While some teenage boys might nominate her as “mother of the year,” Judy H. Viger, 33, has been arrested on five counts of endangering the welfare of a child after she allegedly hired strippers to perform at her 16-year-old son’s birthday party.
Continue reading “New York Mom Arrested For Hiring Strippers For Son’s 16th Birthday Party”
Florida trooper Detrick McClellan (left) was on-duty when he sped at more than 100 mph without emergency lights down a county road and slammed into a Mitsubishi Galant driven by Michelle Campbell, 51. Campbell died in the crash and her granddaughter, 12, flew through the windshield. Her adult niece was also injured. McClellan was found at fault and given three traffic citations even though he said he was responding to a call about someone throwing rocks off an overpass. He was facing citations for careless driving, speeding, and failure to use his emergency lights. Yet, when McClellan came up for his hearing, the ticketing officer was no where to be found and the judge therefore dismissed the case. A video shows officers and McClellan laughing after the dismissal.
We previously discussed the legal issues raised by ChristianMingle promising the faithful to help find “God’s Choice” for them. It seems unlikely that Sean Patrick Banks, 37, was God’s Choice for an ideal Christian date. He is now accused of raping women that he met through ChristianMingle.com across the country.
Meet Joe Rickey Hundley, 60, of Hayden, Idaho who allegedly responded to an irritable flight by getting himself arrested and later fired from his job as a company executive at a defense contractor. Hundley was on a Delta flight when he allegedly slapped a 19-month-old boy who was crying.
![praying_hands[1]](https://i0.wp.com/jonathanturley.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/praying_hands1.jpg)
Mississippi politicians have long allowed their state to rest at the bottom of state in educational quality. Now they have finally decided to act: a new bill would legalize school prayer so children will presumably be able to pray for a day when politicians in the state will actually support public education.
Continue reading “Mississippi Bill Pushes For School Prayer . . . Again”
Two Wichita brothers may have won not only the lottery but the top spot for the most dim-witted felons this week. The brother won a $75,000 winning lottery ticket and celebrated by buying pot and meth . . . and proceeded to burn down their house, securing their own arrests.
Bonnie Jonas-Boggioni, 65, and her husband were driving home to Plano, Texas, when they were pulled over under suspicion of being drug mules. The elderly couple would not seem to fit a profile for a cartel member, but the Tennessee police felt that they had made a critical mistake in their drug conspiracy. Their car had a picture of a marijuana leaf — apparently a common marking for drug mules. It turned out to be a Buckeye leaf decal. After being detained, the police reportedly told the Ohio State football fans that they needed to be more careful in the future and take off the decal. It appears to be the view of the Tennessee police that a picture of something looking like pot is enough for reasonable suspicion.
A new videotape is causing a stir in Florida after Broward Sheriff’s Officer Deputy Alan Dubinski unleashed a torrent of obscenities on a suspect, Jessie Merchant. Duinski threatens to threw the man to alligators. Yet, he was given only a written reprimand and returned to active duty. Ironically, Merchant was being investigated for causing a disturbance. The video is below.
Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Guest Blogger
In the weeks since the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, the call for more action in controlling military style guns and large capacity magazines has increased, but as of yet, nothing concrete has been done on the national level. In fact, the NRA was recently quoted as suggesting that nothing will be done, once the country gets over the “Connecticut Effect”! “The National Rifle Association will wait until the “Connecticut effect” has subsided to resume its push to weaken the nation’s gun laws, according to a top NRA lobbyist speaking at the NRA’s Wisconsin State Convention this weekend.” Think Progress Continue reading “The Connecticut Effect”
Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty(rafflaw)-Guest Blogger
This past week a vote was taken in the United States Senate and it was not a vote to end a filibuster! The vote that I am referring to was a vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.(VAWA) It was noteworthy that the vote actually took place at all, but the results of the vote were especially interesting. The vote to reauthorize VAWA, which was co-sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy, passed by a 78 to 22 margin. All 22 votes against the measure were by male Republican members of the Senate. Continue reading “The Anti-Women 22”
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
I must admit that I gave up watching CNN years ago, even before they attempted to become FOX News lite. Originally, as they created the standard for Cable News, they were an informative leader in providing television journalism. Because of their devotion to the news alone, they became the preferred alternative to Broadcast Network News, which at each network had been put under the “Entertainment Division” and thus viewed as a profit center, rather than a public information service. At the beginning and “golden age” of Television Network News, the FCC had mandated that each network was to provide “news” as a public service, in exchange for their license to control a band on the airways. The leader in this was CBS, a network under the aegis of William Paley, who hired war tested Journalists such as Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite. CBS News was independent of the “Entertainment Division” and as a public service wasn’t expected to turn a profit. While it is true that there was an establishment bias on all news programming yet the coverage ranging from Joe McCarthy, to the Civil Rights Movement and to the Viet Nam War informed the public of great issues and brought home the realities through pictures indelibly imprinting horrific images on the public mind. Reactionary elements within the Corporate/Military Plutocracy viewed all of this with alarm. Their continued success depended upon an uninformed public, lulled by jingoistic propaganda and unaware of who really controlled our nation. There was a determination in these elite circles that the network news, the preferred means by which the public was informed on current affairs, must be reined in. William F. Buckley had already created the meme of a “liberal news bias” by this time as an explanation of why his philosophy of the supremacy of the elite was being bought by the general public. Building upon this meme networks were bought out by conservative corporations, news operations were put under the entertainment divisions and the FCC stop requiring news broadcasting as a condition of licensing.
Ted Turner realized that the traditional network news had been reduced in size and homogenized into a rather unpalatable product. He founded CNN under the paradigm of a 24 hour network dedicated solely to examining the news. Following CNN was the entry of Rupert Murdoch and the “tabloidization” of Cable News along with FOX News becoming a propaganda provider for his Conservative views and allies. This was nothing new for Murdoch who bought out the New Post and the Village Voice, turning them both into neo-conservative propaganda operations, sensationalized with gossip and racy pictures. Sadly, in terms of return on investment, it was a winning strategy for cable news as FOX shot to the top of the ratings. CNN the former ratings leader faltered and tried to become “a little” more like Fox News in order to regain their stature. In the process they became a failure as a serious news provider and have become every bit as inane as shows like “Entertainment Tonight”, even in their coverage of “hard” news stories. At this time in our country’s history with so many serious problems that need to be dealt with, CNN has proven not only incapable, but uninterested in providing coverage of issues that affect us all and of which we the public require more information.
Today, as with many Americans who try to be informed, almost all of the “news” I pay attention to comes from the internet. While I occasionally will watch Rachel Maddow and MSNBC coverage of important events, their coverage too seems lacking of content or even intelligent analysis. There are exceptions at MSNBC when they go away from their usual pundit crew to have on original thinkers undaunted by the need to parrot the establishment. Indeed, the first time I became familiar with Jonathan Turley’s work was seeing him on MSNBC. Since this is the case I had to discover something about CNN’s recent coverage from two articles I read in the Huffington Post, one of which made me snort with amusement, while the other just made me shake my head in disgust as to the current state of CNN, as a representative of mainstream Cable News Continue reading “CNN Cruising Towards Inanity”
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
In August 2011 I wrote a guest blog titled: Tea Party and the Myth of a Grassroots Movement”. Using various newspaper and internet sources I showed that the meme created about the “Tea Party” that it was a “grassroots uprising” of ordinary citizens to take back their country from the out of control liberals, was simply not true. The “Tea Party” is a movement fabricated by certain plutocratic corporate interests to maintain themselves as relatively tax free and maintain control over the fiscal state of our country. I’m revisiting it today because of the guest blog I’ve just submitted about CNN and the rest of the news media, in light of a post by Al Gore at Huffington Post, publicizing his new book which deals with the back-story of the creation of the “Tea Party” and its negative influence upon our country. Some of Al Gores’ evidence and that forming the basis of my original guest blog overlap, but the important difference is he’s Al Gore, former Vice President and a centrist. I on the other hand am merely an aging ex-hippy, who remains a political radical. The truth of the “Tea Party’s” inception is not hidden from view and the facts are blatantly out there. What is important though is that the cable news media, press and the Washington punditry continue to describe the “Tea Party” in terms of its meme and myth as a grassroots entity and thus are complacent in a deception of the American people.
