Tag: You’re Doing it Wrong

Mother of the Year Award

I know a lot of older people who complain about today’s youth. But behind many problem children there are problem parents. Take this story for example. Roman Rodriguez left class to find eight teenagers beating up a smaller child. Rodriguez approached the group, determined who the ringleader was, and addressed him with a request to leave the child alone. His request was met with an attempted punch, which missed. Reacting to the initiated aggression Rodriguez, a teenager with martial arts experience, put the aggressor on the ground and held him. What happened after that makes one ask what the fuck is wrong with some parents:

Rodriguez’s strategy worked. The teen, who Rodriguez could only identify as “Angel” ran home, with his group of friends following. What he wasn’t prepared for was the threat he yelled.

“The kid threatened to stab or shoot Roman,” Colón said.

Rodriguez ran back inside the building to tell his father, who was still packing up after class, what happened.

“My son is a pretty mellow kid and I could tell something was wrong as he was pretty hyped up,” Ricardo said.

As they walked outside together, Ricardo said, the teen had returned brandishing a large kitchen knife with his mother by his side.

“I witnessed this kid’s mother encourage her son to stab mine. She was instigating a fight,” Ricardo said. “My first reaction was to protect my son, but also to avoid any kind of tragedy.”

Emphasis mine. The aggressor returning with a knife is bad in of itself but it’s pretty easy, based on this stroy, to figure out where he learned such behavior. What mother on Earth would give a knife to their child, accompany their child to the scene of a previous fight, and encourage him to stab the kid that had previously won the fight (that, I might add, was started by the kid who lost)? That has to be one messed up household.

Kudos to Roman Rodriguez for doing the right thing. I don’t think the situation could have been handled any better than it was. But the mother of the aggressor… holy shit. The fact that parents like that exist in this world saddens me greatly. Can a child with such a mother have any chance of a decent life?

Surveillance is For Thee Not For Me

Dianne Feinstein isn’t just an unpleasant congress critter (but I repeat myself) when it comes to guns. The crone is also unpleasant when it comes to the police state. Since she’s part of the oligarchy she’s all for mass surveillance… unless her and her compatriots are the ones being spied on:

WASHINGTON — Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), a staunch defender of government surveillance of ordinary citizens, took to the Senate floor Tuesday with the stunning accusation that the Central Intelligence Agency may have violated federal law to spy on Congress.

Feinstein, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, railed against the CIA for compromising the legislative branch’s oversight role — a theme echoed by many of her Senate colleagues throughout the day. The outrage was palpable among lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, and some suggested CIA Director John Brennan should resign if the allegations are true. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who has stuck up for intelligence agencies in the past, declared a potential war.

“This is Richard Nixon stuff,” Graham told reporters. “This is dangerous to the democracy. Heads should roll, people should go to jail if it’s true. If it is, the legislative branch should declare war on the CIA.”

Her hypocrisy, and the hypocrisy of all those who advocated for government surveillance, is palpable at this point. But I’m not surprised to see this kind of double standard from Feinstein. After all she is the same woman who supports any law that restricts the ability of individuals not employed by the government to own firearms while also enjoying the protection that accompanies her armed body guards. I stopped paying attention to what that dingbat says long ago and I think you should to.

Zero Accountability

The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) has a colorful history involving a lot of abuses of power. Police departments abusing power isn’t something that surprises people these days as it’s incredibly common, especially in larger cities. But people often wonder why so much abuses takes place in modern police departments. I believe the answer lies in the lack of accountability modern police officers face. One of Minneapolis’s finest has a habit of beating people while off duty and two lawsuits filed against the department for his behavior have turned into payouts for the victims:

A judge’s order in a Minneapolis police brutality suit last week pushed the city’s bill to $410,653.33 for two lawsuits filed against police officer Michael Griffin.

The suits, one stemming from a 2010 incident and the other from 2011, both involve cases in which Griffin was off-duty and at downtown bars when he allegedly punched or kicked people who did not want to fight him. Three people were hospitalized as a result of the incidents, including one man who was unconscious and bleeding for more than five minutes, according to one of the lawsuits.

Griffin remains a patrol officer in the Fourth Precinct on the city’s North Side, according to a department spokesman. The status of an internal affairs review of the incidents was not immediately available Friday.

Notice two important points. First, the city is footing the bill. Although officer Griffin was the attacker in both cases the tax victims of Minneapolis are left paying for his violence. Mr. Griffin should be the one who has to pay his victims as he was the one who wronged them. Second, Mr. Griffin is still on active duty. The man has been found at fault for assaulting two people. He should not be allowed to remain in his position of authority.

