Random Thoughts 6/4/24: Hunting Hunter

Drinking my coffee, listening to the birds chirp, and trying to corral random thoughts.

• Should Hunter Biden be given the same "It's lawfare, targeting a political opponent, it's rigged, it's a scam prosecution, no one else has ever been prosecuted for this, if his name wasn't Biden this would never be happening, a Trump judge tossed his plea deal because House MAGA Campers made her, the special prosecutor was appointed because Republicans demanded it (and then bitched about it when they got what they wanted and it wasn't what they wanted), the judge is biased, Biden can't get a fair trial because of the publicity, everybody does what he did, wah wah wah wah wah wah wah" treatment as Donald Trump was given?

• Should the judge, her family, the prosecutors, witnesses, and jury members be hounded? Doxed? Plastered all over TV?

• Should Hunter have a media perch outside the courtroom so he can cry a river every day to salivating media figures?

• Should prosecutors pursue cases without fear or favor? Or should they base their prosecutorial decisions on the name/fame of the defendant?

• Someone found that data for fiscal year 2019 - which includes October 2018, when Hunter checked a box saying he wasn't a drug addict on his ATF form - 478 people were referred to the FBI for lying on their forms; 298 of them were prosecuted. I didn't find details on what lies the folks who were prosecuted told, if they ever used their gun (Hunter didn't) or if they owned it for two weeks or more (Hunter didn't).

• The judge, on a vaguely similar case, sentenced the defendant to a year in jail, double what the prosecution asked for. Some info I've seen suggests that probation is the typical sentence. If Hunter's found guilty, will he be given the usual sentence, or will he be sent to jail, to make an example of him to damage Joe Biden's re-election bid?

• Biden could have just pleaded guilty to the charge (oh wait, he did that) and negotiated a deal (oh wait, he did that, too). Which is likely what most of the other folks did. Will he wake up and do that now, instead of trying to fight it?

• Since the prosecution plans on using text messages and Hunter's laptop as part of their evidence, what's the over/under on whether any of his nude shots will be entered into evidence?

• Can the members of the jury who have experience with drug addiction, gun ownership, or both, be fair?

• Why wasn't the woman who found Hunter's gun and tossed it in a trash can at a grocery store charged with something?

Stay tuned - maybe I'll get answers to my questions.

In Case You Missed It (v101)

Here's your recap of last week's posts. It seems some of the posts in my head didn't make it to the interwebs; hopefully I can work on that this week, so I can get some sleep.

I started the week Ranting and Raving about our glorified Wild West culture, where in Texas - where else? - a man who was robbed at an ATM shot several rounds, and several more, in the general direction of where the person who robbed may or not have been, he didn't really know. 

It was also in the direction of a family's vehicle, and the nine-year-old little girl inside who died as a result of what people are laughably calling self-defense. The shooter was not charged with a crime, but he "continues to grieve for" the little girl and, according to his attorney, "the grand jury made the right decision and that the person responsible for her death is the robber." 

The murderer, they said, 

did what we believe anyone in that situation would have done. We are relieved that, despite the emotion and tough decisions that had to be made in dealing with this case, justice was served for (the murderer).

I'm sorry, but there is zero justice being served here, 

• Unless you think that an idiot who's so dumb, he'd shoot at a random vehicle in the ATM line deserves justice. 
• Unless you think that an innocent nine-year-old little girl is acceptable collateral damage for a robbery. 
• Unless you think that a person who shoots at a stranger's vehicle in an ATM line is acting in self-defense, when he doesn't even know whether the person who robbed him is in that car, or any other car in the ATM line.

This stuff is just nuts.

Also nuts? Sunday School, although I think it's better now that I focus on a single classroom instead of wandering up and down the halls. Last week's featured classroom was Face the Nation, where Sen. Joe Manchin made an appearance and explained that he hadn't changed his mind on things - he had just opened his eyes, or something. 

 ...the corporate tax in America in 2017, before the Republican tax cut, was 35 percent. They cut it to 21 percent, 14 percent reduction. All the people that I know are paying 21 percent or more. All the even larger corporations, but some of the largest corporations of a billion dollars of value or more don't even want to pay the minimum of 15 percent.

He said he "never thought" people (I think he meant corporations) weren't paying at least 21%. Has he had his head in his state's coal dust for the last decade or more? I mean, I did a post on GE not paying any federal income taxes back in 2011, for heaven's sake. And West Virginia's almost heaven, so Manchin clearly should have known about this.

For your Extra Credit, I listened in as my favorite Fed banker, Neel Kashkari, talked economics with John Dickerson. On the question of whether implementing a minimum 15% corporate tax would hurt supplies and increase inflation, Kashkari said we need to focus on the short-term,  

the demand side effects totally swamp the supply side effects. And so, when I look at a bill that's being considered, that your two senators talked about, my guess is over the next couple of years it's not going to have much of an impact on inflation. It's not going to affect how I analyze inflation over the next few years. I think long-term it may have some effect. But, over the near term, we have an acute mismatch between demand and supply. And it's really up to the Federal Reserve to be able to bring that demand down. 

For some reason, whatever I was Wondering on Wednesday didn't make it out of my head. I'm blaming the heat, the humidity, no A/C, and the fact that I don't have a light on my screened porch which means I can't write out there at night.

