To preserve (themselves) and protect (themselves)

What apparently passes for good police work in Ohio (and undoubtedly elsewhere):

Police aggressively questioned the tearful girlfriend of a young black man they had just shot dead as he held a BB gun in an Ohio supermarket – accusing her of lying, threatening her with jail, and suggesting that she was high on drugs.

Tasha Thomas was reduced to swearing on the lives of her relatives that John Crawford III had not been carrying a firearm when they entered the Walmart in Beavercreek, near Dayton, to buy crackers, marshmallows and chocolate bars on the evening of 5 August.

“You lie to me and you might be on your way to jail,” detective Rodney Curd told Thomas, as she wept and repeatedly offered to take a lie-detector test. After more than an hour and a half of questioning and statement-taking, Curd finally told Thomas that Crawford, 22, had died.

But it's people wearing t-shirts that are the real problem.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

At least Operation Paperclip

Had arguably redeeming qualities...it wasn't an out-and-out sequel.

The CIA officer tasked with interrogating the most important prisoners in America's secret detention programme allegedly abused captives during the agency's covert operations in Latin America in the 1980s, it has emerged. The US Senate's three-year inquiry into the CIA's use of torture after September 11 reveals that a senior agent involved in the programme was recommended for censure decades earlier for “inappropriate use of interrogation techniques”.

Inspiring.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Nah..."one parting rectal probe" would be more accurate

Mr. Turtle has gummed:

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) bashed a CIA torture report released by Democrats on Tuesday as just one last "thumb in the eye of the Bush administration."

Might want to work on that quality control...

Ugh.

A woman in Los Angeles discovered a swastika in the design of a roll of wrapping paper while she was shopping on Saturday in the Hanukkah section of a Walgreens, television station KNBC reported.

Naturally

And guess what ethnicity that guy is?

On Wednesday, a Staten Island grand jury decided not to return an indictment for the police officer who put Eric Garner, an unarmed black man, in a chokehold shortly before his death. A different Staten Island grand jury was less sympathetic to Ramsey Orta, however, the man who filmed the entire incident. In August, less than a month after filming the fatal July 17 encounter in which Daniel Pantaleo and other NYPD police officers confronted Garner for allegedly selling untaxed cigarettes, a grand jury indicted Orta on weapons charges stemming from an arrest by undercover officers earlier that month.

You know, maybe Mr. Orta deserved to be indicted...just like Daniel Pantaleo?

Well that's rich...

From a walking moral calamity.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) said on Wednesday that slain Ferguson, Mo. teenager Michael Brown would still be alive if he'd acted "like something other than a thug."

Which is rich considering...

As governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee had a hand pardoning or commuting many more prisoners than his three immediate predecessors combined. Maurice Clemmons, the suspect in Sunday's slaying of four Seattle-area police officers, was among them.

I suppose if Mike Huckabee had a conscience these sorts of statements would bother him. Fortunately... [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Priorities people! Not, "priorities, people"

Sounds like at least a good start.

The New York City mayor wants to spend $130 million over four years to overhaul how the nation's most populous city deals with mentally ill and drug-addicted suspects, diverting many to treatment instead of the city's troubled Rikers Island jail complex. Mayor Bill de Blasio's plans, announced Tuesday, are based on the recommendations of a task force he appointed following a series of reports by The Associated Press detailing problems at Rikers, including the deaths of two inmates suffering from serious mental illness.

Undoubtedly this amount will be decried as a massive waste of tax-payer dollars. As opposed to the incredible value that comes from spending $1.8 billion on a pair of baseball stadiums. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Assange's Revenge...served cold...and at Ikea.

Karl Rove is gonna be so mad...it is after all undoubtedly part of Sweden's plan for global domination.

Whistleblower Edward Snowden received several standing ovations in the Swedish parliament after being given the Right Livelihood award for his revelations of the scale of state surveillance. Snowden, who is in exile in Russia, addressed the parliament by video from Moscow. In a symbolic gesture, his family and supporters said no one picked up the award on his behalf in the hope that one day he might be free to travel to Sweden to receive it in person.

Meanwhile, America is about a month away from giving Michelle Duggar's womb a Medal of Freedom. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

It takes a hypocrite to know one

Every county on Earth can pretty much point an accusatory finger at another nation for its history of abuses or current awfulness.

However, some hit home more than others.

Condemned at the UN for rights abuses, North Korea hit back Friday, describing the United States as a human rights "tundra" where racial discrimination flourishes.

..."This is clear proof of the real picture of the US as a tundra of human rights, where extreme racial discrimination acts are openly practised," the spokesman was quoted as saying by the North's official KCNA news agency.

His remarks came a week after the UN adopted a landmark resolution urging the Security Council to refer North Korea's leaders to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for possible indictment on crimes against humanity.

The have a point. Ferguson isn’t about black rage against cops. It’s white rage against progress. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

I'm thankful for Hypocrisy

And self-delusion. Because as a middle-aged white guy I can imagine that everything is hunky-dory, because I've got it pretty sweet. I can walk out the door 365 days 24/7 and not worry about being sexually harassed or killed by a "peace-officer".

Wilson said the incident with Brown was the first time he'd ever used his gun. When Stephanopoulos asked if there was any way the incident could've been handled differently, Wilson replied, "no."

Wilson said he has a "clean conscience" about the way he handled the incident with Brown. ...

"The reason I have a clean conscience is because I know I did my job right," Wilson added.

You did your job "right" alright.  Enjoy that show you co-host on FoxNews with Mark Fuhrman in the next six months.

And THAT is a reflection not just of modern America, but the entirety of American history in a nutshell.

Have some more white-meat America...you're choking on it.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

If there's one thing that is true

Being "calm" is for others with respect to the haves.

