Keeping The Sheeple Up To Date With Reality!!!
Wednesday, August 24, 2016
Monday, August 22, 2016
Elections: Obama administration recoups $2 million from Haiti
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (sentinel.ht) – The $2 million remaining from the 2015 election that, in July, the Obama administration requested Haiti return has been given back to the United States announce the Minister of the Economy on Friday.
Haiti never actually had the money in its possession. The total $33 million the United States had given for the country’s 2015 elections had always been held in a trust fund managed by the United Nations Development Program.
A total of $8 million remained in this fund and of it that which the United States had contributed and was not spent: $2 million.
In July, the Obama State Department announced that it would not be helping Haiti fund its elections and demanded the return of that $2 million of monies it had given in 2015.
The tensions between the two countries stem from Haiti’s decision in early May to redo an election cycle held in 2015 that was grossly fraudulent and violence-ridden. The U.S. did not approve and has “made no bones about it”, according to a State Department spokesperson.
The Minister of the Economy and Finance, Yves Romain Bastien, updated journalists in the press room on Friday.
Regarding Haiti’s struggle to raise $55 million for elections more than 5 years overdue, Bastien said $15 million had been identified and granted to the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP).
Philippine President Duterte Blasts U.S. on Syria and Police Shootings, Threatens to Leave U.N.
The Philippines' controversial president lashed out at both the United States and United Nations on Sunday, threatening to leave the international body amid mounting criticism for an anti-drug campaign that has left hundreds of people in his Southeast Asian country dead.
In a press conference that began after midnight Saturday and lasted until the early morning hours Sunday, President Rodrigo Duterte lambasted the U.S. and U.N. for failing to stem the violence in Syria, where earlier this week a picture of a 5-year-old boy pulled from the rubble in Aleppo went viral.
"Look at the iconic boy that was taken out from the rubble and he was made to sit in the ambulance and we saw it," Duterte said, according to The Associated Press, referring to the photo of Omran Daqneesh. "Why is it that United States is not doing anything? I do not read you."
Duterte also told reporters he was thinking of breaking off from the U.N., whose human rights experts recently criticized a Philippine drug policy that has led to the arrests of more than 4,400 people since June 30, when Duterte took office, as well as the extrajudicial killings of more than 500 suspected dealers.
"Maybe we'll just have to decide to separate from the United Nations. If you're that rude, son of a b-tch, we'll just leave you," Duterte said.
Pointing to the recent killings of black men by police officers in the U.S., Duterte suggested his wasn't the only country with human rights violations on its hands.
"Why are you Americans killing the black people there, shooting them down when they are already on the ground?" he said. "Answer that question, because even if it's just one or two or three, it is still human rights violations."
Asked about the possible repercussions of his remarks, Duterte replied: "I don't give a sh*t about them. They are the ones interfering."
Sunday, August 21, 2016
Native American Pipeline Protest Halts Construction in N. Dakota
Construction halted after more than 1,000 people swarm to protest the Dakota Access pipeline they believe threatens the Missouri River.
A groundswell of Native American activists has temporarily shut down construction on a major new oil pipeline with an ongoing protest that has drawn around 1,200 people to Cannon Ball, N.D.
Construction workers walked away from their bulldozers Monday after protesters surrounded the equipment and called for an end to construction of the Dakota Access pipeline. A group of protesters on horseback also staged a mock charge toward a line of law enforcement officials guarding the site, and the county sheriff alleged others have fired guns and set off pipe bombs.
The $3.8 billion pipeline at the heart of the protest would carry about half a million barrels of crude oil per day from the Bakken oil field to Illinois where it would link with other pipelines to transport the oil to Gulf Coast refineries and terminals.
The protest was staged at a spot where the pipeline would pass beneath the Missouri River, just upstream from the Standing Rock Sioux reservation, a community of 8,500 along the Missouri River in North and South Dakota.
Protesters from dozens of tribes across the country are now camping in tents, tepees and mobile homes at the Sacred Stone Camp a mile and a half from the construction site. A video shows a second, more recently established campsite, the Red Warrior Camp.
"We have to be here," David Archambault II, the chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, who was arrested at the site last week, said in a statement. "We have to stand and protect ourselves and those who cannot speak for themselves."
