is concerned that if more US troops
move to Guam, the island will tip over. ... [and] Congressman Phil Hare of Illinois, who seems unaware
that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are separate documents, and that only one is
the law of the land.
There's
no IQ test for serving in Congress. Q: How many Marines does it take to capsize the island of
Guam? The correct answer is, "You are asking the wrong question." The correct question is how many
congressmen are stupid enough to think you can capsize an island? A: So far as we know (praise God!) just
one...
Hank Johnson warns Guam might capsize.
Saving
Guam from Capsizing All in a Day's Work for U.S. Congressmen. Could Guam capsize? This is
not a question a lot of people would think to ask. ... This is exactly why we have politicians. Politicians
know to study and be concerned about actual important issues so the average citizen doesn't have to worry about
anything more consequential than which funny outfits he should dress his pets in. Our politicians are our
best and brightest, and that's why we put them in charge of what's most important in this nation.
Gun Nuts at 30,000 Feet? [Scroll down]
Some would-be marshals were hired even after they repeatedly shot flight attendants in mock hijack-response
training exercises. One marshal groused that the training for new marshals was "like security-guard training
for the mall." ... The air marshal who brandished his weapon had twice applied to be a cop in Philadelphia but
failed the police department's psychological tests; the marshal was also rejected in his attempt to get a job as
a prison guard. The marshal had received only two weeks of training at the time he threatened scores of
coach passengers.
How AP Helped Cover
for a Female "Captain Bligh": It was big news when Capt. Holly Graf was fired as skipper of the
USS Cowpens. But the story behind the story is how www.MilitaryCorruption.com unearthed a dramatic photo
of Graf's cruiser nearly hitting the destroyer the USS John S. McCain while drag racing at sea and coming
within 300 feet of collision. Many media outlets in this country wanted to quote us and publish the
photo. But some — like the AP — wanted to avoid the truth.
Caught on Camera — Crazed Captain of
Cruiser Cowpens. It's been said a picture is worth a thousand words. We can only hope the
one [in this article] is worth a court martial, even if it makes the Navy blanch to punish an incompetent and
unstable "politically correct" poster girl for all the super feminists at the Pentagon and the U.S. Naval
Academy.
The Taser's Edge. Books
such as Three Felonies A Day detail the near-impossibility of not violating some state or federal law
(inadvertently or not) just by dint of getting out of bed and going about your day. The country is so
thick with Thou Shalt Nots — laws, rules and regulations — that there's almost always a reason
for some cop to pester you. When you get indignant and object, it's open season. ... We are
talking about police tasing people — body-slamming them onto the ground and sometimes breaking
their teeth off in the process — for things like talking back (or even just talking to
themselves...).
TSA Hands Al-Qaeda Its
Playbook. In a blunder of astonishingly poor judgment, the TSA allowed one of its
most sensitive documents, the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) manual, to be posted online.
And then, instead of admitting the seriousness of its security breach, the TSA tried to take the
position that the information wasn't that important. Only after Congress got involved did
TSA take any action.
Bureaucrats With Badges.
Shortly after the Transportation Security Administration assumed control of airport security and [Conrad] Burns was still
serving in Congress he was at Washington's National Airport for a flight home. National is the airport used
almost exclusively by members of Congress to fly in and out of the nation's capital. Burns showed his U.S.
Senate identification to a TSA agent who refused to accept it, telling him she was not familiar with the
government-issued photo ID. He had to produce another form of picture ID she demanded. In an
attempt to be funny, Burns offered his Sam's Club shopping card. The agent accepted it and sent
Burns on his way.
The Federal Bureau of
Non-Investigation. On Monday, ABC News first reported that Fort Hood shooter Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan had
reached out to al Qaeda associates prior to his attack. There were good reasons to speculate that one of these
al Qaeda figures is Anwar al Awlaki — an al Qaeda recruiter who acted as a "spiritual advisor" to two
of the 9/11 hijackers. Awlaki preached at a mosque Hasan attended in 2001 and praised Hasan's attack on his web site
Monday morning [11/9/2009].
A top
psychiatrist at Walter Reed warned Fort Hood about Hasan. This is really looking bad for the
brass at Fort Hood. One of the top psychiatrists at Walter Reed was so concerned about Hasan, that he
wrote a memo outlining his belief in the terrorist's incompetence and reckless behavior.
The FBI in peace and war.
Twice we have suffered slaughters of US citizens on American soil — once on 9/11 and again at Fort Hood.
In both cases the FBI had advance information which might have stopped the plots and twice they failed to share it.
The first time they claimed it was because of the "Gorelick wall" although bureaucratic inertia and FBI problems with
computers were claimed to have played a role as well. This time, it will be interesting to see the excuse.
Citizenship study guide bungles US history.
The publishers of "Twenty-Five Lessons in Citizenship" claim to have sold 1 million copies in the past
83 years to people preparing to take the United States citizenship test. But what does the book
teach those eager new Americans? Its 101st edition informs them that Alexander Hamilton served as
president and that the Superior Court is California's highest court, and suggests citizens "must" vote.
ACLU sues over man's arrest for videotaping
police. The ACLU of Pennsylvania has filed a lawsuit on behalf of a Hill District man who was arrested for
recording an incident between his friend and police. The suit, filed today [8/13/2009], stems from an April 29
incident between a friend of Elijah Matheny, 29, and University of Pittsburgh police officers. ... Matheny took out his
cell phone and began recording the incident. ... Matheny was also charged with "possession of an instrument of crime" in
regards to his cell phone, Walczak said.
The Editor says...
That's an interesting concept: A cell phone can become an "instrument of crime" at any moment, whenever
the cops decide to make it so. Until they make that decision, it's just a telephone. Do they also
have the same discretion in regard to a shotgun or a stick of dynamite? If you use a cell phone as
an "instrument of crime," does that make all cell phones within some (arbitrary) radius "instruments
of crime" as well?
From yard sales to
jail yards. When federal agents can swoop down on your personal garage sale and arrest you for
selling the wrong old doll, this is no longer the land of the free. Yet just such a scenario is possible
because of a campaign called Resale Roundup, which stems from last year's jobs-destroying Consumer Product
Safety Improvement Act. We wonder what's next: handcuffing 10-year-olds for improperly mixing
roadside lemonade?
Well, now that you mention it...
California city shuts down girl's lemonade stand.
Eight-year-old Daniela Earnest has made lemonade out of lemons in more ways than one this week. Hoping to
raise money for a family trip to Disneyland, the Tulare girl opened a lemonade stand Monday [8/3/2009].
But because Daniela didn't have a business license, the city of Tulare shut it down the same day.
The Editor says...
I'm so glad our government keeps us safe from little girls' lemonade stands. Here's another one:
Sweet
Lemonade Kid $lapped. Three sourpuss Parks Department agents put the squeeze on a 10-year-old girl
in Riverside Park yesterday, slapping the tyke with a $50 ticket for hawking lemonade without a permit.
Clementine Lee, who lives just blocks from the Upper West Side park, had dreamed of opening a lemonade stand
since last year and took advantage of yesterday's beautiful weather to set up shop.
'Lemon'
Law Kid Back in Drink Biz. The 10-year-old West Side girl who got a $50 ticket for selling
lemonade in Riverside Park was back in business yesterday and had a special customer — Parks
Commissioner Adrian Benepe. Clementine Lee set up her stand in Columbus Circle, where Benepe bought
three cups at 50 cents a pop.
NY Car Ticketed Repeatedly With Dead Body Inside.
Police made a gruesome discovery earlier this week while getting ready to tow a heavily-ticketed van — a
decomposed body in the back seat. It was that of a missing man, and now his family wants to know to how officers
could ticket the vehicle numerous times — and never notice what was inside.
Getting
away with murder is the norm in Detroit. At least 7 in 10 people who committed murder
in this city last year have gotten away with it. The most generous interpretation of 2008 homicide
warrants and convictions supplied by local law enforcement officials shows that in more than 70 percent
of homicide cases no suspect has been identified, arrested, charged or convicted of a killing.
Bureaucrat scuffs
dream of homeless shoe shiner. He sleeps under a bridge, washes in a public bathroom and was
panhandling for booze money 11 months ago, but now Larry Moore is the best-dressed shoeshine man in the
city. When he gets up from his cardboard mattress, he puts on a coat and tie. It's a reminder of
how he has turned things around. In fact, until last week it looked like Moore was going to have saved
enough money to rent a room and get off the street for the first time in six years. But then, in a
breathtakingly clueless move, an official for the Department of Public Works told Moore that he has to fork
over the money he saved for his first month's rent to purchase a $491 sidewalk vendor permit.
When Cops Can't Use Lights and
Sirens. Sometimes police officers need to get from one place to another more quickly than traffic
conditions will allow, which is why the cars they drive are equipped with sirens and bright flashing lights.
"But, Dunphy," you say, "why write about something so patently obvious? Any fool knows that." No, there
are in fact some fools who do not know that. Strangely enough, one such fool is a former chief of the Los Angeles
Police Department who now sits on the Los Angeles City Council.
Swine
Flu: Conservative Republicans Want to Kill You. At a press conference yesterday
[4/27/2009], Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano — you know, the official in charge of
border security who doesn't think illegally crossing into America is a crime — did her best to
cover all the bases as well as her own bureaucratic rear end. She literally spoke out of both sides of
her mouth in the same sentence as she tried to explain just what the government meant by a "public health
emergency."
Why are
the jail cells empty? Detroit has lost hundreds of sworn officers in recent years. The Police Department
didn't respond to repeated requests for interviews with its top leaders, but it released preliminary statistics showing an
overall decline in criminal activity this year, despite a 24% increase in homicides. East-sider Joyce Betty, 56, isn't
buying it. Last February, a young assailant snatched Betty's purse, which contained $300 in cash, while she pumped gas
at a Mack Avenue filling station. Surveillance cameras captured the crime on videotape, but police never responded.
Detroit police routinely underreport
homicides. The Detroit Police Department is systematically undercounting homicides, leading to a falsely
low murder rate in a city that regularly ranks among the nation's deadliest, a Detroit News review of police and medical
examiner records shows. The police department incorrectly reclassified 22 of its 368 slayings last year as
"justifiable" and did not report them as homicides to the FBI as required by federal guidelines.
Woman gets 30 days in jail for
texting in court. A Utah mother of four small children has been jailed on a judge's order to
serve 30 days behind bars for allegedly sending a text message while she was watching a court
proceeding. The report comes from her father-in-law, Dennis Jackson, who told WND of the series
of events that left his daughter-in-law, Susan Henwood, imprisoned.
Woman
cuffed for not holding escalator handrail. Anyone who has ridden an escalator and bothered to
pay attention has seen — and likely ignored — little signs suggesting
riders hold the grimy handrail. In Montreal's subway system, the friendly advice seems to have
taken on the force of law, backed by a $100 fine. Bela Kosoian, a 38-year-old mother of two, says
when she didn't hold the handrail Wednesday [5/13/2009] she was cuffed, dragged into a small holding
cell and fined.
Teenage hiker's calls ignored; no
street address. Teenage hiker David Iredale used his cell phone to call Australia's equivalent
of 911, seven times pleading for rescue after he became lost in tough scrubland and ran out of water
in 100-degree heat. Each time he got through, he was told he needed to give a street address before
an ambulance could be sent. Shortly after the final call, Ireland collapsed and died of thirst.
Food stamp
rule frustrates police in North Dakota. [John] Schweitzer's misfortune should have been an open-and-shut
legal case. The thief was caught on video surveillance, and he used his own food stamp swipe card to pay for
groceries before leaving with Schweitzer's wallet. But a federal law prohibiting the disclosure of information
about food stamp recipients — even to law enforcement, unless a specific name is provided — meant
it would take months and a lot of legwork before an arrest was made.
Feds' red tape left medical devices
infected with computer virus. The Conficker Internet virus has infected important computerized
medical devices, but governmental red tape interfered with their repair, an organizer of an antivirus working
group told Congress on Friday [5/1/2009]. Rodney Joffe, one of the founders of an unofficial
organization known as the Conficker Working Group, said that government regulations prevented hospital
staff from carrying out the repairs.
Prosecutor Appeals After Judge Drops
Rape Charges Against Liberian Over Lack of Interpreter. The prosecutor in the
case of a Liberian native charged with repeatedly raping and molesting a 7-year-old girl said
Monday that he is filing an appeal of a controversial judge's ruling that dismissed all charges
because an interpreter who spoke the suspect's rare West African dialect could not be found.
Man, 81, charged for
clearing pothole for repair. An Ohio man said he chipped away loose material to prepare a
pothole for repair and thought he was helping the city, not breaking the law. An undercover police officer
spotted 81-year-old James Stacy in the street near Stacy's home with a pickax and a broom last week.
Criminal
Intent. House Bill 1690 by Rep. Terry Keel comes in response to complaints that the City of
Dallas has abused its public nuisance law, under which it may fine the property owner $500 for each day the
nuisance exists and even place a lien on the property. Although the law has historically been used to
shut down brothels, Dallas is utilizing it to extract revenue from ordinary businesses located in high-crime
areas. For example, a carwash in a low-income neighborhood was targeted, even though those running it
had nothing to do with criminal activity.
Living proof that the minimum wage is too high already...
Prisoner wrongly freed after officials get
phony, typo-filled fax. Officials mistakenly released a prisoner from a Kentucky facility after
receiving a phony fax that ordered him freed, and it took them nearly two weeks to realize it. The fax
contained grammatical errors, was not typed on letterhead and was sent from a local grocery store.
Police said natural causes; funeral
home said gunshots. A man's death that police and a medical examiner had said was the result
of natural causes has been ruled a homicide after a funeral home found three bullet holes in his body. The
Kansas City Star reported Thursday that the wounds — two of them in Anthony Crockett's head — were
noticed by funeral home workers after the man's body was embalmed.
Forgotten,
man sits in jail for two years. Joseph A. Shepard Sr. sat in local jails for almost
two years, assuming that his lawyer was making progress on his case and that drug-related charges against
him would soon be resolved in federal court. … Shepard, 53, is a man the system forgot, apparently
ignored by his own attorney — and the prosecutor and judge — as days ticked by in
a municipal lockup where he was confined to a cell 23 hours a day.
What idiots!
Controversial Muslim group gets
VIP airport security tour. The Department of Homeland Security took a Muslim group with known
past ties to terror organizations on a VIP tour of security operations at the nation's busiest airport at
the same time British authorities were working to break up a plot to blow up U.S. airlines.
