Disinformation » Law

California Court To Rule Whether SeaWorld Whales Are Illegal ‘Slaves’

JacobSloan — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 17:58:48 +0000

Regardless of the slim odds of a favorable ruling, it’s a groundbreaking case in its use of the Constitution to fight for intelligent animals’ freedom. Via PhysOrg:

A California federal court is to decide for the first time in US history whether amusement park animals are protected by the same constitutional rights as humans.

The issue arises from a lawsuit filed by rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) in a San Diego court on behalf of five orcas named Tilikum, Katina, Corky, Kasatka and Ulises. The whales perform water acrobatics at the SeaWorld amusement parks in San Diego and in Orlando, Florida.

PETA argues that continuing the whales’ “employment” at SeaWorld violates the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, which prohibits slavery. District Judge Jeffrey Miller heard arguments in the complaint Monday and reviewed the response from SeaWorld, which asked that the lawsuit be dismissed. His ruling is expected to come later. “It’s a new frontier in civil rights,” said Jeff Kerr, PETA general counsel, who described the hearing as a “historic day.”

Boy Convicted Of Theft For Stealing Virtual Items Within Video Game

JacobSloan — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 19:30:25 +0000

Well, if the stock market is regarded as real in the eyes of the law, why not an invisible amulet? Via the Chronicle Herald:

The amulet and mask were a 13-year-old boy’s virtual possessions in an online fantasy game. In the real world, he was beaten and threaten with a knife to give them up.

The Dutch Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the theft conviction of a youth who stole another boy’s possessions in the popular online fantasy game RuneScape. Judges ordered the offender to perform 144 hours of community service.

Only a handful of such cases have been heard in the world, and they have reached varying conclusions about the legal status of “virtual goods” — and whether stealing them is real-world theft.

The suspect’s lawyer had argued the amulet and mask “were neither tangible nor material and, unlike for example electricity, had no economic value.” But the Netherlands’ highest court said the virtual objects had an intrinsic value to the 13-year-old gamer because of “the time and energy he invested” in winning them while playing the game.

Oklahoma Bill Proposed To Outlaw Use Of Human Fetuses In Food

JacobSloan — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:53:26 +0000

Republican Ralph Shortey believes that in the near future, human fetuses will be added to our food to “enhance flavor” and wants the government and pro-life movement to take action. Is he onto something? Talking Points Memo writes:

An Oklahoma Republican is pushing a bill to outlaw the use of human fetuses in food, because, as he says, “there is a potential that there are companies that are using aborted human babies in their research and development of basically enhancing flavor for artificial flavors.”

State Sen. Ralph Shortey introduced a bill on Tuesday “prohibiting the sale or manufacture of food or products which contain aborted human fetuses.”

Though he has allowed that he is not aware of this occurring in Oklahoma, or anywhere for that matter, Shortey cited research he did on the internet that claimed that some companies use embryonic stem cells to help develop artificial flavoring. “It would be a public relations nightmare for a company to use” aborted human fetuses for R&D, Shortey told KRMG Radio, so when asked they usually say something like “we strive to do things ethically.”

“I’m not entirely sure if there are any” companies doing this, he continued. “But the fact is that there is a potential that there are companies that are using aborted human babies in their research and development of basically enhancing flavor for artificial flavors. And if that is happening — because it is a possibility — and if it’s happening then I just don’t think it should even be an option for a company.”

Shortey added that if you took this idea to its logical conclusion, you could “force every human being” to be an organ donor, “and that’s kind of what we’re doing with these children. Before they’re born, we’re going to kill them and then we can do anything we want to with your body.”

Gingrich’s Path To Statehood For A Space Colony

JacobSloan — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:54:53 +0000

Wondering if the Constitution still applies when gravity does not? Newt Gingrich believes so. Buzzfeed dug up Newt’s 1981 bill laying out rules of governance for a future 20,000-person U.S. colony on the moon or Mars. At the moment he’s being bashed from all sides for this, but I think it’s fantastic:

Yesterday Newt Gingrich revealed his “weirdest idea ever” — to provide a path to statehood for a hypothetical lunar colony.

With the help of the skilled research librarians in the Library of Congress Law Library, BuzzFeed tracked down the bill, which Gingrich called the “Northwest Ordinance for Space,” or formally the “National Space and Aeronautics Policy Act of 1981.”

“The Congress declares that the United States is committed to the expansion of free people and free institutions into space,” the bill stated, calling for an array of near earth and solar space travel vehicles to be completed by 2010.

It also called for the creation of “an environmentally acceptable space to Earth power capability that is economically competitive with power generation on Earth,” by the year 2000.

SOPA Author Is A Copyright Violator

JacobSloan — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:35:06 +0000

Vice notes that many of the congress members supporting SOPA/PIPA perhaps need to do a bit of inner soul searching, as they themselves have websites with copyright violations. That includes Lamar Smith of Texas, the author of SOPA, whose website background is a photo (likely lifted from Flickr) by someone named DJ Schulte, who does not receive credit or a link as he should have:

FBI Definition Of Rape To Include Male Victims

Good German — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 15:56:51 +0000

The Associated Press reports (via the Washington Post):

The Obama administration on Friday expanded the FBI’s more than eight-decade-old definition of rape to count men as victims for the first time and to drop the requirement that victims must have physically resisted their attackers.

