Federal laws hold that soldiers who fought for the Confederate States of America during the Civil War are American heroes
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Politics
May 31, 2017
During this Memorial Day period I thought it would be appropriate to mention a couple of laws that have been enacted by Congress.
Public Law 85-425 was enacted May 23, 1958. This law recognizes all members of the armed forces of the Confederate States of America the same as veterans of the Union during the Civil War. The act also provided pensions to the widows of veterans who served in the army and navy of the Confederacy.
Public Law 85-811 was enacted August 28, 1958. This law directed the Secretary of the Army to furnish Government headstones or markers at the expense of the U.S. for the unmarked graves of “soldiers of the Union and Confederate Armies of the Civil War.”
These two laws hold that soldiers who fought for the Confederate States of America during the Civil War are American heroes, the same as those who fought for the Union.
Accordingly, shame, shame on those who are removing the statues of Confederate war heroes or renaming schools and parks bearing their names just because those heroes might offend a few African Americans.
And to think that the Houston school board is spending 1.2 million taxpayer dollars to change the names of seven schools bearing the names of Confederate heroes who, with the possible exception of Robert E. Lee and “Stonewall” Jackson, 99 percent of blacks never heard of.
The law recognizes Confederate soldiers as American heroes and they deserve to be treated as such!
Wednesday, May 31, 2017
CHICAGO POLICE SUPERINTENDENT SAYS MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND SHOOTINGS GOOD NEWS
52 shot in Chicago over Memorial Day weekend, nearly half on final day, but total is less than last year
By Peter Nickeas and Elvia Malagon
Chicago Tribune
May 30, 2017
Shootings over the Memorial Day weekend left seven people dead and another 45 wounded in Chicago, a drop from last year, though almost half of this year's victims were shot the last night of the weekend.
The violence this weekend was similar to three of the last five Memorial Day weekends: 53 gunshot victims in 2012, and 58 in 2015. A total of 34 people were shot in 2014, and 21 were shot in 2013.
Last year's total was 71 and was the worst since at least 2012. It came during a year that saw almost 800 homicides and more than 4,000 people shot.
A police district that bore the brunt of the violence last year, Harrison on the West Side, reported no one shot this year.
The most violent day of the weekend this year was Memorial Day, with 24 people shot, five of them fatally, including a 20-year-old disabled man at a park he visited every day.
Before Monday, only 28 people had been shot over the previous three nights, a low total for any weekend in Chicago.
This year, 1,300 extra officers were deployed during the weekend on top of normal staffing levels, according to police Superintendent Eddie Johnson. Last year, there were about 880 extra officers working, he said.
The officers worked in areas where much of the city violence occurs. The Chicago Police Department parked a mobile command center on one of the city's most widely known open-air heroin markets, at Roosevelt Road and Independence Boulevard, for the first two nights of the weekend.
The RV-size command van moved to an area near 63rd Street and King Drive after the second night. Nineteen of the 28 people shot the first three nights were wounded on the South Side, while the West Side saw just five shootings with a total of eight victims the first three nights.
One person over that period was wounded in a Northwest Side shooting, at Addison Street and Keeler Avenue.
The Cook County sheriff's office parked its mobile command center on a block widely known as one of the city's busiest marijuana spots -- Madison Street and Leamington Avenue -- where there have been close to a dozen shootings over the last 18 months.
It was common to see officers three or four to a car, or officers riding around in rented vans. Evidence techs also were moved into rental cars before the weekend. Many officers' days off were canceled and hours extended.
As the weekend drew to a close Tuesday morning, someone in a passing car fired toward a group standing outside Mount Sinai Hospital, police said.
An evidence tech at the hospital alerted his dispatcher that a car was shooting as nearby officers called out the sound of gunfire near the hospital.
Police at the scene said no one was hit by the gunfire.
Six of the 24 people shot between Monday and Tuesday mornings had been taken to the West Side trauma center for treatment. No one had been taken into custody for those shootings.
By Peter Nickeas and Elvia Malagon
Chicago Tribune
May 30, 2017
Shootings over the Memorial Day weekend left seven people dead and another 45 wounded in Chicago, a drop from last year, though almost half of this year's victims were shot the last night of the weekend.
The violence this weekend was similar to three of the last five Memorial Day weekends: 53 gunshot victims in 2012, and 58 in 2015. A total of 34 people were shot in 2014, and 21 were shot in 2013.
Last year's total was 71 and was the worst since at least 2012. It came during a year that saw almost 800 homicides and more than 4,000 people shot.
A police district that bore the brunt of the violence last year, Harrison on the West Side, reported no one shot this year.
The most violent day of the weekend this year was Memorial Day, with 24 people shot, five of them fatally, including a 20-year-old disabled man at a park he visited every day.
Before Monday, only 28 people had been shot over the previous three nights, a low total for any weekend in Chicago.
This year, 1,300 extra officers were deployed during the weekend on top of normal staffing levels, according to police Superintendent Eddie Johnson. Last year, there were about 880 extra officers working, he said.
The officers worked in areas where much of the city violence occurs. The Chicago Police Department parked a mobile command center on one of the city's most widely known open-air heroin markets, at Roosevelt Road and Independence Boulevard, for the first two nights of the weekend.
The RV-size command van moved to an area near 63rd Street and King Drive after the second night. Nineteen of the 28 people shot the first three nights were wounded on the South Side, while the West Side saw just five shootings with a total of eight victims the first three nights.
One person over that period was wounded in a Northwest Side shooting, at Addison Street and Keeler Avenue.
The Cook County sheriff's office parked its mobile command center on a block widely known as one of the city's busiest marijuana spots -- Madison Street and Leamington Avenue -- where there have been close to a dozen shootings over the last 18 months.
It was common to see officers three or four to a car, or officers riding around in rented vans. Evidence techs also were moved into rental cars before the weekend. Many officers' days off were canceled and hours extended.
As the weekend drew to a close Tuesday morning, someone in a passing car fired toward a group standing outside Mount Sinai Hospital, police said.
An evidence tech at the hospital alerted his dispatcher that a car was shooting as nearby officers called out the sound of gunfire near the hospital.
Police at the scene said no one was hit by the gunfire.
Six of the 24 people shot between Monday and Tuesday mornings had been taken to the West Side trauma center for treatment. No one had been taken into custody for those shootings.
AT LEAST THEY WEREN'T TRIVIAL HOMICIDES
by Bob Walsh
An argument of a freaking parking spot led to two separate shooting events in Miami Beach over the weekend resulting in two dead people.
The first exercise in conspicuous stupidity started late in the evening on Sunday when an asshole in a white BMW tried to squeeze into a parking spot that was too small along Ocean Drive in South Beach. The driver hit a parked Buick, several times, while attempting to park. At that time the Buick owner came over and asked the driver how many more times he intended to smash into his car.
At that time the BMW driver handed a gun to a 19-year old passenger, who opened fire as the BMW pulled away. The Buick owner took a leg shot. other man was hit in the head and killed.
The BMW kept going even after hitting two police cars. That aggravated the local constabulary who shot the dogshit out of the BMW. One suspect in the car died at the scene. A second fled and provided a snack for a K-9 officer. The other two, including the shooter, Jeffery Alexander, 19, of New York, were taken into custody. The wounded Buick owner identified Alexander as the shooter.
An argument of a freaking parking spot led to two separate shooting events in Miami Beach over the weekend resulting in two dead people.
The first exercise in conspicuous stupidity started late in the evening on Sunday when an asshole in a white BMW tried to squeeze into a parking spot that was too small along Ocean Drive in South Beach. The driver hit a parked Buick, several times, while attempting to park. At that time the Buick owner came over and asked the driver how many more times he intended to smash into his car.
At that time the BMW driver handed a gun to a 19-year old passenger, who opened fire as the BMW pulled away. The Buick owner took a leg shot. other man was hit in the head and killed.
The BMW kept going even after hitting two police cars. That aggravated the local constabulary who shot the dogshit out of the BMW. One suspect in the car died at the scene. A second fled and provided a snack for a K-9 officer. The other two, including the shooter, Jeffery Alexander, 19, of New York, were taken into custody. The wounded Buick owner identified Alexander as the shooter.
DRUGGED DRIVING, NOT DRUNK DRIVING BY THE TIGER
Tiger Woods busted for DUI early Monday near his Florida home
BarkGrowlBite
May 31, 2017
The cops in Jupiter, Florida came across a 2015 Mercedes stopped on the side of the road early Monday with its motor running, its brake lights illuminated, its right turn signal flashing, both tire rims on the driver's side showing minor damage and the front and rear tires on that side of the car flat. The driver was crapped out behind the wheel. The cops awakened him and gave him a field sobriety test which he flunked badly. However, blood-alcohol tests proved to be 0.00.
The driver was golfer Tiger Woods. He had crapped out not far from his home.
The Tiger later explained he had suffered a reaction to prescribed medicine and was not driving drunk. Un fortunately for him, what people will remember is his mug shot which showed the Tiger looking at the camera like a deer looking at the headlights of an approaching car, except the deer looks prettier.
And while the Tiger was not drunk, he was still DUI for drugged driving. Grrrr!
BarkGrowlBite
May 31, 2017
The cops in Jupiter, Florida came across a 2015 Mercedes stopped on the side of the road early Monday with its motor running, its brake lights illuminated, its right turn signal flashing, both tire rims on the driver's side showing minor damage and the front and rear tires on that side of the car flat. The driver was crapped out behind the wheel. The cops awakened him and gave him a field sobriety test which he flunked badly. However, blood-alcohol tests proved to be 0.00.
The driver was golfer Tiger Woods. He had crapped out not far from his home.
The Tiger later explained he had suffered a reaction to prescribed medicine and was not driving drunk. Un fortunately for him, what people will remember is his mug shot which showed the Tiger looking at the camera like a deer looking at the headlights of an approaching car, except the deer looks prettier.
And while the Tiger was not drunk, he was still DUI for drugged driving. Grrrr!
Tuesday, May 30, 2017
A HONDA CURSE
Race car driver Fernando Alonzo has a Honda curse hanging over his head
BarkGrowlBite
May 30, 2017
Spanish race car driver Fernando Alonzo is a two-time Formula 1 World Champion.
For the 2010 season, Alonzo joined the famous Scuderia Ferrari team. When the McLaren team switched to Honda power units in 2015, Alonzo left Ferrari to join McLaren. I am sure Fernando now regrets making that move. The McLaren-Honda cars have been an utter failure, usually failing to qualify among the top 10 and often having the engines break down during the races.
Fernando received special permission from McLaren to participate in Sunday’s Indy 500. Fernando acquitted himself well, leading the race for 27 laps. He was running seventh with 21 laps to go when his Andretti Autosport Honda-powered car came to a screeching halt with an engine failure.
Poor old Fernando, he has a Honda curse hanging over his head.
BarkGrowlBite
May 30, 2017
Spanish race car driver Fernando Alonzo is a two-time Formula 1 World Champion.
For the 2010 season, Alonzo joined the famous Scuderia Ferrari team. When the McLaren team switched to Honda power units in 2015, Alonzo left Ferrari to join McLaren. I am sure Fernando now regrets making that move. The McLaren-Honda cars have been an utter failure, usually failing to qualify among the top 10 and often having the engines break down during the races.
Fernando received special permission from McLaren to participate in Sunday’s Indy 500. Fernando acquitted himself well, leading the race for 27 laps. He was running seventh with 21 laps to go when his Andretti Autosport Honda-powered car came to a screeching halt with an engine failure.
Poor old Fernando, he has a Honda curse hanging over his head.
AUSTRALIAN SENATOR: TRUMP ‘IS A LUNATIC, AN A-GRADE LUNATIC’
By Dorina Lisson
The Australian Greens is a minority political party run by fools, literally.
As a Sicilian born Australian, I am ashamed of the offensive insulting comments made by Australian Greens leader Richard Di Natale (a Sicilian/Australian), concerning President Donald Trump and Senator Di Natale's persistent public comments of his dislike/disapproval concerning Australia's close ties with the USA.
I wonder if Di Natale would have the audacity/guts to label a black Muslim American politician an 'A Grade Lunatic' ??? or does he believe it is socially acceptable because President Donald Trump happens to be a white, Christian, heterosexual man ???
Senator Richard Di Natale ... you are a bloody fool !!!
http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/international/2017/02/17/payne-holds-talks-with-us-counterpart-mattis.html
The Australian Greens is a minority political party run by fools, literally.
As a Sicilian born Australian, I am ashamed of the offensive insulting comments made by Australian Greens leader Richard Di Natale (a Sicilian/Australian), concerning President Donald Trump and Senator Di Natale's persistent public comments of his dislike/disapproval concerning Australia's close ties with the USA.
I wonder if Di Natale would have the audacity/guts to label a black Muslim American politician an 'A Grade Lunatic' ??? or does he believe it is socially acceptable because President Donald Trump happens to be a white, Christian, heterosexual man ???
Senator Richard Di Natale ... you are a bloody fool !!!
http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/international/2017/02/17/payne-holds-talks-with-us-counterpart-mattis.html
"I AIN'T FIT TO LIVE, NOT AFTER WHAT I DONE" ..... COP KILLER GOT THAT RIGHT
by Bob Walsh
Willie Corey Godbolt, 35, is a guest of the people in Brookhaven, Mississippi today after murdering eight people including a sheriff's deputy. He got into a beef with his family, including his estranged wife, over their rugrats, on this past Saturday night. Somebody (not a principle in the mess) called the cops and a deputy responded. Something went sideways and when it was over Godbolt was in custody and two juvenile males, Godbolt's mother-in-law, and five other people were dead at a total of three physical locations. A total of seven hours went by between the shooting at the first residence and Godbolt being taken into custody. During that time he went to two other residences and killed four more people.
When Godbolt was arrested he had been wounded, though it wasn't real obvious how he received the wound.
Personally I am kind of surprised that he survived being arrested.
A reporter walked up to the police car Godbolt was in after he was arrested and obtained the quote in the headline of this post. Personally I think they should throw his ass into a chipper-shredder and be done with him, but that's just me. They probably don't do that any more.
Willie Corey Godbolt, 35, is a guest of the people in Brookhaven, Mississippi today after murdering eight people including a sheriff's deputy. He got into a beef with his family, including his estranged wife, over their rugrats, on this past Saturday night. Somebody (not a principle in the mess) called the cops and a deputy responded. Something went sideways and when it was over Godbolt was in custody and two juvenile males, Godbolt's mother-in-law, and five other people were dead at a total of three physical locations. A total of seven hours went by between the shooting at the first residence and Godbolt being taken into custody. During that time he went to two other residences and killed four more people.
When Godbolt was arrested he had been wounded, though it wasn't real obvious how he received the wound.
Personally I am kind of surprised that he survived being arrested.
A reporter walked up to the police car Godbolt was in after he was arrested and obtained the quote in the headline of this post. Personally I think they should throw his ass into a chipper-shredder and be done with him, but that's just me. They probably don't do that any more.
Friday, May 26, 2017
MEDICAL NON-PSYCHOACTIVE CANNABIDIOL (CBD) – YES. SMOKED AND EDIBLE MARIJUANA - NO, NO, NO!
A study of 120 Dravet syndrome patients across the country has shown that cannabidiol (CBD), an extract of cannabis, can reduce the seizures of children suffering from this most serious form of epilepsy
BarkGrowlBite
May 26, 2017
It’s all over the news. “Marijuana Stops Epileptic Seizures.” That’s misleading, possibly on purpose. It’s not marijuana. It’s an extract of cannabis. And it’s not what the stoners want.
Dravet syndrome is the most serious form of epilepsy. Those that suffer from this form of epilepsy experience life-threatening seizures.
Cannabidiol, or CBD, is an extract from marijuana. CBD does not cause the psychoactive effects sought by people who smoke pot or consume edible marijuana.
A recent study by Dr. Orrin Devinsky, director of the New York University Comprehensive Epilepsy Center, and colleagues around the country found that CBD reduced the number and severity of seizures in children suffering from Dravet syndrome. Of the 120 children studied for 14 weeks, half were treated with CBD and the other half received a placebo.
This type of treatment is a far cry from the ‘medical marijuana’ as practiced in California and other states that have legalized the smoking of pot for medical purposes.
Prior to Dr. Devinsky’s study, The American Epilepsy Society said: "Marijuana itself has major shortcomings as an epilepsy treatment ... evidence for efficacy in treating seizures does not meet the necessary standard to recommend it to patients." Worse, researchers state that "marijuana use or withdrawal could potentially trigger seizures in susceptible [epilepsy] patients."
The pot proponents keep trumpeting phony claims that marijuana provides relief to glaucoma patients, eases pain, nausea and vomiting in in chemotherapy patients, and eases multiple sclerosis (MS) muscle contractions, sleep disorders and Tourette’s symptoms.
The American Glaucoma Society has written: "There is no scientific basis for marijuana's use in treatment," and there is evidence that it could actually do damage.
And a study conducted with 6,500 volunteers by England’s prestigious Bristol University showed that cannabis does not ease pain, nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy patients, nor does it ease MS muscle contractions, sleep disorders and Tourette’s symptoms.
Furthermore, two DEA chiefs have debunked medical marijuana as a hoax.
In a 2011 letter to organizations petitioning for a reclassification of marijuana, then DEA Director Michele Leonhart declared that marijuana "has a high potential for abuse," "has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States" and "lacks accepted safety for use under medical supervision." The letter and 37 pages of supporting documents were published in the Federal Register.
And in 2015, DEA chief Chuck Rosenberg rejected the notion that smoking marijuana is "medicine," calling the premise a "joke." In a briefing to reporters, Rosenberg said:
"What really bothers me is the notion that marijuana is also medicinal -- because it's not. " We can have an intellectually honest debate about whether we should legalize something that is bad and dangerous, but don't call it medicine -- that is a joke. There are pieces of marijuana -- extracts or constituents or component parts -- that have great promise medicinally. But if you talk about smoking the leaf of marijuana -- which is what people are talking about when they talk about medicinal marijuana -- it has never been shown to be safe or effective as a medicine."
California’s medical marijuana law is a farce. Pot heads can go to almost any doctor licensed to dispense marijuana and obtain a pot prescription for claimed symptoms such as headaches, backaches, hair loss, erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, depression, ingrown toenails, constipation, diarrhea, irritable bowel, hemorrhoids and, of course, anxiety caused when their dealer has been busted by the cops. At the end of the day, this hoax leaves the pot-prescribing doctors laughing all the way to the bank.
I am vehemently opposed to the legalization of smoked or edible marijuana, whether for medical or recreational purposes. I may be tilting at windmills because it looks like the whole nation is headed to legalized pot. Because I am convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt that marijuana is a very dangerous drug and not the innocuous substance its advocates claim, I will continue to express my opposition during the short time I have left on this earth. I am sure that after I’ve croaked, those Americans who are not stoners will come to regret the legalization of marijuana.
However, I am not opposed to the medical use of non-psychoactive extracts from the cannabis plant. If Cannabidiol,(CBD) can reduce the seizures of children suffering from Dravet syndrome, then by all means let’s treat them with that derivative from the cannabis plant. And if CBD or any other non-psychoactive extract from cannabis is found to treat other diseases, then I’m all for prescribing those extracts.
