Posts from — January 2005

Deprivation of rights under color of law

Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or to different punishments, pains, or penalties, on account of such person being an alien, or by reason of his color, or race, than are prescribed for the punishment of citizens, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.
[my emphasis]
See also:

Title 18, Part I, Chapter 113C, § 2340A – Torture

Title 18, Part I, Chapter 118, § 2441 – War crimes

“. . .We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. . . .”

If you can’t understand the clear statement of the laws of the United States and you don’t believe in the sentiments expressed in the Declaration of Independence, how can you aspire to be the Attorney General of the United States?

1. Declaration of Independence (1776)
2. Constitution of the United States (1787)
3. Bill of Rights (1791)
4. Louisiana Purchase Treaty (1803)
5. Emancipation Proclamation (1863)
6. 19th Amendment to the US Constitution: Women’s Right to Vote (1920)
7. 13th Amendment to the US Constitution: Abolition of Slavery (1865)
8. Gettysburg Address (1863)
9. Civil Rights Act (1964)
10. Social Security Act (1935)

You should read them, but the short version: this was the Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani’s election, not Bush’s, and it was designed to give the majority Shi’ia the political power their numbers deserve.

The Shi’ia turned out in large numbers, the Kurds in lower numbers, because they really want a separate state, and the Sunnis probably didn’t make it into double digits.

The Sunnis didn’t turn out because of the safety issue, which gave Sunni politicians the cover to call for boycotting the elections. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Sunni leaders were helping the insurgents to make the “safety issue” worse.

Have a look at the concept to see if you’re interested.

I would suggest a visit to the Social Security Administration’s website to pick up a copy of Survivors Benefits: SSA Publication No. 05-10084, May 2004, which explains the payments made to the family of those enrolled in the Social Security Insurance system upon the death of the enrollee.

Social Security is not just a retirement system, something the Busheviks seem to ignore.

If you think you like the Bush plan, you might try a Google search on “Eliot Spitzer”, the Attorney General of the state of New York, who has been assisting the state in covering its budget shortfall by winning large fines from the people that Bush wants you to trust with your money. Mutual funds, insurance companies, brokerages, investment bankers have all found themselves funding the state with their fines.

There is a reason that all investment materials carry some form of this warning:

The price of shares and investments and the income derived from them can go down as well as up, and investors may not get back the amount they invested. Past performance cannot be relied upon as a guide to future performance.

Are you feeling lucky?

It’s a good thing I don’t believe in karma.

Thanks to Exit Stage Left for reminding me about Tet.

In response to a question about fixing the system by lifting the cap on Social Security taxes, Kent Smetters, an Associate Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania who worked on President Bush’s Social Security commission made the claim that doing that would have a major impact on small businesses which supply the majority of jobs in the US.

I have no idea what experience he has had in the small business sector, or even how he defines it, but as a small business owner let me enlighten Kent: raising the cap wouldn’t even be noticed.

For a small business owner a forty-hour week is a vacation, because you never get an actual vacation. You are the last person paid and the first to take a cut. You don’t take any more out of the business than is absolutely necessary to pay your personal expenses. Your business is the be all, end all of your existence, your asset, your retirement plan, everything. If a small business owner is able to take a salary above $100,000/year, he or she is getting ready to sell the business.

Someone set up a meal that was typical of most business conferences I have ever been to: i.e. pretty much one problem after another.

Apparently someone forgot that the Iranians would probably be observant Muslims and not the usual convention goers. They had invited a cartoonist to be on a panel at the meal. Senator Joe Biden got lost and was over an hour late.

This isn’t going to work. No one trusts the US. If we had a new Secretary of State that wasn’t associated the Iraq War, some might have given Bush the benefit of the doubt, which was yet another reason that Condoleeza Rice should not have been confirmed.

Saddam Hussein complied with the UN resolutions and disarmed. Everyone knows this now, because the US has spent months and millions looking for weapons of mass destruction and came up empty. Iraq followed the rules and was still invaded. This tells North Korea, Iran, and others, that there is no safety to be bought by disarming; only weapons can provide any protection from aggression.

This is what unilateral, pre-emptive wars bring when the reason for the war is false. We are less safe, have no international credibility, and have lost a major tool in increasing our security.

Thanks to Kat at Lab Kat I can repair the damage. She was added this week.

The Friday Ark is a wide ranging Friday Creature Blogaround, for all those interested.

Amy at blog Amy noticed the perception of stream of consciousness poetry contained in many spam e-mails.

This was the body of an e-mail I received recently:

bedbug absolve oscar conformance attendant galvanism
spend naivete alphameric eavesdropping phosphate splendid
gleam countervail cheerlead precision doggone chantry
gibbet allay lurid inorganic arcing yellow knife
creosote macrophage dibble sixgun armful airstrip
altercate coccidiosis seminar alum allyn barbarism

Back in the 1970s and 80s I was in law enforcement. During that time we started noticing a worrying phenomenon: incidents in which individuals seemed to be intent on making officers use deadly physical force. These are cases in which the individual has no chance of escape or other benefit to be derived from confrontation.

Even if there is no announced outside investigation, all police shootings are subjected to microscopic investigations in the police community. The results are rarely published, but they spread rapidly through the “blue” network.

Eventually these incidents began to be referred to as “Police Assisted Suicide”. In general they involve people who are depressed and decide to commit suicide, but lack the courage or knowledge to do it, or want to really hurt those they leave behind.

Reading Julia’s post at Sisyphus Shrugged on the LA train wreck, it occurred to me that we are seeing another facet of the same problem.

It is hard for me to understand why these people don’t have the common decency to buy a book that gives the details of a successful and painless suicide, rather than involving others in their problem.

If this guy wanted to end it all, he could have volunteered to drive trucks for Halliburton in Baghdad.

Challenger

Commander:
Francis R. (Dick) Scobee, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF

Pilot:
Michael J. Smith, Commander, USN

Mission Specialist:
Judith A. Resnik
Ronald E. McNair
Ellison S. Onizuka, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF

Payload Specialist:
Gregory B. Jarvis
Sharon Christa McAuliffe