by Bob Walsh
The Santa Clara County medical examiner has determined that Santino William Legan, 19, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after being wounded several times by the cops. It seems that the ambulatory turd hit the ground after being wounded by pistol fire and managed to shoot himself in the head with his Kalashnikov.
That means the turd killed four people, including himself.
Sunday, August 04, 2019
HARDLY SURPRISING BUT SOMEWHAT DISTURBING
by Bob Walsh
A situation involving the Stockton PD came very close to going completely sideways Thursday night when the local constabulary stopped a car for reckless driving.
The driver resisted arrest. No great surprise there. At that time a crowd of local asswipes surrounded the officers. Someone from the crowd grabbed a bag from the vehicle (at the request of the driver) and took off. Cops managed to catch him and he was also taken into custody after a fight. A third person tried to interfere with the arrests, got into a shoving match with the cops and was arrested himself.
A search of the vehicle found two loaded firearms and some drugs.
Louis McCornell, 46, Brandon Jones, 33, and Angie Lorian, 52, all became guests of the county. All are of them are Black. (Does that observation make me a racist? Since I am White I am probably a racist anyway so I guess it doesn't matter.)
EDITOR'S NOTE: At least the Stockton cops arrested all of the asswipes. In NY the cops would have meekly walked away.
What's disturbing other than that you you are a racist? And I guess me too!
A situation involving the Stockton PD came very close to going completely sideways Thursday night when the local constabulary stopped a car for reckless driving.
The driver resisted arrest. No great surprise there. At that time a crowd of local asswipes surrounded the officers. Someone from the crowd grabbed a bag from the vehicle (at the request of the driver) and took off. Cops managed to catch him and he was also taken into custody after a fight. A third person tried to interfere with the arrests, got into a shoving match with the cops and was arrested himself.
A search of the vehicle found two loaded firearms and some drugs.
Louis McCornell, 46, Brandon Jones, 33, and Angie Lorian, 52, all became guests of the county. All are of them are Black. (Does that observation make me a racist? Since I am White I am probably a racist anyway so I guess it doesn't matter.)
EDITOR'S NOTE: At least the Stockton cops arrested all of the asswipes. In NY the cops would have meekly walked away.
What's disturbing other than that you you are a racist? And I guess me too!
SF AIRPORT NOW SAFE FROM THE SCOURGE OF PLASTIC WATER BOTTLES
by Bob Walsh
Starting later this month you will be unable to buy a plastic bottle of water at the SF airport. You will be able to buy an aluminum "bottle' of water, at much higher expense, or if you happen to have one of your own with you you may be able to fill it....somewhere. But if you are just traveling thru and want a hit of H20 you are SOL unless you want to get a refillable aluminum or glass bottle of water. (They still make glass water bottles?)
If I didn't know better I would say someone somewhere in this equation has some stock in the aluminum water bottle container business.
Starting later this month you will be unable to buy a plastic bottle of water at the SF airport. You will be able to buy an aluminum "bottle' of water, at much higher expense, or if you happen to have one of your own with you you may be able to fill it....somewhere. But if you are just traveling thru and want a hit of H20 you are SOL unless you want to get a refillable aluminum or glass bottle of water. (They still make glass water bottles?)
If I didn't know better I would say someone somewhere in this equation has some stock in the aluminum water bottle container business.
THE TOOTH FAIRY DID IT IS MORE BELIEVABLE
New York father of three claims his estranged wife, 32, committed suicide and he just disposed of her body in a dumpster and threw away the suicide weapon after her remains are found in a landfill
Daily Mail
August 3, 2019
A man was arrested and faces charges after claiming that his wife committed suicide and he disposed of her body and a gun after her remains were found in a landfill dumpster.
Jason D'Avolio, of Rome, New York, was charged with concealment of a corpse after the body of his estranged wife and mother of his three young children, Kerrilee D'Avolio, 32, was found in Oneida County Landfill, in Ava, New York, the morning of July 30.
Jason is said to have told investigators that he didn't kill Kerrilee, she killed herself, and that he just disposed of her body by putting it in a dumpster.
Oneida County District Attorney Scott McNamara called Jason's version of events 'very suspect.'
Daily Mail
August 3, 2019
A man was arrested and faces charges after claiming that his wife committed suicide and he disposed of her body and a gun after her remains were found in a landfill dumpster.
Jason D'Avolio, of Rome, New York, was charged with concealment of a corpse after the body of his estranged wife and mother of his three young children, Kerrilee D'Avolio, 32, was found in Oneida County Landfill, in Ava, New York, the morning of July 30.
Jason is said to have told investigators that he didn't kill Kerrilee, she killed herself, and that he just disposed of her body by putting it in a dumpster.
Oneida County District Attorney Scott McNamara called Jason's version of events 'very suspect.'
HOMELESS WOMAN ACCIDENTALLY SHOT DEAD BY ROOKIE COP
A Rookie Police Officer’s Gunshot Intended for a Dog, Kills a Texas Woman
By Neil Vigdor
The New York Times
August 2, 2019
A woman was accidentally shot and killed Thursday in Texas by a rookie Arlington police officer whose bullets were intended for her loose dog, the police said, an episode caught on the officer’s body camera.
The victim of the shooting, which happened around 5:20 p.m. near a shopping center in the Dallas suburb, was identified by the Tarrant County medical examiner as Margarita Brooks. The 30-year-old, known as Maggie, appeared to be homeless, people in the neighborhood said, according to The Associated Press.
The officer, whose name has not been released and had just completed field training on July 1, had responded to a 911 call about an unresponsive woman in the grass of a commercial area.
The body camera footage, which captured part of the fatal episode, was released Friday by the Arlington Police Department.
“Get back,” the officer shouted at the approaching dog, a 40-pound Labrador mix that was not leashed.
That’s when the officer, who the Police Department said is 25 years old, fired repeatedly at the dog.
“Oh my God,” Ms. Brooks was heard screaming in the video. “The police shot me.”
A bullet hit Ms. Brooks in the upper torso, according to Will Johnson, the Arlington police chief. He said during a news conference on Friday that both criminal and internal affairs investigations of the shooting were underway.
It was unclear whether the officer was firing warning shots at the dog, which Chief Johnson said suffered a flesh wound and is in quarantine. The chief said Ms. Brooks’ family had been shown the body camera footage.
“Everything about this call is an absolute tragedy,” Chief Johnson said. “Our hearts are broken for the Brooks family and for the officer involved. Our officer was on scene trying to find an individual who may be suffering from a medical emergency. Clearly, this is not the outcome the officer wanted, nor is it the outcome that the department wanted.”
By Neil Vigdor
The New York Times
August 2, 2019
A woman was accidentally shot and killed Thursday in Texas by a rookie Arlington police officer whose bullets were intended for her loose dog, the police said, an episode caught on the officer’s body camera.
The victim of the shooting, which happened around 5:20 p.m. near a shopping center in the Dallas suburb, was identified by the Tarrant County medical examiner as Margarita Brooks. The 30-year-old, known as Maggie, appeared to be homeless, people in the neighborhood said, according to The Associated Press.
The officer, whose name has not been released and had just completed field training on July 1, had responded to a 911 call about an unresponsive woman in the grass of a commercial area.
The body camera footage, which captured part of the fatal episode, was released Friday by the Arlington Police Department.
“Get back,” the officer shouted at the approaching dog, a 40-pound Labrador mix that was not leashed.
That’s when the officer, who the Police Department said is 25 years old, fired repeatedly at the dog.
“Oh my God,” Ms. Brooks was heard screaming in the video. “The police shot me.”
A bullet hit Ms. Brooks in the upper torso, according to Will Johnson, the Arlington police chief. He said during a news conference on Friday that both criminal and internal affairs investigations of the shooting were underway.
It was unclear whether the officer was firing warning shots at the dog, which Chief Johnson said suffered a flesh wound and is in quarantine. The chief said Ms. Brooks’ family had been shown the body camera footage.
“Everything about this call is an absolute tragedy,” Chief Johnson said. “Our hearts are broken for the Brooks family and for the officer involved. Our officer was on scene trying to find an individual who may be suffering from a medical emergency. Clearly, this is not the outcome the officer wanted, nor is it the outcome that the department wanted.”
AFTER TELLING TRUMP ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS ARE COMMITTING RAPE, TEXAS DPS INTELLIGENCE CHIEF GETS BUSTED FOR COMMITTING RAPE
High-ranking Texas DPS chief fired, accused of raping female party guest
CBS Austin
July 31, 2019
AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Department of Public Safety says the chief of their Intelligence and Counterterrorism Division has been fired after being charged with sexual assault.
John Jones was terminated by DPS on Tuesday, the same day he was arrested by investigators from the Travis County Sheriff's Office and the Texas Rangers and booked in the Travis County Jail on the charge of sexual assault.
According to an affidavit, Travis County Sheriff's deputies responded to a call for a sexual assault at Jones' home in Leander on July 21st.
The victim, a woman in her 40s who was a friend of his wife, told investigators she had attended a party at Jones' residence the night before with 10 to 15 other people in attendance, and described Jones as a "pillar of the community" because he had met President Trump.
She told deputies she arrived at the home around 1 p.m. on July 20th and that Jones had been drinking all day to the point of him passing out. She said he woke up in the evening and began drinking again and around 9 p.m. offered to take her for a ride on his ATV.
Court documents state that the woman drove the ATV while Jones sat behind her as they traveled along trails and streets near his home. She said he then instructed her to go off road.
According to deputies, Jones then asked her when she last had sex. She thought the question was odd given Jones' position in the law enforcement community, but answered the question anyway.
She told investigators Jones then reached around her and aggressively grabbed the handlebars, pushing her forward and demanding he steer the ATV. The victim says they went off road and into a brushy clearing, where deputies say he sexually assaulted her.
CBS Austin has learned that Jones took part in a round table discussion with President Trump at the White House in January on border security, where he specifically mentioned his concern about the number of undocumented immigrants in Texas jails for sexual assault.
In a statement, DPS said: “The department takes allegations like this very seriously, and the Texas Rangers are working closely with the Travis County District Attorney's Office and the Travis County Sheriff's Office, which is leading this investigation.”
CBS Austin
July 31, 2019
AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Department of Public Safety says the chief of their Intelligence and Counterterrorism Division has been fired after being charged with sexual assault.
John Jones was terminated by DPS on Tuesday, the same day he was arrested by investigators from the Travis County Sheriff's Office and the Texas Rangers and booked in the Travis County Jail on the charge of sexual assault.
According to an affidavit, Travis County Sheriff's deputies responded to a call for a sexual assault at Jones' home in Leander on July 21st.
The victim, a woman in her 40s who was a friend of his wife, told investigators she had attended a party at Jones' residence the night before with 10 to 15 other people in attendance, and described Jones as a "pillar of the community" because he had met President Trump.
She told deputies she arrived at the home around 1 p.m. on July 20th and that Jones had been drinking all day to the point of him passing out. She said he woke up in the evening and began drinking again and around 9 p.m. offered to take her for a ride on his ATV.
Court documents state that the woman drove the ATV while Jones sat behind her as they traveled along trails and streets near his home. She said he then instructed her to go off road.
According to deputies, Jones then asked her when she last had sex. She thought the question was odd given Jones' position in the law enforcement community, but answered the question anyway.
She told investigators Jones then reached around her and aggressively grabbed the handlebars, pushing her forward and demanding he steer the ATV. The victim says they went off road and into a brushy clearing, where deputies say he sexually assaulted her.
CBS Austin has learned that Jones took part in a round table discussion with President Trump at the White House in January on border security, where he specifically mentioned his concern about the number of undocumented immigrants in Texas jails for sexual assault.
In a statement, DPS said: “The department takes allegations like this very seriously, and the Texas Rangers are working closely with the Travis County District Attorney's Office and the Travis County Sheriff's Office, which is leading this investigation.”
A WEE BIT LATE
120 years after trial, Alfred Dreyfus may be promoted to general
by Assaf Golan
Israel Hayom
August 2, 2019
Around 120 years after Jewish French artillery officer Alfred Dreyfus was put on trial and stripped of his rank because of anti-Semitic rumors in what became known as the Dreyfus Affair, justice might finally be done.
According to the French newspaper L'Opinion, French Defense Minister Florence Parly hinted in a speech she made last week marking the deportation of French Jews during World War II that Dreyfus might be promoted posthumously.
Dreyfus held the rank of captain when he was put on trial for allegedly spying for the German army. He was first tried in 1894 and convicted of treason. He was sentenced to life in prison and exiled. He was stripped of his rank in a humiliating ceremony.
After a public campaign on his behalf, which included writer Emile Zola's famous "J'Accuse!" open letter, Dreyfus was given a retrial in 1899. Again, he was found guilty of treason and sentenced to 10 years in prison, which was eventually commuted.
In 1906, a French appeals court ruled that Dreyfus was innocent. He returned to the army at the rank of major, but a year later he was forced to resign. He volunteered to serve as a lieutenant colonel in World War I.
Dreyfus died in 1935.
Parly called Dreyfus a "brilliant officer who chose to devote his life to his country."
The French minister said that although Dreyfus was readmitted into the military and promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel, it was poor compensation for the four years he had spent in prison and the 12 years he was kept out of the military.
Parly noted that she saw Dreyfus as a role model for children who was being wronged.
"The truth demands courage. 120 years later, the time has come for the army to give Alfred Dreyfus back the honor and years that were taken from him, and I will personally see that it is done. There are scars that cannot be healed," she said.
by Assaf Golan
Israel Hayom
August 2, 2019
Around 120 years after Jewish French artillery officer Alfred Dreyfus was put on trial and stripped of his rank because of anti-Semitic rumors in what became known as the Dreyfus Affair, justice might finally be done.
According to the French newspaper L'Opinion, French Defense Minister Florence Parly hinted in a speech she made last week marking the deportation of French Jews during World War II that Dreyfus might be promoted posthumously.
Dreyfus held the rank of captain when he was put on trial for allegedly spying for the German army. He was first tried in 1894 and convicted of treason. He was sentenced to life in prison and exiled. He was stripped of his rank in a humiliating ceremony.
After a public campaign on his behalf, which included writer Emile Zola's famous "J'Accuse!" open letter, Dreyfus was given a retrial in 1899. Again, he was found guilty of treason and sentenced to 10 years in prison, which was eventually commuted.
In 1906, a French appeals court ruled that Dreyfus was innocent. He returned to the army at the rank of major, but a year later he was forced to resign. He volunteered to serve as a lieutenant colonel in World War I.
Dreyfus died in 1935.
Parly called Dreyfus a "brilliant officer who chose to devote his life to his country."
The French minister said that although Dreyfus was readmitted into the military and promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel, it was poor compensation for the four years he had spent in prison and the 12 years he was kept out of the military.
Parly noted that she saw Dreyfus as a role model for children who was being wronged.
"The truth demands courage. 120 years later, the time has come for the army to give Alfred Dreyfus back the honor and years that were taken from him, and I will personally see that it is done. There are scars that cannot be healed," she said.
Saturday, August 03, 2019
BALTIMORE: ‘THE PIT OF HELL’
Where HAS all the money gone? The truth is Baltimore can't account for millions while poverty is rampant and drugs, danger and yes, rats lurk around every corner of the 7th District, a DailyMail.com investigation reveals
Daily Mail
August 2, 2019
President Trump prompted outrage when he described Congressman Elijah Cummings Baltimore 7th District as a, 'disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.'
The president demanded to know where the $16 billion of Federal funding given to the city had gone.
The city itself cannot account for the millions that have poured into its coffers, according to Baltimore's most recent audit analyzed by DailyMail.com. The 2018 audit notes numerous 'significant deficiencies' and 'material weaknesses' across almost every department. It found a consistent lack of any internal tracking of funds.
In disturbing photos, DailyMail.com captured the grim living conditions as we spoke to demoralized residents.
'I have a three-year-old son who lives with his mother in Pennsylvania,' Smooze told us. 'That's how I want it. If he was here he'd be dead before he was 21. Trump's words were true,' Smoove admitted, 'I could accept them if they came from anybody but him.'
Diane has lived in Gilmore Homes all her life. The area is consistently ranked among Baltimore's top three most dangerous housing complexes. According to Diane, 'What Trump said is true! Look around. It's the pit of hell.'
EDITOR’S NOTE: Where has all the money gone? That money, which was supposed to fund programs designed to improve the terrible living conditions within Baltimore’s black community, lined the pockets of local politicians and the managers of the city programs the federal funds were intended for.
Daily Mail
August 2, 2019
President Trump prompted outrage when he described Congressman Elijah Cummings Baltimore 7th District as a, 'disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.'
The president demanded to know where the $16 billion of Federal funding given to the city had gone.
The city itself cannot account for the millions that have poured into its coffers, according to Baltimore's most recent audit analyzed by DailyMail.com. The 2018 audit notes numerous 'significant deficiencies' and 'material weaknesses' across almost every department. It found a consistent lack of any internal tracking of funds.
In disturbing photos, DailyMail.com captured the grim living conditions as we spoke to demoralized residents.
'I have a three-year-old son who lives with his mother in Pennsylvania,' Smooze told us. 'That's how I want it. If he was here he'd be dead before he was 21. Trump's words were true,' Smoove admitted, 'I could accept them if they came from anybody but him.'
Diane has lived in Gilmore Homes all her life. The area is consistently ranked among Baltimore's top three most dangerous housing complexes. According to Diane, 'What Trump said is true! Look around. It's the pit of hell.'
EDITOR’S NOTE: Where has all the money gone? That money, which was supposed to fund programs designed to improve the terrible living conditions within Baltimore’s black community, lined the pockets of local politicians and the managers of the city programs the federal funds were intended for.
ANTI-GUN PSYCHOPATHS RUNNING CANDIDATE DEBATE IN LAS VEGAS
by Bob Walsh
On October 2, the second anniversary of the Las Vegas music festival shooting, there is going to be a "gun safety debate" for democrap-socialist political candidates in Las Vegas.
There is, as of yet, no info on which candidates have "qualified" to participate in the "debate."
I am confident the people of Las Vegas will give a rousing HI THERE to the mob of hoplophobes that will descend on their fair city to this important (or maybe impotent) political event. Or not.