The new definition will increase the number of people counted as rape victims in FBI statistics, but it will not change federal or state laws or alter charges or prosecutions. It’s an important shift because lawmakers and policymakers use crime statistics to allocate money and other resources for prevention and victim assistance.

The White House said the change was not motivated by the recent Penn State child sex-abuse scandal. Indeed, the expanded definition has been long awaited as many states and research groups made similar changes in their definitions of rape over recent decades.

Senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett called the change a “very, very important step.” The issue got top-level White House attention starting last July, when Vice President Joe Biden raised it at a Cabinet meeting.

Biden, author of the Violence Against Women Act when he was in the Senate, said the new definition is a victory for women and men “whose suffering has gone unaccounted for over 80 years.” Calling rape a “devastating crime,” the vice president said, “We can’t solve it unless we know the full extent of it.”…

Nearly 1 in 5 women and 1 in 71 men in the U.S. have been raped at some time in their lives, according to a 2010 survey by the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which used a broader definition.

Those figures were what framed much of the discussion, said Lynn Rosenthal, the White House adviser on violence against women.

1 in 71? Somehow I suspect that’s inaccurate. Read more here.

40,000 New Laws For New Year Across United States

majestic — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 12:48:50 +0000

The libertarians are really onto something … From MSNBC:

About 40,000 state laws taking effect at the start of the new year will change rules about getting abortions in New Hampshire, learning about gays and lesbians in California, getting jobs in Alabama and even driving golf carts in Georgia.

Several federal rules change with the new year, too, including a Social Security increase amounting to $450 a year for the average recipients and stiff fines up to $2,700 per offense for truckers and bus drivers caught using hand-held cellphones while driving.

NBC News, the National Conference of State Legislatures, The Associated Press, and other organizations tracked the changes and offered their views on the highlights.

Many laws reflect the nation’s concerns over immigration, the cost of government and the best way to protect and benefit young people, including regulations on sports concussions.

Eight states will raise the minimum wage, NBC News reported. They include Arizona, Oregon, Washington, Montana, Colorado, Ohio, Vermont and Florida, NBC News said. San Francisco will become the first city to raise its minimum wage above $10 per hour. The new $10.24 minimum is nearly $3 above the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, set in 2009.

Jan. 1 is the effective date in many states for laws passed during this year’s legislative sessions. In others, laws take effect July 1, or 90 days after passage.

Worker verification
Alabama, with the country’s toughest immigration law, will require all employers who do business with any government entity to use a federal system known as E-Verify to check that all new employees are in the country legally…

[continues at MSNBC]

A Civics Test For Those Wishing To Be President

JDSuss — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 18:14:39 +0000

Imagine if the incumbent US president and all of his Republican challengers were required to respond to a civics test so as to determine their suitability for office. The test would concern the constitutionality of three things: (1) the current money and financial systems (incl. foreign aid); (2) the conducting of undeclared foreign wars, and; (3) the recent legislative attempt to deprive the People of their unalienable rights under §1031 of the National Defense Authorization Act.

Instead of debate after stage-managed debate, why not insist on having each prospective office-seeker commit to responding to this little civics test? After all, if the underlying fundamentals of our laws are simply ignored, how can an aspirant to the nation’s highest elective office be tolerated and even seriously considered? How can such a person be acting in the best interests of the People, viz., the true Sovereign for whom our system of government was established?

Accordingly, I challenge President Obama and the Republicans seeking the nomination to respond to my little civics test, as presented below, by unequivocally stating their respective positions in essay form:

The U.S. Constitution of 1787 was a world novelty. No nation prior to this time had a written constitution in place[1]. Since its adoption in 1789, the U.S. Constitution has been the supreme law of the land. Today it consists of seven articles and twenty-four amendments[2]. Do you believe in adhering to our Constitution?

MONEY
Article I, Section 8, Cl. 5, reserves to the U.S. Congress the power to create money[3], i.e., to control, exercise, and benefit from the power of the purse for the People as a whole (instead of glutting the avarice of special banking interests as agents of economic globalization). How little attention is paid to the unconstitutional monetary system of fiat money and the financial system of fractional reserve banking, conducted by private banksters[4] under the auspices of an unconstitutional cartel misleadingly referred to as the “Federal Reserve System”[5] (financed by the illegal activities of its collection agency, the IRS). And how unquestioningly the populace and the courts accept Wall Street’s securitization of mortgage loans as the ingenuity of an enterprising “capitalist” system, hardly stopping to see the corroding effect this has had on titles to real property and the hostile assault that its unlegislated (MERS) transfer mechanisms has had on the states’ venerable, time-tested land records systems. It is truly ironic that such arguments might at first blush seem quaint or outlandish, or even be considered “ahead of their time” when their validity can be traced to ancient moorings in our Constitution (as well as in commercial and real property laws).

