Sidewalk Graffiti

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Cops Assault 12-Year-Old Girl

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2008/12/galveston_false_arrest.php

It was a little before 8 at night when the breaker went out at Emily Milburn's home in Galveston. She was busy preparing her children for school the next day, so she asked her 12-year-old daughter, Dymond, to pop outside and turn the switch back on.

As Dymond headed toward the breaker, a blue van drove up and three men jumped out rushing toward her. One of them grabbed her saying, "You're a prostitute. You're coming with me."

Dymond grabbed onto a tree and started screaming, "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy." One of the men covered her mouth. Two of the men beat her about the face and throat.

As it turned out, the three men were plain-clothed Galveston police officers who had been called to the area regarding three white prostitutes soliciting a white man and a black drug dealer.


All this is according to a lawsuit filed in Galveston federal court by Milburn against the officers. The lawsuit alleges that the officers thought Dymond, an African-American, was a hooker due to the "tight shorts" she was wearing, despite not fitting the racial description of any of the female suspects. The police went to the wrong house, two blocks away from the area of the reported illegal activity, Milburn's attorney, Anthony Griffin, tells Hair Balls.

After the incident, Dymond was hospitalized and suffered black eyes as well as throat and ear drum injuries.

Three weeks later, according to the lawsuit, police went to Dymond's school, where she was an honor student, and arrested her for assaulting a public servant. Griffin says the allegations stem from when Dymond fought back against the three men who were trying to take her from her home. The case went to trial, but the judge declared it a mistrial on the first day, says Griffin. The new trial is set for February.

"I think we'll be okay," says Griffin. "I don't think a jury will find a 12-year-old girl guilty who's just sitting outside her house. Any 12-year-old attacked by three men and told that she's a prostitute is going to scream and yell for Daddy and hit back and do whatever she can. She's scared to death."

Since the incident more than two years ago, Dymond regularly suffers nightmares in which police officers are raping and beating her and cutting off her fingers, according to the lawsuit.
Griffin says he expects to enter mediation with the officers in early 2009 to resolve the lawsuit.

We've got calls in to the officers' lawyer; we'll let you know if we hear something.

Update: This is from the officers' lawyer, William Helfand:

Both the daughter and the father were arrested for assaulting a peace officer. "The father basically attacked police officers as they were trying to take the daughter into custody after she ran off."

Also, "The city has investigated the matter and found that the conduct of the police officers was appropriate under the circumstances," Helfand says. "It's unfortunate that sometimes police officers have to use force against people who are using force against them. And the evidence will show that both these folks violated the law and forcefully resisted arrest."

Militant Note: I don't care who you are or whether you're a cop or a thug (often, same diff), if you're in plain clothes and you come up to me and grab me, I'm going to resist. I don't care how many times you claim to be a police officer. Remember the old days when cops showed ID and told you that you were under arrest and THEN took you into custody? What happened to that?

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Greatest Movie Scene of All Time

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Government Raids on Family Farms

http://campaignforliberty.com/blog.php?view=6325

The Stowers, parents of eight children (including one son serving in Iraq), have been accused of violating retail food establishment licensure laws.

They describe the events of December 1 in the following video:

The Buckeye Institute's 1851 Center for Constitution of Law announced yesterday that it is filing suit on behalf of the Stowers family against the against the Ohio Department of Agriculture, citing:

... seizure of private property without compensation, unlawful exercise of administrative authority and unlawful application of state police power, among other violations of freedoms guaranteed by the Ohio Constitution.

This case appears to be similar to that of Mark Nolt, who had been selling his farm products to his eager customers for years. When he neglected to renew his state issued permit, the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture began to harass him and his family, raiding his farm several times and confiscating over $50,000 dollars worth of food, including stores of personal family food.

This kind of aggression is disturbing on several levels. On one hand, the state is at war with small-scale farmers: the health and agriculture departments work to discourage farmers from providing alternative food directly to consumers. On another is the degree to which these same agencies are uber-controlling in what we are and are not permitted to put into our bodies all in the name of safety and protecting us from ourselves, or even worse, protecting children from their parents.

