How Young Is Too Young To Be Tasered?

The Taser is a small device, often called an "electroshock weapon." The fundamental concept is that it uses electrical current to disrupt voluntary control of muscles and in stimulation of the recipients sensory nerves. Such jolts of electricity results in sharp pain and involuntary contraction of muscle groups.

So basically, the Taser is a hand-held weapon designed to overstimulate muscles and cause pain.

Now, with that definition in mind, let me tell you a story. The Hero of our story is a sturdy man, tall and in-shape. His job is supposedly defined as dealing with the lowest of the low, and standing between the citizenry and danger--he is a goon in a state-issued costume police man. His name is Dustin Bradshaw.

While the villain of our piece is a ten year old, little girl.

Now, our story takes place on in Ozark Arkansas, and what occurs is that a woman calls the police because her little girl is screaming and crying and not following her mother's instructions. Basically, acting like my three-year old immediately prior to a spanking.

So, the Brave Officer Bradshaw arrives at the scene, and sees the girl who is visibly distraught over...well something. Who knows, it could be just because Mother Dearest told her to go to bed. But she's distraught and upset. So as Brave Officer Bradshaw arrives, Mother Dearest tells him that the young girl is not listening, and that Brave Officer Bradshaw needs to use his Taser on her.

After all, the proper punishment for unruly children is the swift introduction of large amounts of electricity which cause pain and muscle spasms--and possibly death.

So, Brave Officer Bradshaw picks her up and physically carries her to the living room, where he informs her that she's off to jail. After all, not listening to your mother, and throwing a temper-tantrum in your own place of residence is a criminal offense in Arkansas.

Well, as expected, the little girl did not want to go to jail--therefore she kicked and screamed, and had the gumption, gall and temerity to strike the blessed officer of the state!

So, he did as any reasonable Blessed Officer of the State would do, and Tasered her.

Does this make you upset? Does this even bother anyone?

Because I'm disgusted by it beyond belief, and if you for some reason don't think it's true... well, here's the relevant bits from the article at Arkansas Online:

The girl was on the floor of the house screaming and crying. She refused to follow her mother’s instructions and the mother told Bradshaw to use his Taser.

Bradshaw carried the girl to the living room and told her she was going to jail, according to the report.

“While she was violently kicking and verbally combative, [the girl] struck me with her legs and feet in the groin,” Bradshaw wrote in the report.

“The subject was actively resisting arrest at this time,” Bradshaw wrote. “I was having a difficult time placing the cuffs on her and administered a very, very brief drive stun to her back with my Taser. She immediately resisted and was placed in handcuffs.”

Yeah, he's a BIG man all right.

While you're pondering the insanity involved in the fact that this goon policeman is willing and happy to electrocute a 10 year old little girl, I want to point you to a little history from the state of Florida.

The date: January, 2005; the place: Palm Beach, Florida. Douglas Dycus was arrested and charged with felony child abuse and domestic battery for using a stun gun as a discipline device.

What is the difference? They are both electric devices designed to apply pain in measured and controlled jolts. Why is what Douglas Dycus did felony child abuse, while the exact same actions from the Brave Officer Bradshaw justifiable--despite the fact that the little girl being tortured and abused by Brave Officer Bradshaw being 4 years younger that Douglas Dycus' son?

The difference of course is that little piece of state issued jewelry which grants a mere citizen with the awesome abilities of one of the Elect!

Yes, that glorious piece of tin which means that all who the bearer surveys must adore them, and worship their numerous sacrifices to the greater good of their own elite brotherhood. It is that beautiful chunk of tin which allows them the ability to weld weapons of death, and randomly hurt people because... well they had the gall to disagree with whatever drivel the Elect emitted from their mouths.

See, that's the problem here. The Brave Officer Bradshaw was called to a house because a girl was having a temper tantrum, and instead of telling the mom that she should treat her child as a child, he attempted to arrest the girl.

At no point, are we given a reason for the Brave Officer Bradshaw to threaten this child with arrest. The only complaints filed were in conjunction with this event are related to when said 10 year old dared to defend herself against a grown man who was attempting to forcefully take her from her home.