The States are prohibited from creating money under Article I, Sec. 10, Cl.1.[6]. If the states are not permitted to create money and thus increase the money supply, it hardly seems possible that Congress delegated that power to private banks to do so, even if it could lawfully do so and it cannot. It is hoped that the courts will begin to scrutinize more closely the inherent unlawfulness and inequities of what today pass for the accepted norm. In fact, is it not incumbent upon all three branches of government to consider the illegitimacy of the whole monetary system as a perversion of the highest law of the land?[7] And where in the U.S. Constitution does it permit foreign aid to be distributed? If there is no constitutional power to do so, how is it that such a violation of the U.S. Constitution persists? Do you support foreign aid?

UNDECLARED WAR
Article I, Section 8, Cl. 11 reserves to the U.S. Congress the power to declare War. A president has no right to effectively declare War by committing military troops and assets by simple fiat. In fact, under Article II, Sec. 2, Cl. 1 “The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;”(emphasis added). This condition means that in the absence of a declared War, the President is NOT Commander in Chief. Given these constitutional hurdles, how are our military intrusions worldwide legally valid and acceptable?

UNALIENABLE RIGHTS
The first ten Amendments taken together are known as the Bill of Rights. These are a further articulation of the unalienable Rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness set forth in the Declaration of Independence.

Recently, the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate passed legislation purporting to do away with the rights of the People as enumerated in the Bill of Rights. They acted in reaction to some amorphous threat of “terrorism.” Can a statute efface unalienable rights of the People? Explain.

***
As the 2012 presidential election gears up, the nation is in the strange position of allowing a sitting president to continue in office despite his failure to “defend, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” pursuant to his oath of office as prescribed in Article 2, Sec. 1, Cl. 8.

§ President Obama has accepted the current fiat money system and fractional reserve banking of the Federal Reserve System. In fact, he has bailed it out and done everything he can to perpetuate that system;
§ President Obama has not closed Guantanamo Bay, has not really ceased hostilities in Iraq, and has intensified the undeclared war in Afghanistan, and hostilities in Pakistan and Iran and elsewhere; and
§ President Obama is poised to sign the despicable legislation passed by Congress that purports to strip the People of their unalienable, constitutionally-protected rights.

By these numerous constitutional violations should President Obama be impeached under Article 2, Sec. 4?

Should those in Congress who voted to bailout the banksters, who do not question the constitutionality of our money and the status quo financial system, who vote for (undeclared) War expenditures and otherwise endorse military hostilities and the giving away of foreign aid, and who voted to deny the People their unalienable rights – should these Congressmen and women be impeached for their failure to support the Constitution of the United States as they are required to do under Article VI, Cl. 3?

Are not their votes and support, and the president’s failures to act and his unconstitutional actions, tantamount to treason?
___________________

Footnotes:
[1] The French Constitution of 1792 was soon to follow, and from this era onwards there was a movement in every country (except in the Habsburg empire, and Britain, the great mother of anomalies) towards political reform, or national independence, or both, which anchors the structures of liberty in a written constitution with the force of law.

[2] Actually twenty-five if you count the Sixteenth Amendment. But this amendment was never properly ratified, and was wrongfully certified by the Secretary of State. Benson & Beckman, The Law That Never Was (1985).

[3] The right to “coin Money, regulate the value thereof…”

[4] Farrell, Joseph P., Babylon’s Banksters: The Alchemy of Deep Physics, High Finance and Ancient Religion (2010); Astle, David, The Babylonian Woe (undated), last retrieved at http://www.jrbooksonline.com/PDF_Books/the_babylonian_woe.pdf on Feb. 25, 2011.

[5] Brown, Ellen H., Web of Debt: The Shocking Truth About Our Money System — The Sleight of Hand That Has Trapped Us in Debt and How We Can Break Free (2007, 2008).

[6] “No State shall…coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts…”

[7] Vieira, Edwin, Pieces of Eight: The Monetary Powers and Disabilities of the United States Constitution, (2002, 2011); also see Dr. Vieira’s instructive five-part lecture at YouTube.
******

© Jonathan D. Suss, January 2, 2012.
Jonathan D. Suss is an attorney licensed in Maryland who publishes occasional articles. Currently making a marginal living as a blues piano player and woodworker, Suss is an independently poor, cultural mutant who is bereft of ambition to really “be anything” in this phony baloney world—secular or otherwise. Some of his ideas can be further studied at http://spyoptaelip.blogspot.com and he can be contacted at theo4b@gmail.com and at www.stubbyknuckles.com

Obama Signs NDAA With ‘Serious Reservations’

majestic — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:15:16 +0000

While you were out partying on New Year’s Eve, President Obama signed away your civil liberties. Via the Washington Post:

HONOLULU — President Obama expressed misgivings about several provisions of a sweeping defense bill he signed into law on Saturday, pledging that his administration will use broad discretion in interpreting the measure’s legal requirements to ensure that U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism are not detained indefinitely by the military.

