Off with his head!

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Jon Lovitz Astonished His Anti-Obama Speech Went Viral: ‘He’s President, Not King!’

Actor Jon Lovitz was flummoxed that his expletive-laced, anti-Obama diatribe made international news. “Because I criticized the President, it’s news?” Lovitz tweeted incredulously. “Last I checked, he’s President, not King! This is America! Freedom of Speech. what’s the bfd?”

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Once upon a time criticizing the king or the government was a crime called seditious libel:

John Peter Zenger was arrested and imprisoned for seditious libel in 1734 after his newspaper criticized the colonial governor of New York. Zenger spent nearly 10 months in jail before being acquitted by a jury in August 1735. One hundred years later, Nova Scotia’s Joseph Howe also won a jury acquittal on a charge of seditious libel after his newspaper printed allegations that local politicians and police were stealing from the people.

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Ever wonder why Jon Stewart doesn’t make fun of Obama? He doesn’t want to anger the Obot brownshirts.

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SSDD

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We’ve seen this show before:

Twitter used to silence conservatives?

Conservative Chris Loesch, music producer and husband of radio host and CNN contributor Dana Loesch, had his Twitter account suspended on Sunday. He was apparently targeted by leftist users who utilized the “Block & Report Spam” function to trigger the social media account’s automatic spam algorithm. He was notified of his suspension via an email from Twitter claiming it was due to multiple unsolicited mentions to other users. “You will need to change your behavior to continue using Twitter,” the email admonished.

[...]

Conservatives suspect a coordinated campaign to report as spam users with whom liberal users disagree. Several users sent out tweets bragging about getting Mr. Loesch blocked, including one claiming “my life job to make conservatives lives miserable.”

If Twitter is indeed using an algorithm that allows user accounts to be reactively suspended according to malicious whims, that’s a threat to free speech for everyone — regardless of individual political views. Though Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment, Mr. Loesch was told that the company is going to try to create better safeguards to address this issue for the future.

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Remember in the Spring of 2008 when the blogs of Hillary supporters mysteriously got shut down as spam? Looks like Obamanation is up to its old tricks.

(h/t Tom Maguire)

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They’re ba-ack!

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Daily Beast:

It’s mere days from what Occupy Wall Street organizers say will be one of their biggest protests yet, and the people down in Zuccotti Park in Manhattan’s Financial District are hopping mad. Well, at least they’re hopping.

On the afternoon of April 27 in the park, one Occupier called out a signal, and the 100 or so demonstrators-in-training began jumping up and down and converging around a single protester—a tactic intended to keep marchers together in the event of police action. It was the seventh in a series of “Spring Training” protest refresher courses held by Occupy Wall Street in preparation for May 1, a day rich with progressive significance: May Day is celebrated internationally as a day to recognize workers and labor.

OWS organizers say protests scheduled for that day will involve thousands and perhaps tens of thousands of protesters in Manhattan, the cradle of Occupy, and additional protests in other major cities, most notably Los Angeles, where organizers have called for a general strike.

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They’ve got their new spring wardrobes on and their smart phones are charged up! Look out you evil 1%ers, the Occupiers are coming for YOU! (There’s a free concert at Union Square afterwards.)

Check out this ‘graf:

Mark Bray, a 29-year-old history Ph.D. candidate at Rutgers University, said he’s been involved in planning for May Day on OWS’s side since January. A core group of about 60 or so people has been meeting at a variety of locations, Bray said, including at a Greenwich Village church, at the offices of SEIU Local 1199, and in an artist’s space near Wall Street.

(my emphasis)

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Let’s connect the dots. Whenever OWS needs to pump up their numbers they join forces with SEIU. No union is more closely identified with Barack Obama than SEIU. But OWS has nothing to do with Barack Obama.

A number of unions around the country are planning on demonstrating tomorrow. From what I have seen most of them are government or quasi-government employees.

So place your bets. Will tomorrow be the beginning of an “Occupy Spring” or a pathetic last-ditch effort by the OWS movement to seem relevant?

Here’s a hint:

UC Berkeley taking hands-off approach to new Occupy camp

UC Berkeley plans to use words instead of police power to remove about 50 Occupy members who on Sunday started farming a plot of university land in Albany called the Gill Tract, a spokesman said Tuesday.

“There’s dialogue going on and discussion going on so we can bring it to a peaceful conclusion,” said UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof. “Discussion may lead to a better outcome.”

The land near San Pablo Avenue and Buchanan Street is currently used for agricultural research, Mogulof said. A separate parcel of land just south of where the Occupy farmers have set up is slated for commercial development, including a Whole Foods and a seniors housing complex.

Mogulof said UC Berkeley police are administering daily admonishments to the group about trespassing, but the university has not issued a deadline for them to leave.

Occupy the Farm to Take Back the Gill Tract member Gopal Dayaneni said the university cut off water to the area, so the farmers are bringing in their own and hand watering 15,000 seedlings they planted to grow beans, chard, squash, broccoli and other edible items.

He also said the group has one “completely closed” composting toilet for farmers and two portable toilets.