Let us remember something, that seems to have been forgotten in our rush to affirm the Clowns of the State with powers above the mortal's keen:

“Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary.” Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306. This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: “Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed.”

Yes, read that, and understand. The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that a citizen can resist arrest up to and including taking the arresting officer's life if such is necessary.

Think about this, an illegal arrest is nothing less than assault and battery (defined in State v. Robinson, 145 ME. 77, 72 ATL. 260). as such, any person that is suffering under an illegal arrest has the same rights--and responsibilities--to protect their own persons as at any other time when repelling any other type of assault and battery.

What this officer did, was forcefully carry this young child away from her mother (read the article, he describes carrying her into the living room) and then telling her, that he's taking her to jail.

There was no crime, the only "domestic disturbance" was that the girl was not obeying her mother.

Yet, when this child attempted to protect herself from the equivalent of an assault and battery, she was electrocuted.

This is not what a police officer initially stood for!

What this is is an occupying military force which expects its orders to be instantly obeyed regardless of the legal status of said orders.

That is what our police forces have become, and worse, they are actively heading in that direction today.

And sadly, too many people, hyped up on the glories of CSI and Law and Order: Special Victims Unit believe that they don't have the rights which in truth they have--and among those is the right to resist an unlawful arrest.

Luckily, this 10 year old girl survived her electrocution.

Unfortunately, others have not always been so lucky.

Maybe, just maybe, it's time to take these deadly weapons away from those all too willing to torture and kill our children.

Can Twitter Lead to Jail Time?

Imagine it, the date, September 24, 2009. The place, Philadelphia during the G20 Summit. You're sitting in a hotel room, with a off-the-shelf, police-band radio scanner, and a computer. What you're doing is as police actions come over the radio, you're transcribing them to Twitter.

The before you know it, you're under arrest, and the F.B.I. is at your house, taking your books, computers, and rifling through your dirty underwear. After all, larceny in the name of protecting the government is the primary job of the F.B.I.

This is exactly what happened to Elliot Madison (aged 41). He was sitting in a hotel room, transcribing police messages to Twitter when the self-same police arrived and took him to jail. While there they charged him with the following crimes:

• Hindering apprehension or prosecution
• Criminal use of a communication facility
• Possession of instruments of crime

Let's consider these things, and remember I'm not a lawyer. What I am is an intelligent, logical human, who expects things--especially laws--to be human readable without having a lawyer immediately on hand to explain every detail.

The Hindering Apprehension or Prosecution law is fairly straightforward. It details the fact that anyone actively helping people escape prosecution (hiding criminals, etc) is guilty of it. Specifically, this clause:

warns the other of impending discovery or apprehension, except that this paragraph does not apply to a warning given in connection with an effort to bring another into compliance with law; or

What's interesting in regards to this case, is that the Prosecution would have a hard time proving a) the intent of Mr. Madison in this regard and b) the people he was actively providing this information to was actively engaging in a crime. He was sending Twitter messages to people protesting the government--I find it highly odd that the Pennsylvania State Police automatically assume that people protesting governments are engaging in criminal behavior. After all, that has to be the assumption if Mr. Madison is providing t his information to warn them of impending discovery or apprehension in regards to criminal behavior.

The second law there, only comes into bearing if the first one is relevant--or again, if the Pennsylvania State Police believe that dissent with governing bodies is the same as criminal behavior. This law only has bearing if someone commits, causes or facilitates other criminal activity with the use of the "Communication Facility," which is defined by law as:

As used in this section, the term "communication facility" means a public or private instrumentality used or useful in the transmission of signs, signals, writing, images, sounds, data or intelligence of any nature transmitted in whole or in part, including, but not limited to, telephone, wire, radio, electromagnetic, photoelectronic or photo-optical systems or the mail. (Dec. 21, 1998, P.L.1240, No.157, eff. 60 days)

Now, what interests me is the fact that by this definition--and the Pennsylvania State Police's assumptions of inherent criminal activity on the part of protesters--the dispatch officers and officers at the scene are facilitating the same "criminal" behavior as Mr. Madison by sending the same information he did over the radio (after all, he was just transcribing radio communications onto Twitter).