BarkGrowlBite
May 26, 2017
It’s all over the news. “Marijuana Stops Epileptic Seizures.” That’s misleading, possibly on purpose. It’s not marijuana. It’s an extract of cannabis. And it’s not what the stoners want.
Dravet syndrome is the most serious form of epilepsy. Those that suffer from this form of epilepsy experience life-threatening seizures.
Cannabidiol, or CBD, is an extract from marijuana. CBD does not cause the psychoactive effects sought by people who smoke pot or consume edible marijuana.
A recent study by Dr. Orrin Devinsky, director of the New York University Comprehensive Epilepsy Center, and colleagues around the country found that CBD reduced the number and severity of seizures in children suffering from Dravet syndrome. Of the 120 children studied for 14 weeks, half were treated with CBD and the other half received a placebo.
This type of treatment is a far cry from the ‘medical marijuana’ as practiced in California and other states that have legalized the smoking of pot for medical purposes.
Prior to Dr. Devinsky’s study, The American Epilepsy Society said: "Marijuana itself has major shortcomings as an epilepsy treatment ... evidence for efficacy in treating seizures does not meet the necessary standard to recommend it to patients." Worse, researchers state that "marijuana use or withdrawal could potentially trigger seizures in susceptible [epilepsy] patients."
The pot proponents keep trumpeting phony claims that marijuana provides relief to glaucoma patients, eases pain, nausea and vomiting in in chemotherapy patients, and eases multiple sclerosis (MS) muscle contractions, sleep disorders and Tourette’s symptoms.
The American Glaucoma Society has written: "There is no scientific basis for marijuana's use in treatment," and there is evidence that it could actually do damage.
And a study conducted with 6,500 volunteers by England’s prestigious Bristol University showed that cannabis does not ease pain, nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy patients, nor does it ease MS muscle contractions, sleep disorders and Tourette’s symptoms.
Furthermore, two DEA chiefs have debunked medical marijuana as a hoax.
In a 2011 letter to organizations petitioning for a reclassification of marijuana, then DEA Director Michele Leonhart declared that marijuana "has a high potential for abuse," "has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States" and "lacks accepted safety for use under medical supervision." The letter and 37 pages of supporting documents were published in the Federal Register.
And in 2015, DEA chief Chuck Rosenberg rejected the notion that smoking marijuana is "medicine," calling the premise a "joke." In a briefing to reporters, Rosenberg said:
"What really bothers me is the notion that marijuana is also medicinal -- because it's not. " We can have an intellectually honest debate about whether we should legalize something that is bad and dangerous, but don't call it medicine -- that is a joke. There are pieces of marijuana -- extracts or constituents or component parts -- that have great promise medicinally. But if you talk about smoking the leaf of marijuana -- which is what people are talking about when they talk about medicinal marijuana -- it has never been shown to be safe or effective as a medicine."
California’s medical marijuana law is a farce. Pot heads can go to almost any doctor licensed to dispense marijuana and obtain a pot prescription for claimed symptoms such as headaches, backaches, hair loss, erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, depression, ingrown toenails, constipation, diarrhea, irritable bowel, hemorrhoids and, of course, anxiety caused when their dealer has been busted by the cops. At the end of the day, this hoax leaves the pot-prescribing doctors laughing all the way to the bank.
I am vehemently opposed to the legalization of smoked or edible marijuana, whether for medical or recreational purposes. I may be tilting at windmills because it looks like the whole nation is headed to legalized pot. Because I am convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt that marijuana is a very dangerous drug and not the innocuous substance its advocates claim, I will continue to express my opposition during the short time I have left on this earth. I am sure that after I’ve croaked, those Americans who are not stoners will come to regret the legalization of marijuana.
However, I am not opposed to the medical use of non-psychoactive extracts from the cannabis plant. If Cannabidiol,(CBD) can reduce the seizures of children suffering from Dravet syndrome, then by all means let’s treat them with that derivative from the cannabis plant. And if CBD or any other non-psychoactive extract from cannabis is found to treat other diseases, then I’m all for prescribing those extracts.
Thursday, May 25, 2017
IT'S STILL FUN, BUT NOT AS MUCH FUN AS IT USED TO BE
by Bob Walsh
I used to do almost all of the work on my cars. Partly because I am a cheap bastard. Partly because I used to enjoy doing it. I am, however, now old and creaky (relatively speaking) so it isn't as much fun as it used to be.
I have a 65 Mustang and a 64 VW. I still do a lot of the work on those myself as I understand the cars and it isn't physically demanding. Plus I get a lot of satisfaction out of doing it. Plus I am still a cheap bastard. I also have a Saturn sedan and a Dodge Dakota. I do very little of the work on those as they are modern computerized cars and there isn't all that much I CAN do to them.
I finally decided to change the rear shocks on the Dakota. When I go over railroad tracks at speed (a lot of railroad tracks around here on 55 MPH rural roads) the rear end danced around like the first cut contestant on Dancing with the Stars. Got squirrely to the point of being dangerous.
So I called Rock Auto and ordered up a set of the best, most heavy-duty KYB shocks for this thing and waited for a nice day. (I don't crawl under cars when it is 100 degrees. I may be stupid but I am not crazy.) These days I do a little recon before such jobs as I HATE to get halfway and find out I need something. I did that, and was glad I did. Turns out the rear shock bolts and nuts are 18mm. Most metric fitting sets jump from 17 to 19. So I had to go to Harbor Freight and got two 18 mm sockets and also a couple of 1/2 inch drive extensions for my electric impact wrench which I thought I might need. Glad I did.
In any event it took well over two hours to do the job. I found, for instance, that I could not compress the shocks enough by hand to get them to fit so I had to jack up the truck to fit the shocks in the mounting. I also found that it is MUCH HARDER to manhandle a truck tire and rim than a VW tire and rim.
In any event the job is done. I saved a couple of hundred dollars and did not hurt myself (too much) and ended up with the satisfaction of a job well done. Might not be wonderful, but it doesn't suck either.. . .
I used to do almost all of the work on my cars. Partly because I am a cheap bastard. Partly because I used to enjoy doing it. I am, however, now old and creaky (relatively speaking) so it isn't as much fun as it used to be.
I have a 65 Mustang and a 64 VW. I still do a lot of the work on those myself as I understand the cars and it isn't physically demanding. Plus I get a lot of satisfaction out of doing it. Plus I am still a cheap bastard. I also have a Saturn sedan and a Dodge Dakota. I do very little of the work on those as they are modern computerized cars and there isn't all that much I CAN do to them.
I finally decided to change the rear shocks on the Dakota. When I go over railroad tracks at speed (a lot of railroad tracks around here on 55 MPH rural roads) the rear end danced around like the first cut contestant on Dancing with the Stars. Got squirrely to the point of being dangerous.
So I called Rock Auto and ordered up a set of the best, most heavy-duty KYB shocks for this thing and waited for a nice day. (I don't crawl under cars when it is 100 degrees. I may be stupid but I am not crazy.) These days I do a little recon before such jobs as I HATE to get halfway and find out I need something. I did that, and was glad I did. Turns out the rear shock bolts and nuts are 18mm. Most metric fitting sets jump from 17 to 19. So I had to go to Harbor Freight and got two 18 mm sockets and also a couple of 1/2 inch drive extensions for my electric impact wrench which I thought I might need. Glad I did.
In any event it took well over two hours to do the job. I found, for instance, that I could not compress the shocks enough by hand to get them to fit so I had to jack up the truck to fit the shocks in the mounting. I also found that it is MUCH HARDER to manhandle a truck tire and rim than a VW tire and rim.
In any event the job is done. I saved a couple of hundred dollars and did not hurt myself (too much) and ended up with the satisfaction of a job well done. Might not be wonderful, but it doesn't suck either.. . .
SHAME, SHAME ON THESE TWO WHITE WOMEN FOR STEALING TACO, TORTILLA AND BURRITO MAKING TECHNIQUES WHILE IN MEXICO
White women's burrito shop in Oregon is forced to close after being hounded with accusations it was 'culturally appropriating Mexican food and jobs'
By Liam Quinn
Daily Mail
May 24, 2017
Two white women have been forced to close their pop-up burrito shop after they were accused of cultural appropriation.
Kali Wilgus and Liz 'LC' Connelly opened Kooks Burritos in Portland, Oregon, after taking a trip to Puerto Nuevo, Mexico, last December.
For the first few months, the weekend pop-up shop housed in an taco truck was a smash hit. It gained so much popularity, a local weekly newspaper decided to profile the entrepreneurial duo.
But that's when the trouble started for Wilgus and Connelly, after quotes they gave to the Williamette Week led to them being accused of stealing their success.
Explaining their trip, Connelly told the newspaper: 'I picked the brains of every tortilla lady there in the worst broken Spanish ever, and they showed me a little of what they did.
'In Puerto Nuevo, you can eat $5 lobster on the beach, which they give you with this bucket of tortillas. They are handmade flour tortillas that are stretchy and a little buttery, and best of all, unlimited.
'They wouldn't tell us too much about technique, but we were peeking into the windows of every kitchen, totally fascinated by how easy they made it look. We learned quickly it isn't quite that easy.'
Those comments were latched onto by a food blog in the Portland Mercury, which accused Wilgus and Connelly of 'preying' on the women they met in Mexico.
'This week in white nonsense, two white women—Kali Wilgus and Liz 'LC' Connely—decided it would be cute to open a food truck after a fateful excursion to Mexico,' the piece opened.
'The owners of Kooks Burritos all but admitted in an interview with Willamette Week that they colonized this style of food.
'So let’s recap the story thus far: These two white women went to Mexico, ate tacos, and then decided they would just take what the locals clearly didn't want to give them.
'If that wasn't bad enough, they decided to pack up all their stolen intellectual property and repackage it.'
The piece went on to claim getting the weekend taco truck closed was a 'victory' in Portland - a city it accused of having 'underlying racism'.
'These appropriating businesses are erasing and exploiting their already marginalized identities for the purpose of profit and praise,' it stated.
Many on social media and the comments section of the Williamette Week article shared in the outrage.
'Stealing is in their nature so I'm not surprised. They're not creative so they had to get the idea from someone,' Tee McNeill wrote on Facebook.
'Kooks Burritos is now closed. Good riddance!' Jonas Lord said.
'Awww, so you nice ladies stole hard-working and low-income Mexican women's tortilla recipes and are now turning a profit. That's not white basic privilege at all. #disgusting,' Alicia Dominguez commented.
'Now that you all boldly and pretty f***ing unapologetically stole the basis of these women's livelihoods, you can make their exact same product so other white ppl (sic) don't have to be inconvenienced of dealing with a pesky brown middle woman getting in their way. Great job,' Shauna MacKinnon added.
However, after news of the closure spread, many came to the defense of Wilgus and Connelly.
'1. Burritos are from L.A. 2. Tortilla making is easy and not a secret 3. Breakfast burritos=white people food,' one person wrote.
'Seriously!!!!? Do you not think they were speaking metaphorically "looking in people's windows"? She ended up with a tortilla recipe she developed herself and she puts french fries in them. Such cultural appropriation,' another said.
'Oh my god. you cannot be serious,' another wrote.
'If learning how to make a food from another culture and selling it is now considered cultural appropriation, then why not take this issue up with the successful Portland businesses that have been doing this at a much larger scale for years, and stop harassing these two women struggling to start a small business,' another added.
Kooks Burritos has deleted its website, Instagram account, Facebook page, and Twitter profile.
By Liam Quinn
Daily Mail
May 24, 2017
Two white women have been forced to close their pop-up burrito shop after they were accused of cultural appropriation.
Kali Wilgus and Liz 'LC' Connelly opened Kooks Burritos in Portland, Oregon, after taking a trip to Puerto Nuevo, Mexico, last December.
For the first few months, the weekend pop-up shop housed in an taco truck was a smash hit. It gained so much popularity, a local weekly newspaper decided to profile the entrepreneurial duo.
But that's when the trouble started for Wilgus and Connelly, after quotes they gave to the Williamette Week led to them being accused of stealing their success.
Explaining their trip, Connelly told the newspaper: 'I picked the brains of every tortilla lady there in the worst broken Spanish ever, and they showed me a little of what they did.
'In Puerto Nuevo, you can eat $5 lobster on the beach, which they give you with this bucket of tortillas. They are handmade flour tortillas that are stretchy and a little buttery, and best of all, unlimited.
'They wouldn't tell us too much about technique, but we were peeking into the windows of every kitchen, totally fascinated by how easy they made it look. We learned quickly it isn't quite that easy.'
Those comments were latched onto by a food blog in the Portland Mercury, which accused Wilgus and Connelly of 'preying' on the women they met in Mexico.
'This week in white nonsense, two white women—Kali Wilgus and Liz 'LC' Connely—decided it would be cute to open a food truck after a fateful excursion to Mexico,' the piece opened.
'The owners of Kooks Burritos all but admitted in an interview with Willamette Week that they colonized this style of food.
'So let’s recap the story thus far: These two white women went to Mexico, ate tacos, and then decided they would just take what the locals clearly didn't want to give them.
'If that wasn't bad enough, they decided to pack up all their stolen intellectual property and repackage it.'
The piece went on to claim getting the weekend taco truck closed was a 'victory' in Portland - a city it accused of having 'underlying racism'.
'These appropriating businesses are erasing and exploiting their already marginalized identities for the purpose of profit and praise,' it stated.
Many on social media and the comments section of the Williamette Week article shared in the outrage.
'Stealing is in their nature so I'm not surprised. They're not creative so they had to get the idea from someone,' Tee McNeill wrote on Facebook.
'Kooks Burritos is now closed. Good riddance!' Jonas Lord said.
'Awww, so you nice ladies stole hard-working and low-income Mexican women's tortilla recipes and are now turning a profit. That's not white basic privilege at all. #disgusting,' Alicia Dominguez commented.
'Now that you all boldly and pretty f***ing unapologetically stole the basis of these women's livelihoods, you can make their exact same product so other white ppl (sic) don't have to be inconvenienced of dealing with a pesky brown middle woman getting in their way. Great job,' Shauna MacKinnon added.
However, after news of the closure spread, many came to the defense of Wilgus and Connelly.
'1. Burritos are from L.A. 2. Tortilla making is easy and not a secret 3. Breakfast burritos=white people food,' one person wrote.
'Seriously!!!!? Do you not think they were speaking metaphorically "looking in people's windows"? She ended up with a tortilla recipe she developed herself and she puts french fries in them. Such cultural appropriation,' another said.
'Oh my god. you cannot be serious,' another wrote.
'If learning how to make a food from another culture and selling it is now considered cultural appropriation, then why not take this issue up with the successful Portland businesses that have been doing this at a much larger scale for years, and stop harassing these two women struggling to start a small business,' another added.
Kooks Burritos has deleted its website, Instagram account, Facebook page, and Twitter profile.
GAY MARRIAGE AND MARIJUANA
If a man lies with another man they should be stoned
In 2012, the state of Washington passed two laws.
They legalized gay marriage and legalized marijuana.
The fact that gay marriage and marijuana were legalized at the same time makes perfect Biblical sense.
Leviticus 20:13 says: "If a man lies with another man they should be stoned.".
Apparently we just hadn't interpreted it correctly before .
In 2012, the state of Washington passed two laws.
They legalized gay marriage and legalized marijuana.
The fact that gay marriage and marijuana were legalized at the same time makes perfect Biblical sense.
Leviticus 20:13 says: "If a man lies with another man they should be stoned.".
Apparently we just hadn't interpreted it correctly before .
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
BIZARRE SHOOT-THRU MAN'S HEAD TO WOMAN'S CHEST HOMICIDE
by Bob Walsh
I have to admit this is a new one for me. Victor Sibson was stinking drunk in his apartment in Anchorage when he attempted to kill himself by shooting himself in the head. He was successful in shooting himself in the head, but the wound was not fatal. The bullet, however, passed thru his skull and hit and killed his girlfriend, Brittanymae Haag, 22. He is being charged with second-degree murder.
The truly interesting part of this case is the cops really do think that only one bullet was fired and the bullet really did go thru Sibson's skull before it hit Brittanymae. Maybe his brain was so small, or shrivled up by alcohol, the bullet hit only empty air in his cranial vault. The cops believe that she was trying to act to prevent him from killing himself when the gun fired. The bullet lodged in her chest.
Victor claims to have no recollection of the incident. He might even be telling the truth. He is being held pending $250,000 bail and could get 99 years as a guest of the people of Alaska if convicted.
I have to admit this is a new one for me. Victor Sibson was stinking drunk in his apartment in Anchorage when he attempted to kill himself by shooting himself in the head. He was successful in shooting himself in the head, but the wound was not fatal. The bullet, however, passed thru his skull and hit and killed his girlfriend, Brittanymae Haag, 22. He is being charged with second-degree murder.
The truly interesting part of this case is the cops really do think that only one bullet was fired and the bullet really did go thru Sibson's skull before it hit Brittanymae. Maybe his brain was so small, or shrivled up by alcohol, the bullet hit only empty air in his cranial vault. The cops believe that she was trying to act to prevent him from killing himself when the gun fired. The bullet lodged in her chest.
Victor claims to have no recollection of the incident. He might even be telling the truth. He is being held pending $250,000 bail and could get 99 years as a guest of the people of Alaska if convicted.
‘AS A YOUNG OFFICER, THIS BECAME ONE OF THOSE SALIENT MOMENTS IN MY CAREER’
For 25 years, the burned remains of a teenager found during L.A. riots was a mystery. Now, the cop who found him has the answer
By Richard Winton
Los Angeles Times
May 23, 2017
This month the Los Angeles Police Department marks a milestone 25 years since the city’s 1992 riots. The department also closed a long open chapter of the violence that claimed more than 60 lives.
Armando Ortiz Hernandez, until now known only as John Doe No. 80, was identified through fingerprints. He was the last victim to be identified. Hernandez, 18, was inside the auto repair shop at 5801 S. Vermont Ave., just north of Slauson Avenue, when it was set on fire sometime after the riots started on April 29, 1992. His body was not found until May 2.
Jorge Macias was a young officer patrolling the area at the time. He discovered the body. Macias had to wait 25 years to learn the name of the dead man. He talked to The Times about his recollection of finding the victim and what it took to finally make the identification:
FLAGGED DOWN BY A KID
‘Officer, there’s a dead guy in there!’
Here are the circumstances leading to the initial finding of the victim’s body. Although I was assigned to work Southeast Patrol Division, this incident took place in 77th Division. I was patrolling around the third day of the riots, when I was flagged down by a 10-year-old boy. He said, “Officer, there’s a dead guy in there!” He pointed to a burned-out pile of rubble on the west side of the street, which I believe was either Figueroa or Vermont. I asked him to show me where and we approached the still smoldering structure. The boy pointed beyond some fallen girders which had fallen at acute angles ostensibly from the roof, when the roof had given way, sealing the victim’s fate. I had to duck walk under the maze of obstacles including the blackened steel beams until I reached the remains.
FINDING THE REMAINS
‘This became one of those salient moments in my career’
The ground was covered with some four inches of building materials including soaked drywall, which was like a thick opaque slush. Upon seeing the body, I noted the exposed parts including a leg were mostly skeletonized. However, the face and arms were saved by the ground detritus that had protected his hands and face, somewhat mummifying those body parts spared from the flames. I remember thinking that perhaps the Coroner’s Office might be able to fingerprint and identify the body so that loved ones would know what had happened. As a young officer, this became one of those salient moments in my career. I notified Communications Division and set up the ubiquitous yellow crime scene tape as I had so often during that tumultuous time period.
