Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category

« Older Entries

Random notes: May 18, 2013.

Saturday, May 18th, 2013

Not news: New York State Assemblyman Vito J. Lopez (D-Brooklyn) has been accused of sexually harassing several women.

News: Assemblyman Lopez is resigning rather than fighting the charges.

FARK: Soon to be former Assemblyman Lopez plans to run for a seat on the NYC City Council.

The Assembly has not expelled anyone since it ejected five socialists in the early 1920s.

About a month ago, I noted the money laundering and gambling charges against Hillel Nahmad, a prominent member of the NYC art scene. Over the past two days, the NYT has run two longish articles going into more detail about the Nahmad accusations:

  1. Shocked, shocked I am to find out that high-stakes gambling goes on in NYC.
  2. “Information about how the family’s art business actually works has been difficult to pin down. In several settings, the Nahmads have described a company called the International Art Center as their base of art transactions. But in a federal suit last year the Nahmads sought to deny any legal connection between themselves and the center. Lawyers for the other side in that case said they were not even able to determine where the International Art Center was incorporated. A Christie’s invoice in the case showed the center’s location as Switzerland, but the auction house redacted the city and precise address before entering the document into court records. In a deposition in another lawsuit, Helly Nahmad said the International Art Center was based not in Switzerland but in Panama.”

Meanwhile in Utah, the West Valley City Police Department has problems.

Prosecutors have tossed out 125 criminal cases. Dozens of convictions may have to be re-examined. The F.B.I. is investigating the Police Department and several officers.

It all started when two undercover officers shot and killed a 21-year-old woman.

As police investigators combed through the crime scene, they popped opened the trunk of the car belonging to Detective Shaun Cowley — one of two narcotics officers who had been on the scene of the shooting. Inside, they found drug paraphernalia and items linked to previous drug cases.

More:

They found that officers had mishandled evidence and had placed tracking devices on suspects’ cars without getting necessary warrants. Confidential informers had been misused. In some cases, officers had removed trinkets like necklaces or candles from the scene of drug arrests as “trophies.” In a few instances, drugs and money were missing.

And:

The pattern was repeated in case after case, defense lawyers said: When they decided to challenge drug charges rather than accept a quick guilty plea, West Valley City folded up the cases. Then the district attorney, after reviewing hundreds of cases, began dismissing them by the dozen, saying he could not successfully prosecute them.

Posted in Art, Clippings, Law, Politics | No Comments »

“No! No, not Detroit! No! No, please! Anything but that! No! No!”

Monday, May 13th, 2013

In a report to be presented to Michigan’s treasurer on Monday, Kevyn D. Orr, the emergency manager appointed in March to take over operations here, described long-term obligations of at least $15 billion, unsustainable cash flow shortages and miserably low credit ratings that make it difficult to borrow.

More:

“No one should underestimate the severity of the financial crisis,” Mr. Orr said in a statement issued by his office on Sunday. “The path Detroit has followed for more than 40 years is unsustainable and only a complete restructuring of the city’s finances and operations will allow Detroit to regain its footing and return to a path of prosperity.”

And:

“It’s not as bad as what they’re trying to make it out to be,” Edward L. McNeil, a local official for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said on Sunday. Mr. McNeil had not viewed a copy of Mr. Orr’s report, which was not made public until late Sunday, but he said he had grown accustomed to overly negative assessments of Detroit by the state and its representatives.

“All of this was a cooked deal for them to take control of the city and take the assets,” Mr. McNeil said. “This has been a sham.”

(Subject line hattip.)

Posted in Clippings, Politics | No Comments »

Random notes: May 12, 2013.

Sunday, May 12th, 2013

Remember Detective Louis Scarcella, aka one of the “likeable scamps” who put David Ranta away for 22 years?

The other shoe has dropped.

The [Brooklyn district attorney's] office’s Conviction Integrity Unit will reopen every murder case that resulted in a guilty verdict after being investigated by Detective Louis Scarcella, a flashy officer who handled some of Brooklyn’s most notorious crimes during the crack epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s.

More:

The development comes after The New York Times examined a dozen cases involving Mr. Scarcella and found disturbing patterns, including the detective’s reliance on the same eyewitness, a crack-addicted prostitute, for multiple murder prosecutions [Emphasis added - DB] and his delivery of confessions from suspects who later said they had told him nothing. At the same time, defense lawyers, inmates and prisoner advocacy organizations have contacted the district attorney’s office to share their own suspicions about Mr. Scarcella.

And more. I don’t want to quote the entire article, but this is an important paragraph because it illustrates a key point: what you post on the Internet doesn’t disappear.