And that last law is probably the most inherently unstable of the charges brought against Mr. Madison. The "authoritahs" are using the following clause to bring the charge (as the rest of the clauses refer to weapons and/or body armor):

Anything used for criminal purposes and possessed by the actor under circumstances not manifestly appropriate for lawful uses it may have.

The problem with that is that Mr. Madison was using the tools he had at his disposal in inherently legal--and (what seems to this non-lawyer as) an appropriately lawful--manners. He was listening to a police-band radio scanner, and transmitting the information he heard on it over Twitter.

Let us not forget that the Police, as "public servants," their communication is part of the Public Domain. That chatter can legally be listened to by anyone (though transmitting on the relevant bands is legally a no-no and morally really murky).

No, the way this reads is the following concepts are in play:

• (Yet another) Government Agency does not want people actively paying attention to what they are doing and/or saying about the people that they are supposedly serving
• The (Pennsylvania State) police inherently feel that protesting the government and/or any form of governing body is an inherently criminal act

Both concepts scare the tar outta me.

It saddens me that the government is scared of the populace. Actually, that tells me that the government is not effectively doing its job of serving the true needs of the constituency which they are there to serve.

Worse, is the thought that this police force (and the FBI for searching Mr. Madison home for "criminal materials") believe that dissent to the government is bad.

Of course, it's not that unexpected. Time and again, the government--and by that I mean everything from the smallest of podunk towns sheriff's all the way to the Supreme Court--are less interested in serving the true nature of our country as defined by the Constitution as they are by gathering more and more power unto themselves.

No, I firmly believe that what Mr. Madison was doing was morally and legally right. He--as a taxpayer and citizen of this country--is morally obligated to keep tabs upon the criminal governmental agencies out to fleece serve him. Additionally, he is within his right to post that information he has gathered onto any bulletin board service he so desires.

In the end, it is as too often the case these days: the Police attempting to force their will upon the populace via duress.

I Got Your Back.... We Clear?

"That's all right. Don't worry about it. I got your back... We clear?"

Those were the words recorded by 911 operators as Anthony Arambula lay bloodied on the floor of his home, having been shot six times in the back.

"That's all right."

Such a simple phrase, one that I've repeated to my children many, many times over the past few years--whenever they've done something wrong. Whenever they've accidentally hit me. I've used it at work. I used it when I was at school. I've even used it at the restaurant a few days ago, after the waitresses ignored us for twenty minutes.

It's a shorthand for the person you're talking to, telling them that what they have done is not that bad of a thing.

And it was being used by the folks who shot Anthony Arambula in his own home.

Now, you may ask, what was Mr. Arambula doing? Who shot him in the back? What about the police?

The answer there is simple: Mr. Arambula had cornered someone breaking into his home, and had his gun trained on the burglar, as said burglar was in Mr. Arambula's son's room.

Apparently, the police heard the burglar breaking Mr. Arambula's window, and after having been told by Mr. Arambula's wife of his presence, and the burglar's presence, the police in question rushed into the house, and more or less shot the first person they came across.

And after this brilliant display of bravery and intelligence by the "Boys in Blue" they proceeded to a) describe how they were going to cover up the shooting, and blame it on Mr. Arambula, and then b) drag Mr. Arambula around by his leg and finally c) treated Mrs. Aramabula and the rest of the family as if they were the criminals here.

Were it not for the existence of those 911 tapes, the Police's description of events would remain uncontested and incontestable.

Mr. Arambula would have been blamed for the police randomly shooting him in the back.

And these are the so-called guardians of law and order in our society?

It makes me wonder--as it should you--how many times this has happened in the past, and the poor victim just unable to prove that the police willfully and maliciously shot him.

I'm disturbed by the sense of conceit which permeates the police forces in our society today. We're expected to kowtow to their every whim and demand, and they are more than willing to enforce those demands with force.

