Saturday, August 20, 2011
Sunday, August 14, 2011
SF transit blocks cellphones to disrupt protest
So the San Freako Radical Libs are all upset--they yell that this is a violation of Free Speech.
Typical Lib operation--proceeding with their heads up their ass.
First, anyone can buy a cell phone jammer on the internet, from $20 to over $2,000.
Secondly, since the late 1990's, anytime a president comes to town, a standard security tactic is to block cell phone traffic within a mile of the president's route of travel, or location of event.
=================================================================
An illegal, Orwellian violation of free-speech rights? Or just a smart tactic to protect train passengers from rowdy would-be demonstrators during a busy evening commute?
The question resonated Saturday in San Francisco and beyond as details emerged of Bay Area Rapid Transit officials' decision to cut off underground cellphone service for a few hours at several stations Thursday. Commuters at stations from downtown to near the city's main airport were affected as BART officials sought to tactically thwart a planned protest over the recent fatal shooting of a 45-year-old man by transit police.
Two days later, the move had civil rights and legal experts questioning the agency's move, and drew backlash from one transit board member who was taken aback by the decision.
"I'm just shocked that they didn't think about the implications of this. We really don't have the right to be this type of censor," said Lynette Sweet, who serves on BART's board of directors. "In my opinion, we've let the actions of a few people affect everybody. And that's not fair."
Similar questions of censorship have arisen in recent days as Britain's government put the idea of curbing social media services on the table in response to several nights of widespread looting and violence in London and other English cities. Police claim that young criminals used Twitter and Blackberry instant messages to coordinate looting sprees in riots.
Prime Minister David Cameron said that the government, spy agencies and the communications industry are looking at whether there should be limits on the use of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook or services like BlackBerry Messenger to spread disorder. The suggestions have met with outrage -- with some critics comparing Cameron to the despots ousted during the Arab Spring.
In the San Francisco instance, Sweet said BART board members were told by the agency of its decision during the closed portion of its meeting Thursday afternoon, less than three hours before the protest was scheduled to start.
"It was almost like an afterthought," Sweet told The Associated Press. "This is a land of free speech and for us to think we can do that shows we've grown well beyond the business of what we're supposed to be doing and that's providing transportation. Not censorship."
But there are nuances to consider, including under what conditions, if any, an agency like BART can act to deny the public access to a form of communication -- and essentially decide that a perceived threat to public safety trumps free speech.
These situations are largely new ones, of course. A couple of decades ago, during the fax-machine and pay-phone era, the notion of people organizing mass gatherings in real time on wireless devices would have been fantasy.
BART Deputy Police Chief Benson Fairow said the issue boiled down to the public's well-being.
"It wasn't a decision made lightly. This wasn't about free speech. It was about safety," Fairow told KTVU-TV on Friday.
BART spokesman Jim Allison maintained that the cellphone disruptions were legal as the agency owns the property and infrastructure. He added while they didn't need the permission of cellphone carriers to temporarily cut service, they notified them as a courtesy.
The decision was made after agency officials saw details about the protest on an organizer's website. He said the agency had extra staff and officers aboard trains during that time for anybody who wanted to report an emergency, as well as courtesy phones on station platforms.
"I think the entire argument is that some people think it created an unsafe situation is faulty logic," Allison said. "BART had operated for 35 years without cellphone service and no one ever suggested back then that a lack of it made it difficult to report emergencies and we had the same infrastructure in place."
But as in London, BART's tactic drew immediate comparisons to authoritarianism, including acts by the former president of Egypt to squelch protests demanding an end to his rule. Authorities there cut Internet and cellphone services in the country for days earlier this year. He left office shortly thereafter.
"BART officials are showing themselves to be of a mind with the former president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak," the Electronic Frontier Foundation said on its website. Echoing that comparison, vigorous weekend discussion on Twitter was labeled with the hashtag "muBARTek."
Aaron Caplan, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles who specializes in free-speech issues, was equally critical, saying BART clearly violated the rights of demonstrators and other passengers.
"We can arrest and prosecute people for the crimes they commit," he said. "You are not allowed to shut down people's cellphones and prevent them from speaking because you think they might commit a crime in the future."
