German police recently thought that they had just another illegal fishing incident at the Havel River in Berlin when they stopped a man and demanded his license. The man immediately informed them that he had no license and continued to fish. When they told him it was illegal, he promptly identified himself as Si Hong Ri, North Korea’s ambassador to Germany and apologized. He then continued to fish. Si Hong Ri had no identification on him, so the police were forced to call for their office to produce a picture of the ambassador and then stood there as Si Hong Ri continued to fish with immunity and impunity.
Continue reading “When Immunity Becomes Impunity: German Police Stop North Korean Ambassador From Fishing Without License . . . Ambassador Invokes Diplomatic Immunity and Keeps On Fishing As Police Watch”
Those crazy guys in Hamas are at it again. After banning women from riding motorcycles and men working as hairdressers and other “immodest acts,” Hamas has shutdown the Palestinian version of “American Idol” as “indecent” under Islamic laws and values. However, it appears kid shows featuring dismemberment and camps for kids to learn kidnapping are perfectly decent.
Continue reading “Just Say No To Idolatry: Hamas Shuts Down Program As “Indecent” Under Islamic Law”
We have been following the increasing abuse of the legal system in Indonesia, including the application of Sharia law. Now, an atheist (identified only as Alexander) has been arrested and faced five years in jail for questioning the existence of God on his Facebook page. It is the latest blasphemy arrest, discussed earlier in a column.
School officials in Canyons School District Utah appear to be watching too much Sex in the City. The school officials wanted to pick a mascot for the new Corner Canyon High School and pushed the students to accept the ultra-lame “Chargers.” The students balked and instead picked the Cougars, but Principal Mary Bailey and the school district barred the names as “insensitive to women.”
Continue reading “Utah School District Rejects Cougar As Mascot As “Insensitive To Women””
Recently we discussed the twisted jurisprudence of Associate Justice Clarence Thomas. Thomas is back in another disturbing dissent written by Antonin Scalia in the case of Maples v. Thomas. Cory Maples was convicted of two murders in Alabama in 1997. Since Alabama does not pay for post-conviction assistance, he relied on Jaasai Munanka and Clara Ingen-Housz from the law firm of Sullivan and Cromwell. When the attorneys left, however, the firm let the case drop and Maples was never informed that an appeal had been denied. His time for appeal lapsed. Seven justices lined up to support the right to an appeal, including Roberts and Alito who are not known to support criminal defendants in most cases. However, Thomas and Scalia insisted that there was no need for further judicial review in light of the failure of counsel. If leaving a case entirely is not ineffective counsel, it is difficult to see when such a standard would be satisfied in the jurisprudence of Thomas and Scalia.
After pledging to kill our enemies, Newt Gingrich returned to one of his favorite themes: violating the United States Constitution. In Greenville, South Carolina, Gingrich again said that he would ignore Supreme Court decisions that he disagreed with. We have previously discussed the flaws in Gingrich’s legal and historical views, but my concern is that pledging to violate the Constitution would make Gingrich an enemy of our constitutional system. Does this mean that his first act would be to add his own name to the presidential hit list?
In North Carolina, students at the North Windy Ridge Intermediate School were told that they could pick up a free Bible, donated by the Gideons. When Ginger Strivelli’s son came home with a new Bible, she decided to offer her own free copies of sacred books. She is a pagan and brought pagan spell books to the office. She was turned away (though I expect spell books in the age of Harry Potter would be snatched up like Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans). The Buncombe County Board of Education now says that it will reexamine its policies. However, this only came after a non-Christian religion asked for the same access to schools.
It is said that the world will rush to the door of the man with a better mouse trap, but what about a better mouse? A rat lies motionless on a sterile, spotless table. Israel’s Tel Aviv University psychology department is close to developing a cyborg rat — a leap ahead of those mad Swiss scientists. Where the Swiss are developing a more muscular mouse, the Israelis are going for the cyborg rat. I’ll put my money on the Israelis in the upcoming enhanced rodent wars.
Continue reading “Israeli Scientists Developing Cyborg Rats”
This video shows an officer smashing the windows of a house and forcing an older woman into the street in her nightgown to save her from a fire. The problem is that the fire was down the street.
Continue reading “You Can Thank Me Later: Police Officer Breaks Into Wrong House During Fire”
Sites like Wikipedia, Google, YouTube, and Reddit have gone black this morning in protest of The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which threatens Internet independence and free speech as well as a host of other rights. We have long discussed the ever-widening array of criminal and civil penalties pushed through Congress by the powerful radio and television lobby as well as other industry groups. The Obama Administration has been particularly willing to carry the water for these groups over objections from public interest groups. SOPA reflects the power of this lobby and its hold over members of Congress and the Obama Administration. While the Obama Administration has now responded to the outcry by insisting that it will tweak the bill, such promises ring hallow given its past efforts to appease this industry and its dishonest statements recently in other areas like the indefinite detention controversy. Notably, the recent admission from the White House that it has some concerns over the bill did not come until the public rallied against the bill — another indication of the control of an industry group in the drafting of legislation. This lobby is not going to go quietly into the night. It is more likely that it will work with the White House and Congress to achieve the same purposes with an incremental series of laws — if it does not simply win outright.
I have previously questioned the historical and legal views of Newt Gingrich. However, we may agree on one recent historical claim: that Andrew Jackson tended to address enemies by killing them. As shown in the video below, Gingrich embraced this approach as a campaign pledge — eclipsing prior campaign pledges in the primary to bomb countries or torture detainees.
Continue reading “Gingrich Pledges To Kill Enemies Of The United States”
Architect Koen Olthuis, of Dutch firm Waterstudio has proposed a rather intriguing floating parks for cities like New York and London that would create a haven for wildlife in urban centers — a park that would be inaccessible to humans that would create a multi-tiered living area for birds, bees, bats and other small animals.
Continue reading “Dutch Architect Proposes Floating Parks For Urban Centers”
We have periodically been faced with a particularly twisted class of criminals who destroy nature, including historic trees (here and here and here), out of some deep-seated anger or objectification. The latest victim is “The Senator,” a 125-foot-tall bald cypress tree in the Longwood’s Big Tree Park in Florida. It was believed to be the oldest of its kind in North America and the fifth oldest tree in the world. Now it is a burned out trunk.
I have warned for years about the Martian menace and the lack of preparations of anti-Martian devices. Now the Martians are throwing rocks at us and all we can do is collect them. This is a picture of a Martian meteorite that hit near Foumzgit, Morocco in July 2011 and recovered last month.
David T. Peters, 66, of Streetsboro, Ohio chose this unfortunate teeshirt before being arrested for internet child porn. We have seen other arrestees with poor taste in booking attire, but Peters is certainly competing for the top spot.
Continue reading “Can You Guess What This Man Was Arrested For?”