FINDING SOME CLOSURE
‘I am relieved that there is at last a name to this person’
I remember thinking that the young boy who had spotted the body should never had had to witness such a macabre scene. This latter thought has remained with me all these years and I recounted the experience to my children when they asked about these troubled times.
I moved forward in my career eventually making sergeant and lieutenant, where today I oversee recruitment for the Department. However, I never forgot this person or the young boy that first led me to the body. I am relieved that there is at last a name to this person and closure (if there is such a thing) for the family.
By Richard Winton
Los Angeles Times
May 23, 2017
This month the Los Angeles Police Department marks a milestone 25 years since the city’s 1992 riots. The department also closed a long open chapter of the violence that claimed more than 60 lives.
Armando Ortiz Hernandez, until now known only as John Doe No. 80, was identified through fingerprints. He was the last victim to be identified. Hernandez, 18, was inside the auto repair shop at 5801 S. Vermont Ave., just north of Slauson Avenue, when it was set on fire sometime after the riots started on April 29, 1992. His body was not found until May 2.
Jorge Macias was a young officer patrolling the area at the time. He discovered the body. Macias had to wait 25 years to learn the name of the dead man. He talked to The Times about his recollection of finding the victim and what it took to finally make the identification:
FLAGGED DOWN BY A KID
‘Officer, there’s a dead guy in there!’
Here are the circumstances leading to the initial finding of the victim’s body. Although I was assigned to work Southeast Patrol Division, this incident took place in 77th Division. I was patrolling around the third day of the riots, when I was flagged down by a 10-year-old boy. He said, “Officer, there’s a dead guy in there!” He pointed to a burned-out pile of rubble on the west side of the street, which I believe was either Figueroa or Vermont. I asked him to show me where and we approached the still smoldering structure. The boy pointed beyond some fallen girders which had fallen at acute angles ostensibly from the roof, when the roof had given way, sealing the victim’s fate. I had to duck walk under the maze of obstacles including the blackened steel beams until I reached the remains.
FINDING THE REMAINS
‘This became one of those salient moments in my career’
The ground was covered with some four inches of building materials including soaked drywall, which was like a thick opaque slush. Upon seeing the body, I noted the exposed parts including a leg were mostly skeletonized. However, the face and arms were saved by the ground detritus that had protected his hands and face, somewhat mummifying those body parts spared from the flames. I remember thinking that perhaps the Coroner’s Office might be able to fingerprint and identify the body so that loved ones would know what had happened. As a young officer, this became one of those salient moments in my career. I notified Communications Division and set up the ubiquitous yellow crime scene tape as I had so often during that tumultuous time period.
FINDING SOME CLOSURE
‘I am relieved that there is at last a name to this person’
I remember thinking that the young boy who had spotted the body should never had had to witness such a macabre scene. This latter thought has remained with me all these years and I recounted the experience to my children when they asked about these troubled times.
I moved forward in my career eventually making sergeant and lieutenant, where today I oversee recruitment for the Department. However, I never forgot this person or the young boy that first led me to the body. I am relieved that there is at last a name to this person and closure (if there is such a thing) for the family.
VOTER-APPROVED MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION LAW ALLOWS FELONY CONVICTIONS OF CALIFORNIA DRUG DEALERS TO BE REDUCED TO THE EQUIVALENT OF A TRAFFIC TICKET
Pot convictions go up in smoke with California marijuana legalization
By Brian Melley
Associated Press
May 22, 2017
Jay Schlauch's conviction for peddling pot haunted him for nearly a quarter century.
The felony prevented him from landing jobs, gave his wife doubts about tying the knot and cast a shadow over his typically sunny outlook on life.
So when an opportunity arose to reduce his record to a misdemeanor under the voter-approved law that legalized recreational marijuana last year, Schlauch wasted little time getting to court.
"Why should I be lumped in with, you know, murderers and rapists and people who really deserve to get a felony?" he asked.
This lesser-known provision of Proposition 64 allows some convicts to wipe their rap sheets clean and offers hope for people with past convictions who are seeking work or loans. Past crimes can also pose a deportation threat for some convicts.
It's hard to say how many people have benefited, but more than 2,500 requests were filed to reduce convictions or sentences, according to partial state figures reported through March. The figures do not yet include data from more than half of counties from the first quarter of the year.
While the state does not tally the outcomes of those requests, prosecutors said they have not fought most petitions.
Marijuana legalization advocates, such as the Drug Policy Alliance, have held free legal clinics to help convicts get their records changed. Lawyers who specialize in pot defense have noted a steady flow of interest from new and former clients.
Attorney Bruce Margolin said he got two to three cases a week, many of them decades old.
Margolin has spent most of his five-decade career fighting pot cases and pushing for legalization of marijuana, even making it a platform for unsuccessful runs for state Legislature and Congress.
A coffee table in the waiting room of his office is covered with copies of High Times magazine, a book called "Tokin' Women," a history of women and weed, and copies of Margolin's own guide to marijuana laws in every state. His office in the back of a bungalow in West Hollywood has the faint whiff of pot in the air.
Since the passage of Proposition 64, he's gotten convicts out of prison, spared others time behind bars and successfully knocked felonies down to misdemeanors.
But he's also encountered a lot of confusion about the law that went into effect immediately in November.
"They were totally unprepared," he said of judges and prosecutors in courts he's appeared in throughout the state. "It's amazing. You would have thought they should have had seminars to get them up to speed so we don't have to go through the process of arguing things that are obvious, but we're still getting that."
That has not been the case in San Diego, where prosecutors watched polls trending in favor of marijuana legalization and moved proactively to prevent chaos, said Rachel Solov, chief of the collaborative courts division of the district attorney's office. They learned lessons from the 2014 passage of Proposition 47, which reduced several nonviolent felonies to misdemeanors.
Prosecutors in the county researched which convicts serving time or probation were eligible for sentence reductions and notified the public defender's office so they could quickly get into court. Many were freed immediately, Solov said.
"Whether we agree with the law or not, our job is to enforce it," Solov said. "It's the right thing to do. If someone's in custody and they shouldn't be in custody anymore, we have an obligation to address that."
San Diego County led the state with the most number of petitions reported in the first two months after the law was passed. It has reduced sentences or convictions in nearly 400 cases, Solov said.
In Mendocino County, where pot farming is big business and violent crimes are often tied to the crop, District Attorney C. David Eyster said he fights any case not eligible for a reduction, such as applicants with a major felony in their past, a sex offense or two previous convictions for the same crime.
He said he would also fight a reduction if someone is caught cultivating weed while committing an environmental crime, such as stealing or polluting water. Otherwise — in a quirk that has some in law enforcement baffled — someone caught with two plants or 2,000 would both face a misdemeanor.
"This is one of those areas where size doesn't matter," Eyster said.
When it came time for Schlauch's hearing this winter, he showed up an hour early at the Van Nuys courthouse. He was anxious but optimistic as he paced the hallway clutching a folder with letters praising him for doing volunteer work with veterans, working with children with disabilities at a martial arts school and earning a nursing degree long after his run-in with the law.
It had been more than two decades since he was sentenced to nine months in jail. He only served about a month.
The case was so old that the court file was incomplete.
A prosecutor rifling through papers wondered whether he was eligible for relief. He had 8.5 pounds of marijuana, she said. The file noted psychedelic mushrooms were also found, and she questioned whether the discovery of guns made him a threat.
Schlauch, 58, was never charged with a gun offense. He said the registered weapons were unloaded and locked in a safe. His only conviction was for possession with intent to sell marijuana, Margolin said.
The judge flipped through the fat penal code book to review the new law.
"I don't see any reasonable risk of danger. It seems like he's entitled," Judge Martin Herscovitz said. "The petition is granted."
It barely took five minutes to lift a weight he had carried so long. He never had to say a thing or show he had turned his life around. He bounded from the courtroom, elated.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Some guy by the name of Joe Bates made the following comment on the KPCC publication of this article:
When Mr. Schlauch made the decision to illegally deal drugs 25 years ago he knew perfectly well it was a serious felony. He didn't care. Now I do not care that he ruined his life.
I couldn’t have put it any better myself. When Schlauch decided to sell drugs, whether pot or heroin, he sealed his own fate. Fuck him and the others like him!
By Brian Melley
Associated Press
May 22, 2017
Jay Schlauch's conviction for peddling pot haunted him for nearly a quarter century.
The felony prevented him from landing jobs, gave his wife doubts about tying the knot and cast a shadow over his typically sunny outlook on life.
So when an opportunity arose to reduce his record to a misdemeanor under the voter-approved law that legalized recreational marijuana last year, Schlauch wasted little time getting to court.
"Why should I be lumped in with, you know, murderers and rapists and people who really deserve to get a felony?" he asked.
This lesser-known provision of Proposition 64 allows some convicts to wipe their rap sheets clean and offers hope for people with past convictions who are seeking work or loans. Past crimes can also pose a deportation threat for some convicts.
It's hard to say how many people have benefited, but more than 2,500 requests were filed to reduce convictions or sentences, according to partial state figures reported through March. The figures do not yet include data from more than half of counties from the first quarter of the year.
While the state does not tally the outcomes of those requests, prosecutors said they have not fought most petitions.
Marijuana legalization advocates, such as the Drug Policy Alliance, have held free legal clinics to help convicts get their records changed. Lawyers who specialize in pot defense have noted a steady flow of interest from new and former clients.
Attorney Bruce Margolin said he got two to three cases a week, many of them decades old.
Margolin has spent most of his five-decade career fighting pot cases and pushing for legalization of marijuana, even making it a platform for unsuccessful runs for state Legislature and Congress.
A coffee table in the waiting room of his office is covered with copies of High Times magazine, a book called "Tokin' Women," a history of women and weed, and copies of Margolin's own guide to marijuana laws in every state. His office in the back of a bungalow in West Hollywood has the faint whiff of pot in the air.
Since the passage of Proposition 64, he's gotten convicts out of prison, spared others time behind bars and successfully knocked felonies down to misdemeanors.
But he's also encountered a lot of confusion about the law that went into effect immediately in November.
"They were totally unprepared," he said of judges and prosecutors in courts he's appeared in throughout the state. "It's amazing. You would have thought they should have had seminars to get them up to speed so we don't have to go through the process of arguing things that are obvious, but we're still getting that."
That has not been the case in San Diego, where prosecutors watched polls trending in favor of marijuana legalization and moved proactively to prevent chaos, said Rachel Solov, chief of the collaborative courts division of the district attorney's office. They learned lessons from the 2014 passage of Proposition 47, which reduced several nonviolent felonies to misdemeanors.
Prosecutors in the county researched which convicts serving time or probation were eligible for sentence reductions and notified the public defender's office so they could quickly get into court. Many were freed immediately, Solov said.
"Whether we agree with the law or not, our job is to enforce it," Solov said. "It's the right thing to do. If someone's in custody and they shouldn't be in custody anymore, we have an obligation to address that."
San Diego County led the state with the most number of petitions reported in the first two months after the law was passed. It has reduced sentences or convictions in nearly 400 cases, Solov said.
In Mendocino County, where pot farming is big business and violent crimes are often tied to the crop, District Attorney C. David Eyster said he fights any case not eligible for a reduction, such as applicants with a major felony in their past, a sex offense or two previous convictions for the same crime.
He said he would also fight a reduction if someone is caught cultivating weed while committing an environmental crime, such as stealing or polluting water. Otherwise — in a quirk that has some in law enforcement baffled — someone caught with two plants or 2,000 would both face a misdemeanor.
"This is one of those areas where size doesn't matter," Eyster said.
When it came time for Schlauch's hearing this winter, he showed up an hour early at the Van Nuys courthouse. He was anxious but optimistic as he paced the hallway clutching a folder with letters praising him for doing volunteer work with veterans, working with children with disabilities at a martial arts school and earning a nursing degree long after his run-in with the law.
It had been more than two decades since he was sentenced to nine months in jail. He only served about a month.
The case was so old that the court file was incomplete.
A prosecutor rifling through papers wondered whether he was eligible for relief. He had 8.5 pounds of marijuana, she said. The file noted psychedelic mushrooms were also found, and she questioned whether the discovery of guns made him a threat.
Schlauch, 58, was never charged with a gun offense. He said the registered weapons were unloaded and locked in a safe. His only conviction was for possession with intent to sell marijuana, Margolin said.
The judge flipped through the fat penal code book to review the new law.
"I don't see any reasonable risk of danger. It seems like he's entitled," Judge Martin Herscovitz said. "The petition is granted."
It barely took five minutes to lift a weight he had carried so long. He never had to say a thing or show he had turned his life around. He bounded from the courtroom, elated.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Some guy by the name of Joe Bates made the following comment on the KPCC publication of this article:
When Mr. Schlauch made the decision to illegally deal drugs 25 years ago he knew perfectly well it was a serious felony. He didn't care. Now I do not care that he ruined his life.
I couldn’t have put it any better myself. When Schlauch decided to sell drugs, whether pot or heroin, he sealed his own fate. Fuck him and the others like him!
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
ON THE WRONG SIDE OF HISTORY ….. BUT WHOSE HISTORY?
LGBTQ supporters are crying foul over the Texas House passage of a watered-down bathroom bill
BY Howie Katz
Big Jolly Politics
May 22, 2017
Under Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s threat to force a special session, the Texas House passed a watered down bathroom bill that, unlike the Senate version which applies to all public facilities, applies only to public schools.
The House version was attached at the last minute Sunday night to another bill. It prohibits transgenders from using the public school bathroom of their choice. However the House bill requires schools to have a single-occupancy bathroom for those students who don’t want to use the facilities designated for their biological sex.
Houston’s Rep. Senfronia Thompson cried foul. “I was living through that [Jim Crow] era. Bathrooms divided us then, and it divides us now,” she told the House. “America has long recognized that separate but equal is not equal at all.”
I know this is not politically correct, but when we’re talking about transgenders, we could actually be talking about mentally ill people. Dr. Joseph Berger is a prominent Canadian psychiatrist in Toronto whose list of credentials establishes him as a mental illness expert. Dr. Berger believes that people who identify themselves as transgendered are mentally ill or simply unhappy. Accordingly, he has pointed out that hormone therapy and surgery are not appropriate treatments for psychosis or unhappiness.
Bruce Jenner is a perfect example of Dr. Berger’s diagnosis. Brucella – oops, I mean Caitlyn - waited until his 60s to decide he was really a woman. And that was after three marriages and fathering six children, two with each of his wives. He didn’t develop a gender identification problem until he got mixed up with the Kardashians. I’ll believe Caitlyn is a woman when Jenner can get pregnant.
So here we are fighting over bathrooms in order to accommodate a bunch of nut cases. No one knows yet what the final version of the bathroom bill will be when it reaches the desk of Gov. Greg Abbott.
Even the watered down version of the House bill has the LGBTQ groups and their politically correct supporters all exercised. Chuck Smith, CEO of Equality Texas says, “Targeting some of the most vulnerable children in our state is abhorrent, shameful, and disgraceful. The Texas lawmakers of the 85th legislative session are on wrong side of history.”
The wrong side of history? Smith must mean the politically correct version of history. From the founding of our country until a relatively few years ago, no one worried about who used which bathroom. The simple rule of law was, if you had a dick you used the ‘boys/men’ bathroom and if you did not have a dick you used the ‘girls/ladies’ bathroom. And that’s the way it should continue to be.
BY Howie Katz
Big Jolly Politics
May 22, 2017
Under Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s threat to force a special session, the Texas House passed a watered down bathroom bill that, unlike the Senate version which applies to all public facilities, applies only to public schools.
The House version was attached at the last minute Sunday night to another bill. It prohibits transgenders from using the public school bathroom of their choice. However the House bill requires schools to have a single-occupancy bathroom for those students who don’t want to use the facilities designated for their biological sex.
Houston’s Rep. Senfronia Thompson cried foul. “I was living through that [Jim Crow] era. Bathrooms divided us then, and it divides us now,” she told the House. “America has long recognized that separate but equal is not equal at all.”
I know this is not politically correct, but when we’re talking about transgenders, we could actually be talking about mentally ill people. Dr. Joseph Berger is a prominent Canadian psychiatrist in Toronto whose list of credentials establishes him as a mental illness expert. Dr. Berger believes that people who identify themselves as transgendered are mentally ill or simply unhappy. Accordingly, he has pointed out that hormone therapy and surgery are not appropriate treatments for psychosis or unhappiness.
Bruce Jenner is a perfect example of Dr. Berger’s diagnosis. Brucella – oops, I mean Caitlyn - waited until his 60s to decide he was really a woman. And that was after three marriages and fathering six children, two with each of his wives. He didn’t develop a gender identification problem until he got mixed up with the Kardashians. I’ll believe Caitlyn is a woman when Jenner can get pregnant.
So here we are fighting over bathrooms in order to accommodate a bunch of nut cases. No one knows yet what the final version of the bathroom bill will be when it reaches the desk of Gov. Greg Abbott.
Even the watered down version of the House bill has the LGBTQ groups and their politically correct supporters all exercised. Chuck Smith, CEO of Equality Texas says, “Targeting some of the most vulnerable children in our state is abhorrent, shameful, and disgraceful. The Texas lawmakers of the 85th legislative session are on wrong side of history.”
The wrong side of history? Smith must mean the politically correct version of history. From the founding of our country until a relatively few years ago, no one worried about who used which bathroom. The simple rule of law was, if you had a dick you used the ‘boys/men’ bathroom and if you did not have a dick you used the ‘girls/ladies’ bathroom. And that’s the way it should continue to be.
CLOCK BOY IS S.O.L.
by Bob Walsh
You might remember Ahmed Mohamed, who at the age of 14 was arrested at McArthur High School in Irving, Texas when he brought to school a device which looked very much like a bomb but was in fact a disassembled, ancient Radio Shack clock wired to some junk that looked remarkably like a bomb.
The D.A. never filed charges. Young Ahmed's father, Mohamed Mohamed, sued the Irving Independent School District, McArthur High School, the City of Irving and the school principal for unspecified damages.
U.S. District Court Judge Sam Lindsay has just told Mr. Mohamed (very politely I am sure) to kick rocks. His mere assertion that they were discriminated against is not proof of actual discrimination.
The family has in the intervening time left the country and moved to some middle-east shit hole country. At one time they were asking for $15 million and an apology. What they got instead was a "fuck you" which is pretty much what they deserved.
You might remember Ahmed Mohamed, who at the age of 14 was arrested at McArthur High School in Irving, Texas when he brought to school a device which looked very much like a bomb but was in fact a disassembled, ancient Radio Shack clock wired to some junk that looked remarkably like a bomb.
The D.A. never filed charges. Young Ahmed's father, Mohamed Mohamed, sued the Irving Independent School District, McArthur High School, the City of Irving and the school principal for unspecified damages.
U.S. District Court Judge Sam Lindsay has just told Mr. Mohamed (very politely I am sure) to kick rocks. His mere assertion that they were discriminated against is not proof of actual discrimination.
The family has in the intervening time left the country and moved to some middle-east shit hole country. At one time they were asking for $15 million and an apology. What they got instead was a "fuck you" which is pretty much what they deserved.