On Thursday, I threw it back to Sunday School from two years ago that day; Mick Mulvaney, former Trump budget guy, former Trump acting chief of staff, former Trump "dude sent to Ireland to get him out of the way," former Trump supporter, talked with Chuck Todd on MTP about mass shootings; the show was on right after the El Paso and Dayton murders.  

Let's just say they were both, well, they were both their 'best' selves. Here's some of their exchange, talking about Trump and his "dehumanizing rhetoric. Todd asked, "Is he not the president of all Americans here? It does seem as if he's always more worried about how his base is going to react to something than how the American, you know, moral fabric is protected?

He absolutely is the president of all Americans, alright...Listen, we're going to have policy discussions, but my guess is, you show me how you feel about the president, and I'll show you who you think was responsible for the shooting. 

Todd did not drop it there, adding "well, unfortunately, it does appear this was a political motive of this domestic terrorist." And here was Mulvaney's final thought.

This was a political motive by a crazy person with a gun. How do we stop crazy people from getting guns? That's a - -if we can't agree on that, if we can't figure out a way to prevent that from happening, there's very little hope for this nation. Let's try and fix what allows sick people to get these types of weapons.

Here we are, two years later, with the same arguments and the same lack of 'real' action, and, to a large degree, the same "very little hope for this nation." Mulvaney's words, remember - not mine. 

Finally, I attempted the good week/bad week stuff in TGIF. There was lots going on, but much of the post dealt with the Senate and their efforts - partisan and bipartisan - to get things accomplished. There was the Inflation Reduction Act, and the PACT Act, and more.

Speaking of the PACT Act, here's an excerpt from a WaPo editorial congratulating those who fought for the bill's passage, and blasting the Rs delaying the bill "at the last minute...and used to score political points..."

The objections hinged on a technicality: Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.) had raised concerns about reclassifying existing toxic-exposure benefits from discretionary spending to mandatory. He argued that this move could free up space in the discretionary budget for legislators to spend on other programs.

Officials, including Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough, warned that keeping those benefits in the discretionary budget could force the agency to “ration” care, and pointed out that the measure had bipartisan support in June. That did not stop Republican lawmakers from characterizing the bill as an insidious attempt by Democrats to spend hundreds of billions on unrelated causes.

As I get ready to post this, they're still at it in the Senate; the Rs are still fighting, but the Dems are holding strong. We'll see how long it takes for the 'vote-a-rama' to end.

See you later for Sunday School, if not sooner. 

Ranting and Raving (v9): Getting Away with Murder

I almost don't even know where to start with this one, it's so horrifying and so incredibly painful and so insanely stupid, it's hard to even talk about. 

Back in February, in Texas, of course, a nine-year-old girl was shot and killed by a guy who was robbed at an ATM. Here's the story from Houston's KWTX.

Police said the victim of a bank ATM robbery, Tony D. Earls, 41, is in custody charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon after Earls fired his gun at the wrong vehicle, striking and killing an innocent 9-year-old girl.

Earls, the robbery victim, was at the bank’s ATM drive-through making a transaction when an armed robber appeared on foot and robbed Earl at gunpoint.

According to investigators, Earls took out a weapon and fired several rounds in the direction of the suspect, but it’s unknown if the suspect, who is still at large, fired back.

The robbery victim then fired several rounds “at a pickup truck he thought the robbery suspect had gotten into,” police said.

The vehicle’s occupants, a family of five, were not involved in the robbery, police said, adding a stray bullet struck a 9-year-old girl in the backseat of the pickup. She was taken to Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center, where she later died.

 Earls did not know the stray bullet struck the girl when he called police to report the robbery.

It goes to show that anytime there are guns involved, the danger to innocent bystanders is extremely high,” said Houston Police Executive Chief Matt Slinkard.

And then, in July, this happened.

HOUSTON — The family of a 9-year-old Houston girl who died after she was shot by a man who had opened fire when he was robbed at an ATM said Wednesday they remain angered by a grand jury’s decision to not indict the man.

“That was not an accident. That was not self-defense,” April Aguirre, the aunt of Arlene Alvarez said during a news conference as a photograph of the girl as she lay in a hospital bed bloodied and bandaged shortly before her death was shown.

Tony Earls, 41, had been charged with aggravated assault, serious bodily injury, in Alvarez’s Feb. 14 death. A Harris County grand jury in Houston on Tuesday could have indicted him on this charge or several others, including manslaughter and murder, but declined to do so.

And this is not a surprise - at least, it's not a surprise in Texas, where everything is bigger, including the stupid stuff. 

Texas law “gives very, very broad self-defense rights for people carrying guns, even if the person makes a mistake,” said Sandra Guerra Thompson, a law professor at the University of Houston Law Center.

The murderer's attorney said the robber fired and the murderer "fired back in self-defense," and the murderer "continues to grieve for Alvarez but that the grand jury made the right decision and that the person responsible for her death is the robber." The murderer, they said, 

did what we believe anyone in that situation would have done. We are relieved that, despite the emotion and tough decisions that had to be made in dealing with this case, justice was served for (the murderer).

