The Largest Minority

August 16th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

The Democrats really are better than the Republicans on issues of civil liberty and anyone who disagrees with that statement will be locked up in a warehouse.

Inside a warehouse on the northeast side of Denver are dozens of chain link cages topped with rolls of barbed wire. A sign on the wall reads “Warning! Electric stun devices used in this facility”. This is where masses of protesters will be sent during the Democratic National Convention when (not if) mass arrests take place.

The warehouse has already been dubbed “Gitmo on the Platte” by those planning to express their freedom of speech during the convention. Upon seeing video from inside the warehouse, Zoe Williams of Code Pink described the facility as being, “very bare bones and very reminiscent of a political prisoner camp or a concentration camp.” Captain Frank Gale of the Denver Sheriff’s Department would not discuss what he described as his “game plan”, and said that the facility was supposed to be a secret.

The ACLU has raised questions about how prisoners will be able to access food, water, bathrooms, telephones, medical care, and where they can meet with attorneys. None of these basic necessities seem to have been taken into consideration in the bare warehouse that people will be herded into. Mayor John Hickenlooper says there will be a community outreach program to explain the facility’s function.

source

August 13th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

All the legal rights of a human being (sometimes more) and none of the responsibility. Gee, I sure wish I was a corporation. Then other people could bail me out of financial trouble and fight wars when I wanted something.

Two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, according to a new report from Congress.

The study by the Government Accountability Office, expected to be released Tuesday, said about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.

Collectively, the companies reported trillions of dollars in sales, according to GAO’s estimate.

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h/t BuelahMan

August 8th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

18-year-old High school student Irving Gonzalez signed up for the Army’s Delayed Entry Program (DEP), a non-binding contract that left him free to change his mind before basic training. However, when Gonzalez decided he wanted to go to college rather than the Army, the recruiter, Sgt. Glenn Marquette, told Irving Gonzalez that he would be sent to jail if he didn’t join. DEP regulations state “under no circumstances will any (recruiter) threaten, coerce, manipulate, or intimidate (future soldiers), nor may they obstruct separation requests.” Democracy Now! plays the recording of their conversation, questions a spokesman for the US Military Recruiting Command, and talks with a Texas Congressman who is calling for an investigation.

This isn’t the first time teenagers have been intimidated into joining the military by recruiters from the Greenspoint Recruiting Station in Houston. Three years ago Sgt. Thomas Kelt left a message threatening a teenager with arrest if he did not keep an appointment. Rather than punishing Kelt, the Army promoted him to the role of station commander two months later to supervise and train other recruiters.

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August 4th, 2008 by Allison Kilkenny

A word of advice for anyone who is planning on videotaping footage at the Democratic or Republican National Convention this year: hide your camera.

Despite living in the age of information over-saturation, citizens, and protesters especially, face unprecedented levels of intimidation and censorship from an ever-expanding police and intelligence community. But we’re still totally free. I know this because the president keeps telling me this.

The “intelligence-gathering” umbrella was formerly comprised solely of CIA agents, men in crisp, black suits and narrow black ties below their Joe Friday haircuts and garden-variety features. Now, it is a beast of a bureaucracy, a massive fusion network of federal and local agents working together toward the purpose of…well…collecting intelligence. Except, the parameters of what they’re striving toward are unclear these days.

What is pertinent information? What’s being nosy? What constitutes a violation of the Constitution? No one knows. Or rather, no one cares to stop and ask the question except the very people now at the mercy of this gargantuan mistake of a Big Brother. Whenever I imagine the intelligence community these days, I think of The Abominable Snowman crushing Bugs Bunny in his massive paw as he happily sings, “Oh boy! A little bunny rabbit! Just what I always wanted! I will name him George, and I will hug him…”

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July 31st, 2008 by Manila Ryce

Monica Goodling, a graduate of the ever-prestigious Bible study group called Messiah College, is being crucified for simply answering to a higher power – the president. Rather than deny that she repeatedly broke the law, Goodling employs Bush’s own strategy of claiming to be completely ignorant and incompetent in order to dodge blame and responsibility. Stewart also has a little something to say to Blitzer and the bickering children holding this hearing.

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July 28th, 2008 by D.C.

“Fish and Chips” and “Number 16 Bus Shelter,” what would you call these? sentence fragments? Things? Objects? If you guessed any of those answers you would be dead wrong, because they are names for children chosen by parents! I’ll let that sink in… … … Yes, that’s right, the names of children.

In a recent Yahoo news story, the use of absurd and ridiculous names for children has angered a New Zealand judge to take action. Judge Rob Murfitt, of family court in New Zealand, renamed a young girl who had been given the name Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii (No word of a lie, that was her real name). She has been renamed, but the court is keeping her new name confidential to protect her privacy.

The court is profoundly concerned about the very poor judgment which this child’s parents have shown in choosing this name It makes a fool of the child and sets her up with a social disability and handicap, unnecessarily.

Personally, I do not understand what could be going through the minds of the parents who agreed to name their child this-I-won’t-even-repeat-it-because-it’s-so-ridiculous name. Some people just do not seem to have the sense to raise children. I believe that these two parents fall into this category. I cannot understand how they would think that this name would be a suitable name to give to someone. Were they high on drugs? People like this do not deserve to have children.

No parent in their right mind would cause greater burden to be placed on their own children by giving bullies and such an easy target. On the other hand, I also would like to know if Talula, and the other children, had their names registered on birth certificates. If they did, I think it should be illegal to name someone in such a way. I am all for open expression, but in the case of a child’s name, since they have no say about what they are called, the parents should show some restraint in ‘expression.’

Some of the names in the Yahoo story and just plain pitiful. ‘Sex Fruit,’ is an actual name given to a child. If a parent could not comprehend that this name would provide a hard life for their child, then they do not deserve to have a child. If they debated between “David, Peter, and all the other names in the English language” and thought Sex Fruit was the most fitting, then they should have a psychiatric evaluation. Even Gweneth Paltrow’s daughter’s name, Apple, is a more fitting name than ‘Sex Fruit!’

If people are looking for fame and fortune, or looking to get on the Jerry Springer show, at the expense of their child, they really need to re-evaluate their priorities. If they actually thought, at the time, that the name ‘Talula does the hula in Hawaii’ or ‘Fish and Chips,’ were proper names then they need a straight jacket. There are too many people out there that find ways to belittle people that have absolutely nothing wrong with them. By giving them a clear target such as a ‘unusual’ name, the child’s life would most likely result in ridicule. In the case of Talula, her lawyer stated:

The girl had been so embarrassed at the name that she had never told her closest friends what it was. She told people to call her “K” instead

July 26th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

Three white teens were charged Friday in what officials said was an epithet-filled fatal beating of an illegal Mexican immigrant in a small northeast Pennsylvania coal town…

…According to a police affidavit, the defendants and three 17-year-olds encountered Ramirez, 25, and a teenage girl in a park the night of July 12.

The youths goaded Ramirez and the girl, saying, “You should get out of this neighborhood” and “Get your Mexican boyfriend out of here,” documents said. After Ramirez and the girl began walking away, someone yelled an ethnic slur at him, court documents said. He responded, “What’s your problem?”

A fight ensued, during which police said Walsh punched Ramirez in the face. The victim fell and hit his head on the street, leaving him unconscious, after which Piekarsky kicked him in the head, police said.

All three suspects used ethnic slurs during the fight, which ended with Ramirez in convulsions and foaming at the mouth, authorities said. The attackers fled the scene; Ramirez underwent surgery but died July 14 of head injuries.

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July 25th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

By now, most of you are probably aware that the majority of prisoners the US is holding are in secret prisons. While Guantanamo Bay prison is the most well-known, it only represents around 1 percent of the total population of those illegally held around the world.

Additionally, due to a complete lack of public knowledge of these secret prisons, those held are given even worse treatment than the abuses we’ve learned are taking place in Gitmo. What could be worse than being waterboarded and having your genitals electrocuted? Are they forced to watch a Two and a Half Men marathon? We may never know, especially since the people who could potentially inform us about these situations are being locked up by the US military themselves.

This is mafia-style intimidation. Can you imagine if another nation were to forcibly kidnap and imprison any journalist in any country indefinitely for daring to report its methods?

The US military is holding Jawad Ahmad, who has worked with Canadian Television (CTV), at its detention facility at Bagram north of Kabul on allegations he is an “unlawful enemy combatant.”

Ahmad is among 650 people being held at Bagram without trial, US-based International Justice Network executive director Tina Monshipour Foster told reporters.

“Many people in Afghanistan and in Iraq that have been targeted for detention are local journalists covering the conflict in their own country,” said another prominent US human rights lawyer, Barbara J. Olshansky.

“When the United States detains reporters, photographers, camera operators and holds them for long period without charge for any offense and without trials and without any evidence, we know that part of the goal is to just shut people up,” she said.

The intention was to “make sure that the people of those countries and the United States do not know what is going on,” she alleged.

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