PARTING WAYS WITH THOSE DAYS IN AMERICAN HISTORY WHEN CHILD BRIDES WERE QUITE COMMON
Texas Legislature Passes Bill Aimed to End Its Forced Child Marriages Problem
By Meagan Flynn
Houston Press
May 22, 2017
When Dr. Nusrat Ameen hears from young women who married as children, it is often at the stage when they are trying to escape.
Ameen works for Daya, an organization in Houston that helps women or families that are dealing with domestic violence, and has been studying and advocating against forced marriages since 1999. She has heard from a 20-year-old college student whose parents had forced her to marry her cousin at age 16, and whose parents threatened to take away her tuition money unless she consummated the marriage. Ameen has heard from a 17-year-old girl forced to marry a 25-year-old man and who wanted to go off to college, not move in with a man she did not love. She's heard from a mother who was concerned that her daughter's friend was being forced into a marriage, who was wondering, what can we do to stop this?
The Texas Legislature may have just answered with a solution: banning child marriages altogether, as the House voted to do on Friday, sending the legislation up to Governor Greg Abbott for his signature.
Texas has long enjoyed the unfortunate honor of having the second-highest rate of child marriages in the United States, with a rate of seven per 1,000 children married between the ages of 15 and 17, according to a 2016 Pew Research Center report. The Lone Star State just barely second to West Virginia. In Texas, there is actually no minimum age for marriage, so Ameen has even seen child brides as young as 12 or 13 marrying men in their 20s or 30s. From 2000 to 2014, more than 40,000 children got married in Texas, according to data published by the Tahirih Justice Center, another organization staunchly supportive of the bill. The problem cuts across cultural, religious and ethnic divides, Ameen said, but is more common with teen girls than boys.
For a child to get married in Texas, if she is 16 or 17, all she needs is a parent's consent — which can at times be more akin to coercion — and if she is 15 or younger, she also needs judicial approval.
"The parents may have good intentions to get the children off in hands of people they trust, and do something good for them in the long run," Ameen said. "But that may lead to a forced marriage because of the fact that the person is a child, not knowing how to protect herself. Forced marriage can give rise to domestic violence, to having reproductive rights refused and to being financially dependent on the person they are marrying."
Once the child is married and possibly faces domestic violence or sexual assault, even though they are still kids, Child Protective Services cant help them, because they are married.
The bill that passed Friday — Senate Bill 1705, authored by Senator Van Taylor (R-Plano) and sponsored by Representative Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston) — would change all of that. It makes 18 the legal age to marry, and would only allow people younger than 18 to marry if they have already been emancipated by a court order (i.e., a judge found that they live on their own and are no longer dependent on parents or guardians to support themselves).
"We are very grateful to Senator Taylor for his leadership in taking this critical step to protect children in Texas from being forced to marry," Jeanne Smoot, senior policy counsel at the Tahirih Justice Center, another supporter of the bill, said in a statement. "This bill empowers young people to enter marriage only with their full and free consent."
Two poignant stories that circulated in recent months largely rallied legislators to support the bill. One was that of a Houston Chronicle writer's mother, who was forced into a marriage at age 14 and later escaped the marriage and lived lived out of a car for with an infant for several months at age 17. Another was that of Trevicia Williams, who at 14 was forced into a marriage with a 26-year-old abusive man. She gave birth to her first child while she was still one herself, at 15, and when she turned 18 she filed for divorce.
"I felt a deep sense of being powerless because of my age," she told legislators in written testimony. "Within the first 30 days of the marriage, my now ex-husband hit me. ...I asked my mother if I could return home and she told me no."
Should the bill be signed by Governor Abbott, it will go into effect on September 1.
By Meagan Flynn
Houston Press
May 22, 2017
When Dr. Nusrat Ameen hears from young women who married as children, it is often at the stage when they are trying to escape.
Ameen works for Daya, an organization in Houston that helps women or families that are dealing with domestic violence, and has been studying and advocating against forced marriages since 1999. She has heard from a 20-year-old college student whose parents had forced her to marry her cousin at age 16, and whose parents threatened to take away her tuition money unless she consummated the marriage. Ameen has heard from a 17-year-old girl forced to marry a 25-year-old man and who wanted to go off to college, not move in with a man she did not love. She's heard from a mother who was concerned that her daughter's friend was being forced into a marriage, who was wondering, what can we do to stop this?
The Texas Legislature may have just answered with a solution: banning child marriages altogether, as the House voted to do on Friday, sending the legislation up to Governor Greg Abbott for his signature.
Texas has long enjoyed the unfortunate honor of having the second-highest rate of child marriages in the United States, with a rate of seven per 1,000 children married between the ages of 15 and 17, according to a 2016 Pew Research Center report. The Lone Star State just barely second to West Virginia. In Texas, there is actually no minimum age for marriage, so Ameen has even seen child brides as young as 12 or 13 marrying men in their 20s or 30s. From 2000 to 2014, more than 40,000 children got married in Texas, according to data published by the Tahirih Justice Center, another organization staunchly supportive of the bill. The problem cuts across cultural, religious and ethnic divides, Ameen said, but is more common with teen girls than boys.
For a child to get married in Texas, if she is 16 or 17, all she needs is a parent's consent — which can at times be more akin to coercion — and if she is 15 or younger, she also needs judicial approval.
"The parents may have good intentions to get the children off in hands of people they trust, and do something good for them in the long run," Ameen said. "But that may lead to a forced marriage because of the fact that the person is a child, not knowing how to protect herself. Forced marriage can give rise to domestic violence, to having reproductive rights refused and to being financially dependent on the person they are marrying."
Once the child is married and possibly faces domestic violence or sexual assault, even though they are still kids, Child Protective Services cant help them, because they are married.
The bill that passed Friday — Senate Bill 1705, authored by Senator Van Taylor (R-Plano) and sponsored by Representative Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston) — would change all of that. It makes 18 the legal age to marry, and would only allow people younger than 18 to marry if they have already been emancipated by a court order (i.e., a judge found that they live on their own and are no longer dependent on parents or guardians to support themselves).
"We are very grateful to Senator Taylor for his leadership in taking this critical step to protect children in Texas from being forced to marry," Jeanne Smoot, senior policy counsel at the Tahirih Justice Center, another supporter of the bill, said in a statement. "This bill empowers young people to enter marriage only with their full and free consent."
Two poignant stories that circulated in recent months largely rallied legislators to support the bill. One was that of a Houston Chronicle writer's mother, who was forced into a marriage at age 14 and later escaped the marriage and lived lived out of a car for with an infant for several months at age 17. Another was that of Trevicia Williams, who at 14 was forced into a marriage with a 26-year-old abusive man. She gave birth to her first child while she was still one herself, at 15, and when she turned 18 she filed for divorce.
"I felt a deep sense of being powerless because of my age," she told legislators in written testimony. "Within the first 30 days of the marriage, my now ex-husband hit me. ...I asked my mother if I could return home and she told me no."
Should the bill be signed by Governor Abbott, it will go into effect on September 1.
Monday, May 22, 2017
STUDY REVEALS TRUMP HAS SUFFERED THE MOST UNFAVORABLE PRESS COVERAGE OF ANY PRESIDENT ON RECORD
A Harvard study found that 80 percent of Trump coverage was negative during his first 100 days in office, with the tone of the coverage being exceptionally antagonistic
By Sally Persons
The Washington Times
May 18, 2017
President Trump has suffered the most unfavorable press coverage of any president on record, according to a report from the Shorenstein Center at Harvard.
Mr. Trump has dominated the news since taking office, with 41 percent of all stories reviewed by the center focusing on the new president. That’s three times more than the average of previous presidents.
But the tone of the coverage was exceptionally antagonistic.
“Negative reports outpaced positive ones by 80 percent to 20 percent. Trump’s coverage was unsparing. In no week did the coverage drop below 70 percent negative and it reached 90 percent negative at its peak,” the analysts said in their new report, released Thursday.
The numbers could be seen to back up Mr. Trump’s claim this week that he’s suffered “unfairly.”
“Look at the way I’ve been treated lately, especially by the media. No politician in history — and I say this with great surety — has been treated worse or more unfairly,” the president said in an address to graduates at the Coast Guard Academy.
The Shorenstein study looked at coverage from ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, CNN and Fox News as well as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. It also included the Financial Times, the BBC and ARD, Germany’s oldest public broadcast.
Since the 1960s, every president has dominated the news cycle, accounting for about an eighth of all news. But on national television, Mr. Trump accounted for 41 percent of coverage and was the main speaker in his news pieces two-thirds of the time. Another 11 percent of coverage was his administration staff, including his press secretary Sean Spicer.
By Sally Persons
The Washington Times
May 18, 2017
President Trump has suffered the most unfavorable press coverage of any president on record, according to a report from the Shorenstein Center at Harvard.
Mr. Trump has dominated the news since taking office, with 41 percent of all stories reviewed by the center focusing on the new president. That’s three times more than the average of previous presidents.
But the tone of the coverage was exceptionally antagonistic.
“Negative reports outpaced positive ones by 80 percent to 20 percent. Trump’s coverage was unsparing. In no week did the coverage drop below 70 percent negative and it reached 90 percent negative at its peak,” the analysts said in their new report, released Thursday.
The numbers could be seen to back up Mr. Trump’s claim this week that he’s suffered “unfairly.”
“Look at the way I’ve been treated lately, especially by the media. No politician in history — and I say this with great surety — has been treated worse or more unfairly,” the president said in an address to graduates at the Coast Guard Academy.
The Shorenstein study looked at coverage from ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, CNN and Fox News as well as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. It also included the Financial Times, the BBC and ARD, Germany’s oldest public broadcast.
Since the 1960s, every president has dominated the news cycle, accounting for about an eighth of all news. But on national television, Mr. Trump accounted for 41 percent of coverage and was the main speaker in his news pieces two-thirds of the time. Another 11 percent of coverage was his administration staff, including his press secretary Sean Spicer.
29 MEXICAN COPS ROBBED WHILE ON BUS
Gunmen rob busload of federal police officers in Mexico
Associated Press
May 19, 2017
MEXICO CITY -- Authorities in Mexico say gunmen have assaulted and robbed a bus full of federal police.
The National Security Commission reports that the bus was carrying 29 unarmed officers dressed in civilian clothes Monday night to Mexico City, where they were to be on leave after 25 straight days on duty in the Pacific resort city of Acapulco.
The commission says the driver pulled over to check a mechanical problem near a toll booth in the state of Morelos. Armed men then boarded the bus, threatened him and the passengers and relieved them of their possessions.
A statement late Thursday says the officers did not resist in order to avoid injuries or loss of life. Authorities are searching for the robbers.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Them that robs now know how it feels to be robbed.
Associated Press
May 19, 2017
MEXICO CITY -- Authorities in Mexico say gunmen have assaulted and robbed a bus full of federal police.
The National Security Commission reports that the bus was carrying 29 unarmed officers dressed in civilian clothes Monday night to Mexico City, where they were to be on leave after 25 straight days on duty in the Pacific resort city of Acapulco.
The commission says the driver pulled over to check a mechanical problem near a toll booth in the state of Morelos. Armed men then boarded the bus, threatened him and the passengers and relieved them of their possessions.
A statement late Thursday says the officers did not resist in order to avoid injuries or loss of life. Authorities are searching for the robbers.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Them that robs now know how it feels to be robbed.
Sunday, May 21, 2017
TRAITORS WITHIN THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION SEEM DETERMINED TO DESTROY THE TRUMP PRESIDENCY … AND THY’RE GETTING HELP FROM THE PRESIDENT HIMSELF
The New York Times and the Washington Post continually receive information damaging to Trump from sources within the President’s administration
BarkGrowlBite
May 21, 2017
There are traitors within the Trump Administration that seem determined to bring the President down. They keep leaking information to The New York Times and the Washington Post, two liberal news organizations that would love to see Trump fall. The leaks are damaging to the President and bring into question his competency as leader of our great nation.
The latest leak to The New York Times involved Trump’s meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister and the Russian Ambassador in the Oval Office on May 10. That meeting took place one day after Trump had fired FBI Director James Comey.
Here is what Trump told the Russian officials about the firing of Comey:
“I just fired the head of the FBI. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
That had to be leaked by someone who was present during the meeting or, more likely, by someone who was not present but had access to the records of that meeting. I have a strong suspicion the leak came from someone in the State Department or from an FBI official.
That leak is very damaging to Trump in two ways. First, the statement carries with it the strong implication that he fired Comey because of the Russian investigation. And by calling Comey “crazy, a real nut job,” he gave the former FBI director every reason to unload on him when he testifies before the Senate Intelligence Committee in the coming days.
Of course Trump doesn’t help his own cause any because his mouth is the mouth that keeps on giving and giving. And the same with his tweets. The Daily Beast reports that one White House official told it that “if he would just shut his trap” there would be nothing for his enemies to talk about. Another administration official said, “Every day he looks more and more like a complete moron.”
The leak about the May 10 Oval Office meeting is but one of a string of damaging leaks given The Times and the Post since Trump took office. The persons responsible for those leaks are traitors to the President and his administration. Those traitors need to be identified, fired and punished to the full extent of the law if any crimes were committed with the leakage.
BarkGrowlBite
May 21, 2017
There are traitors within the Trump Administration that seem determined to bring the President down. They keep leaking information to The New York Times and the Washington Post, two liberal news organizations that would love to see Trump fall. The leaks are damaging to the President and bring into question his competency as leader of our great nation.
The latest leak to The New York Times involved Trump’s meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister and the Russian Ambassador in the Oval Office on May 10. That meeting took place one day after Trump had fired FBI Director James Comey.
Here is what Trump told the Russian officials about the firing of Comey:
“I just fired the head of the FBI. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
That had to be leaked by someone who was present during the meeting or, more likely, by someone who was not present but had access to the records of that meeting. I have a strong suspicion the leak came from someone in the State Department or from an FBI official.
That leak is very damaging to Trump in two ways. First, the statement carries with it the strong implication that he fired Comey because of the Russian investigation. And by calling Comey “crazy, a real nut job,” he gave the former FBI director every reason to unload on him when he testifies before the Senate Intelligence Committee in the coming days.
Of course Trump doesn’t help his own cause any because his mouth is the mouth that keeps on giving and giving. And the same with his tweets. The Daily Beast reports that one White House official told it that “if he would just shut his trap” there would be nothing for his enemies to talk about. Another administration official said, “Every day he looks more and more like a complete moron.”
The leak about the May 10 Oval Office meeting is but one of a string of damaging leaks given The Times and the Post since Trump took office. The persons responsible for those leaks are traitors to the President and his administration. Those traitors need to be identified, fired and punished to the full extent of the law if any crimes were committed with the leakage.
CALIFORNIA ABOUT TO DECRIMINALIZE MOST CRIME IN THE STATE
by Bob Walsh
OK, what we are talking about here is traffic violations and not robberies or rapes. However, from a numerical standpoint it is a LOT of crime. About four million criminal acts per year. The formerly great state of California is moving towards making most traffic offenses civil infractions rather than criminal ones.
One of the results of this act is that, if passed, violators could not be jailed for refusing to show up in court or refusing to pay fines. I suspect this will greatly increase the scoff-law effect. It would also prevent the state from suspending the licenses of those who refuse to pay their fines.
It should be noted that this proposal is being pushed by the judiciary and not by the legislature, which may still go for it in any case. Most of the CA legislature loves criminals and will do everything in their power to make their life easier.
OK, what we are talking about here is traffic violations and not robberies or rapes. However, from a numerical standpoint it is a LOT of crime. About four million criminal acts per year. The formerly great state of California is moving towards making most traffic offenses civil infractions rather than criminal ones.
One of the results of this act is that, if passed, violators could not be jailed for refusing to show up in court or refusing to pay fines. I suspect this will greatly increase the scoff-law effect. It would also prevent the state from suspending the licenses of those who refuse to pay their fines.
It should be noted that this proposal is being pushed by the judiciary and not by the legislature, which may still go for it in any case. Most of the CA legislature loves criminals and will do everything in their power to make their life easier.
WHY I LIKE LAKE TAHOE, CASINO GOONS AND ALL
By Harry Dunne
Last week my lovely bride of 41 years accompanied me to Lake Tahoe for our anniversary. I had contacted my Harrah's Casino Host and negotiated comps versus gambling. Let me state that I enjoy Harrah's Casinos because the old crew is still alive and well at their locations. Harrah's had a junket going to Reno, but it was full so I called my host who paid our airfare and comped our suite at Lake Tahoe. We travel to Lake Tahoe every year and have built up relationships with several of the staff members. I know hosts, craps dealers, slot techs, bartenders and restaurant managers. Everyone is friendly unless you want trouble. Let me explain that. Nobody wants trouble but sometimes behavior invites it.
I earlier referred to the "Old Crew". I can spot them immediately. The bent nose, unusual facial scars and slicked down died black hair usually around fifty to sixty years old. They always wear a black suit, white shirt and usually a dark tie. They wear good quality leather tied shoes and never loafers. They are gentlemen who's job is to make paying guests feel comfortable and deal with trouble. The uniformed security can usually handle a drunk or couples disagreement but if a person is dumb enough to cheat or make money spending patrons feel uncomfortable then a member of the crew will visit them. Members of the crew don't visit with guests. They will assist you with directions or get your host, but they aren't going to have a long conversation with you.
One evening, two drunken trashy women settled down to play a slot machine together. Their total bet on each spin was thirty cents. If they lost, they loudly mother-fucked the slot machine. If they won, they yelled, "Fuck Yeah!" They yelled for the waitress to bring two more "Buttery Nipples". My wife didn't care for their behavior and several other money spending over the age of sixty patrons felt the same way. Then their two prison tattooed boyfriends wearing wife beater shirts and smelling of weed and Old Milwaukee beer arrived. They thought they were bad and pointedly tried to stare people down. I told my wife they would all be gone soon. It was as if they had disappeared by magic. There was no fighting or even loud talking. The crew arrived spoke softly and they were last seen boarding the down escalator to the basement floor. The only thing left was a smoldering cigarette in the ash tray. A housekeeping lady arrived cleaned the slot machine and smiled.
We reserved a car rental for our third day to see the sights. I arrived at the car rental counter to pick up the car and no one was there. I asked the concierge about it and he texted the rental agent who hadn't shown up for work that day. I had reserved a Toyota Corolla because they are affordable and dependable. The agent still didn't show. The concierge came up to me and handed me a set of keys and said, "Take the Tahoe". It was waiting for us in the valet lane. It wasn't free, but we got for the Toyota price and it was nice.
People don't appreciate good service anymore. I seek it out. I gamble. I give the house a shot at my money and Harrah's appreciates it. We still do things the old way. Before we leave we buy thank you cards filled with tips for the host, driver and any housekeeping. Even though Harrah's falls under the umbrella of a much larger corporation, they still keep their name and they continue treat their customers like old friends.
I also noticed that every day at lunch time, state and local cops were eating in the café. As they approached the cashier they were waived off. They thanked the cashier and always left a gratuity.
I assume these would be the same cops that may have to take a missing person's report on a casino patron who disappeared and was never seen or heard from again.
