Baltimore: Good Ol’ Boys Club Convention.

Baltimore police conference protest (Photo: Baynard Woods/Twitter).

Baltimore police conference protest (Photo: Baynard Woods/Twitter).

There is the woman being publicly strip-searched after being stopped for a missing headlight. There are the officers coercing sex from prostitutes in exchange for avoiding arrest, planting drugs on people they stopped, cursing “shut the fuck up bitch” because they are “the fucking law.” There is the supervisor telling officers “to arrest ‘all the black hoodies’ in a neighborhood.” There are officers using templates for arrests where they only had to fill in dates and names — the words “black male” were already inked in.

Running to 163 pages, the Department of Justice report on the ongoing abuse inflicted upon African Americans by the Baltimore police is full of stories like these.

In light of the DOJ report on just how corrupt the Baltimore cops shops are, of course the staunch defenders of bigoted, killer cops, the FOP, decided to have their conference, which was protested. Well, for a while, at least, until all those pesky persons insistent on pointing to reality were arrested.

Baltimore police arrested a dozen protesters at the Hyatt Regency on Sunday afternoon where the state Fraternal Order of Police was holding a conference.

Some of the protesters refused to leave the hotel on Light Street, blocked access to an escalator and chained themselves to railings as part of a demonstration against discriminatory police practices.

The group, some of whom were with the activist group Baltimore BLOC, were joining hands and carrying signs that read “Abolish Racist F.O.P.”

[Read more…]

Curing LGBT people from their affliction.

Pray-away-the-gay-800x430

Illinois, like many states, passed legislation called the Youth Mental Health Protection Act, to ban the practice of a “failed and discredited non-therapy that attempts to change the unchangeable,” as Equality Illinois put it.

But now five pastors have come together to sue based on religious freedom. They believe they should be exempt from the bill because of their religion and designation as a church and religious institution. Like many churches and religious businesses over the years, when they see a law they don’t like they claim First Amendment protections. This argument could be made with any law, however. There could be an argument that slavery and servitude not to mention abuse of one’s children and family could be sanctioned by The Bible, and thus laws outlawing it should be allowed in the church as part of a “religious freedom” exemption.

Pink News reports Pastor Steven Stultz of Nu-Church Apostolic Ministries of East Garfield is one of those seeking to use the torturous technique on LGBT people. Claiming, “In 1 Corinthians 6:9, the Apostle Paul writes to those who had overcome many sins including homosexuality, stating, ‘such were some of you’ but you were changed through God’s healing,” he said. “I have personally witnessed many people change their sexual orientation through counseling and know it is possible. The government is interfering into someone’s private decisions. This ban on counseling creates fear in the people most in need of comfort and support.”

The pastors’ attorney insists this is a ban on those who seek spiritual guidance at difficult times where they are questioning their sexual orientation.

“Each person should be free to receive Biblical and spiritual counseling from the pastor of their choice to help them orient their sexuality,” said John W Mauck from Mauck and Baker LLC.

Most recently, a Texas teen was forced into a “pray away the gay” boarding school after she tried to take her girlfriend to the prom. The litigation in her case is ongoing and the court documents have been sealed, but she was ultimately released, after trying to escape.

Pastors, go fuck yourselves, please. You aren’t offering comfort, aid, or help. You’re looking for governmental help in kidnapping, imprisoning, and torturing people. While that’s certainly biblical, it has no place among thinking, compassionate, rational people who are living in the 21st century.

Via Raw story.

Trump Confederacy in Kissimmee.

confederate-flag-at-the-trump-rally-x750

KISSIMMEE, Fla. — The most controversial moment of a Donald Trump rally here Thursday night may have come before the bombastic candidate took the stage. For a solid 20 minutes, a Confederate flag with the words “Trump 2016” hung from the railing in the Silver Spurs Arena.

It was easily visible even as public figures like Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Pastor Mark Burns gave warm-up speeches before the Republican presidential nominee took the stage. Then minutes before Trump began his speech, organizers asked the supporters who brought the flag into the venue to furl it.