On October 2, the second anniversary of the Las Vegas music festival shooting, there is going to be a "gun safety debate" for democrap-socialist political candidates in Las Vegas.
There is, as of yet, no info on which candidates have "qualified" to participate in the "debate."
I am confident the people of Las Vegas will give a rousing HI THERE to the mob of hoplophobes that will descend on their fair city to this important (or maybe impotent) political event. Or not.
EVEN THE DUTCH HAVE GOTTEN TIRED OF THIS SHIT
by Bob Walsh
The Netherlands, all things considered, is run by a pretty liberal government and populated by as group of pretty mellow people. They are, however, not stupid. They just joined many other European countries in outlawing the wearing of the burka, niquab, and other full-face covering in many public places.
A pro-Islam political party is already offering to pay the $167 fine for anybody convicted of violation of this law.
The Netherlands, all things considered, is run by a pretty liberal government and populated by as group of pretty mellow people. They are, however, not stupid. They just joined many other European countries in outlawing the wearing of the burka, niquab, and other full-face covering in many public places.
A pro-Islam political party is already offering to pay the $167 fine for anybody convicted of violation of this law.
SO, THEY ARE GOING TO DIG JOHN DILLINGER UP
by Bob Walsh
It seems that John Dillinger, who was shot to death (deliberately murdered some say) by the FBI 85 years ago last month, is going to be exhumed. The family believes that just maybe the body buried under a massive concrete slab is in fact NOT John Dillinger.
I find it hard to believe that Dillinger did NOT die that night in front of the Biograph theater, and I can't think of why they would have buried a different body in his grave, but you never know. He could have been buried under the floor of Capone's vault, or at Area 51.
DNA will tell the tale. Probably.
It seems that John Dillinger, who was shot to death (deliberately murdered some say) by the FBI 85 years ago last month, is going to be exhumed. The family believes that just maybe the body buried under a massive concrete slab is in fact NOT John Dillinger.
I find it hard to believe that Dillinger did NOT die that night in front of the Biograph theater, and I can't think of why they would have buried a different body in his grave, but you never know. He could have been buried under the floor of Capone's vault, or at Area 51.
DNA will tell the tale. Probably.
BEING RICH, GOOD LOOKING AND FAMOUS DOES NOT NECESSARILY MAKE YOU HAPPY
by Bob Walsh
Saoirse Kennedy Hill, 22, granddaughter to the late and by some lamented RFK , died in the last couple of days at the Kennedy compound in Mass, apparently from a self-inflicted drug overdose.
The young woman has apparently had serious depression issues much of her life which she wrote about. She survived one previous suicide attempt.
I confess to NOT being one of the people who worship at the altar of Kennedy. That being said, her death is a damn shame.
Saoirse Kennedy Hill, 22, granddaughter to the late and by some lamented RFK , died in the last couple of days at the Kennedy compound in Mass, apparently from a self-inflicted drug overdose.
The young woman has apparently had serious depression issues much of her life which she wrote about. She survived one previous suicide attempt.
I confess to NOT being one of the people who worship at the altar of Kennedy. That being said, her death is a damn shame.
OHIO COPS BELIEVE IN PUBLIC ORDER
by Bob Walsh
There is a video making the rounds of a relatively young white man attacking a relatively older white man outside of the Trump rally in Ohio Thursday. The young man seemed to be calling the older man a "racist fuck" while the brief attack went on. Several bystanders intervened to protect the victim briefly while several cops grabbed the young asshole, hooked him up and took his happy ass away.
It look like the older guy's glasses might have been broken in the process and he might have caught some modest injury to the face in the process.
I hope they prosecute the little shit to the full extent of the law. He MAY have just exited an unattended red pickup truck in the video shot before the fight started. With luck the cops towed it and he will get a humongus towing and storage bill for his trouble.
Civility is, or at least should be, a two way street.
There is a video making the rounds of a relatively young white man attacking a relatively older white man outside of the Trump rally in Ohio Thursday. The young man seemed to be calling the older man a "racist fuck" while the brief attack went on. Several bystanders intervened to protect the victim briefly while several cops grabbed the young asshole, hooked him up and took his happy ass away.
It look like the older guy's glasses might have been broken in the process and he might have caught some modest injury to the face in the process.
I hope they prosecute the little shit to the full extent of the law. He MAY have just exited an unattended red pickup truck in the video shot before the fight started. With luck the cops towed it and he will get a humongus towing and storage bill for his trouble.
Civility is, or at least should be, a two way street.
BATON ROUGE PD DID A PISS-POOR BACKGROUND CHECK
Chief apologizes over hiring of officer who shot black man
By Rebecca Santana
Associated Press
August 1, 2019
A Louisiana police chief apologized Thursday to his city and to the family of a black man shot and killed by a former police officer in 2016, saying the officer never should have been hired, at the same time his office announced a settlement reversing the officer’s 2018 firing and allowing him to resign instead.
At a news conference in Baton Rouge, Police Chief Murphy Paul and a police lawyer detailed repeated problems with Officer Blane Salamoni that they said should have raised red flags long before Alton Sterling was shot and killed.
Paul was not the chief at the time of the shooting, which launched days of protests over police treatment of black people.
In particular, the lawyer, Leo Hamilton, said Salamoni had been arrested for a physical altercation prior to joining the police department, which normally would have prevented him from being hired. He also failed to disclose his arrest in his application, Hamilton said.
The chief said the Sterling shooting was part of a well-documented pattern of “unprofessional behavior, police violence, marginalization, polarization and implicit bias by a man who should have never ever wore this uniform.”
“I want to apologize to the family of Alton Sterling and also to his kids. We’re sorry because he (Salamoni) should’ve never been hired,” Paul said.
Both state and federal officials declined to prosecute Salamoni and another officer involved in the altercation with Sterling, Howie Lake II. Salamoni — who fired all the shots that killed Sterling — was fired by Murphy in March 2018.
Salamoni appealed and under the settlement announced Thursday, he’ll be allowed to voluntarily resign retroactive to March 2018 instead of being fired. He will not receive any compensation, Hamilton said.
Hamilton said authorities continue to believe Salamoni’s firing was justified but said they advised settling because there was no guarantee that the firing wouldn’t be reversed in litigation. And Paul emphasized that Salamoni would never police Baton Rouge streets again.
Salamoni’s lawyer, John McLindon, said they’re happy the settlement withdraws his termination and allows him to resign.
McLindon said his client would have easily won reinstatement in an upcoming hearing but that he and Salamoni questioned what that would have achieved. McLindon said his client can resign and become an officer elsewhere if he wants.
He said his client had been cleared by both state and federal officials and emphasized that Sterling had a gun and was pulling it out when Salamoni shot him. He criticized the chief’s comments critical of Salamoni, calling them “inappropriate.”
McLindon also disputed that Salamoni had been arrested before starting with the police department.
Officials did not give any information about Salamoni’s pre-employment arrest but The Advocate newspaper described a 2009 incident in downtown Baton Rouge in which Salamoni was detained by police after an off-duty sheriff’s deputy saw him yell at and shove a woman at a bar.
Alton Sterling’s death came at a time of intense scrutiny across the country over the treatment of black people by police.
Salamoni and Lake encountered Sterling after responding to a report of a man with a gun outside the Triple S Food Mart.
Federal authorities, who opened a civil rights investigation immediately after the shooting, said Salamoni yelled that 37-year-old Sterling was reaching for a gun in his pocket before shooting him. The officers recovered a loaded revolver from Sterling’s pocket.
Lake helped wrestle Sterling to the ground, but didn’t fire his gun.
Two cellphone videos of the shooting quickly spread on social media, leading to nightly protests.
Many of the protesters complained about historic tensions between Baton Rouge police and the city’s African American residents. The police chief addressed those concerns Thursday, acknowledging past problems with law enforcement behavior.
“While we obviously cannot change the past, it is clear that we must change the future. And I sincerely apologize for the actions of the past and the role that our profession has played in building barriers in communities of color in the city of Baton Rouge,” Paul said.
Hamilton listed numerous problems investigators discovered about Salamoni, including regular use of profanity and unnecessary force during his work.
He even had problems with other officers. In one instance, Hamilton said Salamoni had a “blow up” with another officer that was so troublesome it caused another officer to say that if something wasn’t done about Salamoni, he could “eventually kill someone.”
Sterling’s relatives have filed a lawsuit against the city. Michael Adams, a lawyer representing three of Sterling’s children in the civil suit, said it was “refreshing” to hear a police chief come out and speak so frankly about the officer’s shortcomings. But he said the city knew Salamoni was a bad cop who was poorly trained and protected from within the department.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Because Baton Rouge allowed him to resign instead of firing him, he'll probably get hired by some backwater Louisiana sheriff's department.
By Rebecca Santana
Associated Press
August 1, 2019
A Louisiana police chief apologized Thursday to his city and to the family of a black man shot and killed by a former police officer in 2016, saying the officer never should have been hired, at the same time his office announced a settlement reversing the officer’s 2018 firing and allowing him to resign instead.
At a news conference in Baton Rouge, Police Chief Murphy Paul and a police lawyer detailed repeated problems with Officer Blane Salamoni that they said should have raised red flags long before Alton Sterling was shot and killed.
Paul was not the chief at the time of the shooting, which launched days of protests over police treatment of black people.
In particular, the lawyer, Leo Hamilton, said Salamoni had been arrested for a physical altercation prior to joining the police department, which normally would have prevented him from being hired. He also failed to disclose his arrest in his application, Hamilton said.
The chief said the Sterling shooting was part of a well-documented pattern of “unprofessional behavior, police violence, marginalization, polarization and implicit bias by a man who should have never ever wore this uniform.”
“I want to apologize to the family of Alton Sterling and also to his kids. We’re sorry because he (Salamoni) should’ve never been hired,” Paul said.
Both state and federal officials declined to prosecute Salamoni and another officer involved in the altercation with Sterling, Howie Lake II. Salamoni — who fired all the shots that killed Sterling — was fired by Murphy in March 2018.
Salamoni appealed and under the settlement announced Thursday, he’ll be allowed to voluntarily resign retroactive to March 2018 instead of being fired. He will not receive any compensation, Hamilton said.
Hamilton said authorities continue to believe Salamoni’s firing was justified but said they advised settling because there was no guarantee that the firing wouldn’t be reversed in litigation. And Paul emphasized that Salamoni would never police Baton Rouge streets again.
Salamoni’s lawyer, John McLindon, said they’re happy the settlement withdraws his termination and allows him to resign.
McLindon said his client would have easily won reinstatement in an upcoming hearing but that he and Salamoni questioned what that would have achieved. McLindon said his client can resign and become an officer elsewhere if he wants.
He said his client had been cleared by both state and federal officials and emphasized that Sterling had a gun and was pulling it out when Salamoni shot him. He criticized the chief’s comments critical of Salamoni, calling them “inappropriate.”
McLindon also disputed that Salamoni had been arrested before starting with the police department.
Officials did not give any information about Salamoni’s pre-employment arrest but The Advocate newspaper described a 2009 incident in downtown Baton Rouge in which Salamoni was detained by police after an off-duty sheriff’s deputy saw him yell at and shove a woman at a bar.
Alton Sterling’s death came at a time of intense scrutiny across the country over the treatment of black people by police.
Salamoni and Lake encountered Sterling after responding to a report of a man with a gun outside the Triple S Food Mart.
Federal authorities, who opened a civil rights investigation immediately after the shooting, said Salamoni yelled that 37-year-old Sterling was reaching for a gun in his pocket before shooting him. The officers recovered a loaded revolver from Sterling’s pocket.
Lake helped wrestle Sterling to the ground, but didn’t fire his gun.
Two cellphone videos of the shooting quickly spread on social media, leading to nightly protests.
Many of the protesters complained about historic tensions between Baton Rouge police and the city’s African American residents. The police chief addressed those concerns Thursday, acknowledging past problems with law enforcement behavior.
“While we obviously cannot change the past, it is clear that we must change the future. And I sincerely apologize for the actions of the past and the role that our profession has played in building barriers in communities of color in the city of Baton Rouge,” Paul said.
Hamilton listed numerous problems investigators discovered about Salamoni, including regular use of profanity and unnecessary force during his work.
He even had problems with other officers. In one instance, Hamilton said Salamoni had a “blow up” with another officer that was so troublesome it caused another officer to say that if something wasn’t done about Salamoni, he could “eventually kill someone.”
Sterling’s relatives have filed a lawsuit against the city. Michael Adams, a lawyer representing three of Sterling’s children in the civil suit, said it was “refreshing” to hear a police chief come out and speak so frankly about the officer’s shortcomings. But he said the city knew Salamoni was a bad cop who was poorly trained and protected from within the department.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Because Baton Rouge allowed him to resign instead of firing him, he'll probably get hired by some backwater Louisiana sheriff's department.
PIECE OF WORTHLESS SHIT SHOULD BE TRATED THE SAME WAY HE TREATED OPOSSUM
DNA Links Convicted Felon To Opossum Found Stabbed, Beaten, Burned, And Hung With Noose In Lynwood
LAPPL News Watch
August 2, 2019
The killer and torturer of an opossum found stabbed, beaten, burned, and hung from a fence in Lynwood was caught by investigators after DNA on the noose around its neck was matched to a convicted felon who lived nearby.
The opossum was found hanging in April 2018 at Yvonne-Burke-John D. Ham park, and SPCALA's Captain Cesar Perea told FOX 11 it was one of the most sadistic cases he's ever seen. "It's up there, I'd say top 10 in my career," he said. "He stabbed it several times, hung it with a noose, and then set it on fire."
But it was the noose around its neck that ended up bringing down its killer. "We removed the noose, and we submitted the noose to the crime lab, and the crime lab pulled DNA from the noose and we got a hit on our suspect," Perea said.
The DNA matched to a convicted felon named Jonathan Aldama, who lived just 400 feet away from the park. When police went to his house to arrest him, they were horrified at what was in his bedroom.
"God, I wanna say we found like 15-20 weapons that were all sharpened and handmade," Perea said. "We found a large amount of blood around these two makeshift bedrooms he had built in the garage."
LAPPL News Watch
August 2, 2019
The killer and torturer of an opossum found stabbed, beaten, burned, and hung from a fence in Lynwood was caught by investigators after DNA on the noose around its neck was matched to a convicted felon who lived nearby.
The opossum was found hanging in April 2018 at Yvonne-Burke-John D. Ham park, and SPCALA's Captain Cesar Perea told FOX 11 it was one of the most sadistic cases he's ever seen. "It's up there, I'd say top 10 in my career," he said. "He stabbed it several times, hung it with a noose, and then set it on fire."
But it was the noose around its neck that ended up bringing down its killer. "We removed the noose, and we submitted the noose to the crime lab, and the crime lab pulled DNA from the noose and we got a hit on our suspect," Perea said.
The DNA matched to a convicted felon named Jonathan Aldama, who lived just 400 feet away from the park. When police went to his house to arrest him, they were horrified at what was in his bedroom.
"God, I wanna say we found like 15-20 weapons that were all sharpened and handmade," Perea said. "We found a large amount of blood around these two makeshift bedrooms he had built in the garage."
TRIPLE MURDERER HOOKED FOR MORE THAN $200,000 BY BULGARIAN WEBSITE HOOKER
Florida man convicted of killing parents and brother over webcam model
Associated Press
August 1, 2019
CHULUOTA, Fla. — A Florida man has been found guilty of murdering his parents and brother because prosecutors say he was angry they cut off his relationship with a model he met on an adult website.
The Orlando Sentinel reports a jury found Grant Amato guilty Wednesday of three counts of first-degree murder in the January slayings.
According to an affidavit, Cody Amato’s girlfriend told deputies Grant Amato had stolen $60,000 and guns from his brother to talk to a Bulgarian woman he met online. Another brother told investigators Grant had stolen $150,000 from their father, including a loan taken out on his parents’ house, and had sent the woman over $200,000 in a three-month period.
Investigators say Grant Amato told them that his parents warned he could have no contact with her if he wanted to continue living at their home.
Grant Amato faces the death penalty.
Associated Press
August 1, 2019
CHULUOTA, Fla. — A Florida man has been found guilty of murdering his parents and brother because prosecutors say he was angry they cut off his relationship with a model he met on an adult website.
The Orlando Sentinel reports a jury found Grant Amato guilty Wednesday of three counts of first-degree murder in the January slayings.
According to an affidavit, Cody Amato’s girlfriend told deputies Grant Amato had stolen $60,000 and guns from his brother to talk to a Bulgarian woman he met online. Another brother told investigators Grant had stolen $150,000 from their father, including a loan taken out on his parents’ house, and had sent the woman over $200,000 in a three-month period.
Investigators say Grant Amato told them that his parents warned he could have no contact with her if he wanted to continue living at their home.
Grant Amato faces the death penalty.
90 CONSTITUENTS OF ELIJAH CUMMINGS BUSTED
Federal Prosecutors Indict 90 Members of Alleged Drug Crews to Stem Baltimore Violence
By Kevin Rector and Jessica Anderson
The Baltimore Sun
August 2, 2019
BALTIMORE -- Federal prosecutors have indicted 90 individuals on gun and drug charges in Baltimore in the past month alone, accusing them of peddling huge amounts of heroin, fentanyl and cocaine as part of underworld drug crews spurring violence across the city.
The defendants were charged in four separate cases, and 51 guns were seized, prosecutors said. Large amounts of drugs and nearly $1 million in cash also were confiscated. In one case, vehicles worth nearly half a million dollars were seized.
Maryland U.S. Attorney Robert Hur said the indictments, some newly unsealed and disclosed for the first time Thursday, represent a concerted effort between federal prosecutors and their local law enforcement partners to combat the historic pace of killing in Baltimore — which saw a staggering 38 homicides last month, and recorded nearly 200 killings already in 2019.
“We work with our partners to identify the most violent parts of the city, identify those violent groups who are responsible for the most violence in those parts of the city, and do the painstaking work of building federal cases against those people," Hur said in an interview.
On Thursday, Hur’s office held a news conference with other law enforcement leaders, including Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael Harrison, ATF Special Agent in Charge Robert Cekada, and recently appointed FBI Baltimore Office’s Special Agent in Charge Jennifer C. Boone outside the Union Baptist Church in the Upton neighborhood, northwest of downtown.