The pipeline's builder, Energy Transfer Partners, said through a spokesperson that it is "constructing this pipeline in accordance with applicable laws, and the local, state and federal permits and approvals we have received."
"This is an important energy infrastructure project that benefits all Americans and our national economy," it said. The company did not respond to a request for additional comment.
The Standing Rock tribe, one of the poorest communities in the nation according to 2010 census data cited by the tribe, relies on the Missouri River for drinking water, irrigation, fishing and recreation, and for cultural and religious practices. The reservation covers about 3,600 square miles along the river.
"An oil spill would represent a genuine catastrophe for the people who live there," said Jan Hasselman, an attorney with Earthjustice, an environmental organization that filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Standing Rock Tribe against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which approved the pipeline. "It isn't just cultural and religious, it's their economic lifeblood."
The suit alleges the pipeline violates the Clean Water Act, the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.
Protests against the pipeline have been ongoing since April. In July, a group of roughly two dozen from the Standing Rock tribe completed a nearly 2,000-mile relay from Cannon Ball to Washington, D.C. They delivered a petition with 150,000 signatures to the Corps calling on it to halt construction of the project.
On July 25, the Corps approved construction of the section of the pipeline upstream from the Standing Rock reservation, and ground was broken on August 10. Protests at the site started small, with about 50 people and grew to an estimated 1,200 on Wednesday, according to Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier.
Mekasi Horinek Camp, a member of the Ponca Nation of Oklahoma and coordinator of the environmental group Bold Oklahoma, claimed the Sioux bands "haven't come together in this traditional way since the Battle of the Little Big Horn."
"It's an historical time," he said, "and just a beautiful thing to be a part of."
As the number of protesters at the construction site and the nearby Sacred Stone Camp swelled, tensions between activists and law enforcement rose.
Protesters came on horseback Monday and a video shows what appears to be a mock charge aimed at law enforcement officials who had formed a line along a steep embankment near the entrance to the construction site. The video shows horses charging toward the officers and pacing in front of their line, directed by activists who yelled a "war whoop," or battle cry.
Neither the horses nor the protesters made physical contact with the officers, according to Montgomery Brown, a member of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe who was at the protest. The officers, however, appear visibly frightened in the video and quickly scrambled up the embankment away from the horses.
Camp said the demonstration was part of a traditional ceremony that brings in the spirit of horses, and Brown called it a traditional way of introducing warriors from separate tribes. The officers were notified of the ceremony ahead of time, Camp said, and were asked to back up to give the horses space.
Kirchmeier said the protest had become "unlawful" as his officers reported incidents of shots being fired, pipe bombs, vandalism and assaults on private security personnel. Construction on the pipeline near Cannon Ball has been "discontinued for the time being," Kirchmeier said.
Protesters denied those allegations. "Firearms and weapons are not allowed at the Sacred Stone Camp and our security has done an exemplary job at maintaining safety amongst the crowd," according to a statement released by Sacred Stone Camp protesters with the groups Honor the Earth and the Indigenous Environmental Network. "As our camp was established on an act of prayer, we are committed to nonviolence."
"We are disappointed that there are those who will put the lives of others in jeopardy," the Energy Transfer Partners' spokesperson said. "We will continue to put the safety of our workers and those who live in the area as our top priority."
The Army Corps of Engineers declined to comment on the project citing the ongoing litigation.
While the protest in Cannon Ball is primarily Native Americans, ranchers are challenging the project elsewhere along its 1,168-mile path. On August 9, lawyers representing 14 Iowa landowners filed a motion to halt construction of the pipeline across their property. The suit challenged Dakota Access's use of eminent domain to seize land for what it says is private use.
Over the past year, protests against fossil fuel infrastucture projects nationwide have increaseed, and at least 24 dozen projects have been rejected or canceled for myriad reasons, the most prominent among them the Keystone XL pipeline.
Protesters at the Sacred Stone Camp said they are hopeful that a federal court will rule in their favor when their case is heard on August 24. In the meantime, they are planning to continue their protests.
Brown, the Standing Rock member, who is also a former Navy medic, said he is seeking additional medical professionals to help ensure the demonstrations can last.