The $662 billion National Defense Authorization Act provides funding for 2012 at $27 billion less than Obama’s request and $43 billion less than Congress authorized in 2011.

The bill also contains several detainee provisions that civil liberties groups and human rights advocates have strongly opposed, arguing that they would allow the military greater authority to detain and interrogate U.S. citizens and non-citizens and deny them legal rights protected by the Constitution.

Obama initially had threatened to veto the legislation. In a signing statement released by the White House on Saturday, Obama said he still does not agree with everything contained in the legislation. But with military funding due to expire Monday, Obama said he signed the bill after Congress made last-minute revisions at the request of the White House before approving it two weeks ago.

In several cases, the president called those changes “minimally acceptable” and vowed to use discretion when applying the provisions.

“I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists,” Obama said. “I want to clarify that my Administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens. Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a Nation.”

The president said his administration would seek to repeal any provisions that are inconsistent with his values and added that he would “reject any approach that would mandate military custody where law enforcement provides the best method of incapacitating a terrorist threat.”…

Marvel Comics Lawyers Argue That Mutants Are Not Human

ralph — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 00:14:18 +0000

Bullpen Bulletin! A “real world” conflict based on the bottom line has infringed on the civil liberties of our uncanny “fictional” heroes, who have lately made a ton of dough for their corporate creator. Grant Morrison has tread this ground in Animal Man to explore the dynamic between the creator and the creation, but sans the grand mega-corporate, economic drama. (Probably need to see Seaguy for that: I wonder if Mickey Eye is behind the actions of Marvel’s Law Defense Team!)

The folks at io9.com do a great job of explaining how the map is not the territory in this collision of “realities.” As Meredith Woerner explains (and check out the Radiolab Podcast):

Mark this up as one more blow to human-mutant equality. Marvel lawyers are putting up a fight to prove the mutants aren’t the same as humans after all. Unleash the Sentinels!

This strange piece of news comes via the Radiolab Podcast, which uncovered a weird saga of legal wrangling and tariff shenanigans.

Toys manufactured in various countries and later imported to the US have to be taxed. And the taxes for each kind of toy vary, depending on the description. Specifically, “dolls” are toys that represent some sort of human, and “toys” are representations that are non-human, such as robots or animals. And it turns out, the non-human toys are taxed at a much lower rate than the human ones, 6.8 percent versus 12 percent. Hence, two Marvel lawyers are arguing that Mutant action figures are not actually human — and therefor shouldn’t be taxed as much. And thus unknowingly unleashing the age-old Mutant debate that has long been a part of the X-Men’s world.

Everything Ron Paul Thinks Is Unconstitutional

JacobSloan — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 13:10:24 +0000

Ron Paul lays it out…

Execution Case Against Mumia Abu-Jamal Dropped

Good German — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 18:45:24 +0000

Reports the Associated Press via the Washington Post:

Prosecutors on Wednesday abandoned their 30-year push to execute convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former Black Panther whose claim that he was the victim of a racist legal system made him an international cause celebre.Abu-Jamal, 58, will instead spend the rest of his life in prison.

Flanked by police Officer Daniel Faulkner’s widow, Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams announced his decision two days short of the 30th anniversary of the white patrolman’s killing.

He said that continuing to seek the death penalty could lead to “an unknowable number of years” of appeals, and that some witnesses have died or are unavailable after nearly three decades.

“There’s never been any doubt in my mind that Mumia Abu-Jamal shot and killed Officer Faulkner. I believe that the appropriate sentence was handed down by a jury of his peers in 1982,” said Williams, the city’s first black district attorney. “While Abu-Jamal will no longer be facing the death penalty, he will remain behind bars for the rest of his life, and that is where he belongs.”

Abu-Jamal was originally sentenced to death. His murder conviction was upheld through years of appeals. But in 2008, a federal appeals court ordered a new sentencing hearing on the grounds that the instructions given to the jury were potentially misleading. After the U.S. Supreme Court declined to weigh in two months ago, prosecutors were forced to decide whether to pursue the death penalty again or accept a life sentence without parole …

U.S. Senate Backs Indefinite Detention of American Citizens

Join Or DIE — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 07:21:14 +0000

Via the World Socialist Web Site:

The US Senate voted Thursday night to approve a military funding bill that codifies into law the criminal state practices begun under Bush — and continued under Obama — in the name of the “global war on terror.”

It explicitly authorizes the military’s indefinite detention without trial of American citizens and mandates that all non-citizens charged as terrorists—including those arrested on US soil—be detained indefinitely by the military rather than brought to trial in a civilian court.

The legislation was part of the National Defense Authorization Act, which provides $662 billion to finance the US military machine and its multiple wars abroad. The act passed the Democratic-controlled body by an overwhelming margin of 93 to 7, underscoring once again that there exists no serious constituency for the defense of democratic rights within any section of the American ruling elite or its two big business parties.

