… or stream of consciousness narrative in lieu of lists of links The browsers are crowded. Thick with links. Bursting with information. But what to do with it all, dear readers? What to do? When the Internet tells one that Hua Hin, Thailand is an ideal ex-pat haven, but Honduras aims to lure us with private cities, where does one turn? We are wanted everywhere at the same time we are welcome nowhere. And I don’t mean merely where does one take one’s weary body when geography beckons. I mean, what does one do when swept away on the bit,…
Category: Official thuggery, bad prosecutions, and bad law
Man steals rare antique gun. He’s so proud he goes on TV with it Speaking of guns, here’s more on 3-D printables. This is gonna change the world. A little drug-war surprise from Paul Ryan. Some dogs are better than their people (sad story). Cage ’em without charges until they die. It’s the new American Way. When he tweeted about the new Congressional Research Service report on the Posse Comitatus Act, Radley Balko noted that these reports are done only at the request of congressthings. So who suddenly needs an update on Posse Comitatus — and why? Ya gotta wonder.…
Finally got through my latest round of deadlines and returned to the snitch book this weekend. The first-round reality-checkers (lawyers, security people, ex-cops, people who’ve been hurt by snitches) gave valuable input. The second draft took less time than I thought once I got to it. So … you guys who volunteered to be second-round reality-checkers, get ready. I’m awaiting an answer on one biggish question. Then I’ll do one more quick run-through and the re-draft will be on its way to you. Around the end of this month or early October it’ll be time for the eagle-eyed proofreaders (of…
The New Yorker excoriates cops in a long (must read) article about how they treat their snitches. The title says it all: “The Throwaways.” Informants are the foot soldiers in the government’s war on drugs. By some estimates, up to eighty per cent of all drug cases in America involve them, often in active roles like [dead young snitch, Rachel] Hoffman’s. For police departments facing budget woes, untrained C.I.s provide an inexpensive way to outsource the work of undercover officers. “The system makes it cheap and easy to use informants, as opposed to other, less risky but more cumbersome approaches,”…
There are so many dogs being shot by cops that they now have a Facebook page. (H/T MLS) But this about takes the cake for puppycides. Gun-rights advocates outbid cops in a gun buyback. Joel already covered this better than I, but you’ll be glad shocked furious to know the ATF has been granted one more power to abuse. They can now steal your stuff in drug crimes. The ATF? Drug crimes? But you see, it’s okay, because as usual in these cases, there don’t actually have to be any drugs or any crimes. So it’s not like they’re exceeding…
Fedgov issues “healthy meal standards” for schools that are so bureaucratic they threaten an actual healthy meal program (that even teaches kids about growing their own food). Don’t think I’ve ever seen anything that shows so profoundly how tangled and deep the relationships of snitches can be with both handlers and targets. Wish Mr. Aoki had agreed to talk more before he died. Not that anything he said would have been believable. The Tesla Museum: closer to becoming a reality thanks to a cartoonist’s crowdsourcery. Two cases in which dogs died in hot cars, apparently because air conditioning systems failed…
Pregnant woman is glad to learn her rape was illegitimate. (Via The Onion, of course.) Bait and switch. And here I thought cats were sneaky! I still think those feddies are up to no good no matter how they dodge the issue. Obviously, I’m not the only one. Oliver Stone. Yay. Michael Moore. Boo. But together they make an excellent case for Julian Assange and free speech. Whatever Assange did or didn’t do in Sweden (and the whole case seems to be a preposterous he said/she said over actions that wouldn’t be considered a crime anywhere outside of Sweden), the…
The topic of recording police and other members of the Authoritah class has arisen hereabouts. Specifically the legality (or otherwise) of recording them. Sad fact is that, although it’s clear as shiny Windexed glass that any citizen ought to be able to record any activity performed in public by “their” government, state laws are often ambiguous at best, lunatic at worst. Most laws about recording were written before half the planet carried video equipment in its pockets and were written in a panic over the horrors of “illegal wiretapping,” to boot. Perfectly innocent people have been threatened with serious prison…
Didn’t watch the Olympics? Darned good thing! Satan might have taken over your brain. Hm. Maybe that explains the guy in that picture. Naw. His brain (sic) just got taken over by stupid. Oh brother, they’re at it again. Guns as a disease. And this is more pseudo-sophisticated than the last attempt. (H/T PT) Is this a new low? Wrong-house raid with puppycide and handcuffed children. Just for starters. Clearly St. Paul cops were going for a world record in cruel and unconstitutional. Pretty amazing. Does it always seem worse when whistleblowers uncover secret spy systems that are not only…
Oh yeah. I’m sure we’d all appreciate advice from this guy. Actual peasants. With actual (well, maybe wooden) pitchforks. protest government overreach into their farms. Another one to share with your friends who are just wondering how to begin preparing. And for those of you who thought seeing the face of Jesus on a piece of burnt toast was as silly as it gets: evidence to the contrary. So wait. Why are they arresting this guy? Hasn’t the gummint been telling us for years that waterboarding is a good thing? Gray State. Not sure just what a “conceptual trailer” might…