A prosecutor’s view of Ms. Gomez is available in an Internet posting on a cigar-smokers forum. Neil Ross, a former assistant district attorney who is now a Manhattan criminal court judge, prosecuted the two Hill cases. In a 2000 posting, he reminisced about a cigar he received from the “legendary detective” Louis Scarcella as they celebrated in a bar after the Hill conviction.

In the post, Mr. Ross said that the evidence backed up Ms. Gomez but acknowledged, “It was near folly to even think that anyone would believe Gomez about anything, let alone the fact that she witnessed the same guy kill two different people.”

Ms. Gomez is the crack addicted prostitute mentioned above. She’s dead now.

Have you ever wondered what it is like to manage a motel in the Rundberg/I-35 area? The Statesman has your answer.

(Note to my out-of-town readers: the Rundberg/I-35 corridor is notorious as a haven for drug dealing and prostitution.)

Austin politics note (readers who aren’t into Austin politics can skip this one):

We had an election yesterday. Specifically, we were asked to vote on bonds for the Austin Independent School District.

There were four bond proposals on the ballot, totaling $892 million. That’s right: AISD wanted to issue nearly one billion dollars worth of bonds.

This is one of the few times where I’ve actually seen organized opposition to a bond election in Austin. There were a lot of large “vote no” signs in yards and in front of businesses. Surprisingly, even the Statesman came out and opposed the bonds. (Our local alternative newspaper, the Austin Chronicle, endorsed the bonds. But the AusChron has never met a tax, a bond issue, or a government boondoggle they didn’t like.)

The end result: half the bonds passed, and half the bonds failed. This is kind of a “WTF?” moment: you’d figure the voting would go all one way or the other. Then again…

Proposition 2, which totaled $234 million, would have relieved overcrowded schools, which district officials said were among the most critical needs on campuses. The proposition contained three new schools and campus additions that district officials say are desperately needed. It also would have funded a 500-seat performing arts center at the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, something critics called a luxury.

“a 500-seat performing arts center at the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders”?!

Proposition 4 would have provided $168.6 million for academic programs, fine arts and athletics. That measure had several controversial proposals in it, most notably $20 million for renovations to the old Anderson High School to create an all-boys school.

Those are the propositions that failed.

Proposition 1, which passed by just a few hundred votes, will provide $140.6 million for health, environment, equipment and technology. The bulk of Proposition 1 will go to technology upgrades, including new computers and networks, and will pump money into energy conservation initiatives.

Proposition 3, the other one that passed, “provides money for renovations across the district”. Proposition 1 and 3 together total out to $489.6 million, and “will add $38.40 to the property tax bill for a $200,000 home.”

Posted in Austin, Clippings, Cops, Law, Politics, Safety | No Comments »

Obit watch: April 8, 2013.

Monday, April 8th, 2013

It hasn’t been a good few days for the movies.

Noted documentary filmmaker Les Blank passed away on Sunday. NYT. LAT. Edited to add: A/V Club (they were late in getting their obit up).

My favorite Les Blank story:

Perhaps his best-known films concern Mr. Herzog, the German director of films like “Aguirre, the Wrath of God” and “Stroszek.” To encourage his student and friend Errol Morris to finish his long-talked-about film on pet cemeteries, Mr. Herzog had said that when it was done he would eat his shoes. The impetus worked: Mr. Morris finished the film (“Gates of Heaven”) in 1978, and Mr. Herzog kept his promise, boiling his leather desert boots in duck fat (and stuffing them with garlic) at Chez Panisse, the celebrated restaurant in Berkeley, and consuming them — partly, anyway — onstage at a local theater. Mr. Blank turned it into a comic, and rather touching, 20-minute film about what artists do for the sake of art, appropriately titled “Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe” (1979).

Blank’s most famous film is another one involving Herzog: “Burden of Dreams” about Herzog and the making of “Fitzcarraldo”.

Margaret Thatcher: LAT. NYT. Battleswarm. I apologize if I seem to be giving her short shrift: my feeling is that everyone who doesn’t live under a rock is aware of her passing, and I am just linking to the obits here for the historical record.

Posted in Clippings, Movies, Obits, Politics | No Comments »

Quote of the day.

Friday, April 5th, 2013

No kidding: this the actual quotation of the day in today’s NYT:

“It becomes more and more difficult to avoid the sad conclusion that political corruption in New York is indeed rampant and that a show-me-the-money culture in Albany is alive and well.”

-Preet Bharara, United States attorney in Manhattan.

Posted in Clippings, Law, Politics | No Comments »

Random notes: April 3, 2013.