The imagery harkens back to a heated debate throughout the South over the flag’s racist meaning after another mass shooting, in Charleston, S.C., which ended with the flag being removed from the capitol grounds. It also harkens back to a New York Times video that recently went viral that recorded unfiltered remarks by Trump supporters that were unabashedly racist, misogynistic, and xenophobic. Confederate symbolism makes an apperance there as well.

The media doesn’t often focus on the attitude of the Trump crowds. Even in this latest case, as tends to happen at Trump rallies, such symbolism got brushed aside as the crowd got whipped up over other matters.

[…]

Most importantly, Trump was speaking in a suburb of Orlando two months after the Pulse massacre and hours after meeting with pastors and evangelicals during an event critics have called an anti-LGBT gathering. Trump made mention of the Orlando attack, saying more people should have reported shooter Omar Mateen to the FBI: “People knew he was demented.” In fact, Mateen was interviewed multiple times by the FBI based on complaints placed by those who knew him.

Clearly building off the closed-door discussions with leaders at the American Renewal Project conference in Orlando earlier in the day, Trump appealed to social conservatives in the room. “The evangelicals took me to a point that I never even thought we could reach,” he said. “All around the country we did well.”

The Advocate has the full story. Speaking of the intense anti-LGBT gathering in Orlando, again, Marco Rubio just will not shut up about being a keynote speaker, and keeps on attempting to defend his stance, while at the same time, telling people not to be judgmental. Hypocrisy knows no limit where Rubio is concerned:

 

ORLANDO — In a speech laden with scripture, Republican Sen. Marco Rubio on Friday compelled church leaders at a conference here to “abandon the spirit of judgment” against LGBT neighbors. The remarks came on the two-month anniversary of a shooting at the Pulse night club located about 10 miles from the religious gathering.

[…]

Rubio was the headline speaker for The American Renewal Project’s two-day event in Orlando, and on Friday devoted much of a 30-minute speech to encouraging preachers to create an accepting environment free of discrimination. “In order to love people, we have to listen to them,” he said. “When it comes to our brothers and our sisters, our fellow Americans, our neighbors in the LGBT community, we should recognize that our nation, while the greatest nation in the history of  mankind, is one with a history that has been marred by the discrimination against and the rejection of gays and lesbians.”

He also emphasized his continued opposition to marriage equality, saying his faith called for the elevation of the “union of one man and one woman.” But he said Christian leaders should understand many gays and lesbians felt “angry and humiliated” that the law until recently did not recognize their own loving relationships. “Many have experienced sometimes severe condemnation and judgment from some Christians,” Rubio said. “They have heard some say that the reason God will bring condemnation on America is because of them. As if somehow God was willing to put up with adultery and gluttony and greed and pride, but now this is the last straw.”

[…]

Rubio’s anti-LGBT record is lengthy. The senator doesn’t support the Equality Act proposed in Congress, for example. It would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the 1967 Civil Rights Act, ensuring protection from discrimination in housing and employment. When he had a chance to vote in 2013, Rubio voted against passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which some moderate Republicans helped pass 64-32 in the Senate, though it would stall in the House. But his discriminatory policy stands don’t stop there. Rubio has in the past said letting LGBT people adopt children is a “social experiment” that he opposes. He also opposed reversing the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that required LGBT people to stay closeted while serving in the U.S. military.

The Advocate has the full story.

Another Day, Another Bad Priest.

Monsignor Lawrence McGovern -- Fox 40 screenshot.

Monsignor Lawrence McGovern — Fox 40 screenshot.

Oh look, another priest who doesn’t understand boundaries, consent, and immoral, unethical behaviour. About the only thing new in this case is that Monsignor McGovern decided to sexually harass an adult. I have no doubt that Monsignor, who has been placed on administrative leave will be yet another priest in the Catholic church’s ongoing game of “Where’s the Pedo Priest?” Given that this is case of sexual harassment, rather than assault or rape, the Monsignor will most likely merit the lightest of smacks on the wrist, perhaps 40 Lord’s Prayers and 50 Hail Marys.