"One of my main concerns right now is either pneumonia or tuberculosis since we are camped so close around each other," Brown said. "From a medical standpoint, you are going to need a lot of staff for these people to self-sustain."
Wednesday, August 17, 2016
Journalists Quarantined At CIA/ Pentagon Backed NBC HQ In New York City
Newsbud along with journalists from around the world showed up at NBC headquarters to Confront NBC for their false reporting and seek comments.
Here is the summary footage from Newsbud's Confront NBC Campaign filmed on August 4th 2016
Here is the summary footage from Newsbud's Confront NBC Campaign filmed on August 4th 2016
Thursday, August 11, 2016
How the Clinton Foundation Got Rich off Poor Haitians
It filtered money through Haiti and back to itself.
In January 2015 a group of Haitians surrounded the New York offices of the Clinton Foundation. They chanted slogans, accusing Bill and Hillary Clinton of having robbed them of “billions of dollars.” Two months later, the Haitians were at it again, accusing the Clintons of duplicity, malfeasance, and theft. And in May 2015, they were back, this time outside New York’s Cipriani, where Bill Clinton received an award and collected a $500,000 check for his foundation. “Clinton, where’s the money?” the Haitian signs read. “In whose pockets?” Said Dhoud Andre of the Commission Against Dictatorship, “We are telling the world of the crimes that Bill and Hillary Clinton are responsible for in Haiti.” Haitians like Andre may sound a bit strident, but he and the protesters had good reason to be disgruntled. They had suffered a heavy blow from Mother Nature, and now it appeared that they were being battered again — this time by the Clintons. Their story goes back to 2010, when a massive 7.0 earthquake devastated the island, killing more than 200,000 people, leveling 100,000 homes, and leaving 1.5 million people destitute. The devastating effect of the earthquake on a very poor nation provoked worldwide concern and inspired an outpouring of aid money intended to rebuild Haiti. Countries around the world, as well as private and philanthropic groups such as the Red Cross and the Salvation Army, provided some $10.5 billion in aid, with $3.9 billion of it coming from the United States. Haitians such as Andre, however, noticed that very little of this aid money actually got to poor people in Haiti. Some projects championed by the Clintons, such as the building of industrial parks and posh hotels, cost a great deal of money and offered scarce benefits to the truly needy. Port-au-Prince was supposed to be rebuilt; it was never rebuilt. Projects aimed at creating jobs proved to be bitter disappointments. Haitian unemployment remained high, largely undented by the funds that were supposed to pour into the country. Famine and illness continued to devastate the island nation.
The Haitians were initially sympathetic to the Clintons. One may say they believed in the message of “hope and change.” With his customary overstatement, Bill told the media, “Wouldn’t it be great if they become the first wireless nation in the world? They could, I’m telling you, they really could.” I don’t blame the Haitians for falling for it; Bill is one of the world’s greatest story-tellers. He has fooled people far more sophisticated than the poor Haitians. Over time, however, the Haitians wised up. Whatever their initial expectations, many saw that much of the aid money seems never to have reached its destination; rather, it disappeared along the way. Where did it go? It did not escape the attention of the Haitians that Bill Clinton was the designated UN representative for aid to Haiti.
Following the earthquake, Bill Clinton had with media fanfare established the Haiti Reconstruction Fund. Meanwhile, his wife Hillary was the United States secretary of state. She was in charge of U.S. aid allocated to Haiti. Together the Clintons were the two most powerful people who controlled the flow of funds to Haiti from around the world. Haitian deals appeared to be a quid pro quo for filling the coffers of the Clintons. The Haitian protesters noticed an interesting pattern involving the Clintons and the designation of how aid funds were used. They observed that a number of companies that received contracts in Haiti happened to be entities that made large donations to the Clinton Foundation. The Haitian contracts appeared less tailored to the needs of Haiti than to the needs of the companies that were performing the services.