They have forgotten that they are neither above the law, nor are they the law. Rather they are just a group of people whose job it is to investigate purported breaks within said law.

Our police forces have become caught up in their own mystique--helped in this by the inane portrayals of the heroic cops on shows such as Law and Order. When in reality, most cops are closer to the ones depicted on The Shield: corrupt and/or power hunger.

After all, it takes a special type of person to be a cop.

The proverbial guard dog, to the wolf in sheep's clothing.

Of course, most of us forget, that the guard dog has much more in common with the wolf than with the sheep; and given half the chance will be just as quick to take advantage of an unwary sheep as the wolf is.

Respect Mah Authoritah!

There's been a lot of recent media attention revolving around the 72-year-old Grandmother in Texas who was tasered by a cop who pulled her over for a routine speeding ticket.

Early on, she got on the media and claimed that the cop lied about her being verbally abusive. Frankly, I believed her--this due to the fact that it seemed more reasonable to me that a cop tasered this woman for jollies than she was verbally abusive.

Well, the police released the video, showing exactly what happened in all it's glory.

And yes, the woman was a bit verbally abusive towards the officer.

But does that give him the right to taser her? Would your opinion be different if he had hit her with his fists or his nightstick? What if he had shot her with his gun?

Frankly, I see no difference between a taser, a gun or a nightstick. All are weapons, and all can, and do, kill.

Now, yes, this woman was speeding, and Texas law does require you to sign a reckless driving summons. So, yes, this woman was in violation of the law by refusing the ticket.

At which point, the officer should have taken her and placed her in the back of the squad car as he was doing.

Which if you've watched the video, it is on this being escorted to the squad car that the woman said she would go ahead and sign the ticket. It is this point, at which this government-mandated goon should have allowed the woman to sign the ticket and go about her merry way.

Instead, he proceeds to push her against the back of her truck, and when she attempts to return to her vehicle, he blocks her, pushes her again, tosses down his ticket book, and then tasers her as she turns away from him.

Yes, this big man, tasered a grandmother who had her back turned to him. Big man there. Oh wait, I'd better not say that, don't want him to come taser me.

But you know what, none of that matters. Sure, the woman was being argumentative, and wasn't the most responsive to the officer's demands. But so what? That's not a reason to taser her.

And as is usually the case, it gets better! The officer in question has been praised by his direct superior, because the officer in question did everything by the book. He treated this woman just the way that the Officers of the Law are expected to treat any one who dares to not immediately bow down in obeisance to said Officers of the Law.

As if wearing a state-approved costume automatically grants you the wisdom and right to be above the citizens who pay your salary.

Most of the people who are approving of this cop's actions are doing so because the lady didn't listen to what the cop said, and worse, because she had the audacity to argue with him.

Maybe if more folks argued with the Powers That Be, we would have less Powers That Be.

No, I cannot think of any legitimate reason that this woman should have been tasered. She had no weapons, and was not physically violent. She was merely argumentative, and unwilling to a) sign a summons and b) place herself into the back of a car driven by a man that she did not know, and was attempting to physically restrain her.

God forbid that there's someone who's not instantly deferential to the "Boys in blue."

The New Legal

What is the definition of a criminal? When does someone become a part of a criminal conspiracy? These are important questions, and we need the answers today--because some of our lawmakers are flouting the edges.

For the record, a criminal is someone who commits a crime, or has been legally convicted of committing a crime.

The second part of the question, is even easier to understand. According to law, a criminal conspiracy exists when two or more people agree to engage in a course of conduct which is itself a criminal offense.

Now, let's play a role-playing game. Say, you own two houses, and being the good steward of your property, you put up one of those houses as a rental unit. After all, you can't live in two houses, and by making the second a rental unit, you gain income, provide housing for someone, and ensure that the house does not become run down and/or decrepit.

Now, imagine said renter decides that they don't want to pay. They just want to live in your house, free of charge, while you pay the mortgage. What does one do?

