Stark reminder

Kansas

Those of you who poo-poo the dangers of electing moral authoritarians to office would do well to read and remember this story. The State of North Carolina involuntarily, against their will and without their consent, sterilized more than 7,500 people, the last one as recently as 1974. This was done under the auspices of the Eugenics Board of North Carolina, one of many such state authorities across the country. The state sterilized the mentally handicapped and epileptics, along with those judged too promiscuous or hard to control.

So be careful before you say, nothing like that could ever happen in America.

Duck and Cover: 08.01.11

Read Duck and Cover
at the Blue Pyramid.

Temporary end game: Debt

What, me, worry?

The Clarion Content could not disagree more with the assertion of the New York Times editorial page this morning that President Obama should have used the 14th Amendment to make an end run around Congressional obstructionists and unilaterally raise the debt ceiling. It is a suggestion straight out of the Dick Cheney playbook. It advocates that when checked by a legitimate institutional disagreement, presidential power should be expanded so that the executive can still get his or her way. It is the methodology of Empire and dictatorship, the road to ruin.¹

We are glad President Obama did not pursue this course.

We do not think that he made a great deal on the compromise to raise the debt ceiling. We disagree with kicking the problem further on down the road, by appointing a bogus, super-committee to make the hard decisions Congress has been putting off for a generation.² President Obama already ignored the recommendations of his own deficit committee.

We are in no way impressed by President Obama's facetious claim that the Bush II tax cuts for the uber-rich will go away in 2013. Firstly, Obama would have to get re-elected, his prospects look pretty dismal right now. Secondly, he would have to keep his promise to let the tax cuts end, something he has not managed to do in his first term.

Bottomline on the debt deal, typical Washington, an ugly boiler room compromise that solves nothing and only delays the reckoning. It highlights the desperate need for a third party to break the political gridlock.

Obama was right about one thing change is coming, the only question left is the agent. If not Obama...this month has highlighted some of the more extreme alternatives.


¹President Obama has already showed his willingness to follow the Bush II-Cheney guide to concentrating power in the Executive Branch. Signing statements, extraordinary Presidential Czars, Afghan policy, etc.

²Nothing stops progress from happening like a committee.

Selling alcohol earlier

Found this picture Google image searching for: "Buying Liquor at 5am."

Not sure how we feel about this one here at the Clarion Content. As libertarian leaning, get the government out my business, kind of people, we know in principle we ought likely be in favor, but practically having knocked back an alcoholic libation or two in our day, we wonder...

The North Carolina State Legislature is considering changing the law to allow liquor sales Monday through Friday to begin at 5am rather than 7am. Theoretically, why is that even the government's concern period? We certainly do not hold with the state's monopoly on hard liquor sales here in North Carolina. But in practice, from no limited experience, we can definitively tell you, dear readers, that very little good comes of alcohol that must urgently be purchased at 5am rather than 7am in the morning.

There are very few healthy, wholesome reasons why folks must have alcohol at 5am. Again, it is generally our contention that the State should stay far away from regulating the wholesome-ness or lack thereof in an individual's behavior that is not threatening to other citizen's lives and well-being. Ah, and therein lies the rub and not just in this case, not threatening to other citizen's lives and well-being.

Specifically, here, how high is the risk to other citizen's lives and well-being in allowing early morning alcohol purchases? The sun is never really up at 5am. This and more is what the State Legislature must weigh, in addition, the bill contains a slew of other provisions and changes to existing alcohol sales law. Read more here.

Blaming the victim

The Clarion Content favors school uniforms, we believe uniforms help improve focus and eliminate potential classroom distractions. However, we do not support draconian school dress codes, which are quite different than uniforms. These dress codes, rather than eliminate confusion and issues, exponentially increase them by setting up battles where youth, inherently, naturally, push the limits creating conflicts with parents, teachers and administrators.

It was during the debate on imposing a statewide (as a sidenote surely this is an issue to be addressed on the local, not the state level) dress code in Florida schools that we heard one of the most egregious cases of blame the victim we have ever heard.

In attempting to illustrate the need for a dress code with the case of an eleven year-old Texas girl who was gang-raped by more than a dozen men, Florida State Representative Kathleen Passidomo said, "There was an article about an eleven year-old girl who was gang-raped in Texas by eighteen young men because she was dressed like a twenty-one year-old prostitute. And her parents let her attend school like that. And I think it’s incumbent upon us to create some areas where students can be safe in school and show up in proper attire so what happened in Texas doesn’t happen to our students."

