Sorry @newtboy, gotta downvote this one on the basis that Cenk is making a big deal out of nothing.

Michigan didn't make sodomy and oral sex illegal, it's ALREADY illegal in Michigan. (Hell, it was illegal to swear in front of women and children until 2002, when they were forced to repeal the law after a man fell out of a canoe, swore, got arrested, and then was represented by the ACLU.)

But here's the thing, the ban is unconstitutional and therefore, unenforceable.

Now, should it be removed? Of course.

However, the idea behind this bill was an amendment to the existing bill to create an animal abuser database, and the guy who proposed the bill (Republican Senator Rick Jones) decided that it simply wasn't worth the effort to fight to get this removed when it's already unconstitutional anyway.

In other words, he took a pragmatic approach to fixing an important issue (animal abuse) by ignoring something that doesn't matter (an unenforceable law).

To his credit, he actually suggested another bill that would automatically strike unconstitutional laws from the state (which kinda seems like something that should be happening anyway).

"The minute I cross that line and I start talking about the other stuff, I won’t even get another hearing. It’ll be done....
Nobody wants to touch it. I would rather not even bring up the topic, because I know what would happen. You’d get both sides screaming and you end up with a big fight that’s not needed because it’s unconstitutional." Rick Jones

http://www.inquisitr.com/2775741/michigan-was-not-trying-to-ban-sodomy-with-logans-law-it-was-simply-not-un-banning-it/

Yes, it's fucking stupid, but "fucking stupid" seems to be the defining trait of most of the US system of government (two party system, electoral college, tacking on stupid amendments, etc)

Three cheers for the ACLU: Patriot 215 doesn't authorize NSA's bulk collection.

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/07/nsa-phone-records-program-illegal-court

Talk...I like that...the guy just robbed a place in his underwear, set a church on fire, broke into a home, saunters down the street firing off shots, and Officer Newtboy is going to approach him and say 'excuse me, sir, but you seem to be having a bad day. Care to talk about it?'

Okay, I guess that's one way to do it.

Also, the cop didn't sound all that flabbergasted and disgusted to me. The first cop hesitated, the 2nd cop decided what action to take and took it, ending the threat, and the prosecutor decided not to charge him with anything. Now, not all prosecutors may feel the same way, but there it is.

Cops can't always convene a commission to decide what to do to end an imminent threat.

But I appreciate that you are so protective of a guy who robbed a place, set a church on fire, did a home invasion, stole a car and walked down the street firing rounds. Perhaps your true calling would be defense attorney or ACLU lawyer.

I was being, semi-serious and half-sarcastic. I know perfectly well that the state will do nothing but shove it's morally righteous high-horse into law. That seems to be the trend nowadays, especially so with the Tea Party brand of crazy Republican/Religious leadership.

However, I truly do feel sorry for the people they will hurt, all the time, with ridiculous law changes like this. I can only hope that every case is brought up with the ACLU and eventually taken before the Supreme Court, if this law goes into action. As there are also other stupid anti-abortion ideas flying around various states in this country (and some are already in effect).

The mother or the child (or both) get the real short-end of the stick here... The part that is so frustrating is that people that are defending this type of law, like the man interviewed in this video, have no clue why this law will be so damaging in the first place. They are oblivious to the real reality that exists underneath their religious or morally created existence where everything turns out "just fine". But, then, they never have to deal with any of the ramifications that result from their ridiculous laws, ideas, and behavior...

Don't worry the ACLU fixed that shit.

"After the ACLU of Massachusetts and the law firm of Fish & Richardson came to Hurley’s defense, the town agreed to compensate him for what was done. The town has also agreed to train administrators and teachers about teachers’ rights to speak as citizens outside of school.
...
Hurley’s records with the school district will no longer have any mention of his firing and he will receive positive references if and when he applies for another teaching position. The training for administrators and teachers — focused on free speech issues — will begin this August."

It's sad that lawyers so often have to be involved to correct heavy handed zealots in positions of power. But it's good to see there are a lot of victories for the protection of free speech, and this was one of them.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/07/23/substitute-teacher-fired-for-his-music-video-mocking-religion-finally-gets-some-justice/

Too big to jail is so last year. Now it's too big to be regulated:

In a remarkable legal filing on Friday afternoon, the NSA told a federal court that its spying operations are too massive and technically complex to comply with an order to preserve evidence.

There's also the complementary talk by the ACLU's Chris Soghoian.

The talk by Jacob Appelbaum and Julian Assange yesterday opened up with a surprise guest: Sarah Harrison, the WL lawyer/journalist/activist who got Snowden out of Hong Kong. I thought I saw her earlier in the day, but then again, there were at least three blokes who bear a striking resemblence to Snowden.

Also, a former MI5 analyst turned whistleblower gave a surprisingly harsh summary of the current state of affairs in western democracies. I'll submit that one later today, should be able to attract at least a couple of views.

I didn't make it in time for the talk by the ACLU's Chris Soghoian on government hacking and the next crypto wars. But I did get into the room for a marvelous talk about European companies (Gamma Group/HackingTeam) who provide the tools for dictatorships to control their population with regards to the internet, aka surveillance suits.

The authoriuty for the nsa warrentless wiretapping was given by executive order,,by bush...in 2001. 12 fucking years ago. The patriot act was signed by bush 41 days after 9/11...The ACLU sued over these policies in 2003. Michael moore devoted 10 minutes of his movie to it in 2004. It was WIDELY REPORTED in 2005 that the nsa was monitoring domestic phone calls and collecting and reading email and phone records. 9 fucking years ago..The nsa has been building billion dollar data centers, they are not fucking invisible buildings that only wonder woman can see. NONE OF THIS HAS EVER BEEN A FUCKING SECRET. Obama and congress just reauthorized all these OLD FUCKING BILLS. It took 12 fucking years for the mindless fox news fucking morons to catch up to what liberals have been saying since at least 2004. here is the ny times, from two thousnd..fucking..five.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/16/politics/16program.html?pagewanted=all&_r=2&

End of the video had a helpful link to the ACLU, which I promptly clicked to support. However evidently you can't sign their petition without a mandatory donation to their org? Eh.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

It's not really a warrant though is it? This is a good take on it:
http://wp.me/p1RmvN-tO

I think the US should track and investigate people to the extent that it doesn't violate the constitution. I think they are violating the constitution. So does the ACLU and the EFF https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/06/86-civil-liberties-groups-and-internet-companies-demand-end-nsa-spying

I think American companies that are working in collusion with the NSA should be forced to disclose any information that is being harvested from domestic or overseas customers.

I don't want to hear the phrase "keeping Americans safe" anymore as an excuse for this Orwellian bullshit.

http://www.aclu.org/reform-patriot-act

http://jonathanturley.org/2012/01/15/10-reasons-the-u-s-is-no-longer-the-land-of-the-free/

http://www.npr.org/news/specials/patriotact/patriotactprovisions.html

and for the person who mentioned that congress holds the most power in our legislature:
http://www.bu.edu/law/central/jd/organizations/journals/bulr/documents/MARSHALL.pdf

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/06/congress-government-spying-votes-charts/65969/

http://www.civilfreedoms.org/?p=7260

i could literally do this all day.
please understand my friend i am NOT buying into any media hysteria.
i just do not trust power and the past two administrations have proven they do not deserve it.

another point i would like to make is my suspicion is not the mere fact of a metadata dragnet perpetrated by the NSA.
hell..if you have a facebook you know your info is being jacked.
no..thats not where my skepticism lies.
for while i am not wholly comfortable with a government organization scooping up massive amounts of data,what bothers me far worse is our government expressly barring (verizon in this case) from letting their customers know the very existence of the program.

i also cannot nor will i ever accept the tacit and,in my opinion,bullshit reasoning that this is all about counter-terrorism.

there is far too broad a brush that can be painted with abuse.
and it is the abuse of power that i am concerned with.

see:
patriot act 1
patriot act 2
victory act 1
victory act 2
military commissions act of 2006
NDAA of 2012

which brought us the great hits of the past decade:
torture
warrantless wiretaps
illegal wars
assasinations
persecution of whistleblowers
persecution of journalists

im sorry man but we are in fundamental disagreement on this.
you see this as a necessary tool for law enforcement and counter-terrorism
and i see a horrific landscape of possible abuses by a government i feel no longer represents the citizenry but is,in fact,an arm of wall street and multi-national corporations.

and the possibilities of abuse are massive.

If the key part of the argument is the "imminent escape" clause, does it not logically follow the suspect must be actually IN the home they search?
Perhaps the ACLU spokesman you speak of knows something I don't, but the description claimed this was not an isolated incident and we know the suspect wasn't in there.
If it was neighboring the standoff, which now seems to be the case, it would really seem to be more about the imminent danger to life from erant bullets or explosions. I could understand that, but that's not what the description claims.

You're taking context way out of proportion, Again, given the circumstances, the searches were valid and needed to find the suspect.

RE: Exigent Circumstances:
"In the criminal procedure context, exigent circumstance means:

An emergency situation requiring swift action to prevent imminent danger to life or serious damage to property, or to forestall the imminent escape of a suspect, or destruction of evidence. /snip"

The key part of this statement is "imminent escape", thus the searches fall under exigent circumstances. ACLU among a few others have already dove into this entire video and it's meaning, they also talked to several attorneys and legal experts and they all say that the searches aren't illegal. Maybe heavy handed, but not illegal.

And lastly (sorry for the long posts), many have already pointed out that this particular video (the only one actually) shows the defensive positioning of the law enforcement, the fact that there's a heli above. This could be a house of interest, possibly someone spotted someone running through the yard, or something seemed suspect. We may never know, but a few officers I've talked to (both in Swat as well as a few of my ex-military contacts) have stated that this isn't standard procedure positioning. That they only arrange themselves like this if they feel there's a threat in the building or car.

Yes, I would go peacefully. I would film the encounter. I would be respectful. I would tell the officers how they are violating my rights. I would contact media outlets, maybe become an activist and I would certainly have my day in court - maybe the ACLU or some similar organization will help.

I'm not sure what sort of Rambo delusions you have, but reality has long shown that any of the above options have a better (admittedly imperfect) track-record of protecting the rights of citizens.

Again, other than a few rare outlyers, the vast majority of people that decide to take up arms against the state end up dead or in jail. Nothing gets solved, public opinion typically favors any fallen officers, and your local SWAT team has just a little more incentive to buy bigger guns.

But go ahead, Rambo, come out guns a'blazin and let me know how that goes for ya.




>> ^Buck:


So if they come for you for real or imagined crimes you will go peacefully. Just like a typical sheep.