Just in time for Tron: Legacy, a Florida bike shop put together 10 custom-built, street-legal Tron Light Cycle lookalikes. For a cool $55,000, you could be riding one to the Dec. 17th premiere.
According to Jeff Halverson of Parker Brothers Choppers, each bike features a steel frame, fiberglass bodywork and a V-twin engine from a Suzuki TLR1000. Stopping power comes from a custom made friction drum that keeps the bike true to the look of Daniel Simon's latest Light Cycle design. Customers have a choice between actual gauges and an iPad dock that displays vital statistics on the iPad's touchscreen.
Though the bike looks like it drove straight off the movie screen, it's not a replica or recreation since the Light Cycles in both Tron films were virtual. "We basically used the images we could get off the web in order to make the bike," said Halverson. "Keep in mind, no one ever made this bike before."
The bike weighs 474 pounds and is just over 100 inches long and 23 inches wide. The rider sits (lies?) 28.5 inches off the ground. Halverson said that it rides like any sportbike, though we've gotta wonder with that huge front tire. Still, we'd welcome the chance to ride one to find out.
Four Light Cycles are still available just in case anyone has us on their shopping list.
THE DRAGONATER WINS IN TRAFFIC COURT AT DEALS GAP, RAISES SPEED LIMIT TO 65 MPH ON THE DRAGON - NOLLE PROSEQUI BY BLOUNT COUNTY ATTORNEY GENERAL. NO TESTIMONY, HEARING NOR TRIAL WHATSOEVER. 60 MPH SPEEDING TICKET DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE, COSTS PAID BY THE STATE, IN BLOUNT COUNTY GENERAL SESSIONS COURT WITH JUDGE BREWER. THP TROOPER RANDALL HUCKEBY ADMITTED ON VIDEOTAPE DURING TRAFFIC STOP THAT ALL SPEEDING TICKETS NORTHBOUND ON US129 AT MILE MARKER 0.5 ARE FEDERAL JURISDICTION, NOT STATE JURISDICTION (VIDEO BY THE DRAGONATER). HUCKEBY WAS ALSO CAUGHT ON VIDEO SPEEDING AT 60 MPH ON THE DRAGON, WITHOUT THE MANDATORY EMERGENCY LIGHTS AND SIREN REQUIRED FOR IMMUNITY FROM PROSECUTION (VIDEO BY THE DRAGONATER). TDOT ADMITTED IN WRITING THAT THE MANDATORY TRAFFIC ENGINEERING SURVEY SPEED AUDIT WAS NEVER PERFORMED, IN VIOLATION OF TN CODE, THUS THE POSTED 30 MPH SPEED LIMIT ON THE DRAGON REVERTS TO THE DEFAULT 65 MPH IN TN CODE. THE DRAGONATER ALSO MADE VIDEO OF TROOPER HUCKEBY SPEEDING UP TO 60 MPH ON THE DRAGON IN A 30 MPH ZONE, WITHOUT MANDATORY EMERGENCY LIGHTS NOR SIREN, IN VIOLATION OF TN CODE, AND PERJURY IN HIS PERSONNEL FILE, WHICH SHOWED HIS $100,000+ SALARY. 2007 TDOT SAFETY AUDIT REPORT CONFESSED THAT THP'S JOB IS TO BAN ALL COMMERCIAL BUSINESSES ON THE DRAGON, SO THP TICKETS INCREASED 11,400% IN BLOUNT COUNTY. THP'S STALKER RADAR OPERATOR MANUAL CONFESSED THAT RADAR CANNOT MEASURE THE SPEED OF VEHICLES WITHIN 18 MPH OF ACTUAL SPEED. WATCH THIS SPACE FOR FULL EVIDENCE FILE. UPDATE 7 MARCH 2011
Up to 18 cops per 11 miles...which is 36 cops per 22-mile lap of the Dragon.
The State of Tennessee Municipal Corporation brags on it's website that THP increased tickets for bikers 11,400% on the Dragon. All other vehicles got a 30% to 50% decrease in tickets, statewide. Blount County now leads all 95 counties for number of tickets for bikers.
Since the Police State Surge at Deals Gap began 4 years ago, over 500,000 bikers have boycott the Dragon, yet the death rate for bikers has tripled.
In 2010, the biker death rate at quadrupled, or more, per rider per mile per day, after THP closed the Dragon for several months, just to spite the bikers, and for ethnic clensing of Blount County biker businesses. BC biker business owners reported a 95% drop in revenue, those that didn't go out of business.
