[Twitchy] Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky, who gave Stanford student Brock Turner what was thought by many to be a lenient sentence when he was convicted of sexual assault in 2016, was recalled by voters in California yesterday:
BREAKING: Voters in California remove Judge Aaron Persky, who was criticized for being too lenient in the sentencing of Brock Turner for sexual assault
This is the first judge recalled in California since 1932 Was too much for California, huh? #MeToo?
Moved to Lurid Crime Tales on P.3: Non-WoT to cluster with the other article on the honourable judge.
[CBSNEWS] Aaron Persky is speaking out one week before voters decide if he should be removed over his handling of a sexual assault trial. The Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party, judge gave former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner a short jail term after Turner was found guilty of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman. The sentence generated global outrage and raised questions about judicial independence and politics in the courtroom.
Persky has remained largely silent as the campaign to remove him from the bench has built over nearly two years. But now, in his only television interview, he defended the sentence that has been so widely condemned.
"If a judge is thinking in the back of his or her mind how is this going to look? How will it look on social media? Will I be vilified on cable news? That's the wrong avenue. We can't do that. We shouldn't do that," Persky told CBS News' John Blackstone.
Persky's sentencing of Turner meant the former Stanford University swimmer walked free after spending just three months in county jail. He said he knew the sentence would generate controversy.
"And by my ethical constraints by the rule of law, I had to completely tune that out," Persky said.
In court, Turner heard the words of his victim, a powerful statement that was widely shared on social media. "You took away my worth, my privacy ... my confidence," she told Turner. "I don't want my body anymore. I was terrified of it."
"If this case were before you today, the #MeToo movement being what it is, might you have been more sensitive to the feelings of the society around you?" Blackstone asked.
"Well, let me say again based on the code of judicial ethics, I can't really discuss the details of the case or my decision making," Persky replied. "But I can say that generally, the answer is absolutely not."
His sentencing of Turner followed the recommendation of the county probation department. The California Commission on Judicial Performance concluded there is "not clear and convincing evidence of bias ... or ... judicial misconduct."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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[Twitchy] A Bay County Sheriff’s Deputy from Panama City, FL took down a hammer-wielding thug with two cans of baked beans at a local supermarket. Back off or this thing just might go off, Coppers!
OK Stan. Drop the hammer or I'll bean ya.
According to the report, the suspect was holding the hammer like a gun, but deputies realized this and used the beans instead. Whatta ya gonna do, Coppers, fart in my general direction?
Bay County Sheriff Tommy Ford and several other law enforcement personnel responded to the grocery store after receiving inaccurate emergency calls from inside the store that an armed man was holding hostages inside and that someone had been shot.
When the authorities arrived they were trying to establish communication with the suspect inside but he walked out of the store, pointing the hammer as if it was a gun.
"We quickly realized that he wasn’t holding a gun but weren’t sure if he had a firearm on him," Bay County Sheriff’s Major Jimmy Stanford told ABC News. Stanford is not related to the suspect, who shares the same last name.
Major Stanford was hoping to catch the suspect off guard and apprehend him from behind but the suspect realized he was also being approached from behind.
"He saw me and then I saw the cans and it was almost like they were meant to be there," Stanford said. Whap! BAM! Take that, Stan. OWWW, ya beaned me!
He quickly threw two cans of baked beans at the suspect, subduing him for a second, before all three law enforcement officials were able to apprehend him.
Baseball lives matter.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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Northrop Grumman announces it has received FTC approval for its acquisition of Orbital ATK, which becomes “Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems” after the deal closes tomorrow.
#1
Orbital ATK Inc. is an American aerospace manufacturer and defense industry company. It was formed in 2015 from the merger of Orbital Sciences Corporation ...
Net income: US$ 293 million (2016)
Total assets: US$ 5.418 billion (2016)
Industry: Space industry; Aerospace industry; ...
Total equity: US$ 1.817 billion (2016)
As for “Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems”, it is a terrible name, the sort of thing dreamed up by bean counters and writers of corporate mission statements.
