"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society." - George Washington
Some interesting facts on the current refugee hysteria;
"Naturally, every age thinks that all ages before it were prejudiced, and today we think this more than ever and are just as wrong as all previous ages that thought so. How often have we not seen the truth condemned! It is sad but unfortunately true that man learns nothing from history."
- Carl Jung (26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961)
Anti-refugee rhetoric echoes dark past - The backlash against Syrian refugees is prompting comparisons to Japanese internment camps -- and comparisons to the treatment of Jews in World War 2.
This post deals with ONE aspect of the overblown email scandal that isn't so overblown, i.e. that she deleted emails (which really pissed off Jon Stewart - video below) and I show you who else amougnst the Politicians deleted thier emails upon leaving office. The revelation may surprise you.
A Point On Hillary Clinton Character - She deleted her emails after leaving public office as did Huckabee and Mitt Romney (not to mention the parallels with Jeb Bush). She had been asked to turn over her emails by an official source so deleting 30,000 of them seems very suspicious... it's like Huckabee or Mitt Romney wiping thier whole servers! (below);
OK. After being asked to turn over her emails why did she delete 30,000 of them? The following are the people who do the same things Hillary does...
Other people who deleted their emails in some way after leaving office;
Mother Jones:Huckabee Hearts Secrecy - The enduring mystery surrounding the former Arkansas governor's M.I.A. records. There's a Mike Huckabee mystery that won't go away.
Send a public records request seeking documents from his 12-year stint as Arkansas governor, as Mother Jones did recently, and an eyebrow-raising reply will come back: The records are unavailable, and the computer hard drives that once contained them were erased and physically destroyed by the Huckabee administration as the governor prepared to leave office and launch a presidential bid.
In 2007, during Huckabee's campaign for the GOP presidential nomination, the issue of the eradicated hard drives surfaced briefly, but it was never fully examined, and key questions remain. Why had Huckabee gone to such great lengths to wipe out his own records? What ever happened to a backup collection that was provided to a Huckabee aide?
Boston Globe: Before leaving office, Romney staff wiped records Just before Mitt Romney left the Massachusetts governor’s office and first ran for president, 11 of his top aides purchased their state-issued computer hard drives, and the Romney administration’s e-mails were all wiped from a server, according to interviews and records obtained by the Globe.
Romney administration officials had the remaining computers in the governor’s office replaced just before Governor Deval Patrick’s staff showed up to take power in January 2007, according to Mark Reilly, Patrick’s chief legal counsel.
As a result, Patrick’s office, which has been bombarded with inquiries for records from the Romney era, has no electronic record of any Romney administration e-mails, Reilly said.
“The governor’s office has found no e-mails from 2002-2006 in our possession,’’ Reilly said in a statement. “Before the current administration took office, the computers used during that time period were replaced and the server used during that time period was taken out of service, all files were removed from it, and it was also replaced.’’
Note: Mother Jones slams Mitt Romney for his hypocrisy on Hillary Clinton's emails though not pressing the fact that Hillary deleted emails right after turning over emails upon request, i.e. before there was time for the emails to be looked over; Mother Jones:Mitt Romney's Email HypocrisyHe blasts Hillary Clinton's email "mess"—but Romney used personal email as governor, and his staff destroyed hard drives when he left office.
CNN:Does Jeb Bush have Hillary Clinton's email problem? What do the Clinton and Bush emails have in common?
Both Clinton and Bush used private servers and personal domains, and gave their closest staffers email addresses on their own domains. They both conducted private and public business with their personal emails — Clinton said she didn't turn over her yoga schedules and event planning, and Bush kept emails relating to his political activity private.
Both, it turns out, handled national security issues with their private emails. We haven't seen Clinton's emails yet, but it's safe to assume she addressed such issues and developments via email during her time at State. The Washington Post reported this week that Bush discussed troop deployments to the Middle East and the protection of nuclear plants.
Clinton's and Bush's servers appear to be housed on their own private property at this point. Bush first housed his at the governor's office in Florida, but according to the Post, he "took it with him" when he stepped down. Clinton's has always been housed at her home in Chappaqua, New York. The encryption practices used to secure both servers remain murky; aides for both candidates have said there were security measures in place, but they've declined to elaborate on details.
And the two each had full control over what emails they released to the public. A Bush aide said a number of his staffers and his general counsel's office decided which emails to release; Clinton had a team of attorneys review her trove of emails for relevant correspondence to turn over to the State Department for approval.
Both turned over about the same portion, half, of the total number of emails sent through their private domains to be released to the public. Bush turned over about 280,000 emails to be made public, while Clinton delivered about 30,000.
And both took their time in doing it. A New York Times report out this weekend revealed that it took Bush seven years after leaving office to fully comply with Florida laws requiring he release his emails for public consumption. Clinton didn't hand over any emails to the State Department until they asked for them, nearly two years after she stepped down.
