Liberty In Peril

                                                                                              formerly,

                                                                                       The Llano Ledger

7-31-20

Nothing will change in law enforcement until training changes.  NBC News reports:

"Andrew Rodriguez was just out of patrol school, eager to learn how to use his academy training in the real world, from real sheriff's deputies in Los Angeles County. But what his field trainers tried to teach him, he testified in September, was how to be a bad cop: to lie that he had found a meth pipe in a suspect's pocket, to harass Black people for no reason, to threaten women into giving up information. When he wouldn't go along, Rodriguez said, the trainers bullied him."

This is well-known.  Been repeatedly reported here and elsewhere.  Yet, nothing changes. Why not?

"Field trainers "serve as gatekeepers for this fraternity where lying and illegal stops are encouraged and rewarded," said Alan Romero, a civil rights lawyer who represented Rodriguez."

When will the judiciary finally do something about this ubiquitous problem?  Indeed, a criminal problem.  Needs to be prosecuted.  Up to judges to throw out cases where it's obvious the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue lied, engaged in criminal activity.  To say nothing of outrageously corrupt, abusive prosecutors.  No question, judges are the ultimate gatekeepers of the judiciary.  Time for them to stand up, stand tall.  Stop tolerating all the bullshit, worse, condoning it.

"The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department denied Rodriguez's claims. But a jury believed him, and in October it awarded him $8.1 million for workplace harassment."

Again, a step in the right direction, but nowhere near enough.  These goddamned training officers need to be criminally prosecuted for their crimes.  Until these bastards do prison time, nothing changes.  Nothing.

"For decades, cities have tried to change the cultures of their police departments, bringing in progressive chiefs and mandating programs to teach officers to become more compassionate and less violent. For the most part, it hasn't worked. More than a thousand people a year have died at the hands of the police since 2013. Black people, Latinos, military veterans and individuals suffering from mental illness are most likely to face lethal force, federal research shows."

Holding officers to the very same legal standards as the civilian population is the only way this will change.

The following is inexplicable, inexcusable:

"Field training officers are a big reason problems persist, according to current and former police leaders, academics and even the U.S. Justice Department. It's not uncommon for trainers, known as FTOs in cop-speak, to have histories of misconduct and citizen complaints, according to a Marshall Project review of 10 big-city departments. The trainers get little formal instruction in how to mold young officers' behavior. Becoming a field trainer is seen as a mark of prestige and seniority, rather than a serious and challenging job, law enforcement officials said. Critics say the low standards create poisonous field training programs that fuel a toxic street-cop culture, marked by too much aggression and too little accountability. Since 2011, the Justice Department has ordered at least five major cities to revamp how they run field training. Training problems have continued despite nationwide protests against police brutality, especially against Black people. In fact, field trainers have been involved in many of the deaths that have prompted demonstrations over the last six years."

Again, until the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue are subject to the same legal standards as the rest of the civilian population, nothing changes.

"Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin was a trainer; as his pupils watched, he kneeled on George Floyd's neck for more than 8 minutes. "What was my client supposed to do but follow what his training officer said?" a defense attorney, Earl Gray, asked during a court appearance for one of Chauvin's trainees, Thomas Lane. Lane is charged with aiding and abetting Floyd's murder."

The trainee knew full well what transpired was not right.  Should have pulled Chauvin off Floyd no matter the personal cost, and/or consequences.

"In Cleveland, the officer who drove up to 12-year-old Tamir Rice on a cold November morning in 2014 was a trainer. Officer Frank Garmback was teaching Timothy Loehmann when a 911 dispatcher asked the pair whether they could check out a report of a man with a firearm outside a recreation center. As they approached, Garmback warned, "Watch him, he's going to run," according to Loehmann's written statement released by local prosecutors. Loehmann got out of the car and shot and killed Tamir two seconds later. Tamir was playing with a BB gun. A grand jury declined to indict Garmback and Loehmann. Sgt. Jennifer Ciaccia, a police department spokeswoman, confirmed that Garmback is still on the force, but she said he no longer works as a trainer. Through his attorney, Garmback declined to comment."

The rookie son of a bitch literally got away with murder.  So did the goddamned 'trainer' who inexplicably remains on the force.

"In Baltimore, Caesar Goodson Jr., a field training officer working an overtime shift, drove a police van with Freddie Gray in the back in April 2015. Local prosecutors said Goodson gave Gray a "rough ride," failing to buckle his seat belt. Gray died from a severe spinal injury days after his arrest for carrying a small knife. Goodson was charged with second-degree murder. During closing arguments, prosecutors contended that as a training officer, Goodson "knows more than the ordinary, average police officer" and could have prevented Gray's injuries. A judge acquitted Goodson, who has returned to work at the police department. Sean Malone, a lawyer who represented Goodson, told The Marshall Project that the department never updated Goodson about the proper procedures for prisoner transports. A second officer, Edward Nero, was also acquitted after his training officer admitted that he didn't teach Nero the proper way to transport a suspect."

No justice.  Nazi America.

"San Jose, California, was the first big city police department to create a field training program; such programs swiftly became fixtures in police departments across the country, said Ryan Getty, a former police officer who has worked as a trainer and is now a criminologist at California State University, Sacramento. He and other policing experts said the biggest failure of the programs is that departments allow officers with questionable backgrounds to mentor new hires. Chauvin, for example, racked up at least a dozen complaints during his 19 years on the Minneapolis force without being disciplined. "They pass on that socialization of 'I don't care what you learned in the academy; this is how you do it on the street,'" said Getty, who is writing a textbook on field training. In his academic research on field training officers, Getty found that if young officers drew citizen complaints within their first two years on the job, it was likely that their trainers had histories of allegations filed against them. "There is a definite association between FTOs and their issues and the trainees' later success or deviance in their careers," Getty said."

Since this is clearly well-known, why hasn't anything been done about it?

"Before recruits can work as officers, they attend police academies, which generally offer four to six months of classes. Then they become trainees on probation, who are easy to fire. Trainees usually don't chase violent 911 calls unless no other patrol officers are around, but as the shooting of Tamir Rice showed, they aren't exempt from responding to complex situations. There are no national standards for how long a young officer should work under the direction of a veteran. In Baltimore, the program lasts 10 weeks, while the Los Angeles Police Department's program lasts a year."

Why no national standards?

"Most departments reviewed by The Marshall Project, even those under court supervision, allow officers with allegations of aggressive behavior against them to become trainers. The 2019 rules to become a training officer in Chicago call for candidates with "an acceptable disciplinary record." Chicago officers can qualify to train new hires as long as they haven't had recent suspensions at least a week long and haven't racked up more than three suspensions of any length within five years. Officers who were named in complaints but weren't disciplined are also eligible."

Practically speaking, anything goes.  When will this change?

"In 2011, the Justice Department described training officers in New Orleans as "unqualified and unsuitable to supervise and train recruits." Federal officials later made similar findings in Cleveland, Baltimore, Chicago and Albuquerque, New Mexico. In court-ordered reform plans, called consent decrees, Justice Department lawyers then mandated boilerplate fixes, including requiring trainers to get 40 hours of instruction and to have regular evaluations. Jonathan Smith, a former chief of special litigation for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division who worked on investigations involving field training, said the mandated changes barely chipped away at the problems. "Far too often, FTOs have been in a department with a culture that needed to be reformed, and they are not part of the reform process," he said. "They are part of the old guard of the department. They teach the old way of doing things." To weed out antagonistic older cops, federal officials in Albuquerque directed the police department to lower the experience requirement for prospective training officers from four to three years on the force."

Symbolism over substance.  Nothing changes.  Nothing will until the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue are subject to the same legal standards as the civilian population.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Sad, isn't it, when the UN Human Rights Council is forced to upbraid nazi law enforcement in the United States?  The Washington Post reports:

"The United Nations human rights office called on U.S. security forces to limit their use of force against peaceful protesters and journalists Friday, as clashes between federal agents and demonstrators continue in Portland, Ore. “Peaceful demonstrations that have been taking place in cities in the U.S. such as Portland really must be able to continue without those participating in them and also the people reporting on them, the journalists, risking arbitrary arrest or detention, being subject to unnecessary disproportionate or discriminatory use of force or suffering other violations of their rights,” Liz Throssell, a spokeswoman for the U.N. human rights office, said at a news conference in Geneva, emphasizing that officers must be “properly and clearly identified.”

You think?

"Anti-racism protests have rocked Portland for around two months, since a wave of demonstrations erupted across the United States in response to the killing of George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis after a white officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. President Trump, eager to quell the unrest, deployed federal forces to Portland, sparking outrage among city officials who oppose the move."

Why aren't local police arresting, jailing, and running the prints of alleged Trump goons who are refusing to disclose their identity and who they work for?

"Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, who was among those tear-gassed by federal agents there this week, has called the officers Trump’s “personal army.”

Again, you're all talk, Mr. Mayor.  Why haven't you ordered local police to stand between Trump's goons and peaceful protesters exercising their constitutional right to protest?

The 'president' is not just an out of control congenital liar, but hopelessly insane:

"But Trump has defended his decision to send federal forces to the city, claiming unrest in Portland is “worse than Afghanistan.” He has also said he would consider sending federal forces to other U.S. cities, including Chicago and New York."

Are our nazi fuhrer and his henchmen deliberately trying to spark a revolution?

"Scenes from Portland in recent days, showing federal forces at times violently clashing with protesters, have provoked outcry across the nation."

For damned good reason.  Called jackbooted nazism.

"Inspectors general from the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security said Thursday they would investigate federal agents’ conduct in Portland and Washington, D.C., where clashes occurred earlier this summer. And U.S. District Judge Michael H. Simon on Thursday barred officers “from arresting, threatening to arrest, or using physical force” against journalists or other legal observers without probable cause."

Goes nowhere near far enough to rein in the Trump nazi and his henchmen deliberately attempting to squelch all dissent, peaceful protest.  In direct violation of the First Amendment.

"The U.N.'s concerns mirrored those of activists in the United States. “There have been reports that peaceful protesters have been detained by unidentified police officers and that is a worry because it may place those detained outside the protection of the law and may give rise to arbitrary detention and other human rights violations,” Throssell said."

That's right.  Nazi America.  Trump's Fourth Reich.

"Recent protests in the United States have sparked a global reckoning over racism and police violence."

Indeed, they have.  Founders?  Spinning in their graves.

"In June, the U.N. Human Rights Council decried violent police tactics and called for an inquiry into systemic racism in the United States. The resolution came after an unusual debate on “systemic racism, police brutality and violence against peaceful protests” in the United States, requested by all 54 countries in Africa. It was adopted unanimously by the 47 countries that belong to the council. “It is important to show Africa … the Human Rights Council has heard the plight of African and people of African descent calling for equal treatment and application of equal rights for all,” Dieudonné W. Désiré Sougouri, Burkina Faso’s ambassador to the United Nations, said when presenting the resolution."

Sad, isn't it?  Adolf and Benito?  Likely wildly cheering on their fiery perches.

Under the Trump nazi, the following is certainly not surprising:

"The United States withdrew from the council in 2018."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Step in the right direction, but nowhere near enough.  United Press International reports:

"A federal judge has issued an order barring federal agents from arresting or using physical force against journalists and legal observers without just cause amid ongoing protests in Portland, Ore. U.S. District Judge Michael Simon on Thursday issued a temporary restraining order against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, unidentified federal officers and others accused of intentionally targeting journalists and observers at protests in the city, which have gone on for nearly two months. The class action suit was filed by the publishers of The Portland Mercury, a bi-weekly alternative newspaper, and is supported by the American Civil Liberties Union. Eight journalists in the suit say they were targeted by federal officers with non-lethal munitions and tear gas -- in one case at a location blocks away from the protest sites, even though they were committing no crimes. In his 22-page order, Simon enjoined federal officers that were sent to Portland and other cities by the Trump administration from intentionally using force against journalists and photographers wearing a visible "press" insignia, as well as clearly identified legal observers, such as those sent by the ACLU."

Again, a step in the right direction, but nowhere near enough:

"He also warned that violators will not be shielded from lawsuits under the "qualified immunity" doctrine."

Where is criminal accountability of Trump's jackbooted bastards who are beating, abusing, arresting peaceful protesters exercising their constitutional right to protest?

The following is insane and no more than a lie by a federal attorney who has falsely sworn an oath to protect and defend the United States Constitution:

"Justice Department Attorney Andrew Warden had argued that federal officers can't readily distinguish press members from violent demonstrators under the conditions of a protest, and that reporters are guaranteed "no special rights of access above and beyond the public." Simon, however, disagreed. "The plaintiffs were identifiable as press, not engaging in unlawful activity or protesting, were not standing near protesters, and yet were subject to violence by federal agents," he wrote. "Contrary to the [defendants'] arguments, this evidence does not support that the force used on plaintiffs were 'unintended consequences' of crowd control."

Raw nazism.  Thankfully, a growing number of us are beginning to see the exigent threat to liberty posed by our insane, nazi dictator and his henchmen.

"The suit is separate from another filed by the ACLU this week that accuses local and federal law enforcement of targeting and attacking volunteer street medics during the protests in Portland."

What about all the peaceful protesters who are beaten, denied due process, falsely arrested by our fuhrer's federal jackbooted bastards?

The Associated Press reports:

"Eighteen people have been arrested this week in Portland, Oregon, on federal charges while protesting the presence of federal law enforcement agents, the state’s top U.S. prosecutor said Friday. The number of arrests doesn’t include those made early Friday, when federal agents again used tear gas against demonstrators. The charges involving the protests include assaulting federal officers, arson and damaging federal property, U.S. Attorney for Oregon Billy J. Williams said. All the defendants are local, and they were released pending trial after making a court appearance. Acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf previously said there had been 43 federal arrests as of Tuesday. The news of additional arrests came hours after a federal judge late Thursday blocked U.S. agents from arresting or using physical force against journalists and legal observers at protests in Oregon’s largest city, where President Donald Trump is testing the limits of federal power. Federal agents used tear gas early Friday to force thousands of demonstrators from crowding around a U.S. courthouse. Protesters had projected lasers on the building and attempted to take down a security fence that had been reinforced to keep demonstrators at a distance. The protesters moved away as clouds of gas rose from the area and flash grenades could be heard. U.S. Judge Michael Simon made his ruling about media and observers a day after Portland’s mayor was tear-gassed by federal agents while making an appearance outside the courthouse during raucous demonstrations. Protests have been kept up in the city for nearly two months since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis."

The following is indeed encouraging:

"Simon had previously ruled that journalists and legal observers are exempt from police orders requiring protesters to disperse once an unlawful assembly has been declared. U.S. lawyers intervened, saying journalists should have to leave when ordered. “This order is a victory for the rule of law,” said Jann Carson, ACLU of Oregon’s interim executive director. The judge said objections by law enforcement were outweighed by First Amendment concerns. “None of the government’s proffered interests outweigh the public’s interest in accurate and timely information about how law enforcement is treating” protesters, he wrote."

No question.  The public has a right to know what law enforcement goons are doing in their name.

"Simon’s order is in effect for 14 days. Journalists and observers must wear clear identification, he said. A freelance photographer covering the protests for The Associated Press submitted an affidavit that he was beaten with batons and hit with chemical irritants and rubber bullets this week. The ACLU lawsuit is one of several filed in response to law enforcement actions during the protests. The state of Oregon is seeking an order limiting federal agents’ arrest powers during the demonstrations. The Justice Department’s inspector general said Thursday it will review the conduct of federal agents who responded to unrest in Portland and in Washington after concerns emerged from members of Congress and the public. On Wednesday, Mayor Ted Wheeler, a Democrat, and hundreds of others were objecting to the presence of federal police sent by Trump, who labeled the demonstrators as “agitators & anarchists” after Wheeler was gassed. It wasn’t immediately clear if the agents knew that Wheeler was in the crowd when they used the tear gas. Wheeler has opposed the federal agents’ presence but has also faced harsh criticism from the protesters, who yelled and swore at him. Earlier in the night, Wheeler was mostly jeered by protesters as he tried to rally the demonstrators who have clashed nightly with federal agents. But they briefly applauded when he shouted “Black Lives Matter” and pumped his fist in the air. City council members accused Wheeler of not reining in police who used tear gas multiple times on protesters before federal agents arrived. And city business leaders have condemned the mayor for not bringing the situation under control before the agents showed up. Wheeler did not participate in lighting any of the fires or attempting to tear down the fence and was surrounded by his security team when he was gassed. Wheeler’s appearance in the protest zone came hours after state attorneys for Oregon urged another judge to issue a restraining order against the federal agents. Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum’s lawsuit accuses federal agents of arresting protesters without probable cause, whisking them away in unmarked cars and using excessive force. Federal authorities have disputed those allegations."

Again, the Mayor has failed to rein in local police.  Should have certainly ordered them between Trump's jackbooted goons and peaceful protesters exercising their constitutional right to peacefully protest.

"The hearing in U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman’s court focused on the actions of the more than 100 federal agents responding to protests outside the Portland courthouse. The state’s motion asks Mosman to command agents from the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, Federal Protective Service and U.S. Marshals Service to immediately stop detaining protesters without probable cause, to identify themselves and their agency before arresting anyone, and to explain why an arrest is taking place."

NBC News reports:

"For much of July, Department of Homeland Security forces have deployed tear gas into crowds of protesters outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse. Under the urging of President Donald Trump to "dominate" protesters, agents have fired projectiles into the crowd, arrested demonstrators and even destroyed medical and food supplies. Residents and local leaders have accused federal officers of acting beyond the scope of protecting federal property and using "police-state like tactics" indiscriminately. Oregon's attorney general has requested a temporary restraining order against federal forces in Portland and is awaiting a decision from a federal judge."

Why is the judge dragging his feet?

"Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz said Thursday that his office will investigate the conduct of federal agents in Portland in response to concerns from members of Congress and the public. The investigation will look at use-of-force allegations and whether agents followed Justice Department guidelines, including adhering to requirements for providing proper identification and deploying chemical agents. "If circumstances warrant, the OIG will consider including other issues that may arise during the course of the review," Horowitz said in a statement. The move comes after a group of Democratic Oregon lawmakers, including Sen. Jeff Merkley, Sen. Ron Wyden, Rep. Suzanne Bonamici and Rep. Earl Blumenauer, sent a joint letter asking the Justice Department to review the federal intervention. Trump's "strongman tactics will not be tolerated," Merkley said in a statement. The president has said more Democratic-led cities, including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit and Baltimore, could see similar federal enforcement efforts."

An out of control nazi dictator.  Trump remains an exigent threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.

"Portland protesters first gathered at the end of May to decry police brutality following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, but demonstrators have switched focus in recent weeks and are now calling for federal forces to vacate the city. Shortly before Harris woke up to a face full of tear gas early Wednesday, federal officers swept through the park where protesters gather across the street from the U.S. courthouse. According to witnesses, agents slashed water bottles and pepper-sprayed food supplies. They also destroyed barbecue grills and first aid kits that had been donated by community members, witnesses said. DHS did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday."

What could the jackbooted nazi bastards say?

"This shouldn't be happening, especially when we're trying to feed each other," said a volunteer, who asked not to be named for fear of being targeted by law enforcement. "All it does is destroy. It hurts." Blumenauer later denounced in a tweet the destruction of food supplies.

    "The needless damage that Trump’s secret police did to @RiotRibs – a volunteer-led effort to feed and supply protesters and those in need – shows just how morally bankrupt and cruel this occupation is.
    — Earl Blumenauer (@repblumenauer) July 22, 2020"

Gutless jackbooted nazi motherf--kers.  Clearly, out of control.

"Hours after the protest camp was cleared, donations flooded in. Campers received 13 new barbecue grills by Wednesday evening, dozens of pizza deliveries and hundreds of water bottles. First aid supplies were restocked, and new tents were erected to replace those that were damaged. The tear gas that billowed through downtown streets Wednesday slammed parents, protesters and even Mayor Ted Wheeler. Shortly before midnight, police declared a riot and repeatedly warned protesters to leave or risk use of force or arrest. But they did not move. Most hoisted signs or chanted in place. Only a handful of people near the barricade continued to shake the fence or toss fireworks toward the federal building. Police drove in marked SUVs around the site, issuing warnings through loudspeakers. Meanwhile, federal officers used tear gas and projectiles to push protesters off the steel barricade that protects the federal courthouse. Wheeler had been standing at the front of the group when he was suddenly shrouded in a cloud of tear gas. Earlier in the night, he had tried to address protesters but was repeatedly taunted and jeered. They screamed over him, calling for his resignation and asking him to leave. A resident asked him what could be done to rid Portland of the federal officers. "I think what we're doing tonight is actually the best thing we can right now: Be here, be unified and be clear," he said. "We didn't want them. We didn't ask for them ... and we want them to leave." Shortly after being hit with tear gas, Wheeler called the tactic "abhorrent." "The tear gas is ... indiscriminate," he said. "It makes me think long and hard about whether this is a really viable tool. I want to look at other options. This is not a good option." Wheeler, who also serves as Portland's police commissioner, has come under fierce criticism for allowing local law enforcement to use tear gas when the protests began. A temporary restraining order bars police from using it, but residents worry what will happen when the order expires."

All the more reason this gutless son of a bitch should have ordered local police between Trump's jackbooted bastards and peaceful protesters exercising their First Amendment right to protest all this goddamned bullshit.

"We've heard this all before," said Tuck Woodstock, a Portland-based reporter who has been chronicling the unrest. "This has created a cycle where, to some extent, every protest is about the night before, because people come out protesting police brutality and then they experience more brutality."

Jackbooted federal goons gas Portland mayor.  United Press International reports:

"Portland, Ore., Mayor Ted Wheeler was one of many demonstrators who were tear-gassed by federal officers late Wednesday, during civil rights protests in the city that have now gone on for nearly 60 nights. Wheeler was marching with a crowd near the city's federal courthouse when government officers began to disperse the activists. President Donald Trump sent the officers to Portland to guard federal property, like the courthouse. Trump said he sent the officers earlier this month after receiving intelligence that the building might be attacked. Wednesday night, officers fired tear gas shortly before midnight and Portland police said fireworks were set off by a nearby debris fire. After cautioning the crowd to leave, the officers used more tear gas, witnesses said. "The reason I am here tonight is to stand with you," Wheeler told the crowd. "If they're launching the tear gas against you, they're launching the tear gas against me."

Jesus Christ.  Why didn't you order local police to stand between peaceful demonstrators and Trump's jackbooted henchmen?

"Portland officials, including Wheeler, have criticized the presence of federal officers, saying they have only escalated tensions."

Then why the f--k haven't you done something about this other than engage in empty, meaningless rhetoric?  Where are the goddamned courts?  Why are they dragging their feet?

"I was made aware of concerns within the community that federal agents may be authorized to use live ammunition on demonstrators this evening," Wheeler tweeted earlier Wednesday night."

Jesus Christ.  All the more reason, Mr. Mayor, you should have ordered local police to stand between you, other peaceful protesters, and Trump's jackbooted bastards.

"I am sharing this information publicly out of an abundance of caution."

You're all talk, Mr. Mayor.  When are you finally going to get off your sorry ass and take action?  -- Even if that action is only to place local police between peaceful protesters and Trump's goons.

Clearly, you have no control over your local police:

"Thursday, Portland police repeated a "riot warning" and said the crowd created a "grave risk of public alarm."

Clearly, as well, your local police are a problem.  As Mayor, when are you going to bring them under control?

"City police made no arrests but federal officers took at least two people into custody."

Why were they arrested?  What was the probable cause?  Where is the video?  Who is jailing them?  City of Portland?  Jesus Christ.

Apparently, the following is having no effect.  Seems local police continue to do as they please:

"Wednesday, the Portland City Council voted to bar police from cooperating with federal enforcement agents or intentionally using force to detain journalists and legal observers. City lawmakers said the federal officers' presence in the city directly influenced the measure."

Trump's federal assault on Portland continues.  United Press International reports:

"Federal officers deployed multiple rounds of tear gas and impact munitions at a crowd of thousands protesters overnight in Portland, local media reported Saturday. At 1 a.m., federal officers fired the tear gas and munitions on a crowd after some protesters nearby set off a series of fireworks toward the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse, The Oregonian reported. Shortly before firing the gas, federal officers declared the gathering unlawful over a loudspeaker. The peaceful civil rights demonstrations nearing their 60th night devolve most nights into clashes between federal law enforcement and a small number of people who launch fireworks, start small fires and try to tear down the fence outside the federal courthouse building, KOIN-TV reported. Friday's demonstrations began with various groups including the Wall of Moms, lawyers and teachers, who later merged with hundreds of people outside the federal courthouse and Justice Center, into a crowd of at least 2,000 people."

Fascinating, isn't it?  Only a small number of people are doing damage, yet, local jackbooted bastards in blue as well as Trump's federal goons can't manage to handle them?

"The predictability of tear gas deployed by federal officers in the civil rights protests has prompted demonstrators to prepare by bringing leaf blowers to deflect it towards officers and stop the gas from spreading, The Oregonian reported."

Clearly, determination, ingenuity, and resourcefulness of Americans knows no bounds.  Precisely, why the citizenry will ultimately win this struggle against the Trump nazi and his henchmen.

"Earlier in the evening, veterans lined the federal courthouse and a row of women linked to the Wall of Moms group also set up near the courthouse. About a half hour later, officers fired the first tear gas after the courthouse fence wavered to pressure as several people started to push it, but a concrete barrier prevented it from toppling over. Many of the officers directly next to the fence wore dark uniforms that said Homeland Security."

Where are their name tags?  The people are certainly entitled to know the identity of their jackbooted oppressors.  Certainly, anyone who is arrested for any reason is entitled to the identity of the arresting officer.  Forget?  This is supposed to be a democratic republic, not a goddamned fascist police-state run under the Trump nazi and his henchmen.

"After ordering people to stop tampering with the fence, federal officers released more tear gas and shot impact munitions, including pepper balls, toward protesters on the front line. They continued shooting irritants and projectiles from inside the building, then emerged from the courthouse and set up directly next to the fence, at times shooting impact munitions at protesters feet away. By 11:25 p.m., officers mostly retreated inside the courthouse, but streamed out to defend the fence minutes later."

Are these gutless pieces of federal jackbooted shit doing all they can to spark an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution?

"The protests decreased in size, and reconvened when tear gas dissipated, continuing until past 2 a.m. The night started with a rally on the steps of the downtown jail next to the federal courthouse and a parade of a vehicles adorned with Black Lives Matter signs honking in support of the rally. Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty praised the crowd for raising awareness about the need for adoption of police reforms and urged them to keep pressing for change."

Only chance for true change is for law enforcement to be held to the very same legal standards as the civilian population.  Unless and until that happens, nothing changes.  More of the same old shit.

"Who knows more about policing in Portland than a Black woman who's been on the front lines for 30 years?" Hardesty asked. "We will not fail!"

Going to take far, far more than empty rhetoric to force desperately needed change.

The Associated Press reports:

"Thousands of people gathered in Portland streets for another night of protests Friday, the same day a U.S. judge denied Oregon’s request to restrict federal agents’ actions when they arrest people during chaotic demonstrations that have roiled the city and pitted local officials against the Trump administration."

The judiciary is certainly a big part of the growing problem of nazism in our formerly great country.

"By 8 p.m. a few hundred people, most wearing masks and many donning helmets, stood near the fountain on Salmon Street Springs, one spot where groups meet before marching to the Hatfield Federal Courthouse and the federal agents there. They chanted and clapped along to the sound of thunderous drums, pausing to listen to speakers. Among various organized groups, including Healthcare Workers Protest, Teachers against Tyrants, Lawyers for Black Lives and the “Wall of Moms,” was Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, who spoke to protesters outside the Justice Center. By 9:40 p.m. crowds of people, pressed shoulder to shoulder, packed the streets chanting “Black Lives Matter” and “Feds go home” as they carried signs and marched to the courthouse. The Federal agents, deployed by President Donald Trump to tamp down the unrest, have arrested dozens during nightly demonstrations against racial injustice that often turn violent. Democratic leaders in Oregon say federal intervention has worsened the two-month crisis, and the state attorney general sued to allege that some people had been whisked off the streets in unmarked vehicles."

A national socialist, fascist 'judge' contributes to the problem:

"U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman said the state lacked standing to sue on behalf of protesters because the lawsuit was a “highly unusual one with a particular set of rules.”

Called bullshit.  ... Hear the rumble?

Gets worse.  Get this:

"Oregon was seeking a restraining order on behalf of its residents not for injuries that had already happened but to prevent injuries by federal officers in the future. That combination makes the standard for granting such a motion very narrow, and the state did not prove it had standing in the case, Mosman wrote."

Where and when did you lose yourself, 'Judge?'  Legalese bullshit in what is supposed to be a democratic republic, not a goddamned fascist police-state where anything goes.

"Legal experts who reviewed the case before the decision warned that he could reject it on those grounds. A lawsuit from a person accusing federal agents of violating their rights to free speech or against unconstitutional search and seizure would have a much higher chance of success, Michael Dorf, a constitutional law professor at Cornell University, said ahead of the ruling."

Just because the suit wasn't as good as it could have been, doesn't excuse the nazi judge for doing shit squat, deliberately ignoring an egregious abrogation of all civil and constitutional rights and liberties by our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his henchmen.

“The federal government acted in violation of those individuals’ rights and probably acted in violation of the Constitution in the sense of exercising powers that are reserved to the states, but just because the federal government acts in ways that overstep its authority doesn’t mean the state has an injury,” he said."

That's called bullshit.  Precisely, why this formerly great country is failing, going down the tubes, -- as the treasonous, traitorous assholes in the judiciary sit and watch.

"The clashes in Portland have further inflamed the nation’s political tensions and triggered a crisis over the limits of federal power as Trump moves to send U.S. officers to other Democratic-led cities to combat crime. It’s playing out as Trump pushes a new “law and order” reelection strategy after the coronavirus crashed the economy."

Precisely, why the House needs to quickly pass new articles of impeachment against the Trump nazi.  Tie him up, legally speaking, until the election.  Especially, since the judiciary seems to be deliberately dragging its feet.

"Protesters in Portland have been targeting the federal courthouse, setting fires outside and vandalizing the building that U.S. authorities say they have a duty to protect. Federal agents have used tear gas, less-lethal ammunition that left one person critically injured and other force to scatter protesters."

Since the number of people doing damage is relatively small, why aren't you arresting them one by one?  Why are you attacking and beating peaceful protesters exercising their constitutional right to protest?  Why hasn't local law enforcement been ordered to place itself between non-violent protesters and the federal jackbooted bastards?

"The lawsuit from Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum accused federal agents of arresting protesters without probable cause and using excessive force. She sought a temporary restraining order to “immediately stop federal authorities from unlawfully detaining Oregonians.”

An achingly clueless, nazi 'judge' failed to act.  Became part of the problem.  -- On a technicality, to generously give the son of a bitch some undeserved benefit of the doubt.

The government attorney has obviously not read the United States Constitution in quite some time:

"David Morrell, an attorney for the U.S. government, called the motion “extraordinary” and told the judge in a hearing this week that it was based solely on “a few threadbare declarations” from witnesses and a Twitter video. Morrell called the protests “dangerous and volatile.”

So are the Trump nazi and his henchmen, Counselor.  Time to remove your head, figuratively, securely lodged up your clueless ass, sir.

"Rosenblum said the ramifications of the ruling were “extremely troubling.” “While I respect Judge Mosman, I would ask this question: If the state of Oregon does not have standing to prevent this unconstitutional conduct by unidentified federal agents running roughshod over her citizens, who does?” Rosenblum said in a statement. “Individuals mistreated by these federal agents can sue for damages, but they can’t get a judge to restrain this unlawful conduct more generally.”

Wouldn't want to confuse a nazi 'judge' with the truth, would we, Counselor?  LOL.

"Before the federal intervention, Mayor Ted Wheeler and other local leaders had said a small cadre of violent activists were drowning out the message of peaceful protesters. But the Democrat, who was tear-gassed this week as he joined protesters, says the federal presence is exacerbating a tense situation and he’s repeatedly told them to leave. Homeland Security acting Secretary Chad Wolf denied that federal agents were inflaming the situation in Portland and said Wheeler legitimized criminality by joining demonstrators, whom Trump has called “anarchists and agitators.”

Expect better of a nazi blow-hard just like his fuhrer, the Trump nazi?  A congenital liar.  When this is all said and done, Wolf needs to be criminally investigated for his part in this ongoing fiasco.

"In the lawsuit, Oregon had asked the judge to command agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the Customs and Border Protection, the Federal Protective Service and the U.S. Marshals Service to stop detaining protesters without probable cause, to identify themselves before arresting anyone and to explain why an arrest is taking place.

"The Oregon attorney general’s motion was one of several lawsuits against authorities’ actions. A different federal judge late Thursday blocked U.S. agents from arresting or using physical force against journalists and legal observers at demonstrations."

Far worse to come, sadly.

NPR reports:

"A federal judge on Friday denied the Oregon attorney general's request for a temporary restraining order against certain actions by federal authorities in Portland, saying the state lacked the legal standing to seek that relief.

"On Friday, U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman denied that request. He explained his reasoning in a 14-page decision. While the case involves allegations of harm done to protesters by law enforcement, he wrote, the plaintiff is not a protester. Beyond that, the state is not seeking redress for past harm done to protesters but rather an injunction against future conduct, which he called "an extraordinary form of relief." Mosman wrote that the state would have needed to make a "very particularized showing" in order to prove its standing to bring such a lawsuit. "Because it has failed to do so — most fundamentally, because it has not shown it is vindicating an interest that is specific to the state itself — I find the State of Oregon lacks standing here and therefore deny its request for a temporary restraining order," he concluded."

When did you lose yourself, 'Judge?'  When was the last time you read the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights, sir?

"Rosenblum filed the lawsuit in response to what she described as two incidents involving federal authorities "overstepping their powers" and injuring and threatening peaceful protesters in Portland last week. Protests against racism and police brutality in Portland have grown increasingly tense after the Trump administration deployed federal law enforcement officers to protect federal buildings there earlier this month. According to Rosenblum, on July 12, a protester standing near the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse was hit in the head with an "impact weapon" and suffered severe injuries. And on July 16, an unmarked minivan with undercover federal agents "wearing generic green military fatigues" grabbed a man off the sidewalk and detained him at the federal courthouse. Mosman noted that the state presented only two examples as evidence, despite painting a picture in its complaint of "numerous protesters being seized from the streets of Portland by unidentified agents." He also said that the state did not present evidence of any official orders or policies behind the seizures, nor any evidence that they are in widespread use."

Making excuses for the federal jackbooted bastards, 'Judge?'

Time to consider impeaching the 'judge.'  Certainly, doesn't seem to be impartial as required by his oath of office:

"Mosman noted that it is not unusual for people involved in major protests to allege that police crossed a "constitutional line" in their interactions with protesters, and for some of those people to file lawsuits seeking money damages and injunctive relief. "There is a well-established body of law paving the way for such lawsuits to move forward in federal court," he wrote. "This is not such a lawsuit."

If that's his judicial philosophy, he's not fit to sit on the bench.

"Rosenblum expressed her disappointment with the ruling in a statement issued Friday, saying she believes Oregonians have the right to know who is policing their streets and why peaceful protesters are being detained. "While I respect Judge Mosman," she added, "I would ask this question: If the state of Oregon does not have standing to prevent this unconstitutional conduct by unidentified federal agents running roughshod over her citizens, who does? Individuals mistreated by these federal agents can sue for damages, but they can't get a judge to restrain this unlawful conduct more generally. Today's ruling suggests that there may be no recourse on behalf of our state, and if so that is extremely troubling."

Seattle, Washington also has a serious problem with a nazi judiciary.  Get this:

"On Friday, U.S. District Judge James Robart granted a motion filed by the Department of Justice seeking a restraining order to block a Seattle Police Department directive banning officers from using "less lethal" crowd-control tools like pepper spray and blast balls. According to the DOJ court filing, the directive was set to take effect at 3 a.m on Saturday. Robart said the temporary restraining order on the directive was "very temporary," and more discussion was needed, The Seattle Times reports. The Justice Department argues that implementation of the directive would change police policies and thereby conflict with requirements of the consent decree that the city's police department has been under since 2012, after a DOJ investigation found a pattern of using excessive force. In his ruling, Robart writes that his decision does not mean the ordinance will no longer be implemented, but he "seeks a pause" until the directive can be further reviewed under the terms of the consent degree. The temporary restraining order will expire in 14 days. Robart has ordered the city of Seattle and the Department of Justice to meet to propose a schedule for briefings on a preliminary injunction no later than August 1."

... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  When will clueless government finally wake up?

ABC News reports:

"A federal judge late Friday blocked Seattle’s new law prohibiting police from using pepper spray, blast balls and similar weapons that was passed following confrontations with protesters. The Seattle Times reports that U.S. District Judge James Robart at an emergency hearing granted a request from the federal government to block the new law, which the Seattle City Council passed unanimously last month. The U.S. Department of Justice, citing Seattle’s longstanding police consent decree, argued that banning the use of crowd control weapons could actually lead to more police use of force, leaving them only with more deadly weapons. Robart said the issue needed more discussion between the city and the Justice Department before the change went into effect Sunday. Ruling from the bench, just before 9 p.m., Robart said the temporary restraining order he granted would be “very temporary.” “I urge you all to use it as an occasion to try to find out where it is we are and where it is we’re going,” Robart said. “I can’t tell you today if blast balls are a good idea or a bad idea, but I know that sometime a long time ago I approved them.” Robart is presiding over a 2012 consent decree requiring the city to address allegations of excessive force and biased policing."

This man is unfit to sit on the bench.  Like his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, he remains an exigent threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Our government is behaving incredibly stupidly.  All levels and branches.  Top to bottom.  Bottom to top.  No one in government seems to be aware its unresponsiveness to out of control law enforcement is leading not only to protest, but open insurrection in a growing number of cities across our formerly great country.  Force by the jackbooted bastards in blue of local law enforcement as well as by Trump's goons is having the opposite of its intended effect.  That is, it's eliciting violence in response.  Open insurrection that could lead to revolution.  Wake up.

The Associated Press reports:

"Protests took a violent turn in several U.S. cities over the weekend, with demonstrators squaring off against federal agents outside a courthouse in Portland, Oregon, forcing police in Seattle to retreat into a station house and setting fire to vehicles in California and Virginia. A protest against police violence in Austin, Texas, turned deadly when a witness says the driver of a car that drove through a crowd of marchers opened fire on an armed demonstrator who approached the vehicle. And someone was shot and wounded in Aurora, Colorado, after a car drove through a protest there, authorities said. The unrest Saturday and early Sunday stemmed from the weeks of protests over racial injustice and the police treatment of people of color that flared up after the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Floyd, who was Black and handcuffed, died after a white police officer used his knee to pin down Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes while Floyd begged for air."

Yet, to date, government has done nothing of substance to force change.  Nothing.  Until law enforcement is held to the same legal standards as the civilian population, nothing will change.  Nothing.  Sadly, there will be more violence in response to out of control violent officers, not less:

"In Seattle, police officers retreated into a precinct station early Sunday, hours after large demonstrations in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. Some demonstrators lingered after officers filed into the department’s East Precinct around 1 a.m., but most cleared out a short time later, according to video posted online. At a late-night news conference, Seattle police Chief Carmen Best called for peace. Rocks, bottles, fireworks and mortars were fired at police during the weekend unrest, and police said they arrested at least 45 people for assaults on officers, obstruction and failure to disperse. Twenty-one officers were hurt, with most of their injuries considered minor, police said."

Yet, not one of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue was arrested for use of excessive force.  Not one.  All protected and coddled.

"In Portland, thousands of people gathered Saturday evening for another night of protests over George Floyd’s killing and the presence of federal agents recently sent to the city by President Donald Trump. Protesters breached a fence surrounding the city’s federal courthouse building where the agents have been stationed. Police declared the situation to be a riot and at around 1:20 a.m., they began ordering people to leave the area surrounding the courthouse or risk arrest, saying on Twitter that the violence had created “a grave risk” to the public. About 20 minutes later, federal officers and local police could be seen attempting to clear the area and deploying tear gas, however protesters remained past 2:30 a.m., forming lines across intersections and holding makeshift shields as police patrolled and closed blocks abutting the area. Multiple arrests were made, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many."

Yet, not one of the out of control, jackbooted bastards in blue or Trump's federal goons was arrested for use of excessive force.  Not one.  No equal justice.  Protected and coddled.

"In the Texas capital of Austin, a protester was shot and killed Saturday night after witnesses say he approached a car that had driven through a march against police violence. In video streamed live on Facebook, a car can be heard honking before several shots ring out and protesters start screaming and scattering for cover. Police could then be seen tending to someone lying in the street. Michael Capochiano, who attended the protest, told the Austin American-Statesman that the slain protester had a rifle and that the car’s driver fired several shots at him before speeding away. Police said the driver was detained and was cooperating with investigators."

What precisely does that mean?  He was telling officers exactly what they wanted to hear?

"In the Denver suburb of Aurora, Colorado, meanwhile, a protester shot and wounded someone after a car drove through a crowd marching on an interstate highway, police said. The wounded person was taken to a hospital in stable condition. Police didn’t release many details about the shooting, including whether the person who was shot had been in the car. Police said on Twitter that demonstrators also caused “major damage,” to a courthouse."

Did police neglect to mention what they might have criminally done to protesters before this damage was done?

"Protesters in Oakland, California, set fire to a courthouse, damaged a police station, broke windows, spray-painted graffiti, shot fireworks and pointed lasers at officers after a peaceful demonstration Saturday evening turned to unrest, police said."

Conveniently, neglect to mention what you jackbooted bastards might have done to turn a peaceful demonstration into a violent one?

"In Virginia’s capital, Richmond, a dump truck was torched as several hundred protesters and police faced off late Saturday during a demonstration of support for the protesters in Portland. Police declared it to be an “unlawful assembly” at around 11 p.m. used what appeared to be tear gas to disperse the group."

Did the torching of the dump truck occur before or after you jackbooted bastards conveniently declared the protest to be an 'unlawful assembly?'

The Associated Press reports:

"Seattle police retreated to a precinct early Sunday, just hours after declaring a riot during large demonstrations in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood near where weeks earlier people had set up an “occupied protest zone” that stretched for several blocks. Some demonstrators lingered after officers filed into the department’s East Precinct around 1 a.m., but most cleared out a short time later, according to video posted online.

"Seattle police Chief Carmen Best called for peace at a late-night news conference, and told reporters she hadn’t seen U.S. agents the Trump administration dispatched to the city at Saturday’s protest.

"Via Twitter, police said they arrested at least 45 people for assaults on officers, obstruction and failure to disperse. Twenty-one officers were left with mostly minor injuries."

How many of your jackbooted bastards were immediately arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

The Associated Press reports:

"Authorities declared a riot early Sunday in Portland, Oregon, where protesters breached a fence surrounding the city’s federal courthouse building where U.S. agents have been stationed. Police described via Twitter the “violent conduct of people downtown” as creating a “grave risk of public alarm.” Police demanded people leave the area surrounding the courthouse, around 1:20 a.m. Sunday, and said those who fail to adhere may be arrested or subject to teargas and impact weapons. By 1:40 a.m., both federal officers and Portland police could be seen on the streets, surrounding the courthouse, attempting to clear the area and deploying teargas. Protesters remained in the streets past 2:30 a.m., forming lines across intersections and holding makeshift shields, as police patrolled and closed blocks abutting the area. Multiple arrests were made, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many."

How many of the jackbooted bastards were immediately arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

"In the hours leading up to the riot declaration, thousands of people gathered in the city Saturday evening for another night of protests as demonstrations over George Floyd’s killing and the presence of federal agents sent by President Donald Trump showed no signs of abating. Crowds began to march toward the city’s federal courthouse around 9:15 p.m., some marching from 5 miles (8 kilometers) away. A large group of demonstrators in the North Portland neighborhood also paraded by the police precinct there, which was roped off and had officers in riot gear standing outside the building. Protesters paused outside a downtown hotel, where federal agents are staying, chanting “Feds go home” and yelling the names of Black people killed by police. As protesters marched down the streets, the Portland Police Bureau posted on social media for people to not walk or block the street as they may be subject to charges such as disorderly conduct and interfering with peace officers. Hundreds of others crossed the Steel Bridge around 11 p.m. to the courthouse, meeting up with thousands of people that had already been tear-gassed by federal agents. The fence surrounding the building had flowers and banners draped across as federal agents emerged from the courthouse to inspect it. They were met with fireworks shot over the fence. Federal agents tossed canisters of teargas at the crowd, while people ran towards the plumes, picked up some of the canisters and threw them back over the fence. As some protesters attempted to cut the fence using power tools, streams of pepper spray were spewed at the crowd. At the nearby Justice Center, images and words were projected onto the building including “Keep fighting. Keep pushing.” During demonstrations the previous night federal agents repeatedly fired tear gas to break up rowdy protests that continued into the early morning Saturday. Authorities say six federal officers were injured and one person was arrested."

How many federal jackbooted bastards were arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

"Demonstrations have happened in Oregon’s largest city nightly for two months since Floyd was killed in Minneapolis in May. Trump said he sent federal agents to Portland to halt the unrest but state and local officials say they are making the situation worse."

Unless and until criminal law enforcement is held to the same legal standards as the rest of the civilian population, nothing will change.  Nothing.  Will get worse.  Precisely, why protest continues and spreads.  Is out of control government at all levels and branches determined to spark an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution?

"There were demonstrations for police reform and against the increased presence of federal law enforcement in cities across the country Saturday. In Seattle, police declared a riot Saturday afternoon following large demonstrations and deployed flash bangs and pepper spray to try to clear crowds. Authorities made more than 40 arrests said 21 officers suffered mostly minor injuries."

Yet, not one jackbooted bastard was arrested for excessive force.  Not one.  Protected and coddled.

"Chuck Lovell, the Portland police chief, released a video message on social media Saturday night calling for peace. “Across the country people are committing violence, supposedly in support of Portland,” Lovell said. “If you want to support Portland then stop the violence, work for peace. Portland police officers and police facilities have been threatened. “Now more than ever, Portland police need your support. We want to be with you in the community and working on the real relationships that will create change. We want to get back to the critical issues that have been hijacked by people committing crimes under the cover of the crowds.”

Goddamned hypocritical of you, Chief.  Conveniently, forget?  Your criminal jackbooted bastards continue to employ excessive force.  Yet, are not held accountable.  The more force your bastards employ, the more violence it will elicit.  Too stupid to understand that, sir?

"Late Friday, a federal judge denied a request by Oregon’s attorney general to restrict the actions of federal police."

This 'judge' needs to be impeached.  Removed from office.

"The Federal Protective Service had declared the gathering in Portland that began Friday evening an unlawful assembly. Harry Fones, a Homeland Security spokesman, said at a news conference Saturday afternoon some people launched large fireworks, threw hard projectiles and used power tools to damage property. Craig Gabriel, Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon, said at the news conference that of the six federal officers who were injured, one suffered a concussion and another was taken to the hospital for burns. He said one person was arrested for failing to comply with orders. That person was later released without charges, bringing the total number of people arrested on or near the courthouse property since early July to 60."

How many of Trump's jackbooted bastards have been arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

Getting worse.  Not better.  Across the country.  ... Hear the rumble? The Washington Post reports:

"Protests in several major cities across the country turned violent Saturday, as weeks of civil unrest and clashes between activists and authorities boiled over, sending thousands of people teeming into public squares demanding racial justice."

They're not getting any.  None.  No significant change.  None.  Same old bullshit.  Worse, law enforcement is unresponsive to desperately needed change.

"From Los Angeles to Richmond to Omaha, police and protesters clashed in another tumultuous night that saw scores arrested after demonstrators took the streets and police in some cities dispersed crowds with tear gas and pepper spray. In Austin, a man was shot and killed in the midst of a downtown rally. In Richmond, a truck was set ablaze outside police headquarters. Outside of Denver, a Jeep sped through a phalanx of people marching down an interstate when a shot was fired, injuring a protester, police said. The focal point of the protests continued to be in the Pacific Northwest, where a week of clashes between activists and federal agents in Portland, Ore., pumped new energy into a movement that began in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis over Memorial Day weekend."

There's been no change.  None.  Empty rhetoric.  Precisely, why protest continues and expands.  Sadly, grows increasingly violent in response to the violence of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue and Trump's out of control federal goons.

"In Portland, the authorities declared a riot after protesters breached a fence surrounding the city’s federal courthouse building. The “violent conduct of people downtown” created a “grave risk of public alarm,” the Portland police wrote on Twitter."

The greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties comes from you out of control jackbooted bastards in blue and Trump's federal goons.

"Early Saturday morning, federal agents and local police demanded that protesters leave the area and used tear gas. But the activists stood their ground, blocking intersections. Several people were arrested."

How many jackbooted bastards were arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

"In Seattle, police declared a riot on Saturday afternoon and used pepper spray and flash grenades in an attempt to disperse a crowd of roughly 2,000 people in the Capitol Hill neighborhood marching in the city’s largest Black Lives Matter protest in more than a month."

How many of your out of control jackbooted bastards were arrested for use of excessive force?  Not one?

"Nightly protests since Floyd’s killing had dwindled in recent weeks in Seattle. But they were reinvigorated in the wake of federal action in the Portland protests and after Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) tweeted that President Trump had sent federal law enforcement agents to the city."

What did you expect would happen?  They'd be embraced with open arms?  LOL.

“For a month, the President threatened to send federal forces to ‘clean up’ Seattle. The President has made good on his threats in Portland, and continues to exacerbate the situation on the ground, endanger communities, and jeopardize the work of local officials,” Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan (D) said Wednesday in a statement. “The President unilaterally deploying paramilitary-type forces into American cities should concern all Americans. His blatant disregard for the constitution — and for the safety and well-being of our residents — is textbook despotism.”

It is.  When Trump's goons engage in excessive use of force, why aren't local police arresting and jailing them?

"Protesters in Omaha marched to bring attention to the killing of James Scurlock, a black man killed by a white bar owner. Police came out in force Saturday night and detained more than 75 people who were marching downtown, obstructing traffic, according to local news reports. While there was no major damage was done, Police Capt. Mark Matuza told the Omaha World-Herald that the gathering “leaned toward the potential of getting violent.”

You and your jackbooted bastards deliberately interfered with the constitutional right to peacefully protest.  You're part of the problem, Captain.

"In Los Angeles, police fired projectiles at activists protesting near a federal courthouse."

That right?  Interfering with a constitutional right?  What were they doing that justified the use of force?

"Seattle’s riot declaration came after protesters set fire to a construction site for a juvenile detention facility and as the police department reported that one person had breached the fencing surrounding the East Precinct, the site of nightly clashes in June that led to a nearly month-long protest occupation, and officers saw smoke in the lobby. Police said protesters were throwing rocks, bottles and fireworks at the officers. As of 7:30 p.m. local time, the department had reported 25 arrests and three police injuries, including an officer hospitalized with a leg injury caused by an explosive. The department posted a photo of unused fireworks found at the scene to its Twitter feed. Protesters erected barricades and fended off police efforts to disperse them with homemade shields, umbrellas and leaf blowers, tactics borrowed from protests in Portland, where activists have clashed nightly with police for nearly two months."

How many criminal jackbooted bastards in blue were arrested for excessive use of force?  Not one?

"Christine Edgar said that when the yellow-clad “Wall of Moms” emerged at Portland’s Black Lives Matter protests last week, she decided that Seattle mothers needed to adopt the tactic as well. With three days’ notice, she said, a Seattle “Wall of Moms” formed to march in the streets to protest the federal presence. “I wanted to make sure that black and brown voices were represented among the moms,” Edgar, who said her son was at the protest, told The Washington Post before addressing the crowd with a megaphone. “When people hear ‘mom,’ they always think of white moms,” she said, “and black, brown and indigenous women have been on the forefront of liberation movements for centuries.” By midafternoon, the crowd, flanked by bicycles and vehicles as a security measure, had marched several blocks to the construction site for the King County Children and Family Justice Center, a juvenile detention facility and courthouse, where dozens of people toppled fences and set fire to five construction trailers. The blazes appeared to have destroyed the trailers and sent large plumes of smoke into the air before the fire department arrived. King County Executive Dow Constantine announced on Friday that the facility, commonly known as the “youth jail,” would close by 2025 in line with the county’s goal of zero youth detention. The facility has been the subject of protests for years by groups calling for an end to youth incarceration. Shortly after the fire, protesters smashed the windows of a Starbucks, which has become a target for its donations to the Seattle Police Foundation. The fire and subsequent clashes outside a police department precinct resulted in the police declaring the protest a “riot” and attempting to disperse the crowd with munitions such as pepper spray, blast balls and rubber bullets. The protesters came prepared, with many wearing protective gear. “After seeing what happened in Portland, I feel it is important to put my body on the line,” Megan Barry, who identifies as white, said before the march began. A marketing professional from Gig Harbor, 22 miles southwest of Seattle, it was her first protest since mid-June. On May 30, she said, she was hit with tear gas when police tried to disperse the first large demonstration in downtown Seattle after Floyd’s death. “I have the luxury of going home and acting like nothing is going on,” she said. “I want to hold myself accountable.”

Sadly, tragically, with the deliberate lack of meaningful change, protest appears to be turning into insurrection.  Wake up.  The worst is yet to come.

NPR reports:

"Protesters including members of Wall of Moms and Don't Shoot Portland are suing the Trump administration over what they describe as a violent and intimidating federal response to nightly demonstrations against systemic racism and police brutality. The group of organizations and individuals filed a nine-count complaint on Monday against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, its leaders and several other federal agencies, whom they accuse of violating protesters' constitutionally protected freedom of speech, freedom from unreasonable seizures, and right to due process, by deploying federal agents to unlawfully "quash Plaintiffs' speech and end their protests." They also argue that federal officers are overstepping their law enforcement authority, and allege that Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf is not legally serving in his role because he has not been nominated by President Trump or confirmed by the Senate."

This son of a bitch needs to be criminally investigated for his actions so far in this fiasco.

"The lawsuit was brought in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by a number of law firms and Protect Democracy, a left-leaning litigation organization. They are representing Don't Shoot Portland, Wall of Moms and five individual Black Lives Matter protesters. Protesters have been gathering in downtown Portland on a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd on May 25. In early July, the federal government began deploying agents to the city in order to protect federal property."

In reality? To unconstitutionally quell peaceful protest.

"The plaintiffs allege that the conduct of those federal agents, including away from the federal courthouse they were sent to protect, suggests they were actually carrying out a different DHS policy: "to intimidate and silence protesters because of their message."

No question.  Quite obvious.

"In the complaint, they describe seeing DHS agents injure peaceful protesters, make arrests without probable cause and use otherwise violent tactics — of which the plaintiffs themselves were repeatedly on the receiving end. "They have been tear-gassed night after night, left vomiting and unable to eat or sleep because of the toxic poison blasted at them," the complaint reads. "They have been shot at over and over — with rubber bullets, bean bags, pepper spray, and a range of other projectiles fired at close range and with brutal effect. They have had flash-bang explosive devices detonated right in front of them. They have been forced to speak and assemble in fear of not just bodily harm, but the possibility of sudden arrest without probable cause."

Called Nazi America.

"More broadly, the complaint argues that the "abusive actions" of federal agents violate legal limitations on federal law enforcement activities that allow agents to be deployed only to protect federal property. But the plaintiffs also quote government officials as saying the agents are there to " 'quell' protests against police brutality by 'tak[ing] over' Portland." "Our clients in Portland are peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights. Federal law enforcement should not be attacking these brave women for speaking up for what they believe," said Deana El-Mallawany, counsel at Protect Democracy. "The intent of the administration's deployment of federal agents in Portland appears to be to stifle speech the president doesn't like. It's important to check this unlawful administration policy now, before it is allowed to spread to other cities across the U.S."