I'm sorry, but there is zero justice being served here, 

• Unless you think that an idiot who's so dumb he'd shoot at a random vehicle in the ATM line deserves justice. 
• Unless you think that an innocent nine-year-old little girl is acceptable collateral damage for a robbery. 
• Unless you think that a person who shoots at a stranger's vehicle in an ATM line is acting in self-defense, when he doesn't even know whether the person who robbed him is in that car, or any other car in the ATM line.
• Unless you think that someone's going to rob a guy at an ATM by driving up to it, getting in line behind other cars, parking his car, getting out, walking up to the car at the head of the line, robbing the drive, going back to his car, getting in, starting it up, and sitting in line until cars move and he can get out of line and drive away. Maybe ATM robbers are that dumb in Texas, but up here, they'd have come on foot, hidden in the bushes, approached your car, stolen your money, and run away. 

There's also especially zero justice being served here if you believe that the only person or entity responsible for a murder is the person who pulls the trigger, which of course is what you tell us all the time. It's never anyone other than the shooter himself, 

• unless it's bad parenting;
• unless it's video games and movies;
• unless it's not saying prayers in school;
• unless it's too much screen time;
• unless it's woke corporations;
• unless it's socialism and critical race theory;
• unless it's red flags that were missed;
• unless it's red flags that weren't missed.

Yeah, unless that last bullet. 

Rick Ramos, the attorney for the Alvarez family, said Wednesday that (the murderer's) actions were reckless and he questioned whether (the murderer) was capable of carrying a weapon as his lawyers had indicated in court records that he had suffered from mental illness before the shooting.

Chew on that for a second. The guy had known mental health issues? The things we're supposed to be worried about?

Aren't we always told that we need to make sure that there's plenty of money that "may" be used for mental programs, and that schools and teachers and coaches and friends and classmates and neighbors and scout leaders and pastors (oh wait, it's never the pastors' fault, what was I thinking?) and everyone else need to identify these issues and make sure they tell someone?

And don't we know, for certain, that mental health issues are why we have so many shootings here? 

Heck, even the NRA tells us that - here's some of what they were telling us back in 2013:

Since 1966, the National Rifle Association has urged the federal government to address the problem of mental illness and violence. As we noted then, “the time is at hand to seek means by which society can identify, treat and temporarily isolate such individuals,” because “elimination of the instrument by which these crimes are committed cannot arrest the ravages of a psychotic murderer.”

Of course, the NRA also said this, and yes, the emphasis is mine:

A person cannot be federally disqualified from owning a gun based simply on a psychiatrist’s diagnosis, a doctor’s referral, or the opinion of a law enforcement officer, let alone based on getting a drug prescription or seeking mental health treatment. Doing so would actually discourage troubled people from getting the help they need.

Chew on that for a second. Keeping a person from having a gun will keep them from getting the mental health care they need?

What the actual hell? Isn't the very decision to get a gun instead of getting treatment for a mental health problem enough of an indication that the person shouldn't have a gun? 

Nope - not in Texas. 

Because Texas doesn't have red flag laws. 

Because Republican legislators Texas, last year, made it possible for anyone, regardless of anything, to carry handguns without a background check and without any training. 

In a nutshell, a person in Texas needs to do exactly as much to get and carry a gun as a nine-year-old little girl needs to do to go with her parents to the ATM: absolutely nothing.

But have no fear: while justice was served here for the murderer, the 'real' killer is still out there... you know, like the real killer of Nicole Brown Simpson is still out there.

... investigators planned to focus on finding the unidentified robber and holding him responsible for Alvarez’s death, with authorities now offering a $30,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.

Clearly, the person responsible for the murder of a child is not the person who murdered her. It's not the shooter, like we've always been told. It's not the guy who has known mental health issues, who "took out a weapon and fired several rounds in the direction of the suspect" and then fired several more “at a pickup truck he thought the robbery suspect had gotten into.” 

It's the guy who robbed the guy who did all of that. 

Guess What: You Live in a Bubble, Too

Like many, I've seen lots of articles and news stories and videos and memes and celebratory posts and agonized posts about the verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial. 

Many of them suggest that people like me are idiots. We're a bunch of poor, hated, misguided libtard snowflakes blah ditty blah blah blah because we have an opinion that disagrees with the opinion of the people who are "right" about the trial. 

 

According to the folks I'm referring to, I live in a leftist bubble, and I'm incapable of forming an opinion; all my thoughts are being spoon-fed from the mainstream media. This message is for them.

You may not agree, but you live in a bubble, too. 

The news media that you follow, the pundits and talking heads you pay attention to, the memes you read, the posts you share, say that Kyle Rittenhouse didn't do anything wrong, and that anyone who's outside your bubble simply hasn't been paying attention. 

They say that he was only defending himself, and that he had every right to be there, and that him wandering around with a gun fortunately long enough to keep him from being charged with a gun crime was fine, and no one should have thought twice about that. They say he used his gun with skill and responsibility.

They say that no one should have been concerned about this baby-faced teenager, in his blue gloves for "helping people" and his gun slung over his shoulder, running around during a riot that started as a protest because people were angry because a black man, once again, was shot by police, who were found to have done so righteously, once again.

They say that the fact that he was "appreciated" by the police, for helping, or for whatever it is they thought he was doing, means that whatever it was he was doing is OK. They say that a good guy with a gun is as good as the police, because the police can't be everywhere at the same time. They suggest that you can be Kyle Rittenhouse, if you want, and that there shouldn't be consequences if that's the choice you make.

They say that he brought the gun to the riot not for self-protection, but to protect businesses, and that his carrying the gun signaled no intent to use it, and that he only killed two people and wounded a third because they 'came at him,' a kid - a child - carrying a rifle in a riot. 