In sum, Haitian deals appeared to be a quid pro quo for filling the coffers of the Clintons. For example, the Clinton Foundation selected Clayton Homes, a construction company owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, to build temporary shelters in Haiti. Buffett is an active member of the Clinton Global Initiative who has donated generously to the Clintons as well as the Clinton Foundation. The contract was supposed to be given through the normal United Nations bidding process, with the deal going to the lowest bidder who met the project’s standards. UN officials said, however, that the contract was never competitively bid for. Clayton offered to build “hurricane-proof trailers” but what they actually delivered turned out to be a disaster. The trailers were structurally unsafe, with high levels of formaldehyde and insulation coming out of the walls. There were problems with mold and fumes.
The stifling heat inside made Haitians sick and many of them abandoned the trailers because they were ill-constructed and unusable. The Clintons also funneled $10 million in federal loans to a firm called InnoVida, headed by Clinton donor Claudio Osorio. Osorio had loaded its board with Clinton cronies, including longtime Clinton ally General Wesley Clark; Hillary’s 2008 finance director Jonathan Mantz; and Democratic fundraiser Chris Korge who has helped raise millions for the Clintons. Normally the loan approval process takes months or even years. But in this case, a government official wrote, “Former President Bill Clinton is personally in contact with the company to organize its logistical and support needs. And as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton has made available State Department resources to assist with logistical arrangements.” InnoVida had not even provided an independently audited financial report that is normally a requirement for such applications.
This requirement, however, was waived. On the basis of the Clinton connection, InnoVida’s application was fast-tracked and approved in two weeks. The company, however, defaulted on the loan and never built any houses. An investigation revealed that Osorio had diverted company funds to pay for his Miami Beach mansion, his Maserati, and his Colorado ski chalet. He pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering in 2013, and is currently serving a twelve-year prison term on fraud charges related to the loan. Several Clinton cronies showed up with Bill to a 2011 Housing Expo that cost more than $2 million to stage. Bill Clinton said it would be a model for the construction of thousands of homes in Haiti. In reality, no homes have been built.
A few dozen model units were constructed but even they have not been sold. Rather, they are now abandoned and have been taken over by squatters. THE SCHOOLS THEY NEVER BUILT USAID contracts to remove debris in Port-au-Prince went to a Washington-based company named CHF International. The company’s CEO David Weiss, a campaign contributor to Hillary in 2008, was deputy U.S. trade representative for North American Affairs during the Clinton administration. The corporate secretary of the board, Lauri Fitz-Pegado, served in a number of posts in the Clinton administration, including assistant secretary of commerce.The Clintons claim to have built schools in Haiti. But the New York Times discovered that when it comes to the Clintons, “built” is a term with a very loose interpretation.
For example, the newspaper located a school featured in the Clinton Foundation annual report as “built through a Clinton Global Initiative Commitment to Action.” In reality, “The Clinton Foundation’s sole direct contribution to the school was a grant for an Earth Day celebration and tree-building activity.” The Clintons claim to have built schools in Haiti. But the New York Times discovered that when it comes to the Clintons, ‘built’ is a term with a very loose interpretation. USAID contracts also went to consulting firms such as New York–based Dalberg Global Development Advisors, which received a $1.5 million contract to identify relocation sites for Haitians. This company is an active participant and financial supporter of the Clinton Global Initiative. A later review by USAID’s inspector general found that Dalberg did a terrible job, naming uninhabitable mountains with steep ravines as possible sites for Haitian rebuilding. Foreign governments and foreign companies got Haitian deals in exchange for bankrolling the Clinton Foundation.
The Clinton Foundation lists the Brazilian construction firm OAS and the InterAmerican Development Bank (IDB) as donors that have given it between $1 billion and $5 billion. The IDB receives funding from the State Department, and some of this funding was diverted to OAS for Haitian road-building contracts. Yet an IDB auditor, Mariela Antiga, complained that the contracts were padded with “excessive costs” to build roads “no one needed.” Antiga also alleged that IDB funds were going to a construction project on private land owned by former Haitian president Rene Preval — a Clinton buddy — and several of his cronies. For her efforts to expose corruption, Antiga was promptly instructed by the IDB to pack her bags and leave Haiti. In 2011, the Clinton Foundation brokered a deal with Digicel, a cell-phone-service provider seeking to gain access to the Haitian market.