In his book, Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal, Joel Salatin discusses the plight of the small farmers and all the cumbersome regulations and laws surrounding the sale of food direct to consumers. In an ironic twist, PDA officials took this book during one of the raids on Mark Nolt's farm in Pennsylvania. The title of the book begs the question "why is a farmer writing a book titled Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal?"

It is unfortunately all too clear to our country's small-scale farmers, as in the cases above, that they are the targets for much government aggression. At this point in the local foods movement, it is clear that the state is doing whatever they can to discourage consumers from using their purchasing power to support small, local farms that provide healthy foods to people; however, when that tactic ceases to be effective, they go after the source.

Update: the Stowers family can be reached at Manna Storehouse, 43565 State Route 303, LaGrange, OH 44050 or at mannastorehouse@windstream.net.

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Goldman Sachs cuts taxes to one percent by moving profits offshore

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Goldman_Sachs_tax_rate_drops_to_1218.html
John Byrne

Bank takes $10 billion bailout, then cuts tax rate 33 percent
Say you got a ten billion dollar loan to shore up your finances, and you paid your employees $10.9 billion, and you raked in $2.3 billion for the year.

What would you say you owed in taxes? One percent?

That's what you'd pay if you were Goldman Sachs, Inc. The high-flying brokerage -- and former home of Bush Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson -- has announced it's paying just $14 million in taxes this year.

Last year, their tax bill was $6 billion, or 34.1 percent. That represents a year-over-year drop of 33.1 percent.

Goldman attributed its lower tax rate to "more tax credits as a percentage of earnings" and "changes in geographic earnings mix."

Tax accounting advisor Robert Willens told Bloomberg News the rate drop seems "a little extreme."

"I was definitely taken aback," Willens told the business wire. "Clearly they have taken steps to ensure that a lot of their income is earned in lower-tax jurisdictions."

Texas Democrat Rep. Lloyd Doggett, who serves on the House Ways and Means Committee, said Goldman, like other banks, shifted income to countries with lower taxes to reduce its tax burden.

"This problem is larger than Goldman Sachs," Doggett told Bloomberg. "With the right hand out begging for bailout money, the left is hiding it offshore."

Paulson was CEO of Goldman Sachs until mid-2006, and earned $35 million at the firm in 2005. He drew a $16.4 million salary in 2006 -- even though he served as chief executive for just half the year.

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Bush shoe-thrower in hospital after beating: brother

BAGHDAD (AFP) — The Iraqi journalist who hurled shoes at US President George W. Bush is in hospital after being beaten up by security guards, his brother charged on Tuesday, as judicial authorities launched a probe into the incident that grabbed headlines around the world.

"He has been taken to Ibn Sina hospital because he has a broken arm and ribs and is also suffering injuries to his eye and leg," Durgham al-Zaidi said of his brother Muntazer.

The 29-year-old Muntazer al-Zaidi became an instant star in the Arab world when he threw his shoes at Bush on Sunday during the US leader's farewell visit to the country invaded by American forces in 2003.

Zaidi, a journalist for private Iraqi television channel Al-Baghdadia, was swiftly overpowered by Iraqi security forces after his action, regarded as the supreme mark of disrespect in the Muslim world.

His brother charged that Zaidi had been beaten by Iraqi security guards but was unable to say whether Muntazer had sustained the injuries while being overpowered during Sunday's protest or while in custody.

He said he had been told that his brother was initially held by Iraqi forces in the Green Zone where the US embassy and most government offices are housed. The Ibn Sina hospital, which is run by American military medical services, is also inside the zone.

Read the rest here: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iks-dGSaJhN4cELNz4--uCwIaNFA

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America: We were unable to give President [sic] Bush the boot, but we *can* give him the shoe!

It is time to carpet the lawn of the White House and carpet both the lawns of Bush's new homes. What better way to stand in solidarity with Iraqi television journalist Muntadar al-Zaidi?

