Cop Who Executed Unarmed Man Released from Prison After One Year
June 16th, 2011People who protested are facing longer jail sentences.
Via: San Francisco Bay Guardian:
Johannes Mehserle, the former BART police officer who shot and killed Oscar Grant while he was lying face down on the Fruitvale station train platform on New Year’s Day 2009, was released from a Los Angeles jail June 13 after serving a total of 365 days for his involuntary manslaughter conviction. He was sentenced to two years behind bars, but Judge Robert Perry granted him an early release due to credit for time served and good behavior.
The same date of his release, the National Lawyers Guild filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of 150 protesters who were mass-arrested during the Nov. 5, 2010 demonstration in Oakland in the wake of Mehersle’s sentencing. Meanwhile, a handful of individuals who engaged in the Jan. 14, 2009 and July 8, 2010 protests launched by Grant supporters — which morphed into riots after community rallies came to an end — are still battling court cases.
Ex-Spy Alleges Bush White House Sought to Discredit Critic
June 16th, 2011Via: New York Times:
A former senior C.I.A. official says that officials in the Bush White House sought damaging personal information on a prominent American critic of the Iraq war in order to discredit him.
Glenn L. Carle, a former Central Intelligence Agency officer who was a top counterterrorism official during the administration of President George W. Bush, said the White House at least twice asked intelligence officials to gather sensitive information on Juan Cole, a University of Michigan professor who writes an influential blog that criticized the war.
In an interview, Mr. Carle said his supervisor at the National Intelligence Council told him in 2005 that White House officials wanted “to get” Professor Cole, and made clear that he wanted Mr. Carle to collect information about him, an effort Mr. Carle rebuffed. Months later, Mr. Carle said, he confronted a C.I.A. official after learning of another attempt to collect information about Professor Cole. Mr. Carle said he contended at the time that such actions would have been unlawful.
It is not clear whether the White House received any damaging material about Professor Cole or whether the C.I.A. or other intelligence agencies ever provided any information or spied on him. Mr. Carle said that a memorandum written by his supervisor included derogatory details about Professor Cole, but that it may have been deleted before reaching the White House. Mr. Carle also said he did not know the origins of that information or who at the White House had requested it.
Research Credit: ottilie
Ireland: Thatched Roof Tract Homes Sit Empty
June 16th, 2011You have to see the pictures of this.
Via: Daily Mail:
As the Irish economy lies in tatters, the so-called Celtic Tiger now kept alive by an 85billion euro bailout, residents across the country have one reminder of the good old times.
Ghost estates have become a new feature of the Irish landscape – hundreds of newly built properties that lie empty after the crash.
But one is perhaps prettier than all the rest – and all the more poignant.
The St James Wood estate in the village of Stradbally consists of 15 gorgeous thatched cottages, all of them lying empty.
Perhaps the asking price of 820,000 euros (£700,000) each, when auctioneers say they are now worth just 200,000 euros (£175,000), is the reason they lie empty.
But nevertheless, what were intended as an idyllic holiday homes are now in danger of being overrun with weeds and the lawns are yellow and dead.
Allied Irish Banks Defaults
June 16th, 2011Via: BBC:
Allied Irish Banks (AIB) has been deemed to be effectively in default on its debts by the association of banks that trade in credit derivatives.
The ruling means the writers of $500m (£306m) of the insurance-like contracts will now have to make cash payouts.
On Thursday, the Irish lender stopped interest payments on some of its bonds and postponed their repayment dates.
The move is expected to cause the affected bond investors 90% losses and to save AIB a total of 2bn euros.
Operation Fast and Furious
June 16th, 2011Maybe it’s an effort to create so much chaos that people will beg for more gun control? Just a guess.
Via: Reuters:
U.S. firearms agents told lawmakers on Wednesday they were instructed to only watch as hundreds of guns were bought, illegally resold and sent to Mexico where drug-related violence has raged for years.
Agents for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Arizona told the House of Representatives Oversight Committee they were told not to arrest the so-called straw buyers and instead see where the guns went.
Republicans and Democrats on the panel expressed outrage about the ATF program — “Operation Fast and Furious” — and demanded answers from the Obama administration about why arrests were secondary to tracking the firearms.
“We monitored as they purchased handguns, AK-47 variants and .50 caliber rifles, almost daily at times,” John Dodson, an ATF special agent in Phoenix, told the committee.
