“The next thing I heard was the shotguns” 3 May 2007
Posted by marisacat in Border Issues, California / Pacific Coast.trackback
Police used batons and fired rubber bullets to control a crowd gathered at the end of an immigrant rights march in MacArthur Park. (Rick Loomis / LAT)
I wanted to repost the link to Xicano Power’s May Day violence post at Para Justicia Y Libertad, he has three videos up and links to more at Chicano Forums.
LAT:
“I was dumbfounded,” said the KPCC reporter, Patricia Nazario. “I’ve covered riots. I’ve covered chaos. I was never hit or struck or humiliated the way the LAPD violated me yesterday.”
Nazario said she was walking away from riot police when she was hit in the back.
Wearing a press pass and holding a microphone, she turned around and told the officer, “Why did you hit me? I’m moving. I’m a reporter,” Nazario recalled.
Then the officer hit her on the left leg, she said, knocking her to the ground and sending her cellphone flying.
“I was shocked, trying to scramble to my feet,” she said. “At that point, I just started crying…. I just felt totally vulnerable.”
Pedro Sevcec was anchoring the evening news for Telemundo when he saw the riot police moving slowly toward the news crews.
A few dozen people had gathered to watch Sevcec do his live broadcast.
“The next thing I heard was the shotguns,” he said.
Police knocked over monitors and lights and hit reporters and camera operators with batons, he said.
Sevcec said police hit him three times and pointed a riot gun at his face before pushing him out of the park.
A police officer takes aim at crowds gathered in MacArthur Park Tuesday afternoon. (Rick Loomis LAT)
And, well, fine, but that [police going after reporters and crew] is not all that happened. I think Bratton is attempting a little diversion:
Police Chief William J. Bratton, who promised an investigation, said at a news conference Wednesday that a key part of the inquiry into the officers’ actions would focus on why they used force against members of the media.
“We should never be engaged in attacking anyone in the media,” Bratton said.
… yes, let’s give another of Rudy’s finest (Bratton and Guiliani did not get along, but perhaps too much was made of that) the benefit of the doubt. We can always endure another blue ribbon commission.
LAT has several pieces up on the events in MacArthur Park… link to officials, activists commentary and eyewitness recollections:
Maritza Alvarez, 36, a filmmaker who was at the northwest corner of MacArthur Park:
“I had a long lens and was able to see a rush of people running into the park. I can tell you [the police] were just shooting indiscriminately. I saw them beat up an elderly man, they knocked his knees down, children were crying. … I’m telling you, it was military-style, there was a commander there saying, ‘One, two, shoot,’ and we were trying to duck behind trees, running. We had to hide behind the stage at one point, we couldn’t even turn our backs. They’re lying when they said they warned us. There was no warning at all.”
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is traveling in El Salvador:
“Yesterday, across the country, we witnessed a day of overwhelmingly peaceful speeches and assemblies in the best American tradition. … Any time that our law enforcement officials employ force, the public has an absolute and unqualified right to expect and demand an aggressive review of the facts. This review is already underway.”
LAPD Chief William J. Bratton:
“Police use of force in any context is always visibly and emotionally upsetting, even when necessary and lawful. Our challenge in reviewing and investigating the actions of the department and its officers and that of the public is to determine if that use of force was an appropriate response to the level of threat, disturbance and danger that they are encountering.”
Blue ribboned commissions headed our way… as I poke around and find other posts on the May Day will throw them up on the page…
Demonstrators stand their ground during a confrontation with police at the end of an immigrant rights march in MacArthur Park. (Rick Loomis / LAT)
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I also wanted to pull a comment of Madman’s forward, with a link to a report on the AL militia men who were arrested recently…
Madman in the Marketplace:
before I head to work:
Ala. 5 accused of planning to machine-gun latinos
Five members of a self-styled militia were denied bail Tuesday after a federal agent testified they planned a machine gun attack on Mexicans, but a judge approved bail for a sixth man.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Armstrong said he could not grant bail to the five because of the agent’s testimony and the amount of weapons — including about 200 homemade hand grenades — that were seized in raids Friday in northeast Alabama.
“I’m going to be worried if I let these individuals go at this time,” he said.
Adam Nesmith, an agent with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, testified that the five — Raymond Kirk Dillard, 46; Adam Lynn Cunningham, 41; Bonnell Hughes, 57; Randall Garrett Cole, 22; and James Ray McElroy, 20 — planned a machine-gun attack on Mexicans in Remlap, a town just north of Birmingham, and went there on a reconnaissance mission April 20. The agent provided no further details.
During the raids last week, agents recovered 130 homemade hand grenades, a grenade launcher, about 70 hand grenades rigged to be fired from a rifle, a machine gun, a short-barrel shotgun and 2,500 rounds of ammunition, authorities said. [snip]
The judge approved $10,000 bail for the sixth defendant, 30-year-old Michael Wayne Bobo, at a later hearing. Bobo, who is being kept in custody until at least Wednesday, was charged with being a drug user in possession of a firearm. The other five were charged with conspiring to make a firearm.
ATF agent Larry Alt testified that investigators who searched Bobo’s home found two rooms loaded with guns and possible explosives components, including fireworks, ball bearings, primers, mouse traps, light bulbs and fertilizer. The man lived in two upstairs rooms in his parents’ home in Trusville, Alt testified.
If they weren’t righties they’d be in a navy brig right now in solitary cells, naked and freezing. This was a terrorist cell, plain and simple, and should be treated as more serious than a bunch of rednecks with a hobby of making homemade weapons.
ugh.