If you can't put em into BK court, or fire em, just burn em out, says BC sheriff James B Wrong...who BC commissioner Jim Folts calls a "mafia thug'.
"I'll burn your house down, set your dog on fire and there won�t be a member of your family left, do you understand me? I won't hire it done, I will do it myself! Do you understand me?" -Deals Gap Blount County sheriff James B. Wrong, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit, Nuchols v. Berrong, No. 04-5645, July 11, 2005
Reasons for the homicidal death rate increase on the Dragon:
As I keep saying, overregulation is not merely a nuisance. It is often counterproductive even by the standards of those promoting it.
Here is an example and some studies to back up my assertion.
Four years ago Wellington, New Zealand reduced speed limits from 50 to 30 km/h (30 to 20 mph) to improve pedestrian safety in an area with a lot of bus traffic. Bus-pedestrian collisions increased. Apparently bus drivers drove slowly in obedience to the new speed limit and pedestrians took that as an invitation to walk into traffic. More typically, drivers simply ignore such speed limits, as in Dublin, Ireland recently.
The problem in Wellington was that city bus drivers actually did obey the speed limit.
Even the traffic calming handbook warns that excess stop signs increase speed and accidents. The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices warns that excess traffic signals are dangerous and counterproductive.
A Federal Highway Administration study found that painting crosswalks on busy, four lane urban streets with traffic faster than 35 mph increased pedestrian accidents. Pedestrians who used those crosswalks were more likely to get badly hurt than pedestrians who crossed similar streets without crosswalks.
A recurring theme is the danger making people feel safer than they really are.
Suppose we mandated better tires. With better tires you can brake harder and turn sharper to avoid a collision. It’s obvious that you would get into fewer accidents with better tires. It’s obvious, but it’s not true.
The effect is called “risk compensation.” The study used antilock brakes instead of better tires.
Drivers with ABS are more likely to tailgate and drive aggressively, relying on good brakes to save them. Pedestrians are more likely to walk in front of slow-moving buses than fast moving buses. Pedestrians are more likely to walk in front of fast-moving traffic when “protected” by a stripe of white paint.
Not all safety-motivated changes are good, and not all are bad. Driving is a lot safer than it was 50 years ago, and we’re going places faster. Obviously something has worked. The problem is, it’s hard to predict which changes have their intended results and which do something unexpected.
Drivers and pedestrians are human beings, not robots. Most of us are comfortable with the risk of everyday life. You can not program our behavior directly. You can only influence it indirectly.
Next time you hear about some “obviously” good law — banning texting while driving is in fashion this year — ask yourself what’s going to happen when it meets the real world.
By John Carr National Motorists Association Motorists.org
When complaints grow too loud, reporters ask public safety agencies for reassurance that traffic law enforcement really is all for the best.
Accused of running a speed trap, the sheriff explained his speed enforcement cut fatal accidents from three or four per year to zero. Police said right-angle collisions were down by half at intersections with red light cameras. The Department for Transport proudly reported that road injuries were down 30% since the introduction of speed cameras.
This is all compelling evidence.
This is all lies.
The government has unique access to safety data. We have to go digging for it if we’re allowed to see it at all. Out of the countless lies told by government to justify regulations or enforcement, these three are among the very few that were independently fact checked.
Aren Cambre pulled the accident reports for Westlake, Texas and discovered that fatal accidents went up when the Sheriff started his speed trap. There were not 3-4 per year before, there were two in total in the previous six years. There were not zero after, there was an average of one per year. The death rate more than doubled.
An auditor asked Manitoba’s government monopoly insurance provider for claim records for Winnipeg. Accidents near cameras were way up. Serious accidents more than doubled and injuries were up 64%.
A researcher bypassed police statistics and checked hospital records to see how many people had been injured in car accidents. Serious injuries had not decreased, as the government claimed.They had increased. Police cut reported injuries by one third by simply not reporting them.
Both Winnipeg and the British government learned from their mistakes. Next time Winnipeg got accident statistics from the provincial insurer the city refused to release them to the public. We can guess what they say. The Department for Transport tried to suppress a study that showed speed cameras increased accidents in work zones.
Around 1990 the U.S. government sponsored a study on the effect of changing speed limits. When the study confirmed the well known result thatnumbers on signs do not do much of anything, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration refused to publish the report. Fortunately, NMA lobbyist Gail Morrison got her hands on a copy and passed it around Congress. The national speed limit was repealed soon after.
We call it cherry-picking. You pick and polish the evidence that supports you and try to bury the rest where nobody will find it.
