Category: Corruption Corner

Fined for Not Using Nonexistent Biofuel

Uncle once again brought another story to my attention that demonstrates how nice is must be to be the state. In their desire to extract as much money as possible from everybody the state decided to make a regulation requiring fuel companies to use a nonexistent biofuel and is now fining those companies for not complying with the impossible:

When the companies that supply motor fuel close the books on 2011, they will pay about $6.8 million in penalties to the Treasury because they failed to mix a special type of biofuel into their gasoline and diesel as required by law.

But there was none to be had. Outside a handful of laboratories and workshops, the ingredient, cellulosic biofuel, does not exist.

In 2012, the oil companies expect to pay even higher penalties for failing to blend in the fuel, which is made from wood chips or the inedible parts of plants like corncobs.

Obviously I’m not a rocket scientist but it seems rather difficult to comply with a regulation that requires the use of unicorn farts. Even though complying with the state’s regulation is literally impossible the fuel companies have no option but to pay less the state bring violence to play. If I were agents of the state I would just make a regulation against emitting CO2 and fine everybody for exhaling.

The United States Government Coercing Other Governments into Censoring the Internet

While our “representatives” are debating the Internet censorship bill known as the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) other agents of the state are busy coercing other government’s into enacting various forms of Internet censorship:

Though a deeply divided Congress is currently considering Internet website censorship legislation, the US has no such official policy—not even for child porn, which is voluntarily blocked by some ISPs. Nor does the US have a government-backed “three strikes” or “graduated response” system of escalating warnings to particular users accused of downloading music and movies from file-sharing networks.

Yet here was the ultimatum that the US Embassy in Madrid gave the Spanish government in February 2008: adopt such measures or we will punish you. Thanks to WikiLeaks, we have the text of the diplomatic cable announcing the pressure tactics.

We propose to tell the new government that Spain will appear on the Watch List if it does not do three things by October 2008. First, issue a [Government of Spain] announcement stating that Internet piracy is illegal, and that the copyright levy system does not compensate creators for copyrighted material acquired through peer-to-peer file sharing. Second, amend the 2006 “circular” that is widely interpreted in Spain as saying that peer-to-peer file sharing is legal. Third, announce that the GoS [Government of Spain] will adopt measures along the lines of the French and/or UK proposals aimed at curbing Internet piracy by the summer of 2009.

The Watch List referenced is the US Trade Representative’s “Special 301” list, updated annually. Spain was duly put on the list in 2008 after failing to take such measures. (“The United States is concerned by the Spanish government’s inadequate efforts to address the growing problem of Internet piracy, described by U.S. copyright industries as one of the worst in Europe,” said the 2008 report.) Spanish copyright holders applauded the move; indeed, the cables show that they repeatedly asked US officials to make it.

At least United States citizens aren’t the only people on the federal government’s watch lists. Whether through direct invasion or underhanded threats the government of the United States likes to force other countries to obey its bidding. What’s frightening about this is when the government here finally enacts Internet censorship legislation there are going to be fewer safe havens that can be proxied into.

The United States isn’t satisfied until the entire world is one big fucking police state. What’s next? Is our government going to give the Spanish government military weaponry to better suppress it’s citizens? Wait, that already happened (what’s really sad is I was going to make that quip but did a quick Google search to ensure it wasn’t false, my default assumption was that the United States had given Spain military aid at some point and apparently it was the correct assumption).

The State Protects Its Cronies

Fascism is basically socialism with the facade of private business kept in place. Whereas many claim our country is moving towards socialism I see it as a trip to fascism as we’re enacting many socialist programs but maintaining the appearance of a capitalistic economy. In fascist economies private industries that obey the demands of the state are rewarded while those that resist are punished. Evidence of such activities exists everywhere in the United States with the government’s granting of immunity to telecommunications companies who allow warrantless wiretapping of their customers:

Also today, the court upheld the dismissal of EFF’s other case aimed at ending the illegal spying, Hepting v. AT&T, which was the first lawsuit against a telecom over its participation in the dragnet domestic wiretapping. The court found that the so-called “retroactive immunity” passed by Congress to stop telecommunications customers from suing the companies is constitutional, in part because the claims remained against the government in Jewel v. NSA.

“By passing the retroactive immunity for the telecoms’ complicity in the warrantless wiretapping program, Congress abdicated its duty to the American people,” said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl. “It is disappointing that today’s decision endorsed the rights of telecommunications companies over those over their customers.”

Today’s decision comes nearly exactly six years after the first revelations of the warrantless wiretapping program were published in the New York Times on December 16, 2005. EFF will now move forward with the Jewel litigation in the Northern District of California federal court. The government is expected to raise the state secrets privilege as its next line of defense but this argument has already been rejected in other similar cases.