Because staying calm has truly always been the avenue to justice.

Why, remember the time Martin Luther King stayed home rather than march?

[Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

"Smartest" of bombs

The never ending line of "immeasurable" successes in America's War on the ill-defined and renewable "enemies" is its own reward...or something.

The drones came for Ayman Zawahiri on 13 January 2006, hovering over a village in Pakistan called Damadola. Ten months later, they came again for the man who would become al-Qaida’s leader, this time in Bajaur. Eight years later, Zawahiri is still alive. Seventy-six children and 29 adults, according to reports after the two strikes, are not...

... A new analysis of the data available to the public about drone strikes, conducted by the human-rights group Reprieve, indicates that even when operators target specific individuals – the most focused effort of what Barack Obama calls “targeted killing” – they kill vastly more people than their targets, often needing to strike multiple times. Attempts to kill 41 men resulted in the deaths of an estimated 1,147 people, as of 24 November.

We are terribly sorry for any inconvenience.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

How thoroughly and completed unexpected

I mean all us anti-interventionist peaceniks predict stuff like this every time, and every time we turn out to be right...because every time nobody listens.

Damn us and our non-existent patchouli-loving stereotypes.

US air strikes in Syria are encouraging anti-regime fighters to forge alliances with or even defect to Islamic State (Isis), according to a series of interviews conducted by the Guardian.

Fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and Islamic military groups are joining forces with Isis, which has gained control of swaths of Syria and Iraq and has beheaded six western hostages in the past few months.

Some brigades have transferred their allegiance, while others are forming tactical alliances or truces. Support among civilians also appears to be growing in some areas as a result of resentment over US-led military action.

On the other hand, it does guarantee perpetual war and unending military expenditure.   Which is probably the point.

Huzzah!

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Well...that sucked

Over the years I've posted pictures of my long-time long-shedding companion of more than 15 years.

Sadly, yesterday was the day I held her as it ended.

And that is the terrible price of having a pet.

You were one hell of a dog ol' girl, but an even better companion.

If you can read this

Then despite the latest forecast of Obama unleashing hell by doing what Reagan once did the world did not end last night. 

Though if you live in Buffalo, perhaps you wish it had.

We cannot recognize the basic humanity of immigrants apparently...or for a few, anybody at all.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Just below a gathering of Juggalos

What good is being in the ol' Confederacy without a gathering of dunces?

The nation’s Republican governors gathered at a Florida resort Wednesday for talks, celebrations, and looking ahead to 2016 – because a lot of these governors have their eye on the White House.

The most anticipated event of the event at the posh Boca Raton Resort Club comes later Wednesday.

A discussion of “The Road Ahead” features most of the 2016 hopefuls, including Govs. Mike Pence of Indiana, Rick Perry of Texas, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Scott Walker of Wisconsin and John Kasich of Ohio. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie will get other time in the spotlight

Oh the "most Christian fellowship" of a prayer-breakfast filled with knives just aching to see a back.

I do not know where the Democratic dunces are gathering this year, but undoubtedly they do not need as much room.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Compromise

The Discovery Channel has engendered controversy by planning to broadcast a guy (wearing a special suit) getting swallowed by a python.

Apparently this most fetishy of stunts is a bad idea for a number of reasons, but one is that it is not surprisingly very unhealthy and dangerous for the snake to swallow a full-grown human being (that isn't say, Sean Hannity -- which would be unhealthy and dangerous but still a positive for non-snakes).

But this is the Discovery Channel, which is owned by the same people that own TLC, which specializes in exploiting human flesh.

So in the spirit of compromise and consistent with their oeuvre, why not offer to have the python swallow a little person, or the latest little termite to ooze out of a Duggar womb -- you know they'll get crankin' on another?






#badtaste...but not as bad as TLC's badtaste

White Stuff

There are times when some places in the United States get worse weather than others...such as Buffalo.

The unrelenting lake effect storm that pummeling everything south of Walden Avenue today already has dumped an astonishing 48 inches of snow on Lancaster. Similar totals are being reported in West Seneca, Alden, Depew and parts of South Buffalo and Orchard Park. It may turn out to be a six footer.

Any more snow and we may have to send this to western New York.

The probe that landed on the surface of a comet has discovered organic molecules, the most rudimentary building blocks of life, according to the German agency involved in the mission.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Billionaire Sports Ownership...not just for getting the taxpayers to build 'em stadiums anymore

Nothing begats success more than owning an unsuccessful franchise, A few months ago Steve Balmer purchased the Los Angeles Clippers (lifetime .379 winning percentage) for $2 billion or so.

What's he get out of is other than being a dancing fool?

More than you may realize.

Buying a team isn't like buying a factory full of machines; Ballmer got few physical assets for his $2 billion. Instead, he paid top dollar to join a successful league and acquire the rights to a star-studded roster.

The IRS offers specific tax breaks to any business loaded with such intangible assets.

So, in addition to taking a normal deduction for Paul's annual salary, Ballmer could claim the point guard is worth additional millions in terms of selling tickets and driving broadcast revenue.
This added value, he could say, was part of the original purchase price. The IRS would then allow him to amortize a significant portion of the $2 billion over 15 years in much the same way a factory owner depreciates aging machinery.

Must be tough making such a sacrifice.

Once again, I think the people that were ALREADY HERE might have a comment to make...

Oh the joys of somewhat pointless debates (but hey, he didn't mention the Armenian Genocide).

The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has claimed that Muslim sailors reached the Americas more than 300 years before explorer Christopher Columbus. Speaking on Saturday at a gathering of Muslim leaders from Latin America, Erdogan said contact between Islam and Latin America dated back to the 12th century.

If they did...I hope they made it all the way to Tennessee and built a latrine. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]