"It's almost the weekend," you're probably thinking to yourself. You're so excited. But not as excited as this fucking bubble-loving pitbull.
Soap and water make this dog literally flip. It really is all about the simple things in life.
[h/t Daily Dot]
People reports that newlywed actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie will spend their honeymoon in Malta shooting "an intimate, character-driven" drama. Here is People's one sentence-description of the plot of that drama:
Pitt and Jolie play a married couple in the south of France who become sexually obsessed with their neighbors.
Pitt and Jolie were married in the south of France last weekend. The film was written by Angelina.
Is every single bit of life on this great big Earth just a sex game to Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, in which we are all tertiary participants?
YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[Image via AP]
It might be a good time for the homeless, or teenagers, or Latinos, or African-Americans, or…actually, shit, pretty much everybody in Albuquerque to get out of town because about 500 cops from across the nation and beyond are set to descend on New Mexico's largest city to play with their guns.
In one of the more shockingly tone-deaf events in recent memory, the shooting scandal-plagued Albuquerque Police Department and the National Rifle Association are gearing up for the Albuquerque Police Pistol Combat Tournament and National Police Shooting Championship in September.
Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry says that they are thrilled to host the event—but the angry families of the many, many victims of recent police shootings in Albuquerque are calling the event "insulting" both to them and their city.
According to the Albuquerque Journal, armed security guards actually locked the doors to Mayor Berry's City Hall office on Wednesday after a small group of protestors–mostly the families of police shooting victims–attempted to personally deliver a letter condemning the event.
The guards promised to deliver the letter to the mayor, but refused to allow them into his office to meet with him in person.
According to the NRA (PDF), in addition to target and speed shooting tournaments, one of the main event programs, "incorporates competitive based skill and scenario courses of fire to allow you to practice and evaluate your skills using your duty firearms and gear in hypothetical police related encounters and solve the challenges presented according to your own tactics. Just bring your duty guns, gear, ammunition, and a desire to learn and have fun."
Don't have a Patrol Rifle or Patrol Shotgun? We have ones you can use, just bring your own ammunition.
There will also be a number of vendor booths set up, where visiting police officers—when they're not having fun competitively pretending to kill people in "skill and scenario courses of fire"—can learn all about the latest weaponry and tactical gear available to their departments back home.
Any way you look at it, Albuquerque seems a blatantly antagonistic location for a law enforcement shooting competition–especially given that there have been an awful lot of people shot and killed by the Albuquerque Police Department since just 2010 alone—40 shootings, 26 of them fatal.
That rate far outpaces those of even much larger cities like New York City–which has 15 times the population and 35 times as many sworn police officers as Albuquerque, but which recorded just 22 police shootings from 2009-12.
The city's astonishingly high police shooting rate came under even more scrutiny last spring after the shooting death of a mentally ill homeless man by police at his campsite in the hills above the city.
On March 16, James Boyd, who had been attempting to camp out in the hills after the city's homeless shelters had closed—and whose family says had a history of schizophrenia—was gunned down in a brutal assault captured on a police helmet-mounted video camera. He was allegedly armed with a pocket knife at the time, although the video of the incident shows that the officers did not appear to be in any imminent danger when they opened fire.
Boyd died in an Albuquerque hospital the next day.
(Warning: Graphic Video)
Following the Boyd shooting, and a press conference where Albuquerque Police Chief Gordon Eden actually praised the actions of the officers who shot Boyd (comments which Mayor Berry later called "a mistake"), the situation between police and Albuquerque residents rapidly deteriorated to the point where on March 30 peaceful protests turned into actual riots, as police fired tear gas on protestors, who responded in kind by blocking traffic, spray painting city property and allegedly trapping officers (who, without any trace of irony, said they feared for their lives) in their patrol cars.
The FBI is currently investigating the Boyd shooting.
In a wrongful death lawsuit filed against the city in late June, Boyd's family claimed that none of the over 40 officers dispatched to the scene had the slightest clue about what they were doing, or took any sort of control over the situation—and that their lack of training led directly to Boyd's violent death.