What are the big differences?
Bush aides have argued that he's been more transparent than Clinton, overall, because he published his emails on an easily accessible website without prompting (but only after releasing them to the Florida public, as required by the state's transparency laws).
Clinton said she deleted all of her personal emails; it's unclear whether Bush has held onto his.
The two were subject to different laws and regulations.
Florida's sunshine law required Bush to release any emails concerning his official business upon leaving office.
The National Archives issued regulations in October of 2009 that required, when employees used personal emails for official business, they "must ensure that federal records sent or received on such systems are preserved in the appropriate agency record-keeping system."
And the scope of business conducted by the two through their personal emails were vastly different. While Bush did use his to address a few national security issues during his tenure, Clinton likely handled much higher-level national security issues and developments, making her emails a much bigger target for hackers and other troublemakers looking to do the U.S. harm.
Wait — the rest of the 2016 field has an email problem?
Right! This isn't unique to Bush and Clinton. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie all used private emails themselves, or their staff used private emails, to conduct public business. Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley has said that he used his private Gmail account for official business as well.
At least one potential contender has skirted the controversy altogether by avoiding email. Sen. Lindsey Graham recently admitted that he has never used email.
i.e. almost ALL the Republicans have this sort of email problem PLUS Hillary Clinton on the Democrat side... is that not suspicious? I think it is and clearly Jon Stewart (above) thinks it is to.
Another interesting mark on Hillary Clinton's character;
This post deals with Hillary Clinton's involvement in expanding mass incarceration showing the Clinton don''t make decisions that help society (unless pushed? How can you trust them on issues that don't pop up in an election year for which they haven't had to take positions to win votes?). In any case, the marketing they did (directing the debate at that time) and not "regretting" it till they had to win votes cause people have Goggle... doesn't make me trust her more but less.
Proven: The Clinton's Helped Increase Mass Incarceration for Americans (including thier bully pulpit marketing);
Extract from Politifact showing that the Clinton's didn't care about thier stricter drug war laws till Hillary started running for elections and even then it took her till April of 2015 to say the laws she helped passed were bad (one should keep in mind that they may not have passed ALL the laws but they had the bully pulpit of the Presidency and they helped push the National Debate towards MORE incarceration so they are indirectly involved with ALL the increases in the incarceration. Politifact often tries to be over accurate by leaving out cultural context and over focusing on the words used). Also, I would like to point out that Bill Clinton smoked marijuana but 'didn't inhale'... clearly he believed that if DID inhale Marijuana they should go to Prison. I say we put Bill Clinton on a lie detector machine and ask him again if he inhaled:
As Jones suggests, the United States has the highest incarceration rate among developed nations, at around 700 prisoners per 100,000 people.
African-Americans in particular are locked up at disproportionate rates. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 37 percent of the 1.5 million men in state and federal prisons in 2013 were black, more than twice the percentage of their share of the population.
It wasn’t always this high; before 1975, the incarceration rate hovered around 200 prisoners.
Some of the growth had to do with Clinton policies, but experts said not all.
Crime policy during the 1970s and 1980s was driven by the "War on Drugs," an initiative launched by President Richard Nixon in 1971. Nixon famously called drug abuse "public enemy No. 1," which led to tougher sentencing and more arrests.
New York passed the nation’s first mandatory minimums for drug offenses in 1973, and Washington passed the first state-level truth-in-sentencing law in 1984. By 1987, five states had adopted sentencing guidelines for judges to follow.
Bill Clinton was instrumental in the passage of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. Authored by then-Sen. Joe Biden, the sweeping crime bill provided $10 billion to fund new prisons, $6.1 billion for crime prevention and money for 100,000 new police officers.
It also enforced harsher sentencing in federal prisons and incentivized the creation of "truth-in-sentencing" laws at the state level. These laws require violent offenders to serve a minimum portion of their original sentence by ruling out the possibility of early parole. Under the bill, states that set this minimum at 85 percent of the sentence were granted funding for new prisons, and by 1998, 27 states and the District of Columbia had qualified.
The president took the final minutes of his first State of the Union to lobby for the bill. Hillary Clinton, too, campaigned for the legislation in speeches and interviewsacross the country.
The bill ultimately found wide support among Democrats and a handful of Republicans.
Just five years after the crime bill was passed, 29 states had truth-in-sentencing laws, and 24 had three strikes laws.
The bill’s effect
So did the crime bill lead to mass incarceration?
The Prison Policy Initiative, a nonprofit group that supports reducing the prison population, has tracked the massive expansion of people in federal, local and state prisons over the past century.
Yes, the overall inmate population of the United States has grown significantly since 1994. But the sharp upward trend actually started in the early 1980s. Prisons were adding inmates in 1990 at about the same rate they were in 1997, three years after the crime bill became law.