Well, you evict the renter of course. Toss them out, and get a new renter. It's a standard procedure, and one should not feel bad about it. I mean, you had a contract that clearly stated that you allowed them to stay within your property for a certain sum of cash on a monthly basis. And that contract clearly had provisions for what happens when one does not pay.

Now, what would you do, if a City Commissioner told every person who decides to not pay their rent, that they should, "stay in their homes. That if anyone is being evicted, then don't leave."

And what if a "community service" organization then made plans to ignore eviction notices, and to forcefully keep an individual within the property.

At what point, do you worry that maybe, just maybe, this dead-beat renter who refuses to pay his agreed upon rental amount, intends to just keep your second house.

Would you care at all? Or would you use the Sheriff's office to enforce the law, and remain in control of the property you own?

I know what I would do.

Now, I used houses there, but in truth, the concept can be applied to any property. You have a car that you rent out, or maybe a TV or a computer. The thing is that one person is in blatant violation of the agreement, and intends to take your property for their own.

It is theft. Pure and simple, and without any other possible interpretation.

If you agree, keep reading. If you don't, I feel sorry for you that you believe it is okay that someone can take what does not belong to them by force.

Now, what would you say, if I told you that that little role-playing, was 100% real?

What would you say, if I told you that a Congressman is encouraging the American population to break the law, and in effect attempt to steal homes?

Because, guess what, it's real.

Representative Marcy Kaptur, on the floor of the House, said this:

What I am telling people right now is, stay in your homes. If the American people, anybody out there is being foreclosed, don't leave, because I will tell you what. If you had a smart lawyer like those banks up there on Wall Street can get, they would take you into court and they couldn't find the mortgage. They couldn't find the mortgage.
So why should any American citizen be kicked out of their homes in this cold weather? In Ohio it is going to be 10 or 20 below zero. Don't leave your home.

Because you know what? When those companies say they have your mortgage, unless you have a lawyer that can put his or her finger on that mortgage, you don't have that mortgage, and you are going to find they can't find the paper up there on Wall Street.

So I say to the American people, you be squatters in your own homes. Don't you leave. In Ohio and Michigan and Indiana and Illinois and all these other places our people are being treated like chattel, and this Congress is stymied. We have the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression and our committees are muzzled. Power is given to one chairman or one person.

...

So I say to the American people, stay in your homes. You have earned them. And don't you get out until you get a really good lawyer who can find your mortgage up there on Wall Street. Because, you know what? They won't be able to find it, and therefore they can't prove you should be evicted.

Think about it. Sure, it's a sad thing that all these folks are facing foreclosure, but whose fault is it? Who signed the loan--which is a legally binding contract? And it's not like they couldn't declare bankruptcy.

But instead, we have this Congressman who is encouraging the populace to break the law, and ignore the legal rights of the mortgage holder. Because let's not forget the simple fact that a person does NOT own their house until all the liens are satisfied--the lien holders do.

No amount of claiming that American's have a "right" to home ownership, or a "right" to not face foreclosure, does not mean that those rights actually exist.

That said, Home Ownership is a right, and along side that right is a responsibility to actually pay for the home.

Otherwise, you're just stealing.

First Guns, Now...

I've long been a proponent of loosening our overly restrictive gun laws. Yes, that's right, I want more guns sold to more folks who obey those various laws already in place. I want to be able to carry my weapon anywhere with me, and not have to worry about silly little power-hungry bureaucrats trying to tell me that I cannot carry my gun.

The reasons for this are many, and diverse, not the least of which is the simple fact that I believe it's my right to be able to defend myself from anyone who wishes harm to me or mine.

Anyways, Britian went through the whole hassle of taking all of the guns away from their law-abiding citizens--and conversely, they managed to get a decent number away from the non-law-abiding citizens as well.

So, what did those criminals begin to do? Why use knives of course. After all, a knife is the next best thing to a gun; plus it's quieter! According to an AP report, 15 teenagers have been murdered in London this year, with 11 of those being stabbed to death.