The Clintons arranged to have Digicel receive millions in U.S. taxpayer money to provide mobile phones. The USAID Food for Peace program, which the State Department administered through Hillary aide Cheryl Mills, distributed Digicel phones free to Haitians. Digicel didn’t just make money off the U.S. taxpayer; it also made money off the Haitians. When Haitians used the phones, either to make calls or transfer money, they paid Digicel for the service. Haitians using Digicel’s phones also became automatically enrolled in Digicel’s mobile program. By 2012, Digicel had taken over three-quarters of the cell-phone market in Haiti. Digicel is owned by Denis O’Brien, a close friend of the Clintons. O’Brien secured three speaking engagements in his native Ireland that paid $200,000 apiece. These engagements occurred right at the time that Digicel was making its deal with the U.S. State Department. O’Brien has also donated lavishly to the Clinton Foundation, giving between $1 million and $5 million sometime in 2010–2011. Coincidentally the United States government paid Digicel $45 million to open a hotel in Port-au-Prince. Now perhaps it could be argued that Haitians could use a high-priced hotel to attract foreign investors and provide jobs for locals.
Thus far, however, this particular hotel seems to employ only a few dozen locals, which hardly justifies the sizable investment that went into building it. Moreover, there are virtually no foreign investors; the rooms are mostly unoccupied; the ones that are taken seem mainly for the benefit of Digicel’s visiting teams. In addition, the Clintons got their cronies to build Caracol Industrial Park, a 600-acre garment factory that was supposed to make clothes for export to the United States and create — according to Bill Clinton — 100,000 new jobs in Haiti. The project was funded by the U.S. government and cost hundreds of millions in taxpayer money, the largest single allocation of U.S. relief aid. Yet Caracol has proven a massive failure.
First, the industrial park was built on farmland and the farmers had to be moved off their property. Many of them feel they were pushed out and inadequately compensated. Some of them lost their livelihoods. Second, Caracol was supposed to include 25,000 homes for Haitian employees; in the end, the Government Accountability Office reports that only around 6,000 homes were built. Third, Caracol has created 5,000 jobs, less than 10 percent of the jobs promised. Fourth, Caracol is exporting very few products and most of the facility is abandoned. People stand outside every day looking for work, but there is no work to be had, as Haiti’s unemployment rate hovers around 40 percent. The Clintons say Caracol can still be salvaged.
But former Haitian prime minister Jean Bellerive says, “I believe the momentum to attract people there in a massive way is past. Today, it has failed.” Still, Bellerive’s standard of success may not be the same one used by the Clintons. After all, the companies that built Caracol with U.S. taxpayer money have done fine — even if poor Haitians have seen few of the benefits. Then there is the strange and somehow predictable involvement of Hillary Clinton’s brother Hugh Rodham. Rodham put in an application for $22 million from the Clinton Foundation to build homes on ten thousand acres of land that he said a “guy in Haiti” had “donated” to him. “I deal through the Clinton Foundation,” Rodham told the New York Times. “I hound my brother-in-law because it’s his fund that we’re going to get our money from.” Rodham said he expected to net $1 million personally on the deal. Unfortunately, his application didn’t go through. Rodham had better luck, however, on a second Haitian deal.
He mysteriously found himself on the advisory board of a U.S. mining company called VCS. This by itself is odd because Rodham’s resume lists no mining experience; rather, Rodham is a former private detective and prison guard. The mining company, however, seems to have recognized Rodham’s value. They brought him on board in October 2013 to help secure a valuable gold mining permit in Haiti. Rodham was promised a “finder’s fee” if he could land the contract. Sure enough, he did. For the first time in 50 years, Haiti awarded two new gold mining permits and one of them went to the company that had hired Hillary’s brother. I wouldn’t go so far as to say the Clintons don’t care about Haiti. Yet it seems clear that Haitian welfare is not their priority.
The deal provoked outrage in the Haitian Senate. “Neither Bill Clinton nor the brother of Hillary Clinton are individuals who share the interest of the Haitian people,” said Haitian mining representative Samuel Nesner. “They are part of the elite class who are operating to exploit the Haitian people.” Is this too harsh a verdict? I wouldn’t go so far as to say the Clintons don’t care about Haiti. Yet it seems clear that Haitian welfare is not their priority.