But cases like this aren’t uncommon. Police officers are generally insulated from the consequences of their misdeeds. Cities often pay the bills of lawsuits stemming from police abuses cases and officers found guilty of wrongdoing often remain employed by the department. This insulation from wrongdoing means officers often face no consequence when they abuse their power. If one doesn’t suffer consequences for abusing power they are more likely to abuse power.

I believe making officers personally responsible for their actions would do a lot to reduce abuses of power performed by police in this country.

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

When you were young did you ever imitate something your parents did only to have them scold you for it? I did and when I called my parents on it they would often say “Do as I say, not as I do.” That’s kind of what this feels like:

US President Barack Obama has once again accused Russia of violating international law and said Moscow was “on the wrong side of history”.

American officials say they are planning to target Russian individuals and organisations with economic sanctions.

They have also once again urged Moscow to withdraw troops from Crimea, and have proposed sending international monitors to Ukraine.

I’m not sure how Obama can, with a straight face, demand Putin stop invading a foreign land when the United States has a long and proud history of doing exactly that. Heck, the entire foreign policy of the United States is based on invading countries for no real reason.

Arizona SB 1062

A lot of emotions have been fired up due to Arizona’s SB 1062 [PDF] bill. If you’re not familiar with the number this is the bill in Arizona that would grant business owners of that state the legal ability to refuse to provide goods and services to homosexual and transgendered persons for religious reasons. The debate over this bill has gotten pretty heated. One side believes that this bill must be stopped because it enables discrimination and the other side believes the bill should be passed because it allows business owners to choose who they wish to associate with. Many libertarians are in the latter camp because of their support for voluntary association. I, insofar as I care about the bill, oppose it.

As a strong advocate of voluntary association how could I oppose a bill that would seemingly advance a business owner’s legal ability to choose he or she wishes to associate with? Simple. This bill doesn’t advance voluntary association, it creates another privileged class.

If you read through the bill it grants business owners the legal ability to refuse service to individuals (the bill doesn’t specifically state homosexual and transgendered persons) if providing that service would go against their religious beliefs. In other words if a business owner refuses services to somebody and that individual sues then the business owner can say that providing services to that person would have violated his or her religious beliefs and it would be a valid legal defense. So this law means religious individuals gain the legal privilege to discriminate against other individuals while nonreligious people do not.

Voluntary association allows any individual to choose who he or she wishes to associate with regardless of reason. This bill allows religious individual to choose who he or she wishes to associate with while leaving nonreligious people unable to do so. As longtime readers of this blog know I’m against providing legal privileges to specific groups. All should be equal under the law. Any attempt to grant specific groups privileges, which is what SB 1062 does, should be opposed in my opinion.

Watching the GOP Slowly Kill Itself

The Republican Party (GOP) has been slowly killing itself for at least the last couple of decades. It continues to pay talk about small government and individual liberty from one side of its mouth while it talks about oppressing the gays and killing brown people from the other side of its mouth. Needless to say the latter two things haven’t proven to be too popular with modern society.

Part of this slow suicide has involved purging any member of the GOP who advocates for something different than the party line. Here in Minnesota the state party demonstrated its desire to die by dismissing one of its elected representatives who voted in favor of legalizing same-sex marriages here:

GOP state Rep. David FitzSimmons became more than a conservative newbie last May when he secured passage of an amendment giving churches that refuse to perform same-sex marriages sturdier legal protection, and then voted for the marriage-legalization bill. He became a good legislator.

FitzSimmons, a 35-year-old agricultural project manager, also became a political whipping boy for the social conservatives who control the dominant Republican Party in his Wright County district. Since May, he’s been the target of vitriol, untruths and threats severe enough to be turned over to law enforcement.

This is why the GOP is doomed. FitzSimmons voting in a manner that was popularly supported and the dickheads composing his party wanted none of that. Instead of embracing the fact that modern society no longer feels the need to use the state’s violence against homosexuals the GOP has put it foot down and loudly declared that it wants to continue its campaign of oppression.

Frankly I can’t help but laugh. During my misguided time in politics I worked within the GOP trying to get Ron Paul nominated. During this time I was surrounded by people who I could only describe as monsters. While there are some good people inside of the GOP, just as there are some good people inside of the Democrat Party, the vast majority were obsessed with striking out against the gays, bombing brown people in sandy parts of the world, and stopping immigrants from crossing the imaginary line that they refer to as a border. As far as I’m concerned the GOP deserve a slow and painful death.