*** end of text of Madman comment ***
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last, something a little lighthearted, aemd had posted a link to the scheme for smileys in WordPress… you know times are desperado when we are down to smileys:
aemd:
Emoticons in wordpress. Don’t know if they all will work as shown but it gives me a good excuse to play around. 
http://codex.wordpress.org/Using_Smilies
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UPDATE, 1:14 pm
Basically everyone is out of the park, and they are still firing.—Narrator of video taken at May Day 2007 police action
Unapologetic Mexican weighs in:
[T]hey have done what they wanted, made their mark, instilled fear. And despite what they say, they didn’t do this because some people stepped off the sidewalk, bullshit. We know why the cops were there and in such gear, and with such attitudes and agendas. The government fears the numbers they saw last year on 2006. In 2006 we actually showed, lived out, demonstrated the Power of the People, and it scared the living shit out of our keepers. Because America is only about the Power of the People in word. That’s advertising to keep us defending our jailers, paying our taxes, and joining the
grindermilitary. America is really about the Power of the Few. And the Power of the Gun. And the Power of the Dollar. And the Power of the Lie. [snip]
He has photos from the day as he was at the Southern corner of the park… and videos up as well…
Wonderful, strong writing:
A naked display of violence acted out upon the powerless by the power-holders in violation with the bedrock of our codified “rights,” and today the blogs and news sites discuss Republican debates, TV-shapes, and one of the many wars we started overseas. Wars started in the name of preserving our Freedoms and Laws. Which were, yesterday, mocked and made irrelevant. They will excuse endangering lives and causing blind panic to break out and military type formations of tear gassing, rubber bullet firing battallions because people “stepped off the sidewalk.” We know what this means. It’s like when someone walks into a bar or a gathering of other people and insults and pushes around people until he gets them to glare or raise a hand or stand up. Then the bully gleefully engages in the fight they wanted so badly the whole time. The one they lacked the courage to outright state was their goal. It’s what I call the “Rio Grande” method of beat-down, for my own reasons.
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Comments
Sorry comments are closed for this entry
Considering how violent America has been on so many fronts in the winter and spring of ‘07, i’m almost afraid to think about how bad this summer is going to be.
Scammed this link from TChris at TalkLeft, from LA City Beat:
I saw film tape of the incident with the local FOX News reporter.. Looked bad. No question.
“We should never be engaged in attacking anyone in the media,” Bratton said.
Huh? ‘We’ (the police) should never be involved in attacking anyone, period!
But maybe he spent too long as Rudi’s Police Chief. I hadn’t realized he was the same guy. Although, as you said, he did not get along with Giuliani (who did other than Kerik) and quit, airc. I think he’s originally from Boston, but could be mistaken.
It’s infuriating to look at those cops in their military-style riot gear. And frightening. And how dumb were they to beat up members of the press? While it’s upsetting that Bratton focuses on the press, it’s fortunate for the other victims, that the press themselves did become targets, or we’d be told that the cops were just defending themselves.
Maybe the press will one day wake up. For all their capitulation over the past several years, how many of their colleagues were murdered in Iraq? Several reports claimed reporters were deliberately targeted by the US military. Certainly Italy is claiming that and Spain, and also the US press itself has made such claims.
Then there is the report by a British insider (currently on trial I think) that Bush and Blair discussed bombing the offices of Al Jazeera. And one of their offices was bombed, as well as the BBC I think.
This administration despises the press. Wish I could find it, but I remember a photo of Jenna Bush sticking her tongue out at the press a few years ago. In a way, they deserve the treatment they are getting.
The press here reminds of DK sychophants. No matter how they suck up to the administration, they still despise them, just as kos despises the sucker-uppers at his site. Most likely while they may hate those who do stand up to them, they have more respect for them.
Those photos are such an indictment of this so-called free, democratic country. It’s becoming more and more difficult to distinguish it from some third world dictatorship.
I wish from now on, dissenters would stay home and not give the police these opportunities. GO ON STRIKE. Crash the market. Boycott their propaganda machine and their advertisers. Take their money! It’s the only way to hurt them.
Sickening, all of it – we’ve stopped nothing, accomplished nothing – it just gets worse. Those boyz are delusional if they think otherwise.
But irony is not dead! Bush at a prayer meeting somewhere just said:
‘And America Welcomes people of all nationalities’! Sure, with the riot police!
MacArthur Park – someone left the cake out in the rain and then the cops shot it with a rubber bullet.
This struck me:
“We should never be engaged in attacking anyone in the media,” Bratton said.
Well no because they actually then report about it. Can’t have that!
Well it would be amusing if it were not tragic.. making a quick round of Blahgsnottery, greater and lesser, they seem flummoxed as to what to say about Dem Cave In w/r/t Iraq.
Horrors, the Dems may field a bill with no timelines. yank those pink poodle chains.
Why be surprised after all these years? Many Many years, from before sanctioning then invading Iraq was a gleam in the Eternal Government’s eye.
Thank God Glenn Greenwald (very fast salon ad to enter, one screen) took on the fearsome, fearful and feared (they quake at night that a blogger might take them on) job of slamming MSM, so Blahg Boyz can feel all better now. Kiss the booboo. Kiss the boob.
Well why should Blahggery be different than much of America (and that includes MSM, to be sure), iow: A great white lump.
The high points from Glenn — and what group does this sound like if you replace a word or two with “Dem Party” or “Reid” or often by silencio (they prefer often not to discuss him), “Rahm”:
yes Kiss the Blahggers’ Booboos.
PS BTW, the GG really is a laugh, it functions as an advertisement for politico.com in the Salon pages. I thought politico might be a bit (just a little, not a lot!) sharp and edgey when it when it opened. It sagged so fast it was just plain sad.
While the victimizing members of the media along with the rest of the crowd is a surprise, I hate the way their “pain” is somehow more valid than the pain of the crying children or the old man that was beaten or anyone of the protesters!
I just heard Bratton on the 10 am local news… he seems stressed that “240 rounds” were shot off, with “no arrests”.
They just cannot reconcile the paperwork, that is my take.
Well, I have a question for Glenn re his, correct, statement that reporters mindlessly pass on government statements.
I’m wondering what he thinks about this from a Recommeded Diary at Dkos, one of the first of many I’m sure, although a little more subtle than, say, Luscious Vagina’s, STFU diaries:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/5/3/94945/06122
The diary is a not-so-subtle attack on Jerome a Paris, who posted a diary on the backing of Obama by Neocons. Must stop reporting such truths before the masses start believing them.
Jermome responds:
He must have been sleeping if he really thinks that site cannot handle criticism of even the worst Dems (excluding the liberal ones of course, like McKinney or Kucinich, they are fair game).
So, what does Glenn Greenwald think of dk only passing on positive talking points about presidential candidates to their readers, and telling anyone who reports anything, no matter how truthful, negative about them? Because this is going to happen a lot.
As to Jerome, he’s another one I don’t understand. Kos has outright insulted him, yet he continues to supply free content to the site and to suck up to kos.
