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POPSChicago's loss: Is passport control to blame? Sounds far more plausible to me than claims that Michelle Obama was being "like Marie Antoinette". More: The exchange underscores what tourism officials here have been saying for years about the sometimes rigorous entry process for foreigners, which they see as a deterrent to tourism. Once the news came out that Chicago lost its Olympic bid, the U.S. Travel Association didn’t miss an opportunity to point that out, sending out a critical press release within hours.… International travel to the U.S. declined by 10 percent in the first quarter of 2009 according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. To lure visitors back, U.S. Travel has been pushing the Travel Promotion Act, which recently was passed in the Senate and is awaiting action in the House, to create a campaign to strengthen the image of the United States abroad.
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POPSThe CIA interrogation investigation: I am ashamed of my country More: I guess what especially turns my stomach here is that the idea wasn’t just to inflict mental anguish on a presumably odious man in order to extract information. It was to inflict that pain by exploiting, as a weakness, whatever flicker of nobility or love remained in an otherwise wretched soul. It was a method of torture that would have been effective only because and to the extent there was something human left in him. Maybe I’m being overly sentimental, but every cell in my body is telling me this is sick and wrong.
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POPSUS highway safety agency withheld distracted driver research More: The research findings were obtained by the Center for Auto Safety and Public Citizen through Freedom of Information requests, the Times said. The newspaper posted the documents on its Web site Monday night. The findings included: _ Cell phone usage by drivers increased 50 percent, from 4 percent in 2000 to 6 percent in 2002. _ Driver distraction contributes to about 25 percent of all police-reported traffic crashes. _ Cell phone use is growing as a distraction while driving… Legislation forbidding the use of hand-held cell phones while driving was not recommended because it does not address the problem and may instead lead drivers to think handsfree phones are safer. The problem is that a cell phone conversation takes the driver's focus off the road, the studies showed.
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POPSBig Brother moves to Tiburon So, rather than tell the residents to LOCK THEIR DOORS, they'd rather spend $100,000 on videotaping and logging the license plate of every car that crosses the city limits. I knew there were reasons I never go to Tiburon...
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POPSDefense Department sees peaceful protests as terrorist activity More: "Teaching employees that dissent on issues of public concern is something to be feared, rather than encouraged, is a dangerously counterproductive use of scarce security resources, making us less safe as a democracy," Northern California ACLU staff attorney Ann Brick and ACLU Washington national security policy counsel Michael German wrote in the letter to Gail McGinn, acting undersecretary of Defense for personnel and readiness. "DOD employees cannot accomplish their mission of protecting our nation and its values unless they understand that those values encompass the right to criticize our government through protest activities," they wrote. "It is imperative that they are taught the difference between political, religious or social activism and terrorism."
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POPSNAIS – it's not about food safety, it's about favoring big agribusiness
More: Producer objections to NAIS involve issues of cost, privacy, and liability. Some producers are worried that meatpackers would transfer liability for bacterial contamination of processed meat back to the farm of origin. Others see NAIS as a threat to the confidentiality of producer records; they're concerned that foreign governments, packers, or other buyers might gain access to those records for their own benefit. Tags that remain on an animal throughout the supply chain could be scanned, and the data retained by buyers to build a database of a producer's products and values. Some worry that packers might use the information they gain from RFID tags for an unfair advantage… Owners of independent livestock markets are concerned about the bookkeeping and reporting burden NAIS creates for them. Some states have already required FFA members to comply with NAIS before they're allowed to participate in livestock projects.
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POPSStop telling us we're too weak and immature to handle it More: Hey, Mr. President. Put these barbarians on trial and watch me. I'll be the guy out in front of the courtroom with a lawn chair, some sandwiches, and a cooler of fine beer. I'll be the guy who hires the brass band to serenade these criminal bastards on their way off to the big house. I'll be the one who shows up at every one of their probation hearings with a copy of the Constitution, the way crime victims show up at the parole board when their attacker comes up for release. I'll declare a national holiday -- Victory Over Torture Day -- and lead the parade right up whatever gated street it is that Cheney lives on these days. Trust me, Mr. President. I can take it.
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POPSThis is not a riot: an effective, nonviolent response to attacks by riot police More: More broadly, standing one’s ground under the force of police batons was pioneered during the Dharasana Satyagraha, a non-violent raid of the Dharasana Salt Works at the conclusion of the Salt March. On May 21, 1930, a march led by two Indian women,Sarojini Naidu and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, was attacked by police. The marchers continued to walk forward even as those at the front of the line were beaten to a bloody pulp. 320 were injured. The news stories of this action were critical in bringing world wide attention to the Indian independence movement. More info on the Dharasana Salt March .
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POPSEast Texas police are highway robbers – stay away from Tenaha, TX! 3/4/09: updated with new URL to story (http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=2009_4699094). Thanks to {{Kreuzberg-Jakob}} for letting me know the link wasn't working. Yet another entry on my list of "Reasons to NEVER visit Texas". More: Law enforcement agencies last year captured tens of millions of dollars from such seizures statewide… Tenaha Mayor George Bowers, 80, defended the seizures, saying they allowed a cash-poor city the means to add a second police car in a two-policeman town and help pay for a new police station. “It’s always helpful to have any kind of income to expand your police force,” Bowers said…Bowers said he would defer questions about whether innocent people were being stripped of their property to Shelby County District Attorney Lynda Russell. Russell could not be reached for comment, and her attorney declined comment… The law, forbids a peace officer at the time of seizure to “request, require or in any manner induce any per
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POPSMonsanto's Harvest of Fear Monsanto are evil. Evil, evil, evil. More: In the majority of cases where Monsanto sues, or threatens to sue, farmers settle before going to trial. The cost and stress of litigating against a global corporation are just too great. But Pilot Grove wouldn’t cave—and ever since, Monsanto has been turning up the heat…Monsanto demanded hands-on access to Pilot Grove’s in-house computers…petitioned to make potential damages punitive—tripling the amount that Pilot Grove might have to pay…Monsanto expanded the scope of the pre-trial investigation by seeking to quadruple the number of depositions.…Monsanto now subpoenaed the records of more than 100 of the co-op’s customers. In a “You are Commanded … ” notice, the farmers were ordered to gather up five years of invoices, receipts, and all other papers relating to their soybean and herbicide purchases, and to have the documents delivered to a law office in St. Louis. Monsanto gave them two weeks to comply.
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POPSDoesn't the First Amendment address this – twice? More: Peter Scheer, executive director of the California First Amendment Coalition, said the city's actions are "dangerously close" to censorship and a violation of the First Amendment. "A city government has no business trying to dictate or influence the content of an advertising image, particularly one that's political and controversial as this is simply because some people don't like it and complained about it," Scheer said. "The whole point of the First Amendment is to protect speech that is unpopular, to protect the views that are in the political minority, as long as they don't cross the line and use the speech for some seriously unlawful purpose, which clearly did not happen here."
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POPSMcCain advisor can't name 1 instance of voting fraud More: Michaelson, who served for 27 years as executive director of the Illinois Board of Elections, said the sharp exchanges over registration fraud have undermined voters’ confidence in the electoral system. “The fact that so many of these illegal registrations are being made public raises a perception in the minds of people,’’ he said. “That’s more of a general concern. You don’t want to perpetuate the idea that our election process is lacking integrity.” Asked whether his own party was responsible for fostering that perception, Michaelson said, “Well, it doesn’t help. It has captured the attention of a lot of people.” Why do it, then? “Maybe it’s because there’s nothing else to talk about,” he said.
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POPSSaying "you should know better than to stand up for your rights" is abhorrent From a thread on BoingBoing, discussing 9/21/07, the day on which 19-year-old MIT engineering student Star Simpson walked into Boston's Logan International Airport wearing a home-made light-up sweatshirt, and asked an airport worker for information about a friend's arriving flight. ...in a persisting environment of anxiety over terrorism, a Boston Logan Airport worker mistook Star Simpson's LED-adorned wearable tech garment for a suicide bomb. That airport worker phoned Boston police. A small misunderstanding over a hoodie quickly became a surreal debacle during which police said they came close to killing Ms. Simpson.
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POPS Couple Terrorized, Assaulted and Arrested For Flying an Upside Down U.S. Flag Even though Kuhn took the flag down, the officer immediately demanded that the couple show their ID's and when they refused told them to put their hands behind their back and was about to arrest them before the couple shut and locked the door. Scarborough then proceeded to kick the door in, "And the next thing we know, the glass is flying, he unlocks the deadbolt and he comes into our house after us," Kuhn told The Alex Jones Show. The officer then pursued Mark Kuhn through the house before intercepting him in the kitchen and putting him in a choke hold. Deborah Kuhn called 911 to report that the officer had broken into the home and was assaulting her husband. The officer then pulled out pepper spray to which Mark Kuhn responded, "Are you going to spray me in my house?" before Scarborough whipped out his billy club and the Kuhn's ran out of the house into the street, pleading for help from their neighbors. "Nine police cars showed up, they whipped out the Tasers,
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