Like You and Me, Only Better

There has been some controversy regarding the National Football League’s (NFL) stance of not allowing any armed individual, except working members of a stadium’s security detail, into its stadiums. Many people point out that the NFL, as a private entity, has the right to set whatever rules it wants. I personally think the organization receives too much tax victim money to be considered a private entity. But the State of Texas has made its stance clear, off-duty police officers will be allowed to carry firearms into the state’s NFL stadium:

DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) – The National Football League has implemented a new stadium policy that would ban off-duty police officers from carrying guns into games…except in the state of Texas.

According to the NFL memo, “off-duty officers who attempt to bring firearms into an NFL facility will be denied entry.”

But a Texas state law overrides the NFL policy. As long as officers attending the game check in at a specific gate and inform Security where they are sitting – they can have their gun.

I’m sure many people are cheering this decision. If it applied equally to all permit holders in Texas I might care. But as the law is currently being enforced it’s just another example of law enforcement receiving additional privileges over us lowly serfs.

This will likely be the outcome mirrored by other states. Decrees will be issued that allow off-duty officers to carry firearms into NFL stadiums while us regular folk will be left to the mercy of the stadium’s security detail. If only us little people could afford to buy lobbyists like police unions and the NFL can.

We’re Going to Need More Cages

Via Shall Not Be Questioned I came across an opinion piece from a guy who wants Connecticut to strictly enforce its new “assault weapon” registration law:

Connecticut has a gun problem.

It’s estimated that perhaps scores of thousands of Connecticut residents failed to register their military-style assault weapons with state police by Dec. 31.

[…]

Although willful noncompliance with the law is doubtless a major issue, it’s possible that many gun owners are unaware of their obligation to register military-style assault weapons and would do so if given another chance.

But the bottom line is that the state must try to enforce the law. Authorities should use the background check database as a way to find assault weapon purchasers who might not have registered those guns in compliance with the new law.

A Class D felony calls for a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. Even much lesser penalties or probation would mar a heretofore clean record and could adversely affect, say, the ability to have a pistol permit.

If you want to disobey the law, you should be prepared to face the consequences.

Let’s consider the logistics of what the author is advocating. It’s estimated that tens of thousands of Connecticut gun owners failed to comply with the new “assault weapon” restrictions. The author wants Connecticut law enforcement agents to use the background check system to discover who may own an “assault weapon” and have him kidnapped and held in a cage for five years. Connecticut already has overcrowded prisons so new facilities would have to be constructed. Back in 1995 the Connecticut General Assembly responded to a request to know the costs associated with building new prison capacity. The cost per bed in Connecticut, at that time, was estimated to be $50,388.

Using a very conservative estimate of 20,000 noncompliant gun owners (since there are multiple tens of thousands I went with the lowest possible figure of 20,000) and 1995 prices to build new cages (because that’s the most recent information I was able to obtain) the state of Connecticut would be look at paying out $1,007,760,000 just to add the capacity necessary to cage all of these gun owners. Again, this figure is a low ball figure since the cost of constructing a new cage is higher than in 1995 and the number of noncompliant gun owners likely exceeds 20,000. But we get the idea that the costs of doing as the author recommends would be mind bogglingly high.

And what would Connecticut get out of spending over one billion dollars to enforce its new law? Not a damn thing. Merely being in possession of an aesthetically offensive semi-automatic rifle doesn’t make an individual violent. The satisfaction that could be obtained from doing what the author advocates is vengeance against the disobedient. If we want to go down that route I’m sure I can find several felonies the author committed in the last week and demand he be caged for them.

Gun Control Activist Arrested for Carrying Gun into a School

It’s only Tuesday and the irony scale has already been pegged. Gun control advocates have a list about a mile long of places that they don’t believe guns should be allowed. While the list ultimately encompasses everywhere the most forbidden of all places are schools. Needless to say it was only a matter of time until a gun control advocate decided to carry a gun into a school:

BUFFALO, N.Y.(WIVB)- More than a dozen cop cars, the SWAT team, K9 units and the Erie County Sheriff’s Air One helicopter swarmed Harvey Austin Elementary School in Buffalo on Thursday after reports of a man with a gun near the school or on the grounds. Dwayne Ferguson, head of the Buffalo chapter of MAD DADS, was taken into custody. He will be arraigned Friday.

[…]

Police believe the 52-year-old may have been the person that prompted the 911 call. Police say they do not believe he had any ill intent and Ferguson has a valid permit for the weapon.