And he can deny it all he wants, but I still believe that is why Armando was banned from the site. His criticisms of Obama and the Democrats’ failures re the war in Iraq. Incivility! Lol! As long as DHinMi et al, that excuse is simply laughable.
Well no because they actually then report about it. Can’t have that! Catnip
Exactly – lol! A freudian slip on Bratton’s part, imo.
While the victimizing members of the media along with the rest of the crowd is a surprise, I hate the way their “pain” is somehow more valid than the pain of the crying children or the old man that was beaten or anyone of the protesters! dreamofpeace
Yes, it is despicable, same as never mentioning the horrors we have subjected the Iraqi people to.
But those victims would have been blamed for attacking the police, if they had not been so stupid as to attack the press.
The problem is that last time Jerome was under some much smaller attack he groveled. Said he hoped to be worthy to write for Dkos.
Showed his neck.
I have enjoyed a lot of what Jerome writes, esp what he writes on his own Just JaP diaries… but …
I have never understood why he venerates Dkos… and why he and Martin fought so hard over at BMT that no one co mingle issues of Soj (a contributer at ET and at BMT and who is a controversial entity) publicly while h e was under supposed consideration.
They browbeat people. Asked for oaths that they understood that jerome was not compromised by issues of Soj. In particular SallyCat (who cleves compeletly to the Dkos model these days or did as a of a couple months ago – ugh I read more of Kos in Feb due to DD then I had in 8 – 10 months) and “RecordKeeper” who refused the oath and left BMT the next month.
It was ugly. I am pretty sure i can find those threads.
#9. That sent a chill up my spine. It’s May ‘07 and they’re already pushing SYFPH? Geez.
Does that include kos? Just sayin’…
that would be big news to me. _Jerome a Paris
Should not be a surprise.
In case wu ming stops by,
Spiegel has a blow by blow of the debate between Sego and Sarko the other night…
They spend the evening iwth a mostly leftischer group and write on the debate and the reactions of the gathering…
That whole Welshman diary and the comments after have me laughing my fucking ass OFF!
How amazingly hilarious!
Mcat — I can find those threads as well if you need them. Recordkeeper was one of my faves — still get emails from her from time to time — Sally Cat is a crazed individual as far as I can tell — no real grasp of anything substantive, including her self-importance.
And Soj?? He/she/it of the “go out and shoot people” fame? The Soj who proudly posted about the grand new business of pimping Romainian women? That Soj? Fuck him/her/it.
brinn exactly, the same soj of the many entities from Great Crime Fighter in AR (chum of the Asa Hutchison family, if one were to believe the drivel) to street child in Mexico City.
One gets whiplash reading himherit.
YUM! Madam madam, who’s got a madam:
The Republican Debate takes place tonight. I don’t understand why we should be focusing on 2008 right now. There must be tons of money at stake, is the only reason I can think of.
True, liberalcatnip – nearly two years to go and they’re already shutting people up. How can you make a decision as important as choosing a Presidential candidate if you are not allowed to hear anything negatove about them?
All it says is that DK is just a big campaign headquarters and if you want to know about candidates, they are the last place to look if you want to make an informed decision. They may as well drape it in red, white and blue and hand out buttons and literature.
Which is why I’d like to know what Glenn Greenwald thinks of blogs playing this role. He is critical of the press doing it, handing out talking points.
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US Acting Attorney Gen. James Comey testified before Congress today. Finally!
Comey Testifies
I really like Comey – he is reasonable and fair and like a breath of fresh air in his testimony, compared to the pack of liars we’ve been exposed to so far. The DOJ was destroyed under this administration. All those fired should be re-instated. Especially Carol Lam who was just honored by they Bar Association.
From what I recall Jerome is really tight with PP – there was a whole photo diary once posted when he visited her in Amsterdam. I think he is safely within the fold – though he has occassionally gotten pissed off about not being asked to be a FPer.
I often enjoy what he writes as well, but am very suspicious of his alliances… Then again he also once wrote a terrible diary chastising smokers as being subhuman – something that really pisses me off even though I plan on being an ex-smoker sometime this month.
brinn,
Yep, that Soj, the bigender former Romanian and small town Georgia, USA cop (or was ItSheHe just a stenographer who sat in on interrogations?) who got into the email order bride business, and who has apparently never been seen or spoken to by any of the people who allow ItHerHim such a wide lattitude on the blogs they rigidly police for any sign of deviance from the approved house opinions. Most of the people here have been banned at Little Orange Footballs and Froggy’s Bottoms, but Soj is still a welcome, often honored, guest at both places, as well as Jerome a P’s site.
Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?
Ha. I knew the name Akin Gump was familiar.
Interesting clients:
oh lucid.. you can smoke around me anytime…
So many people told me to take Mother’s cigarettes away from her… last thing on earth I would do.
She made it a lot longer (91) than all the nay sayers.
Which is not to say if you feel unwell smoking that you should continue. Just that it became religion in thsi country to issue dicta to others about their lives.
Jerome also did a nasty diary about prostitutes as well. Pretty ugly and ignorant.
True, liberalcatnip – nearly two years to go and they’re already shutting people up. How can you make a decision as important as choosing a Presidential candidate if you are not allowed to hear anything negatove about them?
It’s kind of ironic that, as much as Greenwald excoriates the MSM for its use of talking points, kossacks who actually do want a fuller perspective of the candidates will have to turn to them for the negative stuff (except for what comes down from the almighty kos who, unlike the rest of the “community”, can bash any candidate he wants to without any complaints).
As for Bratton – he was of ‘broken windows’ fame – zero tolerance policies on ‘vandalism’ and other ‘quality of life’ issues as the means to reduce crime. It is that sentiment that in my opinion destroyed this city. They began enforcing archaic cabaret laws to shut down the music scene. They enacted ‘quality of life’ initiatives to outlaw drinking in parks, etc. They initiated a zero tolerance pot policy which not only got a lot of my friends arrested, but ended of getting some of them fired as well. They cleared out the legal residents of squats to turn public land over to developers. Oh – and the ’street crime unit’ that shot Diallo and tortured Luima, Bratton’s baby… Thanks Bill.
It really doesn’t surprise me that he presided over Tuesday’s bloodshed.