Send virtual shoes, too! A CLG reader wrote, 'I urge everyone around the world who thinks it appropriate to email George Bush at president@whitehouse.gov a picture of a shoe.'

Contacting the White House

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

10151/10141 Daria Place
Dallas, TX 75229

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Devastating News! Consumer Prices Are Falling

http://www.breakthematrix.com/content/Devastating-News-Consumer-Prices-Are-Falling
by Rick Williams

If you're wondering how stupid (evil?) our so--called leaders and their mainstream media mouthpieces truly are, look no further than their commentary on the latest consumer price news. Consumer prices (a leading inflation barometer) fell last month by the largest amount on record, going back 61 years. Prices across the board fell 1.7 percent in November, surpassing the 1 percent previous record decline set in October. The overall decline in prices reflects a huge drop in energy costs in recent months, with the price of gasoline falling from $4.11 per gallon in July to $1.34 per gallon in November. Only a few months ago, most commentators were anticipating that the wizards at the Fed would be pushing policies to fight inflation-- battling against the prolonged surge in energy prices from Spring-Summer 2008. Oops-- that's all inoperative now. Which, of course, might make one think the Fed has no better crystal ball on such matters than anyone else, and their wonderful "policy" decisions are nothing more than throwing darts at the board. But that's another story-- this column is about the MSM reporting of the price drop news, so let's get to it.

A reasonable thinker might expect that dropping consumer prices are a good thing-- indeed, a wonderful bit of news for the Christmas season. LOWER PRICES MEAN THAT THINGS COST LESS-- THEY'RE CHEAPER, AND MORE AFFORDABLE TO A CASH STRAPPED AMERICAN PEOPLE. And this is precisely the analysis of Austrian School economists and others who share their views. Falling prices are a GOOD THING-- just look at computers and associated technologies over the past 30 years if you want some irrefutable proof by example. The high technology world has displayed steadily falling prices-- combined with steadily increasing quality, functionality and usability. But not so fast, freedom people! Our leaders and their lapdog MSM mouthpieces have a different tale to tell (hint: it's all a pack of lies and obfuscation). Here's their take on the "falling prices" phenomenon:

"A record plunge in consumer prices in November puts pressure on the Federal Reserve to act decisively to guard against a debilitating bout of deflation." AP at msnbc.com Dec. 16, 2008

Read the rest here: http://www.breakthematrix.com/content/Devastating-News-Consumer-Prices-Are-Falling

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Dick Cheney AdmitsTo Authorizing Torture

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Throw Shoes At Bush!

http://flash.vg.no/grafikk/2008/bush/kast_sko.html

Have at him!

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The Liberator Gets Decidered

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Pay-to-Play: Why the Fuss?

From: http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo163.html
by Thomas J. DiLorenzo

The Washington establishment and its kept media are feigning outrage over the fact that the governor of Illinois has been selling political favors. So far, the biggest laugh line came from federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who claimed that Abraham Lincoln would roll over in his grave if he were to know that an Illinois politician was selling political favors to the highest bidder. In reality, Lincoln would be rolling his eyes over the stupidity of such a statement. As Pulitzer prize-winning Lincoln biographer David Donald has noted, Lincoln’s aspiration as a young pol was to be "the DeWitt Clinton of Illinois." DeWitt Clinton was the governor of New York who is "credited" with having invented the spoils system.

By the time Lincoln ran for president, writes David Donald, he had become the master string puller in Illinois politics. He was what would today be called a "lobbyist" for the railroad corporations. In the late 1830s he led the effort to get the Illinois legislature to spend more than $10 million on "internal improvements" of roads and canals, none of which were ever finished; much of the money was stolen; and the taxpayers of Illinois were put deep into debt for many years. A Chicago politician is what we would call him today – a precursor of Mayor Daley and Congressman (and convicted felon) Danny Rostenkowski.