Last week my lovely bride of 41 years accompanied me to Lake Tahoe for our anniversary. I had contacted my Harrah's Casino Host and negotiated comps versus gambling. Let me state that I enjoy Harrah's Casinos because the old crew is still alive and well at their locations. Harrah's had a junket going to Reno, but it was full so I called my host who paid our airfare and comped our suite at Lake Tahoe. We travel to Lake Tahoe every year and have built up relationships with several of the staff members. I know hosts, craps dealers, slot techs, bartenders and restaurant managers. Everyone is friendly unless you want trouble. Let me explain that. Nobody wants trouble but sometimes behavior invites it.
I earlier referred to the "Old Crew". I can spot them immediately. The bent nose, unusual facial scars and slicked down died black hair usually around fifty to sixty years old. They always wear a black suit, white shirt and usually a dark tie. They wear good quality leather tied shoes and never loafers. They are gentlemen who's job is to make paying guests feel comfortable and deal with trouble. The uniformed security can usually handle a drunk or couples disagreement but if a person is dumb enough to cheat or make money spending patrons feel uncomfortable then a member of the crew will visit them. Members of the crew don't visit with guests. They will assist you with directions or get your host, but they aren't going to have a long conversation with you.
One evening, two drunken trashy women settled down to play a slot machine together. Their total bet on each spin was thirty cents. If they lost, they loudly mother-fucked the slot machine. If they won, they yelled, "Fuck Yeah!" They yelled for the waitress to bring two more "Buttery Nipples". My wife didn't care for their behavior and several other money spending over the age of sixty patrons felt the same way. Then their two prison tattooed boyfriends wearing wife beater shirts and smelling of weed and Old Milwaukee beer arrived. They thought they were bad and pointedly tried to stare people down. I told my wife they would all be gone soon. It was as if they had disappeared by magic. There was no fighting or even loud talking. The crew arrived spoke softly and they were last seen boarding the down escalator to the basement floor. The only thing left was a smoldering cigarette in the ash tray. A housekeeping lady arrived cleaned the slot machine and smiled.
We reserved a car rental for our third day to see the sights. I arrived at the car rental counter to pick up the car and no one was there. I asked the concierge about it and he texted the rental agent who hadn't shown up for work that day. I had reserved a Toyota Corolla because they are affordable and dependable. The agent still didn't show. The concierge came up to me and handed me a set of keys and said, "Take the Tahoe". It was waiting for us in the valet lane. It wasn't free, but we got for the Toyota price and it was nice.
People don't appreciate good service anymore. I seek it out. I gamble. I give the house a shot at my money and Harrah's appreciates it. We still do things the old way. Before we leave we buy thank you cards filled with tips for the host, driver and any housekeeping. Even though Harrah's falls under the umbrella of a much larger corporation, they still keep their name and they continue treat their customers like old friends.
I also noticed that every day at lunch time, state and local cops were eating in the café. As they approached the cashier they were waived off. They thanked the cashier and always left a gratuity.
I assume these would be the same cops that may have to take a missing person's report on a casino patron who disappeared and was never seen or heard from again.
OHIO POLICE OFFICER ACCIDENTALLY CONTACTS FENTANYL, OVERDOSES
By Cliff Pinckard
Cleveland.com
May 16, 2017
EAST LIVERPOOL, Ohio -- A police offer who suffered an accidental overdose last weekend after coming into contact with fentanyl during an arrest is recovering, reports say.
East Liverpool patrolman Chris Green nearly died from contact with the drug, requiring four doses of Narcan, WCPO Channel 9 reports.
According to Channel 9, Green pulled over a car on Friday and arrested two men, Justin Buckle, 25, and Cortez Collins, 24. Green noticed put on gloves and a mask after noticing white powder in the car.
However, once he returned to the police station another officer pointed out that Green had powder on his shirt. Green instinctively brushed at the powder while not wearing gloves.
An hour later, Green passed out at the station after contact with the powder.
"One of the officers had to catch him. He started collapsing," Police Chief John Lane tells CBS Pittsburgh.
Emergency workers gave Green a dose of Narcan at the station and three more doses at the hospital.
"This stuff is very dangerous. It takes just the slightest amount. Just like a little granule. Or it gets airborne, you inhale it. It could kill multiple people if it's in the air," Lane tells CBS Pittsburgh.
Green is now recovering at home and will return to work when he feels better, wfmj.com reports. The two suspects have been charged with tampering with evidence, but more charges are expected, Lane tells wfmj.com.
Cleveland.com
May 16, 2017
EAST LIVERPOOL, Ohio -- A police offer who suffered an accidental overdose last weekend after coming into contact with fentanyl during an arrest is recovering, reports say.
East Liverpool patrolman Chris Green nearly died from contact with the drug, requiring four doses of Narcan, WCPO Channel 9 reports.
According to Channel 9, Green pulled over a car on Friday and arrested two men, Justin Buckle, 25, and Cortez Collins, 24. Green noticed put on gloves and a mask after noticing white powder in the car.
However, once he returned to the police station another officer pointed out that Green had powder on his shirt. Green instinctively brushed at the powder while not wearing gloves.
An hour later, Green passed out at the station after contact with the powder.
"One of the officers had to catch him. He started collapsing," Police Chief John Lane tells CBS Pittsburgh.
Emergency workers gave Green a dose of Narcan at the station and three more doses at the hospital.
"This stuff is very dangerous. It takes just the slightest amount. Just like a little granule. Or it gets airborne, you inhale it. It could kill multiple people if it's in the air," Lane tells CBS Pittsburgh.
Green is now recovering at home and will return to work when he feels better, wfmj.com reports. The two suspects have been charged with tampering with evidence, but more charges are expected, Lane tells wfmj.com.
Saturday, May 20, 2017
UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF MARIJUANA, NOT AN ACT OF TERRORISM
Richard Rojas, a U.S. Navy veteran, smoked pot, heard voices and with his car, mowed down 23 pedestrians on Times Square
BarkGrowlBite
May 20, 2017
At noontime Thursday, the usual number of New Yorkers and tourists were walking along the sidewalk on Seventh Avenue in the Times Square area when suddenly they were confronted by a speeding car driving down the sidewalk straight at them. An 18 year-old girl was killed and 22 others were injured. The carnage started at 42nd Street and did not end until Richard Rojas wrecked his car at Broadway and 45th Street.
Rojas,26, served in the U.S. Navy from 2011 until he was kicked out in 2014.
Rojas tested negative for alcohol but told the police he had been smoking marijuana. He also told the cops he was hearing voices.
At first the authorities feared this was an act of terrorism similar to motor vehicle attacks that took place recently in England, France and Germany. It has been determined this was not an act of terrorism, but that it was a nutcase driving under the influence of marijuana.
This incident comes on the heels of a terrible accident near Sacramento on May 10 when a driver high on pot drifted out of his highway lane and killed a father of four.
Then there is the report released last month by the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) and the Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibility which shows that more drivers are being killed under the influence of drugs in highway crashes than under the influence of alcohol, with marijuana involved in more than 1/3rd of the drug-related fatal crashes.
There are some reports that Richard Rojas told the cops the marijuana he smoked was laced with PCP. But the bottom line is that he was high on pot when he mowed down those 23 pedestrians on Times Square.
The pot advocates keep inundating us with hogshit about the marvels of marijuana. When are people going to wake up and accept the fact that marijuana is a very dangerous drug and accordingly, pot should never be legalized!
BarkGrowlBite
May 20, 2017
At noontime Thursday, the usual number of New Yorkers and tourists were walking along the sidewalk on Seventh Avenue in the Times Square area when suddenly they were confronted by a speeding car driving down the sidewalk straight at them. An 18 year-old girl was killed and 22 others were injured. The carnage started at 42nd Street and did not end until Richard Rojas wrecked his car at Broadway and 45th Street.
Rojas,26, served in the U.S. Navy from 2011 until he was kicked out in 2014.
Rojas tested negative for alcohol but told the police he had been smoking marijuana. He also told the cops he was hearing voices.
At first the authorities feared this was an act of terrorism similar to motor vehicle attacks that took place recently in England, France and Germany. It has been determined this was not an act of terrorism, but that it was a nutcase driving under the influence of marijuana.
This incident comes on the heels of a terrible accident near Sacramento on May 10 when a driver high on pot drifted out of his highway lane and killed a father of four.
Then there is the report released last month by the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) and the Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibility which shows that more drivers are being killed under the influence of drugs in highway crashes than under the influence of alcohol, with marijuana involved in more than 1/3rd of the drug-related fatal crashes.
There are some reports that Richard Rojas told the cops the marijuana he smoked was laced with PCP. But the bottom line is that he was high on pot when he mowed down those 23 pedestrians on Times Square.
The pot advocates keep inundating us with hogshit about the marvels of marijuana. When are people going to wake up and accept the fact that marijuana is a very dangerous drug and accordingly, pot should never be legalized!
LA BESTIA: GO IN ALIVE, COME OUT A MUMMY
Every day unaccompanied children take a dangerous ride atop ‘La Bestia’, a freight train, from Mexico’s southern border to the U.S. border
My former police comrade, Jerry Doyle, sent me this excerpt from one of the many books he reads.
From “Tell Me How It Ends”
By Valeria Luiselli
Unaccompanied children from Central America are continually entering the U.S. to escape poverty and violence in their home countries. From April 2014 to August of 2015 it reached crisis proportions when over 100,000 unaccompanied children entered, most fleeing gang violence in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. The journey is fraught with danger -- 80 percent of females who make it are raped, and since 2006 over 120,000 of these migrants have disappeared. If they make it, these children know to immediately seek the U.S. Border Patrol, and soon after they do, a screening process begins:
"The process by which a child is asked questions during the intake interview is called screening. ... A few spaces down [on the intake form], right before the first formal interview question, a line floats across the page like an uncomfortable silence:
“Where is the child's mother? Father?”
"The interviewer has to write down whatever infor¬mation the child can or will give to fill in those blanks¬ -- those two empty spaces that look a bit like badly stitched wounds. Too often, the spaces remain blank: all the chil¬dren come without their fathers and mothers. And many of them do not even know where their parents are. ...
“Why did you come to the United States?” ...
"Their answers vary, but they often point to a single pull factor: reunification with a parent or another close relative who migrated to the U.S. years earlier. Other times, the answers point to push factors -- the unthink¬able circumstances the children are fleeing: extreme vio¬lence, persecution and coercion by gangs, mental and physical abuse, forced labor, neglect, abandonment. It is not even the American Dream that they pursue, but rather the more modest aspiration to wake up from the nightmare into which they were born.
"Then comes question number two in the intake ques¬tionnaire: 'When did you enter the United States?' Most children don't know the exact date. They smile and say 'last year' or 'a few months ago' or simply 'I don't know.' ...
"The third and fourth questions on the intake ques¬tionnaire are ... : 'With whom did you travel to this country?' and 'Did you travel with anyone you knew?' All children travel with a paid coyote. Some of them travel also with siblings, cousins, and friends.
"The fifth and sixth questions are: 'What countries did you pass through?' and 'How did you travel here?' To the first one, almost everyone immediately answers 'Mexico,' and some also list Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. To the question about how they traveled here, with a blend of pride and horror, most say, 'I came on La Bestia,' which literally means 'the beast,' and refers to the freight trains that cross Mexico, on top of which as many as half a million Central American migrants ride annually. There are no passenger services along the routes, so migrants have to ride atop the rail¬cars or in the recesses between them.
"Thousands have died or been gravely injured aboard La Bestia, either because of the frequent derail-ments of the old freight trains or because people fall off during the night. The most minor oversight can be fatal. Some compare La Bestia to a demon, others to a kind of vacuum that sucks distracted riders down into its metal entrails. And when the train itself is not the threat, it's the smugglers, thieves, policemen, or soldiers who frequently threaten, blackmail, or attack the people on board. There is a saying about La Bestia: Go in alive, come out a mummy.
"But, despite the dangers, people continue to take the risk. Children certainly take the risk. Children do what their stomachs tell them to do. They don't think twice when they have to chase a moving train. They run along with it, reach for any metal bar at hand, and fling themselves toward whichever half-stable surface they may land on. Children chase after life, even if that chase might end up killing them. Children run and flee. They have an instinct for survival, perhaps, that allows them to endure almost anything just to make it to the other side of horror, whatever may be waiting there for them."
My former police comrade, Jerry Doyle, sent me this excerpt from one of the many books he reads.
From “Tell Me How It Ends”
By Valeria Luiselli
Unaccompanied children from Central America are continually entering the U.S. to escape poverty and violence in their home countries. From April 2014 to August of 2015 it reached crisis proportions when over 100,000 unaccompanied children entered, most fleeing gang violence in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. The journey is fraught with danger -- 80 percent of females who make it are raped, and since 2006 over 120,000 of these migrants have disappeared. If they make it, these children know to immediately seek the U.S. Border Patrol, and soon after they do, a screening process begins:
"The process by which a child is asked questions during the intake interview is called screening. ... A few spaces down [on the intake form], right before the first formal interview question, a line floats across the page like an uncomfortable silence:
“Where is the child's mother? Father?”
"The interviewer has to write down whatever infor¬mation the child can or will give to fill in those blanks¬ -- those two empty spaces that look a bit like badly stitched wounds. Too often, the spaces remain blank: all the chil¬dren come without their fathers and mothers. And many of them do not even know where their parents are. ...
“Why did you come to the United States?” ...
"Their answers vary, but they often point to a single pull factor: reunification with a parent or another close relative who migrated to the U.S. years earlier. Other times, the answers point to push factors -- the unthink¬able circumstances the children are fleeing: extreme vio¬lence, persecution and coercion by gangs, mental and physical abuse, forced labor, neglect, abandonment. It is not even the American Dream that they pursue, but rather the more modest aspiration to wake up from the nightmare into which they were born.
"Then comes question number two in the intake ques¬tionnaire: 'When did you enter the United States?' Most children don't know the exact date. They smile and say 'last year' or 'a few months ago' or simply 'I don't know.' ...
"The third and fourth questions on the intake ques¬tionnaire are ... : 'With whom did you travel to this country?' and 'Did you travel with anyone you knew?' All children travel with a paid coyote. Some of them travel also with siblings, cousins, and friends.
"The fifth and sixth questions are: 'What countries did you pass through?' and 'How did you travel here?' To the first one, almost everyone immediately answers 'Mexico,' and some also list Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. To the question about how they traveled here, with a blend of pride and horror, most say, 'I came on La Bestia,' which literally means 'the beast,' and refers to the freight trains that cross Mexico, on top of which as many as half a million Central American migrants ride annually. There are no passenger services along the routes, so migrants have to ride atop the rail¬cars or in the recesses between them.
"Thousands have died or been gravely injured aboard La Bestia, either because of the frequent derail-ments of the old freight trains or because people fall off during the night. The most minor oversight can be fatal. Some compare La Bestia to a demon, others to a kind of vacuum that sucks distracted riders down into its metal entrails. And when the train itself is not the threat, it's the smugglers, thieves, policemen, or soldiers who frequently threaten, blackmail, or attack the people on board. There is a saying about La Bestia: Go in alive, come out a mummy.
"But, despite the dangers, people continue to take the risk. Children certainly take the risk. Children do what their stomachs tell them to do. They don't think twice when they have to chase a moving train. They run along with it, reach for any metal bar at hand, and fling themselves toward whichever half-stable surface they may land on. Children chase after life, even if that chase might end up killing them. Children run and flee. They have an instinct for survival, perhaps, that allows them to endure almost anything just to make it to the other side of horror, whatever may be waiting there for them."
THE ‘NARCOSTATE’
30 Mexican governors have been accused of working with and for the drug cartels
By José Gil Olmos
Proceso
May 12, 2017
CIUDAD DE MÉXICO -- It has been three decades, starting from Salinas to be more precise, in Mexico that the gestation occurred as what we know today as the Narcostate or the Statenarco. In this form of Government, organized crime and authorities have merged into one with the deadly consequences we now face; journalists executed, thousands of deaths and disappearances, rampant violence, delinquent Governors, covert parties, participant society, impunity, and a President of the complicit in acquiescence or direct participation.
I am starting from the fact that, from the Salinas Government, this form of co-government began to take shape due to the case of this brother Raul Salinas, who was accused of using the Conasupo networks for drug distribution, although he was jailed for other crimes.
But before this government had already presented some symptoms of overlap between authorities and drug trafficking, as was evident at the ranch "El Bufalo" in Chihuahua. Nevertheless, in Salinas term the signs of the Narcostate were seen.
In three decades, the breakdown of the political class and corruption have crept to the highest levels, leading 30 Governors from different parties to be accused of having links to organized crime, engaging in corruption, creating cover ups of criminal networks, carrying out illegal business, diverting resources and receiving dirty money for their campaigns from different criminal organizations.
Cases such as that of the PRI's Tomas Yarrington and Eugenio Hernandez in Tamaulipas, Mario Villanueva Madrid in Quintana Roo, Fausto Vallejo in Michoacan, Angel Aguirre Rivero in Guerrero and Sergio EStrada Cajgal in Morelos, are some clear examples of how the Narcostate is already a reality.
In that Narcostate, organized crime is the one that governs and controls the territory. Nothing that happens there escapes its power, including the exercise of freedom of expression. Eight journalists have been killed so far this year, including Javier Valdez. It is no coincidence that in states in Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Guerrero, Sinaloa, Michoacan and Chihuahua are where the most cases of murders, threats and persecution of reporters are recorded.
All authorities are involved with the criminal groups where they collude with organized crime. The armed forces do not escape the corrupting power that buys wills with enormous amounts of money to ensure impunity in the distribution and sale of drugs, as well as in the business of kidnapping , extortion, people and arms trafficking.
But in the Narcostate all participate directly or indirectly. Many times the broad sectors of society are accomplice and are part of the networks or grassroots support community that are generated by necessity, by force or by interest around the different criminal groups as has happened clearly in Michoacan, Guerrero, Tamaullipas, Veracruz and State of Mexico.
On other occasions, the society itself has normalized the presence and the violent action of these groups before the impossibility to protest or make a complaint. How can one turn to an authority that is corrupted or is part of the criminal group that governs the municipality or state?
This situation will be a priority for whomever wants to be President in 2018. The expansion of areas controlled by organized crime grows every day, the addict population in Mexico exceeds six million, according to the latest statistics of 2011; the number of journalists killed or disappeared increases day by day, the number of murders in this sexenio has shot up by 600% and there are more than 350,000 displaced from their homes by violence.
Despite the seriousness of the situation, the issue is not on the agenda of any of the presidential hopefuls. None of them speak about organized crime, less of the Narcostate and its consequences. It is a thorny subject that they evade, but whomever wins the election will have to face it.
By José Gil Olmos
Proceso
May 12, 2017
CIUDAD DE MÉXICO -- It has been three decades, starting from Salinas to be more precise, in Mexico that the gestation occurred as what we know today as the Narcostate or the Statenarco. In this form of Government, organized crime and authorities have merged into one with the deadly consequences we now face; journalists executed, thousands of deaths and disappearances, rampant violence, delinquent Governors, covert parties, participant society, impunity, and a President of the complicit in acquiescence or direct participation.
I am starting from the fact that, from the Salinas Government, this form of co-government began to take shape due to the case of this brother Raul Salinas, who was accused of using the Conasupo networks for drug distribution, although he was jailed for other crimes.
But before this government had already presented some symptoms of overlap between authorities and drug trafficking, as was evident at the ranch "El Bufalo" in Chihuahua. Nevertheless, in Salinas term the signs of the Narcostate were seen.