Michael Risher, the American Civil Liberty Union's Northern California staff attorney, echoed the sentiment in a blog: "The government shouldn't be in the business of cutting off the free flow of information. Shutting down access to mobile phones is the wrong response to political protests, whether it's halfway around the world or right here in San Francisco."
On Saturday at the station where cell phone service was disrupted, passenger Phil Eager, 44, shared the opinion that BART's approach seemed extreme.
"It struck me as pretty strange and kind of extreme," said Eager, a San Francisco attorney. "It's not a First Amendment debate, but rather a civil liberties issue."
Eager said many of his friends riding BART on Thursday were upset with the agency's actions, some even calling it a "police state."
Mark Malmberg, 58, of Orinda, Calif., believes that BART could've used a different approach instead of shutting down cellphone usage.
"Even though it sounds like they wanted to avoid a mob gathering, you can't stop people from expressing themselves," Malmberg said. "I hope those who protest can do so in a civil manner."
The ACLU already has a scheduled meeting with BART's police chief on Monday about other issues and Thursday's incident will added be to the agenda, spokeswoman Rebecca Farmer said.
But others said that while the phone shutdown was worth examining, it may not have impinged on First Amendment rights. Gene Policinski, executive director of the First Amendment Center, a nonprofit educational organization, said freedom of expression can be limited in very narrow circumstances if there is an immediate threat to public safety.
"An agency like BART has to be held to a very high standard," he said. "First of all, it has to be an immediate threat, not just the mere supposition that there might be one. And I think the response has to be what a court would consider reasonable, so it has to be the minimum amount of restraint on free expression."
He said if BART's actions are challenged, a court may look more favorably on what it did if expression was limited on a narrow basis for a specific area and time frame, instead of "just indiscriminately closing down cellphone service throughout the system or for a broad area."
University of Michigan law professor Len Niehoff, who specializes in First Amendment and media law issues, found the BART actions troublesome for a few reasons.
He said the First Amendment generally doesn't allow the government to restrict free speech because somebody might do something illegal or to prohibit conversations based on their subject matter. He said the BART actions have been portrayed as an effort to prevent a protest that would have violated the law, but there was no guarantee that would have happened.
"What it really did is it prevented people from talking, discussing ... and mobilizing in any form, peaceful or unpeaceful, lawful or unlawful," he said. "That is, constitutionally, very problematic."
The government does have the right to break up a demonstration if it forms in an area where protests are prohibited and poses a risk to public safety, Niehoff said. But it should not prohibit free speech to prevent the possibility of a protest happening.
"The idea that we're going to keep people from talking about what they might or might not do, based on the idea that they might all agree to violate the law, is positively Orwellian," he said.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/08/13/san-francisco-transit-blocks-cellphones-to-hinder-protest/#ixzz1V2VfCPQZ
Typical Lib operation--proceeding with their heads up their ass.
First, anyone can buy a cell phone jammer on the internet, from $20 to over $2,000.
Secondly, since the late 1990's, anytime a president comes to town, a standard security tactic is to block cell phone traffic within a mile of the president's route of travel, or location of event.
=================================================================
An illegal, Orwellian violation of free-speech rights? Or just a smart tactic to protect train passengers from rowdy would-be demonstrators during a busy evening commute?
The question resonated Saturday in San Francisco and beyond as details emerged of Bay Area Rapid Transit officials' decision to cut off underground cellphone service for a few hours at several stations Thursday. Commuters at stations from downtown to near the city's main airport were affected as BART officials sought to tactically thwart a planned protest over the recent fatal shooting of a 45-year-old man by transit police.
Two days later, the move had civil rights and legal experts questioning the agency's move, and drew backlash from one transit board member who was taken aback by the decision.
"I'm just shocked that they didn't think about the implications of this. We really don't have the right to be this type of censor," said Lynette Sweet, who serves on BART's board of directors. "In my opinion, we've let the actions of a few people affect everybody. And that's not fair."
