Monthly Archives: July 2011

Angelina County jury finds man guilty of evading arrest after being mistaken for burglar in his own home

open quoteA Lufkin man convicted of resisting arrest in his own home after police mistook him for a burglar was sentenced Wednesday to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine.

. . . .

Following a one-day trial and four-hour deliberation, a six-panel Angelina County jury concluded Sauceda was guilty of resisting arrest on March 15, 2009, while being pepper-sprayed, shot with a pepper ball gun and wrestled to the ground by nine Lufkin Police officers in his own living room, according to testimony.close quote (Read more from lufkindailynews.com)

Government hacks write fraudulent article in support of Drug war.

open quoteMilitary man and drug warrior Joseph Califano and former drug czar William Bennett recently teamed up to write a Wall Street Journal editorial entitled “Do We Really Want a ‘Needle Park’ on American Soil?” The editorial is an attack on the recent report by the Global Commission on Drug Policy, which declares that the US War on Drugs has failed and is ruining civilization around the globe. The commission consists of 19 prominent people with credentials equal to or better than Califano and Bennett’s. It calls for the substitution of legalization and harm-reduction policies for the hopeless war on drugs.

. . . .

Prohibition also brings increased violence and property crime. Legalization would bring commercially produced products that are reasonably priced. Consumers would be able to afford the products and could consume them in the privacy of their own homes. Violence and property crime would decline. Sellers would be required to provide sufficient safety information and would be liable if they sold an inherently deadly product.

I have no doubt that if Califano and Bennett were in charge, they would invoke Rockefeller-style laws or even worse (Bennett once suggested that beheading drug dealers was “morally plausible”). The reality is that limited legalization has been shown to work, and that full legalization is the policy we should be working toward.close quote (Read more from mises.org)

Reports: US drone shot down over Iran nuke site

open quoteA U.S. drone was shot down while flying over a nuclear facility in Iran, according to reports in the Iranian media.

Iran’s Fars news agency reported that lawmaker Ali Aqazadeh Dafsari, a member of the parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, had confirmed the unmanned spy plane was flying near the Fordo nuclear enrichment plant in Qom province when it was brought down by Revolutionary Guard soldiers.

It did not say when the alleged incident happened.

Dafsari told Fars that the drone was trying to gather information about the nuclear facility for the CIA.close quote (Read more from msnbc.msn.com)

Turkey responds to Kurdish autonomy vote with a military offensive against Kurdish rebels

open quoteANKARA, Turkey — Turkish soldiers, air force bombers and helicopter gunships conducted a major offensive in southeastern Turkey on Friday after Kurdish legislators declared autonomy in the region and more than a dozen soldiers were killed there by Kurdish rebels.

After Friday prayers in this mostly Muslim nation, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said violence by the Kurdish rebels in the Diyarbakir area will achieve nothing.

“What they did is never going to drag us to the table,” Erdogan said of the Kurdish guerrillas. “If they want to make peace, there is only one thing to do: the terrorist organization must lay down arms,” he said in nationally televised comments in Istanbul.

In a rare show of unity, Erdogan’s ruling party and the opposition issued a joint parliamentary declaration denouncing the violence and vowing solidarity against “terrorism and separatist attempts.”close quote (Read more from washingtonpost.com)

Israel-Iran War in September?

open quoteZerohedge is reporting on some very interesting positioning of U.S. naval ships:

As the most recently updated naval map from Stratfor demonstrates, the CVN 77 G.H.W. Bush has just entered the Persian Gulf, the first time a US aircraft carrier has passed through the Straits of Hormuz in months. What is also notable is that the LHD 5 Bataan amphibious warfare ship has just weighed anchor right next to Libya: this is odd since the coast of Tripoli had been left unattended for many weeks by US attack ships. And topping it all off is that a third aircraft carrier, the CVN 73, is sailing west from the South China seas, potentially with a target next to CVN 76 Ronald Reagan which is the second carrier in the Straits of Hormuz area. Three carriers in proximity to Iran would be extremely troubling.