In three decades, the breakdown of the political class and corruption have crept to the highest levels, leading 30 Governors from different parties to be accused of having links to organized crime, engaging in corruption, creating cover ups of criminal networks, carrying out illegal business, diverting resources and receiving dirty money for their campaigns from different criminal organizations.
Cases such as that of the PRI's Tomas Yarrington and Eugenio Hernandez in Tamaulipas, Mario Villanueva Madrid in Quintana Roo, Fausto Vallejo in Michoacan, Angel Aguirre Rivero in Guerrero and Sergio EStrada Cajgal in Morelos, are some clear examples of how the Narcostate is already a reality.
In that Narcostate, organized crime is the one that governs and controls the territory. Nothing that happens there escapes its power, including the exercise of freedom of expression. Eight journalists have been killed so far this year, including Javier Valdez. It is no coincidence that in states in Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Guerrero, Sinaloa, Michoacan and Chihuahua are where the most cases of murders, threats and persecution of reporters are recorded.
All authorities are involved with the criminal groups where they collude with organized crime. The armed forces do not escape the corrupting power that buys wills with enormous amounts of money to ensure impunity in the distribution and sale of drugs, as well as in the business of kidnapping , extortion, people and arms trafficking.
But in the Narcostate all participate directly or indirectly. Many times the broad sectors of society are accomplice and are part of the networks or grassroots support community that are generated by necessity, by force or by interest around the different criminal groups as has happened clearly in Michoacan, Guerrero, Tamaullipas, Veracruz and State of Mexico.
On other occasions, the society itself has normalized the presence and the violent action of these groups before the impossibility to protest or make a complaint. How can one turn to an authority that is corrupted or is part of the criminal group that governs the municipality or state?
This situation will be a priority for whomever wants to be President in 2018. The expansion of areas controlled by organized crime grows every day, the addict population in Mexico exceeds six million, according to the latest statistics of 2011; the number of journalists killed or disappeared increases day by day, the number of murders in this sexenio has shot up by 600% and there are more than 350,000 displaced from their homes by violence.
Despite the seriousness of the situation, the issue is not on the agenda of any of the presidential hopefuls. None of them speak about organized crime, less of the Narcostate and its consequences. It is a thorny subject that they evade, but whomever wins the election will have to face it.
Friday, May 19, 2017
PRESIDENT OF HONDURAS SUPERVISES TRANSFER OF MS-13 GANG MEMBERS FROM LUXURY CELLS TO A MAX PRISON WITH NO AMENITIES
Inside the 'luxury' Honduras prison where notorious MS-13 gang members were allowed to play video games on 52-inch TVs inbetween visits to the 'Kamasutra' sex room
By Gareth Davies
Daily Mail
May 18, 2017
The luxury Honduras prison where notorious MS-13 gang members were allowed to play video games on 52-inch TVs and take advantage of a sex room have been unveiled.
A transfer of hundreds of members of organised crime gangs from an overcrowded jail to a new maximum security prison has unearthed details of the pampered lifestyles they have left behind.
A total of 773 gang members have been moved from a prison in Tamara, near the Honduran capital city of Tegucigalpa, to the new El Pozo 2 jail in La Tova in the western Honduran department of El Paraiso.
The designer flat-like cells were kitted out with air conditioning, colour-coordinated furniture, food blenders, coffee machines and well-stocked fridge-freezers.
Some of the inmates even had access to a special comfort room with mirrors and ambient lighting, dubbed the Kamasutra, for conjugal visits with their wives and girlfriends.
Entering the Kamasutra was reportedly a privilege for gang leaders and other senior gang members who earned the right through carrying out crimes for their bosses.
And, when they could not enjoy the pleasures of female company, the inmates organised computer game tournaments to keep themselves amused behind bars.
All the prisoners are believed to be members of the notorious Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Barrio 18 gangs in Honduras which is regarded as one the most dangerous countries in the world.
Hondurans were shocked when pictures of the conditions they had enjoyed at the severely overcrowded Marco Aurelio Soto prison were posted on social media.
They included photos of nicely-decorated cells with games consoles where prisoners were allowed to play top games including FIFA and Grand Theft Auto.
In one room, wall decorations included a mirror framed in the shape of a snake in the shape of the number 18 to denote the Barrio 18 gang.
Pictures on the walls included former, mostly dead, gang leaders.
The gang members were transferred to their new maximum security prison under a heavy security escort supervised by the President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez.
Prisons in Honduras are notorious hotbeds of gang activity, with fights, extortion, drug deals and killings common in the country’s overcrowded facilities.
Having swelled to 20,000 members in just two decades the MS-13 gang has gained notoriety for the brutal way members eliminate their enemies.
The group was started nearly 20 years ago in Los Angeles after millions of immigrants from El Salvador came to the United States after a violent civil war left over 100,000 dead.
The mob's habit butchering victims with machetes and shooting rival gang members in the head points to a chaotic and scatter-gun approach, but there is a level of sophistication behind their operations in the US.
It has been revealed MS-13 is organized around five separate ranks, with secret coded messages shared every day on social media in a complex chain of command ruled by chiefs in El Salvador.
Foot soldiers for the gang must seek permission, sometimes from head honchos inside prison, to carry out executions.
But despite the business-like organization of the group, there is not always big money at stake - members must pay as little as $10 to join in the first place.
The gang has since spread all over the country, and are known widely as the best killers - due to their exceedingly brutal weapon of choice, a machete.
They have clashed regularly with the Barrio 18 firm both inside and out of prison.
The MS-13's rivals also go by the name of the 18th Street Gang, because it started in the 1960s near 18th Street in LA's Rampart District.
EDITOR’S NOTE: MS-13, LA’s gift to Honduras.
By Gareth Davies
Daily Mail
May 18, 2017
The luxury Honduras prison where notorious MS-13 gang members were allowed to play video games on 52-inch TVs and take advantage of a sex room have been unveiled.
A transfer of hundreds of members of organised crime gangs from an overcrowded jail to a new maximum security prison has unearthed details of the pampered lifestyles they have left behind.
A total of 773 gang members have been moved from a prison in Tamara, near the Honduran capital city of Tegucigalpa, to the new El Pozo 2 jail in La Tova in the western Honduran department of El Paraiso.
The designer flat-like cells were kitted out with air conditioning, colour-coordinated furniture, food blenders, coffee machines and well-stocked fridge-freezers.
Some of the inmates even had access to a special comfort room with mirrors and ambient lighting, dubbed the Kamasutra, for conjugal visits with their wives and girlfriends.
Entering the Kamasutra was reportedly a privilege for gang leaders and other senior gang members who earned the right through carrying out crimes for their bosses.
And, when they could not enjoy the pleasures of female company, the inmates organised computer game tournaments to keep themselves amused behind bars.
All the prisoners are believed to be members of the notorious Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Barrio 18 gangs in Honduras which is regarded as one the most dangerous countries in the world.
Hondurans were shocked when pictures of the conditions they had enjoyed at the severely overcrowded Marco Aurelio Soto prison were posted on social media.
They included photos of nicely-decorated cells with games consoles where prisoners were allowed to play top games including FIFA and Grand Theft Auto.
In one room, wall decorations included a mirror framed in the shape of a snake in the shape of the number 18 to denote the Barrio 18 gang.
Pictures on the walls included former, mostly dead, gang leaders.
The gang members were transferred to their new maximum security prison under a heavy security escort supervised by the President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez.
Prisons in Honduras are notorious hotbeds of gang activity, with fights, extortion, drug deals and killings common in the country’s overcrowded facilities.
Having swelled to 20,000 members in just two decades the MS-13 gang has gained notoriety for the brutal way members eliminate their enemies.
The group was started nearly 20 years ago in Los Angeles after millions of immigrants from El Salvador came to the United States after a violent civil war left over 100,000 dead.
The mob's habit butchering victims with machetes and shooting rival gang members in the head points to a chaotic and scatter-gun approach, but there is a level of sophistication behind their operations in the US.
It has been revealed MS-13 is organized around five separate ranks, with secret coded messages shared every day on social media in a complex chain of command ruled by chiefs in El Salvador.
Foot soldiers for the gang must seek permission, sometimes from head honchos inside prison, to carry out executions.
But despite the business-like organization of the group, there is not always big money at stake - members must pay as little as $10 to join in the first place.
The gang has since spread all over the country, and are known widely as the best killers - due to their exceedingly brutal weapon of choice, a machete.
They have clashed regularly with the Barrio 18 firm both inside and out of prison.
The MS-13's rivals also go by the name of the 18th Street Gang, because it started in the 1960s near 18th Street in LA's Rampart District.
EDITOR’S NOTE: MS-13, LA’s gift to Honduras.
SICARIOS WOUND A LOS ZETAS LEADER KILLED BY THE MEXICAN ARMY IN 2010
El Sonrics of Los Zetas was killed in 2010, now turns up alive and shot
By Hector Castro
El Norte
May 18, 2017
Monterrey, México -- The shootout that occurred yesterday in the Cumbres Elite Colonia left an unusual casualty, it was reported that among the two injured was a man that in 2010 was reported killed by the army.
Miguel Abrego Nava, 42 years old, alias "El Sonrics", identified previously as a cell leader of Los Zetas in the south of the State.
Even though military sources signalled that on the 14th of August of 2010 that Abrego, who was one of the jefes that had the nickname "El Sonrics" had been killed with another three jefes in the Caracol Colonia, his name was included yesterday on the list of wounded in Cumbres.
He had been identified as the leader of Los Zetas in San Pedro since 2008. It is reported that the other person wounded yesterday was Eduardo Misael Martinez Rivera, 43 years old, an ex Judicial Police agent from Michoacan.
The attack was around 16:10 on the Cumbres Elite Avenue, between Cumbres de Himalaya and Cumbres de los Andes, in the first sector of Cumbres Elite Colonia, when a pick up that they were driving was shot at by sicarios that shot more than 60 rounds at the car.
Abrego was reported with bullet wounds in the Thorax, legs, and abdomen, meanwhile his accomplice had wounds to the Thorax. Abrego and his accomplice were ambushed by gunmen that were in a car and an Explorer.
Of the more than 60 shots that were fired, 29 hit the windshield of the Ranger and 10 hit the vehicle bodywork.
Despite the number of shots, which were fired in a busy Avenue of a residential sector, and one house had its windows shot out, there were no reports of any injuries outside of the criminals.
Abrego and his companion were aided by aided by Red Cross medics, who transferred them to the University Hospital, where they were last night reported as stable. At the scene of the attack were .223 calibre cartridge cases, used by AR-15 rifles as well as 9mm cartridge cases.
The public record of Abrego dates back to May 25th of 1998, when he was accused of carrying out an execution at a restaurant El Rey de Cabrito, as a debt for a cargo of cocaine.
By Hector Castro
El Norte
May 18, 2017
Monterrey, México -- The shootout that occurred yesterday in the Cumbres Elite Colonia left an unusual casualty, it was reported that among the two injured was a man that in 2010 was reported killed by the army.
Miguel Abrego Nava, 42 years old, alias "El Sonrics", identified previously as a cell leader of Los Zetas in the south of the State.
Even though military sources signalled that on the 14th of August of 2010 that Abrego, who was one of the jefes that had the nickname "El Sonrics" had been killed with another three jefes in the Caracol Colonia, his name was included yesterday on the list of wounded in Cumbres.
He had been identified as the leader of Los Zetas in San Pedro since 2008. It is reported that the other person wounded yesterday was Eduardo Misael Martinez Rivera, 43 years old, an ex Judicial Police agent from Michoacan.
The attack was around 16:10 on the Cumbres Elite Avenue, between Cumbres de Himalaya and Cumbres de los Andes, in the first sector of Cumbres Elite Colonia, when a pick up that they were driving was shot at by sicarios that shot more than 60 rounds at the car.
Abrego was reported with bullet wounds in the Thorax, legs, and abdomen, meanwhile his accomplice had wounds to the Thorax. Abrego and his accomplice were ambushed by gunmen that were in a car and an Explorer.
Of the more than 60 shots that were fired, 29 hit the windshield of the Ranger and 10 hit the vehicle bodywork.
Despite the number of shots, which were fired in a busy Avenue of a residential sector, and one house had its windows shot out, there were no reports of any injuries outside of the criminals.
Abrego and his companion were aided by aided by Red Cross medics, who transferred them to the University Hospital, where they were last night reported as stable. At the scene of the attack were .223 calibre cartridge cases, used by AR-15 rifles as well as 9mm cartridge cases.
The public record of Abrego dates back to May 25th of 1998, when he was accused of carrying out an execution at a restaurant El Rey de Cabrito, as a debt for a cargo of cocaine.
SHOULD A 14-YEAR-OLD BOY HAVE TO REGISTER AS A SEX OFFENDER FOR FUCKING HIS 12-YEAR-OLD GIRL FRIEND?
14-year-old could face life as sex offender for sex with 12-year-old girlfriend
By Brian Rogers
Houston Chronicle
May 18, 2017
A 14-year-old junior high student is facing the possibility of life as a registered sex offender after being arrested for having sex with his 12-year-old girlfriend, according to his attorney.
The teen, who was in seventh grade, is charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child. His girlfriend was a sixth-grader at the time.
"He had consensual sex with his little girlfriend and he loved her. They were boyfriend-girlfriend," the teen's mother told the Chronicle. "And because he turned 14, they want to make him a sex offender, put him on the registry with pedophiles and child molesters—really sick and dangerous people."
The law carves out a defense for juveniles having consensual sex with someone within three years of their age, sometimes called a "Romeo and Juliet" rule, which would allow a 17-year-old to legally have sex with a 14-year-old.
But in Texas that does not apply if one of the parties is under 14.
"The idea that a 14-year-old who has sex with a person just a little bit younger then him or her would be treated as the worst of the worst in our society and placed on the sex offender registry
is really sick," said the teen's attorney, Joseph Gutheinz. He spoke about the case on the condition that his client not be identified.
The Harris County District Attorney's Office did not return calls for comment.
The case illustrates the gray area of criminal responsibility for teens having sex before they are legally able to consent at the age of 17.
Gutheinz said the injustice is that the same 14-year-old who is now a defendant, would not have been charged if the teens were the same age. And he would be considered the victim if the other person was 18 or older, he said.
"If he has sex with someone who is younger by just days but is still 13 years old, he could be charged with one of the most serious offenses we have," he said. "It just blows my mind."
He said the discrepancy thwarts the intent of the law.
"It defeats the whole purpose of the Romeo and Juliet defense where you have two people relatively close in age and maturity," he said. "You would think the law would be more sympathetic as you go younger, because both parties are immature."
The teen's mother said her family "is going through hell."
"Because he was 14 by two months, they want to ruin his life," she said. "What kind of life is he going to have if he's a sex offender?"
Experts said charges being filed for a consensual sexual relationship between minors is not unusual in Harris County, even for teens and tweens.
"I had that exact fact pattern that I fought for a year," said Jackie Stewart Gravois, an attorney with the Harris County Public Defender's Office. "They ended up dismissing it because, ultimately, everyone agreed it was a consensual act."
In her case, the two students were also in junior high and he was 14 and she was 12. After prosecutors were assured that there was no violence or threat of force, it was dismissed.
She said similar cases seem to be on the rise over the past few years.
Gravois was not familiar with the teen's legal battle and spoke generally about those types of cases.
"Usually, if the prosecutors can prove that it was consensual and it was not forced in any way, they typically don't file these cases or they end up dismissing them," she said. "That's going to be up to the discretion of the prosecutor."
She noted that Harris County's juvenile judges have wide discretion over whether a teen will have to register as a sex offender.
"Very rarely do the juvenile judges in Harris County force anyone to register," she said. "They usually delay it and send them to sex offender treatment and then make a decision."
Jay Jenkins, an attorney for the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, which is pushing to raise the age of criminal responsibility in Texas, has studied prosecution disparities because of age.
He said he is aware of several criminal cases filed against Houston teens accused of having sex with tweens.
"That's the arbitrary nature of our sexual offense laws," he said. "There's very little rationality to those laws."
EDITOR’S NOTE: These two are too immature to be in love like a couple of adults, but he was hot, got her hot, and they went on to trot. For that he should face charges and possibly have to register as a sex offender? Come on, give me a break!
By Brian Rogers
Houston Chronicle
May 18, 2017
A 14-year-old junior high student is facing the possibility of life as a registered sex offender after being arrested for having sex with his 12-year-old girlfriend, according to his attorney.
The teen, who was in seventh grade, is charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child. His girlfriend was a sixth-grader at the time.
"He had consensual sex with his little girlfriend and he loved her. They were boyfriend-girlfriend," the teen's mother told the Chronicle. "And because he turned 14, they want to make him a sex offender, put him on the registry with pedophiles and child molesters—really sick and dangerous people."
The law carves out a defense for juveniles having consensual sex with someone within three years of their age, sometimes called a "Romeo and Juliet" rule, which would allow a 17-year-old to legally have sex with a 14-year-old.
But in Texas that does not apply if one of the parties is under 14.
"The idea that a 14-year-old who has sex with a person just a little bit younger then him or her would be treated as the worst of the worst in our society and placed on the sex offender registry
is really sick," said the teen's attorney, Joseph Gutheinz. He spoke about the case on the condition that his client not be identified.
The Harris County District Attorney's Office did not return calls for comment.
The case illustrates the gray area of criminal responsibility for teens having sex before they are legally able to consent at the age of 17.
Gutheinz said the injustice is that the same 14-year-old who is now a defendant, would not have been charged if the teens were the same age. And he would be considered the victim if the other person was 18 or older, he said.
"If he has sex with someone who is younger by just days but is still 13 years old, he could be charged with one of the most serious offenses we have," he said. "It just blows my mind."
He said the discrepancy thwarts the intent of the law.
"It defeats the whole purpose of the Romeo and Juliet defense where you have two people relatively close in age and maturity," he said. "You would think the law would be more sympathetic as you go younger, because both parties are immature."
The teen's mother said her family "is going through hell."
"Because he was 14 by two months, they want to ruin his life," she said. "What kind of life is he going to have if he's a sex offender?"
Experts said charges being filed for a consensual sexual relationship between minors is not unusual in Harris County, even for teens and tweens.
"I had that exact fact pattern that I fought for a year," said Jackie Stewart Gravois, an attorney with the Harris County Public Defender's Office. "They ended up dismissing it because, ultimately, everyone agreed it was a consensual act."
In her case, the two students were also in junior high and he was 14 and she was 12. After prosecutors were assured that there was no violence or threat of force, it was dismissed.
She said similar cases seem to be on the rise over the past few years.
Gravois was not familiar with the teen's legal battle and spoke generally about those types of cases.
"Usually, if the prosecutors can prove that it was consensual and it was not forced in any way, they typically don't file these cases or they end up dismissing them," she said. "That's going to be up to the discretion of the prosecutor."
She noted that Harris County's juvenile judges have wide discretion over whether a teen will have to register as a sex offender.
"Very rarely do the juvenile judges in Harris County force anyone to register," she said. "They usually delay it and send them to sex offender treatment and then make a decision."
Jay Jenkins, an attorney for the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, which is pushing to raise the age of criminal responsibility in Texas, has studied prosecution disparities because of age.
He said he is aware of several criminal cases filed against Houston teens accused of having sex with tweens.
"That's the arbitrary nature of our sexual offense laws," he said. "There's very little rationality to those laws."
