We have yet another horrific rape case in India. In this case, a 13-year-old girl who is part of low Dalit caste was abducted and gang raped by men from the higher Jats caste. They took pictures of the rape and threatened to release them if she told anyone. Eventually her mother discovered the truth and told her father, a gardener. The father’s shame under the cultural and religious norms of the area was so great that he drank pesticide and killed himself. In response to the outrage, local leader, Jitender Chhatar blamed fast foods for the rape while the state’s former chief minister, Om Prakash Chautala, called for the lowering of the age of consent to marriage to 15 to combat rapes in the country.
In torts, we are about to discuss animal liability and a case this week captures the liability line in such cases. In Montana, a twenty-four-year old employee of the Animals of Montana was killed by a grizzly bear raised in captivity to appear on films and photographic images.
Continue reading “Grizzly Bear Kills Employee At Private Montana Wild Animal Facility”
The plight of homosexuals in Russia is getting worse under Vladimir Putin. Gays and lesbians had their own Spring movement after the fall of the Soviet Union — coming out of the closet after decades of repression. Then came Putin and his alliance with the Russian Orthodox Church. Putin’s government quickly used gays and lesbians as targets of political attacks. Those political attacks have now turned to actual attacks as thugs raid gay bars and clubs — beating down both men and women while the police do nothing. The recent legislation banning “gay propaganda” (and a ban on parades for 100 years in Moscow) has triggered the increase in attacks as homophobes see official support for their violent campaigns.
Cook County Judge Susan McDunn has had a controversial career with allegations from anti-gay bias to sheer incompetence. She is now adding suggestions of paranoia after appearing in federal court demanding to know what secret and sealed cases have been brought against her — despite the fact that no one has any evidence of such cases existing. Yet, McDunn insists “I’m not paranoid.” She could add that “even if I am paranoid it doesn’t mean my spiritual adviser is not after me.”
Pastor John D. White of Broomfield Township, Michigan is under arrest in a bizarre murder of the daughter of his fiancé in fulfillment of a sexual fantasy. The 14 members of Christ Community Fellowship Church knew that White was an ex-con but believed that he had changed in finding God.
Recently we discussed how Syrians were taking credit for sending Hurricane Sandy to devastate the United States as punishment for our opposition to the Assad regime. According to these sources, the hurricane was the creation of Iranian scientists and we noted that Christian ministers like Pat Robertson have long treated hurricanes as simple divine punishment — not some manufactured Sharia storm. Now, some Muslim clerics have shifted the account to a more traditional “God’s vengeance” theory. Clerics are telling the faithful that the hurricane was punishment for the recent YouTube video, “Innocence of Muslims.” Thank God it was only a trailer. It is frightening to imagine what would have been sent for the full-length movie.
There is a disturbing account of a death of a young man who participated in the annual Halloween celebrations in New Orleans. Clayton Otwell, 21, went to New Orleans with a friend to go to the Voodoo Festival in the City Park. After helping a stranger, he was offered the chance to try a new type of drug called 25-I. It took just one drop up the nose to kill him. The drug is called “N-Bomb” for its chemical composition 25I-NBOMe and is an extremely potent synthetic substance analogous to LSD.
Continue reading “N-Bomb: Man Dies At Voodoo Festival In New Orleans From New Lethal Drug”
We have another controversy (here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here) over the shooting of a dog by a police officer and the allegation that the officer lied about the dog threatening him before the shooting. In Omaha, Chris Schulte was walking his dog near his home when officers told him to stop because they had cut off the street in search of a criminal suspect. Schulte unwisely and inexplicably refused and continued to walk. That resulted in his arrest. Nothing particularly noteworthy there. However, witnesses later heard a shot and an officer reported that Schulte’s dog, Teela, had threatened — an account later contradicted according to the family by a security camera. Teela is a Labrador/golden retriever mix and has never had a reported incident of biting or threatening anyone.
It is times like this that I am struck by the close affinity of man and dog.
Continue reading “Bath or Walk: The Yin and Yang of the Canine World”
Mike Appleton, Guest Blogger
The great storm that ravaged the east coast this past week brought into sharper focus than all of the presidential debates combined the central issue facing voters on Tuesday. Those who continue to believe that we are all in this together applauded the non-partisan meetings between President Obama and New Jersey governor Christ Christie. The ideologues on the right saw those same meetings as a cynical betrayal of conservative orthodoxy. Alternatively, they approved the initial response of Rep. Steve King (R. Iowa), who subordinated concern over the needs of the storm’s victims to the question of what budget cuts would need to be made before providing federal assistance. These distinct responses accentuated the fact that the election is not about economic policy or religious freedom or the mess in the Middle East. It is not about climate change or energy independence or immigration reform. And it is not about abortion or same-sex marriage or the rights of public unions. At its core, the election is a referendum on affirming or rescinding the social contract. All the rest is committee work.
by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
As mentioned in the last installment of this series, silence in various forms can be just as potent a propaganda tool as words or images proper. Variations of this tactic were presented as were examples of successful and unsuccessful attempts at its utilization. This last week a news story appeared that illustrates one of the major types of failure associated with this tactic and it is one that is every more likely and hard to avoid in the Information Age. This type of failure is known colloquially as the Streisand Effect; whereby an attempt to hide or remove a piece of information has the unintended consequence of publicizing the information more widely, usually facilitated by the Internet.