Wednesday, April 3rd, 2013

Some notes from the legal beat to get things started:

Javaris Crittenton is being charged with murder and “gang activity”. Crittenton is a former NBA player with the Lakers, Wizards, and Grizzlies. You may remember him as “that guy who got into a locker room altercation with Gilbert Arenas that ended with guns being pulled and a 38-game suspension”.

Meanwhile, in Arizona, Louis C. Taylor has been freed from prison. Mr. Taylor served 42 years before his release: he was convicted of starting a hotel fire in 1970, when he was 16, and sentenced to 28 life terms. However, it looks like the evidence used to convict Mr. Taylor was questionable, and (if I read the article correctly) the prosecution withheld exculpatory evidence.

Mr. Taylor’s release offered him only a small measure of redemption. Under an agreement with prosecutors in Pima County, he entered a no-contest plea during an hourlong court hearing, which set aside his original conviction and gave him credit for the time he had spent behind bars. The arrangement means that he did not admit guilt, but because he did not contest the charges, he is effectively barred from suing anyone who had a role in his conviction.

And:

Prosecutors, in filings and at Tuesday’s hearing, said they still believed Mr. Taylor was guilty, but chose to accept the agreement because they would not have been able to pursue a new trial. The evidence is too old and scarce, and there are not enough living witnesses, they said.

Of course they believe Mr. Taylor was guilty. God forbid they should admit someone served 42 years for what may not have even been a crime.

On Tuesday, [New York State Senator Malcolm A. Smith], Councilman [Daniel J.] Halloran and the Republican Party leaders were charged with wire fraud and bribery. The senator was also charged with extortion.

Senator Smith is accused of trying to bribe his way onto the ballot for the mayor’s race in New York City.

The complaint described envelopes of cash trading hands in Manhattan hotel rooms and restaurants, payments of thousands of dollars to persuade Republican leaders in New York to put Senator Smith, from Queens, on the Republican ballot in November. The bribes were to be paid to obtain certificates authorizing him to run for mayor as a Republican even though he was a registered Democrat.

Wait. What?

In case you were wondering, Robert “Ratso” Rizzo’s trial on corruption charges is scheduled for September. Ratso’s former assistant, Angela Spaccia, is asking for a separate trial.

From the department of things that suck: noted SF author Ian Banks is dying. Many of my friends, including Lawrence, are big Banks fans. I never got into his work, personally: the only Banks book I own is Raw Spirit: In Search of the Perfect Dram, his non-fiction book about touring Scotland in search of single-malts. But I know that Banks was a hugely important SF writer, and this is just a damn shame.

Firing watch: Mike Rice out as basketball coach of Rutgers after video of him acting like an a–hole becomes public.

Posted in Books, California Über Alles, Clippings, Firings, Law, Obits, Politics, Schadenfreude, Sports | No Comments »

J’accuse!

Monday, April 1st, 2013

I, and the many other Americans I speak for, and the voices in my head (who I also speak for) demand to know:

Why has the Obama Administration not taken decisive action to resolve the Iowahawk hostage crisis, which is now in day 175?

Does the administration want people to believe they can’t spare even one AC-130 set to “frappe”?

The American people want answers, Mister President!

Posted in Clippings, Politics | No Comments »

Random notes: March 28, 2013.

Thursday, March 28th, 2013

Lawrence threw me a nice backlink yesterday, pointing out that Bloomberg’s tobacco proposals will just put money in the pockets of organized crime.

But surely there’s hope for NYC? Surely they’ve learned and will elect someone unlike Bloomberg?

Nope. The NYT profiles Joseph J. Lhota, deputy mayor under Rudy Giuliani and censorious asshat.

Now, as Mr. Lhota promotes himself as a moderate Republican candidate for mayor of New York with urban sensibilities that the national party lacks, his handling of the episode stands out as a deeply discordant moment, raising questions about how he would operate in a diverse city whose current mayor champions unpleasant speech from every quarter.

Hahahhahaha. Bloomberg, champion of free speech. Unless it is about guns. Or tobacco. Or soda. Or food.

Obit watch: James Herbert, noted British horror novelist.

Posted in Art, Books, Clippings, Law, Obits, Politics | No Comments »

Don’t be evil (part 2)

Wednesday, March 27th, 2013

Imagine filing your income taxes in five minutes — and for free. You’d open up a pre-filled return, see what the government thinks you owe, make any needed changes and be done. The miserable annual IRS shuffle, gone.

Great idea. Why don’t we have it?

One word: Intuit.

This doesn’t come as a great shock to me, but I stopped using Intuit products years ago: TurboTax was DRM infested, and the Mac versions of Quicken became steaming piles of crap. I haven’t seen anything that would make me want to go back to using an Intuit product again, ever.

Posted in Clippings, Politics, Stupid | No Comments »

There’s a word for this.