Similar questions of censorship have arisen in recent days as Britain's government put the idea of curbing social media services on the table in response to several nights of widespread looting and violence in London and other English cities. Police claim that young criminals used Twitter and Blackberry instant messages to coordinate looting sprees in riots.
Prime Minister David Cameron said that the government, spy agencies and the communications industry are looking at whether there should be limits on the use of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook or services like BlackBerry Messenger to spread disorder. The suggestions have met with outrage -- with some critics comparing Cameron to the despots ousted during the Arab Spring.
In the San Francisco instance, Sweet said BART board members were told by the agency of its decision during the closed portion of its meeting Thursday afternoon, less than three hours before the protest was scheduled to start.
"It was almost like an afterthought," Sweet told The Associated Press. "This is a land of free speech and for us to think we can do that shows we've grown well beyond the business of what we're supposed to be doing and that's providing transportation. Not censorship."
But there are nuances to consider, including under what conditions, if any, an agency like BART can act to deny the public access to a form of communication -- and essentially decide that a perceived threat to public safety trumps free speech.
These situations are largely new ones, of course. A couple of decades ago, during the fax-machine and pay-phone era, the notion of people organizing mass gatherings in real time on wireless devices would have been fantasy.
BART Deputy Police Chief Benson Fairow said the issue boiled down to the public's well-being.
"It wasn't a decision made lightly. This wasn't about free speech. It was about safety," Fairow told KTVU-TV on Friday.
BART spokesman Jim Allison maintained that the cellphone disruptions were legal as the agency owns the property and infrastructure. He added while they didn't need the permission of cellphone carriers to temporarily cut service, they notified them as a courtesy.
The decision was made after agency officials saw details about the protest on an organizer's website. He said the agency had extra staff and officers aboard trains during that time for anybody who wanted to report an emergency, as well as courtesy phones on station platforms.
"I think the entire argument is that some people think it created an unsafe situation is faulty logic," Allison said. "BART had operated for 35 years without cellphone service and no one ever suggested back then that a lack of it made it difficult to report emergencies and we had the same infrastructure in place."
But as in London, BART's tactic drew immediate comparisons to authoritarianism, including acts by the former president of Egypt to squelch protests demanding an end to his rule. Authorities there cut Internet and cellphone services in the country for days earlier this year. He left office shortly thereafter.
"BART officials are showing themselves to be of a mind with the former president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak," the Electronic Frontier Foundation said on its website. Echoing that comparison, vigorous weekend discussion on Twitter was labeled with the hashtag "muBARTek."
Aaron Caplan, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles who specializes in free-speech issues, was equally critical, saying BART clearly violated the rights of demonstrators and other passengers.
"We can arrest and prosecute people for the crimes they commit," he said. "You are not allowed to shut down people's cellphones and prevent them from speaking because you think they might commit a crime in the future."
Michael Risher, the American Civil Liberty Union's Northern California staff attorney, echoed the sentiment in a blog: "The government shouldn't be in the business of cutting off the free flow of information. Shutting down access to mobile phones is the wrong response to political protests, whether it's halfway around the world or right here in San Francisco."
On Saturday at the station where cell phone service was disrupted, passenger Phil Eager, 44, shared the opinion that BART's approach seemed extreme.
"It struck me as pretty strange and kind of extreme," said Eager, a San Francisco attorney. "It's not a First Amendment debate, but rather a civil liberties issue."
Eager said many of his friends riding BART on Thursday were upset with the agency's actions, some even calling it a "police state."
Mark Malmberg, 58, of Orinda, Calif., believes that BART could've used a different approach instead of shutting down cellphone usage.
"Even though it sounds like they wanted to avoid a mob gathering, you can't stop people from expressing themselves," Malmberg said. "I hope those who protest can do so in a civil manner."
The ACLU already has a scheduled meeting with BART's police chief on Monday about other issues and Thursday's incident will added be to the agenda, spokeswoman Rebecca Farmer said.
But others said that while the phone shutdown was worth examining, it may not have impinged on First Amendment rights. Gene Policinski, executive director of the First Amendment Center, a nonprofit educational organization, said freedom of expression can be limited in very narrow circumstances if there is an immediate threat to public safety.