U.S. Issued 3,400 Visas to Immigrants
from 'State Sponsors of Terror' in 2008. A little-known State Department program has allowed about
3,400 immigrants to come to the U.S. in 2008 from the four nations that a currently listed by the State Department
as "state sponsors of terror" — Iran, Cuba, Syria and Sudan. According to a State Department report on the
Diversity Immigrant Visa Program, 691 visas were granted to immigrants from Cuba, 1,435 to immigrants from
Iran, 1,147 to immigrants from Sudan and 94 to immigrants from Syria.
FBI: Still
not retooled for terror. This weekend's arrest of 17 homegrown al Qaeda wannabes just
across the border in Canada is a nightmarish reminder of the horrors that have been — and
could be — right here at home again if we don't fully get our counterterrorism act together
soon. By many accounts, despite a ballooning budget and staff, the FBI is still struggling
to get its arms around its newly reinvigorated counterterror (CT) mission — a critical capability
that could prevent another 9/11.
The
FBI Closes a Window to the Truth. [Paul] Charlton, who was fired by the Justice Department in
2006 for trying (without success) to force the FBI to record confessions in Arizona, had been sorely frustrated
by its policy. "We lost cases, we had to plead down cases, we had to drop cases just because of this
policy," he recalls in a phone interview. The Justice Department, finally waking up to the arrival
of the 21st century, now has a task force reexamining the virtual ban on recording, which by any reasonable
standard is as obsolete as J. Edgar Hoover. But the FBI shows no openness to change.
After
lights, sirens on I-94, lots of questions. A state trooper rammed a Hudson, Wis., man's van on
New Year's Eve and arrested him for fleeing a traffic stop because he did not quickly pull over. The
driver, who had his kids along, says he was looking for a safe place to stop.
Vertical
tag law costs unsuspecting biker. Antonio Gonzales rode his customized Harley-Davidson from New
Mexico to Bike Week, and then his wallet got a painful welcome from a Flagler Beach police officer —
a $1,151 citation for having his bike's license plate mounted vertically on a saddle bag. "I rode all
the way out here and all I have is 700 bucks," Gonzales said. "Then I get a $1,151 ticket." Many
bikers who ride customized motorcycles mount their plates vertically.
Rewrite Texas Graffiti
Laws. If a graffiti "artist" spray-paints your house or business, you could be the one who
draws the attention of law enforcement. Many Texas cities, including Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, and
Fort Worth, have adopted ordinances creating a criminal offense for property owners who fail to clean up
graffiti.
FAA outage reveals odd computing
practices. By using computing practices that would be considered poor in credit card networks
or power plant operators, for example, the FAA was vulnerable to a problem caused when new software was
loaded at the Atlanta center that distributes flight plans. Because the FAA relies on just two
computing systems, one in Atlanta and one in Salt Lake City, to handle that chore for the entire nation,
the software glitch all but sank the system Tuesday [8/26/2008].
FAA Points
Finger at Switch for Server Crash. Earlier this week, the FAA servers in Atlanta responsible for
handling all flight plans across the country crashed leaving massive flight delays at several major airports
including Atlanta, Boston, Washington D.C., and Chicago. Many would be surprised to hear that as important
a task as these computers handled, the technology in use was from the 1970's. One obvious question after
the servers went down from many was — where are the backup systems?
The FBI's
Upgrade That Wasn't: $170 Million bought an unusable computer system. "We had information
that could have stopped 9/11," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary
Committee. "It was sitting there and was not acted upon. … I haven't seen them correct the
problems. … We might be in the 22nd century before we get the 21st-century technology."
AT&T disaster recovery
awes Homeland Security. To a government employee, for whom efficiency is something one hears about but is
rarely able to achieve, the efficiency which the market can provide can seem like magic: mysterious and forever
out of reach.
Incompetence at the FBI is
compromising presidential power. This is another fiasco for the FBI, which may simply be incapable
of effective counterterrorism. Every independent group that has looked into the FBI — including
the Robb-Silberman commission — has found that the agency is failing in that duty. Whatever
discipline is handed out for this latest foul-up, the country needs to debate again whether domestic antiterror
functions should be taken from the FBI and given to a new agency modeled after Britain's MI5.
FBI Wiretaps Dropped Due to Unpaid Bills.
Telephone companies have cut off FBI wiretaps used to eavesdrop on suspected criminals because of the bureau's
repeated failures to pay phone bills on time. A Justice Department audit released Thursday blamed the
lost connections on the FBI's lax oversight of money used in undercover investigations. Poor supervision
of the program also allowed one agent to steal $25,000, the audit said.
Top terrorist sighting
raises no FBI interest. Two Americans believe they have spotted Adnan el-Shukrijumah,
the al-Qaida operative identified as "the next Mohamed Atta" at a location near Bakersfield, Calif., but
have been unable to get the FBI or Homeland Security to investigate.
Maybe they're too busy investigating stuff like this:
"Weapon
of Mass Destruction" Targets Sex Shop In Waldo, Florida. The device, discovered Sunday
morning [5/28/2006], was made of two gallon-size sports drink jugs connected by hoses. Someone
set it on top of the store's window air conditioning unit. … Under state law, by the book,
deputies say the device is a weapon of mass destruction. "They're looking at hundreds
of thousands of dollars in fines, and … 30 years in jail," Faulk said.
Emergency manager
didn't break off travel plans when bridge fell. The Minnesota Department of
Transportation's head of emergency management was attending a Harvard University program on
terrorist attacks and natural disasters when the Interstate 35W bridge collapsed on Aug. 1.
Instead of rushing back to help coordinate the response, Sonia Kay Morphew Pitt stayed at Harvard
for another two days and then spent eight days in Washington.
Update: The chickens have come home to roost.
MnDOT fires manager accused of improper
travel. The Minnesota Department of Transportation on Friday [11/09/2007] fired the emergency
manager whose frequent travel came under scrutiny, including her decision to remain out of state for several
days after the Interstate 35W bridge collapse. Sonia Morphew Pitt, who had been director of Homeland
Security and Emergency Management, committed "serious employee misconduct" by misusing state resources and
putting her personal life ahead of her professional obligations, the agency said.
Speaking of the I-35 bridge...
Bridge collapse: A half-inch closer to why.
The collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge may have originated with the failure of gusset plates that were sized a
half-inch too thin in the original 1960s design, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said Tuesday
[1/15/2008]. In a Washington news conference, NTSB Chairman Mark Rosenker also said there were no
indications that Minnesota's upkeep of the bridge played any role in its collapse — a statement that
immediately unleashed political debate, with Gov. Tim Pawlenty scolding critics for leaping to conclusions
and DFLers insisting that the full cause has yet to be found.
The Editor says...
The politicians (in Minnesota and Washington) can't afford to have anyone discover that the original
design was faulty. Their crisis mode and proposed highway taxes depend on a finding that the
bridge collapsed due to lack of maintenance.
Self-defense is,
inexplicably, no defense. On Sunday, Bob Mette and his son, Mike, 30, will go to the game at
Soldier Field to watch the Bears play the Lions. On Monday, Bob will drive Mike to Iowa, to prison.
Mike Mette, until recently a Chicago police officer, is scheduled to begin serving a 5-year prison sentence.
His crime? According to the judge's ruling, Mike threw one punch at an angry drunk who chased Mike down
the street and attacked him verbally, physically, repeatedly.
Girl, 10, Arrested for Using Knife to Cut
Food at School. A 10-year-old Florida girl faces felony weapons charges after bringing a small
steak knife to school to cut up her lunch, according to a report on MyFOXOrlando.com. School officials
say the Ocala 5th grader had brought a piece of steak for her lunch, and a four and a half inch steak knife
with which to cut it. According to the report, a couple of teachers took the utensil and called
authorities, who arrested the girl and took her to the county's juvenile assessment center.
Many more stories like this are on
the Zero Tolerance Page.
Police in Laramie, Wyo., Cite
Teen Girls Who Threw French Fries for 'Hurling Missiles'. Three 13-year-old
girls accused of throwing french fries during lunchtime at their school were cited for
"hurling missiles," an adult infraction covered by city ordinances.
TSA can't believe MacBook Air is a real laptop; owner misses
flight. The TSA has been known to take issue with products designed in Cupertino before, but for one particular
traveler, it was Apple's thinnest laptop ever that caused the latest holdup. Upon tossing his ultra-sleek slab of
aluminum underneath the scanner, security managed to find enough peculiarities to remove it from the flow, pull it aside and
wrangle up the owner for some questions.
Did
someone mention the TSA?
Death Investigation Deficiencies: "The
Mississippi medical examiner system doesn't exist, except in name only." So says Dr. Vincent DiMaio, a
renowned forensic pathologist, and author of the guiding textbook for medical examiners. And he isn't
alone. Talk to forensic pathologists across the country about how the state of Mississippi conducts
its forensic autopsies and you'll get chuckles, exasperated sighs and indignation. What you'll be
hard-pressed to find, however, is anyone outside the state who thinks things are being done properly.
Woman Arrested for Dancing at the Jefferson
Memorial. At 11:59, just four minutes after the event's start, U.S. Park Police had detained and
were handcuffing the aforementioned "Jefferson 1" … ostensibly for unauthorized dancing. Or, as former
Bureaucrash chief Jason Talley puts it, "One minute I'm taking video of people celebrating the freedoms etched
in the walls surrounding us, the next we see armed agents of the state putting chains on a friend of ours."
Woman cuffed, booked for
not paying library fines. A Wisconsin woman has been arrested and booked for failing to pay her
library fines. Twenty-year-old Heidi Dalibor told the News Graphic in Cedarburg that she ignored the
library's calls and letters as well as a notice to appear in court. Still, she was surprised when officers
with a warrant knocked on her door, cuffed her and took her to the police station to be fingerprinted and
photographed.
NOPD officer
punished for wearing the wrong uniform. With minutes left in the last shift of his 35-year New
Orleans police career, Sgt. Bobby Guidry received a call from a supervisor telling him he had been suspended
for wearing the wrong uniform shirt, the veteran officer said.
Fake Teen Cop Fools Police, Patrols Chicago
for 5 Hours. A 14-year-old aspiring police officer donned a uniform, walked into a Chicago
police station and managed to get an assignment — patroling in a squad car for five hours before
he was detected, police said Sunday [1/25/2009].
Not the
1st time boy was caught wearing cop gear. A 14-year-old boy charged with impersonating a Chicago
police officer over the weekend had been caught twice before donned in a police uniform and pretending to be
a cop. Prosecutors said he currently is on probation on a similar charge of impersonating an officer
from December 2007. His pastor, Rev. Roosevelt Watkins, said the boy had also been stopped by officers
just last month at the Ford City Mall for wearing a police uniform.
Prosecute
the shooters, not the guns. Of some 2,500 stolen bikes recovered by the police breaking a
thriving ring of thieves, only 55 have been claimed by previous owners, and only 18% of thefts were reported
to police. This indicates that most who have their bikes stolen feel informing the police is a waste of
time. Not everyone bothers to register their bikes or take down serial numbers and such. What's
the point?
EEOC:
An Out-of-Control Taxpayer-Financed Agency. You need not be an American citizen to use a federal
agency to file a lawsuit on your behalf. In what other country is there an agency that would help you sue
yet another government agency or a private company if you weren't a citizen? And provide you with an
interpreter to do so? Not one that I can think of. This case would be entirely moot if we had an
"English First" rule in our schools and required everyone to learn English for employment. I have given
up on the idea that such common sense will again prevail in our society.
Historic Whiskey Could
Go Down the Drain. Here's a sobering thought: Hundreds of bottles of Jack Daniel's whiskey,
some of it almost 100 years old, may be unceremoniously poured down a drain because authorities suspect it
was being sold by someone without a license. Officials seized 2,400 bottles late last month during
warehouse raids in Nashville and Lynchburg, the southern Tennessee town where the whiskey is distilled.
Update:
State settles for a sip of Jack.
A yearlong standoff between an avid Jack Daniel's collector and Tennessee liquor control agents has ended in
compromise and the return of most of the man's million-dollar whiskey collection.
No
Parking Spot? Here Are About 142,000 Reasons. Why is it so hard to find a parking place in
New York City? There are a lot of reasons, but this may be the most infuriating: The city has given
out no fewer than 142,000 free parking permits to public employees and others. That's twice as many as
City Hall had estimated were in circulation. And after two months of research, city officials cannot
say who has them all.
Beer runners' flour trail a recipe for trouble. Two
people who sprinkled flour in a parking lot to mark a trail for their offbeat running club inadvertently caused a
bioterrorism scare and now face a felony charge. The sprinkled powder forced hundreds to evacuate an IKEA
furniture store Thursday [8/23/2007].
Referring to the item immediately above:
Stupidest Terrorist Overreaction? Is this the
stupidest terrorist reaction yet? "Two people who sprinkled flour in a parking lot to mark a trail for their offbeat
running club inadvertently caused a bioterrorism scare and now face a felony charge." The competition is fierce, but
I think we have a winner. What bothers me most about the news coverage is that there isn't even a suggestion that
the authorities' response might have been out of line.
Questions for
the Pentagon: In the sorry tradition of shooting the messenger, the Pentagon is cashiering its
top expert on Islamist doctrine, Stephen Coughlin. Some members of Congress are now contemplating hearings
to ask why. Along with drawing attention to Coughlin's research, now circulating on the Internet, the
growing controversy has thrown a spotlight on Coughlin's alleged nemesis at the Pentagon, a top aide named
Hesham Islam — whose tale deserves closer attention.
Public Land
Mismanagement and Environmental Irresponsibility. Decades of fire suppression by the Forest Service have
disrupted natural fire cycles and turned many western forests into tinderboxes waiting to burn. Dense stands of
spindly deadfall and underbrush now occupy land once characterized by open savannahs and large, widely spaced trees.
One result is larger, more intense fires that burn the publicly owned forests to the ground. Indeed, by the
Forest Service's own estimates, 90 to 200 million acres of federal forests are at high risk of burning in
catastrophic fire events.
Uncle Sam is afraid to say what he means
because he might offend the people who are determined to kill us all.
State
Department: Taliban is not a terrorist organization. A new State Department report designating
terrorist organizations notably excludes one group: the Taliban. The U.S. has been fighting a war
in Afghanistan for almost a decade aimed at "defeating the Taliban," Taliban members repeatedly have threatened
and killed American citizens and lawmakers have increased pressure on State to add the Taliban to the list.