“These types of investigations focused on neighborhoods in our city that suffer the most do not happen without close partnerships between Baltimore police officers, federal agents and prosecutors,” Hur told reporters.
In the first seven months of this year federal prosecutors have charged 215 people with being involved in violent drug trafficking organizations, compared with 246 similar indictments for all of 2018.
Harrison said he hopes the strengthened partnership, which includes sharing “analytical resources” and intelligence from local investigations, will help identify leaders of the crime groups in hopes of charging them with federal crimes, which typically carry stiffer punishments.
"We’re stronger together than we are alone, sharing intelligence and aggressively investigating cases involving drugs and violence in our community,” the commissioner said. “The goal is to impact high-crime areas, and disrupt, dismantle and eradicate areas of illegal drug activity with violence that often goes with it.”
The emphasis on shifting cases to federal court was not welcomed by everyone. James Wyda, the Public Defender for the District of Maryland, questioned the strategy and its long-term effects.
“When cases are brought to federal court, severe sanctions follow. Thus, we should reserve federal court for those cases and clients who deserve the severe sentences that come in federal court...," Wyda said in a statement. "It seems that if there is one lesson learned over the past few decades of mass incarceration of people of color, it’s that we should be careful about celebrating the number of severe sentences doled out in the name of justice.”
While the four cases hinge on local gun possession and drug distribution charges, prosecutors have alleged connections to murderous violence, as well, including toward at least one federal informant.
They also outlined links to major criminal organizations across the country and abroad.
In one case centered on a drug crew known as LNG — for Liberty and Garrison, a reference to a Northwest Baltimore intersection — prosecutors allege indirect links to a Mexican drug cartel and direct membership of the crew’s members in the powerful and far-reaching Black Guerrilla Family and Crips gangs. The indictment suggests the two larger gangs have been cooperating to push fentanyl-laced heroin in Baltimore — where the extremely-potent drug combination has been linked to a historic spike in deadly overdoses.
In a recently unsealed affidavit seeking a search warrant for various properties linked to the LNG investigation, a Drug Enforcement Administration agent wrote that a confidential source identified one of the defendants, Brandon Crawford, as being involved in the 2015 killing of a barbershop employee named Andre Hunt.
Hunt allegedly identified Crawford to federal authorities as a bulk heroin distributor in an effort to win leniency in his own drug case. Crawford allegedly asked Hunt how his own case was going the same day Hunt was ambushed at the Cut Masters barbershop where he worked.
Neither Crawford nor his court-appointed attorney could be reached for comment.
In addition to the LNG case, in which 21 individuals were charged and more than a dozen guns seized, prosecutors highlighted three others.
In one, 25 defendants have been charged as alleged members of the Montford and OTM drug crew, centered in the McElderry Park and Milton Montford neighborhoods in East Baltimore, just east of Johns Hopkins Hospital in an area targeted for redevelopment by the city. Several homicides and shootings have occurred there this year, including a quintuple shooting in June that killed a 19-year-old man.
The crew is accused of selling heroin, fentanyl, and crack and powder cocaine to individual drug users locally and in bulk to other distributors in the city.
Prosecutors said investigators seized nine guns, more than 14 kilograms of cocaine, about 4.5 kilograms of heroin, 479 grams of fentanyl, nearly half a million dollars in cash and jewelry, and approximately $500,000 worth of cars in that case.
In another case, a total of 38 defendants were arrested and accused of being part of a drug crew centered around West Franklin Street and North Loudon and Normandy avenues, in the West Mulberry neighborhood, south of Edmondson Avenue in West Baltimore.
Federal agents seized 17 guns in that case, along with drugs and cash, and court documents alleged links to a May 5, 2018, homicide, an Oct. 16, 2018, shootout, and the robbery of an unlicensed taxi driver.
In a fourth case, prosecutors said six defendants have been charged with working as a drug crew in the area of Frederick and Collins avenues, in the Irvington neighborhood of Southwest Baltimore. A total of five guns were seized, they said, including a Glock pistol modified to fire as a fully automatic firearm.
The cases come as Baltimore again finds itself in the national spotlight after a week of criticisms of the city by President Donald Trump, who in tweets has called the city a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess" and alleged without providing evidence that billions in federal funding has been wasted.
Hur said Thursday that the President’s comments have had “absolutely no impact” on the collaboration between the agencies.
He said his office is focused on helping Baltimore recover from its current elevated violence. Asked about the level of federal resources his office has been provided to do that work, he said he "certainly could always use more, but we are working together, we are working hard, we are working smart with our partners.”
In addition to big gun and drug cases, Hur’s office continues to work on even larger, more complex racketeering cases. It has made an effort to host “call ins” with individuals on parole and probation who have been identified as being at high risk of re-offending, reminding them that they are already on the radar of law enforcement and will face steep federal sentences if they break the law again.
Hur’s office also seeks to connect individuals getting out of federal prison with resources, so their re-entry into society is smooth.
“It’s unproductive and unwise for us to simply have those people going back to their neighborhoods and putting them in situations where they are likely to get back into the criminal activity that put them in prison in the first place,” he said.
Hur acknowledged that dismantling entire drug crews at once can lead to problems.
“In some ways we are a little bit of a victim of our own success. Over the years, we’ve dismantled and split up these big gangs into these smaller, neighborhood crews," he said. “There is the potential that when you uproot or indict the entirety of a [drug trafficking organization], it creates a vacuum.”
Still, “we are in a position where the city is seeing elevated gun violence in the city and we have to respond accordingly,” he said. In dismantling a crew he said, “you give that neighborhood a chance to take a breath, and get respite from the violence, and decide, ‘OK, what do we do to move forward?’ "
Hur praised the Baltimore Police task force officers who work with federal law enforcement agencies in the city for their work in investigating the cases that recently landed.
“I really cannot over-emphasize how important it is to have BPD officers working with our agents,” he said.
And he warned would-be drug traffickers in the city, particularly those involved in violence, that the work is ongoing.
“This is work that has been going on for months and it’s led to this steady drumbeat over the last four weeks of these kinds of cases," he said. "This work is continuing. There is more coming.”
By Kevin Rector and Jessica Anderson
The Baltimore Sun
August 2, 2019
BALTIMORE -- Federal prosecutors have indicted 90 individuals on gun and drug charges in Baltimore in the past month alone, accusing them of peddling huge amounts of heroin, fentanyl and cocaine as part of underworld drug crews spurring violence across the city.
The defendants were charged in four separate cases, and 51 guns were seized, prosecutors said. Large amounts of drugs and nearly $1 million in cash also were confiscated. In one case, vehicles worth nearly half a million dollars were seized.
Maryland U.S. Attorney Robert Hur said the indictments, some newly unsealed and disclosed for the first time Thursday, represent a concerted effort between federal prosecutors and their local law enforcement partners to combat the historic pace of killing in Baltimore — which saw a staggering 38 homicides last month, and recorded nearly 200 killings already in 2019.
“We work with our partners to identify the most violent parts of the city, identify those violent groups who are responsible for the most violence in those parts of the city, and do the painstaking work of building federal cases against those people," Hur said in an interview.
On Thursday, Hur’s office held a news conference with other law enforcement leaders, including Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael Harrison, ATF Special Agent in Charge Robert Cekada, and recently appointed FBI Baltimore Office’s Special Agent in Charge Jennifer C. Boone outside the Union Baptist Church in the Upton neighborhood, northwest of downtown.
“These types of investigations focused on neighborhoods in our city that suffer the most do not happen without close partnerships between Baltimore police officers, federal agents and prosecutors,” Hur told reporters.
In the first seven months of this year federal prosecutors have charged 215 people with being involved in violent drug trafficking organizations, compared with 246 similar indictments for all of 2018.
Harrison said he hopes the strengthened partnership, which includes sharing “analytical resources” and intelligence from local investigations, will help identify leaders of the crime groups in hopes of charging them with federal crimes, which typically carry stiffer punishments.
"We’re stronger together than we are alone, sharing intelligence and aggressively investigating cases involving drugs and violence in our community,” the commissioner said. “The goal is to impact high-crime areas, and disrupt, dismantle and eradicate areas of illegal drug activity with violence that often goes with it.”
The emphasis on shifting cases to federal court was not welcomed by everyone. James Wyda, the Public Defender for the District of Maryland, questioned the strategy and its long-term effects.
“When cases are brought to federal court, severe sanctions follow. Thus, we should reserve federal court for those cases and clients who deserve the severe sentences that come in federal court...," Wyda said in a statement. "It seems that if there is one lesson learned over the past few decades of mass incarceration of people of color, it’s that we should be careful about celebrating the number of severe sentences doled out in the name of justice.”
While the four cases hinge on local gun possession and drug distribution charges, prosecutors have alleged connections to murderous violence, as well, including toward at least one federal informant.
They also outlined links to major criminal organizations across the country and abroad.
In one case centered on a drug crew known as LNG — for Liberty and Garrison, a reference to a Northwest Baltimore intersection — prosecutors allege indirect links to a Mexican drug cartel and direct membership of the crew’s members in the powerful and far-reaching Black Guerrilla Family and Crips gangs. The indictment suggests the two larger gangs have been cooperating to push fentanyl-laced heroin in Baltimore — where the extremely-potent drug combination has been linked to a historic spike in deadly overdoses.
In a recently unsealed affidavit seeking a search warrant for various properties linked to the LNG investigation, a Drug Enforcement Administration agent wrote that a confidential source identified one of the defendants, Brandon Crawford, as being involved in the 2015 killing of a barbershop employee named Andre Hunt.
Hunt allegedly identified Crawford to federal authorities as a bulk heroin distributor in an effort to win leniency in his own drug case. Crawford allegedly asked Hunt how his own case was going the same day Hunt was ambushed at the Cut Masters barbershop where he worked.
Neither Crawford nor his court-appointed attorney could be reached for comment.
In addition to the LNG case, in which 21 individuals were charged and more than a dozen guns seized, prosecutors highlighted three others.
In one, 25 defendants have been charged as alleged members of the Montford and OTM drug crew, centered in the McElderry Park and Milton Montford neighborhoods in East Baltimore, just east of Johns Hopkins Hospital in an area targeted for redevelopment by the city. Several homicides and shootings have occurred there this year, including a quintuple shooting in June that killed a 19-year-old man.
The crew is accused of selling heroin, fentanyl, and crack and powder cocaine to individual drug users locally and in bulk to other distributors in the city.
Prosecutors said investigators seized nine guns, more than 14 kilograms of cocaine, about 4.5 kilograms of heroin, 479 grams of fentanyl, nearly half a million dollars in cash and jewelry, and approximately $500,000 worth of cars in that case.
In another case, a total of 38 defendants were arrested and accused of being part of a drug crew centered around West Franklin Street and North Loudon and Normandy avenues, in the West Mulberry neighborhood, south of Edmondson Avenue in West Baltimore.
Federal agents seized 17 guns in that case, along with drugs and cash, and court documents alleged links to a May 5, 2018, homicide, an Oct. 16, 2018, shootout, and the robbery of an unlicensed taxi driver.
In a fourth case, prosecutors said six defendants have been charged with working as a drug crew in the area of Frederick and Collins avenues, in the Irvington neighborhood of Southwest Baltimore. A total of five guns were seized, they said, including a Glock pistol modified to fire as a fully automatic firearm.
The cases come as Baltimore again finds itself in the national spotlight after a week of criticisms of the city by President Donald Trump, who in tweets has called the city a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess" and alleged without providing evidence that billions in federal funding has been wasted.
Hur said Thursday that the President’s comments have had “absolutely no impact” on the collaboration between the agencies.
He said his office is focused on helping Baltimore recover from its current elevated violence. Asked about the level of federal resources his office has been provided to do that work, he said he "certainly could always use more, but we are working together, we are working hard, we are working smart with our partners.”
In addition to big gun and drug cases, Hur’s office continues to work on even larger, more complex racketeering cases. It has made an effort to host “call ins” with individuals on parole and probation who have been identified as being at high risk of re-offending, reminding them that they are already on the radar of law enforcement and will face steep federal sentences if they break the law again.
Hur’s office also seeks to connect individuals getting out of federal prison with resources, so their re-entry into society is smooth.
“It’s unproductive and unwise for us to simply have those people going back to their neighborhoods and putting them in situations where they are likely to get back into the criminal activity that put them in prison in the first place,” he said.
Hur acknowledged that dismantling entire drug crews at once can lead to problems.
“In some ways we are a little bit of a victim of our own success. Over the years, we’ve dismantled and split up these big gangs into these smaller, neighborhood crews," he said. “There is the potential that when you uproot or indict the entirety of a [drug trafficking organization], it creates a vacuum.”
Still, “we are in a position where the city is seeing elevated gun violence in the city and we have to respond accordingly,” he said. In dismantling a crew he said, “you give that neighborhood a chance to take a breath, and get respite from the violence, and decide, ‘OK, what do we do to move forward?’ "
Hur praised the Baltimore Police task force officers who work with federal law enforcement agencies in the city for their work in investigating the cases that recently landed.
“I really cannot over-emphasize how important it is to have BPD officers working with our agents,” he said.
And he warned would-be drug traffickers in the city, particularly those involved in violence, that the work is ongoing.
“This is work that has been going on for months and it’s led to this steady drumbeat over the last four weeks of these kinds of cases," he said. "This work is continuing. There is more coming.”
BUT PEOPLE ARE MORE CONCERNED ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING
US-Russia arms control treaty dies; US to test new weapon
By Deb Riechmann
Associated Press
August 2, 2019
The United States plans to test a new missile in coming weeks that would have been prohibited under a landmark, 32-year-old arms control treaty that the U.S. and Russia ripped up on Friday.
Washington and Moscow walked out of the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty that President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev signed in 1987, raising fears of a new arms race . The U.S. blamed Moscow for the death of the treaty. It said that for years Moscow has been developing and fielding weapons that violate the treaty and threaten the United States and its allies, particularly in Europe.
"Russia is solely responsible for the treaty's demise," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement released on Friday.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg similarly blamed Russia for what he described as repeated blatant violations of the treaty.
Stoltenberg said members of the 29-nation alliance "regret that Russia showed no willingness and took no steps to comply with its international obligations."
But the U.S. also sees an upside to exiting the treaty. Washington has complained for years that the arms control playing field was unfair. U.S. officials argued that not only was Russia violating the treaty and developing prohibited weapons, but that China also was making similar non-compliant weapons, leaving the U.S. alone in complying with the aging arms control pact.
Now, the U.S. is free to develop weapons systems that were previously banned. The U.S. is planning a test flight of such a weapon in coming weeks, according to a senior administration official, who was not authorized to publicly discuss the weapons development and spoke only on condition of anonymity.
The current Pentagon budget includes $48 million for research on potential military responses to the Russian violations of the INF treaty, but the options do not include a nuclear missile.
The official downplayed the test and said it was not meant as a provocation against Russia. Because the United States adhered to the treaty for 32 years, the United States is "years away" from effectively deploying weapons previously banned under the agreement, the official said Thursday.
Arms control advocates still worry that America's exit from the INF treaty will lead the two nations to also scrap the larger New START treaty, which expires in early 2021.
"Pulling out of this treaty leaves New START as the only bilateral nuclear arms agreement between the U.S and Russia," said physicist David Wright, co-director of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. If President Donald Trump "pulls out of that treaty as well or allows it to lapse, it will be the first time since 1972 that the two countries will be operating without any mutual constraints on their nuclear forces."
Trump hasn't committed to extending or replacing New START, which beginning in 2018 imposed limits on the number of U.S. and Russian long-range nuclear warheads and launchers. Trump has called New START "just another bad deal" made by the Obama administration, and Trump's national security adviser, John Bolton, said in June that it's unlikely the administration will agree to extend the treaty for five years, which could be done without legislative action in either capital.
The Trump administration thinks talks about extending New START are premature. The administration claims that with China's growing arsenal of nuclear warheads, Beijing can no longer be excluded from nuclear arms control agreements. Trump has expressed a desire to negotiate a trilateral arms control deal signed by the U.S., Russia and China.
"We'll see what happens," Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday. "I will say Russia would like to do something on a nuclear treaty and that's OK with me. They'd like to do something and so would I."
The administration official said the U.S. has had regular discussions with the Russians and Chinese about the possibility of a three-way arms control agreement. Trump wants the agreement to address not just intermediate-range weapons, but "all nuclear weapons," the official said.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov urged the United States to observe a moratorium in using intermediate-range weapons.
"We invited the U.S. and other NATO countries to assess the possibility of declaring the same moratorium on deploying intermediate-range and shorter-range equipment as we have, the same moratorium Vladimir Putin declared, saying that Russia will refrain from deploying these systems when we acquire them unless the American equipment is deployed in certain regions," he said in an interview with state news agency Tass.
European leaders are expected to react to Friday's demise of the INF with disappointment and concern.
"With the end of the INF treaty, a bit of security in Europe is being lost," German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said this week. "Now we call all the more on Russia and the U.S. to preserve the New START treaty as a cornerstone of worldwide arms control.
"Nuclear powers such as China must also face up to their responsibility on arms control — they have more weight in the world than at the time of the Cold War."
Over its lifetime, the 1987 INF treaty led to the elimination of 2,692 U.S. and Soviet Union nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles. Until its demise, the treaty banned land-based missiles with a range between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (310 to 3,410 miles).
Pompeo said the U.S. first raised its concerns that Russia was violating the treaty in 2013 during the Obama administration. He said the U.S. tried for six years to prod Russia back into compliance.
In February, Trump determined that Moscow was in material breach of the treaty and the U.S. suspended its own obligations under the agreement. That started a six-month clock to get Russia back into compliance — time that ran out on Friday.
"As it has for many years, Russia chose to keep its non-compliant missile rather than going back into compliance with its treaty obligations," Pompeo said. "The United States will not remain party to a treaty that is deliberately violated by Russia."
By Deb Riechmann
Associated Press
August 2, 2019
The United States plans to test a new missile in coming weeks that would have been prohibited under a landmark, 32-year-old arms control treaty that the U.S. and Russia ripped up on Friday.
Washington and Moscow walked out of the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty that President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev signed in 1987, raising fears of a new arms race . The U.S. blamed Moscow for the death of the treaty. It said that for years Moscow has been developing and fielding weapons that violate the treaty and threaten the United States and its allies, particularly in Europe.
