Police budgets are filling in the holes in their budgets by stopping people and taking their stuff.
Category: Police State
‘We will arrest gay athletes, tourists at Olympic Games’
Since so many of the athletes are gay, this will be a major situation if they try:
‘Gay propaganda’ law co-sponsor says he is unconcerned about a US visa ban, saying: ‘I’ve spoken to US politicians, and they support my stance’
A Russian lawmaker has said the ‘gay propaganda’ law will remain enforced during the Sochi Winter Olympic Games in 2014. Vitaly Milonov, co-sponsor of the ‘non-traditional relationships’ bill, said the government cannot decide when to selectively enforce the law.
It comes as the International Olympic Committee said the Russian government had ‘assured’ them all athletes and spectators will be safe from arrest.
Speaking to Interfax and as translated by GSN, Milonov said: ‘I have not heard any comments from the government of the Russian Federation but I know it is acting in accordance with Russian law.
‘If a law has been approved by the federal legislature and signed by the president, then the government has no right to suspend it. It doesn’t have the authority.’
Amash-Conyers
I’ve been trying to explain to people why I see it as a win, but this article does a better job than I did.
Nixon never left
So the FBI has been investigating the leadership of Antiwar.com:
The FBI memo says:
“There are several unanswered questions regarding www.antiwar.com,” the [FBI] memo says. “It describes itself as a non-profit group that survives on generous contributions from its readers. Who are these contributors and what are the funds used for?”
Reporting on this document in August 2011, Antiwar.com raised concerns about government overreach and intimidation of critics of the country’s wars and national-security policy. Even disclosing the memo’s existence proved hazardous: the site began to lose major funders—to the tune of approximately $75,000 a year, according to Garris—who now feared that donating would draw unwanted attention from the feds.
Garris says Antiwar.com’s experiences are no different from the government obtaining phone and email records of top journalists or compelling writer James Risen to testify about his sources in court. “They’re getting away with systematic intimidation and sabotage” of those who seek to dig deeper into the goings-on of the national-security state, he told TAC.
So, without any evidence that Antiwar.com had committed any crime, but had only questioned and criticized US national security policy, the FBI investigated the readership of the website. The fact that the journalistic website drew the critical attention of the FBI was enough to scare off lots of donors. If that happens often enough, poof, no more Antiwar.com. Problem solved.
Read the whole thing. Pass it around. People need to know.
‘All you libtards take it in the ass’
http://youtu.be/x0Rc8L7ltFw
He certainly sounds like someone I’d want as my police chief:
In a video that has received wide attention, police chief Mark Kessler repeatedly tells those upset by his use of profanity to “go f*ck yourself” as he fires various automatic weapons.
Mayor Mary Lou Hannon told The Morning Call that Kessler had the right to express himself. The city would “not take action to quash free speech, whether or not each member of council or any member of council agrees with it.”
Kessler has uploaded several profanity-laced videos to YouTube. In one video, Kessler berates “libtards” and warns of an armed rebellion against the government.
“F*ck all you libtards out there, as a matter of fact, read my shirt,” he says, turning around to show a message on his back which read, “Liberals take it in the a**.”
“You take it in the ass and I don’t give a f*ck what you say so you can all just go f*ck yourselves. Period. I wont be going to D.C. and I don’t give a f*ck. If you f*cking maniacs want to turn this into an armed revolt, knock yourselves out. I’m not about that, so see you on the other side.”
In a video on basic pistol defense, Kessler repeatedly shoots a picture of scary clown, which he says is Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). He calls Secretary of State John Kerry a “c*cksucker” in another video before firing off an automatic weapon.
Tuesday on his Facebook page, Kessler called for a massive rally to “show these tyrants we will not stand for any more violations on our constitution or our freedoms.”
“I’m calling on all true Americans , all militia members, all true oath keepers to assemble, be ready to march on a tyrannical county government right here in Schuylkill county Pennsylvania, democrats are the true enemy of our country, our freedoms, our constitution, along with liberal news agency’s , liberal news reporters, much like hitlers nazis , time we clean these antiamerican thugs from office,” he wrote.
