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POPSCan Afghans Leap from 13th Century to 21st in 16 Months? Seems as though Mark Twain could have been writing about Afghanistan when he said "habit can't be changed by throwing it down the stairs, it has to be eased down one step at a time." Some of our military and President's "advisers" should read this blog!
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POPSChange or Die? I think so - I've seen too much already When I first went to Los Angeles, 1948, from 20 miles inland and up in the mountains in La Cresenta, you could look out and see Catalina Island - more than 20 miles from shore. In 1966, I worked in a little factory in South El Monte. In the morning, looking out of the loading dock, I could see some hills three miles away. By 3 PM, I could not see the hills because of the smog. That kind of change has taken place all over the world in all metropolitan areas. Guess what? The wind needs no passport. As we have fouled our nest, we have also done the same to those downwind.
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POPSLife Prison Terms for Children? What are we thinking!? What we are thinking is that county prosecutors get elected in the counties they serve in and "being tough" is generally the only qualification people run on. Often the same distinction is used by state legislators to get elected and re-elected. News media outlets all compete for attention, to sell advertising and make a profit. "DA seeks life to teen rapist!" "DA may seek life for young sex criminal!" "Jury may sentence serial hoodlum to life in prison!" Here's the real question - is a particular case about the victim and perpetrator, or is it about someone seeking power and/or money at the expense of someone who may then spend life in prison whether it is really justified or equal justice.
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POPSYou Can't Take Back Executing an Innocent
Long past time in Ohio to end the death penalty and in the other states and the Federal government - why? Think about all the headlines over the past few years about the mess in Illinois over people on death row or in for life who were proved innocent. This has been repeated in a number of other states due to the effort, in part, of the Innocent Project. But they cannot be everywhere nor investigate all cases. Here's the point: If you sentence someone to life and find later on a mistake was made, the solution is to release the person and look for the real offender. If you execute an innocent, there is no way out. Across the country, people who have been accused of nearly the same kind or type of murder get death penalty specifications in once jurisdiction and not in another. We are not just talking about one state versus another state - the variation exists within states, county to county. That means no equal justice for the accused or the relatives and friends of the victims. W
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POPSRight-Wing #1 Scapegoat - ACORN No hypocrites here - ha, ha. How many would support a bar on funding: 1. Pfizer Slapped With $2.3 Billion Fine For Illegally Promoting Drugs & Defrauding Gov't? 2. On July 23, 1992, GE pled guilty in federal court to civil and criminal charges of defrauding the Pentagon and agreed to pay $69 million to the U.S. government in fines " one of the largest defense contracting fines ever. 3. US: DynCorp Billed U.S. $50 Million Beyond Costs in Defense Contract by V. Dion Haynes, Washington Post August 12th, 2009 4. Halliburton didn't hesitate to pay $382 million in fines to the U.S. Department of Justice as part of the settlement of a controversial KBR gas project in Nigeria in which the company admitted to paying a $180 million bribe to government officials. 5. Wackenhut is currently involved with scandal over their guarding the US Embassy in Kabul, and in April of this year - the appellate court's ruling late last week, it upheld all but $5 million of the original $47.5 mi
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POPSOhio's Execution Round One Ever wonder what it would be like to be executed and have it botched? Ohio has 88 counties, 88 elected District Attorneys, several hundred elected common pleas judges who can preside over death penalty cases, 88 elected coroners, hundreds of police departments. None of the elected criminal justice officials in Ohio's 88 counties have to have any specific training to run or be elected to office. Do you think there could possibly be equal justice for either the accused, the victims, or friend and relatives of either party?
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POPSCongo Basin Genocide: Truth and Reconciliation? Read and wonder will the world stand by the next genocide - well it already is taking place in the Sudan. Figuring out why we let this happen and how we play into it is step one for preventing the next one and ending this one - no?
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POPSLatest on Sheriff Joe's Phoenix Putsch Unbelievable - really. The Sheriff thinks he can refuse to follow legal order of the court????? Of course if anyone fails to heed a lawful order of one of his deputies, they are subject to arrest. Maybe, the President should send in National Guard in to protect civil rights of people whose records are in those computers!
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POPSPetition to commute an Ohio death sentence We, unfortunately, have a number of executions scheduled in Ohio in coming months. Many who were given death sentences since the death penalty law in Ohio was rewritten to comply with US Supreme Court rulings have exhausted their court appeal opportunities and are now being scheduled for executions for crimes committed in the 1980s and 1990s. The current system considers each case only on its individual merits and it is left to us, citizens, to determine whether we really want to continue executing so many people when we are unsure whether all of the executions or even just one execution makes us any safer, merciful, or just. Additional factors to consider are that if we seek the end of all executions: 1. Errors in justice can be righted. 2. Justice in the form of life imprisonment for the most aggravated homicides will be more likely imposed and more speedily determined (the time between sentencing and execution is often more than ten years because of time needed for jus
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POPS1, 2, 3... Who are we fighting for? Rape as right of Powerful Afghans? No one expects perfection but some semblance of justice, at least. In Afghanistan, if you are not hooked in to powerful people, a woman or a young boy - watch out! Is it any wonder that as soon as US or NATO troops leave an area, that violence again breaks out as people try to find someone, anyone who will actually protect them and treat them as people of value.
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POPSThe Latest Faux Social Cause: Urban Farming I guess no one remembers truck farms, so a new term had to be invented to cover the couple of thousand folks "playing" farmer and "buying local." Want to buy local and support the reestablishment of truck farms around major US cities? Fine. 1. Plow under your suburban homestead and a few thousand just like it that took the place of farms from the 1950s to the 1980s and into the 90s and sell it at a loss for farmland. 2. Move into the city and give up one of your cars and one motor scooter. 3. Don't buy reasonably prices tomatoes, strawberries, melons in winter from Chile, Guatemala, Argentina. or cheap roses from Columbia. 4. Learn how to "can" tomatoes and fruits as your great-grandmother used to. What am I talking about? What are you talking about?
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POPSJustice? Murder for Hire: Boss Gets Life, the Shooter Gets Death Sentence The death sentence needs to be ended in Ohio but until it is outlawed, at least justice needs to be as equal as possible. Without the guy who ordered the murder, no crime would have taken place. So does it make any sense that the 19 year-old shooter with a violent upbringing gets the death sentence and the boss and two other accomplices get life?
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POPSNot in My Name President Obama, Please! We should be able to see rather plainly that our troops in Afghanistan are being asked to prop up men who should not be! Bring them home or have that tough talk with the Afghan president about what we will and will not tolerate as we try to help them.
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POPSRead Why Death Penalty Cases Can Be So Difficult Justice for the accused (family and friends of the accused) and for the victim's family and friends is never easy. Read about one such case and why Ohio should probably just end the death sentance or at least order a moratorium and spend the time it needs to figure out how to make the system more just for all concerned.
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POPSReally Want to Help Afghans? Help the Women! It is good that there is a call for taking rape more seriously but tougher laws are seldom successful unless authorities are willing to enforce them. In neighboring Pakistan, it took one woman years to get her attackers charged - then they were freed and now being charged again. Hers was not an unusual case.
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POPSEmployee Free Choice Act - Level the playing field The march brought together 300 union members and community allies, both to support “labor’s issue”—the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which Bank of America has attacked—and to denounce the bank’s home foreclosures. Jobs with Justice had led 30 protests of Bank of America across the state, and our alliance in Lynn produced the largest and most diverse one.
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POPSGuatemala Murder: Scandal or Right-Wing Plot? President Colom is the first left-of-center President in Guatemala in decades. The last one in the 1950's was deposed with help from CIA/USA. Makes you wonder if right wing who had been murdering thousands of Mayan-descendants for years is trying to seem "democratic" in its effort to overthrow this president of the people?
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POPSBiloxi, MS Should be Ashamed of Juvenile Justice Detention Center "Toilets and walls are covered with mold, rust and excrement," the lawsuit says. "Insects have infested the facility, and the smell of human excrement permeates the entire building. Children frequently have to sleep on thin mats that smell of urine and mold. Defendants do not provide children with adequate personal hygiene items." Children who have been confined there describe assaults by guards, being locked in their cells for 23 hours every day, inadequate medical and mental health care, and widespread infections caused by the filthy conditions.
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POPSFood crisis hits children the hardest "A significant part of last year's food price fluctuations were the result of excessive speculation in the commodities markets by the very hedge funds and investment banks that helped create the current economic meltdown," reads the letter, signed by 183 social justice and civil society groups. Speculation in commodity markets occurs when business entities -- such as hedge funds and investment banks -- take financial risks while buying or selling raw or primary products in international markets in hope of making profits down the road.
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