"State and local officials say the federal agents' presence has shifted the conversation and exacerbated tensions, and are increasingly calling for their removal. Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, who was tear gassed in a crowd last week, was one of six mayors who penned a letter on Monday asking Congress to pass legislation to block the Trump administration from deploying federal law enforcement to cities without local leaders' consent. Other entities in Oregon have explored legal avenues for restricting the actions of federal agents. Last Thursday, a federal judge temporarily blocked officers from knowingly targeting journalists and legal observers at Portland protests. And on Friday, a different federal judge denied the Oregon attorney general's request for a temporary restraining order, saying the state lacked legal standing."

Apparently, Trump and his henchmen may finally be getting the message.  CBS News reports:

"The Trump administration and Oregon's governor announced they have agreed to begin withdrawing federal officers from downtown Portland following nightly violent clashes between law enforcement and demonstrators. Oregon Governor Kate Brown, a Democrat, said the removal of federal law enforcement from the Department of Homeland Security comes after discussions with Vice President Mike Pence and other Trump administration officials. "After my repeated requests, the federal government has agreed to a phased withdrawal of federal officers that have been deployed to the Mark Hatfield United States Courthouse over recent weeks," she said in a statement. "These federal officers have acted as an occupying force, refused accountability, and brought violence and strife to our community."

Their sorry asses should have been arrested and jailed by local law law enforcement for their violent crimes against peaceful protesters.

"Officers with Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement will begin leaving downtown Portland on Thursday, she said. They will also clean up the courthouse and remove graffiti. "The local Oregon officers of the Oregon State Police will provide protection for free speech and the security of the exterior of the courthouse with the Federal Protective Service," Brown said. "A limited contingent of federal officials, who act as building security year-round, will remain and will stay focused on the interior of the U.S. Courthouse." Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf said in a separate statement he and Brown reached a "joint plan to end the violent activity in Portland directed at federal properties and law enforcement officers."

Wake up, Mr. Wolf.  You and your federal jackbooted bastards elicited this violence.  Beat the shit out of and arrested peaceful protesters exercising their First Amendment right to peacefully protest, you fascist son of a bitch.

The following quote is abject bullshit.  Simply not true.  Forget?  These jackbooted pieces of shit engaged in violence to quell peaceful protest.  Like his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, Wolf is a congenital liar:

"This plan is possible due to the valiant efforts of the DHS law enforcement officers protecting federal property in Portland from violent activity for the past two months," Wolf said. "The department will continue to maintain our current, augmented federal law enforcement personnel in Portland until we are assured that the Hartfield Federal Courthouse and other federal properties will no longer be attacked and that the seat of justice in Portland will remain secure."

The only reason why all this violence occurred is directly due, and in direct response, to the violent criminal activity of federal jackbooted bastards determined to quell peaceful protest.

"Still, the details of the withdrawal are muddled, as White House spokeswoman Sarah Matthews said in a statement that "as the president and Secretary Wolf have both made clear, federal law enforcement officers will not leave until the seat of justice in Portland is secure."

Wolf and his henchmen need to be criminally investigated, not protected and coddled.  They have no credibility.  Lie like hell, -- just like their fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

"As the number of federal officers in Portland ballooned, state and local officials denounced their presence and said the officers were escalating tensions with protesters. On several occasions, federal officers guarding the courthouse used tear gas and other tactics to disperse demonstrators, while the Trump administration said the protesters hurled projectiles at officers, set off fireworks at the courthouse and used lasers to blind law enforcement."

Law enforcement can't seem to grasp the fact when it engages in violence to quell peaceful protest, it elicits the direct opposite.

Trump is insane:

"The president told reporters at the White House on Wednesday the courthouse in Portland is "very well secured" and said officers are "not leaving until they've secured their city." "If they don't secure their city soon, we have no choice, we're going to have to go in and clean it out," he said. "We'll do it very easily. We're all prepared to do it."

What's that, Mr. 'President?'  Spark an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution throughout our formerly great country?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Barr grilled in House hearing.  United Press International reports:

"The Democratic chairman of the House judiciary committee accused Attorney General William Barr at a hearing Tuesday of enabling the failings of President Donald Trump. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, delivering opening remarks at the hearing, said Barr's tenure as the nation's top law enforcement officer "has been marked by a persistent war" against the Justice Department's "professional core in an apparent attempt to secure favors for the president." "In your time at the department, you have aided and abetted the worst failings of the president," he added."

So what else is new?  Rhetoric, alone, is ineffective.  Will take far, far more to force desperately needed change.

"Nadler criticized Barr for sending federal police to Portland, Ore., to monitor demonstrations outside the U.S. courthouse -- action that was taken over the objections of state and local officials in Oregon. The clashes have resulted in a number of arrests."

Be interesting to see how many ultimately result in conviction.

"There is no precedent for the Department of Justice actively seeking out conflict with American citizens, under such flimsy pretext, or for such petty purposes," Nadler said."

Jesus Christ.  Democrats are all talk.  No action.  Why hasn't the House impeached the nazi in the Oval Office a second time?  To legally, figuratively tie him up until the election.

"In his opening remarks, Barr said some of the Portland demonstrators have been overly violent and protests have damaged federal property."

Indeed, they have.  Called insurrection.  -- Insurrection that the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue and the Trump nazi's federal goons have elicited through their employment of violence against peaceful protesters.  Too stupid to understand that, Counselor?  Or, is it the Aryan arrogance of raw nazism, sir?

"What unfolds nightly around the courthouse cannot reasonably be called a protest; it is, by any objective measure, an assault on the government of the United States," he said."

Called insurrection that could lead to revolution, Mr. Attorney General.  You reap what you sow, sir.  Peaceful protest continues nationwide because you fascist bastards in government have done absolutely nothing, shit squat about the outrageously corrupt, abusive, murderous jackbooted bastards in blue last six decades, Mr. Attorney General.  Not to neglect to mention systemic racism embedded in all law enforcement.

"Rioters have barricaded the front door of the courthouse, pried plywood off the windows with crowbars, and thrown commercial-grade fireworks into the building in an apparent attempt to burn it down with federal personnel inside. The rioters have started fires outside the building, and then systematically attacked federal law enforcement officers who attempt to put them out -- for example, by pelting the officers with rocks, frozen water bottles, cans of food, and balloons filled with fecal matter."

You clueless bastards delusionally believe you can beat the shit out of peaceful protesters, arrest them, haul them to jail in unmarked rental vehicles, refuse to disclose the personal identity of the nazi bastards themselves and who they work for?  Then expect there'll be no response to your goddamned violence?

You, sir, personally remain hopelessly clueless, determinedly out to lunch:

"Remarkably, the response from many in the media and local elected offices to this organized assault has been to blame the federal government. To state what should be obvious ... such acts are in fact federal crimes under statutes enacted by this Congress."

So is the criminal activity of not only your unidentified federal jackbooted bastards, but the local criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who are beating the shit out of and arresting peaceful protesters exercising their First Amendment right to protest you out of control fascist bastards.  ... Hear the rumble?  Too deaf to hear?  Or, is it hopeless aggressive stupidity, sir?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.

The following is further evidence Barr simply doesn't understand the gravity of what is currently transpiring in our formerly great country.  The Associated Press reports:

"Attorney General William Barr defended the aggressive federal law enforcement response to civil unrest in America, saying on Tuesday “violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests” sparked by George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police."

A small handful are engaging in this violence.  Yet, your federal jackbooted bastards and local jackbooted bastards in blue can't handle this?  Give me a break.  Are you nazi sons of bitches in government doing all you can to spark a revolution?

The following is clear evidence Barr and his fuhrer, the Trump nazi are hopelessly disconnected from reality:

"Barr told members of the House Judiciary Committee at a much-anticipated election year hearing the violence taking place in Portland, Oregon, and other cities is disconnected from Floyd’s killing, which he called a “horrible” event that prompted a necessary national reckoning on the relationship between the Black community and law enforcement. "Largely absent from these scenes of destruction are even superficial attempts by the rioters to connect their actions to George Floyd’s death or any legitimate call for reform,” Barr said of the Portland protests."

You're insane, Mr. Attorney General.  This violence of a relative few is in direct response to the violence of the criminal jackbooted bastards in law enforcement on peaceful protesters.  Not only that, the deliberate, determined, concerted, continued failure to rein in the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue over the last six decades.  Not to neglect to mention systemic racism within all law enforcement.

NBC News reports:

"Attorney General William Barr faced a grilling from Democrats at a contentious congressional hearing Tuesday as he spoke about the protests following George Floyd's death and defended federal intervention in major cities where the administration says there has been a spate of violence. In his opening statement before the House Judiciary Committee hearing, Barr said that Floyd's death at the hands of police in May "understandably jarred the whole country and forced us to reflect on longstanding issues in our nation."

That's precisely the problem. It hasn't.  You and your fuhrer, the Trump nazi remain hopelessly clueless.  The above is achingly empty rhetoric, sir.  Abject bullshit.  You and others have done nothing to rein in the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue over the last six decades.  Worse, done nothing about rampant racism that remains ingrained throughout all law enforcement.

The following is simply not true.  Remains a lie:

"And while it was a "shocking event," Barr said, "The fact is that these events are fortunately quite rare."

Week after week, month after month, year after year for over twenty-one years these murders committed by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue of innocent, unarmed civilians have been covered in this publication.  Are you a congenital liar, sir, just like your fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

"Meanwhile, Barr said in his prepared statement, which he summarized for the committee, that the decision to deploy federal agents to several cities across the country where demonstrations are taking place "has nothing to do with the problem of violent mob rioting" and instead is "designed to help state and local law enforcement to meet their basic responsibility to solve crimes and keep their communities safe."

Simply, not true.  Crime is significantly down across the nation.  Now, we're seeing it increase as the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue as well as federal goons engage in violence to suppress peaceful protesters.  Why are you shamelessly lying, you fascist son of a bitch?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Ethics complaint filed against U.S. Attorney General.  United Press International reports:

"More than two dozen Washington D.C. lawyers on Wednesday filed an ethics complaint against U.S. Attorney General William Barr, accusing him of violating his professional obligations as a member of the local bar. The complaint is signed by 27 members of the District of Columbia Bar, including four former presidents of the association. It accuses the attorney general of undermining the rule of law by acting more as President Donald Trump's personal attorney than on behalf of the United States, as demanded by ethics rules. The complaint urges the DC Bar to determine whether Barr should be subject to professional discipline due to his misconduct. "The compelling evidence of ... Barr's pattern of dishonest statements and conflict of interest lead to one conclusion: Our DC Bar must commence an independent investigation of these allegations of misconduct," former U.S. Deputy Assistant Attorney General Roy Austin Jr., said in a statement accompanying the complaint. The group claimed in its "bill of particulars" Barr has "engaged in a pattern of serious violations of DC Bar ethics rules, including conflicts of interest" -- such as "ordering and supporting" the dispersal of a group of largely peaceful protesters outside the White House last month."

What took so long?  Where have you been?

"During the June 1 incident, federal law enforcement officers used horses and tear gas to push protesters back from Lafayette Square in Washington, allowing Trump to walk across the street to stage a photo opportunity at the historic St. John's Episcopal Church. The action "violated the protesters' First and Fourth Amendments rights under the Constitution," the lawyers wrote. "By violating the Constitution, [Barr] engaged in misconduct under DC Bar Rule XI." Last month, hundreds of former Justice Department employees similarly called for a probe of Barr's involvement in the Lafayette Square incident in a letter to the department's inspector general. The DC Bar members also asserted the attorney general misled Congress and the public by claiming that the Mueller Report, probing the president's possible involvement with Russian interference during the 2016 election, "did not contain sufficient evidence to establish that [Trump] committed the crime of 'obstruction of justice.'" "Mr. Barr's dishonest, deceitful and misleading statements violated DC Bar Rule 8.4(c)," they claimed."

Other than empty rhetoric, what is the DC Bar going to do about it?

"The Justice Department did not comment on the ethics complaint."

What could they say?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

A National Guard officer has stood up.  Stood tall.  The Washington Post reports:

"An Army National Guard officer who witnessed protesters forcibly removed from Lafayette Square last month is contradicting claims by the attorney general and the Trump administration that they did not speed up the clearing to make way for the president’s photo opportunity minutes later. A new statement by Adam DeMarco, an Iraq veteran who now serves as a major in the D.C. National Guard, also casts doubt on the claims by acting Park Police Chief Gregory Monahan that violence by protesters spurred Park Police to clear the area at that time with unusually aggressive tactics. DeMarco said that “demonstrators were behaving peacefully” and that tear gas was deployed in an “excessive use of force.” DeMarco backs up law enforcement officials who told The Washington Post they believed the clearing operation would happen after the 7 p.m. curfew that night — but it was dramatically accelerated after Attorney General William P. Barr and others appeared in the park around 6 p.m. Monahan has said the operation was conducted so that a fence might be erected around the park. DeMarco said the fencing materials did not arrive until 9 p.m. — hours after Barr told the Park Police to expand the perimeter -- and the fence wasn’t built until later that night. DeMarco’s account of events also reveals for the first time the details of the visit that Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made to Lafayette Square just before the move on protesters — and the warning he gave his troops. Milley, who had arrived in the park with Barr about 30 minutes before the clearing, warned DeMarco to keep officers from going overboard. “General Milley told me to ensure that National Guard personnel remained calm, adding that we were there to respect the demonstrators’ First Amendment rights,” DeMarco said. Milley has since apologized for his presence in Lafayette Square, saying, “I should not have been there. My presence in that moment, and in that environment, created the perception of the military involved in domestic politics.” DeMarco is scheduled to testify Tuesday before the House Natural Resources Committee, which is investigating the government’s actions in clearing protesters away from Lafayette Square with projectiles, gas, smoke and mounted police, including an apparent assault on Australian journalists by two Park Police officers. His statement was posted Monday on the committee’s website. Monahan also is scheduled to testify.

"Laws and court rulings require police to provide demonstrators with repeated, clear warnings of officers’ intentions and then adequate time and avenues for protesters to disperse peacefully, but DeMarco said the warnings given on June 1 almost certainly couldn’t be heard by the crowd. If the street was cleared to accommodate Trump, rules of engagement for the Secret Service also may have been broken."

Fascinating, isn't it?  Deeply troubling, as well.

"At 6:20 p.m., DeMarco said, the Park Police issued three warning announcements to the protesters. But he said the warnings were made using a hand-held megaphone at the base of the Andrew Jackson statue, 50 yards from the protesters. DeMarco said he stood 20 yards from the protesters, “the announcements were barely audible and I saw no indication that the demonstrators were cognizant of the warnings to disperse.” The operation to clear the protesters began at 6:30 p.m., DeMarco said. The National Guard did not participate in the direct push, but was used to follow the officers who dispersed the protesters and establish the new perimeter, DeMarco said. The Guard members were not armed. As the federal and local police waded into the protesters, DeMarco said he saw smoke being used and that he was told by a Park Police officer it was “stage smoke,” not tear gas. But DeMarco said, “I could feel irritation in my eyes and nose, and based on my previous exposure to tear gas in my training at West Point and later in my Army training, I recognized that irritation as effects consistent with CS or ‘tear gas.’" He said he found spent tear gas canisters on the street later."

Somebody's lying.  Guess who?

"The Park Police have adamantly denied using tear gas, instead saying they shot balls with pepper spray irritant in them. The Secret Service have not commented on whether it fired tear gas. DeMarco said that as he followed the Park Police down H Street, he saw “unidentified law enforcement personnel behind our National Guardsmen using ‘paintball-like’ weapons to discharge what I later learned to be ‘pepper balls’ into the crowd, as demonstrators continued to retreat. The protesters were pushed a block away from Lafayette Square. At 7:05 p.m., DeMarco said he watched Trump walking onto H Street, where he would have his picture taken holding up a Bible. “The president’s arrival was a complete surprise,” DeMarco said, “as we had not been briefed that he would enter our sector.” “As for the new security barrier,” DeMarco continued, “whose installation was the stated purpose of the clearing operation, the materials to erect it did not arrive on the scene until around 9 p.m., and it was not completed until later that night.” This required the local and federal police to maintain a human barricade for hours until the fence was built."

Some background information:

"DeMarco, 34, is a U.S. Military Academy graduate and a veteran of three overseas deployments, including a combat tour in Iraq. In 2018, he ran in the Democratic primary for Congress against incumbent Rep. John Sarbanes, and was strongly critical of Trump. He now works as an associate for Booz Allen Hamilton at the Defense Intelligence Agency, according to his LinkedIn profile. DeMarco said he was coming forward “to help ensure that there is a fair factual record of what happened at Lafayette Square, based on what I saw and experienced first-hand.” He said that, having served in a combat zone and having experience in assessing threats, “at no time did I feel threatened by the protesters or assess them to be violent … From my observation, these demonstrators — our fellow American citizens — were engaged in the peaceful expression of their First Amendment rights. Yet they were subjected to an unprovoked escalation and excessive use of force.”

Exactly, right.  The truth nearly always comes out, -- eventually.  Certainly, hope courageous disclosure of the truth, and the risk taken, benefit this young veteran.

"Grijalva said DeMarco’s testimony showed “the discomfort the military has with policing against the American citizen. This was a political stunt at the expense of the protesters and at the expense of the reputations of the National Guard and the police.”

Indeed.  It was.  Sadly, so.  Speaks volumes vis a vis the lack of character of our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his equally unprincipled henchmen.

The Associated Press reports:

"The U.S. Park Police began the violent clearing of protesters from Lafayette Square last month without apparent provocation or adequate warning to demonstrators, immediately after Attorney General William Barr spoke with Park Police leaders, according to an Army National Guard officer who was there. The account of Army National Guard Maj. Adam DeMarco challenges key aspects of the Trump administration’s explanation for the clearing of the protest in front of the White House, just before President Donald Trump walked through the area to stage a photo event in front of a historic church."

Nothing quite like hypocrisy from our nazi fuhrer, is there?

"DeMarco’s account was released in written testimony for his scheduled appearance Tuesday before the House Natural Resources Committee’s hearing on the Park Police’s punching, clubbing and use of chemical agents against what appeared to be largely peaceful protesters on June 1. The administration’s forceful clearing of the protest area in front of the White House came at the height of nationwide street demonstrations sparked by the killings of George Floyd and other Black people at the hands of police. “From what I could observe, the demonstrators were behaving peacefully,” when Park Police, the Secret Service and other, unidentified forces turned on the crowd, DeMarco writes. The rout started shortly after Barr and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, appeared in the square, where Barr appeared to confer with Park Police leaders, he says. The legally required warnings to demonstrators before clearing the square shortly after were “barely audible” from 20 yards (18 meters) away and apparently not heard by protesters, he said. Park Police and other officers began suddenly routing the crowd without warning to National Guard forces present, DeMarco said. And a Park Police liaison officer told DeMarco that his forces were only using “stage smoke,” not tear gas, against the crowd. DeMarco said the stinging to his nose and eyes appeared to be tear gas, however, and said he found spent tear gas canisters in the street later that evening. The National Park Service, which oversees the U.S. Park Police, responded Monday by repeating a statement from Park Police head Gregory T. Monahan, who said last month that his force acted to “curtail the violence that was underway.” The Park Police, a force of a few hundred officers nationwide, oversees a handful of the nation’s most iconic federal lands and monuments."

Again, someone's lying.  Quite obvious who:

"However, videos and accounts by journalists and demonstrators present at the square, and now from the National Guard officer, challenge the Trump administration’s accounts that protesters were attacking security and law enforcement officers there at the time. Democratic lawmakers have repeatedly challenged the Trump administration to provide evidence of that."

Time for the House to again impeach the Trump nazi.  Legally tie him up, figuratively speaking, right up to the election.

"In the past, the Trump administration has also denied the Park Police acted to clear the square ahead of Trump’s photo event."

Expect better of a congenital liar?

"DeMarco says he was the appointed liaison at the event for the Interior Department’s Park Police and the National Guard and was standing near a statue of Andrew Jackson, as Barr and other senior officials involved congregated. DeMarco describes a quick conversation with Milley, the Pentagon’s top general, at the time in the square that DeMarco indicates gave no warning of the imminent push by the Park Police, the Secret Service and others against demonstrators. “As the senior National Guard officer on the scene at the time, I gave General Milley a quick briefing on our mission and the current situation,” DeMarco writes. “General Milley told me to ensure that National Guard personnel remained calm, adding that we were there to respect the demonstrators’ First Amendment rights.”

The following is a problem:

"Shortly after Park Police and others forced out fleeing protesters, Milley walked in military fatigues alongside Trump as the Republican president strolled to nearby St. John’s Church, where demonstrators had been blamed for starting a fire in a building basement on a previous night. Trump thrust a Bible in the air briefly for news cameras, underscoring his administration’s get-tough message against protests."

Goddamned hypocrite.

"Milley subsequently apologized for taking part, after heavy public criticism. Milley said he “should not have been there” and his involvement “created the perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”

The Associated Press reports:

"In his first public accounting of a flashpoint in nationwide street protests, the head of the U.S. Park Police denied Tuesday that his officers turned their clubs and chemical agents on protesters in front of the White House last month to clear the area for a staged photo event by President Donald Trump shortly afterward. Gregory T. Monahan, acting chief of the Park Police, also denied in testimony to the House Natural Resources Committee that the order to clear the square about a half-hour before Trump’s photo event on June 1 came from the White House, Attorney General William Barr or Interior Secretary David Bernhardt. He said the ultimate order to abruptly drive protesters from Lafayette Square came from a Park Police incident commander whom he did not immediately identify."

Why not?

"The demonstrations outside the White House came at the height of this year’s nationwide protests over the killing of Black people at the hands of police. Democrats charged that the action at Lafayette Square, long one of the nation’s most prominent venues for demonstrations, was a “test run” for ongoing use of federal forces against protesters in Portland and elsewhere. “We did not clear that park for a photo op,” Monahan said, under questioning. “There is 100 percent, zero correlation between our operation and the president’s visit.”

Someone's lying.  Guess who?

"But Monahan also acknowledged under questioning from Democratic lawmakers that there was no recording of police radio traffic at the time. He said that was a mistake."

Convenient, isn't it?  Again, someone's lying.

Think not?  Wake up.  Get this:

"Rock- and brick-throwing and other assaults by protesters on Park Police in previous days warranted the violent clearing of the square, Monahan said. But he disclosed that the only injury to his force that day was a punch to the face that occurred as officers were routing the public from the square."

These goddamned liars wouldn't know truth if it figuratively bit them hard on the ass.

Can't argue with video and witnesses who are claiming:

"Law enforcement and security officers that night clubbed and punched protesters and used mounted officers and chemical agents against them in one of the most controversial confrontations at the height of this year’s nationwide protests after the death of George Floyd in Minnesota. The forceful clearing of Lafayette Square came just before Trump appeared in the area without notice, on his way to stage a photo event in front of a historic church nearby. Trump briefly raised a Bible in the air in front of nearby St. John’s Church, in an appearance underscoring his law and order stance on the protests, and returned to the White House."

Goddamned hypocrite.

"Rep. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat and former Marine, said he saw nothing that justified the sudden brute force against what appeared to be a largely peaceful crowd in Lafayette Square at that time. “Your decision process should have been based by what was” happening in the square at the time, Gallego said, after lawmakers watched a video of Park Police with batons advancing on protesters, who were retreating with their hands up. “No one was injured, by the way, until you all advanced. If I had acted that way when I was in the Marine Corps, I probably would have been busted down a couple of ranks."

"Monahan spoke before the scheduled testimony later Tuesday of a National Guard officer at the scene that day, Army National Guard Maj. Adam DeMarco. DeMarco’s written testimony challenges the Trump administration’s explanation that vicious attacks by protesters led federal forces to turn on the crowd. The National Guard officer is expected to invoke the Military Whistleblower Protection Act, which in part says that no one can block a member of the armed forces from lawful communications with Congress. Committee Chairman Raul Grijalva, an Arizona Democrat, said Monday that from DeMarco’s written testimony, “it’s pretty obvious that at the highest levels the calls were being made,” although the testimony does not give any explicit details of anyone giving orders. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Videos and the accounts of journalists and protesters who were present that night depict the crowd as largely peaceful before the rout. Monahan and the Trump administration also said plans to build a fence to block protesters from the square was another factor leading authorities to clear the area. The administration has previously denied that law enforcement and security forces cleared the square to make way for Trump’s appearance before news cameras. In his written testimony, DeMarco said the episode started shortly after Barr and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, appeared in the square, where Barr appeared to confer with Park Police leaders. “From what I could observe, the demonstrators were behaving peacefully,” when Park Police, the Secret Service and other, unidentified forces turned on the crowd, DeMarco wrote in his testimony. The legally required warnings to demonstrators before clearing the square shortly after were “barely audible” from his position 20 yards (18 meters) away, DeMarco said. Protesters were gathered still farther away, and gave no sign of hearing the warnings, he said. Park Police and other officers then began suddenly routing the crowd without warning to National Guard forces present, DeMarco said."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

In follow up to last week's edition of this publication, a dentist has stood up.  Stood tall.  NBC News reports:

"A Chicago teenager who says a police officer knocked out her front tooth at a protest last Friday has a reason to smile after she was gifted veneers by a dentist from the Bravo series "Married to Medicine." Miracle Boyd, 18, showed off her new teeth in a photo posted to her Instagram account Thursday with the caption, "Thank you @dr_heavenly for the smile!!!!!!" Boyd was connected with "Married to Medicine" cast member Heavenly Kimes, a cosmetic and implant dentist, through the social media platform. The series airs on Bravo, which is owned by NBCUniversal, the parent company of NBC News. Kimes said Friday that "people were feverishly tagging" her in a post about Boyd and that the two were connected within a few days of the teen's injury. "Once we heard her story, I answered the call to action," Kimes told NBC News. "She messaged me on Instagram, and we got her a flight right away to Atlanta, so that I could treat her immediately." One of Boyd's front teeth was broken and another was damaged, which expanded the "already large" space between her two front teeth, Kimes said. "We performed high-end cosmetic dentistry," Kimes said. "In total, these services and treatments would have cost her and her parents in excess of $10,000." Kimes did it at no cost."

Readers will recall:

"Boyd, an activist and recent high school graduate, has said she was recording a Facebook Live last week with her cellphone in downtown Chicago’s Grant Park where protesters tried to topple a Christopher Columbus statue, when she said an officer smacked the phone out of her hand and hit her in the mouth. Chicago police said Monday that "criminal agitators pelted fireworks, frozen water bottles and other projectiles" at officers, injuring 49 of them, at the protest. More than 20 complaints, including claims of excessive force, have been filed against police related to the protest, according to the Civilian Office of Police Accountability. The agency said it was investigating video of an officer striking Boyd. The video was uploaded to Twitter by the anti-gun violence group GoodKids MadCity of which Boyd is a member. Kimes said Friday that as an African American public figure, she felt obligated to help Boyd. "With her mission as an activist and public speaker, we wanted Miracle to leave with a lifted spirit, and the determination of push forward," Kimes said. "When she left, she vowed that she would continue to fight peacefully for the justice of African Americans and the Black community, nationally." Boyd said at a news conference Monday that she fights "every day" in her community to end gun violence and that she was "unjustly attacked by a Chicago police officer" who "valued a supremacist statue over" her life, safety and well being. "No matter what I said, no matter what I did, it did not justify me being brutalized and attacked," she said. "I am calling for the officer who attacked me to be relieved of his duties."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

A failed presidency.  The public is dearly paying the price.  ABC News reports:

"President Donald Trump proclaimed in late March that “nobody knew there’d be a pandemic or an epidemic of this proportion.” Confronted with criticism of a lethargic national response, he lamented “a system we inherited” from past administrations. The problem with both statements, according to former public health officials, is that prior administrations not only “knew there’d be a pandemic,” they planned for it – extensively. They did so by crafting so-called “playbooks” and engaging in “table-top exercises” for hypothetical outbreaks – the results of which bore a striking resemblance to gaps that have emerged in the federal government’s response to COVID-19. “I think that this current pandemic has really played out in many ways similar to exercises and table-top simulations that we had done many years ago,” said Dr. James Lawler, a former White House National Security Council (NSC) official during both the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations who worked specifically on pandemic preparedness. “I think, unfortunately, things have played out somewhat predictably,” he added. Multiple public health officials under Presidents Bush and Obama who spoke with ABC News as part of its coronavirus special, “American Catastrophe: How Did We Get Here?”, described the painstaking lengths to which previous administrations planned for viral infectious disease pandemics. Many of those same officials condemned the Trump administration for failing to execute on the strategies gathered as a result of those efforts, such as taking early and aggressive science-based actions, clear communication to the public, and collaboration with international and state partners. Others accused the president of exacerbating matters by shuttering a NSC office specifically tasked with pandemic response preparedness."

Report goes on and on.  Sad, isn't it?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-31-20

Can Trump flout a court order?  NPR reports:

"The Trump administration on Tuesday continued its push to roll back DACA — the program that protects young immigrants brought to the country illegally as children — by refusing to accept new applicants. A number of courts had given those immigrants hope. Last month, the Supreme Court blocked the administration's effort to end the program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. Then two weeks ago, a court in Maryland told the administration to start accepting new DACA applicants. But the administration is refusing to do that, saying it will reject new applicants while launching a "comprehensive review" of DACA and whether to go forward with a new plan to end the program. "I have concluded that the DACA policy, at a minimum, presents serious policy concerns that may warrant its full rescission," said Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf in a memo explaining the administration's decision.

"When asked how that decision could be reconciled with the Maryland court ruling, a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the memo from Wolf is an "intervening action" that makes that decision moot. When reporters asked whether the administration expects to face further litigation over the memo, the official said simply: "Yes, of course." The Trump administration has long argued that DACA was created illegally by President Obama, but no court has ever reached a final conclusion on that question. A group of Republican state attorneys general, led by Ken Paxton of Texas, are making that same argument in a lawsuit still pending in federal court. Immigration advocates are likely headed back to court as well. The group Make The Road New York, one of the plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case, is building a possible test case with a pair of brothers who filed first-time DACA applications this week. Once they are rejected, the plaintiffs are likely to go back to court to argue that the Trump administration is defying the Supreme Court's ruling. Antonio Alarcon, a DACA recipient and activist with Make The Road New York, called today's move by the administration "an attack on me and my family." "Our communities are paying close attention to this administration's attacks. And despite its attempt to distract and blame others we know where the blame lies," he said."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

Federal Gestapo at it again.  ABC News reports:

"Federal agents in green camouflage uniforms have been taking into custody people in the streets of Portland, not close to federal property that they were sent to protect, in what the ACLU on Friday said “should concern everyone in the United States.” “Usually when we see people in unmarked cars forcibly grab someone off the street we call it kidnapping," said Jann Carson, interim executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon." The actions of the militarized federal officers are flat-out unconstitutional and will not go unanswered.”

Empty rhetoric?

"Gov. Kate Brown said President Donald Trump, who deployed Department of Homeland Security officers to Portland, is looking for a confrontation in the hopes of winning political points elsewhere. The Democratic governor on Thursday called the actions "a blatant abuse of power by the federal government.” Her spokesman, Charles Boyle, said Friday that arresting people without probable cause is “extraordinarily concerning and a violation of their civil liberties and constitutional rights.”

Indeed.  Why didn't local law enforcement arrest and jail these unidentified, out of control, fascist bastards?  If you don't arrest and jail them, run their prints, etc., how do you know for sure they're federal agents?

"Federal officers have charged at least 13 people with crimes related to the protests so far, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported Thursday. Some have been detained by the federal courthouse, which has been the scene of protests. But others were grabbed blocks away. One video showed two people in helmets and green camouflage with “police” patches grabbing a person on the sidewalk, handcuffing them and taking them into an unmarked vehicle. “Who are you?” someone asks the pair, who do not respond. At least some of the federal officers belong to the Department of Homeland Security."

Why weren't these unidentified pieces of shit arrested and jailed?  To determine precisely who they work for and who they are.  Again, how do you know they're federal agents?  Trump and his henchmen are congenital liars.  Anything they say must be questioned, verified.

“Authoritarian governments, not democratic republics, send unmarked authorities after protesters,” Democratic U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley said in a tweet."

Clearly, we live in a goddamned, de facto, fascist police-state.

"The Council on American-Islamic Relations Oregon chapter said in a statement: “We are now seeing escalating tactics with protesters being unlawfully detained by unknown Federal law enforcement entities." On Thursday night, federal officers deployed tear gas and fired non-lethal rounds into a crowd of protesters, hours after the head of the Department of Homeland Security visited the city and called the demonstrators, who are protesting racism and police brutality, “violent anarchists.”

Again, why aren't local law enforcement agencies arresting and jailing these unidentified federal thugs arresting and detaining peaceful protesters exercising their First Amendment right to protest?  To determine precisely who they are and who they work for.

"A few hundred people gathered near the federal courthouse Thursday night. Other protesters went to a police station in another part of the city. Police told protesters to leave that site after announcing they heard some chanting about burning down the building. Protester Paul Frazier said Friday the chant was “much more rhetorical than an actual statement.”

As long as they were peaceful, non-violent, not engaging in any criminal activity, they had every right to protest.

"Portland police said Friday they wound up arresting 20 people overnight."

Why didn't you bastards arrest and jail the unidentified federal thugs deliberately interfering with a constitutional right?  You bastards have no honor?  What if they aren't federal agents?  No matter what, these goons are violating the right of peaceful protesters to protest the Trump nazi, his henchmen, and out of control law enforcement at all levels and branches of government.

Get this:

"Homeland Security Acting Secretary Chad Wolf said Thursday that state and city authorities are to blame for not putting an end to the protests, angering local officials. Mayor Ted Wheeler and others have said they didn’t ask for help from federal law enforcement and have asked them to leave."

Jesus Christ.  Why didn't you arrest and jail every one of these goddamned, unidentified federal goons to determine precisely who they are and who they work for?  Are they deliberately trying to spark a revolution?  Without running prints how do you know for sure they're federal agents?

"Homeland Security Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli said Friday morning on “Fox & Friends” that the federal government has a responsibility to protect buildings such as the courthouse."

Disingenuous bullshit coming from one of Trump's henchmen.  Protesters have the right to peacefully protest.  Why are you nazi bastards interfering with that right?

More unadulterated nazi bullshit coming from this fascist son of a bitch:

“What we’ve seen around the country is where responsible policing is advanced, violence recedes," Cuccinelli said. "And Portland hasn’t gotten that memo. Nor have a lot of other cities. And the president is determined to do what we can, within our jurisdiction, to help restore peace to these beleaguered cities.”

Like his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his sidekick, the Barr nazi, Cuccinelli is a liar.  Apparently, doing the bidding of his fuhrer.

"The Department of Homeland Security had no immediate comment when reached by The Associated Press on Friday. Tensions have escalated in the past two weeks, particularly after an officer with the U.S. Marshals Service fired at a protester’s head on July 11, critically injuring him. The protests following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis have often devolved into violent clashes between smaller groups and the police. The unrest has caused deep divisions in a city that prides itself on its activism and progressive reputation."

Police are directly responsible for eliciting this violence from peaceful protesters.  Exacerbated by unidentified alleged Trump federal goons.

NPR reports:

"In the early hours of Wednesday, after a night spent protesting at the Multnomah County Justice Center and Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse, Mark Pettibone and his friend Conner O'Shea decided to head home. It had been a calm night compared with most protesting downtown. By 2 a.m. law enforcement hadn't used any tear gas and, with only a few exceptions, both the Portland, Ore., Police Bureau and federal law enforcement officers had stayed out of sight. A block west of Chapman Square, Pettibone and O'Shea bumped into a group warning them that people in camouflage were driving around the area in unmarked minivans grabbing individuals off the street."

Trump's nazi motherf--ker goons?  Unless these pieces of shit are arrested, jailed, prints run, how do you know who the f--k they are and work for?

"So that was terrifying to hear," Pettibone said."

Adolf Hitler reincarnated.  Trump's Fourth Reich.

"They had barely made it half a block when an unmarked minivan pulled up in front of them. "I see guys in camo," O'Shea said. "Four or five of them pop out, open the door and it was just like, 'Oh s**t. I don't know who you are or what you want with us.' " Federal law enforcement officers have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters since at least Tuesday. Personal accounts and multiple videos posted online show the officers driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation about why they are being arrested, and driving off. The tactic appears to be another escalation in federal force deployed on Portland city streets as federal officials and President Trump have said they plan to quell nightly protests outside the federal courthouse and Multnomah County Justice Center that have lasted for more than six weeks."

Peaceful protesters have every right to protest.  First Amendment.

Trump's Fourth Reich.  Nazi America:

"In a statement, the U.S. Marshals Service declined to comment on the practice of using unmarked vehicles but said its officers had not arrested Pettibone. And on Thursday, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said on background that the agency could confirm Acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf was in Portland during the day. The spokesperson didn't acknowledge other questions about the arrests. Federal officers have charged at least 13 people with crimes related to the protests so far, while others have been arrested and released, including Pettibone. They also left one demonstrator hospitalized with skull fractures after shooting him in the face with "less lethal" munitions on Saturday, according to video and local reports. Officers from the U.S. Marshals Special Operations Group and U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Border Patrol Tactical Unit have been sent to Portland to protect federal property during the recent protests against racism and police brutality."

Here's the out of control nazi problem:

"Interviews conducted by Oregon Public Broadcasting show officers are detaining people on Portland streets who aren't near federal property. Demonstrators such as O'Shea and Pettibone said they think they were targeted by federal officers for simply wearing black clothing in the area of the demonstration. O'Shea said he ran when he saw people wearing camouflage jump out of an unmarked vehicle. He said he hid when a second unmarked van pursued him. Video shot by O'Shea and provided to OPB shows a dark screen as O'Shea narrates the scene. Metadata from the video confirm the time and place of the protesters' account. "Feds are driving around, grabbing people off the streets," O'Shea said on the video. "I didn't do anything f*****g wrong. I'm recording this. I had to let somebody know that this is what happens." Pettibone did not escape the federal officers. "I am basically tossed into the van," Pettibone said. "And I had my beanie pulled over my face so I couldn't see, and they held my hands over my head."

Out of control, jackbooted, federal, nazi motherf--kers.  No greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his henchmen.  Why aren't these unidentified goons arrested, hauled to jail, prints run to determine precisely who they are and work for?  The public has a right to know.

"Pettibone and O'Shea both said they couldn't think of anything they might have done to end up targeted by law enforcement. They attend protests regularly, but they said they aren't "instigators." They don't spray-paint buildings, shine laser pointers at officers or do anything else other than attend protests, which law enforcement have regularly deemed "unlawful assemblies." Blinded by his hat, in an unmarked minivan full of armed people dressed in camouflage and body armor who hadn't identified themselves, Pettibone said he was driven around downtown before being unloaded inside a building. He wouldn't learn until after his release that he had been inside the federal courthouse. "It was basically a process of facing many walls and corners as they patted me down and took my picture and rummaged through my belongings," Pettibone said. "One of them said, 'This is a whole lot of nothing.' " Pettibone said he was put into a cell. Soon after, two officers came in to read him his Miranda rights. They didn't tell him why he was being arrested. He said they asked him if he wanted to waive his rights and answer some questions, but Pettibone declined and said he wanted a lawyer. The interview was terminated, and about 90 minutes later he was released. He said he did not receive any paperwork, citation or record of his arrest."

Out of control, jackbooted, federal, nazi motherf--kers.  Time to confirm their identity and who they work for.  The public is entitled to know who their oppressors are.

"I just happened to be wearing black on a sidewalk in downtown Portland at the time," Pettibone said. "And that apparently is grounds for detaining me." OPB sent DHS an extensive list of questions about Pettibone's arrest including: What is the legal justification for making arrests away from federal property? What is the legal justification for searching people who are not participating in criminal activity? Why are federal officers using civilian vehicles and taking people away in them? Are the arrests federal officers make legal under the Constitution? If so, how? The DHS spokesperson didn't acknowledge the questions. "It's like stop and frisk meets Guantanamo Bay," said attorney Juan Chavez, director of the civil rights project at the Oregon Justice Resource Center."

Nazi America.  Far worse to come.  ... Hear the rumble?

"Chavez has worked on litigation surrounding the weeks of protests and helped lead efforts to curb local police from using tear gas and munitions on protesters. He called the arrest by federal officers "terrifying." "You have laws regarding probable cause that can lead to arrests," he said. "It sounds more like abduction. It sounds like they're kidnapping people off the streets." Ashlee Albies, a civil rights attorney with the National Lawyers Guild, said Pettibone's detention is an example of intimidation by federal law enforcement, and noted that people have a First Amendment right to demonstrate. She also said law enforcement officials have to follow procedures when they detain someone. "I would be surprised to see that pulling up in an unmarked van, grabbing people off the street is an acceptable policy for a criminal investigation," Albies said."

The following is a goddamned lie:

"In a letter released Thursday, Wolf, the acting DHS secretary, said, "Portland has been under siege for 47 straight days by a violent mob while local political leaders refuse to restore order to protect their city." "A federal courthouse is a symbol of justice," Wolf wrote, denigrating protests against racism in the U.S. criminal justice system as an angry mob. "To attack it is to attack America."

Hitler couldn't have said it better, you treasonous, traitorous nazi son of a bitch.  Who the f--k are you and your goons to deny peaceful protesters their First Amendment right to protest?

"This week, Trump has repeatedly spoken about what he calls lawlessness in the city. He praised the role of federal law enforcement officers in Portland and alluded to increasing their presence in cities nationwide. Speaking to Fox News on Thursday, acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan called the protesters criminals."

Horse shit.  Clearly, it is the out of control Trump nazi and his henchmen who are the criminals.  Are they deliberately, determinedly, concertedly attempting to spark a revolution?

More false nazi propaganda coming from the criminal in the Oval Office and his henchmen:

"I don't want to get ahead of the president and his announcement," Morgan said, "but the Department of Justice is going to be involved in this, DHS is going to be involved in this, and we're really going to take a stand across the board. And we're going to do what needs to be done to protect the men and women of this country."

Again, Adolf Hitler couldn't have said it better.  Trump's Fourth Reich.  Time for the gutless Mayor to finally stand up:

"Mayor Ted Wheeler's office declined to comment on the latest events involving federal officers but reiterated a statement from earlier this week, saying federal officers should be restricted to guarding federal property. "We do not need or want their help," Wheeler said. "The best thing they can do is stay inside their building, or leave Portland altogether."

That all you have to say, you gutless son of a bitch?

"Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon said if Wolf's visit to Portland was to inflame the situation so the president can "look tough," the acting DHS leader should leave. "Federal forces shot an unarmed protester in the face," Merkley said in a tweet. "These shadowy forces have been escalating, not preventing, violence." Oregon Gov. Kate Brown similarly called for federal law enforcement officers to leave Portland. She added that Wolf is on a "mission to provoke confrontation for political purposes." "This political theater from President Trump has nothing to do with public safety," Brown said in a statement. "The president is failing to lead this nation. Now he is deploying federal officers to patrol the streets of Portland in a blatant abuse of power by the federal government."

Why haven't you ordered state law enforcement to arrest and jail these out of control, federal, unidentified, jackbooted agitators and instigators of violence to determine their identity and who they work for?  They're committing crimes in Oregon.  Why haven't you taken action?  Clearly, you're not protecting your citizenry against this exigent threat.  Why haven't you urged the Mayor to order local law enforcement to arrest and jail these goons, run their prints to determine precisely who they are and who they work for?

The Washington Post reports:

"City officials on Friday demanded the Trump administration remove what they called a heavy-handed army of federal agents who have been grabbing protesters off the streets — tactics that federal officials defended as legal and necessary to quell ongoing unrest."

They are not legal.  Protesters have the constitutional right to peacefully protest.  First Amendment.  The traitorous, treasonous Trump nazi and his henchmen are abrogating this right.

"The fight between the White House and the left-leaning city government intensified Friday amid videos and firsthand accounts of mysterious federal agents driving around in unmarked rental minivans and detaining protesters. Friday night saw additional clashes, as federal agents used tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash bangs to disperse a group of protesters. At least one person was arrested. The unrest intensified in the early morning hours, as some protesters hurled water bottles and set off smoke bombs and fireworks aimed at courthouse and police buildings."

This violence is elicited, spawned by Trump's federal goons.  Not to neglect to mention local law enforcement.

“I wonder what country I’m living in,” said protester Beth Fernandez."

Called Nazi America.

“Having the feds come in and try to quench this anger is not the right approach and we want them out.” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler called the federal agents Trump’s “personal army” and said they should leave the city. “This is part of a coordinated strategy of Trump’s White House to use federal troops to bolster his sagging polling data, and it is an absolute abuse of federal law enforcement officials,” Wheeler said. “As we were starting to see things de-escalate, their actions last Saturday night and every night since have actually ratcheted up the tension on our streets.”

Since Trump's goons are not traveling in marked vehicles and have no identification on their camo 'uniforms' indicating who they are and who they're working for, why aren't local police arresting and jailing these pieces of shit, running prints to determine precisely who they are to indeed confirm they are federal agents.  Their oppressed victims deserve this information.

"Acting secretary of homeland security Chad Wolf traveled to Portland this week to supervise the federal actions there, and he sharply criticized local law enforcement for not getting tough with “violent anarchists.” Wolf told Fox News on Thursday night that he offered law enforcement assistance to the mayor and local leaders but was asked to “pack up and go home,” which he said is “just not going to happen on my watch.”

All the more reason local law enforcement needs to arrest and jail these pieces of shit, run their prints to confirm precisely who they are and who they work for.

More nazi bullshit courtesy of one of our fuhrer's henchmen:

"He accused local leaders of “fostering an environment that continues to breed this type of lawlessness.”

Wake up, you fascist piece of shit.  Protesters have the right to peacefully protest.  First Amendment.  Why are your goddamned f--king goons abrogating this most precious right, you nazi son of a bitch?

The following is called kidnapping.  Remains a federal crime:

"One widely shared video showed two men in military garb on the street at night taking a young man wearing all black into custody. On the video, the two agents do not answer shouted questions before putting the man into an unmarked minivan and driving away."

Local law enforcement should have immediately arrested these goons.  Hauled their sorry asses to jail, ran their prints.  Confirmed their identity and who they allegedly work for.

"On Friday, Customs and Border Protection issued a statement taking responsibility for the apprehension and asserting its agents were wearing gear that identified them as CBP personnel."

Show us video and metadata of the encounter, you son of a bitch.

"CBP agents went after that person because they suspected he was involved in “assaults against federal agents or destruction of federal property,” the statement said."

Show us evidence of probable cause, you son of a bitch.  Nothing you say can be accepted at face value.  No credibility.

More bullshit:

“Once CBP agents approached the suspect, a large and violent mob moved towards their location. For everyone’s safety, CBP agents quickly moved the suspect to a safer location for further questioning.”

Advise him he had the right to remain silent?  Was entitled to an attorney?

"The agency said the CBP agents identified themselves and were wearing CBP insignia during the apprehension."

Show us all video and metadata supporting your claims.  How do your claims comport with the following?  Here's precisely why your claims cannot be trusted without evidence of their veracity:

"One protester, 29-year-old Mark Pettibone, described being grabbed by several men in green military fatigues and generic “police” patches on their clothing in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Pettibone said he did not know whether the men were police or far-right extremists, who frequently don military-like outfits and harass left-leaning protesters in Portland."  “I was terrified,” Pettibone said in an interview. “It seemed like it was out of a horror/sci-fi, like a Philip K. Dick novel. It was like being preyed upon.” Pettibone was taken to the city’s federal courthouse and placed in a holding cell. Two agents eventually read him his Miranda rights and asked whether he would waive those rights to answer questions. He declined, and the agents let him go. The federal agents who detained him did not tell him why he was being held or provide any record of an arrest, he said."

Somebody's lying.  Abusing authority.  Shitting on all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.  Guess who?

"The federal law enforcement response in Portland has prompted a debate among current and former law enforcement officials about whether DHS and Justice Department law enforcement agencies are being misused by the Trump administration. “The idea that they are leaving the perimeter of that federal property and going out in the streets of Portland gives me a lot of personal angst about their concept of policing in general,” said David Gomez, a former FBI official. “Policing is essentially a contract with the community. That’s why a lot of these communities are erupting, because they feel the police have effectively violated the contract. When you have the federal government coming in there, acting as state police, you’re effectively pushing the community away.”

Precisely, why local law enforcement needs to be arresting and jailing these alleged federal agents, running prints, determining precisely who they are and who they work for.

"CBP’s acting commissioner, Mark Morgan, tweeted Friday that his agents are not hiding their affiliation and are “clearly marked as federal [law enforcement officers] & have unique identifiers.”

Show us all video and metadata, etc. of the encounter, you son of a bitch.  Nothing you say can be trusted without proof.

"The incident and others like it have sparked widespread criticism of the DHS, particularly after an unidentified federal agent outside the courthouse fired a nonlethal round into a protester’s face over the weekend. That protester was badly injured and suffered facial bone fractures. Oregon’s U.S. Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, along with U.S. Reps. Earl Blumenauer and Suzanne Bonamici, all Democrats, asked the Justice Department and DHS inspectors general to investigate what they called “the unrequested presence and violent actions of federal forces in Portland.” The U.S. attorney for the District of Oregon, Billy J. Williams, said he had referred the shooting of the protester to the inspector general in the Justice Department."

Republican nazis have no concern for this ongoing, outrageously unconstitutional, criminal activity of Trump's goons.

Federal officials have no credibility:

"A U.S. Marshals Service spokeswoman said Friday that the agency was not involved in the arrests and apprehensions described by Pettibone and others, adding that its agents always wear identifying insignia. However, nearly a week after the event, Marshals officials will not say whether the person who fired the impact munition into the protester’s face was one of their employees."

That's a problem.  A big problem.  Certainly, one reason of a multitude that these nazi pieces of shit cannot be trusted.  Pose an exigent threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.  ... Just like their fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

"On Friday night, Oregon state law enforcement officials said they and the local district attorney’s office had opened an investigation into the July 12 incident. “It’s painfully clear this administration is focused purely on escalating violence without answering my repeated requests for why this expeditionary force is in Portland and under what constitutional authority,” said Wyden. Blumenauer, who represents part of Portland, said the “jarring reports of federal law enforcement officers grabbing peaceful protesters off the street should alarm every single American. This is not the way a government operates in a functioning democracy.”

This remains a democratic republic in name only.  Not in reality.

"Civil liberties advocates said they will keep fighting in court against the use of federal agents to police the streets of Portland. “The Trump administration has added escalation on top of escalation in our community,” said Kelly Simon, the interim legal director of the ACLU of Oregon. “We won’t stand for it, and we will see them in court more than once in the near future.” Jo Ann Hardesty, a Portland city commissioner, said in a statement that she was proudly “among the loud chorus of elected officials calling for the federal troops in Portland’s streets to go home.” She said their presence “has escalated tensions and put countless Portlanders exercising their First Amendment Rights in greater danger.”

Precisely, the intention of the increasingly desperate Trump nazi.

"Hardesty also called for the Portland police “to immediately disengage in any coordination or collaboration with the federal officers,” saying they should not be “a subsidiary of [Trump’s] federal forces.”

No question.  Quite the opposite.  Local law enforcement needs to be arresting, jailing, running prints on these alleged federal jackbooted bastards to confirm who the hell they are and who they're working for.  The oppressed public deserves and is entitled to this information.

Here's another problem:

"The police bureau did not respond to a message seeking comment Friday about its involvement in the federal response and whether its officers had any role in the detention or questioning of anyone by federal officials. Portland has a history of disagreement with federal law enforcement; the city council has voted to pull its police detectives out of the FBI’s joint terrorism task force, out of concerns about the civil rights of Muslim residents. An FBI spokeswoman said the agency is not responsible for crowd control, and she declined to say whether it is investigating any actions of law enforcement surrounding the unrest."

No transparency.  Forget?  Nazi America.

NPR reports:

"The Oregon Department of Justice is suing several federal agencies for civil rights abuses, and state prosecutors will potentially pursue criminal charges against a federal officer who seriously injured a protester. The federal lawsuit names the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. Marshals Service, the United States Customs and Border Protection and the Federal Protective Service, agencies that have had a role in stepped-up force used against protesters since early July. The state filed the lawsuit late Friday night."

What took so long?

"It lists defendants specifically as John Does 1-10 because the "identity of the officers is not known, nor is their agency affiliation," the lawsuit states. "According to Oregon DOJ spokeswoman Kristina Edmunson, the suit accuses the agencies of engaging "in unlawful law enforcement in violation of the civil rights of Oregon citizens by seizing and detaining them without probable cause." State attorneys are asking a judge to issue a temporary restraining order that "would immediately stop federal authorities from unlawfully detaining Oregonians," the DOJ said in a release. The lawsuit is asking a judge to find that the federal agencies' tactics are indeed unlawful and violate Oregonians' First, Fourth and Fifth amendment constitutional rights. It is also asking that federal agents and officers identify themselves and their agencies before detaining or arresting any person, explain to the person why they're being arrested or detained, and not arrest any person without probable cause or a warrant."

Called the U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights.  Ignored by the Trump nazi and his henchmen.

"The agency said that its Criminal Justice Division has also opened a criminal investigation, joined by Multnomah County District Attorney Rod Underhill, in the case of Donavan LaBella, a peaceful demonstrator who was shot in the head with an impact munition last Saturday night, Edmunson said. Those munitions are intended to be aimed below the waist. LaBella's mom said she believes the officer aimed at LaBella's head. "He's 6-foot-5," said Desiree Labella, referring to her son. "He has to be a terribly trained marksman to be off by 3 feet to hit him in the forehead right between the eyes. If he's that bad of a shot at such a short distance he shouldn't have a gun."

Would indeed be laughable had this man not been so seriously injured by this criminal jackbooted son of a bitch.

"The lawsuit, which is the second announced against federal authorities on Friday, comes after reporting by Oregon Public Broadcasting that revealed federal agents have detained peaceful protesters using unmarked vehicles, with little explanation or indication of which agency they belong to or why people are being taken into custody. "I share the concerns of our state and local leaders – and our Oregon U.S. Senators and certain Congressional representatives – that the current escalation of fear and violence in downtown Portland is being driven by federal law enforcement tactics that are entirely unnecessary and out of character with the Oregon way. These tactics must stop," Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement. The state's lawsuit specifically highlighted the case of Mark Pettibone, a demonstrator who was snatched off the street by federal officers in the early hours of July 16, put into a van, and brought to the federal courthouse. "On information and belief, defendants did not have a warrant to seize Pettibone or the other citizens who have been detained, and will continue to seize individuals off the street without a warrant, in the absence of an injunction," the lawsuit reads. Due to both federal agents and their vehicles being unmarked, the lawsuit states that Oregonians could be at risk of kidnapping by "militias and other civilian 'volunteers' taking it onto themselves to pull peaceful protesters into their cars, in a manner that resembles the federal actions described..." Pettibone echoed that concern in his declaration within the lawsuit. "I did not know whether the men were police or far-right extremists, who, in my experience, frequently don military-like outfits and harass left-leaning protesters in Portland," Pettibone said."

Nazi America.  Trump's Fourth Reich.