Named for singer Barbra Streisand, it is a modern term for an old phenomena. Similar to the meme of “Banned in Boston”, it revolves around the idea that forbidden fruit is the most tempting and that banning or censoring something often makes that item or information more desirable. Babs got her name attached to this propaganda phenomena when in 2003 she attempted to suppress photographs of her residence and inadvertently generated further publicity. This publicity was notably “improved” – although if you’re Babs you might say “exacerbated” – by the World Wide Web.
This week’s story involves the GOP attempting to suppress a non-partisan tax study that debunked their entire Ayn Rand/neoconservative taxation mythology that catering to the wealthy creates jobs. It provides an interesting case study in the Streisand Effect. It also raises some interesting questions about political culpability and consequences.
Continue reading “Propaganda 104 Supplemental: The Streisand Effect and the Political Question”
Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)- Guest Blogger
We all know or should know the Fourth Amendment and how it protects all citizens from an illegal search and seizure of our property and person. ‘ “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.’ ” Cornell Law
Over the years, this valuable right has been watered down. Recently, the Roberts Court heard arguments in a case that did not get much media attention. That case involved a man who was arrested and detained after a traffic stop just because he had been in an apartment that the police had just exercised a search warrant. The name of the case is Bailey v. United States and oral arguments in front of the Supreme Court were heard on November 1st, 2012. Bailey v. United States The narrow issue that the Supreme Court is deciding is whether an individual can be detained by the police merely because he recently left a residence before the police executed a search warrant at that location. Sounds like a no brainer, doesn’t it? Continue reading “The Watering Down of the Fourth Amendment”
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, Guest Blogger
I’m a legal resident of Florida and this week I took advantage of early voting. While I’ve been a political activist for most of my life and usually have a good idea of the issues involved in any particular election, this vote brought home to me that I wasn’t as smart and informed in this election as I supposed. This thought occurred to me the night before I voted, when I carefully looked over the sample ballot sent to me by my County Board of Elections. The sample ballot had six pages and the opportunity to vote twenty six separate times. The first seven of the twenty-six votes, were “no brainers” since it started with the Presidency and ended with County Commissioner. I was familiar with each of these elective offices and the issues entailed in each particular race, but that’s where my familiarity with the issues involved in the next nineteen votes ended. The next possible votes were on whether each of three particular State Supreme Court Judges should be allowed to continue their terms? Not knowing these Judges and/or their judicial views how was I to make such a decision? The next vote was also on whether a particular Justice of the Court of Appeals should be retained in office. The final electoral decision was a vote between one of two people for a four year term to the County Soil and Water commission. This was not a party affiliated position, so other than their names, I had no idea who to vote for, or what their particular conservation philosophy entailed.
Needless to say, I went on the web and found out what was going on in the Judges recall. This is the story and its’ Washington Post link: A Koch Brothers-backed campaign is seeking to vote out three Florida Supreme Court justices.
“A loosely organized Internet campaign against the court two years ago has been fortified by the conservative group Americans for Prosperity, founded by billionaire activists Charles and David Koch. And then came the surprise announcement that the Republican Party of Florida had decided to oppose all three justices, an unprecedented move in the nonpartisan vote.
Party leaders said that “collective evidence of judicial activism” showed the jurists to be liberals who are out of touch with the public. Opponents point to the court’s death penalty decisions and a ruling that kept an “Obamacare” referendum off the 2010 ballot. But the justices’ supporters say an effort is underway to pack the court with new appointees and deliver Republicans the only branch of state government they don’t control.”
While it is true that I had no clue that such a Campaign was going on, in my defense I was out of State for the entire summer and not paying attention to local affairs. This guest blog, however, is not about the Koch’s judicial ploy, but about what followed it on the Florida Ballot. This was the vote on eleven Florida Constitutional Amendments and why I believe that the nationwide movement for voter ballot initiatives is an idea to support democracy, which in practice is anti-democratic in nature. Continue reading “Too Much Democracy?”
-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
While the Duma, the Russian Parliament, is considering laws to “to defend citizens’ religious feelings and national and spiritual values from blasphemy and insult,” Russian Orthodox Christians claim that the Apple logo is anti-Christian and insults their beliefs.
Continue reading “Russian Orthodox Christians Offended By Apple Logo”
By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
No word yet if the Moon is in the seventh house or if Jupiter has aligned with Mars but something curious is happening among the monied gentry that form the Republican base. Seems Presidential candidate Mitt Romney is being called out and dissed by the “family.” First, NJ governor Chris Christie, once thought of as a possible Romney running mate for VP, praises Obama for his FEMA support after Hurricane Sandy (and juxtaposed with Romney’s call to end FEMA), and now Chrysler exec. Ralph Gilles calls Romney a liar and full of something rhyming with Mitt.
Continue reading “Twitter Wars: Chrysler Exec Tweets Romney “Full of … Well, You Know.””