(In an curious coincidence, one of the events at the National Police Shooting Championships involves a competition in which police shoot an impaired man armed with a knife. Remember, this is a "fun" competition between armed police officers, sworn to Serve and Protect while upholding the U.S. Constitution, for bragging rights and prizes.)
The Boyd family is seeking damages and court-ordered changes to police policy in terms of how officers deal with the mentally ill, as well as a requirement forcing the city to pay rental subsidies for the homeless.
Finally, in the wake of that incident and many others, the U.S. Department of Justice stepped in earlier this year to force the Albuquerque Police Department to make changes, saying that police had displayed a pattern of violating civil rights through excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment, which provides protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.
In a scathing report (PDF), the Justice Department showed that the overwhelming majority of police shootings in Albuquerque from 2009 to 2012 were unconstitutional, and often happened when police officers used deadly force where there wasn't an imminent threat or death or injury to themselves or others.
The Justice Department report recommended that the city improve policies, police oversight and officer training—moves that the city agreed to make to ward off a possible federal civil rights lawsuit against the city and police department.
But perhaps most galling of all, especially to the families of the victims of the demonstrably trigger-happy Albuquerque Police Department, was the 2012 revelation that the local police union–the Albuquerque Police Officers Association–actually handed out cash payments to officers involved in shootings.
The payments were supposedly intended to be a sort of "Get Out of Town and Cool Off So You Can Process What Happened" fund, but (in another chilling parallel to some of the "fun" events planned during the upcoming police shooting championship) many in the community contend it developed into a very real cash prize–up to $1,000–for Albuquerque Police Officers to go out and shoot people.
The practice, which also goes on in several other cities, was criticized by both Mayor Berry and then-Police Chief Raymond Schultz but strongly defended by police union officials from across the nation–one of whom told the New York Times that he was shocked and offended that anybody would think that giving police officers who shoot people a quick cash payout was anything other than honorable.
"It is completely perplexing to me how anyone can equate this to anything other than the concern and compassion for a police officer who has just been through a traumatic event," said Joe Clure, president of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association. "It's insulting to me as a police officer that they're trying to paint these guys as villains."
Mike Gomez, whose 22-year-old son Alan Gomez was unarmed when he was shot and killed by Albuquerque police in 2011, called the payments nothing more than a bounty system.
"You're telling police that if you shoot somebody you're going to get paid leave and you're going to get $500," Gomez told the Times. "If the police shoot a person they get this. What does the family get? A funeral bill."
This past June, Mayor Berry again asked the police union to end the practice of giving direct cash handouts to officers involved in shootings, a plea that was rejected outright by union president Stephanie Lopez.
So given that horrifying recent history—and especially at a time when police weapons tactics and policies are under fire across the nation—you might think that a city with such an utterly failed and volatile relationship between its citizenry and the people sworn to Protect and Serve them would not only shy away from holding an event like the National Police Shooting Championship, but would actively apologize for even letting the subject come up in the first place.
And you would be incredibly wrong. In a statement, mayoral spokeswoman Breanna Anderson told the Journal that the NRA-organized event is "welcome" and should generate about $160,000 in revenue for the city.
"We welcome the opportunity to host law enforcement professionals from around the world here in our beautiful city and we thank them for their commitment and service at the local, state and federal levels to keeping our communities and nation safe."
The NRA is just as enthusiastic to be in Albuquerque as city officials are to host them. In 2012, the city and the NRA finalized a deal that keeps the annual event in the city at least through 2017.
"Our relationship with Mayor Berry and the City of Albuquerque has been so successful we have extended our NPSC contract 5 years rather than the standard 2 years," said NRA President David Keene in an October, 2012 statement issued by the city. "The competition attracts over 500 competitors from around the world and we expect that number to continue to grow over the coming years."