[…]

News 4 interviewed Ferguson in March of 2013 at a rally in support of the NY SAFE Act. At the time, Ferguson stated the law did not go far enough.

“Our kids are not buying assault weapons, they’re buying pistols and they’re buying them right out of community stores and back here in the school. So this is serious. It needs to go further than what it is,” he said.

There’s really not much else that needs to be said here. But need has never been my driving factor and there are a few things I want to say about this.

First, the amount of hypocrisy displayed by Mr. Ferguson is so thick that it’s palpable. It was only last year that Mr. Ferguson was upset that the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act didn’t go far enough. His primary hangup regarding the SAFE Act seems to be that it didn’t restrict handguns enough. Specifically he didn’t believe the law went far enough to prevent children from acquiring handguns. As it turns out Mr. Ferguson possesses a permit that allows him to carry a firearm that he feels isn’t restricted heavily enough. Then, to peg the irony scale, he brings that handgun into a school. If he is concerned about children obtaining handguns illegally (because it was still illegal to transfer a handgun to a child before the SAFE Act) wouldn’t you think he would try to prevent children from coming into close proximity to handguns?

Second, stories like this lead me to believe that many gun control advocates aren’t sincere. They spend a lot of time talking about the need to restrict access to firearms but what they really want is to restrict people they don’t like from accessing firearms. I haven’t met a gun control advocate yet that believed police officers and military personnel shouldn’t possess firearms (after all, those groups will need firearms to enforce gun control laws). There are also a large number of gun control advocates that believe “important” people (as defined by them) should be allowed to carry firearms because they’re better than you and me. In the case of Mr. Ferguson it seems he believes he is one of these “important” people, which isn’t surprising considering how egotistical many gun control advocates are (after all they do know what’s best for you).

Third, the reaction by the police was absurd. A dozen police cars, SWAT team, K9 unit, and helicopter aren’t necessary for a report of an individual carrying a firearm. If the initial report involved an actual shooting then I could see such a militaristic response but the act of carrying a firearm isn’t in of itself dangerous. But our society has become so incredibly fearful that we believe any report of a man carrying a gun, especially in a school, warrants the deployment of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of firepower before even a cursory investigation is performed. The first response to the initial call should have involved the 911 operator asking whether or not the individual in question was acting in a violent manner. If he wasn’t then I could see sending an officer or two to the school to inform the individual that carrying a gun on school grounds is illegal and that he should exit the building and place the firearm in his vehicle before returning.

This story demonstrates so many issues I have with gun control advocates and the state in general. Between the irony, hypocrisy, and overreaction I can’t help but sit in here and shake my head.

Immigration

The issue of immigration appears to be back in the news. Democrats claim to want to make it easier for foreigners to become United States citizens and grant amnesty to non-citizens who are already in the country. Republicans claim to also want to make it easier for foreigners to become United States citizens but are against granting amnesty to non-citizens who are already in the country. In other words both parties are using individuals not from around here as political pawns (in other words, business as usual). As expected this has fired up both parties’ political bases.

When the Democrats and Republicans claim they want to make the process of immigration easier they really mean they want to cut down on the paperwork and waiting period for non-citizens to become citizens. Granted, I’m not really sure why somebody living outside of the United States would want to move here of all places but that’s not the issue at hand. The issue at hand is the fact that politicians are arguing about making the process of crossing an imaginary line easier.

If you want to cross an imaginary line on a map you should be free to do so without begging some suit-clad dudes in marble buildings for permission. People born on the other side of the imaginary line being unable to cross it freely is the problem. Nobody should be forced to seek permission from bureaucrats to cross public land. Especially when you consider the fact that the United States was founded by people who either came from the other side of the imaginary line or were descendents of people who did.

But the state has convinced many people living here that those on the other side of the imaginary line are barbarians and must be prevented from crossing that line. We’re told that the state has to inspect anybody crossing the line to ensure they’re not going to kill us all. How ironic that the organization that claims it must ensure people crossing the line won’t kill us is the same organization that crosses the imaginary lines of other nations just to bombing the fuck out of their people. I’m sure the state is a great judge of moral character.

The bottom line is that the entire issue of immigration is stupid. People should be able to move about freely without receiving some stupid stamp of approval. Being born on the other side of some imaginary line doesn’t determine the content of your character. After all, there are many people that have been born on this side of the imaginary line that are, in my opinion, assholes. If we want to argue about immigration let’s discuss drawing lines around all federally owned property so that every politician and federal agent is required to go through immigration in order to enter non-federally owned property. That would certainly be more beneficial to our society as a whole.