Friday - January 11, 2008

A Kiss On The Hand May be Very Sentimental, but Lawyers Are a Guys Best Friend

DeBeers diamond cartel agrees to $295 million settlement in anti-trust price-fixing class action lawsuit. If you bought a diamond from a retailer it actually came through De Beers. If you bought one between January 1, 1994 and March 31, 2006, you are eligible for a refund if you sign up for the settlement. Maximum payout will be about $640.

I know I’m eligible. I think I’ll sign up.  The diamond cartel has been artificially inflating prices for over a century.

Diamonds are said to be a girl’s best friend. Now, that friend is potentially worth a substantial amount of money back as a result of a multimillion-dollar settlement with diamond behemoth De Beers.

The company that controls a huge share of the rough diamond market has agreed to pay nearly $300 million in a price-fixing dispute.

Customers who bought finished diamonds might be able to get hundreds of dollars back.

De Beers, one of the largest diamond suppliers in the world, has agreed to give Americans money back as a result from a class action lawsuit against the company alleging antitrust violations.

John Maher, the plaintiffs’ attorney, said the diamond leader violated the law.

“They controlled and monopolized the sale of rough diamonds and as a result merchants paid more than they should have for those stones,” he said.

De Beers has not admitted to doing anything wrong in the $295 million settlement. An earmark of $135.4 million has been made for consumers who file a claim.

According to the claims administrator, a consumer who purchased a $2,000 engagement ring would be entitled to a maximum of $640 back.

Here are some facts:

Several class-action lawsuits were filed asking for money damages on behalf of diamond purchasers. The lawsuits also asked that the defendants stop certain business conduct. The lawsuits claim that the largest suppliers of diamonds in the world—De Beers S.A. and its associated companies—violated antitrust, unfair competition, and consumer-protection laws by monopolizing diamond supplies, conspiring to fix, raise, and control diamond prices, and disseminating false and misleading advertising. De Beers and the other companies deny they violated the law or did anything wrong. They also say that because they do not do business in the United States, the courts in the United States do not have authority over them.

The courts where the lawsuits were filed have not made any determinations regarding whether the Defendants have done anything wrong. If the lawsuits are settled, the Court will not rule on any of Plaintiffs’ claims or on Defendants’ defenses to those claims, and the lawsuits will be dismissed. This means the Class Members may not sue any Defendant ever again about any past, present or future claims based on or related to the conduct covered by the lawsuits.

So what we have here is a zillion dollar cartel throwing a few pennies to the crowd to make this problem go away. Yeah, $300 million really is just chump change to De Beers.

News article here

FAQs and background info here.

Sign up online here, but please read the other info first.

Wow, some group of lawyers just got very rich!!

Posted by Drew458     on 01/11/2008 at 10:06 PM   
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   Friday - October 26, 2007

Who Needs Rights Anyway?

via SayUncle, we find this lovely bit of news:

I think it’s worth acknowledging the primary functions of the law as it’s used by prosecutors in DC: the gun ban is both a preventive detention statute and an intelligence-gathering tool. At one time when I was a prosecutor, we were prohibited from extending a plea offer in gun cases unless the defendant agreed to come into the office (with his attorney, of course) and be “debriefed” about his knowledge of criminal activity in the city. The statute was also a mechanism for locking up individuals perceived as violent, but against whom other cases could not be brought for whatever reason. It’s pretty simple to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that an individual was in possession of a gun without a license and a lot tougher to prove that he committed a violent crime. These functions may not be relevant to the question whether the statute is constitutional, but it’s worth acknowledging that invalidating the gun ban will surely have a tremendous impact on crime-fighting in the District.

Got that? Here’s a former prosecutor who (a) doesn’t care if it’s constitutional or not (b) knows that the gun ban does nothing to decrease gun crime but makes a nifty tool to imprison people for (c) HAVING A PERCEPTION OF BEING VIOLENT.