On Wednesday, Mike Gomez–whose son was shot and killed by Albuquerque Police Officer Sean Wallace, who was perhaps unsurprisingly scheduled to compete in the upcoming tournament (but who has since dropped out)–told the Journal that the competition goes against the city's publicly-stated goals to reform the department.
"A department saying that they are going to make change and have community policing, they are doing everything against what they are saying," said Gomez.
In addition to shooting the unarmed Gomez, Officer Wallace has also shot two other men during the course of his New Mexico law enforcement career. Officials did not give an explanation as to why Wallace dropped out of the tournament.
Another protestor, Kenneth Ellis–whose son was killed by an Albuquerque cop in 2010 in an shooting a judge later ruled to be unjustified–told KOB-TV that the NRA competition is little more than a contest to see who is the best killer.
"It's very upsetting that we are hosting a police shooting competition when we have the highest police shooting rate in the county," he told KOB, adding "I think there should be a police crisis, intervention and de-escalation competition."
That seems highly unlikely, as at this point–despite the pleas from its own angry and terrified citizenry, a police department with an apparently well-earned national reputation for killing for cash, a national outcry against the over-zealous use of force by police in general and a federal investigation into an incident that (in the non-police world) would likely have been prosecuted as second-degree murder and armed criminal action–it appears that the 2014 National Police Shooting Championship will proceed as scheduled starting on September 13.
So be ready to flee for your lives, Albuquerque, and may God have mercy on you–for the Albuquerque Police Department has proven again and again and again that they will show you none, and next month they're bringing their friends around for some real "fun."
Image via AP
It's been a long time since I worked 9 to 5 and I am still making my peace with weekends and a three-or-four day weekend is like, "What will we do? Will we still be the same people, on the other side of that cavern of nothingness? Do I remember how to read books?" It stresses me out. Anyway Happy Labor Day Weekend, starting right now. Big plans? Barbecues? Sharing a dish of ice cream with your sweetie? Your beau gettin' out the seersucker one last time? Boater hats and shortpants all the way, over here. Actually I am going to a wedding so it's going to be a pretty special weekend, between remembering the American labor force and also the vows of love.
FRIDAY
At 7/6c. if you feel like it there's a two-hour George Strait special on CMT. Has he done something noteworthy? I hope it's positive, if so. Otherwise I can't imagine watching a two-hour George Strait anything. My friend Haylee has been pretty insistent that he is her biological father; maybe it has something to do with that. Getting to the bottom of that, maybe. At 8/7c. the Masters of Illusion will "Walk through Steel" on the CW. I think it's kind of jank that they have a stage magic TV show and also a Penn and Teller shitting on everything show, on the same network. You know what I mean? Like you never buy the same brand pregnancy test as the condom, but also like, both of those things are equally awful. They don't cancel each other out. They are two different ways of being too dorky to survive, you just picked one at random.
At 9/8c. Dorothea Lang is on American Masters ("Grab a Hunk of Lightning!" How did you know that is my dream date, in all seriousness. A hunk made out of lightning) and the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders experience "A Week of Firsts," and I...guess we all kinda know what that means. (I am faking like I know what it means because I wanted to look cool, at least once, before the end of the summer. I'm sorry I faked and then lied.)
At 10/9c. Chris Lilley, the Four Weddings, and ID's Deadly Women are all at it again, the last this time as "Self-Made Widows." I bet that means they were able to become Captains of Industry even after they were bereaved, probably. I bet that's all it is with those women.
She drew herself up to her full height, all five feet and two inches of her. "I may be a widow, ever since my husband was electrocuted kissing a hunk, but damn it I am a self-made widow. Hand me some of those charts and graphs and ledgers and files and documents. For business purposes."
SATURDAY
At 6:30/5:30c. one thing I will not be caring about will be college football on Fox. Especially not "Fresno State" at USC. Now you're just saying words. (In fact, I will be at a bar by this time with my best friend Brad, holding down tables at a raucous restaurant until the rehearsal dinner is over, so actually I might end up watching this so-called football game.)