Terror —
and candor in describing the Islamist ideology behind it. [Scroll down] Holder's
avoidance of the obvious continues the absurd and embarrassing refusal of the Obama administration
to acknowledge who out there is trying to kill Americans and why. In fact, it has banned from its
official vocabulary the terms jihadist, Islamist and Islamic terrorism.
Holder
balks at blaming 'radical Islam' for terror attempts. Despite crediting the Pakistani Taliban
with fostering the recent failed car bombing in Times Square, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. was
reluctant Thursday [5/13/2010] to say radical Islam was part of the cause of that and other recent attacks.
An
obvious but muzzled truth: Islamist terrorism. If you want to watch someone squirm, take
a look at the two-minute videotape of Attorney General Eric Holder dodging Republican Rep. Lamar Smith's
question whether "radical Islam" motivated the Times Square bomber. Holder, who last year called
America "a nation of cowards" for refusing to talk frankly about race, plainly didn't want to say what is
plain to everyone else, that Faisal Shahzad, back from five months in Waziristan, launched his terror
attack because of his Islamist beliefs.
War of Wordcraft. The
newest tactical weapon of this administration against our terrorist enemies appears to be one constructed of
language. Its deployment began when the term "War on Terror" was replaced by "Overseas Contingency Operations,"
and terrorist attacks were renamed "man-caused disasters." More recently, as witnessed in the exchange
with Attorney General Eric Holder and Rep. Lamar Smith, it consists of a complete absence or rejection of
particular words to describe the threat if such descriptions include the term "Islam," even when combined
with the modifying adjectives "radical" or "extremist."
The Tomb of
the Unknown Lawyer. Watching Attorney General Eric Holder as he testified recently before the
House Judiciary Committee was a disheartening experience. Congressman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) tried
repeatedly to get the general to acknowledge that "radical Islam" was a motivation for three of the recent
attacks on the homeland — Nidal Hasan's murderous Fort Hood attack, and the failed attempts of Abdulmutallab
and Shahzad in Detroit and New York, respectively. The administration has said again and again that
these were "isolated" individuals, only to be contradicted when the facts came out.
More
about Terrorist attacks reported as "isolated incidents".
See No Radical
Islam, Hear No Radical Islam. On May 13, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) confronted Attorney General
Eric Holder about whether radical Islam was the motivating factor in the terrorist plots against the United
States over the past year. Rather than acknowledge the religious-ideological threat posed to us, Holder
continued the Obama Administration's pattern of trying to avoid using terms like "radical Islam" and "Islamic
terrorism."
Who Is Governing America?
Attorney General Eric Holder testified the other day before the House Judiciary Committee. Republican
congressman Lamar Smith asked him what seemed to be a pretty simple question. ... Smith re-worded the same
question and re-asked it six times, with Holder refusing to acknowledge what is as obvious as the fact that
I am typing these words and you are reading them. That every major incident of terror of recent
years has been performed by Muslims and that all of them associate their particular theology with their acts of
terror.
An Obvious
but Muzzled Truth. If you want to watch someone squirm, take a look at the two-minute videotape
of Attorney General Eric Holder dodging Republican representative Lamar Smith's question of whether "radical
Islam" motivated the Times Square bomber. Holder, who last year called America "a nation of cowards" for
refusing to talk frankly about race, plainly didn't want to say what is plain to everyone else, that Faisal
Shahzad, back from five months in Waziristan, launched his terror attack because of his Islamist beliefs.
Nicking Our
Public Discourse. What with the Fort Hood mass murderer, the Christmas Pantybomber, and now
the Times Square bomber, you may have noticed a little uptick in attempted terrorist attacks on the U.S.
mainland in the last few months. Rep. Lamar Smith did, and, at the House Judiciary Committee, he was
interested to see if the attorney general of the United States thought there might be any factor in common
between these perplexingly diverse incidents.
Obama's invisible Islam.
The Obama administration seems to have issued an internal gag order that forbids any official statements that
might cast even the most extreme interpretations of the Islamic religion in a negative light. The "force
protection review" of the Fort Hood massacre omitted any mention of shooter Nidal Malik Hasan's openly radical
Islamic worldview or the fact that he made the jihadist war cry "Allahu Akbar!" before opening fire.
Initially, the Obama administration refused to even call the massacre an act of terrorism, much less radical
Islamic terrorism.
Word
to Obama — Daniel Pearl Was Not Beheaded Because He Was a Journalist. Yesterday Barack
Obama signed the toothless Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act of 2009 named in honor of the Wall Street
Journal reporter who was killed by terrorists in 2002. The bill promotes press freedom. The president
declined to take questions from the media at the signing event. Jennifer Rubin at Contentions Blog pointed
out that Barack Obama forgot to mention that Daniel Pearl was murdered by Islamic extremists.
Obama Won't Say Who Killed Daniel
Pearl. At a signing ceremony for the Freedom of Press Act, it is ironic and shameful that Obama
could not bring himself to identify the killers who beheaded the man who fearlessly reported on the jihadist
terrorists.
The Army censors Franklin Graham. The Army
made the wrong decision to forbid Franklin Graham from praying with soldiers at a National Day of Prayer event
on May 5 because he spoke out against Islam.
Rev.
Franklin Graham Banned by the Pentagon for Telling the Truth About Islam. Franklin Graham, distinguished
Christian minister and son of an American evangelical treasure (i.e. Billy Graham) was banned from praying at the Pentagon
for their upcoming May 6th National Day of Prayer event because he called Islam "evil." Apparently Franklin
didn't get the memo that we can't say squat about Islam anymore.
Lawmaker Calls for Hearings into Pentagon's 'Politically Correct'
Decisions. A conservative Republican congressman from Georgia is calling for congressional hearings to
investigate actions by the U.S. military in recent weeks to cancel or rescind invitations that had been made to two
prominent conservative Christian leaders — Franklin Graham and Tony Perkins — to speak at military
prayer events.
PC In The DOD. The
Army disinvited the Rev. Franklin Graham from praying at the Pentagon because he might offend Muslim soldiers.
But isn't that the same attitude that led to the Fort Hood massacre?
Obama Appeases U.S. Muslims. The
New York Times reported Monday [4/19/2010], with no hint that it understood the implications of what
it was reporting, that Barack Obama is reaching out to Hamas-linked groups in the United States, while
hamstringing our response to the terror threat by making obfuscation of the ideology of jihad terrorists
official U.S. policy.
Obama Stands with
Muslims as He Promised. Though the president is taking great public pains to appear tough on
terror and the real terrorists — as opposed to the imaginary ones (i.e., conservatives and Tea
Partiers) — Barack Obama has actually gone to great lengths to make sure others like Shahzad remain
utterly undisturbed. Others who at this very minute remain undetected among us, ready to strike
on orders from radicalized Imams or terror-army chiefs, walk among us, now knowing that they have a true
friend and protector in the White House. Barack Obama has successfully purged from the national
discourse on terrorism — excuse me, "man-made disasters" — any mention of the
religion/political ideology which is the undeniable common denominator.
Obama bans terms Jihad, Islam.
President Barack Obama's advisers will remove religious terms such as "Islamic extremism" from the central
document outlining the US national security strategy and will use the rewritten document to emphasize that the
United States does not view Muslim nations through the lens of terror, counterterrorism officials said.
To this president, there's no such thing as an Islamic extremist.
Obama's jihad on 'jihad'.
President Obama's latest strategic innovation in the war on terrorism is to ignore jihad and maybe it will go
away. The Obama administration is removing terms such as "jihad" and "Islamic extremism" from the U.S.
National Security Strategy in an attempt to convince Muslim countries that America doesn't view them solely
through the lens of counterterrorism. It's reasonable to look beyond terrorism in developing relationships
with Islamic states. ... But the National Security Strategy is not some kind of outreach initiative, it is
the framing document for America's global safety.
What the Euphemisms
Tell Us. In the latest installment of politically correct, not to say Orwellian, language emanating
from the Obama administration, the term "rogue states" has been sidelined in favor of "outliers." The switch
was unveiled as part of the just released Nuclear Posture Review. States like North Korea and Iran, labeled
"rogue" by the Bush administration, will no longer labor under that punitive adjective.
Lieberman:
Omitting 'Islamic' Terrorism From Security Document Dishonest, 'Offensive'. Sen. Joe Lieberman
slammed the Obama administration Sunday for stripping terms like "Islamic extremism" from a key national security document,
calling the move dishonest, wrong-headed and disrespectful to the majority of Muslims who are not terrorists.
The Most Dysfunctional Place on Earth.
We now live in a nation that will not name its enemy. Homeland Security wants to eliminate terms like Islamic
jihad or terrorism from its vocabulary lest we offend some of the people trying to kill us. The United States
has global enemies of every description. Pretending they don't exist is an invitation to attack.
Governor's aide: National Security meeting "surreal".
A close aide to one of the longtime governors in attendance, who was present for much of this meeting, ... described
a strange and "almost surreal" usage of terms, phrases and jargon that dominated their presentations to the governors,
and noted an obviously deliberate avoidance of other more specifically accurate terms that seemed to obscure their
messages.
Terror reviews
avoid word 'Islamist'. Two new documents laying out the Obama administration's defense and homeland
security strategy over the next four years describe the nation's terrorist enemies in a number of ways but fail
to mention the words Islam, Islamic or Islamist.
Administration Dumps 'Jihadist' Term. President Obama
does not see the terrorism challenge as a fight against "jihadists" because that conveys an undeserved religious legitimacy
and risks reinforcing the view that the U.S. is at war with Islam, his counterterrorism adviser said Thursday [8/6/2009].
Dare to Call
It Terrorism. So it turns out that the worst Islamist terrorist strike since 9/11 —
an attack that killed twice as many Americans as were slain in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing — was
not a terrorist attack at all. Just ask the FBI. ... Like the cavalry, the FBI came riding to the PC rescue.
The Federal Bureau of Let's Skip the Investigation pronounced that the killing was not terrorism. Forget
about Islamic (or at least Islamist) terrorism. This mass murder wasn't even terrorism.
Obama
Scraps 'Global War on Terror' for 'Overseas Contingency Operation'. The Obama administration has
ordered an end to use of the phrase "Global War on Terror," a label adopted by the Bush administration shortly
after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. In a memo sent this
week from the Defense Department's office of security to Pentagon staffers, members were told, "this
administration prefers to avoid using the term 'Long War' or 'Global War on Terror' [GWOT.] Please use
'Overseas Contingency Operation.'"
Obama
Scraps 'Global War on Terror' for 'Overseas Contingency Operation'. The Obama administration has
ordered an end to use of the phrase "Global War on Terror," a label adopted by the Bush administration shortly
after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. In a memo sent this
week from the Defense Department's office of security to Pentagon staffers, members were told, "this
administration prefers to avoid using the term 'Long War' or 'Global War on Terror' [GWOT.] Please use
'Overseas Contingency Operation.'"
Homeland Linguistics.
The Obama administration has made great changes in the way we handle national security. And judging by
its actions so far, it seems that the most important failing of the previous administration has been in
semantics. The changes started with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano deciding that the
word "terrorism" was too harsh. She has made a point of not using it, opting instead for "man-caused
disasters." That was merely phase one.
Obama's
War on English. In an age when a waiter is a server, an actress is a female actor, and a
dubiously-competent socialist cult leader is an American president, it was only a matter of time before
the "Global War on Terror" became an "Overseas Contingency Operation" (OCO). Thus Spoke Zarathustra
this week via a memo sent to the Pentagon and select speech writers, officially establishing Team Obama's
redesigned terminology. The War is over, long live the Operation! ... Victory through euphemism!
How
to keep the war on terrorism out of America's backyards: No longer will federal officials speak
of "the long war" and "the war on terrorism." The administration has banned these terms from the government
lexicon. That's not to say that the long war against transnational terrorism is over. Just ask the
police in Lahore, Pakistan. Last week, terrorists armed with heavy weapons and grenades stormed Lahore's
police academy.
No More Jihadists. The
Associated Press is reporting that the U.S. government is moving to kill off jihadists, Islamo-fascists,
and mujahedeen. Not the people: the words. Reports from the Department of Homeland
Security and the National Counter Terrorism Center recommend discontinuing the use of such terms, because, as
the AP report says, "Such words may actually boost support for radicals among Arab and Muslim audiences by
giving them a veneer of religious credibility or by causing offense to moderates." … If we eschew these
words, what how are we supposed to refer to our enemies?
Government Policies Stifle Talk
of Islam. When President Roosevelt addressed Congress after Pearl Harbor, he cited Japan fifteen
times in a speech of five hundred words. When President Bush did the same after 9/11, he uttered "Islam"
or "Muslim" more sparingly — just eleven times in a speech of three thousand words. And when
Senators Obama and McCain spoke at the respective conventions and debates, asking to be entrusted with
America's security, not a single reference to Islam could be found.
Flying Blind in the
War on Terror: Imagine that following the bombing of Peal Harbor in December 1941, that FDR had
prohibiting the use of the terms "Nazi" or "Japanese Imperialism" due to pressure brought to bear by German
and Japanese-American lobbying groups. Or at the height of the Cold War that the US government had
determined to ban the use of "Soviet" or "communism" for fear of offending the sensibilities of
Russian-Americans or European socialists. Yet that is precisely what has happened following the
revelation last week by the Associated Press that the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security
has issued guidelines banning the use of "jihad", "mujahedeen" and other Islamic terminology with reference to
Islamic terrorism. This move lays bare the ideological prison house of political correctness in which
our top policymaker's reside.
Who
Is Afraid to Say "Honor Killing"? The FBI removed all mention of the controversial term "honor
killing" from the wanted poster of a double-murder suspect after FOXNews.com ran a story announcing the use
of the term. Yasser Abdel Said, wanted for the murder of his two daughters, has eluded authorities for
almost a year. ... According to family members, Said felt he was compelled to kill his daughters because they
had disgraced the family by dating non-Muslims and acting too "Western."
Military
report: Terms 'jihad,' 'Islamist' needed. A U.S. military "Red Team" charged with challenging
conventional thinking says that words like "jihad" and "Islamist" are needed in discussing 21st-century terrorism
and that federal agencies that avoid the words soft-pedaled the link between religious extremism and violent acts.
"We must reject the notion that Islam and Arabic stand apart as bodies of knowledge that cannot be critiqued or
discussed as elements of understanding our enemies in this conflict," said the internal report, a copy of which
was obtained by The Washington Times.