In addition, the bill’s new sentencing standards only directly applied to federal cases. But most of the growth since 1980 has taken place within state systems, which have added almost 1.25 million prisoners over that time.
So even though the number of people in federal prison has grown, perhaps as a result of those new standards, federal prisoners represent only a small fraction of the national prison population’s overall growth.
And while the bill incentivized truth-in-sentencing laws at the state level, many states had already enacted harsher laws on their own by 1994, said Marc Mauer, the executive director of the Sentencing Project, a prison policy think tank. Mauer said it’s hard to place the onus of responsibility solely on the Clinton-backed crime bill because the trend towards mass incarceration started as early as 1980.
"(The bill) is sometimes unfairly viewed as being the major factor that has contributed to high incarceration rates," he said.
So what really drove up the inmate population?
"Criminal justice policy leading up to the crime bill was driven by the ‘War on Drugs’ and the desire to appear ‘tough on crime’ by focusing on punishment and retribution, not rehabilitation," said Nicholas Turner, president of the Vera Institute of Justice, an advocacy and research group that published a retrospective on the bill in 2014.
Still, the 1994 bill was the single biggest legislative victory for the tough-on-crime movement. It "certainly didn’t help" the mass incarceration epidemic, Turner said.
Crime rates have been on the decline since the early 1990s, making today’s high incarceration levels even more apparent.
In the past few years, the Clintons have backtracked on the policies they once championed. The former president seems to regret the bill’s passage.
"I signed a bill that made the problem worse," he recently told the NAACP. "And I want to admit that."
Hillary Clinton has also called for changes to the justice system during her presidential campaign, saying in an April 2015 speech that "we don't want to create another 'incarceration generation.' "
Clinton's campaign highlighted its transcript of her exchange with Black Lives Matter activists where she concedes that "what was tried and how it was implemented has not produced the kinds of outcomes that any of us would want."
A look at the effects of the Clintons effect on the drug war debate (destroyed hundreds of thousands of lives);
HILLARY CLINTON'S MEETING WITH BLACK LIVES MATTER ACTIVISTS - Holly Walker and Carlos Jordanson give their professional takes on an increasingly uncomfortable conversation between Hillary Clinton and Black Lives Matter activists. (8:53)
BLACK LIVES MATTER ACTIVISTS DAUNASIA YANCEY AND JULIUS JONES - Black Lives Matter members Daunasia Yancey and Julius Jones discuss their use of disruptive tactics as a means of sparking a fruitful discussion about race issues in the U.S. (5:23)
PANEL - ASSESSING THE BLACK LIVES MATTER MOVEMENT - Lil Duval, Christina Greer and Mike Yard weigh in on the controversial tactics, goals and effectiveness of the Black Lives Matter movement. (5:25)
THE BAN THE BOX CAMPAIGN - Hasan Minhaj investigates the Ban the Box campaign, which would prevent job applicants from being required to disclose their criminal records. (6:17)
I thought I would approach the gun debate again from another angle since I find that my views haven't changed. (I think it's my background in statistics and lack of fear of guns)
In the following video clip Larry Wilmore makes some interesting points but they revolve around a logic that is illogical. Let me explain;
Here is a great example of what's wrong with the gun debate on the left;
Watch how Larry Wilmore freaks out over guns;
More guns is your answer?
Agh! Bah!
My head hurts (thus losing his ability to think logically)
Once Larry Wilmore's head starts hurting he reveals what people on the left think which would be distrubing enough by itself if it wasn't for the fact that Larry Wilmore actually thinks he's making sense;
He starts his example of what's wrong with the gun debate from Fox News by comparing guns to sharks (so wrong I can't even go after Fox news for this which is distressing);
The argument is simple. In an example where guns are like sharks... if you don't have sharks around then no sharks can eat you.
In other words, if you don't have guns around then no guns can shoot you, i.e. this is the logic he starts with is that signs work;
Next, Larry Wilmore explains how guns are dangerous like sharks by their mere presence;
In other words, if he had put up a "no sharks allowed" sign up there would be no sharks.
How he thinks this might work is interesting. Somehow a shark, swimming in the water, would read a 'no sharks allowed' sign and back off.
In the same way, Larry Wilmore is saying having a sign up saying no guns allowed will stop guns from coming into the building.
BUT GUNS CAN'T READ
We know criminals wouldn't care about no guns signs (ever seen back robbers look at a no guns sign in a bank and leave?) so obviously Larry Wilmore is expecting the guns themselves to read the signs. His analogy just gets crazier from here.
True. Allowing guns to roam around freely with thier sharp teeth is just a recipe for disaster.
So if everyone had been packing sharks then everyone would have been safer. Suggesting, of course, that having sharks to defend yourself is just stupid.