Thrown out by this legislation is the right guaranteed under the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution for all those accused of a criminal offense to a “speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury,” and the core provision of the Fifth Amendment declaring that no person shall be deprived of liberty “without due process of law.” It legalizes the abrogation in practice over the past decade of the bedrock principle of habeas corpus, which requires that the state bring a detained individual before an independent court and show just cause for imprisonment.

Defense Bill Would Make America A Battlefield

aaroncynic — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 05:23:50 +0000

Sections inside the Defense Authorization Act, which Congress passes each year to authorize expenditures for the Department of Defense, contain vague and troubling language that could allow for the indefinite detention of American citizens. Via the ACLU:

The Senate is going to vote on whether Congress will give this president—and every future president — the power to order the military to pick up and imprison without charge or trial civilians anywhere in the world. Even Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) raised his concerns about the NDAA detention provisions during last night’s Republican debate. The power is so broad that even U.S. citizens could be swept up by the military and the military could be used far from any battlefield, even within the United States itself.

The worldwide indefinite detention without charge or trial provision is in S. 1867, the National Defense Authorization Act bill, which will be on the Senate floor on Monday. The bill was drafted in secret by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) and passed in a closed-door committee meeting, without even a single hearing.

In support of this harmful bill, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) explained that the bill will “basically say in law for the first time that the homeland is part of the battlefield” and people can be imprisoned without charge or trial “American citizen or not.” Another supporter, Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) also declared that the bill is needed because “America is part of the battlefield.”

Read more at the ACLU’s Blog of Rights

Over 55 Percent of Mississippi Voters Agree That Fertilized Eggs Are Not People

imkaan — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 02:01:22 +0000

Emily Wagster Pettus reports in the AP via Boston Globe:

JACKSON, Miss.— Mississippi voters Tuesday defeated a ballot initiative that would have declared life begins at fertilization, a proposal that supporters sought in the Bible Belt state as a way to prompt a legal challenge to abortion rights nationwide.

The so-called “personhood” initiative was rejected by more than 55 percent of voters, falling far short of the threshold needed for it to be enacted. If it had passed, it was virtually assured of drawing legal challenges because it conflicts with the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that established a legal right to abortion. Supporters of the initiative wanted to provoke a lawsuit to challenge the landmark ruling.

The measure divided the medical and religious communities and caused some of the most ardent abortion opponents, including Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, to waver with their support.

Where Does The Law Stand On Selling Haunted Houses?

JacobSloan — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 19:15:33 +0000

Someone’s assertion that one of the bedrooms in my apartment is haunted got me thinking about this. Do landlords and house sellers have an obligation to disclose paranormal activity and the presence of spirits? Mental Floss writes:

It all depends on the where the house is and the way the laws are worded there.

Some states require sellers to disclose “emotional defects” that could impact and stigmatize a property. This includes traumatic events like murders and suicides, reported paranormal activity and even proximity to homeless shelters.

In Virginia, emotional defects like murders and ghost sightings only have to be disclosed if they physically affect the property (Blood running from the walls? Gotta tell the buyer). In California, sellers do have to disclose emotional defects, but only in a very limited way. The state Civil Code requires that a death on the property only needs to be disclosed if it occurred less than three years prior to the sale and older incidents need to be addressed only if the buyer specifically asks.

There’s an infamous court case often cited when it comes to disclosure law, Stambovsky v. Ackley, that revolves around a haunted house.

Helen Ackley owned a big old Victorian home in Nyack, New York. The town sits about 30 miles north of New York City on the west bank of the Hudson River, in an area known for many haunted places, including the legendary Sleepy Hollow. Mrs. Ackley was well aware that her house was supposedly haunted. In fact, she claims to have seen several ghosts herself, including one that gave her approval for a new paint color in the living room and several dressed in colonial-era clothing. When she decided to put the house up for sale and retire to Florida, though, Mrs. Ackley suddenly got very shy about the ghosts.

Jeffrey and Patrice Stambovsky wanted to buy the house and agreed to Ackley’s asking price of $650,000. It wasn’t until after the couple gave Ackley a $32,500 down payment that they were talking to a local about their purchase and were asked, “Oh, you’re buying the haunted house?”

The Stambovskys were not exactly thrilled to learn about the alleged haunting of their new home and attempted to back out of the sale. Ackley would neither admit any wrongdoing nor cancel the sale and return the deposit, so the Stambovskys took her to court. The Appellate Division of State Supreme Court ruled in their favor in a 3-2 decision.

The court found that, regardless of whether or not ghosts are real and the house was truly haunted, the fact that the house had been widely reported as haunted affected its value. Ackley “had deliberately fostered the belief that her home was possessed by ghosts” in the past and was therefore at fault for not disclosing this attribute of the house to the buyers, who, not being locals, could not readily learn about the defect on their own.