Their priority is, well, themselves. The Clintons seem to believe in Haitian reconstruction and Haitian investment as long as these projects match their own private economic interests. They have steered the rebuilding of Haiti in a way that provides maximum benefit to themselves. No wonder the Clintons refused to meet with the Haitian protesters. Each time the protesters showed up, the Clintons were nowhere to be seen. They have never directly addressed the Haitians’ claims. Strangely enough, they have never been required to do so.
The progressive media scarcely covered the Haitian protest. Somehow the idea of Haitian black people calling out the Clintons as aid money thieves did not appeal to the grand pooh-bahs at CBS News, the New York Times, and NPR. For most Democrats, the topic is both touchy and distasteful. It’s one thing to rob from the rich but quite another to rob from the poorest of the poor. Some of the Democratic primary support for Bernie Sanders was undoubtedly due to Democrats’ distaste over the financial shenanigans of the Clintons. Probably these Democrats considered the Clintons to be unduly grasping and opportunistic, an embarrassment to the great traditions of the Democratic party.
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/437883/hillarys-america-secret-history-democratic-party-dinesh-dsouza-clinton-foundation
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Sovereign law made Cliven Bundy a "patriot" but Korryn Gaines "crazy"
In 2014, a Nevada rancher named Cliven Bundy led an armed militia in a standoff against federal rangers who, acting on a court order, had begun removing cattle that were illegally grazing on public land. Protesters with rifles blocked a highway and surrounded the agents on the ranch, preparing for battle. Not only did the police decide to back down, but Bundy held a press conference the next day calling the standoff a "success."
On August 1, 2016, a Maryland resident named Korryn Gaines refused to open her apartment door for police who, acting on a court order, were there to serve her a warrant for failing to appear in court. After an hourslong standoff, police kicked down Gaines' door, killed her and shot her 5-year-old son.
Getty
Cliven Bundy
Bundy, 70, had been ignoring federal orders to remove his cows since 1993 and owed the government over $1 million in fees. Gaines, 23, was arrested at a traffic stop in March, and police bust down her door five months later.
FOX News and other Bundy supporters called him a "patriot" for exercising his rights, and the New York Times' headline lauded him as "defiant." Gaines has been called crazy and is being blamed for her own death.
What's the difference between Bundy and Gaines?
What they have in common is just as important. Both Gaines and Bundy allegedly believed in the concept of sovereign law. The FBI describes the sovereign citizen movement thusly:
"Sovereign citizens are anti-government extremists who believe that even though they physically reside in this country, they are separate or 'sovereign' from the United States. As a result, they believe they don’t have to answer to any government authority, including courts, taxing entities, motor vehicle departments, or law enforcement.
Other definitions say that sovereign citizens decide which laws to follow and which authoritative bodies to recognize. In Bundy's case, he decided that he did not have to obey the federal governmental agency, the Bureau of Land Management. His reasoned he has a "preemptive" right because his Mormon ancestors worked the land decades before the BLM was established. In a news conference, Bundy said, “I’ll be damned if I’m going to honor a federal court that has no jurisdiction or authority or arresting power over we the people.”
Jim Urquhart // Reuters
A Cliven Bundy supporter and militia member
In Gaines' case, her March traffic stop was allegedly because her car had cardboard signs instead of license plates. One read "Free Traveler." The other read "Any Government official who compromises this pursuit to happiness and right to travel, will be held criminally responsible and fined, as this is a natural right and freedom." Gaines filmed the traffic stop and her arrest and posted the video with this caption:
"Constitutional Law is the only true law. In order to be granted the role as Law enforcement u must take an oath to uphold the Constitution and be granted a DOAO DELEGATION OF AUTHORITY ORDER. The police are not Law enforcement they are Policy enforcers and operate outside of the laws of the Constitution which would make them organized criminals. They enforce CORPORATE Law (to generate revenue, in others words to get money, however in this case they know that i know this and this is them making trouble with me) which is not a true form of the law but so many of us have bended to their criminal ways. Not me."
So again, what's the difference between Bundy and Gaines?
For one, the Bundy family is still alive to stand by their beliefs. Cliven's son Ammon orchestrated his own standoff with police in January after seizing a government building in Oregon. Gaines' son is just 5 and is recovering from a gunshot wound inflicted by police.