Wow!?! An eleven year-old kid, gang-raped by eighteen men and it was her fault because of how she was dressed?!? She had it coming? She wanted it? Eleven year-olds cannot consent to sex in this country. Period. We hope Representative Passidomo's constituents are calling for the resignation of this anti-feminist hater.

Read more here.

Hooray for the Tea Party

A ringing endorsement for the right of privacy was heard from an unexpected quarter today. Freshman Republican Congressman and emboldened veterans provided a shocking Tea Party tumult during a presumably routine vote to extend portions of the Patriot Act.

Specifically twenty-six Republicans bucked their leadership, eight of them freshman lawmakers, and voted against the extension of the Federal Government's abusive invasions of privacy. Today's vote would have: 1) extended the newly granted authority of the FBI to use roving wiretaps on surveillance targets, 2) allowed the government to continue gaining warrantless access to "any tangible items," such as library records, in the course of surveillance, and 3) allowed the government to continue surveillance of targets who are not connected to an identified terrorist group.

In the Clarion Content's view none of this authority should have ever been bestowed on the government to begin with, it was in clear violation of the Constitution and it was a dangerous breach of the Social Contract.

Unfortunately, this is all so much theater as the provisions will likely be extended next week. The Washington Post reports that Republican leadership will be able to jigger the rules and hold a new vote.

The bill to reauthorize key parts of the counter-terrorism surveillance law, which expire at the end of the month, required a super-majority to pass under special rules reserved for non-controversial measures... the final tally was 277 members in favor of extension, and 148 opposed. The Republicans who control the House made plans to bring the measure back for a quick vote later this month under normal rules, requiring only a simple majority for passage.

Not surprisingly the tone-deaf, clueless, Nancy Pelosi had nothing of substance to say about the bill's blatant attack on the rights of Americans or how little has been gained after ten years of stepped up surveillance. Instead, her office focused on mocking the Republicans, "Disarray."

Why think about what she and House Democrats might be able to accomplish with these upstart, rebellious Tea Party Republicans? You didn't think she was actually listening to the State of the Union last week, did you, dear readers?

It was left to the lonely voice in the wilderness, Ohio's Don Quixote, Dennis Kucinich, to remind his fellow members of Congress, "The Patriot Act represents the undermining of civil liberties."

Toning down the rhetoric

The single best way we have heard someone call for the toning down of the temperature of political rhetoric in America came from an unlikely source, Sports Illustrated pro football columnist Peter King. The Clarion Content is very wary of calls to temper or tamp down political rhetoric because of the concomitant chilling effects on all free speech.

King quoted John F. Kennedy, "Let us begin anew, remember on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."

Kennedy was thinking arms control, but the spirit still resonates.

King is a talented writer with a big heart.

Twitter stands up

It has recently come to light that Twitter stood up for the privacy of folks everywhere last month. The big brothers of the United States government got a court order demanding that Twitter turn over information about a number of people connected to WikiLeaks. The feds wanted IP and e-mail addresses. They got a court order demanding them.

Twitter took a stand for the little guy. According to Wired.com, Twitter successfully challenged the gag order in court, and then told the targets their data was being requested, giving them the time to try to fight the court order themselves.

Wired notes,

"Twitter and other companies, notably Google, have a policy of notifying a user before responding to a subpoena, or a similar request for records. That gives the user a fair chance to go to court and try and quash the subpoena. That’s a great policy. But it has one fatal flaw. If the records request comes with a gag order, the company can’t notify anyone. And it’s quite routine for law enforcement to staple a gag order to a records request.

That’s what makes Twitter’s move so important. It briefly carried the torch for its users during that crucial period when, because of the gag order, its users couldn’t carry it themselves. The company’s action in asking for the gag order to be overturned sets a new precedent that we can only hope that other companies begin to follow."

Buying a gun in Canada

One of our favorite Tweeters, Kelly Oxford, put a lovely little post on her blog the other day about buying a gun in Canada. Or as she put it, "Do ...people realize that in Canada you also have the right to own a gun and ammo?"

Yep, it is true, but according to Ms. Oxford..."You can’t just decide you want to go the the local shop and pick one up like an Xbox game rental."

1. Pass a gun safety course (crazy people HATE tests! they hate a day long course! SCHOOL SUCKS!!!!)

2. Provide three references of character (crazy people are crazy! BILL IS CRAZY AND WANTS TO BUY A GUN!!! DON’T SIGN IT HAROLD!)