They tell you that it's perfectly OK for a judge to say that the men Rittenhouse shot could not be called victims, because that was prejudicial. They tell you that it's OK to be prejudicial to the victims, but it's not OK to be prejudicial to the defendant, the only person on trial for what happened, the man-child of the hour. 

They tell you that his two dead victims had criminal records, and they therefore deserved what they got. The third, the one who lived, also had trouble with law enforcement, and he deserved what he got, too. Those criminal charges have nothing to do with Kyle Rittenhouse, and nothing to do with the riot, but that doesn't matter, because they were bad men and, honestly, who cares about them anyway?

They tell you that anyone who doesn't agree with you is wrong, biased, drunk on the lies fed to them by the mainstream media. They tell you that anyone who disagrees hasn't been paying attention to the trial, because if they had, how could they reach a different decision? 

They tell you we need more Kyle Rittenhouses. Elected officials suggest that Rittenhouse should be in Congress; one very famous resident of your bubble suggested that we need Rittenhouse in the Oval Office; another said we should have a national holiday called Kyle Rittenhouse Day, celebrating his freedom and what he did. 

They tell you that Kyle Rittenhouse was a hero and that everything he did that night in Kenosha was fine. That he did what needed to be done and that if he hadn't had acted, bad things could have happened. 

You know what? They'd tell you the same thing if Kyle Rittenhouse had killed your son, your daughter, your grandchild, your niece or nephew, your neighbor. They would turn on you, your family, your community, in a heartbeat, if it served their purpose.

I don't hear you talking about that, and I don't hear you talking about this stuff, either: 

What about Kyle Rittenhouse? He's not going to prison. He can run for Congress, or be a nurse, a career he might pursue, or be a cop, something he thought he wanted to be when he was growing up. The world is his oyster, as they say. 

He will be in his own personal hell, though, suffering for who knows how long, as he says he does now, from PTSD. At some point, I hope he realizes that it is his decisions, his actions, that caused his personal hell. And I hope that he gets whatever help he needs, when he needs it.

He won't have the luxury of having a private hell, though, because he's been adopted by the right-wing bubble, by the Former Guy's lawyers, the stolen-election crowd, by the lunatics, by the pundits, and they will use him, as they've been doing all along, for as long as it serves their purpose. 

He'll have his memories, the picture of him in his Free as F*** t-shirt, and the posters and the videos and the articles and tapes and the reporting and all the rest of it, to remind him forever of how he was their hero. And I hope he realizes how he was used by a bunch of people who, honestly, don't have half the cojones he has - people who wouldn't even think about making the kind of commitment Rittenhouse made when he went to Kenosha.

I hope all the people who are cheering him today remember him in the future. And I hope people realize that we all lost something with this case. 

Quick Takes (v63): Git Along, Little Dogies

I have to apologize for feeling so pessimistic about the Texas abortion law. I didn't give the Lone Star State a fair shake.

The law absolves the government from having to do their own dirty work, and instead encourages people to spy on, follow, snoop in the trash for sanitary products, and do who knows what else to identify women who might be trying to obtain an abortion more than six weeks after their last menstrual period, and to identify their 'abettors' - friends, family, doctors, clinics, people who give them a ride, and so on.

One of the many complaints about the law is that it has no exceptions for rape and incest. But today, we have reason to rejoice: Gregg Abbott, the governor of Texas, has promised to eliminate rape in the Lone Star State!

While saying that no woman will be forced to carry a rapist's child, because of course they have six weeks to figure out if they're pregnant, and can act at any point during that time (yes, he said that), he also was adamant about rape in general.

Rape is a crime, and Texas will work tirelessly to make sure we eliminate all rapists from the streets of Texas by aggressively going out and arresting them and prosecuting them and getting them off the streets. So, goal no. 1 in the state of Texas is to eliminate rape so that no woman, no person, will be a victim of rape.

Well, alrighty then - the problem is solved!! Rejoice, women of Texas!

Oh, wait.... crappydoodlefart. In order to arrest someone for rape, and prosecute them, there must be a victim, otherwise how would we know a rape has occurred? So, won't women have to continue to be victimized?

Assuming we have a victim, we can maybe, if we're lucky and you know, rape kits don't get thrown out, or sit around for decades while the statute of limitation runs out, AND if police start believing women, particularly on date rape, spousal rape, clergy rape, father-daughter rape, uncle-niece rape, brother-sister rape, teacher-student rape, boss-employee rape, rape where alcohol is involved, sex-worker rape, all the other kinds of rape the Rs have defined, and my favorite, rape where "she was clearly asking for it because of her fashion choices" - we can get a prosecution.

Assuming they prosecute and find a rapist guilty, we can sentence him appropriately and keep that *one* rapist from committing any more rapes. Unless of course he's a politician, or maybe a good athlete and shouldn't have his life thrown away for, you know, 20 minutes of action behind a dumpster or anything... or he's an otherwise upstanding member of the community, church, school, company, family and made "just this one mistake..." or other such drivel.

Per the article, in 2019, 14,656 rapes were reported in Texas, according to the state's Department of Public Safety. About 2,200 people were arrested for rape that same year. And, earlier this year, there were over 6,100 rape kits sitting on the shelves in Texas, according to US Senate Whip John Cornyn (R-TX), talking about his home state back in February.