Then at 7/6c., another Parents Just Don't Understand on the Hub, this time concerning "The Tiger Mom & Busy Bee Daughter," so the verdict is kind of already in. On Ovation a new show called Raiders of the Lost ART will go looking for a "Tainted Trove." Raiders of the Lost Art my Aunt Fanny, that's what I say to that.
Ovation will follow that up with its longer-running, exactly identical art-finding show called The Artful Detective at 8/7c., and there's other stuff during that hour, but not really. Are you super into Unforgettable for example? Then you should know it's at a weird time now, and don't forget to tape it. Or else how dumb are you gonna feel. "I forgot to tape Unforgettable! Classic Bonnie!" (Or whatever.)
At 9/8c. ID's Deadly Affairs talks about somebody getting "Burned By Desire," by your electricity boyfriend probably, and there's Hell On Wheels ("Life's A Mystery," which is rich coming from those dudes. Everything is a mystery! You live in the bullshit olden times! If you saw what my phone could do you would jump in a volcano just in case!) and Outlander and Reckless with Cam Gigandet, playing a sexy sex lawyer in Sexytown, from what I can tell in the ads. Not a role he was born for, quite frankly, but that's acting for you. I assume he doesn't play by the rules because he is so reckless. "You can't do that in Sexytown!" they natter and finger-shave, and Cam Gigandet is just like, "I am a reckless sex lawyer. I make the rules."
But in terms of actual shows I might actually watch, I am still fascinated by the double-dips of Hillbilly Blood ("Fourth of July," meh, "KNIFE GRIND" now you are talking!) and there's always America's hottest investigation into the insides of children and the ghosts that are often found there, The Ghost Inside My Child, which is going a little off-book this week with an episode called "Wild West & Tribal Quest." Problematic. That is both teepee and wigwam.
Or maybe they are telling two stories that you don't know are connected until the end and then it's like, "Little did we know that the ghost inside Cassie was the Chickamauga Chief Dragging Canoe, and the ghost inside her little playmate Petey was the General that slaughtered his entire tribe! Crazy, they were just on the other side of the campground this whole time. Anyway, I think they might have little crushes on each other! Or else it is the ghosts inside them, just trying to find peace after all this time."
Me, I will not be watching anything (except myself, maintaining self-control and practicing moderation in front of my close friends' entire families). Doctor Who, later in the weekend. Somewhere in the unending, blank staring canvas full of promise that is the weekend.
At 10/9c., the H2 channel would like to fill you in on 10 Things You Don't Know about Civil Rights. I hope that's close to all of the things I don't know. Frankly I would have thought ten is high, but if you say so, "H2 Channel." Oh, and Intruders, which I just love, on BBC America. Get into that, it's great. I mean, of the one episode I've seen. I love every episode so far. On the outrageous Science Channel's Outrageous Acts of Science: Most Outrageous Acts of Science, this week it's all about "Masters of the Universe." I wonder what that means. I bet it's outrageous.
Also, The Haunting of Chris McDonald (you do know who he is), which is a show that makes less and less sense to me. It's not of huge import to me that I be seen as utterly credible. I am a reckless sex lawyer of the heart. But if I was a person that, say, was in Hollywood and could lend my image or brand or personal deal to a good cause, or a, like a vitamin water even, I would feel so dumb if the people were like, "Actually? Your cred is in the toilet because you went on TV and made absolutely sure we all know you believe in ghosts, which are not real." Lots of people believe in ghosts! "Yeah, lots of people fooled around at summer camp, too, but not on TV. See how this works?" I would just hate to have that feeling of, I used to be famous, but now I am just a person who got haunted on the Lifetime Movie Network.
SUNDAY
At 9/8c. in the morning, there's a one-hour premiere for Ultimate Spider-Man, so that's cool. Lots of big-name cartoons popping up on Sundays, have you noticed that? I guess it's because the Sabbath is just whenever you want it to be these days, these forsaken heathen spider-days. Just text me it on my iPhone, church! I'm watching a cartoon about a man who is also, ultimately, a spider.
