Washington Post – by Melissa Byrne

Like many events that end up with a person in handcuffs, my story begins in a bar. I was in Atlanta earlier this month for Netroots Nation, the annual meeting of progressive organizers and writers, when I overheard friends discussing how to resist President Trump’s first visit to Trump Tower. I jumped into the conversation: “Well, you call me, of course.” Twenty minutes later, we had a rough plan that we would unfurl a banner inside Trump Tower the following week. I have been to many protests since the inauguration, and I was proud to do my part.   Continue reading “I was detained for protesting Trump. Here’s what the Secret Service asked me.”

Courthouse News – by Kevin Lessmiller

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (CN) – A former Tennessee sheriff was sentenced Wednesday to nearly three years in prison after admitting to giving female inmates certain benefits in exchange for sex.

Former Fentress County Sheriff Charles Cravens, 47, was charged in April with three counts of honest services fraud and one count of deprivation of rights under color of law. He pleaded guilty the same day he was charged and resigned as sheriff.   Continue reading “Former Tennessee Sheriff Sentenced for Sex With Inmates”

The Newspaper

Police in North Carolina can pull over motorists even if they have committed no traffic violation. The state’s highest court on Friday approved the stop of a man whose pickup truck fishtailed slightly while making a left-hand turn on a snowy road.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals had reviewed the case and found the driver, James L. Johnson, had done absolutely nothing illegal. The unanimous three-judge panel struck down the traffic stop as unconstitutional, but the high court justices last week insisted on declaring the officer’s actions as legitimate, reversing the lower court’s decision.  Continue reading “North Carolina Supreme Court Upholds Stopping Drivers Without A Violation”

MassPrivateI

MorphoTrust (MT) is trying to convince motorists that mobile biometric driver’s licenses (MDL) are a good thing. Two years ago MT convinced the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) to pilot their mobile driver’s license program.

MT wants you to download an image of your driver’s license to your smartphone and use that instead of a physical license. A KTVQ video revealed how the MT app uses facial recognition to verify an individual’s identity.   Continue reading “Mobile biometric driver’s licenses coming to a state near you”

RT

Energy Transfer Partners, the corporation behind the Dakota Access Pipeline, has sued Greenpeace and other environmental groups for “eco-terrorism” over their protests against the controversial pipeline.

According to the Dakota Access Pipeline company, environmental groups launched an “eco-terrorism campaign” against the pipeline, and engaged in “acts of terrorism,” including soliciting donations and interfering with construction, damaging its “critical business and financial relationships,” Reuters reports.  Continue reading “DAPL protesters sued for being ‘eco-terrorists’ by company behind pipeline”

Bangor Daily News – by Alex Horton, Washington Post

At $700 million, Wednesday night’s Powerball prize is the second-largest lottery jackpot in its history, and the math is working out in favor of lotto commissions.

Two years ago, your chances of becoming an instant millionaire were 1 in roughly 175 million. Now, the odds are 1 in roughly 292 million.

Tweaks to the game in October 2015 increased the number of total balls, from 59 to 69, from which players need to pick five. It may seem like a modest change, but the odds of winning the jackpot shot up astronomically.   Continue reading “How Powerball manipulated the odds to make another massive jackpot”

ABC News – by Janet McConnaughey, AP

The American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana is chastising state police because a trooper ticketed a driver who gave him the middle finger.

The ticket alleged public intimidation, a felony carrying up to five years in prison and a $1,000 fine, ACLU of Louisiana Executive Director Marjorie Esman said in a letter faxed to the Louisiana State Police on Monday. Giving the ticket was illegal retaliation for protected free speech, she said.   Continue reading “ACLU: Police can’t ticket drivers for giving the finger”

Judicial Watch

A high-ranking public housing official charged with providing government-subsidized homes to the poor stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the agency and used it to buy furniture, alcohol, clothes, makeup and other personal items. The crooked public official scammed the government for years undetected which may seem unbelievable though not when it comes to the agency she worked for, a bastion of corruption known as Housing and Urban Development (HUD).   Continue reading “HUD Director Goes on $336,000 Shopping Spree with Low-Income Housing Funds”

Jon Rappoport

In these pages, I’ve emphasized that mainstream news often fails to follow up on their own stories.

They publish a shocking account of a scandal, and then they drop it like a hot potato.

Why? There are several reasons, but the most important is: the scandal is too revealing. It indicts an institution or organization that, in the long run, must be protected.   Continue reading “The FBI evidence lab, a cesspool”

MassPrivateI

The TSA is winning the war on Americans minds as commuters are being tricked into giving away their rights without a fight.

The above video warns that facial recognition body scanners are coming to a train station near you…

“Soon you might have to pass through one of these to get to your train or subway.”
Continue reading “TSA facial biometric body scanners and government watchlists being used in train stations”

The Newspaper

Judge concludes that the evidence tends to show Whittier, California police used illegal ticket quotas.