EDITOR’S NOTE: These two are too immature to be in love like a couple of adults, but he was hot, got her hot, and they went on to trot. For that he should face charges and possibly have to register as a sex offender? Come on, give me a break!
WHAT HAPPENS TO KIDS ON THE SEX OFFENDERS’ REGISTRY?
The sex offenders’ registry results in harassment and death threats, and is a sure job killer
Daily Mail
May 18, 2017
Harris County, Texas prosecutors may choose not to pursue a case of 'sexual assault' between two juveniles if they feel violence or coercion were not involved, according to public attorney Jackie Stewart Gravois.
But others in the state of Texas are not so lucky. Josh Gravens is one of them.
In an interview with The Texas Observer in 2012, he told how he and his sister had touched one another intimately twice in 1999, when he was 12 and she was eight.
That came after his own sexual abuse at the hands of a female babysitter and her two male friends, he said.
'I was sexually confused, and it started to play out with my sister ... Like, where my body part touched her body part. It was never penetrative.
'Obviously, it couldn't have been what they call consensual, but it was playing.'
A Christian counselling center told his mom she had to contact the police. She didn't want to press charges, so the state took up prosecution.
Gravens, now aged 30, admitted all of the claims against him at the time. 'I thought it was so important that I never call my sister a liar,' he said.
In a lot of cases, he says, the victim is called a liar 'and has to deal with it later on. I never wanted that to happen to my sister.'
He was then put on the sex offenders' registry until 2021.
That notes down everything from the person's current appearance - if Josh grows a beard or gets a haircut he needs to file a new picture - to their shoe sizes.
Registered offenders can be subject to random police checks at their home. They cannot vote. Juveniles can be refused access to school education.
Gravens was aged 13 when he was told he would be placed in the Texas Youth Commission (TYC) for three years.
There, he said, he would be beaten up because of his age and the nature of his crime, while the guards turned a blind eye.
After being released aged 16, he joined high school. Everything went well - he was named 'friendliest boy' - until a local newspaper did a report on sex offenders.
He was shunned by his former friends and even teachers.
The same thing happened - but worse - when he went to college to study political science.
After a TV news report on local registered offenders, he began to receive death threats and was chased by a truck full of men throwing bottles at him.
He dropped out, aged 19, and worked on a construction crew until he was let go for his own safety.
'Multiple people had said they planned on throwing me out of the tower,' he explained.
He then got a job traveling around the country, working on wind farms, until he forgot to register while working in Washington state for a month.
As a registered offender, he needs to register in any county that he stays in for more than a week.
He spent 13 days in jail, was fined $2,000 and spent $6,000 on a lawyer to get him out.
Gravens also lost his job, because his parole officer told him he didn't have to tell his new employers about his status, because his case was adjudicated, so technically he was never convicted of a felony.
He got married and bought a pizza restaurant in Witchita Falls, but decided to commute from another county because he didn't want to have to register as a sex offender where his business was.
The police found out; he was fined again and lost his business.
The local prosecutor considered sending him to jail for eight years, while he was expecting his first child.
He was spared that when his sister wrote a letter to the judge asking for clemency.
As of 2012, he was working in Plano, Texas, and considering going back to college. He still lives in the state.
Josh told The Texas Observer that his faith and the 'strong support' of his family had kept him going through his trials. But he knows many don't have either.
'I've never had thoughts of suicide,' he said. 'But if any person were weaker than me, mentally or whatnot, it would crush them.'
Daily Mail
May 18, 2017
Harris County, Texas prosecutors may choose not to pursue a case of 'sexual assault' between two juveniles if they feel violence or coercion were not involved, according to public attorney Jackie Stewart Gravois.
But others in the state of Texas are not so lucky. Josh Gravens is one of them.
In an interview with The Texas Observer in 2012, he told how he and his sister had touched one another intimately twice in 1999, when he was 12 and she was eight.
That came after his own sexual abuse at the hands of a female babysitter and her two male friends, he said.
'I was sexually confused, and it started to play out with my sister ... Like, where my body part touched her body part. It was never penetrative.
'Obviously, it couldn't have been what they call consensual, but it was playing.'
A Christian counselling center told his mom she had to contact the police. She didn't want to press charges, so the state took up prosecution.
Gravens, now aged 30, admitted all of the claims against him at the time. 'I thought it was so important that I never call my sister a liar,' he said.
In a lot of cases, he says, the victim is called a liar 'and has to deal with it later on. I never wanted that to happen to my sister.'
He was then put on the sex offenders' registry until 2021.
That notes down everything from the person's current appearance - if Josh grows a beard or gets a haircut he needs to file a new picture - to their shoe sizes.
Registered offenders can be subject to random police checks at their home. They cannot vote. Juveniles can be refused access to school education.
Gravens was aged 13 when he was told he would be placed in the Texas Youth Commission (TYC) for three years.
There, he said, he would be beaten up because of his age and the nature of his crime, while the guards turned a blind eye.
After being released aged 16, he joined high school. Everything went well - he was named 'friendliest boy' - until a local newspaper did a report on sex offenders.
He was shunned by his former friends and even teachers.
The same thing happened - but worse - when he went to college to study political science.
After a TV news report on local registered offenders, he began to receive death threats and was chased by a truck full of men throwing bottles at him.
He dropped out, aged 19, and worked on a construction crew until he was let go for his own safety.
'Multiple people had said they planned on throwing me out of the tower,' he explained.
He then got a job traveling around the country, working on wind farms, until he forgot to register while working in Washington state for a month.
As a registered offender, he needs to register in any county that he stays in for more than a week.
He spent 13 days in jail, was fined $2,000 and spent $6,000 on a lawyer to get him out.
Gravens also lost his job, because his parole officer told him he didn't have to tell his new employers about his status, because his case was adjudicated, so technically he was never convicted of a felony.
He got married and bought a pizza restaurant in Witchita Falls, but decided to commute from another county because he didn't want to have to register as a sex offender where his business was.
The police found out; he was fined again and lost his business.
The local prosecutor considered sending him to jail for eight years, while he was expecting his first child.
He was spared that when his sister wrote a letter to the judge asking for clemency.
As of 2012, he was working in Plano, Texas, and considering going back to college. He still lives in the state.
Josh told The Texas Observer that his faith and the 'strong support' of his family had kept him going through his trials. But he knows many don't have either.
'I've never had thoughts of suicide,' he said. 'But if any person were weaker than me, mentally or whatnot, it would crush them.'
Thursday, May 18, 2017
GET RID OF ALL STATUES AND RENAME ALL SCHOLLS THAT HONOR GEORGE WASHINGTON, THOMAS JEFFERSON AND THE OTHER 11 SLAVE-OWNER PRESIDENTS
If the Southern vestiges of slavery, which to civil rights activists represents racism at its worst, must be erased from history, then it stands to reason so must our 13 slave-owner presidents
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Politics
May 16, 2017
Ever since the 2015 mass-murder by a white supremacist of nine black worshipers in a Charleston, South Carolina church, there has been a move by civil rights activists to remove all statues of Confederate war heroes sitting on public grounds and to rename all schools that are named in honor of those men. So far at least 60 statues have been removed and schools renamed.
Four Confederate monuments have been designated for removal in New Orleans. An obelisk honoring an 1874 uprising against Reconstruction by whites in New Orleans, was taken down on April 24 by workers wearing flak jackets and scarves to conceal their identities. The statue of Jefferson Davis was recently removed in the middle of the night. Statues of Confederate generals, P. G. T. Beauregard and Robert E. Lee are next on the chopping block.
Those clamoring for the removal of statues and the renaming of schools and parks say that symbols of the Confederacy and slavery are a painful reminder to blacks of white supremacy.
The latest effort to erase or rewrite history is taking place in Charlottesville, Virginia where the city fathers want to remove a statue of Robert E. Lee astride a horse.
The Houston Independent School District Board of Trustees has ordered that the names of seven schools be changed to erase the names of Confederate heroes, including Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson. And how much is that going to cost? $1.2 million taxpayer dollars. That’s $1.2 million so that some blacks won’t be painfully reminded of white supremacy
But why stop with Confederate heroes? If slavery represents racism at its worst, then we should tear down the statues of all slave owners and change the names of schools that bear their names. How about starting with George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, two large slave owners? And there are 11 other presidents that were slave owners who have either statues sitting somewhere on public grounds or schools named after them.
In addition to Washington and Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James K. Polk, Zachary Taylor, James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant were American presidents who were slave owners. Down with their statues! Get their damn names off those school buildings!
Think I’m kidding? George Washington Elementary School in New Orleans is being renamed for Dr. Charles Richard Drew, a prominent black surgeon.
We are seeing political correctness at its worst. Sure slavery was a dark part of our history. But history is what it is and it should not be erased or rewritten. That’s something Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Kim Il Sung did.
I venture to say the majority of blacks in New Orleans don’t have the foggiest idea of who Jefferson Davis and P. G. T. Beauregard were. They probably see their statues as nothing more than repositories for pigeon poop.
And what about those seven Houston schools? Here again, most blacks have no idea who the people they are named after were. I don’t live in the Houston school district, but if I did, I would strongly resent $1.2 million of my tax dollars being wasted to placate a few rabble rousers.
That’s right, a few rabble rousers. I’m willing to bet that the overwhelming majority of blacks are not painfully reminded of slavery and white supremacy whenever they see a statue of Robert E. Lee or “Stonewall” Jackson, or whenever they see their names engraved on school buildings.
By Howie Katz
Big Jolly Politics
May 16, 2017
Ever since the 2015 mass-murder by a white supremacist of nine black worshipers in a Charleston, South Carolina church, there has been a move by civil rights activists to remove all statues of Confederate war heroes sitting on public grounds and to rename all schools that are named in honor of those men. So far at least 60 statues have been removed and schools renamed.
Four Confederate monuments have been designated for removal in New Orleans. An obelisk honoring an 1874 uprising against Reconstruction by whites in New Orleans, was taken down on April 24 by workers wearing flak jackets and scarves to conceal their identities. The statue of Jefferson Davis was recently removed in the middle of the night. Statues of Confederate generals, P. G. T. Beauregard and Robert E. Lee are next on the chopping block.
Those clamoring for the removal of statues and the renaming of schools and parks say that symbols of the Confederacy and slavery are a painful reminder to blacks of white supremacy.
The latest effort to erase or rewrite history is taking place in Charlottesville, Virginia where the city fathers want to remove a statue of Robert E. Lee astride a horse.
The Houston Independent School District Board of Trustees has ordered that the names of seven schools be changed to erase the names of Confederate heroes, including Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson. And how much is that going to cost? $1.2 million taxpayer dollars. That’s $1.2 million so that some blacks won’t be painfully reminded of white supremacy
But why stop with Confederate heroes? If slavery represents racism at its worst, then we should tear down the statues of all slave owners and change the names of schools that bear their names. How about starting with George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, two large slave owners? And there are 11 other presidents that were slave owners who have either statues sitting somewhere on public grounds or schools named after them.
In addition to Washington and Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James K. Polk, Zachary Taylor, James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant were American presidents who were slave owners. Down with their statues! Get their damn names off those school buildings!
Think I’m kidding? George Washington Elementary School in New Orleans is being renamed for Dr. Charles Richard Drew, a prominent black surgeon.
We are seeing political correctness at its worst. Sure slavery was a dark part of our history. But history is what it is and it should not be erased or rewritten. That’s something Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Kim Il Sung did.
I venture to say the majority of blacks in New Orleans don’t have the foggiest idea of who Jefferson Davis and P. G. T. Beauregard were. They probably see their statues as nothing more than repositories for pigeon poop.
And what about those seven Houston schools? Here again, most blacks have no idea who the people they are named after were. I don’t live in the Houston school district, but if I did, I would strongly resent $1.2 million of my tax dollars being wasted to placate a few rabble rousers.
That’s right, a few rabble rousers. I’m willing to bet that the overwhelming majority of blacks are not painfully reminded of slavery and white supremacy whenever they see a statue of Robert E. Lee or “Stonewall” Jackson, or whenever they see their names engraved on school buildings.
IT'S THE EXCREMENT-ENCRUSTED BUMS, STUPID BART BASTARDS!
by Bob Walsh
BART is the Bay Area Rapid Transit District. It runs around a large chunk of the San Francisco Bay and out into some of the feeder communities. Unfortunately the ridership is off considerably and the non-peak ridership is WAY off. The BART board of directors is attempting to figure out why.
BART has an interesting seat-hog law, which has never been enforced and is about to be formally withdrawn. The ordinance makes it illegal to take up more than one seat in most circumstances. Many people right now park backpacks and other stuff on a second seat or otherwise flop out and take two seats. The actual reason for withdrawing the ordinance, however, is that it is "unfair" to homeless, excrement-encrusted bums who bring all of their excrement-encrusted belongings onto BART with them and who NEED two or three or more seats to flop out on, sleep and dump their excrement-encrusted belongings on while their excrement-encrusted bodies are napping, etc.
BART stations and elevators and to some extent trains have the reputation of smelling bad and being filthy, in large part because excrement-encrusted homeless bums use the trains, elevators and stairwells as latrines.
Strangely enough the BART board does not see any connection between the ridership drop-off and their policy of turning BART trains into mobile flop-houses for excrement-encrusted bums.
BART is the Bay Area Rapid Transit District. It runs around a large chunk of the San Francisco Bay and out into some of the feeder communities. Unfortunately the ridership is off considerably and the non-peak ridership is WAY off. The BART board of directors is attempting to figure out why.
BART has an interesting seat-hog law, which has never been enforced and is about to be formally withdrawn. The ordinance makes it illegal to take up more than one seat in most circumstances. Many people right now park backpacks and other stuff on a second seat or otherwise flop out and take two seats. The actual reason for withdrawing the ordinance, however, is that it is "unfair" to homeless, excrement-encrusted bums who bring all of their excrement-encrusted belongings onto BART with them and who NEED two or three or more seats to flop out on, sleep and dump their excrement-encrusted belongings on while their excrement-encrusted bodies are napping, etc.
BART stations and elevators and to some extent trains have the reputation of smelling bad and being filthy, in large part because excrement-encrusted homeless bums use the trains, elevators and stairwells as latrines.
Strangely enough the BART board does not see any connection between the ridership drop-off and their policy of turning BART trains into mobile flop-houses for excrement-encrusted bums.
YOU CAN STILL BE FIRED IN CA. FOR BEING A COMMIE
by Bob Walsh
Under the current civil service law you can be summarily fired from your job in the formerly great state of California if you are a communist. Assemblyman Rob Bonta (D-Alameda) introduced a bill to get rid of that law. He has since withdrawn his legislation under intense opposition from the local Vietnamese community, which has no use for commies. The stupid bastard even apologized for introducing the bill, AB22, in the first place.
Under the current civil service law you can be summarily fired from your job in the formerly great state of California if you are a communist. Assemblyman Rob Bonta (D-Alameda) introduced a bill to get rid of that law. He has since withdrawn his legislation under intense opposition from the local Vietnamese community, which has no use for commies. The stupid bastard even apologized for introducing the bill, AB22, in the first place.
A TRAGEDY NO MATTER HOW YOU SLICE IT
by Bob Walsh
A four-year old child is dead at a small home daycare operation in Orange, Virginia. It appears the child shot himself on Monday.
One of the residents of the home is a Stafford County Sheriff's Deputy. The deputy is still in training at the academy and has been with that agency about six months. The weapon was NOT a service weapon and the brief news blurb I read did not say anything about the ownership or normal storage of the weapon. I am not up on gun storage laws, if any, in Virginia. I know in CA it is a criminal offense to store a handgun where a person under 18 can access it.
Even if it turns out the deputy had no knowledge of or responsibility for the gun it is a tragedy and a pointless, stupid death.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This will give anti-gunners an organism.
A four-year old child is dead at a small home daycare operation in Orange, Virginia. It appears the child shot himself on Monday.
One of the residents of the home is a Stafford County Sheriff's Deputy. The deputy is still in training at the academy and has been with that agency about six months. The weapon was NOT a service weapon and the brief news blurb I read did not say anything about the ownership or normal storage of the weapon. I am not up on gun storage laws, if any, in Virginia. I know in CA it is a criminal offense to store a handgun where a person under 18 can access it.
Even if it turns out the deputy had no knowledge of or responsibility for the gun it is a tragedy and a pointless, stupid death.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This will give anti-gunners an organism.
SATAN MADE COP DO IT
'I am despicable': Kern County lawman convicted in drug plot blames Satan
By Veronica Rocha
Los Angeles Times
May 16, 2017
A former Kern County sheriff’s deputy who pleaded guilty Monday to conspiring to steal marijuana seized during criminal investigations apologized in a recorded video message for his misdeeds, saying Satan was “playing games” with him.
In a May 7 video entitled “I am sorry!” Logan August appeared seated with his wife as he apologized to Kern County residents, law enforcement officials and “anybody I had ever worked with that wears the badge that I disgraced.”
“I made a horrible decision,” the 30-year-old Bakersfield resident said in the YouTube video. “It was nobody else’s fault. Nobody influenced me to do it. I made that decision based on Satan playing games with me and making me feel like I was prideful and unable to go to family members for help.”
August and Derrick Penney, another former Kern County sheriff’s deputy, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute marijuana, according to U.S. Atty. Phillip A. Talbert. They have agreed to forfeit any money they earned from the trafficking operation. August and Penney face up to five years in prison.
The former deputies were accused of working with former Bakersfield police detective Patrick Mara and others to steal marijuana from the Kern County Sheriff’s Office storage unit, according federal court documents. The plot transpired between June 2014 and October 2014, according to the documents.
Federal authorities said the group planned to sell the cannabis, which had been previously seized by police during drug operations on private and public properties.
August was assigned to the Sheriff’s Major Vendor Narcotics Unit and participated in drug busts.
After August and Penney, 34, of Star, Idaho, stole the marijuana, they had it trimmed, so it could be sold, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. August then handed the eight pounds of marijuana to a confidential informant who sold it for him, federal authorities said.
August shared his earnings with Penney, each receiving about $1,200, according to federal prosecutors. August also gave a portion of the proceeds to Mara, who is about to begin a five-year federal prison sentence in a separate case, authorities said. Mara, a 13-year Bakersfield police veteran, admitted to stealing methamphetamine from drug dealers during traffic stops.
Federal authorities said August took the marijuana from drug busts on 10 separate occasions and gave his informant about 25 pounds of cannabis. After the marijuana was sold, he received $15,000, according to federal prosecutors.
In his video, August thanked people for leaving negative comments on his social media.
“I am deserving of everything you said,” August said. “I am despicable and I am a piece of crap and that is me in this world.”
By Veronica Rocha
Los Angeles Times
May 16, 2017
A former Kern County sheriff’s deputy who pleaded guilty Monday to conspiring to steal marijuana seized during criminal investigations apologized in a recorded video message for his misdeeds, saying Satan was “playing games” with him.
In a May 7 video entitled “I am sorry!” Logan August appeared seated with his wife as he apologized to Kern County residents, law enforcement officials and “anybody I had ever worked with that wears the badge that I disgraced.”
“I made a horrible decision,” the 30-year-old Bakersfield resident said in the YouTube video. “It was nobody else’s fault. Nobody influenced me to do it. I made that decision based on Satan playing games with me and making me feel like I was prideful and unable to go to family members for help.”