As president, one of Lincoln’s very first acts was to call Congress into a special session in June of 1861 to begin work on the Pacific Railroad Bill, which would eventually result in the greatest spectacle of graft and corruption in American history up to that point (the Credit Mobilier scandal). Lincoln benefitted personally from this legislation which gave him, the president, the right to choose the eastern starting point of the government-subsidized transcontinental railroad. He chose Council Bluffs, Iowa, where he had recently purchased a large parcel of real estate that is known to this day as "Lincoln’s hill." Many of Lincoln’s Republican Party luminaries, from Thaddeus Stevens to Justin Morrill and Oakes Ames, and even General Sherman, accumulated fortunes through graft and patronage that was created by Lincoln’s Pacific Railroad Bill (see my book, Lincoln Unmasked).

The even bigger absurdity of the establishment’s "outrage" over the behavior of the Illinois governor is highlighted by the fact that selling political favors defines what Washington politics (and all other politics in America) is all about. With the lone exception of Congressman Ron Paul, every Washington politician spends most of his time selling political favors of one kind or another. Legislation and regulation is "sold" for campaign "contributions," kickbacks, highly-paid jobs for relatives and friends, and various "in-kind" goodies. It’s what they do. It’s what politics is about. The governor of Illinois is not guilty of anything more than what almost every single politician in Washington does every single day.

Government has become so adept at selling political favors that scholarly treatises have been written about a veritable science of "political extortion." A case in point would be the book Money for Nothing: Politicians, Rent Extraction, and Political Extortion, by Fred S. McChesney (Harvard University Press, 1997). Much has been written about governments granting favors to businesses in return for "campaign contributions" or outright kickbacks, but McChesney focuses on an even more insidious phenomenon: politicians threatening to impose menacing costs on businesses or entire industries with regulation and taxation as "a form of political extortion or blackmail."

Political extortion or blackmail may take the form of threats of price controls, for example, or threats to withdraw occupational licenses, corporate charters or building permits. Or it can come in the form of threats to raise the cost of doing business through a special excise tax or an especially onerous regulation. The purpose of the threats, McChesney explains, is to solicit bribes (i.e. campaign contributions/kickbacks) from the threatened businesses or industries. Politicians even have their own language of political extortion and blackmail. McChesney quotes one pol as describing how, early in his career, he "came across the concept of ‘milker bills’." "Representative Sam, in need of campaign contributions, has a bill introduced which excites some constituency to urge Sam to work hard for its defeat (easily achieved), pouring funds into his campaign coffers and ‘forever’ endearing Sam to his constituency for his effectiveness."

"Cash cows" is another name for legislation that is threatened in order to "milk" campaign "contributions" from threatened industries and individuals. And then there are "juice bills" that are designed to "squeeze" cash out of threatened businesses. Not to be excluded from our political lexicon are "fetcher bills," designed for the same purpose – to "fetch" cash from corporate lobbyists with threatening legislation.

Among the examples of such political extortion cited by McChesney are:

* Product liability legislation that is proposed periodically to fetch campaign cash from both sides of the debate.
* Proposed legislation to restrict futures trading that fetches loads of cash from futures traders.
* Proposed price controls on pharmaceuticals, which squeezed millions from the pharmaceutical industry.
* Proposed price controls on cable television, which had the same effect.
* Proposals to ban smoking altogether, or to impose even more onerous tobacco taxes, always fetches millions from the tobacco companies.
* Proposals to increase excise taxes on alcoholic beverages are tried and true juicer bills.
* Proposals to lower the legal blood alcohol content while driving always solicits millions from the alcoholic beverage industry.
* Proposals to "tax the wealthy" more heavily and "make them pay their fare share" are classic examples of fetcher legislation.

In every case, once a sufficient amount of cash has been "extracted" from the threatened individuals, groups, and corporations, the menacing legislation is dropped. It is no different, in other words, from the underworld thugs who demand bribes in return for allowing a business to exist in "their" neighborhood, as portrayed in every movie about organized crime that has ever been made. Justice would require that several hundred members of the U.S. Congress (and the administration) be treated in exactly the same way that the governor of Illinois is being treated.