When you see a statistic, ask yourself: is it the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Do I believe what they are telling me? Can I figure out what are they not telling me?
I’ll come back to this later. In the meantime, a puzzle:
I don’t care about reducing red light running or red light running crashes. Why not?
A clue: read about “proxy variables” in statistics.
CAMDEN, N.J. -- Financial troubles in Camden continue. Despite pleas from local residents, one of the most crime-riddled cities in the United States is about to lay off about half of its public safety forces.
Camden City Council approved the layoff proposal unanimously on Thursday in spite of angry arguments from workers and residents to find a way to save the jobs.
Camden has a small tax base and relies on the state for most of its funding. Meanwhile, New Jersey's budget cuts have gone statewide.
An Associated Press report from NBC New York said the layoffs are to be effective Jan. 18. The state Civil Service Commission has already approved them.
Union leaders have met with city officials to iron out possible concessions in an attempt to save as many of the 383 targeted positions as possible.
Fire Officers Union President Al Ashley noted 67 firefighters stand to lose their jobs under the current layoff plan. That translates to a safety issue for his staff and the public.
Some blamed council and Mayor Dana Redd for the situation. Others criticized six bargaining units they believe could make concessions to reduce the 383 layoffs called for to close a $26.5-million budget gap.
And others were pointing to Gov. Chris Christie for not fully funding the troubled town.
Christie spokesman Michael Drewniak mentioned that out of nine New Jersey municipalities granted transitional aid, Camden received the largest portion of $159 million in available funding.
"All governments — municipal, school districts, county and state — are having to make do and do better with what they have."
The union Camden Council 10 President Karl Walko heads represents non-uniformed employees from public works employees to clerks and typists. The mantra of "doing more with less" is something Council 10 employees have been doing already, Walko says.
According to philly.com, Walko said 40 percent of the police dispatch unit would be dismissed along with 42 percent of the clerical staff in the courts. He said 25 of the city's 40 laborers would be let go, a loss he said could paralyze the city in a snowstorm.
Despite the state contributing $69 million in aid to Camden — $15 million above what it budgeted — according to the Courier Post, Walko says the layoff plan is "an abandonment of the city and its residents by the state of New Jersey."
Ken Chambers, president of the union that represents Camden's everyday firefighters, said concessions like the ones made already by Council 10 aren't feasible for police and firefighters.
Camden Mayor Dana L. Redd and John Williamson, head of the police officers' union, said in a joint phone call that talks between the city and public safety unions were continuing.
The sides plan to meet over the next several weeks to discuss concessions that would save public-safety jobs in what was recently rated the second-most-dangerous city in the United States, according to the mayor and Williamson.
"Why would anyone ever want to ride one of those things?"
-Keith Wandell, non-biker CEO of Harley Davidson, looking at a Buell
So Harley Davidson was secretly paid billions of taxdollars to kill sportbikes Made-In-USA, and paid by Uncle Scam to export HD factories to India. Just like Bushobama paid Government Motors billions of taxdollars to export factories to Communist China and Brazil.
Other bailout banksters include General Electric (GE), owner of NBC and MSNBC TV "news", which are now government-owned propaganda, just like the British Broadcasting Corporation (where The Dragonater was a STAR, or a god, on a good day).
Note that the so-called "Federal" Reserve Bank is a private corporation with zero audits allowed, the only corporation in USA allowed that immunity. The so-called "Fed" counterfeits all so-called "US dollar bills" ("Federal" Reserve Debt Notes) out of thin air then bills the US Govt for trillions of taxdollars interest. So to pay off that national govt debt, the so-called "Fed" keeps all IRS income taxes, with zero income taxes going to run the US Govt. There is no law requiring payment of income taxes...
"Not one dime of income taxes goes to support any federal program."
-President Ronald Reagan, right before George Bushes' CIA cousin John Hinkley Jr shot him (released from loonybin by George Bush Jr and Hussein Obama Soetoro)
The Bankster Bailout didn't cost the taxslaves $700-million, not $7-trillion, but over $30-trillion, mostly given to offshore banks, zero accounting to Congress. The best way to rob a bank is to own one...
The Fed created a bailout of the commercial paper market. A special entity called CPFF LLC, funded by the Fed, bought commercial paper from companies. They included GE, which tapped the facility 12 times for $16.1 billion, the Fed disclosed this week.
Assistance to companies, which also included Toyota Motor Corp. ($4.6 billion), Harley-Davidson Inc. ($2.3 billion) and Verizon Communications Inc. ($1.5 billion), topped out at $348.2 billion on Jan. 21, 2009, according to the Fed.