“Our primary purpose isn’t to camp, it’s to farm” Dayaneni said Tuesday, although people are camping overnight.

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To understand how stupid this occupation is you really need to see Zombie’s post:

Before the Occupation, the Gill Tract was an agricultural research farm where twenty-somethings getting their PhDs would work the fields to grow crops, as they researched biology or how to raise better, healthier plants. But now, after this incredible revolution by Occupy, the Gill Tract has been utterly transformed into a farm where twenty-somethings work the fields to grow crops. The only difference is that before, the farm served a scientific function to improve society, and was managed by experts and hard-working students doing meaningful research; but now, it’s run by a bunch of smug amateurs and dropouts who plant store-bought seedlings in the middle of what once was a controlled research environment. Meet the new farm — same as the old farm, except worse.

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But I had to laugh at this part:

Dayaneni said the group hopes to avoid an Occupy situation where the site attracts criminals and substance abusers by imposing a rule that anyone who shows up must work.

“We’re super clear about the fact that this is a farm,” Dayaneni said. “Those who do the work make the decisions.”

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They are starting to sound like Republicans.

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20 years ago

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Rodney King got beaten by the cops on March 1, 1991. A little over a year later the cops got acquitted. On April 29, 1992 parts of Los Angeles exploded in violence and an orgy of looting and arson.

Th videos show the anarchy that the Black Bloc of OWS wants to unleash on the world.

Exit question – What’s gonna happen when if George Zimmerman is acquitted?

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Hipster racism?

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From Jezebel’s “A Complete Guide to ‘Hipster Racism’“:

A long time ago (not really!), it was socially acceptable to own people. Then it wasn’t, but it was socially acceptable to murder people if they looked at your wife. Then it wasn’t! Yay! But it was still okay to say that people whose skin color you didn’t like weren’t allowed to be around you. And so on. Eventually we arrived at the point (now) where it’s socially unacceptable in mainstream culture for white people to say denigrating things about people of other races. But just because the behavior has been suppressed, that doesn’t mean people’s prejudices have simply disappeared. And white people haaaaaate being told what to do in our own country (fun fact: not actually “ours”)!

So racism went underground. Sure, you can’t say racist things anymore, but you can pretend to say them! Which, it turns out, is pretty much the exact same thing. There are a couple of strains of “ironic racism” making the rounds right now, and a couple of typical defenses.

1. “Tee-Hee, Aren’t I Adorable?”
This category includes things like wide-eyed acoustic covers of hip-hop songs, suburban white girls flashing gang signs, and this Tweet from Zooey Deschanel: “Haha. RT @Sarabareilles: Home from tour and first things first: New Girl episodes I missed. #thuglife.” See, it’s hilarious, because we aren’t thugs—we are darling girls, and real thugs are black people who do crime! Oh, hey, can I call you back? I need to sew more ric-rac on my apron. I hope a black person didn’t get into my ric-rac Kaboodle and steal all of it! JK, LOL. RIP, Whitney.

(Now, I’m obv not saying that Zooey Deschanel is some terrible racist. I don’t know her, although I did sit next to her at a restaurant once, and she ordered “olives.” She seemed lovely, and she didn’t call anyone the n-word for the entire meal. But I’m saying that we are all kind of bizarrely cavalier and careless these days, throwing our most deeply-considered morals under the bus for the sake of a few cheap jokes. It’s weird, and we owe the world a little more critical thinking.)

2. “Recreational Slumming.”
Wherein privileged people descend for a visit inside the strange, foreign spaces of othered groups. Like, I don’t know, IHOP. Or that “scary” bar in the south end. Then they go home again. Catchphrase: “It’s soooooo ghetto, but I actually totally like it!”

3. “Ummm, I’m a Writer and I’m Trying to Write in Here!”
This is Lesley Arfin crowing about the majestic power of the n-word, and white kids whining that it’s “unfair” that black people “get” to use “it”. You know, because words are powerful and words are Arfin’s craft and would you take the color red away from the best painter on Twitter??? And besides, don’t you just find Arfin to be so RAW and DELICIOUSLY NAUGHTY? It’s all tied up with the deliberately obtuse people who conflate “freedom of speech” with “immunity from criticism.” You “can” say the n-word. Go ahead and say it if you want, Skrillex. And I will go ahead and give you the world’s most sidewaysiest eyeball forever. Because it hurts people. Why do you want to hurt people?

4. “God, Don’t White People Suck?”
Okay, I get what you’re trying to do here—having some fun at the expense of the oppressors while setting yourself up as one of the “cool” white people—but mainly what you end up doing is implying that black people don’t like informative radio or TED talks. Stuff White People Like: having the best brains! Isn’t it great that we can make fun of ourselves while still reminding you that we’re better than you?

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WTF?

Zooey Deschanel is racist for using the hashtag “#thuglife?” Since when is “thug” a racial term? It used to refer to the Thuggee, a Hindu cult of assassins, but the term entered the mainstream a long time ago. Gee, black people use oxygen. Does that mean breathing is racist?

