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Video Seems To Show Cops Shooting Man To Death Despite Hands Held High

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After shooting Flores, cops stood idle for 3 minutes, making no attempt to help the mortally wounded man.

Texas Sheriff Slams Release of Video Showing Man With Arms Up Before Shooting

A Texas sheriff’s office has criticized the release of witness video showing deputies fatally shooting a man who appears to have his hands in the air, which has prompted outrage and an investigation in Texas.
Gilbert Flores died Friday shortly after the shooting, which occurred when deputies responded to a domestic disturbance call.
A college student said he saw the San Antonio incident and started filming with his cellphone.
"He kind of just put his hands in the air. After he put his hands in the air, they shot him," student Michael Thomas told ABC affiliate KSAT-TV in San Antonio.
Thomas sold the footage to KSAT for $100, police say, and the station posted the unedited video on its website and used it on-air.
“As a result, people from outside our community have bombarded us with inappropriate comments, and today, physical threats toward our deputies,” the Bexar County Sheriff's Office said in a Facebook post. “These deputies have not been charged with a crime and a family lost their loved one. This is unethical and sad.”
Meanwhile, Sheriff's Office spokesman James Keith has confirmed to ABC News that there is a second video of the shooting that was filmed by a neighbor. They said that it will not be released publicly because it is being considered as evidence.
In the footage obtained by KSAT, 41-year-old Flores is slightly blocked by a pole in the video but both of his arms appear to be raised when he was shot. The two deputies were identified by the Sheriff's Office in a statement as Greg Vasquez and Robert Sanchez, with the office reporting the deputies saying Flores was armed, but did not specify what kind of weapon he allegedly had, according to the Associated Press.
Vasquez and Sanchez are on paid administrative leave during the investigation, officials said.
Police say Flores injured a woman and an 18-month-old girl inside a home, prompting the domestic dispute call, and the deputies reportedly used non-lethal force weapons before the fatal shooting outside the home.
The Sheriff's Department is now criticizing the release of the video, posting a message on its Facebook profile about how the "sensational behavior" by KSAT has prompted "physical threats toward our deputies."
"Certainly, what's in the video is a cause for concern, but it's important to let the investigation go through its course so that we can assure a thorough and complete review of all that occurred," Sheriff Susan Pamerleau said at a news conference Friday.
The district attorney's office confirmed that it is investigating the case and will consider Thomas' footage.
"That gives us a whole different perspective that we've never had before," a spokesman for the district attorney's office told ABC News.
ABC News' Matt Gutman contributed to this report.

Man Sentenced To Life For Marijuana Released After 20 Years

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Marijuana Life Sentence Jeff Mizanskey
Jeff Mizanskey speaks after being released from the Jefferson City Correctional Center after serving two decades of a life sentence for a marijuana-related charge in Jefferson City, Mo., on Sept. 1, 2015.

Man Who Got Life Sentence for Marijuana Goes Free

He plans to advocate for the legalization of weed

“I spent a third of my life in prison,” said Mizanskey, now 62, who was greeted by his infant great-granddaughter. “It’s a shame.”(JEFFERSON CITY, Mo.) — A man sentenced to life without parole on a marijuana-related charge was freed Tuesday from a Missouri prison after being behind bars for more than two decades — a period in which the nation’s attitudes toward pot steadily softened.
Family, friends, supporters and reporters flocked to meet Jeff Mizanskey as he stepped out of the Jefferson City Correctional Center into a sunny morning, wearing a new pair of white tennis shoes and a shirt that read “I’m Jeff & I’m free.”
After a breakfast of steak and eggs with family, Mizanskey said, he planned to spend his post-prison life seeking a job and advocating for the legalization of marijuana. He criticized sentencing for some drug-related crimes as unfair and described his time behind bars as “hell.”
His release followed years of lobbying by relatives, lawmakers and others who argued that the sentence was too stiff and that marijuana should not be forbidden.
Mizanskey was sentenced in 1996 — the same year California became the first state to legalize marijuana for medical purposes. Medical marijuana is now legal in 23 states, and recreational marijuana has been legalized in Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Washington state and Washington, D.C.
“The reason he’s getting out is because the public clearly has changed its opinion about marijuana, and it’s just one of many ways in which that has been reflected in recent years,” said Mizanskey’s attorney, Dan Viets.
Such “extreme” cases could further fuel changing perceptions of nonviolent drug crimes, said Michele Deitch, a senior lecturer at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Austin at Texas.
“These cases really become exhibit A in the need for sentencing reform,” said Deitch, an attorney and expert in criminal-justice policy.
Just last year, the heavily Republican Missouri Legislature passed a law to allow certain people with epilepsy to seek treatment with a marijuana extract containing little of the chemical that causes users to feel high and larger amounts of a compound called cannabidiol, or CBD. The patients can include children, Viets said.
“Nobody saw that coming,” he said. “That is a pretty radical statement.”
Police said Mizanskey conspired to sell 6 pounds of marijuana to a dealer connected with Mexican drug cartels. At the time, the life-with-no-parole sentence was allowed under a Missouri law for repeat drug offenders. Mizanskey already had two drug convictions — one for possession and sale of marijuana in 1984 and another for possession in 1991.
He was the only Missouri inmate serving such a sentence for a nonviolent marijuana-related offense when Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon agreed in May to commute his sentence. The commutation allowed Mizanskey to argue for his freedom before a parole board, which granted the request in August.
Nixon’s actions are “a reflection of political confidence in changing norms around marijuana use,” said Cecelia Klingele, a criminal justice policy expert at the University of Wisconsin Law School.
The governor cited Mizanskey’s nonviolent record, noting that none of his offenses involved selling drugs to children. The law under which he was originally sentenced has been changed.
Other states are re-evaluating punishments for drug possession, motivated in large part by the high cost of imprisoning low-level, nonviolent offenders.
In Connecticut, a new law will make possession of small amounts of hard drugs, including heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine, a misdemeanor for a first-time offense, rather than an offense carrying up to seven years in prison. Nebraska and Alabama expect to save hundreds of millions of dollars by using new laws to cut down on the number of offenders locked up for possessing small amounts of drugs.
In Missouri, backers of two ballot initiatives to legalize pot have permission from the secretary of state to begin collecting signatures to put the issue before voters in 2016. Another petition proposes reducing sentences for nonviolent drug offenders who are serving time with no opportunity for parole.
Now that he’s free, Mizanskey said, he will not smoke marijuana. He’s on parole, after all.
But if the drug ever becomes legal on the state and federal levels, he said, “definitely.”

Stonefish: World's Most Venemous Fish

Woman Says Her Twin Boys Weren't Loved So She Drowned Them

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Investigators: Arizona Woman Acknowledges Drowning Twin Sons

An Arizona woman told investigators that she drowned her 2-year-old twin sons and tried to kill her 3-year-old stepbrother in the same way because she didn't want them to live with the difficulties she faces.
Court records released Monday say 22-year-old Mireya Alejandra Lopez told investigators that she takes medication for depression, schizophrenia and psychosis. Still, investigators say it's unknown whether her mental condition was linked to the deaths or whether the difficulties she cited were psychological issues.
Lopez offered several reasons for the attacks, including that her kids were bullied and that her stepbrother rarely ate and was anti-social. She also said she and her twins weren't loved, investigators said in court records.
Daniel Marino, who identified himself as the step-grandfather of the twins, briefly spoke with reporters outside of the home, saying the "two little angels did not deserve that at all."
Marino said Lopez was recently released from mental health treatment.
Lopez is accused of drowning her sons Sunday in a bathtub at her stucco house in suburban Avondale and then wrapping them in a blanket. Police also said she stuck a pen in the neck of one of her sons to ensure that he would die.
The deaths were discovered by Lopez's mother, who thought the twins were asleep but eventually noticed they weren't breathing. The grandmother yelled for help and, along with someone else who was at the home, tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate them.
While the lifesaving measures were made, police said the grandmother could hear Lopez in the bathroom, where Lopez was found trying to drown her stepbrother. Lopez's mother managed to pull the boy to safety. The 3-year-old wasn't injured.
Lopez was arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder. Her bail was set at $2 million.
It's not yet known whether Lopez has a lawyer.
The boy's father, Samuel Avitia, declined to comment.
During a brief court appearance early Monday, Lopez spoke in a quiet voice when asked to provide her name and date of birth. She is scheduled for a court hearing Friday.
Lopez had three children, according to court records.
Police declined to release the names of the three boys involved in Sunday's attack.

Lizzie Velasquez: "Ugliest Woman" Video Changed My Life For The Better

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Bullying victim turned global motivational speaker, Lizzie Velasquez
Bullying victim turned global motivational speaker, Lizzie Velasquez takes on her newest role as an anti-bullying activist in Washington, DC in “A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story.”

Lizzie Velasquez: 'Ugliest woman' video changed my life for the better




When she was 17, Velasquez faced an onslaught of cyber-bullying, as strangers on YouTube labeled her the "Ugliest Woman in the World." Comments were cruel: "Why did your parents keep you?"and "Kill it with fire."But today, at 26 and only 63 pounds, Velasquez stands strong as an anti-bullying activist. A documentary on her life and work, "A Brave Heart," premieres Sept. 25. She has also partnered with Tumblr to promote "Post It Forward,"a campaign to promote positivity in online communities and a platform that addresses the mental and emotional health of young people.
Velasquez tells TODAY her story of faith, self-respect and courage.
Honestly, I had no idea I was different from other kids until I started kindergarten. To my family, I was just Lizzie. It was a big slap of reality for a 5-year-old. The other kids were scared of me, pointing at me, not wanting to sit with me. I couldn't process it. I wasn't doing anything to them, so why was it happening to me? And I didn't dare tell anyone.
Finally, I told my parents and they said, "There is nothing wrong with you, you are just smaller than the other kids. You are beautiful and smart and can accomplish anything."
My parents gave me an incredible foundation and a strong faith in who I am. They loved me in the face of so many unknowns. When I was first born, doctors said they might have to care for me my whole life. But my family surrounded me with the most incredible support system.
As I got older, I knew my syndrome wasn't going away. It was a hard pill to swallow. I wanted to look like everyone else and blend in, and I couldn't find a way to make that happen. I couldn't blame the doctors or my parents, so I blamed myself.
Courtesy: Lizzie Valasquez
Congresswoman Linda Sanchez and Lizzie Velasquez meet on Capitol Hill to discuss the first federal anti-bullying bill, the Safe Schools Improvement Act, in “A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story.”
But in high school, things started to get better. I realized I had power over my own life - to be positive. I decided to be brave and join activities and make friends and learn how to be outgoing.
It was scary, but I knew it would pay off. I was staff writer for the school newspaper and took photos for the yearbook. I tried out for cheerleading. The uniforms were really cute and every time I wore it around the school, I felt like a superhero. I was more myself around my peers, the version of myself around my family.
Everything seemed to be looking up until one day I was procrastinating doing my homework, looking for music on YouTube and I saw a familiar thumbnail. Clicking it turned my life upside down. It was a video posted of me with over four million views with comments saying the world would be a better place if I took myself out of it. I read every single comment thinking there would be one person to stand up for me. Not one person said, "She's a child, leave her alone," or "You don't know her story, why she looks like that."
I felt like someone was putting a fist through the computer screen and physically punching me. I bawled my eyes out.
I have no idea who the person was who called me the "ugliest woman in the world." I don't know if it's a man or a woman. I wish I did. I would send a thank you card and flowers because that video changed my life for the better.
I didn't want to retaliate — it was a waste of time. I just wanted to prove them wrong. I realized I could use it for the greater good. I went to college, became a motivational speaker and wrote a book.
In 2013, I did a TEDx talk in Austin. Until then I had sort of a following online but this was completely different - it went viral. Sara Hirsh Bordo, who produced the TedWomen event, invited me to lunch to discuss all of the exciting things happening as well as getting to know each other more. She called me a few days later saying she felt like her purpose was to help shine a light on my story by doing a documentary on my life.
I told her I didn't want the documentary to be just another longer version of my TED talk and I don't want it to be just about me. That was important to me. When you see the film, it is my story, but it's also everyone's story. People can relate to being bullied or feeling insecure or being embarrassed by their looks.
Courtesy: A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story
I also had the opportunity to work in the film with Tina Meier, the mother of Megan Meier [who hanged herself in 2006 after being bullied on MySpace]. I felt like I carried a piece of Megan with me everywhere. We talked about the fact that unfortunately bullying will never end — ever. It's a big reminder that there is work to do to ensure others do not feel alone. We have to show them there is light at the end of the tunnel.
For more: Megan Meier Foundation at http://www.meganmeierfoundation.org/megans-story.html
Recently, I joined the Tumblr team and their campaign, "Post It Forward," which is so in line with everything I stand for: Take the high road and show compassion for others; encourage others to share their stories and remind them they are not alone. It's a hub for users to feel safe enough to post what they are personally dealing with. I am honored to partner with them — their heart is in the right place.
Recently I did a video explaining what I have gone through. I know exactly what it is like to be attacked online and to feel at risk of letting negatives define you.
It might seem like I am having an incredible life, but I still have bad days. I am still processing the fact that I have a final diagnosis on my health. I have a weak immune system and if I am on the go for weeks straight and don't have a full day to recover, it hits me pretty hard. The doctors say I have to take care of myself first to help others.
The most frequent question I am asked is how do I stay so positive. I always tell people I allow myself sad days to be alone and close the blinds and listen to sad music like Adele and cry, eat junk food and have a pity party. I let it out of my system for one day, but the sun comes out the next day I have the power to go on.
I want to remind people that at the end of the day, yes, I am an inspiration and motivation for people, but I am human. It's OK to show your vulnerable side and people won't see you as weak.
Awful things happened to me, but I am still here smiling and happy. I am so grateful that what I have been through has given me the opportunity to be a voice for so many people.