I had an interesting conversation a couple of weeks ago with an acquaintance of an acquaintance who is a cop in another city in Virginia.  When I asked if open-carry was common in that city, he scoffed: “If I see anyone open-carrying, they are going to get jumped on by me and any other cop in the district.” We were in a polite setting and it would not have been proper for me to get all in his face about it.  (BTW, open-carry is legal by anyone over 21 in the Commonwealth of Virginia)

On one hand, I know what he meant.  He works in a bad part of this city and the general population he encounters are less than nobel in their collective contribution to society.  That notwithstanding, you can see the parallel in his words to this prosecutor’s above.

It is the general perception by law enforcement and the government that they are our betters.  That we are but sheep needing to be tended to.  If we get out of line, we will be poked and prodded until we comply, or else sent to the slaughterhouse.

It is very disturbing.

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 10/26/2007 at 02:22 PM   
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   Thursday - September 27, 2007

Great Summary of Parker/Heller

From the CATO Institute

D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and attorney general Linda Singer, in their petition to the Supreme Court and in a Washington Post op-ed ("Fighting for Our Handgun Ban,” September 4), raise four arguments in support of the city’s ban. Their first argument is that the Second Amendment ensures only that members of state militias are properly armed, not that private citizens can have guns for self-defense and other personal uses. That contentious question has been debated at length on these pages. See Dennis Henigan, “The Mythic Second,” March 26, 2007; and Robert A. Levy, “Thanks to the Second Amendment,” April 16, 2007.

The city’s remaining three arguments — two legal claims and one policy claim — have received comparatively less attention. First, declares the mayor, even if the Second Amendment protects private ownership of firearms for non-militia purposes, a ban on all handguns is reasonable because D.C. allows possession of rifles and shotguns in the home. Second, the Amendment restricts the actions of the federal government, but not the states, and D.C. should be treated the same as a state for Second Amendment purposes. And third, “handgun bans work”; the streets of the Nation’s Capital are safer as a result. Let’s consider each argument in turn.

The rest of the article lays out why each of those arguments is not going to pass muster.

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 09/27/2007 at 10:33 AM   
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   Wednesday - April 11, 2007

Rape!

You have absolutely no freakin’ idea how pissed off this makes me. The taxpayers of this country who will foot the bill for the millions that were spent to prosecute these boys have been raped. The boys themselves who have had their lives wrecked and had to spend time in jail and thousands of dollars in their defense - have also been raped. Duke University has been raped with unending bad media coverage for THIRTEEN MONTHS - with a good bit of assistance from several dozen bigoted faculty members who piled on the boys unjustly. Jesse Jackson even piled on playing his usual race card to assist in the rape. The only person who WASN’T RAPED is the stupid stripper who started it all!

DAMN IT, this is an outrage!

And MIKE NIFANGUL stands there zipping his pants up after raping everyone in order to get re-elected. Nifong, the Duke faculty, Jesse Jackson, the slobbering media - all need a good ass-whuppin’, if not fines and jail time themselves.

The rest of us need a Morning After Pill. DAMN! DAMN! DAMN!

Duke Lacrosse Case Charges to Be Dropped
_{(ABC NEWS) - April 10, 2007}

The office of North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper will announce that he is dismissing all charges against three Duke Lacrosse players, ABC News has learned from sources close to the case.

The three players, Reade Seligmann, David Evans and Collin Finnerty, were facing charges of first degree kidnapping and first degree forcible sexual offense. The charges stem from an off-campus party on the night of March 13, 2006.

In the hours after the party, one of two dancers hired to perform for the players claimed she had been violently raped in a bathroom by members of the lacrosse team. The players had also been indicted for first degree rape, but that charge was dismissed on Dec. 22, 2006.

Special prosecutors from the Attorney General’s office took over the case after Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong recused himself in January, citing charges of unethical conduct filed against him by the North Carolina Bar. Since then, Jim Coman and Mary Winstead have examined the case from scratch, interviewing key witnesses and working through reams of evidence.

The reasons that will be cited for the dismissal are not yet known, though the case has been riddled with criticism and colored by controversy since its early months. Defense attorneys released documents showing the accuser changed key details of her story in the weeks and months after the alleged assault.