Are Whales Slaves?

bluemana — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 02:16:54 +0000

PETA is asking … Hamilton Nolan reports on Gawker:

PETA has filed a lawsuit charging SeaWorld with violating the 13th Amendment by enslaving killer whales. This could be interesting.

The scorn heaped upon this lawsuit in the court of public opinion will be roughly equal to the scorn once heaped upon the ideas of abolition and female suffrage. Somebody please have Jay Leno read some Peter Singer before he starts to discuss this news.

Obama Is The Worst President In U.S. History Regarding Medical Marijuana

JacobSloan — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 15:15:47 +0000

…Or so the Medical Marijuana Project argues. What happened, Barry? You were supposed to be so cool.

During his run for the presidency, Barack Obama instilled hope in medical marijuana supporters by pledging to respect state laws on the matter. And for the first two years of his term, he was generally faithful to his promise. Yet suddenly, and with no logical explanation, over the past eight months he has become arguably the worst president in U.S. history regarding medical marijuana.

British Lawyers Claim US Declaration Of Independence Is Illegal

majestic — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 23:30:40 +0000

John Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776"

BBC News reports on some British lawyers who have dared to show up in Philadelphia and claim that US Independence is illegal:

Was the Declaration of Independence legal?

In Philadelphia, American and British lawyers have debated the legality of America’s founding documents.

On Tuesday night, while Republican candidates in Nevada were debating such American issues as nuclear waste disposal and the immigration status of Mitt Romney’s gardener, American and British lawyers in Philadelphia were taking on a far more fundamental topic.

Namely, just what did Thomas Jefferson think he was doing?

Some background: during the hot and sweltering summer of 1776, members of the second Continental Congress travelled to Philadelphia to discuss their frustration with royal rule.

By 4 July, America’s founding fathers approved a simple document penned by Jefferson that enumerated their grievances and announced themselves a sovereign nation.

Called the Declaration of Independence, it was a blow for freedom, a call to war, and the founding of a new empire.

It was also totally illegitimate and illegal.

At least, that was what lawyers from the UK argued during a debate at Philadelphia’s Ben Franklin Hall.

The event, presented by the Temple American Inn of Court in conjunction with Gray’s Inn, London, pitted British barristers against American lawyers to determine whether or not the American colonists had legal grounds to declare secession.

For American lawyers, the answer is simple: “The English had used their own Declaration of Rights to depose James II and these acts were deemed completely lawful and justified,” they say in their summary.

To the British, however, secession isn’t the legal or proper tool by which to settle internal disputes. “What if Texas decided today it wanted to secede from the Union? Lincoln made the case against secession and he was right,” they argue in their brief…

[continues at BBC News]

Is Temporary Marriage The Wave Of The Future?

JacobSloan — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 20:07:17 +0000

Is a lifetime of monogamy fast becoming an impossible dream, and an until-death marriage agreement nothing but an unfair trap, sprung by your past self onto your future self? Mexico City likely will test out a system in which matrimonial contracts run for two years, as a solution to the problems associated with messy divorces and drawn-out unhappy unions. In the future, lifelong marriage will likely be seen as an arcane and barbaric institution. Reuters reports:

Mexico City lawmakers want to help newlyweds avoid the hassle of divorce by giving them an easy exit strategy: temporary marriage licenses.

Leftists in the city’s assembly — who have already riled conservatives by legalizing gay marriage — proposed a reform to the civil code this week that would allow couples to decide on the length of their commitment, opting out of a lifetime.

The minimum marriage contract would be for two years and could be renewed if the couple stays happy. The contracts would include provisions on how children and property would be handled if the couple splits.

“The proposal is, when the two-year period is up, if the relationship is not stable or harmonious, the contract simply ends,” said Leonel Luna, the Mexico City assemblyman who co-authored the bill. Luna says the proposed law is gaining support and he expects a vote by the end of this year.

Around half of Mexico City marriages end in divorce, usually in the first two years.

The church criticized the proposed change. “This reform is absurd. It contradicts the nature of marriage,” said Hugo Valdemar, spokesman for the Mexican archdiocese. “It’s another one of these electoral theatrics the assembly tends to do that are irresponsible and immoral.”

You Can No Longer (Legally) Have Sex with Animals in Florida

bluemana — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 18:57:04 +0000

Matthew Hendley writes in the Broward-Palm Beach New Times:

… Senate Bill 344, which bans “sexual contact” and “sexual conduct” with animals, goes into effect on Saturday [October 1].

Unfortunately for animal sexers, several people have faced charges in Florida after being caught fornicating with fauna; however, we couldn’t find a case of anyone being convicted. Police say Eugene Hickman, a 54-year-old DeFuniak Springs resident, was arrested in June after his grandson walked into a bedroom and saw him naked on top of the family bulldog, attempting to have sex with it.

According to the Walton County Clerk, Hickman is scheduled to go to trial in November on an animal cruelty charge as well as a charge of lewd and lascivious exhibition charge for allegedly doing the deed in front of the kid … Still, State Sen. Nan Rich’s bill banning sex with animals didn’t pass until her third attempt because legislators were convinced they were wasting their time on something that never happens.