Commercial Paper
“The AMLF was the single most successful government intervention during the financial crisis,” said Peter Crane, president of Crane Data LLC, a money-fund research firm in Westborough, Massachusetts, in an interview. “In a crisis when you have esoteric corners of the market involved, you have no choice but to go to the experts, and the experts will be self- interested players.”
While the AMLF helped stabilize money funds, they didn’t start buying commercial paper again. That left issuers without their biggest group of customers and unable to roll over short- term debt as it matured. At 5:45 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 15, GE Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey R. Immelt met for half an hour with Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. in the secretary’s office, according to Paulson’s schedule.
An hour and 15 minutes later, Federal Reserve Bank of New York President Timothy F. Geithner convened a staff meeting to focus on “GE issues,” according to his schedule. He and Paulson conferred by phone afterward.
On Oct. 1, Geithner’s schedule noted a tentative conference call with Immelt, who was a board member of the New York Fed, a position he still has today. GE spokesman Gary Sheffer said the company doesn’t see a conflict with Immelt’s membership on the New York Fed’s board. He declined to comment on the content of Immelt’s conversations.
Unintended Consequences
“Any situation where the potential exists for a conflict of interest is concerning,” said Kurt Bardella, spokesman for Representative Darrell Issa, the California Republican who will become chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee next month. “This really brings into focus one of the unintended consequences of institutionalizing the federal government picking winners and losers while those entities are partaking directly and indirectly in what should be exclusive government functions.”
Conflict Review
“It seems clear that the biggest beneficiaries were the insiders,” said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington. “We have a huge pinata here. The question is whether we had insiders deciding who would get the candy or was everyone in the same boat? Think of the people who get upset about the government giving a homeowner some help. Now multiply the sums by about 100 million. We should care.”
In the depths of the financial collapse, the U.S. Federal Reserve pumped $3.3 trillion into keeping credit moving through the economy. It eventually lent $57.9 billion to the auto industry — including $26.8 billion to Ford, Toyota and BMW.
The Fed on Wednesday was forced to reveal the identity of the companies it aided during the crisis, after contending to Congress that keeping their identities and the details of such lending secret was essential. Much of Wall Street, and corporate giants such as General Electric, Harley Davidson and McDonald's, took advantage of the Fed's help. We've done the math on how the Fed propped up the auto industry.
While Chrysler and General Motors had to go to Congress to beg for cash in 2008, every other automaker's finance arm was having trouble as well. Typically, once they lend money to a buyer, they sell the loan, get the cash upfront, then pump the proceeds back into the business. They also take out short-term loans called commercial paper that keeps the day-to-day business afloat. The crash cut the circuit, raising the chances the automakers couldn't make loans to buyers and keep selling new vehicles.
That's where the Fed stepped in. In normal circumstances, the Fed only lends money to banks, leaving the decisions about who should get credit to them. But when the financial markets started to collapse in late 2008, the Fed set up several programs to lend money directly to corporations, a highly unusual step.
According to the data, from October 2008 through June 2009 the fed bought $45.1 billion in commercial paper from the credit arms of four automakers - Ford, BMW, Chrysler and Toyota - along with GMAC (the former General Motors credit arm). Of those, Ford sold the most, with $15.9 billion.
The Fed also lent $13 billion to investors who bought bonds backed by loans to new car buyers from automakers and banks. The Fed made clear that while investors got the loans, the move was meant to keep the lenders in business; the credit arms of Ford, Chrysler, Nissan, Volkswagen, Honda and Hyundai all benefited directly.
Ford spokeswoman Christin Baker said the two programs "addressed systemic failure in the credit markets, and that neither program was designed for a particular company, or even a particular industry." Ford Credit has disclosed through SEC filings and conference calls with media and investors that it was taking part in both programs.
BMW told Bloomberg that the Fed lending "supported our financial profile and offered us an additional funding source, especially at times when the money markets and capital markets did not function properly and efficiently."
According to the Fed, the commercial paper loans have been paid in full, while some $2 billion remains outstanding on loans for bond investors.
The secrecy surrounding the details of the loans only masked how much aid corporate America and Wall Street needed. While General Motors and Chrysler took the brunt of the blowback for relying on government handouts, the reveal of the Fed numbers show that a far bigger slice of the U.S. auto industry needed help.