Abbott's emphatic declaration that the state's Number 1 goal is to eliminate rape is laughable; so is his cavalier toss-off line that rape victims can have an abortion at any time during the six weeks after they're raped. I'm guessing he thinks they'll just sit around every day, eating bonbons and taking pregnancy tests, and putting a bunch of Uber or Lyft drivers on speed dial? Not working, going to school, trying to find a safe place to sleep in their own home, trying to avoid the clawing hands of a respected elder, and so on. Just hanging out, taking pregnancy tests.

Nah, I was right to feel so pessimistic. I can almost hear him and the rest of the Republicans singing as they left their press conference, can't you?

Whoopee ti yi yo, git along little dogies. It's your misfortune and none of my own...

Sunday School 8/30/20: Extra Credit

In this week's Sunday School, we heard from two pretty good non-answer-people, one from each party. Today, I wanted to switch gears and hear from people who are not politicians, who are not afraid of answering questions, talk about a subject that they are uniquely qualified to talk about (and that the politicians are uniquely not qualified to talk about): professional athletes, talking about professional athletes and social justice. 

First up? Chuck Todd on MTP, talking with former NBA player (and SU alum) Etan Thomas, and current WNBA player /VP of the Players Association Sue Bird. The interview comes after last week's actions across multiple sports leading to the cancellation of nine NBA games, 11 MLB games, six WNBA games, four NHL games, and more. 

Thomas talked about the leagues standing in solidarity, and making "their powerful statement heard really around the world" and said they've gone above and beyond, not only by not playing, but through the new social change fund, and through focused advocacy work. And he pointed out how it was "interesting" to hear people complaining that the athletes went back to work after their 'strike' or 'boycott' or whatever it should be called, noting that

...it's also not the job of professional athletes to solve the policing problems that we have in this country. You know, that should be the focus of all the people we just saw at the Republican convention this past week. And I would say, instead of Donald Trump screaming "law and order" at the American citizens exercising their right to protest, that he should be screaming "police accountability." But I bet we probably won't hear that. 

Todd, noting that when players boycott, they're taking money out of the hands of the owners, sponsors, and the leagues, asked Bird what role owners and sponsors should play in all of this. She noted that in the WNBA, the owners support the players, noting that she and others heard directly from their owners saying, "We support whatever you want to do."  That being the case, she said, 

I think a lot of it is more so about, like you said, the corporate sponsors, trying to get them to understand where we stand, what we believe in, what we're fighting for.

And, she added, "this isn't new for us. We've been doing this for year, and years, and years."  She said that

what was so special about this moment was an opportunity, like Etan said, for all of these leagues to be unified. And that’s, that’s when, you know -- we've learned in the WNBA when we're unified as one voice, that's where the impact is felt for us. So to have all these leagues together, I mean, you've seen what's happened. 

Todd asked Thomas about some athletes suggesting that, while they're doing a lot, they're not doing enough. Thomas said people always want to do more, and he also wanted to make clear that "this has nothing to do with being for the police or against the police. That's just the right redefining the issue." He used his kids to illustrate the difference between being supportive and being an enabler.

So, for instance, I love my baby Sierra. You know, that's my girl. But if baby Sierra came to me and said, "Daddy, I want to have chocolate chips for dinner," I wouldn't be supporting her by telling her that she can go have chocolate chips for dinner, you know what I mean? That's not supporting her.

And Trump and the right believe that you have to allow the police to do anything that they want to do and then that equals supporting them... Applauding someone and saying, "Everything that you do is wonderful" is not supporting them. It's actually enabling them. And, you know, so I would say Trump is actually acting more anti-police than what he's claiming to be.

Todd turned to Bird, asking if she understood the need or desire to do more. She talked about being in the 'wubble' (the WNBA bubble) and how all of the players being together, being able to talk about the emotionally and mentally draining, "traumatizing and re-traumatizing" experiences the black players have had, makes people feel like they're not doing enough.

We've actually been doing the work. And to be honest, I've had a front row seat with, you know, my girlfriend Megan Rapinoe. She took a knee four years ago. It took four years for that to come back around. So personally for me, I like to share that message with the players because, while it doesn't feel like you're doing enough and while people are going to come at you and be, like, "Well, what are you going to do about it." Just you have to, like, find solace in the fact that we actually are doing the work.

Thomas was asked about NBA players speaking out more than athletes in other leagues like the NHL and MLB, with Todd noting "here're two sports that are whiter and certainly their fan bases are very white," and asked about the importance of the sports world uniting "across racial lines."  Thomas said it's "definitely important," adding

Right now, you know, when you see from the right there's so much of a divisive type of a tone. I mean, just looking at the Republican National Convention, you know, everything is divisive. And so sports has the opportunity to be able to bring people together. And so -- and it's a matter of empathy. So some of these sports that you say, you know, as you say are whiter, you know, they might not be dealing with the same things that I'm dealing with as a Black man in this country. 

He talked about "the conversation" that black parents have with their sons - and daughters -about what to do when they're stopped by the police. Not if, mind you -- but when they are stopped, and how they can't act like their white friends might, because "they will get to live."  And, he pointed out,

... the fact that you are making millions of dollars in the NBA doesn't save you from being Black. And that's the difference. So when the policeman pulls me over... it doesn't matter what I've accomplished in life or who I am or, you know, what tax bracket I'm in or anything like that. I'm a Black man and I'm a threat.