Legal analysts and forensic experts have criticized what they call a critically flawed photo identification lineup — a lineup that led to the identification and indictment of Evans, Finnerty, Seligmann. No DNA evidence was found matching any lacrosse players with samples from the rape kit, while DNA from unidentified men was found on the accuser’s body and clothing.

On Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the Attorney General confirmed to ABC News that his office had completed its investigation into the Duke lacrosse case. A press conference on the outcome of their inquiry is widely expected sometime this week, though members of that office have not yet revealed a date and time.

Posted by The Skipper     on 04/11/2007 at 03:28 AM   
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   Wednesday - April 04, 2007

The World Is Going Insane, Part XXVII

Once again, I am speechless. With the help of lawyers, the inmates are truly in charge of the asylum ... and they’re getting paid well for it. I just don’t understand where this is going.

In case you missed the big party in Seattle back in 1999, thousands of mad hatter protesters rampaged through the streets of Seattle protesting during a meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO). They clogged the city streets, broke into shops and generally made a mess of the town before dozens of them were carted off to jail.

Now, seven years later with the assistance of the ACLU, the protesters who were arrested have won a $1 million lawsuit. Let me repeat that: they are being paid $1 million for getting arrested. If anybody out there can tell how this is happening in a modern, civilized country under a rule of law, I’d sure like to know because I want to organize a protest of my own and get paid off too.

Key quote below: “Nothing is going to replace the time spent in jail and the lost right to protest WTO but I feel good about the settlement because it shows the city and the police are willing to accept some changes in their training and we hope the police follow through and won’t do this again.”

Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable ....

Seattle To Pay WTO Protesters $1 Million
_{(SEATTLE TIMES) - Monday, April 2, 2007}

The city of Seattle will pay $1 million to WTO protesters who were arrested in Westlake Park seven years ago and will clear their records, in a settlement announced today.

The money will cover the plaintiffs’ legal fees, with the rest divided among 160 protesters, who will get roughly $3,000 to $10,000 per person, said Mike Withey, their attorney.

“We think the cash settlement does send a message that what Seattle did was wrong and we shouldn’t have been denied our constitutional rights,” said Ken Hankin, a Boeing engineer and one of the arrested protesters.

The $1 million will come from the city’s insurer, not taxpayers, Withey said. The city has already paid $800,000 to settle multiple claims involving police misconduct during the WTO protests.

Withey said today’s announcement “closes a chapter in Seattle history” because it marks the last of the legal cases stemming from protests and arrests involving 1999 World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle.

Seattle police officers will also receive training on why the department lacked probable cause for mass arrests, Withey added.

“Nothing is going to replace the time spent in jail and the lost right to protest WTO,” Hankin added. “But I feel good about the settlement because it shows the city and the police are willing to accept some changes in their training, and we hope the police follow through and won’t do this again.”

A federal jury ruled in January that the city was liable for unlawful arrests of the protesters. The jury also determined that the arrests did not violate the protesters’ free-speech rights because they were not made as a result of a city policy.

City Attorney Tom Carr could not be reached for comment on the settlement.

Posted by The Skipper     on 04/04/2007 at 03:18 AM   
Filed Under: • Insanity • Lawyers • Liberals • Stoopid-People •  
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   Thursday - March 29, 2007

Quote Of The Day

“I have to admit we really blew the way we let those attorneys go. You know you’ve lost it when people sympathize with lawyers.”

- President George W. Bush, March 28, 2007

Posted by The Skipper     on 03/29/2007 at 03:50 AM   
Filed Under: • Humor • Lawyers •  
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   Friday - March 23, 2007

We Need a Storm

Just saw this over at Kim’s

Help Needed
Reader George K writes:

Kim,

I’m writing you today to ask for your help.  Not for money, just to help spread the word about the abuses of the AFT against law abiding gun dealers.  We need a “blogburst” or whatever they are called these days.

Red’s Trading Post in Twin Falls, Idaho (Idaho’s oldest gun store) is being shut down by the ATF over minor clerical mistakes.  The owners and staff at Red’s are like family to me.  They provided a lot of help and advice to me while I was setting up my own business, and continue to help promote my firearms classes.  Right now, this is the only way I can help them back.