"An agency like BART has to be held to a very high standard," he said. "First of all, it has to be an immediate threat, not just the mere supposition that there might be one. And I think the response has to be what a court would consider reasonable, so it has to be the minimum amount of restraint on free expression."
He said if BART's actions are challenged, a court may look more favorably on what it did if expression was limited on a narrow basis for a specific area and time frame, instead of "just indiscriminately closing down cellphone service throughout the system or for a broad area."
University of Michigan law professor Len Niehoff, who specializes in First Amendment and media law issues, found the BART actions troublesome for a few reasons.
He said the First Amendment generally doesn't allow the government to restrict free speech because somebody might do something illegal or to prohibit conversations based on their subject matter. He said the BART actions have been portrayed as an effort to prevent a protest that would have violated the law, but there was no guarantee that would have happened.
"What it really did is it prevented people from talking, discussing ... and mobilizing in any form, peaceful or unpeaceful, lawful or unlawful," he said. "That is, constitutionally, very problematic."
The government does have the right to break up a demonstration if it forms in an area where protests are prohibited and poses a risk to public safety, Niehoff said. But it should not prohibit free speech to prevent the possibility of a protest happening.
"The idea that we're going to keep people from talking about what they might or might not do, based on the idea that they might all agree to violate the law, is positively Orwellian," he said.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/08/13/san-francisco-transit-blocks-cellphones-to-hinder-protest/#ixzz1V2VfCPQZ
Thursday, August 11, 2011
London Riots: 'The Police Did Nothing'
The article below talks about London, England.
BUT, ladies and gentlemen, look for the same thing to happen here.
Police administrators are appointed by politicians, and the Administrators are themselves politicians. The follow Politicians Rule #1: Never piss off any person or group who can affect your career.
Police Administrators are big on IMAGE. They want to project an image that every officer is a kind-hearted public servant. Having to subdue some miscreant who has ascended the permissiveness ladder negates that image.
Should the miscreant get his/her ass kicked as the outcome of the struggle, there are always cries by his/her friends and family of "Police brutality" and "excessive force". Look for your Police Administrator TO INITIALLY SIDE WITH THE MISCREANT.
You-the police officer--will be reviewed by your city, state, and Federal prosecutors to determine if you did use "Excessive force".
Next up, some parasitic lawyer will file a suit against you for using "Excessive force". This can go on from a year to 5 years. In that time, you can not sell anything you own, because it might become part of the settlement or award to the miscreant.
So, you can see--There is no motivation for police officers to protect anyone outside of themselves. Why risk getting disabled and/or killed for ungrateful superiors and public?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904006104576500421787042468.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion
Cameras will eventually help the authorities round up some of the perpetrators, but they failed to prevent the lawlessness in the first place..
By ANNE JOLIS
London
Kamran Raif sits in front of the smashed windows of his brother's store in north London. It's Tuesday night, your correspondent needs soda, and this is the only 24-hour grocery within a mile.
A can of Red Bull at his side and fists jammed into his parka, 29-year-old Mr. Raif watches and waits. Like most of London after the previous three nights of mayhem, our stretch of Islington is tense but still.
The night before, at approximately 9:30 p.m., between 30 and 40 teenagers broke into the shop and left with all its liquor, cigarettes and cash. Mr. Raif, his brother and a handful of customers were inside at the time.
"I saw them coming and started to lock the doors, but they kicked through the glass and forced the doors open. All the customers ran to the back and my brother called the police," he recalls.
The storefront comes with a metal shutter, but the lock had been broken since Mr. Raif's brother bought the business four years ago. They never felt the need to fix it until this week.
Once inside, the looters snatched six-packs of Supermalt from the shelves nearest the entrance and hurled them at the cigarette and alcohol cases behind the register. To Mr. Raif they appeared to be 16 or younger and sober. He doesn't know if they were kids from the neighborhood, but despite their hoods and balaclavas he could tell "from their hands" that his looters were mostly white.
"They were very shameful. It was a horrible experience," he says.
