YES! We’ve got the lowdown on liberty, gang! Join El G Grande as he gathers around the table for our first CABAL group production! In this audio, Gard, Malcolm and Adam discuss the news that Massachusetts cops are arresting people who film them doing misdeeds. Nothing like “serving and protecting” huh? Then, the Conspiracy team looks at the news that music mega corporations are trying to shut down audio streaming sites. Can you say, “shoot yourself in the foot,” music corporations? Incredible! It’s all here and at www.libertyconspiracy.com! Be Seeing You!

[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

It’s tax season again. And for many of us, the idea of doing taxes and giving the IRS the pound of flesh they demand is a harrowing thought. One Austin, Texas, man, claiming to have been fed up with being ripped off by the IRS for over 20 years, flew a small plane into a building containing the local IRS office Thursday morning.

Joseph Andrew Stack, 53, flew a Piper Cherokee PA-28 into the side of the Echelon 1 building at 9430 Research Drive at around 10 a.m. Central time. According to FAA officials, the plane took off from nearby Georgetown Municipal Airport at about 9:40.

Stack was killed in the resulting explosion. Two people in the building were injured, and one person is unaccounted for, according to reports. The IRS said it is still trying to account for its 190 employees who were in the building at the time. News reports disagree on whether firefighters have been able to bring the building fire under control.

A lengthy diatribe posted to Stack’s web site this morning, since taken down at the request of the FBI, revealed that Stack suffered what he considered years of abuse by the IRS and laws meant to harm businesses like his, noting that “this rant could fill volumes with example after example if I let it.”

Stack’s apparent suicide note speaks of the irony of stockbrokers killing themselves after the 1929 crash, while after the 2007 crash the wealthy get bailed out at the expense of the poor, who pay for it all. (This much is true.)

“I know I’m hardly the first one to decide I’ve had all I can stand. . . . I can only hope that the numbers get too big to be white washed and ignored that the American zombies wake up and revolt; it will take nothing less.”

Federal officials are saying they do not consider this a terrorist attack. “At this time, we have no reason to believe there is a nexus to terrorist activity,” says a Department of Homeland Security news release.

Before leaving for the airport this morning, Stack set his home on fire, according to local officials. Worse, he apparently set the fire while his wife and daughter were away, leaving them shocked and distraught when they returned home to find it on fire.

It’s easy to understand what drove Stack over the edge: “In a government full of hypocrites from top to bottom, life is as cheap as their lies and their self-serving laws.” He makes a number of legitimate complaints about the U.S. government, grievances which we all suffer and are all unlikely to see redressed any time soon.

But Stack seems to think that if enough people kill themselves in government offices, perhaps taking some bureaucrats with them, the rest of the country will “wake up and begin to see the pompous political thugs and mindless minions for what they are.” Violence, he concludes, “not only is the answer, it is the only answer.”

I must disagree: Few people woke up after September 11; in fact, that event put nearly everyone to sleep. But the continuing decline of the U.S. economy which began in earnest in 2007 and shows no signs of stopping certainly began to wake people up.

Those of you who are desperate, understand first that you aren’t alone, and there are ways out of this mess which don’t involve killing yourself or IRS agents. A good place to begin would be to learn the economics behind how we were all taken for a ride. Then you can recognize and denounce the people who want to do more of the same to you. There is a way out, and it’s called liberty. Learn the philosophy of liberty, why it is the only way to have real prosperity, and then join the rest of us who are working hard for a free society.

Jersey Shore? Fuhgeddaboudit. Jersey City is the gem of reality TV. Shore is MTV. Jersey City is FBI. Like, how real is that? Killer videos of pols talking trash and passing cash have been unspooling in federal court in Newark at the trial of Jersey City Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini. Beldini was busted last summer in an FBI sweep that corralled dozens of Jersey pols. It was one of the largest corruption roundups in Jersey’s thick history of roundups. The majority of the busted were from Hudson County, parent entity of Jersey City, second largest city in the state. Twelve public servants have pleaded guilty; Leona Beldini is first to stand trial. Charges? Bribe taking, attempted extortion, and conspiracy to commit extortion. MTV’s Jersey Shore has hot munchkin Snooki, but Jersey City has the far classier — albeit far older — Beldini. Back in the day, Beldini was burlesque queen “Hope Diamond.” “The Gem of Exotics.”

In the here and now, Deputy Mayor Beldini is a prominent Realtor, past president of the Hudson County Board of Realtors. Until suspended as deputy mayor (an appointed position) Beldini was Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy’s liaison to various development-related municipal agencies. Beldini also headed the board of the quasi public Jersey City Economic Development Corporation, which among other things, administers the city’s Urban Enterprise Zone projects. One third of Jersey City is Urban Enterprise Zone. Development projects in The Zone are eligible for a wide array of tax exemptions and utility breaks.

Mayor Jerramiah Healy hasn’t been indicted but he appears in FBI videos featuring Beldini. (There are other tapes, starring other pols.) As does former Jersey City Housing Authority Commissioner, Vice President of the Board of Education, and Hudson County Affirmative Action Officer Edward Cheatam. (Yup, Ed wore 3 hats.) Also appearing: the late Jack Shaw, a well worn political consultant. Cheatam has pleaded guilty to conspiring with Beldini and others “to accept corrupt cash payments” in return for “official influence.”* Consultant Jack Shaw died of a Valium overdose a few days after being busted.

Mayor Jerry Healy is Jersey City’s version of Jersey Shore’s bod-flaunting JWOWW. JHOWW-come-he-keeps-getting-elected and Beldini go back decades. A Healy son has a license in Beldini’s real estate office and Beldini and the Healys are neighbors in Jersey City. They have summer homes a block from each other in Bradley Beach at the — where else — Jersey shore. In 1999, when Healy was Chief Judge of Jersey City Municipal Court, cops visited his vacation crib. Neighbors were bitching about party hearties. Healy wrestled with the cops on his porch. In the nude. (Though one neighbor said he was clutching a towel when the fracas began.) Healy pleaded guilty to a minor disorderly conduct charge.

In 2004, mayoral candidate Jerry Healy was seen — and photographed — passed out naked on his front porch in Jersey City. The nudie pic, which was posted on the Internet by an opponent, might have discouraged a less determined electorate. But Healy swept to victory.