August and Derrick Penney, another former Kern County sheriff’s deputy, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute marijuana, according to U.S. Atty. Phillip A. Talbert. They have agreed to forfeit any money they earned from the trafficking operation. August and Penney face up to five years in prison.
The former deputies were accused of working with former Bakersfield police detective Patrick Mara and others to steal marijuana from the Kern County Sheriff’s Office storage unit, according federal court documents. The plot transpired between June 2014 and October 2014, according to the documents.
Federal authorities said the group planned to sell the cannabis, which had been previously seized by police during drug operations on private and public properties.
August was assigned to the Sheriff’s Major Vendor Narcotics Unit and participated in drug busts.
After August and Penney, 34, of Star, Idaho, stole the marijuana, they had it trimmed, so it could be sold, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. August then handed the eight pounds of marijuana to a confidential informant who sold it for him, federal authorities said.
August shared his earnings with Penney, each receiving about $1,200, according to federal prosecutors. August also gave a portion of the proceeds to Mara, who is about to begin a five-year federal prison sentence in a separate case, authorities said. Mara, a 13-year Bakersfield police veteran, admitted to stealing methamphetamine from drug dealers during traffic stops.
Federal authorities said August took the marijuana from drug busts on 10 separate occasions and gave his informant about 25 pounds of cannabis. After the marijuana was sold, he received $15,000, according to federal prosecutors.
In his video, August thanked people for leaving negative comments on his social media.
“I am deserving of everything you said,” August said. “I am despicable and I am a piece of crap and that is me in this world.”
Wednesday, May 17, 2017
THE ‘QU’ILS MANGENT DE LA BRIOCHE CONSERVATIVES’
Some Conservatives want to go so far right as to abolish Medicare, Medicaid and welfare
BarkGrowlBite
May 17, 2017
In their haste to keep their promise to abolish Obamacare, House Republicans have passed a health care bill that will sock it to older Americans and those with preexisting conditions.
The idea is to let private health insurance take over the health care of all Americans and then the competition between the insurers will lower health care costs. That is a figment of someone’s imagination.
First, since there is no mandate to obtain health insurance – a good thing – many if not most healthy Americans will opt not to get health insurance, preferring to wait until their good health begins to fade. That will leave the insurance carriers covering those who are not in the best of health and the elderly with their old age ailments. And that is going to raise insurance premiums, not lower them. It has been estimated that premiums could be five times higher for people over 65 than they are now.
Under the House passed bill, people with pre-existing conditions would be placed into a ‘High Risk Pool’ with high premiums, high deductibles and minimal coverage.
As for competition lowering insurance premiums, all one has to do is look at the competition between automobile insurance companies. GEICO, Progressive, Liberty and other companies promise they will save you $500 or more than what you are paying now. Yeah, but there’s a catch. They are not giving you the exact same coverage. If they did, their premiums would be the same as you are paying now, perhaps even higher. And so it will be with health insurance.
America is truly the land of milk and honey ….. but not for all, with many struggling just to keep a roof over their heads, food in their stomachs and clothes on their backs. I’m all for the free market but when it comes to health care the free market with its high insurance premiums will drive those who can’t afford them to the emergency rooms rather than to a physician. And who is going to end up paying for that? Why it’s going to be those who are more fortunate. If you think hospital bills are high now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Some conservatives want to abolish Medicare and Medicaid which they condemn as socialized medicine, and welfare which to them represents socialism. Apparently they believe the tooth fairy is going to dump tons of coins under the pillows of every middle class and poor member of our society. America is a very charitable country, but private charities and churches will not by any stretch of the imagination be able to meet the needs of those who would lose Medicare, Medicaid and welfare.
Conservatives who want to abolish those government lifelines remind me of Marie Antoinette. Whether the French Queen actually said it or not, folklore has it when Marie was informed that the poor had no bread, she exclaimed “Qu'ils mangent de la brioche,” which translates to “Let them eat cake.”
I am well aware there is a lot of fraud in our welfare programs. But abolishing welfare is like throwing the baby out with the dirty bath water. There are many people in dire need of assistance. A good number of those have brought their plight upon themselves. But are we going to ‘Marie Antoinette’ them because they fucked up?
That’s why I call those conservatives who want to abolish Medicare, Medicaid and welfare, ‘Qu'ils mangent de la brioche conservatives’ or if you prefer, ‘Let them eat cake conservatives’.
I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat. Both parties stink like shit. I am an independent conservative, but not an ideologue or doctrinaire. On fiscal issues I am a conservative, but on social issues I consider myself a moderate. I’m certainly not about to flush the poor down the shitter.
While I’m in favor of doing away with Obamacare, some aspects of that law are not bad. Nor is everything liberals espouse evil. I don’t know what the solution to our fucked up health care system is, but I have absolutely no confidence Congress can find it, no matter which party is in control.
If the Republicans want to abolish Obamacare, they better do it in the next 18 months. It looks like the midterm Congressional elections will be disastrous for the Republicans. In order for the current Senate to pass their version of the healthcare act, they will have to have some bipartisan support. But any such bill will never be acceptable to the ‘Qu'ils mangent de la brioche conservatives’ in the House.
BarkGrowlBite
May 17, 2017
In their haste to keep their promise to abolish Obamacare, House Republicans have passed a health care bill that will sock it to older Americans and those with preexisting conditions.
The idea is to let private health insurance take over the health care of all Americans and then the competition between the insurers will lower health care costs. That is a figment of someone’s imagination.
First, since there is no mandate to obtain health insurance – a good thing – many if not most healthy Americans will opt not to get health insurance, preferring to wait until their good health begins to fade. That will leave the insurance carriers covering those who are not in the best of health and the elderly with their old age ailments. And that is going to raise insurance premiums, not lower them. It has been estimated that premiums could be five times higher for people over 65 than they are now.
Under the House passed bill, people with pre-existing conditions would be placed into a ‘High Risk Pool’ with high premiums, high deductibles and minimal coverage.
As for competition lowering insurance premiums, all one has to do is look at the competition between automobile insurance companies. GEICO, Progressive, Liberty and other companies promise they will save you $500 or more than what you are paying now. Yeah, but there’s a catch. They are not giving you the exact same coverage. If they did, their premiums would be the same as you are paying now, perhaps even higher. And so it will be with health insurance.
America is truly the land of milk and honey ….. but not for all, with many struggling just to keep a roof over their heads, food in their stomachs and clothes on their backs. I’m all for the free market but when it comes to health care the free market with its high insurance premiums will drive those who can’t afford them to the emergency rooms rather than to a physician. And who is going to end up paying for that? Why it’s going to be those who are more fortunate. If you think hospital bills are high now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Some conservatives want to abolish Medicare and Medicaid which they condemn as socialized medicine, and welfare which to them represents socialism. Apparently they believe the tooth fairy is going to dump tons of coins under the pillows of every middle class and poor member of our society. America is a very charitable country, but private charities and churches will not by any stretch of the imagination be able to meet the needs of those who would lose Medicare, Medicaid and welfare.
Conservatives who want to abolish those government lifelines remind me of Marie Antoinette. Whether the French Queen actually said it or not, folklore has it when Marie was informed that the poor had no bread, she exclaimed “Qu'ils mangent de la brioche,” which translates to “Let them eat cake.”
I am well aware there is a lot of fraud in our welfare programs. But abolishing welfare is like throwing the baby out with the dirty bath water. There are many people in dire need of assistance. A good number of those have brought their plight upon themselves. But are we going to ‘Marie Antoinette’ them because they fucked up?
That’s why I call those conservatives who want to abolish Medicare, Medicaid and welfare, ‘Qu'ils mangent de la brioche conservatives’ or if you prefer, ‘Let them eat cake conservatives’.
I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat. Both parties stink like shit. I am an independent conservative, but not an ideologue or doctrinaire. On fiscal issues I am a conservative, but on social issues I consider myself a moderate. I’m certainly not about to flush the poor down the shitter.
While I’m in favor of doing away with Obamacare, some aspects of that law are not bad. Nor is everything liberals espouse evil. I don’t know what the solution to our fucked up health care system is, but I have absolutely no confidence Congress can find it, no matter which party is in control.
If the Republicans want to abolish Obamacare, they better do it in the next 18 months. It looks like the midterm Congressional elections will be disastrous for the Republicans. In order for the current Senate to pass their version of the healthcare act, they will have to have some bipartisan support. But any such bill will never be acceptable to the ‘Qu'ils mangent de la brioche conservatives’ in the House.
HOUSTONIANS FACE ROYAL SCREWING IN PRIVATE KANGAROO COURT FOR TOLL ROAD VIOLATIONS
Expired credit cards leave Houstonians with expensive toll payments
Click2Houston
May 15, 2017
HOUSTON - Expired credit cards have thousands of Houstonians stuck with big bills after being caught unexpectedly in the cross hairs of the Harris County Toll Road Authority.
Consumer expert Amy Davis discovered many drivers are remanded to a little known court where, some say, the deck is stacked against them.
"They're trying to hide something," attorney Cory Roth said. "They're trying to hide the amount of money they collect every year. They're trying to hide the amount of people that get sued every year."
Tucked upstairs on the third floor of a building on Prairie in downtown Houston is where thousands of toll violators are summoned to appear. About 750 drivers are sued every week -- totaling about 39,000 each year.
"They said that I would get a warrant if I didn't show up," said Deborah Bostwick, who told Davis she was in the hospital dying of cancer when the Harris County Toll Road Authority claims she ran through toll booths without paying.
"You can actually go to jail," said Antoinette Tolson, repeating what a clerk in the court told her.
KPRC Channel 2 News wanted to take you inside, but the judge wouldn't allow our camera in the courtroom.
"We're trying to get a copy of the docket here today, of everyone who's scheduled to appear here for cases," Davis told a Harris County Toll Road employee at the court.
"OK. I don't have a comment on that right now," he said as he quickly ducked inside the court.
HCTRA maintains the Texas Motor Vehicle Records Disclosure Act prohibits it from releasing the names and case information of anyone in the court.
"I think it's nonsense," Roth said. "Courtrooms are public places. It is very clear. A courtroom is a public place."
Roth takes issue with the court for several reasons. State law allows Harris County to make its own rules and hire a private law firm to do the dirty work of collections and prosecutions of drivers accused of running tolls. The law firm Harris County commissioners approved is Linebarger, Goggan, Blair & Sampson. The firm has donated $80,000 to commissioners since getting the contract.
Linebarger is a private debt collector. Since it's collecting on behalf of a government agency, it has its own sort of E-ZPass. None of the consumer protection laws apply, like the requirement to provide proof you actually owe a debt. There is no statute of limitations, meaning they can come after you years later.
"My first questions was: Why haven't I been alerted about this?" Steven Devadanam told Davis.
Devadanam's unpaid tolls were from 2015. Even though he has an EZ Tag and receives statements from the Harris County Toll Road Authority every month, showing he's got plenty of money in his account, when he called to add a rental car to his account in February, a customer service agent gave him the bad news.
"'Did you know that you have a $762 balance?' Devadanam said the woman asked him. "And I said, 'Uh, no. I wasn't aware of that. I didn't drive to Canada.'"
Devadanamt added a Toyota Prius to his account in the summer of 2015.
The Toll Road Authority issued him an EZ plate so he could drive on the toll road until his EZ Tag arrived by mail. The HCTRA admits it took it 17 days to mail the tag. By the time it arrived, Devadanam's EZ plate had expired. He racked up $45.50 in unpaid tolls that turned into $724, 16 times what he originally owed.
"I'm not gonna pay for a balance that I didn't generate or create," Devadanam said.
"How much effort does the Toll Road Authority make to actually notify people?" Davis asked Gary Trietsch, executive director of the HCTRA.
"We are bound by state law that all we can do is send it to the address that's on their license plate information," Trietsch replied.
The Texas Transportation Code said the authority must send unpaid toll notices to the address of the vehicle's registered owner.
The HCTRA said it sent nine notices before it sent Devadanam's account to collections. Seven of those were returned. But there is nothing stopping Harris County from contacting customers like Devadanam at their email address on file.
"By Harris County not making an effort to notify consumers, Linebarger gets more money," Davis told Trietsch.
"Linebarger gets more money, but, uh, you know, No. 1: We have a million and a half transactions a day. There are going to be errors," he said.
They seem to be errors that work in Linebarger's favor. In the last three years, Linebarger has collected $25.2 million for the Harris County Toll Road Authority. It collected $28.6 million for itself from all the extra fees it charged drivers.
"It's not fair. It's just not fair," Roth said.
A lot of EZ Tag customers get slapped with extra fees when credit cards expire or you get a new one. Many assume when you link your new credit card to your account, the Toll Road Authority will simply charge it for the unpaid tolls. That does not happen. You have to remember to pay those separately.
Linebarger spokesman Joe Householder sent us the following statement:
"There are two certain ways to avoid paying a fine for a toll violation. You can pay your tolls as they are incurred, or you can avoid driving on the toll roads, which are clearly marked as such. One should not lose site of the fact that driving on a toll road and not paying your tolls is a violation of law -- a Class C misdemeanor. The law allows large counties like Harris to choose how it prefers to enforce toll violations. Harris County opted for a civil administrative process, as opposed to a criminal process."
Here is how your missed toll can easily turn into hundreds of dollars:
*When you run three tolls that cost $1.75 each ($5.25 total) within 365 days, the HCTRA will send you the first invoice after the third violation, but will add $11 to each violation ($10 per violation as administration fee approved by Commissioner’s Court plus $1 per violation to the county attorney per state statute). That total is now $38.25.
*The HCTRA will try to collect for 45 days before it sends the debt to Linebarger, Goggan, Blair & Sampson. At that time, the county adds $14 per violation, adding up to $80.25
*Linebarger attempts to collect for 60 days. Then it can add a $50.00 fee when a hearing is scheduled. The total is now $130.25.
*If you go to the hearing and ask the administrative judge to hear your case but are unsuccessful, the judge can charge you $500, plus you’ll pay $110 in court costs, bringing your total to $740.25.
Click2Houston
May 15, 2017
HOUSTON - Expired credit cards have thousands of Houstonians stuck with big bills after being caught unexpectedly in the cross hairs of the Harris County Toll Road Authority.
Consumer expert Amy Davis discovered many drivers are remanded to a little known court where, some say, the deck is stacked against them.
"They're trying to hide something," attorney Cory Roth said. "They're trying to hide the amount of money they collect every year. They're trying to hide the amount of people that get sued every year."
Tucked upstairs on the third floor of a building on Prairie in downtown Houston is where thousands of toll violators are summoned to appear. About 750 drivers are sued every week -- totaling about 39,000 each year.
"They said that I would get a warrant if I didn't show up," said Deborah Bostwick, who told Davis she was in the hospital dying of cancer when the Harris County Toll Road Authority claims she ran through toll booths without paying.
"You can actually go to jail," said Antoinette Tolson, repeating what a clerk in the court told her.
KPRC Channel 2 News wanted to take you inside, but the judge wouldn't allow our camera in the courtroom.
"We're trying to get a copy of the docket here today, of everyone who's scheduled to appear here for cases," Davis told a Harris County Toll Road employee at the court.
"OK. I don't have a comment on that right now," he said as he quickly ducked inside the court.
HCTRA maintains the Texas Motor Vehicle Records Disclosure Act prohibits it from releasing the names and case information of anyone in the court.
"I think it's nonsense," Roth said. "Courtrooms are public places. It is very clear. A courtroom is a public place."
Roth takes issue with the court for several reasons. State law allows Harris County to make its own rules and hire a private law firm to do the dirty work of collections and prosecutions of drivers accused of running tolls. The law firm Harris County commissioners approved is Linebarger, Goggan, Blair & Sampson. The firm has donated $80,000 to commissioners since getting the contract.
Linebarger is a private debt collector. Since it's collecting on behalf of a government agency, it has its own sort of E-ZPass. None of the consumer protection laws apply, like the requirement to provide proof you actually owe a debt. There is no statute of limitations, meaning they can come after you years later.
"My first questions was: Why haven't I been alerted about this?" Steven Devadanam told Davis.
Devadanam's unpaid tolls were from 2015. Even though he has an EZ Tag and receives statements from the Harris County Toll Road Authority every month, showing he's got plenty of money in his account, when he called to add a rental car to his account in February, a customer service agent gave him the bad news.
"'Did you know that you have a $762 balance?' Devadanam said the woman asked him. "And I said, 'Uh, no. I wasn't aware of that. I didn't drive to Canada.'"
Devadanamt added a Toyota Prius to his account in the summer of 2015.
The Toll Road Authority issued him an EZ plate so he could drive on the toll road until his EZ Tag arrived by mail. The HCTRA admits it took it 17 days to mail the tag. By the time it arrived, Devadanam's EZ plate had expired. He racked up $45.50 in unpaid tolls that turned into $724, 16 times what he originally owed.
"I'm not gonna pay for a balance that I didn't generate or create," Devadanam said.
"How much effort does the Toll Road Authority make to actually notify people?" Davis asked Gary Trietsch, executive director of the HCTRA.
"We are bound by state law that all we can do is send it to the address that's on their license plate information," Trietsch replied.
The Texas Transportation Code said the authority must send unpaid toll notices to the address of the vehicle's registered owner.
The HCTRA said it sent nine notices before it sent Devadanam's account to collections. Seven of those were returned. But there is nothing stopping Harris County from contacting customers like Devadanam at their email address on file.
"By Harris County not making an effort to notify consumers, Linebarger gets more money," Davis told Trietsch.
"Linebarger gets more money, but, uh, you know, No. 1: We have a million and a half transactions a day. There are going to be errors," he said.
They seem to be errors that work in Linebarger's favor. In the last three years, Linebarger has collected $25.2 million for the Harris County Toll Road Authority. It collected $28.6 million for itself from all the extra fees it charged drivers.
"It's not fair. It's just not fair," Roth said.
A lot of EZ Tag customers get slapped with extra fees when credit cards expire or you get a new one. Many assume when you link your new credit card to your account, the Toll Road Authority will simply charge it for the unpaid tolls. That does not happen. You have to remember to pay those separately.
Linebarger spokesman Joe Householder sent us the following statement:
"There are two certain ways to avoid paying a fine for a toll violation. You can pay your tolls as they are incurred, or you can avoid driving on the toll roads, which are clearly marked as such. One should not lose site of the fact that driving on a toll road and not paying your tolls is a violation of law -- a Class C misdemeanor. The law allows large counties like Harris to choose how it prefers to enforce toll violations. Harris County opted for a civil administrative process, as opposed to a criminal process."
Here is how your missed toll can easily turn into hundreds of dollars:
*When you run three tolls that cost $1.75 each ($5.25 total) within 365 days, the HCTRA will send you the first invoice after the third violation, but will add $11 to each violation ($10 per violation as administration fee approved by Commissioner’s Court plus $1 per violation to the county attorney per state statute). That total is now $38.25.
*The HCTRA will try to collect for 45 days before it sends the debt to Linebarger, Goggan, Blair & Sampson. At that time, the county adds $14 per violation, adding up to $80.25
*Linebarger attempts to collect for 60 days. Then it can add a $50.00 fee when a hearing is scheduled. The total is now $130.25.
*If you go to the hearing and ask the administrative judge to hear your case but are unsuccessful, the judge can charge you $500, plus you’ll pay $110 in court costs, bringing your total to $740.25.
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