3. Provide information on your love life and financial affairs (have abuse charges against your lady/boy friends?? bankrupt? SORRY GUIDO!!)

***note: when husbands/wives get a license to buy a weapon, the spouse must sign a form indicating they feel safe with him/her buying a weapon.

Now mail this all in, get a license back in the mail (4-6 weeks later) and go and BUY YOUR GUNS AND ALL THE AMMO YOU NEED.

If you don’t like those rules, you are too stupid to own a weapon that can kill people when you move your finger.

Ahhh, Kelly Oxford. If you think that is great, you should read her thoughts about family.

Different?

The faces have changed, but the game remains the same

Despite what the defenders of the Obama administration want to tell you, dear readers, the chilling post 9.11 security climate is still in effect. It is more than that Homeland Security is checking nutsacks at airport terminals this holiday season. Our quarrel is not only with the balance between safety and privacy, but with the attitude and atmosphere of the state. The mentality of the state's security apparatus has not noticeably changed under the ostensibly liberal Obama.

What the Clarion Content's small "c" conservative editorial board believes this reflects is that President Obama and his policy team do not come at the world from a less regulation where ever possible framework. Obviously. From their point of view, more is more. This means that, although the current administration does not believe in the invading one's privacy for the same draconian reasons as Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales and John Yoo, their p.c. based paternalism yields essentially the same result. Guantanamo is still open. Black prison sites are still likely maintained. Alliances with strong men across Central Asia, irrespective of national and individual citizen's sovereignty, continue. The state makes unwarranted, and frequently undisclosed, compromises of individual American citizen's civil liberties.

Ultimately there is a government mindset, led by the security apparatus, that believes proper enforcement and public safety trump individual rights and the protect and serve mantra of policing. We ran across another story today that underlined this message recently.

A fifty year-old airline pilot has come under fire from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), an arm of the Department of Homeland Security, after posting a behind the scenes tour of security flaws at San Francisco International Airport on YouTube. The pilot, who taped the clips with his cell phone, has been flying for the airlines for more than a decade. He alerted Sacramento's KXTV when he posted the videos saying he wanted the information to be made public.

According ABC7 in San Francisco, the video posting resulted in federal air marshals and sheriff's deputies showing up, menacingly unannounced at the pilot's house. This appearance that the pilot, a deputized federal air marshal, also recorded, was made to personally and aggressively confiscate his federally issued handgun. Rather than handle this paperwork detail administratively in an office environment, security descended on the pilot in his own home, to make a show of force and displeasure.

His attorney, Don Werno, says he believes the TSA was sending a message that "you've angered us by telling the truth and by showing America that there are major security problems despite the fact that we've spent billions of dollars allegedly to improve airline safety."

Once again, enforcement attacks the whistleblower. Obviously, this sort of individual incident is far below the Presidential radar, unless it involves Henry Louis Gates Jr. or another member of the elite with access.

Change? Only who is sitting at the table has changed, the game remains the same.

Wikileaks

The best take we have heard on the Wikileaks disclosures so far came from the Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu who said, "You should hear what we say about you."

Bell Labs, an untold story

Tim Wu, the developer of Net Neutrality theory, has written a fascinatingly little article for io9.com. He documents the interplay between Bell Labs, the government and the profit motive of a corporation. Bell Labs, for some fifty plus years, was one of the preeminent research institutions and facilities in the world. Its scientists garnered seven Noble Prizes. They invented the transistor and Unix. But it was not a public facility, nor a wholly state-owned entity, it was a private actor with its own particular motives.

Wu shows what that wrought, in this brilliant nugget- here.

Wrongful imprisoned man freed

Long time readers of the Clarion Content know how we love to publish stories of the cops screwing over the people. It runs to the core of our small "c" conservatism. Don't give the Man too much power for you maybe the next one it is exercised on.

We have got another story for you.

A deaf man, Stephen Brodie, was exonerated in Texas for the rape of a five year-old suburban Dallas girl. He was released Tuesday after serving about ten years in prison.

According to the Associated Press, Mr. Brodie has been deaf since childhood, but police questioned him for hours without an interpreter. He eventually confessed, but later told The Associated Press he felt scared and pressured. Unfortunately, the judge ruled the confession admissible at trial. After that Mr. Brodie and his attorney figured a guilty verdict, which was punishable by up to 99 years in prison, was all but certain. So they cut a deal, Brodie plead guilty to assaulting the girl in exchange for a lighter sentence.

