Bored Oklahoma teens who shot a random jogger in the back are being tried as adults not juveniles because "it was an adult crime"; though killing while bored seems a juvenile crime by definition. So does immediately confessing a motive, "we were bored," to the police, it would seem to me. But there's more. Despite the confessions, it was not immediately clear who pulled the trigger as the three teens trailed their victim, Australian college baseball player Christopher Lane, in their car, then sped away to find a next target. But that didn't stop Oklahoma police from charging just TWO of the boys with first degree murder, bail denied, with the third considered an accessory. I've provided the mug shots to give you a hint. For which 15 and 16 year-old do you think the state of Oklahoma is seeking the death penalty? (Spoiler: YES) And the older accessory --17 but white-- gets bail and will be tried as a juvenile. Pundits deride African American leaders for not decrying the Lane murder like they did that of Trayvon Martin, presumably because the victim was white. But I'll ask where is the community outcry for young James Edwards and Chancy Luna, joy-killers
Tag: Poverty
US Court today declares legal discrimination through marriage benefits denied to be wrong; but is that all there is to it?
Here it is, society was discriminating all along against the Gay community by denying Gays certain benefits allowed married heterosexuals, and the US courts are beginning to rule that as having been wrong. We should applaud that! However, now the courts should also begin to rule it wrong that children are forced into poverty by economic discrimination against their usually, quite heterosexual parents. That's right! Just look some at the poverty statistics, Please. 34052
Holmes Sweet Holmes
For NMania1: Thanks for the Voice And for Bob Holmes: I love you Bob, I swear. But you deserve this. Don't feel too sad--I deserve much worse. 28686
Colorado Springs corruption detectives sniff desperation of lottery ticket clerks
You'd think Colorado Springs' many kleptocrats, considering our locale's famously embarrassing lower than average IQ, must be stupid enough to get caught. Other than the odd treasurer with a gambling habit, law enforcement is not going after them. Instead, according to an article in today's Gazette, local detectives are policing convenience store clerks, exposing the corruption of workers who have to tender anything over a five into a time-lock safe. A Colorado Lotto sting operation busted two out of twenty clerks surveyed this weekend who pretended their customers had losing tickets, and who later tried to redeem the tickets for themselves. One of the corrupted employees worked at the west side Farmcrest, now she's on the lam, so I have a personal interest in calling the sweep an entrapment. 27140
Howard Zinn disses civil obedience
"Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders and millions have been killed because of this obedience. Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty, starvation, stupidity, war and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves and the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem." --Howard Zinn
Temporarily embarrassed millionaires cursing guilty Casey Anthony, as theft of Social Security and Medicare begins
Thinking about the Tea Party Poor: "Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires." — John Steinbeck Think our judicial system is broke? It is, but not because it gave young Bad Mom Casey Anthony a chasmic benefit of the doubt. It's broken because of Walmart, Citizens United, and all the corporatist, anti-democratic rulings that guarantee that ordinary Americans no longer have recourse in the courts.
Bob Holmes said he cares for Homeless PEOPLE
...but that homeless women breed like rabbits. And while I wasn't there at the rally at UCCS or however the hell they put it, it strikes me that it's incredibly unlikely that he used the PEOPLE noun to modify the "homeless" adjective. I've noticed a tendency among the Repub/Tea Potty "leaders" here to forget that part. So, Bob, it's like this bubba. Seriously. Your Pomar Foundation welcomed George W into town for a Blasphemy Session yesterday. Guess you're a supporter of his policies, yes? See, he and Your Party don't just kill people with bullets and bombs. Although I suspect that's your prefered method. No, they also kill people by manipulating economic systems to favor a very few wealthy at the expense of a very huge large humongous outrageously big majority of the people, many of whom suffer from such diseases of Society as a result thereof, as Homelessness. Your Heroic Lion-Heart Bush made and indeed, as a consultant still makes, for instance Mexico into a nightmare state. His puppet dictators there have, at the insistence of YOUR Right Wing fellow-travelers, destroyed Mexico's economy using the same techniques they're applying to the economy of the United States today. The fast answer
1/2 million in London in Pre-wedding drama
Demonstrating against cuts which force austerity on the poorest... but not on the richest. They've already (the protesters) once gotten their hands on Charles' car with him and lovely bride Camel-face errr his lovely camel Camilla, errr never mind over cutting education. Sound familiar? What that demonstrated was that the police tactic of "kettling" didn't work. Not if it's strategically outmaneuvered, instead of ONE or only several larger demonstrations, have a whole bunch of demonstrations all around the "kettle". Kettle the police in other words. While planning for his son's wedding. A huge Taxpayer Subsidized affair blatantly stating "Ha-Ha, we're rich, you're not, suck on it you Silly Peasants!" much like our own Self-Anointed Royals here in Colorado Springs. (Hi, Princess Lisa!) or Scott Walker in Wisconsin or the Emperor Brothers Koch. They attempted a "Let them eat cake" maneuver saying how the poor, wretched starving Royals had to "tighten their budget as well" for instance the newly created Princess will have to ride in a Previously Owned Rolls Royce! A, Qu'elle Horreur!!! Imagine the shame of the Royals being seing in public in a Used Car!!??? I personally believe Prince William will look quite handsome at the guillotine or, for the
Labor Rally In Austin commemorated Fallen Workers
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Shocking Gag-Zette Headline!