In 2006, Mayor Healy was back for a rematch with the Bradley Beach cops. (This time he was clothed.) Two officers rassled him to the ground outside his sister’s bar and gave him a few shots of pepper spray. The shots chased a good deal of beer. Healy was convicted on disorderly conduct charges in 2007. The same year he was made chairman of the Hudson County Democratic Organization, a monster political machine that’s been somewhat weakened by a decade of corruption indictments and flaccid leadership.

By the Spring of 2009, Jerramiah Healy was on the mayoral campaign trail again, with Leona Beldini as campaign treasurer. Things were looking good. New York City Mayor Mike “The Situation” Bloomberg was set to toss a $1,000-a-head fundraiser for Healy at his NYC townhouse. (The Situation and his deputy mayor, Kevin Sheekey, have Jersey City roots. Sheekey’s family goes way back with the Healy family.) Another big bux event was scheduled at the Beacon, an elegant condo fortress in one of Jersey City’s poorest nabes. Plus, a new developer in town was spreading cash around.

Developer David Esenbach wanted to build a high-rise luxury condo project of 750 units on land next to a site contaminated with chromium in an inner city neighborhood. Esenbach was confident the units could be marketed for half-a-mil each. But he worried the city’s planning, zoning, and overall development process might be too slow and cumbersome.

Esenbach conveyed his concern to Mayor Jerry Healy, Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini, Housing Commissioner Ed Cheatam, and political consultant Jack Shaw in meetings at Healy’s favorite luncheonette (City Hall is so impersonal) and other eateries. The foursome assured Esenbach that Jersey City was developer-friendly. Healy touted “a planning department let’s put it that way, that’s receptive.”** Beldini and Cheatam praised the director of the Division of Zoning Enforcement. “Tony’s Good” opined Cheatam. “He’s good” echoed Beldini. “Tony’s good. Tony’s been good for a long time” said Cheatam.

Despite the real estate slump, Beldini seemed to think Esenbach’s projected price of half-a-mil each for his condos was on target. Saying “with what’s happening, the inner city is the place to invest.” Esenbach granted Beldini exclusive dibs on marketing the condos. Beldini touted her ability to “cut through red tape” and cited her position at the Economic Development Corporation and as the mayor’s liaison to the Parking Authority. (Parking being a huge issue in large scale development projects.) She also tried pitching a “shovel ready” former sausage factory for a potential condo project but Esenbach didn’t bite. He’d already passed on a macaroni factory pitched by Cheatam.

(In ye old days, Jersey City produced something other than oleaginous pols and real estate capers.)

As the meetings progressed Esenbach made “donations” totaling $20 thousand. (A slice of what he was laying out at other meetings with Shaw, Cheatam, and myriad other officials.) Leona Beldini didn’t handle the cash but was enthusiastic about the transfer. Saying $10 thousand was for “J” (Jack Shaw) and the “Jersey City Democratic Committee”. She delineated how the money would be broken down into “different funds” (to beat legal limits on contributions) in order to “funnel it back into the mayor . . . which everybody does.” Esenbach said he’d “do him (Shaw) another 10 for Healy” and would “do more before election.” “Beautiful” replied Beldini.

Mayor Healy didn’t handle the cash. Cheatam and Shaw did the blunt talk. Esenbach did the taping.

Oh nooo! Developer David Esenbach didn’t exist. He was really developer Solomon Dwek, serial Ponzi schemer. In 2006, Dwek was nailed by the Feds for bank fraud after kiting tens of millions in bad checks. Apres bust, Dwek turned informant. Dwek was a natural for the job of Sting Boy. At Beldini’s trial, he admitted bribing countless public servants re development deals for some 10 years in Jersey and New York. He’d laundered the bribes through his family’s Yeshiva in Monmouth County. Dwek’s gift of grifter gab served him well with Healy, Beldini, Cheatam, and Shaw. On the FBI tapes the Fab Four echo each other’s lines and finish each other’s sentences like folks in a very old marriage. Dwek picked up their dialog and fed it back. Riffing on the slippery chit chat.

As for visuals, the tapes are cinema verite as shot from under a shirt. A herky jerky chest level camera catches Mayor Healy fist-pumping pepper onto potato salad. His tie hangs unknotted as if he’s starting to strip. His face looks red even in black and white. On one tape Leona Beldini describes the upcoming Healy fund raiser at the Beacon as an “elegant affair” with “carving stations” and “champagne.” The guests would be swell as well. “We want people who’ll look good.” One wonders — was Healy invited?

Political consultant Jack Shaw lends a touch of Banquo to the vids. As said, he died of a Valium overdose a few days after being busted. Accident? Only his shadow knows. His shadow hangs over the FBI’s case in Hudson County. After his arrest, Shaw allegedly agreed to cooperate with the Feds. His input would have been invaluable. It was Shaw who introduced Esenbach/Dwek to many of the indicted or suspect pols and it was Shaw who collected $40,000 from Dwek as an alleged bribe for the biggest fish in the batch — Joseph V. Doria, state commissioner of the Department of Community Affairs (DCA). As DCA head, Joe Doria chaired the New Jersey Redevelopment Authority, the Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency, and the Council on Affordable Housing. Doria, a Hudson County machine man elevated to state power by former Governor Jon Corzine, admits meeting with Shaw and Dwek but denies taking bribes. Doria resigned as DCA head last summer, after his offices were raided by the FBI. He has not been indicted.

Jack Shaw cut his corruption teeth in Cook County, Illinois. He told Solomon Dwek that of all the places he knew, Hudson County was the most like Cook County. When the state’s attorney in Cook investigated Shaw in the late 70s, he emigrated to Hudson County. (He was invited in.) In Hudson, Shaw was jack of all trades. Among other things, he served as campaign manager and advisor to ex Hudson County Executive Robert Janiszewski. In 2002, Janiszewski pleaded guilty to extorting bribes from developers. Until his arrest became public knowledge, he wore a wire for the Feds. There went another batch . . .