“Rather than conduct any enforcement actions, we took notes, we recorded observations, we tracked movements of these individuals, we wrote reports but nothing more.”
Dodson said agents were never given reasonable answers why their activities were limited.
An ATF supervisor in Phoenix, Peter Forcelli, said some tried to raise concerns with supervisors but were rebuffed.
“My concerns were dismissed,” he told the committee. “I believe that these firearms will continue to turn up at crime scenes, on both sides of the border, for years to come.”
More: “Fast and Furious” a “Catastrophic Disaster”
Cryptogon Readers Send Contributions
June 16th, 2011I don’t know what happened over the last 24 hours or so, but it’s not Game Over for Cryptogon just yet! Thank you all very much.
BD NZ$200 [!!!]
MW $20
JC $25
MF $25
LL $100
BA CA$50
JW $100
Libyan Rebels: DIY Weapons
June 15th, 2011Via: Al Jazeera:
As the war in Libya stretches on, the availability of arms and ammunition is becoming a problem for rebel fighters.
A school in Misurata has become the laboratory for invention of new weapons with the help of discards and scraps.
Change: First Lady Wants Hollywood to Excrete Even More Pro Military Propaganda
June 15th, 2011Reel Power: Hollywood Cinema and American Supremacy by Matthew Alford:
Hollywood is often characterized as a stronghold of left-liberal ideals. In Reel Power, Matthew Alford shows it is in fact deeply complicit in serving the interests of the most regressive U.S. corporate and political forces. Films like Transformers, Terminator: Salvation and Black Hawk Down are constructed with Defense Department assistance as explicit cheerleaders for the U.S. military, but Matthew Alford also emphasizes how so-called radical films like Three Kings, Hotel Rwanda and Avatar present watered-down alternative visions of American politics that serve a similar function. Reel Power is the first book to examine the internal workings of contemporary Hollywood as a politicized industry as well as scores of films across all genres. No matter what the progressive impulses of some celebrities and artists, Alford shows how they are part of a system that is hard-wired to encourage American global supremacy and frequently the use of state violence.
Via: CNBC:
Michelle Obama wants to see more stories of military families on TV and in movies, so she came to Hollywood to do something about it.
The first lady met with members of the writers, producers, directors and actors unions at the Writers Guild Theater to discuss Joining Forces, an initiative aimed at increasing public consciousness and support of military families.
Obama said she created the initiative with Jill Biden to help the nation understand “that when our country goes to war, we have families that are serving right along with them.”
During Monday’s hour-long program, Obama shared the stage with a National Guard pilot, a retired soldier and the wife of an Army officer. Writer-director JJ Abrams, whose film “Super 8” topped the weekend box office, moderated the discussion.
Research Credit: afterhours
Economic Data ‘Shows Troubling Mix of Weakness, Inflation’
June 15th, 2011I guess they don’t know the term stagflation over at Reuters.
Via: Reuters:
A closely watched measure of consumer prices logged its biggest rise in nearly three years in May and a regional factory gauge contracted this month, showing the economy facing a troubling mix of weakness and inflation.
The Labor Department said on Wednesday its Consumer Price Index, excluding food and energy, increased 0.3 percent, the largest gain since July 2008, after rising 0.2 percent in April.
Core inflation was lifted by steep rises in motor vehicle and apparel prices. Analysts pointed to supply chain disruptions from Japan’s earthquake as a factor behind the auto price rise.
Economists had expected the core CPI, which is closely watched by the Federal Reserve, to rise 0.2 percent. Overall inflation eased, rising 0.2 percent after a 0.4 percent gain in April, as energy prices finally fell.
Separately, the New York Federal Reserve Bank’s “Empire State” index — a measure of factory activity in New York state — contracted for the first time since November, surprising economists who had expected a rise.
China Hiding Extent of Lead Poisoning Among Children
June 15th, 2011Via: BBC:
China has been accused of trying to cover up the extent of lead poisoning among children, and of blocking effective testing and treatment.
A report by Human Rights Watch says local authorities in heavily-polluted industrial areas have been sending sick children back to contaminated homes.
It says that in these areas – Henan, Yunnan, Shaanxi and Hunan provinces – anyone who complains is being harassed.
China has promised to clean up chronic pollution from heavy metals.
But reports of poisoning remain widespread – hundreds of thousands of children are suffering from lead poisoning, the HRW report says.
It says that parents are being denied the right to tests and medical help, and says the government should stop delaying a meaningful response as the problem would damage future economic growth and health care.