I get it though. I would probably have gone to church a lot more if they had figured out a way to combine it with my first love, Megatron. So I guess just cartoons and then at noon, Real Housewives of Melbourne. It's episode six, I'm afraid to look and see how many are left. I really want to get into it, but the way they talk.
At 8/7c. it's a fake Sunday because tomorrow is also Sunday, don't forget, so all there is is, Big Brother, A PBS Special about the Secrets of Her Majesty's Secret Service (yes please) and Rachael Ray and Guy Fieri driving a garbage truck all around their garbage lives, picking up strays and hitchhikers, making their lives worse just by being there, feeding them garbage food for garbage people, building a garbage army. Wipeout is entitled this week "My So Bald Life," which is a fair effort I guess, given the show is even dumber than Ninja Warrior, but you know with me it's all about Steve Austin's Broken Skull Challenge on CMT. A vastly more cerebral, and dare I say sensual, program.
At 9/8c., ABC is throwing a "Show of Strength Telethon" for two hours, so I guess that's a happening. It seems like there used to be a lot more telethons, doesn't it? I guess now the power is in our hands. I like young Jerry Lewis. Old Jerry Lewis has a million problems and I don't like him. (Maybe he's dead, I think that would count as a problem. "My problem is: No more problems.") But young Jerry Lewis, adorable. After Gomer Pyle and Dobie Gillis, he was my favorite as a child. ...Yep, not lookin' at that lineup for too long. Moving on.
Breathless on PBS, the two-hour Falling Skies finale on TNT, and yet another episode of Unforgettable because now they are just straight trolling you. Otherwise it's Ray Donovan, which I've enjoyed this season actually, and then over here in that same garbage area from before, Long Island Medium and 90 minutes of Kardashian tedium. (Oh did I not tell you? I spit rhymes, also.)
At 10/9c. there is a special on FYI called Make My Food Famous that I hope involves of really intense body-shaming the food in a disorder and breaking down its ego until it will just say whatever questionable bullshit you tell it to say, and then eventually marry Bill Rancic. Make My Food a e! Presenter would actually be a good show! You would learn so many tips. "That hamburger meatloaf is not getting people to the purse cam fast enough. That'll cost in eliminations." "That stroganoff is so oblivious it's acting like it didn't even notice how much weight she's gained since her last film. It's like, why are you even here on the Red Carpet? Go be dinner if you aren't going to take this seriously, Beef Stroganoff. God."
On Bravo it's Game of Crowns season and hopefully series finale, a "Snaketacular" Naked & Afraid (nerrrrp), and the dramz: a Manhattan cliffhanger, Masters of Sex continuing to hand the first great season's ass to it, yet another Reckless, and The Strain. Wait, another Reckless? Is that even possible? Does Cam Gigandet have more to add? "And one more thing! I apologize for that time I was so Reckless I killed Marissa Cooper!" Dude they should totally get Mischa Barton off whatever whitecap buoy I imagine her bobbing on, far out past the breakers, watchin' the world die, and put her on Reckless. I would watch the shit out of that. Maybe, or I mean like, possibly.
MONDAY, just quickly
8/7c. Bachelor in Paradise, Love & Hip Hop Atlanta, Masterchef (Top 6), and Bear Grylls all have new episodes. CBS has a Fall Preview that I bet will be slightly more interesting than watching the same ads you have already seen one million times because CBS loves commercials more than anyone has ever loved anyone. If you try to watch Big Brother online, it's like, twice as long as it would be if you watched it on TV. Think about that.
At 9/8c. Ninja Warrior takes it to Nationals, ANTM wonders if you want to be on top, Houdini is finally starting on History, there's a Hotel Hell and in related news the Kardashian finale, LMN's got a 90-minute special on called "Lost for Life," let me know how that goes, and the second part of the RHOC Reunion on Bravo. Really what is happening though is that "unauthorized" thing on Saved by the Bell, so if you really insist on infantilizing yourself like it's darling to still enjoy things were shitty in the first place, have at it. Me, I don't like to do things for effect,I find inauthenticity embarrassing, but that's just me.