Jack Shaw had his ups and downs. He riled a few cronies by allegedly embezzling from them to support a cocaine habit. The State Commission of Investigation said scathing things about how Shaw and a buddy ran the Hudson County chapter of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. But in Hudson County, tomorrow is always another day. As the new millennium glided along, Shaw was guiding New York developer George Filopoulos of Metrovest Equities through the shoals of Jersey City’s development process. The result? The Beacon. An elegant condo fortress in one of Jersey City’s poorest nabes. FHA mortgages available! By the buy, Jack Shaw’s girlfriend was/is property manager for the Beacon. Money that Dwek gave Shaw flowed back to Mayor Jerry Healy’s campaign through her checkbook.

Even after death, Jack Shaw is a go-to guy. Leona Beldini’s attorney claims Jack was the real grafter. Cheatam? How ’bout that name? Solomon Dwek is a deceitful rat, Beldini an honest public servant. So pure she didn’t need to take the stand in her own defense. She just sat next to her attorney, shining . . .

As this is being written, the jury is out onU.S. v. Leona Beldini. In the FBI tapes, Deputy Mayor Beldini kept her hands clear of Dwek’s cash. Quid pro quo was at tongue’s length. Perhaps the jury will say “not proven.” But whether Beldini is convicted or not, the Feds deserve some sort of media award. Jersey City is a Reality TV classic. Its images are forever.

*Ex-Hudson County Official Admits Conspiring with Numerous Others to Extort Cash in Return for Official Influence, USDOJ, U.S. Attorney, District of New Jersey, 09/18/09

**Unless otherwise noted, all quotes are from the following transcripts of videos and audio tapes played during the U.S. v. Leona Beldini trial, and published in the Newark Star-Ledger:

• Dwek, Cheatam, Shaw body recording transcript 2, March 11, 2009
• Jersey City diner hidden camera video: Mayor Healy, Beldini meet with Dwek, March 13, 2009
• FBI informant, Jersey City deputy mayor Beldini discuss campaign donations, March 24, 2009

Carola Von Hoffmannstahl-Solomonoff
Mondo QT

Send comments or confidential tips to:

mailto:editor@mondoqt.com

["Jersey City, New Jersey" photo by Oquendo; CC BY 2.0]

We hope you’ll take a moment to listen to Gardner Goldsmith discuss the courage of Brad Jardis, a NH cop who was also a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, and who just resigned from the police force, after fighting hard to keep his job and acknowledge the importance of free choice.

Brad recently stated publicly that he would not arrest people who were using medical marijuana. He would recognize the unconstitutionality of the law prohibiting use of the weed for medicinal purposes. He would stand for his oath to protect the constitution.

He was hassled for it, and now, we respond.

That, plus a revealing piece on Bill Clinton’s corrupt friends and their massive profits thanks to the corrupt government of Haiti. All from www.libertyconspiracy.com

Be Seeing You!

By the way, doesn’t Elton John’s music really irritate you? Yeah, thought so!

[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

In early December, after days of deliberation, an Albany jury delivered corruption convictions to Joseph L. Bruno, New York State’s former Senate majority leader. On their way to finding Joe guilty of two federal felony charges the jury requested extensive read-backs and clarifications. Joe’s crony cozy deals were aired and re-aired. How often do New Yorkers get such detailed info about malfeasance in high places? About as often as Joe Bruno turned down gifts from pals doing business with the state.

Republican Joe Bruno’s abuse of power to gild his own lily was fierce. But his style? Old hat. Self-serving pols masquerading as servants of the people are a bipartisan New York special. And once they get in, they never get out. Some municipalities and counties have been under the same greasy thumbs since the daze of Rip Van Winkle. Oh but there’s hope! The Working Families Party (WFP) is making inroads in upstate races. Running candidates on the Democrat, Republican, Independence, or Whatever lines.

A tenant activist friend in NYC refers to WFP as the “Working Phonies Party.” Note to self — ask why.

More hope 4 New York; the possibility that state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo will be our next governor. Folks admire how Andy pounces on big-time financial fraudsters. Denouncing them seven ways to Sunday. That his pounces often result not in prosecution, but in payoffs aka fines and/or some form of political enhancement for himself, matters not. The non-necessity of prosecuting the powerful is another New York special. In late 2008, Michael Garcia, former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, decided that X Governor Eliot Spitzer shouldn’t face charges for availing himself of the money laundering services of the New York State-based, international prostitution ring he patronized. Stepping down to run his father’s real estate empire was punishment enough. Hey — Spitz knew he did a bad thing. When state attorney general, he excoriated money launderers and prostitution rings.

As a private citizen angling for another public berth, Spitzer is excoriating (expectorating?) anew. Coming on as Mister Reform in forums as far flung as the BBC and Slate magazine. In November, Spitz sniped Treasury Secretary Tiny Tim Geithner (former head of the New York Fed) for having “no backbone” while Wall Street partied with bizzaro securities and for flubbing the AIG bailout. Implying he, Spitzer, would have done it right. Prison’s loss might seem our gain if Spitz didn’t preen so nakedly. The man is a self love machine. Hard to understand why he had to hire hookers. As for bizzaro securities, Spitz as AG was a dud when it came to prosecuting the mortgage frauds that inflated the values on which said securities were based. Though he did excoriate predatory lenders and collect some mighty fine fines. . . .

For a fine example of Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in full NY pounce, think back to the brief period when the bursting housing bubble made it seem as if mortgage fraud perped by parties larger than brokers, bank clerks, and appraisers might finally matter. In November 2007, Attorney General Cuomo sent ominous missives to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In the accompanying press release, Cuomo announced he was subpoenaing the government sponsored enterprises (GSEs) as part of an “industry-wide investigation into mortgage fraud.” An independent examiner would review all appraisals and mortgages purchased by Fannie and Freddie from Washington Mutual (WaMu), the nation’s largest savings and loan. (By the end of 2008, WaMu was the nation’s largest bank failure.) Transactions with other lenders would also be scrutinized.

Fannie and Freddie were suspected of buying and bundling fraud-inflated mortgage loans (as fodder for mortgage backed securities) from lenders colluding with several prominent appraisal entities. In a November 6, 2007, letter to Richard F. Syron, then Chairman of Freddie Mac, Cuomo said “GSEs may also have an interest in inflating (or at least in not questioning) the value of pooled loans . . . the higher the values of the loans closed, the greater the value for which the securities are sold on the secondary market.”