Turns out that even when Brodie was arrested and convicted, the cops knew that a fingerprint, found on the window through which the perpetrator entered the victim's home, did not match their suspect or anyone living there. Even worse, prosecutors failed to notify Brodie's trial attorney that testing showed that a hair found at the crime scene and presumed to be the assailants excluded Brodie as the source.

Brodie received an apology from Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins, whose office had reopened the case and whose investigation ultimately led to Brodie's exoneration.

Sorry about those ten years, pal.

More good news from Afghanistan

Ron Paul could not have done any worse...or two sides of the same coin

Despite the lies and bullshit that King George the II's successor, Barry Obama, is spewing from the Oval Office, the reality is America continues to finance its own fucking over in Afghanistan. News yesterday and today have once again highlighted this reality.

As reported in the New York Times, The Financial Times and elsewhere, on Wednesday, the last business day before a national holiday, Afghan state security forces attacked, punched, pushed, and pummeled back hundreds of its own governments' employees. These workers were attempting to storm the central branch of the embattled Kabul Bank to claim their monthly wages. You see, dear readers, there has been a run on the bank.

Why, you ask?

Well, the King George II and Dick's stoolie in Afghanistan, President Hamid Karzai has been up to his elbows in corruption. President Barry, in his attempt to play the hard man, has looked the other way. In the meantime the Kabul bank has lent hundreds of millions of dollars to allies of President Hamid Karzai and poured money into risky real estate investments in Dubai. The Afghan president’s brother, Mahmoud Karzai,is the bank’s third largest shareholder. He lives in a beachfront villa in Dubai bought for him by the chairman of Kabul Bank. Coincidence, he says, "Every issue is twisted to use against the Karzai family."

The bank is a key pillar in the new American sponsored financial system in Afghanistan. Too bad, because it is one more way the American taxpayer is paying to extort ourselves.

Now the security of its deposits are in question. Maybe Goldman Sachs could lend them some of our money? Or AIG?

The Financial Times reports Karzai's brother was better known for running Afghan restaurants in the United States until his Karzai was put on the golden throne by Bush II, Dick and their billionaire corporate partners Haliburton and Blackwater. Today Karzai's brother has considerable financial interests not only in the Kabul Bank, but also an Afghan cement producer, a Toyota dealership in Afghanistan, mining and real estate.

Might have been smarter to invest those billions in America...

Or is that thought unpatriotic?

*fyi America has spent $105 billion of Afghanistan so far in 2010. Good thing we don't need that money at home.

Craigslist killer commits suicide

Accused Craigslist killer Philip Markoff apparently committed suicide in jail yesterday. He was found dead with a plastic bag over his head. He had been living quite the secretive double life before the murder. He was attending medical school at Boston University and planning to marry when he was arrested at age twenty-four with his fiance.

His fiance was cleared and apparently had no idea. She rapidly called off the wedding. In addition to the murder, he was also charged with armed robbery and kidnapping in two similar incidents in which the victims were solicited via Craigslist, but were not injured.

Authorities said that Markoff allegedly shot Julissa Brisman, a New York masseuse who traveled to Boston after placing an advertisement for her services on Craigslist, three times with a handgun on April 14, 2009 after they struggled in the doorway of her room on the 20th floor of the Marriott Copley in Boston.

He had been awaiting trial ever since.

Can the Government track your movements?

Earlier today, we published a fiery invective from our small "c" conservative hearts about ridiculous government interference in the minutia of our lives. Read it here. This issue touches that same nerve, but in a much bigger picture way.

As reported by the Washington Post, "A federal appeals court ruled for the first time Friday that police cannot use a Global Positioning System device to track a person's movements for an extended time without a warrant."

This will move the issue towards the Supreme Court because federal circuit courts in New York and California have previously upheld warrantless GPS tracking of vehicles by the Man and his flunkies.

This time a D.C. Circuit court ruled that, "such surveillance technology represents a leap forward in potential government intrusion that violates constitutional protections against unreasonable searches."

The Post reports, "The federal government has mandated that U.S. cellphone carriers make nearly all their phones trackable... However, companies say that the federal law that allows them to turn over data to law enforcement without subpoenas is prone to abuse."

No kidding. So, they can and already are tracking you with your phone.

Thanks a lot, King George the II!

And way to stand-up to him, you knock-kneed Democrats!

Law enforcement defends their right to use the technology as a cost savings to taxpayers. Brilliant! If it is cheaper for the cops, who needs our rights?

It is always Danger Will Robinson time when we reach the courts as the last line of defense for our freedoms.