Zerohedge goes on to report:

CIA veteran Robert Baer, the man played by George Clooney in Syriana, who as Al Jazeera reports, appeared on KPFK Los Angeles, warning that Israeli PM Netanyahu is “likely to ignite a war with Iran in the very near future.” It gets worse: “Masters asked Baer why the US military is not mobilising to stop this war from happening. Baer responded that the military is opposed, as is former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who used his influence to thwart an Israeli attack during the Bush and Obama administrations. But he’s gone now and “there is a warning order inside the Pentagon” to prepare for war.” The punchline: “There is almost “near certainty” that Netanyahu is “planning an attack [on Iran] … and it will probably be in September before the vote on a Palestinian state. And he’s also hoping to draw the United States into the conflict”, Baer explained.” For the betting public out there, an September CL call may not be the dumbest trade possible…

All this is real interesting, but here’s the real kicker: Economist Nouriel Roubini has tweeted the link to the ZeroHedge story. As long-term EPJ readers know, I consider Roubini the most connected man in finance. He has a small house warming party and George Soros shows up. To ring in the New Year, he shows up at billionaire Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich’s New Year’s eve party. He gave Larry Summers stock in his company. Within hours of DSK being arrested, he tweeted that Christine Lagarde would take his place–as she has done. He is a consultant to most of the central banks in the world.

I have never seen Roubini tweeting on foreign affairs before, he is unlikely to be tweeting because he finds the story interesting. The story likely falls in line with what he is hearing from his very in the know network.
close quote (Read more from economicpolicyjournal.com)

Israeli police will not face trial over death of Palestinian girl

open quoteIsraeli policemen suspected of shooting dead a 10-year-old Palestinian schoolgirl in 2007 will escape prosecution after a court said that too much time had elapsed to allow a re-examination of the case.

The decision will come as a blow for the girl’s parents, who have campaigned for justice for their daughter, Abir Aramin, who died after being struck in the head during a school break.

. . . .

But it backed an earlier decision not to charge two border policemen allegedly involved in her death, in part because of the difficulty of conducting an investigation so long after the incident in the absence of fresh evidence.

. . . .

Eyewitnesses claimed that border guards, who had clashed with stone-throwing Palestinian rioters nearby, fired at the girl from a passing jeep. The police opened an investigation but closed it a short while later, arguing it was possible she had been killed by a rock and that there was insufficient evidence to proceed.close quote (Read more from independent.co.uk)

The New Israeli Anti-Boycott Law

open quoteThe U.S. State Department responded Tuesday to the new anti-boycott law passed in Israel, saying that the freedom to organize and protest is a democratic value Israel and the U.S. have long shared.

. . . .

When asked to comment on the anti-boycott law, the U.S. State Department said the law was an “Israeli internal matter” but also hinted its criticism by pointing out the right to peaceful protest in democratic countries.

. . . .

J Street condemned the Knesset’s passage of the bill as well as a “clear and unabashed violation of the fundamental democratic precept of freedom of speech.”

According to newly passed law, a person or an organization calling for the boycott of Israel, including the settlements, can be sued by the boycott’s targets without having to prove that they sustained damage. The court will then decide how much compensation is to be paid. close quote (Read more from haaretz.com)

CIA’s Fake Vaccination Drive Angers Public Health World

open quotet’s a conspiracy plot straight out of a spy novel: on Monday, the Guardian reported that as part of the Osama Bin Laden capture effort, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) set up a fake vaccination clinic in Abbottabad, Pakistan, to collect DNA from Bin Laden’s children. The idea was to look for a match with DNA from Bin Laden’s sister, who died in early 2010 in Boston, to verify that the Bin Laden family was in the compound before attacking. It’s not clear whether the ploy worked; the CIA isn’t talking.close quote (Read more from news.sciencemag.org)