So it looks like the Madame’s attorney was right, regarding the professions of the women who worked for her! Too funny, and Randy Tobias described the whole process as ‘like ordering pizza’. Sort of a clue as to their opinion of women in general, even educated ones!
This is going to be lots of fun for the summer –
Lucid, I never liked Jerome much after he sucked up to kos. I see Opol doing the same thing now. Both have created a lot of controversy which got many people banned. Yet, they go on and suck up forgetting those who fought for their right to post there. Not a word about them, like a ‘thank you’ maybe. That’s what I liked about Comey. He did that. He acknowledged, in a much more dangerous environment, the people who had stood up for what was right, when he gave his own farewell speech in 2005. That could have affected his career.
It’s sad that so few have the guts or the Independent spirit any movement requires if it’s going to be successful. Less and less I’m blaming kos – seems like people don’t mind being used so long as they can have an audience – yeah, I know, that’s not ‘pragmatic’ of me. But to me, they are enablers and that interferes with changing things that are wrong. I have no respect for them, and think their ‘pragmatism’ claims are just to excuse their less-than-honorable behavior.
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MC – ‘loyalty oaths’? It gets scarier and scarier the more I learn about these people.
well then there is the soft version. Less DD but still a finger shake. Bite that metaphorical finger off!
All very well and good to couch it in not insulting one another, but it never stays there. These things always become a roadblock.
Earlier he/she references the 2003/04 primary run. Missed a lot. FWIW Dean supporters were browbeaten. Just politics, but let’s not pretend it did not happen.
“duranta”, who works in one of the projects in NO, an organiser, has a good quote in the thread.
So the Madame had someone working inside at Akin, Gump! This woman had access to all kinds of useful information, and the notion that she wouldn’t (for example) have peddled some inside dope to the other side in some big deal or other is too naive for words. She would have all sorts of business and personal information on all sorts of subjects about all sorts of powerful people. And tell me that she didn’t arrange for some of the firm’s clients and some of its partners to utilize the services of her other place of employment, I can always use a good laugh, and that would have me gasping for breath and going incontinent.
Thanks Marisa for posting about this. This has become a major juggernaut against the “Others.” Here in TX, our state legislature is about to pass a couple of bills that would suppress the vote of thousands of Latinos.
Oh, great catch, Catnip! I remember reading about that law firm also. What a tangled web it is with both parties. Vernon Jordan who got Monica Lewinsky a job, airc. Many people speculated whether she was a plant, a temptation to Clinton, to keep him in line, knowing his ‘weaknesses’. I never thought so, at least not consciously, but is it beyond belief now?
And this:
Lol, more and more I’m thinking that ‘Escort Service’ is not what it seems. Spying on top government officials, using prostitutes as bait and then keeping them in line by bribing them. That would explain so many of them backing down on important issues. Damn, if it turns out to be true! We are screwed, if these idiots are so stupid as to fall into such traps.
oh lucid… the Disneyfication of Manhattan. Broke my heart.
CNN happened to cover the day the Metropolitan Diner closed in Times Square, their last day after 50 years in one family. Nice old fashioned, lots of aluminum in view, diner. Stood in my kitchen with tears on my cheeks.
For what? For Rudy and Disney and bullshit.
All the top cops that fanned out from the Guiliani regime are a horror, from Timoney to Bratton. Kerik, an dout and out criminal.
… and Kelly too.
I think that McBride, the old San Jose top cop who has been at the Hoover Inst was a mollifying factor in some of the early years of Bratton in LA… but I think McBride is off the scene.
All those men are effing mean. Vicious.
XP,
if you write on what is in the TX leg w/r/t the Latino vote, drop me an email, i will post it…
Thanks for having those videos at your post.. I think more than a few viewed them last night.
Exactly JJB. The madame would be wise to hire some body guards. With all the political and corporate dirt she likely has I wouldn’t be surprised if there aren’t backroom discussions going on about taking her out.
Sabrina
Here you go. Just a sub thread with Recordkeeper indicating to leave her alone. The post and the whole thread is around 220 comments, link to the whole post/thread is there, if you want it.. BMT had a very tumultuous late fall in 2005. IMO his site never really recovered.
Here in TX, our state legislature is about to pass a couple of bills that would suppress the vote of thousands of Latinos. XP
I wonder if any of the US As from Pat Roberson’s law school were involved in any way. This is one of the issues that has come up in the US A scandals. Maybe you should check out who the US As were if there are any prosecution issues, ie, felony claims being used to push those bills. Just a thought.
It was in Texas also that the entire corporate fraud unit was eradicated and replaced by more corporate friendly US As. The two women attorneys ending up dead. Nothing is beyond imagination with these criminals.
Lucid, thanks for the reminder about Bratton. I had forgotten much of what he did, since Kerik was so much worse. I wonder will anyone attack Giuliani tonight on his record? The only one likely to do that would be Ron Paul, and I’m not sure he’s going to be there.
To her credit, MSOC is allowing ABTD’s cage to be rattled:
She must be willing to finally cut him lose. Good for her.
well I don’t think so, cut him loose, I mean.
She jsut needs to fight and can’t run over to Dkos and know a line up of “made men” enemies will appear. And the match can commence.
And her latest schtick is that Madman was a source of enlightenment for her.
She forgets all her invitations to him to FP at MLW. He never even bothered to register.
She simply wanted then, and now, to use Madman to poke at Armando – and whomever else.
Speaking of Timony, is it just my imagination or does the New Yorker run some in-depth[sic] slobber piece on some super-cop or another about every damn month now ?
For more fun stuff about Bratton’s Bullies, there’s always the 5/2 post from Five Before Midnight’s blog. Lots of good quotes and links there.
Oh. It looked good on paper at any rate.
Armando uses the word “libel” the same way that D*v*d B*r*n and a jackass or two at Mo Betta whose eyes I caught as the resident “nobody” use the word “authoritarian.” No bearing on reality, no relation to the actual definition. It just means whatever they want it to mean, and they pull it out like a magic charm whenever cornered.
oow
well you never know. She could find some sense under a rock. LOL Stranger things have happened.
But i think she is wedded to the idea that these Boyz, even a partial set, can help her.
I think that is what it is all about.
