The Ultraviolet Garden

War is now a permanent export of the USA. So are the attendant war crimes.

And anyone who thinks US security interests are being improved by those ghastly facts on the ground is a damned fool. —jk

Read more here.

These are some courageous people. Chief Gee’s lost some weight. And his smirk is gone. He actually looked kind of nervous. Click here to read about it and listen to the rest of what happened.

They are why I could never be a misanthropist. Not that I haven’t been tempted.

The Star has just published the following article about Benamar’s case.

Shrugging Off Torture

He’s the only known case of Extraordinary Rendition in Canada. What I’m mad about is that they still have not apologized for what they put him through. Stephen Harper came back saying that after they investigated themselves they found themselves to be innocent of all wrongdoing. (I will believe an investigation took place when I see proof of it, I don’t know if they had an investigation or an “investigation”. Or if they skipped the whole kerfuffle entirely and said, “Let’s don’t and say we did”.)

But it seems to me that they still have to explain HOW—and via WHOSE authorization—did he end up being delivered in the middle of the night in the back seat of a car and into the hands of his torturers in a Brooklyn jail in the first place! Don’t you guys know we torture people here?

Not only have they deeply affected Ben’s life forever, but we may not know how many other cases of Extraordinary Rendition there might have been. And why the fuck am I capitalizing that euphemism? Somebody please, slap the shit out of me. It’s kidnapping! Oh, excuse me: Kidnapping. (The truth is always worth capitalizing.)

Anyway, I’m very glad that the Star published the article. The story needs to be kept alive. When all the proceedings are done and the crowds go home, he still has to live with what they put him through.

How very dare you, Canada.

Here’s a clip I made from the movie Four Rooms. I love this movie. The first room I could do without but the rest of them are great. This is room 309. The Misbehavers.

I’m behind in a couple of things I need to do, but I’ve actually been making progress.

New photos of the cats.

I wonder if linking to one of my own pages will cause a trackback to appear. I’m about to find out.

Nice try, Michael. Not unexpected. I suppose you don’t have much else to do, legally. There’s not a lot of options open to you. It’s that damn video tape. If only it would go away.

Thanks for the heads-up, Noble.

Youtube pulled the video of Deputy Paul Schene and Travis Brunner. Good thing I downloaded it beforehand.

Again, here’s the video. I reposted it.

If you’d like to d/l it, right click and “save as”.

Unlike the others, this vid has sound. I wouldn’t have it up any other way. See, I don’t think it’s okay to sanitize things so we don’t have to experience any trauma. As long as we, as a collective, support the police/policy; as long as we accept the principle of qualified immunity for cops, then we should be made to witness the results of that mistake.

Sound and all.

“Be made to” isn’t the best way to put it. I’m not talking about forcing anyone to witness anything. I’m referring to its availability to those who actually do want to know what these cretins get up to while they’re supposed to be serving and protecting the public—a public which includes Malika Calhoun. Of course that’s not what this goofy asshole did.

I think it’s pretty obvious that the testimony of the police hasn’t lived up to the good faith and qualified immunity bestowed upon it.

The guy in that video assaulting Malika is the same guy who shot two persons (1 of them to death) in ’02 and ’06. He has been under investigation for those shootings. Might want to look at this guy’s entire career. He’s apparently had it made… like a serial killer in a horror film.

I can’t think of any good reason for giving police officers special privileges. In fact, considering the special powers and resources they already have, it makes sense to hold them to a higher standard than the public at large. A crime committed by a police officer, if treated differently than one committed by anybody else, should carry a tougher penalty, not a lower one.

And we should get rid of those special charges and penalties for people who victimize police officers, too.

Frankly, if regular paychecks, taxpayer-issued guns and armor, and backup a radio call away aren’t enough to keep Paul Schene and his buddies happy in their work, they’re welcome to try their hand at really dangerous jobs, like driving taxis or working on commercial fishing boats. —J.D. Tuccille, Civil Liberties Examiner

You can read the rest of J.D.’s article here.

Officer Paul Schene is 6’2″ and approximately 195 pounds; we’re quite convinced that 194 pounds of that weight is solid ass. The other pound is stupidity. —Danny Vice

Deputy attacks teen girl in holding cell, then blames her for assaulting him.

Thugcops who beat 15 yr old Malika Calhoun were surprised, I bet, when the detective assigned to do a follow-up to the case saw the vid and actually did not think it was okay.

He alerted supervisors. Well. At least that’s the story. I’d actually LIKE to believe that they’re not all like this. So if this is true, then kudos to the detective. I just don’t know if I can trust the information.

Here is the video I posted before, only WITH audio:

The reports filed by the thugs (Paul Schene and Travis Brunner) are pretty infuriating.

Both Schene’s and Brunner’s report on this say that Malika’s shoe hit Schene on the leg, causing “bruising, bleeding and pain”. (I wouldn’t doubt if they used the exact same wording, they usually do because they’re not the smartest beasts around.)

He didn’t look like he was in too much pain when he was dragging this little girl around by the hair and pummeling her head with his fist.

They recommended an assault charge against their victim.

Brunner told investigators that Malika was “real lippy” and that she called them “fat pigs”.

Well. That settles it then. Fuck, you should have given her another wallop to the head. One for “fat” and another for “pigs”, then one for being “lippy”. Add three more, one for the “bruising”, two for the “bleeding” and three for the “pain” and suffering Officer Schene had to endure by this girl.

Right?

Cops are still the biggest BABIES I have ever seen in my life.

*playing a violin for an authoritarian cop’s “bruised” and “bleeding” leg.*

I have a gnawing suspicion that if what they did to Malika were done to them, they’d be crying like little bitches.