Imagine if Cuomo’s investigation proved Fannie and Freddie had colluded in inflating loan values! Wall Street would be shaken to its crap real estate foundations. The public would get an in-depth look at government sponsored mortgage fraud. Pols and appointed officials who control and/or oversee housing and finance at the federal level would be disgraced. In the heat of the moment, sweeping policy reforms would be enacted. Important heads might roll off to actual prison. And should Fannie and Freddie need a bailout, taxpayers would definitely balk at covering a pair of proven grifters.

Whew. The bomb never blew.

Five months after his missive to Fannie and Freddie, Andrew Cuomo closed his industry-wide investigation into mortgage fraud. On March 3, 2008, Cuomo announced an agreement had been reached with Fannie and Freddie and their official overseer, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO). He also thanked Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, for help in crafting the agreement. In Cuomo’s words, the agreement “begins to set right what had gone so wrong in the mortgage industry — rampant appraisal fraud.” Which occurred because “banks were putting pressure on appraisers to up the value of loans just to make a quick buck.” Nothing was said about prosecuting the unidentified banks that suborned fraud. (Though “predatory lending” got the de rigueur tongue lash.) As for the possible interest by Fannie and Freddie in inflating values, the topic was gone with the wind.

A few months after Cuomo closed his investigation, taxpayers bailed out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Quoting CNN Money (The Most Expensive Bailout) “Congress essentially wrote a blank check to the Treasury Department in July 2008 to do what needed to be done to inject capital into the two firms.”

In the agreement struck with Cuomo, Fannie and Freddie didn’t acknowledge any wrongdoing. However, they graciously agreed to contribute $24 million for the creation of an “Independent Valuations Protection Institute.” The institute would monitor lenders doing business with Fannie and Freddie for appraisal code adherence. The code (the Home Valuation Code of Conduct or HVCC) was a brand new one shaped by Andrew Cuomo. And oh yeah, OFHEO. The board of the new institute would be approved by, and answerable to, Andrew Cuomo. And oh yeah, OFHEO. That a state attorney general was playing the primary role in setting crucial policy for national lending standards, and for two humongous enterprises sponsored by the federal government mattered not.

In September, 2008, as part of the full federal takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, OFHEO officially merged with the Federal Housing Finance Board to form a whole new independent federal agency, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA). Prior to the merge, OFHEO was a sub-agency of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Andrew Cuomo was HUD secretary between 1997 and 2001. As HUD head, he had the power to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Weird thought: what if Andrew Cuomo’s industry-wide investigation into mortgage fraud had uncovered bad stuff at Fannie and Freddie going back to his own days at HUD? Cuomo would’ve had to investigate himself! For failures in oversight — and in policy. Cuomo was one of several HUD heads who pressed Fannie and Freddie to take on more and more subprime mortgages in the name of advancing affordable homeownership. An ideal shared by Senator Chuck Schumer. In 2005, when the danger of Fannie and Freddie’s bulging mortgage portfolio was raised in Congress, Schumer opposed stricter GSE regulation in the name of protecting affordable housing.

Schumer incidentally, receives a hefty hunk of his political contributions from the finance, insurance, and real estate industries. No biggie tho. These industries are traditionally generous to members of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.

As for the home valuation code established by Cuomo and oh yeah, OFHEO, many in the real estate industry hate the HVCC and are trying to dislodge it. Claiming it keeps appraisal values artificially low. (Think they complained about appraisal values being artificially high?) Luckily, the Obama admin is tapping taxpayers in order to keep values inflated and housing affordable.

For those considering Andrew Cuomo as potential governor, the issue isn’t the goodness or badness of HVCC, but how he conducted his industry-wide investigation of mortgage fraud and how it reflects on his ability to potentially govern the Empire State.

New York government rolls on lack of transparency and autocratic attitude. Decisions affecting the fates and finances of some 20 million people are made by handfuls of power players in closed rooms. Hidden agendas and under-the-table alliances scotch democratic process. Even when results are beneficial (rarely) the public is treated like children who need to be administered, rather than as constituents. Hot button issues are come-ons for the rubes. Reform sentiment is exploited as a weapon for power grabs, extortion, and government expansion. Reformers are only reformers when it suits them. Questions are raised and accusations made but investigations fade away after advantages are gained or the wrong ox gets gored.

I’d say Andrew Cuomo is ready to lead.

Carola Von Hoffmannstahl-Solomonoff
Mondo QT

Send comments or confidential tips to:

mailto:editor@mondoqt.com

["Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac come for your houses" photo by Ken Kennedy; CC BY-SA 2.0]

Raising a child is probably the most important thing a person will ever do in life. Yet we constantly hear stories of child abuse and neglect.

The creators of Survey Magnet recently put this question to me: Should you need a license to parent? After all, many less important activities require a license, such as driving, or even fishing.

My first reaction to the question was something along the lines of: “Hell no, that’s absolutely nuts.” Justifying the answer takes a bit of work, though it isn’t that hard. We know that foster parents and adopters, for instance, already require approval from the state before children are placed with them. Yet this doesn’t prevent child abuse; many of the worst abuses take place in state-approved foster homes by state-approved foster parents.

In answering the question for Survey Magnet, though, I didn’t focus on this aspect. Instead, I looked more at the long-term ramifications of such a licensing scheme. Most people don’t realize that it’s been done before right here in these United States and elsewhere in the world, and the results were horrible. During the eugenics craze of the 20th century, millions were forcibly sterilized, sometimes without their knowledge, or simply killed outright.

Most horribly, Adolf Hitler imported American eugenics to Germany, first sterilizing over 400,000, then engaging in “euthanasia” of 275,000 more through 1945, and during World War II, engaging in the mass executions of millions. Killing the “unfit” as government policy was never implemented in the U.S., but many doctors and mental institutions did it informally anyway through neglect or poisoning. Thus was the lethal injection born. Had it not happened in Germany, it might have happened here.

Read my full response to the question of parental licensing at Survey Magnet.