You’d think she;d notice the downward trajectory of depending on them…
Thanks for the link to the Jerome thread, MC. I just glanced at it and it’s mind-numbing, the number of internal controversies that have gone on. Welshman and Jerome, eg – fighting over soj with Booman siding with Jerome, who are both defending soj, someone no one knows anything about and is totally scary, airc.
My head is spinning. Who can you trust of these kossacks, from kos all the way down through the ranks? Not even worth trying to figure out. All you could do is throw up your hands and get the hell away from them! They all seem crazy to me. This comment from the thread says it perfectly:
And this from Glenn Greenwald describes them perfectly also, except he’s not talking about them:
Vapid, has he checked out the feminnnissssmss stuff I wonder? Glenn Greenwald may be right about the media, but he needs to spend more time on the blahhhgs. In a contest, I think they’d win hands down as to who is more vapid or jr. high clique oriented. Maybe I’ll send him a few threads since he’s apparently oblivious about it all. Which is fine, so long as he doesn’t write stuff like this in defense of the blogs.
As for the latest flamefest, I still think armando is a very poor judge of people. I don’t think he would need money, for one thing, he seems to be one of the few of them that actually had a real job. And for him to still believe that kos can afford his near millionaire lifestyle based on his ads is either extremely naive, or a deliberate lie which I doubt. The truth probably will come out, it would be foolish for him, or anyone else to participate in any deception re who’s funding that site.
But when Madman asked the questions, he so looked up to kos (which discredits his judgement totally imo) it never occurred to him that kos might not be telling him everything. And apparently still doesn’t. Anyway, it’s more likely that Kos may be funded by a private individual or organization. If it was the DP there have to be disclosure wouldn’t there? So I suppose he could call it a lie to say it was the DP.
If it all turns out to be true and armando did not know, he will owe a lot of people an apology.
thanks for the recap on the debate. it certainly sounds a lot more substantive and less scripted than what passes for political discussion over here.
while i generally like jerome’s stuff esp. his site, the soj business was a main reason for welshman breaking off from eurotrib and starting new international times, which is as brit liberal democratic a place as eurotrib is continental socialist.
so many factions and fallings-out. every time a fight bubbles up, i end up having to add another site to my reading list. ah well, human nature, i suppose.
as for maryscott’s bringing madman up, i think she’s being honest here. often an argument that you don’t “get” in one context will resurface when you’re in a different spot down the road, and can see what you missed before. as people run afoul of the blogheelers (thx to madman for the term IIRC), they tend to take the longstanding critics of the blogheelers’ arguments more seriously, and often internalize them.
i tend to think that there is a lot of grey area and complexity in between the consensus here and the bully corps at daily kos (and no, that is not intended to suggest an equivalency, to be clear). not that anyone should be beyond criticism, but just that i don’t think people are as black and white as they are sometimes portrayed. then again, i’m in a rather unique position of being on talking terms with a lot of folks that are dead to one another, so perhaps i’m unintentionally glossing things over.
not passing judgement or carrying anyone’s water but my own, but that’s how i see it.
only wu ming understands everyone.
BMT had a very tumultuous late fall in 2005. IMO his site never really recovered.
That’s because I left. [insert appropriate snarky smiley here]
I see our queen is in Virginia. Do you guys want to keep her? We’ve had more than enough of her here.
ha! miss d, that old line again.
Sen. Reid’s STFU Diary? Shades of DK:
Reid Defends His ‘presidentials,’ takes a jab at Edwards
They can’t ban him, because he’s no longer in the Senate – kos will probably get a memo if he hasn’t already – and Edwards supporters are likely to be furious. It’s going to be a fun two years.
wu ming
sorry for the delay on the comment.. I hd a hot meal and long hot shower…
**************
If Reid is pushing at Edwards iwth a barely concealed slapwa, they are trying to consolidate the one two punch of Hillary and OBama.
Oh well politics. And I had long suspected Edwards only got that “win” in NC as the local machines did a deal with Helms. Nothing else makes sense, But only guessing.
Reid can hit back with how little Edwards showed up for the Intell committee when he did serve.
LOL…
well wu ming I will add one thing.
Loyalty oaths – they were blogswarmed thru the site from spring of 2003 onward, directed at Dean supporters… later there was a regime to run Dean Supporters off (Democrats and Democrat voting Ind.) I take those things seriously – aside from what was done, all along to Green and Nader supporters — then the STFU tirades (still going).
There was not mere influence and encouragement / discouragement at the site, there ws full on bullying.
And working hand in hand with Delaware Dem, who hates women, wants abortion criminalised after 10 weeks or so, operates as a Dem party organiser, (low level without a doubt) would fellate the pope before he’d touch a woman (just my opinion) doing all of that when you purport to be for women and womens rights…
Some things are clear cut, in my book. Esp wanting, endlessly, things, tangibles from the very people carrying out the ward heelers regime.
These are merely my opinions. But I don’t take any of that lightly. Nor did I take Voyeurs lightly.
fair enough.
and given the choice between responding to me immediately and having a hot meal and shower, that’s a no brainer. i wouldn’t respond to me if a meal was in the way. the online obsession with immediacy is a flaw IMO, there’s more than enough time to let things percolate a bit or get real life stuff done. it’s one of the advantages of text, noone has to respond right this minute.
wu ming
btw while i was eating NPR carried a great blow by blow of a rally (Sego) today in Paris, it ws via a correspondent for the BBC.
They may have audio at the NPR site.
That sent a chill up my spine. It’s May ‘07 and they’re already pushing SYFPH? Geez.
Markos loves authoritarian assholes, control freaks, bullies and thugs. He adores the pseudo-religious, the reflexively dishonest and little men like Jason who are more interested in power (and gluttony) than anything else.
Hey ya’ll! This is a hoot! At politico they have a page of member submitted questions that you can vote on to be asked of the repub candidates tonight!
I just voted that Tom Tancredo should be asked:
“Other than xenophobia, for what reason should Americans vote for you?”
Tons of fun for everyone!
This was so seven years ago, DNC2000, which was before Bratton got here. Of course, that chief was Bernard Parks who is now on the city council and will be finger wagging at Bratton about it as he’s the lone opponant to Bratton’s upcoming reappointment as chief. Fine, but Parks, look inward at two demonstrations at least during your tenure that mirrored this one.