"Pettibone's arrest has spurred national attention as President Trump has made Portland a focal point in recent days, criticizing local elected leaders for being overly lenient on protesters. On Thursday, acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf flew into Portland to tour the Mark O. Hatfield Courthouse, the federal facility where graffiti and other vandalism has been frequent in seven weeks of protests over police violence and racial injustice. Since arriving just before July 4, the officers from Customs and Border Protection's elite BORTAC unit and the U.S. Marshals Special Operations Group have guarded Portland's federal courthouse. They've also assisted the Portland police in clearing protesters from city streets."

In direct violation of the First Amendment right to peacefully protest.  Nazi America.

"City, state and congressional leaders have criticized the federal force's use of weapons against protesters and demanded their departure. "The federal administration has chosen Portland to use their scare tactics to stop our residents from protesting police brutality and from supporting the Black Lives Matter movement," Rosenblum said in a statement. "Every American should be repulsed when they see this happening. If this can happen here in Portland, it can happen anywhere."

Mayor has his say.  NBC News reports:

"Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said President Donald Trump doesn't have a clue about what's going on in his city, adding that the Trump administration's tactics in the area "are abhorrent." "Well, the president has a complete misunderstanding of cause and effect," Wheeler said in responding to Trump's Sunday morning tweet about Portland. "What's happening here is, we have dozens, if not hundreds of federal troops descending upon our city. And what they're doing is, they are sharply escalating the situation." "Their presence here is actually leading to more violence and more vandalism," he continued. "And it's not helping the situation at all. They're not wanted here. We haven't asked them here. In fact, we want them to leave." The president earlier Sunday tweeted that his administration is "trying to help Portland, not hurt it."

How?  By abrogating the First Amendment right to peacefully protest?  Trump remains a congenital liar:

"Their leadership has, for months, lost control of the anarchists and agitators," he wrote. "They are missing in action. We must protect Federal property, AND OUR PEOPLE. These were not merely protesters, these are the real deal!"

So are you, Mr. 'President.'  A reincarnation of Adolf Hitler.  A nazi dictator who is deliberately, concertedly, determinedly, traitorously, treasonously abrogating the United States Constitution.

"The tweet comes as the increased federal presence in Portland has come under intense scrutiny following videos posted online showing agents, who were not clearly identified, hauling away protesters in unmarked vans. Videos on social media also showed federal officers in camouflage aiming weapons and using smoke against protesters.

"Speaking Sunday, Wheeler said he believes the Trump administration is breaking the law with its usage of a federal policing force in his city. "The tactics that the Trump administration are using on the streets of Portland are abhorrent," he said. "People are being literally scooped off the street into unmarked vans, rental cars, apparently. They are being denied probable cause and they're denied due process." "They don't even know who's pulling them into the vans," he continued. "The people aren't identifying themselves. And, as far as I can see, this is completely unconstitutional."

Called Nazi America.  A fascist police-state.

"Wheeler said he and other top Oregon officials are pushing the administration to "take these people out of our city."

Why isn't local law enforcement arresting, jailing, running the prints of these alleged federal agents to determine their identity and who they work for?  The public has the right to know the identity of its oppressors.

"They are not helping us. They are hurting us," he said. "They're escalating an already dangerous situation. And what I want to do is raise awareness nationally. This could happen in your city. And what we're seeing is a blatant abuse of police tactics by the federal government, by a Trump administration that's falling in the polls. And this is a direct threat to our democracy." He said that before federal agents arrived, violence and vandalism tied to the protests had decreased considerably. "Our local and state law enforcement officials had contained the situation," Wheeler said. "The energy was coming out of the demonstrations. We had hoped they would end within a matter of days. And what happened instead is, the federal troops came in. They used their unconstitutional tactics. They injured nonviolent demonstrators, and the whole thing blew up again like a powder keg."

Are Trump and his henchmen determined to spark a revolution?

"Wheeler expressed fear that a resident or a local or state law enforcement officer "is going to get killed" because of the Trump administration's efforts. Democratic members of Oregon's congressional delegation said Friday they will demand a federal investigation into the situation, saying that the deployment of federal officers has inflamed tensions and led to violent confrontations and questionable arrests. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, has called for the federal officers to leave Portland. Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum sued the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies Friday over the deployment. The American Civil Liberties Union also filed a lawsuit on Friday to protect journalists from police tactics. On Sunday, the three Democratic chairs of the House Judiciary, Oversight and Homeland Security committees called on the inspectors general from the Justice Department and Homeland Security to open an immediate investigation into the Trump administration's tactics against protesters in Portland, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere."

Trump is insane.  Presents an exigent threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties:

"On Sunday, Trump tweeted Democrats "will destroy our Country as we know it." "Unimaginably bad things would happen to America," he said if he loses this fall. "Look at Portland, where the pols are just fine with 50 days of anarchy. We sent in help. Look at New York, Chicago, Philadelphia. NO!"

The above coming from a nazi dictator who states he may not accept the results of the upcoming presidential election.  The Associated Press reports:

" President Donald Trump is refusing to publicly commit to accepting the results of the upcoming White House election, recalling a similar threat he made weeks before the 2016 vote, as he scoffs at polls showing him lagging behind Democrat Joe Biden. Trump says it’s too early to make such an ironclad guarantee.

“I have to see. Look ... I have to see,” Trump told moderator Chris Wallace during a wide-ranging interview on ”Fox News Sunday.” “No, I’m not going to just say yes. I’m not going to say no, and I didn’t last time either.” The Biden campaign responded: “The American people will decide this election. And the United States government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House.”

The Washington Post reports:

"A Navy vet asked federal officers in Portland to remember their oaths. Then they broke his hand. He came to the protest with a question. He left with two broken bones in a confrontation with federal officers that went viral."

Nazi America.

"Christopher David had watched in horror as videos surfaced of federal officers in camouflage throwing protesters into unmarked vans in Portland. The 53-year-old Portland resident had heard the stories: protesters injured, gassed, sprayed with chemicals that tugged at their nostrils and burned their eyes. David, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and former member of the Navy’s Civil Engineer Corps, said he wanted to know what the officers involved thought of the oath they had sworn to protect and defend the Constitution. So, he said, on Saturday evening, he headed to downtown Portland to ask them."

Uncommon Valor.

"That night’s protests outside the federal courthouse — the 51st day of ongoing demonstrations — began with a line of local moms linking arms and demanding the federal agents stop targeting Portland kids. David, who had never attended a protest before, hung back and watched. He was trying to keep his distance, he said, as a host of health problems have made him especially vulnerable amid a still-raging coronavirus pandemic. He asked one woman when the feds would show up, but she said it was also her first protest since the Department of Homeland Security deployed tactical units from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection to bolster protections for federal buildings and officers in the Pacific Northwest city. Just as he was about to leave, David said, the federal officers emerged. They rushed a line of protesters nearby, knocking them to the ground. David walked toward a gap in the line, calling out to the officers."

Uncommon Valor:

“Why are you not honoring your oath?” he bellowed. “Why are you not honoring your oath to the Constitution?” An officer trained his weapon on David’s chest as several agents pushed him, sending David stumbling backward. But he regained his center and tried again. Another agent raised his baton and began to beat David, who stood unwavering with his arms at his sides. Then another officer unloaded a canister of chemical irritant spray into David’s face."

Jackbooted nazi motherf--kers.

Uncommon Valor:

"That was all he could handle, David said, he turned and walked away, flipping off the federal forces as he went."

Nothing quite like the finger to send a clear "F--k you" to a jackbooted nazi motherf--ker.

"A video taken by Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling that captures David’s moment of resistance has, as of early Monday, been viewed nearly 9 million times. Unable to see from the chemicals burning his eyes and blurring his vision, David said, he stumbled into a cloud of gas that made him cough and retch. He found his way to a bench in the park, where a street medic aided him and eventually pulled him away from the advancing officers."

Trump's gutless nazi motherf--kers.

"At the hospital, he said, he learned his right hand had been broken in two places. In the time since, he has been hailed on social media as a hero. Some have dubbed him Portland’s own man of steel, a defender of the city, an anti-fascist super-soldier. David said he is none of those things. “It’s just us normal people out there,” he said. “There were a whole group of pregnant moms standing out there linking arms and they got gassed. You hear people like [President] Trump say it’s just a bunch of wacko fringe people in liberal cities who are out there, but no way. We’re all just normal people who think what’s happening is wrong.”

Bodes well that people are increasingly willing to stand up no matter the personal cost.  Despite their faults, the Founders must be impressed, cheering on the resistance to tyranny as they look on from the next life.

NPR reports:

"On Sunday, a new image of the stiff federal response in Portland went viral: a video of 53-year-old Navy veteran Christopher David being struck repeatedly with a baton wielded by a federal law enforcement officer. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and a former member of the Navy's Civil Engineer Corps, David told The Washington Post that he hadn't previously been to any protests, but he wanted to know how the federal officers thought about their oath to defend the Constitution. "Why are you not honoring your oath to the Constitution?" he says he yelled at the officers. Video of the incident shows an officer dressed in camouflage hitting David with a baton and another officer spraying him in the face with a chemical irritant. "I stood my ground at that point and just stayed there ... I did nothing provocative. They just started whaling on me with batons, and I let them," David told The Independent. The incident left him with a broken hand.

    "Federal police strike protester with baton, use pepper spray and tear gas outside courthouse in Portland pic.twitter.com/VX2xTVaaYq
    — Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) July 19, 2020"

CBS News reports:

"The White House on Tuesday sought to provide a legal justification for the administration's decision to deploy federal law enforcement to Portland in response to unrest as President Trump comes under scrutiny over whether he and the officers are acting outside the bounds of the law. When pressed on which provision of the U.S. Constitution gives the president the authority to send federal authorities to American cities against the wishes of their elected leaders, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany cited a provision of federal law, 40 U.S. Code 1315, that says the secretary of Homeland Security "shall protect the buildings, grounds and property that are owned, occupied, or secured by the federal government … and the persons on the property."

That's it.  On federal property.  Not on the streets of the city, often nowhere near federal property.  Certainly, are not authorized to arrest innocent, peaceful protesters exercising their First Amendment right to protest.  These jackbooted bastards are kidnapping innocent protesters with no probable cause, failing to identify themselves, denying those they've abducted due process, the rule of law, their constitutional rights.

"Agents from several federal agencies were sent to Portland in an effort to quell protests around the federal courthouse in the city, but local and state officials have now called for the federal officers to leave after they clashed with demonstrators. Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said she is planning to file a lawsuit against numerous federal agencies over alleged violations of civil rights and for detaining demonstrators without probable cause. Lawmakers are also working on legislation to block the Trump administration from deploying federal forces."

Why the delay in hauling these jackbooted motherf--kers into court?  This bullshit has been going on quite some time.  You're not protecting the right of peaceful protesters to protest the Trump nazi, his henchmen, and local law enforcement.

"Still, a memo obtained by CBS News showed the Trump administration is planning to send 175 federal officers to support local police departments in other cities, including Chicago, Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Kansas City, Missouri. Mr. Trump told reporters Monday "we're sending law enforcement" to some cities — with Democratic leadership — he painted as out of control."

It is our fuhrer, the Trump nazi and his henchmen who remain out of control.  Running our formerly great country like a goddamned fascist dictatorship.

"But Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot warned against the Trump administration sending federal law enforcement to her city, telling reporters she had "great concerns" given the violence in Portland. "We don't need federal agents without any insignia taking people off the street and holding them, I think, unlawfully," she said."

"McEnany, however, said officers are wearing insignia indicating they're law enforcement, but "don't identify themselves to crowds because it would put them at great risk."

Your goddamned jackbooted bastards are placing innocent, unarmed, peaceful protesters at more than great risk.  You and your bastards are denying them due process, their constitutional right to protest, etc.  The right to know the identity of their oppressors.  Nazi America.

"She also called the protests in Portland "egregious" and lambasted Lightfoot, specifically, claiming the mayor is "clearly unable to control her streets."

Adolf Hitler couldn't have said it better, you fascist piece of shit.

More nazi horse shit:

"McEnany said spikes of crime in some U.S. cities following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in late May underscore the need for a federal crackdown. "Governors and mayors really need to step it up, particularly in Democrat cities where Democrat streets are out of control," she said."

Wake up, you nazi piece of shit.  Your goddamned out of control federal goons and local police are eliciting this violence.  Too goddamned stupid to understand that?

ABC News reports:

"Federal officers’ actions at protests in Oregon’s largest city, hailed by President Donald Trump but done without local consent, are raising the prospect of a constitutional crisis — one that could escalate as weeks of demonstrations find renewed focus in clashes with camouflaged, unidentified agents outside Portland’s U.S. courthouse. Demonstrators crowded in front of the U.S. federal courthouse and the city’s Justice Center late Monday night, before authorities cleared them out as the loud sound and light of flash bang grenades filled the sky. State and local authorities, who didn't ask for federal help, are awaiting a ruling in a lawsuit filed late last week. State Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in court papers that masked federal officers have arrested people on the street, far from the courthouse, with no probable cause and whisked them away in unmarked cars."

A federal crime.  Kidnapping.

"Constitutional law experts said federal officers' actions in the progressive city are a “red flag” in what could become a test case of states’ rights as the Trump administration expands federal policing."

What about the constitutional right of peaceful protesters to protest the Trump nazi, his goddamned henchmen, not to neglect to mention corrupt, abusive, violent local police?

“The idea that there’s a threat to a federal courthouse and the federal authorities are going to swoop in and do whatever they want to do without any cooperation and coordination with state and local authorities is extraordinary outside the context of a civil war,” said Michael Dorf, a professor of constitutional law at Cornell University. “It is a standard move of authoritarians to use the pretext of quelling violence to bring in force, thereby prompting a violent response and then bootstrapping the initial use of force in the first place,” Dorf said."

Raw nazism imposed by our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his henchmen.

"The Chicago Tribune, citing anonymous sources, reported Monday that Trump planned to deploy 150 federal agents to Chicago. The ACLU of Oregon has sued in federal court over the agents’ presence in Portland, and the organization’s Chicago branch said it would similarly oppose a federal presence. “This is a democracy, not a dictatorship," Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, said on Twitter. “We cannot have secret police abducting people in unmarked vehicles. I can’t believe I have to say that to the President of the United States."

Empty, hollow rhetoric is not enough.  Nowhere near.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.

"Top leaders in the U.S. House said Sunday that they were “alarmed” by the Trump administration’s tactics in Portland and other cities. They have called on federal inspectors general to investigate."

Again, not good enough.  Nowhere near.  If there is no immediate relief in the courts, vis a vis all suits filed to date, time for Democrats in the House to draft and pass new articles of impeachment against the Trump nazi.  Tie him up until election day having to defend himself.

The following is called abject hypocrisy displayed by Republican nazis too goddamned gutless to stand up to their out of control fuhrer, the Trump nazi:

"The Trump administration's actions run counter to the usual philosophies of American conservatives, who typically treat state and local rights with great sanctity and have long been deeply wary of the federal government — particularly its armed agents — interceding in most situations."

Republicans are not conservatives.  Far from it.  They've treasonously embraced fascism.

"But Trump has shown that his actions don't always reflect traditional conservatism — particularly when politics, and in this case an impending election, are in play. One prominent Republican, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who is from the libertarian-leaning flank of the party, criticized federal policing. “We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will,” Paul said in a tweet Monday."

He's right.  At least, this Republican is not a nazi.  Sad, isn't it, there aren't far more standing up to this exigent threat to liberty?

"The protests have roiled Portland for 52 nights. Many rallies have attracted thousands and been largely peaceful. But smaller groups of up to several hundred people have focused on federal property and local law enforcement buildings, at times setting fires to police precincts, smashing windows and clashing violently with local police. Portland police used tear gas on multiple occasions until a federal court order banned its officers from doing so without declaring a riot. Now, concern is growing that the tear gas is being used against demonstrators by federal officers instead. Anger at the federal presence escalated on July 11, when a protester was hospitalized with critical injuries after a U.S. Marshals Service officer struck him in the head with a less-lethal round. Video shows the man, identified as Donavan LaBella, standing across the street from the officers holding a speaker over his head when he was hit."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

... Interestingly, before getting on with the rest of the latest law enforcement issues in this edition, the Portland fiasco has certainly raised the ire of the better half of the human species.  ABC News reports:

"As protesters continue to clash with federal law enforcement agents in Portland, Oregon, a group of moms stepped up to help protect the protesters. More than two dozen women created what they called a Wall of Moms over the weekend to create a barrier between protesters and federal officers, who are under fire for their use of force against people protesting police brutality after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on Memorial Day."

Uncommon Valor. Seatbelts on:

"The women, who wore face masks and helmets for safety, chanted, "Feds steer clear, moms are here," as they linked arms to form the barrier, according to ABC News' Kayna Whitworth, who is covering the protests in Portland. "Many of them who were here last night tell me they were tear gassed by federal authorities - but they are back today - and they brought their friends," Whitworth wrote on Instagram. The Wall of Moms is the brainchild of Bev Barnum, a mom of two who organized a Facebook event calling on moms to meet at the protest site on Saturday evening. "We moms are often underestimated. But we’re stronger than we’re given credit for," Barnum, who could not be reached by ABC News, wrote on Facebook. "So what do you say, will you stand with me? Will you help me create a wall of moms?" "Thank you so much for being brave. Thank you for being willing to help the protestors," Barnum wrote on her post, which received more than 500 responses. Barnum reflected on the success of the moms' movement in a later post, writing alongside a photo of the moms at the protest, "When I asked moms to join me in protest on Friday night, while I was in my pj's, getting ready for bed . . . I didn't imagine that this would be my reality by Sunday morning." "In the span of 30hrs, women from all across the world have asked how they too can make this happen in their community," she wrote. "You want to know the truth? You have to ask your friends to stand with you. You have to ask strangers to trust you enough to go into harm's way. And you most especially have to trust that these women are going to show up until there isn't a single protestor left to protect."

Uncommon Valor.

"Moms form a human shield as CBP agents prepare to fire tear gas and flash bangs at the Federal Courthouse in Portland, Oregon, July 19, 2020, during another night of protests in the city. Leslie Spurlock/Zuma Press

"Mothers stand between federal law enforcement officials and demonstrators during a protest against racial inequality in Portland, Oregon, July 19, 2020. Caitlin Ochs/Reuters

"We got gassed last night and it did suck, but we’ve all been through childbirth, IEP meetings, and long barf-filled nights," Maureen Kenny Mimiaga, one of Barnum's co-founders, wrote on Facebook. "We got this."

Uncommon Valor.  Outstanding.  Best humanity has to offer.  Great to see so many in our formerly great country willing to stand up to the Trump nazi and his henchmen.  Bodes well for liberty.

"The federal agents deployed in Portland this week were part of a Department of Homeland Security task force established to respond to the growing protests and acts of civil disobedience that came after the death of Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police. The state's attorney general has launched a criminal investigation into two "unlawful" tactics allegedly made by federal agents. Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum also announced she filed a federal civil lawsuit on Friday evening against the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. Marshals Service and the U.S. Customs and Border Protection to begin the process for a restraining order to stop the agents "from unlawfully detaining Oregonians."

Despite all their faults, the Founders, indeed, would have been proud the last several months.  At least some of us are standing up to tyranny.  The number will grow as Trump and his henchmen continue to be exposed for whom and what they are.

7-24-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

Sadly, the 'war' goes on in Chicago.  The Associated Press reports:

"Protesters trying to topple a Christopher Columbus statue in downtown Chicago’s Grant Park clashed with police who used batons to beat people and made at least a dozen arrests after they say protesters targeted them with fireworks, rocks and other items. The clash Friday evening unfolded after at least 1,000 people tried to swarm the statue in a failed attempt to topple it following a rally in support of Black and Indigenous people. Police said 18 officers were injured and at least 12 people were arrested during the clash. Four protesters were also hurt during the confrontation, which led local elected officials and activists to condemn the officers’ tactics.

Sadly, tragically, the tactics of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue elicit violence.  Apparently, law enforcement remains clueless or is deliberately engaging in these tactics to intentionally spark a revolution.  Either way, the end result remains the same.

The following is extremely interesting since prominent local officials and members of the state legislature have condemned the Mayor's use of force:

“We unequivocally condemn Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s decision to send the Chicago police to beat, arrest, and terrorize the demonstrators and journalists gathered in Grant Park tonight,” a group of elected officials said in a statement released late Friday. The statement was signed by several members of the City Council, including Alderwoman Jeanette Taylor and Alderwoman Rossana Rodriguez Sanchez, and two members of the Legislature — state Rep. Delia Ramirez and state Sen. Robert Peters."

The violence inflicted by these out of control jackbooted bastards remains over the top:

"Local news site Block Club Chicago reported that one protester, an 18-year-old woman, had several of her front teeth knocked out when an officer punched her. It also shared a video of that assault and a photo of the woman’s bloodied mouth and missing teeth. It identified her as Miracle Boyd, a member of the anti-gun violence group GoodKids MadCity."

Apparently, the son of a bitch got his cookies off.  As usual, self-serving law enforcement did what it could to excuse its jackbooted bastards:

"The police department said in a statement that officers assembled in the park as the protesters converged there and were “providing security and protecting their First Amendment right to peacefully assemble.” It said that as demonstrators approached the statue “some members of the crowd turned on the police and used the protest to attack officers with fireworks, rocks, frozen bottles, and other objects.”

... And your jackbooted bastards did nothing to provoke the violence?  LOL.

"Amika Tendaji, an organizer for the protest, during which artists tagged the statue with slogans including “Decolonize Chicago” and “Black Lives Matter,” decried the officers’ use of force to protect a statue. “I think the people of Chicago and the world have proven that they are over police brutalizing people,” she said. “They’re over police murder, they’re over police terrorism, so the people are going to keep fighting.”

Sadly, tragically, that's how revolutions spawn.  The masses are finally beginning to understand we now live in a de facto, fascist police-state.  A democratic republic in name only.  These statues should not be defaced, toppled, or destroyed.  Belong in museums as a reminder of a highly-abusive past that should never, ever be forgotten.

NBC News reports:

"An 18-year-old activist in Chicago said an officer knocked her front tooth out at a protest in the city Friday night where protesters trying to topple a Christopher Columbus statue clashed with police. An anti-violence organization she is a part of, posted a video on Twitter that appears to show an officer hitting her. The activist, Miracle Boyd, was at Grant Park where she said an officer knocked out her front tooth as she recorded the arrest of a protester. "The police officer came up to me, and he smacked the phone out of my hand, and it hit me in the mouth," she told NBC Chicago. Boyd did not immediately return a request for an interview Monday. She told BuzzFeed that she had finished delivering a speech to a group of protesters in the park and was leaving to go home when she heard the sound of fireworks being set off. She headed in the direction of the sound and started recording a livestream on Facebook, the outlet reported. "They were beating a white woman with a baton," Boyd told BuzzFeed. "They were macing everyone. I was trying to get footage of the police viciously attacking on people." Boyd, a recent high school graduate, denied being the aggressor and said she has been labeled as such because she was shouting at police, BuzzFeed reported. She said that she has never thrown anything or swung at a police officer. At a news conference Monday, she said that she fights "every day" in her community to end gun violence and that she was “unjustly attacked by a Chicago police officer” who “valued a supremacist statue over” her life, safety and well being. "The police are not serving and protecting," she said. "There is no way I should have left a protest bruised and battered for exercising my freedom of speech and freedom to assemble." Boyd said she is not a menace, a hood rat or a rebel and that she is a dedicated freedom fighter. "No matter what I said, no matter what I did, it did not justify me being brutalized and attacked," she said. "I am calling for the officer who attacked me to be relieved of his duties." The Civilian Office of Police Accountability said in a statement Sunday it had received more than 20 complaints against police "as a result of protests in Grant Park" and had opened preliminary investigations into the most "egregious" ones. It also said it was investigating "widespread video" of an incident of an officer striking a civilian. A spokeswoman for the agency confirmed Monday the video referred to in the statement is the one involving Boyd that was posted to Twitter by the anti-gun violence group GoodKids MadCity."

The Associated Press reports:

"The war of words between Chicago’s mayor and President Donald Trump escalated Monday after a weekend where dozens of people were injured by gunfire and 12 were killed, with the mayor rejecting any suggestion that federal troops should be dispatched as they were in Portland, Oregon, and Trump all but promising to send them. “I have great concerns about that in particular, given the track record in the city of Portland,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said, even as Trump was telling reporters that federal officers could help bring order to Chicago. “I have talked to the mayor of Portland (and) we don’t need federal agents without any insignia taking people off the street and holding them, I think, unlawfully,” Lightfoot added."

Apparently, Trump and his henchmen are trying to spark a revolution.

"The American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois rejected any deployment of federal forces in Chicago, vowing to hold the “Trump administration and any such federal forces accountable for unconstitutional actions.”

"As for the protest Friday night, more than 20 complaints have been filed against police, according to the Civilian Office of Police Accountability. They included claims of excessive force and unnecessary use of pepper spray. The agency is also investigating video of an officer striking 18-year-old Miracle Boyd, an activist who says at least one of her teeth was knocked out."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

Manhattan DA undaunted.  ABC News reports:

"The Manhattan DA sought the president’s tax records as he investigates hush payments to women who alleged long-denied extramarital affairs with Trump. A federal judge in New York is now considering whether the subpoena was properly tailored or overbroad and whether it was motivated by a desire to harass or otherwise issued in bad faith. "This is not a properly tailored subpoena," said the president’s attorney Will Consovoy on Thursday. Protracted litigation over the subpoena could keep the tax records private through the election or through the time the statute of limitations would expire. "What the president’s lawyers are seeking here is a delay," said Dunne. "There is nothing new here." Consovoy told the judge the president hasn’t decided which specific arguments he intends to pursue as he fights the attempt to get him to relinquish his financial records. The Manhattan DA’s office pushed for an expedited review and argued the president is not entitled to drag out his challenge to the subpoena. "There is no special heightened standard just because he is the president," Dunne said. The DA’s office also questioned whether Mr. Trump has standing to challenge a subpoena served on his accounting firm now that the Supreme Court turned down his immunity claim."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

A Republican-owned nazi U.S. Supreme Court backs its fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  United Press International reports:

"The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied a request from congressional Democrats to finalize a ruling that would allow them to quickly resume the fight for President Donald Trump's tax records. Democrats petitioned the court last week to make final their ruling earlier this month that sent the case back to a lower court for further examination. Doing so would allow them to "accelerate the proceedings in the lower courts." The Supreme Court denied the application Monday in an unsigned order, which means the case, Trump vs. Mazars USA, won't reach the lower court any sooner than Aug. 3. Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor would have granted the request, the order noted. Democratic lawmakers first sought the records after Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, testified last year that he'd manipulated the value of the president's assets for personal gain. In its July 9 ruling, the court ruled in a 7-2 vote that lower courts didn't do enough to address the Constitution's "separation of powers concerns." It was one of two rulings by the court that day involving Trump's fiscal records. The other granted a request by New York City prosecutors to let a grand jury see the records. The high court agreed Friday to expedite its judgment in the New York case."

Apparently, to the Supreme Court, the Democrats pose more of an immediate political threat to the Trump nazi than New York prosecutors.  LOL.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

Time to remove your head from your ass, Mr. Secretary of State.  The Washington Post reports:

"Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Thursday that the American way of life and its founding principles are “under attack,” focusing his criticism on voices in the mainstream news media and protesters who have torn down statues of historical figures."

Your gutless embrace of fascism, and that of your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, is what is ferociously challenged, Mr. Secretary of State.  So is your rabid ignorance of precisely what the Founders stood for, sir.  You are caustically reminded the Founders were white men of privilege, treated their women who didn't get the right to vote until a century ago like chattel.  To say nothing of the slaves the Founders owned.  Like the Trump nazi, Mr. Secretary, are you callously re-writing reality?

"Speaking in Philadelphia at the National Constitution Center, where he accepted the first report of the advisory “Commission on Unalienable Rights,” Pompeo said the events roiling the United States today are antithetical to the nation’s ideals."

What are you promulgating, Mr. Pompeo?  What 'ideals' are those, sir?  The right of rich white men to own slaves?  Treat their women like shit?

“And yet today, the very core of what it means to be an American, indeed the American way of life itself, is under attack,” he said."

Exactly what are you speaking of?  The right to pay a non-livable wage so the top of the food chain takes, owns, and controls all?  Keep racism, bigotry alive and well to control the masses, sir?  So that fascist bastards like you and the Trump nazi can keep your boot heel on the neck of your minions?  That how nazis like you, sir, get your cookies off abusing power?

Have you lost your mind, sir?  The following is hopelessly insane.  Indicative of profound fear as the walls close in on Trump and his henchmen.  Get this:

“Instead of seeking to improve America, leading voices promulgate hatred of our founding principles.”

What is challenged, sir, is your embrace of nazism, refusal to combat the ongoing racism that continues in our formerly great country since its founding.  Fascism, nazism, national socialism defined as the pernicious blend of government, business, and religion. 'Justified' by perversion and bastardization of the latter.

"Pompeo had harsh criticism for the New York Times’ 1619 Project, named for the year the first slaves were transported to the New World, saying its underlying message was that “our country was founded for human bondage.”

Did you misspeak, Mr. Pompeo?  This country was certainly founded on bondage, not for bondage.  -- Unless of course, you were a woman, a slave, or a Native American.  Think it wasn't sir?  Ignoring reality doesn't change that reality, Mr. Secretary.  Just exposes your egregious ignorance.

The following is the same old, false nazi ideology embraced by Republican nazis during the Fifties extending to the present:

“They want you to believe the Marxist ideology that America is only the oppressors and the oppressed,” he said. “The Chinese Communist Party must be gleeful when they see the New York Times spout their ideology.”

Jesus Christ.  That the best you have to offer in defense of the indefensible?  It's nonsense.  Criticism remains ferocious against the few communist regimes remaining.  Including China, sir.  No question, communism is a failed ideology.  Five Year Program after Five Year Program massive failures in the former Soviet Union.  Handwriting on the wall decades.

Sadly, it was hopelessly greedy nazis in the Republican Party who desperately enabled China to become as financially successful as it is today, sir.  All those cheap products that flooded the market led to the U.S. no longer being a manufacturing country.  Loss of good jobs, good wages.  To enable the top of the food chain to own nearly all.  Including, the masses working at non-livable wages in service level jobs.  Sad legacy of Republican nazis.  Unbridled greed.  Chickens have finally come home to roost.  Country being torn apart as neither major political party is worth a shit.  For totally different reasons.

"He also criticized the “rioters” who have yanked down statues around the country, many of them erected in honor of Confederate officers in the Civil War but also slave-owning founders of the nation."

These statues belong in museums.  A reminder of the past.  Never, ever to be forgotten.  Men, at the time of the Civil War, who owned slaves, betrayed this country to start their own.  Traitors.  Think the Founders who owned slaves should be excused as well?  White men of means who treated their women like chattel, to say nothing of the slaves they owned and exploited to line their pockets.

“The rioters pulling down statues thus see nothing wrong with desecrating monuments to those who fought for unalienable rights — from our founding to the present day,” he said. “This is a dark vision of America’s birth. I reject it. It is a disturbed reading of history. It is a slander on our great people. Nothing could be further from the truth!”

Wake up, Mr. Pompeo.  Your head remains securely lodged up your clueless ass.  The Founders were white men of means.  They fought for their 'unalienable rights.'  Not those of their women who they considered chattel.  Forget?  Women only received the right to vote a century ago.  Certainly, the Founders ignored the 'unalienable rights' of the slaves they owned.  Not to neglect to mention those of Native Americans whose land they stole, broke every treaty signed.  Why are you and your fuhrer, the Trump nazi self-servingly re-writing history, Mr. Secretary of State?

Amazing how this nazi cherry picks history, distorts reality to support and defend the indefensible:

"Citing Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave and abolitionist who called the Constitution “a glorious liberty document,” Pompeo added, “America is special. America is good. America does good, all around the world.”

Yes, the Constitution is about liberty, but limited to white men of means right up to and including the end of the Civil War.  Denied after that to emancipated slaves and their descendants right up to the present.  Women only getting the right to vote a century ago.  Moreover?  Conveniently, forget? Renewed effort to support and defend racism six decades ago right up to and including the present by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Forgotten, sir?  Memory gone?  Or, is it selective memory, sir?  Yes, our formerly great country is 'special.'  Does not, however, excuse all its faults.  Indeed does good.  Does not, however, excuse all the evil perpetrated by this country in the Middle East and elsewhere.  You see the good.  Remain hopelessly blind to all malfeasance and abuse.

Abject hypocrisy:

"Pompeo’s remarks were made during a speech that otherwise focused on the necessity of the United States being a model for human rights around the world and making human rights a central component of U.S. foreign policy."

While intentionally, concertedly ignoring human rights right here in the United States.

Symbolism over substance:

"Pompeo created the Commission on Unalienable Rights a year ago and directed the 11 academics appointed to it — including his mentor at Harvard Law School — to examine the basics of human rights doctrine rooted in documents like the Declaration of Independence. He has said he hopes it will spark a debate on human rights at time when some authoritarian governments are committing abuses with abandon."

What about the abuse and violence against peaceful protesters courtesy of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue at behest of your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his sidekick, the U.S. Attorney General, Mr. Pompeo?  No problem with that, you fascist son of a bitch?

"But Pompeo’s remarks came in for immediate criticism from some human rights groups, who have been wary that the commission’s work will downgrade the importance of some rights over others, particularly abortion rights and the rights of LGBT people. “Secretary Pompeo’s speech today on the Commission on the Unalienable Rights loosely clothed a foray into the culture wars under the seal of the U.S. State Department,” said Rob Berschinski, vice president for policy at Human Rights First. “It should rightfully be seen as a political speech unbecoming of a secretary of state.”

No question.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

Trump again demonstrate his total lack of class vis a vis the death of civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis.  NBC News reports:

"As lawmakers from both parties offered their condolences and reflected on the life and legacy of Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who died Friday night, the White House stayed silent, waiting until Saturday morning to acknowledge the death of the civil rights icon. "Rep. John Lewis was an icon of the civil rights movement, and he leaves an enduring legacy that will never be forgotten. We hold his family in our prayers, as we remember Rep. John Lewis’ incredible contributions to our country," White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany tweeted Saturday morning. President Donald Trump arrived at his Sterling, Virginia, golf club around 9:15 a.m. E.T., just minutes before McEnany tweeted about Lewis. Trump, who shared dozens of tweets and retweets about his Democratic opponents Friday night, did not personally acknowledge Lewis' death until shortly after 2 p.m., about a half hour before returning to the White House. "Saddened to hear the news of civil rights hero John Lewis passing, Trump said in a tweet. "Melania and I send our prayers to he and his family." The White House also announced late Saturday morning that flags would be lowered to half-staff for the remainder of the day in honor of Lewis."

Jesus Christ.  Indeed, surprising the racist Trump nazi went even that far.  LOL.

Here's Trump's problem:

"Lewis viewed Trump as a threat to democracy. He boycotted Trump's 2017 inauguration after telling NBC News that he did not view Trump as a "legitimate president" due to evidence of Russia's meddling in the 2016 election. Trump was criticized for tweeting racist insults in response to Lewis' comments, writing at the time that the Georgia lawmaker "should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart (not to mention crime infested) rather than falsely complaining about the election results. All talk, talk, talk - no action or results. Sad!"

In view of the above and far, far worse:

"Some encouraged Trump to "please say nothing" about Lewis' death. "Please don’t comment on the life of Congressman Lewis. Your press secretary released a statement, leave it at that," Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, of which Lewis was a member, tweeted Saturday. "Please let us mourn in peace."

    .@realDonaldTrump while the nation mourns the passing of a national hero, please say nothing. Please don’t comment on the life of Congressman Lewis. Your press secretary released a statement, leave it at that.

    Please let us mourn in peace.
    — Congressmember Bass (@RepKarenBass) July 18, 2020"

Sad, isn't it?

"Other Republican lawmakers, many of whom did not always see eye to eye with Lewis, honored the congressman Friday night as news of his death broke. "Laura and I join our fellow Americans in mourning the loss of Congressman John Lewis," President George W. Bush said in a statement Friday. "America can best honor John's memory by continuing his journey toward liberty and justice for all."

A class act.  Especially, in light of the following:

"Lewis also skipped Bush's inauguration in 2001 in protest of the controversial election results in Florida that resulted in Bush's victory."

How about that?  LOL.

"Lewis, a sharecroppers' son who became a giant of the civil rights movement, died Friday after a monthslong battle with cancer, his family said. He was 80. The longtime Georgia congressman, an advocate of nonviolent protest who had his skull fractured by Alabama state troopers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, was the last surviving speaker from 1963's March on Washington."

Uncommon Valor.

The Associated Press reports:

"People paid great heed to John Lewis for much of his life in the civil rights movement. But at the very beginning — when he was just a kid wanting to be a minister someday — his audience didn’t care much for what he had to say. A son of Alabama sharecroppers, the young Lewis first preached moral righteousness to his family’s chickens. His place in the vanguard of the 1960s campaign for Black equality had its roots in that hardscrabble Alabama farm and all those clucks. Lewis, who died Friday at age 80, was the youngest and last survivor of the Big Six civil rights activists who organized the 1963 March on Washington, and spoke shortly before the group’s leader, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., gave his “I Have a Dream” speech to a vast sea of people. If that speech marked a turning point in the civil rights era — or at least the most famous moment — the struggle was far from over. Two more hard years passed before truncheon-wielding state troopers beat Lewis bloody and fractured his skull as he led 600 protesters over Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge."

Indeed, Uncommon Valor.  At tremendous personal cost to enable the following:

"Searing TV images of that brutality helped to galvanize national opposition to racial oppression and embolden leaders in Washington to pass the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act five months later. “The American public had already seen so much of this sort of thing, countless images of beatings and dogs and cursing and hoses,” Lewis wrote in his memoirs. “But something about that day in Selma touched a nerve deeper than anything that had come before.” That bridge became a touchstone in Lewis’ life. He returned there often during his decades in Congress representing the Atlanta area, bringing lawmakers from both parties to see where “Bloody Sunday” went down. More brutality would loom in his life’s last chapter. He wept watching the video of George Floyd’s death at the hands of police in Minnesota. “I kept saying to myself: How many more? How many young Black men will be murdered?” he said last month. Yet he declared, or at least dared to hope: “We’re one people, we’re one family. We all live in the same house, not just the American house but the world house.” Lewis earned bipartisan respect in Washington, where some called him the “conscience of Congress.” His humble manner contrasted with the puffed chests on Capitol Hill. But as a liberal on the losing side of many issues, he lacked the influence he’d summoned at the segregated lunch counters of his youth, or later, within the Democratic Party, as a steadfast voice for the poor and disenfranchised."

As our formerly great country continued to nazify over the last six decades, the bottom of the food chain and middle class have been increasingly looted by the top of the food chain and corporate management suite to line their bottomless pockets.  One of the reasons today our formerly great country is being torn apart at the seams.  Chickens finally coming home to roost.

Despite all the deaths, all the beatings, ongoing denial of all civil and constitutional rights and liberties, etc., sadly, racism remains alive and well in Nazi America.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-24-20

Think anything's changed at Wells Fargo?  NBC News reports:

"Troy Harlow has always made sure to pay his monthly mortgage bill on time, even after he filed for personal bankruptcy protection in late 2017 following a kidney transplant that put him on permanent disability. "I needed to have a place to live," Harlow said in an interview. "I keep everything paid because I know it has to be paid." But Wells Fargo, the bank that handles Harlow's mortgage, had other ideas for him."

Sound familiar?

"On April 29, without Harlow's knowledge or permission, Wells Fargo told the bankruptcy court overseeing his payment plan that he had asked the bank to pause his mortgage payments because he had been hurt by COVID-19. Harlow, 48, of Buchanan, Virginia, made no such request and had continued to forward the full amount owed on his mortgage to Wells Fargo, court documents show."

Jesus Christ.  ... Wells Fargo, a congenital liar just like our fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

"The bank claimed that it had placed Harlow in a forbearance program, a temporary arrangement under the CARES Act aimed at helping borrowers who attest to financial hardship related to the coronavirus. Under the program, borrowers whose loans are financed by government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Ginnie Mae can stop making payments for up to a year. Harlow's mortgage was originated by the Federal Housing Administration and went into a pool of loans sold to investors by Ginnie Mae. Forbearance plans don't reduce the amount outstanding on a mortgage, and borrowers must pay all that is owed later, although under the CARES Act, additional fees don't accrue during the hiatus. In mid-May, Harlow's attorneys learned of Wells Fargo's move and immediately objected to it in bankruptcy court. The bank's request put Harlow's court-approved bankruptcy repayment plan at risk. "I was just astounded that this was going on behind my back," Harlow said. "I hope we can get this straight, because I do not want to lose my house."

Apparently, a widespread problem:

"Harlow's attorneys say he isn't alone. They have identified more than a dozen cases in Virginia, as well as cases in Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina and Texas, where Wells Fargo has wrongly claimed that borrowers asked to pause their mortgage payments in forbearance plans. The lawyers have also found that the bank put through secondary requests for forbearance on behalf of homeowners who had asked to participate in the program initially but who no longer wanted to."

Fraud.  Aryan arrogance at the top of the food chain.  When will these criminal bastards be prosecuted?

"In some cases, the bank withdrew the improper forbearance notifications after borrowers' attorneys alerted them to the errors. But Wells Fargo didn't take responsibility for the mistakes, court documents show. Erroneous forbearance filings in Chapter 13 bankruptcy cases can put borrowers' homes at risk of foreclosure and represent a fraud against the bankruptcy court, said Thad Bartholow, a lawyer at Kellett & Bartholow who has sued the bank on behalf of wronged borrowers. The erroneous filings can also hurt consumers' credit reports, which are relied upon by other lenders and prospective employers, and generate unneeded legal costs."

Rob a bank and your sorry ass rightfully goes to prison.  When the bank steals from its customers, why no equal treatment?

"Mary Eshet, a spokeswoman for Wells Fargo, provided a statement to NBC News.

"During this unprecedented time, we've focused on ensuring that our customers who need assistance receive the benefits of available relief programs," the statement said. "In the early days of the pandemic, we provided immediate payment relief to customers in bankruptcy if a review of their court filings indicated they were impacted by COVID-19 or if they had a loan modification review in process. In those cases, we notified the customers or their attorneys and filed a notice with the court. We followed up with customers in these circumstances after some raised questions and, in the majority of cases, those we have contacted wanted the payment relief. If a customer does not want a forbearance, we remove it and notify the bankruptcy courts."

Here's the problem:

"None of the borrowers in the lawsuit who were contacted by NBC News told the bank that they'd been affected by COVID-19, and none had requested the bank's assistance because of it. Nor had they requested loan modifications when Wells Fargo claimed they wanted forbearance. In addition, none of the borrowers or their attorneys say they were contacted by Wells Fargo. Asked about the discrepancies, Wells Fargo said that because it had seen references to COVID-19 in the borrowers' court filings, it provided forbearance."

Took it upon itself to do so without permission?  Jesus Christ.  How many lost their homes as a result of this self-serving criminal bullshit?  How many were denied jobs as a result of erroneous filings on their credit reports by these criminal bastards?  When will government start prosecuting these criminal sons of bitches at Wells Fargo?  When?

"Wells Fargo is the nation's fourth-largest bank, with $1.95 trillion in assets. On Tuesday, the bank reported a loss of $2.4 billion for the second quarter and slashed its dividend. NBC News couldn't determine the full extent of Wells Fargo's erroneous forbearance filings; so far, the only situations to emerge have involved borrowers whose payments are monitored by bankruptcy courts. Wells Fargo doesn't appear to reap significant financial benefits from the filings, mortgage servicing experts said. But banks handling loans in forbearance programs under the CARES Act do get nominal amounts for some work. The Wells Fargo spokeswoman declined to say whether the bank has benefited financially from making unrequested forbearance filings. Implementing forbearance plans without customer approval is reminiscent of other troubling practices at Wells Fargo in recent years."

Unless and until bank corporate management is subject to the same level of legal accountability as its customers, shit happens.  Nothing changes.  Customers continue to be ripped off by these bastards.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

First female U.S. Green Beret.  United Press International reports:

"An Army National Guard soldier became the first woman to join the Green Berets Thursday, according to U.S. Army Special Operations command."

About time.

"The soldier, alongside 400 others, received her Special Forces tab and wore her green beret during a COVID-compliant graduation ceremony for the Special Forces Qualification Course, which was presided over by Lt. Gen. Fran Beaudette, Commanding General for U.S. Army Special Operations Command. "From here, you will go forward and join the storied formation of the Green Berets where you will do what you are trained to do: challenge assumptions, break down barriers, smash through stereotypes, innovate, and achieve the impossible," Beaudette told graduates. "Thankfully, after today, our Green Beret Men and Women will forever stand in the hearts of free people everywhere," Beaudette said. The Army has withheld the soldier's name and other biographical information for personal and operational security reasons, officials said. She is the first woman to graduate from Special Forces training since the Pentagon opened all combat jobs to women in 2015, including those in the secretive Special Operations community. The Green Berets were one of the last assignments in the Army without any women. In 1980, Capt. Kate Wilder met requirements to graduate from the Army Special Forces Course, but was not permitted to do so. Wilder eventually received a graduation certificate, but never served in a Special Forces unit and afterward the Army did not allow women to go through the course. The soldier who graduated this week was initially set to graduate the roughly yearlong course in April, but had to repeat part of the training before continuing on to the final portion."

Green Berets are indeed exceptional soldiers.  Have a 'can do' philosophy second to none.  Had the privilege of going to college with one who had served as a Green Beret medic in Vietnam.  On a fact-finding school trip to West Virginia, a semi at near highway speed rear-ended a compact stopped at a stop light with the driver severely injured in a vehicle that had been flattened by the truck.  The Green Beret removed him from the car, administered CPR, including mouth-to-mouth resuscitation for quite some time.  To no avail.  Remarkable resilience.  A never give up, never say die philosophy second to none.  Accident scene looked like a battlefield.  The death certainly had quite an impact on the rest of the trip.

7-17-20

Before proceeding to the usual fare, one more example of Uncommon Valor.  This one, courtesy of a man who had suffered horrendously at the hands of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Yet, stood tall, stepped up, and saved the life of an officer.  Seatbelts on.  CBS News reports:

"Uniontown, Pennsylvania — Who could blame Daylan McLee for hating the police? McLee was falsely accused of pointing a gun at an officer and spent a year in jail before a jury finally acquitted him — not to mention the countless traffic stops. "What happens?" CBS News asked. "Oh, a typical run-in is you're just pulling out from your house and you get pulled, no traffic violations," McLee added. "How does that make you feel about police, in general?" "Definitely a lot of animosity, as in, if I see them, I want to go the other way," McLee said."

Uncommon Valor:

"And that was the bitterness he brought to this street corner in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, last month. McLee said he rushed here after hearing a huge crash: "There was just a lot of screaming, a lot of chaos. Ah man, I get chills when I think of it."

Stepped up. Rose to the occasion:

"It was a bad traffic accident involving a police car. An officer trapped inside. A gas tank leaking. Flames spreading toward the cabin. Another officer who responded to the crash tried to rescue his colleague but couldn't get the door open, and that's when a lone bystander, McLee, stepped toward the burning wreckage."

Uncommon Valor:

"I don't know how I got that door open, and I grabbed him out."  "All of a sudden the door just gets ripped open," said Jay Hanley, the officer McLee rescued. "It's amazing when there's true love in people and they can get you out of something like that — no matter who you are or where you come from. There should be more people like that," Hanley said."

Indeed.  There should.  There are.  Time for the same in the law enforcement community.  As a society, we cannot survive without good law enforcement.  The current jackbooted bastard in blue mentality needs to end.  Now.  Before too late.

"Last week, McLee came over to check on Hanley and meet his very thankful wife. That's the other thing they're grateful for. Despite all his run-ins with the law, McLee still believes there are a lot of good cops worth keeping. "We're waiting for you to get back out there," McLee said. "I appreciate it, man, thank you," Hanley said."

There are.  No question.  The good ones need to step up.  Rid law enforcement of the bad ones.  Before too late.

"In times of rage, we often paint groups with a broad brush. But McLee said at some point you have to go back and fill in lines between good and bad because, in that subtlety, lies our humanity. "I want people to start to look at everybody as Americans and not, 'He's White, he's Black, he's Asian.' We're people - and when we start realizing that, things should get better."

Exposing the malfeasance to the light of day is the first step.  The second is holding criminal officers to the same legal standard as the civilian population.  The third is officers getting to personally know those in the community they serve.

Now, sadly, back to the usual fare:

7-17-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

More on the June 1, 2020 Washington, DC jackbooted fiasco.  The Washington Post reports:

"Civil rights groups on Wednesday accused D.C. police of assisting federal authorities who forcibly cleared Lafayette Square on June 1 ahead of President Trump’s visit to a nearby church for a photo op. In a federal lawsuit that added the District government and officers as defendants, the groups suing on behalf of protesters accuse the Trump administration of violating demonstrators’ constitutional rights in an “unprovoked and frankly criminal attack.” The groups and Black Lives Matter of D.C. sued last month, and their new allegations challenge Police Chief Peter Newsham's statements that D.C. police were not involved in clearing protesters from the park before Trump was photographed holding a Bible near St. John’s Episcopal Church. The groups have alleged that police and military forces deployed horses, batons, shields and riot control agents — including pepper spray, smoke canisters and rubber or plastic projectiles — against largely peaceful protesters without justification. Newsham has said that D.C. police did not take part in the operation to clear the square, and that officers on the scene learned only a few minutes in advance that force and chemical agents would be used against demonstrators earlier than a planned 7 p.m. citywide curfew. Shortly before the U.S. Park Police initiated the operation, D.C. police instructed officers to hold their positions on streets around the square, officials said. “We were not involved in the movement of the president — the unplanned movement of the president,” Newsham said the following day. Court filings on Wednesday accuse D.C. police of deploying tear gas against demonstrators trying to leave the area and forcing them to turn back. They cited the experiences of a Virginia man, Dustin Foley, and his 15-year-old daughter, who joined the case. The lawsuit said Foley and his daughter came downtown to protest and deliver water and sandwiches to peaceful demonstrators gathered after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. When the Foleys fled Lafayette Square, they were confronted by D.C. police with chemical agents one block west at 17th and H streets NW and forced to turn back, the suit asserted. “The video footage we obtained and the experience of Mr. Foley and his daughter directly contradict Chief Newsham's assertions that D.C. police officers were not involved in the brutal assault on protesters the evening [of] June 1,” said Scott Michelman, legal director for the ACLU of the District of Columbia."

A police chief would never lie, would he?  LOL.  Couldn't be, could it?  LOL.  Sue the living shit out of all officers involved in this criminal assault, a deliberate, concerted, well-orchestrated, exceptionally brutal attack, -- apparently inflicted at behest of the Trump nazi and his henchmen.  When will these jackbooted bastards be held accountable for their crimes? When? Equally important, when will Trump and his henchmen?

"Other entities representing the protesters include the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and the Arnold & Porter law firm. Michelman said D.C. officials have tried to distance themselves from the “brazen assault.” But, he said, “MPD engaged in the same type of wanton violence as the federal forces.” In a statement Wednesday, D.C. police reiterated that the agency “was not involved in the unscheduled movement of the President from Lafayette Square to St. John’s church,” but did not address the allegation that its officers deployed tear gas."

Why not?

"D.C. police have said they were not in Lafayette Square, which is federal property, but did have officers on nearby city streets who confronted fleeing protesters. That included a D.C. police line along I Street NW between 15th and 17th streets NW, where arrests were made. The White House, the Defense Department and Park Police said tear gas was not used but acknowledged the deployment of pepper spray — a similar agent with the same chemical effect of incapacitating people through extreme irritation of the eyes, mouth, nose, lungs and skin, and temporary blindness. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and a court order declaring that Trump, Attorney General William P. Barr and other administration officials conspired to and did violate protesters’ constitutional rights. It also seeks a court order barring officials from repeating what the plaintiffs say are unlawful activities."

NPR reports:

"Civil liberties advocates are urging Attorney General William Barr to name a special prosecutor to investigate possible violations of protesters' rights during the June 1 crackdown in Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C., NPR has learned. Federal officers deployed tear gas, rubber bullets, pepper spray and smoke canisters to scatter the mostly peaceful group of demonstrators, clearing the way for President Trump to pose for pictures in front of the historic St. John's Episcopal Church. The crowd had been kneeling, praying and chanting, "I can't breathe," some of the last words of George Floyd, the man killed by police after his arrest in Minneapolis. Floyd's death on May 25 sparked the national protest movement about the treatment of Blacks by law enforcement. In a new letter, the American Civil Liberties Union argues Barr has a conflict of interest in overseeing any investigation, given his role in issuing an order to federal law enforcement to clear the square and disperse the crowd.

"The ACLU argues someone else besides Barr must preside to achieve a full and independent investigation into the clearing of Lafayette Square. "Given the inherent conflict of interest present, appointment of an outside prosecutor is needed to ensure impartiality of any investigation and, if warranted, of any prosecution of any criminal acts committed by members of the executive branch," wrote Kate Ruane, senior legislative counsel at the ACLU."

How can you be sure the Barr nazi won't appoint a prosecutor that will do precisely what Barr wants, expects?

"The ACLU said the federal action in the square violated protesters' First Amendment rights to assemble and Fourth Amendment rights to be free of unreasonable search and seizure. The civil liberties group said other statutes could come into play as well, including a federal law that bars conspiracies to injure or intimidate people exercising their constitutional rights and another statute that prohibits interfering with people engaged in lawful speech or peaceful assembly.

"The ACLU letter pointed out that the Justice Department has launched criminal cases against protesters around the country for removing Confederate statues and throwing incendiary devices, painting protesters as "instigators" who deserve to spend decades in prison. "Responsibility for the violent events of June 1 may extend to the very highest levels of the federal government, including to the attorney general of the United States," the ACLU said. "The country deserves to have these outstanding questions addressed and those responsible for the attacks on our civil rights and liberties that occurred on June 1, 2020, must be held accountable."

Indeed.  Think it possible in a de facto fascist police-state?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Qualified Immunity.  NPR reports:

"In the wake of the police killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, people are asking hard questions about what, exactly, should be done about the police. Take them out of schools? Defund them? Or should we abolish them altogether? Seemingly radical notions like defunding police departments or outright abolition of the police have gained momentum in no small part because police departments have proven, again and again, resistant to even the most modest reforms. Even smaller-bore efforts to remove so-called "bad apples" have often gone nowhere; police officers seldom lose their jobs for brutality and misconduct. They're also rarely arrested or indicted — let alone convicted — of wrongdoing in criminal cases."

That's right.  Precisely why unless and until criminal officers are subject to the same system of justice as the civilian population, nothing changes.  Shit squat.

"It's also virtually impossible to get redress by suing a police officer in a civil case, thanks to a judicial doctrine called qualified immunity. Effectively, qualified immunity means that government officials like police officers can only be held accountable in civil court for violating a person's rights if those rights are "clearly established" in already-existing case law. To help us understand how qualified immunity shapes the criminal justice system, we spoke with Josie Duffy Rice, who's been thinking about the doctrine's history and influence for a long time. She's the president of The Appeal, a journalism organization that focuses on policy and the justice system, and she's the co-host of their podcast Justice in America. Here's a snippet of our conversation, which has been condensed and edited for clarity. For those of us who aren't super-familiar with the concept, what is qualified immunity? Qualified immunity is essentially a defense available to public officials when they're accused of wrongdoing."

Called nazi justice.