The problem with hipsters isn’t so much racism as classism, arrogance and a sneering contempt for everyone they consider inferior to themselves. That and the fact that they seem incapable of grasping small “d” democracy.

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Sleepy Sunday Music Open Thread

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These new meds are kickin’ my ass but I don’t miss insomnia. I’ll do a regular post after I take another nap.

What are you doing today?

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No News Open Thread

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It’s one of those days where nothing seems to be happening. I have yard work to do so y’all behave yourselfs.

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Caturday Open Thread

It's Caturday!

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I just woked up. What’s going on?

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Better luck next time

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Rangers Fan Cries After Couple Snags Foul Ball

Rangers first baseman Mitch Moreland tried doing something nice for the fans in the middle of the eighth inning on Wednesday by tossing a foul ball into the stands. The ball was scooped up by a man who handed it to his female companion. The couple was all smiles, but the small child seated with his parents nearby was visibly distraught.

The young Rangers fan started crying as the couple next to them began posing for pictures with the foul ball.

As the YES Network cameras captured the scene, Michael Kay reacted first by saying worse things could happen. But then he ripped the couple for not giving the ball to the kid once he saw the replay.

“Oh my God they can’t give it to the kid? They’re actually like rubbing it in the kid’s face. Very cold,” he said.

Luckily, someone in the Rangers dugout noticed and gave the kid another ball.

WTF?

It’s not like they snatched the ball away from the kid.

I’ve been going to Giants games since I was a little boy. I never caught a foul ball (or homer) and nobody ever gave me one either.

If I ever do catch one why should I feel obligated to give it to somebody else’s rugrat? The snot-nosed little brat will probably trash it anyway. I’ll put it on the shelf next to my Humm-Baby kazoo and Croix de Candlestick.

Not only did the kid get his own ball out of the deal, but today the team announced they were giving him a jersey autographed by the whole team. Throwing tantrums does pay-off.

BTW: I always take my glove with me to games just in case.

This is an open thread.

This is some serious stink-eye:

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He’s making a list and checking it twice

Off with their heads!

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Joe Moneybags Gazette:

Try this thought experiment: You decide to donate money to Mitt Romney. You want change in the Oval Office, so you engage in your democratic right to send a check.

Several days later, President Barack Obama, the most powerful man on the planet, singles you out by name. His campaign brands you a Romney donor, shames you for “betting against America,” and accuses you of having a “less-than-reputable” record. The message from the man who controls the Justice Department (which can indict you), the SEC (which can fine you), and the IRS (which can audit you), is clear: You made a mistake donating that money.

Are you worried?

Richard Nixon’s “enemies list” appalled the country for the simple reason that presidents hold a unique trust. Unlike senators or congressmen, presidents alone represent all Americans. Their powers—to jail, to fine, to bankrupt—are also so vast as to require restraint. Any president who targets a private citizen for his politics is de facto engaged in government intimidation and threats. This is why presidents since Nixon have carefully avoided the practice.

Save Mr. Obama, who acknowledges no rules. This past week, one of his campaign websites posted an item entitled “Behind the curtain: A brief history of Romney’s donors.” In the post, the Obama campaign named and shamed eight private citizens who had donated to his opponent. Describing the givers as all having “less-than-reputable records,” the post went on to make the extraordinary accusations that “quite a few” have also been “on the wrong side of the law” and profiting at “the expense of so many Americans.”

These are people like Paul Schorr and Sam and Jeffrey Fox, investors who the site outed for the crime of having “outsourced” jobs. T. Martin Fiorentino is scored for his work for a firm that forecloses on homes. Louis Bacon (a hedge-fund manager), Kent Burton (a “lobbyist”) and Thomas O’Malley (an energy CEO) stand accused of profiting from oil. Frank VanderSloot, the CEO of a home-products firm, is slimed as a “bitter foe of the gay rights movement.”

These are wealthy individuals, to be sure, but private citizens nonetheless. Not one holds elected office. Not one is a criminal. Not one has the barest fraction of the position or the power of the U.S. leader who is publicly assaulting them.

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Once again Obama earns the adjectives “historic” and “unprecedented.”

The Obots will be clapping with glee but they only care about tribal wins and losses. The OWSers will be crowing about beating up on the 1%ers but I guess they never heard of Martin Niemöller:

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn’t a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

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Power that is not guided by principle is a bad thing.

(h/t Lola-at-Large)

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New Obama ad: “I killed Bin Laden!”

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Seriously.

3 1/2 years in office and that’s all he has to brag about?

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The mob rules!

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Dr. Boyce Watkins of Syracuse University at Huffpoop:

George Zimmerman Bail Reverses All Hard Work Done for Trayvon Martin

What do you do when your municipality is holding arguably the most-hated and notorious killer on earth? You grant him bail. That’s exactly what Judge Kenneth Lester did for George Zimmerman, the man who killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin.

As a condition of his bail, Zimmerman is not allowed to have possession of firearms, drink alcohol, or use drugs. He must also maintain a curfew. How nice.

If the city of Sanford wanted to embarrass itself any further, it just did.