In Alabama Town, Offenders Must Choose Between Church And Jail

JacobSloan — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 18:28:45 +0000

“It was agreed by all the [area] pastors that the crime problem [is due to] the erosion of family values and morals.” Crime problem solved. Via the Washington Post:

Jail or Jesus. These are the options that one Alabama town is giving its non-violent offenders.

The program is called Operation Restore Our Community, WKRG reports. Bay Minette citizens charged with a misdemeanor can choose spending a year’s worth of Sundays in a local church rather than paying a fine and sitting in the clink.

Town police chief Mike Rowland…told the Alabama Press-Register: “It was agreed by all the pastors that at the core of the crime problem was the erosion of family values and morals. We have children raising children and parents not instilling values in young people.”

The stark choice has civil libertarians asking whether the initiative could be seen as government-coerced religion, which is forbidden under American law. The American Civil Liberties Union called the program “blatantly unconstitutional.”

One of the 56 participating pastors, Robert Gates, put that feeling into more biblical terms, telling WKRG, “You show me somebody who falls in love with Jesus, and I’ll show you a person who won’t be a problem to society.”

No mosques or synagogues are participating in the program because they do not exist in the area, according to the Press-Register.

Troy Davis Executed in Georgia

imkaan — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 04:31:05 +0000

Reports the AP via CBS News:

Georgia executed Troy Davis on Wednesday night for the murder of an off-duty police officer, a crime he denied committing right to the end as supporters around the world mourned and declared that an innocent man was put to death.

Defiant to the end, he told relatives of Mark MacPhail that his 1989 slaying was not his fault. “I did not have a gun,” he insisted. “For those about to take my life,” he told prison officials, “may God have mercy on your souls. May God bless your souls.”

Davis was declared dead at 11:08 ET. The lethal injection began about 15 minutes earlier, after the Supreme Court rejected an 11th-hour request for a stay. The court did not comment on its order, which came about four hours after it received the request and more than three hours after the planned execution time.

Though Davis’ attorneys said seven of nine key witnesses against him disputed all or parts of their testimony, state and federal judges repeatedly ruled against granting him a new trial. As the court losses piled up Wednesday, his offer to take a polygraph test was rejected and the pardons board refused to give him one more hearing.

U.S. Federal Court: ‘1984 May Have Come A Bit Later Than Predicted, But It’s Here At Last’

majestic — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 13:31:20 +0000

What are the chances that the U.S. Supreme Court will restrict the use of GPS tracking devices in police surveillance? We’ll find out soon, reports Adam Liptak in the New York Times:

In a series of rulings on the use of satellites and cellphones to track criminal suspects, judges around the country have been citing George Orwell’s “1984” to sound an alarm. They say the Fourth Amendment’s promise of protection from government invasion of privacy is in danger of being replaced by the futuristic surveillance state Orwell described.

In April, Judge Diane P. Wood of the federal appeals court in Chicago wrote that surveillance using global positioning system devices would “make the system that George Orwell depicted in his famous novel, ‘1984,’ seem clumsy.” In a similar case last year, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the federal appeals court in San Francisco wrote that “1984 may have come a bit later than predicted, but it’s here at last.”

Last month, Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis of the Federal District Court in Brooklyn turned down a government request for 113 days of location data from cellphone towers, citing “Orwellian intrusion” and saying the courts must “begin to address whether revolutionary changes in technology require changes to existing Fourth Amendment doctrine.”

The Supreme Court is about to do just that. In November, it will hear arguments in United States v. Jones, No. 10-1259, the most important Fourth Amendment case in a decade. The justices will address a question that has divided the lower courts: Do the police need a warrant to attach a GPS device to a suspect’s car and track its movements for weeks at a time?

Their answer will bring Fourth Amendment law into the digital age, addressing how its 18th-century prohibition of “unreasonable searches and seizures” applies to a world in which people’s movements are continuously recorded by devices in their cars, pockets and purses, by toll plazas and by transit systems.

The Jones case will address not only whether the placement of a space-age tracking device on the outside of a vehicle without a warrant qualifies as a search, but also whether the intensive monitoring it allows is different in kind from conventional surveillance by police officers who stake out suspects and tail their cars…

[continues in the New York Times]

Gibson Guitars Vs. the U.S. Government

Easy Rider — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 01:35:35 +0000

Via Brooklyn Vegan and Gibson.com:

The Federal Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. has suggested that the use of wood from India that is not finished by Indian workers is illegal, not because of U.S. law, but because it is the Justice Department’s interpretation of a law in India. (If the same wood from the same tree was finished by Indian workers, the material would be legal.) This action was taken without the support and consent of the government in India.

On August 24, 2011, around 8:45 a.m. CDT, agents for the federal government executed four search warrants on Gibson’s facilities in Nashville and Memphis and seized several pallets of wood, electronic files and guitars. Gibson had to cease its manufacturing operations and send workers home for the day, while armed agents executed the search warrants. Gibson has fully cooperated with the execution of the search warrants.