Saturday, March 23rd, 2013

My sister and her family (who I love dearly) gave me this shirt for Christmas.

I was wearing it this afternoon when I went to REI, as I also planned to wear it to the blogmeet as a recognition signal. Anyway, I’m standing in the checkout line at REI, not even thinking about the shirt, when one of the clerks looks at me…

…and says, “Hey! I have that shirt at home!”

Not what I expected at REI, but between that and clerks at B&N who want to discuss how GD dumb the proposed assault weapons ban is, I believe that word is: Winning!

Posted in Clothing, Guns, Politics, Shirts | No Comments »

You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! watch. (Part 1 of what I hope will be a more than infrequent series)

Saturday, February 16th, 2013

Jessie Jackson, Jr. has been charged with…

… one count of conspiracy to commit false statements, mail fraud and wire fraud in the misuse of approximately $750,000 in campaign funds…

Yes, this is just an indictment; he hasn’t been convicted yet, but all the reporting I’ve seen is stating the indictment was the first step towards a plea deal, and Jackson does plan to plead guilty to at least some of the charges.

The allegations include:

According to the WP, while the co-conspirator was not named, “the description makes clear that [Mrs. Jackson] was the co-conspirator”. She hasn’t been charged in this case, but:

Jackson’s wife was charged with filing false income-tax returns from 2006 through 2011, according to a separate criminal information in her case. That charge has a maximum sentence of three years in prison.

The reporting I’ve seen provides some additional context for Jackson Jr.’s spending. This wasn’t “I needed to pay the house payment, so I took money out of campaign funds” spending:

I remember reading the stories that Jackson Jr. was absent from Congress and out of touch, and the eventual announcements he was being treated for depression, but I did not associate those with an on-going criminal investigation:

Jackson eventually fled Washington for psychological treatment, abandoning Capitol Hill for several weeks without telling congressional leaders why he was absent. Later in the summer of 2012, his office announced that he was being treated for depression at the Mayo Clinic, whose doctors issued a more detailed statement in mid-August saying he suffered from bipolar disorder. Despite his months-long absence from the District, Jackson won reelection Nov. 6 with 71 percent of the vote.

Posted in Clippings, Law, Politics | 1 Comment »

Today’s Austin quasi-gun show update.

Tuesday, February 5th, 2013

I have written previously about the activities of the Austin Public Safety Commission, an appointed “advisory body to the city council on all budgetary and policy matters concerning public safety, including matters related to the Austin Police Department, the Austin Fire Department, and the Austin/Travis County Emergency Medical Services Department.”

The Public Safety Commission, it should be noted, is different from the Greater Austin Crime Commission, which has engaged in gun buybacks in the past.

I call that point out because the Public Safety Commission issued a series of “recommendations” to the city council yesterday. As reported in the Statesman, APSC recommends:

  1. “banning the leasing of government-owned facilities to gun shows”.
  2. “vendors at such shows to conduct background screenings”. This doesn’t make a lot of sense: we’re going to ban gun shows on public property, but we’re going to require vendors to conduct background screenings at the gun shows we’ve banned? I don’t believe the city can require vendors to conduct background checks at gun shows on private property; I think this is superseded by state preemption law.
  3. “…enforcing a state law prohibiting the carrying of firearms — except by those with concealed hand gun permits — in public parks, public meetings of government bodies, non-firearm related events at schools, colleges or professional events and political rallies, parades and meetings.” Wow, that’s a daring recommendation, guys. Enforce existing law.
  4. Instruct the “Austin City Council, Travis County Commissioner’s Court and Austin Community College and Austin Independent School District boards of trustees” to “divest ownership in any companies that manufacture and sell assault weapons or high capacity magazines to the public”.
  5. “Direct the Austin Police Department and Travis County Sheriff’s Office to study gun buy-back programs and come back with recommendations.” Oh, boy, I hope they do. As you may have noted at the link above, the last gun buy-back turned into a gun show. If they have another buy-back, I’d love to take a shot at picking up some more nice older Smiths.
  6. “Collect data on guns used in crimes”. I’m not sure from the context of the Statesman article what this means. I was listening to KLBJ-AM briefly last night, and caught part of a story on the commission recommendations; apparently, what they’re looking for is information about where crime guns come from. Are they stolen, legally purchased, bought at gun shows, etc.?

It is perhaps also worth noting that former mayor Will Wynn and current mayor Lee Leffingwell are members of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and that Wynn is one of the members of that group who has been convicted of a criminal offense.

The more I hear out of these people, the better a recall election sounds.

Posted in Austin, Clippings, Guns, Law, Politics, Travis County | Comments Off

« Older Entries