For two, it's in the language history will use to define them. Was Gaines radical or empowered? Disobedient or defiant? Informed or crazy? Bundy was called a patriot and a leader and had the support of politicians like Sen. Rand Paul.
Also, there's this: How is it that Bundy organized over 100 people in a tactical standoff and beat the feds, but Gaines, one woman in her own apartment, scared the police so much they shot first?
Link: https://revolt.tv/stories/2016/08/08/sovereign-law-made-cliven-bundy-patriot-korryn-gaines-crazy-3517d33d30
Scathing Report on Baltimore Cops Vindicates Black Residents
Baltimore PD: A Black man stopped 30X in 4 yrs. Of 410 people stopped at least 10X 95% Black
With startling statistics, a federal investigation of the Baltimore Police Department documents in 164 single-spaced pages what black residents have been saying for years: They are routinely singled out, roughed up or otherwise mistreated by officers, often for no reason.
The 15-month Justice Department probe was prompted by the death of Freddie Gray, the black man whose fatal neck injury in the back of a police van touched off the worst riots in Baltimore in decades. To many people, the blistering report issued Wednesday was familiar reading.
Danny Marrow, a retired food service worker, said that over the years, he has been stopped and hassled repeatedly by police.
"It started when I was 8 years old and they'd say, with no probable cause, 'Hey, come here. Where are you going?'" he said. "No cause, just the color of my skin."
"Bullies in the workplace," he said. "They don't want you to get angry or challenge their authority, so they'll use force, they'll put the handcuffs on too tight. And if you run, they're going to beat you up when they catch you."
The Justice Department looked at hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, including internal affairs files and data on stops, searches and arrests.
It found that one African-American man was stopped 30 times in less than four years and never charged. Of 410 people stopped at least 10 times from 2010 to 2015, 95 percent were black. During that time, no one of any other race was stopped more than 12 times.
With the release of the report, the city agreed to negotiate with the Justice Department a set of police reforms over the next few months to fend off a government lawsuit. The reforms will be enforceable by the courts.
Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and Police Commissioner Kevin Davis acknowledged the longstanding problems and said they had started improvements even before the report was completed. They promised it will serve as a blueprint for sweeping changes.
"Fighting crime and having a better, more respectful relationship with the community are not mutually exclusive endeavors. We don't have to choose one or the other. We're choosing both. It's 2016," said Davis, who was appointed after the riots in April 2015.
Six officers, three white and three black, were charged in Gray's arrest and death. The case collapsed without a single conviction, though it did expose a lack of training within the department.
Calvin Void, 45, said Wednesday that he was once tackled by a police officer who was convinced he had just participated in a drug deal. But when the officer checked his pockets, he found no cash or drugs. Still, Void was arrested.
"He smacked me in the head with his walkie-talkie," Void said, motioning to a patch of discolored skin on his scalp. "And he said if I reported him I couldn't come around here anymore because he'd jump out and whip my ass. It made me frightened."
Anthony Williams, a 27-year-old father raising young children in Sandtown-Winchester, the neighborhood where Gray was arrested, said he was once with his kids and saw officers chasing a teenager for smoking marijuana.
"There was five of them. They jumped on him. I had to tell my kids they were just playing," he said.
The government report represented a damning indictment of how the city's police officers carry out the most fundamental practices, including traffic stops and searches.
It found that officers make a large number of stops — mostly in poor, black neighborhoods — with dubious justification and unlawfully arrest citizens when officers "did not like what those individuals said."
"These violations have deeply eroded the relationship between the police and community it serves," Vanita Gupta, head of the Justice Department's civil rights division, said at a news conference alongside the mayor and police commissioner.
The Justice Department has undertaken similar investigations of the police in Chicago; Cleveland; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Ferguson, Missouri, among other cities.
Federal investigators interviewed Baltimore residents, police officers, prosecutors, public defenders and elected officials, rode along with police on duty and reviewed documents and complaints.
"Nearly everyone who spoke to us ... agreed the Baltimore Police Department needs sustainable reform," Gupta said.
Among other findings: Blacks account for 63 percent of the city's population and roughly 84 percent of all police stops. From 2010 to 2015, officers stopped 34 black residents 20 times, and seven African-Americans 30 times or more.