Now, like any responsible, intellect group of people, Britain looked at this situation, and thought, "Hey, we can't stop criminals ourselves, let's make sure that our people can defend themselves."

And then I woke up.

No, what those intelligent, responsible pansys and appeasers in the British government decided was to try to convince the law-abiding citizens to not even carry their knives anymore.

Here's the relevant sentence of the AP report:

Britain's government has begun a campaign of graphic Internet advertisements aimed at warning young people about the dangers of carrying a knife.

Brilliant eh? The dangers of carrying a knife.

Let's be honest here, I carry a knife every day of my life. In the past year, I've not carried it on two distinct days--and both of those days were when I was visiting an airport to get on an airplane. If you reached into my left, front pocket right this second, you'd find it--at which time I'd have to hit you for sticking your hand into my pocket.

Digression aside, I've been doing this for years. In fact, long before it was a pocket knife, it was a six-inch, folding knife I carried on my belt. Quite useful for when I was out in the woods. The relevant thing though is that I carried it nearly every day.

And you know what? I've not once hurt myself or someone else with any of my knifes. I've used my pocket knife to cut things (including straws for my kids) and all sorts of other legitimate uses. Amazing how someone can carry a knife, or a gun, and not hurt someone with the thing.

My point is that a weapon is an inanimate object. No gun or knife ever killed anyone. Not one. It's a literal impossibility that one could do it (at least yet, I'm sure one day we'll have smart, autonomous weapons that will kill their creators). They can be the CAUSE of death; but so can keys, screwdrivers, automobiles, tree limbs, bricks, hands, rolls of quarters or even a rusty spoon.

What is Britain going to take away from its citizenry after all the knives are gone? Forks? Screwdrivers?

It's insane to think that just because a weapon is removed from the people, that the people won't figure out a way to kill one another. Like it or not, it's in our nature to be aggressive beings.

I don't see that changing, no matter how many weapons the government takes from our hands.

To Knock, or Not To Knock....

Back in 1995, case number 514 U.S. 927 appeared before that highest of high benches; those keepers of the writ of law; the new High Priests of our land: The Supreme Court. Commonly known as Wilson v. Arkansas, this case gave the land the joys of the No Knock warrant.

For those of you who are unaware of this particular travesty, the No Knock warrant is the type of search warrant which allows police to enter your home without identifying themselves. Basically, it's the Gestapo, bursting down your door, usually between 1 and 4 in the morning, with their guns pulled, in the hopes that you won't destroy your drug evidence--because evidence can always be destroyed in the 30 seconds it takes a cop to announce himself.

Unsurprisingly, this type of search warrant has led to the unnecessary deaths of police and citizens alike. People like the father of 3, Police Officer Ron Jones. Officer Jones was playing stormtrooper, when he burst through the door of one Corey Maye. Maye had a young daughter in his house, and being the responsible father, when he was woken by someone breaking and entering, he made a decision and protected his family. After killing Officer Jones, he realized that it was the police breaking into his home, so he surrendered; only to now be serving a life sentence without parole solely for the perfectly reasonable action of protecting his family.

Of course, things don't always end up this nicely for those being served warrants. Kathryn Johnston, a 92 year old woman, was surprised by one of these things, and she ended up dead. Despite the fact that anonymous tips--which are almost universally the cause of no-knock warrants--informed the police that Mrs. Johnston held a large cache of drugs in her home, no drugs were ever found. All that happened was Mrs. Johnston was killed. Oh wait, that's not all that happened; in an effort to exculpate themselves from the blame of the death of Mrs. Johnston the officers on the scene planted three bags of marijuana.

How's that for police work.

Amazingly for Mrs. Johnston family, Mrs. Johnston is apparently getting some justice in this world. Fox News is reporting this morning that the officer in question gets to spend the next 5 years in prison.

How did we become this? At what point did our homes stop being sacrosanct and start being subject to searches and invasion all at the random voice of a drug informant?

If someone breaks into my home without announcing who they are, I am going to do everything in my power to stop them, and leave them dead. My family is that important to me--and quite frankly, other humans just aren't.