Strategic Collapse in the War on
Terror: Words matter, and in the global war on terror we are losing the battle of words, in a self-inflicted
defeat. The consequences could not be more profound. Recent government policy memoranda, circulating through the
national counter-terrorism and diplomatic community, establishes a new "speech code" for the lexicon in the war on terror,
as reported by the Associated Press and
now available in the
public domain. These new "speech codes" recommended that analysts and policy makers avoid the
terms jihad or jihadist or mujhadid or "al-Qaida movement" and
replace them with "extremists" and by extension other non-specific terms.
Let's call this 'terrorism' by its real
name. It's official: We're fighting … terrorists. You can also call them violent
extremists if you like, but never use jihadist or mujahedeen or Islamo-fascist to
describe our enemy. These words are deemed pejorative and offensive, according to a recent Bush administration
memorandum to federal employees whose jobs involve explaining our ongoing war to the public.
Homeland Security
Newspeak. The Department of Homeland Security thinks it's a bad idea to use the word "liberty"
when describing America's foreign policy goals. Nor does it much like the terms "Islamist" and
"jihadist." Heaven forbid the federal government cause needless offense in the current war against,
well, whoever. Such are the recommendations on "Terminology to Define Terrorists," a nine-page, "Official
Use Only" memo issued in January by Homeland Security's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.
The
War on Words: During the past year, several federal agencies — including the
Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, and the National Counter Terrorism Center —
have declared a war on words. Specifically, these agencies have issued memoranda discouraging their
employees from naming the enemy in the War on Terror. The prohibition included words such as "jihad,"
"Islamist," "Islamofascism," and "caliphate," among others.
The
Jihad against Free Speech: One important element to note in connection with the recent
Al-Haramain designation is that on at least two separate occasions it had used legal threats against
US media organization to coerce retractions following reports of its ties to the international terror
network -- ties that are now considered well-established by both the US government and the media. These
incidents are instructive on how Islamic extremists have previously used lawfare strategies to silence those
asking questions about their activities, and give us insight into how these legal theats are being used today
to scuttle media investigations.
Uncle Sam isn't the only one.
PC
language hinders the fight against terrorism. There is never any situation so challenging that
Government ministers cannot exacerbate it. Last year ministers directed local councils to employ a
special PC vocabulary in their drive to wean the Muslim community, especially young men, from extremism
and support of terrorism. In this lexicon of euphemism, "extremism" became "community resilience" and
"terrorism" was translated into "anti-Islamic activity". What retard dreamed up this nonsense?
Somewhat related:
Civilian base employee
files federal lawsuit against Camp Lejeune CO. A Camp Lejeune civilian employee filed a federal
lawsuit this week accusing base officials of violating his constitutional rights by requiring him to remove
anti-Islamic bumper stickers from his Toyota. ... As result, [Jesse] Nieto, a retired Vietnam War veteran who
has worked aboard base since 1994, is not able to use his vehicle to visit Arlington National Cemetery, the
site where his son was buried after he died in the 2000 terrorist attack on the U.S.S. Cole.
A war of words over honour killings.
In its initial poster seeking fugitive Texas cab driver Yasser Abdel Said — sought for the double homicide
of his teenaged daughters — the bureau said he disapproved of their dating non-Muslim boys and stated that
they were murdered "due to an 'Honour Killing.' Though family members speculated that the father's Islamic
belief motivated the crime, the use of the phrase "honour killing" incensed the local Muslim-American community,
who argued that the accused's religion should not be linked to the double homicide, which left his two daughters
dead in the back of his taxi. After a public outcry, the FBI struck the offending words three weeks ago.
Strategic Collapse at
the Army War College. A faculty member publicly defends Hamas while students are not allowed
to read texts on militant Islam.
Speaking Truth to Muslim Power.
'The United States is not at war with Islam and will never be. In fact, our partnership with the Muslim world is
critical in rolling back a fringe ideology that people of all faiths reject." So spoke President Barack Hussein
Obama in Turkey last week. Following in the footsteps of the Bush administration, Mr. Obama wants to avoid labeling
our enemy in religious terms. References to "Islamic terrorism," "Islamic radicalism," or "Islamic extremism" aren't
in his speeches. "Jihad," too, has been banished from the official lexicon.
Language
Police Terrorize Common Sense. There is nothing wrong with crafting careful language when dealing with
terrorism. For years political leaders have used terms such as Islamist terrorist or Islamo-fascist to carefully
distinguish militants from the vast majority of peace-loving Muslims. But there is a difference between being
careful and being cowardly.
Fort
Hood massacre report gutless and shameful. There are two basic problems with the grotesque
non-report on the Islamist- terror massacre at Fort Hood (released by the Defense Department yesterday
[1/15/2010]): [#1] It's not about what happened at Fort Hood. [#2] It avoids entirely
the issue of why it happened. Rarely in the course of human events has a report issued by any
government agency been so cowardly and delusional.
GOP
Congressman Blasts Pentagon Report on Fort Hood Shooting. The independent Pentagon review of the
Fort Hood massacre purposely avoids any mention of radical extremism, a congressman who represents the area
where the base is located has charged. Rep. John Carter, R-Texas, told Fox News Monday [1/18/2010] that
the 86-page report — released last week — fails to mention alleged shooter Nidal Malik
Hasan's extremist views and behavior.
Pentagon
Whitewash: November is not so far away that it deserves forgetting or whitewashing: An
Arab terrorist named Nidal Hasan went to a health-care center, in a fort -- at an Army base -- in
Texas, and opened fire killing 14 people while he shouted "Allahu Akbar." But you would not know this
if you read the Pentagon Report on the massacre released Friday [1/15/2010].
Muslim question
persists in Army shooting. Fear of offending Muslims or being insensitive to religion was likely a
key factor to why Army supervisors missed signs that the suspect in the deadly Fort Hood shooting rampage was a
Muslim extremist, according to national security experts.
Video:
Holder Refuses to Say 'Radical Islam' Causes Terrorist
Attacks. How is it possible to prosecute the war against radical Islam when Obama administration
officials don't believe radical Islam causes terrorist attacks?
Barack Obama declares the 'War on Terror' is over. The US
president has instead replaced it with a softer approach stressing "new partnerships" and multilateral diplomacy.
"Our long-term security will not come from our ability to instill fear in other peoples but through our capacity to speak
to their hopes," Mr Obama said in a message introducing a new national security strategy.
Brennan's
Surrender. We've seen the enemy and it's not just the jihadists. It's also our own government,
which refuses to see this very real enemy. How can we fight and defeat what we refuse to see?
Obama Makes
Little Headway Among Arabic-Speaking Muslims. Barack Obama entered office with high hopes of improving
the U.S. image among Muslims worldwide. He hauled out his middle name, gave his first interview as president
to Al-Arabiya television, quoted hadith, gave major speeches in Istanbul and Cairo, and talked ceaselessly of
"respect" for Muslims. Where has all this gotten him?
The
Elephant in the Room: Islamism and appeasement. In a speech in Cairo about a year ago,
President Obama sought a "new beginning" for the United States and the world's Muslims. In pursuit of
this initiative, Obama gave his first interview as president to Al-Arabiya television, apologized for America's
past behavior, bowed before Saudi royalty, sided with the Palestinians against our ally Israel, did next to
nothing to forestall Iran's development of nuclear arms, and released a National Defense Strategy last week
that ignores the connection between Islamism and terrorism.
New national security strategy borders on incoherent.
Is it possible to defeat an enemy we don't understand? That is only one of the questions that ought
to occur to anyone reading President Obama's new national security strategy. Administration officials
and loyalists have been trying to put the best possible face on the congressionally mandated 52-page document.
But anyone who glances at so much as a page will see that is rife with platitudes, wishful thinking and self-delusion.
The
endless hypocrisy of Eric Holder. [Scroll down] Holder's refusal to link radical
Islam with the epidemic of global terrorism is likewise entirely political. When asked at a
congressional hearing if radical Islamic terrorists were behind the Fort Hood killings, the attempted
Christmas Day bombing and the foiled Times Square bomb attack, he refused to identify that obvious common
catalyst. He cited instead a "variety of reasons." The nation's chief prosecutor wasn't looking
at the evidence, but adhering to a politically correct predetermined dogma.
None Dare Call
It... What? Former Speaker Newt Gingrich may be the most notable public figure in some time to
state the obvious: radical Islam is a clear and present danger to America. In a speech last week
at The American Enterprise Institute in Washington, Gingrich said, "this is not a war on terrorism ... this
is a struggle with radical Islamists." The problem, he said, is that too many leaders are "sleepwalking"
and won't face the threat.
Refusing to Name the
Enemy. [Scroll down] Can one imagine during World War II if the American government and
military had never used the term "Nazism" or "kamikaze" to describe the enemy? It is unthinkable.
Indeed, at present, it is unforgivable that American officialdom has covered up who our present-day
enemy is, what it stands for, and what its ultimate goals are.
Pentagon Whitewashes Cause of Ft. Hood Massacre.
When I heard the initial report on Friday on the findings in the Fort Hood shootings investigation, I almost
ran my car off the road. The words "workplace violence" were used. As if the shooting at Fort Hood
was like a fired worker going back in to his place of business and killing his co-workers. Maj. Nidal
Hasan is depicted as a loner, who everyone thought was a nice guy who just snapped. ... Can we not honor our
dead by calling the name of the enemy? In Fort Hood, it was a radical Islamist who was an al-Qaeda
wannabe. He was a terrorist.
State seizes antique
gambling equipment. Antique gambling equipment, including a roulette wheel dating to the 1880s,
was seized from an antique store here by state agents under a state law prohibiting the possession of
unlicensed gambling equipment. "Some of these things are over 100 years old," said Ron Turner,
owner of the Cowboy Cabin. "These are not gambling devices. These are antiques. It's a
historical collection. This never is, nor will be, a gambling establishment."
Denver Mint Requires
Visitors to be Ungroomed. When taking a tour of the U.S. Mint, certain items are prohibited,
including...
Cameras or camera cell phones
Handbags, book bags, backpacks, purses, fanny packs, diaper bags
Packages of any type
Strollers
Food or beverages of any kind
Video recorders or any type of recording device
Tobacco products
Personal grooming items (makeup, hair brush or comb, lip or hand lotions, etc.)
Illegals caught at BWI,
released. Federal authorities late last week detained and later released eight illegal
aliens from Mexico who authorities said were acting suspiciously near a gate at Baltimore-Washington
International Thurgood Marshall Airport. Officials said the illegals were detained Saturday
morning [4/29/2006] near Gate D3, a Northwest Airlines gate, after federal air marshals noticed
them gathered in the area with no carry-on luggage. … ICE officials said they were investigating
possible connections between the illegals and a human-trafficking or human-smuggling operation, but
would not comment on why they released the illegals.
Shotgun-wielding Minnesota farmer, 74, charged
after chasing down thief. A farmer who chased down a thief and held him at gunpoint until
authorities arrived now faces a more serious charge than the thief himself. Kenneth Englund, 74, was
charged with second-degree assault, a felony. The thief, who the sheriff said admitted stealing about
$5 worth of gasoline from Englund's neighbour, was charged with misdemeanour theft.
Felonized for Foiling a Real Crime.
Bradford Township, Minn., doesn't have its own police force, relying instead on deputies sent from 15 miles
away. When Bradford Township Board member Kenneth Englund detected thieves stealing gasoline from his
neighbor's farm, he attempted to detain the thieves using his unloaded shotgun. ... [Now] Englund faces the
most serious charge from the incident.
McNab v. United States: Invalid
Foreign Laws Lead to Years in U.S. Prison. The Supreme Court is currently considering whether
to take the case of four businesspeople sent to prison for importing lobster tails from Honduras. Their
convictions are predicated on supposed violations of the Lacey Act, which makes it a crime to import "fish or
wildlife taken ... in violation of any foreign law." Here, the foreign laws are Honduran fishing
regulations that have been declared null and void in Honduras, but are somehow still being enforced by
American federal courts.
Zero Tolerance for Security Guards.
Security guard George Stevenson chased a suspected burglar onto Arlington Elementary School property and
through the school itself. When he was apprehended, the suspect was armed with a knife. According
to school officials, however, the real criminal was Stevenson. Because he carried an otherwise legal
pistol, Stevenson was arrested and charged with felony possession of a weapon on school property.
Government Puts
Rat Control Business Out of Business. The Arizona Structural Pest Control Commission (ASPCC) halted
a teenager's innovative — and popular — rat control business because he failed to hold a
$78 state-regulated commercial pest control license and pass an exam covering over 40 pages of laws and
rules unrelated to his mesh wire rat prevention devices.
[If you build a better mousetrap, Big Brother will find a way to regulate and tax it.]
$58,000 Spent Fighting Over a Treehouse.
Two anonymous complaints about a treehouse have cost a Clinton, Mississippi homeowner at least $28,000 in legal
fees and local taxpayers about $30,000 in a fight to have a playhouse torn down.
Homeowner reconsiders mowing lawn after jail stint.
Linda A. Ballew spent four nights in the Harris County Jail for ignoring court orders related to a long-running dispute about
her overgrown lawn before she finally agreed to cut the grass Tuesday [6/5/2007].
Failure to Water. In another example of
overcriminalization, police in Orem, Utah decided to enforce an ordinance against neglected yards by arresting
Betty Perry, a grandmother and widow who was seriously negligent in watering her lawn. The 70-year old
was handcuffed, arrested, and taken to jail.
She has been in the news before!
Gardening Grandma Arrested for Failure
to Prune. On April 3, 2002, Kay Leibrand surrendered to the police. She was fingerprinted.
They took her mug shots. The 61-year old grandmother and software engineer was told that she had broken
the law. She might go to jail or perhaps she would get off with just a fine. On May 30, 2002,
she was arraigned. Her crime was allowing street-side xylosma bushes to grow more than two feet
high. … Never before in city history had it prosecuted a resident for such horticultural excess.
Wrong
apartment raided in Annapolis. Wearing masks and carrying rifles, Annapolis police officers attempting
to execute a search warrant broke down the door of an apartment, set off a percussion grenade that released smoke
and a flash of light and noise, and kicked one occupant in the groin. Then they realized that they were
at the wrong address.
Minneapolis SWAT Team Raids Wrong House.
Khang, a Hmong immigrant with shaky command of English, set down his gun, raised his hands and was soon on the
ground, an officer's boot on his neck. The gunmen, it turned out, were members of a police SWAT team that
had raided the wrong address because of bad information from an informant — a mistake that some critics
say happens all too frequently around the country and gets innocent people killed.