Alison Parker’s Father: I Will Do ‘Whatever It Takes To End Gun Violence’

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Andy Parker Memorial Service
Andy Parker, father of Alison Parker, is comforted by a family member of Parker’s boyfriend and colleague, Chris Hurst, following the Interfaith Service of Remembrance and Healing to commemorate the lives of WDBJ reporters Alison Parker and Adam Ward at the Jefferson Center in Shaftman Performance Hall in on Aug. 30, 2015, in Roanoke, Virginia

Alison Parker’s Father: I Will Do ‘Whatever It Takes To End Gun Violence’

ROANOKE, Va. (CBSDC/AP) — The father of the Virginia reporter who was gunned down by an ex-colleague last week on live television says he will do “whatever it takes to end gun violence.”
In an op-ed for The Washington Post, Andy Parker, the father of WDBJ-TV reporter Alison Parker, wrote that he will devote all of his “strength and resources to seeing that some good comes from evil.”
“I am entering this arena with open eyes. I realize the magnitude of the force that opposes sensible and reasonable safeguards on the purchase of devices that have a single purpose: to kill,” he wrote.”
Parker called on federal and local legislators from Virginia to step up their actions on gun control.
“Legislators such as Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), who represents Roanoke, where the shooting of my daughter and her colleague Adam Ward took place on live television. In his more than two years as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Goodlatte has had plenty of opportunity to bring up universal background check legislation and other gun violence prevention bills. He has refused to lead on this issue, and he has done absolutely nothing to help contain the carnage we are seeing. On the other hand, Goodlatte had no problem cashing his check from the National Rifle Association during the 2014 election cycle. Shame on him,” Parker said.
He continued, “At the state level, we are talking about legislators such as Virginia state Sens. John S. Edwards (D-Roanoke), who represents the area where Alison and Adam lived, and William M. Stanley Jr. (R-Franklin), who represents my home district. Edwards’s district also contains the Virginia Tech campus, so he is fully aware of how easy it is for dangerously mentally ill individuals to acquire guns in the commonwealth of Virginia. Yet he has been a constant opponent of sensible gun reforms, such as expanded background checks, during his nearly 20 years in the state senate, breaking ranks constantly with his colleagues in Virginia’s Democratic Party.”
Parker praised California for enacting the gun violence restraining order policy following last year’s mass shooting in Isla Vista at the hands of Elliot Rodger.
“To California legislators’ credit, they wasted no time in taking decisive action to prevent the next tragedy. Yet when Edwards and Stanley had a game-changing opportunity to vote on a similar GVRO policy in Virginia, they elected to serve their gun lobby masters and voted no. Shame on them,” he wrote.
Community religious leaders gathered Sunday to remember 24-year-old Alison Parker and 27-year-old cameraman Adam Ward.
The interfaith service at the Jefferson Center in Roanoke was filled with somber prayers across several religions, along with music from the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra and others.
The ceremony, attended by about 500 people according to Christie Wills, a spokeswoman for the interfaith group that organized the event, began with a slideshow of the WDBJ-TV journalists wearing warm smiles as they worked as a tag-team on stories.
In his remarks, WDBJ-TV General Manager Jeffrey Marks recalled that Parker and Ward were almost never angry. Marks said he suspected that the most you would get out of Parker was an “emphatic darn,” and then she would be back hard at work.
“Adam and Alison saw that as their mission — to awaken us to what is good and fun in life,” Marks said.
Marks also talked about better prioritizing mental health treatment.
“Mental illness cannot exist on the periphery of health care." Marks said. “It should be obvious that it needs to be center stage because most mental illness is treatable if we can get to the sufferer. In this case, we didn’t.”
Ward and Parker were on an early morning assignment for WDBJ-TV at Smith Mountain Lake when Vester Lee Flanagan walked up and shot them and Vicki Gardner, a Chamber of Commerce official, with a 9mm Glock pistol during a live interview. Ward and Parker died at the scene and Gardner is recovering in a hospital.
The shootings occurred as thousands of viewers across the central Virginia community watched the footage quickly spread to millions on social media. Flanagan shot himself as police pursued his car. He died hours later.
Ward’s funeral will be Sept. 1 at First Baptist Church in Roanoke. Parker’s obituary says after a private memorial service, a celebration of her life will happen at a later date.


Donald Trump's Ace In The Hole: Voters Don't Really Care About Policy

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Donald Trump’s ace in the hole: Voters don’t really care about policy

Chris Cillizza
There's a persistent idea in politics -- it's particularly rampant in political journalism and academia -- that voters are deeply interested in the specifics of each candidate's policies. That the way people make up their minds in an election is through a thorough review of where the candidates stand on a variety of issues.
That is, of course, bunk -- at least for the majority of swing voters. Typically, the way these people decide whom to vote for is based on their perceptions -- and often misperceptions -- of the candidates. The idea that the average undecided voter is looking for deep dives into policy from the candidates before making up his/her mind is a farce.
Witness a poll question buried deep in the new Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics poll of Iowa voters. Here's how the question reads: "Do you want to be clear about specific policies [NAME OF FIRST CHOICE CANDIDATE] would address if elected or do you trust [HIM/HER] to figure it out once [S/HE] is in office?"
Just 41 percent of likely Republican Iowa caucus-goers said they wanted their preferred candidate to "be clear about specific policies" while almost six in 10 (57 percent) said they would simply trust him or her to figure it all out once they got into office.
What these numbers prove -- not for the first time in this election -- is that Donald Trump has a remarkably refined understanding of the Republican electorate. "Well, I think the press is more eager to see it than the voters, to be honest," Trump said earlier this month in Iowa when asked when he might release a detailed immigration plan. "I think the voters like me, they understand me, they know I'm going to do the job. ... I think they trust me. I think they know I'm going to make good deals for them."
Donald Trump's immigration plan, explained
Play Video1:19
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump released a detailed immigration plan, and its "great, great wall" is just the beginning. (Gillian Brockell/The Washington Post)
The political class scoffed. No plan!? People won't stand for it! (Trump did soon put out a relatively detailed immigration plan, by the way.) Except, no one really cared. The people who like Trump not only believe he will take care of all of the problems facing the country when he gets elected but a big part of why they like him is because his message is: Leave it to me. I've got this.
There are, without question, voters who engage deeply on a single policy or a series of policies. But to assume that they are the a) the majority of the country or b) the majority of swing voters is simply wrong. Trump appeals to a desire within a decent-sized chunk of the electorate which has little interest in knowing the ins and out of policies and would rather simply elect someone they trust to handle things.
Call it the Homer Simpson philosophy: "Can't someone else do it?"



Chris Cillizza writes “The Fix,” a politics blog for the Washington Post. He also covers the White House.

Coal Company Executives Emblematic Of The 1%

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Coal Companies Are Dying While Their Execs Grab More Cash

The industry is collapsing, but its corporate bigwigs are doing just fine.

| Wed Sep. 2, 2015 
These are dark days for coal. In July, the industry hit a milestone when a major power company announced plans to shutter several coal-fired power plants in Iowa: More than 200 coal plants have been scheduled for closure since 2010, meaning nearly one-fifth of the US coal fleet is headed for retirement. President Barack Obama's recently completed climate plan, which sets limits on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, is designed to keep this trend going over the next decade. But the industry was in deep trouble even before Obama's crackdown, thanks to the rock-bottom price of natural gas made possible by America's fracking boom.
In case the shutdown of hundreds of coal plants wasn't a sufficient indicator of the industry collapse, here's another clue: coal companies' rapidly deteriorating bottom lines.
For execs at the top 10 public coal companies, cash pay grew 8 percent on average while combined share price dropped 58 percent.
study this spring from the Carbon Tracker Institute found that over the past five years, coal producers have closed nearly 300 mines and lost 76 percent of their value. In August, Alpha Natural Resources, the country's second-largest coal company, filed for bankruptcy, making it the biggest domino to fall in a string of more than two dozen corporate collapses during the past couple of years. On Monday, one of the company's top executives resigned. Meanwhile, shares of Peabody Energy, the world's biggest coal company, hit their lowest price ever, dipping below $1. A year ago, Peabody's share price was hovering above $15; it peaked at $72 back in 2011. The stock plunge at Arch Coal was even more extreme—it fell from $3,600 to under $2 between 2011 and August 2015. (It has since rebounded slightly.) This year, both companies have been among the worst performers in the S&P 500.
You might think that the leaders of coal companies would be made to pay the price for these failures. But in the perverse world of American corporate compensation, they are, in fact, getting a raise.
According to a report today from the Institute for Policy Studies, which bills itself as the country's oldest progressive think tank, executive salaries and bonuses at the top 10 publicly traded coal companies increased an average of 8 percent between 2010 and 2014, even as the companies' combined share price fell 58 percent. Meanwhile, the same executives cashed in well over $100 million in stock options, according to the report, which analyzed the companies' public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In other words, coal execs are cashing in while their companies tank.
"That [stock-based] part of their compensation package is not so valuable right now, so the value of their cash-based pay has been going up," said Sarah Anderson, the report's author. "We're seeing this move to insulate them from the implosion of the coal sector by handing out more cash."
The chart below, from the report, shows how cash compensation started to rise just as the share prices took their second dive in five years:
At Peabody, for example, CEO Greg Boyce cashed in $26 million in stock before the price collapse that began in 2011. At Arch Coal, cash compensation for the company's top five executives grew 94 percent between 2010 and 2014, to an average of $2.3 million. Arch, Alpha, and Peabody did not return requests for comment.
To be clear, there's no evidence of anything criminal happening here. But you can include this trend in the pantheon of corporate executives getting rewarded for their companies' bad performance. Even the world's best CEO probably wouldn't be able to save these corporations—the fact is, the American coal market is disappearing and isn't coming back. But, Anderson argues, if these execs were truly interested in fixing their business models, they could have invested in alternative forms of energy, such as gas or renewables. "The smart thing," according to Anderson, "would have been to diversify their portfolio so they wouldn't be so vulnerable."