The Stockton Catholic Diocese has suspended a monsignor over allegations that he sent pictures of his penis to the church pool maintenance man who complained — only to be fired.

According to FOX40, Monsignor Lawrence McGovern, the pastor of Presentation Parish in Stockton, has been removed from his duties after the landscaper filed a lawsuit against the church for sexual harassment.

According to an attorney for the unidentified father of two, who is also a church parishioner,  McGovern sent his client sexually explicit pictures.

“It’s extremely disturbing that the person’s who is head of this parish would be sending text with photographs of his exposed genitals,” attorney Vince Finaldi said before ading. “Someone’s who’s engaging in that type of conduct has very, very serious credibility issues and issues with judgement.”

According to Finaldi, his client confronted the priest over the pictures and pressed him over his vow of celibacy.

According to the victim, McGovern responded, “Oh, that just means that you’re not married.”

The local diocese issued a statement saying, “Today the Diocese of Stockton learned for the first time of employment related allegations against Monsignor Lawrence McGovern, the Pastor of Presentation Parish in Stockton. In accordance with the Canon Law of the Church, Bishop Stephen Blaire has placed Monsignor McGovern on administrative leave pending a full and complete investigation.”

A full and complete investigation. Right. There really isn’t anything to investigate though, is there? So what they actually mean is that they need to get together to figure out what they are going to try and sell people to make them believe they are actually doing something.

According to Finaldi, McGovern should be dismissed, saying, “That person has no business being in a parish and head of a school where there are numerous young children walking around everyday.”

I’m with Mr. Finaldi. I’m damn tired of priests and cops constantly being given another ride on the merry-go-round, no matter how bad their behaviour, and no matter what heinous acts they commit.

Via Raw Story.

You’ll know they are Christian by their love…

Dr. Paul Hard.

Dr. Paul Hard.

It happened in Alabama, and as the Chief Justice Roy Moore was speaking after being suspended for defying the Supreme Court’s same-sex marriage ruling.

He will go on trial in September.

A few hundred feet away from Moore’s speech to crowds with many holding signs like ‘homosexuality destroy families’ and ‘sodomy ruins nations’, there was an alternative press conference organized by the Human Rights Campaign.

Among the people speaking there were people like Dr Paul Hard, who has been involved in a legal fight for his husband who died five years ago to be recognized as his husband.

And when he began to speak about his partner’s death, a man in the crowd laughed.

‘You can’t have a husband,’ he said.

John Archibald, a columnist who was there at the conference, asked: ‘How can any man, no matter his position on Roy Moore or any issue, stand before another and mock his pain?

‘How can one stand under the banner of God and laugh at another man’s death?

‘How — in the name of God — can one deride genuine grief?’

He added: ‘Christians cannot let these people define their religion. All they have is volume. As a substitute for moral authority.’

https://vine.co/v/5bihOImElmJ

Lovely, isn’t it, how Christians behave? If they don’t like something, they can be as ugly and immoral as they like, smug in their sense of self-righteousness. They should be busy cultivating a sense of shame. If you aren’t one of those very ugly Christians, where are your voices? Get busy, and drown these assholes out, put them down, tell them in no uncertain terms that they are not Christians, regardless of them sharing the same beliefs.

Via Gay Star News.

John Lott: Oh So Fraudulent.

JOhn_Lott_screencap-800x430

Think Progress has an excellent, in depth look at the fall and rise of John Lott, the so-called academic of the NRA and gun fondlers everywhere. Apparently, his fraudulent, unethical past has not stopped people from taking this scary side quack seriously, once again.

The United States seems to be in a perpetual cycle mourning mass shootings in the country. This year alone, there have already been 233 mass shootings, where four or more victims were shot, leaving 310 dead and 930 injured. But every time another shooting happens, advocates pop up arguing that more guns don’t actually lead to more violence and stall the much-needed conversation about gun control.