The police never did appear, although they followed up nine hours later with a phone call. "Everything we pay here—taxes, rates, rents—it's all so expensive. And we can't even get the police when there are people robbing our shop." Mr. Raif pauses as a string of patrol cars and a fire truck speed down the street, heading north to a rougher neighborhood. "They were busy. I know."
By mid-morning Tuesday he and his brother had cleaned up, restocked and reopened.
"We got the metal shutter fixed too," he says, raising one eyebrow and glancing up. Neither of us mentions the Molotov cocktails and sledgehammers that have made fast work of similar barricades since Saturday. In Brixton, in Hackney, in Croydon many of the Raifs' peers have been ruined and won't be reopening.
"I've been here 12 years," says the Pakistan native. "I've never seen anything like it."
So what's the problem? Welfare cuts, racist police, the "rich"?
"Please," he laughs. "We're all poor.
"Look, my point of view is this: It started in Tottenham, on Saturday, when a man got shot by the police. People protested, and then some people went and burned down a police car. And the police did nothing. They burned down more police cars, they burned down a bus, they burned down a building—and the police did nothing. They needed to respond. Instead the police retreated in Tottenham. So this, whatever you call it, it started as something against the police. The police did not show the strength to push back, and it spread. And that is why I'm out here now like a security guard."
As we speak, "it" is spreading to Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Wolverhampton. Elsewhere in London, locals have formed vigilante groups and are patrolling their own streets.
Home Secretary Theresa May earlier on Tuesday had defended the government's use-of-force policies, declaring that "the way we police in Britain is not through use of water cannon. The way we police in Britain is through consent of communities."
Consent, and the most surveillance cameras per capita in the free world. It's been a terrible week for Westminster's brand of compassionate panopticism. This is what happens when consent breaks down. Cameras will eventually help the authorities round up some of the perpetrators, but they failed to prevent the lawlessness in the first place.
As for the Raif brothers, they have no army—only a shop to run. "Things are already hard. If we close down, where's the money going to come from? We stay open. We see now it's at our own risk. But this is our business."
Miss Jolis is an editorial page writer for The Wall Street Journal Europe.
BUT, ladies and gentlemen, look for the same thing to happen here.
Police administrators are appointed by politicians, and the Administrators are themselves politicians. The follow Politicians Rule #1: Never piss off any person or group who can affect your career.
Police Administrators are big on IMAGE. They want to project an image that every officer is a kind-hearted public servant. Having to subdue some miscreant who has ascended the permissiveness ladder negates that image.
Should the miscreant get his/her ass kicked as the outcome of the struggle, there are always cries by his/her friends and family of "Police brutality" and "excessive force". Look for your Police Administrator TO INITIALLY SIDE WITH THE MISCREANT.
You-the police officer--will be reviewed by your city, state, and Federal prosecutors to determine if you did use "Excessive force".
Next up, some parasitic lawyer will file a suit against you for using "Excessive force". This can go on from a year to 5 years. In that time, you can not sell anything you own, because it might become part of the settlement or award to the miscreant.
So, you can see--There is no motivation for police officers to protect anyone outside of themselves. Why risk getting disabled and/or killed for ungrateful superiors and public?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904006104576500421787042468.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion
Cameras will eventually help the authorities round up some of the perpetrators, but they failed to prevent the lawlessness in the first place..
By ANNE JOLIS
London
Kamran Raif sits in front of the smashed windows of his brother's store in north London. It's Tuesday night, your correspondent needs soda, and this is the only 24-hour grocery within a mile.
A can of Red Bull at his side and fists jammed into his parka, 29-year-old Mr. Raif watches and waits. Like most of London after the previous three nights of mayhem, our stretch of Islington is tense but still.
The night before, at approximately 9:30 p.m., between 30 and 40 teenagers broke into the shop and left with all its liquor, cigarettes and cash. Mr. Raif, his brother and a handful of customers were inside at the time.
"I saw them coming and started to lock the doors, but they kicked through the glass and forced the doors open. All the customers ran to the back and my brother called the police," he recalls.
The storefront comes with a metal shutter, but the lock had been broken since Mr. Raif's brother bought the business four years ago. They never felt the need to fix it until this week.