By 2018, Dutch Rail Will Be Fully Powered By Wind

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A Dutch passenger trainHolland is one of those "old" European countries where innovation is stifled by the hobnail boot of socialism.

By 2018, Dutch rail will be fully powered by wind

By: Matt Hickman
September 1, 2015

The Netherlands, a nation that’s been keen on harnessing the power of the wind since pretty much forever, has announced that in an effort to slash transport-related carbon emissions, its entire electric train network — all 1,800 miles of it — will run on energy produced at European wind farms. To be clear, Dutch trains already partially run on wind turbine-generated juice, a hugely impressive feat. But never a kingdom to rest on its laurels when it comes to sustainable transport, the Netherlands is now eying an ambitious total switch-over to wind power within three short years.
As reported by Railway Technology, a 50 percent wind power benchmark — a benchmark first established in 2014 through an agreement between Rotterdam-headquartered energy supplier Eneco and VIVENS, a consortium of Dutch rail carriers including state-owned Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS) — will be reached by the end of this year.
By 2016, that figure will jump to 70 percent and, in 2017, 95 percent. By 2018, all electric trains in the Netherlands, which carry an estimated 1.2 million passengers per day, will be wind-powered.
Roughly half of the wind farms powering the Netherlands’ 1.5kV DC electric rail system will be domestic operations, while the other half will be carefully selected farms located in neighboring Belgium and in Scandinavian nations.
So why the split? If the Netherlands, home to several large terrestrial and offshore wind farms boasting a total capacity of 2.7 GW and growing, can easily power a zero-emission electric rail system by way of domestic wind farms without assistance from its neighbors, why doesn’t it?
Michel Kerkof, an account manager at Eneco, explains to Railway Technology:
"If the Dutch railways sourced 100% of the 1.4 tWh of energy they needed each year from within the Netherlands, this would decrease availability and increase prices of green power for other parties. That is why half of the demand will be sourced from a number of new wind farms in Belgium and Scandinavia, which have been specifically assigned for this contract."
It's worth noting that despite the charming ubiquity of water-moving windmills in the Netherlands, when it comes to the per capita capacity of energy-producing wind turbines, the vertically challenged country doesn’t even crack the EU top five. Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Germany and, of course, Denmark, all top the list.
Kerkof adds: “This partnership ensures that new investments can be made in even newer wind farms, which will increase the share of renewable energy. In this way, the Dutch railways aim to reduce the greatest negative environmental impact caused by CO2 in such a way that its demand actually contributes to the sustainable power generation in the Netherlands and Europe.”
Mobility — that is, the various methods that people employ to transport themselves from point A to point B — is responsible for 20 percent of carbon emissions in the small but super-dense nation that, time after time, proves itself to be one giant clog-clad footstep ahead of the pack.
On that note, this past June, a court in The Hague ordered the Dutch government to reduce CO2 emissions by 25 percent within the next five years. The landmark ruling was prompted by a class-action lawsuit brought against the government by nearly 900 Dutch citizens — the world’s first-ever climate liability suit.
Via [Railway Technology] via [Gizmodo]


Read more: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/energy/blogs/by-2018-dutch-rail-system-completely-powered-wind?google_editors_picks=true#ixzz3kaNUcAYE


Clinton Email "Bombshell" On John Boehner: "I'll Drink To That"

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Can't you just taste his bitter, drunken, photoshopped tears?

Clinton Email Bombshell: John Boehner Probably Blackout Drunk Right Now

Read more at http://wonkette.com/593530/clinton-email-bombshell-john-boehner-probably-blackout-drunk-right-now#3VJb2Rj4d1RAotCV.99
Monday brought us another end-of-month dump of like 7000 Hillary Clinton emails from the State Department, and the most important things we learned are: she likes The Good Wife and Parks and Recreation, she wrote the goofiest diplomatic email heading/message in history, and everyone says Boehner’s a drunk. She is definitely one email away from prison, now.
One of the great unknown questions
One of the great unknown questions
That’s almost certainly some kind of code involving the murder of Vince Foster, or maybe it’s a reference to Benghazi, where Clinton passed over the diplomatic outpost’s frantic calls for help. Or, if you believe the lamestream media, the message was asking whether State had managed to obtain an exception to Israeli import duties for a shipment of frozen American carp that was destined to be made into gefilte fish. Yes, even Hillary’s weird emails turn out to be boring.
But then there’s this breakdown of strategy for the 2010 midterm elections sent to Clinton by longtime Friend Of Billary Sidney Blumenthal, who is rather amused to see the GOP establishment trying to pivot from inviting the Palinistas in for the primaries, but to shut them out during the general (not that it ultimately mattered; the wackobirds showed up in droves and brought us a Permanent Dumbfuck Majority in the House). The fun stuff comes in Blumenthal’s assessment of John Boehner’s standing among his GOP peers, which is mostly that he serves as a pissing target:
blumenthal boehner
Poor Drinky Drunky John, the Drunk. “He is louche, alcoholic, lazy, and without any commitment to any principle” and also “careworn and threadbare, banal and hollow, holding nobody’s enduring loyalty.” And Boehner’s “a would-be DeLay without the whip. He’s the one at the end of the lash.” 
We seriously doubt that anything in the email dump will hurt Hillary Clinton’s chances in 2016, since Democrats don’t seem to care about it much, but we’re pretty impressed by Blumenthal’s gift for purple prose. If he doesn’t have a successful political potboiler on the bestseller lists by the time Hillary takes the Oath of Office, he has only himself to blame.

Read more at http://wonkette.com/593530/clinton-email-bombshell-john-boehner-probably-blackout-drunk-right-now#3VJb2Rj4d1RAotCV.99


Miguel De Unamuno And The Bakery Of Life

The Thinking Housewife Plunges Into The Abyss Of Conspiratorial Thinking

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Dear Fred,


In recent months The Thinking Housewife has promoted several "false flag" conspiracy theories: "9/11," the "staged" slaughter of two dozen kindergartners at Sandy Hook Elementary School and, most recently, the killing of a female reporter and cameraman in Roanoke, Virginia.

Given America's zeal to drop atomic bombs and to start bogus wars -- Vietnam, Iraq, Nicaragua -- I have no difficulty believing that American government - at federal and local levels - would not hesitate to cause carnage within the nation's borders.

However, irrefutable proof of "patriotic" wrongdoing is egregiously evident overseas, whereas belief that "Sandy Hook" and "Roanoke" were "stage sets" is garden variety bizarre.


"Bergolio's" supposedly bogus pontificate is another instance of The Thinking Housewife's identification of occult wrongdoing in "high places."

Yes, "questions" can always be asked. 

But at some point it becomes necessary -- if only to stay sane -- to make use of a well-calibrated shitometer.

Beyond the bizarreness of denying Sandy Hook, Roanoke, Global Warming and Evolution we discern the mycelia of slipshod epistemology and the irrepressible gossip of conspiratorial speculation which, in the case of The Thinking Housewife's post "The Hand in the Virginia Shooting" is predictably sprinkled with the verb "seem."

It "seems" to 9/11 Truthers that toppling The Twin Towers was an "inside job." 

It "seems" to protestants that Catholicism is rife with moral monstrosity. 

Los 10 Momentos Más Vergonzosos De La Iglesia Católica


It "seems" to The Thinking Housewife that Pope Paul IV is "just the fellow" on whom to wager her eternal salvation. 

"The Thinking Housewife's Passion For Pope Paul IV Who Initiated Jewish Ghettos"

In the mid-sixties my Dad -- an unflappable, judicious fellow -- sat on Rochester New York's longest grand jury ever, determining which "race riot cases" should "go to trial." 

In the evening over dinner, Dad was flummoxed by the day's proceedings. "I cannot understand how eye witnesses to the same event can offer antithetical testimony even though they have no apparent ax to grind." (Since The Rochester Race Riots, science has determined that eyewitness testimony is an unusually fallible form of evidence... a finding that casts provocative epistemological light on the canonical gospels' frequent reference to "eyewitness testimony" as if this fallible "mechanism" guaranteed infallible results.)

Laura "seems" unaware that humans harbor "every" conceivable view on every conceivable topic... which is why scientific rigor, with its methodological commitment to proving itself wrong -- is indispensable to the determination of truth, or at least the closest approximation we can make.

Why does The Thinking Housewife repeatedly engage conspiratorial thinking especially as it relates to "false flag attacts?" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag

Typically, passion for "doubt" arises from a countervailing passion for authoritarian certainty.

Although seldom acknowledged, doubt shadows certainty.



There is also this...

Authoritarians are especially keen on the extraction of clear, dependable meaning from world events and it is in the nature of conspiratorial thought to posit multiple interactive levels of subtle, almost invisible meaning: the more intricate the presumed motivation behind a "seemingly" inexplicable tragedy, the more meaning saturates the gestalt.

What must be avoided at all cost is the prospect that particularly horrifying events are meaningless eruptions from the twisted depths of deranged minds, often genetically (or pathologically) obligated to behave with meaningless inexplicability.

Authoritarians cannot believe in meaninglessness because their belief systems impose a cornerstone conviction that everything must be meaningful and that apparent meaninglessness is the result of not having probed deeply enough to discover an evildoer's consciously-chosen commitment to align with the perverse "meaningfulness" of Satan himself. 

Christians don't discuss theodicy much... but, in truth, they should. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodicy

At bottom, conspiratorial thinking is a dependable defense against meaninglessness, "seeming" to vitiate the commonplace observation that "s/he just snapped."

Despite frequent displays of bravado we are fragile creatures and often snap.

Consider the case of the schizophrenic woman in Texas who recently drowned her twin two year olds. 

"Woman Says Her Twin Boys Weren't Loved So She Killed Them"

Will the religious right now call for comprehensive psychiatric care, or will they satisfy themselves with condemning Mom's deliberate perversity?

Deliberate perversity is meaningful. 

"Snapping" is not.

Someone (other than God) must be held responsible.

Jesus' morality -- based largely on paradox and The Kingdom's essential qualities of mercy and forgiveness (up to "seven times seventy times") -- turned The Law of The Talion (whence the word "retaliate") on its head.

There are two fundamental approaches to Judeo-Christianity. 

We can prioritize vengeance, vindictiveness, retribution and retaliation. 

Or "we" can prioritize mercy, compassion, forgiveness and love - most importantly as these qualities reach out to enemies and "the least among us."

For those with eyes to see it is clear that people who are more at home with revenge invest primary believe in the Old Testament (at least as it relates to behavior) whereas those who commit themselves to mercy and love subscribe to The New.

To this day, a hugely disproportionate number of religious devotees are "politely rabid" in pursuit of vengeance and punishment while shunning any manifestations of love, mercy and compassion that take place outside one's hearth, home and sect. 