Red’s has started an online petition asking for fair treatment of FFL dealers by the ATF.  As of this time, they have only received about 860 signatures.  This is unacceptable.  One of the silly “Impeach Bush” petitions that will likely go nowhere has almost 19,000 signatures!

Please understand that this petition is not about Red’s Trading Post.  It is about all FFL dealers.  Law abiding dealers across the nation are being shut down for trivial issues.  Small dealers usually have to close as the legal costs would bankrupt them.  (Red’s has already spent $20K in their fight) This also affects the average gun owner.  Where will you buy your guns when your local dealer is shut down?

Read about Red’s battle with the ATF here.

Sign the petition Here.

It’s in the upper 900’s now.  I want to see at least 3,000 by tonight. 

Go. 

Now.

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 03/23/2007 at 02:26 PM   
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   Wednesday - March 21, 2007

D’oh!

I probably just cost the Skipper a lawsuit by using that title, but he’s on some sunny beach right now chasing grass skirts, so he doesn’t care. 

Overlawyered

That syllable is trademarked? D’oh!
Twentieth-Century Fox has a trademark for “the spoken word ‘D’oh’” (popularized by Homer Simpson’s annoyed grunts) though the docket indicates that they have not yet filed a statement of use; the USPTO kids’ page, however, indicates that that syllable, along with many other sounds, are trademarked.

H/T Michelle Malkin

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 03/21/2007 at 11:05 AM   
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   Thursday - March 15, 2007

There Ought to be a Law!

Our Friend John Stossel has an interesting read today.

Whenever someone is hurt in an accident, people say, “There ought to be a law!”
Politicians rush to oblige them and then take credit for all the lives they saved.

But shouldn’t they also accept blame for the lives lost because of those laws?

Heh

Posted by Mr. Christian     on 03/15/2007 at 10:34 AM   
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   Tuesday - March 06, 2007

Chocolate Lawsuit

One billion dollars for levee repairs and $76 billion for “the city’s tarnished image and tourist industry losses”? If this was anybody else but Ray “Chocolate” Nagin, I’d say it was a joke. But no. Sadly, Nagin looked around his city and realized he was short on chocolate - the green kind. Probably due to the city’s population being less than half of what it was before Katrina.

Unfortunately, the half that did come back are committing as much if not more crime than before. Murders, rapes and robberies are back to pre-hurricane levels so Mayor Ray needs lots of greenbacks to fix the city’s image. What does he figure to do with all that money, buy the criminals off? Probably. One thing you can be sure of - if he wins the lawsuit, at least half will wind up in certain politicians bank accounts. It is Louisiana, after all and we are talking about Democrats. That is a combination only Satan could love ...

Mayor Nagin: We ‘Piled It on’ in Suit Against Army Corp of Engineers
_{NEW ORLEANS (FOX NEWS) - Saturday, March 03, 2007}

Only $1 billion of the $77 billion the city is seeking from the Army Corps of Engineers is for infrastructure damages it says it suffered because of levee breaches during Hurricane Katrina. The rest is for such things as the city’s tarnished image and tourist industry losses.

The city “looked at everything and just kind of piled it on,” Mayor Ray Nagin said. “We got some advice from some attorneys to be aggressive with the number, and we’ll see what happens,” he said.

New Orleans has joined big business and thousands of homeowners in filing claims seeking compensation from the corps for damages sustained when the levees broke during the 2005 storm, flooding 80 percent of the city. The claims allege poor design and negligence by the corps led to the failure of flood walls and levees.

The city attorney’s office also considered such things as “decreases in the city’s image, tourist industry activity and potential business industry, losses in the tax base and generated revenue, and a decrease in the city’s overall population,” in making the assessment, according to a statement from City Hall.

A spokeswoman for the mayor could not explain how the city quantified losses not tied to infrastructure. A 43-page form filed with the corps, reserving the city’s right to sue for $77 billion, also provides little insight. It does not quantify “loss of tax revenue,” for example, and supporting documents for city-owned properties, such as a police crime lab and libraries, omit any estimates of property values of flood-related damages, The Times-Picayune newspaper reported Saturday.