Once inside, the looters snatched six-packs of Supermalt from the shelves nearest the entrance and hurled them at the cigarette and alcohol cases behind the register. To Mr. Raif they appeared to be 16 or younger and sober. He doesn't know if they were kids from the neighborhood, but despite their hoods and balaclavas he could tell "from their hands" that his looters were mostly white.
"They were very shameful. It was a horrible experience," he says.
The police never did appear, although they followed up nine hours later with a phone call. "Everything we pay here—taxes, rates, rents—it's all so expensive. And we can't even get the police when there are people robbing our shop." Mr. Raif pauses as a string of patrol cars and a fire truck speed down the street, heading north to a rougher neighborhood. "They were busy. I know."
By mid-morning Tuesday he and his brother had cleaned up, restocked and reopened.
"We got the metal shutter fixed too," he says, raising one eyebrow and glancing up. Neither of us mentions the Molotov cocktails and sledgehammers that have made fast work of similar barricades since Saturday. In Brixton, in Hackney, in Croydon many of the Raifs' peers have been ruined and won't be reopening.
"I've been here 12 years," says the Pakistan native. "I've never seen anything like it."
So what's the problem? Welfare cuts, racist police, the "rich"?
"Please," he laughs. "We're all poor.
"Look, my point of view is this: It started in Tottenham, on Saturday, when a man got shot by the police. People protested, and then some people went and burned down a police car. And the police did nothing. They burned down more police cars, they burned down a bus, they burned down a building—and the police did nothing. They needed to respond. Instead the police retreated in Tottenham. So this, whatever you call it, it started as something against the police. The police did not show the strength to push back, and it spread. And that is why I'm out here now like a security guard."
As we speak, "it" is spreading to Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Wolverhampton. Elsewhere in London, locals have formed vigilante groups and are patrolling their own streets.
Home Secretary Theresa May earlier on Tuesday had defended the government's use-of-force policies, declaring that "the way we police in Britain is not through use of water cannon. The way we police in Britain is through consent of communities."
Consent, and the most surveillance cameras per capita in the free world. It's been a terrible week for Westminster's brand of compassionate panopticism. This is what happens when consent breaks down. Cameras will eventually help the authorities round up some of the perpetrators, but they failed to prevent the lawlessness in the first place.
As for the Raif brothers, they have no army—only a shop to run. "Things are already hard. If we close down, where's the money going to come from? We stay open. We see now it's at our own risk. But this is our business."
Miss Jolis is an editorial page writer for The Wall Street Journal Europe.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
RICK SANTELLI BLASTS CNBC GUEST FOR CALLING TEA PARTIERS ‘FREAKED OUT WHITE MEN WHO ARE UNEMPLOYED’
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/rick-santelli-blasts-cnbc-guest-for-calling-tea-partiers-freaked-out-white-men-who-are-unemployed/
Banking analyst Meredith Whitney was made to eat her words on CNBC Wednesday after she called Tea Party members “freaked out white men who are unemployed.” Rick Santelli, who appeared on the program shortly after Whitney’s rant, ended up launching into the CNBC contributor for her comments. And it got pretty heated.
Santelli stated that the last person who said anything close to what Whitney did was “King George” when he was referring to the “colonists.” Santelli inferred that Whitney would have thought our Founding Father’s were “angry” as well when he said, “I don’t need to rant… You know, those were our Founding Fathers.”
Santelli was responding to the following statement made by Whitney:
I would suggest that the debate is really around unemployment, and I think that, you know, call the Tea Party whatever you will, the fringe element is, you know, I characterize freaked out white men who are unemployed and have been unemployed for three years and they’re scared to death. And three to four million of them are just about to roll off of unemployment benefits in the next three months. So, this is only going to get worse. For this reason, you have to deal with structural issues. So, if you are a Machiavellian Democrat, you want to deal with this issue and defuse the Tea Party as fast as you possibly can, because this poses the biggest threat to their reelection I think in ’12.
NewsBuster’s Noel Sheppard adds:
For those unfamiliar with Santelli’s muni reference, Whitney has recently come under fire for having predicted eight months ago there would be widespread defaults by municipal bond issuers around the country this year.