In an unprecedented burst of revelation, The Gospel of John offers this epochal re-vision of "moral theology":

The Gospel of John, Chapter 9

International Standard Version 

Jesus Heals a Blind Man

As he was walking along, he observed a man who had been blind from birth.His disciples asked him, “Rabbi,[a] who sinned, this man or his parents, that caused him to be born blind?”
Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned. This happened so that[b] God’s work might be revealed in him. I[c] must do the work of the one who sent me[d] while it is day. Night is approaching, when no one can work.As long as I’m in the world, I’m the light of the world.” After saying this, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he spread the mud on the man’s eyes and told him, “Go and wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated “Sent One”). So he went off, washed, and came back seeing.
Good Religion And Bad Religion
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/02/bad-religion-and-good-religion.html

Are Highly Religious People Less Compassionate?
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/08/are-highly-religious-people-less.html

Does Religion Make Practitioners More Moral? New Evidence Suggests The Answer Is No
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/09/does-religion-make-practitioners-more.html

In the minds of "highly religious people" --- i.e., the "scribes,""pharisees,""high priests" and "canon lawyers" of every generation --- the prime directive is assignation guilt for deliberately irresponsible behavior, a mission that conveniently contrasts the "black" souls of "the damned" and the rigid believer's personal salvation. 
"As night follows day," the "highly religious" are determined to identify-and-condemn anyone responsible for the evil in their lives, and by extension for the evil in the world.
And so it is that a few verses later, John portrays the Pharisees' renewed effort to ignore The Master's teaching on the unassignability of guilt in order to double down on the blind man's sinfulness.

The Pharisees Investigate the Healing

13 So they brought to the Pharisees the man who had once been blind. 14 Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and healed[e] his eyes. 15 So the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had gained his sight. He told them, “He put mud on my eyes, then I washed, and now I can see.”
16 Some of the Pharisees began to remark, “This man is not from God because he does not keep the Sabbath.”
But others were saying, “How can a sinful man perform such signs?” And there was a division among them.
17 So they asked the formerly[f] blind man again, “What do you say about him, since it was your eyes he healed?”[g]
He said, “He is a prophet.”
18 The Jewish leaders[h] did not believe that the man[i] had been blind and had gained sight until they summoned his parents[j] 19 and asked them, “Is this your son, the one you say was born blind? How does he now see?”
20 His parents replied, “We know that this is our son and that he was born blind. 21 But we don’t know how it is that he now sees, and we don’t know who opened his eyes. Ask him. He is of age and can speak for himself.” 22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders,[k] since the Jewish leaders[l] had already agreed that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus[m] was the Messiah[n] would be thrown out of the synagogue. 23 That’s why his parents said, “He is of age. Ask him.”
24 The Jewish leaders[o] summoned the man who had been blind a second time and told him, “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.”
25 But he responded, “I don’t know whether he is a sinner or not. The one thing I do know is that I used to be blind and now I can see!”
26 Then they asked him, “What did he do to you? How did he heal[p] your eyes?”
27 He answered them, “I’ve already told you, but you didn’t listen. Why do you want to hear it again? You don’t want to become his disciples, too, do you?”
28 At this, they turned on him in fury and said, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses! 29 We know that God has spoken to Moses, but we do not know where this fellow comes from.”
30 The man answered them, “This is an amazing thing! You don’t know where he comes from, yet he healed[q] my eyes. 31 We know that God doesn’t listen to sinners, but he does listen to anyone who worships him and does his will.32 Ever since creation it has never been heard that anyone healed[r] the eyes of a man who was born blind. 33 If this man were not from God, he couldn’t do anything like that.”
34 They asked him, “You were born a sinner[s] and you are trying to instruct us?” And they threw him out.

Yeshua Excoriates Fellow Pharisees: "The Woe Passages"

"Love Your Enemies. Do Good To Those Who Hate You," Luke 6: 27-42

"Do You Know What You're Doing To Me?"
Jesus of Nazareth
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/12/do-you-know-what-youre-doing-to-me.html

"Twelve Steps For The Recovering Pharisee (Like Me)" By John Fischer
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/07/12-steps-for-recovering-pharisee-like.html