"So let's say you are driving down the street, you get pulled over. A cop tells you to get out of your car. He beats you within an inch of your life. And later, you want to sue him for the harm that you endured, for any medical bills or for any sort of financial consequences that came out of your experience. If it was a random person, you could sue them in civil court, aside from there being possible criminal consequences, and they could find that this person owes you money. Because of qualified immunity, public officials are held to a much lower standard. Basically, they can only be held accountable insofar as they violate rights that are "clearly established" and according to existing case law. The courts are usually saying that there are no previous cases with this case's exact fact pattern. There are no cases where a cop beat someone this exact way, and where a public official has been held accountable in the past."

Nazi justice.  In a de facto fascist police-state.  Adolf and Benito would have been proud.  Bet they're not wildly cheering on their fiery perches?

"Because we've never held anybody accountable for this, we cannot now hold them accountable. And obviously that creates a tension, because if you never are willing to hold anyone accountable for anything, there's never going to be any clearly established violations."

A most convenient 'Catch-22' for the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue, isn't it?  'Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.'  Nazi justice.

"There is just example after example of incompetence combined with recklessness and maliciousness where the courts say that this is actually okay. I mean, it's not okay morally, but it's okay legally. This sounds like cops are basically impervious to any lawsuits or civil repercussions. Why would we want to give cops and police officers that kind of protection? Many years ago, the Civil Rights Act of 1871 — which is also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act — was passed by Congress. It gave Americans the right to sue public officials who violate their rights. It was pretty straightforward: It said every state official who causes a deprivation of any rights guaranteed by the Constitution shall be liable to the party injured. And that's pretty clear. If you get beat up by the police officer, you get to sue the police officer, and this police officer is liable to you. So what changed in the way that right to sue was interpreted? In 1967, the Supreme Court invented this thing called qualified immunity. They sort of say, this is like a small exception to the rule, okay? If a public official acts in "good faith" and believes that their conduct is authorized by law, then they are not accountable."

Called bullshit.  To protect and coddle the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.

Gets worse.  Get this:

"Fifteen years after 1967, there's this case called Harlow v. Fitzgerald. Then, the courts basically change their reasoning — and that's when this whole "clearly established" thing comes out. Now, it doesn't matter if the officer acted in good faith. Even if officers or officials act maliciously, unless the victim can show that his or her right was "clearly established," they basically can't get any relief. All of a sudden, you see a situation where nobody's liable."

Nazi justice in Nazi America.  A de facto fascist police-state.  A democratic republic in name only.  In reality?  Raw nazism.

Most convenient, isn't it, for the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Not easy being a Black officer in racist law enforcement.  The Washington Post reports:

"David J. Thomas grew up in Detroit in the 1960s, two blocks from the headquarters of the 10th Precinct. Nighttime echoed with .50-caliber machine guns. Mornings dawned over neighborhood rubble. Thomas remembers being 11 years old, approaching a squad car outside the corner store and asking a police officer how fast it could go. The officer stuck a nickel-plated handgun in his face and said: “It goes fast. Now get away from my damn car.” Thomas remembers being 12 and pulling a wagon full of newspapers down the street to help friends with their paper routes. Officers in a nearby squad car rounded up the friends, searched them, asked for IDs and told them it was against the law to walk in the street. Thomas remembers being in middle school and the police hauling him and his friends into alleys to rough them up for sport. Thomas remembers being 19 and being followed by an unmarked car from the basketball court to a friend’s house, where police drew shotguns and ordered him facedown in the snow because a black suspect had just committed armed robbery somewhere else."

Coup de grace?  Get this:

"And he remembers being 22 and telling his father that he himself was going to become a police officer. It was a decent job in public service, in a city dying with the auto industry: a $20,000 salary and the chance to be out in the community. His father was furious. He hated the police for the way they treated black people, Thomas says, and was convinced the racism of police culture would corrupt his son. “What he saw standing before him was 60 years of his life, me becoming something that he did not trust and someone that my community would hate,” says Thomas, who spent 20 years in law enforcement and is now a mental health counselor working with police officers in Gainesville, Fla. “His greatest fear was that I would become a traitor.”

Imagine that.

"This is the struggle of black police officers, then and now. They sign up for a job that offers a path to a middle-class life and a chance to honor their communities by pledging to protect them, but they can face questions of loyalty from neighbors who are skeptical of law enforcement. They want to “be the change,” then realize what they’re up against: a police culture with a legacy of prejudice, protected by unions, resistant to self-examination and primed to use force."

Seatbelts on:

"Black Americans have endured this type of force and oppression for generations. Some became police officers anyway. From the video of Floyd’s death, many feel fresh horror and an old dread. Police officers “beat up my brothers,” says Rochelle Bilal, who grew up in North Philadelphia in the ’60s and ’70s. “We thought they were the occupied enemy in my neighborhood. We’d be up on the roofs throwing stuff down at them. We saw nothing good from them.” In 1986, at age 29, she decided to follow a local officer’s advice and be the change she wished to see. “But how could I know, when I walked into the door,” Bilal says, “that I had not really understood racism, and disparity in treatment, until I was in the police academy?” As a recruit, Bilal saw white officers escape formal discipline while black officers were punished for similar infractions. On patrol, she would pull up and hear other officers saying, “Aw, dang, here’s Angela Davis.” In 2009, as a veteran, she saw an online message board for city police — under the banner of “the voice of the good guys” — become a bulletin for obscene racial remarks such as “ghetto monkey faces.”

Jesus Christ.  ... Think anything's changed?

"Now, at 63, Bilal is the sheriff of Philadelphia. She is a black woman protecting a major U.S. city while grappling with a major cultural problem. She was an early advocate for a Pennsylvania bill banning chokeholds. And if she had been on the scene in Minneapolis in May, when Chauvin put his knee on Floyd’s neck? “Those of us who are conscious cops, we would have knocked his butt, and there would have been a fight on the street: cop on cop,” she says. That kind of intervention is not inevitable, however, even when officers are conscious of the dangers of abusive policing. One of the officers charged with aiding and abetting Floyd’s killing is a young black man, on only his third shift, who had hoped to help fix police culture from the inside, his mother told the New York Times. At a June court appearance, the young officer’s lawyer told the judge that during the encounter with Floyd, his client told his colleagues , “You shouldn’t do this,” and tried to “communicate that this situation needs to change direction,” to no avail. Contacted last week by The Washington Post, the lawyer declined to elaborate."

The rookie officer should have stood up.  Stood tall.  Honored his oath of office.  Pulled the murderous officer off Floyd.   Intervened no matter the personal consequences.  Including death.  Called Uncommon Valor.  Doing the right thing no matter what. No matter the personal cost.

Report goes on and on.  Time for change.  ... Hear the rumble?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

The Trump nazi and his henchmen in the 'Justice' Department have carried out their first execution.  NPR reports:

"The Justice Department has put to death Daniel Lee, 47, marking the first federal execution since 2003, after a chaotic overnight series of court rulings."

The five Republican nazis on the Supreme Court facilitated the final order to proceed.

"Lee had been convicted of killing three people, including a child, as part of a broader racketeering scheme to fund a white supremacist cause. He had waited more than 20 years on federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind. Lee, strapped to a gurney and connected to an IV in his left arm, said: "I didn't do it. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life but I'm not a murderer," according to a pool report from the prison. Lee blamed a judge in Arkansas for ignoring DNA evidence in his case and said he was on the other side of the country when the killings happened. He said at one point, "I bear no responsibility" for the murders in his case, according to the pool report. Lee's last words were, "You're killing an innocent man." As a senior Bureau of Prisons official told Lee that he was being put to death, the condemned man shook his head, according to the pool report. A U.S. marshal lifted a black telephone inside the execution room — a small square room with green tiles and windows looking at the witness' rooms, where observers were able to see what was taking place — and asked whether there was anything to impede the execution. He said there was not and the execution could proceed. The time of death was 8:07 a.m.

"Ruth Friedman, Lee's lawyer, criticized what she called the "shameful" process that led up to Lee's death. The prisoner was taken to the death chamber in the dark of night and kept in place even as the final legal obstacles were resolved, she said. "Over the four hours it took for this reckless and relentless government to pursue these ends, Daniel Lewis Lee remained strapped to a gurney," Friedman said in a statement. "A mere 31 minutes after a court of appeals lifted the last impediment to his execution at the federal government's urging, while multiple motions remained pending, and without notice to counsel, he was executed."

"Attorney General William Barr used a statement later on Tuesday to repeat the details in Lee's case and state that, in Barr's view, the story has a fit conclusion. "Today, Lee finally faced the justice he deserved," Barr said. "The American people have made the considered choice to permit capital punishment for the most egregious federal crimes, and justice was done today in implementing the sentence for Lee's horrific offenses."

What about the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who murder innocent, unarmed civilians with impunity, Mr. Attorney General?  Why aren't you demanding changes in state and federal law to allow for execution of these murderous savages in blue, sir?  Since you nazi bastards in the GOP support, insist on capital punishment, why isn't it equitably applied to all in our formerly great country including the murderous, criminal jackbooted bastards in blue, Mr. Attorney General?  Why no equal justice, you fascist son of a bitch?

"The execution followed an early morning 5-4 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, which rejected a challenge to the single-drug protocol authorities used in the lethal injection. Chief Justice John Roberts concluded Lee and other men on death row had virtually no chance of succeeding in their claim that pentobarbital injections amounted to cruel and unusual punishment under the 8th Amendment."

Certainly, true since the Supreme Court is run and owned by five Republican fascists.

"The high court's four liberal justices dissented. Stephen Breyer raised doubts about the constitutionality of capital punishment, pointing out that Lee's co-defendant, considered more culpable in the murders, had received a life sentence."

No equal justice.  Surprised?  Why?  Forget?  This is a Supreme Court run and owned by the nazi element in our formerly great country.

"Justice Sonia Sotomayor decried the rush to execute Lee, rather than build a fuller record in the lower courts. The federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., had earlier agreed to expedite proceedings there over the lethal injection process. "In its hurry to resolve the government's emergency motions, I fear the court has overlooked not only its prior ruling, but also its role in safeguarding robust federal judicial review," Sotomayor wrote. The Supreme Court also refused to consider a claim by Earlene Peterson, 81, a relative of Lee's victims, who had asked the Bureau of Prisons to delay the execution, citing the coronavirus pandemic. She and other family members had appealed to Attorney General William Barr and President Trump to commute Lee's sentence to life in prison."

The point of this article is not about the guilt or innocence of the man just executed.  He may or may not have been guilty.  Rather, the point made is quite simple.  Since our formerly great country remains more than willing to execute offenders, why isn't the same standard applied to the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who murder innocent, unarmed civilians?  Why no equal justice?  Why special treatment for these pieces of human excrement?  Why?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Unbridled bigotry in Nazi America.  ABC News reports:

"Amid nationwide unrest and frustration with law enforcement, Attorney General William Barr on Wednesday acknowledged that communities of color are often policed differently from white ones, calling the unfairness a “widespread phenomenon.”

Then why haven't you and your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, finally smartened up?  That is, done something about this goddamned racism?  Is it because you both are racists?  You have no credibility, Mr. Attorney General.  Just like your fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  Goddamned pitiful.  ... Hear the rumble?

“I do think it is a widespread phenomenon that African American males, in particular, are treated with extra suspicion and maybe not given the benefit of the doubt,” Barr told ABC News Chief Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas in an exclusive interview."

You think?  Finally, willing to admit the obvious?

“I think it is wrong if people are not respected appropriately and given their due,” he explained, “and I think it’s something we have to address.”

Has been going on all over our formerly great country for over six decades now, Mr. Attorney General.  Not only to Blacks, across the board.  All races and ethnicities have been targeted by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who enjoy getting their cookies off egregiously abusing authority.

"Backlash and protests in the wake of multiple high-profile killings of unarmed African Americans – including of George Floyd in Minneapolis – has evolved into a national reckoning and calls for an overhaul of law enforcement. Barr said he hopes Floyd’s death “is a catalyst for the kinds of changes that are needed.”

Your actions to date as Attorney General scream otherwise, sir.  You have no credibility.  One thing for damned sure.  Unless and until the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue are held to the same legal standard as the civilian population, nothing changes.  Shit squat.  No equal treatment.  Worse?  Continued special treatment, as intended by the Nazi Right in our formerly great country.

“Before the George Floyd incident I thought we were in a good place,” he continued."

You're hopelessly delusional, Mr. Attorney General.  Head, figuratively, securely lodged up your determinedly clueless ass.

“I think that this episode in Minneapolis showed that we still have some work to do in addressing the distrust that exists in the African American community toward law enforcement.”

Understatement of the last six decades, sir.  Called aggressive stupidity, Mr. Attorney General, that is, doing all you can to remain as determinedly, concertedly, hopelessly stupid as possible.  Distrust of all law enforcement remains across the board, sir, that is, all races and ethnicities question outrageous, pervasive criminal behavior of the jackbooted bastards in blue.

Your empty, hollow, disingenuous assertions above pay lip service to a problem that is tearing our formerly great country apart.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  Too deaf to hear?  Or, too hopelessly stupid to understand what's coming as our formerly great country continues to be torn apart?

"In Congress, efforts to enact legislative change in law enforcement have thus far failed. A police reform bill penned in June by Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., died in the Senate, where Democrats voted almost unanimously against moving forward with the proposal."

For damned good reason.  It offered nothing but the same old failed, achingly deceptive Republican double talk, blatant bullshit, that remains, by design, egregiously ineffective, achingly substanceless, no more than continued mindless support of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue no matter what they do.

"Scott, who joined Barr during his visit to South Carolina on Wednesday to meet with law enforcement, insisted “the bill wasn’t a failure,” and told ABC News that he remains hopeful that legislators can come together on crafting a bipartisan effort."

You're as clueless as Barr and his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, Senator.  Unless and until law enforcement lives under the same legal standard as the rest of the civilian population, nothing changes.  Shit squat.  The abusive and murderous behavior of officers continues unabated.

Special treatment of these bastards needs to end.  Moreover, you and your fellow nazis in the Republican Party need to start talking to the victims of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Not just to the criminals in uniform perpetrating all this violence.

Where is your concern for increasing terrorism perpetrated by the Nazi Right, Mr. Attorney General?  NBC News reports:

"As protesters took to the streets in Indiana on July 6 to decry an alleged hate crime at Lake Monroe, a red Toyota Corolla sped toward them, dragging two protesters along, on the hood and on the side of the car. Both suffered non-life-threatening injuries. A few days later, a 66-year-old white woman was arrested and charged in the incident. Tragically, this was not an isolated crime. Over the past months, as renewed anti-police-violence protests have spread across the U.S., dozens of drivers have accelerated into the crowds. In Seattle, a 24-year-old protester died and another was seriously injured after a car struck them on a closed highway."

Why aren't your criminal jackbooted bastards in blue doing anything about this growing problem, Mr. Attorney General?  Is it because you and the bastards approve?

"Over the past months, as renewed anti-police-violence protests have spread across the U.S., dozens of drivers have accelerated into the crowds."

No problem with this, Mr. Barr?  Goes back quite some time.  No concern, you fascist son of a bitch?

"In the U.S., vehicle rammings gained popularity on the far-right as a violent anti-protest tactic during the early waves of Black Lives Matter street-blocking protests in 2015. Memes online then normalized this behavior and encouraged drivers to take matters into their own hands. But these memes are not limited to the dark corners of the internet, and neither are these attacks. We are now seeing everyone from an avowed extremist in Charlottesville, Virginia, and a reported Ku Klux Klan member in Lakeside, Virginia, to an older woman in Indiana charged in this kind of attack. So why have so many lone actors of so many differing ideologies taken up this tactic recently? We can’t speculate as to what motivates the drivers, but we do know the far-right is once again encouraging the violence, often through the use of online memes and jokes about targeting protesters."

It's all based on one overriding, underlying ideology, nazism.  Fascism, nazism, national socialism defined as the pernicious blend of government, business, and religion. 'Justified' by perversion and bastardization of the latter. To date, you've failed to provide evidence Antifa is indeed the threat you claim, Mr. Attorney General.

Where is your concern for terrorism perpetrated by the Nazi Right, sir?  Your gutless silence remains deafening, Mr. Barr.  Is it because you and your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, support and defend what these nazi bastards are perpetrating, Mr. Attorney General?  Is that why you and the Trump nazi look the other way?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Think Sen. Cruz serves the best interests of Texans?  ... Or, the best interests of himself and his fuhrer, the Trump nazi?  In his most recent newsletter received 7-9-20, the Senator opines:

"This summer, as we are battling a deadly global pandemic, an angry mob has gotten out of control, and our businesses, our institutions, and our history are getting dragged into the riot riptide. What began with rightful outrage over the horrific act of police brutality that unjustly took the life of George Floyd on Memorial Day has devolved into angry rioters exploiting peaceful protests to sow chaos and division."

Simply, not true.  Egregious distortion of reality to defend a regime determinedly emulating Hitler's Third Reich.  Trump's Fourth.  It is law enforcement that remains out of control.  That is directly responsible for eliciting this violence.  To abuse authority.

Get its cookies off violently attacking citizens exercising their constitutional right to peacefully protest.  Clearly, our nazi Senator has bought the bullshit propaganda of his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his sidekick, the United States Attorney General.

The Senator is caustically reminded the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue have been an out of control problem the last six decades.  Remains nothing new.  Shoot first, ask questions later.  Murder innocent, unarmed civilians with near impunity.  Are not subject to the same level of legal accountability as the rest of the civilian population.  By design.

The following is an egregious distortion of reality, simply not true.  Called nazi bullshit perpetrated by Trump, Barr, and their henchmen:

"These violent individuals have destroyed businesses and harassed, assaulted, and in some cases killed innocent civilians and law enforcement officers. They’ve torn down statues honoring Junipero Serra and Hans Christian Heg, and made plans to tear down a statue of the Great Emancipator – Abraham Lincoln. How tearing down monuments to a Catholic priest, an immigrant and an abolitionist who died fighting for the Union, and the American president who issued the Emancipation Proclamation is relevant to police brutality strains credulity."

Disingenuous bullshit.  You and your fellow nazis in the Republican Party so desperate you'd distort reality, lie like hell to keep this fascist abomination, your fuhrer, the Trump nazi in office?  Why is Trump defending statues of Confederate 'heroes' who owned slaves, treasonously, traitorously betrayed this country to start their own?

These statues need not be destroyed, Senator.  They belong in museums.  Remain part of history that should never, ever be forgotten.  You underestimate the anger, sir, that still remains a century and a half after the war.  The racist legacy that remains alive and well to this very day.  Centered now in the Trump nazi, his henchmen, and supporters.

Amazing how the nazi element so readily cherry picks circumstances and data that can way too easily be distorted to its advantage, while gutlessly ignoring the facts and unvarnished truth.  Demonstrates a level of cowardice and desperation that can also easily be found at both political extremes.  Political Center conveniently, gutlessly ignored.

Ferociously pointedly, when will you and your fellow Republican nazis hold the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue accountable for all the violence and property damage they've criminally incited since the murder of Mr. Floyd?  What about holding your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, and his sidekick the U.S. Attorney general accountable for their criminal involvement in this matter, Senator?

More bullshit:

"Enough is enough. It’s time to take back our cities. That’s why, in the weeks ahead, I will introduce legislation to hold state and local officials liable when they abdicate their legal duty to protect the public, in cases where death, serious bodily harm, or significant property damage have occurred."

Jesus Christ.  Clearly, Senator, your blatant, ignorant embrace of nazism blinds you to reality, sir.  What about the continuous murder of innocent, unarmed civilians of all races and ethnicities all across our formerly great country by the out of control jackbooted bastards in blue, Senator?  As covered week after week, month after month, year after year in this publication and elsewhere?

As U.S. Senator, you remain hopelessly derelict in your duty to honor your falsely sworn oath of office to uphold the United States Constitution.  Instead, you treasonously, traitorously, treacherously uphold the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who continue to murder and abuse innocent, unarmed civilians with near impunity.  How do you sleep nights, Senator?  Is rabid ignorance bliss, sir?

"This month, we celebrated the birth of our nation and the gift of independence. Throughout the history of mankind, freedom has been the exception. And yet, here in America, freedom has been delivered and defended for every man, woman, and child."

That's simply not true.  Not only for Blacks and other minorities, but across the board.  The top of the food chain enjoys freedom.  Rest of us?  Forced to do what we're told.  That's not liberty.  Quite the opposite.  Worse, every branch and level of government is bought and paid for.  Owned by the corporate management suite and the top of the food chain.  Nazi America.

"Our Founding Fathers believed that rights come from God – not government – and that all men are created equal. These two revolutionary beliefs are the bonds that unite Americans still today."

The above is the way it is supposed to be.  No longer happens to be anywhere near the truth.  Been gone quite some time.  Never completely true, anyway, since the Founders owned slaves, women were not allowed to vote until a century ago, etc.  List can go on and on.

What is not in dispute, and has not been in dispute, is the fact this country was founded by and for white men of means who controlled all that went on.  Including their women, Native Americans, not to neglect to mention the slaves the Founders owned.  A legacy that has profound negative effects on all to this very day, Mr. Cruz.

Precisely, why peaceful protest continues unabated across our formerly great country at this time.  Time to wake up, Senator.  Smell the coffee.  Time to stop making excuses for the inexcusable.  You believe, sir, in a fantasy world that is far from fruition, nowhere near reality.

The following remains egregious distortion of reality.  No more than a lie.  Perpetrated by a United States Senator demonstrably, determinedly, concertedly divorced from reality, determined to remain in his own little fantasy world:

"At a time when politicians at the local and state levels have ceded to the violent anarchists harming our children, destroying our cities, and fueling the flames of anger and unrest that threaten to tear apart the fabric of our society, now more than ever, we need leaders – on both sides of the political aisle – who will stand up and remember that America is the greatest nation in the history of the world."

Simply, not so.  Cruz distorts reality, like Hitler did, to secure, justify, and impose unlimited nazi power.  Think it can't get worse?  More psychotically divorced from reality?  Wake up.  Get this:

"We need leaders who do not endeavor to tear down the foundations of our nation. We need leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who will make an explicit appeal to the promises this nation was founded upon, the promises of freedom, the promises of equality."

Your fuhrer, the Trump nazi is no Martin Luther King, Senator.  Neither are you, sir.  Quite the contrary, Senator.  Our formerly great country is precisely where Nazi Germany was in 1933 when Hitler became Chancellor.  The worst was yet to come.  Yet, you and your fellow nazis remain blind, hopelessly ignorant:

"We have not yet fully achieved that, but we can. That’s the beauty of this American experiment. We're a nation founded on the proposition that all men are created equal, and we must remember Dr. King’s call to unity and justice."

The nazification of our formerly great country over the last six decades or so has made that increasingly impossible.  Impossible, now, under your fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

The following sadly illustrates the Senator's increasingly desperate, exponentially growing blindness, dangerous embrace of a fantasy world, certainly, not reality:

"Last week, I appeared on Fox News’ ‘Hannity’ and made the case that we’ve got to stand up for law enforcement and stand up for America."

Stand up for law enforcement that is murdering innocent, unarmed civilians, Senator?  Stand up for a country that now treats all but the top of the food chain like shit, Senator?

No one is condemning all law enforcement, Senator.  No one.  Certainly, not this writer and publication.  I condemn the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who are not accorded the same legal treatment and accountability as the rest of the civilian population.

Until that changes, expect more of the same from out of control officers.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  Why are you and your fellow nazis in the GOP doing all you can to spark one?  Why do clueless Democrats refuse to courageously stand up to this growing scourge of nazism?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

The following is an increasing problem as our formerly great country continues to nazify under Trump.  The Associated Press reports:

"The U.S. Roman Catholic Church used a special and unprecedented exemption from federal rules to amass at least $1.4 billion in taxpayer-backed coronavirus aid, with many millions going to dioceses that have paid huge settlements or sought bankruptcy protection because of clergy sexual abuse cover-ups. The church’s haul may have reached -- or even exceeded -- $3.5 billion, making a global religious institution with more than a billion followers among the biggest winners in the U.S. government’s pandemic relief efforts, an Associated Press analysis of federal data released this week found. Houses of worship and faith-based organizations that promote religious beliefs aren’t usually eligible for money from the U.S. Small Business Administration. But as the economy plummeted and jobless rates soared, Congress let faith groups and other nonprofits tap into the Paycheck Protection Program, a $659 billion fund created to keep Main Street open and Americans employed. By aggressively promoting the payroll program and marshaling resources to help affiliates navigate its shifting rules, Catholic dioceses, parishes, schools and other ministries have so far received approval for at least 3,500 forgivable loans, AP found. The Archdiocese of New York, for example, received 15 loans worth at least $28 million just for its top executive offices. Its iconic St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue was approved for at least $1 million. In Orange County, California, where a sparkling glass cathedral estimated to cost over $70 million recently opened, diocesan officials working at the complex received four loans worth at least $3 million. And elsewhere, a loan of at least $2 million went to the diocese covering Wheeling-Charleston, West Virginia, where a church investigation revealed last year that then-Bishop Michael Bransfield embezzled funds and made sexual advances toward young priests. Simply being eligible for low-interest loans was a new opportunity. But the church couldn’t have been approved for so many loans -- which the government will forgive if they are used for wages, rent and utilities -- without a second break."

Fascinating, isn't it?

"Religious groups persuaded the Trump administration to free them from a rule that typically disqualifies an applicant with more than 500 workers. Without this preferential treatment, many Catholic dioceses would have been ineligible because -- between their head offices, parishes and other affiliates -- their employees exceed the 500-person cap. “The government grants special dispensation, and that creates a kind of structural favoritism,” said Micah Schwartzman, a University of Virginia law professor specializing in constitutional issues and religion who has studied the Paycheck Protection Program. “And that favoritism was worth billions of dollars.” The amount that the church collected, between $1.4 billion and $3.5 billion, is an undercount. The Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference, an organization of Catholic financial officers, surveyed members and reported that about 9,000 Catholic entities received loans. That is nearly three times the number of Catholic recipients the AP could identify. The AP couldn’t find more Catholic beneficiaries because the government’s data, released after pressure from Congress and a lawsuit from news outlets including the AP, didn’t name recipients of loans under $150,000 -- a category in which many smaller churches would fall. And because the government released only ranges of loan amounts, it wasn’t possible to be more precise. Even without a full accounting, AP’s analysis places the Catholic Church among the major beneficiaries in the Paycheck Protection Program, which also has helped companies backed by celebrities, billionaires, state governors and members of Congress. The program was open to all religious groups, and many took advantage. Evangelical advisers to President Donald Trump, including his White House spiritual czar, Paula White-Cain, also received loans."

Report goes on and on.  In great detail.  What ever happened to the First Amendment Establishment Clause, church-state separation, that is, freedom from religion?  Not surprising in a de facto fascist police-state.  For new readers:  Fascism, nazism, national socialism defined as the pernicious blend of government, business, and religion. 'Justified' by perversion and bastardization of the latter.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

In follow up to an earlier edition of this publication, NBC News reports:

"The judge in former national security adviser Michael Flynn's case has asked the full Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to rehear Flynn's request for an order directing him to dismiss the case as the Justice Department has sought to do. A three-judge panel of the appeals court granted Flynn's motion and ordered U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan to dismiss the case last month. Now Sullivan is asking the full court to consider the issue. If the full court agrees, it would wipe out the panel's order. In his motion, Sullivan said the panel's ruling "threatens to turn ordinary judicial process upside down." "It is the district court's job to consider and rule on pending motions, even ones that seem straightforward," he said. "This court, if called upon, reviews those decisions — it does not pre-empt them."

Have to admire the persistence of the Judge.  Certainly, doing all he can to uphold his oath of office despite enormous pressure from Trump and the U.S. Attorney General.

"Flynn twice pleaded guilty to charges that he lied to FBI agents in January 2017 about his conversations with Russia's ambassador to the U.S. But after an agreement to cooperate with prosecutors fell apart in a separate case involving Flynn's former business partner, Flynn sought to withdraw his plea. Flynn asked the appeals court last month for an order directing Sullivan, who handled his case, to dismiss it. That came after the Justice Department filed a motion to dismiss the case, which led Sullivan to appoint a retired federal judge to examine the government's justification and to analyze whether Flynn should be separately found in contempt of court for his guilty plea. The three-judge panel also said Sullivan had no authority to appoint the retired judge. President Donald Trump applauded the panel's ruling, saying Flynn, who was his national security adviser for the first three weeks of his administration, had been "persecuted."

Readers are reminded Flynn, under oath, twice admitted the charges were indeed true.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

'Don't do as I do, do as I say.'  The Associated Press reports:

"U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has criticized an independent U.N. human rights expert’s report insisting a American drone strike that killed a top Iranian general in January was a “watershed” event in the use of drones and amounted to a violation of international law."

The United States is not at war with Iran.  Why are we still in the region engaging in armed conflict?  Why did our fuhrer, the Trump nazi have the General killed?  To get his cookies off abusing power?

"The report presented by Agnes Callamard to the U.N.-backed Human Rights Council on Thursday chronicled events around the death of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and the legal implications of his killing as part of a broader look on the use of drone strikes. Callamard, the special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions who has been commissioned by the council, called the January strike in Iraq “the first known incident in which a state invokes self-defense as justification for an attack against a government official outside a declared armed conflict.”

That's a problem.  A big problem.  Called murder.

Clearly, the Secretary of State's possible involvement in this killing also needs to be investigated:

"Pompeo said in a statement late Thursday that the U.S. rejected her report and “opinions.” “Ms. Callamard’s conclusions are spurious,” he said. “The strike that killed Gen. Soleimani was in response to an escalating series of armed attacks in preceding months by the Islamic Republic of Iran and militias it supports on U.S. forces and interests in the Middle East region.”

There is no declared war, Mr. Secretary of State.  Why are we still waging one?  Other than indefinitely, how many more decades will this undeclared war continue, sir?

"Pompeo said the strike on Baghdad International Airport was carried out “to deter Iran from launching or supporting further attacks against the United States or U.S. interests, and to degrade the capabilities of the Qods Force.” He said Callamard “gives more cause to distrust U.N. human rights mechanisms.”

To the world community, as well as to an increasing number of us here in the United States, growing distrust is centered on this government and its continual lies.

Here's the problem:

"The Trump administration pulled the United States out of the rights council two years ago, accusing it of an anti-Israel bias and alleging that it is too accepting of autocratic regimes that regularly abuse human rights."

The Israeli aggressor, consequently, continues to abrogate the right of Palestinians to an independent state.  Continues to threaten to commandeer additional Palestinian territory.  Does so with impunity.

"Callamard is perhaps best known for leading an investigation into the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi national, and issuing a scathing report on the actions of Saudi officials. In her new report, Callamard acknowledged in her report that international humanitarian and human rights law can provide “diverging answers” on the legal validity of some drone strikes, and the one against Soleimani raised “genuine uncertainty as to how to interpret its lawfulness. She said the United States had not “engaged with” her as she drafted the drone report. But based on the evidence the U.S. provided, “the targeting of Gen. Soleimani, and the deaths of those accompanying him, constitute an arbitrary killing for which, under (international human rights law), the U.S. is responsible,” she said. Callamard wrote that the strike targeting Soleimani was “qualitatively different” from other drone strikes that targeted non-state actors. “This is the primary reason the Soleimani strike is considered a watershed change in the conduct of extra-territorially targeted strikes and killings,” she stated in the report. “It is hard to imagine that a similar strike against a Western military leader would not be considered as an act of war, potentially leading to intense action, political, military and otherwise, against the state launching the strike,” she added."

She's quite correct.  Imagine the response of the United States had it been one of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff killed by an Iranian drone strike.

"Among other recommendations, the report calls on the United Nations to examine the legal framework on the use of drones and for the U.N. Security Council - which Callamard called “missing in action” on the subject of drone strikes - to take up the issues. The report’s release came as the United States mounts an increasingly intense diplomatic offensive to try to depict Iran’s Islamic Republic as the world’s most rogue regime. Tehran has countered by issuing an international arrest warrant and asking Interpol for help in detaining President Donald Trump and dozens of others it believes carried out the drone strike on Soleimani. Trump faces no danger of arrest, and Interpol said it would not consider Iran’s request."

Clearly, dangerously, might makes right.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Obstruction of justice. Legally perpetrated by our fuhrer, the Trump nazi. The Washington Post opines:

"President Trump has attempted to make law and order his calling card in the 2020 election. In fact, he’s tweeted or retweeted the words “LAW & ORDER” — in ALL CAPS — more than two dozen times since May 31. The same president just commuted the sentence of a political ally, Roger Stone, who was recently convicted of seven crimes, including ones aimed at shielding the president himself."

Nothing quite like hypocrisy, is there?  LOL.

"The first thing that jumps out at you about Trump’s pardons and commutations is the inordinate number of them which have gone to people with either personal or political ties to Trump (or both): Joe Arpaio, Dinesh D’Souza, Conrad Black, Bernard Kerik, Rod Blagojevich, Michael Milken, Paul Pogue, David Safavian, Eddie DeBartolo Jr. and now Stone. It’s hardly unheard-of for a president to pardon allies — see Marc Rich et al. — but Trump has taken it to another level."

He has.  Called legalized obstruction of justice.  Sends a dangerous message to all who work for the fascist son of a bitch:  "Cover my sorry ass, and I'll cover yours."

"And the Stone clemency both reinforces this pattern and brings it to an entirely different level. The five counts of lying Stone was found guilty of included his effort to obscure his contacts with WikiLeaks, which published information on Democrats as part of Russia’s effort to interfere in the 2016 election. Trump is, quite literally, pardoning crimes that served to protect himself personally. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) summed it up accordingly on Saturday morning: “Unprecedented, historic corruption: an American president commutes the sentence of a person convicted by a jury of lying to shield that very president.”

Romney has indeed stood tall.  About the only Republican who has done so since Trump took office.

"Beyond the obvious political implications, though, are the types crimes for which Trump has pardoned people or commuted their sentences. Here’s a look at the crimes for which the law-and-order president has opted to unilaterally circumvent justice:

Lying about contacts involving a man, Julian Assange, who served as a conduit for Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. election and who is currently under indictment (Stone)

Three war crimes, including two murders (Clint Lorance)

Murder (Michael Behenna)

Alleged murder (Mathew Golsteyn)

Arson that burned 139 acres of federal land (Steven and Dwight Hammond)

Corruptly trying to sell a U.S. Senate seat for personal gain (Blagojevich)

Using his high profile after the 9/11 attacks to commit tax fraud (Kerik)

Refusing a judge’s order to stop detaining people suspected of being undocumented immigrants (Arpaio)"

The article goes on and on in great detail.  Clearly, our nazi fuhrer has no shame.

NBC News reports:

"Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, on Saturday criticized President Donald Trump’s decision to commute the prison sentence of Roger Stone, calling it “unprecedented, historic corruption.” “An American president commutes the sentence of a person convicted by a jury of lying to shield that very president,” Romney wrote on Twitter. Romney, a leading critic of the president, was the first prominent Republican to condemn Trump for his decision to clear Stone's 40-month prison sentence. Other Republicans have been quick to rally around the president, taking to Twitter to voice their support for Stone's commutation.

"Democrats have fiercely criticized Stone's commutation, likening Trump's actions to that of a "Mafia boss."

CBS News reports:

"House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler tweeted Friday night that the committee would be conducting an investigation. "A jury found Roger Stone guilty," Nadler wrote. "By commuting his sentence, President Trump has infected our judicial system with partisanship and cronyism and attacked the rule of law."

"House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff called Trump's decision "among the most offensive to the rule of law and principles of justice." "With this commutation, Trump makes clear that there are two systems of justice in America: one for his criminal friends, and one for everyone else," Schiff added. "Donald Trump, Bill Barr, and all those who enable them pose the gravest of threats to the rule of law."

There is no greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than our fuhrer in the Oval Office, the Trump nazi.

"In a statement, Speaker Nancy Pelosi decried the "staggering corruption" of commuting Stone's sentence. "Congress will take action to prevent this type of brazen wrongdoing.  Legislation is needed to ensure that no President can pardon or commute the sentence of an individual who is engaged in a cover-up campaign to shield that President from criminal prosecution," Pelosi said."

Empty, hollow rhetoric Madam Speaker.  The current Senate would never go along.  Other than meaningless talk, what are you and Democrats going to do now about this growing cancer in our formerly great country?

"A commutation results in a partially reduced or eliminated sentence but doesn't affect the fact that an individual was convicted. Stone told Fox News on Thursday that "if I should be fortunate enough to get a commutation, I would continue to fight for vindication."

A lying, convicted criminal.

"The case against Stone, 67, stemmed from former special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. Federal prosecutors accused the political operative of collaborating with WikiLeaks to release emails stolen from the Democratic Party in order to harm Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential campaign, and subsequently lying about the efforts. He also faced one count of tampering with a witness, radio personality Randy Credico, by urging him not to cooperate in the investigation into Russian interference mounted by the House Intelligence Committee. A federal jury found Stone guilty of all seven charges of obstruction, making false statements and witness tampering."

Interestingly:

"Just before Stone was to be sentenced in February, all four federal prosecutors involved in the case abruptly withdrew after senior officials at the Justice Department overruled their initial recommendation that Stone receive seven to nine years in prison. The move raised questions as to whether the department bowed to political pressure from the White House, given Mr. Trump's public support for Stone and criticism of the initial sentencing recommendation. One of the prosecutors who resigned from Stone's case, Aaron Zelinsky, told the House Judiciary Committee last month that the Justice Department intervened to recommend a lighter sentence for Stone because of his relationship with Mr. Trump."

Expect better of a nazi dictator?

"Zelinsky told lawmakers the move by the department was "unprecedented" and that Stone was "treated differently because of politics." He said in written testimony before his appearance that Timothy Shea, then the acting U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, "was receiving heavy pressure from the highest levels of the Department of Justice to cut Stone a break, and that the U.S. attorney's sentencing instructions to us were based on political considerations."  Jackson then sentenced Stone to 40 months in prison."

NPR reports:

"The commutation, which Trump issued days before Stone was to report to federal prison, brings an end to Stone's legal fight — but only further inflames the political battle over his prosecution and the broader Russia investigation. Earlier Friday evening, a federal appeals court had denied an emergency bid from Stone to stay out of prison. The case against Stone was brought by then-special counsel Robert Mueller as part of his probe into Russia's interference in the 2016 election and possible ties between Moscow and the Trump campaign. Stone was indicted on charges of lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstruction. The charges related to his efforts during the 2016 presidential race to act as an intermediary between the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks was releasing Democratic emails stolen by Russian intelligence services, and Stone publicly and privately presented himself as someone with inside knowledge about the group's operations. After the election, when Stone was questioned under oath about the matter by the House Intelligence Committee, he lied to lawmakers about his efforts to contact WikiLeaks. He also tried to prevent an associate from testifying before the committee."

Readers will recall:

"After a tumultuous runup to his trial, during which the presiding judge, Amy Berman Jackson, imposed a gag order on Stone after he published a threatening photograph of her, a jury found him guilty on all seven counts in November. After his trial, Stone raised allegations of juror misconduct and tried to get the verdict dismissed. Jackson entertained the motion, even holding a hearing in which she brought back members of the jury for questioning, but she ultimately rejected Stone's bid for a new trial and sentenced him to more than three years in prison. Stone has since appealed his conviction."

Trouble in Trump nazi 'paradise?'  LOL.  Get this:

"In an interview this month with ABC News, Attorney General William Barr called Stone's prosecution "righteous" and said the sentence handed down was "fair."

Mueller has his say in a Washington Post editorial:

"The work of the special counsel’s office — its report, indictments, guilty pleas and convictions — should speak for itself. But I feel compelled to respond both to broad claims that our investigation was illegitimate and our motives were improper, and to specific claims that Roger Stone was a victim of our office. The Russia investigation was of paramount importance. Stone was prosecuted and convicted because he committed federal crimes. He remains a convicted felon, and rightly so."

What took so long, Counselor?  Trump has distorted reality, shamelessly lied since taking office regarding this matter and many, many others.

"Russia’s actions were a threat to America’s democracy. It was critical that they be investigated and understood. By late 2016, the FBI had evidence that the Russians had signaled to a Trump campaign adviser that they could assist the campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to the Democratic candidate. And the FBI knew that the Russians had done just that: Beginning in July 2016, WikiLeaks released emails stolen by Russian military intelligence officers from the Clinton campaign. Other online personas using false names — fronts for Russian military intelligence — also released Clinton campaign emails."

Certainly, highly damaging to Clinton and the campaign.  Trump and his henchmen benefited from this.  Instead of standing tall and screaming bloody murder when it was obvious what the Russians were doing, the Trump nazi gutlessly, self-servingly called all of it a 'witch hunt.'  Think this nazi has no clue, no conscience, no integrity, no honor?

"Following FBI Director James B. Comey’s termination in May 2017, the acting attorney general named me as special counsel and directed the special counsel’s office to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. The order specified lines of investigation for us to pursue, including any links or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign. One of our cases involved Stone, an official on the campaign until mid-2015 and a supporter of the campaign throughout 2016. Stone became a central figure in our investigation for two key reasons: He communicated in 2016 with individuals known to us to be Russian intelligence officers, and he claimed advance knowledge of WikiLeaks’ release of emails stolen by those Russian intelligence officers."

Certainly, not a 'witch hunt' as falsely claimed by the Trump nazi to this very day.

"We now have a detailed picture of Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. The special counsel’s office identified two principal operations directed at our election: hacking and dumping Clinton campaign emails, and an online social media campaign to disparage the Democratic candidate. We also identified numerous links between the Russian government and Trump campaign personnel — Stone among them. We did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired with the Russian government in its activities. The investigation did, however, establish that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome. It also established that the campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts. Uncovering and tracing Russian outreach and interference activities was a complex task. The investigation to understand these activities took two years and substantial effort. Based on our work, eight individuals pleaded guilty or were convicted at trial, and more than two dozen Russian individuals and entities, including senior Russian intelligence officers, were charged with federal crimes."

Stone lied to Congress:

"Congress also investigated and sought information from Stone. A jury later determined he lied repeatedly to members of Congress. He lied about the identity of his intermediary to WikiLeaks. He lied about the existence of written communications with his intermediary. He lied by denying he had communicated with the Trump campaign about the timing of WikiLeaks’ releases. He in fact updated senior campaign officials repeatedly about WikiLeaks. And he tampered with a witness, imploring him to stonewall Congress. The jury ultimately convicted Stone of obstruction of a congressional investigation, five counts of making false statements to Congress and tampering with a witness. Because his sentence has been commuted, he will not go to prison. But his conviction stands. Russian efforts to interfere in our political system, and the essential question of whether those efforts involved the Trump campaign, required investigation. In that investigation, it was critical for us (and, before us, the FBI) to obtain full and accurate information. Likewise, it was critical for Congress to obtain accurate information from its witnesses. When a subject lies to investigators, it strikes at the core of the government’s efforts to find the truth and hold wrongdoers accountable. It may ultimately impede those efforts. We made every decision in Stone’s case, as in all our cases, based solely on the facts and the law and in accordance with the rule of law. The women and men who conducted these investigations and prosecutions acted with the highest integrity. Claims to the contrary are false."

NBC News reports:

"Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Sunday he will grant a longtime Democratic request to have former special counsel Robert Mueller testify before the committee. Graham's comments followed Mueller's Washington Post op-ed about President Donald Trump's commutation of Roger Stone's prison sentence. "Apparently Mr. Mueller is willing - and also capable - of defending the Mueller investigation through an oped in the Washington Post," Graham tweeted. "Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee have previously requested Mr. Mueller appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee to testify about his investigation. That request will be granted." Asked if they have formally invited Mueller to testify before the committee, a Graham spokeswoman told NBC News: "A formal invitation to Mr. Mueller is in the works." Senate Judiciary Democrats in 2019 called on Graham to request Mueller's testimony to discuss his report at the conclusion of the investigation into Russian electoral interference, but Graham had denied the request. Mueller would testify before the House Intelligence Committee later that year. "I'm all good, I'm done with the Mueller report," the South Carolina Republican told CNN in April 2019. "We will have [Attorney General William] Barr come in and tell us about what he found. I made sure that Mueller was able to do his job without interference. The Mueller report is over for me. Done."

You remain a crafty, duplicitous son of a bitch, Senator.  Not worth a crap.

NPR reports:

"President Trump issued his first pardon in August 2017, just about seven months into his presidency. Three years and three dozen clemencies later, some patterns have emerged. One clear pattern is Trump's tendency to grant clemency to prominent political figures and people who have shown loyalty to him, clemency scholars say. That propensity was on full display on Friday, as Trump commuted the sentence of his former campaign adviser Roger Stone. Stone was just days away from beginning a 40-month prison term for lying to lawmakers investigating Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election. "Modern presidents have sullied clemency through disuse (both Bushes) and occasional self-serving grants (Clinton)," Mark Osler, a law professor and clemency scholar at the University of St. Thomas' School of Law, told NPR via email. "However, no president has ever used clemency primarily to reward friends and political allies" — until Trump.

"With only a handful of exceptions, Osler said, Trump's clemency grants have gone to "people he knows or learned about from Fox News." On a single day in February, Trump pardoned or commuted the sentences of 11 people, all of whom had one thing in common: either their cases were promoted on Fox News or they had an inside connection to the president. Trump also prefers to disregard the advice of the Office of the Pardon Attorney in the Department of Justice, said American University professor Jeffrey Crouch, who has written extensively on the presidential pardon power. That office is responsible for vetting the thousands of clemency requests the government gets every year. For over a century, presidents have relied on the recommendations of that office. Not so for Trump, who prefers to make his own decisions. A Washington Post investigation found that most of Trump's grants of clemency "have gone to well-connected offenders who had not filed petitions with the pardon office or did not meet its requirements." "He has largely ignored the little guy, or anonymous offenders who apply for presidential mercy through the usual channels," Crouch told NPR. "Under President Trump, the old back door to clemency — getting the president's attention somehow — seems to have become the new front door."

Stone presiding judge stands tall.  The Associated Press reports:

"A federal judge on Monday demanded more information about President Donald Trump’s decision to commute the prison sentence of longtime ally Roger Stone. U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ordered that the parties provide her by Tuesday with a copy of the executive order that commuted Stone’s sentence. She also asked for clarity about the scope of the clemency, including whether it covers just his prison sentence or also the two-year period of supervised release that was part of his sentence.

"Although presidents have broad authority to commute prison sentences and issue pardons, the brief order from Jackson — who presided over Stone’s trial last year — makes clear the judge still is seeking information and clarity about the clemency, including the actual executive order from the White House."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Amazing how the fascist narcissist in the Oval Office blames everyone but himself for his problems. The Washington Post reports:

"For months, Anthony S. Fauci has played a lead role in America’s coronavirus pandemic, as a diminutive, Brooklyn-accented narrator who has assessed the risk and issued increasingly blunt warnings as the nation’s response has gone badly awry. But as the Trump administration has strayed from the advice of many of its scientists and public health experts, the White House has moved to sideline Fauci, scuttled some of his planned TV appearances and largely kept him out of the Oval Office for more than a month even as coronavirus infections surge in large swaths of the country. In recent days, the 79-year-old scientist and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has found himself directly in the president’s crosshairs. During a Fox News interview Thursday with Sean Hannity, Trump said Fauci “is a nice man, but he’s made a lot of mistakes.” And when Greta Van Susteren asked him last week about Fauci’s assessment that the country was not in a good place, Trump said flatly: “I disagree with him.”

Called aggressive stupidity.  Would be laughable if so many weren't dying.  Fauci is the expert.  Trump is not.  Trump cares not for those dying.  Only concern?  Re-election.  Trump knew the pandemic was a problem late last year.  Did not take it seriously.  Still hasn't.  With no guidelines, Trump and his henchmen want the kids back in school.  When some of them get sick or pass on the virus to their elders, what excuse will the Trump nazi make at that time for his aggressive stupidity?  Indeed, Fauci changed recommendations as the pandemic developed and more was learned.  That's how science operates.  Not so, out of control nazi fuhrers.

"Fauci no longer briefs Trump and is “never in the Oval [Office] anymore,” said a senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. Fauci last spoke to the president during the first week of June, according to a person with knowledge of Trump’s calendar. For some administration officials, such developments have been an early sign their job was on the line. But Trump cannot directly fire Fauci, a career civil servant with more than 50 years in government service who enjoys strong bipartisan support in Congress. In any case, the president has no plans to get rid of him, said the official. As for Fauci himself, although he is frustrated by the turmoil and the state of the outbreak, friends say he has no plans to abandon his post, which includes a critical role in the development of a coronavirus vaccine and treatments. Fauci has found other ways to get his message out, from online Facebook chats to podcasts and print media interviews. And in recent days, with coronavirus cases slamming hospitals in the South and West, he has been frankly critical of the U.S. response — and implicitly, of the president. “As a country, when you compare us to other countries, I don’t think you can say we’re doing great. I mean, we’re just not,” Fauci said in a podcast interview with FiveThirtyEight last week."

ABC News reports:

"As top White House officials criticized the nation's leading infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci -- including a top aide sharing a mocking cartoon -- four former directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have penned an op-ed warning that "undermining" science and the "willful disregard for public health guidelines" is "leading to a sharp rise in infections and deaths" from the novel coronavirus. "The four of us led the CDC over a period of more than 15 years, spanning Republican and Democratic administrations alike," Tom Frieden, Jeffrey Koplan, David Satcher, and Richard Besser wrote in an opinion article published Tuesday in The Washington Post. "We cannot recall over our collective tenure a single time when political pressure led to a change in the interpretation of scientific evidence." "Unfortunately, their sound science is being challenged with partisan potshots, sowing confusion and mistrust at a time when the American people need leadership, expertise and clarity," the former directors wrote. The unusual repudiation came as the White House sought to discredit Fauci, who has provided a more blunt and sobering assessment of the state of the epidemic than the president and his top aides have sought to project -- one they see as politically inconvenient as Trump campaigns for re-election. The day before, Trump shared a message on Twitter accusing doctors and the CDC of "lying" in order to influence the November election; he provided no evidence and did not elaborate."

Expect better of a congenital liar?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

Abortion rights upheld.  The Associated Press reports:

"A federal judge on Monday permanently blocked Georgia’s 2019 “heartbeat” abortion law, finding that it violates the U.S. Constitution. U.S. District Judge Steve Jones ruled against the state in a lawsuit filed by abortion providers and an advocacy group. Jones had temporarily blocked the law in October, and it never went into effect. The new ruling permanently enjoins the state from ever enforcing House Bill 481. Georgia’s measure sought to ban abortions once a “detectable human heartbeat” was present, with some limited exceptions. Cardiac activity can be detected by ultrasound as early as six weeks into a pregnancy, before many women realize they’re pregnant, according to a legal challenge. The bill narrowly passed the Georgia General Assembly amid intense lobbying for and against. Those who challenged the lawsuit said the ruling proves their contention that the measure was unconstitutional. Lead plaintiff SisterSong, an Atlanta-based group that fights abortion restrictions on behalf of African American and other women of color, called it a “huge win for bodily autonomy.” “No one should have to live in a world where their bodies and reproductive decision making is controlled by the state,” SisterSong Executive Director Monica Simpson said in a statement. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who has supported the restriction, immediately vowed an appeal. “We will appeal the court’s decision,” Kemp said in a statement. “Georgia values life and we will keep fighting for the rights of the unborn.” The prospects of an appeal are uncertain, though, considering the U.S. Supreme Court last month struck down other abortion restrictions from Louisiana."

Who the hell are you, Governor, and your fellow nazis in the Republican Party to force your perverse ideological and religious views on others?  In direct violation of the First Amendment Establishment Clause, church-state separation, that is, freedom from religion.  Ferociously pointedly, who the f--k are you nazis to dictate to a woman what she can and cannot do with HER uterus?  Raw nazism.  Adolf and Benito would have been proud of you fascist bastards.  Think they're not wildly cheering on their fiery perches, you clueless son of a bitch?

The Associated Press reports:

"A federal judge agreed Monday to suspend a rule that requires women during the COVID-19 pandemic to visit a hospital, clinic or medical office to obtain an abortion pill. U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland concluded that the “in-person requirements” for patients seeking medication abortion care impose a “substantial obstacle” to abortion patients and are likely unconstitutional under the circumstances of the pandemic. “Particularly in light of the limited timeframe during which a medication abortion or any abortion must occur, such infringement on the right to an abortion would constitute irreparable harm,” the judge wrote in his 80-page decision. Chuang’s ruling will allow healthcare providers to arrange for mifepristone to be mailed or delivered to patients during the public health emergency declared by the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone to be used in combination with a second drug, misoprostol, to end an early pregnancy or manage a miscarriage. “By causing certain patients to decide between forgoing or substantially delaying abortion care, or risking exposure to COVID-19 for themselves, their children, and family members, the In-Person Requirements present a serious burden to many abortion patients,” Chuang wrote."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

As our formerly great country continues to nazify under Trump, the following is a most timely and cogent reminder of why hundreds of thousands of our best and brightest fought and died in the Second World War European Theater.  Seatbelts on.  Truly rough stuff.  NBC News reports:

"A 90-year-old Holocaust survivor was finally able to thank the family of an American soldier who gave her hope upon being liberated from a Nazi death camp in World War II, 75 years on. Lily Ebert was connected with the children of the soldier over a Zoom call coordinated by her great-grandson, Dov Forman, on Sunday. "It is unbelievable. I never knew something like this could happen. It was a fantastic feeling," Ebert told NBC News by phone from her home in London. Their meeting was made possible by a tweet Forman sent that went viral. The 16-year-old said he took it upon himself to start documenting Ebert's stories of the war once coronavirus lockdown restrictions were eased and he could visit. "My great-grandma obviously isn't going to be around forever and her story will eventually become my whole family's responsibility to carry on," Forman said."

A 16-year-old with more sense and insight than most adults I know.

"During one of his recent visits, Forman said he noticed a German banknote preserved in one of Ebert's old photo albums. Ebert explained that a few weeks after being liberated in the German town of Pfaffroda, she met an American soldier. Without anything else to write on, she said the soldier used a banknote to put down his words of encouragement to her.

    "Yesterday my great Grandma (Lily Ebert - an Auschwitz survivor) showed me this bank note- given to her as a gift by a soldier who liberated her. Inscribed, it says “a start to a new life. Good luck and happiness”. Later on, she met up with those who freed her (third photo). pic.twitter.com/LAx2ZGFCnH
    — Dov Forman (@DovForman) July 5, 2020

"The start to a new life. Good luck and happiness," he wrote."

That young American soldier certainly knew what he was fighting for.  -- What so many of his comrades had courageously died for.

"While it was a simple gesture, it was life-changing for young Ebert. "This soldier was the first human being who was kind to us," she said. "It was the first time after this terrible life that somebody was kind and I knew that somebody wants to help." Touched by the story, Forman decided to share images of the banknote on Twitter. To his surprise, he said it went viral within hours, gaining over a million views. A Twitter user who saw it sent him a suggestion that the mystery soldier may be American Pvt. Hyman Schulman. Although he died in 2013, Schulman's story of the war was well documented in many letters he sent back to his wife that have since been rediscovered by his family. With some research, Forman said he was able to locate Schulman's children in New York and bring the families together digitally. "It was really special. It felt like we were family, we just clicked," Forman said. For Ebert, it was also a special moment to speak to people who had a deep understanding of the horrors of the past. "I know that this soldier told his family, he wrote to his family every day the stories that he saw," she said. "With that, I feel some connection to them."

