I think that I would be in jail for this one.

Here is a story about an Oklahoma trooper who tried to arrest an EMT and Paramedic because they didn't pull over fast enough when the trooper pulled up behind them with his emergency lights on. The trooper (Daniel Martin) also claims that the EMT flipped off the trooper. (Last I checked that isn't illegal, even if he did.) The crew told the trooper that they had a patient in the back, and asked the trooper to follow them to the hospital to give them the ticket. Trooper Martin then tried to arrest the rather large paramedic, and was unsuccessful. He called for backup and began choking the medic.




One of the patient's family members filmed the whole thing. The EMT and medic gave written statements, which the EMS agency put on the web. Independent witnesses also gave statements, which are available here.



According to the EMT, one trooper said he was going to resort to deadly force because he was 'flipped off.' The trooper, in his statements, claimed that one of the crewmembers attacked the Trooper Martin, but that it was not caught on tape.

I ask:

where is the dash cam video?
if the OHP has evidence that the EMS crew attacked Trooper Martin, why haven't charges been filed?
does the OHP expect me to believe that the ambulance crew attacked a trooper with a patient and a patient's family member on board, 4 car loads of family following, 2 independent witnesses, along with a video of the incident, and NOT one of those witnesses saw the EMS crew strike the trooper?

I would probably be in jail. Cop or not, grab my throat, and it is on.

Remembering the 343

On September 11, 2001, 343 firefighters perished while running to the sound of the guns. The Shortly thereafter, 40 passengers and crew of flight 93 lost their lives defending against what is believed to have been an attack against the White House. Their actions on that infamous day saved countless lives.



This Memorial Day, I remember them, as well as all the young men and women who have given their lives in defense of our nation.

I also fervently hope that the difficulties that lie in the future of our great nation will take as few lives as possible.

President Obama's speech this week on the "prolonged detention" of people who are suspected of being capable of carrying out a terrorist action sometime in the future, but who have not yet committed any crimes scares the crap out of me.

The plan is for persons to be detained indefinitely for crimes they have not committed. Held without trial. Without evidence. See the video from MSNBC:




Couple that with the Administration's statements that opposition to illegal immigration, being a veteran, opposing restrictions on the Second Amendment (which, by the way we are allowed to do under the FIRST Amendment), and opposing the Obama Administration makes you a potential terrorist, means that anyone that anyone of us can be "disappeared" by a government. If this does not scare you, I do not know what will.

Remember, I warned you that Obama would use the powers you gave to W, and that you would not like it. I told you conservatives that this wa a bad idea. It isn't as fun to say "I told you so" as I thought it would be.

Unions

One of the problems that I have always had with Conservatives is their constant bashing of Unions. Now don't get me wrong, I think some of the things Unions get in their contracts are outrageous, and I have posted on this topic before. More than once.

The thing is the Corporations are doing the same thing.

1 A Union is a bunch of workers who band together to negotiate better prices for their product (their labor) than they could get as individuals.

2 A Corporation is a bunch of investors who band together to negotiate better deals that they could as individual investors.

No real difference.

The problem I have here is when Corporations are given the same rights as real people in regards to property and even better deals than people in regards to taxes and regulations. Then when the Corporation breaks the law, the only thing the individual investors lose is a little money. (Which the Government then gives you in the form of a "bailout")

Our President is so articulate

I mean, after 8 years of Bush claiming he was "the decider" and all, it is a refreshing change to see a president who is so well educated, that he doesn't make those sorts of mistakes.

Or it is that the MSM just doesn't make as big a deal of Obama's?

Read how Obama celebrated Cinco de Quatro, er Quatro de Mayo, yeah that's it.

Max Blumenthal, you are a liar

Max Blumenthal wrote a piece in the Daily Beast, essentially claiming that all gun owners are a bunch of Racist terrorists. some of the memorable quote here are:

If a new militia movement coalesces, its members will have no shortage of sophisticated assault weapons to choose from. At the gun show in Reno, I witnessed the sale of rocket-propelled-grenade launchers and bazooka guns;

Yet the video you published on Youtube doesn't show a single Bazooka or RPG. Where is the proof? If you witnessed that, why didn't you inform the police or BATFE agents that are present at every gun show? Selling these items without the proper permits is illegal. Unless, of course, it never happened.

He goes on:

Nearby, I interviewed another dealer retailing a brand of.50-caliber assault rifle that was banned in California because it could supposedly down an airplane. He told me by slightly altering the bullets his gun fired, and by converting the gun from semi-automatic to bolt-action, he was able to sell it in California once again.

In other words, the man complied with the law and produced a legal product. If you outlaw all .50 caliber firearms, anyone producing a .49 caliber or .51 caliber rifle would be legal, wouldn't they?

You also completely ignore the fact that a bolt action rifle is not going to shoot down an airplane. Heck, a person wanting to down aircraft might as well fire geese at the plane.

More lies, in the form of the "Mexican gun" myth:

Weapons like these are useful to Mexican narco-cartels, too. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' Phoenix field division claimed that “many gun shows attracted large numbers of gang members from Mexico and California. They often bought large quantities of assault weapons and smuggled them into Mexico or transported them to California.”

(Hey BATFE- where are all of the arrests of these 'gang members' who are smuggling $1,000 semi auto rifles into a country where fully automatic weapons can be bought for half that much?)

Lets reinforce the racism angle, as well:

Though big guns were the main attraction, a handful of retailers in Reno appealed to some visitors’ apparent enthusiasm for Nazi memorabilia. Swastika-emblazoned flags, photographs of Hitler and his henchmen, and anything related to the Third Reich were available at several booths. There was obviously no way to gauge the percentage of show attendees who adhered to the racist fringe, but the prominence of so much Nazi regalia suggested they maintained a significant presence.

You , Mr Blumenthal, are a liar.

This is a personal note, but I found a picture on the internet of a woman named Patricia King. This woman is accused of killing her husband. That is not the subject of this post.

What I find interesting about the picture is that she is the virtual twin of a woman I once knew. I heard once that everyone has a doppleganger. Heather Reyes, if you ever see this, here is your twin:

Presidential humor?

I read today that the left is wishing death to a member of the media that dares question the Messiah, BHO. Of course, when the left wishes someone dead and the President laughs, it is just a joke, right? It isn't like Obama likes Limbaugh, right?

Then why isn't it just a joke when someone else jokes that, "Despite how the conflict has been portrayed by our glorious media, if you gave any U.S. soldier a gun with two bullets in it, and he found himself in an elevator with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Osama bin Laden, there's a good chance that Nancy Pelosi would get shot twice, and Harry Reid and bin Laden would be strangled to death."

CBS Sports distanced itself from Feherty's writing, saying it was "an unacceptable attempt at humor and is not in any way condoned, endorsed or approved" by the network. The PGA Tour also criticized him for an attempt at humor that "went over the line."

Why is that so serious, and requires an apology? Why isn't NBC attempting to distance itself from Sykes? Or is it only humor to wish death on people from the right?

When you are right, you are right

I know I have spent more than a few bytes criticizing Obama and his policies. Today I am going to have to agree with one of them. Obama is seeking legislation to reign in the behavior of credit card companies. The problem is the way contracts have been constructed for years. Hidden clauses, excuses to raise interest rates, punishing fees hidden in contracts, and other abuses need attention.

It goes like this: a credit card company sees an account that has a large balance, and they find a reason (having nothing to do with the performance of the account or the debtor's payment history) to raise your rate to the penalty rate. That penalty rate is retroactive- that is, the rate applies to purchases already made, and the only way to avoid this rate is to pay off the balance. A person with a large balance cannot do this, so the card company makes some fat cash. Example:

Lets say you owe $10,000 on a CC and the interest is 12%. Your payment is $200, with $100 of that as interest. Then, you get in a billing dispute with your cell phone carrier over an early termination fee, and you refuse to pay it. The cell carrier sends you to collections. You credit card company sees this on your credit report, and you are increased to the default rate of 29%.

That means that your interest is now about $240 each month, and your payment is now $340 per month. You manage it for 3 months before being late. You are charged a $50 late fee. You manage to pay late for 4 more months, before catching up. You pay on time for 4 months, then fall behind over the next six, paying when you can, before defaulting.

In that time, you pay $6120 to the bank. Your new balance is $9,600, and over the 18 months you were being charged the higher interest rate, you paid $5,720 in fees and interest and $400 towards your balance. The bank sells your account to a junk debt buyer for 10% of the balance after you have been delinquent for six months, and writes off the remaining 90% of the balance (they still charge interest and fees while you are in default)- $10,038.

So to sum it up: You pay the bank $6,120, the junk debt buyer pays $1,003, and the federal government gives the bank a $2,500 reduction in taxes because the bank shows a paper loss of $10,038 even though they were paid $9,620. You still owe the $10,000 original loan, and then some. All of this over a year and a half. Every month they can get you to pay beyond that year and a half nets the bank another $380 or so in profit, and does not really reduce your balance. The longer they can keep you out of bankruptcy, the more they make. That is why the banks all fund the "non-profit" credit counseling organizations- to keep you out of bankruptcy for as long as possible.

People should honor their contractual obligations, but contracts are binding on both parties, not just to the benefit of one. Interest changes that apply to balances already charged, as well as "universal default" should not be allowed. After all, would you stand for your bank changing the interest on your car to 30% because of a problem that is totally unrelated to the loan?

Your constitutional rights and the Patriot Act

Remember several months ago, when I said I would delight in the pain of my Republican friends when they began to complain about the Obama Administration using the powers they gave President Bush? Well, here we have a story about Ashton Lundeby, a 16 year old being held as a suspected terrorist. Without a lawyer, without trial, without any constitutional protections at all.

When the Patriot Act was passed, many Americans warned that this law would be abused. We were told that we were being ridiculous and paranoid. "Everyone deserves their day in court," we said. We were told that terrorists didn't deserve constitutional protections. "But what happens when the definition of terrorist is expanded?" we asked. "That won't happen," we were told, "stop being paranoid."

Well, here we are. First, it is kids calling in bomb threats. Then, it will be some other demographic that fits some legally technical definition. It will not be long before people who own evil assault rifles are declared to be terrorists.

You see, when you give power to government in the form of a new law, you must remember that it is in the nature of governments to abuse that law, to use it in ways that you never intended, to find ways to exploit that law to grant themselves even more power. It does not matter whether that government is liberal or conservative, Republican or Democrat.

Government can only rule through force, so when you ask the Government to act on your behalf, what you are doing is applying force by proxy. Since Governments are run by people, who by nature always want more power and wealth than they already have, government will always seek more of those resources.

The definition of these evil terrorists has been expanded. The secret police knock on your door, spirit away your child, your spouse, your roommate, and whisk him away to a secret prison, where he or she has no Constitutional rights. Welcome to the dictatorship.

(BTW- Mom in the video says she does not "believe in guns." Guns are not like the tooth fairy. They exist whether you believe in them or not. As you just saw, the people with the most guns win. That is why the Second Amendment is so important.)

Thanks to David Codrea for the tip.