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The Lie Whose Exposure Could End the Clintons' Political Careers

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Update From Dan in Canada

I got an update from Dan in Canada whose been having the legal troubles stemming from his purchase of magazines for a gun.

Despite the best efforts of my lawyer, the judge found me guilty of “importation of a prohibited device” and “possession of a prohibited device”. I will be sentenced on January 22nd. My lawyer is asking for an “absolute discharge” because I ordered these magazine bodies from a reputable source (Brownells) and knew that they would come through customs, so it’s not like I was trying to sneak them across the border. The National Firearms Association (the Canadian version of the NRA) is going to back me for an appeal as their legal advisors believe that the judge erred in law and that the RCMP provided incomplete and incorrect information which may have prejudiced the judge’s decision.

There has also been an interesting development. As I was leaving the court room with my lawyer; a sheriff (they provide courtroom security and escort prisoners in and out of the cells) was blocking the exit and as I brushed past him he grabbed my right arm and it felt like he was trying to put me into a hold. I went into normal defense mode and pulled out of it. He then started yelling that I was under arrest and to put my arms behind my back which I did (I had my back to him). He still kept yelling to put my hands behind my back and when I told him they were behind my back (which they were) he tripped me and sent me to the ground. He still kept yelling to put my hands behind my back and when I told him they were behind my back he jumped on me, put me in a head lock and he still kept yelling to put my hands behind my back and when I told him they were behind my back and that he was on top of me. Another meathead showed up and they cuffed me and put me in cells. I can't believe that arrogant little roid-rage prick. If it would have been anywhere else this idiot would have been sent to the hospital with a broken face. I complied knowing that these dimwits love nothing more than to go on a power trip. I’m surprised I wasn't tasered.

After I had my appearance to set a date for sentencing I was released from the court and a North Vancouver RCMP was waiting for me and put me under arrest for "threatening” and "assaulting" the sheriff. I was brought to RCMP cells and held for 24 hours. I then had a phone conference with a justice of the peace and was released on a promise to appear. I made my first appearance two weeks later for these latest charges and I now have a copy of his statement and he claims that I tried to “gouge out his right eye as I resisted arrest”. I don't know how the crown will be able to prove any of these charges as my lawyer was right there and saw and heard everything, and oddly enough the sheriff doesn’t have statements from anyone else. I have now had to retain a new lawyer as my existing one can’t be my lawyer and my witness.

It’s amazing how they try and make criminals out of ordinary people. I also want to lay charges against another of the guards that grabbed me by the throat and pushed me onto a bench in the cell while I was handcuffed with my hands behind my back and with my legs shackled. What a coward and I told him so. All of this has to be on video as there’s cameras everywhere in the court house and in cells.

I’ll let you know what happens at the sentencing.

Yours in Liberty,
Dan

Thanks, Dan. This is yet another bogus example of how you're guilty no matter what the charge or evidence unless you have the connections to make yourself innocent again.

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Google Admits to Capability of Censoring Search Results

GOOGLE, Inc. acknowledged this week that its employees do have the ability to alter search results and rankings. For a company who claims their mantra to be “Do no Evil” this is a troubling admission, albeit not too surprising. Most are already aware that Google along with a consortium of other companies helps the Chinese government (and now Australia and Italy) censor the internet in a scheme dubbed “The Great Firewall of China.”

However, for a company which once claimed to rely solely on their proprietary ”PigeonRank”1 system, a computer generated algorithm developed by Google, Inc.’s founders, it sort of makes their disclaimer at the bottom of the Google news page disingenuous.

From Google News:
“The selection and placement of stories on this page were determined automatically by a computer program. The time or date displayed reflects when an article was added to Google News.”

Read the rest here: http://smargus.com/2008/12/google-admits-to-capability-of-censoring-search-results/

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Watch and Revolutionize Yourself

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