Telecommunications companies are willing to play ball because the state, who controls the courts, said no prosecution will be allowed against said telecommunication companies. On top of the telecommunication companies are unlikely to fight warrantless wiretapping orders in court because they have immunity and therefore no harm can come to them for playing the state’s game.

Police Officers Wanted, Critical Thinkers Need Not Apply

It’s no secret that many police officers are lacking in the critical thinking department. This makes sense as the state want thugs to enforce their rules instead of individuals dedicated to seeking justice for those who have been wronged. In fact potentially officers are being rejected because they’re scoring to high on intelligence tests:

A man whose bid to become a police officer was rejected after he scored too high on an intelligence test has lost an appeal in his federal lawsuit against the city.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York upheld a lower court’s decision that the city did not discriminate against Robert Jordan because the same standards were applied to everyone who took the test.

[…]

Jordan, a 49-year-old college graduate, took the exam in 1996 and scored 33 points, the equivalent of an IQ of 125. But New London police interviewed only candidates who scored 20 to 27, on the theory that those who scored too high could get bored with police work and leave soon after undergoing costly training.

Emphasis mine. I believe the real theory is people scoring higher on intelligence tests are more likely to think critically about what they’re doing and decide to either seek more honorable employment or fight for legal reform. The state doesn’t want people who will question orders or currently established laws, they want dumb brutes who will do exactly as they’re told.

It’s sad to see intelligence isn’t seen as a virtue when hiring a police officer.

New Jersey Police Destroy a BMW in Search of Non-Existant Drugs

The war on drugs should be renamed the sanction of police abuse. In their eternal search for drugs police officers have been sanction with a great number of easily abusable powers, such as destroying private property in an attempt to find drugs:

The instrument cluster and leather dashboard were gone. The caramel-colored seats were torn up. The gear shift was ripped out and stray wires hung limp everywhere. Geico, Richardson’s insurance company estimated the damage at $12,636.42 — more than he paid for the car — and declared the vehicle a “total loss.”

According to police reports, the damage to the black BMW 325i came in the aftermath of a traffic stop during which officers detected a “strong odor of raw marijuana” inside the vehicle. Searching for a cache of drugs, members of three different police agencies and a detective from a federal drug task force spent two days tearing the car apart, the reports said.

So what did police find after their $12,000 search?

Absolutely nothing.

The destruction of this car was made possible because an officer pulled the driver of the BMW over and claimed his spidy keep cop senses detected the smell of marijuana. An officer can only search your vehicle if they have a warrant or probable cause but the war on drugs has essentially made probable cause any cockamamy excuse a police officer can think up. All an officer must do is claim he could smell drugs and it’s an instant sanction to search the vehicle. While I lack a time machine to directly interview the authors of the Bill of Rights I’m pretty sure the destruction of this car would qualify as an unreasonable search and seizure.

Truth be told there is a chance that Geico may have a rare chance to bring a case against the police for their actions but it will only come at taxpayer expense. Even if you win a case against the police you still loose because you’re only getting your tax money back. The officers who destroyed the car are effectively immune from lawsuits and thus have no fear of being sued. What a brilliantly designed system, the state gets away with anything it wants and may return some of our money if they decide they went too far.

Recalling Federal “Representatives”

Something I’ve often recommended over the years has been initiating recalls on politicians who attempt to expand the powers of the state (be it an individual state or the federal state). People in Montana are attempting to recall their senators who voted in favor of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA):

(HELENA) – Moving quickly on Christmas Day after the US Senate voted 86 – 14 to pass the National Defense Authorization Act of 2011 (NDAA) which allows for the indefinite military detention of American citizens without charge or trial, Montanans have announced the launch of recall campaigns against Senators Max Baucus and Jonathan Tester, who voted for the bill.

It appears as though my recommendation has been for naught as recalling a federal “representative” isn’t a straight forward as I first believed. Each individual state is able to set internal policy including settings grounds for which “representatives” can be recalled or otherwise removed from office before their term is up. Unfortunately those working on the federal level believe themselves to be immune to any for of early removal not initiated by the House or Senate [PDF]:

The United States Constitution does not provide for nor authorize the recall of United States
officials such as United States Senators, Representatives to Congress, or the President or Vice
President of the United States, and thus no United States Senator or Member of the House of
Representatives has ever been recalled in the history of the United States

[…]

Although the Supreme Court has not needed to directly address the subject of recall of Members
of Congress, other judicial decisions indicate that the right to remove a Member of Congress
before the expiration of his or her constitutionally established term of office is one which resides
within each house of Congress as expressly delegated in the expulsion clause of the United States
Constitution, and not in the entire Congress as a whole (through the adoption of legislation), nor
in the state legislatures through the enactment of recall provisions

Not surprisingly this interpretation on individual state power was produced by the Senate. The bottom line is clear, according to the federal government a federal “representative” can only have his or her stay terminated early if a federal body initiates the expulsion. Some people are quick to bring up the Tenth Amendment as it reserves all powers not expressly mentioned in the Constitution for the individual states. Unfortunately the Constitution does describe how to send a “representative” home early in Article I, Section 5, Clause 2:

Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member.