Woman Arrested for Making Faces
at a Dog. A prosecutor has dropped charges against a woman who was arrested for staring at and
making faces at a police dog.
Pennsylvania
Woman Cited for Cursing at Toilet. A Scranton woman who allegedly shouted profanities at her overflowing
toilet within earshot of a neighbor was cited for disorderly conduct, authorities said. Dawn Herb could
face up to 90 days in jail and a fine of up to $300.
Update:
Potty mouth protected by First Amendment.
A woman who was cited for loudly cursing at her overflowing toilet — and then at a neighbor
who told her to quiet down — has been acquitted on First Amendment grounds.
Guards make woman remove bra that triggered
metal detector at Idaho courthouse. Security guards refused to allow a woman into a federal
courthouse in Idaho until she removed a bra that triggered a metal detector. Lori Plato says she and her
husband, Owen Plato, were stunned when U-S Marshals Service employees asked her to remove her bra after the
underwire supports set off the alarm.
Truancy for Parents in Texas. Texas may
join the ranks of states like Minnesota and California who are attempting to use the criminal law as a parenting
tool. A proposal in the state legislature would charge parents with a misdemeanor and a fine if they fail
to attend a parent-teacher conference at their child's school.
See
a Smoker in a Non-Smoking Area? Call 911. If you catch someone smoking in a non-smoking
area in Omaha, Neb., call the police. The Omaha Police Department is encouraging city residents to
call 911 in the wake of the citywide ban on smoking that went into effect on Oct. 2.
[Is that what the designers of the 9-1-1 system had in mind?]
Subway Rider Busted for Selling a
Token. Transit police handcuffed and cited a man who sold a $1.75 subway token to another
rider who was having trouble with a token vending machine. Transit authority spokeswoman Jocelyn Baker
… acknowledged that [Donald] Pirone sold the token at face value and did not make a profit. But
the law is the law, she said.
HPD still issuing tickets for
license plate borders. "It was never the intention of the Legislature for people to be receiving
traffic citations for having license brackets," said state Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, who sponsored
the bill. "It's clearly out of bounds for them to be issuing tickets now." ... The [Houston police]
department's most prolific officer, Matthew Davis, issued at least 1,216 license bracket tickets since
January. He wrote 30 in one day in February and has issued more than 200 since [Governor] Perry signed
Williams' bill.
Innocent Man Stuck With 100 Parking Tickets.
After two years, innocent man is still fighting parking tickets incorrectly issued because of a personalized license
plate. In the two years since San Carlos resident Nick Vautier moved to California's San Francisco Bay Area,
he has received over a hundred parking tickets worth $3000. He is not responsible for a single one of them,
but several jurisdictions continue to prosecute him without ever having established any guilt.
Why
was Cho Free? Now comes news that a court in 2005 found Virginia Tech gunman Cho Seung-Hui to
be "mentally ill" and an "imminent danger to others" — but then let him go.
The Wait for License Plates Still Tops Seven
Weeks. More than two years after installing a new computer system that cost twice as much as
expected, the state Division of Motor Vehicles is still taking more than seven weeks to mail out license
plates and vehicle titles — more than twice as long as it took before the system was installed,
records show.
Is
this any way to help the homeless? Mary Baker and Ruth Neikirk love to cook. What's more,
they love to cook for poor people. They do it frequently, preparing meals at home and bringing them to
their church in Virginia. … The people they cook for love it too. But there's a problem. It
was "criminal activity." The Fairfax County health department points out that —
horrors — Mary and Ruth are actually preparing food and serving it to people! Without
a license!
Wabash Valley woman didn't realize
second cold medicine purchase violated drug laws. When Sally Harpold bought cold medicine
for her family back in March, she never dreamed that four months later she would end up in handcuffs.
Now, Harpold is trying to clear her name of criminal charges, and she is speaking out in hopes that a law
will change so others won't endure the same embarrassment she still is facing.
Buy too much
cold medicine, go to jail. [Sally] Harpold is a grandmother of triplets who bought one box
of Zyrtec-D cold medicine for her husband at a Rockville pharmacy. Less than seven days later, she
bought a box of Mucinex-D cold medicine for her adult daughter at a Clinton pharmacy, thereby purchasing
3.6 grams total of pseudoephedrine in a week's time.
Step Away from the Cold Medicine. As is
often the case with policies aimed at curbing the drug supply, civil liberties were one of the first casualties
of the meth hysteria. Several cities and states, for example, quickly made it illegal for businesses to
sell customers combinations of ingredients that together, are used to make meth, but that are perfectly legal
if bought separately. Sell bhutane [sic], cold medicine, and matches to the same customer, and an unknowing
store clerk could well be arrested. These laws effectively deputized private business to begin policing
the shopping habits of their customers — never a good idea.
[Certain combinations of products cannot be purchased simultaneously without sounding an alarm. Try this
experiment at your own risk: Go to Radio Shack and try to buy a speed dialer and a 6.5536 MHz
crystal at the same time.]
Police Hit Grandmother With Taser Gun
Five Times. Beverly Kidwell, 68, was in the waiting room of the police department in
suburban Dayton when the incident occurred. … Kidwell said she waited a long time in the lobby
and, when she got up to leave, the officer hit her with the Taser gun.
Illustration courtesy
nbc4i.com
[That sounds like a one-sided story, but what could the other side
possibly be?]
Take 32 Grams of Tylenol and Call Me in 25
Years. In 2004 a Florida jury convicted Richard Paey of drug trafficking involving at least
28 grams of the narcotic painkiller oxycodone, which carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 25 years.
But there was no evidence that Paey, who has suffered from severe chronic pain for two decades, planned to do
anything with the pain reliever except relieve his pain. … This penalty is both cruel and unusual; first-time
offenders charged with unauthorized possession of prescription drugs typically get probation.
Boulder Woman Jailed Over Garage
Door. A Boulder woman was out of jail Thursday, after being locked up over the weekend for
installing a new garage door. The Boulder Daily Camera reported in its Thursday editions that Megan
Forbes was arrested and taken to jail on Sunday [4/9/2006] for failing to show up on a court summons she
received for replacing her original garage door with a new one.
Risk
of not knowing technology: jail. The AP recently ran a story about a substitute teacher who
was convicted of exposing students to pornography. Her contention that it was inadvertent because she
couldn't keep up with pop-ups seems plausible, but the equally non-tech-savvy jury didn't buy it (despite the
fact that the prosecution never even made a reasonable case by checking for spyware). What seems
particularly Kafka-esque is the potential 40-year sentence she faces.
Elderly
Woman Slammed in the Slammer. In a very sad story, 78-year-old Garland resident Betty Smith
related her horrendous tale of woe to Dallas County Commissioners at their January 9th meeting. Her story
of abuse by the Dallas County judicial system and Sheriff's Department began when she was awakened by knocks
on the door at 4:00 one morning. The officer told her she was being arrested for illegally ordering a
duplicate copy of her driver's license. Never mind that Ms Smith's car had been carjacked not long ago,
along with her purse and personal belongings, including her driver's license. … On the way to jail, the
deputy told her that her record indicated that she had committed a homicide in Arizona.
Woman
slammed against car by San Jose police officer wins appeal. [Scroll down] [Laura] Bushell-McIntyre,
a pediatric nurse who had just graduated from San Jose State, was attending the fraternity party when police
arrived in response to a disturbance call. The court said she had complied with Officer William Foster's
request to leave the house, but touched his badge after repeatedly asking him for his badge number. Foster
then put her in a pain compliance hold and slammed her against a car, the court said.
They're being called
the Kutztown 13. They are a group of high schoolers charged with felonies for
bypassing security with school-issued laptops, downloading forbidden internet goodies and
using monitoring software to spy on district administrators. … The administrative password
that allowed students to reconfigure computers and obtain unrestricted internet access was
easy to obtain. A shortened version of the school's street address, the password was
taped to the backs of the computers. The password got passed around and students began
downloading such forbidden programs as the popular iChat instant-messaging tool.
Editor's Note: The school
administrators acted with incompetence, putting the admin password on the back of the
computer. The kids who figured out how to use the computers to their full potential
are the people who should go to the head of the class — not to prison.
Woman Ticketed for
Sitting on a Playground Bench with No Kids. The Rivington Playground on Manhattan's East
Side has a small sign at the entrance that says adults are prohibited unless they are accompanied by
a child. … [The ticket] could bring a one thousand dollar fine and 90 days in jail.
What ever happened to respecting our elders? An
82-year-old California woman says an officer cited her for taking too long to cross an intersection.
Mayvis Coyle insists when she entered the crosswalk the signal was green, but it turned red before she reached
the other side where an officer was waiting with a $114 ticket. "He treated me like a six year old,
like I don't know what I'm doing," Coyle said.
Woman
arrested over 96 cents. A Mansfield, Ohio, woman was arrested and
jailed for failure to file a 2001 city income tax bill totaling 96 cents … [after] she
explained the situation to a city employee who told her not to bother with the trifling amount.
Handicap permit should let a man
sit. Arthur doesn't want me to tell you his last name because he'd rather not get
on the bad side of the police. … His wife walks into the store to shop. Arthur likes to
wait in the car. "I can't follow her around for an hour and a half," he tells me. They've
been doing it this way the past year and a half … This worked out fine until the other day when a
community service officer working for the Cudahy Police Department leaned in Arthur's open window
and told him it was not legal for him to sit in the car and wait like that.
Retired Police Sergeant
Faces 35 Years for Not Producing a Drivers License. On July 18th, five
deputies arrived in three taxpayer funded patrol vehicles to take one nonviolent [65 year
old] man to jail, thus carrying out Judge Mackay's 90-day old warrant. [Raymond] Karczewski
offered no resistance, yet his wife reports her husband was rammed up against the side
of the house with his head slammed into the siding. If Karczewski is such a threat to
society, why did the criminal justice system wait 90 days to act? In 90 days Karczewski
could have been long gone but was arrested at home.
Gonzales asked to probe prosecution
of agents. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher yesterday asked Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales to
investigate what he called "the exceedingly harsh prosecution" of two U.S. Border Patrol agents now facing
20 years in prison for shooting a suspected drug smuggler in the buttocks.
Connecticut Court
Rules on Self Defense Shooting. The state's highest court ruled
Friday [7/9/2004] that a cab driver had no right to carry the pistol he used to
shoot a robber because his taxi is not a place of business.
Outrageous!
97-year-old
handcuffed, jailed for unpaid traffic ticket. Police say they had no
choice but to go by the book when they handcuffed a 97-year-old woman and took her
to jail for failing to pay a traffic ticket.
Editor's Note: The police
are really saying they have no
common sense, no judgement, no latitude or discretion of any kind. This is
the inevitable end product
of zero tolerance policies. Was
the arresting officer any safer with this woman handcuffed? Is Highland Park safer
with the old lady under arrest? Can you just imagine the riots that would have resulted
if this had been a black woman?
Dialectical Justice:
Most criminals are well aware that bank robbery is major crime that usually draws in the FBI and earns the
thief years in the slammer. Those currently casing a bank in California should be on notice that even if
caught they could get away with only 60 days in jail, four months less than the mandatory maximum for
first-time DUI. To draw such a softball sentence, combined with media protection, it appears to help
if the criminal is a professional ethnic and Marxist anti-war activist such as Carl Pinkston.
It's called hibiscus, but it won't get you
high. Landscape contractor Blair Davis was in his northwest Harris County home around 2 p.m.
when there was a knock at his door. Davis said he hadn't even gotten his
hand on the doorknob when it flew open and he was looking at the barrel of a pistol. Behind the gun were
about 10 members of the Harris County Organized Crime and Narcotics Task Force, who burst into the home, guns
drawn, and began shouting at him to get down on the floor.
Editor's Note:
Even if this had actually been marijuana, which it wasn't, is marijuana
really that dangerous? Can you say, "Excessive force?"
$185 fine
for dropping sunflower seed. It could be called a case for the birds, but an
Oklahoma woman is crying fowl over a $185 fine for dropping a sunflower seed in public.
Town Battles Army Corps Over Permafrost.
Challenging an Army Corps of Engineers assertion that permafrost 20 inches thick is a "navigable water" of the
United States, an Alaskan borough attempting to build public playgrounds and athletic fields on a two-acre
parcel of permafrost has sued the Corps over its enforcement of the Clean Water Act. "This case is a
classic example of the Corps operating without boundaries, limits, or common sense in its application of
the Clean Water Act," said Russell Brooks, managing attorney of Pacific Legal Foundation's (PLF) Northwest
Center.
So Much Has Changed in Just
60 Years. One survey a few years back showed that a full one-third of the American people fear
the government. It has become intrusive and secretive. Franklin Roosevelt managed a truly global
war, with 12 million Americans under arms, using a White House staff of about 15 people. There
are now thousands on the White House staff, and they can't even manage a very small war in a little country.
Clarence
Thomas laments marijuana ban. Rehnquist concurred. O'Connor is just
unpredictable. She has endorsed states rights for marijuana but not for abortion. The
other six justices, we can now say, is consistent in its centralization of power to Washington. This
paves the way for federal agencies, such as the Department of Homeland Security, to control every private
exchange of money and goods in the U.S.
Terrorism? Naah … .
When explosions killed fifteen people and injured over 100 at an oil refinery in Texas City, Texas, on March 23,
2005, the FBI quickly ruled out terrorism as a possible cause. When a group calling itself Qaeda al-Jihad
and another Islamic group both claimed responsibility, the FBI was still dismissive. But then it came to
light that investigators did not even visit the blast site until eight days after the explosions —
and eight days after they ruled out terrorism as a possibility.
Many more terrorist attacks have been reported as "isolated
incidents." See this page.
Security at
Supermax slammed in fed report. Prison officials allowed convicted terrorists in the federal
super-maximum lockup in Florence to communicate with outside radicals for years and subsequent steps taken to
shut down the links have serious gaps. … The FBI, which handles letters from the most dangerous
prisoners, is supposed to produce translations within 60 days, according to the report. In reality, it
sometimes takes as long as six to 18 months, the report says.
[Why do known terrorists have mail privileges at the "Supermax" prison?]
Dubai undertow: How
about that INS official who mailed Mohamed Atta his visa six months to the day after he died in an unusual
flying accident in Lower Manhattan? How about leaving the ports to those State Department chaps who approved
the September 11 killers' laughably incomplete paperwork ("Address in the United States: HOTEL,
AMERICA")? Or how about those officials at Federal Aviation Administration headquarters who on the
morning of September 11 found it all a little too much and just walked out of the room? After
all, all those guys still work for the U.S. government. By golly, if we're gonna have security
breaches at American ports, let's make sure they're all-American security breaches.