Final question was to Bird, about what she'd say to the politicians who "don't like it when the sports world speaks out on social issues." 

... as a female athlete, the one thing that I've come to realize is we're judged on everything except our sport. We've been judged because we're Black, gay, because we're women. Nobody talks about us playing. So you fast forward, you know, ten, 20 years of this and we've developed an identity. And we're being authentic to it. And so for us, when people say, "Stick to sports," it's kind of, like, yeah, 20 years ago, we tried. You wouldn't let us. And now you're saying that? So it makes no sense to me.

Or to me, frankly.  

No, It's Not a Double Standard

White House Communications Director and Press Secretary Sean Spicer frequently gets himself all entwangled fighting off the press in the tiny White House briefing room. Like he did the other day, when speaking to comments made by the Trump SCOTUS nominee.

Neil Gorsuch, in a conversation with Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, said that "any criticism about a judge's integrity and independence" were "disheartening" and "demoralizing."
The comments were conveyed as being in reference to statements made by Trump regarding the "so-called judge" (that would be James Robart) who issued the temporary restraining order halting the Executive Order on Immigration.

Gorsuch confirmed the dis- and de- comments were his, even as Trump suggested otherwise (and, of course, personally attacked Blumenthal).  While others confirmed that Gorsuch was specifically referring to Trump's comments, Spicer offered this instead:

There's a big difference between commenting on the specific comments that have been made, and the tweet, and his general philosophy about the judiciary and the respect for his fellow judges. 

He literally went out of his way to say I'm not commenting on a specific instance. So to take what he said about a generalization and apply it to a specific is exactly what he intended not to do. 

And Spicer also noted that executive criticism of the judiciary was a time-honored tradition, and even Barack Obama did it in a State of the Union address.

I get it, but at some point is seems like there's clearly a double standard when it's how this is applied. When President Obama did it, there was no concern from this briefing room. When (Trump) does it, it's, you know, a ton of outrage. 

So, I checked to see what Obama said in his 2010 SOTU, where he made some very well-reported (and seriously wrong place, wrong time) comments, to see whether I could find a personal attack on one or more justices of the Supreme Court in Obama's remarks (emphasis added):

With all due deference to separation of powers, last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests - including foreign corporations - to spend without limit in our elections. I don't think elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests or, worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people. And I urge Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps correct some of these problems.

In 2015, on the fifth anniversary of the decision, Obama made a broader statement on the case, and I looked again for a personal attack against a SCOTUS justice (again, emphasis added):

Our democracy works best when everyone's voice is heard, and no one's voice is drowned out. But five years ago, a Supreme Court ruling allowed big companies - including foreign corporations - to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence our elections. The Citizens United decision was wrong, and it has caused real harm to our democracy.  With each new campaign season, this dark money floods our airwaves with more and more political ads that pull our politics into the gutter. It's time to reverse this trend. Rather than bolster the power of lobbyists and special interests, Washington should lift up the voices of ordinary Americans and protect their democratic right to determine the direction of the country that we love. 

Unless I'm blind, I don't see Obama doing what Trump did to Judge Robart - including allocating blame directly to the judge, "should anything happen."  And, if there's nothing Robart-like in Obama's statements, there certainly isn't anything remotely close to Trump's comments about Judge Gonzalo Curiel, the Indiana-born "Mexican" judge who was involved in the Trump University case.

Remember that one, when Trump was a candidate?  Let's all refresh our memories, by reviewing these comments from campaign appearances and media interviews (emphasis added):

...very hostile judge...because it was me... there's a hostility toward me by the judge, tremendous hostility, beyond belief...he happens to be Spanish... he is Hispanic... a judge who is very hostile... extremely hostile to me... he has been extremely hostile to me... a very hostile judge. Now he is Hispanic, I believe. He is a very hostile judge to me. I said it loud and clear... A hater of Donald Trump, a hater. He's a hater. His name is Gonzalo Curiel and he is not doing the right thing... judge, who happens to be, we believe, Mexican, which is great. I think that's fine... I think Judge Curiel should be ashamed of himself... it's a disgrace that he's doing this... the judges in this court system, federal court... they ought to look into that Judge Curiel because what Judge Curiel is doing is a total disgrace... he's proud of his heritage, OK? I'm building a wall... we are building a wall. He's a Mexican.We're building a wall between here and Mexico... he is giving us very unfair rulings, rulings that people can't even believe... he is giving us unfair rulings Now, I saw "why?" Well, I'm building a wall, OK? And it's a wall between America and Mexico. Not another country. He's of Mexican heritage and he's very proud of it... 

It makes me want to vomit all over again, just reading all of this hatred from the man who wanted to be - and now is - the president.

But - back to the point -- I'm STILL trying to find a similarity between Obama blasting a SCOTUS decision and Trump's comments about either Judge Robart or Judge Curiel. There is no double standard here, is there?

We might need some clarification from Sean Spicer on this one.

Wondering, on Wednesday (v46)

Out, out, damned spot.

I mean, "out, out damned citizen-threatening, car-stealing-and-crashing, go-to-town-and-get-drunk-on-the-donations, snack-eating government-property-destroying, gun-toting terrorists". Get the heck out of Oregon, and don't let the door hit you in the behind on the way out.