Prosecutors trying to put you in prison for a crime you didn’t commit can fabricate evidence, coerce witnesses into lying on the stand, and enjoy absolute immunity. They cannot go to prison. They cannot even be sued. They aren’t even likely to get so much as a reprimand from the bar association or from their bosses, even after publicly admitting to framing you.

So argued an attorney for Joseph Hrvol and David Richter, prosecutors in Pottawattamie County, Iowa, who argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday in their case, Pottawattamie County v. McGhee, that they were entitled to absolute immunity for their roles in knowingly putting two teenagers in prison for murder.

In 1977, the two prosecutors coerced Kevin Hughes into lying on the stand, telling him what to say, in order to obtain convictions against Curtis W. McGhee Jr. and Terry J. Harrington, both 16 at the time. The two would spend 25 years in prison for the murder of a retired police officer who was working as a security guard in Council Bluffs, despite the facts that Hughes changed his story several times before trial and that prosecutors also let a more likely suspect in the case get away and covered it up. Their convictions were finally overturned in 2003 by the Iowa Supreme Court, which found that Hughes had committed perjury.

The courts have held that prosecutors enjoy absolute immunity under the common law for any actions they take at trial, though only qualified immunity when they perform police functions such as investigating crimes and gathering evidence. Stephen S. Sanders, the attorney for the prosecutors, argued that since they used the fabricated evidence at trial, they should be covered by absolute immunity.

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, who is often the swing vote in cases concerning the scope of the Constitution’s due process clause, appeared troubled by the distinction.

“So the law is, the more deeply you’re involved in the wrong, the more likely you are to be immune?” Justice Kennedy said. “That’s a strange proposition.”

Neal K. Katyal, a deputy solicitor general, argued for the federal government in support of the state prosecutors. Mr. Katyal said that even in the case of police officers, they could be sued only if they had duped prosecutors into using fake evidence. There is no constitutional violation, he said, if the police and the prosecution are acting in concert, because the prosecutors’ absolute immunity would apply to the police as well.

“Again,” Justice Kennedy said, “the more aggravated the tort, the greater the immunity.” — New York Times

An amicus brief filed with the court by the Cato Institute, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the American Civil Liberties Union presents years of research showing that prosecutors almost never suffer any sort of sanctions when they engage in misconduct, even “egregious” misconduct such as knowingly prosecuting innocent people, and that even with compensation laws recently enacted in some states, it’s nearly impossible for victims of prosecutorial misconduct to recover any damages.

I’m not sure what’s more disturbing, the fact that prosecutors routinely get away with framing people or the fact that the government wants to keep it that way. The federal government, 27 states, and several intergovernmental associations all filed briefs in support of the prosecutors.

An error in a national criminal record database cost Eschol Amelia Studnitz her job.

The 59 year old Carroll County, Md., resident was working as a senior accountant for Corporate Mailing Services of Arbutus last summer when the Social Security Administration, which had just awarded it a contract to handle mail, told the company that she was “unsuitable” to obtain a required level 1 security clearance to work on the contract. SSA never explained why.

As a result, CMS immediately fired Studnitz, giving her just a few minutes to collect her personal effects.

Just days later, SSA sent a second notice to the company saying that Studnitz had been pre-screen approved. No mention was made of the previous letter. But by that time it was too late.

It turns out that the original error came from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Crime Information Center database, which SSA uses as part of its security clearance screening. But it took intervention on the part of Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.) to discover the error.

TheBaltimore Sun reported the horrifying story of what such an error in a government database can do.

“This is a horrible injustice to her,” said Lillie Coney, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. But Coney said she was not surprised the error involved the FBI’s National Crime Information Center database.

“There have been several well-publicized incidents involving inaccuracies in the NCIC database,” she said, some dating back 20 years. According to online Maryland court records, a nursing home won an $11,676 civil judgment against Studnitz in 2005, but she says that actually involved her late father’s estate. She has no criminal record.

Still, Studnitz appears to have limited legal options, said Marley Weiss, a University of Maryland law professor. CMS has no obligation to rehire her. Nonunion, private-sector workers can be fired for “any reason or no reason,” except for a prohibited basis such as race or age.

A lawsuit against the government would be difficult, she predicted, because public agencies may argue they have immunity from such claims. “Of course,” Weiss said, “there is an extreme sense of unfairness to this.” — Baltimore Sun

To add insult to injury, an FBI spokesman told theSun that it does not track errors in the NCIC database. NCIC relies on data submitted to it by state and local governments, much of which is erroneous before the FBI even receives it.

A 2005Wired News investigation into inaccuracies in private databases managed by companies such as ChoicePoint found that in Texas, for instance, “the Texas DPS was notorious for having incomplete, out-of-date and missing criminal records.” These are the records purchased by companies like ChoicePoint as well as forwarded on to the NCIC database.

Many companies are now performing background checks using such databases to screen prospective employees and sometimes even current employees. People who have lost their jobs or job offers due to database errors like these have generally been able to get the databases corrected, but aren’t generally successful at getting their jobs back — or getting hired. And in the meantime they’re unemployed, living on unemployment checks, savings, or worse.

Experts recommend you check your credit report regularly for errors or unusual activity that could indicate identity theft. Maybe you should also check your own criminal background and find out which state you’re a registered sex offender in, which state has a warrant out for your arrest, and how many years you supposedly spent in prison for some crime you never had anything to do with.

Even with Rep. Bartlett working on Studnitz’s case, it seems unlikely she’ll get her job back. CMS’s president dithered in a statement to theSun, saying only that, “We’re still working through this process. It’s unresolved.” But in an October 21 letter, the company now says she was fired for poor performance, an allegation she disputes.

There are several lessons I hope you’ll take away from this. First, relying on government to do anything right — even something it supposedly should do like maintaining a criminal database — is risky; government is made up of people, and people make mistakes. Government just provides a structure where people within it can make more mistakes than normal and not have to suffer consequences for them. (This is known as sovereign immunity.) Second, I’ve noticed over the years that people have this unwarranted trust of anything they see on a computer screen. Computers are only as accurate as the data they’re given, and that’s done by people — who, as we all know, make mistakes. Third, correcting a mistake in a computer database is easy; far easier, in fact, than the bureaucracy required to convince the people in charge of the database to fix the mistake, and far easier even than navigating the corporate bureaucracy required to get one’s job back, if that can be done at all.