"Russia is solely responsible for the treaty's demise," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement released on Friday.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg similarly blamed Russia for what he described as repeated blatant violations of the treaty.
Stoltenberg said members of the 29-nation alliance "regret that Russia showed no willingness and took no steps to comply with its international obligations."
But the U.S. also sees an upside to exiting the treaty. Washington has complained for years that the arms control playing field was unfair. U.S. officials argued that not only was Russia violating the treaty and developing prohibited weapons, but that China also was making similar non-compliant weapons, leaving the U.S. alone in complying with the aging arms control pact.
Now, the U.S. is free to develop weapons systems that were previously banned. The U.S. is planning a test flight of such a weapon in coming weeks, according to a senior administration official, who was not authorized to publicly discuss the weapons development and spoke only on condition of anonymity.
The current Pentagon budget includes $48 million for research on potential military responses to the Russian violations of the INF treaty, but the options do not include a nuclear missile.
The official downplayed the test and said it was not meant as a provocation against Russia. Because the United States adhered to the treaty for 32 years, the United States is "years away" from effectively deploying weapons previously banned under the agreement, the official said Thursday.
Arms control advocates still worry that America's exit from the INF treaty will lead the two nations to also scrap the larger New START treaty, which expires in early 2021.
"Pulling out of this treaty leaves New START as the only bilateral nuclear arms agreement between the U.S and Russia," said physicist David Wright, co-director of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. If President Donald Trump "pulls out of that treaty as well or allows it to lapse, it will be the first time since 1972 that the two countries will be operating without any mutual constraints on their nuclear forces."
Trump hasn't committed to extending or replacing New START, which beginning in 2018 imposed limits on the number of U.S. and Russian long-range nuclear warheads and launchers. Trump has called New START "just another bad deal" made by the Obama administration, and Trump's national security adviser, John Bolton, said in June that it's unlikely the administration will agree to extend the treaty for five years, which could be done without legislative action in either capital.
The Trump administration thinks talks about extending New START are premature. The administration claims that with China's growing arsenal of nuclear warheads, Beijing can no longer be excluded from nuclear arms control agreements. Trump has expressed a desire to negotiate a trilateral arms control deal signed by the U.S., Russia and China.
"We'll see what happens," Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday. "I will say Russia would like to do something on a nuclear treaty and that's OK with me. They'd like to do something and so would I."
The administration official said the U.S. has had regular discussions with the Russians and Chinese about the possibility of a three-way arms control agreement. Trump wants the agreement to address not just intermediate-range weapons, but "all nuclear weapons," the official said.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov urged the United States to observe a moratorium in using intermediate-range weapons.
"We invited the U.S. and other NATO countries to assess the possibility of declaring the same moratorium on deploying intermediate-range and shorter-range equipment as we have, the same moratorium Vladimir Putin declared, saying that Russia will refrain from deploying these systems when we acquire them unless the American equipment is deployed in certain regions," he said in an interview with state news agency Tass.
European leaders are expected to react to Friday's demise of the INF with disappointment and concern.
"With the end of the INF treaty, a bit of security in Europe is being lost," German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said this week. "Now we call all the more on Russia and the U.S. to preserve the New START treaty as a cornerstone of worldwide arms control.
"Nuclear powers such as China must also face up to their responsibility on arms control — they have more weight in the world than at the time of the Cold War."
Over its lifetime, the 1987 INF treaty led to the elimination of 2,692 U.S. and Soviet Union nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles. Until its demise, the treaty banned land-based missiles with a range between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (310 to 3,410 miles).
Pompeo said the U.S. first raised its concerns that Russia was violating the treaty in 2013 during the Obama administration. He said the U.S. tried for six years to prod Russia back into compliance.
In February, Trump determined that Moscow was in material breach of the treaty and the U.S. suspended its own obligations under the agreement. That started a six-month clock to get Russia back into compliance — time that ran out on Friday.
"As it has for many years, Russia chose to keep its non-compliant missile rather than going back into compliance with its treaty obligations," Pompeo said. "The United States will not remain party to a treaty that is deliberately violated by Russia."
Friday, August 02, 2019
TRUMPERS BEWARE: BE CAREFUL WHERE YOU WEAR YOUR MAGA CAP
Man claims he was brutally attacked by a dozen teenagers shouting 'Fuck Trump' for wearing a MAGA hat in Manhattan
By Stephanie Pagones
New York Post
August 1, 2019
A man claimed he was attacked by a group of teenagers in Lower Manhattan because he was wearing a MAGA hat, according to reports.
Jahangir Turan, 42, told CBS New York he was walking on Canal Street near Greene Street shortly before 7 p.m. Tuesday while wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat when he was roughed up by more than a dozen teens, who cursed at him as they confronted him.
The kids shouted “Fuck Trump” during the attack, according to Fox 5 NY.
Turan, who bought the hat earlier that day, said he suffered a broken cheekbone and a black eye.
“I love President Trump. I think he’s doing a great job,” the alleged victim told Fox. “It’s sad to get beat up for wearing this hat. This is America.”
Police confirmed Turan filed a police report but only said he was attacked by a man who punched him in the head and fled. He did not provide details about any statement the suspect may have made, nor that he was wearing a MAGA hat at the time, police said.
Turan refused medical attention at the scene.
By Stephanie Pagones
New York Post
August 1, 2019
A man claimed he was attacked by a group of teenagers in Lower Manhattan because he was wearing a MAGA hat, according to reports.
Jahangir Turan, 42, told CBS New York he was walking on Canal Street near Greene Street shortly before 7 p.m. Tuesday while wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat when he was roughed up by more than a dozen teens, who cursed at him as they confronted him.
The kids shouted “Fuck Trump” during the attack, according to Fox 5 NY.
Turan, who bought the hat earlier that day, said he suffered a broken cheekbone and a black eye.
“I love President Trump. I think he’s doing a great job,” the alleged victim told Fox. “It’s sad to get beat up for wearing this hat. This is America.”
Police confirmed Turan filed a police report but only said he was attacked by a man who punched him in the head and fled. He did not provide details about any statement the suspect may have made, nor that he was wearing a MAGA hat at the time, police said.
Turan refused medical attention at the scene.
BEING A SPECTATOR IS NOT NECESSARILY SAFE
by Bob Walsh
I vaugely remember, when I was a rug rat, a horrific crash at Le Mans that killed close to 100 spectators. Excrement occurs.
On Wednesday a high performance navy jet crashed in Star Wars Canyon, a scenic overlook where aviation buffs hang out in Death Valley to watch military aircraft zooming at low altitude thru a canyon. Seven people, all French tourists, were slightly injured when the F-18A slammed into the canyon wall and sprayed debris all over the place.
Unfortunately nobody saw an ejector seat or a parachute.
The canyon is officially called Rainbow Canyon. It got its unofficial name due to its resemblance to the canyon a young Luke Skywalker used to practice his high-speed low-level flying in.
EDITOR'S NOTE: It was confirmed the pilot died.
I vaugely remember, when I was a rug rat, a horrific crash at Le Mans that killed close to 100 spectators. Excrement occurs.
On Wednesday a high performance navy jet crashed in Star Wars Canyon, a scenic overlook where aviation buffs hang out in Death Valley to watch military aircraft zooming at low altitude thru a canyon. Seven people, all French tourists, were slightly injured when the F-18A slammed into the canyon wall and sprayed debris all over the place.
Unfortunately nobody saw an ejector seat or a parachute.
The canyon is officially called Rainbow Canyon. It got its unofficial name due to its resemblance to the canyon a young Luke Skywalker used to practice his high-speed low-level flying in.
EDITOR'S NOTE: It was confirmed the pilot died.
HONDURAN PROBABLY COULD HAVE GOTTEN A KID IN MEXICO AT A DISOUNT PRICE OF $50
Illegal Immigrant from Honduras Bought Baby for $80 in Guatemala to Get Priority Release in US
By Charlotte Cuthbertson
The Epoch Times
July 31, 2019
WASHINGTON—Children are being rented, bought, kidnapped, and recycled so that single adults, mostly men from Central America, can gain quick release into the United States after crossing the border illegally.
The cost of renting a child varies.
“We’ve had indications … that it could cost anywhere from a few hundred—or even in some cases, less than $100—up to $1,000 or more,” said Kevin McAleenan, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), during a congressional hearing on July 18.
McAleenan said in one case, a 51-year-old illegal alien had purchased a 6-month-old baby for $80 in Guatemala so that he could easily get into the United States. The man, a Honduran national, confessed to border agents when he was faced with a DNA test.
“We’ve seen all manner of smuggling organizations communicating to potential customers and to those crossing the border how to bring a child with them to be allowed to stay in the United States,” McAleenan said. “They’ve been active in advertising, literally on Facebook and on the radio in Central America.”
Homeland Security Investigations, a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), sent 400 agents to El Paso and Rio Grande Valley, Texas, in mid-April to interview families that Border Patrol suspected were fake. In the past eight weeks, HSI special agents have identified 5,500 fraudulent families—about 15 percent of all cases referred.
McAleenan said agents have uncovered 921 fake documents, and 615 individuals have been prosecuted for trafficking or smuggling a child.
“That tells me that we might be scratching the surface of this problem and the number of children being put at risk might be even higher,” he said.
“Everybody knows that if they bring a child, they’ll be allowed to stay in the United States—they call it a ‘passport for migration.’ I heard that directly from a gentleman from Huehuetenango, the westernmost province of Guatemala.”
He said almost every case summary he has seen mentions the same thing: “The subject stated that he made the attempt because he heard in his hometown that anyone traveling to the United States with a child will be released.”
The southern border has become so overwhelmed that most illegal aliens don’t even claim credible fear for asylum anymore, knowing they’ll still be released expeditiously into the United States—especially if they have a child.
In Yuma, Arizona, less than 10 percent of illegal aliens make an asylum claim, sector Chief Anthony Porvaznik said on April 17.
300,000 Children
Since Oct. 1, 2018, more than 300,000 children have crossed the southern border, according to McAleenan. Most of them entered as part of a family unit, but 67,000 also entered as unaccompanied minors. Family units increased by 469 percent from the first nine months of the 2018 fiscal year to the same period in the 2019 fiscal year.
The legal loophole that is fueling the sharp increase in family units was opened in 2015 by a California judge, who amended the Flores Settlement Agreement to prohibit the detention of families for more than 20 days. Previously, the 20-day rule was applied to unaccompanied minors only.
An immigration case can’t be adjudicated within 20 days, so families who cross the border illegally are now released by Border Patrol within days, with a future court date that most fail to honor.
One of the most telling statistics is that of men crossing the border with a child. In 2014, less than 1 percent of all men apprehended by Border Patrol in the Rio Grande Valley Sector had a child with them. That number now sits at 50 percent, according to Rodolfo Karisch, chief Border Patrol agent for that sector.
McAleenan said smugglers pair up adults and children.
“If they have an individual who wants to go to the United States and someone else has a child that they might want to make some additional money renting [out], or they want the child delivered to a relative in the United States,” they’ll buy fake documents and then get smuggled to the border.
“There’s a whole fake document operation in all three countries,” McAleenan said, referring to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.
“The vulnerabilities in our legal framework [are] incentivizing smugglers and families to put children at risk. The recycling problem is maybe the worst manifestation of that,” he said. Recycling refers to when a child is used by an adult to get across the border easily as a “family unit,” then sent back to be used again.
“ICE now has three significant cases, multiple cities around the country, where they’ve identified a small group of children—say five to eight children—who are being used by dozens of adults to cross our border, seeking release into the United States.”
The adults involved in fraudulent family claims are prosecuted by the Department of Justice for federal crimes including immigration crime, identity and benefit fraud, alien smuggling, human trafficking, and child exploitation.
Changing Flores
McAleenan said Congress could make the biggest impact—“not only on the flow, but on protecting children”—by making a change to the Flores agreement.
He said that prior to the 2015 change to Flores, the Obama administration started detaining families together for the duration of their immigration case, which takes around 45 days. The flow of illegal immigrants slowed in response, as those with meritless asylum claims were deported.
“If people are not successful in coming with a child being released, they’re actually getting a decision from an immigration judge resulting in repatriation for the vast majority, that would mean others would not try to come,” McAleenan said.
Although almost 90 percent of those who claim credible fear when presenting themselves at the border pass the initial screening, less than 20 percent are granted asylum relief by an immigration judge. For Central Americans, that number is less than 10 percent.
Rep. Katie Hill (D-Calif.) told McAleenan at the hearing that a Democrat-controlled House won’t amend the Flores agreement, nor will it provide funding for more detention beds.
McAleenan pushed back, saying he’s not ready to accept that a system that worked under the Obama administration five years ago wouldn’t be accepted by Congress today. Then, he said, families were kept together for 40 to 50 days in a campus-like setting with education, recreation, medical care, and courtrooms on site.
“We’re not seeing successful results in immigration cases when anyone is released from being detained in custody, but especially for families—they’re more likely to cut off their [tracking] bracelets; they’re less likely to show up for hearings; they’re less likely to respond to a final order of removal,” McAleenan said. “So being able to address that at the border in an expedited and fair way, with due process, is a much better solution than what we’re doing now.”
He said he’s already discussing bipartisan options with the Senate Judiciary Committee, but he’d like to start a discussion in the House.
67,000 Unaccompanied Minors
McAleenan is also concerned about the increased number of unaccompanied minors coming across the border and the legal loopholes that prevent them from being sent back home.
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) has been established for years to help victims of trafficking; however, a loophole prevents the United States from returning children back to their home countries unless they are from Canada or Mexico (contiguous countries).
McAleenan said even if Central American countries want their children back, U.S. law prohibits it.
“We’ve had all three ambassadors from the Northern Triangle countries assert that those governments should have some say in what happens to that unaccompanied child,” he said.
Instead, an unaccompanied child gets moved from Border Patrol to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which then finds a sponsor in the United States to place the child with.
Currently, around 11,000 unaccompanied minors are in the care of HHS, creating a proxy foster care system. The vast majority (88 percent) hail from the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Most are aged between 15 and 17.
“The number of unaccompanied minors entering the United States during this fiscal year has risen to levels we have never before seen,” Jonathan Hayes told the House Judiciary Committee on July 25. Hayes is responsible for the unaccompanied minor program within the HHS’s Office and Refugee Resettlement department.
Hayes said that as of June, the average length of time that a child stays in HHS custody is approximately 42 days—a “dramatic decrease” from late November 2018, where the average length of care was 90 days.
McAleenan said it’s often a parent, who is already in the United States illegally, who pays a smuggler to deliver their child up to the border.
“I don’t think most people realize that most of these unaccompanied children are being released to parents or relatives in the United States who are also here unlawfully, who may not have permission to work in the United States,” McAleenan said.
New restrictions, placed by Congress in the latest round of appropriations, include a provision that illegal aliens in a household with an unaccompanied minor are now exempt from deportation.
McAleenan is also concerned about the increased number of unaccompanied minors coming across the border and the legal loopholes that prevent them from being sent back home.
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) has been established for years to help victims of trafficking; however, a loophole prevents the United States from returning children back to their home countries unless they are from Canada or Mexico (contiguous countries).
McAleenan said even if Central American countries want their children back, U.S. law prohibits it.
“We’ve had all three ambassadors from the Northern Triangle countries assert that those governments should have some say in what happens to that unaccompanied child,” he said.
Instead, an unaccompanied child gets moved from Border Patrol to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which then finds a sponsor in the United States to place the child with.
Currently, around 11,000 unaccompanied minors are in the care of HHS, creating a proxy foster care system. The vast majority (88 percent) hail from the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Most are aged between 15 and 17.
“The number of unaccompanied minors entering the United States during this fiscal year has risen to levels we have never before seen,” Jonathan Hayes told the House Judiciary Committee on July 25. Hayes is responsible for the unaccompanied minor program within the HHS’s Office and Refugee Resettlement department.
Hayes said that as of June, the average length of time that a child stays in HHS custody is approximately 42 days—a “dramatic decrease” from late November 2018, where the average length of care was 90 days.
McAleenan said it’s often a parent, who is already in the United States illegally, who pays a smuggler to deliver their child up to the border.
“I don’t think most people realize that most of these unaccompanied children are being released to parents or relatives in the United States who are also here unlawfully, who may not have permission to work in the United States,” McAleenan said.
New restrictions, placed by Congress in the latest round of appropriations, include a provision that illegal aliens in a household with an unaccompanied minor are now exempt from deportation.
By Charlotte Cuthbertson
The Epoch Times
July 31, 2019
WASHINGTON—Children are being rented, bought, kidnapped, and recycled so that single adults, mostly men from Central America, can gain quick release into the United States after crossing the border illegally.
The cost of renting a child varies.
“We’ve had indications … that it could cost anywhere from a few hundred—or even in some cases, less than $100—up to $1,000 or more,” said Kevin McAleenan, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), during a congressional hearing on July 18.
McAleenan said in one case, a 51-year-old illegal alien had purchased a 6-month-old baby for $80 in Guatemala so that he could easily get into the United States. The man, a Honduran national, confessed to border agents when he was faced with a DNA test.
“We’ve seen all manner of smuggling organizations communicating to potential customers and to those crossing the border how to bring a child with them to be allowed to stay in the United States,” McAleenan said. “They’ve been active in advertising, literally on Facebook and on the radio in Central America.”
Homeland Security Investigations, a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), sent 400 agents to El Paso and Rio Grande Valley, Texas, in mid-April to interview families that Border Patrol suspected were fake. In the past eight weeks, HSI special agents have identified 5,500 fraudulent families—about 15 percent of all cases referred.
McAleenan said agents have uncovered 921 fake documents, and 615 individuals have been prosecuted for trafficking or smuggling a child.
“That tells me that we might be scratching the surface of this problem and the number of children being put at risk might be even higher,” he said.
“Everybody knows that if they bring a child, they’ll be allowed to stay in the United States—they call it a ‘passport for migration.’ I heard that directly from a gentleman from Huehuetenango, the westernmost province of Guatemala.”
He said almost every case summary he has seen mentions the same thing: “The subject stated that he made the attempt because he heard in his hometown that anyone traveling to the United States with a child will be released.”