That's pretty much where things ended up today out there in Burns where the Bundy Gang has been holed up on our property, keeping our employees (the ones who work at the Refuge) from going to work for three weeks or so, begging for snacks (and getting dildos instead), and so on. Our other employees - the FBI and the rest of them - had taken a hands-off approach, until yesterday, that is, when they stopped a convoy -a convoy! - of Bundys and Bundys-lite on their way to a meeting in a nearby town.

I had been wondering why, when these terrorists left the 'compound' to go drop in on meetings, they weren't picked up. Seems the FBI had plans to get them in a quiet spot, to reduce the risk of harm, and that appears to have been a good plan. I'm glad they arrested the ones they did, but I don't believe those who are left at the Refuge should get off Scot-free. I wonder again what it would look like if they weren't white ranchers, and if folks would be so quick to label a martyr a member of a different group.

Speaking of "out, out damned fill-in-the-blank" I'm also wondering, this Wednesday, how I'm going to change up the GOP Debate bingo board now that the Artist of the Deal has painted himself into a corner and will be out of the mix?. Unless, of course, he capitulates, which would of course lend a whole new meaning to Sarah Palin's Capitulator in Chief line.

Do you think I might win with this card and my lucky dauber?

I sure hope so!

How to Obtain an Indictment

How to indict a ham sandwich:

(1) Make a ham sandwich:

• Take two slices of any kind of bread.
• Spread one side of one of the pieces of bread with butter.
• Spread one side of the other piece of bread with your favorite mustard.
• Place a mess of ham on the buttered side of the one piece of bread
• Place some cheese on top of the ham.
• Place the other piece of bread, mustard side down, on the cheese.
• Slice the sandwich in half; stick a toothpick in each half of the sandwich. 
• Put the sandwich on a plate.

(2) Hand the plate with the ham sandwich to a New York District Attorney.

(3) Have the DA present the ham sandwich to a grand jury.

(4) Receive indictment.

How to indict a New York City police officer for jumping a suspect from behind, putting him in an illegal choke hold, literally riding the suspect to the ground without relaxing the choke hold, continuing (along with several other officers) to hold the suspect, at times by pressing the side of his face into a Staten Island sidewalk, and ignoring the suspect's repeated pleas that he was unable to breathe:









Anyone have the recipe for this?

My Middle Aged White Lady Perspective: Juries Do Their Best

No indictment for Officer Darren Wilson, but a huge indictment of our justice system?  It might have been the right decision, or it could have been the worst decision in recent memory?  So many questions, still, after the announcement that there was no probable cause to charge Wilson with any of five different crimes in the death of Michael Brown.

My middle-aged white lady perspective is that when you get into an altercation with a police officer, such as the one that was described by Wilson and witnesses, you stop being merely 'an unarmed teenager' and start being a criminal. And should such an altercation occur, and the suspect were to flee, I would expect the officer to pursue and arrest the perpetrator. The district attorney, who would have the clear intent of obtaining an indictment against the person who assaulted the officer, would present evidence to the grand jury, and if it got that far, a jury trial could occur.

I've been on juries three times, never a grand jury.

One was an attempted murder with related felony charges. I was a kid, only in my twenties. The families of the victim and the alleged perpetrator were going at each other, shooting comments back and forth during jury selection. They were staring and glaring at us as we sat during voir dire, mumbling comments about us, and continuing their snarking back and forth at each other.

After several admonitions from the judge, which fell on deaf ears, the spectators were removed; there was a physical altercation outside as everyone left. When we were excused for the lunch break, we were harassed in the hallway by the perpetrator's family, more comments and dirty looks, and we were escorted down the hall by the court attendants. The people harassing us were all black. Most of us were white. We all were scared.

We came back after lunch to find out that that the two sides had settled during the break and that our services were not needed.  On our way out after being excused, the two families were going at it, and we were hurried out of the way again by the court attendants.  Once we were outside, we all expressed gratitude that we didn't have to see it through, although emboldened by not having to, we all were very confident that we could have done it.

My second criminal trial was a felony DWI case. The DA did a horrible job presenting his evidence; the defense attorney did a good job presenting his, and we found the gentleman not guilty.  After being excused, we were harassed in the hall outside the court room.

By the DA. Who told us we were idiots because clearly this guy was a drunk and we should have locked him up because he was a threat to humanity. And while that might have been the case, the evidence did not show that and we told the DA that.  He ended up being shoved down the hallway, still growling at us, by others from his office.

We did what we were supposed to do as trial jurors, and decided the case based on the evidence presented, even though we all suspected that he was a repeat offender (hence the felony charge) and there was a good chance he had been drinking that night. In the interest of full disclosure, after the trial, the defense attorney bought us all a drink.

The third one was a civil trial involving a fender bender in the parking lot of an ice cream parlor, much less glamorous, but again, based on the evidence presented, the six of us made our decision and assigned blame to both parties proportionally.

In Missouri v. Darren Wilson,  the grand jury was not presented a case where the clear goal was to obtain an indictment; to me it was more of an investigative effort. They heard evidence from not only witnesses, investigators and the alleged perpetrator, Officer Wilson himself, but they also saw media reports and personal video and audio recordings. This was not a trial, and it was not intended to be one. Some seem to think that was the point, and so from that perspective, the justice system failed. I disagree.