Posted by The Skipper     on 03/06/2007 at 06:20 AM   
Filed Under: • Democrats • Corruption and Greed • Lawyers •  
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   Thursday - February 08, 2007

Leftenant Declares The War In Iraq Is Illegal

Lt. Ehren Watada needs to be clapped in irons and frog-marched to the stockade - and left there to pound big rocks into little rocks for the next forty years. That is my decision.

“But, Skipper” you ask, “What gives you the right to pass judgment on this man?”

I’ll tell you what right. It’s the same right that allows Lt. Watada to unilaterally declare the the war in Iraq is illegal, therefore he is relieved of the obligation to report because to do so would mean following an “illegal order” which officers are allowed to do. This has to be the lamest excuse to avoid duty that I have ever heard and the full weight of the UCMJ needs to drop on his pointy little head.

An “illegal order” is when someone over you orders you to shoot unarmed prisoners or murder civilians or something along those lines. “Soldier, report for duty” is not an illegal order. On top of that the contention that the war itself is illegal fails the test because the Commander In Chief ordered it and the US Congress approved it by a wide 77-23 margin.

But no, this Lieutenant has placed himself above the law and is speaking out to every leftist, anti-war group in the country to try to gather support for his defense which hasn’t a legal leg to stand on. In other words .... Cindy Sheehan in uniform.

Now he’s trying to get other service members to follow his lead and violate their oath. Here is an excerpt from his most recent speech. The full text is at the link at the bottom of the quote ...

We have all seen this war tear apart our country over the past three years. It seems as though nothing we’ve done, from vigils to protests to letters to Congress, has had any effect in persuading the powers that be. Today, I speak with you about a radical idea. It is one born from the very concept of the American soldier (or service member). It became instrumental in ending the Vietnam War, but it has been long since forgotten. The idea is this: that to stop an illegal and unjust war, soldiers can choose to stop fighting it.

Now it is not an easy task for the soldier for he or she must be aware that they are being used for ill-gain. They must hold themselves responsible for individual action. They must remember duty to the Constitution and the people supersedes the ideologies of their leadership. The American soldier must rise above the socialization that tells them authority should always be obeyed without question. Awareness of the history of atrocities and destruction committed in the name of America—either through direct military intervention or by proxy war—is crucial.

They must realize that this is a war not of self-defense, but by choice, for profit and imperialistic domination. WMD, ties to Al Qaeda, and ties to 9/11 never existed and never will. The soldier must know that our narrowly and questionably elected officials intentionally manipulated the evidence presented to Congress, the public, and the world to make the case for war. They must know that neither Congress nor this Administration has the authority to violate the prohibition against pre-emptive war— an American law that still stands today. Though the American soldier wants to do right, they must know some of these facts, if not all, in order to act.

-- Lt. Ehren Watada, “Soldiers Must Choose To Stop Fighting”

UNIFORM CODE OF MILITARY JUSTICE

Article. 90. ASSAULTING OR WILLFULLY
DISOBEYING SUPERIOR COMMISSIONED OFFICER

Any person subject to this chapter who--

(1) strikes his superior commissioned officer or draws or lifts up any weapon or offers any violence against him while he is in the execution of his officer; or

(2) willfully disobeys a lawful command of his superior commissioned officer;

shall be punished, if the offense is committed in time of war, by death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct, and if the offense is committed at any other time, by such punishment, other than death, as a court-martial may direct.

_{(Full text of the UCMJ here)}

Posted by The Skipper     on 02/08/2007 at 12:41 PM   
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   Saturday - January 13, 2007

Disorder In The Court

It’s about time for this case to just go away. District Attorney Mike Nifong needs to do the same. In fact he needs to be frog-marched out of his office and into jail himself. Now he’s trying to slip away in the dark of night while no one is looking. The case is falling apart and his conduct in prosecuting it has been abominable, if not criminal.

As hard as it has been for me to work up sympathy for a bunch of rich, white jocks who were stupid enough to thow a drunken frat party and hire a stripper, I have to admit these boys have been screwed by a system of justice that is often prosecuted in the media and all too often shows a racist bias from the git-go.