#4
re: SteveS: I considered the name 'Northrop Grumman' terrible the second Northrop was appended to the Ironworks' moniker.....
(but I may be a bit biased)
[PRESSTV] Russian President Vladimir Putin ...President-for-Life of Russia. He gets along well with other presidents for life. He is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substance. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to him. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substances... has called on the EU to halt its sanctions imposed on Moscow over the situation in Ukraine.
"The sanctions and all the restrictions imposed for political reasons... are no way to resolve political issues," said Putin on Tuesday following talks in Vienna with his Austrian counterpart Alexander Van der Bellen.
"They are harmful for everyone, those who put them in place and those who are targeted," he added.
"Everybody has an interest in getting the sanctions lifted, us too," Putin added.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
"and we totally didn't shoot down that airliner. It was....umm...someone else"
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/06/2018 7:35 Comments ||
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[PRESSTV] The White House has announced that the summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will be held on Singapore's southern island of Sentosa.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said on Tuesday that "the venue for the Singapore summit between @POTUS and Leader Kim Jong Un will be the Capella Hotel on Sentosa Island. We thank our great Singaporean hosts for their hospitality."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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Will he be sitting with the American team or on his dear friend Kim’s side of the table?
[NYPOST] NBA star turned Kim Pudge Jong-un ...the overweight, pouty-looking hereditary potentate of North Korea. Pudge appears to believe in his own divinity, but has yet to produce any loaves and fishes, so his subjects remain malnourished... soulmate Dennis Rodman will be in Singapore during President Trump’s summit with the North Korean dictator next week, The Post has learned.
"The Worm" will arrive in the country a day before the June 12 sitdown ‐ and sources said he could even play some sort of role in the negotiations.
"No matter what you might think about his presence. One thing’s for sure the ratings will be huge," a source said. "A lot of times in situations that involve complex diplomacy countries like to identify ambassadors of goodwill and whether you agree with it or not Dennis Rodman fits the bill."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
This is interesting because Rodman must have left his home-world weeks ago in order to reach Earth in time for the summit.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
06/06/2018 9:34 Comments ||
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#6
How many NORK girls will Pudgy bring for Rodman's entertainment?
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
06/06/2018 12:16 Comments ||
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#7
Only expendable ones. Too hard to disinfect
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/06/2018 12:20 Comments ||
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#8
If true this is a tasteless joke.
Hopefully the US will not officially get involved with Rodman. Should that happen it would be yet another public demonstration of of Western masochism.
Talking with the Devil, making deals with the Devil may at times be necessary. Whether this necessity exists in this case is highly questionable.
However one must never lie to oneself, pretending that the Devil is anything but the Devil.
North Korea is a scorpion, it cannot change its evil and demented nature and persist.
[PRESSTV] The scandal-plagued Wells Fargo bank has announced plans to sell all of its branches in US Midwest, putting an end to its retail presence there.
Wells Fargo, the second-largest bank in the United States, declared on Tuesday that it would sell 52 retail branches in the Midwest to Flagstar Bank, ending its physical presence in Indiana, Michigan and Ohio, and a few locations in Wisconsin.
The sale is reported to include 33 branches in Indiana, 14 in Michigan and Wells Fargo's only branch in Ohio, plus the four in Wisconsin. Wells Fargo will still have 48 branches in Wisconsin.
The 52 branches covered roughly 490 employees managing 2.3 billion dollars in deposits and assets.
Mary Mack, Wells Fargo’s head of community banking, said the bank will be "working closely with Flagstar over the coming months to ensure a smooth transition and uninterrupted service."
"We remain committed to these communities, and Wells Fargo will continue to have a presence in the area with other businesses including commercial lending, wealth management, retail brokerage, and home lending," he added.
The the Socialist paradise of San Francisco ...where God struck dead Anton LaVey, home of the Sydney Ducks, ruled by Vigilance Committee from 1859 through 1867, reliably and volubly Democrat since 1964... -based Wells Fargo said the sale was part of a previously announced plan to close 5,000 branches by 2020 and should be completed by the end of this year.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] Chief Justice of Pakistain (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar on Tuesday took notice of the acquittal of a man earlier convicted for brutally attacking law student Khadija Siddiqui with a knife.
Justice Nisar has summoned the case's record at the apex court's Lahore registry on Sunday (June 10), according to a blurb issued by the Supreme Court.
The top judge's notice comes a day after Justice Sardar Ahmed Naeem of the LHC, through a short order, acquitted Shah Hussain of all charges after accepting his appeal against the five-year sentence handed to him by a sessions court.
The verdict had shocked the nation that had rallied behind the law student's fight for justice after being stabbed 23 times. Civil society activists, journalists, celebrities and political figures took to social media to express disappointment over Hussain's acquittal.
As netizens posted in support of Khadija and expressed outrage over the court verdict, #JusticeForKhadija became the top trend on Twitter in Pakistain.
Shortly after Monday's verdict, Khadija had told Dawn.com that she would appeal the LHC decision in the Supreme Court.
Appearing on DawnNewsTV on Monday night, she expressed shock and disappointment over the acquittal, saying it was "beyond [her] imagination" that someone could get off scot-free after stabbing her 23 times.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] A judicial magistrate in Mithi handed a two-year prison sentence to four people for forcing a 14-year-old Hindu girl to marry a 55-year-old man, Dawn reported on Tuesday.
The magistrate also slapped the convicts with a fine of Rs5,000 each. The girl's husband Ponomal, her father Palomal, the pundit Santosh, who officiated the marriage, and another man Mohan who acted as controller had been charged under Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act, 2013.
In March this year, the girl's mother and other relatives had accused Palomal of selling off his daughter to a Ponomal for Rs70,000 following which the police had locked away Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! them. A first information report was filed on behalf of the state under Sections 3, 4 and 5 of the Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act, 2013.
The convicts will be sent to a jail in Mirpurkhas to serve their time. Their lawyer, Mohen Manthrani said that it was the first time a court in the region had convicted anyone under the Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act, 2013, since its passing.
Child marriage is a punishable offence in Sindh. According to the Child Marriages Restraint Act, a child marriage includes any marriage where one of the contracting parties is less than 18 years of age.
Those found guilty of entering into, or facilitating, a child marriage can be sentenced to rigorous punishment for up to three years.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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[NATION.PK] A couple in Lahore was rubbed out in a suspected 'honour killing' case by some unknown button men.
According to police, the couple, identified as Salman and Noreen, was recently got married and shifted to Nishter Colony.
Some unknown assailiants had entered the couple's residence and opened fire on the victims.
The police said that two had been killed by shots to the heads. The bodies were shifted to the Jinnah Hospital to carry out the post-mortem examination.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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GENEVA (Ay-Pee) ‐ The United Nations human rights office called on the Trump administration Tuesday to "immediately halt" its accelerating policy of separating children from their parents after they cross the U.S. border with Mexico, insisting there is "nothing normal about detaining children."
"The use of immigration detention and family separation as a deterrent runs counter to human rights standards and principles," [a front person] said during a briefing in Geneva. "The child’s best interest should always come first." On the other hand -
Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, lashed back: "Once again, the United Nations shows its hypocrisy by calling out the United States while it ignores the reprehensible human rights records of several members of its own Human Rights Council. We will remain a generous country, but we are also a sovereign country, with laws that decide how best to control our borders and protect our people. Neither the United Nations nor anyone else will dictate how the United States upholds its borders."
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/06/2018 09:20 ||
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#1
We shouldn't let them one step in our land. Illegals and UN
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/06/2018 9:37 Comments ||
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#2
Remind me again why we still play this farce with the UN and we haven't kicked them all out and burned the building to the ground?
#14
Most of the Illegals aren't black, but Mestizo. One sure-fire way to shut down the US border is to announce that any person, regardless of where they're from, that caught within the US boundaries, will be sent to Venezuela, with whatever they have on hand when they're caught.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
06/06/2018 22:04 Comments ||
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#15
Send the garbage UN to Switzerland, the home of the League of Nations (nice that Congress took things seriously and avoided the League of Nations like the plague).
[AlAhram] The United States is pressing European allies to ready more NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and structure.... battalions, ships and planes for combat, officials say, in a fresh move to shore up NATO's deterrence against a potential Russian attack.
U.S. Secretary of Defence Jim Mattis will seek broad agreement for the plan in Brussels on Thursday when alliance defence ministers meet, laying the ground for endorsement by NATO leaders at a summit in July, four U.S. and NATO officials and diplomats told Rooters.
The plan would require NATO to have 30 land battalions, 30 air fighter squadrons and 30 navy ships such as destroyers ready to deploy within 30 days of being put on alert, although the proposal does not discuss specific troop numbers or a deadline for setting up the strategy.
The size of battalions vary across NATO, from 600 to 1,000 soldiers.
This lays down a challenge for European governments, pilloried by U.S. President Donald Trump ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States... for slashing military spending after the Cold War, to remedy long-running problems with helicopters and jets that are grounded for lack of parts.
"We have an adversary (Russia) that can move quickly into the Baltics and Poland in a ground attack," said one senior NATO diplomat who was briefed on the U.S. plans.
"We don't have the luxury of taking months to mobilise," the diplomat said, saying the U.S. idea was known as 30-30-30-30.
One U.S. official said the initiative was primarily aimed at countering Russia and fitted with the Pentagon's 2018 National Defence Strategy, which accuses Moscow of seeking to "shatter the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation."
Russia's war games last year, involving what Western officials said were 100,000 troops, also prompted concerns about accidental conflicts that could be triggered by such exercises, or any incursions into Russian-speaking regions in the Baltics.
The Kremlin firmly rejects any such aims and says it is NATO which is the security threat in eastern Europe.
Wrong-footed by Moscow with Russia's seizure of Crimea in 2014 and its intervention in Syria's war in 2015, the United States is distrustful of the Kremlin's public message and wants to be ready for any eventuality.
Whose Troops?
With more than 2 million troops, NATO's forces outnumber those of Russia, whose active duty members are around 830,000, according to the International Institute of Strategic Studies, a British-based military think-tank.
Russia's annexation of Crimea prompted NATO to set up a small, rapid-reaction "spearhead" force and put four battalions in the Baltics and Poland, backed up by U.S. troops and equipment on rotation.
But is unclear how fast the alliance could move large troop numbers to its eastern flank and how long it could sustain them for, with La Belle France already stretched in Africa and British cutbacks reducing the size of deployable forces, officials said.
According to a 2016 study by the Rand Corporation, Britannia, La Belle France, and Germany could each muster a brigade of three or more battalions along with battle tanks and other armour in around a month. But their resources would be badly strained, leaving little capacity for any other conflicts.
Another unknown is how the U.S. '30-30-30-30' proposal would fit in with other initiatives put forward aimed at improving European military combat readiness and to address shortfalls in weaponry and other military assets.
The European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... last December launched a defence pact to develop crisis-response forces and work together to develop new helicopters and ships. French President Emmanuel Macron aims to set up a new French-led European "intervention force".
"We only have a certain amount of forces in Europe, and they cannot be committed to every military proposal," a second senior NATO diplomat said.
#1
Pff...shatter NATO...NATO members have done more to shatter NATO than Russia will ever do.
The NATO countries are useless boat anchors. They will never carry their fair share. Never. If they had to spend the 2% minimum, they'd have to make cuts in other parts of their budgets. This would mean the politicians would get voted out, and this must never be allowed to happen.
Some allies, screwing us like this.
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
06/06/2018 3:23 Comments ||
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Posted by: Jack Chaiter7913 ||
06/06/2018 7:32 Comments ||
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#3
Once again. F*'m. Sorry, Secty Mattis, but he who defends everything, defends nothing.
#4
Remember the 70's and 80's world of Red Storm Rising where armies stared at each other through the Fulda Gap? Only the hard-line Stalinists left in the Russia would miss it,but --- what a change! Taking 30 days, 30 days!, to pull a brigade together !?!
#5
Simple solution: If you want to remain in NATO, you need to provide 2500 combat troops and support elements for each 5 million in your population. "Support elements" include everything from logistics to combat air support. Russia would sh$$ full-size cinder-blocks -- by the truckload.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
06/06/2018 22:10 Comments ||
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The next inevitable step after this story from a few days ago and the Iran PressTV article below.
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the decaying remnant of the Ottoman Empire.... ’s ambassador to Iraq said Tuesday that Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi was told by Ottoman Turkish officials of plans to reserve water at a dam Ankara has operated which stirred water security fears in Iraq.
In a news conference in Baghdad, ambassador Fatih Yildiz said "We had informed Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi during his visit to Turkey in 2017 that we had completed the construction of the (Ilisu) dam and were preparing to fill it," adding that "we listened to fears voiced relating to the filling of the dam from the Iraqi side, and did postpone it, which cost us a lot".
The ambassador said dialogue between both sides will continue in relation to the project, adding that the agreement between both countries provides for releasing enough water quantities.
Yildiz dismissed media reports that the dam could cut water supply to Iraq, adding that it serves power generation rather than irrigation.
Iraq has detected a drop in water levels at the Tigris River in Baghdad and djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... , which aroused fears of drought resulting from the Ottoman Turkish project.
Iraqi water resources minister said in statements two days ago that Turkey violated understandings with Iraq by starting to fill the dam last March.
[PRESSTV] Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi has criticized The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the decaying remnant of the Ottoman Empire.... for holding water behind a dam, a decision which affects irrigation in Iraq, saying the move serves Ankara’s internal political purposes.
"... the whole issue is political and electoral, and Turkey is trying to use it to win the votes of its farmers", Abadi said Tuesday, making a clear reference to the upcoming snap votes in Turkey where the AKP party of president Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey... is seeking to consolidate its ruling position.
Abadi said filling the basins at Ilisu earlier than expected would not affect Iraq’s supply of drinking water but insisted that his government would pursue the case in contact with Turkey and neighboring Iran, which would also be affected by Turkey’s decision.
However, it was a brave man who first ate an oyster... Turkey’s ambassador to Iraq said that his country had earlier informed Abadi’s administration of the decision about Ilisu, adding that it won’t harm Iraq’s interest.
"We will not take any step without consultation with the neighboring country on how we can cooperate and provide support during any problem," Fatih Yildiz said in a briefing in Baghdad, adding, "This is an important matter for both countries."
Turkey’s Ministry of Forest and Water Management said only a portion of the water running through Ilisu had been held. A front man of the ministry said the operations would not affect the flow of water on the Tigris as Turkey was "partially" filling the dam’s basin by closing one of the valves on the first of three diversion tunnels. The official said the two other tunnels would be closed three and six months later respectively.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
06/06/2018 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Twitchy] Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky, who gave Stanford student Brock Turner what was thought by many to be a lenient sentence when he was convicted of sexual assault in 2016, was recalled by voters in California yesterday: 
[CBSNEWS] Aaron Persky is speaking out one week before voters decide if he should be removed over his handling of a sexual assault trial. The 
...President-for-Life of Russia. He gets along well with other presidents for life. He is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substance. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to him. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substances...
North Korea
[NATION.PK] A couple in Lahore was 
Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, lashed back: "Once again, the United Nations shows its hypocrisy by calling out the United States while it ignores the reprehensible human rights records of several members of its own Human Rights Council. We will remain a generous country, but we are also a sovereign country, with laws that decide how best to control our borders and protect our people. Neither the United Nations nor anyone else will dictate how the United States upholds its borders."
... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey...