Nowhere in the clause does it state that expulsion of a member is solely reserved for the respective House but our federal “representatives” are interpreting it that way. Their justification is since removal of a federal “representative” is mentioned in the Constitution that power is exempt from the Tenth Amendment. I always find it funny how selectively the Constitution is interpreted. In the case of removing a federal “representative” the Constitution must be interpreted exactly at written, that is to say no unmentioned powers may be used. Meanwhile the Second Amendment clearly states, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” yet, according to our “representatives” and the Supreme Court it leaves room for some infringements.

Sadly the Constitution wasn’t a well written document and contains a lot of vague language that can be twisted to grant the federal government more power than was originally intended. The purpose of the Constitution was to restrict the powers of the federal government but that intention was entirely lost when the individual states allowed the federal government sole authority in interpreting the foundational document. Now that the federal government reserves sole power of constitutional interpretation they have effectively made themselves immune to constituent scrutiny.

How the System Works

Several times I’ve stated that the United States is no longer land of the free but a fascist state. When people read the term fascist state it instantly brings to mind cattle cars full of Jews being sent off to death camps. Those atrocities aren’t what defines a fascist state anymore than they define a communist state. Fascism is a fairly loose ideology that involves strong nationalism (America, fuck yeah) and a marriage of state and business. Our country meets both of these characteristics and the latter can be easily demonstrated by stories of government officials getting plush private sector jobs in exchange for government contracts:

Siemens AG, Europe’s largest engineering company, hired Stanley McChrystal, a former commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, for a new unit seeking U.S. government contracts.

McChrystal, 57, will serve as chairman of Siemens Government Technologies, which spans security systems to engineering software for defense equipment, the Munich-based company said in a statement today. Siemens appointed former U.S. Army Lieutenant General John Sylvester and Robert Coutts, a former Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT) executive, as board members.

If you’re a company that is looking for big money government contracts you need to play the game. The game isn’t played by offering the best product or best prices but by buying off political actors. By hiring McChrystal Siemens has sent a message to the United States military, “Buy our stuff because there is great high-paying sluff jobs waiting for you if you do.” When record companies want horrible legislation pushed through they send in their lobbyists, many of whom are former Washington politicians who were granted big money lobbyist positions in exchange for shoving through horrible legislation. Seeing their former comrades get such jobs encourages other politicians to follow suit in the hopes of receiving the same treatment.

Environments such as this breed conflict of interest. Instead of representing the wants of the people politicians are encouraged to represent the wants of large business who can afford to pay former politicians to be lobbyists. Nothing but corruption can spawn from this twisted marriage. Capitalism can’t work under fascist economic conditions as the profit motive is entirely eliminated, replaced by this gross beast known as the political means of acquisition.

To Serve and Protect

There are times when I find myself absolutely disgusted with the capacity humans contain for inflicting pain and death upon their fellow homo sapiens. It seems people with incredibly high capacities for such behavior often find themselves in places of power tying others down and pepper spraying them to death:

No doubt you’ve heard the adage: a picture is worth a thousand words. A picture of 62-year-old Nick Christie could be worth thousands of dollars when a jury sees it.

The photo shows the Ohio man restrained inside the Lee County Jail with his body covered in pepper spray.

“This photo is a picture of a man who is strapped to a chair naked inside a jail for hours with a hood over his face. That evokes thoughts of being tortured,” says Cleveland-based lawyer Nick DiCello who represents the Christie family.

So who is the man pictured in this photograph? A poor son of a bitch whose wife called the police in order to take her depressed husband to the hospital and ensure he received his medication:

“I was shocked. This was something out of a horror movie,” says Joyce Christie. She said her husband was depressed and was showing signs of erratic behavior a few days before leaving for Florida.

She called authorities and pleaded with them to take her husband to a hospital and be given his medications. Instead, he was taken to jail for disorderly intoxication.

Instead he was taken, strapped to a chair, and pepper sprayed until he died. Obviously the officers who committed this heinous act are now in prison for murder… never mind that only happens to mere serfs like you and me:

The District 21 Medical Examiner ruled his death was a homicide because he had been restrained and sprayed with pepper sprayed by law enforcement officers. But to this day, nobody has ever been charged with a crime, and the Lee County State Attorney cleared the sheriff’s office of any wrong doing.