At 10/9c. your choices are Teen Wolf or Mistresses. Under the Dome is on too, but that is not one of your choices. Plus if you're that kind, you're already watching the Saved by the Bell thing anyway. Enjoy your evening, and I'll see you Tuesday morning probably a fairly changed man. Act normal 'til then. I think this weekend is going to be a great one for you, too. One to remember.
Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. What are you watching tonight? What are we missing out on? Recommendations and discussions down below.
America's huddled masses made an interesting discovery: The sister of brutally and publicly murdered photojournalist James Foley, Katie Foley, bears some resemblance to a former classmate of Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza. Could the Secret Summer Stock really have used the same crisis actor twice? (Probably not.)
"We're either staring at the same person or a twin. I am just—wow," YouTube Truth-seeker Crusaders2127 told his viewers. "Shoulder: Same. Cheeks: Same. Damn near the same sized mouth."
What's happening here is a sort of compounding madness.
In the frantic aftermath and muddled initial reporting of the Sandy Hook shooting (and subsequently many of America's other senseless murder sprees), a weird, toxic idea emerged that the shooting was, in fact, a staged incident designed to stigmatize gun owners and legitimize legislation restricting gun ownership
Much of this idea's persistence and longevity can be ascribed to the fact that "crisis actors" do actually exist; firefighters, local law enforcement, the coast guard, and others actually do employ them in disaster preparedness drills. In 2012, in the best and most hilarious example, HALO corporation (a real company founded by real former U.S. Special Ops and Intelligence personnel) staged a zombie apocalypse at their annual counter-terrorism summit in San Diego. Former CIA and NSA director Michael Hayden was there. Halo partnered with a company called Strategic Operations Inc. for the event, a company that "specializes in hyper-realistic tactical and combat trauma training that make use of various special effects and actors performing as role players," according to Gannett's Defense News.
For more than enough people, maybe too many, the very existence of this weird cottage industry is/was enough of a smoking gun unto itself. It quickly became the evidentiary basis for a perversely thrilling home game that anyone with internet access could play: Find two physically similar witnesses to two separate politically charged tragedies and propose that they are the same "crisis actor."
Below are the actual videos of the media interviews with Katie Foley and Lanza's acquaintance Alex Israel. As will become very obvious over the course of viewing these, neither their physical features, voices, nor mannerisms really seem all that similar once you seem them in action:
Part of the confusion here stems from comparing two reasonably alike faces while they both do the "Stan Laurel" grimace, a facial expression that can make a lot of people, crisis actors, and normal actors, look alike.
Good looking out though. We will catch them one day.
[screencaptures, h/t via r/conspiracy]
To contact the author, email matthew.phelan@gawker.com, pgp public key.
Back before Bryan Cranston was winning Emmys and making out with Julia Louis Dreyfus
Other notable performances include a very young, very excited-about-broccoli Elijah Wood, the dulcet tones of Morgan Freeman advising viewers to "Stay black, stay strong," and smoke Black & Longs, and Paul Rudd in a Nintendo commercial that plausibly could have been shot last week, because that man just does not age.
Because we all have to start somewhere, and the internet never forgets.
[h/t AV Club]
Slate’s
resident neoconservative
“Imagine if Romney, having been caricatured as a cat’s-paw of the Wall Street overclass, decided to rail against the outsize power of the megabanks and in favor of a more competitive and inclusive capitalism,” Salam writes today. “If we let Romney be Romney, we might find the populist the party needs.”
Imagine. If. Might. Mitt 2016.
Should Romney actually run? Speak your mind below.
Photo credit: Getty Images
Cee-Lo Green avoided a potential jail sentence today by pleading no contest to charges that he slipped a female companion MDMA
The former The Voice coach was charged last year when a 33-year-old woman told police that after he put an ecstasy pill in her drink, she woke up next to him in bed the next morning, naked and unsure of the night's events.