I would have to agree with Larry Wilmore here, packing sharks to defend yourself is just stupid.
If you pack a gun instead you could just shoot the shark and no one would die (something as big as a shark in 4 feet of water would be a much easier target than a bank robber or mass murderer with a gun already drawn)
In other words, "liberals" have a tendency to think that guns have a mind of thier own like sharks do. How these many mistaken ideas can coalesce on one side that normally sticks to facts is startling and I try and explore that in the next part. But I think the source of the problem lies in a fear of death mixed with bad marketing of the debates and the issues for money making purposes.
I think this image helps clear up some of what I'm saying;
Here is an image of a common problem, expressed by a dog but found amougst toddlers as well, i.e. guns lying around carelessly, without their safety on, that get triggered. (leaving a gun lying around - especially a loaded gun - is like leaving your car turned on and leaving the house for a week long hike, with kids nearby).
Notice that EVERY gun has a safety.
(a lock so the trigger can't be accidently depressed)
IN other words the owner of this gun LITERALLY just left the gun lying around, loaded and without it's safety on.
A dog managed to shoot it accidentally like kids shoot each other if they get their hands on a gun lying around the house. Doesn't happen in countries like Switzerland where they are trained to handle guns, just in the US where we treat them like cars but not worthy even of getting enough training like we do when we learn to drive and no test to pass to prove you can drive/shoot. i.e. by this method is it any surprise we end up with armed untrained idiots?
The fact that it is possible to handle guns safely has been proven by other countries so the problem isn't a sentient gun (like using a metaphor of a shark would suggest) its the people handling the guns;
The problem is that people are mistaking a statistic for the answer, which is true in the most superficial way, which further proves my point that people's emotional responses are making them illogical to such an extreme as to be the source of the gun debate problem. I'm not saying that if the left fixes it's illogical issue with guns the debate will straighten out, Fox News is way too good at messing things up for it to work, but of Fox news owners were in prison the debate would be fixed because the trouble makers would be out of the way, THEN we can have a reasonable discussion without the Oligarchs purposely trying to mess up the debate.
Here is a look at the statistic and what statistics has to say about such a superficial correlation (even in statistics you wouldn't call this a cause and effect relationship between more guns and gun deaths... as a percentage of gun owning people to guns, the Swiss would beat us hands down);
Assuming a correlation between the quantity of guns and gun deaths while leaving our variables such as type of gun culture involved and type of training the average gun user has is called a type 2 error in statistics.
With news like this i.e. "GUNS = DEATH" people are getting even more scared and thinking even less rationally.
At 4:52 Fox News claims that Gun Free Zones are criminal protection areas which seems excessive and helps confuse anyone looking at the issue. Gun Free Zones aren't criminal protection areas, they are blind spots in our cultural consciousness. Somehow we think that putting up a sign saying "no guns"...
Can stop a crime from occurring. Apparently being a criminal means they listen to rules if you put it up in sign form...
To say that the "gun free zone" sign attracts criminals may not be a proven thing and thus Fox News is caught in an exaggeration or lie (as usual) but surely you don't think putting up a sign is going to deter criminals, right?
I don't understand why this is going on (after 65 years) but given that this is an emotional reaction I can explain the inconsistencies in the logic fairly easily. I should say that I know how the word "gun" can shut off the thinking faculties in even the most successful people. The fear of guns seems to be almost pathological as the fear of death must be. A whole culture based on buying stuff an planning predictable futures brought to an abrupt end by the loud sound stick. A car is not so loud, not so scary. But a gun is just terrifying as we are naturally scared of loud sounds to begin with and we only know of guns in context of killing and death while we know of cars in context of fun (car trips) AND "accidents" (death) AND murder. With no guns people may start using cars for mass murder (like they used swords in the past or clubs and stones before that - with bow and arrows in between).
This interesting blindness to cars VS guns as tools of death is expressed in this 1950s Bugs Bunny cartoon where is walks past a car (barely missing it, i.e. inches from death) and says that 'having guns is dangerous';
65 years later we are still having the same debate so lets just accept there is an emotional element in the discussion on both sides that is so strong it is blinding everyone to various extents.
Ultimately, if you read the Declaration of Independence in context of the second amendment, you are left with the very strong impression that the Founding Fathers wanted weapons for hunting AND as balance of power against a tyrannical Government.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
(Notice how much the British sounds like present day GOP Congress? i.e. by not helping the people as per Article 1 Section 8, the GOP are fulfilling the requirements laid out in the Declaration of Independence allowing revolution! Surely, with today's armaments, the population is inadequately armed to fulfill it's Constitutional responsibility of overseeing the Government)
So to say the Founding Fathers meant the second amendment for hunting just proves that the liberals have their thinking caps off for this one (and they are stomping on it out of frustration).
