Sometimes a little paranoia is justified.
The Guardian is running a story by Spencer Ackerman detailing the location of a warehouse used by the Chicago Police Department as a kind of Hotel California--you know--a place where you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.
The building, in an area of town known as Homan Square, actually sounds more like a facility you'd associate with benign humanitarians such as the late, unlamented Chilean General, Augusto Pinochet. Once they've dragged you in, you have officially disappeared.
The story cites cases in which people accused of crimes were kept off the official books, were shackled to walls and floors for extend periods while frivolous things such as a prisoner's Miranda and phone rights were ignored. In addition it claims access to defense attorneys have been routinely denied. It also says the type of interrogations which take place in the cells are a tad more aggressive than you'd normally see on episodes of the TV show, "Law and Order." Ackerman maintains at least one person has died while in custody at Homan Square.
According to the Guardian the CPD denies any of that malevolent shit happens, despite a growing number of abused victims and their lawyers going public about it.
Well, you have to say something don't you? Especially if you're running a joint down the street from Wrigley Field which is so obscenely unconstitutional and brutal it ranks right up there with Abu Ghraib.
Meanwhile things are getting weirder and weirder out in Las Vegas. A little over a week ago Tammy Meyers was shot and killed in what was initially reported as a road rage incident.
The original version was Mrs. Meyers had taken her daughter out for a driving lesson and then on the way home one of them honked at a speeding driver who began following them. When they arrived home one of the two people in the trailing vehicle opened up with a pistol. During the deadly confrontation Tammy Meyers was fatally wounded as her son, Brandon came charging out of the family house with a hand gun, returning fire.
Apparently it isn't as simple as some two bit hot head with a gun who decided to end a perceived insult with a gun. The entire sordid tale has morphed. While the Vegas police have decided it is best to shut up until all the facts are clear numerous reports state Mrs. Meyers dropped off her daughter at the home, then, with her armed son, went out to look for the car and its occupants who had done who knows what.
Police arrested 19 year old Erich Nowsch Jr. on Friday and charged him with the killing. A couple of media sources say Nowsch told friends he was in a park and became suspicious of a car circling the area. He told his buddies he unloaded on the people he deemed threatening. Police are now saying the gunfight began several blocks from where it culminated--a few houses away from the Meyers' home.
In addition, outlets such as the Daily Mail and others, are contending the whole shooting was a drug deal gone bad. The most recent theory being Mrs. Meyers was in the market for black market pharmaceuticals and Nowsch was the supplier. Robert Meyers, the victim's husband, has told reporters his wife knew the shooter, but was a mother figure to him, even loaning him money when he was hungry.
The only things we know for sure is Erich Nowsch, a tatted up skinny dude with the look of a doomed loser and Brandon Meyers both had guns and used them.
Yes, in the end, no matter what the actual facts, it was just another evening of well armed Americans on the streets who were willing to pull the trigger numerous times. And, despite the tragedy of Tammy Meyers' death, we can be thankful there was only one casualty.
Finally, in the Bill O'Reilly/Falkland Islands/Buenos Aires flap, various national media outlets are, "shocked, shocked," O'Reilly told a New York Times reporter that if he decided her report was inappropriate, "I'm going to come after you with everything I have. You can take it as a threat."
Well, what did you expect of a guy who makes a living as a bellicose bully? The odds are pretty sound that late tonight Fox News operatives will be picking through Times reporter Emily Steel's garbage bags looking for any professional indiscretions, or personal vices.
Hey, that's the way they roll.
Last night O'Reilly told his audience, "I want this to stop now. I hope we can stop it. I really do." Those of us who are of a certain age remember Dick Nixon basically saying the same thing about Watergate.
Given his constant Joe McCarthyesque bombast, many of us consider O'Reilly, at worst a congenital liar, or at minimum, a guy who twists the truth like a pretzel in order to justify his opinions. When you have those two options, it is tough to give a rat's ass what this beast said, or did 30 plus years ago.
Let's face it, none of his faithful are going to believe he is guilty of anything--every last one of them is going to go all in on the, "I'm being persecuted because I'm a conservative," line he is currently spewing.
The truth is, he is the epitome of all the terrible right wing geeks who rage wildly on television and radio. Every one of them bounce back and forth between Herr Goebbels and St. Sebastian, using them both to their advantage whenever it suits them.
And people wonder why I'm a democrat.
sic vita est
2-24-15
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