The justice system that has obtained international prominence as one of the most inept, irresponsible, racist and unprofessional organizations in the country has set a new standard for judicial indecency. The family of Trayvon Martin worked hard to get Zimmerman arrested because he was a flight risk, now he’s a flight risk all over again.

Granting bail for George Zimmerman, for the most part, is a slap in the face to those around the world who worked for his arrest. It simply says that without regard to the will of the people, those possessing the power of the state have no obligation to answer to anyone or even share whatever information they are using to come to their illogical decisions.

Granting bail to Zimmerman renders all the rallies, petitions and hard work done around the world to bring him to justice meaningless. It effectively communicates defiance within the Sanford judicial system to say, “We don’t care what you think. We’re going to do whatever we choose to do.”

At this point, it’s hard to argue against anyone who feels compelled to hold the city of Sanford accountable for its actions. Boycotts, (peaceful) civil disobedience, and other tools at our disposal are called for when it comes to dealing with this tragedy of a judicial process. George Zimmerman himself should not be tried in the court of public opinion, but the public deserves answers to ensure that this son of a judge who’s been allowed to skirt responsibility for his actions in the past, isn’t being given yet another free ride by one of his father’s friends.

George Zimmerman may or may not be guilty of second-degree murder in the death of Trayvon Martin. But when accused of racial inequality, disrespect for the law, and stomping on the civil rights of its citizens, the Sanford judicial system has been found guilty beyond measure.

The same system that let a killer walk away from the scene of the crime and held a boy’s body in the morgue long after his parents filed a missing person’s report, is the one that is now allowing George Zimmerman to walk the streets with the rest of us.

This is what Sanford justice is all about, and it is a reminder that we cannot simply sit back and let the system take its course.

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In case you were wondering, no, Dr. Watkins does not teach law. What is it about these people with finance and economics degrees? I think all those numbers must kill brain cells. I would be embarrassed to take any class from someone so woefully ignorant, especially at a university as prestigious as Syracuse.

Let’s start with the factual errors. The City of Sanford did not grant bail to George Zimmerman. That decision was made by a circuit court judge employed by Seminole County. There is no “Sanford judicial system.” This case is in the jurisdiction of the Eighteenth Judicial Circuit.

The investigation into the death of Trayvon Martin was originally handled by the City of Sanford Police Department. Due to media attention and public pressure, the case was taken over by a special prosecutor appointed by the governor. That prosecutor is Angela Corey, the State Attorney in Florida’s Fourth Judicial Circuit Court.

George Zimmerman did not simply walk away from the crime scene. He was the focus of a continuing investigation. He was questioned at length on several occasions, including an four hour interrogation on the night of the killing. The police notified Trayvon’s father of his son’s death at 8 am the following morning. Trayvon’s body was autopsied the next day after the killing and was held an additional couple of days as a courtesy until funeral arrangements were made by the family.

Our legal system is based upon the presumption of innocence. The 8th Amendment is the shortest amendment and states:

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

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In Florida as in all the other states, the amount of bail is determined by a judge after the consideration of certain factors. These include the seriousness of the offense charged, the danger to the community, the risk of flight and the strength of the evidence. The opinion of a lynch mob is irrelevant.

The judge in this case determined that Zimmerman was not a flight risk. He has longstanding ties to the community, his family lives in the area, he voluntarily surrendered his passport, he stayed in contact with the police and he had turned himself in when charges were filed.

Dr. Watkins admits that George Zimmerman should not be tried in the court of public opinion but that is precisely what he is demanding. The “court of public opinion” is simply another term for mob rule. And when the mob is made up of people like Dr. Watkins, injustice is the only possible outcome. One of the Huffpoop commenters said it best:

Watch a Western film some time, Professor. The people who storm the jail in a mob action aren’t the heroes.

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UPDATE:

Media attorneys due in court in Zimmerman case

Attorneys for the Orlando Sentinel, WFTV-Channel 9, NBC, CNN, The New York Times and other media companies are to be in court today fighting for access to records in the George Zimmerman case, but today’s fight may not be a long one.

Some of what they’re demanding was released Monday, a week after they made their requests. Those are the records in Zimmerman’s court file, such things as his written plea of not guilty and a request by his lawyer that an earlier judge step aside because of a potential conflict of interest.

Another set of much-sought-after records may be another, bigger fight. Those are the ones collected by the special prosecutor and spelling out what evidence she has against Zimmerman.

[...]

Two weeks ago, Zimmerman’s lawyer formally asked Special Prosecutor Angela Corey to provide the records by today, a deadline she is required by law to meet.

Once she provides them to him, they’re public records, meaning they should be available to anyone who asks for them.

But the day after Zimmerman’s arrest, defense attorney Mark O’Mara asked that those records be sealed, and Corey’s trial lawyer, Bernie de la Rionda, agreed, and so did Seminole County Judge Mark Herr.

But on Thursday, Corey’s office indicated it was preparing to release them to the public.

It’s not clear whether the case’s new judge, Circuit Judge Kenneth Lester Jr., will listen to arguments today about those prosecution records.