The following?  Horrific:

"Ebert, who was born in Hungary, has always been vocal about her experience, sharing it with not just her family but also speaking to schools, businesses and community groups. She had been taken to Auschwitz at the age of 14 and separated from her mother, brother and sister who were all killed there. Ebert and her two other younger sisters — one of whom is still alive — were sent to a munitions factory where they endured slave labor for four months. "They dehumanized us," she said. They were forced to work grueling, long hours, deprived of food and sleep. It was the responsibility of having to look out for her younger sisters that helped keep her going, she said. And she also made a vow to herself. "I promised myself that if I survived by some miracle, I would tell the world what happened there," Ebert said. "The next generation and next generations should know the story so that something like that should not be repeated to any human being ever." And Ebert has been able to keep to her promise."

Think history can't repeat itself?  ... As our formerly great country continues to deteriorate under our fuhrer, the Trump nazi?  Would like to think the sane here would never allow it.  Then again, his insane supporters treasonously, traitorously continue to protect and defend the fascist bastard no matter what he does or doesn't do.

"The families are planning another Zoom call next week, Forman said, and are even discussing an in-person meeting once coronavirus-related travel restrictions are lifted. "I hope one day that I will meet them personally, I would very much like to have that," Ebert said."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-17-20

In follow up to an earlier edition of this publication, NPR reports:

"Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., said Tuesday that she would lift a hold on more than 1,100 senior military promotions after the Department of Defense assured her that it did not block the promotion of Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman — a key witness in the impeachment inquiry of President Trump. Duckworth, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and combat veteran, put the hold on promotions earlier this month, demanding written confirmation from Defense Secretary Mike Esper that the former National Security Council aide had been recommended for advancement to full colonel. "Donald Trump's unprecedented efforts to further politicize our military by retaliating against Lt. Col. Vindman — for doing his patriotic duty of telling the truth under oath — are unconscionable," the senator said in a statement announcing that she would lift the hold. "I'm glad the Department of Defense was finally able to set the record straight that Vindman had earned and was set to receive a promotion to Colonel." "We must always protect the merit-based system that is the foundation of our Armed Forces from political corruption and unlawful retaliation," she added."

How does the above square with the following?  NBC News reports:

"The National Security Council sent a list of allegations about Lt. Col. Alex Vindman to the Pentagon after he testified before the House in impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump, according to one person who has seen the document and two others briefed on it. The Pentagon received the document, which alleged Vindman created a hostile work environment at the NSC, as he was on track to be promoted to colonel. The accusations outlined in it, if substantiated, would have kept him from moving up a rank in the Army, the people familiar with the document said. They said it was not the typical evaluation that military officers serving on the NSC are given when their temporary positions end and they are set to return to the Defense Department, as Vindman was scheduled to do about six months after this document was sent to the Pentagon. The NSC is housed in the White House and chaired by the president, though it's managed day-to-day by the national security adviser. The Pentagon conducted a command-level investigation into the allegations, looking for evidence to substantiate the claims about Vindman’s conduct while he was detailed to the NSC, the people familiar with the document said. But ultimately the military could not corroborate any of the accusations, the people familiar with it said. Included in the list was an accusation that Vindman had verbally abused a colleague, a senior administration official said."

Gets worse.  Get this:

"The list of allegations suggests that the White House tried to derail the promotion of an Army officer the president said he wasn't "happy" with and viewed as disloyal. It could also suggest White House retaliation against Vindman for his impeachment testimony went beyond ousting him, and his twin brother, from the NSC in February, before their time was up. Vindman’s promotion recently had become a flashpoint between the White House and the Pentagon, which planned to move forward with it this summer, despite the president’s opposition. Defense Secretary Mark Esper made clear to the White House that he would not strike the lieutenant colonel’s name from the Army’s list of promotions, two people familiar with the matter said. Esper made the case to Trump in recent weeks that blocking Vindman’s promotion would hurt his presidency, the two people said. Pentagon spokesperson Jonathan Rath Hoffman declined to comment on internal administration communications. Last week Vindman asked to retire from the Army after more than two decades in the military, with his lawyer saying in a statement that Vindman had endured "a campaign of bullying, intimidation, and retaliation" from the president. The White House and the NSC did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Vindman declined to comment. The Army selected Vindman to be promoted to colonel earlier this year. The list of soldiers selected for promotion to colonel, which included Vindman's name, was expected to be made public in mid-May. It was sent from the Army to the Pentagon's Personnel Office and ultimately to Esper earlier this summer. A defense official said Esper approved the list on Monday, July 6. While the coronavirus pandemic has delayed some paperwork, including promotions, three defense officials said this list was held up because some defense officials were worried the White House would remove Vindman's name from it. The NSC sent its list of accusations against Vindman to the Defense Department's executive secretary in late 2019, according to two people familiar with the memo. For the Pentagon's investigation into the allegation that Vindman had been verbally abusive to a colleague with whom he shared office space, defense officials interviewed both Vindman and the colleague. They found that the two had gotten into an argument, but that it was just a minor spat and they continued to work together afterward. After Vindman was forced out of the NSC in February, Trump suggested the Army might take some sort of action against him for unspecified alleged wrongdoing. "We sent him on his way to a much different location, and the military can handle him any way they want," Trump said."

Makes no sense.  While it is indeed true Vindman's career in the military was indeed over due to the Trump nazi, why not have stayed long enough to have received the promotion and additional benefits he clearly earned?  Then retired.  ... Just to stick it to the fascist bastard.  Since no one will comment, likely far more to the story.  As usually the case, the truth finally comes out at some point.  We'll see.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

The following is indeed appalling regarding the state of affairs within our formerly great country.  At the same time, offers hope that the First Amendment Freedom of Speech may indeed be the key to a desperately needed change in thinking.  NBC News reports:

"A retired Air National Guard colonel and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee instructor says her social media post about slain soldier Pfc. Vanessa Guillen's sexual harassment allegation was taken out of context."

Think so?  Think not?  Read on:

"Betsy Schoeller, a former Wisconsin Air National Guard officer, posted comments on Facebook in response to an article about Guillen's killing, saying sexual harassment is the price of admission for women in the military and "if you're gonna cry like a snowflake about it, you're gonna pay the price."

Ms. Schoeller is indeed one tough, strong woman.  Great element of truth to what she claims regarding sexual harassment in the military or anywhere else for that matter.  Sadly, it's been a 'man's world' for far, far too long.  At the same time, when sexual harassment turns into sexual abuse, sexual assault, rape, murder, moreover, it's no longer sexual harassment.  It's an exigent threat to survival.

Not surprisingly:

"Her comments drew backlash and were condemned by university officials in a statement Saturday as "beyond thoughtless" and "repugnant." "UWM in no way condones Ms. Schoeller's comments, and we understand and empathize with the outrage and concerns we are hearing," the statement said. "There can be no excuse or rationalization for the killing of SPC Guillen and the circumstances surrounding this tragedy."

There is none. Nor, was Ms. Schoeller claiming such.

"The university also said there were legal reasons it could not fire Schoeller "for her social media postings, as some have demanded" and that it cannot regulate the private speech of its employees."

That's right.  It can't.  Called the First Amendment Freedom of Speech.  Don't like what she said?  Verbally, confront her.  Engage her in an exchange of ideas.

"An online petition launched Friday by a UW-Milwaukee student calling for Schoeller to be terminated has more than 133,000 signatures."

The above is shortsighted.  Un-American.  The Founders wrote the First Amendment for a number of different reasons.  -- One of them, free exchange of ideas.  Absolutely necessary for the survival of any civilization.

Time for Ms. Schoeller to have her say:

"Schoeller released a statement Sunday through UW-Milwaukee, where she is a senior lecturer at the School of Information Studies, in which she offered her condolences to Guillen's relatives and sympathy to all victims of sexual assault and harassment. Schoeller, 58, said that she did not mean to imply that this is how she feels and that she is sorry her words were misinterpreted. She did not immediately return a request for an interview Monday. "I was giving voice to the messaging that women hear in the culture of sexual harassment: The message we receive from the culture is not only will you suffer from sexual harassment, if you squawk about it, you will suffer even more. "Because it isn’t just the sexual harassment. That's just the beginning," the statement said. "Then comes the agonizing decision about reporting. Or not reporting. The pressure applied by friends who know about it and only want to help. Having to ultimately stand up to that culture of sexual harassment on your own."

If you don't, this shit will never end.  Clearly, the chain of command is not the way to resolve this problem.  Victim, all-too-often, gets blamed.  Time for an independent agency to handle these complaints.  Prosecute offenders.

"Schoeller has taught at the university for 23 years, according to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. She retired in 2017 as a colonel in the Wisconsin Air National Guard."

The Guard still, figuratively, has its head securely lodged up its ass regarding this matter:

"The Guard said on its Facebook page Saturday that it was informed of "tasteless and insensitive comments" made by a former member."

Called the unvarnished truth.  Wake up.  Time to end the political correctness bullshit game government is so goddamned fond of playing.

"That individual's comments and conduct are inconsistent with our values as an organization, and we do not condone them in any way," the Guard said, adding that it "cannot regulate the speech of former members" of the organization."

Jesus Christ.  How about ending the self-righteous crap?  ... Finally doing something about sexual harassment, sexual assault, physical assault, and all the other crap going on in the military?

Here's the problem:

"Guillen, 20, disappeared at Fort Hood on April 22. Partial human remains found last week near the Leon River in Central Texas were confirmed to be those of Guillen, a family lawyer said Sunday. Private Guillen's family has been demanding answers since she disappeared. They have said Guillen told them she was sexually harassed. In June, officials at Fort Hood announced that they had appointed a team to investigate those accusations."

Here's the truth:

"Schoeller said in her statement released Sunday that she has seen the toll sexual harassment takes on individuals and entire military units. "The point I was making is that this is what women are facing in a culture of sexual harassment and misogyny," Schoeller said. "It's not easy to be a woman in the military. Not easy at all. There are some men who have adapted to the idea of working alongside women, but there are just as many who have not." Schoeller said that she has "seen many attempts to squash this harassment culture from the military," such as zero tolerance, reporting procedures, sensitivity training, discussions, focus groups and role playing. "Somehow there was always one more case. Now SPC Guillen was dead," Schoeller said. "And I knew why. Because the culture of sexual harassment was still alive and well, despite our best efforts."

Precisely, why there is urgent need for a totally independent federal agency to handle these complaints.  An agency with its own investigators, prosecutors, and judges.  Independent court system.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

More of the same old defense of the indefensible.  The Washington Post reports:

"Audio of the forceful push led by U.S. Park Police to sweep protesters out of Lafayette Square on June 1, moments before President Trump’s visit to St. John’s Episcopal Church, was not recorded by the Park Police radio communications system, the agency said Tuesday."

Why not?

"The sudden march into the group of protesters, featuring members of the Park Police, Secret Service, D.C. National Guard and Arlington County police, is now under investigation by Congress and the inspectors general of the Interior Department and Justice Department and the subject of civil lawsuits. The sweep along H Street caused an uproar because police used smoke and chemical irritants, along with officers on horseback, to clear out protesters well before a 7 p.m. curfew, with advance announcements that many said they did not hear. Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, which is investigating the June 1 incident, said Tuesday that “Trump administration officials ordered the attack on clergy, nonviolent protesters, and working members of the press. For the official audio record of that day to now turn up missing has every appearance of a coverup.”

Without question.

"Grijalva said his committee is hoping to hear from acting U.S. Park Police chief Gregory T. Monahan later this month. “The American people deserve firm, clear answers from the administration,” Grijalva said, “about who issued what orders that day, where those orders ultimately came from, and why these recordings are mysteriously unavailable.” When investigators review a police operation, they typically rely on audio and video recordings made by police to verify accounts made in statements or interviews. But the Park Police, along with nearly all federal uniformed police, have never worn body cameras. Officers and commanders said they expected that their comments and orders made during the operation would be captured electronically, to create a contemporaneous record of the event. But that didn’t happen."

Why not?  What were you hiding?

“At the conclusion of the demonstrations,” Park Police Lt. Jonathan Hofflinger said in response to an inquiry from The Washington Post, “we discovered that the radio recorder was not working and did not record any transmissions. However, written radio logs were generated as a redundant practice. This recorder issue has since been rectified.”

Think so?  Or, is this son of a bitch lying?

"Hofflinger did not respond to questions about how written radio logs were compiled, why the recorder didn’t work or how it has been rectified. Monahan did not respond to requests for comment. It was unclear whether the Park Police communication system has failed to record transmissions in other instances. “It’s very disappointing,” said Kenneth Spencer, chairman of the Park Police’s Fraternal Order of Police Labor Committee. “It’s frustrating, especially at the officer level, because a lot of information that would serve the perspective of the officers on what was actually taking place would have been recorded.”

It's absence could also protect officers who engaged in excessive force, and/or other criminal behavior.

"Monahan had been scheduled to testify before a House Natural Resources Committee hearing on the incident last week but declined to appear. A letter from an Interior Department official said Monahan could not attend the hearing because the Park Police was still “in its highest operational status” due to protests at parks in Washington."

Convenient, no?  Couldn't be lying, could he, to avoid incriminating himself and his fellow criminal jackbooted bastards in blue?

“These are things that are just inexcusable in 2020,” said Geoff Alpert, a criminologist at the University of South Carolina who has studied how police recall critical incidents in subsequent interviews. He and others said having an audio record of an incident is crucial. “It is the investigation,” Alpert said. “It’s all you’ve got. Memory and reasoning can be clouded. They can be manufactured. A recording of an action is far more preferred than trying to get someone to remember what they did and why.” Steve Souder, a widely respected public safety communications expert who oversaw 911 systems in Arlington, Montgomery and Fairfax counties, said of the Park Police failure, “I find it quite shocking. They want this stuff recorded. They have nothing to hide.”

That right?  LOL.

"Souder said modern dispatch technology has made it easy to record every transmission, by dispatchers, commanders and officers in the field, even on systems with multiple channels or talk groups. “In my mind, you should record everything,” Souder said. “You never know when you’re going to need it.” He said that “these recording systems are all digitized. They record everything.” Spencer said there is some video of the operation taken by authorities that has not been released."

Why not?  Where's the transparency?

"He said video of the “large chaotic event” would show provocative actions by the protesters, such as throwing large objects or shooting fireworks at the police, which protesters have largely denied."

Could also show out of control jackbooted bastards in blue violently attacking protesters to get their cookies off, abusing power.

"But even those cameras would capture only select areas of the protest, and not the full sweep of interactions being reported by officers over the radio. The incident, which started about 30 minutes before an announced curfew, sparked criticism because protesters were forced from the area amid smoke and chaos, and because the president showed up soon after for a photo op in front of the church."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Desperate change in tactics by the U.S. Attorney General to divert attention from the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  NPR reports:

"A surveillance camera is said to have recorded it all: a woman in a black t-shirt stepping out of a tan minivan; the lighting of a toilet-paper fuse, the arc of a beer bottle filled with fuel as it was thrown onto the dashboard of an empty police car. That act of vandalism, in the early hours of May 30, is why two Brooklyn lawyers are fighting federal explosives charges and could face as much as life in prison. They had been sitting in a New York jail until Tuesday night, after a government effort to keep them behind bars failed."

Imagine that.

"Federal prosecutors haven't accused Urooj Rahman, 31, or Colinford Mattis, 32, of harming anyone that night. But they have indirectly cast the two defendants as characters in the favored Trump administration narrative that suggests that last month's violent protests weren't just an eruption of anger from peaceful protesters, but rather the work of dedicated extremists."

... 'Can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit,' Mr. Attorney General?  Most protesters throughout our formerly great country were peaceful, you lying son of a bitch.  It was the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who elicited violence through their tactics, you clueless piece of crap.

"In a recent memo to U.S. Attorneys and department heads, Attorney General William Barr made clear how he expected the department to respond — in the same way it did to organized crime or terrorism "by disrupting their violent activities and ultimately dismantling their capability to threaten the rule of law." Urooj Rahman and Colinford Mattis don't claim to be members of any group; their friends say they aren't people who espouse radical beliefs, but against this backdrop, they have been treated as if they are."

Trump and his henchmen remain that insanely desperate vis a vis exponentially increasing criticism of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue and their defenders that they're willing to take a raucous hard dump on the law and U.S. Constitution in the process?  Do whatever it takes to keep this abysmal failure, a racist fascist fuhrer, in the Oval Office?

... Not to neglect to mention the dramatically dropping approval statistics of our failed fuhrer, the hopelessly, inept Trump nazi.  Time to wake up, Mr. Attorney General.  Before too late.  ...  Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  Too deaf to hear?  The public has had enough.  Why is out of control law enforcement throughout our formerly great country doing all it can to spark a revolution?

"This is not a case about youthful indiscretion or a crime of passion," a government lawyer argued at a recent hearing in the case. "It is about a calculated, dangerous crime committed by adults who risked the lives of innocent civilians and first responders, who had more Molotov cocktails ready... These were lawyers in particular who had every reason to know what they were doing was wrong and knew the consequences. Committing this crime required a fundamental change in mindset for them."

That right, Counselor?  Or, is it bullshit not so cleverly designed to influence the jury pool since you may have no substantive or legitimate case at all?  Be interesting to see.  More to the point, how many other cases do you have where you are similarly bastardizing the law and U.S. Constitution to desperately keep your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, in office?  If that's indeed true, sir, what does that make you?  A Hitler 'wannabe's' second in command?

"Barr has said publicly that the FBI is building cases against "a witches' brew" of extremist groups who he claims hijacked the protests. "When we arrest people and charge them, at this stage anyway, we don't charge them with being a member of Antifa," Barr told NPR's Steve Inskeep in an interview on June 25. "We charge them for throwing a Molotov cocktail, or we charge them for possession of a gun, or gasoline, or things to make bombs with. Those are the kinds of charges that are filed."

That right?  Where are public records of all such examples filed to date, Mr. Attorney General?  Every damned one of them?  Release this information so these cases can be independently reviewed.  Why not?  Why no transparency?  Will you ram these cases through the 'justice' system with no review to determine whether or not you're, indeed, abusing power to protect your fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

"By most accounts Rahman and Mattis were idealistic attorneys hoping to change the world. Government attorneys are trying to make the case that all changed on May 29th when the pair drove to a convenience store to buy beer bottles, gasoline, and toilet paper and built homemade explosives they intended to use. In doing that, they became part of Barr's witches' brew. "These defendants allegedly hurled Molotov cocktails at NYPD vehicles without regard for the potentially deadly consequences," the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District, Richard Donoghue, said in a statement when he announced the charges against the two attorneys. "Such criminal acts should never be confused with legitimate protest. Those who carry out attacks on NYPD officers or vehicles are criminals, and they will be treated as such." The police say it is an open-and-shut case — a camera outside the 88th Precinct caught the entire episode; and, if that's true, it is compelling evidence against Rahman and Mattis. What it doesn't explain, though, is why their case has been treated so differently — so much more harshly — than other Molotov cocktail protester cases around the country."

Good question.  Certainly, a troubling question in view of the fact the Trump nazi and his henchmen are doing all they can to obliterate all transparency in this regime.  Indeed, there is no greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than the current occupant of the Oval Office.  Finally after three and a half years, the public is beginning to understand this.  Precisely, why Trump and his henchmen are figuratively shitting in their pants, becoming far more repressive, deliberately, concertedly ignorant of all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.  Where is the concern of the Barr nazi and his fuhrer, the Trump nazi for all the innocent unarmed civilians being murdered by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue?

"Prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Eastern District of New York decided to charge Rahman and Mattis federally and the charges read like a domestic terrorism case: arson, conspiracy, use of destructive device, civil disorder, making or possessing a destructive device, and the use of explosives during a crime of violence. That last charge alone – something called 924(c) in the criminal code – carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 30 years in prison."

While criminal jackbooted bastards in blue continue to murder innocent, unarmed civilians with near impunity.  Where's the justice in Nazi America, Mr. Barr?  Trump and his henchmen are certainly growing increasingly uncomfortable as his approval statistics continue to drop, and his base begins to desert him at his rallies.  Could that be the reason for all the above and what is yet to come in this article?

"NPR reviewed forty-seven recent federal cases filed against other protesters who threw Molotov cocktails or started fires damaging police property nationwide, and this case was the only instance in which 924(c) appears. (Prosecutors charged another woman, Samantha Shader, alongside Mattis and Rahman. Shader threw a Molotov cocktail at a police van filled with officers in another part of Brooklyn that night. It is unclear why they were charged together.) Most protesters arrested for throwing Molotov cocktails are charged under 844(i) – malicious damage or destruction by fire or explosive. When asked why the Rahman-Mattis case was charged differently, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's office declined to comment. But two federal prosecutors who worked in the Eastern District and know the U.S. Attorney there well say the fact that the two were lawyers and knew better certainly played a role in the decision to level so many serious charges. Defense Attorney Paul Shechtman, who represents Urooj Rahman, said he thinks federal prosecutors brought the case because they thought the local prosecutor in Brooklyn would be too lenient. "Ever since it has been taken federally, it has been treated with a seriousness, a harshness unlike any I have ever seen," Shechtman said."

Called piling on.  Usually, indicates the government has little to nothing and is desperately attempting to see what sticks.  The fact these attorneys are from immigrant families apparently has conveniently struck a chord with the national socialist, fascist, Trump nazi, Barr, and their henchmen:

"Before all this happened, Rahman and Mattis were kids from immigrant families who were making good. Rahman, born to a Pakistani working-class family, grew up in Brooklyn and had gone to Fordham Law School. She had worked as a human rights lawyer overseas and was working for Bronx Legal Services helping tenants in Housing Court. "She's not a radical," her friend Salmah Rizvi said. "She believes in our system. She's not an anarchist or somebody on the fringe who is disconnected. No, she is quite the opposite." Mattis grew up in East New York, the son of Jamaican immigrants. With the help of a program called Prep for Prep, which places high-achieving minority students in private high schools, he attended St. Andrew's, a boarding school in Delaware. He went on to graduate from Princeton University and NYU School of Law. Until a few months ago, he was an associate at Pryor Cashman, a mid-level law firm in Manhattan. The company confirmed he had recently been laid off in COVID-19-related cutbacks. "His mother had been fostering three children and when she died last year, Mattis stepped in. They're all under the age of 11," said Carolyn Chica, a mentor and advisor for Prep for Prep with Mattis. "And he's a great dad." So Rahman was a public interest lawyer. Mattis was working at a corporate firm trying to raise three kids. Chica said no one would have imagined it would all come to this. "It's just surreal," she said."

Get this:

"The scene outside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn on May 29th was raucous and chaotic. Thousands of chanting protesters filled the plaza in front of the arena; police in riot gear drew up next to them. Demonstrators threw water bottles and bricks at the cops on the line and when the police moved in to arrest them it was a clash that included swinging batons and pepper spray. Brooklyn Assemblywoman Diana Richardson was in the crowd and expressed anger at the police response. "The NYPD is being excessively aggressive with this crowd and it is inappropriate," she told a reporter there. "I am an elected official and they just pepper-sprayed me." Urooj Rahman was there too. A local journalist interviewed her just outside the Barclays Center shortly after the police began their arrests. She wore a keffiyeh that she kept adjusting to cover her face. "I think this protest is a long time coming. I think the mayor should have held the police department back, like the mayor in Minneapolis did," she began. "This s*** won't ever stop unless we f***ing take it all down and that's why the anger is being expressed in this way." By then, protesters had started torching police cars, putting up barricades and mixing it up with authorities."

Insurrection.  By protesters tired of the oppression.  Had to have scared the living shit out of Trump, Barr, and their henchmen.  Scared the living shit out of all of us, as well, in our formerly great country who don't want revolution, just adherence to the United States Constitution, rule of law, fairness in the system, and an end to corporate control, ownership of all branches and levels of government.  Sadly, tragically, all bought and paid for.

"By night's end, hundreds of protesters were arrested and some 400 NYPD officers were injured, some seriously. A handful of the cops are facing disciplinary action for their behavior. One waved a gun at crowds gathered in Greenwich Village, another pushed a protester to the pavement causing a concussion. The short excerpt from Rahman's interview was taken in the midst of all that. It first aired on a YouTube channel from a news outlet called LoudLabs, and eventually ricocheted around the Internet after the New York Daily News posted it on its website alongside with a mugshot of Rahman wearing a black t-shirt that read "The Struggle Continues." It went viral because not long after that interview, Rahman climbed into a van with Mattis, drove to the nearby neighborhood of Fort Greene and, police say, threw that Molotov cocktail into an abandoned, vandalized police car and tried to get away. No one was around, according to defense attorney Shechtman, except for two police officers across the street. "They gave chase and Urooj and Colin were arrested," he said."

Let's see the evidence, Mr. Attorney General.  All of it.  Where's the transparency?

"NPR called more than two dozen federal law enforcement officials across the country to discuss their investigations into the recent violence. Without discussing individual cases in detail, they said that the Justice Department was making protester cases a priority and in the absence of finding cases linked to extremists groups, they've been told to pursue any protester cases that they do have aggressively — like the one in Brooklyn. Alleged crimes like arson or vandalism are usually considered local crimes, charged and tried in local courts. But Rahman and Mattis are facing charges in federal court. To make that possible, prosecutors have to show a federal interest. It has to affect, for example, interstate commerce in some way. The way prosecutors in the Eastern District have done that in this case is by using the Commerce Clause."

Why are they going about it in such fashion?  Is it because there are so few examples of this and they're desperate to make an example vis a vis this particular case?

"The theory in this case is because the New York Police Department receives federal funding, that's a federal interest," said Rachel Barkow, vice dean at NYU School of Law. Mattis was in her criminal law class in 2014, though Barkow says she doesn't remember him and had to look him up in records to be sure. "They are also arguing that the police car itself travels in the country, so that's the other hook," she said. "I believe it would pass constitutional muster. But if we're asking, as a matter of discretion, is this the kind of thing that should be a federal crime? You know, no. This could have easily been handled by local prosecutors and it's a bit odd that it's been charged federally."

Could it be growing desperation of Trump, Barr, and their henchmen as the political walls close in on our fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

Gets more interesting, more convoluted:

"The aggressiveness of prosecutors in the Rahman-Mattis case goes beyond just the charges. The government is also fighting their pre-trial release on bail. Most defendants who have no criminal history and can show strong ties to the community can generally work out a bail package with a judge. And initially, a Magistrate judge said both Rahman and Mattis could be released to home confinement, if they agreed to be electronically monitored and posted a $250,000 bond. Rahman and Mattis were released and were home for five days before they were rearrested."

Fascinating, isn't it?

Gets worse:

"The prosecution had appealed their bail package. A District judge reviewed the case a second time and also agreed the pair weren't a danger to the community and could be released. Prosecutors appealed again, this time to a three-judge panel in the U.S. District Court of Appeals. The crime was so serious, they argued, no bail package could be stringent enough. However Rahman and Mattis might have conducted themselves before May 29th didn't matter, they said, because they had all the hallmarks of secure and stable life and yet still committed this crime. Fifty-six former federal prosecutors were so alarmed by the government's argument, they filed a friend of the court brief. Brian Jacobs, a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York was one of them. "Under the Bail Reform Act it is entirely appropriate for district judges and magistrate judges to consider a defendant's history and characteristics in weighing whether there's a bail package that could assure the safety of the community," Jacobs said. "The position the government takes [in this case] is that if you have an alleged offense that reaches a certain level of seriousness, when you have a certain quantum of proof on the government's side, the defendant's history and characteristics no longer matter." A three judge panel heard the appeal last week and the government argued that the two judges who granted bail didn't properly weigh the presumption that this kind of crime posed a danger of repeat behavior. Shechtman, for his part, said this was all about one night in which two good people lost their way."

If indeed all went down that night exactly as claimed by the government.  At this point, we don't know that.  Our government has gotten too good at lying, both in public and under oath.  Can no longer be trusted to tell the truth.

"Two of the three judges decided Tuesday night to reaffirm the decision of the lower court and ordered that Rahman and Mattis be released on bail. The two walked out of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn a few hours later, ending weeks of solitary confinement at the facility. They had been isolated in a bid to prevent them from catching COVID-19. It is unclear whether the government will appeal their bail again. Both Rahman and Mattis have pleaded not guilty to all charges and are due in court again in mid-July."

Needless to say, this case will be carefully monitored.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Trump, the racist, exposes himself for whom and what he is.  NBC News reports:

"President Donald Trump on Monday took aim at NASCAR's Darrell "Bubba" Wallace, a prominent Black driver, falsely claiming on Twitter the sport's recent anti-racist stance lowered its television ratings. "Has @BubbaWallace apologized to all of those great NASCAR drivers & officials who came to his aid, stood by his side, & were willing to sacrifice everything for him, only to find out that the whole thing was just another HOAX?" Trump tweeted. "That & Flag decision has caused lowest ratings EVER!" The president's tweet comes as he's made his views on race central to his re-election campaign following protests and a growing national discussion on race after George Floyd's death in police custody. NASCAR drivers have rallied to support Wallace. NASCAR Cup Series driver Tyler Reddick tweeted in response to Trump, "We don’t need an apology." "We did what was right and we will do just fine without your support," he continued. The tweet was later deleted. Courtney Weber, a spokesperson for Richard Petty Motorsports and Wallace, said the team is aware of Trump's tweet. "Wallace has extensively exhausted the topic via a multitude of interviews in recent weeks. It is clear there is nothing more to say," Weber said.

"Speaking with Fox News Radio, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. and a prominent Trump ally, said he didn't think Wallace "has anything to apologize for." "You saw the best in NASCAR," he said. "When there was a chance that it was a threat against Bubba Wallace, they all rallied to Bubba's side. So I would be looking to celebrate that kind of attitude more than being worried about it being a hoax." Since NASCAR announced a ban on the Confederate flag last month, the sport has seen a boost in television ratings. Overnight ratings following the sport's June race at Martinsville, which immediately followed the banning announcement, were up 104 percent over a comparable 2019 race."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

The following is appalling, but true.  Mirrors the history of Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini.  NPR reports:

"When a young Southern Baptist pastor named Alan Cross arrived in Montgomery, Ala., in January 2000, he knew it was where the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. had his first church and where Rosa Parks helped launched the famous bus boycott, but he didn't know some other details of the city's role in civil rights history. The more he learned, the more troubled he became by one event in particular: the savage attack in May 1961 on a busload of Black and white Freedom Riders who had traveled defiantly together to Montgomery in a challenge to segregation. Over the next 15 years, Cross, who is white, would regularly take people to the old Greyhound depot in Montgomery to highlight what happened that spring day."

Extremely important, history not be forgotten.

"They pull in right here, on the side," Cross said, standing in front of the depot. "And it was quiet when they got here. But then once they start getting off the bus, around 500 people come out – men, women and children. Men were holding the Freedom Riders back, and the women were hitting them with their purses and holding their children up to claw their faces." Some of the men carried lead pipes and baseball bats. Two of the Freedom Riders, the civil rights activist John Lewis and a white ally, James Zwerg, were beaten unconscious."

Nazi America.  Wake up.

"Though he had grown up in Mississippi and was familiar with the history of racial conflict in the South, Cross was horrified by the story of the 1961 attack on the Freedom Riders. Montgomery was known as a city of churches. Fresh out of seminary, Cross had come there to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ."

Sadly, the Nazi Right in our formerly great country has gutlessly bastardized the teachings of Christianity's Head Honcho.  As did Hitler and Mussolini.

"Why didn't white Christians show up?" he recalled wondering. To his dismay, Cross learned that many of the people in the white mob were regular churchgoers. In the years that followed, he made it part of his ministry to educate his fellow Christians about the attack and prompt them to reflect on its meaning."

Uncommon Valor.  Could have gotten himself killed by these racist, fascist, jackbooted, satanic bastards who falsely call themselves 'Christians'.

"You think about the South being Christian, but this wasn't Christianity," Cross said. "So what happened here in the white church? How did we get to that point?" It's a question he explored in his 2014 book, When Heaven and Earth Collide: Racism, Southern Evangelicals, and the Better Way of Jesus. The answer to the question lies partly in U.S. history, beginning in the days of slavery and Jim Crow segregation, but not ending there. Elements of racist ideology have long been present in white Christianity in the United States. Less than three weeks after the 1961 attack on the Freedom Riders, Montgomery's most prominent pastor, Henry Lyon Jr., gave a fiery speech before the local white Citizens' Council, denouncing the civil rights protesters and the cause for which they were beaten — from a "Christian" perspective. "Ladies and gentlemen, for 15 years I have had the privilege of being pastor of a white Baptist church in this city," Lyon said. "If we stand 100 years from now, it will still be a white church. I am a believer in a separation of the races, and I am none the less a Christian." The crowd applauded."

Think the Head Honcho was applauding?  Wouldn't recognize the religion He founded.

Gets worse.  Get this:

"If you want to get in a fight with the one that started separation of the races, then you come face to face with your God," he declared. "The difference in color, the difference in our body, our minds, our life, our mission upon the face of this earth, is God given." Lyon saw himself as a devout Bible believer, and he was far from an extremist in the Southern Baptist world. A former president of the Alabama Baptist Convention, his Montgomery church had more than 3,000 members. How respected people of God could openly promote racist views was a question that would trouble many Southerners in the years that followed."

For damned good reason.

"Among them was a young woman growing up in East Texas in the 1970s, Carolyn Renée Dupont. The girl's grandmother took her regularly to church, made her listen to sermons on the radio and gave her a quarter for every Bible verse she memorized. But the grandmother believed just as deeply in the superiority of the white race. "I asked her about that once," Dupont recalled, "and she said, 'I just don't believe Blacks should be treated the same as whites.' " Dupont, now a historian at Eastern Kentucky University, said the experience with her grandmother spurred her to focus her research on the racial views of Southern white evangelicals. "I wanted to understand what seemed like a central riddle about the South," she said. "The part of the country that was the most fervent about religious faith was also the one that practiced white supremacy most enthusiastically." It was the same question that bothered Cross as a young pastor in Montgomery. At an earlier point in American history, some Christian theologians went so far as to argue that the enslavement of human beings was justifiable from a biblical point of view. James Henley Thornwell, a Harvard-educated scholar who committed huge sections of the Bible to memory, regularly defended slavery and promoted white supremacy from his pulpit at the First Presbyterian Church in Columbia, S.C., where he was the senior pastor in the years leading up to the Civil War. "As long as that [African] race, in its comparative degradation, co-exists side by side with the white," Thornwell declared in a famous 1861 sermon, "bondage is its normal condition." Thornwell was a slave owner, and in his public pronouncements he told fellow Christians they need not feel guilty about enslaving other human beings. "The relation of master and slave stands on the same foot with the other relations of life," Thornwell insisted. "In itself, it is not inconsistent with the will of God. It is not sinful." The Christian Scriptures, Thornwell said, "not only fail to condemn; they as distinctly sanction slavery as any other social condition of man."

Report goes on and on. Wake up.  Before too late.  ... Hear the rumble?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

U.S. Senator stands up.  Stands tall.  CBS News reports:

"Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth, a combat veteran from Illinois, announced Thursday she plans to block more than 1,100 military promotions until she receives confirmation from Defense Secretary Mark Esper that he will not block an expected promotion for the Army officer who was a key witness in President Trump's impeachment proceedings. Duckworth said she is seeking written confirmation from Esper that "he did not, or will not, block the expected and deserved promotion" of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, who testified before House investigators during their impeachment inquiry into Mr. Trump's dealings with Ukraine, to full colonel. Duckworth's blanket hold applies to 1,123 senior military promotions above the rank of colonel."

For damned good reason:

"Our military is supposed to be the ultimate meritocracy," Duckworth, who served in the Reserved Forces for more than two decades, said in a statement. "It is simply unprecedented and wrong for any commander in chief to meddle in routine military matters at all, whether or not he has a personal vendetta against a soldier who did his patriotic duty and told the truth — a soldier who has been recommended for promotion by his superiors because of his performance."

Goddamned right.

"Duckworth said she will lift her hold on Senate approval of the promotions once Esper confirms whether Vindman was among those selected for promotion from lieutenant colonel to colonel, whether the Army included Vindman on its list of promotions to colonel sent to the Pentagon, and whether Esper or another Defense Department official will or has submitted a list of Army promotions to colonel to the White House for approval that includes Vindman."

Vindman stood tall.  Put his career on the line testifying against his fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

Readers will recall the following was covered in this publication and elsewhere:

"As an expert on Ukraine on the National Security Council, Vindman participated in the July 2019 phone call between Mr. Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, during which the president asked his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden. Vindman raised concerns with the call to superiors at the National Security Council. During testimony before the House Intelligence Committee, Vindman said Mr. Trump's suggestion to Zelensky was "inappropriate." The call was the focal point of House Democrats' impeachment inquiry into Mr. Trump, who was impeached by the House on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress in December. The president was acquitted of both charges by the Senate in February."

Gutless Republican nazis supported their fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  Principle?  What's that?  Republican national socialists have no clue.

Atrocious behavior by the Trump nazi and his henchmen:

"Days after Mr. Trump's acquittal, Vindman was removed from his post at the National Security Council and escorted out of the White House. Mr. Trump has attacked Vindman, claiming he was "very insubordinate" and "was given a horrendous report by his superior," and his criticisms of the Army officer furthered concerns that the president was retaliating against those who testified against him during impeachment proceedings."

That's exactly what happened.  Expect better of a nazi dictator?

"The Washington Post reported last month that numerous government officials were concerned Vindman's promotion was in jeopardy due to his participation in the impeachment inquiry. Promotions are typically approved by the Army and Pentagon before they are submitted to the White House and Senate for confirmation."

Gets worse.  Get this.  NBC News reports:

"Joe Biden criticized President Donald Trump on Tuesday for attacking Sen. Tammy Duckworth — a Purple Heart recipient who lost both of her legs while serving in Iraq — as unpatriotic. Speaking at a virtual fundraiser that Duckworth also attended, Biden said that the comments were "disgusting, sickening" and demonstrated the "depravity of what’s going on in the White House right now." "While in fact (Trump is) coddling Putin — Putin carries him around like a puppy in one of those little puppy cages. While that's going on he attacks, he attacks the senator from Illinois who is a literal hero, combat veteran, lost both legs fighting for her country, and he says she’s not a patriot. Folks we cannot let this stand," Biden said."

Other than empty rhetoric, Mr. Biden, what are you and gutless Democrats going to do about it right now, sir?

"The attacks against Duckworth began on Sunday after the Democratic lawmaker from Illinois was asked in an interview on CNN whether statues of George Washington should be removed because he owned slaves. Duckworth said she thought there should be a "national dialogue" on the issue. Duckworth's response drew criticism from Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who went on his show and called her "a deeply silly and unimpressive person" and said that Duckworth and other Democratic leaders "actually hate America." "Can you really lead a country that you hate?" Carlson continued, noting that Duckworth was being considered as a possible Biden running mate."

Jesus Christ.  Wake up, Tucker.  This woman nearly lost her life fighting for achingly clueless assholes like you, sir.

"Trump shared a video on Twitter of Carlson's segment attacking Duckworth and his campaign issued a statement saying that "Duckworth is now using her military service to deflect from her support for the left-wing campaign to villainize America's founding." Duckworth shot back at Carlson after his segment aired, tweeting "Does @TuckerCarlson want to walk a mile in my legs and then tell me whether or not I love America?" Duckworth lost both of her legs during the Iraq War in 2004 when a rocket-propelled grenade hit the helicopter she was co-piloting."

Ms. Duckworth is an example of Uncommon Valor.  Unlike our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, his henchmen, and all who support this traitorous, treasonous, fascist dictator in the Oval Office.

"During the virtual fundraiser Tuesday evening, Duckworth also spoke to attendees, criticizing Trump. "Instead of trying to bring our country back together, he spent his time defending dead Confederates who took up arms against this nation and engaging in xenophobic and racist language geared towards many Americans, including the Asian American and Pacific Islander community," Duckworth said."

Treasonous, treacherous, traitorous behavior courtesy of our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

Think it can't get worse? Wake up.  It does.  The Associated Press reports:

"Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the national security aide who played a central role in President Donald Trump’s impeachment case, announced his retirement from the Army Wednesday in a scathing statement that accused the president of running a “campaign of bullying, intimidation, and retaliation.” The statement from attorney David Pressman said Vindman was leaving the Army after more than 21 years after it had been made clear “that his future within the institution he has dutifully served will forever be limited.”

Outrageous injustice perpetrated against a soldier who stood tall.  Risked it all to tell the truth under oath against our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

“Through a campaign of bullying, intimidation, and retaliation, the President of the United States attempted to force LTC Vindman to choose: Between adhering to the law or pleasing a President. Between honoring his oath or protecting his career. Between protecting his promotion or the promotion of his fellow soldiers,” read the statement, first obtained by CNN. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trump in February ousted Vindman from his White House job just two days after his acquittal by the Senate. Vindman’s lawyer said his client had been told to leave in retaliation for “telling the truth.” Vindman had testified that he didn’t think it was “proper” for Trump to “demand that a foreign government investigate” former Vice President Joe Biden and his son’s dealings with the energy company Burisma in Ukraine. In gripping testimony, Vindman also spoke of his family’s story and his father bringing them to the U.S. when he was a young child. “Dad, my sitting here today in the U.S. Capitol, talking to our elected officials, is proof that you made the right decision 40 years ago to leave the Soviet Union and come here to United States of America in search of a better life for our family,” he testified. “Do not worry, I will be fine for telling the truth.”

Uncommon Valor.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

The U.S. Supreme Court protects and coddles its fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court is denying Congress access to secret grand jury testimony from special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation through the November election."

Why?  The public is entitled to this information prior to the election.  Needs to know whether or not Trump sought and/or received assistance from the Russians.  What better source of information than disclosed secret grand jury testimony relevant to the issue?  Why shouldn't Congress be able to exercise its checks and balances authority to investigate the president?  Then, disclose it to the public it allegedly, supposedly serves.  Certainly, not itself.  LOL.  Without question, grand juries are no more than a rubber stamp for prosecutors.  Great truth to the joke a prosecutor can indeed get a grand jury to indict a rock.  Readers are reminded the grand jury considering the Llano County Jail rape fiasco decades ago was a Who's Who of the movers and shakers of our hell hole County.  LOL.

"The justices agreed on Thursday to hear the Trump administration’s appeal of a lower court order for the material to be turned over to the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives. The high court’s action will keep the documents out of congressional hands at least until the case is resolved, which is not likely to happen before 2021. Arguments themselves might not even take place before Americans decide whether to give President Donald Trump a second term."

Most convenient for the Trump nazi and his henchmen:

"The delay is a victory for Trump, who also is mounting a Supreme Court fight against congressional efforts to obtain his banking and other financial records. Those cases are expected to be decided in the coming days or weeks."

If there's nothing to hide, why not disclose all of it?  Forget?  The public has the right to know whether or not the president is a crook.

"The House wants previously undisclosed details from the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, called the court’s decision disappointing. “Unfortunately, President Trump and Attorney General (William) Barr are continuing to try to run out the clock on any and all accountability. While I am confident their legal arguments will fail, it is now all the more important for the American people to hold the President accountable at the ballot box in November,” Nadler said in a statement. The federal appeals court in Washington ruled in March that the documents should be turned over because the House Judiciary Committee’s need for the material in its investigation of Trump outweighed the Justice Department’s interests in keeping the testimony secret. Mueller’s 448-page report, issued in April 2019, “stopped short” of reaching conclusions about Trump’s conduct, including whether he obstructed justice, to avoid stepping on the House’s impeachment power, the appeals court said. The committee was able to persuasively argue that it needed access to the underlying grand jury material to make its own determinations about the president’s actions, the court said.

"Democrats have suggested that the grand jury materials could reveal new misconduct that could potentially form the basis of new articles of impeachment, but such a course would have been unlikely so close to the 2020 election even if the court had allowed the material to be turned over immediately. The House impeached Trump for his efforts to get Ukraine to announce an investigation of Biden, but the Republican-controlled Senate acquitted the president in February. It is also unclear how many new, or incendiary, revelations might be contained in the grand jury transcripts. Mueller’s report, though redacted in parts, revealed more than a year ago significant information about the president’s efforts to choke off the investigation and raised substantial questions about whether he had committed obstruction of justice. Besides, many of the witnesses closest to Trump appeared voluntarily before Mueller’s team of prosecutors, and the Justice Department in recent months has released written — albeit redacted — summaries of those interviews. That means the public already has insight into the accounts of key Trump associates, including son-in-law Jared Kushner and advisers like Steve Bannon and Hope Hicks."

Redacted 'summaries' are worthless.  Cannot be trusted.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

No equal pay for equal work.  Surprised?  Why?  Forget?  We're living in Nazi America.  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court is leaving in place a decision that employers can’t use past salary history to justify a pay disparity between male and female employees."

Convenient, no?

"The court on Thursday declined to take up a case from the California-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Judges there said the federal Equal Pay Act, which generally requires men and women to be paid equally for the same work, doesn’t allow past salary history to be used as justification for a pay disparity. As is usual, the justices did not explain their decision declining to take the case."

Expect better of a nazi Court?  Why?

"The case the justices turned away involved a Fresno County public school math consultant who sued after learning she made less than male colleagues. Aileen Rizo challenged the school system’s policy that based all new employees’ salaries on their prior salaries. The school system argued the policy didn’t favor men or women. California law has since changed so that employers can’t use a person’s salary history in determining their starting salary. A total of 18 states bar employers from using prior salary information to set a new salary. The case had been to the Supreme Court once before. The justices sent it back to the Ninth Circuit last year for review because a decision in the case had been written by Appeals Court Judge Stephen Reinhardt but was released 11 days after his death on March 29, 2018. The justices said in an unsigned opinion at the time that judges can’t rule from beyond the grave. “Federal judges are appointed for life, not for eternity,” the opinion said. After a new judge was appointed to replace Reinhardt, the Ninth Circuit issued a new majority opinion that reached the same result."

All the more reason the Supreme Court should have heard the case.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Church-state separation as dictated by the First Amendment Establishment Clause remains in dire jeopardy courtesy of a nazi U.S. Supreme Court.  United Press International reports:

"The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that private employers with moral or religious objections can legally refuse to provide health coverage for birth control as mandated by the Affordable Care Act. In a 7-2 decision, the court agreed with an argument by the Trump administration that it has authority to expand religious exemptions under the law. The court's five conservative justices, led by Clarence Thomas, were joined by liberals Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan in the decision, which reversed a lower court decision that froze the administration's policy with a restraining order. The high court agreed to hear the case after petitions by the administration and the Little Sisters of the Poor, a Roman Catholic religious order for women."

Outrageously condescending, patronizing nazi bullshit courtesy of one of the most fascist members of this nazi Court:

"For the past seven years, [the Little Sisters of the Poor] -- like many other religious objectors who have participated in the litigation and rulemakings leading up to today's decision -- have had to fight for the ability to continue in their noble work without violating their sincerely held religious beliefs," Thomas wrote for the majority. "After two decisions from this court and multiple failed regulatory attempts, the federal government has arrived at a solution that exempts the Little Sisters from the source of their complicity-based concerns -- the administratively imposed contraceptive mandate."

What about the views and rights of the people the Sisters serve, Mr. Justice?  Who the hell are you, your fellow nazis on the Court, and the Sisters themselves to collectively impose your outrageously perverse ideological and religious views on others?

"Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor, two of the three women on the high court bench, voted against the expansion. "Today, for the first time, the court casts totally aside countervailing rights and interests in its zeal to secure religious rights to the nth degree," they wrote in dissent. "This court leaves women workers to fend for themselves, to seek contraceptive coverage from sources other than their employer's insurer, and ... to pay for contraceptive services out of their own pockets. The Constitution's Free Exercise Clause, all agree, does not call for that imbalanced result."

... Hear the rumble?  An wanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms as our formerly great country continues to embrace the ideology of nazism.

The Washington Post reports:

"Wednesday’s decision greatly expands the ability of employers to claim the exemption, and the government estimates that it could mean that 70,000 to 126,000 women could lose access to cost-free birth control.

"Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg issued a blistering dissent, in which she said her colleagues had gone too far to appease religious conservatives. Until now, “this court has taken a balanced approach, one that does not allow the religious beliefs of some to overwhelm the rights and interests of others who do not share those beliefs,” Ginsburg wrote in a brief joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor. “Today, for the first time, the court casts totally aside countervailing rights and interests in its zeal to secure religious rights to the nth degree.” Reproductive rights groups were alarmed by the decision. NARAL Pro-Choice America President Ilyse Hogue released the following statement: “The Supreme Court’s decision to allow the Trump administration to put control over people’s birth control in the hands of the whims of their bosses and employers is deplorable. This decision just further exposes that ultimately, the Radical Right is really about controlling women and our lives with no eye towards equality or public health and well being.” Religious groups said the legal battles should stop."

Won't happen.  This ruling ensures the opposite.

Equally alarming?  Get this.  The Washington Post reports:

"The Supreme Court on Wednesday said two parochial school teachers could not contest their firings in federal court because of the constitutional protection allowing religious organizations to choose who teaches the faith. The 7 to 2 decision affirms the “ministerial exception” that protects religious organizations from some lawsuits invoking federal anti-discrimination laws. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented."

For damned good reason.  Do the nazis on this Court truly believe employees who choose to work for a religious organization forfeit all civil and constitutional rights and liberties?

"Judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco had said two teachers could proceed with their lawsuits against Catholic schools in California. One teacher alleged age discrimination, and another, now deceased and represented by her husband, said she was fired after informing the school that she had breast cancer. “The religious education and formation of students is the very reason for the existence of most private religious schools, and therefore the selection and supervision of the teachers upon whom the schools rely to do this work lie at the core of their mission,” Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote for the majority."

Raw nazism.  Gets worse.  Get this:

“Judicial review of the way in which religious schools discharge those responsibilities would undermine the independence of religious institutions in a way that the First Amendment does not tolerate.”

So, according to the ideology and religious beliefs of the Alito nazi, anyone who chooses to work for a religious organization in effect forfeits all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.

Indeed, a sad, dark day in Nazi America.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Legacy of the Trump nazi.  NPR reports:

"Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and the GOP majority have confirmed 200 judicial nominees by President Trump. It's a record that will affect U.S. law for decades. With a boost from the Republican-led Senate, President Trump has now confirmed 200 federal judges. Each one has a life term, representing a legacy that could extend for a generation."

A national socialist, fascist, nazi legacy.

"The president often trumpets the achievement in speeches and on Twitter. But the credit belongs as much to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who took a victory lap last week. "When we depart this chamber today, there will not be a single circuit court vacancy for the first time in at least 40 years," said McConnell, who's been advancing the judicial nominees with single-minded focus. "Filling all of these circuit seats is an unmitigated success, no downside to that," said Severino, who leads the Judicial Crisis Network, a group that pushes for confirmation of Trump judges. "Let's, as leader McConnell has said, 'Leave no vacancy behind.' "

No downside?  Future generations will have to deal with the nazi legacy represented by these appointments.  A legacy that might wind up in an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution.

"She pointed to Trump's record in appointing judges to the federal appeals court, one step below the Supreme Court. Over eight years, President Barack Obama confirmed 55 appellate picks. Trump already has installed 53 in just four years. Democrats said there's a reason for that startling number — Republican stonewalling of the previous president. "McConnell confirmed the fewest judges since President Truman during Obama's last two years in office," said Christopher Kang, who vetted judicial nominees in the Obama White House. "So the reason President Trump had 200 judgeships to fill in the first place is because McConnell obstructed." Obama made the nominations, but McConnell kept them from being confirmed to wait for a Republican — in Trump — whose campaign the Senate majority leader then carried out with zeal, Kang said.

"Even if Donald Trump is gone from office in January, these judges are going to be ruling for decades to come," Kang said. And, he added, they'll be ruling in cases that matter: abortion access, climate change, voting rights and more."

... Hear the rumble?

"For some civil rights advocates, something else stands out about the Trump judge picks: diversity. "They are largely white and male," said Vanita Gupta, who runs the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. "It is an astonishing lack of representation."

Expect better of a racist nazi?

"By her count, nearly 7 in 10 of the Trump judges are white men. Just 28 of the 200 are people of color. And, she said, there's only one Latina appeals court judge, and no Black appellate judges. "You end up with a judiciary that is really out of step with where the country is as a whole because it takes a fair amount of work actually to end up with those statistics," Gupta said."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Nothing quite like hypocrisy from the Nazi Right, is there?  The Washington Post reports:

"Conservative members of Congress and advocacy groups that ardently criticize excessive government spending were among those accepting small-business pandemic relief funds from the treasury this year, according to data released Monday. Americans for Tax Reform Foundation, led by firebrand anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist, took a loan between $150,000 and $350,000 from the Paycheck Protection Program. The Ayn Rand Institute and Citizens against Government Waste likewise accepted loans funded by the program.

"The Ayn Rand organization, named for the mid-20th century author who influenced libertarian and conservative thought, said that it chose to take government funds unapologetically. “For advocates of freedom, individual rights, and limited government to turn down these relief funds means choosing to play only the victim’s role in the government’s bizarre game of ‘loot and be looted.”’ The Americans for Tax Reform Foundation is one of two related tax reform groups led by Norquist, who famously said: “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”

Report goes on and on.  Outrageously hypocritical bullshit defending the indefensible.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Think Trump's playing with a full deck?  CBS News reports:

"As coronavirus infections continue to spike in more than half of the states, President Trump said he believes the country is "in a good place" and will be in "very good shape" in the next few weeks, despite a warning from the nation's top infectious disease expert that the U.S. must confront the continuing pandemic immediately. In an interview with Greta Van Susteren, chief national political analyst for Gray Television, set to air Sunday, Mr. Trump said he disagrees with an assessment from Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, that the U.S. is still "knee deep" in the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic and must confront the "serious situation" immediately. "I think we are in a good place," Mr. Trump told Van Susteren. "I disagree with him. You know, Dr. Fauci said 'don't wear masks,' and now he says 'wear them.' And you know, he's said numerous things, 'don't close off China. Don't ban China.' And I did it anyway. I sort of didn't listen to my experts and I banned China." The president predicted that in the next two to four weeks, "I think we're going to be in very good shape." The surge of coronavirus cases comes after many states began to lift restrictions on businesses and allowed stay-at-home orders to expire, with those that were among the first to reopen their economies, such as Texas and Florida, experiencing a spike in hospitalizations and people testing positive."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-10-20

Late breaking.  Trump loses a big one at the Supreme Court.  NBC News reports:

"The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday gave President Donald Trump a chance to beat back House Democrats' efforts to obtain his financial records but ruled he is not immune from the Manhattan district attorney's attempt to get his taxes. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. wants years worth of Trump's tax returns as part of his probe into hush-money payments to two women while House Democrats sought financial records from the Trump Organization's accounting firm and two banks to determine if foreign governments, including Russia, hold sway over him. Both matters will go back to lower courts to determine if Trump needs to turn over any documents, which will not likely be settled before Election Day. In our judicial system, "the public has a right to every man's evidence," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the decision on the New York case. "Since the earliest days of the Republic, 'every man' has included the president of the United States. Beginning with Jefferson and carrying on through Clinton, presidents have uniformly testified or produced documents in criminal proceedings when called upon by federal courts." He added: "(W)e cannot conclude that absolute immunity is necessary or appropriate under Article II or the Supremacy Clause." The rulings, both 7-2, with Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissenting, represent a mixed bag for the president, allowing him to drag out the legal process but not providing him with any clear-cut victories. Trump blasted the efforts to gain his financial information, tweeting after the rulings that it was "a political prosecution."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

Uncommon Valor. Seatbelts on.  NPR reports:

"Janis Shinwari takes his oath Monday as a naturalized U.S. citizen in a ceremony in Fairfax, Va. He worked eight years as an Afghan interpreter with the U.S. military in his homeland, and was credited with saving the lives of five U.S. troops. Many immigrants have inspiring stories. Then there's Janis Shinwari, who worked eight years as an Afghan interpreter with the U.S. military in some of the most dangerous parts of his homeland. "During his service, he saved the lives of five American soldiers. That is not something many people can say," Ken Cuccinelli, the acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services. Socially distanced and wearing masks, 170 immigrants became the newest American citizens Monday in a series back-to-back naturalization ceremonies in Fairfax, Virgina. About 15 took the oath at a time to guard against overcrowding in the government office."