The southern border has become so overwhelmed that most illegal aliens don’t even claim credible fear for asylum anymore, knowing they’ll still be released expeditiously into the United States—especially if they have a child.
In Yuma, Arizona, less than 10 percent of illegal aliens make an asylum claim, sector Chief Anthony Porvaznik said on April 17.
300,000 Children
Since Oct. 1, 2018, more than 300,000 children have crossed the southern border, according to McAleenan. Most of them entered as part of a family unit, but 67,000 also entered as unaccompanied minors. Family units increased by 469 percent from the first nine months of the 2018 fiscal year to the same period in the 2019 fiscal year.
The legal loophole that is fueling the sharp increase in family units was opened in 2015 by a California judge, who amended the Flores Settlement Agreement to prohibit the detention of families for more than 20 days. Previously, the 20-day rule was applied to unaccompanied minors only.
An immigration case can’t be adjudicated within 20 days, so families who cross the border illegally are now released by Border Patrol within days, with a future court date that most fail to honor.
One of the most telling statistics is that of men crossing the border with a child. In 2014, less than 1 percent of all men apprehended by Border Patrol in the Rio Grande Valley Sector had a child with them. That number now sits at 50 percent, according to Rodolfo Karisch, chief Border Patrol agent for that sector.
McAleenan said smugglers pair up adults and children.
“If they have an individual who wants to go to the United States and someone else has a child that they might want to make some additional money renting [out], or they want the child delivered to a relative in the United States,” they’ll buy fake documents and then get smuggled to the border.
“There’s a whole fake document operation in all three countries,” McAleenan said, referring to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.
“The vulnerabilities in our legal framework [are] incentivizing smugglers and families to put children at risk. The recycling problem is maybe the worst manifestation of that,” he said. Recycling refers to when a child is used by an adult to get across the border easily as a “family unit,” then sent back to be used again.
“ICE now has three significant cases, multiple cities around the country, where they’ve identified a small group of children—say five to eight children—who are being used by dozens of adults to cross our border, seeking release into the United States.”
The adults involved in fraudulent family claims are prosecuted by the Department of Justice for federal crimes including immigration crime, identity and benefit fraud, alien smuggling, human trafficking, and child exploitation.
Changing Flores
McAleenan said Congress could make the biggest impact—“not only on the flow, but on protecting children”—by making a change to the Flores agreement.
He said that prior to the 2015 change to Flores, the Obama administration started detaining families together for the duration of their immigration case, which takes around 45 days. The flow of illegal immigrants slowed in response, as those with meritless asylum claims were deported.
“If people are not successful in coming with a child being released, they’re actually getting a decision from an immigration judge resulting in repatriation for the vast majority, that would mean others would not try to come,” McAleenan said.
Although almost 90 percent of those who claim credible fear when presenting themselves at the border pass the initial screening, less than 20 percent are granted asylum relief by an immigration judge. For Central Americans, that number is less than 10 percent.
Rep. Katie Hill (D-Calif.) told McAleenan at the hearing that a Democrat-controlled House won’t amend the Flores agreement, nor will it provide funding for more detention beds.
McAleenan pushed back, saying he’s not ready to accept that a system that worked under the Obama administration five years ago wouldn’t be accepted by Congress today. Then, he said, families were kept together for 40 to 50 days in a campus-like setting with education, recreation, medical care, and courtrooms on site.
“We’re not seeing successful results in immigration cases when anyone is released from being detained in custody, but especially for families—they’re more likely to cut off their [tracking] bracelets; they’re less likely to show up for hearings; they’re less likely to respond to a final order of removal,” McAleenan said. “So being able to address that at the border in an expedited and fair way, with due process, is a much better solution than what we’re doing now.”
He said he’s already discussing bipartisan options with the Senate Judiciary Committee, but he’d like to start a discussion in the House.
67,000 Unaccompanied Minors
McAleenan is also concerned about the increased number of unaccompanied minors coming across the border and the legal loopholes that prevent them from being sent back home.
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) has been established for years to help victims of trafficking; however, a loophole prevents the United States from returning children back to their home countries unless they are from Canada or Mexico (contiguous countries).
McAleenan said even if Central American countries want their children back, U.S. law prohibits it.
“We’ve had all three ambassadors from the Northern Triangle countries assert that those governments should have some say in what happens to that unaccompanied child,” he said.
Instead, an unaccompanied child gets moved from Border Patrol to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which then finds a sponsor in the United States to place the child with.
Currently, around 11,000 unaccompanied minors are in the care of HHS, creating a proxy foster care system. The vast majority (88 percent) hail from the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Most are aged between 15 and 17.
“The number of unaccompanied minors entering the United States during this fiscal year has risen to levels we have never before seen,” Jonathan Hayes told the House Judiciary Committee on July 25. Hayes is responsible for the unaccompanied minor program within the HHS’s Office and Refugee Resettlement department.
Hayes said that as of June, the average length of time that a child stays in HHS custody is approximately 42 days—a “dramatic decrease” from late November 2018, where the average length of care was 90 days.
McAleenan said it’s often a parent, who is already in the United States illegally, who pays a smuggler to deliver their child up to the border.
“I don’t think most people realize that most of these unaccompanied children are being released to parents or relatives in the United States who are also here unlawfully, who may not have permission to work in the United States,” McAleenan said.
New restrictions, placed by Congress in the latest round of appropriations, include a provision that illegal aliens in a household with an unaccompanied minor are now exempt from deportation.
McAleenan is also concerned about the increased number of unaccompanied minors coming across the border and the legal loopholes that prevent them from being sent back home.
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) has been established for years to help victims of trafficking; however, a loophole prevents the United States from returning children back to their home countries unless they are from Canada or Mexico (contiguous countries).
McAleenan said even if Central American countries want their children back, U.S. law prohibits it.
“We’ve had all three ambassadors from the Northern Triangle countries assert that those governments should have some say in what happens to that unaccompanied child,” he said.
Instead, an unaccompanied child gets moved from Border Patrol to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which then finds a sponsor in the United States to place the child with.
Currently, around 11,000 unaccompanied minors are in the care of HHS, creating a proxy foster care system. The vast majority (88 percent) hail from the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Most are aged between 15 and 17.
“The number of unaccompanied minors entering the United States during this fiscal year has risen to levels we have never before seen,” Jonathan Hayes told the House Judiciary Committee on July 25. Hayes is responsible for the unaccompanied minor program within the HHS’s Office and Refugee Resettlement department.
Hayes said that as of June, the average length of time that a child stays in HHS custody is approximately 42 days—a “dramatic decrease” from late November 2018, where the average length of care was 90 days.
McAleenan said it’s often a parent, who is already in the United States illegally, who pays a smuggler to deliver their child up to the border.
“I don’t think most people realize that most of these unaccompanied children are being released to parents or relatives in the United States who are also here unlawfully, who may not have permission to work in the United States,” McAleenan said.
New restrictions, placed by Congress in the latest round of appropriations, include a provision that illegal aliens in a household with an unaccompanied minor are now exempt from deportation.
FOR TRRYING TO KILL HIS WIFE HE ONLY HAS TO SERVE 60 DAYS ON WEEKENDS
Man gets two months in jail to be served on weekends for poisoning estranged wife in Macomb Township, Michigan
By Jameson Cook
Macomb Daily
August 1, 2019
A woman’s impassioned plea for a judge to jail her ex-husband who drugged her, succeeded mildly as the judge jailed him for only 60 days, to be served on weekends.
Brian Kozlowski, 46, of Mount Clemens, was sentenced to five years probation with the first two months in the county jail Thursday by Visiting Judge Antonio Viviano in Macomb County Circuit Court.
Viviano previously indicated he would sentence Kozlowski to probation but issued a slightly tougher sentence after listening to a 20-minute description of the ordeal and its impacts by the victim.
The woman, who requested anonymity, accused Kozlowski of trying to kill her by placing eight sleeping pills in her morning pot of coffee. The coffee was also was consumed by their adult daughter. Both of the women nearly crashed their cars on their way to work after consuming it. He performed the acts shortly after the woman filed for divorce in May 2018.
“Brian’s continuous, methodical, and calculated plot to poison me included a complete disregard for human life, including his own daughter, along with hundreds of other drivers who he put at risk every day for weeks,” she said. “I believe this was attempted murder. Once Brian realized he lost me and there was no getting me to stay in this unhealthy marriage, his goal was to eliminate me.
“To think that the man I fell in love with at 16 years old and have three beautiful children with would endanger my life was unbelievable.”
The Macomb Township couple had been married for 23 years and were together 29 years, raising three children. He works in a machine shop and she is an accountant.
She said she believes his motive was financial as he would benefit from her death by collecting more than $1 million from her retirement account, life insurance and savings. She was earning $180,000 per year working for a large company.
“Brian was trying to kill me to keep his comfortable life from slipping away,” she said. “Clearly, financial gain was the tip of his sword.”
The woman said noticed the effects the first time when she nearly crashed her car on a freeway while driving to work in Detroit and had blurry vision, felt nauseous and vomited at work. After suffering effects multiple days, she placed hidden cameras in the kitchen. She observed Kozlowski dissolve eight sleeping pills in a shot glass and pour it in the pot of coffee he made each morning for weeks. After she first watched the video, she said she didn’t drink the coffee and saved it for evidence to ensure evidence for a criminal conviction.
Kozlowski was charged with poisoning, punishable by up to 15 years in prison, and in June pleaded no contest to the charge.
Viviano sentenced Kozlowski below the guideline range of between 19 months and 39 months in state prison at the minimum end, far below Macomb County Prosecutor’s Office request and Probation Department’s recommendation of 38 months.
Despite her concerns, the victim requested a county jail term, which would be limited to one year.
After Viviano announced the two-month jail term, to be served on weekends, Assistant Macomb Prosecuted Darra Slanec blurted, “It’s a slap in the face” to the victim, and asked to redress the judge, who denied her request.
Her boss, Prosecutor Eric Smith, had expressed concern about Viviano's potential probationary sentence Wednesday in a news release.
On Thursday, Smith told a TV stations he believes Viviano was more concerned about Kozlowski maintaining his employment, and said his office plans to appeal the sentence.
Viviano called the case "difficult."
"Miss Kozlowski's statement was moving. I was moved by Miss Kozlowski's statement. She did suffer. She did suffered because of the actions of this man. Whatever she did, she doesn't deserve that."
Viviano also criticized Smith's attempt to influence the outcome of a court case through publicity, calling it "actually illegal."
"I certainly am not allowed give up this gentleman's right to an individualized sentence due to pressure being put on the court by outside forces," he said. "That is not proper."
Kozlowski’s attorney, Brian Legghio, in seeking the lighter sentence, said Kozlowski has “great, profound remorse,” and has little chance of recidivism with the help of strong family support. His parents –- a retired Center Line police officer and retired school district employee -- attended the sentencing.
“He did a regrettably stupid, heinous act,” Legghio said. “That doesn’t mean he should lose his entire life.”
Kozlowski’ told the judge, “I am truly sorry for what I did, I deeply would like to apologize to my ex-wife for everything I’ve done, and my family.”
Legghio in court and in an 18-page sentencing memorandum said that Kozlowski was suffering from depression and emotional trauma from his wife at the time informing him in 2016 she wanted a divorce, her verbal jabs to him and his suspicions she was having an affair.
In the memo file Thursday, Legghio says Kozlowski drugged her “to make her tired so that she wouldn’t ‘run around all night.’
“It was never his intention to poison his wife,” he wrote. “Her constant belittling remarks and intended behavior caused him enormous pain and humiliation, which led him to act out his upset and impulses.”
However, Slanec said Kozlowski is only suffering depression and trauma only because he got caught and knew he was facing prison.
Slanec and the victim also noted this was not a one-time, impulsive incident but a premeditated effort.
She described her fear of during the period she was filming him, calling it "crippling and consuming."
“I spent every day terrified every day he would catch me and every night sleepless in fear he would see the cameras and come into our bedroom and hurt me,” she said.
The victim said she also learned Kozlowski placed laxatives in her protein shake powder and in the past had put Adderall in her vodka drinks while the couple spent long days on their boat.
She said the incident has severely damaged his relationship with his children; two of them are estranged, and Kozlowski is living with the third child, a 26-year-old man.
“Brian has destroyed our family,” she said. “He’s taken away any chance of us being a functioning divorced family. He’s driven wedges between our three children who are still struggling in their own way to face the reality of what he did and at the same time balance everything I’ve ever instilled with them about family coming first and being there for each other no matter what.”
“My heart breaks every time I think what he has done to them. The devastating effects of what he did to them will stay with them the rest of their lives.”
After the ruling, Leggio called the sentence "proportionate."
"My client and I appreciate the independence of this judge," he said.
He said Kozlowski has suffered from the loss of relationships with his children.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is how weekend sentences work out. You check into jail Friday evening and are released Monday morning. And here comes the kicker. You are credited with being jailed on Fridays and Mondays. So, instead of being credited only for Saturday and Sunday, you are credited for serving four days each weekend. Thus, instead of serving 30 weekends, Kozlowski will have to serve only 15 weekends. Not bad for a guy who tried to kill his wife.
By Jameson Cook
Macomb Daily
August 1, 2019
A woman’s impassioned plea for a judge to jail her ex-husband who drugged her, succeeded mildly as the judge jailed him for only 60 days, to be served on weekends.
Brian Kozlowski, 46, of Mount Clemens, was sentenced to five years probation with the first two months in the county jail Thursday by Visiting Judge Antonio Viviano in Macomb County Circuit Court.
Viviano previously indicated he would sentence Kozlowski to probation but issued a slightly tougher sentence after listening to a 20-minute description of the ordeal and its impacts by the victim.
The woman, who requested anonymity, accused Kozlowski of trying to kill her by placing eight sleeping pills in her morning pot of coffee. The coffee was also was consumed by their adult daughter. Both of the women nearly crashed their cars on their way to work after consuming it. He performed the acts shortly after the woman filed for divorce in May 2018.
“Brian’s continuous, methodical, and calculated plot to poison me included a complete disregard for human life, including his own daughter, along with hundreds of other drivers who he put at risk every day for weeks,” she said. “I believe this was attempted murder. Once Brian realized he lost me and there was no getting me to stay in this unhealthy marriage, his goal was to eliminate me.
“To think that the man I fell in love with at 16 years old and have three beautiful children with would endanger my life was unbelievable.”
The Macomb Township couple had been married for 23 years and were together 29 years, raising three children. He works in a machine shop and she is an accountant.
She said she believes his motive was financial as he would benefit from her death by collecting more than $1 million from her retirement account, life insurance and savings. She was earning $180,000 per year working for a large company.
“Brian was trying to kill me to keep his comfortable life from slipping away,” she said. “Clearly, financial gain was the tip of his sword.”
The woman said noticed the effects the first time when she nearly crashed her car on a freeway while driving to work in Detroit and had blurry vision, felt nauseous and vomited at work. After suffering effects multiple days, she placed hidden cameras in the kitchen. She observed Kozlowski dissolve eight sleeping pills in a shot glass and pour it in the pot of coffee he made each morning for weeks. After she first watched the video, she said she didn’t drink the coffee and saved it for evidence to ensure evidence for a criminal conviction.
Kozlowski was charged with poisoning, punishable by up to 15 years in prison, and in June pleaded no contest to the charge.
Viviano sentenced Kozlowski below the guideline range of between 19 months and 39 months in state prison at the minimum end, far below Macomb County Prosecutor’s Office request and Probation Department’s recommendation of 38 months.
Despite her concerns, the victim requested a county jail term, which would be limited to one year.
After Viviano announced the two-month jail term, to be served on weekends, Assistant Macomb Prosecuted Darra Slanec blurted, “It’s a slap in the face” to the victim, and asked to redress the judge, who denied her request.
Her boss, Prosecutor Eric Smith, had expressed concern about Viviano's potential probationary sentence Wednesday in a news release.
On Thursday, Smith told a TV stations he believes Viviano was more concerned about Kozlowski maintaining his employment, and said his office plans to appeal the sentence.
Viviano called the case "difficult."
"Miss Kozlowski's statement was moving. I was moved by Miss Kozlowski's statement. She did suffer. She did suffered because of the actions of this man. Whatever she did, she doesn't deserve that."
Viviano also criticized Smith's attempt to influence the outcome of a court case through publicity, calling it "actually illegal."
"I certainly am not allowed give up this gentleman's right to an individualized sentence due to pressure being put on the court by outside forces," he said. "That is not proper."
Kozlowski’s attorney, Brian Legghio, in seeking the lighter sentence, said Kozlowski has “great, profound remorse,” and has little chance of recidivism with the help of strong family support. His parents –- a retired Center Line police officer and retired school district employee -- attended the sentencing.
“He did a regrettably stupid, heinous act,” Legghio said. “That doesn’t mean he should lose his entire life.”
Kozlowski’ told the judge, “I am truly sorry for what I did, I deeply would like to apologize to my ex-wife for everything I’ve done, and my family.”
Legghio in court and in an 18-page sentencing memorandum said that Kozlowski was suffering from depression and emotional trauma from his wife at the time informing him in 2016 she wanted a divorce, her verbal jabs to him and his suspicions she was having an affair.
In the memo file Thursday, Legghio says Kozlowski drugged her “to make her tired so that she wouldn’t ‘run around all night.’
“It was never his intention to poison his wife,” he wrote. “Her constant belittling remarks and intended behavior caused him enormous pain and humiliation, which led him to act out his upset and impulses.”
However, Slanec said Kozlowski is only suffering depression and trauma only because he got caught and knew he was facing prison.
Slanec and the victim also noted this was not a one-time, impulsive incident but a premeditated effort.
She described her fear of during the period she was filming him, calling it "crippling and consuming."
“I spent every day terrified every day he would catch me and every night sleepless in fear he would see the cameras and come into our bedroom and hurt me,” she said.
The victim said she also learned Kozlowski placed laxatives in her protein shake powder and in the past had put Adderall in her vodka drinks while the couple spent long days on their boat.
She said the incident has severely damaged his relationship with his children; two of them are estranged, and Kozlowski is living with the third child, a 26-year-old man.
“Brian has destroyed our family,” she said. “He’s taken away any chance of us being a functioning divorced family. He’s driven wedges between our three children who are still struggling in their own way to face the reality of what he did and at the same time balance everything I’ve ever instilled with them about family coming first and being there for each other no matter what.”