A reporter said that officers were laughing and saying, “double time, it’s time to tussle” while they were assaulting people.
They blamed it on the “instigators” but if that’s so, why did they shoot 240 foam bullets(which feel like anything but that when they hit you)at a much larger crowd some distance away?
Why are you shooting a “less lethal” shotgun in a way where it can cause lethal results if it hits someone in the face or head?
Also, they have middle management people in the LAPD running off to the Los Angeles Timesand telling its reporters that they don’t even know where these officers’ supervisors were or what they were doing when this was all going on.
The latest is that Bratton is getting the FBI involved. The mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa is still in El Salvador answering questions there about what happened at home and the police union is defending its members. The reporters might sue because for one thing, the officers violated an agreement between the two in place since 2002.
They have one. It’s called the Twiddling Your Thumbs While More People Die (HR 666) bill.
Markos loves authoritarian assholes, control freaks, bullies and thugs. He adores the pseudo-religious, the reflexively dishonest and little men like Jason who are more interested in power (and gluttony) than anything else.
That description used to apply mainly to Republicans.
brinn
voted for the same one you did.. thanks for the hoot..
*************
Radfem
Thanks for the update! Bratton hs had supportive quotes today for his cops. I am expecting little, tho they LAPD is, as I understand it, under Federal Watch. But so was the entire Fucking RNC (for obstruction of voting rights) when ‘00 happened.
I think MacArthur Park was done to send a signal.
Hard to see it any other way.
Pity they kept Bernard Parks around, an asshole as well.
*************
catnip!
well with Kos DD DH and a few others leading the pack, and the former members of the pack now whiners on the sidelines… how is it not Republican.
it most certainly is reactionary! And conservative. And repressive. And regressive.
And so on..
I used to like Jerome a Paris, because generally I like French people and his diaries were mostly interesting. We had many friendly exchanges in the comments and regularly rated each other’s contributions highly. When his son’s illness recurred, I offered in email to give him long-distance Reiki. Jerome sent me photos of him. Etc. But after this comment of his, as far as I’m concerned, Jerome can go fuck himself.
He’s like the other gutless egomaniacs who are attracted to DKos like ants to Pepsi. He’ll do and say pretty much anything to keep his access to the Big Microphone.
His kid is still on my Reiki list, however.
colleen: Markos loves authoritarian assholes, control freaks, bullies and thugs. He adores the pseudo-religious, the reflexively dishonest and little men like Jason who are more interested in power (and gluttony) than anything else.
That’s about the size of it.
***
re: rubber bullets – this is good paper from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Gov’t regarding “less-lethal” weapons for crowd control, with info on the tragic death of Victoria Snelgrove after the Red Sox won the World Series.
I don’t know if the quotes will come out OK, but here goes….
The Boston Police are truly awful. They aren’t as bad as Philly police, but almost. I would take the NYPD over them any day.
And Now for Something Completely different:
From Jeff Wells latest post at RI.
BTW I was nearly run over today on I-19 as first a white DHS (can you say G-13?) truck came hurtling past me at over 95 mph (estimating, of course) followed by two run of the mill “chile verdes” trucks. A few miles down the road I saw that they had a car pulled over and two very large black duffels exposed in the trunk.
Just another moment en el paradiso, tortilla curtain stylee…
Hi ya’ all!
Just discovered that one of the local public access channels shows “Democracy Now”, and with my new hours at the new position I’m actually home in time to watch (you wouldn’t know unless you go to the channel’s website to see their schedule … Time Warner doesn’t list it on their on-screen guide). Got to see a lot more footage of the police attack. It is plain that the press were specifically targeted, and it’s also, IMHO, no coincidence that the Mayor was far away and Bratton was too. One can’t help but feel that it was planned.
Gonna be an ugly summer.
And Mahoney is staying out of it. Where as last year he made himself a broker, for god’s sake (quite literally)
Cute. Love those pontiffs in waiting.
Sorry, I should have said AL playoffs, not the World Series. My bad.
police, about 50 feet away, were trying to clear the crowded street of celebratory Red Sox fans, many of whom were drunk and boisterous.
Celebratory Red Sox fans getting drunk and boisterous! Now that’s unexpected.
Actually, this Reid “slapwa” may backfire on him. If Edwards manages to distance himself sufficiently from the lapdog Dems still in Congress, it can only be a good thing for his candidacy. I’ll go send him some money.
svix–I love the dk party line how you “became a troll”. In view of some of MEsoc’s fans urging her to write a book about her blogging experiences, I think–when you have spare time from other writing should do a satirical work on your “evolution” as a “troll”. “Losing TU: One Banned Kosovarian’s Account”
—
fuck msnbc download adobe flashplayer 9 to get the video. I did. I refreshed page. it still doesn’t work, and EVERYTHING works on my new computer.
—–
read thru the HRC (not to be confused with hrh, as they do at dk!) introduction of the reauthorization of war bill. however, looking into it, it seems that it is possible they can “reauthorize” on terms more appealing to the elected Dems.
In that Atlantic article we’ve often referred to here( the one that finds Hillary with the Seante prayer group), it also describes Hillary’s relationship with Byrd, and how she patiently she did her understudy duties with him.
#42, SB:
SB, Armando is a liar. He makes shit up, twists and spins, weasels, obfuscates, and then attempts to browbeat people into believing his lies. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it turned out he was well aware of all kinds of behind-the-scenes sleaziness at DKos, and that’s why he thought he was “safe” and could act as abusively as he liked.
He probably won’t say anything about the dirt because he’s hoping to get welcomed back into the fold sometime in the future, along with MSock.
So, Hillary announces she’s going to introduce a bill to withdraw the Iraq war authorization in October, 2007 – the anniversary date of the first AUMF. Whoop dee flipping doo. They just had their little symbolic showdown with “commander guy” by timing the veto with his mission accomplished stunt. What impact did they have? Zip.
Yet Hillary is now a political “genius” because of this move in the eyes of fawning centrist kossacks. You know what would be a genius flipping move? Impeaching the bastards and ending this fucked up war ASAP – not next year sometime when it will look good during the elections.
It’s ALL about political opportunism. Who cares about the dead bodies?
#67, Miss D: Yes, good idea! “How I Became ‘An Enemy of the People’”
It’s all so Stalinist.