As Bloomberg reported in July, during the first six months of 2011, muni defaults are down 60 percent compared to the same period last year.
Obviously aware of this, Santelli chose to pull that scab off in order to get back at the banking analyst.
Perhaps now CNBC guests would be well advised to steer clear of making negative remarks about the Tea Party — at least in Santelli’s presence.
Watch for yourself here:
Banking analyst Meredith Whitney was made to eat her words on CNBC Wednesday after she called Tea Party members “freaked out white men who are unemployed.” Rick Santelli, who appeared on the program shortly after Whitney’s rant, ended up launching into the CNBC contributor for her comments. And it got pretty heated.
Santelli stated that the last person who said anything close to what Whitney did was “King George” when he was referring to the “colonists.” Santelli inferred that Whitney would have thought our Founding Father’s were “angry” as well when he said, “I don’t need to rant… You know, those were our Founding Fathers.”
Santelli was responding to the following statement made by Whitney:
I would suggest that the debate is really around unemployment, and I think that, you know, call the Tea Party whatever you will, the fringe element is, you know, I characterize freaked out white men who are unemployed and have been unemployed for three years and they’re scared to death. And three to four million of them are just about to roll off of unemployment benefits in the next three months. So, this is only going to get worse. For this reason, you have to deal with structural issues. So, if you are a Machiavellian Democrat, you want to deal with this issue and defuse the Tea Party as fast as you possibly can, because this poses the biggest threat to their reelection I think in ’12.
NewsBuster’s Noel Sheppard adds:
For those unfamiliar with Santelli’s muni reference, Whitney has recently come under fire for having predicted eight months ago there would be widespread defaults by municipal bond issuers around the country this year.
As Bloomberg reported in July, during the first six months of 2011, muni defaults are down 60 percent compared to the same period last year.
Obviously aware of this, Santelli chose to pull that scab off in order to get back at the banking analyst.
Perhaps now CNBC guests would be well advised to steer clear of making negative remarks about the Tea Party — at least in Santelli’s presence.
Watch for yourself here:
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
NEBRASKA ATTORNEY GENERAL COMPARES WELFARE RECIPIENTS TO…RAVENOUS RACCOONS
n a recent speech, Nebraska Attorney General and 2012 GOP Senatorial candidate John Bruning drew an interesting analogy. With great fanfare, he compared welfare recipients to…ravenous raccoons.
In a video that was shot by a liberal group called the American Bridge 21st Century, the politician can be seen making the curious connection. In the clip, Bruning tells the audience a story about a local construction project that was stopped in its tracks so that it wouldn’t harm endangered species. TPM has more:
…Bruning makes the comparison as part of an elaborate metaphor originally focused on environmental regulations. He describes a requirement that workers at a construction project gather up endangered beetles by luring them into a bucket with a dead rat in order to release them elsewhere. But the plan is thwarted when hungry raccoons then eat them straight out of the rat-infested bucket. Which, according to Bruning, is a perfect image to illustrate how welfare recipients receive their benefits.
Watch Bruning’s comments, below:
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/nebraska-attorney-general-compares-welfare-recipients-to-ravenous-raccoons/
The Huffington Post provides a transcript:
“So the biologist has to go out there, and he sets these traps. They put a rat carcass in the bottom, and the beetles crawl up and they fall into the bottom of it. And they put all these buckets up and down the side of the road and they capture all the Burying Beetles. The biologist goes out in the morning, grabs the beetles, and they take them two miles down and they gently let the beetles out. So that the beetles will survive.
The raccoons figure out the beetles are in the bucket. And it’s like grapes in a jar. The raccoons, they’re not stupid, they’re going to do the easy way if we make it easy for them — just like welfare recipients all across America. If we don’t send them to work, they’re going to take the easy way out.”
Sunday, August 7, 2011
San Diego police officer shot in City Heights: one suspect remains at large
http://www.760kfmb.com/story/15222889/san-diego-police-officer-shot-in-city-heights-one-suspect-remains-at-large?redirected=true
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