I haven't read everything yet -- it's all online, including Wilson's incredible statement that he "felt like a five year old holding onto Hulk Hogan" during the altercation with Brown in the police car. That shocked me - I mean, doesn't that sound more like something a middle-aged white lady would say, rather than a comment from a cop?

There are 24 volumes of grand jury testimony alone, as well as another 24 documents labeled Reports and Forensic Evidence, and 30 Law Enforcement Interviews. There are many conflicting statements, conflicting between Witness A and Witness B, as well as conflicting between Witness A and Witness A -- the same witness making different statements at different times. And there are many statements that conflict with the forensic evidence from the crime scene itself.

Ultimately, that is why I think the grand jury did what they did.  Asked to make a decision as to whether Darren Wilson murdered Michael Brown, based on all the evidence presented, they said no.

It doesn't make them racist.

It doesn't mean they're glad Michael Brown is dead.

No one is, including this middle-aged white lady.

Blame the parents? Punish the parents

When you're 16, steal some beer, get absurdly drunk with your friends, then get behind the wheel and kill four people and seriously injure the aforementioned friends, do you blame your parents?  And if you manage to convince someone that it WAS your parents and your wealthy, no-consequences-apply upbringing that caused you to behave with reckless abandon, do you thank your parents, or do you just ignore them with abandon, as you do everything else?

News feeds are blowing up with this tale out of Texas, where everything is bigger, apparently including the balls of kids and parents and lawyers and judges.  Here's Ethan Couch, the innocent looking

Photo captured from Raw Story

beer-stealing, heavy drinking, Valium popping, drunken driving   killer who, according to his attorney, grew up with mean, manipulative, buy-your-way-out-of-trouble parents and so never learned how to say "I'm sorry" or how to behave in polite society.

Poor Ethan. Three hours after the accident, his blood alcohol level was still three times the legal limit. According to reports,

Couch was going 70 miles per hour in his father's Ford F-350 pickup in a 40-mph zone when he lost control and started a deadly chain of collisions that claimed the lives of 24 year old Breanna Mitchell, whose car had broken down on the side of the road; Hollie Boyles and her 21 year old daughter Shelby, who lived nearby and come outside to help Mitchell; and Brian Jennings, a youth pastor who was also playing the role of good Samaritan.

According to the psychologist who's known Poor Ethan since this past June (having begun treating him shortly after the accident), he didn't have any friends, he didn't know what high school he went to, or where he went to church.  He had essentially raised himself, his mother showering him with presents, his father a man who didn't "have relationships, he takes hostages" and there was a nasty divorce.  Intellectually, the psychologist said, Poor Ethan was 18; emotionally though, he was only twelve.

Poor Ethan. The kinder, gentler judge he had, the woman who decided not to send him to jail for 20 years as requested by the prosecution but instead to probation for ten years, believed what she was told by the defense and the psychologist, and thinks that intensive inpatient therapy is the answer. And 'Take Hostages' Daddy is willing to fork over $450K a year for the privilege of sending Poor Ethan across the country to California for treatment.

I guess it's only fair, since for a long time folks have been blaming bad behavior of poor people on their upbringing and lack of economic 'benefits' like the kind Poor Ethan had to deal with, and we've blamed the bad behavior of young men on them being raised by single moms, with no strong father figure in the picture, that we come full circle and now blame rich parents for the horrendous behavior of their kids.

But if we're going to blame Mommy and Daddy for Poor Ethan's behavior, why don't we punish them?  If they're responsible, make them pay for their ruined child's actions. Not the $450K to send Poor Ethan to camp in Cali. Let's make them pay in a way that is less pleasant for them. Clearly, throwing the kid away doesn't seem to be a big deal -- that's what they've already done if we believe the psychologist, defense attorney, and the judge.

First, let's find a place for Poor Ethan and his pathetic parents somewhere in Texas, preferably affiliated with the criminal justice system, where the survivors, the families of the victims, can keep an eye on them, and can visit them any time they want, day or night, and ask them what the hell they were thinking. Shout at them, or scream at them, or just sit and stare at them.  What the families do is up to them; that the parents and Poor Ethan are available for the activity is what's important.

Have all three of them attend this intensive, inpatient therapy that is supposedly going to be the answer to making the 'spoiled brat' a productive member of society.

Let's take away a boatload or ten of Daddy's money, and set up long term, ridiculously well funded accounts for the families of the four who were murdered; for the victim now left blinking incredulously at his sad fate; for all the other passengers in the truck; for the church left without its pastor; and for the school system that apparently so miserably failed Poor Ethan that he doesn't even know its name, so that they can figure out how never to let a child like this fall through the cracks again..

Let's make Mommy and Daddy perform 2000 hours of community service, together, during each of the ten years of Poor Ethan's probation. Yes, they must do the service together, so they can learn what they should have been doing as parents all those years when they were messing with Poor Ethan.

And, since if Poor Ethan fails to abide by the letter of the probation, he will end up in jail; to be fair, and just, so should Mommy and Daddy.

Oh, and Poor Ethan, who never learned how to say I'm Sorry, maybe this'll help:

I'm sorry, so sorry, that I was such a fool I didn't know love could be so cruel oh, oh, oh, oh, uh-oh, oh yes. You tell me mistakes are part of being young, but that don't right the wrong that's been done. 

 Poor Ethan.