More about the Dubai port deal is
on this page.
Boston
transit police begin passenger ID stops. Although officials would release
few details about the initiative, the identity checks will mark the first time local rail
and subway passengers will be asked to produce identification and be questioned about their
activities.
Police
Use a Taser on a 75 Year Old Woman. A Rock Hill [SC] police officer
received a verbal warning and was required to attend a Taser retraining course
after using a stun gun on an elderly woman.
When sexism claims are
a real hoot. You've probably heard of Hooters — the restaurant chain known for
attracting male customers by hiring waitresses who are well-endowed and dressed to show it. The firm
now employs more than 30,000 people. Some would consider this a success story, but our government
didn't. Not because Hooters is using sex to sell — but because its waitresses
are — get ready — women! "Discrimination!" cried the EEOC.
NOAA's radio transmitters missing backup
power. During the power failure two years ago, the NOAA (National Weather Service) radio
station serving NYC was dead.
When date rape is a
life sentence: I opened the floodgates recently with a column about Rich Gorman, a former Florida
State University student who is serving a five-year prison sentence for a "rape" that involved a 5- to
15-second sex act. He stopped immediately when she said "stop," and asked, "What's wrong?" —
not the usual query of a rapist — and then gave his soon-to-be accuser a ride home.
The employee
whose office let 9/11 hijackers into the US gets a bonus. The State Department
official who was forced to retire because her office allowed most of the September 11
hijackers into the United States has won an "outstanding performance" award of $15,000.
It's now a crime to delete files:
International Airport Centers sues former employee, claiming use of a secure file deletion utility violated
federal hacking laws.
More information about secure file deletion is
on this page.
Court Declares Atheism
a Religion. A federal appeals court has sided with a Wisconsin prison inmate
who claimed his constitutional rights were violated with officials would not allow him to
create a study group for atheists. In its ruling, the Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals ruled that Wisconsin prison officials were mistaken when they did not recognize
atheism as a religion.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
hasn't done its job. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has failed to conduct mandatory
status reviews for nearly all of the 100 Florida species currently on the federal endangered species
list, according to a legal challenge announced [recently] by Pacific Legal Foundation's Atlantic Center.
Mail Sent to Walter Reed Never
Delivered. Turns out the trouble at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the focus of a firestorm of
criticism over poor treatment of wounded war veterans, reached into the mailroom. The Army said Friday
[6/15/2007] that it has opened an investigation into the recent discovery of 4,500 letters and
parcels — some dating to May 2006 — at Walter Reed that were never delivered to soldiers.
Would
the FBI Have Heeded "Able Danger"? I really don't think the FBI would
have acted on the information. Instead, today, we'd be sweeping under the rug
yet more ineptitude by the, unfortunately, "lead agency" in the War on Terror. Let's
look at what the FBI has done with other similar information they received before and,
even worse, after 9/11.
Secret CIA details found
easily on Internet: report. The names of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) personnel, including covert operatives,
internal telephone numbers and locations of two dozen CIA installations can be found
through Internet searches, a US newspaper has reported. Through online services that
provide public, legally obtained information for a fee, a reporter netted a directory
of 2,600 CIA employees and 50 internal phone numbers, according to a Chicago Tribune
investigation.
DHS Gets
Another F in Computer Security. Most federal agencies that play key roles in the war on terror
are doing a dismal job of protecting their computers and information networks from hackers and viruses,
according to portions of a report to be released by a key congressional oversight committee
Thursday [3/16/2006]. The Department of Homeland Security, which is charged with setting the
government's cyber security agenda, earned a grade of F for the third straight year from the
House Government Reform Committee.
Homeland
Security secretary has stopped using e-mail. If you're like most of us, your e-mail box fills up daily with
pure junk. I'm not just talking about spam, though that's certainly a problem. I'm talking about chain letters,
stupid jokes forwarded 384 times, news you don't need, even wedding invitations. Homeland Security secretary Michael
Chertoff found a solution to his e-mail problem: He no longer uses it.
Ineptitude
Has Become a Hallmark of the Port Authority. It is reasonable to ask: How many major
blunders and missteps arising from poor judgment and faulty analysis is any one governmental agency entitled
to before heads roll and new management and strategies put in place? The recent history of Port
Authority projects suggests that the organization is in serious need of an overhaul.
State
Department criticized for purchasing Chinese PCs. A State Department purchase of more
than 15,000 computers built by the Lenovo Group of China is starting to draw criticism in the latest
sign of American unease about the role of foreign companies in the American economy.
The Editor says...
Setting aside the impact on our economy for a moment, what about the security risks of buying
computer hardware from a Communist country which is a potential enemy? How does anyone
know that the computers are free of built-in timed-release viruses and military-grade spyware?
Visa And A
Prayer. A bruised and betrayed Britain vows to kick out foreign Muslim clerics
who inspire violence and hatred while blocking entry of radical imams. But America keeps
ushering them in — by the hundreds. Are we really that stupid? Yes. Since
9-11, the multiculturalists at the State Department have admitted more than 1,000 religious workers
from Muslim nations, including terror hotbeds like Pakistan. In fact, they've granted
religious-worker visas to 113 imams from that country alone, immigration records show.
Woman threatened with arrest because of a bumper
sticker. A Denver police sergeant is under investigation for allegedly threatening
to arrest a woman for displaying on her truck a derogatory bumper sticker about President Bush.
Meter reading without
sanity checking: An Illinois woman received a $74,000 water bill for allegedly using
ten million gallons of water. Of course it was the result of a faulty meter. A utility
bill like this should never have been mailed.
FBI, Please Protect Us
from Terrorists and the ACLU. Does the FBI suspect that the ACLU is planning
a terrorist attack? If not, why is the FBI wasting time and resources monitoring such
groups when it admits it cannot process the information it already has?
Editor's Note: I'm not a big fan of the
ACLU, as you can see here. The ACLU is one
of the most destructive forces acting upon our traditional American culture, and is especially
threatening our freedom of religious expression in public places. The ACLU is a lot
of things, but it's not a violent terrorist organization.
An Object Lesson in Incompetence
at the Social Security Administration. This is one man's anecdote about a
mixup at the Social Security Administration (SSA). The software that the SSA uses
to sort mailing addresses when sending out social security cards has a bug which causes
correct ZIP codes in some addresses to be replaced with incorrect ZIP codes.
Regulating
cornrows: Usually, the established businesses get away with using licensing boards and "safety"
regulations to crush competitors. That's unfair. And if the question is who's protecting the public,
it seems to me Taalib-Din Uqdah has done much more than the bureaucrats who wanted him to spend 125 hours
studying shampooing.
Domestic Violence & Show
Trials With Predetermined Outcomes. Introduced in the 1980's with good intentions,
these laws have mutated into a system of repression, power and control, manipulated by the domestic
violence industry and exploited by vengeful spouses seeking advantage in divorce and child custody.
Lost in
translation. The federal Bureau of Prisons is holding 119 persons with "specific ties" to
international Islamist terrorist groups, yet has no full-time Arabic translators or a system to monitor their
communications, according to Congressional sources and a whistleblower who now fears retaliation from inmates.
False negatives on fingerprints: An
accused murderer using an alias had been stopped and fingerprinted three times, but IAFIS (the FBI's Integrated
Automated Fingerprint Identification System) didn't match his fingerprints to those on file under his real name.
Are people working under false
identities at DOD? How many people using false identities have been employed by the Defense
Department? Are some illegal aliens? As of now, the government does not have definitive answers
to these questions.
Setting terrorists
free: The Department of Homeland Security is releasing drug smugglers and human traffickers, and
perhaps even suspected terrorists and violent felons, as a matter of policy — because it doesn't
have the resources to keep them in custody.
Uncle Sam loses stuff
One big reason we should all oppose the idea of a National
ID Card is that Big Brother -- I mean, Uncle Sam -- has a tendency to lose laptop computers.
Maybe they get lost every day, but the ones we hear about are the laptops with thousands of people's personal
information aboard.
Lost items puzzle nuclear research
lab. The U.S. federal Idaho National Laboratory nuclear-reactor research lab cannot account for
more than 200 missing computers and disk drives that may have contained sensitive information. The
computers were among 998 items costing $2.2 million dollars that came up missing over the past three years.
67
computers missing from nuclear weapons lab. The Los Alamos nuclear weapons laboratory in New Mexico is
missing 67 computers, including 13 that were lost or stolen in the past year. Officials say no classified
information has been lost. The watchdog group Project on Government Oversight on Wednesday released a memo dated
Feb. 3 from the Energy Department's National Nuclear Security Administration outlining the loss of the computers.
Audit: Labs
Can't Account for Explosives. Hundreds of non-nuclear explosive devices are untested or unaccounted
for due to poor record keeping at two of the nation's top national laboratories, a federal audit found Wednesday
[6/28/2006]. … For example, Sandia officials couldn't account for at least 410 items, including
detonators, rocket motors, shaped explosives and bulk explosive powders.
Customs Service Withholds Data on
Missing Guns, Computers: The U.S. Customs Service is refusing to publicly release data on
thousands of computers and weapons for which it cannot account, getting angry attention from a member of the
Senate Judiciary Committee. The move comes just three days after an inspector general's audit at the
Justice Department found more than 200 weapons and 400 laptop computers missing from the FBI.
Missing FBI Laptops Still a Problem.
Three or four FBI laptop computers are lost or stolen each month and the agency is unable to say in many instances
whether information on the machines is sensitive or classified, the Justice Department's inspector general said
Monday [2/12/2007].
Laptops, weapons
missing at DEA. More than 90 weapons and 230 laptop computers belonging to the Drug Enforcement
Administration have turned up missing over the past five years and, despite efforts by the agency to address
weaknesses in tracking the items, "significant deficiencies" remain, a report said yesterday [3/28/2008]. The
lost and stolen weapons include pistols, rifles, shotguns and a submachine gun, said a 105-page report by the
Justice Department's Office of Inspector General….
Audit: ATF Lost 76
Weapons, 418 Laptops. The ATF lost 76 weapons and hundreds of laptops over five years, the
Justice Department reported Wednesday [9/17/2008], blaming carelessness and sloppy record-keeping.
Thirty-five of the missing handguns, rifles, Tasers and other weapons were stolen, as were 50 laptops,
the internal audit found. Two of the stolen weapons were used in crimes.
Lost DOT Laptops: Compromised Personal
Data? A series of data breaches at agencies under the United States Department of Transportation
has put the Personal Identification Information of at least 133,000 people at risk. According to
information WTOP obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, since 2001, the DOT has lost nearly 400
laptop computers and had nine instances when Personal Identification Information was lost or stolen.
Personal data at risk in
lost IRS laptops. At least 490 IRS computers have been stolen or lost since 2003 in security
breaches that potentially jeopardized the personal information of more than 2,000 taxpayers, a government
audit reported Wednesday [4/6/2007]. The computers were lost in 387 incidents, most of which were
not reported to the IRS computer security office as required, according to the report by the Treasury
Inspector General for Tax Administration.
Hundreds of Texas driver's licenses mailed to the
wrong people. An agency that warns Texans not to share personal information with strangers because
of the risks of identity theft mistakenly mailed hundreds of driver's licenses to the wrong people.
Man Threatened with Arrest After
Taking Photos of Police. After taking several snapshots and without talking to the police, Parker
said he left. After driving three blocks, he realized he was being followed by six squad cars. "I
thought they were all just trying to pass me, so I pulled over. They come running out of their cars at
me," he said.
Security Gaffes Cited in Courthouse
Spree. The deputy, a 51-year-old woman just 5 feet tall, was simply no match for the inmate
she was escorting to the courtroom, a 6-foot-1, 200-pound former college linebacker on trial for rape.
Authorities say Brian Nichols overpowered deputy Cynthia Hall, took her gun, and easily gained access to the
courtroom, where he went on to kill the judge and a court reporter. Security cameras captured images of
him overpowering the deputy, but no one, it turned out, was watching the screens.
Freeze! I just had my nails
done! How many people have to die before the country stops humoring feminists? Last week, a
defendant in a rape case, Brian Nichols, wrested a gun from a female deputy in an Atlanta courthouse and went
on a murderous rampage. Liberals have proffered every possible explanation for this breakdown in security
except the giant elephant in the room… The New York Times said the problem was not enough government
spending on courthouse security. Yes, it was tax-cuts-for-the-rich that somehow enabled a 200-pound
former linebacker to take a gun from a 5-foot-tall grandmother.
Inaugural
doomsday? [Recently] it was revealed that the FBI is on the verge of
scrapping a $170 million computer overhaul the agency said was critical in the
war against terrorism. The computers don't work. The bureau will pay a
research firm $2 million to discover what's wrong and see if it can be
fixed. Adding ludicrous to stupid, The New York Times reported some veteran
agents are resisting the transition to computers because they favor pens and pads.
Update:
Lockheed
Martin Picked for FBI Computers. Lockheed Martin Corp. will build a new computer system for
the FBI in an effort to put to rest the bureau's multimillion-dollar troubles with technology. The
Sentinel system, the replacement for a failed computerized case management project, is expected to
cost $425 million and be finished in late 2009, the FBI's chief information officer said
Thursday [3/16/2006] at a news conference.
Wyoming
woman arrested on false federal charges. Hope Clarke was put in handcuffs on a bench warrant for
failing to put away her marshmallows and hot chocolate while staying at Yellowstone National Park last
year. Federal agents apparently blindly relied on a computer database, even though the court had a copy
of the citation showing she had paid.
Ohio Man Loses Home and Business After
Allowing Employees to Play Golf. William Pierce had no way of knowing he was violating a labor
regulation because the DOL had not yet informed employers that flextime was illegal. The Department of
Labor sued him in 1989 for willfully violating the Fair Labor Standards Act and ordered him to pay $50,000
in fines.
Don't Pay for an Airline Ticket with
Cash. Willie Jones paid cash for a ticket to Houston, where he planned to purchase plants and
shrubbery for his business. But by paying in cash, Jones immediately aroused suspicions that he was a
drug dealer. Carrying large amounts of cash and being an African-American apparently fits the DEA's
profile of such a criminal.