In addition to pat-downs, Baltimore officers perform unconstitutional public strip searches, even of people not under arrest, the report said. It said officers routinely use unreasonable force, including against juveniles and people who aren't dangerous.
The direction often came from the top: In one instance, a police supervisor told a subordinate to "make something up" after the officer protested an order to stop and question a group of young black men for no reason.
Baltimore police are trained in aggressive tactics that foster an "us vs. them mentality" toward the community, the report said.
Eugene O'Donnell, a former New York City police officer and a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said the report failed to take into account the complicated realities of being a police officer in Baltimore.
"They have huge unresolved problems, huge festering problems," O'Donnell said. "And the Justice Department has nothing to say about that at all."
He said the Justice Department criticized officers for making unlawful stops, when "it's absolutely impossible to articulate what is and what is not a lawful stop. It's a minefield."
Wednesday, August 3, 2016
WikiLeaks: Hacked Emails Prove Hillary ARMED JIHADISTS In Syria - Including ISIS
Fresh off of throwing the Democratic National Convention into turmoil after proving that party officials had conspired to sabotage Bernie Sanders' campaign, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange announced that he has some even more damaging material in his trove of hacked emails — this time involving Hillary Clinton pushing to arm jihadists in Syria, including ISIS.
As Gateway Pundit's Jim Hoft notes, in her testimony in January 2013 during the congressional Benghazi hearings, Clinton denied under oath having any knowledge of the weapons trade program with Syrian rebels that took place a year before the Benghazi attack. Now Assange says that in the collection of hacked emails his group has procured, 17,000 are "about Libya alone," and among them is proof that Clinton "pushed" for weapons to be sent to "jihadists within Syria, including ISIS."
"So, those Hillary Clinton emails, they connect together with the cables that we have published of Hillary Clinton, creating a rich picture of how Hillary Clinton performs in office, but, more broadly, how the U.S. Department of State operates," Assange told Democracy Now Tuesday. "So, for example, the disastrous, absolutely disastrous intervention in Libya, the destruction of the Gaddafi government, which led to the occupation of ISIS of large segments of that country, weapons flows going over to Syria, being pushed by Hillary Clinton, into jihadists within Syria, including ISIS, that’s there in those emails.There’s more than 1,700 emails in Hillary Clinton’s collection, that we have released, just about Libya alone."
Proof that the Democratic presidential nominee helped arm ISIS? Not exactly the kind of "experience" the Clinton campaign has been touting. And, of course, this is just more evidence that Clinton's 2013 Benghazi testimony was riddled with lies.
During that testimony, Clinton told Sen. Rand Paul that she didn't have "any information" on any weapons transfer program with insurgent groups in Turkey or elsewhere run out of Libya. Here's the transcript (video below):
Last month, Assange told ITV last month that the information his group had obtained on Clinton could "proceed to an indictment." While he says he has no intention of influencing the election in Donald Trump's favor, Assange has made clear that he believes Clinton is a particularly dishonest politician.Paul: My question is, is the US involved in any procuring of weapons, transfer of weapons, buying, selling anyhow transferring weapons to Turkey out of Libya?Clinton: To Turkey? I’ll have to take that question for the record. That’s, nobody’s ever raised that with me.Paul: It’s been in news reports that ships have been leaving from Libya and that they may have weapons. And what I’d like to know is, that annex that was close by, were they involved with procuring, buying, selling, obtaining weapons and were any of these weapons being transferred to other countries? Any countries, Turkey included?Clinton: Well, Senator you’ll have to direct that question to the agency that ran the annex. And, I will see what information was available.Paul: You’re saying you don’t know?Clinton: I do not know. I don’t have any information on that.
"We do see her as a bit of a problem for freedom of the press more generally," he told ITV. "She has a long history of being a liberal war hawk, and we presume she is going to proceed."
The Clinton campaign's attempt to blame Russia for the leaked DNC emails has also clearly irritated Assange, who blasted the campaign for it on NBC News. "In order to divert attention from proof that we published that the Sanders campaign was subverted within the DNC," he said, "the Clinton campaign tries to take attention away from a very serious domestic allegation about election interference and try and bring in foreign policy."
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