With credit markets largely frozen amid nervousness by investors throughout the system at the time, Harley sold commercial paper - a form of short-term loan - to the Fed 33 times over five months between late 2008 and early 2009 for a total of more than $2.3 billion. The money was used primarily by Harley's lending unit, which provides retail loans for motorcycle buyers and wholesale loans to Harley dealers, said company spokesman Bob Klein.
"It was an available source when a lot of other sources were frozen or hard to come by," said Klein.
Klein noted that there never was more than $1.35 billion in debt outstanding to the Fed at one time because Harley's borrowing included rollovers and refinancing as paper matured.
Area banks, Harley-Davidson took help from Fed
When the Federal Reserve unleashed a barrage of programs in 2008 to try to prevent the collapse of the financial system, a handful of Wisconsin firms - mostly banks, but the state's perhaps best-known company as well - opted in.
Data released last week on more than 21,000 loans and other transactions the Fed made during the financial crisis shows at least nine state financial institutions - including Wisconsin's two biggest banks - and Milwaukee motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson Inc. used some of the emergency measures.
The records indicate Wisconsin companies borrowed a total of more than $41 billion through the Fed's special programs from 2008 through early 2010, a fraction of the total $3.3 trillion in credit issued in the United States and beyond by the Fed as it sought to prevent widespread financial calamity.
Dictator Obama's Secretary of War Vinnie Da Chin Panetta and the Pentagram Joints Chief Of Operation Northwoods testified to Congress yesterday that Obama takes his orders to invade from United Nations and NATO, not Congress.
This is the equivalent ot Caesar crossing the Rubicon with his military to invade Rome under martial law, resulting in civil war, and 5 years later every member of the Roman Senate stabbing Caesar in the back...literally on the Ides Of March (next week...).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Caesar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_the_rubicon
H.CON.RES.107 -- Expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high... (Introduced in House - IH)
HCON 107 IH
112th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. CON. RES. 107
Expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
March 7, 2012
Mr. JONES submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
Expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.
Whereas the cornerstone of the Republic is honoring Congress's exclusive power to declare war under article I, section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that, except in response to an actual or imminent attack against the territory of the United States, the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress violates Congress's exclusive power to declare war under article I, section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution and therefore constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s testimony asserting that the United Nations and NATO have supreme authority over the actions of the United States military, words which effectively declare Congress a ceremonial relic, have prompted Congressman Walter Jones to introduce a resolution that re-affirms such behavior as an “impeachable high crime and misdemeanor” under the Constitution.
During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing yesterday, Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey brazenly admitted that their authority comes not from the U.S. Constitution, but that the United States is subservient to and takes its marching orders from the United Nations and NATO, international bodies over which the American people have no democratic influence.
Panetta was asked by Senator Jeff Sessions, “We spend our time worrying about the U.N., the Arab League, NATO and too little time, in my opinion, worrying about the elected representatives of the United States. As you go forward, will you consult with the United States Congress?”
The Defense Secretary responded “You know, our goal would be to seek international permission. And we would come to the Congress and inform you and determine how best to approach this, whether or not we would want to get permission from the Congress.”
Despite Sessions’ repeated efforts to get Panetta to acknowledge that the United States Congress is supreme to the likes of NATO and the UN, Panetta exalted the power of international bodies over the US legislative branch.
“I’m really baffled by the idea that somehow an international assembly provides a legal basis for the United States military to be deployed in combat,” Sessions said. “I don’t believe it’s close to being correct. They provide no legal authority. The only legal authority that’s required to deploy the United States military is of the Congress and the president and the law and the Constitution.”
In an effort to re-affirm the fact that “the use of offensive military force by a President without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution,” Republican Congressman Walter Jones has introduced a resolution in the House of Representatives.
The Pentagon is engaging in damage control after shocking testimony yesterday by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta at a Senate Armed Services Committee congressional hearing during which it was confirmed that the U.S. government is now completely beholden to international power structures and that the legislative branch is a worthless relic.
During the hearing yesterday Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey brazenly admitted that their authority comes not from the U.S. Constitution, but that the United States is subservient to and takes its marching orders from the United Nations and NATO, international bodies over which the American people have no democratic influence.
Panetta was asked by Senator Jeff Sessions, “We spend our time worrying about the U.N., the Arab League, NATO and too little time, in my opinion, worrying about the elected representatives of the United States. As you go forward, will you consult with the United States Congress?”
The Defense Secretary responded “You know, our goal would be to seek international permission. And we would come to the Congress and inform you and determine how best to approach this, whether or not we would want to get permission from the Congress.”
Despite Sessions’ repeated efforts to get Panetta to acknowledge that the United States Congress is supreme to the likes of NATO and the UN, Panetta exalted the power of international bodies over the US legislative branch.
“I’m really baffled by the idea that somehow an international assembly provides a legal basis for the United States military to be deployed in combat,” Sessions said. “I don’t believe it’s close to being correct. They provide no legal authority. The only legal authority that’s required to deploy the United States military is of the Congress and the president and the law and the Constitution.”
Panetta’s assertion that he would seek “international permission” before ‘informing’ Congress about the actions of the US military provoked a firestorm of controversy, prompting the Pentagon to engage in damage control by claiming Panetta’s comments were misinterpreted.
“He was re-emphasizing the need for an international mandate. We are not ceding U.S. decision-making authority to some foreign body,” a defense official told CNN.
However, this is not the first time that the authority of international bodies has been framed as being superior to the US Congress and the Constitution.
In June last year, President Obama arrogantly expressed his hostility to the rule of law when he dismissed the need to get congressional authorization to commit the United States to a military intervention in Libya, churlishly dismissing criticism and remarking, “I don’t even have to get to the Constitutional question.”
Obama tried to legitimize his failure to obtain Congressional approval for military involvement by sending a letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner in which he said the military assault was “authorized by the United Nations (U.N.) Security Council.”
Panetta’s testimony that the US looks to obtain “international permission” before it acts, allied with Obama citing the UN as the supreme authority while trashing the power of Congress, prove that the United States has ceded control over its own affairs to unelected international bureaucrats, just as the countries of the European Union have done likewise.
Attorney General Eric Holder, the top “legal” voice of the US regime, argued to Northwestern University law students that the US Constitution is no limit to the regime dictatorially assassinating Americans. This follows regime arguments to seize and “disappear” any person in opposition to regime dictates as “terrorist supporters,” and extracting their confessions with controlled drowning (euphemistically “waterboarding”), found by all US and international courts as torture. The regime’s followers in Congress voted for legislation (2006 Military Commissions Act, 2012 NDAA) that these dictates are consistent with the US Constitution.
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2012/03/attorney-general-holder-degrades-us-to-fascist-assassination-nation-99-response.html
MYFOXNY.COM - It might sound a little disturbing to some people but a new pilot program will attempt to recover kidneys from people who die at home in Manhattan.
A team of organ specialists will have about 20-minutes after a cardiac-arrest patient is declared dead to arrive at the home, check a donor registry, determine medical eligibility, obtain a family member's consent and get the person into a specialized ambulance.
A special team will monitor 9-1-1 calls about people in danger of dying and they will travel directly to a person's home without being summoned.
The program is being launched Wednesday. It could eventually lead to thousands more organs donated each year. But the five-month trial, a collaboration between Bellevue Hospital and New York City's police and fire departments, could be declared a success without a single organ being recovered, organizers say.
It's being called the Organ Donation Unit. It is being funded by a $1.5 million grant from the U. S. Department of Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA),
The team — composed of two EMTs, an organ donor family services specialist and a Bellevue emergency physician — will interact with grieving and shocked family members in the limited time available before it is too late to use a person's organs. A police detective will arrive at the scene before the team to make sure there's nothing about the death that warrants a criminal investigation.
Donors will need to be between the ages of 18 and 60 who die of heart attacks. The trial will only take place in Manhattan. Only kidneys will be harvested in the trial program. The only organs that can be recovered from deceased individuals who die from cardiac arrest are kidneys and livers.
The project is "very, very modest but has the potential to prove a concept that could be revolutionary," said Dr. Lewis Goldfrank, director of emergency services at Bellevue Hospital Center.
Of the roughly 50,000 people who died of all causes last year in downstate New York area hospitals, only about 600 were judged eligible to donate their organs. Of those, only 261 became donors, said Elaine Berg, the president and CEO of the New York Organ Donation Network.
The small number is due in part to policies preventing the vast majority of people who die of cardiac arrest from becoming donors, said Goldfrank, who estimated that each year 350,000 to 450,000 people in the U.S. suffer cardiac arrest outside of a hospital, with most dying.
As an ethical measure, EMTs attempting to revive a person and the doctor who ultimately makes the decision to declare a person dead won't know whether the patient is a registered organ donor and whether he or she is considered a candidate for the pilot program.
Team members will be sent to the scene in a specialized "Organ Preservation Ambulance," but will only enter the home after a person has been declared dead. Once there, they must determine whether the person is a registered organ donor and they must check whether the person has any medical conditions — such as cancer or AIDS — that would eliminate them as candidates.
The pilot program team has been told they have 50 minutes from the time a person's heart stops beating to the time his or her body must be placed in the ambulance and hooked up to a machine that creates blood circulation. Once at Bellevue, another machine will increase body oxygen. Only residents of the island of Manhattan who are between 18 and 59 will be eligible for the pilot program.
Similar programs are already in place in France and Spain, where there are fewer barriers because people in those countries are considered organ donors unless they opt out.
Over 109,000 people await a life saving organ transplant in the U.S. A new name is added every 13 minutes. While solid organ transplants are routine surgical procedures, more than 6,500 people die each year because an organ is not available.
"Donating an organ can save a person's life – that's why I am an organ donor," said Mayor Bloomberg. "But the unfortunate truth is that 8,000 New Yorkers are currently on the wait list for a donation, and there are barriers that make saving their lives not as simple as it could be. This new pilot program will help us test a process that could transform the way we donate organs and help save many lives."
EVERYTHING Brian Aitken was or had worked for was wiped away one winter afternoon after his mother called the police on him.
Separated from his wife, the entrepreneur and media consultant, now 27, had moved back home to New Jersey from Colorado toward the end of 2008 to be closer to their young son.
In between jobs, his well-oiled life was running ragged, and on Jan. 2, 2009, when his ex canceled his visit with their son, he became distraught, muttered something to his mother, and left his parents' home in Mount Laurel, N.J.
"He said something that scared her, things that a guy will only say to his mom, like . . . 'Life's not worth living anymore,' " said Larry Aitken, Brian's father.
Sue Aitken, a trained social worker, decided to play it safe and called police, but she hung up before the 9-1-1 dispatcher could answer. Police traced the call and showed up anyway, and found two handguns in the trunk of Brian's car. And now Brian, her middle child, a graduate student with no prior criminal record, is serving a seven-year prison sentence for weapons charges.
No one blames Sue Aitken for Brian's arrest, except herself maybe, but his father and attorney claim that the Burlington County Prosecutor's Office and the former Superior Court judge who tried the case ignored evidence that proved Brian had the guns legally. The family has asked New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie for clemency and has garnered a great deal of support on a "Free Brian Aitken" Facebook page and among gun-rights advocates.
Aitken and his supporters believe that he had a legal exemption to have the handguns in his car because he was moving from his parents' home to a residence in Hoboken.
"This case is the perfect storm of injustice," said Aitken's attorney, Evan Nappen, of Eatontown, Monmouth County, who specializes in gun laws.
The Burlington County Prosecutor's Office and former Superior Court Judge James Morley said Aitken and his legal team tried during closing arguments to raise an issue related to Aitken's moving that wasn't presented during the trial, but Morley wouldn't consider it. Aitken remains in prison pending his appeal.
A few weeks after Aitken's trial over the summer, Morley learned that Christie was not going to reappoint him, due in part to a 2009 case in which he dismissed animal-cruelty charges against a Moorestown cop accused of sticking his penis into the mouths of five calves. Morley said there was no way of knowing whether the calves had been "puzzled" or "tormented" by the officer's actions.
Nappen thinks the animal-cruelty case exemplifies poor decision-making by Morley.
"Brian didn't receive oral sex from calves; he only lawfully possessed firearms," Nappen said.
A spokesman for Christie acknowledged that his office had received clemency requests for Aitken, but declined to comment further.
Handguns in a duffel bag When Mount Laurel police arrived at the Aitkens' home on Jan. 2, 2009, they called Brian - who was driving to Hoboken - and asked him to return to his parents' home because they were worried. When he arrived, the cops checked his Honda Civic and, inside the trunk, in a box stuffed into a duffel bag with clothes, they found two handguns, both locked and unloaded as New Jersey law requires.
Aitken had passed an FBI background check to buy them in Colorado when he lived there, his father said, and had contacted New Jersey State Police and discussed the proper way to transport them.
"He bought them at Bass Pro Shops, for God's sake, not some guy named Tony on the street corner," his father said.
New Jersey and Colorado are on opposite ends of the gun-control spectrum. In Colorado, all he needed was the background check to own the guns.
In the Garden State, Aitken was required to have a purchaser's permit from New Jersey to own the guns and a carry permit to have them in his car.
He also was charged with having "large capacity" magazines and hollow-point bullets, which one state gun-control advocate found troubling.
"What little I can glean about the transportation issue leaves me puzzled, but a person with common sense would not be moving illegal products from one place to another by car," said Bryan Miller, executive director of CeaseFire NJ, an organization devoted to reducing gun violence.
"If Mr. Aitken did the research he said he did, he would not have hollow-point bullets and large-capacity magazines in the vehicle," Miller said. "They are illegal, period."
New Jersey allows exemptions for gun owners to transport weapons for hunting or if they are moving from one residence to another. During the trial, Aitken's mother testified that her son was moving things out, and his friend in Hoboken testified he was moving things in. A Mount Laurel officer, according to Larry Aitken, testified that he saw boxes of dishes and clothes in the Honda Civic on the day of the arrest.
The exemption statute, according to the prosecutor's office, specifies that legal guns can be transported "while moving." Despite testimony about his moving to Hoboken, a spokesman for the prosecutor said the evidence suggested that Aitken had moved months earlier, from Colorado to Mount Laurel. "Again, there was no evidence that he was then presently moving," spokesman Joel Bewley said.
After Nappen raised the moving-exemption issue, he said, the jury asked Judge Morley for the exemption statute several times and he refused to hand it over to them. Morley, in a phone interview, echoed the sentiments of the prosecutor's office.
"My recollection of the case is that I ruled he had not presented evidence sufficient to justify giving the jury the charge on the affirmative offense that he was in the process of moving," Morley said.
Morley declined to comment further.
Aitken, who did not testify, was convicted and in August sentenced to prison. His father said that his son was involved in an "incident" after arriving in prison but that he doesn't discuss it.
"This is the most normal, everyday, All-American regular kid, and for this to happen to him is a disgrace," Larry Aitken said. "It's a disgrace of society."
A US military court has spared an American soldier from an early discharge from the US Army after he admitted to shooting unarmed Afghan civilians for fun.
Staff Sergeant Robert Stevens, 25, an Army medic from the State of Oregon, was only sentenced to nine months in prison on Wednesday for killing Afghan civilians, after pleading guilty.
He confessed to opening fire on two Afghan farmers in March 2010 for no apparent reason. He and other US troops were acting on orders from a squad leader during a patrol in March, Reuters reported.
The case began as an investigation into hashish use among US soldiers who were part of an infantry unit then known as the 5th Stryker Brigade. But the investigation has grown into the most serious prosecution of alleged atrocities by US military personnel in nearly nine years of conflict in war-torn Afghanistan.
Four more US soldiers are implicated in the case. The soldiers have been charged with other crimes, including mutilating bodies and keeping body parts as trophies.
Stevens has agreed to testify against the other members of the group.
A 47 year old gay man was arrested at San Francisco International Airport after ejaculating while being patted down by a male TSA agent. Percy Cummings, an interior designer from San Francisco, is being held without bail after the alleged incident, charged with sexually assaulting a Federal agent.
According to Cummings’ partner, Sergio Armani, Cummings has “multiple piercings on his manhood” which were detected during a full body scan. As a result, Cummings was pulled aside for a pat-down. Armani stated that the unidentified TSA agent spent “an inordinate amount of time groping” Cummings, who had apparently become sexually aroused. Cummings, who has a history of sexual dysfunction, ejaculated while the TSA agent’s hand was feeling the piercings. The TSA agent, according to several witnesses, promptly called for back up. Cummings was thrown to the ground and handcuffed.
A TSA spokesperson declined to comment on this specific case, but said that anyone ejaculating during a pat-down would be subject to arrest.
Hours before being place on Interpol’s most wanted list, Julian Assange announced that WikiLeaks was going to release thousands of documents related to the recent arrest of Percy Cummings, who is charged with sexually assaulting a TSA agent during a pat-down.
Cummings is currently being held in Federal custody without bail. According to Assange, the documents will identify the alleged victim of the assault, as well as a pattern of official misconduct by him. The leaked documents state that male TSA agents have reported being sexually harassed by the alleged victim. He is also said to have used his agency seniority to be assigned exclusively to pat-down duty of male passengers. Several of his colleagues have also expressed disdain with the enthusiasm he has shown performing the pat-downs.
Assange claims that the leaked documents “will lead to the shut down of the TSA.” Calls and emails to the TSA asking for comment on the release of these documents have not been returned, however the TSA has stated that they are currently investigating the leak of the Percy Cummings arrest documents.
Citing the imminent demise of the TSA, Assange claims that the incident leading up to Cummings’ arrest would be “the shot heard around the world.”
He must be related to Barbie Cummings, who makes cops ejaculate during traffic stop searches.
Tennessee Highway Patrol stars in porn video with Barbie Cummings