Six police officers in Whittier, California have taken a stand against ticket quotas, and now they will have a chance to tell their story to a jury. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Howard L. Halm last month found sufficient evidence to believe the officers have a valid claim.   Continue reading “California Cops Sue Over Ticket Quotas”

Liberty Blitzkrieg – by Michael Krieger

I warned everybody about this in several posts last week. How some of the worst cretins rummaging around the carcass of American freedom and democracy instantaneously began salivating ferociously at the opportunity to look heroic by coming out in opposition to a grossly exaggerated Nazi threat hyped up by the corporate media. The events in Charlottesville presented such a tremendous opportunity for sleazy people in power to preposterously frame themselves as “speaking truth to power,” I knew they’d milk it for all it’s worth. Days later, and they’re still doing it.   Continue reading “No, Corporate CEOs are Not Heroes”

MassPrivateI

Americans brace for major police presence during eclipse. Police across America are afraid terrorists might attack Americans distracted by the eclipse.

Police told to issue tickets to people who are distracted by the sun and not paying attention to their surroundings.

You never know, the person standing next to you wearing eclipse glasses could be a terrorist.   Continue reading “Americans brace for major police presence during eclipse”

Union Leader – by Mark Hayward

MANCHESTER — Over the last three years, Manchester police operated nine federally funded DWI sobriety checkpoints that have nabbed a total of three drunken drivers, according to data the police department made available to the New Hampshire Union Leader.

Police did make other arrests — nine for violations such as driving after license revocation — and they wrote a few dozen warnings.   Continue reading “Police data: Three DWI arrests in three years at Manchester checkpoints”

Strategic Culture – by Eric Zuesse

Two of the U.S. government’s supposed allies are supposedly not allies of each other but enemies of each other, but, away from the glare of the ‘news’media, they actually work together with each other to control, by means of their secret actual alliance with one-another, a substantial, if not the major, part of U.S. foreign policies — especially regarding Iran, Russia, Syria, Israel, Palestinians, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Turkey, but much else besides. These two secret allies of each other, who largely determine U.S. foreign policies, are the Saud family, and the government of Israel.   Continue reading “The Saudi-Israeli Alliance”

The Intercept – by Ryan Grim

There is no one left in the White House who has any idea what they’re doing. At least nobody conservative.

President Donald Trump never tires of reminding audiences that he is not a politician, and he proves it on an hourly basis. He is by turns a nationalist, a populist, and a demagogue — but rarely acts as a traditional conservative.   Continue reading “The White House is Now Run Entirely by Hucksters, Democrats, and Generals”

Future Tense – by April Glaser

The iPhone’s Touch ID fingerprint unlocking is one of the most intuitive security features in consumer technology. Strong passwords are hard to remember and annoying to type. And biometric security, like fingerprint IDs, is great for keeping things locked down. But like anything, Touch ID is really great until it isn’t. Your fingerprints are, after all, readily available, and it’s not that hard for someone to force you to press a button to unlock your phone, which, let’s face it, is probably packed with all kinds of private information, like credit card numbers, search histories, or clandestine texts.

Continue reading “The Next iOS Update Has a Feature to Prevent Cops From Searching Your iPhone”

KRQE News 13

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Caught on camera, a Walmart security guard used her work car to allegedly run down a bicyclist in the store parking lot. KRQE News 13 has obtained the surveillance video and police lapel video from the incident.

It happened around 6:30 p.m. on July 21 at the Walmart near Coors and I-40.

Surveillance cameras were on and rolling in the store’s back lot when a Walmart security guard car appeared traveling north. A few seconds later, a bicyclist entered the frame headed south. Immediately, the security car turned around and beelined for the man on the bike at a clearly high rate of speed.   Continue reading “Surveillance video captures Walmart security guard allegedly mow over bicyclist”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

Throughout the 2016 campaigning cycle, then candidate Trump frequently criticized NATO as “obsolete” and repeatedly knocked allies for not paying their “fair share.”

Then, in a shocking reversal, Trump hosted a joint press conference with NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg, just a few months after moving into the White House, in which he declared: “I said it was obsolete.  It’s no longer obsolete.”   Continue reading “Urban Warfare: NATO Issues RFP For Training To Fight In Big Cities With “Dense, Interconnected Populations””

BAN THE NY TIMES!!!

New York Times – by John Feinblatt

When militia members and white supremacists descended on Charlottesville, Va., last Saturday with Nazi flags and racist placards, many of them also carried firearms openly, including semiautomatic weapons. They came to intimidate and terrify protesters and the police. If you read reports of the physical attacks they abetted, apparently their plan worked.

They might try to rationalize their conduct as protected by the First and Second Amendments, but let’s not be fooled. Those who came to Charlottesville openly carrying firearms were neither conveying a nonviolent political message, nor engaged in self-defense nor protecting hearth and home.  Continue reading “NY TIMES: Ban the Open Carry of Firearms”