The Diane Klieman Story: Special Agent
Diane Klieman thought that working for the Custom Service at JFK Airport was the right way to continue to serve
her country. She turned out to be wrong. Almost dead wrong!
Police seize legal
gunowner: A gunowners group is protesting the seizure of a legally armed citizen in a bookstore
by two police officers who responded to an anonymous caller alarmed by the weapon.
The Kevin Mitnick
Case: Kevin Mitnick's sixth Amendment right of a speedy trial was
violated. Should this not be taken into account when passing sentence? The
amount of $80 million estimated for the supposed damages he caused are also
out of hand. At no time did he deprive anyone of their property by removing or damaging
it — nor did he use any information he obtained for financial
gain — instead pursued knowledge over monetary reward. It is preposterous
to punish activities that society normally rewards and encourages.
Hate Tour. How the
State Department invites and pays for extremists to visit the US. Inviting members of extremist
organizations or individuals that refuse a rational, civilized debate is, frankly, a waste of money. If,
moreover, the Americans chosen to meet with the program's foreign participants happen to be hard-line critics
of the US, we have a recipe for disaster.
Nuclear
data found missing at DOE office in New Mexico. An inventory has found another
case of missing data involving nuclear weapons, this time at the Energy Department's regional
office in Albuquerque. The Energy Department said that an "accounting discrepancy"
involving three copies of a "controlled removable electronic media" — or
CREM — [more commonly, a computer disk] was found at the regional office as
part of the nationwide inventory of such devices.
A heartless homeland security
screw-up: Do you remember when immigration officials sent out flight school visa approval notices
for two of the 9/11 hijackers — six months after they had committed their suicide attacks on
America? President Bush proclaimed his outrage, four federal immigration officials were reassigned, and
Washington vowed that such embarrassing bureaucratic paperwork snafus would never happen again. I'm sorry
to report to you that it has, in fact, happened again.
Jury pool truly is a bunch of A-listers. If
you're on the A-list at Suffolk Superior Court this month, then most likely you're also in the jury
pool. A computer glitch at the state Office of Jury Commissioner alphabetized names of potential
jurors, rather than shuffling them, before summonses were sent out. That created a jury pool of
people whose last names mostly begin with the letter A.
Release
of Home Addresses Angers Concealed-Carry Licensees: A Second Amendment group
says the sheriff in Shelby County, Ohio, had no right to release the home
addresses of 87 people licensed to carry concealed pistols.
Controlling Pests or Controlling
Competition? The Pacific Legal Foundation challenges a California licensing law that would
require a 30-year business veteran to become an apprentice.
Justice
for little Angelo: It is too bad that only one man will go to jail for
this crime. There ought to be room in a cell somewhere for the social workers
and their bosses who made this murder possible in the face of blatant evidence about
the dangers that an infant could see, even if the responsible adults refused
to see.
Is talking
about online gambling illegal? According to the U.S. Justice Department, I
may have just committed a felony. Federal prosecutors say helping Americans find online
casinos or sports betting operations could amount to "aiding and abetting" illegal
gambling, a crime punishable by up to two years in prison.
Not
Guilty By Reason of Limited English Proficiency: In a terrifying blow
to the future of law enforcement and criminal proceedings, Pennsylvania prosecutors
were forced to drop drug charges against a man after a Pennsylvania Superior Court
declared a search void due to the accused's inability to understand English.
Government Workers: Working Hard or Hardly Working?
[In May 2004], the General Accounting Office (GAO) made headlines with its report
that scores of high ranking employees from eight federal agencies had degrees from
bogus colleges or unaccredited schools.
Unintended Consequences? In August, 1991, 18 EPA
agents burst into the offices of Higman Sand and Gravel with guns drawn. After 53 years in business
with a spotless record, the owners found themselves in federal court, accused of illegally storing hazardous
waste. The EPA agents had found a small quantity of paint thinner dumped on the property. At trial,
it was discovered that the paid informant had done the deed. He stood to gain $24,000 if the owners been
convicted, in addition to the $2,000 he had already been paid for the hot tip.
Tennessee man ticketed for flashing
lights. A Tennessee man who flashed his highbeams at oncoming traffic to warn them of a
patrol car was ticketed for "interfering with a police officer in the course of his duties".
Suit
filed after cops confiscate motor home: A California man has filed
suit in U.S. district court in Detroit after police from Royal Oak, Mich., confiscated
his motor home because it allegedly bore "obscene" pro-life messages.
FDA Takes Tyranny to the
Heartland. In this age of almighty government, nearly every blade of grass is regulated,
oftentimes heavy-handedly, as Michigan farmer Richard Hebron found out when the Michigan Department of
Agriculture (MDA), on Oct. 13, 2006, carried out a highly orchestrated sting operation against him for
transporting unpasteurized, unprocessed milk of the highest quality to enthusiastic consumers. That
day, his wife also was served a warrant in the dragnet.
The George Norris Subsection:
Feds
raid orchid-grower's home: George Norris said he believes his troubles may
stem from the US Fish and Wildlife Service's use
of CARNIVORE, a
government system that can tap into computer e-mails. "They
showed me page three of a five-page e-mail from several years ago where I was
being offered smuggled plants," he said. "They did not show me pages four
and five, which were my answer to this fellow, telling him we would not buy any
such plants that were undocumented. This was so old that I don't even
remember this e-mail."
Editor's Note: In
case the link to that article goes nowhere, the full text of the story can be found
here.
Orchids… not
Osama. The Fish and Wildlife Service can walk into anyone's home at any time and tear it
apart without even having to say what it is they are looking for; they spend taxpayer money on wild
goose chases like this one, ripping apart lives for the sake of a few orchids that are legally in this
country in the first place.
Criminalizing everyone.
"You don't need to know. You can't know." That's what Kathy Norris, a 60-year-old grandmother of eight, was told
when she tried to ask court officials why, the day before, federal agents had subjected her home to a furious search.
The agents who spent half a day ransacking Mrs. Norris' longtime home in Spring, Texas, answered no questions while they
emptied file cabinets, pulled books off shelves, rifled through drawers and closets, and threw the contents on the floor.
The six agents, wearing SWAT gear and carrying weapons, were with — get this — the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service.
Norris Orchid Saga continues.
I've written extensively here about the drama surrounding George Norris and Manuel Arias Silva's troubles with
the law. Both are elderly and in ill health, and from what I can gather from those "in the know", they are not
big bad orchid smugglers guilty of stripping the wild of rare orchids species, but victims of a complicated
web of petty politics, egos, and treachery.
Sad News About George Norris,
the Orchid Man. There are ironies upon ironies in this set of events. The chief among them is
that George Norris, as part of the orchid-growing and -trading community, is dedicated to the preservation of
orchid species and especially interested in the preservation and propagation of rare and endangered species.
The law which he was accused of breaking (provision of the CINES treaty) was ostensibly designed to preserve
endangered orchid species, but it has financially ruined a thriving orchid business and orchid-grower, making
the fate of orchid species more precarious by culling from the ranks of civil society someone who lived and
breathed orchids.
The
Unlikely Orchid Smuggler: A Case Study in Overcriminalization. George Norris, an elderly
retiree, had turned his orchid hobby into a part-time business run from the greenhouse in back of his home.
He would import orchids from abroad — South Africa, Brazil, Peru — and resell them at
plant shows and to local enthusiasts. He never made more than a few thousand dollars a year from his
orchid business, but it kept him engaged and provided a little extra money — an especially important
thing as his wife, Kathy, neared retirement from her job managing a local mediation clinic. Their life
would take a turn for the worse on the bright fall morning of October 28, 2003, when federal agents,
clad in protective Kevlar and bearing guns, raided his home, seizing his belongings and setting the gears in
motion for a federal prosecution and jail time.
Jailing
the innocent: Every day, many Americans commit crimes of which they are
unaware. Many of the crimes with which Americans are charged are absurd.
Report: Overextending the Criminal Law
President
Bush's secret service buffoons: [The Secret Service recently]
investigated renowned editorial cartoonist Michael Ramirez… because Ramirez drew
a provocative cartoon that was clearly intended to defend the president.
Silencing
Student Speech — And Even Artwork — in the Post-Columbine Era: The
relevant supreme court cases, and how they have been misapplied.
Judge
kills death sentence because jurors read the Bible. Although Robert
Harlan was convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering a 25-year-old woman and
shooting another woman passer-by who tried to help, leaving her paralyzed, a
Colorado judge overturned his death sentence because some jurors had
read the Bible during their deliberations.
Why the Fourth Amendment is
Right and Bush and Ashcroft are Wrong: Various news stories in recent years document the fact
that police have on numerous occasions battered down doors, entered the wrong houses and even killed innocent
people. These no-knock raids illustrate very clearly just how little protection Americans have against
being subjected to unreasonable searches and seizures of their persons and property.
Shrink-Wrapping Our Rights:
Laws relating to computers, software, and the Internet are being proposed and passed at such a breathless rate
that even those of us trying to follow them are having trouble keeping up. Unfortunately, some bad laws,
such as the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA), are likely to encourage other bad laws, such
as proposals to increase surveillance of the Internet.
Everyone is checked for guns —
except known terrorists! Database used on law-abiding Americans while al-Qaida and other enemies
get a free ride. Even the names of suspected al-Qaida cell members in the U.S. would not show up in a
background check by a gun store.
Did You Hear
the One About the Armed Robber Who… A pro-Second Amendment group says the Ninth Circuit
Court of Appeals has "lost its marbles," after throwing out the conviction of an armed robber who didn't mean
to show his loaded gun to a bank teller.
Call A Cop, Go To Jail. There
seems to be a law against holding cash. Robert R. Reiner had $350,000 of his father's money that he wished
to deposit in the bank. He asked the police to help provide security. They called the feds and the
feds took the money — presumably on the principle of guilty until proven innocent.
Upload a File, Go to Prison.
Two congressmen introduce a bill to criminalize the uploading of copyright works to peer-to-peer networks.
The penalty: five years in prison and $250,000 in fines. Critics say the law goes too far.
DigitalConsumer.org Have you ever made a tape of your
favorite songs to enjoy in your car stereo? Have you ever bought a CD and ripped it to your portable MP3
player? If so, you should know that recent changes to copyright law have been used to take away your
personal use rights to the media you legally acquire. That means that activities like making mixes or
copying music to a portable player are quickly being restricted or prevented.
Shift-Key Case Rouses
DMCA Foes. Critics say it's the absurdity of the unforeseen consequences of the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act that necessitates a change in the law. The DMCA goes too far and sends a chilling effect
through the academic community, they say.
Everyone a
criminal: Today, Americans draw prison sentences for unknowingly violating vague regulations,
the meanings of which are interpreted by the regulatory police who enforce the regulations.
The U.S. police state: Attorney Russ
Stein details his arrest for "idling." You have to read it to believe it.
Detroit's
voter rolls in question: Despite having died eight years ago, Kathe Beddow
still retains one mortal privilege: The right to vote. The city Elections Department in
July sent Beddow a voter registration card, even though she hasn't voted in more
than a decade.
Arrested
for catching a mouse? A California law requires a trapping license in
order to kill mice. The Animal Protection Institute of Sacramento pushed the
bill, which mandates anyone who takes furbearing mammals or non-game animals must
purchase a trapping license by passing a complex test and paying a fee of $78.50, the
San Francisco Chronicle reported.
The crime of distributed computing:
Misapplication of Georgia's anti-hacking laws puts an honest technician in hot water.
This ties in nicely with the Draconian
Punishment of the Month: In the 7th century B.C., an Athenian named Draco
established a code of laws which, rather than promoting stability and equality as expected,
became known for their terrible severity. Even 2600 years later, we use the word
Draconian [for cases like the ones on this page.]
Illinois Home Schoolers Told to Resist
Demands of Area Superintendent: The Home School Legal Defense Association is urging home-schooling
families in northeastern Illinois to ignore demands that they attend a pre-trial hearing to prove they are in
compliance with the law.
Senate
Asked to Probe FBI Case. According to congressional sources, the two
prominent senators have written to Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, chairman of the Judiciary
Committee, asking for hearings on the growing crisis of espionage failures at the FBI.
The confederacy of dunces: FBI
orders the wrong man arrested at airport; he was held for three weeks.
Air Force radio frequency jams garage
door openers. A secretive Air Force facility in Colorado Springs tested a radio frequency this
past week that it would use to communicate with first responders in the event of a homeland security
threat. But the frequency also controls an estimated 50 million garage door openers, and hundreds
of residents in the area found that theirs had suddenly stopped working.
[Of all the wide-open frequencies in the radio spectrum, the Air Force just had to have this
frequency that is being used by 50 million devices? We're supposed to assume the interference is
justified, because after all, it's for "homeland security", which has become the government's new trump card.]
First Responders: Historically, police
departments, fire departments and EMTs have all had their own independent communications equipment, so when there's a
disaster that involves them all, they can't communicate with each other. A 1996 government report said this about
the *first* World Trade Center bombing in 1993: "Rescuing victims of the World Trade Center bombing, who were caught
between floors, was hindered when police officers could not communicate with firefighters on the very next floor."
Property Rights In Radio
Communication: The FCC has been unable to keep up with the pace of change
in radio communication since the end of World War II. It took the FCC
nearly 10 years to finalize allocation and assignment criteria for television. For
four of those years, it had to impose a "freeze" on the licensing of stations. It was
almost 30 years before the FCC was able to change those specifications with the Low
Power TV proposal. It took the FCC three years to settle a dispute between FM radio
and VHF television over the same frequencies, and it took 10 years to reallocate some
frequencies from UHF television to mobile radio. Access to channels is thus constricted
by a bureaucracy which frequently needs 10 years to make a major decision, and the result
is a backlog of applicants that can only be described as chaotic.
EPA
Seeks Faith-Based Grants For Green Causes: The director
of an Environmental Protection Agency energy program told a meeting of
environmentalists Thursday [12/19/2002] that the White House's faith-based
initiative should include federal grants for religious groups that
advocate green causes.
Blacks
and Guns: Unfortunately, the way police crack down on crime — by
cracking down on all kinds of minor infractions, looking for excuses to search
people, being suspicious of everyone who looks suspicious — is a great irritant to
the law-abiding citizens.
Persnickety
police prompt panic in Pasadena: Woman gets the run-around while threatened
on the freeway by an armed man... who eventually got away.
Feds decline private assistance -
again! Rick Stanley, the Libertarian candidate for U.S. Senate, was characteristically
blunt. "Two years ago, when the fire started at Mesa Verde National Park, local volunteers showed up with
bulldozers and water trucks. They could have put the fire out in a matter of hours. But the
National Park Service was unwilling to accept private assistance. Twenty-four-thousand acres of beautiful
forest land was incinerated before that fire burned itself out."