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If those records are released, we’ll know everything the prosecution knows.

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Dragon Lady Open Thread

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She still lives rent-free inside their heads.

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Scary Sarah

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A Nuanced Portrait

George Zimmerman

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Reuters:

George Zimmerman: Prelude to a shooting

A pit bull named Big Boi began menacing George and Shellie Zimmerman in the fall of 2009.

The first time the dog ran free and cornered Shellie in their gated community in Sanford, Florida, George called the owner to complain. The second time, Big Boi frightened his mother-in-law’s dog. Zimmerman called Seminole County Animal Services and bought pepper spray. The third time he saw the dog on the loose, he called again. An officer came to the house, county records show.

“Don’t use pepper spray,” he told the Zimmermans, according to a friend. “It’ll take two or three seconds to take effect, but a quarter second for the dog to jump you,” he said.

“Get a gun.”

That November, the Zimmermans completed firearms training at a local lodge and received concealed-weapons gun permits. In early December, another source close to them told Reuters, the couple bought a pair of guns. George picked a Kel-Tec PF-9 9mm handgun, a popular, lightweight weapon.

By June 2011, Zimmerman’s attention had shifted from a loose pit bull to a wave of robberies that rattled the community, called the Retreat at Twin Lakes. The homeowners association asked him to launch a neighborhood watch, and Zimmerman would begin to carry the Kel-Tec on his regular, dog-walking patrol – a violation of neighborhood watch guidelines but not a crime.

Few of his closest neighbors knew he carried a gun – until two months ago.

[...]

The 28-year-old insurance-fraud investigator comes from a deeply Catholic background and was taught in his early years to do right by those less fortunate. He was raised in a racially integrated household and himself has black roots through an Afro-Peruvian great-grandfather – the father of the maternal grandmother who helped raise him.

A criminal justice student who aspired to become a judge, Zimmerman also concerned himself with the safety of his neighbors after a series of break-ins committed by young African-American men.

Though civil rights demonstrators have argued Zimmerman should not have prejudged Martin, one black neighbor of the Zimmermans said recent history should be taken into account.

“Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. I’m black, OK?” the woman said, declining to be identified because she anticipated backlash due to her race. She leaned in to look a reporter directly in the eyes. “There were black boys robbing houses in this neighborhood,” she said. “That’s why George was suspicious of Trayvon Martin.”

[...]

One morning in July 2011, a black teenager walked up to Zimmerman’s front porch and stole a bicycle, neighbors told Reuters. A police report was taken, though the bicycle was not recovered.

But it was the August incursion into the home of Olivia Bertalan that really troubled the neighborhood, particularly Zimmerman. Shellie was home most days, taking online courses towards certification as a registered nurse.

On August 3, Bertalan was at home with her infant son while her husband, Michael, was at work. She watched from a downstairs window, she said, as two black men repeatedly rang her doorbell and then entered through a sliding door at the back of the house. She ran upstairs, locked herself inside the boy’s bedroom, and called a police dispatcher, whispering frantically.

“I said, ‘What am I supposed to do? I hear them coming up the stairs!’” she told Reuters. Bertalan tried to coo her crying child into silence and armed herself with a pair of rusty scissors.

Police arrived just as the burglars – who had been trying to disconnect the couple’s television – fled out a back door. Shellie Zimmerman saw a black male teen running through her backyard and reported it to police.

After police left Bertalan, George Zimmerman arrived at the front door in a shirt and tie, she said. He gave her his contact numbers on an index card and invited her to visit his wife if she ever felt unsafe. He returned later and gave her a stronger lock to bolster the sliding door that had been forced open.

“He was so mellow and calm, very helpful and very, very sweet,” she said last week. “We didn’t really know George at first, but after the break-in we talked to him on a daily basis. People were freaked out. It wasn’t just George calling police … we were calling police at least once a week.”

In September, a group of neighbors including Zimmerman approached the homeowners association with their concerns, she said. Zimmerman was asked to head up a new neighborhood watch. He agreed.

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It was such a simple story – literally black and white. A trigger-happy racist vigilante. An innocent young black kid walking home from the store with some candy and a soft drink. Racial profiling and cold-blooded murder.

Then the facts screwed it up.

Whatever else he may be, George Zimmerman is not a caricature. He’s not even “white” as most of us would define it. If he’s white then so is Barack Obama. He is a husband, father and human being. He was a good neighbor. He killed a man, but is he a murderer?

He had good reason to be concerned about crime. The condo community he lived in had seen a wave of burglaries and attempted break-ins. He was one of the victims. Then one night he saw a strange face in the neighborhood. According to Zimmerman’s statement during the 911 call Trayvon Martin was acting suspiciously, so he called the police like he was supposed to do.

Did Zimmerman exercise bad judgment in following Trayvon? Probably. It certainly didn’t work out very well for either of them. But was he acting recklessly or maliciously? I haven’t seen evidence of that.

There are still unanswered questions. What (if anything) was Trayvon doing that made him seem suspicious? Was Zimmerman following Trayvon or chasing him? Why didn’t Trayvon go home (he had a headstart and 90 seconds to travel 70 yards). Who confronted who? Who threw the first punch?