Daily we see stories about these “Tea Party” legislators elected to office on all levels of our government. They are falsely portrayed as populists, who are “fed up” and ran for office to “change things” and return to our Constitution. Large percentages of “Tea Party people in polls still believe that Barack Obama was born in Africa and is a Muslim intent on destroying Christianity and America. They see him as a communist, socialist and fascist simultaneously intent on dismantling our capitalist way of life and crushing American exceptionalism. I understand that one can be a reasonable person an oppose Barack Obama’s activity as President. I oppose some of his positions strongly and I voted for him. However, if you believe the “birthers” and those who call him radical names, then I must say in my opinion you are delusional. He is a slightly right of center Democrat, hawkish on foreign policy and deferential to the Corporate Plutocracy. He may be a Constitutional Scholar, but he certainly hasn’t done enough to protect our Constitutional Freedoms. Yet we see this ultra right wing faction of the Republican Party thinking Obama as the anti-Christ and believing they are part of a spontaneous revolution performed in the interests of “protecting” America. Here’s why that isn’t true. Continue reading “Tea Party: A Phony Movement Mantled as Legitimate”
By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Author’s Note: Grace Under Pressure is an on-going series of posts honoring everyday people who courageously and honorably make positive differences in their own lives and the lives of others. It is my own personal affirmation that unexpected heroes reside among us and serve as quiet but unshakable proof that virtue really is its own reward — and ours too.
Imagine a day where you are confronted by ten women who have been beaten and raped and are desperately seeking your help. Imagine those women have done nothing more than venture out to feed their families knowing full well that armed gangs are hunting them for sport. Then imagine you are confronted by ten more women the next day and then the next and so on in a horrific circulating daily struggle to survive. That is the world of Colette. Colette cannot give her last name for fear of reprisal from the same thugs who torment her fellow refugees at a camp just north of one of the Congo’s provincial capitals at Goma. Fifty thousand displaced men, women, and children are crowded in the camp which lies adjacent to the Virunga National Park. They are just a fraction of the estimated 250,000 people displaced in East Congo by the civil war despite the presence of the largest U.N. peacekeeping force in the world.
We have been following the disgraceful tenure of Jesse Jackson Jr. who disappeared for months as federal investigators closed in on his corrupt practices. He then was inexplicably reelected despite not running or offering any demonstrable evidence of any effort beyond self-dealing for himself and his family. He then resigned costing Chicago millions to replace him. It was, as noted earlier, just the latest scandal involving the family of Jesse Jackson in Chicago. It will now apparently get worse. Jackson will take a plea that reportedly implicates his wife, Sandi, in criminal conduct. However, for those concerned about the Administration giving a sweet deal to the powerful family of Jesse Jackson, the plea will raise some legitimate concerns if public reports are accurate. [Update: As expected, both Jacksons were charged on one count each. He was charged with misuse of campaign funds and she was charged with tax fraud).
Missouri GOP Rep. Rick Brattin still doesn’t buy that whole evolution thing. Indeed, Brattin is the latest politician to seek to make science conform to religious beliefs by introducing bills that would force creationism into science classes and make “intelligent design” theories equivalent to evolution as a scientific subject. Brattin has proclaimed in this district that he would work to stop the “slow erosion of our God ordained liberties and freedoms.” That apparently begins by ordering “God-ordained” science for Missouri children. By the way, Missouri is already ranked 41st out of 50 states in school quality. Brattin appears committed to beating South Dakota for the distinction of the worst school system in the nation. Students will now receive education in the three rs: reading, ‘riting, and religion.