Green's lawyer told the
In exchange for avoiding up to four years in jail for furnishing a controlled substance, Green was reportedly sentenced to three years' formal probation, 360 hours of community service and 52 Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.
[image via AP]
[Rescuers enter the El Comal gold and silver mine in Bonanza, Nicaragua, where a landslide trapped approximately 29 miners Friday. Rescuers were able to make contact with around 20 of the trapped miners, who have reportedly requested food and water. Image by Esteban Felix via AP]
Over the course of under three weeks, the casino resort town of Atlantic City, N.J. will see its city lose three iconic casinos and over 8,000 jobs, leaving a quarter of the town's casino workforce unemployed.
The Showboat casino will close Sunday, August 31, followed by Revel, which is set to close its doors over September 1 and 2nd. The last of the three to go will be Trump Plaza, which is scheduled for closure on September 16.
The Associated Press reports that these closings will result in the loss of 8,000 jobs for Atlantic City's casino workers:
"We never thought this would happen," said Chris Ireland, who has been a bartender at the Showboat since it opened. His wife works there, too, as a cocktail server. Before dinnertime Sunday, neither will have a job. "They just want to eliminate competition," Ireland said. "Everyone's in favor of a free market until it doesn't exactly work for them."
The mayor of Atlantic City, Don Guardian, has expressed his sympathy for the loss of jobs, but vows that the seaside city will be moving toward becoming a more multidimensional city not just focused on gambling
Via the AP:
"This is going to be a difficult few weeks for many of us in Atlantic City," he said. "People will lose their jobs, and that is never good news. Our hearts go out to our neighbors and friends. We still have difficult waters to navigate."
The closing of the casinos (as well as the Atlantic Club in January) comes with speculation over what will happen to the iconic landmarks of the Atlantic City boardwalk. Converting the buildings into permanent housing, or school properties, are all ideas that have been discussed, but no set plans are in place.
[Image via AP]
Dear Newark PD Officer:
On August 12th around noon, I was walking home from the store after buying a breakfast sandwich. As I approached the corner of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. and Court Street I heard you say these words from the megaphone of an unmarked car: "Stop running or I'm going to shoot you!"
My heart stopped.
I turned around and noticed a young African-American male running and your vehicle following him. As a concerned citizen and local community organizer, I stayed in the area, stood at a reasonable distance, and began filming the scene with my phone. After handcuffing the young man and walking to the driver's side door of the car, you noticed me filming and asked, "Can I help you with something?"
From the second you laid eyes on me you treated me as a problem. I am not a problem. I am a person. You, on the other hand, are a problem. The way you treated me as less than human, as worthy of handcuffs and a prison cell, despite the fact that I did nothing wrong, is a problem. The way you police, particularly as a white man in a predominately black and brown neighborhood, is a problem. Your arrogant attitude is a problem. Your thuggish tactics of intimidation are a problem. You as an individual are not only a problem but you are part and parcel of a larger pattern: an institutionalized injustice whereby police systematically and disproportionately harass, arrest, brutalize, incarcerate, and kill poor people of color—with impunity.
Just last month a federal investigation determined that the Newark PD "engaged in a pattern of unconstitutional practices, chiefly in its uses of force, stop-and-frisk tactics, unwarranted stops and arrests and discriminatory police actions." It's officers like you and behavior like this that necessitates federal government intervention, contextualizes Mayor Ras Baraka's call for a civilian review board, and warrants the community's distrust for law enforcement and hatred towards cops.
After you disrespectfully asked if you could help me, you walked away from the vehicle and moved aggressively towards where I was standing. "You know you're going to get locked up? You're impeding an investigation," you yelled at me. I informed you that I knew my rights and were within them. (I was a legal observer and not impeding the so-called investigation). After realizing I was not just another black boy you could bully, you tried to make me put away my phone and walk away. I refused. I resisted. And you gave up, only after realizing that I couldn't be hoodwinked—and that I had it all on camera.