Uncommon Valor:

"As an interpreter, Shinwari wasn't supposed to fight when he joined the U.S. military in 2004. But four years later, he was with an American unit that was ambushed by the Taliban in eastern Afrghanistan. "It was the worst firefight of my life," Army Capt. Matt Zeller told NPR in 2013. "I ran out of grenades. I was literally counting my bullets, and I remember thinking, we might not make it out of this one alive." Shinwari grabbed a rifle and rushed to the scene. "I saw Matt Zeller, that he was alive in a ditch and there were two Taliban behind him to kill him," Shinwari recalled. "I shot the two Taliban and I saved Matt Zeller's life." They had met just 10 days earlier, and have been close friends ever since."

How many others in similar circumstances may have been denied citizenship?  How many? Think of the long-term consequences.  There will come a time when our formerly great country will again be confronted with a war on the scale of the Second World War.  Who will want to help us?

Consider the consequences of the following:

"The U.S. government has had programs to bring both Afghan and Iraqi interpreters to the U.S. after their service in those wars. The Iraqi program was shut down several years ago, while the Afghan program is still operating. But both were plagued by delays and issued far fewer visas than allocated."

Why?  How is this justified?

Consider the following:

"Shinwari had to wait nearly three years for a visa. He was on a Taliban kill list and spent most of that time on a U.S. military base near Kabul for his own safety. Only rarely could he travel a few miles to his home for brief visits with his wife and two young children."

How is this right? How?

"That was really hard for me that I couldn't see my kids for a while," he said. "The saddest part was that my kids couldn't go outside to play with the other kids because of some security reasons. They were home all the time." When Shinwari and his family reached the U.S. in 2013, a GoFundMe campaign raised $35,000 within days."

Uncommon Valor:

"But Shinwari declined the money. Instead he and Zeller used it to set up No One Left Behind, a nonprofit that works to bring interpreters to the U.S. "This is our responsibility that we should keep our promise, that we promise these gentlemen in Afghanistan, that if you serve for two years, you are eligible for a U.S. visa," Shinwari said."

A terrible injustice:

"More than 18,000 former interpreters are still awaiting those visas. A similar number have already come to the U.S. The transition can be difficult, with many struggling to get by with low-paying jobs. Shinwari, 42, said he's been fortunate. He says he's still saving lives by working at a Briartek, a company that makes rescue beacons for sailors. The U.S. military is a client. He says he's grateful for his new life. "The best part is you're safe. You don't have to worry, you can sleep well. Once you are here, you're free," he said.  And then he headed off to work. He said his company has remained open during the Covid pandemic, and he hasn't missed a day of work."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

Nazi justice in a de facto fascist police-state.  ... Hear the rumble?  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court on Thursday strengthened the Trump administration’s ability to deport people seeking asylum without allowing them to make their case to a federal judge."

Raw nazism.

"Immigration experts suggested the administration would use sweeping language in the majority opinion to bolster broader efforts to restrict asylum. The high court’s 7-2 ruling applies to people who are picked up at or near the border and who fail their initial asylum screenings, making them eligible for quick deportation, or expedited removal. Justice Samuel Alito wrote the high-court opinion that reversed a lower-court ruling that said asylum-seekers must have access to the federal courts. Congress acted properly in creating a system “for weeding out patently meritless claims and expeditiously removing the aliens making such claims from the country,” Alito wrote."

The achingly clueless Alito nazi is caustically reminded our UNDOCUMENTED forebears arrived in this continent centuries ago, STOLE it from its native inhabitants, then BROKE every goddamned treaty signed.

"Lee Gelernt, the American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who argued the case in the Supreme Court, said the outcome will make it hard to question the actions of immigration officials at the U.S. border. “This decision will impact potentially tens of thousands of people at the border who will not be able to seek review of erroneous denials of asylum,” Gelernt said."

Exactly as intended by the Trump nazi and his henchmen on the U.S. Supreme Court.

"In practical terms, the impact may be limited. Even after the ruling from federal appeals court in San Francisco that the justices threw out Thursday, only about 30 asylum-seekers whose claims were quickly rejected had sought access to the courts, Gelernt told the justices during arguments in February. But Cornell University law professor Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration expert, said the decision lends support to broader administration action on asylum. “Justice Alito used sweeping language in his majority opinion upholding Congress’s efforts to limit due process for arriving immigrants. While not necessary to the precise holding in the case, the Trump administration is sure to use such language to justify its broader efforts to restrict asylum seekers,” Yale-Loehr said."

Trump is certainly emulating early behavior of one of his fascist forebears, Adolf Hitler:

"The administration has made dismantling the asylum system a centerpiece of its immigration agenda, saying it is rife with abuse and overwhelmed by meritless claims. Changes include making asylum-seekers wait in Mexico while their cases wind through U.S. immigration court, denying asylum to anyone on the Mexican border who passes through another country without first seeking protection there, and flying Hondurans and El Salvadorans to Guatemala with an opportunity to seek asylum there instead of the U.S. On Monday, the Trump administration published sweeping new procedural and substantive rules that would make it much more difficult to get asylum, triggering a 30-day period for public comment before they can take effect.

"Since 2004, immigration officials have targeted for quick deportation undocumented immigrants who are picked up within 100 miles of the U.S. border and within 14 days of entering the country. The Trump administration is seeking to expand that authority so that people detained anywhere in the U.S. and up to two years after they got here could be quickly deported. On Tuesday, a federal appeals court threw out a trial judge’s ruling that had blocked the expanded policy. Other legal issues remain to be resolved in the case."

A raucous boot clicking, goose stepping, treasonous, treacherous, traitorous Seig Heil!, Mr. 'President?'

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

The following is beyond appalling.  Would be laughable if taxpayers were not figuratively taking it hard in the ass.  NPR reports:

"The IRS sent nearly $1.4 billion in coronavirus relief payments to dead Americans, a new report by an independent government agency shows."

Surprised?  Wake up.

"The Government Accountability Office said the error involved almost 1.1 million checks and direct deposits sent to ineligible Americans. The payments were part of the coronavirus aid package passed in March known as the CARES Act. So far, the IRS has dispersed over 160 million payments — worth nearly $270 billion — to people for coronavirus relief. The improper payments happened because of confusion over whether dead people should receive payments, the GAO report concludes."

What confusion?  Dead is dead, isn't it?

"In the hectic early days, as the IRS was preparing to send out millions of payments, the tax bureau bypassed established protocols, declined to use available death records and did not clearly communicate with the Treasury Department, which oversees its work. The IRS did not use those death records, which are maintained by the Social Security Administration, for the first three batches of coronavirus relief payments — which account for 72% of the money dispensed to date. The IRS had developed a process in 2013 to use death records to prevent improper payments to dead people. It bypassed these controls for coronavirus relief payments, the GAO found. Initially, the IRS was unclear about whether the law permitted it to deny relief payments to the deceased. And the Treasury Department was "unaware the payments may go to decedents," the GAO found. It wasn't until later, after the Treasury Department realized that payments had been made to dead people, that it determined in conjunction with legal counsel that those who had died as of the date of the payment were not eligible for relief money."

Jesus Christ.  Give me a break.  This government is out of control.

Gets worse.  Get this:

"An NPR investigation in May found that Americans who had died as early as January 2018 had received checks from the IRS. In response to NPR's story, a bipartisan group of lawmakers demanded answers from the Treasury Department and the IRS about how many dead Americans received the payments and what steps the government will take to recover the improperly dispensed money. "While it is essential that our constituents receive stimulus payments quickly, these improper payments to deceased individuals represent significant government waste and a burden to constituents who mistakenly accept the payments," the lawmakers said in a letter."

You think?

"The Treasury Department previously told NPR that payments made to people who died before the coronavirus relief payment was received should be returned to the government. The IRS has published instructions on its website for how to return payments."

What is the compliance statistic?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

Like his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, Barr has serious credibility issues.  NPR reports:

"Attorney General William Barr said Thursday that he doesn't believe President Trump has overstepped the boundaries between the White House and the Justice Department in a number of big recent cases."

Example after example in this publication and elsewhere, week after week last three and a half years, scream otherwise.

"Barr told NPR in a wide-ranging interview that he believes Trump has "supervisory authority" to oversee the effective course of justice — but Barr said that ultimately, the choices were made and carried through independently by the Justice Department. "It's very important that the attorney general make sure that there's no political influence at stake involved in that — and there wasn't," Barr said."

Simply, not true.  Example after example in this publication and elsewhere indicate otherwise.

"NPR's Steve Inskeep asked Barr about the case of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, in which the Justice Department dropped charges even after Flynn's guilty plea; about the firing of U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman in New York City; and about others."

Failed to give a straight up, straight out answer to any of Inskeep's softball questions.  Offered no evidence in support of the following unadulterated bullshit:

"Barr faulted what he called "irregularities" in the Flynn case that he said made it appropriate for him to resolve it by scrapping the prosecution. And he denied that there was anything suspicious about the replacement of Berman, including any connection to ongoing investigations that might involve associates of Trump. "Anytime you make a personnel move, conspiracy theorists will suggest that there's some ulterior motive involved," Barr said."

That the best you have to offer, Mr. Barr?  No more than a crock of shit to defend the indefensible?  'Can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit?'

"Barr also defended his recent comments in which he claimed without evidence that foreign countries could potentially counterfeit "millions" of mail ballots to interfere in the November presidential race."

Talking out your sorry ass, Mr. Attorney General?  To back your fuhrer, the Trump nazi?  ... Is the fascist bastard in the Oval Office that afraid should mail-in ballots became ubiquitous, most ballots would, in fact, be for the Democrats?  LOL.  Is that the issue?  LOL.

"It's a claim [foreign counterfeiting of ballots] that a number of election officials and experts have rejected, calling it "preposterous" and "false." State officials of both parties have pushed for increased access to mail ballots in response to the coronavirus pandemic."

Barr can't, won't be confused by the truth:

"But on Thursday, Barr doubled down, calling mail-ballot security processes "primitive." When pressed on whether he had evidence to suggest such a plot was underway by foreign adversaries, the attorney general said that he did not, but that his department had evidence of foreign countries being interested in interference more broadly — and that he thought mail voting was an obvious target. "You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out," Barr said."

No, all you have to be is a congenital liar like your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, Mr. Attorney General.  ... That the best you have, sir?  Pitiful.  Here's why:

"Skeptics among elections specialists point to the dozens of aspects of each jurisdiction's mail ballots that would need to be replicated for an attack of this nature to work: from the bar code, to the weight of the paper, to the successful forgery of voters' signatures. "It shows a fundamental lack of understanding about the soup to nuts of administering an election," said Paul Gronke, a political science professor at Reed College. "You can't just source the paper, re-create the ballot styles, fake the signatures, on any kind of mass scale."

Sadly, the Attorney General doesn't seem to understand supporting the insanity of his fuhrer, the Trump nazi, is making him, the AG, appear hopelessly stupid.  LOL.

Coup de grace?

"Barr, who voted by mail in 2019 and 2012, according to The Washington Post, said that he supports mail voting in isolated situations but that he does not believe broad expansion is possible without significant fraud and mistakes. Most election officials disagree. "Election officials spend a great deal of our time building in security measures," said Washington Secretary of State Kim Wyman, a Republican, this week when asked about Barr's claims. "The idea that people could print millions of ballots either within the country or external to the country, just on its face, is not going to pass muster with an election official."

Apparently, Mr. Barr is as insane as his fuhrer, the Trump nazi:

"Barr also defended on Thursday his thesis that recent protests over police brutality against Black Americans have been infiltrated and overrun by antifa agitators."

No truth to that claim.  None.

"Barr and Trump have repeatedly painted antifa as a criminal, far-left anarchist organization, blaming its adherents for some instances of violence and looting during recent protests for police accountability. NPR reporting found no sign of antifa links so far in cases brought by the Justice Department, but Barr reiterated Thursday that antifa is more of an "umbrella term" and that protesters who identify as antifa would have been charged with specific actions like throwing a Molotov cocktail."

Barr continues to shamelessly talk out his ass.  Where's the evidence?

"The attorney general also defended police amid the ongoing protest movement about law enforcement in Black communities. "The statistics on police shootings of unarmed individuals are not skewed toward the African American," he said. "There are many whites who are shot unarmed by police."

That last statement of his is indeed true as affirmed repeatedly in this publication over the years.  Doesn't excuse, however, the number of innocent, unarmed Blacks murdered by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue, Mr. Attorney General.  Time to wake up, sir.  ... Hear the rumble?  Our formerly great country is being torn apart.  Too deaf to hear?  Or, is it mindless, unlimited aggressive stupidity?

Here's the truth, you fascist piece of shit:

"While white people account for a higher number of unarmed fatal police shootings, Black people, who make up about 13% of the U.S. population, are disproportionately affected. Of the 352 unarmed people shot and killed by police in the U.S. since Jan. 1, 2015, white people accounted for 145 of the deaths; Black people made up 123 of those killed, according to a compilation of fatal police shootings by The Washington Post."

No end to the stupidity:

"On the subject of the coronavirus pandemic, Barr once again criticized state governors for implementing strict mitigation protocols in an attempt to slow the spread of the virus, accusing those leaders of abusing their power and compromising citizens' livelihoods. "Basically, putting the entire population in home detention and telling people that they have to shut down their livelihood and their business. And they leave that to the discretionary decision of governors," Barr said."

Jesus Christ.  Time to finally wake up, Mr. Barr.  First, many have died due to the failure of Trump to take the pandemic seriously from late last year right up to the very present.  Second, there was no coordinated plan of action between the federal government and the states to address this catastrophe.  Total failure of government.  All levels and branches.  How do you and your fuhrer, the Trump nazi, sleep nights?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

The following is beyond appalling.  If true, treasonous on the part of the Trump nazi.  NPR reports:

"Members of Congress in both parties demanded answers on Monday about reported bounties paid by Russian operatives to Afghan insurgents for targeting American troops. The stories appeared to have taken even the most senior lawmakers off guard, and they said they wanted briefings soon from the Defense Department and the intelligence community. "I think it is absolutely essential that we get the information and be able to judge its credibility," said Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee. The story is unfolding along two parallel tracks in Washington, based on two key questions: First, what actually has taken place — and have any American troops been killed as a result of Russian-sponsored targeted action? And second: Who knew what about the reporting on these allegations that has flowed up from the operational level in Afghanistan? The White House tried to defend itself over the weekend on both counts, arguing that senior intelligence officials aren't convinced about the reliability of the reports and that they never reached President Trump or Vice President Pence personally."

That so?  Sure of that?

"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who usually receives some of the most sensitive intelligence briefings as a member of the so-called Gang of Eight leaders in Congress, said she too hadn't been informed and sent a letter Monday requesting a briefing for all members of the House soon. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called for a briefing for all members of the Senate."

Here's the problem, a big problem for Trump if indeed true:

"Pelosi cited reports in The New York Times and The Washington Post that suggested that Trump has been aware of the bounty practice since earlier this year but he and his deputies haven't acted in response. "The administration's disturbing silence and inaction endanger the lives of our troops and our coalition partners," she wrote."

Again, if true.  Not clear yet.

"Another top House lawmaker demanding more information was Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, Republicans' No. 3 leader in the chamber.

    "If reporting about Russian bounties on US forces is true, the White House must explain:
    1. Why weren’t the president or vice president briefed? Was the info in the PDB?
    2. Who did know and when?
    3. What has been done in response to protect our forces & hold Putin accountable?
    — Liz Cheney (@Liz_Cheney) June 28, 2020

"White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said on Monday that members of Congress have been invited to the White House to learn more about the bounty allegations. McEnany said that lawmakers from the "committees of jurisdiction" had been invited by White House chief of staff Mark Meadows but she did not detail who specifically would attend or who would brief them or when. McEnany repeated that there was "no consensus" about the allegations within the intelligence community and that it also includes some "dissenting opinions." McEnany suggested that intelligence officials decided to keep the bounty payment allegations below Trump's level until they were "verified," as she put it, but those details were not clear."

... Raising the question, -- is she desperately trying to cover Trump's sorry ass?

"Although Trump and John Ratcliffe, director of national intelligence, both said the president hasn't been briefed about the alleged bounty practice, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not address whether aspects of the reporting had been included in written briefings submitted to the president. McEnany did not directly address a question about written briefing materials on Monday. Past accounts have suggested that Trump doesn't read many of his President's Daily Briefs and prefers to hear from in-person intelligence presenters — but even then, according to the recent book by former national security adviser John Bolton, Trump does more talking than listening. This has added to questions about practices within the administration for passing intelligence to the president that he might not like or wish to hear about. For example, former officials have said they learned not to talk with Trump about Russian interference in U.S. elections, about which the president has been critical and skeptical. Another example included reports that suggested Trump had received warnings about the coronavirus in his daily briefing but hadn't absorbed them; the White House has detailed two specific briefings Trump received about the virus early this year."

Here's the problem:

"What was clear Monday is that members of Congress want to resolve these questions fast. The House Armed Services Committee's Thornberry said that the safety of American and allied troops could depend on it. "When you're dealing with the lives of our service members, especially in Afghanistan — especially these allegations that there were bounties put on Americans deaths, then it is incredibly serious," he said. "We in Congress need to see the information and the sources to judge that ourselves, and it needs to happen early this week. You know, it will not be acceptable to delay."

The Associated Press reports:

"The White House said Monday that President Donald Trump wasn’t briefed on U.S. intelligence assessments earlier this year that Russia secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing American troops in Afghanistan because the information had not been “verified.”

That true?  Or, are you covering for the 'president?'

"Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany asserted that intelligence “would not be elevated to the president until it was verified.” However it is rare for intelligence to be confirmed without a shadow of doubt before it is presented to senior government decision-makers."

Precisely, why her statement is highly questionable.

"McEnany added that a House briefing for select members of Congress was underway at midday Monday, but she said that even now, Trump still has not been briefed on the intelligence. She declined to say why a different standard applied to briefing lawmakers than the president."

Simply adds to her lack of credibility.  Appears to be covering Trump's ass.

“There is no consensus within the intelligence community on these allegations and in effect there are dissenting opinions from some in the intelligence community with regards to the veracity of what’s being reported and the veracity of the underlying allegations continue to be evaluated,” McEnany said."

Hard to believe something like even the possibility of a bounty on U.S. troops would be withheld from any U.S. president.

"The intelligence assessments came amid Trump’s push to withdraw the U.S. from Afghanistan and suggested Russia was making overtures to militants as the U.S. and the Taliban held talks to end the long-running war. The assessment was first reported by The New York Times, then confirmed to The Associated Press by American intelligence officials and two others with knowledge of the matter. While Russian meddling in Afghanistan isn’t new, officials said Russian operatives became more aggressive in their desire to contract with the Taliban and members of the Haqqani Network, a militant group aligned with the Taliban in Afghanistan and designated a foreign terrorist organization in 2012. Russian operatives are said to have met with Taliban leaders in Doha, Qatar, and Afghanistan; however, it’s unknown if the meetings were to discuss bounties."

Where there's smoke, almost always, there's fire:

"The officials the AP spoke to said the intelligence community has been investigating an April 2019 attack on an American convoy that killed three U.S. Marines after a car rigged with explosives detonated near their armored vehicles as they traveled back to Bagram Airfield, the largest U.S. military installation in Afghanistan. Three other U.S. service members were wounded in the attack, along with an Afghan contractor. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack on Twitter. The officials the AP spoke to also said they were looking closely at insider attacks — sometimes called “green-on-blue” incidents — from 2019 to determine if they are also linked to Russian bounties. In early 2020, members of the elite Naval Special Warfare Development Group, known to the public as SEAL Team Six, raided a Taliban outpost and recovered roughly $500,000. The recovered funds further solidified the suspicions of the American intelligence community that the Russians had offered money to Taliban militants and linked associations. One official said the administration discussed several potential responses, but the White House has yet to authorize any step."

Why not?

"The intelligence officials told the AP that Trump was briefed on the bounty matter earlier this year; Trump denied that, tweeting Sunday neither he nor Vice President Mike Pence had been briefed. Trump tweeted Sunday night he was just told intelligence officials didn’t report the information to him because they didn’t find it credible. The intelligence officials and others with knowledge of the matter insisted on anonymity to discuss the highly sensitive matter."

More disingenuous bullshit:

"The White House National Security Council wouldn’t confirm the assessments but said the U.S. receives thousands of intelligence reports daily that are subject to strict scrutiny. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who golfed with Trump on Sunday, tweeted Saturday it’s “Imperative Congress get to the bottom of recent media reports that Russian GRU units in Afghanistan have offered to pay the Taliban to kill American soldiers with the goal of pushing America out of the region.” GRU is a reference to the Russian military intelligence agency. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the No. 3 Republican in the House, called for the White House to share more information with Congress, saying, if true, lawmakers need to know “Who did know and when?” and, referring to Russian leader Vladimir Putin, “What has been done in response to protect our forces & hold Putin accountable?” Democratic presumptive presidential nominee Joe Biden said reports Trump was aware of the Russian bounties would be a “truly shocking revelation” about the commander in chief and his failure to protect U.S. troops in Afghanistan and stand up to Russia. Russia called the report “nonsense.”

Get this:

"John Bolton, an ex-national security adviser who was forced out by Trump last September and has written a tell-all book about his White House tenure, said Sunday it’s “pretty remarkable the president’s going out of his way to say he hasn’t heard anything about it. One asks, why would he do something like that?” Bolton told NBC’s “Meet the Press” he thinks the answer “may be precisely because active Russian aggression like that against the American service members is a very, very serious matter and nothing’s been done about it, if it’s true, for these past four or five months, so it may look like he was negligent. But, of course, he can disown everything if nobody ever told him about it.”

"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, one of the few congressional leaders typically briefed on sensitive intelligence matters, told ABC’s “This Week” she hadn’t been informed about the reported bounties and requested a report to Congress on the matter. “This is as bad as it gets, and yet the president will not confront the Russians on this score, denies being briefed. Whether he is or not, his administration knows and our allies — some of our allies who work with us in Afghanistan had been briefed and accept this report,” she said."

Fascinating, isn't it?

"Trump responded to Biden on Twitter, saying, “Russia ate his and Obama’s lunch during their time in office” But it was the Obama administration, with international allies, that suspended Russia from the Group of Eight after its unilateral annexation of Crimea from Ukraine — a move that drew widespread condemnation. Biden criticized Trump for “his embarrassing campaign of deference and debasing himself” before Putin. Trump tweeted “nobody’s been tougher” on Russia than his administration."

Expect better of a congenital liar?

ABC News reports:

"The White House faced mounting questions Tuesday about how much and how long President Donald Trump has known about reported Russian bounties on U.S. troops in Afghanistan, as lawmakers called on the administration to share more information and potentially take action. The White House on Tuesday continued to provide briefings to select members of Congress on the intelligence, which a military official told ABC News showed that Russian intelligence officers had over the past year offered to pay Taliban militants to kill American troops. But the Trump administration resisted providing the wider briefings requested by Democratic congressional leaders and neither Trump nor other White House officials were speaking or answering questions publicly on the matter Tuesday."

Why not?  The public is entitled to this information.

"Republican lawmakers joined their Democratic colleagues in expressing concern that Russia's actions may have potentially cost U.S. lives, forcing the White House to rush to contain the political fallout of the revelations. Democrats, sometimes joined by those on the other side of the aisle, have long alleged Trump has not responded forcefully enough to Russia's provocative behavior. Even as top U.S. intelligence and national security officials issued a series of rare, on-the-record statements emphasizing what they portrayed as the inconclusive nature of the intelligence, new reports called into question why Trump and the White House continued to insist he had not been briefed on the matter."

Here's the issue:

"The Associated Press reported Monday, citing unnamed U.S. officials, that top White House officials were aware of the intelligence early last year and that the information had been included in Trump's written intelligence briefing, known as the President's Daily Brief, at the time. It was not clear if the president had actually read the briefing, though. The AP also reported that John Bolton, who was national security adviser at the time, told colleagues that in March 2019 he had briefed Trump about the intelligence. Bolton declined to comment on the report, during an interview Tuesday with Sirius XM's "The Joe Madison Show" Tuesday."

Why not, John?  Covering your ass as well as that of the Trump nazi?  The public had a right to this information.  In a supposedly democratic republic, the people run and own government.  Certainly, not the other way around.  Ferociously pointedly, the public had a right to know there was the possibility the Russians had placed a bounty on our troops.

Extremely disturbing:

"The New York Times, citing two unnamed officials, reported that Trump had received a written briefing on the topic in late February. Again, it was unclear if he had read the briefing materials. White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Monday that the president had yet to be briefed on the intelligence, noting "the veracity of the underlying allegations continue to be evaluated."

Clearly, someone's lying.  Or, misinformed.

"Asked if the information had not been in the President's Daily Brief, too, she replied, "He was not personally briefed on the matter."

Why not?  How is that possible?  Especially, on a matter of such grave significance, that is, the possibility of a Russian bounty on our troops?

"The night before, Trump had tweeted, "Intel just reported to me that they did not find this info credible, and therefore did not report it to me or" the vice president. Asked on Monday what Trump meant, McEnany replied, "I have no further details on the president’s private correspondence."

Jesus Christ.  How can that be?  Protecting the sorry ass of our fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

"On Monday night, top intelligence and national security officials released statements – apparently coordinated, using similar language – casting doubt on the reports. U.S. National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said the administration, including the National Security Council, had “been preparing should the situation warrant action.”

On a matter of such significance and grave consequence to our troops, the president should have been informed.  Again, someone's lying.  None of this adds up.

These bastards seem to be covering their ass and that of their fuhrer, the Trump nazi:

"Like O’Brien, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe and Central Intelligence Agency Director Gina Haspel had tough words for those who leak classified information to members of the press. Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman, referring to the Russian military unit said to have been involved, said that the “Department of Defense continues to evaluate intelligence that Russian GRU operatives were engaged in malign activity against United States and coalition forces in Afghanistan.”

The public you allegedly serve deserves far better than bullshit.  Not to neglect to mention our troops who serve in Afghanistan.

Gets worse.  Get this:

"Rather than brief members of Congress of both parties simultaneously as is standard, the White House has been offering small-group briefings split along party lines."

Jesus Christ.  What the f--k is going on here?  We're all Americans, aren't we?

Get this:

"A group of Republican congressional allies were the first to be briefed Monday, followed by a small group of congressional Democrats on Monday morning and a separate briefing for Senate Republicans were also expected later in the morning. House Democrats emerged from the briefing renewing their call for an all-member briefing from the intelligence community, with House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer saying the briefing “was not as a substitute” for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Chuck Schumer’s requests for a full briefing for all Members of Congress. “The president called this a hoax publicly. Nothing in the briefing that we have just received led me to believe it is a hoax,” Hoyer said. “There may be different judgments as to the level of credibly but there was no assertion that the information we had was a hoax.” While the lawmakers refused to discuss details of the briefing due to its secret nature, Schiff emphasized that the briefing fell short – complaining that the “right people to give the briefing really were not in the room.”

Why not?  An effort under way to cover the ass of the Trump nazi?

“We need to hear from the heads of the intelligence agencies about how do they assess the allegations,” Schiff said. “What can they tell us about the truth or falsity of these allegations? What can they tell us about steps they are taking or undertaking to vet the information they may have?” Those briefing the House Democrats included National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, and three other senior National Security Council officials, according to an aide to Hoyer. It’s not just political leaders demanding answers. So, too, is the father of a Marine killed in an April 2019 attack. The father of Cpl. Robert Hendriks, 25, of Locust Valley, New York told the AP in an interview that U.S. officials should have immediately addressed the allegations, even if they were just a rumor."

No question.

“If this was kind of swept under the carpet as to not make it a bigger issue with Russia, and one ounce of blood was spilled when they knew this, I lost all respect for this administration and everything,” Erik Hendriks said."

Sadly, that's been gone quite some time.

"The AP has reported that the attack that killed Hendriks and two other Marines in April 2019 is under investigation in connection to the alleged Russian bounties. GOP Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska said Monday he had heard from many military families in his home state who were "livid." He said Congress must focus on several questions. "Number one: Who knew what, when, and did the commander in chief know? And if not, how the hell not? What is going on in the process?" he said. "And number two, what are we going to do to impose proportional cost in response?" He said such a response would amount to Taliban and Russian intelligence operative "body bags."

You're all talk, Senator.  How in good conscience can you and other Republicans support the massive failure currently occupying the Oval Office, that is, our fuhrer, the Trump nazi?

NPR reports:

"House Democrats condemned President Trump after a meeting at the White House about alleged Russian bounty payments for the killing of U.S. troops on Tuesday and said they want more information from the intelligence community. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., led a delegation of Democrats to the briefing, including the chairmen of the Foreign Affairs, Armed Services and Intelligence committees. Hoyer said he didn't believe they received "any new substantive information." The lawmakers also criticized what they called the poor practices within the Trump administration that have led to this point. "This was a red flag — it either was not waved or the president ignored that wave," Hoyer said. At issue are what appear to be disputed allegations within the spy world about whether Russian paramilitary or intelligence operatives might have paid bounties to the Taliban in order to target U.S. and allied troops. Top Trump administration national security officials have suggested that the intelligence agencies are trying to substantiate these allegations. The reports may have come from U.S. forces on the ground in Afghanistan and interviews with captured enemies. Now the question is whether spy agencies can learn more about the practices from other sources."

Apparently, this issue goes back quite some time.  Reportedly, to some time last year.  More than enough time to have resolved it:

"Some officials have said that work may now be disrupted because of the press reports and public furor about it."

The above is no more than a blatant attempt to excuse the inexcusable.

"The Democrats who visited the White House on Tuesday said they considered the evidence now known to be serious enough to have merited not only a presentation to Trump but also a public warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin not to target American forces. Hoyer and his colleagues said they want to hear directly from intelligence community leaders, as opposed to the White House officials with whom they met on Tuesday, and for every member of Congress to get a presentation too."

What about the public that foots the bill, pays for all this bullshit?  Not to neglect to mention the families who paid the ultimate price, that is, loss of a loved one?

"The New York Times and The Associated Press have reported that intelligence officials described the Russian bounty allegations to White House officials months or more ago, likely in written materials — ones Trump evidently did not absorb, given his denials about knowing of the story.

"Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., a former CIA officer and member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said there were no members of the intelligence community at the White House to brief Democrats on the topics they were interested in discussing. Spanberger said she was concerned that intelligence prepared by professionals in the field is being treated as opinion rather than fact. "There seems to be a general impression that intelligence isn't meant to be taken as the report is given, that it is something that people get to cast their own opinions on or aspersions on," Spanberger said. "Particularly given what I know of the work that goes into its potential documents, I find it unfortunate."

Far worse than that, aggressive stupidity.

"Spanberger said she has personal experience preparing intelligence for reports, including the President's Daily Brief, and that it is a process that includes vetting sources, caveating sources and overlaying information to build a larger picture of a potential threat. She said that what she called the trend of casting doubt on that information and on nonpartisan intelligence officers is troubling. "I think as a former intelligence officer over the past number of years, we see a lack of interest in the product put out by the intelligence community," Spanberger said. "We have seen constant attacks on our public servants in the intelligence community, the CIA officers or FBI agents." The White House has faced significant scrutiny since the first reports of the bounty payments were made public and stirred confusion among onlookers about what was known when and by whom."

Report goes on and on.  This is a massive, inexcusable failure of government.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

Clear victory for abortion rights and the United States Constitution First Amendment.  Freedom from religion.  United Press International reports:

"The Supreme Court ruled Monday that a Louisiana law requiring doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals was unconstitutional. At issue, was Act 620, Louisiana's "Unsafe Abortion Act," which would require admitting privileges at a hospital no further than 30 miles from location where abortion is performed."

An outrageous, unnecessary impediment to abortion imposed by the Nazi Right to force its perverse ideological and religious views on the rest of us.

"The case, June Medical Services vs. Russo, had been tied up in legal battles since doctors first sued the state in 2014. The case was brought before the Supreme Court after the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law. A narrowly divided Supreme Court, which began oral arguments in March, ruled 5-4 Monday in favor of June Medical Services, which operates Hope Clinic, an abortion provider in Shreveport, La., against Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals Interim Secretary Stephen Russo. Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts ruled in favor of the medical services company, and in effect was the swing vote in the politically divided decision. The court found that the Louisiana abortion law was unconstitutional based on Supreme Court precedent in a 2016 Texas case, where similar admitting privileges abortion law was struck down. The court found that the Texas law placed an "undue burden" on patients' rights to an abortion as half the state's abortion clinics closed."

Raw nazism courtesy of national socialists, fascists in the Republican Party.

"Justice Stephen Breyer, who wrote the majority opinion, said that he agreed with the district court that the Louisiana law offered "no significant health benefit," and placed a "substantial obstacle" on women seeking abortion. Breyer was joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Elena Kagan. Julie Rikelman, a lawyer for the Center for Reproductive Rights, had argued on behalf of June Medical Services, that the Texas case, Whole Woman's Health vs. Hellerstedt, set a precedent that should be followed. Rikelman also said the admitting privilege requirement would force abortion clinics in Louisiana to close and cause similar "undue burden" on patients. Roberts, who said that the 2016 precedent in Texas "was wrongly decided," still agreed in a separate opinion with Rikelman that the justices must adhere to the Texas precedent in the Louisiana case, joining the four liberal justices in the decision. "This is a big win that vindicates what we've said all along, which is that the Louisiana admitting privileges law is unconstitutional," the Center for Reproductive Rights said in a statement. "We won an identical case four years ago in Whole Woman's Health vs. Hellerstedt, and the fact that we had to fight so hard again goes to show that nothing should be taken for granted when it comes to protecting abortion rights. Indeed, the court did not speak with a clear majority opinion which could muddy the waters when clarity is needed to protect abortion rights." The four other conservative justices wrote separate dissents. Associate Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the main dissent, argued that he would return the case to the district court. And he would require "a plaintiff whose own rights are at stake," to join the suit instead of June Medical, which he argued "wants to rely on the rights of third parties."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

The following is appalling.  Then again, expected from a national socialist, fascist, congenital liar.  NPR reports:

"A video shared by President Trump on Twitter Sunday includes a man who appears to be a Trump supporter saying "white power" in response to protesters. In the video, apparently taken at The Villages, a retirement community in Florida, people wearing Trump shirts and with Trump signs on their golf carts drive by protesters yelling insults at them and about the president. In one exchange — eight seconds into the two-minute video — a white man holding a sign that says "Make America Sane Again," a reference to Trump's campaign slogan, yells: "Where's your white hood?" In response, a white man driving a golf cart with signs reading "Trump 2020" and "America First" yells back "white power." Trump retweeted the video, which was shared by an unknown Twitter user, and said, "Thank you to the great people of The Villages. The Radical Left Do Nothing Democrats will Fall in the Fall. Corrupt Joe [Biden] is shot. See you soon!!!" "White power" is a white supremacist slogan, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Trump retweeted the video before 8 a.m. ET Sunday and deleted his tweet around 11 a.m. In a statement, Judd Deere, the White House deputy press secretary, did not apologize for the tweet or condemn the racist term but said instead: "President Trump is a big fan of The Villages. He did not hear the one statement made on the video. What he did see was tremendous enthusiasm from his many supporters." South Carolina's Tim Scott, the only Black Republican senator, called the retweet "indefensible." "He should not have retweeted," Scott said on CNN Sunday."

Clearly, sadly, the handwriting's on the wall:

"The president's tweet comes at a time of increased racial tension in America, with the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis police custody leading to mass protests against police brutality and for racial justice. In an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll conducted a week after Floyd's death, two-thirds of Americans said Trump has mostly increased racial tensions in the country. In a more recent poll, from The New York Times and Siena College, 61% of voters said they disapproved of Trump's handling of race, while just 33% said they approved. "Today the President shared a video of people shouting 'white power' and said they were 'great.' Just like he did after Charlottesville," Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, said in a tweet of his own. "We're in a battle for the soul of the nation — and the President has picked a side. But make no mistake: it's a battle we will win."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

7-3-20

Another blatant attack on the First Amendment Establishment Clause by a national socialist, fascist, increasingly nazi U.S. Supreme Court.  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court elated religious freedom advocates and alarmed secular groups with its Tuesday ruling on public funding for religious education, a decision whose long-term effect on the separation of church and state remains to be seen. In Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, the high court ruled 5-4 that states must give religious schools the same access to public funding that other private schools receive, preserving a Montana scholarship program that had largely benefited students at religious institutions."

Why should taxpayers fund churches?  Precisely, the intended end result of this ruling.  First Amendment is abundantly clear.  Establishment Clause.  De facto church-state separation.  Our nazi Court has ruled otherwise.  ... Hear the rumble?

Not surprisingly:

"It prompted a jubilant reaction from the reelection campaign of President Donald Trump, who counts religious conservatives as a core part of his base. The campaign lauded the decision as “a victory for educational freedom,” underscoring its importance for a White House that often spotlights religious liberty."

The Nazi Right in our formerly great country has shamelessly, determinedly, concertedly bastardized Christianity.  Readers are reminded Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini both claimed to be 'Christians.'  So does, our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

"Sister Dale McDonald, public policy director for the National Catholic Educational Association, said the ruling has the potential to stem nationwide enrollment declines at Roman Catholic schools that are forcing the closure of hundreds of institutions. “This is a chance to get public schools and religious schools on equal footing,” McDonald said, adding that the extent of change would depend on how many state legislatures opt to expand tuition assistance."

Sister, why should taxpayers have to pay, that is, be forcibly looted to indoctrinate your students that abortion is supposedly wrong, allegedly immoral?  That a woman has no ultimate control over HER uterus other than to bring an unwanted pregnancy to term?

In the Church's perverse view, no way to effectively, reliably prevent pregnancy other than keeping panties up and on, legs crossed?  Who the hell is any church or religious group to impose such perverse ideological and religious views on others who do not share them?

Forced now, to do it courtesy of looted taxpayers.  -- Taxpayers, who do not subscribe to such perverse religious beliefs.  This is precisely why the Founders included the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment to protect us against such tyranny.  ... An Establishment Clause now bastardized by Republican nazis and their shills.

Here's the problem:

"Critics assailed the decision as another in a series of setbacks for a principle with long roots in the U.S. legal system. It is “the latest in a disturbing line of Supreme Court cases attacking the very foundations of the separation of church and state,” said Daniel Mach, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s freedom of religion program. Tuesday’s ruling focused on a program that offered indirect tuition assistance through tax credits rather than direct state aid to religious schools."

Same end result.  No more than disingenuous bullshit imposed by the nazi Court to support its Nazi Right base.

"The court left unresolved the extent to which religious schools may use public funding for explicitly religious activities, such as worship services and religious-education courses. Mach said that issue likely would be the focus of future litigation, given that many religious schools consider doctrinal education to be at the core of their mission. Others tracking the Montana case stopped short of predicting a major expansion of state funding for religious education."

That's certainly what's coming.

"Douglas Laycock, a law professor at the University of Virginia who co-authored a brief supporting the plaintiffs on behalf of multiple religious groups, described the decision as “incremental” and “building cautiously” on a 2017 case that ruled a Missouri church could use a state grant to resurface its playground. “But incremental moves have been accumulating since 1986, and what would pretty clearly have been unconstitutional in the ’70s and early ’80s is now, sometimes, constitutionally required,” Laycock wrote in an email."

Precisely, the intention of nazis on the Supreme Court.

"At least two faith-based organizations joined secular counterparts in opposing the ruling on principles of church-state separation, saying public money for religious education forces people to fund faiths to which they do not subscribe. “Government funding to religious schools requires taxpayers to support religious institutions and beliefs that may violate their own, something the First Amendment was intended to avoid,” Rabbi Jonah Pesner, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, said in a statement."

Precisely, the problem with all such Court rulings.

"Rachel Laser, president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, contended that many of the religious schools participating in Montana’s program had discriminatory policies."

Why should taxpayers be forced to pay for this bullshit?

“Members of the faith should fund those religious schools, not the taxpayers,” said Laser, who is Jewish. “It would offend my religious freedom to fund a school that requires belief that Jesus Christ is necessary for my salvation.”

The Nazi Right in our formerly great country conveniently ignores this.

"Another attorney who co-authored a brief supporting the plaintiffs, Becket Fund for Religious Liberty vice president and senior counsel Eric Baxter, predicted the ruling will not result in significant new funds flowing to religious schools."

Hopefully, that will remain a check and balance against an increasingly national socialist, fascist Supreme Court.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

Hopefully, there'll be no violence during Trump's rally in Tulsa.  If there is, the following from the Trump nazi will certainly be a factor.  ABC News reports:

"President Donald Trump on Friday, gearing up for his first campaign rally in months in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Saturday, threatened any protesters who show up outside or try to disrupt the event, saying “it will be a much different scene” than how they've been dealt with in "New York, Seattle, or Minneapolis." "Any protesters, anarchists, agitators, looters or lowlifes who are going to Oklahoma please understand, you will not be treated like you have been in New York, Seattle, or Minneapolis. It will be a much different scene!"

First Amendment clearly guaranties their right to peacefully protest.

"It wasn't clear exactly what Trump meant or what he could do to carry out his threat, but he has taken an increasingly hostile tone towards protesters in recent weeks, this time putting “protesters” in same category as “anarchists” “looters” and “lowlifes.”

Talking about yourself, Mr. 'President?'  To say nothing of out of control, violent National Guardsmen and law enforcement responsible for eliciting violence out of peaceful protesters fighting back against their violent oppressors throughout our formerly great country?

"He has blamed "antifa" for violence at protests, without evidence, and has repeatedly bragged about how the National Guard in Minneapolis dealt with protesters like a "knife cutting butter."

Trump remains a congenital liar with no credibility.  Antifa was not responsible for the violence.  There is no evidence of it.  None.  Out of control National Guardsmen and the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue were responsible for most, but not all of it.  Most of the arrests were locals, not outside agitators as falsely claimed by the lying U.S. Attorney General.

"A curfew was imposed beginning Thursday night until Saturday at 6 a.m., according to Tulsa police, citing concerns ab[o]ut organized groups coming to the city. After the rally, another curfew will be in place until 6 a.m. Sunday. The rally begins at 7 p.m. Trump's rally was initially scheduled for Friday, June 19, known as Juneteenth, the holiday marking when the last people who were still enslaved were told they were freed, more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. In a rare instance of his backing down under pressure, the president, after saying he spoke with two black Secret Service agents, announced last week that he would reschedule the rally for the next day."

Will likely make no real difference.  Here's why:

"The city also is tense because it's the site of a race massacre in 1921 in which as many as 300 people were killed."

Delusionally believe Trump's not a racist white supremacist?  Precisely, why he's having a campaign rally in Tulsa:

"Trump, in another tweet Friday, also said he views his rally in Tulsa as the re-launch of his reelection campaign, saying, "Big crowds and lines already forming in Tulsa. My campaign hasn’t started yet. It starts on Saturday night in Oklahoma!" The rally is expected to draw as many as 100,000 Trump supporters, some of whom had lined up outside the 19,000-seat Bank of Oklahoma Center in Tulsa, days before the rally. Trump claimed this week that over a million people had requested tickets for the event and his campaign has been exploring possible venues for an overflow crowd."

Trump's Tulsa rally, a flop.  The Washington Post reports:

"He threatened violence against protesters, endangered his supporters by flouting health recommendations and endured a 110-day, coronavirus-induced dry spell, but when President Trump finally stepped back onto his rally stage Saturday night in Tulsa, he saw a sea of blue seats. The thousands of empty arena chairs, after his campaign had hyped overflow crowds and ticket requests totaling more than 1 million, symbolized the beleaguered state of Trump’s presidency and of his quest to win a second term. To a nation broken by a pandemic and a recession — and with a racial justice movement roiling communities across the country — Trump offered neither reconciliation nor rapprochement. Instead, he put up a fight. Trump belittled the seriousness of the coronavirus, mocked health experts and recalled, “I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down,’” because as more tests are conducted, more infections are discovered. And the president uttered a racially insensitive term in describing the “many” alternate names for the novel coronavirus that originated in China. With cities coast to coast pulsating in protest of racial injustice, Trump used his bully pulpit to exacerbate the chaos and division in hopes of capitalizing on the nation’s fraying bonds. He condemned what he called “this cruel campaign of censorship” and, in reference to the debate over removing monuments and memorials to Confederate generals, declared: “They want to demolish our heritage. ... We have a great heritage. We’re a great country.”

Are we?  Think so?  ... As our formerly great country continues to deteriorate?

"Trump basked in the raucous, mask-free adulation of thousands of supporters, some of whom traveled long distances to take in the show, though the crowd filled about half of an arena that holds 19,000. The campaign built a second stage for Trump to address an expected overflow crowd of thousands, but with no attendees, the speech there was scrapped, and workers quickly got to dismantling the stage. Relative to the campaign’s expectations, this was a humiliation. After campaign manager Brad Parscale touted that more than 1 million people had requested tickets to the Tulsa rally, Trump told reporters on Monday: “We expect to have, you know, it’s like a record-setting crowd. We’ve never had an empty seat. And we certainly won’t in Oklahoma.”

NBC News reports:

"President Donald Trump was supposed to get a boost Saturday from his first campaign rally since late February. Instead, he got a bust. After bragging earlier in the week that more than 1 million people had signed up to come see him, Trump found that he couldn't fill a 19,000-seat arena in a state where he won by 36 percentage points and on a night that his aides had promoted as a major show of his strength. The sparse crowd in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was more than just a humiliation for Trump. It weakened a key argument of his re-election narrative. To explain how he might be able to win despite poor polling numbers — and amid national crises — he has posited that a "silent majority" of Americans back him. "The silent majority is stronger than ever before," Trump said Saturday night. But the poor turnout suggests just the opposite — that enthusiasm for him is weaker than it appears. That isn't likely to sit well with Trump, who gambled that his backers were so loyal they would brave the risk of spreading coronavirus to see him in person. His bet backfired. Rather than receiving a jolt of energy, Trump got a dose of reality. Worse yet, for the president, it was delivered at a time when he desperately needs to reset the frame of the election. For most of the last four months, when Trump had expected to tour the country in service of his re-election, he has been running a Rose Garden campaign. Most Americans don't approve of his handling of the coronavirus, his response to nationwide protests against systemic racism, or both. And his rival, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, has seized a sizable polling lead."

The following is achingly pathetic:

"But while Trump delivered a series of broadsides to adversaries real and imagined — he devoted more than 10 minutes to enumerating excuses for why he had difficulty descending a ramp while at West Point last week — it was difficult, at times, to tell exactly which side he was taking. "They want to demolish our heritage so they can impose their new oppressive regime in its place," Trump said of the removal of statues to Confederate leaders in the wake of protests against police killings of Black men and women. A little bit later, he claimed to have "done more for the Black community in four years" than Biden ever has. It was a boastful night for the president, who also praised himself for the federal response to coronavirus. "I have done a phenomenal job with it," he said. "I saved hundreds of thousands of lives. We don't ever get a mention."

Trump remains a goddamned liar:

"Epidemiologists say that the U.S. death toll would have been much lower if the president and other government officials had pushed policies like social distancing sooner."

Get this:

"All in all, Trump's hour-plus speech sounded familiar in its mix of grievance, self-congratulation and invective against political adversaries. But what was notably different from typical Trump rallies was the muted reaction from the audience. The one thing Trump needed more than anything, he didn't get. There were no deafening chants of "build the wall" or other crowd favorites. He wasn't often forced to pause for applause. And, with his upper lip and cheek shining for most of the night, Trump appeared to be working hard to sustain the modest energy in the room. That should have served as a reality check for him: right now, his supporters amount to less of a "silent majority" than an absent minority."

NBC News reports:

"It was supposed to be the moment President Donald Trump restarted his campaign and got on the offensive, with time slipping away before voting begins. Instead, Trump’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, became one more in a string of unforced errors, leaving his campaign now searching for a reboot to the reboot. In the hours after the event, advisers and Republican strategists admitted the night was a flop and a missed opportunity to shift the momentum into Trump’s direction — and said it was unclear when there might be another rally. Still, they insisted there was plenty of time to recover from the images of a thinly filled arena, headlines about infected aides and a speech that failed to hit on the most pressing issues with voters. “This was a bad night for our effort,” said one senior adviser. “Hardly a deal-breaker, lots of time to go, many miles ahead. But everything was awful tonight: crowd size, lack of focus in the speech, way too many riff stories.” Much of that calculation is centered on the assumption that the economy will rebound in the coming months, making it crucial that businesses continue to reopen so the campaign can pitch an American comeback story. Even if the country is still struggling with millions unemployed and a second wave of the coronavirus in the fall, advisers say they were all but certain the numbers will have improved from April and May, a White House official said."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

Jackbooted bastards in Washington, DC join forces with the military.  The Washington Post reports:

"Hemmed in by police on all sides, Camellia Magness feared that the military helicopter descending on downtown Washington might unleash a final assault on protesters. It was June 1, nearly three hours after federal police in riot gear charged largely peaceful demonstrators as they gathered near the White House to protest after the killing of George Floyd. Magness and others had lingered downtown past a 7 p.m. curfew. Military helicopters had been flying high overhead, seeming to track their movements. But shortly before 10 p.m., a Black Hawk swept low over protesters in Chinatown and held its position, producing gusts that snapped thick tree limbs and swirled the air with volleys of dust and broken glass, sending many running for cover in panic and confusion. “I thought they were going to land,” Magness, 24, said, fearing soldiers would pour out and force protesters into waves of police. The Washington Post reconstructed the movements of the two D.C. Army National Guard helicopters that parked nearly still in the air over protesters in Chinatown that night, using flight-tracking data, images and videos. One of the helicopters dropped as low as an estimated 45 feet, according to a 3-D model created by The Post. That altitude meant that the helicopter, a Lakota painted with the red cross of a medical evacuation aircraft, was below the height of the tallest nearby buildings, the analysis shows.

"On the streets, the maneuvers created wind speeds equivalent to a tropical storm, according to calculations by aerospace engineers who reviewed The Post’s data. The two helicopters hovered over the protesters for a combined 10 minutes, first one and then the other, as protesters ran for cover. The maneuvers — which did not appear to result in reported injuries — were a surreal coda to a day of demonstrations in Washington following the police killing of Floyd in Minneapolis that stunned human rights groups, military law experts and former pilots, who described them as a show of force more commonly used to disperse civilians in war zones."

Jesus Christ.  Nazi America under our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

"D.C. Guard officials, who have launched an investigation into the incident, declined to discuss the helicopter’s altitude, whether senior officers ordered the low-flying tactic, whether the pilots received unclear guidance about their mission or whether the pilots were grounded amid a review. “It was clear they were trying to intimidate us,” Magness said."

F--k the bastards.  These out of control pieces of human excrement displayed their true colors.  Egregiously failed to uphold their oaths of office to protect and defend The United States Constitution.

"Magness and her roommate arrived downtown from Baltimore around 7 p.m., after law enforcement already had used chemical agents, smoke and batons to clear streets outside the White House for President Trump to walk through the Lafayette Square area for a photo op. Earlier, the president had berated local and state leaders as “weak” for not doing more to quell unrest, and he pledged decisive action. “We’re going to do something that people haven’t seen before,” he said, “but you got to have total domination, and then you have to put them in jail.” Magness and her roommate, Dzhuliya Dashtamirova, 22, fell into a crowd near the White House, snaking northeast to U before swinging south toward Chinatown. Along the way, there were National Guard and law enforcement personnel everywhere they looked, the women said — including the sky. At least nine aircraft were overhead, according to publicly available flight-tracking data. At least three were D.C. Guard helicopters. The D.C. Guard’s helicopters generally soared hundreds of feet over the city, The Post found, except for the nearly 10 intense minutes captured on numerous videos when a pair swooped low, battering demonstrators with the downward rush of air from spinning blades, known as rotor wash. The Black Hawk and Lakota left Fort Belvoir in Virginia just after 9:30 p.m. Fifteen minutes later, the Lakota roared past the Lincoln Memorial at about 460 feet and east over the Mall at about 72 miles an hour. Those calculations used signals tracked from the helicopters’ transponders from the crowdsourced flight-tracking website ADS-B Exchange.

"9:50 – 9:52 p.m.

"The transponder for the Black Hawk did not broadcast GPS data like the Lakota did, but it was spotted by 7th Street NW flying low and slow with its spotlight shining down at protesters.

"Meanwhile, the Lakota headed north over Logan Circle as high as approximately 940 feet before doubling back south past Lafayette Square and then heading east toward Chinatown. In its descent near Chinatown, it slowed to about 15 mph.
9:50:00 p.m.
9:52 – 9:55 p.m.

"The Lakota turned west past the National Portrait Gallery at an estimated height of 250 feet and headed North on 9th NW. The Black Hawk turned around and headed back north on 7th Street NW, according to flight data and time-stamped video analysis. Videos taken from the ninth floor of an 11-story condominium building appear to show the Black Hawk at around 110 feet. The condo occupants said they could see soldiers onboard wearing night-vision goggles. Military helicopters typically travel in pairs during flight operations in military maneuvers. In at least two instances, videos show the helicopters appeared to relieve each other as they passed above Chinatown."

Report goes on and on.  In great detail.  Nazi America.  Trump's Fourth Reich.

"The Washington Post reconstructed who did what to clear protestors from the streets outside the White House on June 1. Watch how it unfolded."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Democrats block achingly worthless GOP law enforcement reform in Senate.  NPR reports:

"Senate Democrats, emboldened by a national outcry for reform of the country's law enforcement departments, blocked debate on a Republican police reform bill that they said did not go far enough to address racial inequality."

Had they not done so, Republicans likely had the votes to ultimately pass this outrageously inadequate bill.

"Republicans needed 60 votes on a procedural vote to begin debate on the legislation. The motion failed 55-45, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell voting against it for procedural reasons to allow the Senate to try again. Two Democrats, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Doug Jones of Alabama, broke with the party, as did independent Sen. Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with Democrats. One week ago, with his party's leadership behind him, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, the chamber's lone Black Republican, unveiled the bill with hopes of voting on the measure ahead of the Fourth of July recess. Republicans said the plan addresses a national outcry for reform of the country's law enforcement departments and agencies."

No better than more of the same.

"But by Tuesday, Democrats were demanding bipartisan talks before green-lighting floor debate. The move rankled Republicans, who say they already addressed Democrats' demands to quickly move a bill addressing police brutality."

The GOP bill does not address police brutality.  Remains no more than more of the same old bullshit.  -- Not that Democrats have a plan to hold the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue to the same legal standard of accountability as the rest of the civilian population.

"The failed procedural vote is the latest reminder of the steep challenges facing Congress to address national protests triggered by the death of George Floyd. Floyd was killed May 25 in Minneapolis police custody. Both parties have raced to respond to the political pressure, rolling out dueling plans that each side argued would overhaul the way police officers do their jobs. But the competing proposals remain far apart and optimism about finding some common ground faded amid sniping about the process."

Neither plan will hold the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue to the same legal standard as the rest of the population.  Unless and until that happens, nothing truly changes.  More of the same old bullshit we've seen the last six decades in our formerly great country.

"On June 8, Democrats unveiled a bill banning federal police from the use of chokeholds, lowering legal standards to pursue criminal and civil penalties for police misconduct and prohibition of no-knock warrants in drug-related cases."