The Hand in the Virginia Shooting

August 31, 2015
2BAE86B500000578-3211529-A_disgruntled_former_news_reporter_filmed_himself_executing_two_-a-164_1440622419906
WHY is this a white hand pointing at Alison Parker, the TV reporter allegedly murdered in Virginia last week, when the man we are told who killed her, Vester Lee Flanagan, was black? It is extremely strange that in this very long Daily Mail article about the case as a “race revenge murder,” there is not a single acknowledgement of this glaring contradiction even though the picture clearly shows a white hand. Flanagan does appear somewhat light-skinned in some ofthe photos released, but this photo of him as a child is clearly of someone dark-skinned. Also, he himself claimed he was black and many others have referred to him as black. This is not a black hand.
vester1
In a previous entry, a reader commented that the interview with the father of Parker seemed staged. I didn’t think so upon initially viewing it, but then when one hears of these horrible shootings, one’s initial reaction is entirely one of sympathy. Looking at the father’s acting history now, I am beginning to wonder if the reader was on to something. Was this another false flag operation intended to terrorize the American public and incite racial division? [And, more importantly, promote “gun control?”]  Is it possible that we are being toyed with this much?
We are left with these disturbing questions.
— Comments —
Wheeler writes:
Some other things that are interesting about the recent shooting in Virginia…
The suspect apparently bought his pistols legally, with background checks, etc. This has not been heavily reported from what I have observed. But the father of the young female victim has continued speechifying about gun control, his intentions to dedicate his remaining years to increased gun control, and is quoted as saying “They messed with the wrong family.”
Who is “they?” I don’t think the father has done what most normal fathers would have done, which is to aim at least some hostility towards the dead shooter for murdering his daughter. He seems to be under the impression that one of the shooter’s guns actually composed the hateful, anti-white manifesto discovered by investigators. Who is “they?” People who own guns? People who support the Second Amendment?
Or perhaps we can be charitable and assume that the “they” are the media outlets who have somehow been unable to label this shooting as a “hate crime,” an inability which seems to have come upon the media quite recently; they had no problems labeling the Charleston church shooting as a “hate crime,” even before a suspect was in custody, if memory serves.
Last week, a friend of mine heard on Fox Radio a brief mention that workers were in the process of dismantling and repairing the wooden structure at the crime scene in Virginia. I have not yet been able to confirm this. If this is true, it’s very odd that the processing of a highly-visible double homicide scene was accomplished so rapidly and turned over to renovation personnel. If this is true, one hopes that the investigators will not need to revisit the scene for forensic purposes.
Bruce writes:
People get darker, not lighter when they mature to adulthood. Judging from the boyhood photo and the adult photos we’ve seen it appears that Flanagan has definitely lightened himself in a manner similar to what Michael Jackson and Sammy Sosa did. So my guess is he had all sorts of racial identity issues in his crazy head. He probably went from self-hating black to hating whitey.
Laura writes:
That does not look like an artificially bleached hand.
Dan R. writes:
I see it as the hand of a light-skinned black, or as the hand of the man in this photo, Vester Flanagan/Bryce Williams.
I always shake my head when people start talking of plotting to divide black and white. Isn’t there enough evidence of a deep hostility on the part of blacks toward whites without going into this kind of speculation? Are the dozens of examples covered on View From the Right simply anecdotal
or fraudulent? Maybe “white girl” don’t “bleed a lot?”
Laura writes:
Those crimes are not part of what appears to be an orchestrated campaign for gun control. (I’ve added that point in brackets in the original post above because it’s an important one.) The almost daily crimes such as those at View from the Right bring no calls for gun control. When I wrote of inciting racial division, I meant doing it in a conceivably deceitful way. Flanagan was supposedly reacting to the Charleston shooting and responding to racism.
Some of Flanagan’s photos make him look light-skinned in his face, but these are inconsistent with the dark skin in his childhood pictures. It may be that he did have some kind of treatments.
But the hand is very white, in my opinion.
G.P. writes:
Concerning the hand holding the gun in the shootings. While it may be impossible to determine that the hand was that of Bryce Williams, it certainly looks to be so and the evidence will bear this out.
As shown above, he was a very light skinned black man as can be seen in many pictures. What I find more disturbing it what hasn’t the full 24 page manifesto been released yet? What are they trying to hid from the public?
Emily writes:
With due respect, I’ve seen many examples of black skin getting lighter with age instead of darker (though it is not the norm). Weakening metabolisms and environmental factors can play a huge part (e.g. a little black boy playing outside everyday growing up to do mostly indoor camera-work and spend his off-hours on an iPhone instead of playing sports). It’s plausible to me that the attached photograph belongs to the white hand in the shooting photo.
….But this is probably wishful thinking on my part. No deviousness or set-up could truly surprise me at this point. Sigh.
Laura writes:
The photo you sent is similar to the ones linked to above. It shows that Flanagan’s face is quite light,w which is inconsistent with his childhood pictures and the appearance of his family members. If it was aging factors or some kind of chemical effect, it would not, I think, appear so uniformly white.
Of course, it may very well be Flanagan’s hand.
Thomas F. Bertonneau writes:
The hand in the video looks to me like it might belong to a darkly complected person (see especially the contrast between the thumbnail and the thumb itself).  It is unclear to me why the gun-control-obsessed Left would stage a horrendous black-on-white double murder, one of whose victims looks like she is a college-girl, or how they might think to benefit from it, pardoning the abuse of the verb.  On the other hand, the Left, by its racially divisive rhetoric, has been nurturing the image of black-on-white murder as a type of radical just retribution against “The Man” for decades, ramping up its stridency in the last two or three years.  (Think of movies like Machete and Django Unchained.)  My sense is that the named perpetrator committed the crime – he was the sort of unstable mentality prone to act on the Left’s violence-soliciting provocations.
I come from an old mixed-raced family out of Saint-Domingue by New Orleans.  I have some intimate experience of varying phenotypes, even in consanguineous persons.  No one would take me for anything but white.  My late father, whose birth-certificate categorized him as “colored,” had a light-olive complexion and very subtle Negro features, but his complexion darkened as he aged.  His older brother, my late uncle, was extremely darkly complected.  As my sister-in-law once said about first meeting him: “I couldn’t really figure it out but he was obviously a Negro.”  It is also the case that lenses, lighting, film-chemistry, and nowadays the algorithms of digital imaging can lighten or darken complexions.  In some photographs my father looks pale; in others, dark.
I have what I regard as a better theory than the one being proffered in this thread to explain the weird reactions of presumably bereaved survivors of murder victims.  Decades of “progressive” education have produced cohorts of people who are so politicized and so concomitantly de-spiritualized that they have no idea how properly to react to news of an enormity, one in which a loved-one has been brutally killed.  For such people it is natural to exploit personal bereavement by making it an occasion for political posturing.  I find this explanation not only more plausible than the other but frankly more horrifying.
John writes:
This is the second time today I have heard conspiracy theories raised in connection with the Virginia shooting.  Here is my take:
1. This is clearly the hand of a lighter skinned black person.  It never would have occurred to me to think otherwise.  The dark tint of the skin is natural and uniform, not the result of a tan.  The finger nails and undersides of the finger tips are lighter by contrast and appear pink, as is the natural case with black skin.  The hand is fleshy and lacks the creases typical of thinner white skin.
2. As to the darker coloration of Flanagan as a youth, this is most likely the result of the photography.  Photographic processes can easily make people look darker or lighter than they actually are.  There is no need to spin a conspiracy.
3. As for the media’s reluctance to present this as a so-called “hate crime,” what would you expect?  We all know the media are biased liars, bought and paid for by their masters, and hired to do their bidding exclusively.  If they did otherwise, they’d be out of a job pronto.  We should point these facts out, but not act as if we expect honesty from these whores, as it only suggests that they are capable of being honest.
4. Again, the shooting can’t be a so-called “hate crime” because the victims were white and the killer black. What more to we need to know about it?  The purpose of so-called “hate crimes” laws is not to confer equal justice and protect the innocent, but to elevate the victim status of certain favored groups over others, thus fomenting racial resentment and entitlement.  The other purpose is to eliminate free speech by turning it into “hate speech” and criminalizing it.  With regard to these laws, we should not be demanding their equal application.  This only confers legitimacy on the underlying concept.  What we should be demanding is their total elimination
5. Finally, conspiratorial thinking at this low a level is an effective way to marginalize oneself in any serious debate; so let’s not do it.
Fred writes:
Does anyone know how did the killer know where the victims were going to be that morning? I haven’t found anything, did someone from the station tip him off?
Laura writes:
I don’t know.
Isn’t it odd that the interview was at 6:30 a.m.?  The mall was empty of course at that time. How did the shooter know they were going to be there then?
This is sketchy but I don’t think this image, supposedly taken by the cameraman as he was shot, looks like Bryce Williams as he appeared on television at all. Again, these are intriguing issues; I am not saying they are enough to prove this was a false flag operation.
NATIONAL PICTURES Scrren grab of suspected shooter involved in the shooting dead a camerman and reporter live on air. Cameraman Adam Ward and reporter Alison Parker were shot dead during a live broadcast at Bridgewater Plaza near Smith Mountain Lake, USA.
NATIONAL PICTURES
Screen grab of suspected shooter involved in the shooting dead a camerman and reporter live on air. Cameraman Adam Ward and reporter Alison Parker were shot dead during a live broadcast at Bridgewater Plaza near Smith Mountain Lake, USA.
Laura writes:
Dr. Bertonneau writes:
No one would take me for anything but white.  My late father, whose birth-certificate categorized him as “colored,” had a light-olive complexion and very subtle Negro features, but his complexion darkened as he aged.
But look at the photo of Bryce Williams as a child.
Laura writes:
Okay, folks. Watch this video very closely.
I take back what I said about making no conclusions.
Notice how the gunman approaches. (I don’t know how he is filming himself or how the video was obtained, but I guess it’s on his phone?) Anyway, he is approaching and it is very odd that NO ONE REACTS TO HIS PRESENCE when in normal circumstances they would absolutely have seen a man coming so close to them. Even if they had not heard him, they would have seen him on the periphery and sensed the vibrations of his steps on the boardwalk. It is especially odd that the woman being interviewed does not react when he is a few feet away and she is facing him. Then see that the gunman shoots Alison Parker several times at close range (he is shooting and filming himself at the same time, huh?) and yet she is clearly not shot or wounded at all and starts to run. Also notice that the cameraman is oddly looking away and filming the parking lot or something when the gunman has stopped and is standing right in front of them.
Mark Jaws writes:
I grew up with folks of all shades and colors. That is not the hand of a white man. That is not even the hand of a light skinned Hispanic. That is the hand of a mixed race Afro-European, which is exactly what the killer was.
Laura writes:
You mean it’s the hand of someone who looks like this:
vester1
Laura writes:
The Fellowship of the Minds reports that the video images show the shooter had to have changed clothes during the shootings.
wbdj-shooter-bryce-williams-changed-clothes-while-shooting
A female reader writes:
Regarding how Flanagan would know that the reporter and cameraman would be at the interview location at that time:  the simplest explanation is that he was watching for them to leave the station that morning and followed them to the interview location in his car.  He reportedly lived close to the Roanoke station.
Laura writes:
Yes, that’s a possibility. Still, he would have to have been at the station at what is normally an unusual time for an interview and benefited from the coincidence that the interview just happened to be in a secluded place (because of the time and location) with few bystanders.
Mr. Jaws writes:
The picture of the hand holding the gun was taken in the morning light, perhaps making the brown hand lighter than it appears. But the picture of the killer as a young boy shows a darker complexion than of what we of him later as an adult.
Diana Blackwell writes:
Why does the shooter’s hand look “white?”  Because it is outdoors, reflecting a lot of light.  You can try this at home, with different objects and different lighting conditions.
Look at the gun in the photo.  See how the gun has a dark finish–black or near-black?  Now look at how the top side of the gun is reflecting enough light to appear almost white.  Did the gun undergo chemical lightening treatments?  Is some sort of funny-business going on?  No, this is a perfectly common and natural lighting phenomenon that applies to human beings as well as inanimate objects.
Human skin does not always reflect the same amount of light or the same colors.  A person with pale, milky skin may appear red-skinned when standing near a red wall that reflects red light.  A dark-skinned person can look darker or paler depending on the specific lighting conditions at the time.
Photographers and portrait painters understand these things and go to great lengths to control the lighting when they work.  There is a whole art to this.  Lighting can make a person look older or younger, prettier or uglier, fairer or darker, etc.
Here are some links to Google images of “African-American hands.”  (Herehere, and here) Take a look, and then consider whether you would have known these were “black” hands without being told,  from the photos alone.
Please, everybody, let’s not manufacture a conspiracy out of thin air.  There is more than enough reason to believe that the shooter was Vester Flanagan.
Laura writes:
Your photos are from an unknown source and I have no idea whose hands they are just because they are labeled “African-American” hands. Nevertheless, the first photo looks clearly like a black hand. The second two are very ambiguous with the third appearing more white than black.
I certainly realize light makes a difference, but I don’t think it makes as much difference as this hand at the alleged crime scene suggests, especially given that it was 6:30 a.m. Leaving that aside, the hand curiosity here is only one issue.  Nothing has been manufactured “out of thin air.” A number of very serious issues have been raised here based on the only evidence we have: the news reports. View the video of the shooting I mentioned above. Again, notice that none of the three people, including the interviewee who is facing the gunman, seems to be aware that a man is standing right in front of them with a gun and has walked toward them while recording it all on video. Very strange. Notice that Parker appears to have been shot several times at close range and yet starts running with no apparent injury.
Deana writes:
Mr. Bertonneau has hit the nail squarely on the head. Decades of brainwashing (how many times have we heard leftists insist, “the personal IS political!”) coupled with the disintegration of the family and the relegation of Christianity into nothing more than a faint memory has made people believe that political expression is the proper way to demonstrate grief, sorrow, and anger. I have no doubt the father and other family members are devastated but it is bizarre to see someone talking about politics policy less than 12 hours after his flesh and blood was murdered.
I do not believe at this time there is any conspiracy. The hand looks to me to be that of a light skinned black man.
Laura writes:
Did you view this video of the shooting to which I linked in the discussion above?
Since you have concluded that no conspiracy has occurred, which would be a great relief for me personally to learn and be assured of because, like most sane people, I do not relish the idea of sinister government plots, could you please explain the following glaring problems with this event?
1. Why do the reporter, cameraman and woman being interviewed not react to a man coming toward them while he is filming them and holding a gun even though we can clearly hear his footsteps on the boardwalk in the recording and we can see that he stops right in front of them?
2. Why is the gunman wearing a different shirt (blue checked shirt) from the black shirt he is wearing in the image (see above) taken by the cameraman? Do you think he changed his clothes while shooting three people?
3. Why do we see Alison Parker shot, apparently in the chest, at close range and yet see no visible injury and see her sprinting away as if she is not wounded at all? How could she not be stopped after being shot several times in the chest?
Thank you for your consideration of these questions.
I will say one thing. If this was a staged event, which I now believe it was, it was very poorly executed. A more professional producer is in order.
Funky PhD writes:
I’ve carefully watched the shooter’s video, and think I can answer some of Laura’s questions. The inattention of the interviewer and interviewee can be attributed to their being live on the air at the time Flanagan approached with his cell phone camera in his left hand, and the gun in his right. Even if they saw Flanagan approach, both Parker and the interviewee, knowing they were on the air, would have ignored him, as nothing is more amateurish than to acknowledge or respond to passers-by when conducting one of these types of live interviews. When Flanagan walked up to them, the cameraman was filming the boats in the marina to his right, and panning back to Parker and the interviewee. He therefore would not have seen Flanagan at all. It is curious than Parker appears not to see Flanagan when he first levels his gun at her but doesn’t fire (at about 17 seconds). He is, however, standing behind the cameraman, and lowers his weapon quickly. Perhaps Parker didn’t see the gun because from her vantage point, it would have been behind the cameraman’s left shoulder. When he does fire, Parker runs away; but it is possible that his first three or four shots did indeed miss her. Even at that distance, it’s hard to hit someone with a pistol, especially if it’s held in only one hand. But even if she was hit by one or two of the first four shots, she still could have run a few steps. As he continues shooting, she darts down the walkway away from the gunman, but just before the camera drops and the screen goes black, you see her veer suddenly to her left instead of continuing straight. This may indicate that the fourth or fifth shot hit her. In any event, the video records (by my count) 15 gunshots, only four of which are visible. Presumably, Flanagan shot both Parker and the cameraman several times while the camera was on the ground, most likely moving closer to them and (according to one news account) shooting both in the head. The interviewee also reported that he shot at her several times, missing with all but one bullet.
All of this is to say that to my eye, the video confirms the accounts of the attack that have been provided. There’s nothing in it to suggest anything was staged.
Laura writes:
In response:
It is understandable, I guess, that Parker did not look at the man who was approaching them since she was right in the middle of an interview though I do think even in those circumstances it is unnatural not to look at someone approaching very close by. (She must have had poor peripheral vision. I can tell if someone is pointing at me — and I certainly would have been alarmed if someone was pointing an object at me — even if they are several feet away and I am not looking directly at them.) It is not understandable in my opinion that the woman being interviewed did not at least glance at the man standing right in front of them and walking around close by. We can hear his footsteps.
Yes, it is possible that the cameraman was panning the scene all around, though it is odd that he would do this while the interview was going on live; Parker is clearly holding the microphone to the woman and we know it was on-air interview at that very moment. Still that is possible. There should be a video recording of the interview since it was live.
The shooter appears very close when he shoots at Parker. It is possible that he missed. I have to say it just doesn’t look like it to me. This, we have to conclude, can only be somewhat subjective for us. But, let’s say he missed. Parker was reportedly shot in the head. We see her running away very fast here and she appears to have gotten quite far as she is sprinting away. He would have had to shoot her in the head as she is running away. That’s definitely possible. But it seems odd that he is shooting Parker and she is running away and the others are not screaming or running too while he is shooting at Parker and that he is a good enough shot to shoot her in the head as she was running away, even though he missed her when she was standing right in front of him.
I am not a very brave person in a crisis, but I do think if I were holding a large object such as a television camera and I saw a friend of mine being shot by a man standing right next to me, I would not stand there with the camera running. I would instinctively and without hesitation throw the camera at him as hard as I could as it would be a quick and easy way to disable him. If I was too afraid to do that, I would be the sort of person who would simply be running away as soon as I saw my friend being attacked. The cameraman did neither of these things.
How do you explain the different shirts?
Laura writes:
Looking at it again, it is possible that the different shirts are explained by lighting, and that he is wearing the same shirt. I don’t understand why the cameraman’s image is as grainy and unclear as it is. Did he adjust the settings on his camera while his friend was being shot?
 Hurricane Betsy writes:
I love conspiracy theories but, yes, that is the hand of a Negro with white blood. I have seen countless such folks where I used to work.
The comments from “Funky PhD” about wrap it up, I’d say. Well done, Funky!
Dr. Bertonneau writes:
You ask, “Why do the reporter, cameraman and woman being interviewed not react to a man coming toward them while he is filming them and holding a gun even though we can clearly hear his footsteps on the boardwalk in the recording and we can see that he stops right in front of them?”  To react apprehensively to Flanagan would have been “to disrespect” him, which well-trained, good Eloi would rather die than do.
They fail to react because they have been conditioned never to believe that a person of minority status could harbor ill-will towards them or actually plan to harm them or in fact harm them.  Such people are never perpetrators; they are always and only victims.  Had the two journalists seen a glaze-eyed white person approaching them with a gun, they would probably have taken notice.   This phenomenon is connected with the explanation why bereaved parents of the murdered college-girl reporter respond so bizarrely – with a set-piece political speech – to their own bereavement.
I extend this interpretation retroactively to a number of other incidents in the last year when survivors of massacres interviewed by reporters within twenty-four hours of the event performed like robots, seemingly passionless, and prone to make hackneyed political statements.  I repeat that I find this hollowed-out-person syndrome even more frightening than the worst of the conspiracy theories.  Not only is it more likely than the conspiracy theories – it is terrifying in its implications.
Laura writes:
To say that they didn’t react because he was black is to say that they saw him and looked at him. There is no evidence from this video to suggest that they did. That’s my point. That’s the strange and artificial thing. They didn’t even look at him even though he is approaching with a phone and filming them, and presumably also has a gun in his hands (though perhaps it is concealed at that point.) Now if they had looked at him before this video feed, one would think that they would have been wary that a man who was widely known to be mentally unstable and had been fired from the station was creeping toward them while they were on air.
Bruce writes:
As far as the woman running away, I think it’s possible she was hit by the first shots even if we can’t see it. Incapacitation from a gunshot wound isn’t usually instantaneous. Deer (a human-sized animal) often run a fair distance after being shot by a hunter with a rifle (much more powerful than a handgun). For this reason, hunters usually choose large caliber rifles so the dying deer doesn’t get too far. Incapacitation often follows the drop in blood pressure that results from large wound cavity. It is quick but not instantaneous.
Laura writes:
I’m sorry, but when a bullet hits a body, there is some sign of a blow being received. Do you have any idea of what the impact of a real bullet from a handgun is? A bullet fired that close would probably throw a woman Alison Parker’s size, but in any event, even if she kept running her body would have recoiled from a serious blow from a gun that close.
Bruce adds:
In our digital age it’s so hard to know what’s real and what’s not. So much for the so-called “information age.”
Laura writes:
Yes, that is true. And because of the inconclusiveness of video evidence such as this, journalists should request under the Freedom of Information Act, police photos of the crime scene. Problem solved. Let’s see the crime scene. Let’s see the bodies. Let’s settle the issue for good. Whatever is true or not true in this particular case, I’m afraid the age in which journalists could take for granted that what the police told them was true in highly publicized shooting sprees and terror events is over. Read that? OVER.
Funky writes:
There is video of the newsfeed, and this video intercuts Flanagan’s cell-phone video with what went onthe air.
This answers why the photo of Flanagan with the gun in his hand was so grainy:  that widely-broadcast image was captured from Ward’s camera as it fell. [Laura writes: In other words, before that moment, Ward just stood there with a roughly 40-pound potential weapon in his hands and watched while his friend was being shot. Okay. Very sad.]  When the feed continues briefly with the camera on the floor, the image is clear.  I’m guessing that Flanagan shot at Parker as she ran away, maybe hitting her in the torso, which prevented her from continuing down the walkway. He probably didn’t hit her in the head, as she is still screaming after the first eight shots have been fired. I think Flanagan wounded Parker, bringing her down, then immediately turned to his right and shot Ward in the head, which dropped him to the ground.  There is then about a three-second pause, during which I think Flanagan took a few steps forward and to his left, which would have brought him to within point-blank range of Parker.  Then there’s another shot, another brief pause, and two more shots.  This is probably when Flanagan shot Parker in the head.  Then there’s another brief pause, which probably corresponds to him turning back to his right to shoot at Gardner.  Two to three more trigger pulls would have emptied his gun (a Glock 19, which holds 15 cartridges in the magazine, plus one in the chamber).  I count 15-16 shots in the video (the uncertainty is due to the video ending in the middle of what appears to be a gunshot).
Again, it all adds up, and putting the videos side by side confirms the positions of the cameraman, the interviewer, and the interviewee.  The supposed shirt discrepancy is a matter of lighting and the poor resolution of the video capture.  The only part of the story that remains unclear to me is how Flanagan knew that Parker and Ward would be at Smith Mountain Lake, which is about 26 miles from Roanoke.  Your female reader must be correct that he followed them there from the station.  If he didn’t, and instead met them there, that means that he had prior knowledge of their whereabouts.  This raises the question of whether he had a confederate at the station who told him where they would be.
 Laura writes:
I haven’t looked at that clip yet.
This video shows the difference between a handgun just like the one fired, but allegedly with real bullets,  and the apparent handgun with blanks in the Virginia shooting.
Dr. Bertonneau writes:
Laura writes: “In other words, before that moment [of the first shot], Ward just stood there with a roughly 40-pound potential weapon in his hands and watched while his friend was being shot.”
Yes, because due to his conditioning, or rather his de-conditioning, he could not believe what was happening.  Ward had no concept of a weapon.  He had no concept of self-defense because he had no concept of danger, especially from a person like Flanagan, who was, from the point-of-view of Liberal Goodthink, solely a victim, and never a perpetrator.
Parker and Ward were completely naive; their upbringing and education occurred in an ideological bubble that shut out social reality and basic common sense.  There is a conspiracy – of fifty years standing: It is the acculturation of every new cohort to the unreality of the prevailing worldview.  No one should underestimate the damaging effect of the Modern Liberal Regime of childrearing and education.  It creates Eloi.
Laura writes:
Again, when you say he didn’t think of Flanagan as threatening: He didn’t see Flanagan supposedly until Flanagan started to shoot. I just can’t see liberal groupthink being much of an issue when the man standing next to you is actually shooting your co-worker and you are likely to be next. But, once again, it is possible.