“My heart breaks every time I think what he has done to them. The devastating effects of what he did to them will stay with them the rest of their lives.”
After the ruling, Leggio called the sentence "proportionate."
"My client and I appreciate the independence of this judge," he said.
He said Kozlowski has suffered from the loss of relationships with his children.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is how weekend sentences work out. You check into jail Friday evening and are released Monday morning. And here comes the kicker. You are credited with being jailed on Fridays and Mondays. So, instead of being credited only for Saturday and Sunday, you are credited for serving four days each weekend. Thus, instead of serving 30 weekends, Kozlowski will have to serve only 15 weekends. Not bad for a guy who tried to kill his wife.
BLONDES ARE KNOWN FOR LEADING SHEEP TO THEIR SLAUGHTER
Woman with the Israelis when executed, is suspected of setting them up for the hit
By Chivis Martinez from Radio Formula
Borderland Beat
August 1, 2019
The blonde woman who was eating with Azulay Alon and Ben Sutchi when they were executed, has been identified. She was with the men at an establishment in Artz Pedregal Plaza.
At first she was identified as Vanessa Bayer , aka "La Wera"; However, her real name is Vanessa Ballar Fallas, of Mexican origin, who is considered a centerpiece to clarify the double murder of Israelis, Ciro Gómez Leyva reported.
Meanwhile, her photograph is already part of the Interpol alert issued by the Mexican authorities to find her anywhere in the world.
It should be remembered that Vanessa Ballar fled through the kitchen of the restaurant where Azulay Alon and Ben Sutchi were killed, accompanied by a man.
On the other hand, it is suspected that "La Wera" would have set up the Israelis, so she would also be complicit in the murderers. At the time of the attack, the victims were closing a deal for heavy weapons.
By Chivis Martinez from Radio Formula
Borderland Beat
August 1, 2019
The blonde woman who was eating with Azulay Alon and Ben Sutchi when they were executed, has been identified. She was with the men at an establishment in Artz Pedregal Plaza.
At first she was identified as Vanessa Bayer , aka "La Wera"; However, her real name is Vanessa Ballar Fallas, of Mexican origin, who is considered a centerpiece to clarify the double murder of Israelis, Ciro Gómez Leyva reported.
Meanwhile, her photograph is already part of the Interpol alert issued by the Mexican authorities to find her anywhere in the world.
It should be remembered that Vanessa Ballar fled through the kitchen of the restaurant where Azulay Alon and Ben Sutchi were killed, accompanied by a man.
On the other hand, it is suspected that "La Wera" would have set up the Israelis, so she would also be complicit in the murderers. At the time of the attack, the victims were closing a deal for heavy weapons.
GRITS SHOULD HAVE REMAINED IN CANADA
Flirting with more rational pot policies
BY Scott Henson
Grits for Breakfast
July 31, 2019
Grits returned yesterday from a much-needed vacation in cooler climes, only to find Texas #cjreform news gushing like a fire hydrant pried open to beat the summertime heat.
Let's start with marijuana. Just before I left town, we learned that the Texas Legislature had altered marijuana laws to make it difficult-to-impossible to prosecute low-level marijuana cases. Bexar County DA Joe Gonzalez took leadership on the issue, announcing he would not prosecute possession cases without a lab result. DAs in Tarrant, Fort Bend, Nueces, and Williamson Counties followed suit, with Williamson County Attorney Dee Hobbs citing the risk of false convictions. And the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's editorial board quoted Grits in a post calling for District Attorneys to use the opportunity as a natural experiment to see what would happen if pot were decriminalized.
Notably, while on vacation in Quebec, Grits got a first-hand look at how marijuana legalization plays out in the real world. Two words: boring and lucrative. Pot smoking wasn't any more prevalent in public than previously, said the locals, but the dispensaries were bustling with commerce and filled with satisfied customers. Prices were 40-50% less than black-market prices in Texas, even though Canadian taxes on weed are significant. All in all, it seemed to this writer like the epitome of a win-win policy; just a very grown-up way to handle the matter.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Typical liberal hogwash.
BY Scott Henson
Grits for Breakfast
July 31, 2019
Grits returned yesterday from a much-needed vacation in cooler climes, only to find Texas #cjreform news gushing like a fire hydrant pried open to beat the summertime heat.
Let's start with marijuana. Just before I left town, we learned that the Texas Legislature had altered marijuana laws to make it difficult-to-impossible to prosecute low-level marijuana cases. Bexar County DA Joe Gonzalez took leadership on the issue, announcing he would not prosecute possession cases without a lab result. DAs in Tarrant, Fort Bend, Nueces, and Williamson Counties followed suit, with Williamson County Attorney Dee Hobbs citing the risk of false convictions. And the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's editorial board quoted Grits in a post calling for District Attorneys to use the opportunity as a natural experiment to see what would happen if pot were decriminalized.
Notably, while on vacation in Quebec, Grits got a first-hand look at how marijuana legalization plays out in the real world. Two words: boring and lucrative. Pot smoking wasn't any more prevalent in public than previously, said the locals, but the dispensaries were bustling with commerce and filled with satisfied customers. Prices were 40-50% less than black-market prices in Texas, even though Canadian taxes on weed are significant. All in all, it seemed to this writer like the epitome of a win-win policy; just a very grown-up way to handle the matter.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Typical liberal hogwash.
PHISHER ANGLED AND CAUGHT THE BIGGIE IN THE BIG HOUSE
Texas Man Facing 350 Years In Prison For Hacking Into L.A. Superior Court, Sending 2 Million Phishing Emails
LAPPL News Watch
August 1, 2019
A Texas man was found guilty Thursday of hacking into the Los Angeles Superior Court computer system and then using it to send about 2 million phishing emails, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
A jury found 33-year-old Oriyomi Sadiq Aloba guilty of 27 federal criminal charges, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, attempted wire fraud, unauthorized impairment of a protected computer, unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information and aggravated identity theft, authorities said.
He faces a statutory maximum sentence of more than 350 years in federal prison, according to the Department of Justice.
Aloba and his co-conspirators gained access to an employee’s email account in 2017 and then sent out emails with a link to a phishing website disguised as a Dropbox link, and asked employees for email addresses and passwords, authorities said.
Thousands of employees gave out their email credentials to the hacker, who then used them to send out millions of phishing emails, the DOJ said.
LAPPL News Watch
August 1, 2019
A Texas man was found guilty Thursday of hacking into the Los Angeles Superior Court computer system and then using it to send about 2 million phishing emails, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
A jury found 33-year-old Oriyomi Sadiq Aloba guilty of 27 federal criminal charges, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, attempted wire fraud, unauthorized impairment of a protected computer, unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information and aggravated identity theft, authorities said.
He faces a statutory maximum sentence of more than 350 years in federal prison, according to the Department of Justice.
Aloba and his co-conspirators gained access to an employee’s email account in 2017 and then sent out emails with a link to a phishing website disguised as a Dropbox link, and asked employees for email addresses and passwords, authorities said.
Thousands of employees gave out their email credentials to the hacker, who then used them to send out millions of phishing emails, the DOJ said.
HUMAN RIGHTS AND HUMANITARIAN AID ORGANIZATIONS ARE CORRUPT, MISSPENDING DONATIONS AND POLITICIZING THEIR WORKS
What are human rights groups hiding?
By Itai Reuveni
Israel Hayon
August 1, 2019
The past two years have been tough for the larger humanitarian aid organizations and they have had to struggle to keep their aura of altruism intact.
A number of large organizations have had to fight accusations of sexual harassment, employee harassment and the mismanagement of donor funds.
On Monday, a confidential report by the United Nations Ethics Committee was leaked to the media and with it the panel's recommendations to censure the head of the notorious United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) for "abusing their authority for their own benefit, suppressing legitimate internal opposition, and achieving personal goals in inappropriate ways," as well as for misusing the funds raised for humanitarian aid.
For decades, the human rights industry has touted a halo that over the years became a defensive wall against any criticism from home and abroad.
The senior officials in these organizations were automatically perceived as angels and anyone who dared to criticize or call for reforms in major international organizations, such as Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, was blasted for trying to undermine their good work.
But the immunity enjoyed by these bodies soon became destructive to the very human rights they are sworn to protect. Professionals have been replaced by extreme political activists; rights campaigns and aid projects gave way to media campaigns; entire populations have been excluded from the focus of these organizations, and the concept of human rights as a universal value soon dissolved into political interests.
A year ago the world learned that Oxfam, one of the largest international aid organizations, compiled a confidential internal report documenting how senior Oxfam officials exploited their status to operate a prostitution network abusing underage earthquake survivors.
The report was kept from Oxfam's donors – especially donor countries - so as not to damage its reputation. Oxfam, by the way, was very vocal in its demand for an international boycott of Israel's SodaStream over its "immoral" operations in Judea and Samaria.
Amnesty, which refuses to deal with anti-Semitism in Europe and which is obsessed with Israel, is currently at the center of a serious case of employee abuse that is so severe, two of its employees have committed suicide.
In this case, as in the cases of UNRWA and Oxfam, the investigation was conducted secretly and far from the eyes of the donors and the public, so as to avoid tarnishing the organization's reputation.
Irresponsibility, lack of transparency and lack of oversight are common in the human rights and international aid industry, where many groups have long abandoned the principles of neutrality, promoting universal values and independence from political interests.
The cases of UNRWA, Oxfam, Amnesty, and many other groups underscore the claim that in these types of organizations ideology trumps ethics, proper management and values that they have pledged to promote.
By the way, it seems that the Swiss government has decided to suspend its funding for UNRWA – allegations of financial mismanagement were apparently successful where proof of anti-Semitism, support for terrorism, and the indoctrination of hatred via education failed.
The same phenomenon exists on the donor side as well, especially in foreign governments. The funds are tainted by ulterior motives, and it is not always possible to know how appropriation decisions were made.
One must remember that human rights and humanitarian aid organizations are ordinary organizations, and their employees are human beings who are not necessarily more – or less – moral than others. It is precisely because of their pretense of being morally superior that they must face scrutiny and thereby protect human rights values from political abuse.
Such organizations must be completely transparent. If they have been able to hide sex and embezzlement scandals from governments and countries, one can only imagine what they might be hiding with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and other issues.
By Itai Reuveni
Israel Hayon
August 1, 2019
The past two years have been tough for the larger humanitarian aid organizations and they have had to struggle to keep their aura of altruism intact.
A number of large organizations have had to fight accusations of sexual harassment, employee harassment and the mismanagement of donor funds.
On Monday, a confidential report by the United Nations Ethics Committee was leaked to the media and with it the panel's recommendations to censure the head of the notorious United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) for "abusing their authority for their own benefit, suppressing legitimate internal opposition, and achieving personal goals in inappropriate ways," as well as for misusing the funds raised for humanitarian aid.
For decades, the human rights industry has touted a halo that over the years became a defensive wall against any criticism from home and abroad.
The senior officials in these organizations were automatically perceived as angels and anyone who dared to criticize or call for reforms in major international organizations, such as Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, was blasted for trying to undermine their good work.
But the immunity enjoyed by these bodies soon became destructive to the very human rights they are sworn to protect. Professionals have been replaced by extreme political activists; rights campaigns and aid projects gave way to media campaigns; entire populations have been excluded from the focus of these organizations, and the concept of human rights as a universal value soon dissolved into political interests.
A year ago the world learned that Oxfam, one of the largest international aid organizations, compiled a confidential internal report documenting how senior Oxfam officials exploited their status to operate a prostitution network abusing underage earthquake survivors.
The report was kept from Oxfam's donors – especially donor countries - so as not to damage its reputation. Oxfam, by the way, was very vocal in its demand for an international boycott of Israel's SodaStream over its "immoral" operations in Judea and Samaria.
Amnesty, which refuses to deal with anti-Semitism in Europe and which is obsessed with Israel, is currently at the center of a serious case of employee abuse that is so severe, two of its employees have committed suicide.
In this case, as in the cases of UNRWA and Oxfam, the investigation was conducted secretly and far from the eyes of the donors and the public, so as to avoid tarnishing the organization's reputation.
Irresponsibility, lack of transparency and lack of oversight are common in the human rights and international aid industry, where many groups have long abandoned the principles of neutrality, promoting universal values and independence from political interests.
The cases of UNRWA, Oxfam, Amnesty, and many other groups underscore the claim that in these types of organizations ideology trumps ethics, proper management and values that they have pledged to promote.
By the way, it seems that the Swiss government has decided to suspend its funding for UNRWA – allegations of financial mismanagement were apparently successful where proof of anti-Semitism, support for terrorism, and the indoctrination of hatred via education failed.
The same phenomenon exists on the donor side as well, especially in foreign governments. The funds are tainted by ulterior motives, and it is not always possible to know how appropriation decisions were made.
One must remember that human rights and humanitarian aid organizations are ordinary organizations, and their employees are human beings who are not necessarily more – or less – moral than others. It is precisely because of their pretense of being morally superior that they must face scrutiny and thereby protect human rights values from political abuse.
Such organizations must be completely transparent. If they have been able to hide sex and embezzlement scandals from governments and countries, one can only imagine what they might be hiding with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and other issues.
Thursday, August 01, 2019
DEMOCRATS, ABETTED BY A LAPDOG MEDIA, CHEAT WHEN IT’S THEIR TURN TO DEAL IN THE POKER GAME OF POLITICS
Whenever Republicans, especially President Trump, say something unfavorable to blacks, the Democrats deal the race card from the bottom of the deck
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Times
July 31, 2019
Because Rep. Elijah Cummings is a civil rights icon, he is untouchable. Cummings represents a congressional district in Baltimore. His district includes most of the majority-black precincts of Baltimore County. He’s been in office since 1996. Cummings is now the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.
During a hearing of his committee on July 18, Cummings shrieked at acting head of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan about the conditions of the illegal immigrant detention facilities. He repeatedly kept McAleenan from attempting to speak and shouted at him:
“I’m talking about human beings. I’m not talking about people that come from, as the president said, shitholes. These are human beings. Human beings. Just trying to live a better life.”
When McAleenan said his department was “doing our level best,” Cummings shut him off again and continued to shriek:
“What does that mean? What does that mean? When a child is sitting in their own feces, can’t take a shower? Come on man. What’s that about? None of us would have our children in that position.”
President Trump did not take kindly to the outrageous treatment of McAleenan. He tweeted:
“Rep. Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men and women of the Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA.”
“As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient and well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rate and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous and filthy place.”
That’s all it took for the race card to be dealt from the bottom of the deck. The lapdog media had a field day quoting all the Democrats, from Pelosi on down, calling Trump a racist for daring to attack Cummings and his largely black district.
Let’s take a look at what Cummings said. Children sitting in their own shit? He must have gotten that from the same source who told AOC that the detainees were having to drink out of the crapper.
On the other hand, Trump was right about Cummings being a bully and Baltimore being a rat and rodent infested mess. While taking a tour of East Baltimore a year ago, former Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh said:
“What the hell? We should just take all this shit down. Woah, you can smell the rats. Whew, Jesus. Oh my God, you can smell the dead animals.”
Oh, where was the race card against Pugh? Can’t play it because she is black.
But that’s not all. Back in 2015, Bernie Sanders, who has screamed multiple times that Trump is a racist, after touring a black neighborhood in West Baltimore, said:
“Anyone who took the walk that we took around this neighborhood would not think you’re in a wealthy nation. You would think that you were in a Third World country.”
Let’s see now. By Democratic standards Trump is a racist for calling Baltimore a rat and rodent infested mess. Aha, by referring to Baltimore as a third world country, that makes presidential candidate Bernie Sanders a racist too. But the Democrats won’t pull the race card from the bottom of the deck because he is running on their ticket.
In a Washington Post interview on Tuesday, Trump also compared Baltimore to the Central American country of Honduras, saying: “Baltimore is worse than Honduras, okay? If you look at the number of shootings, the number of crimes, the number of everything, Baltimore is worse than Honduras, okay?”
Trump, like many of us, may be a racist. But when he attacks AOC’s squad and Cummings, he is not attacking them because they are persons of color, he’s attacking them for what they say and stand for. When he describes Baltimore as being like a shithole, it's because Baltimore is a shithole. And that does not make our President a racist!
Trump’s correct characterization of Baltimore even attracted a rodent from Red Bill de Blasio’s rat-infested city. Al Sharpton, the Tawana Brawley hoaxer and instigator of the Crown Heights riot, happened to be in Baltimore Monday on a previously planned trip. Here is what that rodent said:
“Little did I know that Mr. Trump was going to attack the congressman from this city. But not only the congressman but the people of this city, in the most bigoted and racist way.”
“He attacks everybody. I know Donald Trump. He's not mature enough to take criticism. He's like a child. But he has a particular venom for blacks and people of color. He doesn't refer to any of his other opponents or critics as 'infested.' He does not attack their districts. He attacks Nancy Pelosi. He attacks Chuck Schumer. He attacks other whites but never said their districts or states are places no human being wants to live.”
With his sordid history, Sharpton has absolutely no business attacking Trump, or anyone else for that matter.
Then there is Kamala Harris. Oops, Kamala must have made a terrible mistake by pulling the race card on Joe Biden during the first presidential debate when she attacked him for supporting two ‘racist’ senators way back when. That card was supposed to be dealt only to Trump and other Republicans.
The most recent polls show that 51 percent of Americans believe Trump is a racist. Well, no wonder when the public has been bombarded day after day ever since Charlottesville with multiple descriptions on TV and in the printed press of Trump as a racist. Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels said, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” The Democrats and the lapdog media are doing Goebbels proud.
On Tuesday, Wall Street Journal columnist Jason L. Riley wrote: “The news media has spent the past week trying to rehabilitate the reputations of Baltimore and Al Sharpton, which is more evidence that they’ll try just about anything to advance the Democratic Party’s Trump-is-a-racist storyline.”
And here is a fact Trump failed to mention. After St. Louis, Baltimore has the highest per capita homicide rate of America’s largest cities, exceeding that of Chicago. 90 percent of the murders in Baltimore are black on black.
Ach mein lieber Gott im Himmel, by mentioning that 90 percent of the murders in Baltimore are black on black, I’ve just exposed myself as a racist.