Not good enough.  Unless you hold these bastards to the same legal standards as the rest of the population, nothing truly changes.  Nothing.  Just more of the same old crap.

"The Republican proposal, on the other hand, uses incentives, federal reporting requirements and training to diminish the use of choke-holds, other dangerous restraints and no-knock warrants. It also boosts usage of police body cameras."

Pitiful.

"Mitch McConnell has put up a bill challenging us to either to comply with his political game that is about obstructing the United States Senate's ability to actually do something or to play a game with him," Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., told reporters, "which is only about covering his political concerns and not about the real concerns that the American people have about the realities of two systems of justice in America. And we're not going to play that game. And we're not going to be played."

Wake up, Senator.  Democrats have already been played by their fear of not being returned to office should they insist on full legal accountability for the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  The Democratic plan does not hold police to the same legal standard as the rest of the population.  Unless and until that happens, nothing truly changes.  Nothing.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Our fuhrer, the Trump nazi, loses yet another at the Supreme Court.  Doesn't your heart break?  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected President Donald Trump’s effort to end legal protections for 650,000 young immigrants, the second stunning election-season rebuke from the court in a week after its ruling that it’s illegal to fire people because they’re gay or transgender. Immigrants who are part of the 8-year-old Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program will retain their protection from deportation and their authorization to work in the United States — safe almost certainly at least through the November election, immigration experts said. The 5-4 outcome, in which Chief Justice John Roberts and the four liberal justices were in the majority, seems certain to elevate the issue in Trump’s campaign, given the anti-immigrant rhetoric of his first presidential run in 2016 and immigration restrictions his administration has imposed since then. The justices said the administration did not take the proper steps to end DACA, rejecting arguments that the program is illegal and that courts have no role to play in reviewing the decision to end it. The program covers people who have been in the United States since they were children and are in the country illegally. In some cases, they have no memory of any home other than the U.S."

The dictator in the Oval Office was not a happy camper:

"Trump didn’t hold back in his assessment of the court’s work, hitting hard at a political angle. “These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives. We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!” he wrote on Twitter, apparently including the LGBT ruling as well."

Jesus Christ.  Apparently, Republicans on the Court may be finally waking up.  Beginning to understand the status quo is not sustainable.  ... Hear the rumble?  A dreaded, unwanted second American revolution catastrophically looms.

    "These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives. We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd. Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!
    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 18, 2020

"In a second tweet, he wrote, “Do you get the impression that the Supreme Court doesn’t like me?”

Grow up, Mr. 'President.'  Time to wake up and get your facts straight:

"Later, he said the decision showed the need for additional conservative justices to join the two he has appointed, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, and pledged to release a new list from which he would choose a nominee if another opening occurs on his watch. Both of his appointees dissented on Thursday, though Gorsuch wrote the LGBT rights ruling.

"Roberts, with whom Trump has sparred, wrote for the court that the administration did not pursue the end of the program properly. “We do not decide whether DACA or its rescission are sound policies,“ Roberts wrote. “We address only whether the agency complied with the procedural requirement that it provide a reasoned explanation for its action. Here the agency failed to consider the conspicuous issues of whether to retain forbearance and what if anything to do about the hardship to DACA recipients.” The Department of Homeland Security can try again, he wrote. But any new order to end the program, and the legal challenge it would provoke, would likely take months, if not longer. “No way that’s going to happen before November,” said Stephen Yale-Loehr, a professor of immigration law practice at Cornell University Law School.

"DACA recipients were elated by the ruling. “We’ll keep living our lives in the meantime,” said Cesar Espinosa, who leads the Houston immigration advocacy group FIEL. “We’re going to continue to work, continue to advocate.” Espinosa said he got little sleep overnight in anticipation of a possible decision. In the minutes after the decision was posted, he said his group was “flooded with calls with Dreamers, happy, with that hope that they’re going to at least be in this country for a while longer.” From the Senate floor, the Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said of the DACA decision, “I cried tears of joy.”

Nazis in our formerly great country are caustically reminded our UNDOCUMENTED forebears arrived in this continent centuries ago, STOLE it from its native inhabitants, then BROKE every goddamned treaty ever signed.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Bolton sticks it to his fuhrer.  CBS News reports:

"Former national security adviser John Bolton's soon-to-be published memoir of his tenure in the White House levels some serious charges about President Trump's words and conduct in office in the nearly year and a half that Bolton spent in the job. "The Room Where it Happened," over 500 pages long, details the president's fraught relationship with foreign leaders and his approach to foreign policy objectives, as experienced by Bolton. At various points in the book, he describes himself as "flabbergasted" or stunned by things the president said or tweeted. Mr. Trump has claimed Bolton made things up, while the director of national intelligence and the Justice Department accuse Bolton of wrongly publishing classified information.

"President Trump and his campaign have made being tough on China a key campaign platform. But several passages in Bolton's book seem to undermine that argument. In one of the more jarring passages of the book, Bolton claims the president voiced his support for concentration camps to Chinese President Xi Jinping during the 2019 G-20 world leaders summit. "XI explained to Trump why he was basically building concentration camps" for the Uighurs, Bolton writes. "According to our interpreters, Trump said that Xi should go ahead with building the camps, which he thought was exactly the right thing to do." On another human rights topic, in June 2019, the president dismissed the human rights protests in Hong Kong, saying, "I don't want to get involved," and "we have human-rights problems, too," according to Bolton. The president also dismissed the Tiananmen Square massacre, suggesting it was a long time ago. "Who cares about it? I'm trying to make a deal," he said, according to Bolton. Trump urged Xi to help him get reelected.  Bolton also alleges that Mr. Trump pushed Xi in trade negotiations to agree to purchase American agricultural products in order to boost Mr. Trump's political standing with U.S. farmers and help him win reelection. During a June 2019 conversation with Xi, Mr. Trump turned the conversation to the 2020 presidential election, Bolton writes. "Trump then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China's economic capability and pleading with Xi to ensure he'd win. He stressed the importance of farmers and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome," Bolton said.  Bolton wrote in the book that he was prevented from publishing the president's direct words. Bolton and then-White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney learned of the president's invite to Kim Jong Un to meet him at the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) through the president's Twitter feed. "Mulvaney looked just as flabbergasted as I was. I thought the tweet was a throwaway," Bolton writes. But it wasn't a throwaway tweet. The photo op took place in June 2019. "I felt sick that a stray tweet could actually result in a meeting," Bolton wrote. Bolton suggests that during a conversation between the president and Prime Minister Teresa May on Russia, the president appeared not to know Britain is a nuclear power. The discussion turned to Russia's hit job on a defected former Russian intelligence agent and his daughter, which a British diplomat described as a chemical-weapons attack on a nuclear power. "Trump asked 'oh, are you a nuclear power?' Which I knew was not intended as a joke," Bolton writes."

If the above is true, Bolton's ass should have testified during the Senate impeachment trial despite his following misgivings:

"The former national security adviser says he thinks the House should have broadened its purview for its impeachment inquiry. "Had the House not focused solely on the Ukraine aspects of Trump's confusion of his personal interests (whether political or economic), but on the broader pattern of his behavior — including his pressure campaigns involving Halkbank, ZTE and Huawei among others — there might have been a greater chance to persuade others that 'high crimes and misdemeanors' had been perpetrated," he writes."

No question.  Precisely, one of the criticisms directed at Democrats at the time by this publication and others.

"But Bolton, who could have testified about the president's alleged actions during the impeachment saga, said he doesn't think it would have made a difference."

That's insane.  Gets worse:

"Had a Senate majority agreed to call witnesses and had I testified, I am convinced, given the environment then existing because of the House's impeachment malpractice, that it would have made no significant difference in the Senate outcome," Bolton writes."

Apparently, Bolton was more interested in lining his pockets courtesy of his book, than doing the right thing and testifying against his nazi fuhrer.

The Associated Press reports:

"President Donald Trump “pleaded” with China’s Xi Jinping during a 2019 summit to help his reelection prospects, according to a scathing new book by former Trump adviser John Bolton that accuses the president of being driven by political calculations when making national security decisions. The White House worked furiously to block the book, asking a federal court for an emergency temporary restraining order Wednesday against its release. Bolton’s allegations that Trump solicited Chinese help for his reelection effort carried echoes of Trump’s attempt to get political help from Ukraine, which led to his impeachment. “I am hard-pressed to identify any significant Trump decision during my tenure that wasn’t driven by re-election calculations,” Bolton wrote."

Certainly, seems to be the case last three and a half years since Trump took office.

"The 577-page book paints an unvarnished portrait of Trump and his administration, amounting to the most vivid, first-person account yet of how Trump conducts himself in office. Several other former officials have written books, but most have been flattering about the president. Other former officials have indicated they were saving their accounts of their time working for Trump until after he left office to speak more candidly. The Associated Press obtained a copy of Bolton’s book in advance of its release next week. Bolton, Trump’s national security adviser for a 17-month period, called Trump’s attempt to shift the June 2019 conversation with Xi to the U.S. election a stunning move and wrote that it was among innumerable conversations that he found concerning. He added that Congress should have expanded the scope of its impeachment inquiry to these other incidents. Deeply critical of the president and much of his senior team, Bolton wrote that because staff had served him so poorly, Trump “saw conspiracies behind rocks, and remained stunningly uninformed on how to run the White House, let alone the huge federal government.” He added that while he was at the White House, Trump typically had only two intelligence briefings a week “and in most of those, he spoke at greater length than the briefers, often on matters completely unrelated to the subjects at hand.”

Sad, isn't it?  Not surprising, however.

"On Thursday Trump denounced the book as “a compilation of lies and made up stories, all intended to make me look bad.” “Many of the ridiculous statements he attributes to me were never made, pure fiction,” he tweeted."

That right, sir?  As a congenital liar, delusionally believe you have any credibility?

"Trump accused Bolton of violating the law by releasing the book, telling Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” on Wednesday: “It’s highly classified information, and he did not have approval.”

Simply, not true.

"The book includes embarrassing claims that Trump thought Finland was part of Russia, didn’t know that the United Kingdom was a nuclear power and called reporters “scumbags” who should be “executed.” As for the meeting with the Chinese president in Osaka, Japan, Bolton wrote that Trump told Xi that Democrats were hostile to China. “He then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win,” Bolton said. “He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome.” Bolton wrote that he would print Trump’s exact words, “but the government’s pre-publication review process has decided otherwise.” The book, titled “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” is set to be released Tuesday by Simon & Schuster. It has been the subject of a lengthy battle between Bolton and the White House. The Justice Department sued on Tuesday in an effort to delay publication of the book, claiming that it still contained highly classified information and that a required review by the National Security Council had not been concluded. According to the filing, a career official determined no classified material remained in April, but national security adviser Robert O’Brien initiated a secondary review that deemed additional information to be classified. Bolton wrote that he was asked to add phrases like, “in my view,” to make it clear he was expressing his opinion instead of relying on sensitive information. In others, he was asked to describe things more generally. He was asked to remove quotation marks nearly every time he recounts conversation between Trump and foreign leaders and himself and foreign leaders."

Freedom of speech?  What's that?  ... Right, Mr. 'President?'  Can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit?

"The White House’s contention that so much of the book was classified appeared to be a tacit admission that many of Bolton’s allegations were accurate — as inaccurate information could not be classified."

No shit.  LOL.

"Bolton wrote that he raised some of his concerns about Trump’s conversations with foreign leaders with Attorney General William Barr and flagged similar worries with White House attorneys and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “The pattern looked like obstruction of justice as a way of life, which we couldn’t accept,” he wrote. Trump continually pandered to Xi, Bolton wrote. At a White House Christmas dinner in 2018, Bolton said Trump asked why the U.S. was sanctioning China over its treatment of Uighurs. China suspects Uighurs, who are predominantly Muslim and culturally and ethnically distinct from the majority Han Chinese population, of harboring separatist tendencies. In recent years, China has dramatically escalated its campaign against them by detaining more than 1 million people in internment camps and prisons. “At the opening dinner of the Osaka G-20 meeting, with only interpreters present, Xi explained to Trump why he was basically building concentration camps in Xinjiang,” Bolton wrote. “According to our interpreter, Trump said that Xi should go ahead with building the camps, which he thought was exactly the right thing to do. ” In the book, Bolton describes every Trump decision as being guided by concerns for his own reelection, a claim that evokes the scandal that sparked Trump’s impeachment last year. The book alleges that Trump directly tied providing military aid to Ukraine to the country’s willingness to conduct investigations into his Democratic challenger Joe Biden and Biden’s son Hunter. In one conversation, Trump said “he wasn’t in favor of sending them anything until all the Russia-investigation materials related to Clinton and Biden had been turned over,” Bolton writes. Trump’s decision to withhold military assistance to Ukraine until it agreed to investigate Biden led the House to charge Trump was abusing his power. The aid was ultimately released once the holdup became public. The GOP-controlled Senate ultimately acquitted the president on that count and a count of obstructing Congress’ investigation of the incident."

No justice.  No honor.  Republican nazis in the Senate traitorously, treasonously backed their fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

"Bolton was called to testify before House lawmakers conducting the impeachment inquiry, but he declined, suggesting he wanted a federal court to decide whether he should heed a White House directive not to cooperate with the inquiry."

Too much money to be made selling the book, right, Mr. Bolton?

"House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who managed the impeachment case against Trump, said Thursday “we’ll never know” if Bolton’s testimony might have made a difference in the case."

Democrats certainly made a mistake limiting the impeachment case against the fascist bastard.  The country paid one hell of a price for that gutlessness.

"Schiff told “CBS This Morning” that Bolton’s decision to save his information for his book was “the price the country had to pay for John Bolton’s putting profit above country.”

Certainly, true.  Democrats are also to blame for gutlessly limiting the impeachment case.  Clearly, not worth a shit.  More concerned with returning to office than doing the right thing.

ABC News reports:

"President Donald Trump is not "fit for office" and doesn't have "the competence to carry out the job," his former national security adviser John Bolton told ABC News in an exclusive interview. In an explosive new book about his 17 months at the White House, Bolton characterizes Trump as "stunningly uninformed," ignorant of basic facts and easily manipulated by foreign adversaries. But his assessment that Trump is not "fit" to be president is among the most stunning indictments of a sitting president by one of their own top advisers in American history. "There really isn't any guiding principle that I was able to discern other than what's good for Donald Trump's reelection," Bolton told ABC News chief global affairs correspondent Martha Raddatz. "He was so focused on the reelection that longer-term considerations fell by the wayside," he added."

The Washington Post reports:

"A federal judge on Saturday rejected the Justice Department’s emergency request to block publication of John Bolton’s White House memoir but said the former Trump national security adviser “likely jeopardized national security” and exposed himself to criminal prosecution."

Think so?  We'll see.  Trump and his henchmen in the DOJ will certainly do all they can to stick it to him.

"U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth of the District of Columbia denied the Trump administration’s request for a restraining order on the book, set for publication Tuesday, citing his publisher’s declaration that more than 200,000 copies have already shipped for sale. But Lamberth noted that it appeared Bolton failed to complete a pre-publication government review and get written authority that his manuscript contained no classified information before publishing."

That's highly unlikely for reasons about to be discussed shortly.  -- The judge may indeed be covering his ass, trying to deflect expected rage from Trump and his henchmen:

“While Bolton’s unilateral conduct raises grave national security concerns, the government has not established that an injunction is an appropriate remedy,” Lamberth wrote. “For reasons that hardly need to be stated, the Court will not order nationwide seizure and destruction of a political memoir.” However, Lamberth said a private review of passages the government alleged contain classified information persuaded him that Bolton “has gambled with the national security of the United States... [and] has exposed his country to harm and himself to civil (and potentially criminal) liability.”

Think so?  Consider the following:

"Bolton, a veteran diplomat and security expert, denied the book contained any classified information. He asserted that after a painstaking, months-long review, a career White House official, Ellen Knight, effectively cleared his manuscript in April before Trump political appointees undertook to stall it through November’s election. Bolton in that case could have sued the government, Lamberth said, instead of “unilaterally” opting out of the review process. “This was Bolton’s bet: If he is right and the book does not contain classified information, he keeps the upside [of publicity and sales]; but if he is wrong, he stands to lose his profits from the book deal, exposes himself to criminal liability, and imperils national security,” the judge said. “Bolton was wrong,” Lamberth concluded."

We'll see, won't we?  What are you so afraid of, Judge?  The truth?  Most of what is classified has no business being classified in the first place.  Remains classified to spare government officials embarrassment.

"On Saturday, reaction from Trump was swift. The president — who previously said he thought and hoped Bolton would have “criminal problems” — wrote in a tweet: “Bolton broke the law and has been called out and rebuked for so doing, with a really big price to pay. He likes dropping bombs on people, and killing them. Now he will have bombs dropped on him!”

Jesus Christ.  Wake up, Mr. 'President.'  Bolton has yet to be investigated.  Already, have him convicted of a crime he has yet to be charged with?  One thing for sure, Donald.  Bolton has certainly exposed you for the incompetent fool you truly are.

"Legal experts said the ruling in some ways marked a “symbolic” victory for the government as far as stopping Bolton’s book. The government waited to the 11th hour to file suit, and Bolton’s attorney argued Friday it was political “theater” intended to placate the president. But Lamberth’s decision also dealt a personal and professional blow to Bolton, while the government continues to litigate to clawback any of his book profits, including a reported $2 million advance, by alleging he violated government nondisclosure agreements."

Bolton was aware of the risk.  Hard to believe he didn't know what he was doing.  Then again, Trump and his henchmen may find a sympathetic judge as this issue continues to be litigated.  Should that happen and Bolton loses it all, certainly exposed Trump for whom and what he is.  Indeed, a public service.

"Mark S. Zaid, a lawyer who has represented more than two dozen current and former government employees who have sought to publish books, said the likelihood of the government being able to show “irreparable harm” now that an injunction was denied is “literally impossible.” “But absent some cataclysmic event occurring, Bolton is facing loss of millions of dollars,” he said. The Justice Department also could seek to prosecute Bolton for publishing the book without authorization."

All this will likely take years to resolve since the government had apparently declared no classified material remained in the manuscript, -- then conveniently changed its mind a couple of months ago in light of the quickly approaching election and Trump's declining poll numbers.  Somebody's lying.  Guess who?

"The government did not name publisher Simon & Schuster as a defendant but asked the court to enjoin it along with Bolton. In a statement, company spokesman Adam Rothberg said, “We are grateful that the Court has vindicated the strong First Amendment protections against censorship and prior restraint of publication. We are very pleased that the public will now have the opportunity to read Ambassador Bolton’s account of his time as National Security Advisor.” Bolton attorney Charles J. Cooper said, “We welcome today’s decision by the Court denying the Government’s attempt to suppress Ambassador Bolton’s book.” Cooper added, “We respectfully take issue, however, with the Court’s preliminary conclusion at this early stage of the case that Ambassador Bolton did not comply fully with his contractual prepublication obligation to the Government, and the case will now proceed to development of the full record on that issue. The full story of these events has yet to be told — but it will be.” At a hearing conducted by videoconference Friday, Deputy Assistant Attorney General David M. Morrell said he did not know whether the president was involved in the process of clearing the book for publication and acknowledged he knew of no precedent in which high-level officials intervened in classification reviews."

Carefully consider the following.  Will likely present a problem for Trump and his henchmen:

"The government acknowledged that after Knight on April 27 said Bolton had completed required edits, Trump appointees began another review. That process was led by Michael Ellis — a former aide to Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and the National Security Council’s new senior director for intelligence — who received his classification authority March 1 and was not trained on it before he completed the Bolton manuscript review. Morrell acknowledged the government could confirm that only three of the six samples it gave the court were classified before Ellis’s re-review. One of those included a matter described in a government declaration Wednesday, in which Gen. Paul M. Nakasone, director of the National Security Agency, said a limited portion of the draft manuscript “implicates” TS/SCI. He said “compromise of this information could result in the permanent loss of a valuable [signal intelligence] source and cause irreparable damage to the U.S. [signal intelligence] system.”

Think so?  Get this:

"Bolton in a court filing Thursday argued that “sweeping” changes demanded just two days earlier by the White House after Ellis’s re-review apparently would eliminate passages describing most of Trump’s conversations with advisers, foreign leaders and numerous others portraying him in an unflattering light, Bolton said in a court filing. Among its disclosures already reported, the book states Trump asked Chinese President Xi Jinping to help him win the 2020 U.S. election, confirms Trump attempted to use military aid to pressure Ukraine on political investigations, and says Trump expressed willingness to halt or obstruct criminal investigations as personal favors to authoritarian foreign leaders."

Pot calling the kettle black:

"Trump has previously responded on Twitter by calling Bolton a “Wacko” and claimed that the former close aide’s account is “a compilation of lies and made up stories, all intended to make me look bad.”

Called the truth, Mr. 'President.'  Then again, expect better of a congenital liar?

ABC News reports:

"In an exclusive interview with "Good Morning America," John Bolton, President Trump's former national security adviser, condemned the president, saying he hoped history will remember him as "an aberration." "His policymaking is so incoherent, so unfocused, so unstructured, so wrapped around his own personal political fortunes, that mistakes are being made that will have grave consequences for the national security of the United States," Bolton told George Stephanopoulos Monday. But the reaction was swift against Bolton, who refused to testify before House lawmakers during the impeachment hearings. He later said he would appear as a witness before the Senate during Trump's trial but Republicans blocked a vote to call witnesses.

"Bolton announced during Sunday's special that he will not vote for Trump, adding on Monday that he's "not switching to the Democratic Party. I'm still a rock-ribbed conservative Republican." Instead, he will write in a conservative politician's name in November. That contrasts with what Bolton told voters in 2016 when he supported Trump's candidacy -- saying that a vote for a third-party candidate was a vote for Hillary Clinton. "Having watched Donald Trump for 17 months, I cannot in good conscience vote for him, and I think there are a lot of other Republicans who feel the same way. This is not a happy election for conservatives," Bolton said.

"In the days since details from Bolton's book first started to leak, Trump and his allies have attacked him. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called him a "traitor" and accused him of lying -- charges that Bolton dismissed. "He's responding the same way that President Trump is -- they call names, they deny -- but they're not willing to face up to what the real facts are," Bolton said.

"The Trump administration has also accused Bolton of revealing classified information in his book. A federal judge seemed to agree Saturday, ruling that the Department of Justice can't block the release of his book, but warning Bolton "has exposed his country to harm and himself to civil (and potentially criminal) liability." Bolton said Monday he and his lawyers "respectfully disagree" with the judge."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Another official in the Trump Administration resigns in protest.  The Washington Post reports:

"A senior State Department official who has served in the Trump administration since its first day is resigning over President Trump’s recent handling of racial tensions across the country — saying that the president’s actions “cut sharply against my core values and convictions.”

What took so long? Where were you all this time?  Then again, better late than never.

"Mary Elizabeth Taylor, the assistant secretary of state for legislative affairs, submitted her resignation on Thursday. Taylor’s five-paragraph resignation letter, obtained by The Washington Post, serves as an indictment of Trump’s stewardship at a time of national unrest from one of the administration’s highest ranking African Americans and an aide who was viewed as both loyal and effective in serving his presidency. “Moments of upheaval can change you, shift the trajectory of your life, and mold your character. The President’s comments and actions surrounding racial injustice and Black Americans cut sharply against my core values and convictions,” Taylor wrote in her resignation letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “I must follow the dictates of my conscience and resign as Assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs.” Taylor, 30, was unanimously confirmed to her position in October 2018 and is the youngest assistant secretary of state for legislative affairs in history and the first black woman to serve in that post. She has been a pivotal behind-the-scenes figure in the administration. Tapped for her legislative expertise and strong relationship with senators due to her work for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Taylor served as the White House’s deputy director for nominations before joining the State Department. In her White House role, she helped shepherd more than 400 presidential appointments through the Senate, including those of Supreme Court Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, CIA director Gina Haspel, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell and Pompeo."

How could you support bona fide nazis who you knew would take a raucous hard dump on all civil and constitutional rights and liberties?

"Taylor’s decision to leave the administration amid the racial tensions flaring nationwide appears to be the first high-profile resignation made in protest of the president’s actions that has been made public. One member of the Defense Science Board, James N. Miller, submitted his resignation to Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper shortly after Trump’s controversial photo op in Lafayette Square, but he was a former Obama administration official who had served on the committee that advises the Pentagon on science issues since 2014. In contrast, Taylor was viewed as a loyal member of the administration and is a lifelong member of the Republican Party. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment."

What could they say?  Got to be a significant blow to our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

“I am deeply grateful to you, Mr. Secretary, for empowering me to lead this team and strategically advise you over these last two years,” Taylor wrote in the resignation letter she submitted to Pompeo. “You have shown grace and respect in listening to my opinions, and your remarkable leadership have made me a better leader and team member. I appreciate that you understand my strong loyalty to my personal convictions and values, particularly in light of recent events.”

On June 3, Taylor sent a message to her team of roughly 60 State Department employees, acknowledging that in the aftermath of Floyd’s death that her heart “is broken, in a way from which I’ve had to heal it countless times.” “George Floyd’s horrific murder and the recent deaths of other Black Americans have shaken our nation at its core. Every time we witness these heinous, murderous events, we are reminded that our country’s wounds run deep and remain untreated,” Taylor wrote in her note, also obtained by The Post. “For our team members who are hurting right now, please know you are not alone. You are seen, recognized, heard, and supported. I am right here with you.”

Going to take far more than rhetoric and a resignation to correct the injustice, Ms. Taylor.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

A U.S. Attorney stands up, stands tall.  NBC News reports:

"Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan, plans to step down and President Donald Trump will nominate the current chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission to succeed him, Attorney General William Barr announced Friday evening."

... Think so?  LOL.

Uncommon Valor:

"But Berman said he learned of the plan in a Justice Department press release and shot back that he has no intention of stepping down. "I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York," he said in a statement late Friday night. "I will step down when a presidentially appointed nominee is confirmed by the Senate. Until then, our investigations will move forward without delay or interruption. I cherish every day that I work with the men and women of this Office to pursue justice without fear or favor — and intend to ensure that this Office's important cases continue unimpeded."

Could certainly be fired by the Trump nazi.  Hasn't happened yet.  Could certainly raise political problems for Trump since this prosecutor has vigorously legally pursued the Trump administration and its henchmen:

"Word of Barr's announcement caught senior officials in the Manhattan U.S. attorney's office off guard. His office prosecuted former Trump confidante Michael Cohen, though he was recused from involvement in the case. And he was overseeing the investigation of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani's business activities."

If confirmed, his successor has effectively no federal prosecutorial experience.  Fascinating, isn't it?

"Barr said the president will nominate Jay Clayton to succeed Berman. "For the past three years, Jay has been an extraordinarily successful SEC Chairman, overseeing efforts to modernize regulation of the capital markets, protect Main Street investors, enhance American competitiveness, and address challenges ranging from cybersecurity issues to the COVID-19 pandemic." He said Berman "has done an excellent job leading one of our nation's most significant U.S. attorney's offices, achieving many successes on consequential civil and criminal matters." Until Clayton can be nominated and confirmed, Barr said, Craig Carpenito, the United States Attorney in New Jersey, will serve as acting US attorney in New York. Berman's statement, however, said he has no intention of leaving his position vacant. Berman has also overseen the prosecution of two Florida businessmen, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, former associates of Giuliani who were tied to the Ukraine impeachment investigation. Berman's office filed charges last fall, accusing them of violating federal campaign finance laws."

Democrats were quick to react:

"House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler tweeted, "America is right to expect the worst of Bill Barr, who has repeatedly interfered in criminal investigations on Trump’s behalf." "We have a hearing on this topic on Wednesday," said Nadler, D-N.Y., who represents parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn. "We welcome Mr. Berman’s testimony and will invite him to testify." Preet Bharara, who preceded Berman in the office was fired in the early days of the Trump administration tweeted, "Doesn't sound like 'stepping down.'" He added: "Why does a president get rid of his own hand-picked US Attorney in SDNY on a Friday night, less than 5 months before the election?" New York's senior U.S. senator, Democrat Charles Schumer, said the move "reeks of potential corruption of the legal process. What is angering President Trump? A previous action by this U.S. attorney or one that is ongoing?"

NPR reports:

"The U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York is in a fight with the Justice Department over his job. Geoffrey Berman has overseen prosecutions of associates of President Trump, including Trump's former personal attorney Michael Cohen. He also brought the grand jury indictment against associates of the president's current personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. Attorney General William Barr, in a statement released late Friday night, said that Berman is "stepping down" and that the president is nominating Jay Clayton, chairman of the Securities and Exchange, to succeed Berman. A short time later, Berman fired off his own announcement, denying Barr's statement. "I learned in a press release from the Attorney General tonight that I was 'stepping down' as United States Attorney," Berman said. "I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. I will step down when a presidentially appointed nominee is confirmed by the Senate."

"Under Berman's watch, his office aggressively investigated and prosecuted Trump "fixer" Michael Cohen, who ultimately pleaded guilty to financial crimes, lying to Congress and campaign finance crimes. Under oath, Cohen implicated Trump in payments made to two women ahead of the 2016 elections to keep them quiet about affairs they said they had with Trump. Berman issued a grand jury indictment against Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, two Giuliani associates. The two have pleaded not guilty to setting up a shell company to hide the foreign sourcing of a $325,000 donation to a superPAC committed to Trump's reelection. The two also allegedly helped Giuliani in efforts to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter in Ukraine. And Berman's office has investigated the business dealings of Giuliani himself, but no charges have been brought against him."

The following is sadly true:

"This is clearly a political takeover of the historically independent Southern District of New York," said Elie Honig, a former assistant U.S. attorney for the district, in an interview with NPR's Weekend Edition. "When you look at the timing of this — the fact that it was announced late on a Friday night, the fact that the attorney general immediately was caught in a misleading statement when he said the U.S. attorney is stepping down ... and you look at all the important pending cases in the SDNY right now, the only logical conclusion to me is that this is a political move." Honig said that if the Trump administration wishes to push the matter further — over Berman's stated objection and without Senate confirmation of his replacement — it's likely to end up in the courts. "The question is, can the president just fire or move aside the U.S. attorney barring [Senate approval]?" he said. "In other words, can the attorney general and the president just say 'You're out, somebody else'?" During Berman's tenure, the SDNY has also taken on other high-profile cases, including the prosecution of multimillionaire Jeffrey Epstein on federal sex trafficking charges. Berman later charged two corrections officers who were supposed to guard Epstein with dereliction of their duties after Epstein's apparent suicide in his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center."

The Associated Press reports:

"The powerful U.S. attorney in Manhattan who has been overseeing investigations of President Donald Trump’s allies showed up at his office to work Saturday, defying the attorney general who abruptly acted hours earlier to oust the prosecutor. “I’m just here to do my job, Geoffrey S. Berman told reporters. The administration’s push to cast aside Berman has set up an extraordinary political and constitutional clash between the Justice Department and one of the nation’s top districts, which has tried major mob and terrorism cases over the years and is investigating Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. “I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position,” Berman said in a statement late Friday. It also is deepening tensions between the department and congressional Democrats who have accused Attorney General William Barr of politicizing the agency and acting more like Trump’s personal lawyer than the country’s chief law enforcement officer."

Get this:

"Barr offered no explanation for his action. The White House announced that Trump was nominating Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton, a well-connected Wall Street lawyer has virtually no experience as a federal prosecutor, for the job. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said he was unlikely to proceed with Clayton’s nomination unless New York’s senators, Democrats Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, gave their consent to the pick. Schumer already has said the bid to oust Berman “reeks of potential corruption of the legal process.”

Certainly, appears to be the case.

"The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., said his committee was inviting Berman to testify this coming week. Only days ago, allegations surfaced from former Trump national security adviser John Bolton that the president sought to interfere in an investigation by Berman’s office into the state-owned Turkish bank in an effort to cut deals with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoan. Berman’s statement said he would stay on the job until a nominee was confirmed by the Senate. He challenged Barr’s power to remove, given that Berman was appointed by federal judges, not by the president. Under federal law, a U.S. attorney who is appointed by district court judges can serve “until the vacancy is filled.” But the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel argued in a 1979 opinion that the “power to remove a court-appointed U.S. attorney rests with the president.” It says “the president is responsible for the conduct of a U.S. Attorney’s office and therefore must have the power to remove one he believes is an unsuitable incumbent, regardless of who appointed him.”

Trump likely has the power.  Upstanding U.S. Attorneys across the country could certainly resign in protest.

Especially, in light of the following:

"Federal prosecutors in New York have overseen numerous prosecutions and investigations with ties to Trump in recent years. That includes an ongoing investigation into Giuliani’s business dealings, including whether he failed to register as a foreign agent, according to people familiar with the matter. They were not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The office has also prosecuted a number of Trump associates, including Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who served a prison sentence for lying to Congress and campaign finance crimes. Berman has overseen the prosecution of two Florida businessmen, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, who were associates of Giuliani and tied to the Ukraine impeachment investigation. The men were charged in October with federal campaign finance violations, including hiding the origin of a $325,000 donation to a group supporting Trump’s reelection. Attention refocused on the office this past week after news organizations, including The Associated Press, obtained copies of Bolton’s tell-all book. Bolton alleges in the book that Trump sought to cut a deal to stop federal prosecutors in New York from investigating whether Halkbank violated U.S. sanctions against Iran in order to free an American pastor imprisoned in Turkey. Six weeks after the pastor’s release, Bolton writes, Trump told Erdogan on a call that “he would take care of things, explaining that the Southern District prosecutors were not his people, but were Obama people, a problem that would be fixed when they were replaced by his people.” The episode Bolton describes occurred months after Berman assumed the role of U.S. attorney."

Fascinating, isn't it?

"A Republican who contributed to the president’s election campaign, Berman worked for the same law firm as Giuliani and was put in his job by the Trump administration. But as U.S. attorney, he won over some skeptics after he went after Trump allies, and had a direct hand in other investigations that have angered the president."

Clearly, Berman did not forget his oath of office, that is, to do his job and uphold The United States Constitution, rule of law.

"Berman was appointed by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions in January 2018, after Preet Bharara, then US attorney in New York, was fired. Bharara had refused to resign along with dozens of other federal prosecutors appointed by President Barack Obama."

Should not have been forced out.  Were doing the job.  Supposed to be separation between the 'Justice' Department and the Oval Office.  That is, no politicization of the system of justice.

"Months later, FBI agents raided Cohen’s offices, an act the president decried as a politically motivated witch hunt. Berman withdrew from Cohen’s prosecution; it was never explained why. The following April, in the absence of a formal nomination by Trump, the judges in Manhattan federal court voted to appoint Berman to the position permanently. The White House never said why Trump didn’t formally nominate Berman."

Fascinating, isn't it?  The judges certainly knew he did his job.  Precisely, why they voted to appoint him.

Clearly, a great prosecutor who did not let partisanship get in the way:

"Yet the links between the White House and some of Berman’s investigations were clear. His office subpoenaed Trump’s inaugural committee for a wide range of documents as part of an investigation into various potential crimes, including possible illegal contributions from foreigners to inaugural events. Weeks before the 2018 midterm election, Berman announced insider trading charges against an ardent Trump supporter, Republican Rep. Chris Collins. Collins, who represented western New York, has since resigned. Under Berman’s tenure, his office also brought charges against Michael Avenatti, the combative lawyer who gained fame by representing porn actress Stormy Daniels in lawsuits involving Trump. Avenatti was convicted in February of trying to extort Nike after prosecutors said he threatened to use his media access to hurt Nike’s reputation and stock price unless the sportswear giant paid him up to $25 million."

Clearly, Trump and Barr want this man out of office.  -- A prosecutor who has shown his true mettle.  Uncommon Valor.

United Press International reports:

"President Donald Trump has fired Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman following Berman's refusal to resign, Attorney General William Barr said Saturday. Shortly after Barr's announcement Berman posted a statement to Twitter confirming he would be leaving office. "In light of Attorney General Barr's decision to respect the normal operation of law and have Deputy U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss become Acting U.S. Attorney, I will be leaving the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, effective immediately," Berman wrote. "It has been the honor of a lifetime to serve as this District's U.S. Attorney and a custodian of a proud legacy, but I could leave the district in no better hands than Audrey's. She is the smartest, most principled, and effective lawyer with whom I have ever had the privilege of working."

Trump remains a congenital liar:

"Trump told reporters Saturday that he was not involved in Barr's decision to fire Berman."

Not true.  Goddamned disingenuous bullshit from a congenital liar:

"Well, that's all up to the attorney general. Attorney General Barr is working on that," Trump said on the South Lawn as he prepared to fly to Tulsa, Okla., for Saturday's rally. "That's his department, not my department. But we have a very capable attorney general so that's really up to him. I'm not involved."

Jesus Christ.  No credibility.  A goddamned liar.  Trump fired Berman for doing his job.

"The move "reeks of potential corruption of the legal process," Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y, said. "What is angering President Trump? A previous action by this U.S. attorney or one that is ongoing?"

NBC News reports:

"Attorney General William Barr said Saturday that at his request, President Donald Trump had fired Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan."

Wasn't it truly the other way around, Mr. Attorney General?  LOL.  Two congenital liars.  Whatever happened to the truth?  LOL.

Height of Aryan arrogance:

"Barr said in his Saturday letter that he had been "surprised and quite disappointed" by Berman's response on Friday night, saying he had "hoped that [Berman's] departure could be amicable" and had believed there was still a chance he might remain within the administration in some capacity."

Jesus Christ.  You and your goddamned fuhrer, the Trump nazi, both wanted him out for investigating Trump, his henchmen, to say nothing of their prosecution (henchmen.)

Unadulterated bullshit:

"Unfortunately, with your statement of last night, you have chosen public spectacle over public service," Barr wrote. "Because you have declared that you have no intention of resigning, I have asked the President to remove you as of today, and he has done so."

Isn't it you and your nazi fuhrer who have intentionally created the 'public spectacle,' you jackass?

"Democrats were sharply critical of the move, with House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler tweeting Friday that "America is right to expect the worst of Bill Barr, who has repeatedly interfered in criminal investigations on Trump’s behalf." "The House Judiciary Committee will immediately open an investigation into this incident, as part of our broader investigation into Barr’s unacceptable politicization of the Department of Justice," Nadler said in a statement Saturday. "On Wednesday, the Committee will hear from two whistleblowers who will explain why Barr’s attempt to fire Mr. Berman is part of a larger, ongoing, and wholly unacceptable pattern of conduct." "The whole thing smacks of corruption and incompetence, which is what we have come to expect from this President and his Attorney General," he said in the statement."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Nazi justice in Nazi America.  The following is beyond appalling, indicative of a fascist police-state run and owned by the Trump nazi and his henchmen.  Seatbelts on.  NBC News reports:

"The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on Wednesday ordered that a federal judge dismiss the case against President Donald Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn, ending his long court battle and freeing him of the prospect of a prison sentence."

Readers are reminded Flynn pled guilty under oath more than once.

"By a 2-1 vote, a three-judge panel said U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan had no choice but to grant the Justice Department's motion to drop the case against Flynn. "Because this is not the unusual case where a more searching inquiry is justified, and because there is no adequate remedy for the intrusion on 'the Executive’s long-settled primacy over charging decisions,' we grant the petition for mandamus in part and order the district court to grant the government’s Rule 48(a) motion to dismiss the charges against Flynn," Judge Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee, wrote in the three-judge panel's majority decision."

Nazi justice courtesy of a 'judge' who clearly repaid her fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

The crime:

"Flynn twice pleaded guilty to charges that he lied to FBI agents in Jan. 2017 about his conversations with Russia's ambassador to the U.S. But after an agreement to cooperate with prosecutors fell apart in a separate case involving Flynn's former business partner, Flynn sought to withdraw his plea. Last month, Flynn asked the appeals court for an order directing U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan, who is handling his case, to dismiss it. That came after the Justice Department filed a motion to dismiss the case, which led Sullivan to appoint a retired federal judge to examine the government's justification and to analyze whether Flynn should be separately found in contempt of court for his guilty plea. Because he was never sentenced, Flynn was never actually convicted so there is no conviction to wipe off the record. If Sullivan follows the appeals court's instructions and formally grants the government's motion to dismiss, the case will be over. Sullivan could also appeal Wednesday's ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. He has not said whether he would do so. Any judge on the full federal appeals court could also ask to review Wednesday’s decision, which would put it on hold."

Someone in the Judiciary needs to stand tall.  Honor his or her oath to uphold The United States Constitution.

"Trump was quick to celebrate the decision, tweeting: "Great!" "Appeals Court Upholds Justice Departments Request To Drop Criminal Case Against General Michael Flynn!" he added."

To be expected from our nazi fuhrer who engineered this appalling atrocity with the aid of his henchmen in the 'Justice' Department and the Judiciary.  Nazi justice.  In Nazi America.  Sad, isn't it?

"Trump in March tweeted that he was "strongly considering a full pardon" for Flynn. Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec tweeted on the ruling as well, posting, "WIN in General Flynn's case."

Jesus Christ.  An egregious loss for the U.S. Constitution, rule of law, and the non-nazi population of our formerly great country.

"Judge Robert Wilkins, appointed by former President Barack Obama, authored a partial dissent to the court's ruling on Wednesday, saying that the appeals court should have waited to see whether Sullivan granted or denied the government's motion to abandon the case before deciding whether to order him to drop it. "That is not for us, as a Court of Appeals, to decide in the first instance," he wrote. "Rather, the District Court must be given a reasonable opportunity to consider and hold a hearing on the government’s request to ensure that it is not clearly contrary to the public interest."

You think?  ... Hear the rumble?

"In early May, the Justice Department abruptly notified Sullivan it would no longer prosecute the case, saying that Flynn's conduct was not "material" to any investigation and therefore did not violate the law. After that sudden move, Sullivan appointed retired U.S. District Judge John Gleeson as a friend of the court to offer his views on the case moving forward. Flynn's lawyers had argued that once the government seeks to drop a case, the judge has almost no choice but to accept. Wednesday's decision also said Sullivan had no authority to appoint Gleeson. Sullivan scheduled a July 16 hearing on whether to let the government to drop Flynn's case. The ruling comes as a federal prosecutor is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday on what he described as "political influence" in Justice Department decision making in the case against Trump's longtime adviser and confidant Roger Stone. The prosecutor, Aaron Zelinsky, who has worked at the Justice Department since 2014 and was on the team prosecuting Stone, said he resigned from that team because the Justice Department inappropriately pushed for a lighter sentence. "I have never seen political influence play a role in prosecutorial decision making, with one exception: United States v. Roger Stone," Zelinsky said in prepared testimony."

This is one f--ked up 'president,' 'Justice' Department, and Judiciary.  Worse, Trump has managed to seat at least two hundred 'judges' during his reign.

"Zelinsky was one of four prosecutors who withdrew from the Stone case in February after they were asked to submit a revised filing that invited the judge to impose a more lenient sentence, pressuring the prosecutors to "water down and in some cases outright distort" the nature of Stone's conduct, Zelinsky said."

Nazi America.  Day is night, night is day, and shit smells perversely sweet.  All ass backwards courtesy of the Trump nazi and his henchmen.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-26-20

Think Trump hasn't lost his mind?  NBC News reports:

"Dr. Anthony Fauci said Tuesday that the federal government is trying to expand testing, not slow it down as President Donald Trump has suggested in recent days. In testimony before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Fauci was asked about the president’s recent comments and whether he agrees that it makes sense to limit the number of COVID-19 tests. “It's the opposite, we're going to be doing more testing, not less,” said Fauci, the nation's top infectious diseases expert, who has played a key role in the Trump administration’s response to the pandemic. Fauci said that to his knowledge, “None of us have ever been told to slow down on testing — that just is a fact. In fact, we will be doing more testing.” Fauci's comments come in stark contrast to Trump’s remarks Saturday, when he told a crowd of his supporters at his first campaign rally in months that he wanted to slow down testing for the coronavirus. "Testing is a double-edged sword," said Trump, who added that the U.S. has conducted 25 million tests. "When you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people, you’re going to find more cases, so I said to my people, 'Slow the testing down, please.'"

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

Judge sticks it to ICE.  ABC News reports:

"U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents can no longer make civil immigration arrests in and around New York state courthouses, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. Legal aid attorneys and immigrant rights organizations had called for an end to the practice in recent years. The immigration raids jeopardized public safety and discouraged victims and witnesses from reporting crimes and participating in the legal process, according to Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez. He and New York Attorney General Letitia James filed the lawsuit against ICE and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to end the practice. "Allowing every resident equal access to our justice system is crucially important and necessary for maintaining fairness and public safety," Gonzalez said in a statement on the ruling. James and Gonzalez filed their lawsuit in September. The Trump administration filed a motion to dismiss it, but Judge Jed Rakoff of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York denied the motion in December. In his ruling on Wednesday, Rakoff wrote, "It is one thing for the state courts to try to deal with the impediments brought on by a pandemic, and quite another for them to have to grapple with disruptions and intimidations artificially imposed by an agency of the federal government in violation of long-standing privileges and fundamental principles of federalism and of separation of powers." According to a 2018 ACLU report, ICE agents have "dramatically expanded" their presence at courthouses under the Trump administration, with fear of deportation deterring some immigrants from reporting crimes."

Jackbooted, goose stepping, nazi motherf--kers.

"A 2019 study by the Immigrant Defense Project found that ICE arrests and sightings in and around New York state courts increased by 1,700% in 2018 compared to 2016. "Our victory over the Trump administration's over-policing policies ensures the important work happening in local courts will continue undeterred without the targeting of immigrants seeking access to our courts," James said in a statement."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

The following is beyond pitiful.  Sadly, indicative of just how clueless, out to lunch, law enforcement tragically remains.  The Washington Post reports:

"The crowds have thinned and the smoke has cleared, with more than a week of nationwide protests leaving in their wake a nation increasingly resolved to change a broken law enforcement system. But they also have left police officers badly shaken, and in some cases physically bruised. Nationwide, police leaders say the rank and file are struggling to come to grips with the level of animus they encountered on the streets, as epithets, bricks and bottles all came hurtling their way. Police have been targets of protest many times before, of course. But never quite like this."

What took so long?  Why over five decades?  To finally wake up and smell the coffee?  Nothing has truly changed in decades.  Precisely, why the response has been as strong as it is.  Needs to remain peaceful.  Nearly impossible when the jackbooted motherf--kers in blue are assaulting protesters for protesting.  No excuse for the looting, rioting, etc.  Only makes law enforcement more murderous than it already is.

“I’ve had members say they feel like a Vietnam veteran returning home to a country that hates them,” said Robert Harris, a Los Angeles police officer and director of the force’s police union. “It’s not that our members expect thank-yous. It’s the difficulty in knowing that the protesters want to be treated with equality and fairness and respect, and what they’re protesting for isn’t afforded to the officers themselves.”

Wake up, you clueless piece of crap.  They're reacting to the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue who are murdering innocent, unarmed civilians, abusing the shit out of their authority to get their cookies off.  Arresting and ticketing innocent young people to line government coffers.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Madam County Attorney? 'Sonny Boy?'

“The morale is low,” he said. “They’ve taken quite a beating.”

Tough shit.  About time.  Without desperately needed change, hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.

No question:

"Such sentiments are likely to elicit little sympathy from protesters outraged about the killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, and the countless deaths of black Americans at the hands of law enforcement officers that preceded it. Police in the United States have shot and killed nearly 500 people already this year — an average of about three a day. The figure does not include those, like Floyd, who died by other means."

Unadulterated bullshit based on ignorance:

"But the fact that police feel besieged and beleaguered potentially complicates efforts to transform Floyd’s death into a catalyst for changing the system and preventing the sort of brutality that protesters say his death exemplified."

Above?  No more than an empty, hollow excuse for the murderous thugs in blue.  Gets worse.  Get this:

"Although many police leaders say they agree with protesters’ aims, they also think their efforts to change have been underappreciated and their line of work unfairly vilified."

Day is night, night is day, and shit smells perversely sweet in the fantasy world of these criminal jackbooted assholes.

Aching cluelessness, aggressive stupidity at its most ignorant worst:

“Law enforcement is the only profession where you get rocks, bricks and molotov cocktails thrown at you merely because you’re in the same chosen profession as someone else who did something horribly wrong thousands of miles away,” said Steven Casstevens, head of the International Association of Chiefs of Police. “I can’t believe that’s where we are. Aren’t we better than that as a country?”

Jesus Christ.  Wake up, Chief.  Remove your head, figuratively, securely lodged up your clueless ass.  Delusionally believe none of your officers are criminal jackbooted bastards abusing the shit out of innocent civilians? What planet do you live on, sir?

"A Washington Post-Schar School poll released Monday found that a wide majority of Americans support the protesters, with nearly three-quarters of the country backing them. More than two-thirds of respondents said they thought Floyd’s killing reflected broader problems with police treatment of black Americans, up from less than half after 2014 protests in Ferguson, Mo."

Galling bullshit by an NYPD union leader too clueless to do anything but gutlessly whine:

“Stop treating us like animals and thugs and start treating us with some respect,” New York police union leader Mike O’Meara demanded angrily at a news conference Tuesday."

Time for you jackbooted bastards to follow your own advice.  Stop treating innocent civilians as 'animals and thugs.'  Where's respect for the humanity you purportedly serve?  Stop murdering innocent, unarmed civilians.  Stop beating the shit out of the innocent simply to get your cookies off.  Stop issuing the innocent tickets to line government coffers.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Madam County Attorney?  'Sonny Boy?'

Crock of shit:

“We’ve been left out of the conversation. We’ve been vilified. It’s disgusting.”

Jesus Christ.  Time for you criminal bastards in blue to be subject to the very same legal standards as the civilian population.  Time to end special treatment for the achingly lawless criminals in blue who delusionally believe they can do as they please with impunity.  Those days are gone.  One of the reasons why an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  ... Hear the rumble?  Too deaf to hear?  Or, sadly, is it aggressive stupidity?

Here's the f--king problem, Mr. O'Meara:

"The rift between police departments and critics who urge their overhaul has grown in recent days as officers in several cities close ranks to defend colleagues accused of using excessive force on protesters. In Buffalo, officers cheered two colleagues who shoved an elderly man to the ground during a protest, leaving him bleeding on the pavement. The police union in Philadelphia is selling “Bologna Strong” T-shirts, celebrating officer Joseph Bologna, who faces assault charges alleging he clubbed a student protester in the head."

Jackbooted criminal motherf--kers in blue.

More bullshit by the determinedly clueless:

"David Klinger, a former officer who is now a criminologist at the University of Missouri at St. Louis, said many officers are experiencing “bewilderment” at the wave of anger they’re facing. Klinger called Floyd’s killing “the most disturbing thing I’ve ever seen,” and he noted that police leaders nationwide have widely condemned it. But many officers feel as though they are being blamed for the crimes of others."

Wake up, you clueless son of a bitch.  Stop making excuses for a law enforcement community that has clearly been out of control at least six decades.

Determined, unabated cluelessness from those who remain aggressively ignorant of what has been going on decades:

“They don’t understand the vitriol directed at them because they didn’t do anything. They are a symbol of something,” Klinger said. “Officers understand the righteous anger. But not why it is directed at them personally, and why it takes the form of rocks and bottles and bricks.”

Poor, poor babies.  You gutlessly ignore the criminal, abusive, murderous behavior of your fellow officers all over our formerly great country.  Do squat shit to bring them under control.  The Blue Wall.  You bastards need to wake up.  Before too late.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.

Here's the bottom line:

"The vast majority of participants in protests that filled cities from coast to coast did not use violence, police acknowledge."

... Unlike the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

The following is the mark of an out of control dictator.  CBS News reports:

"President Trump tweeted late Wednesday night that if Seattle's leaders don't "take back" their city now, he will, as protesters have taken over a portion of the city that's become an "autonomous zone." The Seattle Police Department has conceded several blocks of the city, boarding up windows and letting those protesting the death of George Floyd to do as they see fit. Mr. Trump, who hasn't ruled out the use of the Insurrection Act, threatened to "take back" the city from the "anarchists" if necessary.

"Radical Left Governor @JayInslee and the Mayor of Seattle are being taunted and played at a level that our great Country has never seen before. Take back your city NOW. If you don't do it, I will. This is not a game. These ugly Anarchists must be stooped IMMEDIATELY. MOVE FAST!"

Aren't you, yourself, Mr. 'President' doing precisely the same, that is, 'taunting and playing' the American people?  There is no greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

Gets worse.  Get this:

"Anarchists just took over Seattle and the Liberal Democrat Governor just said he knows "nothing about that," the president tweeted on Thursday. Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan responded to the president by telling him to "go back to your bunker," a reference to the president's brief visit to the White House's underground bunker when the protests outside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue became chaotic. Mr. Trump claimed he visited the bunker for an "inspection," but Attorney General Bill Barr later said the Secret Service recommended the president go to the bunker as a safety precaution."

Expect a congenital liar not to lie?

"Mr. Trump has used his Twitter account to express his desire for forceful measures against protesters in the last several weeks, as people have taken to the streets to speak out against police brutality and racial inequality and in some cities, vandalism and other crimes have also taken place. It's not entirely clear what Mr. Trump, who has long feuded with Inslee, meant by his threat to take over Seattle, if necessary. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said last week that he opposes using the centuries-old Insurrection Act to deploy active-duty troops to states to quell protests, something that didn't sit well with the White House after Mr. Trump has threatened to send the military to states to "dominate the streets."

Expect better of an out of control nazi dictator?  Fascism, nazism, national socialism defined as the pernicious blend of government, business, and religion. 'Justified' by perversion and bastardization of the latter.

CNN News reports:

"Seattle police want to resume operations at a downtown precinct they left empty as protesters began occupying the area around it. The area around the precinct is now occupied by protesters, some of whom are calling it the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone. According to CNN affiliate KOMO, police boarded up the East Precinct building in the Capitol Hill neighborhood and left it unoccupied during protests over the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Protesters have also hung signs on the East Precinct, KOMO reported, some of which read "Seattle People Department" and "The Property of the People." But Seattle's Mayor Jenny Durkan says the city will not be accepting federal troops to move the protesters out. "The threat to invade Seattle -- to divide and incite violence in our city -- is not only unwelcome, it would be illegal," Durkan said at a Thursday press conference. She added that the majority of the protests have been peaceful. Her comments come as a response to President Donald Trump's tweets earlier in the day. President Trump had tweeted to Durkan and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, "Take back your city NOW. If you don't do it, I will."

    "Radical Left Governor @JayInslee and the Mayor of Seattle are being taunted and played at a level that our great Country has never seen before. Take back your city NOW. If you don't do it, I will. This is not a game. These ugly Anarchists must be stopped IMMEDIATELY. MOVE FAST!
    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2020

"But Durkan responded by saying, "One of the things this president will never understand is that listening to the community is not a weakness. It's a strength." Meanwhile, the Seattle police chief is openly criticizing city leaders for evacuating the Third Precinct building in the city's Capitol Hill district. "You should know, leaving the precinct was not my decision," Police Chief Carmen Best said in a video addressed to the members of the department. The video was posted on the police department's YouTube page on Thursday. Chief Best added that the city "had other plans for the building and relented to severe public pressure," and expressed her anger at how all this came about. She said officers spent days protecting the building before the city boarded it up. Earlier, in a news conference Wednesday, Assistant Police Chief Deanna Nollette said, "We're trying to get a dialogue going so we can figure out a way to resolve this without unduly impacting the citizens and the businesses that are operating in that area."

Report goes on and on.  Be interesting to see how it's finally resolved, hopefully, non-violently.