Forest Service ignores offers of
Russian help: The Associated Press reported that then-District IX FEMA director Buddy Young went
to the [Los Alamos] fire and publicly announced, "You will not bring the Russian planes in here: We're
not having any Russians coming here and fighting our fires."
FBI
Looking Into Los Alamos Breach. The FBI has conducted two interviews and may schedule a third with
the woman who walked out carrying classified documents from what's supposed to be one of the most secure
facilities in the world, the Los Alamos National Laboratory, CBS News has learned. The incident has
exposed continuing security weaknesses at Los Alamos, which has been the focus of security and management
scandals for seven years.
The forest service
smokescreen: Last summer, four young firefighters died at the Thirtymile Fire in Washington
state's Okanogan National Forest... because of the Forest Service's gross incompetence. And not a single
person has been held publicly accountable for the fatal failures.
Disputed Air ID Law May Not Exist:
A recent lawsuit filed by Electronic Frontier Foundation founder John Gilmore against U.S. Attorney General John
Ashcroft, United Airlines and several others challenges the requirement that airline flyers present
government-issued identification in order to travel within the United States. The suit claims unpublished
federal regulations have created an "internal passport" for Americans in violation of the U.S. Constitution. As
it turns out, there may be no such law on the books.
Parents of 2-year-old 'streaker'
taken to court: Court claims 4th Amendment doesn't apply to social workers. Because a 2-year-old,
acting in typical toddler fashion, ran out of the house naked chasing a cat, a social worker demanded entry into
the North Carolina child's home to interview all children in the household, ultimately landing the parents in court.
Tommy Thompson's Reign
Of Terror: The government claims a crisis of unpaid child support. Leading scholars have
declared these claims to be everything from a "myth" to a "hoax." Yet some in the Bush administration
seem determined to continue the failed policies of the Clinton years. Health & Human Services Secretary
Tommy Thompson recently announced mass arrests of parents he says have disobeyed government orders.
Radiation Levels at the Capitol are 65 Times EPA
Standards for that Facility: Vice President Dick Cheney just announced that nuclear power should
be part of our national energy strategy. But a little-noticed 11th-hour regulatory action
by the Clinton administration may block the way. (Thanks a lot, Bill.)
Man Imprisoned 30 Years for Crime FBI Knew He
Didn't Commit: Representatives on the House Government Reform Committee showed a rare display of
emotion on Thursday [5/3/2001], as they heard the story of a man who spent 30 years in prison for a crime
the FBI knew he did not commit.
FBI and Anthrax: Another TWA
800 in the Making? In the fruitless attempt to locate the perpetrators of the anthrax attacks that
took place in the U.S. after the Sept. 11 hijackings, the FBI is once again ignoring evidence that
conflicts with its predetermined and wrongheaded theory of who was behind this biowarfare.
The Steven Hatfill Subsection
Who Carried Out the Anthrax
Attacks? Calling it a "Cold Case," the report noted that after five years, 53,000 leads,
and 6,000 subpoenas, the FBI still has no arrests. [Jim] Stewart asked, "So who did it? Former Attorney
General John Ashcroft once singled out Dr. Steven Hatfill, a bioweapons specialist, as a 'person of
interest.' But there have been no charges." That statement shortchanges the facts surrounding the
government's wrongful pursuit of Hatfill and its destruction of his life and career. In fact, Hatfill has
sued the government for invasion of privacy, and he has sued the media, including the New York Times, for
defamation.
The Crucifixion of Steven
Hatfill: Almost oblivious of the fact that they are in effect charging Dr. Hatfill with
wantonly murdering five innocent fellow Americans, the media have swarmed around him like angry bees, dredging
up incidents in his distant past to justify their continuing attacks.
Ashcroft May Target Hatfill With
RFK Tactics: In an attempt to justify the harassment of Dr. Steven Hatfill, the Department of Justice
may resort to tactics used by Robert Kennedy against the Mafia, Hatfill's friend and spokesman Pat Clawson told NewsMax.com.
UPI Exclusive: FBI is
tracking Hatfill: Fifteen months after a series of anthrax-laced letters killed five Americans,
the FBI again intensified its acknowledged interest in bio-war expert Stephen Hatfill, conducting a search of a
Maryland state park and openly tracking him around Washington streets, despite emerging concern over their methods.
Another Richard Jewell? A
lawyer has said that if Steven Hatfill is guilty in the anthrax attacks, he must be the dumbest criminal going.
Rogue Elephant: Ask
Dr. Steven Hatfill if he thinks this is a new and improved FBI. Spurred on by a university research
professor and a New York Times columnist, the FBI has turned Hatfill's life inside out.
A person
of interest: Is a vote for a Republican a vote for a police state? Those who
saw Dr. Steven Hatfill's Fox News press conference on Sunday, Aug. 25, must be asking
themselves this question. Once again, the FBI and Department of Justice (so-called) are
displaying what former Scripps Howard News Service editor Dan Thomasson
calls "a callous disregard for a citizen's rights."
Judge dismisses anthrax libel
case. A federal judge on Friday dismissed a libel lawsuit filed against The New York Times by a
former Army scientist once identified as a person of interest in the 2001 anthrax attacks. U.S. District
Judge Claude Hilton in Alexandria dismissed the case a week after lawyers for the Times argued that Steven
Hatfill should be considered a public figure under libel law, which makes it much more difficult for a public
figure to win a judgment than a private citizen.
Silence = Danger: A judge
orders journalists to name their confidential sources. The order arises in a civil suit filed by
Steven Hatfill, the bioterrorism expert whom federal investigators suspected was behind the 2001 anthrax
mailings. A former federal employee, Hatfill claims that the Justice Department and the FBI, by leaking
to the press information about their suspicions of him, violated his rights under the federal Privacy Act.
The News Media Vs. the Innocent.
Years ago, Ray Donovan, Ronald Reagan's Labor Secretary, was prosecuted for corruption, only to be acquitted.
After the verdict, Donovan asked plaintively, "Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?" Steven
Hatfill knows where to go to get his reputation back. But upon arriving there, he finds the door blocked
by someone who says her privileges are more important than his good name. That someone, of course, is a
journalist. And, not surprisingly, she enjoys the broad support of other journalists, who have proved to
be slow learners about the obligations they share with their fellow citizens.
$5.8 million for scientist in
anthrax lawsuit. The Justice Department has agreed to pay $5.8 million to settle a lawsuit
with former Army scientist Steven Hatfill, who was named as a person of interest in the 2001 anthrax attacks.
Hatfill claimed the Justice Department violated his privacy rights by speaking with reporters about the case.
Settlement documents were filed in federal court Friday [6/27/2008].
How the FBI Botched the Anthrax Case:
The anthrax investigation, almost from the beginning, was hampered by top-heavy leadership from high ranking, but
inexperienced FBI officials, which led to a close-minded focus on just one suspect and amateurish investigative
techniques that robbed agents in the field the ability operate successfully.
The
Anthrax Fiasco: Throughout one of the largest investigations in law-enforcement history, agents
were fixated on a "lone wolf" theory that Director Robert Mueller's FBI, for all intents and purposes, now
admits was wrong. Helped along by a sympathetic press corps, the obsession with a domestic perpetrator
has ended up in a dead end. … The FBI's mad scientist theory also fit the agenda of the political left, which
didn't want the trail of evidence to prove state-sponsorship of terror — particularly by Iraq.
Steven Hatfill Vs. The Media:
If the left wants an example of the Bush Administration's incompetence in the war on terror, they've got it in
the case of former government scientist Dr. Steven Hatfill, who was falsely accused of the anthrax murders.
The U.S. Government "has determined that settlement is in the best interests of the United States and has
agreed to pay Dr. Hatfill and his attorneys $2.825 million dollars and purchase for Dr. Hatfill
an annual annuity of $150,000," the Department of Justice said in a statement released on Friday, June 27.
But there was no apology for ruining an innocent person's life and career.
Update:
NY Times Wins in Libel Suit
Brought By Former Anthrax Suspect. A federal appeals court is handing a legal victory to the New York Times
by upholding a lower court's ruling tossing out a former Army scientist's claim that he was libeled by the newspaper in
columns which linked him to the deadly anthrax attacks in 2001. The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, based in Richmond,
Va., ruled that the scientist, Stephen Hatfill, was a public figure in the national debate over bioterrorism preparedness.
Apparent
suicide in anthrax case. Bruce E. Ivins, a scientist who helped the FBI investigate the
2001 mail attacks, was about to face charges. … Ivins died Tuesday [7/29/2008] at Frederick Memorial
Hospital after ingesting a massive dose of prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine, said a friend and
colleague, who declined to be identified out of concern that he would be harassed by the FBI.
The anthrax case and the
suicide. There still have been no media mea culpas in the public lynching of Steven Hatfill. There
is still no resolution on the anthrax attacks — resolution the public deserves to have and the victims'
families needs to know.
After Suicide, Feds Consider Closing
Anthrax Case. The chief suspect in the anthrax attacks now dead, the Justice Department is
expected to decide within days whether to close what had been one of its most high-profile unsolved cases. Five
people died and 17 others were sickened when anthrax-laced letters began showing up at congressional offices,
newsrooms and post offices soon after Sept. 11, 2001.
FBI used aggressive
tactics in anthrax probe. Before killing himself last week, Army scientist Bruce Ivins told
friends that government agents had stalked him and his family for months, offered his son $2.5 million
to rat him out and tried to turn his hospitalized daughter against him with photographs of dead anthrax
victims.
Bruce Ivins
Wasn't the Anthrax Culprit. Despite the seemingly powerful narrative that Ivins committed
suicide because investigators were closing in, this is still far from a shut case. The FBI needs to
explain why it zeroed in on Ivins, how he could have made the anthrax mailed to lawmakers and the media, and
how he (or anyone else) could have pulled off the attacks, acting alone. I believe this is another
mistake in the investigation.
Bad 'News'. This may mark the end of the
anthrax story but the reckless destruction of people's reputations and the disrupting and blighting of their
lives in the media is continuing on. There is much to be said for the British practice of limiting what
can be reported in the media about someone on trial until after that trial is over. Once a charge has
been made and publicized from coast to coast — if not internationally — later
exoneration will never get the same publicity, so the damage cannot be undone.
The Anthrax Truth Movement: On Wednesday [8/7/2008],
the FBI released a raft of documents to buttress its case against Bruce Ivins, whom the government says bears
"sole responsibility" for the 2001 anthrax attacks. … The FBI's cartload of paper is unlikely to settle
the case. Like 9/11 and the Kennedy assassination, the anthrax attack bears the hallmarks of a tragedy
destined to spawn innumerable alternative theories.
Prosecutors
Clear Hatfill in Anthrax Case. Federal prosecutors yesterday [8/8/2008] officially "excluded"
scientist Steven J. Hatfill from involvement in the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings, formally closing the
door on a costly episode that sidetracked the FBI's search for the real culprit for nearly five years.
U.S.
settles with anthrax mailings subject Steven Hatfill for $5.82 million. The former
Army scientist who was the prime suspect in the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings agreed Friday [8/8/2008]
to take $5.82 million from the government to settle his claim that the Justice Department and the
FBI invaded his privacy and ruined his career.
What If the
FBI Is Right About Bruce Ivins? One of the most frequent questions asked [about bioterrorism] is,
"If the Unabomber had been a biologist instead of a mathematician, could he have produced a sophisticated
bioweapon?" The answer has always been "No: That would require a team of individuals."
However, if the FBI is right about Ivins, such a lone individual can produce such a weapon.
The Anthrax
Attacks Remain Unsolved. The FBI's six-year investigation was the largest inquest in its
history, involving 9,000 interviews, 6,000 subpoenas, and the examination of tens of thousands of photocopiers,
typewriters, computers and mailboxes. Yet it failed to find a shred of evidence that identified the
anthrax killer — or even a witness to the mailings.
FBI and Media
Corruption in Anthrax Case. The FBI has officially "closed" the case and conveniently
blames a dead man, who committed suicide under FBI pressure, for the anthrax murders. The FBI
blames "the late Dr. Bruce Ivins" and claims that he "acted alone in planning and executing these
attacks." But the "evidence" is unconvincing and the case should still be considered unsolved.
Who Was the Real Anthrax Mailer?
There's a gaping hole in the FBI's argument that U.S. Government scientist Bruce Ivins was the anthrax mailer.
In addition to the 100 scientists with access to virulent anthrax from Ivins's flask whom the FBI claims to have
ruled out, one unauthorized individual had a special kind of access — the kind you get when you steal something.
Obama Obstructs
Oversight of FBI in Anthrax Case. Despite bipartisan congressional support for examining the FBI's
gross mishandling of the post-9/11 anthrax attacks, President Barack Obama is telling Congress that he doesn't
want the agency to be scrutinized and held accountable.
The Wrong Man.
In the fall of 2001, a nation reeling from the horror of 9/11 was rocked by a series of deadly anthrax attacks.
As the pressure to find a culprit mounted, the FBI, abetted by the media, found one. The wrong one.
This is the story of how federal authorities blew the biggest anti-terror investigation of the past
decade — and nearly destroyed an innocent man.
Nobody went more overboard in preparation for Y2K than the FBI.
The FBI and the mad bombers.
(Posted on December 9, 1999.) The FBI is warning us, through its Project Megiddo report, that right-wing
Christians are dangerous terrorists prone to incite violence in the weeks ahead.
Death by the FDA:
Is the FDA out to deliberately kill Americans? No, but the end result is the same.
Culture
Problems at Justice: A 76-year-old disabled man was evicted because his caretaker
brought cocaine into the apartment. In another case, an elderly woman was evicted because
her mentally disabled daughter, who lived with her, was found in possession of cocaine in a
location blocks away from the apartment. These extraordinary injustices are tallied as
victories in the war on crime.
Whatever Happened to Equal
Protection? Prosecutorial abuse has reached new heights in Idaho. A white husband is
being prosecuted for committing a hate crime for coming to the aid of his wife, who was assaulted by a
black man.
Honest and hard-working need not
apply: I have been struck by the stark differences between how the U.S. government postures
itself toward an ever-growing number of citizens who insist that agencies be tolerant, friendly, honest, fair
and generous to the population versus the manner in which so many federal agencies treat their own employees,
which is very bad.
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