John Lott is, if not the most influential, certainly the most prolific “academic” in the gun debate. He has authored weekly columns in local newspapers on the horrors of gun free zones, published widely-distributed books on the ostensible benefits of right-to-carry laws, and his newest book The War on Guns has received rave reviews by prominent conservatives, like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), and Newt Gingrich.

Before Lott’s flurry of activity, it was difficult to find anybody arguing that widespread gun ownership made societies safer — even the NRA was reticent to make such a bold claim, defending gun ownership with reference to the constitution, not criminology.

But Lott’s recent successes belie a far more shadowy past. A little over a decade ago, he was disgraced and his career was in tatters. Not only was Lott’s assertion that more guns leads to more safety formally repudiated by a National Research Council panel, but he had also been caught pushing studies with severe statistical errors on numerous occasions. An investigation uncovered that he had almost certainly fabricated an entire survey on defensive gun use. And a blogger revealed that Mary Rosh, an online commentator claiming to be a former student of Lott’s who would frequently post about how amazing he was, was in fact John Lott himself. He was all but excommunicated from academia.

Despite his ethical failings, Lott rose from the ashes in the wake of the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School to once more become a prominent voice in the gun debate.

Perhaps unaware of Lott’s previous transgressions, or believing he had turned a new page by founding the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), many in the media who were desperate for an authoritative, pro-gun academic voice seized on Lott’s credentials and provided him with a new platform. In the past few years, Lott and his organization have been cited by dozens of media outlets as an authority on gun violence statistics, including the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, LA Times, Politifact, CBS, CNN, Fox News, and many others.

However, the media’s newfound faith in John Lott is deeply misguided. Rather than turn a new page, Lott has instead returned to his old playbook and used his platform to deceive the public. Our own multi-year investigation into Lott and his organization has uncovered a startling array of new ethical violations, ranging from the profoundly bizarre to the outright fraudulent.

Devin Hughes and Evan DeFilippis have a breakdown of the five most troubling incidents at Think Progress. Highly recommended reading, because way too many people believe this absolute bullshit, clinging to it, because this confirms what they so desperately want to believe, that the good cowboy with the gun can come blazing in to save the day against any odds, no matter how overwhelming. In a country so stuffed with guns, it doesn’t do to simply dismiss the high amount of fantasists with guns, they are dangerous, and becoming more dangerous every day, and it’s well to remember that many of those gun happy fantasists are cops, who play their little fantasies out every day. It pays to be well informed, especially when it comes to a con-man happily shilling for the NRA, and assuring all those fantasists they are so very right.

Full story here.

Cop Who Killed 73 year old: record of excessive force.

Punta Gorda Police Officer Lee Coel is pictured in this undated handout photo, received August 11, 2016. Punta Gorda Police Department/Handout via Reuters.

Punta Gorda Police Officer Lee Coel is pictured in this undated handout photo, received August 11, 2016. Punta Gorda Police Department/Handout via Reuters.

A Florida police officer who mistakenly killed a 73-year-old woman during a role-play exercise this week has been the subject of excessive force complaints in the past, according to a police official and media reports.

[…]

Punta Gorda police have released few details about what led to Knowlton being shot by a live round, and Lewis declined to answer questions at the news conference.

He acknowledged reports that Coel, a K-9 police officer, had been accused of allowing his police dog to attack a man while on patrol in October last year.

“This officer was involved in a K-9 apprehension incident,” Lewis said. “Currently that incident is in civil litigation.”

Lawyer Scott Weinberg said Coel intended to cite his client, Richard Shumacher, for riding a bike at night without a headlight or taillight when the attack occurred.

Weinberg, who has filed a notice of intent to sue the city and the police department, released a police dash-cam video of the incident earlier this year. In it, Coel can be seen holding Shumacher down while the dog mauled him.

“The bottom line is that when I released this video two months ago, I had warned everybody that this man was going to kill somebody,” Weinberg said in a phone interview. “I told the chief to his face that this man was dangerous.”