A Skeptic on Virginia Shooting

August 31, 2015
I AM not familiar with the other work of this Youtube journalist, but here is his latest video. Reporting from his studio in his laundry room, he has a number of questions about the Virginia shooting. (Warning: Some mildly foul language.) Though he says he is convinced it was a hoax, he by no means presents an irrefutable case. He does, however, raise some troubling points.


60,000 Antelopes Died in 4 Days — And No One Knows Why

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Justice Scalia Explains Why Kim Davis Should Issue Gay Marriage Licenses

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Kentucky county clerk denies same-sex couple marriage license
Play Video1:17
Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis tells a same-sex couple hoping to be married that she is not issuing marriage licenses "under God's authority." (Hillary Thornton/WKYT-TV)

Justice Scalia explained why Kim Davis should issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples or find a new job

Video: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/09/02/justice-scalia-explains-why-kim-davis-should-issue-marriage-licenses-to-same-sex-couples-or-find-a-new-job/

Kim Davis, the clerk of Rowan County, Ky., refuses to issue marriage licensesto same-sex couples because she believes same-sex marriage is immoral.According to Davis, her religious convictions prevent her from issuing the license: “To issue a marriage license which conflicts with God’s definition of marriage, with my name affixed to the certificate, would violate my conscience.”
In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, Kentucky Gov. Steven Beshear ordered all county clerks in the state to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, but Davis refused. A federal district court ordered her to comply and issue such licenses, and she still refused. She sought relief in federal court, and even sought relief from the Supreme Court, but to no avail. She now risks contempt.
No justice publicly dissented from the Supreme Court’s denial of Davis’s plea for relief, and this was not surprising. The law on this point is clear. Davis cites her religious conscience as the excuse for her intransigence, but she is wrong to do so.  That’s not only my view, but the view of no less than Justice Antonin Scalia.
Davis has a right to observe and adhere to her religious beliefs, but she does not have a right to her job as county clerk. The latter obligates her to follow federal law, including the applicable judgments of federal courts, and it is now the law of the land that the Constitution bars state governments from refusing to recognize same-sex marriages on equal terms with opposite-sex marriages. If, as Davis claims, her religious convictions bar her from issuing such a marriage license, she should resign.
Now Scalia has not, to my knowledge, said anything directly about Davis’s actions, but he has addressed the question of what public officials should do when their official obligations conflict with their religious conscience. Writing in “First Things” in 2002, Scalia explained that if he were to conclude that the death penalty is fundamentally immoral, he should no longer serve on the bench.
[W]hile my views on the morality of the death penalty have nothing to do with how I vote as a judge, they have a lot to do with whether I can or should be a judge at all. To put the point in the blunt terms employed by Justice Harold Blackmun towards the end of his career on the bench, when he announced that he would henceforth vote (as Justices William Brennan and Thurgood Marshall had previously done) to overturn all death sentences, when I sit on a Court that reviews and affirms capital convictions, I am part of “the machinery of death.” My vote, when joined with at least four others, is, in most cases, the last step that permits an execution to proceed. I could not take part in that process if I believed what was being done to be immoral. . . .
[I]n my view the choice for the judge who believes the death penalty to be immoral is resignation, rather than simply ignoring duly enacted, constitutional laws and sabotaging death penalty cases. He has, after all, taken an oath to apply the laws and has been given no power to supplant them with rules of his own. Of course if he feels strongly enough he can go beyond mere resignation and lead a political campaign to abolish the death penalty” and if that fails, lead a revolution. But rewrite the laws he cannot do.
Davis is in a similar position. Her official position obligates her to take part in the state’s licensing and recognition of marriages. Insofar as the state’s definition of an acceptable marriage differs from her own, Davis is obligated to follow the state’s rule so long as she maintains her current office.
Think of it this way. Someone who objects to war due to his religious conscience has a right to be a conscientious objector and not serve in the military, even were there to be a draft. But he does not have the right to serve as a military officer, draw a paycheck from the military and then substitute his own personal views of when war is justified for that of the government. The same applies here.
If Davis believes the government’s definition of marriage is fundamentally immoral and contrary to her religious convictions, she should remove her self from the state’s machinery of marriage. That she has every right to do. What she does not have the right to do, however, is serve as a government official and fail to fulfill the obligations that come with that office.
UPDATE: Some readers object to the title of this post on the grounds that Justice Scalia’s 2002 essay was not addressed to Kim Davis or the current controversy over same-sex marriage.  Indeed, it would be hard for Scalia to have addressed this controversy in 2002.  But the Scalia essay nonetheless “explains why” Davis should comply with the law or resign.  This is because it explains why public officials should either fulfill their public obligations under the law or, should they feel precluded from fulfilling their obligations due to religious objections, resign from their position. That is the question Scalia addressed in 2002, and that is the question raised by Davis’s appeal to religious conscience today. For that reason, I stand by the headline, with one modification. As originally posted, it read “Justice Scalia explains why Kim Davis should issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples or find a new job.” I’ve revised it to put it in the past tense. Otherwise, I stand by the headline.


Jonathan H. Adler teaches courses in constitutional, administrative, and environmental law at the Case Western University School of Law, where he is the inaugural Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Business Law and Regulation.