Poverty spread in County since 2000. Oh My. The Gagzette is now recognizing that there are actual poor people in the city.And County. That's the shocking part of the news. For those who aren't in Colorado Springs, and don't know, that would sound like they've got their heads buried so far up their colons that they just didn't actually realize, well... that's part of it but not the whole story. The whole story is their journalistic commedy act is like Fox Lite and they steadfastly deny that the same market forces that concentrate the vast majority of the wealth into the hands of a tiny minority of the people, would just by a bizarre co-inky dink mean that the wealth is snatched from the hands of those who are subsequently labeled "The Poor" and "The Workforce" and "those scurvy beggardly welfare bums". Adam Smith with his "Invisible Hand" crap strikes again. Oh, and it happened during the reign of Emperor George the 2nd, aka the Chimpleton. Whose first act as president was to cut taxes for the richest, eliminated some corporate tax debt, cut regulatory "excesses" like the half measures which were designed to keep the Rich Bitch vermin from poisoning
Pueblo Bank “refuses to take Bailout money” explained
What they don't tell you in the commercial, with the president of the bank loudly saying tough-talking anti-"socialist" trash... is that the money they're refusing to "take" is not money targeted to the bank itself, but the people whose mortgages are owned by the bank. The bottom line is that the money is specifically Targeted, "earmarked" to people the Banker considers not worthy of the title human, he would prefer the terms "deadbeat" or "Loan thief" to describe those at the bottom of the heap, those taken in by the slick-dick advertising promoted by, among others, officials of his bank. "Why didn't they read the anywhere between 8 and 21 page documents, mostly single spaced small-type sentences and paragraphs filled with phrases like "party of the second part agrees to indemnify party of the first part"? in the 25 minutes alloted to the sales pitch? OUR HIGHLY EXPERIENCED HIGH PRESSURE SALES AGENTS WHO 19520
Army Career “opportunities”
We've seen the ads, "Join the Military and get job training that employers want".. yeah right. One of my friends in El Paso was at the time a Scout for the Third Herd, 3rd Armored Cavalry. Stationed at Ft Bliss but spent most of his time (between the constant wars in which America has been engaged, unofficially) in this patch of Hell called MacGregor Range sandwiched between the limits of Ft Bliss, Biggs Army Air Field, White Sands Missile Range and Holloman AFB. His take on it was the job opportunities using his training would be either working as a cop or a hitman. (Personal aside, I don't make any distinction at all between the two jobs.) A double-digit percentage of the unemployed in Colorado are veterans. That's about twice the percentage of the population who are veterans. The TeeVee college ads, trade schools actually, because the Wealthiest don't want to spring for a real academic education, they want to keep us firmly planted in the Servant Class, make promises to recently discharged Veterans that strongly echo the lies of the Military Recruiters. "get training the employers are looking for". You know, it would be a Hell of a lot easier for
G7 vow to cancel Haiti Debt…
30 years too late. Mighty white of them. Swiss courts delayed announcing their decision, hours before the Earthquake, to reinstate the money stolen from Haiti by the Dvalier family, with the help of the CIA and Pentagon, and Swiss banks along with other multinational banking Corporations, to the Duvaliers. Not to Haiti. One Swiss official said that it's customary to wait several weeks before announcing court decisions. 14481
Child labor behind White Christmas
Child victims of American desperation
I like this last picture of Shaniya Davis, taken it appears, on the ordinary occasion of a new cellphone camera. The five-year-old's body was just recovered by North Carolina police. Her mother Antoinette Davis, 25, has been arrested on charges of selling her daughter into prostitution. 11702
Woe to the lowly in Rio
Despite the efforts of Oprah and the Obamas, it didn't take the International Olympic Committee long to eliminate Chicago from the competition to host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. Expected to be one of the final two candidates, the city was ousted in the first round. I'm sure this intends a complex message to reach feeble American-warmonger-greedy-capitalist-bully-imperialist-fat-faced-consumer-run-amok ears, and one that I'm sure we'll not take time to understand. Okay, so, whatever. 9542
Since the subject came up…
Some of our Anti-Worker friends have tried to point out the error of our collective way and convince us that the Boss-Man is only looking out for our best interest, and we should feel privileged to work for less than it costs us to survive, and raise our families, and one day perhaps retire... in other words, the amount it takes US to produce our labor. Since we'd then have to find some other ways to survive in anything more than Abject Poverty, we would not only be working essentially for free, for the One Master, we would have to subsidize it with outside labor. In Short, WE would be paying for the privilege of working, for King Soopers or whoever else. 8097
To think some of them live in our town…
Murdering coward Minutemen. This is one of their latest outrages. The robbery and murder of an American Latino family. Actually they left one survivor, but the father and his NINE year old daughter were mowed down in their own homes. 8091
Trickle-up Poverty, the DarkSide of Voodoo Reaganomics…
There's a Fake Arabian Nights story, about Aladdin. Seems he didn't get the hang of the Genie all that quickly, he had a few mishaps along the way. 4948
Delinquencia vs Los Evangelicos and those caught in between
I haven't yet written anything about my Nicaragua trip and I hesitated to do so without giving it some thought. Just what did I see when I was there and how to explain it to my fellow Americans... lol? 3514
Poverty beyond our comprehension
Income distribution according to religion
Income Distribution of U.S. Religious Traditions -PEW %Pop. Sample Religious Tradition
Who’s your daddy?
It is the mainstay of both standard American law and the afternoon talk show and TV judge programs. It is the sad and sick concentration on tracking down the biological dad and making him pay.... literally. 2458
Perspective on poverty for children
The minimum wage and Colo Spgs establishment.
You know those signs all over downtown and every park in the city, that say not to give money to panhandlers? Written by people who are supposedly Experts in the area of homelessness. I personally have had people approach me and hand me money. I couldn't work out a mechanism within my psyche to go up to strangers and ask for any kind of help. But the money came in handy. I bought food with it mostly, fuel for my camp stove, feed the machines at the laundromat to have clean clothes and bedding. I believe that even for the most addicted amongst the homeless, at least some of the money actually goes on their needs and not just cigarettes, whiskey and wild wild women. 881