Think about this for a moment. Their justification for this is that she called them names and kicked off her shoe toward them (after they’d been exchanging words for awhile, which a cop should avoid, why they thought it was appropriate to ARGUE with anyone is beyond me. They could have—and SHOULD have—ignored it).

What do you even SAY to something like that?

And didn’t their mama ever teach them that folk saying “Sticks and Stones”?

To download this, right click here and “save target as…”.

I’ve got no problem believing that they shoved crack up his ass. That is not as hard to believe as the actual shooting. Dave Chappelle was right… they just sprinkle some crack on them.

It’s not been proven though—that they shoved crack up his ass. That’s its beauty! They know that their supporters are so irrational that they’ll grab onto anything to be able to continue saying that Oscar somehow deserved his fate.

Glad to know that ppl’s fates can be determined on the street, by cops. I guess the cop-groupies don’t really like the justice system like they contend. Otherwise they’d demand its use. Yes, even by cops.

Cophood trumps all. Thanks for the reminder.

God damn. They’re crazy.

Who could deny, now, that we’re living in a police state and have been for quite some time? These goons are true American Nazis.

(That’s not hyperbole. Where do you think the Nazis got their ideas from? We were the originators of those ideas. We already know that Joseph Goebbels was deeply influenced by Edward Bernays—who created our nations first “Public Relations” office, cleverly avoiding the bad word “propaganda”, since the Germans gave it such unpopular connotations. Even Bernays admitted it’s the same thing, relabeled.)

These cops aren’t mentally stable. They’re crazy. Knowing this, how can we protect ourselves from them? I’ve watched the vid repeatedly to see if there were anything, anything at all, that Oscar could have done to save his own life. I can’t see a thing.

That’s scary. Because if that’s the situation—and there is no doubt of that—I’ll die or be beaten to a pulp no matter what I do. And so would you. Even those of you who’ve stupidly defended the criminals with such logic as “he deserved it”—they’d get you too. And ppl just like you would be saying that about you.

And no—I don’t consider twitching as you’re being beaten viciously and choked by the knee of the goon who just punched you so hard that your head bounced off the fuckin’ wall to be anything remotely akin to “resisting”.

“Punchy Pirone”…

Great post about cop mobster Tony (AKA “Punchy”) Pirone. Kudos, Packratt. Also what a great moniker. That’s what I’m going to call him from now on.

SF Examiner published some interesting observations:

BART’s initial probe into the fatal shooting New Year’s Day of an unarmed passenger by a transit agency police officer is under fire after recently released footage of the incident shows another officer punching the Hayward father in the head prior to the shooting. That’s after BART announced it had completed its internal investigation into the death of 22-year-old Oscar Grant III and police Chief Gary Gee said only the shooter, former Officer Johannes Mehserle, was being investigated and that the other officers involved had followed proper police procedure.

Well now. Isn’t that interesting.

And, Gary Gee gets named their “Dim Bulb of the Week”:

What: Chief Gee was already under fire for the botched BART Police investigation of former officer Johannes Mehserle’s fatal shooting of an unarmed 22-year-old passenger, which sparked destructive riots across Oakland. Now Gee has cluelessly sent a memo on his own letterhead instructing rank-and-file officers how to send money, food, books and letters to Mehserle at Santa Rita Jail where he is being held on murder charges.

Why: This latest tin-eared episode surfaced at the same time as a previously unseen cell-phone video showing a second BART officer apparently hitting an unresisting Oscar Grant III just before the shooting — contradicting the BART internal report that all other officers at the scene behaved professionally.

Fallout: Attorney John Burris, representing the dead man’s family in a $25 million claim against BART, said Grant’s mother was “appalled” by the memo. She has every right to be.

Meanwhile, Punchy Pirone’s lawyer Bill Rapoport is so desperate that he’s actually going to argue that Punchy was provoked. And that Punchy was trying to protect his partner, a female officer.

It is contrary to our own eyes. Several men, including Oscar Grant, were seated with their backs against the wall, surrounded by cops. Out of the blue, and for no apparent reason, Punchy Pirone can be seen marching into the frame from the lefthand side. He’s pointing at a seated Oscar Grant. You can clearly see Punchy directing speech, seemingly toward Oscar Grant, along with the pointing.

You can clearly see Oscar responding to what might have been an order. After all, if you were seated on your ass, with your back to the wall, surrounded by cops… and a big, burly cop comes aggressively toward you, pointing at you and directing his speech at you… you’d probably stand up as well. Maybe you were told to stand up. Or maybe you were standing up to try to be polite, a trained social reflex: officer addresses you, you sit up straight and comply with orders.

See, once Punchy Pirone arrives in the immediate area (which had been controlled before his immediate presence), he physically assaults Oscar Grant and is screaming at him.

Watch the video again. Closely.

How any sane person can say that it was necessary for anyone’s safety, that Punchy Pirone walk up onto a controlled scene, and assault someone? Turning it, ultimately, into a murder scene?

As Oscar was seated, surrounded by officers, he could not have been assaulting Punchy’s female partner. It is scientifically impossible. How can you do both at the same time? Unless we’re talking about theoretical quantum physics or something, where… in this universe Punchy Pirone will be rolling up on and then punching and screaming at an unarmed man sitting on the floor, but in another universe Punchy Pirone will be walking up to Oscar to give him a bouquet of roses and ask for his hand in marriage—and yet in another universe Punchy Pirone will be wearing a tutu and spinning ’round and ’round in a lovely pirouette. And so on.

It’s not possible. We’ve seen the videos. We know. We cannot unknow, after having seen it with our own eyes.