We haven’t seen all the evidence but many minds are already made up. There are some who will continue to insist it was murder. Others will say it was clearly self-defense. But there is also a place between “guilty” and “innocent” called “not proven.”

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Jeralyn has more here.

Tom Maguire has his take here.

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Racial Profiling

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One day back when I was working retail security I was watching by CCTV when I observed a black male adult approach the pneumatic tools, select one and conceal it in his pants. Then he selected a second one and concealed in his pants with the first. Then he headed for the exit.

I un-assed the office and ran after him, catching up with him outside in the parking lot. I identified myself and placed him under arrest. As I was handcuffing him he said “It’s cuz I’m black, right?” I had to bite my tongue to keep from replying “Yeah, we let white people steal whatever they want.“

The first time I heard the term “racial profiling” was in a 60 Minutes story about drug couriers (aka “mules”) transporting cocaine and other drugs from entry ports in Florida and along the US-Mexico border via the interstate highways to cities in the northeast. This led to the creation of “Operation Pipeline“:

The term “profiling” first became associated with a method of interdicting drug traffickers during the late 1970s. In 1985, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) instituted Operation Pipeline, an intelligence-based assessment of the method by which drug networks transported bulk drugs to drug markets, and began training local and state police in applying a drug courier profile as part of highway drug interdiction techniques. Under Operation Pipeline, police were trained to apply a profile that included evidence of concealment in the vehicle, indications of fast, point-to-point driving, as well as the age- and race characteristics of the probable drivers. In some cases, the profiling technique was distorted, so that officers began targeting black and Hispanic male drivers by stopping them for technical traffic violations as a pretext for ascertaining whether the drivers were carrying drugs.

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This is also about the time that drug forfeiture became trendy in law enforcement. State and local cops in rural Texas, Tennessee and Georgia staked out the interstates, stopping black and Hispanic drivers on any pretext hoping to find drug couriers.

A term used synonymous with racial profiling is “driving while black (or brown).” This is the idea that the cops stop people because of their race. I have no doubt that it occurs, but how common is it?

In some cities and neighborhoods nearly everyone is a member of a racial minority. If the police pulled over every black and brown driver in South-Central LA there wouldn’t be any cars left on the road. But if they pulled cars over at random they would still be stopping more black and brown drivers.

Poor neighborhoods are the ones most likely to be high-crime neighborhoods with heavier police patrols. More cops means more traffic stops. Poor people are also more likely to be driving older vehicles in need of repair or to have expired registrations, which are the kind of things cops look for. And blacks and Hispanics are more likely to be poor.

Cops are supposed to enforce traffic laws. So how do we determine which traffic stops are legit and which ones are based on racial profiling?

The answer is a pet cause of mine – cameras in police cars.

I think every patrol car in the country should be equipped with a dash cam that includes a microphone worn by the cops. With today’s digital recording capabilities entire shifts could easily and cheaply be recorded and stored. Then we would have a record of everything that took place from the beginning of a traffic stop until the end. We can also compare how the officers treat drivers of different races.

It’s not a perfect solution but it would answer a lot of questions.

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He’s LeBron, baby!

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“I’m LeBron, baby. I can play on this level. I got some game.”

– Sen. Barack Obama, 2004

Obama: I Can Do Every Job Better Than Those I Hire to Do It

It appears one of the great challenges that President Obama has had to overcome in office is that no one around him is as good at his job as he is.

From Jodi Kantor’s The Obamas, page 66:

Obama had always had a high estimation of his ability to cast and run his operation. When David Plouffe, his campaign manager, first interviewed for a job with him in 2006, the senator gave him a warning: “I think I could probably do every job on the campaign better than the people I’ll hire to do it,” he said. “It’s hard to give up control when that’s all I’ve known.” Obama said nearly the same thing to Patrick Gaspard, whom he hired to be the campaign’s political director. “I think I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters,” Obama told him. “I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m gonna think I’m a better political director than my political director.”

This is not some long-ago sentiment, or momentary lapse into egoism. Michelle Obama declared at a Democrat party fundraiser in California last June:

“He reads every word, every memo, so he is better prepared than the people briefing him,” she said. “This man doesn’t take a day off.”

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Whether you call it ego, conceit or self-confidence, nobody runs for POTUS without quite a bit of it. But Obama is the definition of hubis – “overweening pride.” Get him away from a teleprompter and he’s a stuttering clusterf**k. Put him in a debate with Hillary and he copies off her paper.

As for his political skills, he only won his first campaign by getting all the competition thrown off the ballot. He got his clock cleaned by Bobby Rush in 1992. Then he hired David Axelrod, but even then he only won in 2004 because his opponents had dirty laundry. Hillary spent less money than he did and got more votes, and McPalin would have won had it not been for the financial meltdown.

Obama’s a jerk of all trades.

BTW – How many championships has LeBron won?