Coel also was accused of excessive force in April 2013 while working as a police officer for Miramar, Florida police, court records show.

That incident and another case led investigators to determined Coel had violated department policies, and he was forced to resign, the Miami Herald reported.

Is anyone surprised by this? Anyone? Why, every single time, does it take multiple incidents, and at least one death to kick an evil asshole out of a cop shop? And lately, even murdering people isn’t enough to get cops fired. This is so wrong. Beyond wrong. Beyond fractally wrong. This has to stop. A cop gets investigated for excessive force? That’s it, you’re out, and you lose everything, job, pension, all of it. Maybe, just maybe, cops might start getting the message that a badge is not a license to do whatever they want.

Via Raw Story.

Where the Confederacy Is Rising Again.

static2.politico.com

John Savage at Politico has an in-depth article about the Sons of Confederate Veterans, who not only continue their constant fight to keep confederate statues, symbols, and flags in place and protected, but are now planning a massive confederate monument, at the intersection of Interstate 10 and Orange’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard, in the town of Orange, East Texas. Nothing subtle about that.

…Throughout this tempest, the Texas chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, an aging army of deeply religious, federal government distrusting, neo-Confederate true believers, has emerged as a steadfast defender of Confederate iconography. The Texas SCV only claims about 5,000 members, but their ideology carries significant weight in the state. SCV members sued the University of Texas in an effort to stop the removal of the Jefferson Davis statue. They distributed more than 1,000 Confederate flags in Fort Worth after the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo banned the Confederate battle flag. Wherever someone wants to rename a school or remove a statue that honors the Confederacy, the SCV’s members soon follow.

But the Texas SCV is not only fighting against the disappearance of Confederate symbolism, they are behind the construction of what is likely the largest Confederate memorial built in a century — a multi-ton shrine nearing completion in an east Texas town near the Louisiana border. For the SCV, this battle is not just about protecting a Confederate heritage, it’s about resurrecting it, restoring that heritage so that they will continue to have something to protect.

[…]

Jim Toungate is the adjutant of the Williamson County chapter of the Texas SCV, and Savage had a long interview with him at his residence.

[Read more…]

Darnell Wicker.

Darnell Wicker (Photo: Family of Darnell Wicker).

Darnell Wicker (Photo: Family of Darnell Wicker).

Darnell Wicker was pronounced dead around 2 a.m. from multiple shots to his torso, upper right extremity and lower extremities after police officers opened fire on him. The Jefferson County Coroner’s office in Louisville, KY admitted that they don’t know exactly how many times the 57-year-old man was shot.

Police officers Taylor Banks and Beau Gadegaard were responding to a domestic violence call when Wicker came outside holding a knife and a tree saw, according to WDRB.

“He came outside — he came out the door and was holding a knife in his hand, he started kind of swinging it around a little bit and he kind of came at us and so we shot,” an officer explains on the video.

Two women who witnessed the event tell a different story, however. Anita Jones, Wicker’s girlfriend and Denita Jones blame the police.

“They just ran up past him — around him — and just said, ‘Drop your weapon!’ Pow! Pow! Pow! Pow!” Anita Jones described police not waiting for Wicker to drop the items. “He had no chance to drop the weapon.”

“The officers jumped out, came around, pushed her out of the way,” said Denita Jones. “I was far enough over here that he ran beside me, pushed her out of the way, said, ‘Ma’am move!’ ran up, the other one went that way. ‘Put it down!’ Pop! Pop! Pop!”

The officers also didn’t perform any kind of first aid on Wicker and the EMTs arrived nine minutes after he was shot.

“I was the person who actually had called them, and I didn’t want that to actually happen,” Denita Jones said. “That was my thing. I just wanted the situation to be okay.”

Once again, you have cops shooting someone, and once again, you have cops who refuse to render aid, even the simple act of calling for an ambulance. This has happened time and time again. Michael Brown. Paul O’Neal. And so many more. Pretty much all the people shot by cops. This is a demonstration of ingrained callousness, the dehumanization of bigotry. Body cam footage is below the fold, and it is graphic, so all the warnings.

[Read more…]

Homosexual totalitarianism is out of the closet!

1-uI7vS3iDiQocCuAK_ahlgw

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will meet with a group of around 700 evangelical pastors this week, hoping to win over hardline, anti-gay Religious Right leaders who have thus far been hesitant to embrace his struggling candidacy.

Trump is scheduled to speak on Thursday at a closed-door meeting in Orlando, Florida hosted by the American Renewal Project (ARP), a group of evangelical Christian pastors. The event has been widely criticized as anti-LGBT, with another selected speaker — former Florida senator and former GOP presidential candidate Mark Rubio — fending off accusations of insensitivity for appearing at the event so soon after the tragic murder of nearly 50 people in Orlando at a gay nightclub in June.

Rubio has also defended his doing so, won’t shut up about it, actually. These are people who have no empathy whatsoever, don’t know what compassion means, and are utterly bereft of lowly sympathy.

Accusations of anti-gay sentiment are rooted in inflammatory statements made by the ARP’s founder, David Lane. Lane’s group is sponsored by the American Family Association, which is listed as an anti-gay hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. In addition, he has personally called for “war” against the “pagan onslaught imposing homosexual marriage” in the past, and repeated similarly bombastic sentiments to Bloomberg this week.

“Homosexual totalitarianism is out of the closet, the militants are trying herd Christians there,” Lane said.

Indeed, Lane appeared hopeful that Trump would be swayed to his right-wing ideology. He said he appreciated the businessman’s support for repealing the Johnson Amendment — the law that makes it illegal for churches to retain tax-exempt status if they explicitly endorse candidates — but remained focused on pushing him to embrace policies many believe discriminate against LGBT people in the name of religion.

“[Repealing the Johnson Amendment is] a good first step,” Lane told Bloomberg. “But what about the religious liberty of Christian photographers, Christian bakers, Christian retreat centers, and pastors who believe same-sex intercourse and marriage is sin? These Christians were simply living out their deeply held convictions of their Christian faith when they politely refused to provide services for a same-sex wedding. Doesn’t the First Amendment give us all a right to our beliefs?”

As usual, these bigoted hate-mongers manage to completey lose the “all” in all a right to our beliefs. Yes, we certainly do have the privilege to believe whatever we like, no matter how daft, reasonable, or hateful. The key word being all. That means you don’t get to make the rules, Mr. Lane. Your right to believe what you like does not extend to harming people, and yes, discrimination is harm.

Trump could, hypothetically, push on without such endorsements, but there is a tactical value at stake: Evangelical turnout operations are often heavily reliant on leadership — especially faith leaders who attend Pastors and Pews meetings, many of whom played a key role in evangelical get-out-the-vote efforts during the 2012 election cycle.

This means Lane’s wish for a more vocally-anti-LGBT Trump could very come true, if only out political necessity. Nearly three-quarters of white evangelical Christians remain opposed to marriage equality — even though most other major religious groups in America support it. Since the group still makes up a sizable part of the Republican electorate, Trump may be hoping to revive his rapidly decreasing poll numbers by winning back the core of his Republican base.

This might be more than a probability, given Trump’s latest attempt to wrest money from people, the “Trump Gold Card“:

According to Trump, the card will signify to the world that you “are tired of a government that bows down to foreigners, refuses to even say the words ‘Radical Islam,’ and leaves our borders wide open!”

Trump-card-800x430

Trump Woos Radical Christians at Think Progress. The ‘Trumpet your Trumpness’ is at Raw Story.

Black Lives Matter Is Silly.

Getty Images.

Getty Images.

So sayeth former NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly.

“I think these demonstrations are counter-productive, they’re silly,” Kelly said.

Speaking on John Gambling’s AM 970 radio show, Kelly specifically addressed last week’s demonstrations outside City Hall, during which protesters organized in part by Millions March NYC called for the divestment of the NYPD, paid reparations to the families of victims of police shootings, and the resignation of Commissioner Bill Bratton (the last of which actually happened).

When asked, Kelly characterized the protests as “so ridiculous and myopic. If there’s on group that’s concerned about black lives more than any other group it clearly is the police department not only in New York City but really throughout America.” He also complained that rallies and marches criticizing police conduct can really “depress” working cops.

People get damn depressed over cops committing willful murder at a very high rate, commish. People who lost a loved one to aggressive, bigoted, hyped up stormtroopers just might get damned depressed. Angry, too. Angry enough to make the point that murderous cops must go, and that policing as it stands here in uStates has to change. The current model breeds bias, bigotry, and corruption. Let’s not forget about all those murderers being churned out from cop school.

“[Police] think they’re doing a good job, and then you see these demonstrations,” he said.

It’s worth noting that that under Kelly’s leadership, NYPD officers routinely violated New Yorkers’ constitutional rights.

Well, there’s a surprise. :eyeroll:

Later in his interview, Kelly—who now makes an undisclosed salary as an executive at K2 Intelligence—blamed some cities’ rising crime rates on the so-called “Ferguson effect,” in which officers frightened by investigations and national calls for justice apparently refrain from doing their pledged duty of policing neighborhoods and keeping civilians safe. Kelly also reiterated his affection for stop-and-frisk. “Stopping and questioning people who are acting suspiciously,” is “perfectly reasonable and authorized in the law,” he said.

Actually, commish, crime rates are down, except for all the ones being committed by cops. Those are going up. The “Ferguson Effect” was waking people the fuck up, and no, cops don’t like that. You’re at least right about something.

Via Gothamist.

Cops: High Fivin’

5

The behaviour of the cops who murdered Paul O’Neal just get worse. They actually high fived after murdering an unarmed young man, and it was this moment that one cop expressed annoyance over a probable 30 day suspension. These people are utterly despicable, and placing them on administrative leave is not nearly enough. This is outright murder, and the murderers should be punished.

CBS Chicago’s Charlie De Mar saw the video and reported that it shows one officer high fiving another before saying “F***, I’m going to be on desk duty now for 30 days”; and one officer saying to another, “Make sure this (body-camera) is off.”

“We just came from watching Chicago police officers execute Paul O’Neal. … It is one of the most horrific things that I have seen, aside from being in a movie. These police officers decided to play judge, jury and executioner,” he said. “It is amazing to me. It is horrific, it is tragic, that these officers did what they did and took their street justice in their own hands—the things that they are trying to prevent, or supposed to prevent.”

I seriously advise people to avoid the comments on that tweet. There’s a whole lot of poison there. Full story here.

A Christian Calls…

X

Police are investigating a threat made to a local mosque in Watauga, Texas, where an unidentified man threatened to decapitate Muslims who attended it.

Local news station Fox4News reports that the Watauga Mosque received a particularly disturbing threat via a telephone message this week, when a caller made explicitly violent threats that went well beyond the kind of verbal abuse callers normally level against the mosque.

“F*ck you, f*ck Muhammad, f*ck Islam,” said the caller, who identified as a “Christian” during their message. “This is America. If you don’t like the way we do sh*t, get the f*ck out.”

“We’ll start just cutting off the heads of all of you motherf*ckers,” the caller continued. “Huh? How would you like that? Maybe we need another Christian crusade, which I think we do.”

“I’m a Christian, I’m gonna tell you, I’m your f***ing enemy. I hate you, and I will never be your f**kin’ friend.

“When he started talking about chopping off people’s heads and launching a crusade against Muslims, that’s when it started to get scary because that’s an actionable threat,” said Alia Salem, Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

“I want to be very clear that the Muslim community has no animosity towards the Christian community, but we do ask the Christian community stand up against this kind of hatred. This does not speak for the vast majority of Christians,” said Salem.

I think that would be excellent, if Christians spoke up, and spoke out, with clear condemnation of the Christian caller. You have a great opportunity here to demonstrate that you are not bigoted, nor do you support such bigotry on the part of anyone.

Via Fox4.