1st Circuit Appeals Court Upholds Right To Record Police In Public

JacobSloan — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 16:46:19 +0000

A resounding victory for the First Amendment. However, outside of the four-state jurisdiction of the First Circuit, the police state lives on. The Citizen Media Law Project gets giddy:

In the case of Glik v. Cunniffe, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has issued a unanimous opinion in support of the First Amendment right to record the actions of police in public.

For those of you not familiar with Simon Glik’s case, Glik was arrested on October 1, 2007, after openly using his cell phone to record three police officers arresting a suspect on Boston Common. In return for his efforts to record what he suspected might be police brutality — in a pattern that is now all too familiar — Glik was charged with criminal violation of the Massachusetts wiretap act, aiding the escape of a prisoner and disturbing the peace.

Unlike most arrestees, Glik, with the assistance of the ACLU, fought back against this treatment. Undeterred, in February 2010, Glik filed suit in federal court against the officers and the City of Boston under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Massachusetts Civil Rights Act. Glik alleged that the police officers violated his First Amendment right to record police activity in public and that the officers violated his Fourth Amendment rights by arresting him without probable cause to believe a crime had occurred.

The First Circuit ruled that “Glik was exercising clearly-established First Amendment rights in filiming the officers in a public space, and that his clearly-established Fourth Amendment rights were violated by his arrest without probable cause.”

Let’s see if we can find some more excellent quotations.

“[I]s there a constitutionally protected right to videotape police carrying out their duties in public? Basic First Amendment principles, along with case law from this and other circuits, answer that question unambiguously in the affirmative.”

“Glik filmed the defendant police officers in the Boston Common, the oldest city park in the United States and the apotheosis of a public forum. In such traditional public spaces, the rights of the state to limit the exercise of First Amendment activity are ’sharply circumscribed.’”

“[A] citizen’s right to film government officials, including law enforcement officers, in the discharge of their duties in a public space is a basic, vital, and well-established liberty safeguarded by the First Amendment.”

“Gathering information about government officials in a form that can readily be disseminated to others serves a cardinal First Amendment interest in protecting and promoting ‘the free discussion of governmental affairs.’”

Man Faces 75 Years In Prison For Filming Police In Public

JacobSloan — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 17:37:23 +0000

Despite no criminal history, Michael Allison may spend the remainder of his life behind bars as punishment for recording his (unexciting) interactions with officers who stopped by his mother’s home, where he repairs old cars. (The concern was that some of the vehicles were unregistered.) After griping to the local police department about selective enforcement and presenting his recordings as evidence, Allison was charged with five counts of eavesdropping, a class one felony. Why jail him? To send the message that documenting the actions of public officials will not be tolerated.

Appeals Court Deems Obama Healthcare Mandate Unconstitutional

Good German — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 23:59:14 +0000

Note to Obama: Don’t take ideas from plutarchist Massachusetts governors (I do not expect him to take my advice…) Reuters reports:

An appeals court ruled Friday that President Barack Obama’s healthcare law requiring Americans to buy healthcare insurance or face a penalty was unconstitutional, a blow to the White House.

The Appeals Court for the 11th Circuit, based in Atlanta, found that Congress exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to buy coverage, but also ruled that the rest of the wide-ranging law could remain in effect.

The legality of the so-called individual mandate, a cornerstone of the 2010 healthcare law, is widely expected to be decided by the Supreme Court. The Obama administration has defended the provision as constitutional.

The case stems from a challenge by 26 U.S. states which had argued the individual mandate, set to go into effect in 2014, was unconstitutional because Congress could not force Americans to buy health insurance or face the prospect of a penalty.

“This economic mandate represents a wholly novel and potentially unbounded assertion of congressional authority: the ability to compel Americans to purchase an expensive health insurance product they have elected not to buy, and to make them re-purchase that insurance product every month for their entire lives,” a divided three-judge panel said.

Obama and his administration had pressed for the law to help halt the steep increases in healthcare costs and expand insurance coverage to the more than 30 million Americans who are without it.

Who Rules America? Breaking Down the Top 1%

James Curcio — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 18:38:03 +0000

Here’s an excerpt from an article by G. William Domhoff on Global Research. This may not exactly be news to some of us, but it certainly re-affirms a lot:

…the bottom line is this: A highly complex and largely discrete set of laws and exemptions from laws has been put in place by those in the uppermost reaches of the U.S. financial system. It allows them to protect and increase their wealth and significantly affect the U.S. political and legislative processes. They have real power and real wealth. Ordinary citizens in the bottom 99.9% are largely not aware of these systems, do not understand how they work, are unlikely to participate in them, and have little likelihood of entering the top 0.5%, much less the top 0.1%. Moreover, those at the very top have no incentive whatsoever for revealing or changing the rules. I am not optimistic.

(Full Article Here)

Texas Man Buys A $300,000 House For $16

BananaFamine — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:23:45 +0000

Reports KENS5 San Antonio: