On this day 1992

The Rodney King Criminal Trial Verdict Acquitting Four Police Officers was Announced, Followed by Four Days of Riots, 55  Deaths, and $1,000,000,000 in Damage

On this day in 1992, riots broke out in South Central L.A. after an all-white Simi Valley jury acquitted four police officers who had been videotaped beating Rodney King.  King suffered a broken face bone, a broken ankle, and many bruises and cuts.

The riots continued for four days, during which L.A.P.D. officers pulled out of several areas, leaving law-abiding citizens and local businesses completely at the “mercy” of the rioters.  55 people died, thousands were injured, there were dozens of fires, and over a billion dollars in damage.

Korean-owned businesses were especially targeted by the rioters.

The riots ended only after the National Guard was called in to restore order.

Among those seriously hurt was Reginald Denny, who was pulled from his truck, severely beaten by several rioters, and then left lying on the street, all while a TV helicopter crew caught the incident on camera and broadcast it live on local television.  The rioters struck Denny in the head with a cinder block and fractured his skull in 91 places.  Four heroic local residents saw Denny’s beating on TV, rushed to the scene, grabbed Denny, put him into a cab, and drove him to a nearby hospital.  Denny’s ability to speak and walk is impaired to this day despite years of rehabilitative therapy.

Rodney King was represented by Johnnie Cochran in his civil suit against L.A. and was awarded $3.8 million.

NYT Look Back Article

Time article about Reginald Denny

Wikipedia article

On this day 1862

UNION FORCES TAKE NEW ORLEANS

On this day in 1862, Union forces, led by Admiral David Farragut, took the City of New Orleans in a surprise attack from the Gulf of Mexico rather than via the Mississippi River to the north, where most of the Confederate forces were massed.  Farragut secured the Union’s takeover of New Orleans by taking the last two Confederate forts between New Orleans and Vicksburg, 400 miles to the north.  The Union’s control of New Orleans and the Mississippi split the Confederacy into two and severely hampered its ability to supply its troops.

More info here

We need to do something radical

Cato Institute: Who Just Made the Case for Drug Legalization? Drug-warrior in chief Jeff Sessions, That’s Who

For decades, critics of the drug war have argued that drug prohibition begets violence. Recently, that argument received the seemingly unwitting support of a surprising source: drug war advocate and new Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

“You can’t sue somebody for a drug debt. The only way to get your money is through strong-arm tactics, and violence tends to follow that,” Sessions told reporters. . .

Eight states and the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana. Marijuana growers, distributors and buyers in those jurisdictions can go to court to settle their differences rather than resorting to violent self-help. The violence that Sessions insists is inherent in the drug trade is a byproduct of prohibition.

It’s certainly true that the manufacturers, distributors and users of illegal drugs cannot avail themselves of the court system when disputes arise. Sessions’ implication that the problem is inherent in the drug market, however, is simply false. The reason drug market participants can’t go to court is because the government refuses to let them.

Sessions wants to roll back legalization and renew the war on drugs — but he accidentally argued the opposite case.

None of this is new. In 2017, if two alcohol distributors have a dispute, they go to court or settle it in the market. In 1929, if two alcohol distributors had a dispute, they often settled it on the street corner with Tommy guns. 

Alcohol distribution isn’t inherently violent. The government made it that way.

With the passage of the 18th Amendment in 1919, the American alcohol market was driven underground. As prohibition took hold, the murder rate skyrocketed, attacks on police officers spiked, and criminal gangs took over large swaths of urban America. We talk about Chicago today as a city plagued by crime, but Prohibition-era Chicago had it beat hands-down. The market for alcohol didn’t evaporate under Prohibition, it just became more illegal and more violent.

When Prohibition was repealed by the 21st Amendment, the murder rate dropped for more than a decade. Attacks on police officers dropped as well, and the wave of crime receded … until the drug war ramped up. . .

Even conservative estimates put the toll of lives lost to the Mexican drug war in the tens of thousands. Other estimates reach much higher. Police and paramilitary responses have failed to stem the flow of illicit drugs into the U.S. There is simply too much money to be made. The one policy that has shown some potential for reducing drug violence in Mexico: legalization in America.

It’s time to learn the same lesson with other drugs that we were forced to learn with alcohol: Addiction should be treated as a public health issue, not a crime. Alcohol prohibition didn’t end alcoholism or alcohol abuse, and it didn’t rid America of the “bad people” who consumed it.

There is no reason to continue believing that drug prohibition is any more likely to do those things than alcohol prohibition was. Rather than continually escalating the war on drugs into an actual war — President Donald Trump has even hinted at a military invasion of Mexico — let’s learn the lesson our great-grandparents did. Drug use is not inherently violent. Drug prohibition, however, is.

The drug market is going to exist no matter what hard-line policies President Trump and Attorney General Sessions come up with. The only question is whether it’s going to be a peaceful, legally regulated market or a vigilante-enforced black market. Jeff Sessions understands, if unwittingly, the problem with drug prohibition. Now he just needs to accept the obvious solution.

Source Article

Dilbert:

Scott Adams‏ @ScottAdamsSays  56m56 minutes ago

Prediction: The next Muslim country to have a nuclear arsenal will be France.

105 replies565 retweets1,294 likes

No kidding

Krauthammer on Coulter at Berkeley: ‘Reaching a Situation Where’ ‘Fascist Gangs Can Shut Down Free Speech’

On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” columnist Charles Krauthammer weighed in on the cancellation of Ann Coulter’s Berkeley speech by stating, “we’re reaching a situation where thugs are threatening violence. Basically, fascist gangs can shut down free speech.”

Krauthammer said, “[T]he danger here is, that we’re reaching a situation where thugs are threatening violence. Basically, fascist gangs can shut down free speech.”

He added, “If you can’t have the government guaranteeing the safety of speakers, then we have lost the — one of the fundamental uniting elements of our society. If there’s anything that unites us, it’s belief in the First Amendment, belief in free speech. whenever you talk about America, what makes us unique, we believe in liberty. It begins with religious liberty, and it also begins with free speech. And if you can’t get agreement on defending that, I mean, the obligation of any authority right now, is to say Ann Coulter can speak, and we will protect her. That’s why you pay your taxes. That’s why we have police. And we are not going to allow a gang of thugs, really fascist gangs — this is how it started in Europe in the 20s and the 30s, fascist gangs would literally intimidate their opponents to the point where they became dominant. I don’t think they’re going to take over. This is not Mussolini. But nonetheless, it is very disturbing that in America, somebody cannot speak because there are thugs who threaten violence.”

Source

On this day 1970

NIXON AUTHORIZES U.S. INVASION OF CAMBODIA

Top Aides Resign

Six Student Protestors Shot/Killed at Kent State and Jackson State by National Guard/Police

Congress Restricts President's War Powers

On this day in 1970, Republican President Richard Nixon ordered the invasion of Cambodia, a decision which caused the resignation of key aides, led to protests and the murder of protestors by the National Guard and local police, and caused Congress to restrict the president’s war powers.

Secretary of State William Rogers and Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, who had continually argued for a downsizing of the U.S. effort in Vietnam, were excluded from the decision to use U.S. troops in Cambodia. Gen. Earle Wheeler, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, cabled Gen. Creighton Abrams, senior U.S. commander in Saigon, informing him of the decision that a “higher authority has authorized certain military actions to protect U.S. forces operating in South Vietnam.” Nixon believed that the operation was necessary as a pre-emptive strike to forestall North Vietnamese attacks from Cambodia into South Vietnam as the U.S. forces withdrew and the South Vietnamese assumed more responsibility for the fighting. Nevertheless, three National Security Council staff members and key aides to presidential assistant Henry Kissinger resigned in protest over what amounted to an invasion of Cambodia.

When Nixon publicly announced the Cambodian incursion on April 30, it set off a wave of antiwar demonstrations. A protest at Kent State University resulted in the killing of four students by Army National Guard troops. Another student rally at Jackson State College in Mississippi resulted in the death of two students and 12 wounded when police opened fire on a women’s dormitory. The incursion angered many in Congress, who felt that Nixon was illegally widening the war; this resulted in a series of congressional resolutions and legislative initiatives that would severely limit the executive power of the president.

More at a later date about the Kent State and Jackson State protests/murders.

Source article

More here

On this day 1965

U.S. INVADES DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

On this day in 1965, Democrat President Lyndon Johnson sent 22,000 American troops into the Dominican Republic to prevent a claimed communist takeover. 

President Johnson declared that he had taken action to forestall the establishment of a “communist dictatorship” in the Dominican Republic. As evidence, he provided American reporters with lists of suspected communists in that nation. Even cursory reviews of the list revealed that the evidence was extremely flimsy–some of the people on the list were dead and others could not be considered communists by any stretch of the imagination. 

Many Latin American governments and private individuals and organizations condemned the U.S. invasion of the Dominican Republic as a return to the “gunboat diplomacy” of the early-20th century, when U.S. Marines invaded and occupied a number of Latin American nations on the slightest pretexts. In the United States, politicians and citizens who were already skeptical of Johnson’s policy in Vietnam heaped scorn on Johnson’s statements about the “communist danger” in the Dominican Republic. Such criticism would become more and more familiar to the Johnson administration as the U.S. became more deeply involved in the war in Vietnam.

Source article

More here

From Ann Althouse

ANONYMOUS EMAIL THREAT CAUSES PORTLAND TO CANCEL ROSE PARADE AND JOIN BERKELEY IN FAILING TO PROTECT FREE SPEECH

So now that's all it takes to end freedom of expression in Portland. What a flimsy, pathetic place.

And it was only a threat to drag and push a specific set of people who were going to be present at a particular place and time. Do the police in Portland not know how to manage crowds? Let the parade happen, let the protesters arrive and protest, and deal with the situation as it unfolds. If you won't do that, you don't have a free society.

Fascism wins again

From Ann Althouse's review of "Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign."

Even Hillary's Debate Practice Opponent Knew Trump Could Beat Her Given His Superior Messaging 

 67% of the way in: "But [Hillary] accepted the conventional wisdom that she could win or lose the presidency based on her performances [in the debates] against Trump — a rival who thrived on getting under the skin of an opponent. And what [Phillippe] Reines found, [playing the role of Trump] as he practiced against her, round after round, is that Hillary’s heavily nuanced policy arguments were boring and easy to pick apart with a sharp retort. Her strength and her weakness were one and the same: she mastered so much material. 'As the guy who would kick her ass over and over again,' it was obvious to Reines that Trump’s messaging was better, said a source with singular knowledge of his thinking.... [H]er stiffness and her inability to reply to specific questions with thematic answers... were painfully obvious in the debate-prep sessions. Reines had been able to exploit them and outperform her. Heading into the first debate.... Hillary and her team were nervous that Trump might do the same thing. " 

I think everyone knew this but no one, particularly the liberal media, wanted to say it

On this day in 1865, the worst maritime disaster in American history

THE SULTANA SINKS DROWNING 1,700 UNION VETERANS AND SURVIVORS OF CONFEDERATE P.O.W. CAMPS

On this day in 1865, just days after the end of the Civil War, the worst maritime disaster in American history occurred when the steamboat Sultana, carrying 2,100 passengers, exploded just north of Memphis and sank in the Mississippi River, killing all but 400 of those aboard.  To make this tragedy even worse, all but 100 of those killed were Union veterans, and most were survivors of Andersonville and other brutal Confederate prisoner of war camps.

From the Halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli

On this day in 1805, the Marines attack Fort Derne after a 600 mile march through the Libyan desert

600 miles through desert?!

Another really dumb Wisconsin law

Lawsuit re sale of homemade baked goods ban heads to court

Just really stupid

Trump promoted from Hitler to hog-tied.

Trump, Bound

On Inauguration Day, the president seemed poised to destroy American democracy. Here are the people and institutions that have kept him in check—for now.

The resistance declares victory

This day in 1954 was a part of my childhood.  There was a terrifying polio epidemic going on.  Imagine being a parent with little kids and worried that they might be infected with crippling and incurable polio, that they may never walk again, and that they might even die.  And then this.

THE SALK POLIO VACCINE TRIALS:

"The Great Public Health Experiment in American History."

A nationwide trial of an experimental vaccine using school children as virtual guinea pigs would be unthinkable in the United States today.

But that's exactly what happened in 1954 when frantic American parents -- looking for anything that could beat back the horror of polio -- offered up more than 1.8 million children to serve as test subjects. They included 600,000 kids who would be injected with either a new polio vaccine or a placebo.

Equally remarkable, the Salk polio vaccine trial stands as the largest peacetime mobilization of volunteers in American history, requiring the efforts of 325,000 doctors, nurses, educators and private citizens -- with no money from federal grants or pharmaceutical companies. The results were tracked by volunteers using pencils and paper.

And it lasted just one year, with officials hopeful at the outset that they would be able to begin giving the vaccine to children within weeks of the final results. . . 

"That's what makes it the greatest public health experiment in history," said David Oshinsky, who wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning book Polio: An American Story. "It's not just the success of the trials. It's the incredible organization involved, with tens of thousands of mothers and families coming together to save their children. And it was all done privately. That's what makes this so incredible."

There was enormous pressure to get the field trial under way in advance of the 1954 polio season. Polio epidemics took place during the summer, with the number of cases rising through June and July and peaking in August. . . 

"We realized we wanted to get it accomplished in 1954, early enough that it could possibly have an impact on that year's polio season," said David Rose, archivist for the March of Dimes.

A grass-roots movement without precedent

The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis already had a nationwide network of health officials, medical professionals, elementary educators and volunteers in place to help respond to polio outbreaks. These were the same people who would form the workforce needed for the clinical trial. In addition, the foundation's annual "Mother's March" raised millions in dimes and dollars each year, which was used for polio research and aid to communities enduring polio epidemics. . .

Legions of proud 'Polio Pioneers'

Between April 26 and July 10, 1954, volunteers distributed Salk's series of three polio shots. In all, more than 443,000 children received at least one polio inoculation, while more than 210,000 received a placebo, according to the March of Dimes.

"There were three shots and it was a double-blind study," Oshinsky said. "Neither the child nor the caregiver knew who was receiving the vaccine or a placebo, so the paperwork was enormous."

All the kids in the trials became known as the "Polio Pioneers," and each received what would become a much-treasured Polio Pioneer metal pin and certificate of membership signed by O'Connor himself. . .

Researchers spent the rest of 1954 following the health of all the children, and taking blood samples from 40,000 kids in the study to examine their antibody response.

Through three months of winter and the early spring of 1955, the researchers analyzed and evaluated the data gathered on inoculation, blood samples, and resulting cases of polio. Much of the work was done by hand, although some computations were performed using punch cards that were fed into a primitive computer the size of a room, Oshinsky said.

People were on pins and needles waiting for the results of the trial. Even Salk himself knew nothing about how the analysis was proceeding, his son said.

'An instant hero'

Then, just one year after the trial started, the National Foundation announced the results: The Salk vaccine proved 80 to 90 percent effective in preventing polio.

"The vaccine works. It is safe, effective and potent," stated the press release issued by the National Foundation on Tuesday, April 12, 1955. It concluded, "There can be no doubt now that children can be inoculated successfully against polio."

The New York Times blared the news with a banner headline: "SALK POLIO VACCINE PROVES SUCCESS; MILLIONS WILL BE IMMUNIZED SOON; CITY SCHOOLS BEGIN SHOTS APRIL 25."

"Salk became sort of an instant hero," said Muhlenberg College's Wilson. "He appeared on the cover of Time magazine. He really was celebrated. [President Dwight] Eisenhower entertained him at the White House." 

The whole article 

See also 

Andrew McCarthy/NRO on the sanctuary cities decision

A RULING ABOUT NOTHING

A federal judge suspends Trump’s unenforced ban on funding for sanctuary cities

A showboating federal judge in San Francisco has issued an injunction against President Trump’s executive order cutting off federal funds from so-called sanctuary cities. The ruling distorts the E.O. beyond recognition, accusing the president of usurping legislative authority despite the order’s express adherence to “existing law.” Moreover, undeterred by the inconvenience that the order has not been enforced, the activist court — better to say, the fantasist court — dreams up harms that might befall San Francisco and Santa Clara, the sanctuary jurisdictions behind the suit, if it were enforced. The court thus flouts the standing doctrine, which limits judicial authority to actual controversies involving concrete, non-speculative harms. 

Just wait for Republican judges to do the same to a Dem president - they'll do it even better

Oh heck, it doesn't matter

FASCISTS WIN

Coulter Cancels Her Speech at Berkeley Amid Safety Dispute

I'm sure the liberals will rush to defend Coulter's free speech rights

Oh why not, let's sell and buy some aborted baby parts to make a little money

Video: Planned Parenthood exec who ‘wanted a Lamborghini’ caught haggling over aborted baby body parts

Not for the faint-hearted. Thanks to Pastor Tim Buelow for the lead.

Not so surprising

Poll: Huge Shift in Sweden as Majority Now Want Fewer Asylum Seekers

This was inevitable

I remember it well

TRUMP'S TAX PLAN RESURRECTS THE LAFFER CURVE

The famous napkin on which Art Laffer drew his curve for Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Jude Wanniski.  Ronald Reagan campaigned on it and implemented it.  Bush 41 called it "voodoo economics".  Another Bush, another mistake.

The napkin is now on display at the National Museum of American History.

(For those who are interested, check out the Larry Kudlow podcast from last Saturday for his interview with Art Laffer.)

Not from The Onion

Man drinks 13 beers during a half marathon he didn't train for

“There was no point where I thought I wouldn’t finish,” Farnan says, despite deciding to run just the day before the race. “I thought, you know, I’ll do it, but I haven’t been training properly. How do I run it without being worried about my time?” The answer was "beer."

Isn't beer always the answer?

Not Surprising

Lawyer for Berkeley Republicans in Coulter Case Slams ACLU for Absence

Asked whether there was “something special” about suing UC Berkeley, the home of the Free Speech Movement, Dillon answered:

“I never thought I’d be on the same side of an issue as Willie Brown, Bernie Sanders, Bill Maher, Keith Ellison, and every other person who’s a lawyer. Now, there are some amateur lawyers, like Howard Dean, who looks up a case on the Internet and then thinks he’s a Supreme Court scholar — and, you know, some of our members of Congress who play lawyers on TV, apparently. But no, I think I don’t know any lawyers, serious lawyers practicing constitutional law, who think that this is appropriate.

“And I have had dozens and dozens of emails and calls from lawyers who don’t know me, around the country. They all start with, ‘I don’t support what Ann Coulter says, but,” you know, or, ‘I hate what Donald Trump stands for, but you’re absolutely right on this, and this cannot stand.’

Berkeley ought to be condemned by all

Israel Pauses on Remembrance Day to Honor the Six Million Killed during The Holocaust

Link to video

‘The Liberals’ Version of Book Burning’: Bill Maher Goes Off on Berkeley Over Coulter Backlash

“Berkeley used to be the cradle of free speech,” he stated. “And now it’s just the cradle for f*cking babies!”

No, Berkeley is now the cradle for fascists

ABC/WaPo Poll:

Among 2016 voters Trump would beat Hillary in a rematch - even in the popular vote

Among Americans who say they voted in the 2016 election, 46 percent say they voted for Hillary Clinton and 43 percent for Trump, very close to the 2-point margin in the actual popular vote results. However, while Trump would retain almost all of his support if the election were held again today (96 percent), fewer of Clinton's supporters say they’d stick with her (85 percent), producing a 40-43 percent Clinton-Trump result in this hypothetical re-do among self-reported 2016 voters.

Let's see how much media coverage this gets

We need to do something radical

Activists Hope Record Support For Marijuana Can Help Fight Opioid Addiction

Opioid deaths contributed to the first drop in U.S. life expectancy since 1993 and eclipsed deaths from motor vehicle accidents in 2015, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A study published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence, found hospital visits for complications from prescription painkillers are dropping in states with legal weed. The hospitalization rate for opioid abuse and dependence in states with medical marijuana are roughly 23 percent lower than states without legal access . . .

Emergency room visits for opioid overdoses are on average 13 percent lower than states without medical marijuana programs . . .

Medical researchers are not claiming pot will “solve” the opioid epidemic, but the study adds to a growing body of evidence that marijuana can be effective.  Researchers trying to study the efficacy of marijuana as an alternative painkiller to opioids continue to face roadblocks to research and a federal government that is hostile to the idea of easing restrictions on pot. Recent studies suggest marijuana can be an effective pain treatment and does not come with the risks of debilitating addiction . . . 

Research released in February from the University of British Columbia and University of Victoria suggests patients suffering from chronic pain and mental health conditions will choose marijuana over their addictive prescription drugs when doctors give them a choice. 

Trump needs to do a 180 and consider legalization of all drugs