It’s been more than two and a half years and his wife still can’t accept what happened.

The motto found on my police cars throughout the country is, “To serve and protect.” This motto implies the police are supposed to serve and protect us but it seems from historical examples such as this one that they really exist to serve and protect each other. I’m curious if police brutality has been on the rise or has always been this prevalent that has only been brought to light with the invention of the information superhighway we known as the Internet.

Never Let the Police Search Your Vehicle

Everybody repeat after me, “I will never, ever give a police officer permission to search my vehicle. If he wants to search it he can come back with a fucking warrant.” Even if you have nothing to hide the police will plant evidence in your vehicle if they want to nail you. Don’t believe me? Why don’t we ask Officer Bill Glass:

A former Haskell police officer was found guilty after pleading no contest to fabrication of physical evidence charges.

Bill Glass resigned from the Haskell Police Department in March of 2010, saying allegations he’d planted methamphetamine in a car during a traffic stop were “baseless.” When the drugs were sent off for testing, a chemist at the lab traced them back to the officer.

When you give an officer permission to search your vehicle your are giving them an ample opportunity to boost their arrest numbers by fabricating evidence. Unless the officer has a warrant or probably cause (which basically means any poor excuse an officer can fabricate, but at least it’s something) they can not search your property without express permission.

If you’re asked to step out of your vehicle during a traffic stop do so but make sure you lock your car doors and put your keys into your pocket before exiting the vehicle. At any point during the traffic stop if an officer asks, “May I have a look inside the vehicle?” you should only responsd by saying, “No.” Ignore anything they say after that because they’re going to try guilting or threatening you into giving them permission. Do not say anything further because the officer will try to hang you with it. In fact it would be a very good idea to get your lawyer on the horn at that point in time.

Papers Please

Remember when our “representatives” established the Transportation Sexual Assaulter Security Administration (TSA) and claimed they would only be used for airports? Remember when TSA agents were caught harassing Amtrak passengers and later truck drivers in Tennessee? That’s what we call mission creep and anytime the government establishes a new agency with limited powers you can guarantee mission creep will follow. In fact I would say this law of mission creep is more stable and provable than the law of gravity. Well fellows denizens of the United States, the TSA’s mission creep shows no signs of stopping:

Rick Vetter was rushing to board the Amtrak train in Charlotte, N.C., on a recent Sunday afternoon when a canine officer suddenly blocked the way.

Three federal air marshals in bulletproof vests and two officers trained to spot suspicious behavior watched closely as Seiko, a German shepherd, nosed Vetter’s trousers for chemical traces of a bomb. Radiation detectors carried by the marshals scanned the 57-year-old lawyer for concealed nuclear materials.

When Seiko indicated a scent, his handler, Julian Swaringen, asked Vetter whether he had pets at home in Garner, N.C. Two mutts, Vetter replied. “You can go ahead,” Swaringen said.

Let me just say I’m getting sick of state agents using dogs to do whatever the fuck they want. The only person who knows if a dog “alerts” or “indicates a scent” is the handler and they can claim any reaction made by the dog is an “alert” or “indicator.” Thus dogs are incredibly brought in to create phony probably cause as nobody can really argue against the handler’s word, especially since dogs can’t speak. I would bet money the case mentioned above was merely a case of profiling, put the target in a situation where he would feel nervous and watch for his physical reactions. If the target doesn’t break out into a sweat or studded his speech you let him go, otherwise you harass him without cause some more.

The Transportation Security Administration isn’t just in airports anymore. TSA teams are increasingly conducting searches and screenings at train stations, subways, ferry terminals and other mass transit locations around the country.

“We are not the Airport Security Administration,” said Ray Dineen, the air marshal in charge of the TSA office in Charlotte. “We take that transportation part seriously.”

The TSA’s 25 “viper” teams — for Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response — have run more than 9,300 unannounced checkpoints and other search operations in the last year. Department of Homeland Security officials have asked Congress for funding to add 12 more teams next year.

How much money to you think somebody got paid to come up with the tacticool acronym VIPR? Still this excuse by the TSA to expand its powers shows why you need to give agencies very narrow names. Instead of calling the agency the Transportation Security Administration they should have been given the name Airport Restricted Security Agency Guarding the Gateway Between the Secure Area of the Airport and the Insecure Area of the Airport using Metal Detectors (ARSAGGBSAAIAAMD). Sure it’s a mouthful but they at least have to perform an agency name change before expanding their powers a terrible amount.

Let the TSA be a lesson to you, if the government asks for powers in one market they will always use that new power to justify the expansion of their power. At the rate we’re going there will be TSA checkpoints on the border of individual states and we’ll be required to provide our papers in order to traverse from one state to another.