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Heavily medicated open thread

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So I get approved for VA benefits and the doctor perscribes five, count ‘em – FIVE – medications for me to take. Six if you count the ointment for my nether regions. Take this one every day on an empty stomach. Take these two twice a day with meals. Take two of these once a day and one of these twice a day.

Funnest side effect warning: May cause flatulence and diarrhea. Waiting to see if I am one of the lucky ones or not. But no worries, if they show up they might go away after twelve weeks.

How is your day going?

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Late Night is for Night Owls

About to head to bed here in a bit, but thought I’d share this beautiful manufacturing job by TPTB:

04.2012 Social Security is rushing even faster toward insolvency, driven by retiring baby boomers, a weak economy and politicians’ reluctance to take painful action to fix the huge retirement and disability program.

The trust funds that support Social Security will run dry in 2033 — three years earlier than previously projected — the government said Monday.

There was no change in the year that Medicare’s hospital insurance fund is projected to run out of money. It’s still 2024.

I kept that last bit in there because it’s relevant to what I’m about to remind you of:

09.2011 WASHINGTON — The centerpiece of President Obama’s job-creation plan, a proposal to further reduce Social Security taxes, is emblematic of a package of modest measures that some economists describe as helpful but not sufficient to lift the economy from its malaise.

In his speech on Thursday night, Mr. Obama asked Congress to cut the amount that workers must contribute toward Social Security benefits, extending an existing measure, and to reduce, for the first time, the matching payments that employers are required to make.

The cuts, which would deprive the government of about $240 billion in revenues next year, are the largest items in the president’s $447 billion job-creation plan, which includes payments to unemployed workers, incentives for companies that hire workers and increased federal spending on infrastructure.

Bolding mine. We discussed this at the time. If I recall correctly, the argument went like this: “Oh lookey! Obama delivering on a Grover Norquist/GOP promise to slowly kill Social Security.” The opposition was, like, “Awesome. Eleventy-dimensional chess!” You tell me who was right. #SawThisComing

Moral of the story? Every year Obama is in office, we lose another year of Social Security. We can’t afford 4 more years.

PS: The reason the Medicare date didn’t change is because those taxes weren’t cut, if that wasn’t obvious enough.

This is an open thread.

Barking up the wrong tree

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Via Ace of Spades:

Va. investigates voter fraud

Results of an ongoing Virginia State Police investigation of voter registration irregularities from the 2008 general election may signal a more significant voter fraud issue than some state lawmakers realized.

As Virginia legislators hotly debated a voter ID bill that narrowly passed the General Assembly, many were unaware of a state police investigation that, so far, has resulted in charges against 38 people statewide for voter fraud. Warrants have been obtained for a 39th person who can’t be located.

A majority of those cases already have resulted in convictions, and 26 additional cases are still being actively investigated nearly 3½ years after the state Board of Elections forwarded more than 400 voter and election fraud allegations from 62 cities and counties to Virginia State Police for individual investigation.

“We believe these complaints ran the gamut from voter registration fraud issues through potential fraud at the polling place on Election Day,” said Donald Palmer, secretary of the Virginia Board of Elections, who was appointed by Gov. Bob McDonnell in February 2011. “We do not have specific numbers on how the complaints broke down. However, (the state board of elections) is aware that arrests have been made over the past few years for individuals engaging in voter registration fraud.”

Palmer added that recent indictments obtained by the Richmond commonwealth’s attorney’s office for voter fraud and the results of the state police investigation “remind us that unfortunately, fraud does exist in Virginia’s elections.”

Many opponents of the voter ID law maintained that there was no evidence of widespread election fraud in Virginia, and the law would suppress the vote of minorities and others who don’t have adequate identification. About 3.7 million Virginians voted in the 2008 election.

Richmond had by far the largest number of voter-fraud cases opened by state police — 124 — followed by Fairfax County with 37, Chesterfield and Prince William counties with 20 each, Alexandria with 19, Henrico with 17 and Petersburg with 13, according to state police data requested by the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

A total of 194 cases statewide where police determined a violation likely occurred have been closed because the commonwealth’s attorneys in those localities declined to prosecute those individuals, police said.

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For years the Democrats have been telling us to oppose voter identification laws because they claim they are unnecessary and racist. They claim they are racist because people of color are more likely to be poor and poor people are more likely to lack the requisite identification needed to vote under the proposed voter ID laws. But official identification remains cheap and easy to obtain for the vast majority of people and even welfare recipients need such identification to obtain benefits.

The Democrats also claim that voter ID laws are unnecessary because voter fraud is extremely rare. Now it turns out that may not be the case. I’m one of those people who prefers data to anecdotal evidence, but if voter fraud is not being investigated and/or prosecuted, where will accurate data come from?

I think the Democrats are barking up the wrong tree. As long as the laws provide adequate alternative ways that proper identification can be obtained by all eligible voters, what’s the hang-up?

Instead of showing us examples of eligible voters who can’t obtain ID they should spend their time and energy figuring out how to get it for them.

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Trapped in 1963

Touré Neblett

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Touré Neblett:

Inside the Racist Mind
The fact that you may honestly believe you are not biased does not free you from unconscious racism

After a recent event where I spoke about racial identity, a white woman sidled up to me, leaned in close so no one near us could hear, and said, “I’m racist.” Many people would be repelled. I was entranced. Here was someone who could tell me first hand how the racist mind worked. Social scientists have done studies on Klansmen and Neo-Nazis but those sorts of people are outliers, socially and mentally, while this woman was the sort of person you might encounter on a normal day. She seemed indicative of the sort of racist mind we’d be mostly likely to meet. She seemed normal. So I decided to talk to her and find out how her mind worked.

Studies show most people have some sort of prejudice or bias. “Decades of cognitive bias research demonstrates that both unconscious and conscious biases lead to discriminatory actions even when an individual does not want to discriminate,” write Michelle Alexander in her book The New Jim Crow. “The fact that you may honestly believe that you are not biased against African Americans, and that you may have black friends and relatives, does not mean that you are free from unconscious bias. Implicit bias tests may still show that you hold negative attitudes and stereotypes about blacks even though you do not believe you do and do not want to.” Part of the problem is the monsoon of negative messages about blacks coming at Americans which makes being non-racist almost like mentally swimming upstream.

Still, most people today are ashamed to be racist and know to do their best to never reveal it. So after this woman at the event told me she was racist, I said, “Really?!” in a way that indicated I wasn’t offended and that she could feel comfortable to speak freely. She did.

“I just have these thoughts,” she said, almost whispering into my ear. I felt like she was confessing as if I were her priest. “My mind just goes places. I can’t control it. I know it’s wrong but I can’t help myself. I say, Don’t think like that! But it’s what people told me when I was younger.” Then she leaned back and someone else said hello and our moment of penance concluded.

I wanted to hear more but I had heard enough to understand. She had mental habits based on ideas implanted long ago that had taken root in her subconscious. She’s got various stereotypes and biases firmly lodged in her long-term memory where she stores things like how to ride a bike. That’s why the thoughts feel like they come at her automatically and beyond her control—“My mind just goes places.” At this point, unlearning those perceptions would be as hard as unlearning bike-riding—if there were near-constant media messages and social reinforcements about how to ride a bike. And yet society has also taught her that she should be ashamed to judge people in this way. It’s sad that she knows she should not think racist thoughts but cannot stop herself because the lessons were learned and reinforced so well.

[...]

Some people suggest that the multiracial embrace of Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jordan, Will Smith and others portends the end of racism. But this, as the writer Arundati Roy says, is like the President pardoning one turkey before Thanksgiving and then eating another—and America eats thousands. The human mind is complex enough to integrate hypocrisy and contradictions. There have long been extraordinary blacks who succeeded far more than the vast majority and were accepted as special. The racist mind need not hate every black person it encounters, and indeed not hating all may serve as a valuable safety valve, releasing pressure and proving to the mind itself that it is not racist. Few people want to think of themselves as bad or evil.

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Ever get involved with someone who is still carrying baggage from one or more previous relationships? I’m talking about someone with more issues than National Geographic.

Her ex(es) cheated on her so you will forever pay the price. It doesn’t matter that you never cheated or that you bend over backwards to demonstrate your innocence and fidelity.  She knows you are guilty and she’ll keep digging until she finds the proof.

Slavery and Jim Crow segregation are two of the ugliest chapters in our nation’s history. The only thing worse was the genocide we committed upon the Native Americans.

But please excuse me if my feelings of shame for those historic events is limited. I didn’t do it. I wasn’t even born until 1960. All the relatives I have been able to trace came to this country after the Civil War and none of them lived in Jim Crow states. I feel no guilt over things that were committed by other people before I was born.

I wasn’t taught racism as a child. I cannot recall ever hearing my mother, grandmother or step-father ever using racial epithets or suggesting that blacks and other people of color were not equal to us. The school system in my hometown was fully desegregated by 1967. Everyone attended the same high school.

The last time I had thoughts I couldn’t control I was in puberty and the thoughts were sexual in nature rather than racist. The guilt I felt associated with those thoughts had a lot to do with why I quit going to church.

When James Byrd, Jr. was murdered by three white supremacists down in Texas, I felt sickened and outraged. But I had not one single thought nor tiniest feeling of sympathy for or connection to the animals that did it.

Let’s assume for a moment that Mr. Neblett is correct and most white people are unconsciously racist. What can we do about it?

We fought a war to end slavery. A lot of political capital was spent to end segregation. We passed new laws and constitutional amendments to make everyone equal under the law. We made racism socially unacceptable. As even Mr. Neblett admits, racial bigotry is considered a thing to be ashamed of nowadays. So what else do we still need to do?

I’m serious – is there some law we still need to pass? Are there reparations we still need to make? What will it take to end our national penance for the past?

Because I am sick and tired of being blamed for the words and actions of other people. And I am sick and tired of being judged by the color of my skin by people like Touré Neblett.

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Breaking news:

George Zimmerman released on bond in Trayvon Martin killing

George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch volunteer who shot an unarmed teenager, was released from jail about midnight Sunday, two days after a Florida judge set his bond at $150,000.

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