Local Congressman in trouble

A local North Carolina Congressman is in hot water after being caught on tape grabbing an amateur videographer by the scruff of the neck. Congressman Bob Etheridge, of Lillington, NC, which is just north of Fort Bragg and Fayetteville, and south of Raleigh, was leaving a fundraiser hosted by California Congressperson Nancy Pelosi.

The amateur cameraman is waiting on the street ala the paparazzi and asks, "Do you fully support the Obama agenda?"

This question irritates the Congressman and he demands to know the video cameramen are. He repeats the question several times as they refuse to answer. He attempts to swat the camera out of his face unsuccessfully, then gets even more aggressive. The tape shows Representative Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat, holding the young man by the wrist and grabbing him by the back of the neck.

Did the Congressman get ambushed? Yes. Did he overreact? Yes. This is the logical extension of what happens to public discourse when America plays gotcha politics. We can all get in the sewer together or we can all climb out of the sewer together.

Supreme Court backs away from Miranda

The Supreme Court in a controversial 5-4 decision, that highlighted the importance of Presidential elections that determine Supreme Court nominees, backed away from strict enforcement of Miranda Rights last week. Miranda Rights refer to rights specifically outlined in the United States Constitution that a criminal suspect may or not be aware they have.

The Miranda warning is so standard in United States criminal procedure that many of us are familiar with its basic form from television and the movies, "You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney, and to have an attorney present during any questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you at government expense."

The Supreme Court having long held that the "burden rests on the government" to show that a crime suspect had "knowingly and intelligently waived" his rights changed its position. The Court, packed with appointments made by King George the II, ruled in favor of coercive interrogation. (Clearly a policy the Bush-Cheney regime favored.) The Court decided that a suspect's words can be used against him if he fails to clearly tell police that he does not want to talk. The police are no longer required to get a statement of the subject's waiver of their right to remain silent before interrogating him.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the ruling "turns Miranda upside down" and "marks a substantial retreat from the protection against compelled self-incrimination."

One more step towards the Sovietizing of the United States.

Still pro-torture

Senator Kit Bond

Unfortunately, despite the brave stance taken by Senator John McCain, himself a victim of torture, many top Republicans are still in favor of torturing suspected (and/or potential) terrorists. The Wall Street Journal reported in its March 20-21 issue that Senator Kit Bond, the leading Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee is regularly complaining that the CIA won't be able to get the information in needs from suspects with only the nineteen acceptable military intelligence interrogation techniques.

Obviously, Senator Bond has never been tortured. Anyone who has experienced extensive sleep deprivation especially accompanied by loud music or other piercing noises knows that it can be extremely physically painful and produce near insanity like effects. Just the fact that piercing is an acceptable synonym for loud in this context speaks volumes about the pain inflicted. Torture with the repeated application of icy cold water (even if it is not used to simulate drowning) can be just as bad.

Your school did what?

This is one of those stories that is hard to believe even after one reads it. The Lower Merion School District of Ardmore, Pennsylvania has supplied more than 1,800 of its students with laptop computers. It didn't tell the students that the district had the ability to remotely activate webcams in the laptops and photograph students in their homes and bedrooms.

The jig was up when Assistant Principal Lindy Matsko of Harriton High School asserted publicly that student Blake Robbins had been "engaging in improper behavior in his home." Her evidence was photographs taken of the student remotely by the district's secret laptop embedded camera. Needless to say, Robbins' parents sued the school district. The lawsuit alleges, "many of the images captured and intercepted may consist of images of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions, including, but not limited to, in various stages of dress or undress."

Tech News World reports the school district has rapidly backpedaled. "The district has now deactivated the feature, however, and has no plans to reactivate it "without express written notification to all students and families," wrote Superintendent Christopher McGinley in a statement issued on Thursday."

No kidding? Suddenly it has dawned on them that it was not a good idea to be secretly photographing high school kids in their homes? Didn't anybody in the district see "American Pie?"

Privacy lawyer, Parry Aftab, told Tech News World, "I have seen Trojan horses used by stalkers so they could turn on webcams remotely, but this is the first time I've ever heard of a school with the audacity to do something like this. There are criminal trespassing laws possibly at work here, and maybe wiretapping as well. This is not Nazi Germany or Cold War Russia... They have no authority over what students do in their own homes."

It is amazing that nobody in the district saw this coming. How could it not be obvious what a bad idea this was? It just goes to show how much American's general expectations of privacy have eroded. School administrators thought that this was good policy.