(Hat tip: Threat Level)

Police officers dressed as gangbangers shot and killed a northeast Georgia pastor Tuesday as he was trying to drive away from a convenience store.

Jonathan Paul Ayers, 28, had been the pastor of Shoal Creek Baptist Church in Livonia for about a year before the fatal shooting. That day, police said, Ayers was seen engaging in an apparent drug transaction with, and then dropping off, a woman who was under surveillance by a northeast Georgia tri-county drug task force. The woman was later arrested on cocaine charges, but no drugs were found on Ayers or in his car.

Surveillance video from the Shell station in Toccoa where the shooting took place shows Ayers coming inside to use the ATM and then, as he is trying to drive out of the parking lot, a Cadillac Escalade attempts to box him in, while what appear to be gangbangers jump out of the SUV and point guns at him. Ayers reverses direction and tries to get around the vehicle, and one of the gangbangers runs into the vehicle’s path and is apparently struck lightly. At this point Ayers puts the car in drive again and the gangbangers start shooting at Ayers.

“He was struggling with the agents. He got back into the car, put the car in drive and started driving toward the other agent who fired two shots in to the automobile,” Stephens County sheriff Randy Shirley told WSB radio. But the store surveillance video shows Ayers was already driving away when what appeared to be gangbangers arrived and blocked his car.

Later it would be learned that the gangbangers were undercover police officers, something store owner Joe Joseph said he didn’t know when he heard the gunshots.

“I saw the first gunshot outside,” he said. “And I was looking outside, I saw a red Honda car backing up — backed up where the air machine is and stopped … I thought they were shooting each other. I didn’t know they were undercover agents. There was nothing marked.”

They shot two more times (after) the second shot, he took off,” Joseph said. “I think whatever they’ve done is wrong because in a business place and the daytime.” — WYFF-TV

“I had a parking lot full of people,” Joseph told WNEG-TV. “I mean they could have blown up one of my pumps and that would have been a total mess.”

Ayers reportedly crashed into a utility pole a short distance away and was taken to the hospital.

“Who shot me?” he asked EMTs who responded.

Ayers’ brother-in-law, Matt Carpenter, says that this means he did not know the gangbangers were also undercover police officers.

“I think it scared him,” when the black Cadillac Escalade pulled next to Ayers’ car and two men got out with guns drawn, said Carpenter.

Carpenter said that’s why he tried to speed away. . . .

“I’ve rerun it in my mind,” Carpenter said. “He had used an ATM inside, got into his car and then a black Escalade pulled up and [they] jumped out . . . If they ID’d themselves, he couldn’t hear them because his windows were up.” — Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The Cadillac Escalade is popular among gangbangers of both the ordinary criminal variety and the police variety.

“They deserve punishment,” said Ayers’ sister, Rebecca Floyd. “They deserve to feel somewhat of the pain we’re feeling, because I can’t get my brother back he’s gone forever.”

Floyd said there’s no way her younger brother would have run if he would have known the men who had guns were officers. The officers were undercover and weren’t in uniform, but investigators said they had badges around their necks and clearly identified themselves.

“I think anyone in that situation would run,” Floyd said. “I know I would. If someone pulled up to me with guns, I would run.”

She said her brother was known to help strangers.

“I could bet my life on it he did not know her,” she said. “I could bet my life on it, because that’s the kind of person he was. He was a good Christian man, and that was his goal was to lead souls to Christ.” — WYFF-TV

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation has launched an investigation into the shooting. The two gangbangers, who were not named, are on paid vacation until the investigation is complete.

I can tell you now what the results of the investigation will be. Despite the fact that statements by the sheriff are contradicted by the surveillance video, the investigation will find that the officers followed “proper procedures” and will not be subject to any sort of justice. Police procedures generally allow for shooting at the driver of a car which strikes an officer, which explains why one of the officers ran himself into its way.

Though these police officers will not likely face justice in this life, there is always the next.

Ayers is survived by his wife Abby, who is 16 weeks pregnant.

Jonathan Ayers is the latest victim of Richard Nixon’s long-running, unwinnable, immoral “War on Drugs.” By making illegal things which have no business being illegal in the first place, it has undermined the Constitution and the rule of law itself, turned millions of honest people into “criminals,” caused thousands of innocent people to lose their money, cars and even homes, without ever being charged with a crime, and resulted in countless deaths of innocent people. It has wrought destruction on our society to a scale unequaled by any other U.S. government program.

Ayers showed us by example what we should be doing: minister to those in need, instead of throwing them in cages at taxpayer expense and allowing innocent Americans to get caught in the crossfire. It’s time to end the War on Drugs before any more innocent people lose their cars, their homes or their lives.

Did you buy extra ammunition after Barack Obama was elected President, and are you still concerned that he might ban your guns? Are you concerned that the economic crisis could devolve into a depression, or worse? Do you think the federal government has overstepped its authority under the Constitution? If so, the government thinks you’re a right-wing extremist and a potential terrorist threat.

Last week the Department of Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis published an “analysis” of “right-wing extremists” in the United States in which it claims, quite vaguely, that: “Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.”

Naturally the document was leaked and has provoked a firestorm of controversy, with conservatives saying it unfairly paints their viewpoints as extremist. You’ll have to read it for yourself to see how far it goes in demonizing anyone who believes in individual rights and limited government. But here’s a sample:

(U//FOUO) Rightwing extremist chatter on the Internet continues to focus on the economy, the perceived loss of U.S. jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors, and home foreclosures. Anti-Semitic extremists attribute these losses to a deliberate conspiracy conducted by a cabal of Jewish “financial elites.” These “accusatory” tactics are employed to draw new recruits into rightwing extremist groups and further radicalize those already subscribing to extremist beliefs. DHS/I&A assesses this trend is likely to accelerate if the economy is perceived to worsen. . . .