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Times
July 31, 2019
Because Rep. Elijah Cummings is a civil rights icon, he is untouchable. Cummings represents a congressional district in Baltimore. His district includes most of the majority-black precincts of Baltimore County. He’s been in office since 1996. Cummings is now the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.
During a hearing of his committee on July 18, Cummings shrieked at acting head of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan about the conditions of the illegal immigrant detention facilities. He repeatedly kept McAleenan from attempting to speak and shouted at him:
“I’m talking about human beings. I’m not talking about people that come from, as the president said, shitholes. These are human beings. Human beings. Just trying to live a better life.”
When McAleenan said his department was “doing our level best,” Cummings shut him off again and continued to shriek:
“What does that mean? What does that mean? When a child is sitting in their own feces, can’t take a shower? Come on man. What’s that about? None of us would have our children in that position.”
President Trump did not take kindly to the outrageous treatment of McAleenan. He tweeted:
“Rep. Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men and women of the Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA.”
“As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient and well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rate and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous and filthy place.”
That’s all it took for the race card to be dealt from the bottom of the deck. The lapdog media had a field day quoting all the Democrats, from Pelosi on down, calling Trump a racist for daring to attack Cummings and his largely black district.
Let’s take a look at what Cummings said. Children sitting in their own shit? He must have gotten that from the same source who told AOC that the detainees were having to drink out of the crapper.
On the other hand, Trump was right about Cummings being a bully and Baltimore being a rat and rodent infested mess. While taking a tour of East Baltimore a year ago, former Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh said:
“What the hell? We should just take all this shit down. Woah, you can smell the rats. Whew, Jesus. Oh my God, you can smell the dead animals.”
Oh, where was the race card against Pugh? Can’t play it because she is black.
But that’s not all. Back in 2015, Bernie Sanders, who has screamed multiple times that Trump is a racist, after touring a black neighborhood in West Baltimore, said:
“Anyone who took the walk that we took around this neighborhood would not think you’re in a wealthy nation. You would think that you were in a Third World country.”
Let’s see now. By Democratic standards Trump is a racist for calling Baltimore a rat and rodent infested mess. Aha, by referring to Baltimore as a third world country, that makes presidential candidate Bernie Sanders a racist too. But the Democrats won’t pull the race card from the bottom of the deck because he is running on their ticket.
In a Washington Post interview on Tuesday, Trump also compared Baltimore to the Central American country of Honduras, saying: “Baltimore is worse than Honduras, okay? If you look at the number of shootings, the number of crimes, the number of everything, Baltimore is worse than Honduras, okay?”
Trump, like many of us, may be a racist. But when he attacks AOC’s squad and Cummings, he is not attacking them because they are persons of color, he’s attacking them for what they say and stand for. When he describes Baltimore as being like a shithole, it's because Baltimore is a shithole. And that does not make our President a racist!
Trump’s correct characterization of Baltimore even attracted a rodent from Red Bill de Blasio’s rat-infested city. Al Sharpton, the Tawana Brawley hoaxer and instigator of the Crown Heights riot, happened to be in Baltimore Monday on a previously planned trip. Here is what that rodent said:
“Little did I know that Mr. Trump was going to attack the congressman from this city. But not only the congressman but the people of this city, in the most bigoted and racist way.”
“He attacks everybody. I know Donald Trump. He's not mature enough to take criticism. He's like a child. But he has a particular venom for blacks and people of color. He doesn't refer to any of his other opponents or critics as 'infested.' He does not attack their districts. He attacks Nancy Pelosi. He attacks Chuck Schumer. He attacks other whites but never said their districts or states are places no human being wants to live.”
With his sordid history, Sharpton has absolutely no business attacking Trump, or anyone else for that matter.
Then there is Kamala Harris. Oops, Kamala must have made a terrible mistake by pulling the race card on Joe Biden during the first presidential debate when she attacked him for supporting two ‘racist’ senators way back when. That card was supposed to be dealt only to Trump and other Republicans.
The most recent polls show that 51 percent of Americans believe Trump is a racist. Well, no wonder when the public has been bombarded day after day ever since Charlottesville with multiple descriptions on TV and in the printed press of Trump as a racist. Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels said, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” The Democrats and the lapdog media are doing Goebbels proud.
On Tuesday, Wall Street Journal columnist Jason L. Riley wrote: “The news media has spent the past week trying to rehabilitate the reputations of Baltimore and Al Sharpton, which is more evidence that they’ll try just about anything to advance the Democratic Party’s Trump-is-a-racist storyline.”
And here is a fact Trump failed to mention. After St. Louis, Baltimore has the highest per capita homicide rate of America’s largest cities, exceeding that of Chicago. 90 percent of the murders in Baltimore are black on black.
Ach mein lieber Gott im Himmel, by mentioning that 90 percent of the murders in Baltimore are black on black, I’ve just exposed myself as a racist.
RONNIE AND TRICKY DICK REFERRED TO AFRICANS AS MONKEYS AND CANNIBALS
Ronald Reagan described African delegates to the UN as 'monkeys' who were 'still uncomfortable wearing shoes' in 1971 phone call with President Nixon, shocking newly released tapes reveal
Daily Mail
July 31, 2019
Ronald Reagan once described African delegates to the UN as 'monkeys' who were 'still uncomfortable wearing shoes' in a shocking phone call with President Nixon in 1971, according to newly released tapes.
The phone call came a day after the UN Assembly voted to recognize the Communist People's Republic of China as the legitimate government, and expel Taiwan. The motion, which was opposed by Nixon, was supported by a number of African nations.
Outraged with the vote, Reagan who was then governor of California, called Nixon to vent his fury and drop the slur saying: 'To see those, those monkeys from those African countries.'
Nixon then called the African delegates 'cannibals' in a subsequent phone call with his Secretary of State William Rogers.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Off with their heads! Shit, we can’t do that because they’ve both already croaked.
Daily Mail
July 31, 2019
Ronald Reagan once described African delegates to the UN as 'monkeys' who were 'still uncomfortable wearing shoes' in a shocking phone call with President Nixon in 1971, according to newly released tapes.
The phone call came a day after the UN Assembly voted to recognize the Communist People's Republic of China as the legitimate government, and expel Taiwan. The motion, which was opposed by Nixon, was supported by a number of African nations.
Outraged with the vote, Reagan who was then governor of California, called Nixon to vent his fury and drop the slur saying: 'To see those, those monkeys from those African countries.'
Nixon then called the African delegates 'cannibals' in a subsequent phone call with his Secretary of State William Rogers.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Off with their heads! Shit, we can’t do that because they’ve both already croaked.
THE WAGES OF SIN IS.....GETTING BOOTED FROM YOUR SORORITY
by Bob Walsh
Both of Lori Laughlin's daughers, Olivia Jade, 19, and Isabella, 20, got their asses kicked out of Kappa Kappa Gamma. "Sources" said that the girls are taking it day by day and that this adversity is strengthening the bond between them. Ins't that special? Maybe the feds will let them share a cell.
The scandal has hurt Olivia hardest as all of her sponsors have bailed on her and she no longer gets paid tons of money just for being cool. Damn, isn't life a bitch? Maybe she can get a gig on Orange is the New Black.
Both of Lori Laughlin's daughers, Olivia Jade, 19, and Isabella, 20, got their asses kicked out of Kappa Kappa Gamma. "Sources" said that the girls are taking it day by day and that this adversity is strengthening the bond between them. Ins't that special? Maybe the feds will let them share a cell.
The scandal has hurt Olivia hardest as all of her sponsors have bailed on her and she no longer gets paid tons of money just for being cool. Damn, isn't life a bitch? Maybe she can get a gig on Orange is the New Black.
ALABAMA CLAIMS LAST SLAVE SHIP
by Bob Walsh
The Clothilda was the last known ship to bring a load of slaves to North America. An Alabama plantation owner made a bet in 1860 that he could successfully import a batch of slaves. This was long after the IMPORTATION of slaves had been outlawed.
The trip was successful. About 100 slaves were brought in, the ship was moved up the Mobile River after the slaves were unloaded and the ship was burned. These particular slaves formed a city, Africatown, which still exists, when they were freed at the end of the Civil War.
Earlier this year the remains of the ship were discovered. The state has filed an admiralty claim in federal court claiming ownership of the remains in order to protect it from scroungers. The claim, if successful, would grant ownership of the ship to the state, which then plans to transfer it to the Alabama Historical Commission.
The Clothilda was the last known ship to bring a load of slaves to North America. An Alabama plantation owner made a bet in 1860 that he could successfully import a batch of slaves. This was long after the IMPORTATION of slaves had been outlawed.
The trip was successful. About 100 slaves were brought in, the ship was moved up the Mobile River after the slaves were unloaded and the ship was burned. These particular slaves formed a city, Africatown, which still exists, when they were freed at the end of the Civil War.
Earlier this year the remains of the ship were discovered. The state has filed an admiralty claim in federal court claiming ownership of the remains in order to protect it from scroungers. The claim, if successful, would grant ownership of the ship to the state, which then plans to transfer it to the Alabama Historical Commission.
FED MOVE
by Bob Walsh
The Federal Reserve announced yesterday that their interest rate is moving DOWN from 2.25% to 2.0%, the first downward move in about ten years.
The Federal Reserve announced yesterday that their interest rate is moving DOWN from 2.25% to 2.0%, the first downward move in about ten years.
IT WAS BOUND TO HAPPEN ….. NOW JEWS ARE ACCUSED OF BEING WHIE SUPREMACISTS
AOC says Palestinians 'have no choice but to riot' against Israel
By Lukas Mikelionis
Fox News
July 31, 2019
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agreed that Israel is “criminal” in its treatment of Palestinians, whom she said have no other choice but to “riot” against the Jewish state.
The New York Democrat made her remarks during an appearance on the hip-hop program “Ebro in the Morning” with Ebro Darden, where they touched on a variety of issues concerning the freshman congresswoman.
The host asserted that “corrupt” governments in Israel, the United States, Russia and Saudi Arabia were “all working in concert.”
“How do you have white supremacist Jews?” Ebro asked. “How do you have people like Stephen Miller? How do you have these individuals who are legit aligning with racism and white supremacy, but they're Jewish? And it's something that most people can't wrap their brains around. But it's a real thing.”
He added: “And what's going on with Israel and Palestine, while it's very, very, deep, it is very, very, criminal, and it is very, very unjust.”
But rather than push back against the claims, Ocasio-Cortez agreed with them, saying “Absolutely” and adding that “I think, too, where we're at as a country when it comes to Israel-Palestine is very much a generational issue.”
She said the right-wing unfairly accuses her of anti-Semitism when she’s actually just being critical of the Israeli government.
“Criticizing the occupation doesn't make you anti-Israel, frankly. It doesn't mean that you are against the existence of a nation,” she said. “It means that you believe in human rights, and it's about making sure that Palestinian human rights are equal to Israeli human rights, and there are a lot of troubling things happening there.”
Ocasio-Cortez went on to say that Palestinians also have no other choice but to resort to violence as they are “marginalized.”
“Jewish people have been persecuted throughout all of human history, but I don't think that by marginalizing Palestinians, you create safety,” she said.
“I believe that injustice is a threat to the safety of all people, because once you have a group that is marginalized and marginalized and marginalized — once someone doesn't have access to clean water, they have no choice but to riot, right? And it doesn't have to be that way.”
The Democrat’s remarks come at a time she and her fellow progressive freshman colleagues are being accused of anti-Semitism for embracing the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.
Two other Democrats, Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, have recently compared boycotts of Nazi Germany to the boycott of Israel.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Ebro is an anti-Semitic asswipe of the worst kind, and by appearing on his show and agreeing with his vitriol, AOC is not far behind.
By Lukas Mikelionis
Fox News
July 31, 2019
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agreed that Israel is “criminal” in its treatment of Palestinians, whom she said have no other choice but to “riot” against the Jewish state.
The New York Democrat made her remarks during an appearance on the hip-hop program “Ebro in the Morning” with Ebro Darden, where they touched on a variety of issues concerning the freshman congresswoman.
The host asserted that “corrupt” governments in Israel, the United States, Russia and Saudi Arabia were “all working in concert.”
“How do you have white supremacist Jews?” Ebro asked. “How do you have people like Stephen Miller? How do you have these individuals who are legit aligning with racism and white supremacy, but they're Jewish? And it's something that most people can't wrap their brains around. But it's a real thing.”
He added: “And what's going on with Israel and Palestine, while it's very, very, deep, it is very, very, criminal, and it is very, very unjust.”
But rather than push back against the claims, Ocasio-Cortez agreed with them, saying “Absolutely” and adding that “I think, too, where we're at as a country when it comes to Israel-Palestine is very much a generational issue.”
She said the right-wing unfairly accuses her of anti-Semitism when she’s actually just being critical of the Israeli government.
“Criticizing the occupation doesn't make you anti-Israel, frankly. It doesn't mean that you are against the existence of a nation,” she said. “It means that you believe in human rights, and it's about making sure that Palestinian human rights are equal to Israeli human rights, and there are a lot of troubling things happening there.”
Ocasio-Cortez went on to say that Palestinians also have no other choice but to resort to violence as they are “marginalized.”
“Jewish people have been persecuted throughout all of human history, but I don't think that by marginalizing Palestinians, you create safety,” she said.
“I believe that injustice is a threat to the safety of all people, because once you have a group that is marginalized and marginalized and marginalized — once someone doesn't have access to clean water, they have no choice but to riot, right? And it doesn't have to be that way.”
The Democrat’s remarks come at a time she and her fellow progressive freshman colleagues are being accused of anti-Semitism for embracing the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.
Two other Democrats, Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, have recently compared boycotts of Nazi Germany to the boycott of Israel.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Ebro is an anti-Semitic asswipe of the worst kind, and by appearing on his show and agreeing with his vitriol, AOC is not far behind.
THE ANTI-BDS LAWS OF 27 STATES ARE THE ‘IRON DOME’ OF ISRAEL’S ECONOMY
Bottom-up foreign policy proves effective way to challenge BDS
by Eliana Rudee
Israel Hayom
July 31, 2019
In the past several years, 27 states have adopted laws designed to discourage boycotts of Israel, known as anti-BDS laws. These efforts gained more momentum when the US House of Representatives passed a bill against the Boycott, divestment and sanctions movement last Thursday in a show of overwhelming support, with 349 co-sponsors and 16 Democrats and one Republican opposing the measure.
The vote occurred amid a debate on the BDS movement in the United States, as earlier in the month, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) introduced a boycott resolution that would affirm the American “right to participate in boycotts in pursuit of civil and human rights at home and abroad, as protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution.”
In response to the anti-BDS bill’s passing, Omar tweeted “Our [First Amendment] right to free speech allows boycott of inhumane policies,” she tweeted. “This bill is unconstitutional.”
According to Joseph Sabag, CEO of the Israeli-American Coalition for Action, Omar’s rhetoric and pro-BDS bill “retort to dishonesty and misrepresentation, trying to deceive the public by misrepresenting the nature of laws and the status of judicial treatment of these laws.”
“In January, a federal judge ruled that anti-BDS laws are entirely constitutional,” he explained.
Pro-BDS bills “stand no chance of success,” Sabag told JNS.
“Israel is a large consumer of US goods, and jobs depending on exports are significant,” he continued. “If states were to pass BDS bills that limited [US -Israel cooperation in the] sciences, pharmaceuticals, water desalinization and avionics, removal of trade would have a devastating impact on the quality of life.”
South Carolina State Rep. Alan Clemmons, whose state was one of the first to pass anti-BDS legislation back in 2015, told JNS that the legislation for his state was “common sense.”
“BDS is fueled by anti-Semitism and seeks to harm South Carolina’s businesses for doing business with Israel,” he said. “It was the common sense thing to do, which is why the law was passed unanimously by the legislature.”
While the anti-BDS bill in the House and a previous one in the Senate last February has brought the legislation to the national debate, the passage of anti-BDS legislation has been a bottom-up effort on the state and local level that has been part of a strategy by the Israel-American Coalition for Action.
Sabag said that these anti-BDS bills have been effective on the state-level and have seen success.
Compared to Congress, he said “states themselves are much more clear-eyed about what their interests are and face far fewer inhibitions in identifying and pursuing an issue that speaks to a compelling state interest.”
“State capitals are a far more functional place right now than Washington, DC, and states have compelling economic interests to defend their own state economy,” he said.
Both Sabag and Clemmons noted that Omar’s resolution related directly to their pro-Israel policymaking approach to promoting anti-BDS resolutions through a bottom-up approach. Promoting resolutions from the state level, they say, is a novel inversion of the pro-Israel lobby and the most effective way to challenge the BDS movement.
Airbnb: The big first-test case
According to Sabag, the new policy approach started in 2007, when then-Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives Marco Rubio passed a bill requiring state retirement of funds to divest themselves of investments in companies doing business in Iran’s energy sector. The unintended dynamic that emerged, Sabag posed, was a change in the foreign-policy making model from a top-down approach to a bottom-up approach.
As the past executive director of the Israel Allies Foundation, he recalled that in 2014, he began to “hear concern about BDS from members of Congress who saw it as a mounting threat that had to be taken seriously.” Partnering with Clemmons and Professor Eugene Kontorovich, head of the international law department at the Kohelet Policy Forum, Sabag “recycled the Iranian divestment model.”
“Before, foreign-policy making started with the president, made its way to Congress, and only then would the states get their say. But beginning with Iranian divestment, states began to go ahead with some expression of policy, and by doing so consistently, it ripened an issue so that Congress has to follow the approach taken by their home states,” he explained.
From 2007-2010, noted Sabag, “you saw two-dozen states pass anti-BDS laws before Congress had to go ahead and respond with a federal pre-emption deal as to not look irresponsible. Now, this bottom-up policymaking has become the model by which most pro-Israel and Jewish community concerns are being addressed at this time.”
“Airbnb is a great example of why this is such an important development,” related Clemmons, referring to Florida and Texas directives for all state contractors to cease doing business with Airbnb in response to its November 2018 decision to delist properties in Judea and Samaria.
“Simply consider where we would be at this moment had 27 states not passed regulatory legislation, given that half the Congress can barely muster the resolve to pass a lukewarm resolution on the matter,” he said.
Sabag similarly noted that Airbnb “provided the big first test case of state-based anti-BDS laws, and the outcome was satisfying to the pro-Israel community.”