What happened to “innocent until proven guilty”? How can a DA get away with suppressing evidence? Why does every case involving whites and blacks have to devolve instantly into charges of racism? Too many questions ... not enough answers ...

Nifong Asks To Be Replaced
D.A. seeks special prosecutor to take over Duke lacrosse case; delay likely
_{DURHAM (CHARLOTTE OBSERVER) - January 13, 2007}

District Attorney Mike Nifong asked to withdraw from the Duke lacrosse case Friday after hiring a lawyer to defend him against misconduct charges and meeting with the woman who had accused three players of raping her.

Nifong asked N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper to assign a special prosecutor, a spokeswoman for Cooper said late Friday. David Freedman, the Winston-Salem lawyer representing Nifong, said the request did not come easily.

“He deeply regrets having to get out of this case,” said Freedman. “He felt his presence would only take away from the story the prosecuting witness has to tell.” If Cooper accepts, it could be weeks before his office decides whether to proceed or drop charges against David Evans, 23, Collin Finnerty, 20, and Reade Seligmann, 20.

“From day one we’ve wanted a prosecutor who would follow the evidence and then make his decision, instead of letting his decision direct the evidence,” said Brad Bannon, defense attorney for Evans. “We are absolutely confident in the ability of the Special Prosecution office to review the evidence objectively and competently.” Efforts to reach Cooper were unsuccessful.

The three former players face charges of kidnapping and first-degree sexual offense after a 28-year-old student at N.C. Central University—hired to perform as a stripper—said she was gang-raped and beaten at a March 13 party thrown by Duke’s lacrosse team. The players say the accusations are lies.

The case has gained nationwide attention and created a maelstrom of anger in Durham and across the nation. First, it was directed against the players, who were seen as emblems of privilege in a working-class city. Then, it was directed against Nifong and the accuser.Nifong began the case in spring with a flurry of interviews during which he insisted that three lacrosse players committed a racially motivated gang-rape of the woman. The accuser is black; the players white.

On Friday, Nifong brushed off reporters’ questions. “I’m not sure where y’all are getting this stuff,” Nifong said in a curt telephone interview after the news broke. “I’m not commenting.”

There are several clues to Nifong’s timing: He recently hired Freedman, the defense lawyer, and the accuser visited his office Thursday, where she received a subpoena to testify at a Feb. 5 hearing.

Though Nifong hopes to be relieved as prosecutor in the case, it likely will dog him. He faces a hearing before the N.C. State Bar. The families of the accused have indicated they plan to sue him in civil court.

- More ...

Stripper Lied ... White Boys Fried
-- by Ann Coulter

About a month after members of the Duke lacrosse team were falsely accused of raping a stripper last year, 88 members of the Duke faculty fanned the flames of hysteria by signing a letter announcing that they were “listening” to students “who know themselves to be objects of racism and sexism.”

Maybe they should have been listening to the accused, several of whom had iron-clad alibis. Now the professors are going to need a new example of “racism and sexism” at Duke since their case in chief has turned out to be a fraud.

In lieu of a gang rape perpetrated by high-stepping white male athletes against a poor black woman, the Duke lacrosse case has turned out to be another in a long string of hoax hate crimes in which whites are falsely accused. The lacrosse players denied that any rape had occurred and immediately submitted their DNA to the state, confident that the DNA would prove them innocent. It did: Not a trace of DNA from any of the lacrosse players was found on the accuser, though this girl had more DNA in her than a refrigerator at a fertility clinic.

She had DNA from five other men, which ought to have raised suspicions about her story that she had not had sex with anyone for the week before the alleged gang rape. Well, that was one of the several versions of events the accuser has offered police to date, although my personal favorite was the one in which Elvis came back from the dead and sexually assaulted her. (I think that was version No. 3—I’d have to check my notes.)

This is the second time this woman has accused a group of men of gang-raping her. One more time and it’s officially considered a hobby. And yet despite the vast privilege, untold wealth and bright shiny whiteness of the defendants, they are still under criminal indictment in this case. Three of the players face up to 30 years in prison for a crime every sane person knows they did not commit. Ah, the life of the privileged!