Hillary is playing a form of scrabble. Shift the letters til she gets some way of moving on from that fucked vote.
And I am sorry to be cynical but the report coming out that Obama has very early SS protection and that it was Reid going to Chertoff… well color me sceptical. I smell PR. And again, separating Hillary and Obama from whoever else (I guess that is only really Edwards).
Tired line up.
I do think of all the candidates, Obama would be the one most likely to be assassinated, because it’s a given there is some nutjob well-armed American that would itch to go after the pure symbolism of Obama.(and I mean “pure” in the sense of only as a symbol)
any democratic president will be an assassination target. heck, any democrat that does anything but grovel to the right (and even then, milquetoast daschle got an anthrax letter, so noone’s safe).
if a dem manages to win the race in ‘08, they had better do a thorough review of SS and capitol police. the reaction to anything but abslute victory is going to be ugly. i mean, clinton was basically the second coming of eisenhower, and even he had RW terrorists arming themselves from the day he took office.
Well even ‘92 as the second coming of Eisenhouwer looks liberal now. None of this crowd will be doing a bus tour the way the clintons did.. and accidentally got close to actual people. The kind who still breathe and don’t draw a government, campaign or national party pay check. that bus pulled into some chronically depressed areas of America. And even coming from AR, they were shocked at some of the desperation. Guess they never left the Hyatt in LR.
It dissipated fast as they assumed office and was barely more than veneer anyway.
3 months ago I was appalled at the self imposed restricted access for the primary candidates. Not that it matters, none of them is running on populist, liberal or human acknowledging issues. It makes 2002 – 04 look flaming liberal.
It is brutal how little they care. I read that a reporter was allowed to walk with Obama for a couple m inutes as he changed venues, but was not allowed to ask questions. It was an aside in a larger article on how the primary was shaping up.
If at all accurate, utterly disgusting.
They should simply nominate a Blackberry and be done with it.
Hillary already has SS coverage seconday to former first lady status.
the question would be if jesse jackson or al sharpton were ever provided such coverage as presidential candidates. i.e.-were they ever considered “viable” enough to require it.
would be interesting to know the decision-making process behind it. guarding backers investments?
I am unexpectedly crabby due to some misfortune of someone I know. and am in a big bind cuz I have so much to do myself, but really want to give assist to this person.
makes me want to hit the sack now with a book (am reading Ricks’ “Fiasco” ) and fall asleep after 20 more pages.
knowing full well I’ll wake up again at some ungodessly hour…
“Tin soldiers and Nixon’s coming
We’re finally on our own
This summer I here the drumming…”
this very well could be a bloody summer
Kevin
Jesse jackson racked up 7 million votes. And the party has never forgiven him. He ws def a challenger.
usually you have to emerge as the established frontrunner, or a second who is very close in numbers to the frontrunner to be assigned SS. A big transition. This is charatertised as 8 months early. Which seems about on track, tho with the early primaries and the squished sequence, maybe 6 months is closer to accurate for this schedule..
hmmmm, throwing out some bucks for a babe in a tub, maybe?
HOT TIP: Grover Norquist on DC Madame Jeane Palfrey’s Client List.
Wu ming, I agree regarding the threat to any president, or candidate. This country has more than its share of seriously disturbed individuals.
SV, what a weasel Jerome was in that situation. How on earth could he, on the one hand, agree with Msoc about thugs, and on the other excuse one of the worst examples of mob thuggery I have ever seen? And to turn on someone who had been an ally! This is why I have no respect for him. He will grovel, and for what, to be able to post his diaries on a blog? Their priorities are pretty skewed. Pretty soon, he himself is likely to become a victim of the same mob. They have been after him for a while. I used to rec his diaries just to spite them, but I wouldn’t now. ‘First they came for hrh ……’ they should remember that little poem. It is very instructive.
There is a line in the movie, one of my fav. movies btw, A Man For All Seasons, when Thomas Moore confronts Richard Rich after he looks at the reward he got for betraying him, I can’t remember the quote exactly, but he expresses his dismay that he would have done it for so little. That’s how I feel about these people who throw their friends away for the privilege of posting on what is really in the scheme of things, a pretty obscure blog.
Rotfl, Madman I saw something about that earlier today, and I admit I was praying it was true. There were some great comments around the tubes about Grover and his bathtub.
Brownfemipower reminds us:.
state brutality is not an anomaly.
D.C. Housing Complex Cameras Tell Residents Not To Loiter
The powers that be just love the Clampdown.
She should have had a commercial…
Two Limos stop in an el campo real setting. The dark tinted windows roll down slowly and GHWB extends a litch like leprous limb, with a lusty gesture to handcuffed Grover in the neighboring vehicle. The wrinkled wretch wears a silken set of flag festooned pj’s, but his fellow rider=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJZoai2HIeA”>Terri Hatcher only wears a ball gag and various genatlia crimping metal clips. Grover for his part is being sodomized by a black/filipino recent Yaley who is repeatedly reciting all of Iago’s lines in a loop.
“Pardon me,” intones the dusty supulchre creep of the Elder George’s voice, “but do you have any Jeane Palfrey?”
Sorry, broken link=
Terri Hatcher
i don’t know how long or where he stayed, but edwards did spend some time down in fresno a month or so ago talking with UFW members and citrus farmers about the freeze damage. only democrat that i’m aware of that’s ventured beyond sacramento in the valley (well, dodd spoke at a longshoreman’s hall in west sac yesterday, but he’s lucky if he even ends up a cabinet member, he’s so far back). whole lot of grinding poverty down there, not sure if it was more than a quick photo op, but i credit him for even noticing they exist.
Edwards was in Tucson today…
Amazingly, I missed his brief appearance (/not)
I saw Norquist dabate at Oxford once. He appeared in a state of thrill.
Whata bunch.
New Thread
Resistance Thread…;)
HOT TIP: Grover Norquist on DC Madame Jeane Palfrey’s Client List.
Delicious, Matt Stoller’s hero and role model. Of course Norquist is much, much more than the head of a conservative think tank. He’s the guy who wanted to drown the federal government6 in a bath tub and destroy the NARP and Planned Parenthood, the guy whose offices were busted by the treasury Dept after 9/11 because Wahabi ‘charities’ were operating out of them, he’s the GOP’s money launderer, their go-to guy and so much else.