“The regulatory reach of these 27 statewide anti-BDS laws reaches into the trillions of dollars of the American economy,” said Sabag, calling the laws the ‘iron dome’ of Israel’s economy.
“It will be a long time before another publicly-traded company caves to pressure by BDS,” he said, which is “exactly what we set out to accomplish.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Columnist Jonathan S. Tobin has a warning:
“The support of Lewis and other members of the Congressional Black Caucus for Omar’s pro-BDS resolution remains a troubling indication of the cracks within the Democratic Party. The refusal of all of the Democratic senators running for president to join the bipartisan consensus against a tough anti-BDS bill is another indication that the anti-Israel left has more clout than the House vote indicated.”
It should come as no surprise that Black Caucus members supported Omar’s pro-BDS resolution because it is simply a reflection of black anti-Semitism in this country.
by Eliana Rudee
Israel Hayom
July 31, 2019
In the past several years, 27 states have adopted laws designed to discourage boycotts of Israel, known as anti-BDS laws. These efforts gained more momentum when the US House of Representatives passed a bill against the Boycott, divestment and sanctions movement last Thursday in a show of overwhelming support, with 349 co-sponsors and 16 Democrats and one Republican opposing the measure.
The vote occurred amid a debate on the BDS movement in the United States, as earlier in the month, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) introduced a boycott resolution that would affirm the American “right to participate in boycotts in pursuit of civil and human rights at home and abroad, as protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution.”
In response to the anti-BDS bill’s passing, Omar tweeted “Our [First Amendment] right to free speech allows boycott of inhumane policies,” she tweeted. “This bill is unconstitutional.”
According to Joseph Sabag, CEO of the Israeli-American Coalition for Action, Omar’s rhetoric and pro-BDS bill “retort to dishonesty and misrepresentation, trying to deceive the public by misrepresenting the nature of laws and the status of judicial treatment of these laws.”
“In January, a federal judge ruled that anti-BDS laws are entirely constitutional,” he explained.
Pro-BDS bills “stand no chance of success,” Sabag told JNS.
“Israel is a large consumer of US goods, and jobs depending on exports are significant,” he continued. “If states were to pass BDS bills that limited [US -Israel cooperation in the] sciences, pharmaceuticals, water desalinization and avionics, removal of trade would have a devastating impact on the quality of life.”
South Carolina State Rep. Alan Clemmons, whose state was one of the first to pass anti-BDS legislation back in 2015, told JNS that the legislation for his state was “common sense.”
“BDS is fueled by anti-Semitism and seeks to harm South Carolina’s businesses for doing business with Israel,” he said. “It was the common sense thing to do, which is why the law was passed unanimously by the legislature.”
While the anti-BDS bill in the House and a previous one in the Senate last February has brought the legislation to the national debate, the passage of anti-BDS legislation has been a bottom-up effort on the state and local level that has been part of a strategy by the Israel-American Coalition for Action.
Sabag said that these anti-BDS bills have been effective on the state-level and have seen success.
Compared to Congress, he said “states themselves are much more clear-eyed about what their interests are and face far fewer inhibitions in identifying and pursuing an issue that speaks to a compelling state interest.”
“State capitals are a far more functional place right now than Washington, DC, and states have compelling economic interests to defend their own state economy,” he said.
Both Sabag and Clemmons noted that Omar’s resolution related directly to their pro-Israel policymaking approach to promoting anti-BDS resolutions through a bottom-up approach. Promoting resolutions from the state level, they say, is a novel inversion of the pro-Israel lobby and the most effective way to challenge the BDS movement.
Airbnb: The big first-test case
According to Sabag, the new policy approach started in 2007, when then-Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives Marco Rubio passed a bill requiring state retirement of funds to divest themselves of investments in companies doing business in Iran’s energy sector. The unintended dynamic that emerged, Sabag posed, was a change in the foreign-policy making model from a top-down approach to a bottom-up approach.
As the past executive director of the Israel Allies Foundation, he recalled that in 2014, he began to “hear concern about BDS from members of Congress who saw it as a mounting threat that had to be taken seriously.” Partnering with Clemmons and Professor Eugene Kontorovich, head of the international law department at the Kohelet Policy Forum, Sabag “recycled the Iranian divestment model.”
“Before, foreign-policy making started with the president, made its way to Congress, and only then would the states get their say. But beginning with Iranian divestment, states began to go ahead with some expression of policy, and by doing so consistently, it ripened an issue so that Congress has to follow the approach taken by their home states,” he explained.
From 2007-2010, noted Sabag, “you saw two-dozen states pass anti-BDS laws before Congress had to go ahead and respond with a federal pre-emption deal as to not look irresponsible. Now, this bottom-up policymaking has become the model by which most pro-Israel and Jewish community concerns are being addressed at this time.”
“Airbnb is a great example of why this is such an important development,” related Clemmons, referring to Florida and Texas directives for all state contractors to cease doing business with Airbnb in response to its November 2018 decision to delist properties in Judea and Samaria.
“Simply consider where we would be at this moment had 27 states not passed regulatory legislation, given that half the Congress can barely muster the resolve to pass a lukewarm resolution on the matter,” he said.
Sabag similarly noted that Airbnb “provided the big first test case of state-based anti-BDS laws, and the outcome was satisfying to the pro-Israel community.”
“The regulatory reach of these 27 statewide anti-BDS laws reaches into the trillions of dollars of the American economy,” said Sabag, calling the laws the ‘iron dome’ of Israel’s economy.
“It will be a long time before another publicly-traded company caves to pressure by BDS,” he said, which is “exactly what we set out to accomplish.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Columnist Jonathan S. Tobin has a warning:
“The support of Lewis and other members of the Congressional Black Caucus for Omar’s pro-BDS resolution remains a troubling indication of the cracks within the Democratic Party. The refusal of all of the Democratic senators running for president to join the bipartisan consensus against a tough anti-BDS bill is another indication that the anti-Israel left has more clout than the House vote indicated.”
It should come as no surprise that Black Caucus members supported Omar’s pro-BDS resolution because it is simply a reflection of black anti-Semitism in this country.
YOUNG BLACK MEN COMMIT HOMICIDES AT NEARLY 10 TIMES THE RATE OF WHITE AND HISPANIC YOUNG MEN COMBINED
A Reality Check on ‘Racism’ and Urban Decay
By Jason L. Riley
The Wall Street Journal
July 30, 2019
The news media has spent the past week trying to rehabilitate the reputations of Baltimore and Al Sharpton, which is more evidence that they’ll try just about anything to advance the Democratic Party’s Trump-is-a-racist storyline.
Alas, we could be having a much more productive debate about why black-run cities like Baltimore haven’t produced more black economic advancement. Or why black politicians like Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, who was re-elected to a 13th term with more than 76% of the vote in 2018, so routinely skirt responsibility for the living conditions in their districts. Or whether there is any significant connection between black political power and black prosperity.
Mr. Trump’s Twitter spasms may eventually turn off enough white suburban moms to cost him re-election, but caution isn’t part of his repertoire. And when dealing with political opponents who are obsessed with racism, real or imagined, indifference to whether you are labeled a racist might even be an asset. The reality is that much of the racism that the left complains about these days has proved under scrutiny to be imaginary, which is good news for the country but bad news for politicians and activists who thrive on racial division.
The last time most of us thought about Baltimore was probably 2015, when residents rioted after a black suspect died in police custody. A year earlier, riots had erupted in Ferguson, Mo., after another black suspect was shot dead while assaulting a police officer. Much was made of the fact that Ferguson’s city leaders and police department were mostly white. A U.S. Justice Department review of the incident said that it was “critically important for law enforcement agencies, and the Ferguson Police Department in particular, to strive for broad diversity among officers and civilian staff.”
But if racial and ethnic diversity were so essential to preventing police shootings and subsequent race riots, what explained the unrest the following year in Baltimore, which had a black mayor, a black City Council majority, a black police chief and a majority-minority police force? Is it possible that biased law enforcement isn’t the problem?
In 2016 Harvard economist Roland Fryer published an empirical studythat examined more than 1,000 police shootings in 10 major departments nationwide. He concluded that there was no evidence of racial bias in police shootings and that blacks are about 24% less likely “to be shot at by police relative to whites.” So far, such research has failed to persuade Colin Kaepernick, Black Lives Matter activists and Democratic presidential candidates. And the political press prioritizes anecdotal evidence and viral videos on social media, not hard data. Still, it’s worth noting that a new academic study published last week is broader in scope than Mr. Fryer’s and backs his findings.
Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from the University of Maryland and Michigan State University concluded that racial disparities in police shootings stem from racial disparities in criminal behavior and not from police bias. “We did not find evidence for anti-Black or anti-Hispanic disparity in the police use of force across all shootings, and, if anything, found anti-White disparities when controlling for race-specific crime.”
Many on the political left and in the media are loath to discuss how large black-white differences in violent crime rates result in racially disparate encounters with police. But why should anyone be surprised that young black men are far more likely than their white peers to be shot by police when young black men commit homicides at nearly 10 times the rate of white and Hispanic young men combined? “One of our clearest results is that violent crime rates strongly predict the race of the person fatally shot,” write the authors. Moreover, “reducing race-specific violent crime should be an effective way to reduce fatal shootings of Black and Hispanic adults.” More minority cops might help law enforcement build trust in certain communities, but the “data suggest that increasing racial diversity would not meaningfully reduce racial disparity in fatal shootings.” Minority officers are no less likely to draw their weapons on minority suspects.
When liberals decide to grapple with these realities, we’ll know they are serious about addressing racial disparities, never mind fixing the nation’s Baltimores. But don’t hold your breath. Mr. Sharpton was a frequent visitor to the Obama White House , and given the way the people on stage Tuesday and Wednesday night have lined up to kiss his ring, chances are that the reverend will be monetizing racial strife for years to come. We may be in a racial holding pattern until the 2020 election. Mr. Trump won’t back down, and his opponents, if they’re being honest with themselves, don’t really want him to.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Mr. Trump’s Twitter spasms may eventually turn off enough white suburban moms to cost him re-election.
By Jason L. Riley
The Wall Street Journal
July 30, 2019
The news media has spent the past week trying to rehabilitate the reputations of Baltimore and Al Sharpton, which is more evidence that they’ll try just about anything to advance the Democratic Party’s Trump-is-a-racist storyline.
Alas, we could be having a much more productive debate about why black-run cities like Baltimore haven’t produced more black economic advancement. Or why black politicians like Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, who was re-elected to a 13th term with more than 76% of the vote in 2018, so routinely skirt responsibility for the living conditions in their districts. Or whether there is any significant connection between black political power and black prosperity.
Mr. Trump’s Twitter spasms may eventually turn off enough white suburban moms to cost him re-election, but caution isn’t part of his repertoire. And when dealing with political opponents who are obsessed with racism, real or imagined, indifference to whether you are labeled a racist might even be an asset. The reality is that much of the racism that the left complains about these days has proved under scrutiny to be imaginary, which is good news for the country but bad news for politicians and activists who thrive on racial division.
The last time most of us thought about Baltimore was probably 2015, when residents rioted after a black suspect died in police custody. A year earlier, riots had erupted in Ferguson, Mo., after another black suspect was shot dead while assaulting a police officer. Much was made of the fact that Ferguson’s city leaders and police department were mostly white. A U.S. Justice Department review of the incident said that it was “critically important for law enforcement agencies, and the Ferguson Police Department in particular, to strive for broad diversity among officers and civilian staff.”
But if racial and ethnic diversity were so essential to preventing police shootings and subsequent race riots, what explained the unrest the following year in Baltimore, which had a black mayor, a black City Council majority, a black police chief and a majority-minority police force? Is it possible that biased law enforcement isn’t the problem?
In 2016 Harvard economist Roland Fryer published an empirical studythat examined more than 1,000 police shootings in 10 major departments nationwide. He concluded that there was no evidence of racial bias in police shootings and that blacks are about 24% less likely “to be shot at by police relative to whites.” So far, such research has failed to persuade Colin Kaepernick, Black Lives Matter activists and Democratic presidential candidates. And the political press prioritizes anecdotal evidence and viral videos on social media, not hard data. Still, it’s worth noting that a new academic study published last week is broader in scope than Mr. Fryer’s and backs his findings.
Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from the University of Maryland and Michigan State University concluded that racial disparities in police shootings stem from racial disparities in criminal behavior and not from police bias. “We did not find evidence for anti-Black or anti-Hispanic disparity in the police use of force across all shootings, and, if anything, found anti-White disparities when controlling for race-specific crime.”
Many on the political left and in the media are loath to discuss how large black-white differences in violent crime rates result in racially disparate encounters with police. But why should anyone be surprised that young black men are far more likely than their white peers to be shot by police when young black men commit homicides at nearly 10 times the rate of white and Hispanic young men combined? “One of our clearest results is that violent crime rates strongly predict the race of the person fatally shot,” write the authors. Moreover, “reducing race-specific violent crime should be an effective way to reduce fatal shootings of Black and Hispanic adults.” More minority cops might help law enforcement build trust in certain communities, but the “data suggest that increasing racial diversity would not meaningfully reduce racial disparity in fatal shootings.” Minority officers are no less likely to draw their weapons on minority suspects.
When liberals decide to grapple with these realities, we’ll know they are serious about addressing racial disparities, never mind fixing the nation’s Baltimores. But don’t hold your breath. Mr. Sharpton was a frequent visitor to the Obama White House , and given the way the people on stage Tuesday and Wednesday night have lined up to kiss his ring, chances are that the reverend will be monetizing racial strife for years to come. We may be in a racial holding pattern until the 2020 election. Mr. Trump won’t back down, and his opponents, if they’re being honest with themselves, don’t really want him to.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Mr. Trump’s Twitter spasms may eventually turn off enough white suburban moms to cost him re-election.
TEXAS SCHOOL BOARD CONDEMNED FOR TRYING TO KEEP KIDS FROM USING DRUGS
Want To Play In Band Or Park On Campus? If You’re A Bushland ISD Student, Prepare For A Drug Test
By Kristen Cabrera
Texas Standard
July 30, 2019
Bushland ISD in the Texas Panhandle has initiated a policy of testing students in middle and high school for drugs like marijuana, cocaine and alcohol. The ACLU and other civil liberties organizations worry about students’ privacy, and the punishments under the new policy.
Drug testing in the district had previously been limited to athletes, but the new policy includes any student who wants to participate in extracurricular activities, or who wants a parking pass. Failing a test would result in removal from any extracurricular activities and loss of parking privileges. Administrators say the district does not have a drug problem yet, but that the tests are a preventative measure.
District officials say they want to prevent drug problems before they start. Critics say the policy could backfire, causing students to become more isolated and fearful of trusting adults.
Andrew Hairston is an attorney with Texas Appleseed, which describes itself as a nonprofit social justice organization. He is also the director of the organization’s school-to-prison pipeline project. He says Bushland ISD’s new drug testing policy is a violation of students’ privacy and is too invasive for what the district is trying to accomplish.
“[The tests] seem very invasive, could be up to 10 times a year, could take saliva samples from these young people,” Hairston says. “Just you know way too superfluous for the issue that the school district is trying to address.”
Hairston says that instead of stopping drug use, this new policy might push students into isolation and bad habits, if they do not have access to extracurricular activities or parking passes. He also says that the policy will push more students into the school-to-prison pipeline, because it criminalizes and punishes young people.
“The idea that substance abuse would be criminalized at all, or that it would be so heavily regulated and made into a punitive measure by the school district is concerning,” Hairston says.
Hairston says that the district needs to put more trust in students to come to adults and trained mental health professionals to talk about the problems they face outside of school. But a policy that punishes students instead of promoting an open conversational and safe culture means they won’t do it, and will push their efforts backward.
“Counselors, school psychologists and social workers can pay tremendous dividends for a culture of openness and communication between young people and the adults who are charged with their care,” Hairston says. “Then ultimately that will address some of these fundamental issues that are brought up this policy and others like it.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Bushland ISD deserves to be commended rather than condemned for its effort in fighting drug abuse.
On the other hand, Andre Hairston and his ilk are worsening the drug abuse problem, not diminishing it..
By Kristen Cabrera
Texas Standard
July 30, 2019
Bushland ISD in the Texas Panhandle has initiated a policy of testing students in middle and high school for drugs like marijuana, cocaine and alcohol. The ACLU and other civil liberties organizations worry about students’ privacy, and the punishments under the new policy.
Drug testing in the district had previously been limited to athletes, but the new policy includes any student who wants to participate in extracurricular activities, or who wants a parking pass. Failing a test would result in removal from any extracurricular activities and loss of parking privileges. Administrators say the district does not have a drug problem yet, but that the tests are a preventative measure.
District officials say they want to prevent drug problems before they start. Critics say the policy could backfire, causing students to become more isolated and fearful of trusting adults.
Andrew Hairston is an attorney with Texas Appleseed, which describes itself as a nonprofit social justice organization. He is also the director of the organization’s school-to-prison pipeline project. He says Bushland ISD’s new drug testing policy is a violation of students’ privacy and is too invasive for what the district is trying to accomplish.
“[The tests] seem very invasive, could be up to 10 times a year, could take saliva samples from these young people,” Hairston says. “Just you know way too superfluous for the issue that the school district is trying to address.”
Hairston says that instead of stopping drug use, this new policy might push students into isolation and bad habits, if they do not have access to extracurricular activities or parking passes. He also says that the policy will push more students into the school-to-prison pipeline, because it criminalizes and punishes young people.
“The idea that substance abuse would be criminalized at all, or that it would be so heavily regulated and made into a punitive measure by the school district is concerning,” Hairston says.
Hairston says that the district needs to put more trust in students to come to adults and trained mental health professionals to talk about the problems they face outside of school. But a policy that punishes students instead of promoting an open conversational and safe culture means they won’t do it, and will push their efforts backward.
“Counselors, school psychologists and social workers can pay tremendous dividends for a culture of openness and communication between young people and the adults who are charged with their care,” Hairston says. “Then ultimately that will address some of these fundamental issues that are brought up this policy and others like it.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Bushland ISD deserves to be commended rather than condemned for its effort in fighting drug abuse.
On the other hand, Andre Hairston and his ilk are worsening the drug abuse problem, not diminishing it..
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