ICE Agents Got That Can’t-Throw-People-In-Jail Blues
My previous post on immigration discussed the Obama administration’s proposal for immigration reform. I wasn’t thrilled with it, and I laid much of the problem with the abusive use of power by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. So now today I read that Chris Crane, president of the ICE employees’ union, wants its agents [...]
Pow!
So, a six year old schoolboy makes the shooting gun gesture with his finger and the idiots at the Roscoe Nix Elementary School in Silver Spring, Maryland decided to suspend him. They’ve now backed down, but there is apparently some controversy over whether he just pointed his finger or whether he also said “Pow!” Here’s [...]
A Brief Note to Wayne LaPierre
Wayne LaPierreNational Rifle Association of America11250 Waples Mill RoadFairfax, VA 22030 Dear Wayne, I just received your letter of July 18, 2011 inviting me to your upcoming American Values Leadership Forum at the end of September. I must say, the guest list looks like a conservative all-star lineup — Michele Bachmann, Haley Barbour, John Boehner, John [...]
In Which the TSA Picks on Someone Smarter Than They Are
Jonathan Turley links to yet another story of TSA idiocy: The family was going through security when two TSA agents singled Drew Mandy out for a special pat down. Drew is severely mentally disabled. He’s 29, but his parents said he has the mental capacity of a two-year-old, which made the experience that followed at [...]
Five Half-Assed Ideas From Michael Moore
God, Michael Moore is such a partisan freak sometimes. Here are his “Five Ways the Democrats Can Avoid a Catastrophe and Pull Off the Mother of All Upsets”: 1. Immediate Wall-to-Wall TV Ads, Internet Videos, and Appearances Hammering Who the Hell Put Us in the Misery We’re In. That would be George Bush and the [...]
Three Badgelickers Explain Why You Shouldn’t Make Videos of Cops
Radley Balko has been covering the issue of citizens who take videos of cops and get arrested for it. It’s only illegal in a few states (including Maryland and Illinois) but that doesn’t mean you can’t get arrested for it anywhere. In Radley’s latest piece, he interviews two prosecutors and the head of the Fraternal [...]
I Am Not An FBI Agent
This is the seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, of which I am not an employee or representative: I am not trying to deceive you into thinking I am an agent or representative of the FBI, nor am I trying to assert any authority, FBI-like or otherwise. No matter what those goofballs at the [...]
A Pleasant Alternative to the Things Unsaid
This bit of embarassment to my whole gender has already been shredded here and here and here, so let me just offer a constructive suggestion: Dear Anne, Congratulations on your wedding day. I wish you and Robert all the best. Kind regards, Andrew Would that have been so fucking hard?
Of Whores and Holes
If you’ve ever spent time editing digital audio recordings, you know that they can become hard to understand when you compress them just a little too much… (The story follows a short commercial.)
A Warning From a Violent Man
Radley Balko points out that former president Bill Clinton has an ugly editorial in the New York Times. It’s the anniversary of the bombing of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City, which killed 168 people. Clinton goes through the motions of mourning their deaths, but then he moves on to casting blame: Finally, we should never [...]
Republican Liberty Caucus FAIL
Radley Balko once again demonstrates his total awesomeness. Actually, Radley’s not all that awesome, it just that his opponent at the Republican Liberty Caucus of Illinois is incredibly stupid. He accuses Radley of padding his resume by falsely claiming to be a biweekly columnist for Forbes.com, and then demonstrates that a search shows only two [...]
“An honorable place to work”
Media mogul Ted Turner, being interviewed by Tom Brokaw: MR. BROKAW: You met Vladimir Putin when he was just an aide to the mayor of St. Petersburg. …most people see not in his eyes a soulful person, but the eyes–three letters, as someone has put it: KGB. That he is… MR. TURNER: Well, he had that [...]
When is a Sex Offender not a Sex Offender?
People are sometimes shocked that I’m wary of laws requiring sex offenders to register. How could I possibly object to alerting communities about rapists and child molesters? Because the laws are written by grandstanding legislators, and grandstanding legislators are often stupid and callous, and stupid, callous legislators are a much greater threat than some sex [...]
Use a Pellet Gun, Go To Jail
New Jersey resident Ryan Narciso could get three years in jail for having an air-powered pellet gun in his car, according to a story by Ken Serrano at MyCentralJersey.com: The gun, a Gamo P-23, was sitting under the rear window of the 2004 coupe. Looking like a larger-caliber handgun, the firearm drew a quick response from the [...]
We’re Dead Last! We’re Dead Last!
The story Radley Balko was in town for last month is now officially out in the open, with an op-ed in the Chicago-Tribune: At Reason Magazine, we recently took a look at how the 35 most-populous cities in the United States balance individual freedom with government paternalism. We ranked the cities on how much freedom [...]
What Do Rush Limbaugh, Rosanne Barr, and I Have In Common?
Morons insult us because of our weight. There are plenty of reasons to dislike Rush Limbaugh and the things he stands for, but a surprising number of his detractors feel compelled to point out that he’s fat. It was the same with Rosanne Barr when she started her sitcom. Lots of people commented on and [...]
Do People Suck?
Mike at Crime & Federalism says “Yes, they do.” His evidence is pretty compelling: The story of a 78-year-old man being hit by a car and left lying in the street as people walk on by. (You can click to see security video of the hit-and-run. It’s a little shocking.) A 78-year-old man is tossed like [...]
Common Sense, It’s a Theory
Scott Greenfield was ranting against relying too much on “common sense”: One of the offshoots of the push that resulted in the elevation of George W. Bush to the presidency was the empowerment of “regular” people. This meant that views and opinions, under the category of “common sense,” were raised to a level equal to, [...]
Immigration Analogies
Over at the conservative blog Illinois Review, John Ruskin quotes with approval from an unnamed letter writer who has a few things to say about the recent protests against stronger immigration enforcement (elisions mine) : Certain people are angry that the US might protect its own borders, might make it harder to sneak into this [...]
People May Be Reading This
Lindsay Beyerstein links to an Ad Council ad that’s apparently trying to encourage kids to be careful what they post online. You can see it for yourself here, but to save you time, Lindsay’s description will do: The ad shows a girl called Sarah silently enduring public harassment from a series of progressively older and [...]