Wrongly Convicted North Carolina Brothers Each Get $750 K Payout

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The Number Of Police Officers Shot And Killed Is Down This Year. Half Are Black

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Shaun King

In the United States, the perception of truth often means more than truth itself. While theconservative media lies to blame the Black Lives Matter movement for the tragic shooting deaths of police officers, the mainstream media is rushing to cover what appears to be a dramatic increase in gun violence against police officers.
Except, this isn't true. Our country is on pace to have fewer officers shot and killed while on duty this year than last year (and almost any year on record for that matter).
Often, people who are sympathetic to police will quote that 83 police have died in the line of duty in 2015. And that is true, but what they aren't telling you is that 13 of those officers had heart attacks or that 19 died in car accidents or that three died because of 9/11-related illnesses.
A total of 26 police officers have been shot and killed in the line of duty this year. Each of those is tragic and a reflection of the violence in our country. This, though, is not some race-based dramatic uptick in police shooting deaths. Forty-seven officers were shot and killed in 2014 and we are on pace to have fewer than that this year. Comparatively, 662 people have been shot and killed by police in America as of September 1 and a total of 792 people have been killed by police altogether this year.
Not only that, but as the media attempts to blame black activists for these deaths, the truth they aren't telling you is that half of all police who've been shot and killed this year were actually African Americans. That, though, is inconvenient for their narrative.
We should be able to have the emotional maturity and intellectual honesty to discuss these issues without misstating or skewing the facts (or outright lying about them). It only makes matters worse.
Not only that, but far more police are dying by suicide than they are at the hands of others.
Police officers are many times more likely to commit suicide than to be killed by a criminal; nine NYC policemen attempted to take their own lives in 2012, alone. Eight succeeded. In 2013, eight NYPD officers attempted suicide, while six succeeded. If police want to protect themselves, a wise move might be to invest in psychiatric counseling, rather than increased firepower.
Again, though, we don't hear these stories because they don't give the conservative media a chance to blame activists and leaders for anything.

"Bad Black People." Why Bill O'Reilly Is Wrong Even When He's Right"
Extrajudicial Execution By Killer Cops: Best Pax Posts

Cop Arrested After Video Shows Her Shoot Unarmed Man in Back Lying Face Down in the Snow

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/cop-arrested-after-video-shows-her.html

Open Season On Unarmed American Black Men, A Compendium Of Pax Posts
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/open-season-on-american-black-men.html

Alan: Blacks are arrested - and prosecuted - at least twice as often as whites for the "contraband" crimes that most often put Americans behind bars. 

If white people were incarcerated as often as blacks for the crimes both commit with the same regularity, and if blacks were incarcerated for the crimes they commit as often as whites are for those same crimes, the "black prison time" figure of 32% (above) would be cut in half and the "white prison time" figure of 6% would double.

The situation is further complicated because it is much harder for released blacks to find work than it is for released whites, making persistent black unemployment a source of recidivism.

Are there any circumstances under which you would hire Jamal ahead of James?

Blacks Arrested For Contraband Twice As Often Though Much Less Likely To Have Contraband

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/blacks-2x-as-likely-to-be-arrested-for.html

The Future Of Race In America: TED Talk By Michelle Alexander, Author Of "The New Jim Crow"

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-future-of-race-in-america-ted-talk.html

Lists Of Americans Killed By Cops In 2013, 2014, 2015
http://www.killedbypolice.net/kbp2014.html

Walter Scott’s Killing Is the Sum of Every Black Nightmare About White Cops

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/walter-scotts-killing-is-sum-of-every_7.html

Killing Good Black People Over Dysfunctional Tail Lights

Open Season On Unarmed American Black Men, A Compendium Of Pax Posts

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/open-season-on-american-black-men.html

50 Police Officers Shot & Killed In 2014. Huge, Steady Decline Since 1970s

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/12/50-police-officers-shot-killed-in-2014.html

The Beginning Of The End For Cop-Killer Privilege: "#CrimingWhileWhite"

American Cops Fire More Bullets At One NYC Man Than All German Cops Fire In A Year
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/09/85-shots-us-cops-use-more-ammo-per-man.html


1 Small Town's Cops Have Killed More People Than Combined Police Of Germany And U.K.
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/02/1-small-towns-cops-have-killed-more.html

The Caging Of America: Why Do We Lock Up So Many People?
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/04/caging-of-america-why-do-we-lock-up-so.html

Selma, "Glory" And America's Astronomical Incarceration Rate
Particularly For Blacks
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-common-and-john-legend-win-best.html


There's Never Been A Safer Time For Cops Nor A More Dangerous Time For Criminals
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/11/theres-never-been-safer-time-to-be-cop.html

"Non-Racist" Gringos Cheer Black Man Who Would "Ventilate Black Asses With M16s"
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/09/non-racist-gringos-cheer-black-man-who.html

Jesus Says: If Walter Scott Was Running Away Because He Was Guilty Of Something, Kill Him

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/jesus-says-if-walter-scott-was-running.html

Compendium Of Pax Posts: What's Wrong With Race Relations? 
Hatred, Cops And The Law
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/compendium-of-pax-posts-whats-wrong.html

Here's The News Report We'd Be Reading If Walter Scott's Murder Wasn't On Video
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/04/heres-news-report-wed-be-reading-if.html

Pax On Both Houses: Compendium Of U.S. Prison System Posts

Compendium Of Pax Posts On Violent Criminals And Violent Police

Diane Rehm Guest Gets To The Nub Of Police Violence And How Easily It's Prevented

"Is The United States Still A Nation Of Law? Bad Cops And Bad Politicians Walk"

Killer Cops: Slow Motion Serial Killing By White People




2 Sisters Sentenced To Be Gang Raped And Paraded Naked By An Unelected All Male Court

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"Trial By Ordeal: The Bloody Old Testamental Roots Of Modern Justice"
2 Sisters Sentenced To Be Gang Raped And Paraded Naked By An Unelected All Male Court

It's more than disturbing - it's deranged. Young girls and women are continuously violated and abused under the guise of religion and archaic, misogynist laws. News of another extreme case is sweeping social media and people are reacting. Amnesty International has created PETITION to stop the rape sentence of two sisters in India's Baghpat District.
 
An unelected all-male village council in India has ordered that 23-year-old Meenakshi Kumari and her 15-year-old sister be raped and paraded naked.
The ‘sentence’ was handed down as punishment after their brother eloped with a married woman.
Nothing could justify this punishment. It’s not fair. It’s not right. And it’s against the law. Demand that the local authorities intervene immediately.
Unelected village councils such as this are widespread in parts of India. More often than not they are made up of older men from dominant castes, who prescribe rules for social behaviour in villages.
The supreme court of India has branded their decrees illegal, yet in some states they continue to operate – and their punishments are carried out.
The whole family, including the eloped woman, are at risk of reprisals. A brother of the sisters, Sumit Kumar, said, “In the panchayat [village council], the Jat decision is final. They don’t listen to us. The police don’t listen to us. The police said anyone can be murdered now.”
Act now. Demand the Director General of Police, Jagmohan Yadav, ensures the safety of Meenakshi Kumari, her sister and family.
Please sign and share the Amnesty International PETITION in hopes of stopping this atrocity, as well as sending a message to the world that these horrific abuses against women will not be tolerated.

Related:
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter continues to speak out against the abuses of women worldwide. Here is an excerpt from: Jimmy Carter: 'Losing My Religion For Equality'
This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women's equal rights across the world for centuries.
At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.
The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and why there are still so few women in office in the West. The root of this prejudice lies deep in our histories, but its impact is felt every day. It is not women and girls alone who suffer. It damages all of us.
To learn more about the work of Amnesty International visit here, or follow Amnesty International on Facebook.

ORIGINALLY POSTED TO LESLIE SALZILLO ON TUE SEP 01,


Canada's Defense Minister Had Words For Scott Walker's Border Wall

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So, we've all heard, by now, Scott Walker (R-Fantasyland) thinks that a wall along the Canadian border is "a legitimate concern".  Canada's Defense Minister had words about that.
I would remind that governor or anyone else in the United States of the enormous progress that we have made beyond the [border] agreement that Prime Minister Harper signed with President Obama, which massively improves continental perimeter security. As you know, we often find there are some American political actors who are not aware of the progress that has been made on continental security.
So we'll continue to remind our American friends that Canada has taken extraordinary efforts to ensure the joint security and you know I don’t think—quite frankly I can tell you as the former minister of immigration, that Canada has a much greater legitimate concern about the northward flow of illegal migration than the United States does of a southward flow of illegal migration
(bold = my favorite line of the whole thing)
And of course, his campaign is saying he didn't really suggest a wall.  Funny, he tweeted later in the day that he "wouldn't ignore concern expressed from law enforcement".  I'd love to know who these law enforcement people are.

"What Donald Trump Understands About Republicans," New York Times

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Excerpt:Pew survey in June found that when voters were given a choice between “immigrants burden the country by taking jobs, housing and health care” and “immigrants strengthen the country through hard work and talents,” a majority of those polled, 51-41, chose “strengthen the country.” Republicans, however, disagreed, with 63 percent saying immigrants were a burden and 27 percent saying immigrants strengthened the country.

What Donald Trump Understands About Republicans

by Thomas Edsall
New York Times
Donald Trump’s success is no surprise. The public and the press have focused on his defiant rejection of mannerly rhetoric, his putting into words of what others think privately. But the more important truth is that a half-century of Republican policies on race and immigration have made the party the home of an often angry and resentful white constituency — a constituency that is now politically mobilized in the face of demographic upheaval.
Demographic upheaval may be understating it. From 1970 to 2010, the Hispanic population of the United States grew fivefold, from 9.6 million to 50.5 million. From 2000 to 2010, the number of white children under 18 declined by 4.3 million while the number of Hispanic children grew by 4.8 million. In 2013, white children became a minority, 47.7 percent ofstudents ages 3 to 6.
We have become familiar with Trump’s selling point — that he, more than any other Republican candidate, voices nativist and protectionist views in aggressive and abrasive terms, without qualm: “I Love the Mexican people. I do business with the Mexican people, but you have people coming through the border that are from all over. And they’re bad. They’re really bad.” He has vilified Latin American immigrants as “bringing drugs, bringing crime” and as “rapists.”
Not very subtly, Trump conflates American blacks with Mexican immigrants. “I know cities where police are afraid to even talk to people because they want to be able to retire and have their pension,” he declaredin Nashville on Aug. 29. “That first night in Baltimore,” when rioting broke out in protest over the death of Freddie Gray in police custody, “they allowed that city to be destroyed. They set it back 35 years in one night because the police weren’t allowed to protect people. We need law and order!”
Urban gangs, in turn, provide Trump with an opportunity to link immigration and crime. “You know a lot of the gangs that you see in Baltimore and in St. Louis and Ferguson and Chicago, do you know they’re illegal immigrants?” Trump vows that after the election, “they’re going to be gone so fast, if I win, that your head will spin.”

Whites Seeing Discrimination Against Whites
Percent of white respondents in 2014 who agreed or disagreed with this statement: Today discrimination against whites has become as big a problem as discrimination against blacks and other minorities.