CBS News reports:

"Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best said Sunday the groundswell of support for implementing police reforms that has erupted in the weeks following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis indicates that there will be long-lasting changes to policing. "This is a pivotal moment in history," Best said on "Face the Nation." "We are going to move in a different direction, and policing will never be the same as it was before."

Hopefully, that's true. Alternative?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution.  ... Hear the rumble?

"Protests that erupted immediately following Floyd's death in late May have continued now into a third week, and Seattle has become an epicenter of the demonstrations. In the city's Capitol Hill neighborhood, protesters set up an "autonomous zone" and police evacuated their precinct there. President Trump has urged Seattle's mayor and Washington Governor Jay Inslee to "take back" the city and threatened to intervene if they did not take action."

Aggressive stupidity at its very worst.  Could spark an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution.

"Best said protests are peaceful, but said it's been a challenge for her and other Seattle leaders to determine "who is a leader or an influencer." "I know that many of our city officials and others are trying to establish some sort of communication with someone who can give us some direction about what the intent is and how we might move forward," she said. Best attended a Black Lives Matter march in the area and recalled witnessing many demonstrators who carried signs calling for an end to police brutality and changes to qualified immunity. "I know standing there watching and listening that we're going to change in policing. We have to. It has to be a movement that involves everybody," she said. "And we need to reimagine and re-figure out, if you will, how we're going to move forward as a country and as an organization to make things better for everybody. It's incredibly difficult, but with every challenge, there's opportunity. There's opportunity to move forward and bring people together and get positive change. I absolutely believe that."

Hopefully, that turns out to be far more than empty, hollow rhetoric.

The Washington Post reports:

"This Seattle protest zone is police-free. So volunteers are stepping up to provide security.

"Antonio Ochoa has no formal security training. But around 3 a.m. on recent Saturday, they were called to help defuse the situation unfolding on a street corner. A man had been yelling, and he began punctuating his anger by knocking over a metal trash can. Ochoa, who is white and uses they/them pronouns, did not engage the man, who is black, directly. Instead, they began picking up trash, while giving the man space. He quickly turned apologetic and offered to help clean up."

How about that?  Who'd 'a 'thunk' it?  LOL.  Clearly, doesn't always take a baton, stun gun, and/or a Glock.

"For the past several days, Ochoa, 28, has been serving as an unarmed volunteer “sentinel,” or guard, in the protest zone. Ochoa, a self-described leftist libertarian recently furloughed from the Seattle International Film Festival, and other volunteers have been serving four-hour shifts to help to keep the peace. The zone was formed last week amid the Black Lives Matter protests. Activists had gathered at a neighborhood police precinct to call for accountability and an end to police violence. In response, on June 8, police officers left that area. A spontaneous protest encampment has since sprung up outside the building, run by volunteer activists. Core to the zone is a vision of a self-governed community with no formal policing. Instead, volunteers, many of them avowed police abolitionists, have begun to organize their own safety force. Among other incidents, these volunteers have confronted a man throwing apples and threatening punches, a car driving toward a large crowd of pedestrians and a vehicle circling the block repeatedly and taking photos. Volunteers say they have engaged with armed visitors from outside the city who came to the zone convinced that Seattle needed saving from left-wing agitators. They have defused fights, protected store windows from vandals and handled mental-health crises. Protesters rushed to douse the flames when a lone arsonist attempted to set fire to the precinct early Friday. The director of an LGBTQ resource center publicly thanked sentinels from the protest zone Sunday for their assistance watching over a broken window until plywood arrived, attributing the incident to a mental-health or drug-addiction issue with a person who regularly sleeps in the center’s doorway. Volunteers say this work is a way to highlight what a city without police might look like. “We have a chance to really build something here, so I have a vested interest in defending that as a part of my community,” said Ochoa, who lives in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. “I live on the Hill, and the police presence here has always been tense and kind of malicious.” Over the weekend, about two dozen people served as sentinels, provided the micro-neighborhood with a round-the-clock security presence. From a folding table under a pop-up tent on the sidewalk, a volunteer coordinated schedules on a whiteboard and notepad. On Sunday, a half-dozen people inquired about signing up, including several women of color. The coordinators paired volunteers to establish a buddy system, handed out radios for on-site communication and added phone numbers to a group chat on the encrypted text service Signal. They offered basic tips in de-escalation: Speak in a low volume, establish a dialogue, use slow hand movements to communicate that the situation is calm, alert offenders that they are being watched. That was the approach a pair of volunteers took with a man throwing apples at passersby. Ochoa and others watched him carefully, while assuring him that their intention was not to hurt him. He punched one of the sentinels, who did not retaliate. Eventually, the man calmed down and left. “These alternatives that don’t involve forcing someone to the ground and immediately handcuffing them work and provide for a much safer community in general,” Ochoa said. Listening and trying to understand the needs of those who are in an altered mental state — whether drunk, high or struggling with mental illness — is essential to the approach."

Report goes on and on.  Why is it we see matters only in terms of black and white?  No shades of gray.  No brilliant hues of color.  No creativity.  What if there were to be a different approach?  What if some people were trained to do the above under circumstances that didn't involve the need for brute force?  Or to go in as first responders with police as backup?  Or, how about teaching officers some of the techniques described above?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Another military leader stands tall against his fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  United Press International reports:

"Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley apologized Thursday for his role in a photo opportunity last week by the White House and President Donald Trump during which protesters were forcefully cleared away by police. Milley, Trump and Defense Secretary Mike Esper walked from the White House to St. John's Episcopal Church, where the president was photographed holding a Bible. To get there, they walked through Lafayette Square after U.S. Park Police used tear gas to disperse a crowd of activists who were protesting the police killing of George Floyd in Minnesota. The show of force came shortly after Trump threatened to mobilize thousands of active U.S. military members to quell violent demonstrators. Speaking in a recorded video message at a virtual graduation ceremony for students at National Defense University Thursday, Milley said his appearance was "a mistake." "I should not have been there," he said. "My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics. As a commissioned uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I have learned from, and I sincerely hope we all can learn from it. We who wear the cloth of our nation come from the people of our nation and we must hold dear the principle of an apolitical military that is so deeply rooted in the very essence of our republic." Milley called Floyd's death "senseless and brutal" and praised the national movement that's followed as evidence that "freedom is working." "We never introduced federal troops on the streets of America as a result of the combined efforts of the National Guard and law enforcement at quelling the violence and deescalating very, very tense situations," he said."

You give the National Guard and law enforcement far more credit than they deserve, General.  Both elicited violence on the part of protesters who chose to fight back against their oppressors.  Had federal troops been introduced, could have elicited the dreaded, unwanted second American revolution already catastrophically looming.  ... Hear the rumble?

"Milley also said the U.S. military must learn from the protests and do more to erase "centuries of injustice" to black Americans. He acknowledged that only a handful of black officers hold the top posts in all branches of the military."

What are you personally doing, General, to change that?  You still deserve credit, sir, for ultimately standing up to our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.

NPR reports:

"Ten days after leaving the White House with President Trump and walking with him across a park that had been forcibly cleared of protesters, the nation's most senior military officer is calling that excursion "a mistake." "I should not have been there," Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declared Thursday in a video message to graduating officers at the National Defense University. "My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics." Milley has drawn pointed criticism from retired military officers not only for accompanying the president in what turned out to be a staged photo-op in front of a boarded-up St. John's Church, but for having done so dressed in baggy battle fatigues. The four-star Army general appeared to express regret for that, as well. "We who wear the cloth of our nation come from the people of our nation, and we must hold dear the principle of an apolitical military that is so deeply rooted in the very essence of our republic," Milley said in the commencement address. "And this is not easy." Milley, whom Trump chose last year to hold the military's highest rank, also admonished the graduating class of commissioned officers to embrace the U.S. Constitution. "The freedoms guaranteed to us in the Constitution allow people to demand change, just as the peaceful protesters are doing all across the country," he said. "As you graduate today, reflect on what you have witnessed over the past two and-a-half weeks — what it means to all of us as Americans, and what it means to you and I, as leaders." Both Milley and Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who also accompanied Trump in his walk across the cleared Lafayette Square, have said they were not aware where Trump was going when they fell in step behind him, and that they thought they were leaving the White House to thank National Guard troops stationed nearby. Aides have also said Milley was dressed in fatigues because he was headed to an FBI operations center.

"In his remarks to the NDU graduating class, Milley offered a piece of advice that appears to stem from a lesson he learned from the Lafayette Square episode. "Always maintain a keen sense of situational awareness," the 61-year-old general said as he stood before a backdrop of military flags. "As senior leaders, everything you do will be closely watched, and I am not immune." Unlike Esper, Milley did not appear in photos of Trump holding a Bible in front of St. John's Church. But many images were taken of Milley trailing behind Trump in a place that had been cleared of protesters only minutes earlier. "As a commissioned uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I learned from," Milley told the NDU graduates. "And I sincerely hope we all can learn from it."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Several major corporations finally seeing the light?  Couldn't be, could it?  The Associated Press reports:

"Microsoft has become the third big tech company this week to say it won’t sell its facial recognition software to police, following similar moves by Amazon and IBM. Microsoft’s president and chief counsel, Brad Smith, announced the decision and called on Congress to regulate the technology during a Washington Post video event on Thursday. “We’ve decided we will not sell facial recognition technology to police departments in the United States until we have a national law in place, grounded in human rights, that will govern this technology,” Smith said."

Delusionally believe that's truly possible?  That is, the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue won't use this technology to abuse innocent civilians, line government coffers with money looted from the innocent?  Give me a break.

"The trio of tech giants is stepping back from law-enforcement use of systems that have faced criticism for incorrectly identifying people with darker skin. Ongoing protests following the death of George Floyd have focused attention on racial injustice in the U.S. and how police use technology to track people."

Jesus Christ.  This shit has been going on quite some time.  You corporate shysters have been lining your pockets off sales of this technology for years.  Now, just seeing the light? Afraid of losing business as the spotlight gets shown on your bottomless greed and the damage done to all civil and constitutional rights and liberties?

"But while all three companies are known for their work in developing artificial intelligence, including face recognition software, none is a major player in selling such technology to police. Smith said Thursday that Microsoft currently doesn’t sell its face recognition software to any U.S. police departments. He didn’t say if that includes federal law enforcement agencies or police forces outside the U.S."

Don't think all three haven't nonetheless benefited?

"Several other companies that are less well known dominate the market for government facial recognition contracts in the U.S., including Tokyo-based NEC and the European companies Idemia and Gemalto."

Think they all don't find a way to benefit from abuse of this technology?

The following rings hollow.  Appears to be 'symbolism over substance' to shamelessly quote the Limbaugh nazi:

"Microsoft, Amazon and IBM are calling on Congress to set national rules over how police use facial recognition — something that’s now being considered as part of a police reform package sparked by the protests following Floyd’s death. “If all of the responsible companies in the country cede this market to those that are not prepared to take a stand, we won’t necessarily serve the national interest or the lives of the black and African American people of this nation well,” Smith said. “We need Congress to act, not just tech companies alone.”

Jesus Christ.  What a crock of shit.  First, people of all races and ethnicities are abused by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Not just blacks.  Second, there is no way law enforcement won't find a way to abuse this technology to f--k over the innocent, line the pockets of government illicitly.  These corporate bastards appear to be embracing current political correctness to ensure they have a way of continuing to line their bottomless pockets.  No more than self-serving bullshit.  -- Just like the meaningless rhetoric coming out the mouths of our nazi fuhrer, his equally clueless fellow fascists in the Republican Party, not to neglect to mention truly worthless Democrats more interested in retaining office than forcing desperately needed radical change that would subject all law enforcement, judges, and prosecutors to the same level of justice and treatment under the law as the rest of us.  Without that, nothing changes.  ... Hear the rumble?

The double talk bullshit never ends.  Get this:

"Microsoft has spent two years warning of the potential dangers of face-scanning technology being abused to enable oppressive mass surveillance, but the company has opposed outright bans on government use of the technology passed in San Francisco and other cities. That’s led to criticism from groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union, which says Microsoft is lobbying for weak regulations that could end up legitimizing and expanding police use of facial recognition. “Congress and legislatures nationwide must swiftly stop law enforcement use of face recognition, and companies like Microsoft should work with the civil rights community — not against it — to make that happen,” said Matt Cagle, an attorney with the ACLU of Northern California, in a statement Thursday."

Snowball's chance. Wake up.  ... Hear the rumble?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Think Trump capable of smartening up?  LOL.  NBC News reports:

"President Donald Trump was hit with strong backlash Thursday over his decision to hold a campaign rally next week on Juneteenth, a holiday marking the end of slavery, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the site of one of the deadliest race riots in American history, in 1921."

Unbridled Aryan arrogance.

"Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the decision to hold a rally there on June 19 "is disrespectful to the lives and community that was lost during the Tulsa race riot."

Trump couldn't care less.

"This was a massacre of innocent Black inhabitants by White supremacists in a span of 24 hours," Bass said in a statement to NBC News. "This was the worst act of racial violence to date," she added, "and yet this is the place that the president, who has pursued nothing but a hostile and oppressive agenda for black people since his inauguration, has chosen to celebrate." "To make matters worse, he has chosen Juneteenth, a day of our emancipation. This is ridiculous and yet another slap in the face to black people," Bass added. Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, a member of the caucus, tweeted that a Trump campaign rally with "rebel flags" on Juneteenth "is overt racism from the highest office in the land."

When will gutless Democrats finally stand up to this racist nazi?  ... Too afraid of not being re-elected?

"Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., called it "a message to every Black American: more of the same." Rep. Joe Kennedy, D-Mass., tweeted: "99 years ago a white mob massacred hundreds of Black people in the Greenwood District of Tulsa. The most racist President of my lifetime knows exactly what message he’s sending when he goes there on Juneteenth." Juneteenth is recognized as a holiday or an observance in 47 states and the District of Columbia, according to a Congressional Research Service report. The day, also known as Emancipation Day or Black Independence Day, celebrates the end of slavery in the United States after the Civil War. The holiday dates back to June 19, 1865, when "Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, TX, and announced the end of the Civil War and the end of slavery," the CRS report said. "Even though the Emancipation Proclamation came more than two years earlier, many slave owners continued to hold their slaves captive after the announcement, so Juneteenth became a symbolic date representing African American freedom." Decades later, in 1921, white rioters looted and destroyed Tulsa's Greenwood District, known for its affluent black community, according to the Tulsa Historical Society and Museum. The state's governor declared martial law and National Guard troops arrived in the city. Many black Tulsa residents were imprisoned and more than 800 people were treated for injuries, the museum says. "Contemporary reports of death began at 36. Historians now believe as many as 300 people may have died," the museum says on its website."

The Washington Post reports:

"President Trump pushed back his first campaign rally in months by one day after critics condemned him for scheduling it on Juneteenth, the observance of the end of slavery in the United States, in a city that experienced one of the country’s worst episodes of racial violence in U.S. history."

Think delaying the rally will make any difference at all?

"In a late-night tweet of Friday, Trump said he is pushing the “Make America Great Again” rally in Tulsa back a day, to June 20, in response to “many of my African American friends and supporters.” “We had previously scheduled our #MAGA Rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for June 19th — a big deal,” Trump wrote. “Unfortunately, however, this would fall on the Juneteenth Holiday. Many of my African American friends and supporters have reached out to suggest that we consider changing the date out of respect for this Holiday, and in observance of this important occasion and all that it represents.”

Coming from a white supremacist, a racist, delusionally believe that lie means anything at all?

Our hopelessly insane fuhrer remains clueless:

"In a television interview recorded Thursday, Trump said the date had not been chosen deliberately but dismissed concerns about the timing. “Think about it as a celebration. My rallies are celebrations,” Trump told Fox News. “In the history of politics, I think I can say, there’s never been any group or any person that’s had rallies like I do … The fact I’m having a rally on that day you can really think about that very positively.”

Pitiful.  Gets worse, much worse:

"During the same interview, Trump also asserted that, “I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other president.” “And let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln, ’cause he did good, though it’s always questionable, you know,” he added without further explanation."

Think this man fit for office?

"The timing and location of the rally had drawn heavy criticism from African American leaders and Democrats, who said it sent the wrong message, particularly in the wake of weeks of protests sparked by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody. Tulsa was the site of a 1921 massacre in which a white mob killed dozens of black people and destroyed black-owned businesses. In a tweet this week, Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), an African American woman considered as a possible running mate for Joe Biden, wrote that “Tulsa was the site of the worst racist violence in American history.” “The president’s speech there on Juneteenth is a message to every Black American: more of the same,” she said. Similarly, Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.), also a black lawmaker on Biden’s list of potential vice presidents, tweeted, “This isn’t just a wink to white supremacists—he’s throwing them a welcome home party.”

"But Oklahoma state Rep. Ajay Pittman (D), a member of the legislature’s Black Caucus, said Trump only changed the date because of the backlash and not “an attempt to respect” the holiday. “In reality, it was due to the outcry of disdain around the nation. His actions confirm that his black and brown supporters were an afterthought due to the color of their skin,” she said in statement reported by the Oklahoman. There likely would have been, and may still be, protests of Trump’s visit, which Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum (D) seemed to try to temper in a tweet Thursday after the rally was first announced. “In Tulsa, we protect the free and peaceful exchange of ideas. We did it during the last two weeks of protests, and we will do it during the President’s visit to Tulsa next week,” Bynum wrote."

Protesters need to remain non-violent.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Another egregious example of Trump's aggressive stupidity.  NBC News reports:

"The Trump administration launched an attack Thursday on the International Criminal Court, which is set up to prosecute war crimes and genocide, authorizing economic sanctions against officials investigating or prosecuting U.S. personnel without Washington’s consent."

Jesus Christ.  What could Trump possibly be thinking?  Where did we lose ourselves?  Why won't we impose the same standards on ourselves as we do on others across the globe?  ... Don't do as I do, do as I say?

"The decision to slap sanctions on court officials comes after ICC appeals judges authorized an investigation in March into allegations of war crimes by U.S. military and intelligence personnel, Afghan forces and the Taliban in Afghanistan. President Donald Trump also authorized the expansion of visa restrictions against ICC officials and their family members. “The International Criminal Court’s actions are an attack on the rights of the American people and threaten to infringe upon our national sovereignty,” the White House said in a statement."

How many times in the last several decades have we done precisely the same to other nations we wished to shamelessly control?

"In order to place economic sanctions on these officials, the president had to declare a national emergency, using authorities more often reserved for pursuing terrorists or actions against North Korea and Iran. The administration said it had “strong reason to believe” that there is “corruption and misconduct” at the highest levels of the prosecutor’s office, but provided no evidence to back up this claim."

Are you lying Mr. 'President?'  Forget, sir?  A congenital liar has no credibility.

"ICC officials declined to comment immediately but said they would be issuing a reaction soon. The decision on the war crimes investigation by the Hague-based court in March overturned a ruling by a lower chamber last year that blocked the probe concluding, among other reasons, that its chances of success and prosecution were “extremely limited.” The Trump administration has repeatedly lambasted the court."

For what?  Doing the right thing?  Holding war criminals accountable?

Unbridled desperation driven by abject fear:

"In April last year, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the U.S. would repeal or deny visas to International Criminal Court staff seeking to investigate Americans for crimes in Afghanistan or elsewhere."

What are you and your fuhrer so afraid of Mr. Secretary of State?  The truth?  If nothing to hide, why not cooperate?

More unadulterated, gutless bullshit:

"The White House pointed out Thursday that the United States is not a member of the ICC and accused it of pursuing “politically-motivated” investigations against Washington and its allies, including Israel. The White House added that it was concerned that “adversary nations” were manipulating the court by “encouraging these allegations” against American personnel."

Show us the proof.  How do we trust congenital liars?

"Attorney General William Barr later specifically named Russia without providing details or evidence to substantiate the claims. About U.S. forces, ICC chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda’s office has said it has determined that there is a reasonable basis to believe that war crimes were committed by members of the U.S. armed forces in Afghanistan and by members of the CIA in secret detention facilities in Afghanistan and in other countries, particularly between the period 2003-2004. It also determined that there is a reasonable basis to believe that crimes against humanity and war crimes have been committed by the Taliban and their Haqqani network and that war crimes were committed by the Afghan National Security Forces. America’s war in Afghanistan — its longest — has raged for more than 18 years, costing the lives of around 2,300 U.S. troops and wounding many thousands of others."

Again, if there is no truth to these allegations, why not cooperate?  Why stonewall?  Makes us look guilty as hell.  Is that because we are?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Think Trump may have met his match?  LOL.  The Washington Post reports:

"When Melania Trump stayed behind in New York after her husband’s presidential inauguration, she said it was because she didn’t want to interrupt their then-10-year-old son Barron’s school year. News stories at the time concentrated on an apparent frostiness between the first couple and on the exorbitant taxpayer costs to protect Melania and Barron away from Washington. Those stories are true, but Washington Post reporter Mary Jordan reveals in a new book that the first lady was also using her delayed arrival to the White House as leverage for renegotiating her prenuptial agreement with President Trump. The campaign had been full of harsh news about Trump’s alleged sexual indiscretions and infidelities, from the “grab them by the p---y” Access Hollywood tape to an affair with Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal; Melania Trump learned new details from the media coverage, Jordan writes. The incoming first lady needed time to cool off, and “to amend her financial arrangement with Trump — what Melania referred to as ‘taking care of Barron,’ ” Jordan writes in “The Art of Her Deal: The Untold Story of Melania Trump.” Melania’s original prenup had not been incredibly generous, Jordan reports. But she had been with Trump longer than either of his ex-wives and had bargaining power: Her perceived calming effect on him was so great that Trump’s pals and at least one of Trump’s adult children exhorted her to come to the White House as soon as possible. The 286-page book, which plays off the title of Trump’s well-known business guide, is a deeply reported look at the rise of the country’s only immigrant first lady since Louisa Adams. For her book, Jordan conducted more than a hundred interviews, with everyone from the first lady’s Slovenian schoolmates to former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, and she lays out an argument that Melania Trump is as devoted to her own mythmaking as her husband is to his."

A match made in Hell?  LOL.

“Both are avid creators of their own history,” Jordan writes, arguing that the #FreeMelania hashtag ought to be retired because of her consistent support of her husband and her moves to stay in the White House."

Money talks, bullshit walks.  LOL.

“She is ... much more like him than it appears,” Jordan adds."

Comes as no surprise, does it?  LOL.

"Jordan, a longtime Post reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2003, secured a rare one-on-one interview with the future first lady while covering the 2016 campaign. The Post received a copy of her book ahead of its June 16 release date. The reporting goes back to Melania Trump’s childhood in a small town in Slovenia, then part of communist Yugoslavia, where her mother was a patternmaker in a children’s clothing factory and her father, who joined the Communist Party at one point, was a chauffeur and repaired cars. Melania was walking runways by age 7, modeling clothes her mother made, and sat for a photo shoot at 16."

NBC News reports:

"First lady Melania Trump favorably renegotiated her prenuptial agreement after husband Donald Trump won the White House, according to a new book by Washington Post reporter Mary Jordan. Mrs. Trump stayed in New York for months after the president's inauguration, saying publicly it was because she didn’t want to interrupt son Barron’s school year. Privately, Jordan writes in "The Art of Her Deal: The Untold Story of Melania Trump," she was using the time to cool off and leverage her absence in negotiations — as the president's allies wanted her in Washington to be a calming force for the president. According to a Post report on the book, Mrs. Trump learned new details about her husband during the scandal-riddled campaign, which was marked by reports of his alleged infidelities and a hot mic tape that captured him describing groping women's genitals and kissing them without consent. Trump has denied the affairs."

... Doesn't your heart break?  Poor, poor baby.  LOL.

"Mrs. Trump then used her marriage, the president's longest relationship, and her newfound standing as first lady to rework her initial prenuptial agreement, which the book reports had not been particularly generous. Mrs. Trump's nearly six month stay in New York as first lady wasn't cheap: Reportedly, her military flights to Washington cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, while guarding her and Barron cost the city millions. Mrs. Trump referred to the prenup renegotiation as "taking care of Barron," the author writes, according to the Post report, and she sought written assurances that her only child with the president would be treated like his oldest three children when it came to inheritance and financial opportunities. Jordan’s book, the Post reports, paints a picture of an ambitious Mrs. Trump who embraced and encouraged the president’s political ambitions and is committed to winning a second term for her husband. In a statement, the first lady's chief of staff, Stephanie Grisham, said: "Yet another book about Mrs. Trump with false information and sources. This book belongs in the fiction genre."

Think so?  LOL.

"NBC News has not independently confirmed the reporting in the book, which is set to be released Tuesday."

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Another move backwards by our fuhrer, the Trump nazi.  The Associated Press reports:

"In a move applauded by President Donald Trump’s conservative religious base, his administration on Friday finalized a rule that overturns Obama-era protections for transgender people against sex discrimination in health care."

Who the hell are the Trump nazi and his henchmen to force their perverse ideological and religious views on all in direct violation of the First Amendment Establishment Clause, that is, freedom from religion?

"The Department of Health and Human Services said it will enforce sex discrimination protections “according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology.” This rewrites an Obama-era regulation that sought a broader understanding shaped by a person’s internal sense of being male, female, neither or a combination. LGBTQ groups say explicit protections are needed for people seeking sex-reassignment treatment, and even for transgender people who need care for common illnesses such as diabetes or heart problems. But conservatives say the Obama administration exceeded its legal authority in broadly interpreting gender."

They're not 'conservatives.'  The late Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater was a conservative.  These bastards are national socialist, fascist nazis traitorously, treasonously determined to force their perverse religious views on all.

"The reversal comes in the middle of LGBTQ Pride Month. Activists and Democratic lawmakers noted that Friday was also the four-year anniversary of the mass shooting at the Pulse gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in which 49 people were killed. Behind the dispute over legal rights is a medically recognized condition called “gender dysphoria” — discomfort or distress caused by a discrepancy between the gender that a person identifies as and the gender at birth. Consequences can include severe depression. Treatment can range from sex-reassignment surgery and hormones to people changing their outward appearance by adopting a different hairstyle or clothing.

"The American Medical Association strongly criticized the Trump administration’s action. “The federal government should never make it more difficult for individuals to access health care — during a pandemic or any other time,” said Dr. Susan Bailey, the group’s president. Under the Obama-era rule, a hospital could be required to perform gender-transition procedures such as hysterectomies if the facility provided that kind of treatment for other medical conditions. The rule was meant to carry out the anti-discrimination section of the Affordable Care Act, which bars sex discrimination in health care but does not use the term “gender identity.” Women’s groups say the new regulations also undermine access to abortion, which is a legal medical procedure. “No one should fear being turned away by a medical provider because of who they are or the personal health decisions they have made,” said Fatima Goss Graves, president of the National Women’s Law Center. The ACLU says it has already moved to try to prevent the rollback of protections for transgender people. The LGBTQ civil rights group Lambda Legal said it will sue."

Needs to.  Nazism must be strongly challenged before too late.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.

"More than 1.5 million Americans identify as transgender, according to the Williams Institute, a think tank focusing on LGBT policy at the UCLA School of Law. A bigger number — 4.5% of the population— identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, according to Gallup. Roger Severino, head of the HHS unit that enforces civil rights laws, said transgender people continue to be protected by other statutes that bar discrimination in health care on account of race, color, national origin, age, disability and other factors. “Everyone deserves to be treated with respect and according to the law,” said Severino. “Our dedication to our civil rights laws is as strong as ever.” He cited recent actions to safeguard access to treatment for disabled people in the coronavirus pandemic."

The mark of an insane, treasonous, treacherous, nazi traitor in the Oval Office:

"For the Trump administration it’s the latest in a series of steps to revoke newly won protections for LGBTQ people in areas ranging from the military to housing and education. The administration also has moved to restrict military service by transgender men and women, proposed allowing certain homeless shelters to take gender identity into account in offering someone a bed for the night, and concluded in a 2017 Justice Department memo that federal civil rights law does not protect transgender people from discrimination at work. The new rule would also affect the notices that millions of patients get in multiple languages about their rights to translation services. Such notices often come with insurer “explanation of benefits” forms. The Trump administration says the notice requirement has become a needless burden on health care providers, requiring billions of paper notices to be mailed annually at an estimated five-year cost of $2.9 billion."

There is no greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than the current incumbent of the Oval Office.

The following may ultimately wind up changing and/or canceling at least some of Trump's anti-LGBTQ tactics exposed in the above article.  Think all the unrest in the country may be having an effect on the U.S. Supreme Court?  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court ruled Monday that a landmark civil rights law protects gay, lesbian and transgender people from discrimination in employment, a resounding victory for LGBT rights from a conservative court. The court decided by a 6-3 vote that a key provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 known as Title VII that bars job discrimination because of sex, among other reasons, encompasses bias against LGBT workers. “An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the court. “Sex plays a necessary and undisguisable role in the decision, exactly what Title VII forbids.” Justices Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh and Clarence Thomas dissented."

Surprised?

“The Court tries to convince readers that it is merely enforcing the terms of the statute, but that is preposterous,” Alito wrote in the dissent. “Even as understood today, the concept of discrimination because of ‘sex’ is different from discrimination because of ‘sexual orientation’ or ‘gender identity.’” Kavanaugh wrote in a separate dissent that the court was rewriting the law to include gender identity and sexual orientation, a job that belongs to Congress. Still, Kavanaugh said the decision represents an “important victory achieved today by gay and lesbian Americans.”

Certainly, does.  About time.

Here's why:

"The outcome is expected to have a big impact for the estimated 8.1 million LGBT workers across the country because most states don’t protect them from workplace discrimination. An estimated 11.3 million LGBT people live in the U.S., according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA law school. But Monday’s decision is not likely to be the court’s last word on a host of issues revolving around LGBT rights, Gorsuch noted. Lawsuits are pending over transgender athletes’ participation in school sporting events, and courts also are dealing with cases about sex-segregated bathrooms and locker rooms, a subject that the justices seemed concerned about during arguments in October. Employers who have religious objections to employing LGBT people also might be able to raise those claims in a different case, Gorsuch said. “But none of these other laws are before us; we have not had the benefit of adversarial testing about the meaning of their terms, and we do not prejudge any such question today,” he wrote. The cases were the court’s first on LGBT rights since Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement and replacement by Kavanaugh. Kennedy was a voice for gay rights and the author of the landmark ruling in 2015 that made same-sex marriage legal throughout the United States. Kavanaugh generally is regarded as more conservative. The Trump administration had changed course from the Obama administration, which supported LGBT workers in their discrimination claims under Title VII."

United Press International reports:

"The Trump administration had asked the high court to rule that Title VII does not cover LGBT Americans, and doing so was not the original intent of lawmakers. Gorsuch joined Chief Justice John Roberts and associate justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan in voting for the majority. Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh voted in dissent."

A step forward.  A step back.  A Republican-nazi owned Court trying to find its way?  The Associated Press reports:

"The Supreme Court is for now declining to get involved in an ongoing debate by citizens and in Congress over policing, rejecting cases Monday that would have allowed the justices to revisit when police can be held financially responsible for wrongdoing."

Unless and until that happens, nothing will change in law enforcement.  Certainly, remains outrageously unconstitutional the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue are not held to the same legal standard of justice the rest of us are subject to.  ... Hear the rumble?

The Court still doesn't get it:

"With protests over racism and police brutality continuing nationwide, the justices turned away more than half a dozen cases involving the legal doctrine known as qualified immunity, which the high court created more than 50 years ago. It shields officials, including police, from lawsuits for money as a result for things they do in the course of their job. As is usual the court didn’t comment in turning away the cases, but Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a 6-page dissent saying he would have agreed to hear one of the cases.  “I have previously expressed my doubts about our qualified immunity jurisprudence,” he wrote, explaining he believes the court’s “qualified immunity doctrine appears to stray from the statutory text.”

Here's the problem:

"As a result of qualified immunity, even when a court finds that an official or officer has violated someone’s constitutional rights, they can still be protected from civil lawsuits seeking money. The Supreme Court has said qualified immunity protects officials as long as their actions don’t violate clearly established law or constitutional rights which they should have known about."

Jesus Christ.  That's called bullshit.  A nazi re-write of the United States Constitution in favor of the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Unless and until law enforcement receives equal treatment, hear the rumble?  An unwanted. dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looms.  Victims of these criminal bastards in law enforcement deserve financial compensation for their losses. Moreover, when will prosecutors finally start holding the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue criminally accountable for their crimes?  When?  ... Too deaf to hear the rumble?

Clearly, Republican nazis on the Court are not quite sure how to deal with all the unrest that seems headed to a radical change in the established order.  Status quo, clearly unsustainable as the shit continues to hit the fan:

"The Supreme Court’s decision not to wade into the qualified immunity debate follows nationwide protests against racism and police brutality sparked by the death in Minnesota of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man who died May 25 while being restrained by a white officer. In Congress, a bill introduced by House Democrats in the wake of Floyd’s death would make it easier for injured individuals to claim damages in civil suits against police officers. The White House, however, has said that provision is a nonstarter and not likely to be part of a Senate Republican bill that’s in the works."

Republican nazis are clearly, insanely unable to understand the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue must receive equal treatment, not special treatment courtesy of an outrageously corrupt and abusive 'justice' system.  Are Republicans stupidly doing all they can to spark an unwanted, dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looming?

The push for the court to reexamine qualified immunity has come both from the left and right, including Thomas, a conservative, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a liberal. In 2018, when the court said that an Arizona police officer who shot a knife-wielding woman four times was immune from being sued, Sotomayor said the decision “sends an alarming signal to law enforcement officers and the public.”

It tells the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue they can do as they please with impunity.  ... Hear the rumble?

"Since then, the court has been asked to take a number of different cases involving qualified immunity. Some of the cases the court rejected Monday were filed at the court more than a year ago and many others had been pending for months, before Floyd’s death and the protests it prompted. The incidents themselves that sparked the lawsuits go back years and in some cases almost a decade."

Unless this issue is resolved, expect far more violence as our formerly great country continues to deteriorate.  Hopefully, Republican nazis on the Supreme Court will wake up before too late.

NPR reports:

"Amid the tumult over police brutality allegations across the country, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to reexamine the much-criticized, modern-day legal doctrine created by judges that has shielded police and other government officials from lawsuits over their conduct."

Outrageous injustice that contributed to turning a supposedly democratic republic into a goddamned de facto fascist police-state.  The treasonous 'Justices' responsible all those years ago are traitors.  Treacherously betrayed their falsely sworn oaths of office to uphold The United States Constitution.

"In an unsigned order, the court declined to hear cases seeking reexamination of the doctrine of "qualified immunity." Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, saying the "qualified immunity doctrine appears to stray from the statutory text."

Indeed, a surprising semblance of liberalism coming from this otherwise Republican nazi.

"It takes the votes of four justices to grant review of a case. Developed in recent decades by the high court, the qualified immunity doctrine, as applied to police, initially asks two questions: Did police use excessive force, and if they did, should they have known that their conduct was illegal because it violated a "clearly established" prior court ruling that barred such conduct?"

Blatant unadulterated bullshit cleverly designed to protect the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue from financial accountability for their crimes.

More insane bullshit the criminals in law enforcement have used to escape financial accountability for the financial losses these pieces of shit have inflicted on their victims:

"The idea behind the doctrine was to protect police from frivolous lawsuits and allow some "breathing room" for police mistakes that involve split-second judgments in tense and dangerous situations. But in practice, because of recent Supreme Court decisions, lower courts have most often dismissed police misconduct lawsuits on grounds that there is no prior court decision with nearly identical facts. Several recent studies, including one conducted by Reuters, have found that dozens of cases involving horrific acts, some just as bad as those involving George Floyd in Minneapolis and Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky., were thrown out of court on the grounds that there was no "clearly established" court precedent forbidding the conduct. That's why critics of the qualified immunity doctrine have called it a Catch-22 that says to victims, in effect, "Heads, the police win. Tails, you lose."

This doctrine guaranties the criminals in law enforcement often elude any accountability for their crimes since prosecutors remain in bed with corrupt and abusive law enforcement, that is, usually fail to criminally prosecute these bastards.

"Two Supreme Court justices have repeatedly urged the court to reexamine qualified immunity doctrine: Sonia Sotomayor, arguably the court's most liberal justice, and Thomas, arguably its most conservative. In one previous dissent, Sotomayor said the court "displays an unflinching willingness" in allowing the lower courts to grant qualified immunity to police officers but "rarely intervenes" when lower courts go too far. This "one-sided approach" transforms qualified immunity into "an absolute shield for law enforcement officers," she wrote."

Exactly as intended by a nazi U.S. Supreme Court all those years ago, -- to protect their criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.

"Similar unusual ideological alliances have been formed by organizations that file briefs regularly at the court — from the conservative/libertarian Cato Institute and the Institute for Justice to the liberal American Civil Liberties Union and the NAACP, all of which have urged the court to revisit the qualified immunity doctrine."

To date? To no avail.  ... Hear the rumble?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Trump medically falling apart?  The Washington Post reports:

"President Trump late Saturday tried to explain his slow and unsteady walk down a ramp at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, which had generated concern and mockery on social media, by claiming the walkway was “very slippery” and that he was worried about falling. The walk in question came at the conclusion of Saturday’s commencement exercises at West Point, where Trump was the guest speaker. As he exited the raised platform by descending a ramp alongside Lt. Gen. Darryl A. Williams, the academy’s superintendent, Trump was visibly tentative and took short, careful steps. Video of the moment was widely shared on social media, with critics of the president — including Republican operatives working on the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group whose ads have provoked the president’s ire — using the hashtag #TrumpIsNotWell in their tweets. The chatter seemed to get the attention of Trump, who is spending the weekend at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J. At 10:57 p.m. Saturday, the president wrote on Twitter: “The ramp that I descended after my West Point Commencement speech was very long & steep, had no handrail and, most importantly, was very slippery. The last thing I was going to do is ‘fall’ for the Fake News to have fun with. Final ten feet I ran down to level ground. Momentum!”

Believe a congenital liar?

"Elements of Trump’s explanation strained credulity. Trump’s claim that the ramp had been “very slippery” was inconsistent with the weather, which on Saturday in West Point, N.Y., was sunny and clear-skied. The grass plain on which the commencement took place was dry. In addition, Trump wrote that he “ran down” the final stretch of the ramp. Video footage of the episode shows the president picking up his pace slightly for the final two steps, but that would hardly be considered a run or a jog by any standard definition. Once on flat ground, Trump appeared to walk normally as he surveyed the field and mingled with officers on his walk to board Marine One, which was parked roughly 100 yards or so from the platform stage. The ramp video was not the only clip from Trump’s speech to generate considerable attention on social media. Another was when he briefly took a sip of water while standing behind the presidential lectern. As Trump raised a small glass of water toward his mouth with his right hand, he used his left hand to steady the bottom of the glass so he could take a sip."

Trump's insanity is of far greater concern.

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-19-20

Trump stonewalls any and all oversight of pandemic bailout programs.  The Washington Post reports:

"The Trump administration’s intensifying efforts to block oversight of its coronavirus-related bailout programs is raising new alarms with government watchdogs and lawmakers amid concerns about the anonymity of companies receiving unprecedented levels of taxpayer funds. Government watchdogs warned members of Congress last week that previously unknown Trump administration legal decisions could substantially block their ability to oversee more than $1 trillion in spending related to the coronavirus pandemic. In a letter to four congressional committee chairs Thursday, two officials in charge of a new government watchdog entity revealed that the Trump administration had issued legal rulings curtailing independent oversight of more than $1 trillion in Cares Act funding. The letter surfaced amid growing bipartisan outrage over the administration’s decision not to disclose how it is spending hundreds of billions in aid for businesses. On Monday, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin appeared to bow to that pressure, saying he would work with Congress on new oversight measures. But some Democrats have said the White House is not taking disclosure requests seriously enough. “They seem to be saying one thing while doing exactly the opposite,” said Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.), chairwoman of the House Oversight Committee. “If the Trump administration is committed to full cooperation and transparency with taxpayer dollars, it is unclear why it is manufacturing legal loopholes to avoid responding to legitimate oversight requests.”

Could it be there is indeed something to hide?

"According to the previously undisclosed letter, Treasury Department attorneys concluded that the administration is not required to provide the watchdogs with information about the beneficiaries of programs created by the law’s “Division A.” That section of the Cares Act includes some of the most controversial and expensive programs in the coronavirus response efforts, including the administration’s massive bailout for small businesses and nearly $500 billion in loans for corporations. Mnuchin surprised many lawmakers last week when he announced he would not allow the names of Paycheck Protection Program recipients to become public after the Trump administration had said for months that the data would eventually be disclosed. The letter from the inspectors general and Mnuchin’s insistence that the PPP data will not be released come after the White House has repeatedly rebuffed efforts to scrutinize where all the taxpayer funding is going."

Why is that?  What are they desperately trying to hide?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-12-20

Highly reminiscent of our outrageously bought and paid for judiciary, Llano County prosecutors, Sheriff Bill Blackburn and his criminal SS jackbooted bastards in black who continue to egregiously disgrace themselves and the badge, do as they please regardless of the law and Constitution, carefully consider the following.  It's appalling.  Runs against the grain of everything our formerly great country once stood for.  No longer.

In follow up to an earlier edition, another vicious, gutless piece of shit in blue charged.  NBC News reports:

"A New York City police officer who was seen in a video shoving a woman to the ground at a George Floyd protest in Brooklyn on May 29 is facing multiple charges, the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office said. Officer Vincent D'Andraia turned himself in at the 84th Precinct in Brooklyn on Tuesday. He is charged with assault, criminal mischief, harassment and menacing in the incident the city's police commissioner Dermot Shea has described as "troubling" and "disturbing." He is the first city police officer in New York to face arrest over his conduct during the large protests that have followed since Floyd, a black man, died on May 25 after a white officer knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes in Minneapolis during an arrest. "I fully support the long-held American tradition of non-violent protest," District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said in a statement, adding that he "cannot tolerate the use of excessive force against anyone exercising this Constitutionally guaranteed right. This is especially true of those who are sworn to protect us and uphold the law." Gonzalez said he is "deeply troubled by this unnecessary assault" and "will now seek to hold this defendant accountable."

What took so long?

"D'Andraia, 28, who lives in Holbrook on Long Island, could not immediately be reached for comment. He reports to the 73rd Precinct, which includes Brownsville, a neighborhood in Brooklyn. He is expected to be arraigned later Tuesday. In a statement released late Friday, the police commissioner said that D'Andraia and another officer involved in a separate incident on May 30 had been suspended without pay. Shea did not identify the officers. The second officer, who has not been named publicly, was recorded pulling down a man's face mask and then spraying the man in the face with pepper spray during a protest in Brooklyn."

Jesus Christ.  Not fit to be in law enforcement.

"D'Andraia's supervisor, Deputy Inspector Craig Edelman, the precinct commander, would also be transferred as a result of the incident, the commissioner said."

To become someone else's problem?

"Both suspensions came after the department's Internal Affairs Bureau concluded investigations into the incidents. Shea said the cases have been referred to a Department Advocate for disciplinary action. "While the investigations have to play out, based on the severity of what we saw, it is appropriate and necessary to assure the public that there will be transparency during the disciplinary process," Shea said in his statement Friday. He added that the incidents "run counter to the principles of NYPD training, as well as our mission of public safety."

Let's hope it's more than empty rhetoric.

"The woman who was filmed while shoved, Dounya Zayer, 20, has said she was standing in the street protesting peacefully on the night of May 29 when, without provocation, an officer walked up to her and told her to get out of the street. She said she asked why and that the officer then shoved her and called her a "stupid f------ b----." The district attorney's office said the incident occurred at approximately 8:44 p.m. near the Barclays Center. D'Andraia was walking with a contingent of police officers assigned to monitor a large crowd of demonstrators. D'Andraia allegedly smacked Zayer's cell phone out of her hand and violently shoved her to the ground, according to investigators. "She can be seen rolling on the street and into a curb," the district attorney's statement said. "Meanwhile, the defendant and fellow officers can be seen to continue walking." Video of the encounter quickly spread across social media. At a news conference last Tuesday near where the incident occurred, Zayer said she was shoved with such force that she flew out of her shoes, slamming her head onto the street. "I am in pain. My head hurts. I haven't slept in three days. And I cannot stop throwing up," she said. "But I am trying everything in my power to hold myself together for the people who are depending on me to speak on the situation." Zayer said she was hospitalized and treated for a seizure and a concussion. "He did this in front of his lieutenant and multiple other officers who watched me hit the ground. One even looked back to make sure I was still on the ground, and they continued walking," Zayer said. "Not one officer tried to help me, and not one officer tried to stop the officer who assaulted me."

Criminal jackbooted motherf--kers in blue.

"Zayer's lawyer, Tahani Aboushi, told NBC News on Tuesday that although D'Andraia has been arrested and charged, she and her client "are cautiously optimistic and justice remains to be seen." "His commander Craig Edelman who watched the assault is just as culpable," Aboushi said. "We're very concerned that the NYPD has only chosen to transfer Edelman instead of holding him accountable." Aboushi said Zayer "is having a very difficult time" and is still experiencing back and shoulder pain and has been vomiting often."

The bastards remain out of control:

"In recent weeks, New York police officers have repeatedly been accused of misconduct against protesters, including driving into a crowd and using excessive force to push them back. Shea apologized at a news conference on Thursday for any instances of misconduct his officers had committed. He also said anti-police rhetoric has raised tension in the city."

Crock of shit.  Abusive, criminal behavior of the jackbooted bastards in blue themselves is directly responsible for the tension.  Not criticism of these pieces of shit.  Time to wake up, Commissioner.  ... Hear the rumble?

More bullshit, abject unwillingness of the jackbooted bastards in blue to take any personal responsibility for their criminal behavior:

"It encourages fighting the police during lawful arrests, and while all this is going on, we hear silence from so many of our elected officials, it's sickening," Shea said."

The brutal behavior of the jackbooted bastards in blue elicits the fighting.  The video is clear, unmistakable.  Officers are out of control.  Precisely, why city officials aren't backing these bastards.

More abject bullshit, self-serving lies:

"Patrick Lynch, president of the Police Benevolent Association, which represents about 24,000 active officers, in a statement Tuesday took aim at the mayor and department leadership. "Once again, Mayor de Blasio and the NYPD brass are sacrificing cops to save their own skin," Lynch said. "They created the failed strategy for managing these demonstrations." Lynch added: "They sent police officers out to do the job with no support and no clear plan. They should be the ones facing this mob-rule justice."

You and your fellow achingly gutless, criminal jackbooted bastards in blue need to resign in disgrace.

"Representative Yvette Clarke, a Democrat whose district includes Brownsville, said she hoped the investigations lead to the firings of D’Andraia and Edelman. "Violence like we witnessed by Officer D’Andraia can escalate to murder," she said. "That’s too scary a reality that's already stolen too many lives."

You and your fellow Democrats, Congresswoman, are all talk, no action.  When are you finally going to do something about this ongoing catastrophe?

No justice.  Precisely, why there is desperate need for a new federal agency whose sole function would be to investigate, arrest, charge, and prosecute corrupt, abusive, criminal officers, prosecutors, and judges in a special court that would adjudicate only these cases.  Total independence.  The only way to rein in these criminals, particularly the murderers in blue.

Sadly, the achingly clueless bastards in law enforcement don't need a legitimate reason to kill.  Enjoy carte blanche to murder on the job.  Nearly always, with impunity.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Sue the living shit out of the jackbooted motherf--kers, the department, and the city.  Any officer engaged in, or threatening this kind of unnecessary violence needs to be criminally prosecuted.  Not protected and coddled.  Not put on paid leave, -- no more than a paid vacation.  Not sent home without pay to catch up on his beauty sleep.

Firing is egregiously insufficient.  How can the law enforcement community be trusted?  No foreign power, no terrorist organization, not even the criminal element presents a greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than the criminal jackbooted bastards in law enforcement.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Madam County Attorney?  "Sonny Boy?"

These are extremely dangerous times for our formerly great country.  ... Hear the rumble?  An unwanted dreaded second American revolution catastrophically looming.  -- As our legislators and other government officials figuratively 'fiddle while Rome burns.'

Not good enough.  Nowhere near.  Short of an unwanted dreaded second American revolution, only one way for these atrocities to end.  Again, time for a new federal agency whose sole function would be to investigate, arrest, charge, prosecute corrupt, abusive, criminal officers, prosecutors, and judges in a special court whose sole function would be to adjudicate such cases.  Total independence.

Local  and state authorities are egregiously incapable of handling these cases. Tend to protect their own.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Goes with the territory, doesn't it, Bill?  Precisely, why there is no faith or trust in your criminal jackbooted bastards.  Local authorities here in Nazi Llano County have their heads figuratively, securely lodged so far up their clueless ass their eyeballs are turning inside out.  Protect and coddle your clueless, out of control officers.  Imagine that.

Unadulterated, blatant ongoing horse shit.  ... Right, Bill?  F--k these jackbooted bastards.  Aren't worth a crap.  Continually abrogate their oaths of office to protect and defend the United States Constitution.  ... Right, Sheriff?  Includes not only deputies, but the brass as well.  No principles.  No honor.  Lying, conniving, abusive, murderous jackbooted thieving thugs.  The American Civil Liberties Union needs to step up and represent the victims of abusive law enforcement.

To say nothing of innocent civilians all across our formerly great country who are victimized by abusive police.  Need far better representation than a public defender.  Forget?  It's how the bastards in government line government coffers.  All too often, looting the innocent.  Those on the bottom of the food chain.  ... Right, Sheriff?

No justice.  The American Way.  Nazi America.  When is this shit finally going to end?  All of it.  Wake up, Sheriff.  Again, where is dashcam video of the killing of Jeffrey Gray Wise, 52, of Austin by DPS and the Llano County Sheriff's Office?  Two hundred sixteen weeks, now.  A goddamned disgrace.

Why are you still sitting on this information?  What are you hiding, Sheriff?  What is the identity of the officers who killed Wise?  Too gutless to release this information to the public that pays your salary and that of your goons?  Reportedly, there were three officers involved in the shooting.  Who the hell are they?

When will the goddamned 'law' 'enforcement' community finally stop making excuses for engaging in outrageous criminal activity including blatant murder, violent assault, sexual assault, theft, drug trafficking, etc.?  List can go on and on.  Protecting its own no matter what it does or doesn't do? Convenient, isn't it, Sheriff?  Again, no foreign power, no terrorist organization, not even the criminal element presents a greater threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties than all branches and levels of government, -- including law enforcement.

Corruption within law enforcement remains an existential threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.  So what else is new?  ... Right, Bill?  Same old duplicitous, aggressively stupid shit occurs right here in Nazi Llano County.  ... Doesn't it, Sheriff?

Think it'll change any time soon?  Don't hold your breath, readers.  Not how things work in Nazi America, right, Sheriff?  Highly reminiscent of how your goons operate though, isn't it, Bill?  Forget?  'Stupid is as stupid does.'  F--ked up is f--ked up no matter where, no matter how.  Problem throughout all law enforcement.

Including right here in Nazi Llano County, right, Sheriff?  Too many officers clearly have their heads securely lodged where the sun seldom shines.  Egregious insanity continues to be perpetrated by the criminal jackbooted bastards in blue.  Ongoing issue.  All over our formerly great country.

Not just in Dallas as in the Guyger case, but all over the nation.  No end to it.  Surprised? Why?  In today's increasingly national socialist climate anything goes, right, Bill?  Live in a de facto fascist police-state, quickly transitioning to the Trump nazi's Fourth Reich.  Certainly, a problem here in Nazi Llano County, isn't it, Sheriff? Your goons, however, aren't held accountable when they egregiously f--k up. Ever.

Precisely why you refuse to release information on your deputies to the long-suffering public? That is, employment history, criminal background, results of drug testing, etc..  ... Got to protect your criminal jackbooted thugs preying on the citizenry with virtual impunity, right, sir?

Equally pointedly, why hasn't Llano County Deputy Leroy Rodriguez, Badge #764 been held criminally accountable for egregious abuse of power involving denial of property rights to a Kingsland property owner?  To say nothing of consequent resultant physical damage done to a motor home on that property.  Why are you protecting this clueless son of a bitch, Sheriff?

Why hasn't he been prosecuted for official oppression?  Where is financial compensation for the damage this jackbooted piece of human excrement is responsible for? Ferociously pointedly, why are the District Attorney and the County Attorney continuing to protect this jackbooted piece of shit?  He and others like him present an exigent threat to life, liberty, all civil and constitutional rights and liberties.

Equally to the point, why are your jackbooted pieces of human excrement refusing to enforce Berardi's property rights?  Your goons have failed to take action against Theresa Ahrens when she tore down a no trespassing sign and barrier on Berardi's property.  Have you, your goons, and/or Madam County Attorney been bribed by Johnny Greene?

Ahrens frequently drives all the way through Berardi's property.  Coup de grace?  When Berardi complained to Llano County Deputy Idle about the trespassing, the officer's response was insane.  Said the Sheriff told him to tell Berardi since Ahrens believes she owns his property she can't be charged with trespassing.  Perfect Catch-22, right, Sheriff?  You're not fit for office, Bill.  Bribed by Johnny Greene?

Why is Theresa Ahrens allowed by your goons to dictate what vehicles can and cannot be parked on Berardi's property?  Ahrens claims she has proof the property belongs to her where the vehicle was parked.  Has failed to produce it. Surveyors say otherwise.  Back up Berardi.  Yet, your jackbooted bastards refuse to enforce Berardi's property rights.  Why?  Somebody lining somebody's pockets, Sheriff?

Ms. Ahrens micro-mini portable 'house' is parked on an unused unmarked Llano County road.  Imagine that.  Madam County Attorney well-aware.  Has done nothing.  Shit squat.  Egregiously ignored her oath of office.  Someone bribing you, Becky?  Lining your pockets, Counselor?  Paying you not to sell the unused unmarked County road to Berardi?  Doesn't the County want and need the sale money, to say nothing of the resultant tax income?

No question, County and State agencies remain determinedly, concertedly, achingly incapable of criminal investigation of their own.  Precisely, why a new federal agency desperately needs to be created whose sole function would be to investigate, arrest, charge, prosecute corrupt, abusive, criminal officers, prosecutors, and judges in a special court whose sole function would be to adjudicate only such cases.  Total independence.  Certainly, go a long, long way to cleaning up this cess pool County.  Rein in the outrageously corrupt, abusive, achingly inept, self-serving assholes who run and own this hell hole.

Sheriff, you falsely claim the Kingsland County Commissioner has the authority to resolve this ongoing property rights issue.  Clearly, doesn't.  You, Madam County Attorney, and "Sonny Boy" are certainly an egregious impediment, continue to determinedly stonewall.  Someone's pockets are being lined.  Again, where's financial compensation for the damage Llano County Deputy Leroy Rodriguez, Badge #764 is directly responsible for to the Pace Arrow?  Why hasn't he been prosecuted for this damage, to say nothing of infringement of Berardi's property rights?  -- Just getting started, Sheriff.  Far more to come.

-- You're not doing your jobs, Sheriff.  You've got a loose vicious dog problem in Kingsland, Bill.  When will you and the troops finally do something about this ongoing issue?  Certainly, a recurring problem on Skyline, particularly on occasion at the intersection of Odessa.  Pedestrians, runners, and cyclists are at risk.  Too busy lining County coffers with bogus tickets?

Cowardly fail to financially and/or materially support those fighting for all civil and constitutional rights and liberties at great personal cost and risk?  Get what you truly deserve.  Forfeiture of liberty.  At the hands of outrageously corrupt and abusive government.

6-12-20

Uncommon Valor.  A former officer at her very, very best.  Got the boot for courageously doing the right thing.  Seatbelts on.  The Washington Post reports: