A note on censorship at Blogger: Is Google just another name for the NSA or "nothing left to lose"?
I will be creating a second site online for double-posting of texts. There is a danger, I am led to believe, that these blogs may disappear from one day to the next. I also may be denied the opportunity to sign-in at any time. I expect alterations in the size of this text.
Censorship that is political or content-based -- permitted or protected by corrupt public officials -- is dangerous in America, where conflicting political opinions are not exactly unforeseeable.
To enforce an unofficial consensus on controversial issues, like the Gaza horrors, is unwise and used to be unconstitutional. That is, when we had a Constitution that applied to and was enforced for ordinary people.
America's Constitution is now a document more honored in the breach than in the observance, it seems, unless one happens to be a corporation asserting First Amendment rights. ("How censorship works in America.")
Continuing silence and even complicity of a few N.Y. journalists in computer crime and censorship against me is not only foolish, for them, but may be suicidal for all U.S. media. Silencing a tortured dissident will not make the evils I describe disappear. ("Terry Tuchin, Diana Lisa Riccioli, and New Jersey's Agency of Torture.")
Censorship rarely stops with one controversial writer's opinions and thoughts. Soon others will be denied their free speech rights until we are left only with the profound philosophical wisdom of Mr. Boehner and Marco Rubio, perhaps, who are allowed to publish their writings as the rest of us are left to ponder their immortal words:
"Hell is the kingdom of the mad, abused, monstrous, traumatic, surreal, disgusting and excremental [prison?] which Jacques Lacan, after the ancient god of havoc calls Ate, [also known as "Malbus,"] it is a landscape of desolation and despair. But it is a despair that its inhabitants would not wish for a moment to be snatched from them. For it is not only what gives them an edge over credulous idealists of every stripe; it is also the misery that assures them that they still exist. Even this, did they but know it, is a lie, for theologically speaking, as we have seen, there can be no life outside God. ... the evil, who believe that they have seen through it all, are thus ensnared in illusion to the end."
Terry Eagleton, On Evil, p. 78. ("The Wanderer and His Shadow" and "Drawing Room Comedy: A Philosophical Essay in the Form of a Film Script" then "Is it rational to believe in God?")
Jennifer Shuessler, "Book Portrays Genocidal Nazi as Evil, but Not Banal," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. C1. (Hannah Arendt did not suggest that Eichman was ignorant or stupid, in an academic sense, merely "unaware," unconcerned with the moral meaning of his actions by his own choice. Nothing in the book under review undermines that claim.)
Peter Baker & Steven Erlanger, "U.S. and Europe Are Struggling With a Response to a Bold Russia," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A1. (Mr. Putin has taken the initiative by suggesting a "path to peace." Will we take him up on these proposals?)
Mark Landler & Eric Schmidt, "ISIS Says It Killed Second American After U.S. Strikes: Video Shows Beheading of Hostage and Raises Pressure on Obama to Act," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A1. (Ground invasion is unlikely in Syria; further incidents targeting Americans are extremely likely, both in the region and worldwide; experts suggest this is partly in reaction to the events in Gaza. Mr. Netanyahu seems to be sporting a watch remarkably similar to my Invicta. Perhaps my watch is deemed part of the 1,000 acres in the Palestinian territories declared "annexed" by Israel?)
Salman Masood, "Pakistani Lawmakers Support Premier," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A6. (Pakistan's PM Narwaz Sharif holds on for the time being. He must distance himself from U.S. drone policies that he has endorsed in the past and avoid awkward references to his alleged unnumbered Swiss accounts filled with U.S. dollars that have mysteriously "appeared" in them.)
Isabel Kershner, "Israel Says Hamas is Hurt Significantly," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A7. (80% of Palestinians support Hamas; Israeli attack ads against UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon will not help with the UN investigation into atrocities committed by Israeli forces in the recent actions in Gaza.)
Somini Segupta & Rick Gladstone, "Palestinian Leaders Seek Actions in Security Council and Court," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A7. (Hannal Ashrawi has moved away from American influence and towards a global perspective on ending the occupation. Money alone is not going to win her loyalty.)
Andrew Roth, "Putin Tells European Official That He Could Take Kiev in Two Weeks," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A10. (Probably an understatement by Mr. Putin.)
Adam Liptak, "A Prisoner's Beard Offers the Next Test of Religious Liberty for the Supreme Court," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A15. (Does inmate Gregory Holt have the right to grow a beard as part of his religious observance as a Muslim? Perhaps if Mr. Holt were a corporation he would prevail in his suit.)
Stephanie Clifford, "Congressman's Fraud Trial to Start After Fall Elections," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A20. (Republican Michael R. Grimm will face trial for fraud after his expected reelection in November. Mr. Grimm is from Staten Island which has a great baseball team.)
Alison Leigh-Cowan, "Second Trial For Rowlands On Charges of Corruption," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A18. (John G. Rowland is on trial for corruption. He is from Connecticut and favors plaid jackets.)
Trip Gabriel, "Judge Rejects Defense's Criteria for Convicting Ex-Governor as Jury Gets Case," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A16. (Gov. Bob McDonnell and wife convicted and facing extensive prison sentences will soon have more Democrats joining them in federal prison. Mr. McDonnell is from Virginia, delighting in an occasional "smoked ham.")
Developments in New Jersey focusing on whether Mr. Christie (an attorney) through assistants (also attorneys) threatened or asked persons to lie to a N.J. legislative committee investigating "Bridge-gate" will be based on Port Authority police officers, under David Samson, Esq. at the time, who may have told witnesses to "shut up" or they would be "destroyed" at the request of the Governor, allegedly, even as Kim Guardagno and the N.J. Attorney General's office receive new subpoenas this week duces tecum -- some pertaining to my matters, allegedly -- making similar allegations concerning OAE attorneys and others.
Did Mr. Rabner (or his predecessors) request that New Jersey attorneys and others lie, or remain silent, about unethical actions they were asked to take by OAE attorneys, and/or agents of such OAE attorneys, and/or "others" enjoying New Jersey protection and in connection with me? ("Have you no shame, Mr. Rabner?" and "What did you know, Mr. Rabner, and when did you know it?")
Additional sources pertaining to these issues will be posted below if I am able to regain access to these blogs. ("New Jersey's 'Ethical' Legal System" and "David Samson, Esq. Resigns.")
I will be required to visit New Jersey some time next week. There is always a risk when I am in the Garden State that I will be shot in the back, accidentally, by an off-duty police officer, or assaulted by a person or persons unknown. In the event that I suffer an "unforeseen accident," I will try to ensure that the relevant sources are posted anyway and that efforts continue to obtain the truth in my matters. ("Stuart Rabner's Selective Sense of Justice.")
Steven Strunsky & Ben Johnson, "P.A. Cops: "We were told to shut up on GWB closings" [!] -- Officers Say They Had Expressed Concerns About Traffic Backups," The Star Ledger, September 4, 2014, p. 1. (Intimidation and lying constitute obstructions of justice: "New Jersey's Office of Attorney Ethics.")
Shawn Boburg, "Vivid Accounts Show Cops' Concern: Lawyers Say P.A. Officers Were Told Not to Interfere in Gridlock," The Record, September 4, 2014, p. A-1. (Cops and others told witnesses to lie, or say nothing, ostensibly on behalf of Mr. Christie or his agents. Did John McGill tell my former secretary to lie about being spoken to, did he contact clients illegally, threaten my relatives to say nothing to me about illegal information gathering against me? Is this New Jersey's "legal ethics," Mr. Rabner? "New Jersey's Feces-Covered Supreme Court" and "New Jersey's Legal System is a Whore House.")
Michael Phillis, "Guardagno Office Subpoenaed on 'Hoboken Issues,' Unclear If It Involves Mayor's Claim," The Record, September 5, 2014, p. A-3. (Additional matters were the subject of this federal request for information -- preferably, the truth, I hope -- from the New Jersey Attorney General: i.e., matters pertaining to me have also, finally, interested some federal and New York prosecutors.)
Richard A. Oppel, Jr., "As 2 Go Free, a Dogged Ex-Prosecutor Digs In: Insists He Had Right Men in '83 Killing, Despite DNA," The New York Times, September 8, 2014, p. A1. (Persistent, hate-based efforts to destroy and smear targeted individuals, who have been exonerated, borders on insanity by prosecutors. "Prosecutorial Misconduct.")
Jonathan M. Katz & Erik Eckholm, "DNA Evidence Clears Two Men in 1983 Murder," The New York Times, September 3, 2014, p. A1.
Matt Appuzzo & Manny Fernandez, "Justice Department Inquiry to Focus on Practices of Police in Ferguson," The New York Times, September 4, 2014, p. A12.
Jonathan M. Katz, "From Death Row to Unfamiliar World," The New York Times, September 4, 2014, p. A17.
Terry Eagleton, On Evil (New Haven: Yale U. Press, 2010).
William Styron, "Victims: The Death-in-Life of Benjamin Reid," and "Benjamin Reid: Aftermath," in This Quiet Dust and Other Writings (New York: Random House, 1982), pp. 109-137, also "A Death in Cannan," [sic.] pp. 149-150.
"The law (and one must assume that a definition of the law includes the totality of its many arms, including the one known as law enforcement) is not merely imperfect, it is all too often a catastrophe. To the weak and the underprivileged the law in all its manifestations is usually a punitive nightmare. Even in the abstract the law is an institution of chaotic inequity, administered so many times with such arrogant disdain for the most basic principles of justice and human decency as to make mild admissions of 'imperfection' sound presumptuous. If it is true that the law is the best institution human beings have devised to mediate their own eternal discord, this must not obscure the fact that the law's power is too often invested in the hands of mortal men who are corrupt, or if not corrupt, stupid, or if not stupid, then devious or lazy, and all of them capable of the most grievous mischief. ..."
William Styron, "A Death in Cannan," in This Quiet Dust, pp. 149-150.
Among the features that become obvious to me as I review and edit my posts at these blogs is the "structural" racism that plagues America's legal system.
President Obama not withstanding, the racism I describe seems to pervade America's political-legal-aesthetic culture in all of its aspects.
It is often an internalized form of racism that takes its devastating toll on young people long before they enter the "system." One out of three young African-American males, at least, will experience the nightmare of incarceration, often unjustly. ("So Black and So Blue in Prison.")
The word "structural" is crucial because I am describing not an incidental feature of the workings of law in our society, but a defining and essential characteristic of America's legal architecture that is -- often unconsciously -- kept in place by the very mechanisms created to eradicate this hideous aspect of ourselves. ("Judith Butler and Gender Theory.")
This is merely to acknowledge the insidiousness of racism in American society.
Why is such simple and irrefutable truth impossible for otherwise intelligent people (who happen to be judges) to accept? ("Protecting Sex Workers.")
With very few exceptions judges wish to deny the presence of racial factors that are dispositive, in most cases, in order to focus on "neutral principles" of law that are as mythical as the tooth fairy. ("Albert Florence and New Jersey's Racism" and "America's Holocaust.")
It is time to tell the truth about this reality of racism that must be confronted in a serious way. The human consequences of continued failure to examine and repair this wound in ourselves will be lethal for all of us.
The point about the death penalty is not simply the barbarity of the punishment which has been abandoned by most First World nations, including Russia when it entered the European Union (I heard Mr. Putin argue, brilliantly, against the death penalty in a television show), but the systematically racist and economically-determined character of the penalty in the American legal system that makes it, in the words of Justices Blackmun and Brennan as well as Marshall: "hopelessly inequitable."
The death penalty violates the equal protection and cruel and unusual punishment sections of the Constitution, to say nothing of due process violations, because it is and can only be an expression of racism in America. ("The FBI Wants Assata Shakur.")
Political scientists can, literally, predict on a statistical basis, a priori, roughly the number of "false-positives" (as it were) of persons who are factually innocent of the crime of murder but who happen to be guilty of being black in America and, thus, likely to be convicted and EXECUTED. ("Driving While Black [DWB] in New Jersey.")
It may be a greater determinant of conviction in most American courtrooms that the defendant is African-American than any amount of evidence or the law let alone charges and/or facts in the matter. ("Manifesto For the Unfinished American Revolution.")
As a gentleman who happened to be a former inmate and also African-American (this may be redundant) once explained to me: "They'll put a crime on some [dark-skinned person] -- and he's gonna wear it."
What that man did not say that we both know is that there are prosecutors who do not care if a person is innocent of the underlying offense, who ignore the truth, because what they care about for career reasons is getting a conviction. Accordingly, anybody who may be convicted for "something" -- especially when a conviction is desperately sought because of publicity for a crime -- will do just fine. ("Larry Peterson Cleared by DNA.")
The assumption that nobody will care about a poor African-American defendant is, sadly, usually accurate. The most recent result of this madness is a man deprived of 30 years of his life while sitting on death row for a murder he did not commit. Mr. McCollum was lucky to avoid execution. All of this incarceration and years of litigation to win exoneration with very little acknowledgment of his pain and the daily denial of his humanity. Some people are offended that this man "presumed" to stand up for his rights. What do you expect him to do? ("John McGill, Esq., the OAE, and New Jersey Corruption.")
Far from being an isolated case this travesty is essential to America's legal system because these convictions confirm stereotypes that our society is not yet willing to relinquish.
It is necessary for men like Mr. McCollum to be convicted and, if possible, to be executed, regardless of guilt, in order to keep American racism in place. ("Justice For Mumia Abu-Jamal" and "Freedom For Mumia Abu-Jamal" then "Mumia Abu-Jamal and the Unconstitutionality of the Death Penalty.")
This grotesque injustice will be repeated, every day, in some part of the country, sometimes on a large scale and at other times in smaller cases. The process will continue until we examine and admit our pathology, collectively, at a national level that involves legal academia, courts, and legislatures, both state and federal. ("Jabbar Collins Serves 16 Years As An Innocent Man" and "Louis C. Taylor Serves 42 Years as an Innocent Man" then "Abuse and Exploitation of Women in New Jersey" and "Aaron Schwartz, Freedom, and American Law.")
In light of the foregoing statements it is obvious why I am still dealing with attempts to silence and steal from me as well as the absurdity and corruption in failures to deal with my problem on the part of the authorities.
I am asking the nation and all readers to look at this reality, directly, a reality of corruption and hypocrisy in our legal and ethical standards that will not go away if we ignore it. ("New Jersey's 'Ethical' Legal System" and "Foucault, Rose, Davis, and the Meanings of Prison.")
"LUMBERTON, N.C. -- Thirty years after their convictions in the rape and murder of an 11-year-old girl in rural North Carolina, based on confessions that they quickly repudiated and said were coerced, two mentally disabled half-brothers were declared innocent and ordered released Tuesday by a judge here."
These men are African-Americans, surprisingly enough. Henry Lee McCollum, 50, and Leon Brown, 46, who were serving life-sentences, essentially, have been deprived of their lives -- "murdered," in a manner of speaking -- by the evil of racism and typical incompetence in America's legal system. A legal system that works so differently for persons like Stuart Rabner and Solomon Dwek. How strange that the Times did not mention racism as a factor in this case? ("Stuart Rabner's Selective Sense of Justice" and "Have you no shame, Mr. Rabner?")
My pursuit of the truth from New Jersey is approaching 30 years, 12 years online. I continue to receive no response from public officials. (Again: "John McGill, Esq., the OAE, and N.J. Corruption" and "New Jersey's Office of Attorney Ethics.")
Mistakes are made by judges and juries. People suffer for those mistakes. Deliberate actions designed to cause human suffering in disdain for the truth and cover-ups are much worse.
The atrocity committed against these two men in North Carolina seems to bear characteristics of both kinds of legal disasters, stupidity and malice are equally visible, much the same is true in my situation in light of the glaringly apparent cover-up. ("New Jersey Supreme Court's Implosion.")
Disasters in a legal system undermine its integrity, especially when they are "mishandled" by cowardly and lying officials, as in New Jersey. ("New Jersey's Office of Attorney Ethics" and "New Jersey's Judges Disgrace America" then "New Jersey's Failed Judiciary.")
The struggle against racism is costly and time-consuming. Many persons will wonder why we devote our lives to remedying injustices. The effort to bring to light such evils, to correct them, and do the right thing is never-ending for many of us. The victims of legalized and sanctioned injustices in America will never desist in the effort to find the truth that alone allows for healing and redemption.
I expect continued censorship and attempts at silencing. People prefer their lies to the realities that the lives of Mr. McCollum and Mr. Brown force them to confront. For example, Justice Scalia in debate with Justice Blackmun, contended that the proposed execution of Mr. McCollum "vindicated the death penalty." No doubt Justice Scalia would also argue that Bush v. Gore vindicates America's electoral process. I dissent:
"The exoneration based on DNA evidence was another example of the way tainted convictions have unraveled in recent years because of new technology and legal defense efforts like those of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, a non-profit legal group in North Carolina that took up the case."
Mr. McCollum, like me, has experienced interrogational torture using psychological methods. Mr. McCollum suffers from some intellectual impairments, but he was highly eloquent in his remarks after being released describing all that had been taken from him.
The Supreme Court has recently -- to Justice Scalia's chagrin -- rejected the death penalty, finally, for minors and the mentally-impaired. Mr. McCollum's case reinforces the wisdom of this decision and requires that we do much more to prevent recurrence of this nightmare in the future.
As a final petty insult of Mr. McCollum and Mr. Brown, the men were returned to prison Tuesday to await filing of the paperwork for their release "which to the frustration of the defense lawyers and the men's relatives was delayed, apparently until Wednesday."
In commenting on the similar life and experiences of Benjamin Reid, William Styron noted:
"There is, of course, no such thing as absolute justice, but even advocates of capital punishment will grant that when a human's life is at stake, there should be the closest approximation of absolute justice the law can attain."
Mr. Styron concluded:
"It is this abrupt, irrevocable banishment, this preemption by the state of the single final judgment which is in the province of God alone -- and the subtle but disastrous effect this act has upon the whole philosophy of crime and punishment -- that wrecks the possibility of any lasting, noble concept of justice and causes the issue of the death penalty to become not peripheral, but central to an understanding of a moral direction in our time."