Catnip,
That description used to apply mainly to Republicans.
It does not matter what they call themselves, they’re still the same bastards.
I’m off tomorrow to celebrate my b-day and the incredible Princess Katterfly and mine’s sixth anniversary of unwedded bliss (we met at a hemp rally on mi cumpleaños, dontcha know!) this cinco de mayo weekend so forgive me for my earliness, but just a little reminder about what this kinda marginal to mexicans, but sooo important for tequila and corona sales to nostoros pinche gringos, holiday is really commemorating:
Cinco de Mayo
One day I’ll get my thoughts together on Maximillian, a somewhat sympathetic figure IMnotsoHO, and Cinco de Mayo and write an essay or something about it. Its deep and I think I need to re read Conrad’s Lord Jim before I deluded myself enough to endeavor to write it.
I live that hell, myself. At least a little bit, and in my own genetically recessive mind.
An excerpt from the link above:
BTW and in case I don’t get the chance to contribute a comment to this groovalicious salon tomorrow (yeah, so what if I’ve gotten into the Anejo ya! Si, tenga crudo, yo pagare):
Forever remember Kent State! (/bows to Kevin)
My mom was hopped up on scopolamine and in horrific “twilight sleep” shortly after it happened and 17 hours later I was here, cyanotic and technically dead… somehow I knew they were using live rounds and my abiku nature damnanded a regotiation.
I lost.
And so here I sit in the middle of the Kali yuga, wishin’ somehow that people could just really realize we are all one family (depraved, and thrice damned cousins included)
Ay! ya me voy…my querida princessa me desea…
So sad – this post from a member of Democraticunderground who opposed the war:
My Brother Died In Iraq Today
That’s all she said. Many Iraqis died today also.
Sad that the whole thing is just a big political game to so many, the politicians, the blahgers, the media et al. Too bad that they don’t seem to grasp the reality of what this war does every day to the lives of millions of human beings. Maybe if they really could empathize, on a human rather than a political level with the victims of their wars, they would be less willing to support them.
It isn’t that this one death is more important than others, but his sister is a blogger. She’s not one of the BBB, but she does have her own blog. Her brother left a wife and a baby. And this will happen each and every day to other victims of the lies they told. The troops, the Iraqi people – and there is no sign of it ending. And the blahgers say we have to give the Dems time, as if there was time!
It’s not going to end.
I want the media to find a family that was destroyed by Vietnam AND now has been destroyed, again, by Iraq.
Because you know they are out there.
There is one I know of, Marisacat. Well, not in the sense that anyone died yet, but the diary I posted that was troll-rated on DK a few threads back. The diarist is a Vietnam Vet, totally opposed to this war, his two sons (and now a third) are in the military. One has just been redeployed to Iraq, the other just returned from Afghanistan.
He tried to dissuade his third son (18) from joining the military, but couldn’t. He hoped the military would reject him, for reasons that he believes they should have. But they didn’t. I think he himself may be disabled, either physically or mentally, not sure. And his diary was given a troll tag on dk.
Great post, Tuston – happy 6th anniversary – those trucks, btw, were they US drivers, or Mexican? I read that the Truckers here are planning to block the highways to protest Mexican trucks being allowed to drive here in the US and threaten their jobs. Haven’t heard any more about it.
SB….interesting I scanned a spanish language paper in Nogales el martes pasado that said “TRAILEROS Causan Caus en el Reten” …the truckers had decided to occupy both lanes of the two lane highway at the checkpoint just south of Santa Anna and about 100K north of Hermosillo…folks in cars (gringo turistas included) get to zip thru but the trucks wait in line for hours on end to get thru…pretty brave of the truckers to face down soldiers with full autos (of course los soldados son indios pobres, and I don’t think they’d fire on more than rabbits without serious provocation)… ya know whole trailer of mota “confiscated” there once…
I really gotta go now…PK is patient, but she ain’t no saint (shhhh! she’s not reading my drivel right now, so I ‘ve got enough leash to hang myself….upside down, and by the foot of course!)
OKay this is really it, (hey I like ya’ll but I luv PK) gonna run
but I realize I didn’t answer:
were they US drivers, or Mexican
US Feds drove the trucks and busted mules (mexicans or not, I couldn’t see)
Gotta go and grab some chocolate before I go (she’s callin
Lol, I’d wave to PK but that might get you in trouble! Just kidding.
Re the truckers, thanks – I hadn’t heard any more about that. A hemp convention! Anyway, have a great birthday!
Sabrina
I remember that people posted here about that diary. The treatment of him was awful.
Anyone truly opposed to the war, to occupation and invasion to aerial bombing, to destroying a society — really could not tolerate Dkos as it has become.
I have long since realised that opposition to the war early on from Kos was two fold, Dem propaganda as fake opposition to Bush and that the early blogs in 2001/2/3 were the ‘War Blogs”. To get traction you needed to be for or against.
Anyone worth anything would be grinding their teeth over the weeks — hell MONTHS and years if we go all the way back — of fake positioning from the Democrats. So clear at the outset that is all it was, ever.
I caught a lovely bit of sneak in the Jake Tapper column. Early version referred to the Dem weasels today as “A serene lump of Democrats” then it was changed to “A serene group of Democrats”.
Lumps with no spine. An asshole and some vestigial feet-like (4 of those) appendages. Fluff of hair here and there and a mouth.
About it.
Quislings.
Fluff of hair here and there and a mouth.
Rotfl! So true! And teeth, don’t forget Biden!
Dk does not want to talk about the war ending – or about impeaching the criminals who started it. Or election fraud (btw, Florida has gone to paper ballots, with a Republican Gov!) And Feeney really is in trouble. Bradblog kept up the fight and is probably persona non grata at dk. He did some great reporting on Feeney’s role in election fraud a few years ago.
I’ve never seen a link to his site there. Or to Rawstory. They denigrate everyone. These were the fighters, never dk. They have never stopped pushing to get things done. I keep asking, what has DK accomplished? I know what some of the other sites have done, like Bradblog, eg. Getting Paper ballots into Florida is success! While Dk could not care less about issues, ‘ideas’ others have gone forward without them. And accomplished things.