(U//FOUO) Historically, domestic rightwing extremists have feared, predicted, and anticipated a cataclysmic economic collapse in the United States. Prominent antigovernment conspiracy theorists have incorporated aspects of an impending economic collapse to intensify fear and paranoia among like-minded individuals and to attract recruits during times of economic uncertainty. Conspiracy theories involving declarations of martial law, impending civil strife or racial conflict, suspension of the U.S. Constitution, and the creation of citizen detention camps often incorporate aspects of a failed economy. Antigovernment conspiracy theories and “end times” prophecies could motivate extremist individuals and groups to stockpile food, ammunition, and weapons. . . .

(U//FOUO) DHS/I&A assesses that rightwing extremists will attempt to recruit and radicalize returning veterans in order to exploit their skills and knowledge derived from military training and combat. These skills and knowledge have the potential to boost the capabilities of extremists — including lone wolves or small terrorist cells — to carry out violence. The willingness of a small percentage of military personnel to join extremist groups during the 1990s because they were disgruntled, disillusioned, or suffering from the psychological effects of war is being replicated today.

That’s just the beginning.

Interestingly, the report draws a distinction between “right-wing extremists” and “law-abiding citizens,” as if good, honest, moral people could not possibly hold any of these viewpoints.

A DHS spokesman told FOX News that nothing was wrong with this assessment, citing a January assessment of left-wing extremists the department also issued.

DHS spokeswoman Sara Kuban said the April 7 assessment is one in an ongoing series published by DHS “to facilitate a greater understanding of radicalization in the United States.”

“DHS has no specific information that domestic right-wing terrorists are currently planning acts of violence, but right-wing extremists may be gaining new recruitments by playing on their fears about several emerging issues,” Kuban said. . . .

“This is the job of DHS, to assess what is happening in this country, with regard to homegrown terrorism, and determine whether it’s an actual threat or not, and that’s what these assessments do. This is nothing unusual. These assessments are done all the time. This is about awareness,” the official told FOX News on Monday. — FOX News

You might be tempted to believe that if you hadn’t actually seen the left-wing extremist assessment, so I invite you to read it for yourself and contrast it to the right-wing extremist document. It’s much more clear about its definition of left-wing extremists and even gives examples of organizations it considers to be left-wing extremists (and they’re quite difficult to argue with, unfortunately for my more liberal readers).

As you’ll see, the left-wing document is narrowly focused on specific groups and activities while the right-wing document covers almost any belief to the right of, well, Barack Obama. It names no organizations as examples, and as one commentator pointed out, doesn’t even say there’s an actual threat! You right-wing extremist loonies are just a potential threat to the nation, and so the government is going to have to keep an eye on you.

This report smacks of profiling and harassing American citizens based on their political views, and specifically based on their opposition to the Obama administration’s proposals.

This used to be called “democracy” and “free speech” protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution. But under Obama, “Homeland Security” has become an instrument of oppression of opposing points of view. — WorldNetDaily

Oh, Bush would have done the same thing if he thought he could get away with it. Let’s not pretend this is a purely Democratic problem. The problem is that the institution of government allows people who disagree with each other to beat each other over the head with the world’s largest hammer, and whoever is out of power must suffer at the hands of whoever is in power. That whoever is in power can be changed every couple of years makes it no less of a problem; it just means that everyone gets a chance to wield the hammer, and to be hit by it, in turn.

Oops, that’s an antigovernment sentiment. I must be a right-wing extremist.

The Transportation Security Administration compromised security testing of airport security screeners at as many as 11 airports by sending out an e-mail about the tests and failing to report the compromise, according to a report released Friday by the Department of Homeland Security inspector general.

On April 28, 2006, an unidentified official in TSA’s Office of Security Operations sent the e-mail to an internal distribution list with the subject of “Notice of Possible Security Test.” While the e-mail was “recalled” 14 minutes later by the OSO’s assistant administrator, the inspector general found that 187 of the 388 users of the mailing list had already read it, including four individuals at three airports which were about to be tested by the IG.

The e-mail “provided key details about our covert airport security testing program, including our test methodology and the physical description of one of our undercover testers,” the report said. “TSA’s disclosure of our covert testing procedures was inappropriate and interfered with a legitimate function of our office. In addition, at no time did any TSA official inform us that our testing was compromised.”

The TSA disagreed strongly with the conclusions, saying that it never intended to tip off covert testing and that its sending out of the e-mail message about the upcoming tests did not actually compromise anything, and this under idiot Kip Hawley’s own hand. You can read the report (Kip Hawley’s response is attached to it) and judge for yourself.

While you’re judging, listen to what a TSA spokesman had to say about the report:

“There’s no evidence that the release of the message compromised covert testing,” said TSA spokesman Greg Soule. “There was never any intention or an attempt to circumvent covert testing. This incident happened two years ago, changes have been made to the field communications system, including a high-level review to ensure this type of event doesn’t occur again.” — Nextgov

I’d be more inclined to believe it if this was the first time such a compromise had happened, but it isn’t. TSA officials at San Francisco International Airport compromised airport security testing there in 2003-2004. That’s just one incident that comes to mind offhand. And the reason there’s such testing in the first place is that TSA is so focused on illegal water bottles that it consistently misses fake bombs — and real ones.

Most of the screeners on the front lines of airport security might be trying to keep people safe in the only way they know how, but some of the management above them clearly have some strange ideas about what constitutes security. So you’ll forgive me if I don’t fly anywhere as long as the TSA exists in its current form.

Last July, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents conducted a raid of a home allegedly looking for a fugitive alien. Instead, they found a Customs and Border Protection officer.

K-9 officer Jim Slaughter, a seven year veteran of CBP who works at the San Luis, Ariz., border crossing, told KSWT-TV that five ICE agents entered his home without a warrant, but immediately backed off when he told them he was a CBP officer.

His wife, Sheila, asks the important questions:

“Here they invaded my home, think of this, my children weren’t home. What if my husband hadn’t of been home? What would they have done to me?” says Sheila. — KSWT-TV

The Slaughters now believe that ICE agents simply had the wrong address, but he is suing the Department of Homeland Security because, he says, ICE refused to apologize or even explain the incident.

Unfortunately I’m afraid the suit, which cites the Fourth Amendment, isn’t likely to go anywhere. Courts have repeatedly ruled that when police raid the wrong house, citizens have no recourse, as long as the police simply made an “honest” mistake. Police being honest? When does that happen? And this bizarre miscarriage of justice is a direct result (you might say unintended consequence) of Richard Nixon’s war on drugs.

When alcohol was prohibited in the United States, it didn’t take long for people to recognize it as a universally bad idea. Yet the same is true of the prohibition of other drugs, and for the same reasons. A popular slogan at the time was, “Save Our Children: Stamp Out Prohibition.” Perhaps we should bring it back, because the war on drugs certainly is endangering our children.

Ethan Nadelmann, founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, spoke at the New Hampshire Liberty Forum regarding the harm that the so-called war on drugs has done to society and what his organization is doing about it.

“This war on drugs, and the underlying prohibitionist system on which it’s based, is one of the greatest horrors, one of the greatest insults to freedom and justice, one of the greatest indignities happening in our society and around the world today,” Nadelmann said during his talk.

The Drug Policy Alliance aims to “promote drug policies based on science, compassion, health, and human rights,” according to its Web site. As most readers here already know, the drug war is itself the source and cause of drug war related problems such as gang violence, drug overdoses, and many other problems which don’t seem related to the drug war at first glance.

Unfortunately, due to schedule constraints, it was the only talk regarding drug policy at the Liberty Forum which I was able to capture. Blame the organizer for scheduling so many great talks during the same time slots.

You haven’t done anything wrong, so why should you worry about surveillance? It was Cardinal Richelieu who said, “If you give me six lines written by the most honest man, I will find something in them to hang him.” The United States doesn’t hang innocent people any more, but it certainly does imprison them by the millions, and occasionally does kill them.

So why worry about surveillance, if you are honest? As the Miranda saying goes, anything can be used against you in a court of law. Law enforcement’s job is to come up with things to use against you, and the most innocent bits of data, combined together in ways you might not expect, can paint the most honest, innocent person as a criminal. Someday you could find yourself on trial for a crime you never committed, for instance, or you could be detained for hours every time you try to board an airplane or cross the border.

Last week the Electronic Frontier Foundation launched its Surveillance Self-Defense project, an online guide for protecting your private data against government spying. EFF created the guide, it said in a news release, “to educate Americans about the law and technology of communications surveillance and computer searches and seizures, and to provide the information and tools necessary to keep their private data out of the government’s hands.”

After all, data the government doesn’t have can’t be used against you. I presume, of course, that you are innocent of wrongdoing, and it is for innocent people that this guide is designed: activists who use their First Amendment rights to lobby for changes in government policy, for example, or ordinary Americans who get caught up in a criminal investigation due to a computer error, or simple human mistake such as police serving a warrant at the wrong house. Unfortunately this sort of thing happens far too often.

“Despite a long and troubling history in this country of the government abusing its surveillance powers, most Americans know very little about how the law protects them or about how they can take steps to protect themselves against government surveillance,” said EFF senior staff attorney Kevin Bankston. “The Surveillance Self-Defense project offers citizens a legal and technical toolkit with tips on how to defend themselves in case the government attempts to search, seize, subpoena or spy on their most private data.”

The site explains the law in the United States as it applies to what data the law enforcement and intelligence communities can obtain about you and how they obtain it. It then covers in depth how to protect your personal data on your computer, as it is in transit over the Internet, and while it is held by third parties. Importantly, it also provides an easy to understand overview of what security is and how to assess your personal security risks so that you can implement security measures which make sense for your own circumstances. Finally it covers specific security measures and technologies which you can use to protect yourself.

I’ve reviewed the site myself and I highly recommend it for anyone who has even the slightest possibility of being targeted by the government for any reason. And, unfortunately, that means every single individual, since, but for happenstance, the next person who gets their house mistakenly raided and their dog shot to death by a SWAT team could be you. Protecting your privacy using these techniques won’t guarantee your security, of course, but it will certainly reduce the likelihood of becoming the next victim of government surveillance.

The U.S. military paid just under $1 million for two 19 cent flat washers. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

C&D Distributors, LLC, bilked the Pentagon over ten years for $20.6 million in excessive shipping costs for a variety of small parts whose value rarely exceeded $100, according to acting Department of Defense inspector general Gordon Heddell. The problem is that the electronic acquisition system the military used to buy such small parts didn’t bother to check whether the shipping costs seemed reasonable. The company, and the surviving sister of the twins who ran the company, are awaiting sentencing, according to Heddell’s statement to the House Subcommittee on Defense Committee Appropriations Thursday at a hearing on defense outsourcing.

Nor is it hard to find examples throughout history. Heddell helpfully provided some dating all the way back to the Revolutionary War, citing letters from George Washington that vendors were overcharging him, and that suppliers often defrauded the Continental Army, such as contractors who “provided Continental forces with barrels of meat that were filled with stones and tree roots and provided other spoiled food rations, such as rancid flour. The contractors also provided Continental forces with gunpowder that had deteriorated, and thus was unusable.”

The situation today isn’t much different:

“Today, instead of debris-laden barrels of meat, contractors have built inadequate or unusable facilities, provided defective equipment and parts, stolen fuel, bribed contracting officials, grossly overcharged for goods, and failed to deliver products in a timely manner, if at all.”

The report goes on to list many other instances of waste, fraud and abuse committed not only by defense contractors, but by military contracting officers such as John Cockerham, who was to have received over $9 million in kickbacks for delivering hundreds of contracts to various unscrupulous suppliers during 2004 and 2005.

Heddell says the problem is that DoD’s acquisition workforce did not grow when annual defense spending more than doubled since 2001, allowing for more opportunities for fraud and abuse and reducing the ability of the department to conduct oversight. He stated that his office is “actively involved in aggressive audit planning” and has launched a web site to help auditors and others to detect fraud.

The problem is, of course, that few in the government are watching how your money is spent before it’s spent. It isn’t hard to find examples of waste, fraud and abuse throughout the government, in any agency. As Heddell was quick to note, such problems in government acquisition have existed since the dawn of the country, and likely since the dawn of time. One can find fraudsters even in the private sector if one looks hard enough, but it’s much easier and more profitable for criminals to defraud the big, lumbering, stupid government.