Of course the easiest way to stop all of these senseless killings, of both the gestapo and those being ground under their heel, is to simply outlaw no-knock searches. Make everything be a knock-and-announce search, and at that point, the folks inside the house know it's a cop coming through their windows waving guns at their family.

Wilson v. Arkansas gave us three guidelines for a no-knock search:

• "Circumstances present a threat of physical violence"
• There is "reason to believe that evidence would likely be destroyed if advance notice were given"
• Knocking and announcing would be "futile" Richards v. Wisconsin, 520 U.S. 385, 394 (1997)

Let's be perfectly honest here--the first, the threat of physical violence, is always there. This is America, I have guns. Other folks have guns. It's a part of our national identity and culture. We have a strong history of self-defense, and I for one refuse to rely on the gestapo for that defense; especially where my family is concerned. Additionally, if there weren't guns, then there would be knives, swords, baseball bats, screwdrivers, forks, chainsaws, rakes, shovels, and all sorts of other implements with which I can carry out all sorts of body harming, if not outright deadly, violence.

The other two, those are just silly. Even with no-knock, evidence can be destroyed, and if it's "futile" to knock and announce, it's also not hurting anything to do so.

Of course, those "reasons" are really just random justification for the act. After all, the law of the land as defined in Hudson v. Michigan is that violations of the knock-and-announce rules (i.e. not knocking on a knock and announce warrant) is not a valid reason to exclude evidence.

Kind of scary, no?

Emotional Profiling

Seattle PI has an interesting article on the TSA entitled: Airport Profilers: They're Watching Your Expressions. Frankly this is yet another TSA program that just flat out scares me. It is giving a huge amount of power to individuals with no true way to verify their opinions. It's subjective and emotionalism, and scary to me.

Consider this quote:

But a central task is to recognize microfacial expressions -- a flash of feelings that in a fraction of a second reflects emotions such as fear, anger, surprise or contempt, said Carl Maccario, who helped start the program for TSA.

Basically, if you have a serious hate on concerning authority figures, guess what, if you fly, you make get a strip search.

Yet, if that wasn't scary enough, the fact that it's spreading should scare you. Additionally, one must question why such a program is spreading. After all, here's some statistics from it:

Since January 2006, behavior-detection officers have referred about 70,000 people for secondary screening, Maccario said. Of those, about 600 to 700 were arrested on a variety of charges, including possession of drugs, weapons violations and outstanding warrants.

One percent. Out of the 70,000 people inconvenienced by this emotionalism, less than 1% have been arrested. Additionally, those arrests were due to drug possession, weapons violations and outstanding warrants, which would have most likely been caught via normal operational security. So not only are the numbers on record a 1% success rate, but that is inflated by not removing those from the numbers who would most likely have been caught anyways.

In, parting, I'd like to leave you a passage from a classic work of literature.

It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself -- anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face (to look incredulous when a victory was announced, for example) was itself a punishable offence. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime, it was called.

-- 1984 by George Orwell

Could it be a 1% Tolerance Policy?

Escambia County School District (FL) possesses a Zero-Tolerance Policy for students concerning both weapons and drugs, to the extent that both fingernail clippers and aspirin warrant suspension, if not expulsion. Yet this same school district has been ordered by an EEA arbitrator and a judge that a school teacher that was found to have a massive (50X a positive test result) dosage of cocaine in his body has to be rehired.

What type of message is this for students? Drugs are ok, if you're an adult?

If Mr. Sites is supposed to be a role model for students, should he not be held to the same rules and regulations that students are? Why should he have his job, working with children, when he has proven himself to be a criminal (drug usage is still a crime you know). But ultimately I blame the EEA, yes the teacher's union which originally threw fits about Sites being fired. Now tell me, whose interest is this in? The students? Mr. Sites? The union (can't collect union dues if the guy's fired)? I applaud Superintendent Paul for not going along with this. In my opinion, as a tax payer, voter, and soon-to-be parent in Escambia County, Mr. Sites has NO business having anything to do with children.

End of story.