[…] Kessler is also a freshman member of the North Schuylkill School Board and founder of the Constitution Security Force, which lists the Southern Poverty Law Center as an “anti-American organization.”
Sometimes people tell me cops would never turn on the people like that. I just laugh and laugh!
http://youtu.be/AQakPtOQCJo
We were ‘actively misled’
Ron Wyden has been trying to warn us all along:
While some Senators are insisting that we need to keep going with NSA surveillance and just trust them that the NSA and FBI aren’t abusing the law and the information they have access to, others are pointing out that it’s a lot of hogwash. Senator Ron Wyden, who has been leading the charge against these programs for years (and was mostly ignored for that effort), gave a great speech describing how defenders of the program are directly choosing to mislead the American public. A key point, though it comes late in the speech, is the following:
The public was not just kept in the dark about the Patriot Act and other secret authorities. The public was actively misled.
Most of the speech is detailing exactly how that happened, and the distortions defenders of the program try to tell the American people and why they’re wrong. We’ll highlight a few, but reading or watching the whole speech is worthwhile.
He notes that he warned, quite specifically (and publicly) that when the American public found out how the laws were being interpreted, they would be surprised. That, clearly, proved accurate:
When the Patriot Act was last reauthorized, I stood on the floor of the United States Senate and said “I want to deliver a warning this afternoon. When the American people find out how their government has interpreted the Patriot Act, they are going to be stunned and they are going to be angry.” From my position on the Senate Intelligence Committee, I had seen government activities conducted under the umbrella of the Patriot Act that I knew would astonish most Americans.
Furthermore, he points out that officials chose to directly mislead the American public.
If that is not enough to give you pause, then consider that not only were the existence of and the legal justification for these programs kept completely secret from the American people, senior officials from across the government were making statements to the public about domestic surveillance that were clearly misleading and at times simply false.
It just keeps getting worse
Unreal. And this might be a good time to tell you we’re doing a C&L book chat at 2 pm EST with Radley Balko, author of “Rise of the Warrior Cop”:
July 17, 2013 SAN ANTONIO, Texas (CN) – A police officer for a Texas school district may have used excessive force in fatally shooting a teenager who fled the scene of a fistfight, a federal judge ruled.
Denys Lopez Moreno sued Officer Daniel Alvarado, Police Chief John Page and the Northside Independent School District in September 2011 for the death of her 14-year-old son, Derek Lopez.
The incident unfolded on Nov. 12, 2010, when Lopez allegedly exited a school bus and, in view of Alvardo, punched another student.
Lopez ignored Alvarado’s order to freeze and fled the scene with the school officer tailing him in a patrol car, according to the amended complaint.
With Lopez hiding in a shed at a nearby home, Alvarado drove back to the scene of the fight but allegedly refused to give up the search.
“Ignoring his supervisor’s orders to ‘stay with the victim and get the information from him,’ Alvarado placed the second boy into the patrol car and sped into the neighborhood to search for Derek,” the complaint states.
Local homeowners then directed Alvarado to the shed, Moreno claimed.
“In violation of NISD police department procedures, Alvarado drew his weapon immediately after exiting the patrol car,” the complaint states. “With his gun drawn, he rushed through the gate and into the back yard. Within seconds from arriving at the residence, Alvarado shot and killed the unarmed boy hiding in the shed.”
Moreno said the officer had a history of disregarding orders.
“In approximately a four (4) year period leading up to the shooting, defendant Alvarado had been reprimanded sixteen (16) times,” according to the complaint. “Specifically, he had been reprimanded for insubordination and failure to follow supervisors’ directives seven (7) times. Due to his poor service record, Alvarado was suspended without pay on five (5) occasions. On May 21, 2008, Alvarado was recommended for termination by Page. Despite being recommended for termination for insubordination and for refusal to follow supervisor directives, Alvarado remained on the force without remedial training.”
African American Wallet Exchange
Remember this, from Michael Moore’s “The Awful Truth”?
‘I thought they were going to shoot me next’
This looks like a real must-read book. I’ve been writing for what seems like forever about the militarization of our police forces, and make no mistake: There is very little accountability anymore. Hardly any, in fact.