50%
Disagree:
Agree:
Men
55%
52
50


43
45
47
All whites
Women
Tea Party
76
61
53
37
21
36
44
62
Republican
Independent
Democrat
48
46
55
60


Ages 18-29
49
52
44
34
30-49
50-64
65 and older
58
37
Working class
37
61
College educated
Evangelical Protestant
63
56
49
40
33
43
47
58
Catholic
Mainline Protestant
Unaffiliated

The ease with which Trump has grasped top-dog status has provoked apprehension in the Republican establishment –perhaps most vividly in George Will’s comment on the renegade billionaire:
Every sulfurous belch from the molten interior of the volcanic Trump phenomenon injures the chances of a Republican presidency.
George Will and other traditional conservatives reject the bombastic language Trump favors, preferring a more elliptical approach in order to avoid alienating moderate voters Republicans need to win in 2016.
Trump is going directly after those Republican voters who seek to protect what some scholars call “compositional amenities” – the comfort of a common religion and language, mutually shared traditions, and the minimization of cultural conflict.
The territory Trump has ventured onto is fertile ground for his brand of demagoguery.
The Pew Research Center found in a 2012 survey that while all respondents were split, 46-48, on the question of whether “the growing number of newcomers threaten traditional American values,” Republicans viewed immigrants as a direct threat to American values, 60-32, and conservative Republicans even more so, 64-30.
A more recent Pew survey in June found that when voters were given a choice between “immigrants burden the country by taking jobs, housing and health care” and “immigrants strengthen the country through hard work and talents,” a majority of those polled, 51-41, chose “strengthen the country.” Republicans, however, disagreed, with 63 percent saying immigrants were a burden and 27 percent saying immigrants strengthened the country.
Responses to the question of whether “discrimination against whites has become as big a problem as discrimination against blacks and other minorities” reflect Republican concerns from a different perspective. This question was asked by the Public Religion Research Institute in October 2014. The results demonstrate that not only do a majority of whites, 52 percent, agree, but that this agreement is heavily concentrated among conservative constituencies, including Tea Party supporters and white evangelicals.
In 2013, well before a Trump bid was visible, the polling company Latino Decisions, which specializes in analysis of the Hispanic electorate, developed a survey measure of “openness to diversity.” The measure is based on the strength of support or opposition to 16 statements about possible consequences of immigration, including “a bigger, more diverse workplace will lead to more economic growth”; “there will be too many demands on government services”; “people will become more accepting of their differences and more willing to find common ground”; and “crime and problems in our neighborhood will go up.”
In a poll of 2,943 respondents of all races and ethnicities, conducted for the liberal Center for American Progress, the firm found that the groups scoring lowest on the openness to diversity measure were made up of white conservatives, white seniors, white born-again Christians and the white working class – all Republican-leaning constituencies.
The Trump phenomenon arguably represents a culmination of the 50-plus-year transformation of the Republican Party.
That transformation was set in motion in 1964, when Barry Goldwater, the Republican presidential nominee, opposed the newly enacted Civil Rights Act. What remained of longstanding black support for the Republican Party disappeared overnight.


Continue reading the main story

Accepting American Diversity

The scores below, from a 2013 survey, rank openness to diversity on a scale of zero (no or low acceptance) to 160 (highest).

110
Asian millennial college graduates
Latino millennial college graduates
African-American college graduates
100
White liberals
Liberals
Asians
Postgraduates
Female college graduates
African-Americans
Millennials
Unmarried women
Latinos
90
White millennials
More open
All women
Survey average: 86.5
All men
Less open
Whites
High school education only
Married men
White working class
80
Age 65 and older
Whites age 65 and older
White born-again Christians
Conservatives
White Republicans
White conservatives
70

In the four presidential elections before 1964, according to American National Election Studies, Republican candidates had won an average of 30 percent of the minority vote. From 1964 to 2008, the Republican share dropped to an average of 6.1 percent of the minority vote. Since 1964, the Republican Party has become, in effect, a white party.
The 1964 election began the realignment from Democrat to Republican of the eleven states of the former Confederacy – including the Deep South of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi — the region most opposed to civil rights and voting rights for black Americans.
In the wake of the 1964 Johnson-Goldwater contest, the national Democratic Party became identified with racial and ethnic liberalism.
By 1981-82, in large part because of the enfranchisement of blacks after passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, Southern Democrats, once the hard-core backers of segregation, moved sharply to the left on racial issues. By 1982, Southern Democrats in the House voted 66 to 6 in favor of legislation strengthening the Voting Rights Act. In the Senate, every Democrat from the Confederate South voted for the legislation.



The Republican shift to racial conservatism gained momentum under the presidency of Ronald Reagan, who established a record of opposition to civil rights laws.
A sampling of the Reagan record includes his 1982 attempt to allow schools that practiced racial discrimination to retain tax exemptions, including Bob Jones University:his veto, later overridden, of the 1987 Civil Rights Restoration Act, which barred all federal funds to schools that discriminated.
More recently, since the 2010 Republicanmidterm sweep19 states have enacted a total of 27 laws designed to limit pro-Democratic minority turnout by requiring photo identification for voters, by limiting early voting, and by tight regulation of voter registration processes, among other restrictive measures.
In the case of immigration, Republican opposition to liberal reform legislation was so intense that in 2005 a Republican Congress rejected legislation proposed by its own president, George W. Bush. In January of that year, Bush promised to expend political capital to pass comprehensive immigration reform that included a path to legal status and, ultimately, to citizenship. The Republican controlled House instead passed the Border Protection, Anti-Terrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005. That bill amounted to a direct repudiation of the Bush proposal; it included only anti-immigrant and tough border provisions. The bill passed the House with Republicans voting 203 to 36 in favor and Democrats opposed 164 to 17. The bill died in the Senate.
The current prominence of an anti-immigrant wing of the Republican Party is part of an international phenomenon. The Trump campaign represents the American iteration of hostility to third world immigration now visible across Europe, where overwhelmingly white right-wing parties are flourishing from Greece to Britain. European opposition to immigration, and the strength of this opposition on the political right, was demonstrated in a Pew Research Center study of voters in seven countries — Italy, France, Britain, Spain, Poland, Greece and Germany – that showed that voters on the right were 18 points more likely than voters on the left to agree that “immigrants are a burden because they take jobs and social benefits.”
Donald Trump, in other words, is part of a movement gaining momentum among whites across the Northern Hemisphere. The Trump campaign will serve as a measure of the strength of this movement in the United States.
Trump’s vitriol expresses the degree to which the American debate over immigration has grown ugly, even hideous. At the same time, Trump’s followers are motivated, and enraged, by what they see as a breakdown of law and order and the erosion of norms and standards they believe should be upheld. They are frustrated by the poor performance of the public schools their children attend, by cities and suburbs they believe to be under siege, by a criminal justice system they perceive as dysfunctional, and by a government they view as incompetent.

Earlier this week Trump added a new campaign commercial. It begins: “JEB BUSH’S THOUGHTS ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS” and displays a film clip of Bush saying “Yes, they broke the law, but it’s not a felony. It’s an act of love.” Interspersed are three mug shots: “Francisco Sanchez: Charged with Murder,” “Santana Gaona: Convicted of Murder,” and “Brian Omar Hyde: Charged with Murdering Three People.”
“LOVE?” the next screen reads. “Forget Love. It’s Time to Get Tough!”
To voters who see the world this way, Trump offers the promise that he can restore a vanished America, that he can “make America great again,” as his campaign puts it. Trump clearly finds this endeavor personally gratifying, even as his odds of winning the nomination remain slim. To his followers, the letdown of defeat could be brutal, leaving them stranded, without a candidate who can successfully capture the intensity of their beliefs.


George Will: The Havoc That Trump Wreaks - On His Own Party

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Every sulfurous belch from the molten interior of the volcanic Trump phenomenon injures the chances of a Republican presidency. After Donald Trump finishes plastering a snarling face on conservatism, any Republican nominee will face a dauntingly steep climb to reach even the paltry numbers that doomed Mitt Romney.
It is perhaps quixotic to try to distract Trump’s supporters with facts, which their leader, who is no stickler for dignity, considers beneath him. Still, consider these:
George F. Will writes a twice-weekly column on politics and domestic and foreign affairs. He began his column with The Post in 1974, and he received the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 1977. He is also a contributor to FOX News’ daytime and primetime programming.View Archive
The white percentage of the electorate has been shrinking for decades and will be about 2 points smaller in 2016 than in 2012. In 2008, Barack Obama became the first president elected while losing the white vote by double digits. In 2012, Hispanics, the nation’s largest minority, were for the first time a double-digit (10 percent) portion of the electorate. White voters werenearly 90 percent of Romney’s vote. In 1988, George H.W. Bush won 59 percent of the white vote, which translated into 426 electoral votes. Twenty-four years later, Romney won 59 percent of the white vote and just 206 electoral votes. He lost the nonwhite vote by 63 points, receiving just 17 percent of it. If the Republicans’ 2016 nominee does not do better than Romney did among nonwhite voters, he will need 65 percent of the white vote, which was last achieved by Ronald Reagan when carrying 49 states in 1984. Romney did even slightly worse among Asian Americans — the fastest-growing minority — than among Hispanics. Evidently, minorities generally detected Republican ambivalence, even animus, about them. This was before Trump began receiving rapturous receptions because he obliterates inhibitions about venting hostility.
Trump is indifferent to those conservative tenets (e.g., frugality: He welcomed Obama’s stimulus) to which he is not hostile (e.g., property rights: He adored the Supreme Court’s Kelo decision vastly expanding government’s power of eminent domain). So, Trump’s appeal must derive primarily from his views about immigration. Including legal immigration, concerning which he favors a “pause” of unspecified duration.
Some supporters simply find Trump entertainingly naughty. Others, however, have remarkable cognitive dissonance. They properly execrate Obama’s executive high-handedness that expresses progressivism’s traditional disdain for the separation of powers that often makes government action difficult. But these same Trumpkins simultaneously despise GOP congressional leaders because they do not somehow jettison the separation of powers and work conservatism’s unimpeded will from Capitol Hill.
For conservatives, this is the dispiriting irony: The administrative state’s intrusiveness (e.g., its regulatory burdens), irrationalities (e.g., the tax code’s toll on economic growth), incompetence (Amtrak, ethanol, etc.) and illegality (we see you, IRS) may benefit the principal architect of this state, the Democratic Party. This is because the other party’s talented critics of the administrative state are being drowned out by Trump’s recent discovery that Americans understandably disgusted by government can be beguiled by a summons to Caesarism.
Trump, who uses the first-person singular pronoun even more than the previous world-record holder (Obama), promises that constitutional arrangements need be no impediment to the leader’s savvy, “management” brilliance and iron will. Trump supporters consider the presidency today an entry-level job because he is available to turn government into a triumph of the leader’s will.
This is hardly the first time we have heard the United States singing lyrics like those of Trump’s curdled populism. Alabama Democrat George Wallace four times ran for president with salvos against Washington’s “briefcase totin’ bureaucrats” who “can’t even park their bicycles straight.” What is new is Trump promising, in the name of strength, to put the United States into a defensive crouch against “cunning” Mexicans and others.
Republicans are the party of growth, or they are superfluous. The other party relishes allocating scarcities — full employment for the administrative state.
Trump assumes a zero-sum society, where one person’s job is another’s loss. Hence his rage against other nations’ “stealing” jobs — “our” jobs.
In 2011, when Trump was a voluble “birther” — you remember: Obama supposedly was not born in the United States, hence he is an illegitimate president — an interviewer asked if he had people “searching in Hawaii” for facts. “Absolutely,” Trump said. “They can’t believe what they’re finding.” Trump reticence is rare, but he has never shared those findings. He now says, in effect: Oh, never mind. If in November 2016, the fragments of an ever smaller and more homogenous GOP might be picked up with tweezers, Trump, having taken his act elsewhere, will look back over his shoulder at the wreckage he wrought and say: Oh, never mind.
Disclosure: The columnist’s wife, Mari Will, works for Scott Walker.
Trump takes jab at Bush saying 'anchor baby'
Play Video1:43
The Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump took his message to Dubuque, Iowa, Aug. 25. His agenda included attacking Jeb Bush on the term "anchor baby," the war in Iraq and division within the U.S. (AP)
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