Duke English professor Cathy N. Davidson recently wrote an opinion piece defending her signing of the “listening” letter, noting that it was “not addressed to the police investigation,” but rather “focused on racial and gender attitudes all too evident” after the alleged rape. She explained that the letter had merely “decried prejudice and inequality in the society at large.”

This would be like defending a letter written during the Dreyfus affair on the grounds that the letter did not explicitly accuse Alfred Dreyfus of treason against France, but simply took the occasion of his arrest to decry the treasonable attitudes of the Jews in society at large. If poor black women are constantly being raped by rich white men, then how about they produce one case?

Professor Davidson’s column—written when it was clear to everyone except Nancy Grace that three innocent men were facing 30 years in prison for a rape they did not commit—notes that she remains “dismayed by the glaring social disparities implicit in what we know happened on March 13” and says the incident “underscores the appalling power dynamics of the situation.”

OK, this one they made up, but the case still illustrates a larger truth! If anything, our awareness of the “power dynamics of the situation” is too high. What we need is a little of that skepticism liberals bring to every single criminal case that is not a white-on-black crime or a rape case involving Bill Clinton.

The truth, as opposed to the larger truth, is that the allegedly powerful white males are at risk of losing their freedom at the hands of a lunatic accuser and a power-mad prosecutor. Meanwhile the allegedly powerless poor black woman has destroyed people’s lives with her false accusations, for which she will walk away scot-free.

Don’t liberals ever have to pony up at least one example of a powerful privileged white male trampling on the rights of a powerless black woman in order to keep droning on about powerful privileged white males? Every real-life example invariably turns out to be a hoax, among the most spectacular the Tawana Brawley case and now the Duke lacrosse case.

According to the Los Angeles Times—in an article about another hoax “hate crime” on a college campus—false reports of racist hate crimes on college campuses have averaged about one a year for 20 years.

Liberal professors believe that crying wolf is valuable for calling attention to the societal problem of wolves, even though there’s never a wolf in any particular case. Evidently, awareness of an alleged societal ill—of which we have no actual examples—is worth ruining the lives of three innocent people. After all, they’re just powerful white men.

At the next White Males of Privilege meeting, someone ought to bring up how they can use their vast power to win the right not to be put on trial for crimes they didn’t commit.

Posted by The Skipper     on 01/13/2007 at 10:29 AM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Judges-Courts • Lawyers • Racism •  
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   Sunday - December 17, 2006

CAIR’s Hidden Agenda

What would you think if I told you there was a bill before Congress that is being promoted by the NAACP, CAIR, Amnesty International and the ACLU, and that this bill has been dead in Congress for two years because it is complete idiocy? What if I told you that this bill is about to be resurrected by the Democrats who sponsored it: John Conyers, Nancy Peolsi and Russ Feingold?

The bill is the End Racial Profiling Act of 2004 and in spite of the feel-good name is just another milestone on the road to total anarchy. Take a look at the full text of the bill and decide for yourself ....

Get the picture? Law enforcement officers would have to prove they were not racially profiling a particular group ... and maintain records for proof of certification of compliance or else face numerous lawsuits from every jerk in the world who could hire an attorney - AND WHOSE LEGAL FEES WOULD BE PAID BY YOU AND ME, THE TAXPAYER! The bottom line is (a) a lot of lawyers get rich, (b) law enforcement’s hands are tied, and (c) criminals commit more crimes that go unpunished and if punished, could result in taxpayer funded lawsuits.

Most importantly, the case of the six Imams thrown off the Northwest flight recently is now being used by CAIR to pull this bill off the shelf and get the new Democrat controlled Congress to pass it. This insidious plot is taking place right before your eyes. There is only one hope for rational people ... VETO. I sincerely hope President Bush has the backbone to do just that. If not, we’re on the road to hell and traveling in the fast lane ...

The Real Purpose Behind The Imam Publicity Blitz
-- By Katherine Kersten, Minneapolis Star-Tribune

On Dec. 1, a curious report on the grounded-imams incident at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport appeared on the website of the Iranian Quran News Agency. The report quoted extensively from Madhi Bray, executive director of the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation. The foundation is the American arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, “the world’s most influential Islamic fundamentalist group,” according to the Chicago Tribune.

Bray’s initial statement about the incident had an all-American, see-you-in-court ring. He demanded “large financial compensation for the imams,” adding, “We want US Airways and any other airline displaying this type of behavior against Muslims to be hit where it hurts, the pocketbook.”

The report echoed statements made by the imams themselves. Omar Shahin, their spokesman, has portrayed the incident in a way that’s consistent with a lawsuit and a public relations offensive. He’s called for a Jesse Jackson-style boycott of US Airways, and applied classic civil-rights rhetoric to the incident: “This is prejudice; this is obvious discrimination,” the Star Tribune quoted him as saying. “I cannot change the color of my skin,” he told Newsweek.

But the report on the Iranian website, which has appeared on a variety of Muslim websites worldwide, had a larger primary focus. After the imams incident, it quoted Bray as saying Muslims want “new, broad-sweeping legislation that will extract even larger financial and civil penalties for any airline that participates in racial and religious profiling.”

The report is optimistic that Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, will lend his support to new legislation. Ellison, it says, has expressed his opposition to “such racial and religious profiling.” Ellison, through a spokesman, declined to comment.

One piece of legislation in the works is the End Racial Profiling Act. It is an important priority of Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, whose district includes one of the largest Muslim populations in the country. Conyers introduced the bill in 2004 and 2005, but it went nowhere. Now the alignment of forces may be changing. Conyers will probably be chairman of the House Judiciary Committee when the new Democratic-controlled Congress convenes next month.

Nancy Pelosi, who called herself a “proud” cosponsor of the Profiling Act in 2004, is the incoming House speaker. And in January, Ellison, who represents the district where the imams incident occurred, will take his seat in Congress.

The act, although it doesn’t as yet impose large penalties, would bar any federal, state or local law enforcement agency from “relying, to any degree, on race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion in selecting which individuals to subject to routine or spontaneous investigatory activities.” That would include questioning, searches and seizures.

- More ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 12/17/2006 at 03:54 AM   
Filed Under: • Democrats • Lawyers • Muslims •  
• Comments (5) • Trackbacks (1) • Permalink •  

   Tuesday - November 28, 2006

The Old Rugged Cross

This story probably needs no explanation. It involves a cross erected in the Mojave Desert over 70 years ago by private citizens, an atheist and the ACLU. The result is a cross covered in plywood, a satisfied godless madman and $63,000 in the pockets of the ACLU.

It’s enough to bring tears to my eyes. I need to go visit the firing range to clear my vision and take out a little anger. Be back later ....

In 1934, a gritty prospector named J. Riley Bembry gathered a couple of his fellow World War I veterans at Sunrise Rock. Together they erected the cross, in honor of their fallen comrades. The memorial has been privately maintained ever since.

A wrinkle developed in 1994, when the federal government declared the surrounding area a national preserve. With the cross now located on newly public land, ...the ACLU demanded that the National Park Service tear down the cross.

Mr. Buono insists that his seeing the monument ("two to four times a year") violates his civil rights. A federal district court found in his favor, and the decision was subsequently upheld by the Ninth Circuit.

The ACLU, however, has made out quite nicely. Not only has it prevailed in the courts to date, but it has managed to pocket $63,000. Owing to a quirk in civil-rights law, the taxpayer once again ended up paying the ACLU for pressing a highly controversial church-state lawsuit.

-- FreeRepublic.com (May 27, 2005)

I was in Las Vegas at the end of September and called into Jay at his e-radio show on WideAwakesRadio. I mentioned that I was going to go searching in the Mojave Desert to find a small cross that I’d read about that had been ordered removed by a federal judge after the ACLU sued. Jay mentioned that he’d like to see a picture of it, so here it is.

Seeing a cross covered in plywood is startling to me. It is celebrated by the ACLU as a victory. To me it…what word can I use to describe this anti-religious display? It offends.

-- StopTheACLU (November 28, 2006)

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/28/2006 at 03:31 PM   
Filed Under: • Corruption and Greed • Lawyers • Religion •  
• Comments (9) • Trackbacks (0) • Permalink •  

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