But why did my filming upset you? What do you have to hide? What is it that you don't want us to see? What were you doing to make the young man moan as he sat handcuffed inside your car? People are watching you. In fact, since I uploaded the video to my Facebook page, well over 2,000 people have watched you and your boys. Over 2,000 people have shared it with their networks.That means thousands of people have seen your face and watched how you treated me. They are not happy. And they know exactly what you look like. That young man may still be locked up but the video of your misconduct is free for the world to see.
Telling an unarmed individual that you would shoot him if he did not stop running is morally reprehensible, professionally unsound, and legally impermissible. Evading arrest while unarmed does not warrant one to be shot at. That's obscene. Threatening me with arrest without a justifiable cause is a violation of my civil and human rights. I have a right to be outside; to be black and outside. I have a right to care about what goes on in my neighborhood and on my block. I have a right to film you. And you do not have the right to arrest me for doing absolutely nothing wrong.
In case you forgot: You are paid to "protect and serve," not harass and bully.
What you did to that young man and what you did to me was wrong. As a community we will not tolerate harassment from you or any member of the Newark Police Department. I demand to be treated as a person, not a problem. If you are incapable of treating me and other black and brown residents of Newark as human beings then you need to resign from your position, or be terminated immediately. In the meantime, I demand a written apology from you, Police Director Ivonne Roman, and Police Chief Sheilah Coley. Also, I demand a formal statement from the Newark police department asserting that this will never happen again.
Sincerely,
Nyle Fort
***
Dear Black Male Police Officer Who Hurt My Arm and Tried to Break My Spirit in Camden,
I am certain you don't remember me. Twenty-one years have passed and, if you are still policing, my name/story/face/body might easily resemble that of so many other black people you've since encountered.
I will never forget you, though. Never. And how can I?
I've tried to empathize with you and assess things from your vantage point:
You, a black cop, charged with protecting other black people from themselves in a mostly black and brown city that white media (i.e. The Courier Post and Philadelphia Inquirer) and ineffective-out-of-touch politicians called the "hood"…
You, a black cop, who may have grown up in the same city you ended up seeking to "protect" while unaware of the ways that economic divestment, political corruption, utter poverty, high-density public housing, a booming unemployment rate, a horrific educational system impacted the social lives of the black folk you hit and cussed at and falsely accused and arrested in Camden…
YOU, a BLACK cop, in Camden who apparently understood gun violence, gang activity, and the '90s drug boom as the sickness undeniably destroying our community as opposed to symptoms of a more pervasive American condition of white racial supremacist capitalism that infects everything from federal law to your actions…
You could not have known I wasn't a "lookout boy" walking down the street in Pollack Town when you were cruising along patrolling the neighborhood I grew up in. No. You thought I purchased my clothes and gold chain by using drug money? You thought I was bad and bold enough to scream "Po Po" as a warning to the dealers, some of whom were my friends, hanging out on streets you were patrolling at 3pm in the bright afternoon? And even if I were a lookout boy, you actually believed I had no right to be treated fairly, to not be read my rights after you gripped me up and twisted my arm behind my back and threw me in the back of your cruiser and drove away only to leave me in another part of town?
I was an A student. But that did not matter. I was a member of the Institute for Political and Legal Education at Camden High at the time. But that did not matter. I knew my rights and you feigned ignorance. But that did not matter. My body ached after you assaulted me. But that did not matter. I cried because I was so angry, so full of hatred for you. But that did not matter. My uncle pleaded with you and kept repeating "he's a good kid." But that did not matter. It shouldn't have to matter.
Yet that's the problem: none of it matters when you happen to be black walking through the streets minding your business on the other side of a white racial supremacist gaze. You couldn't truly see me because others have won at convincing you to not see yourself. You, black cop, apparently believed the lies others told you about your black self, and you are part of the problem.
Sincerely,
Darnell L. Moore, who was never a lookout boy from Pollack but that didn't matter
Nyle Fort is a Master's of Divinity candidate at Princeton Theological Seminary, a youth pastor, freelance writer, and grassroots community organizer based in Newark, New Jersey. Follow him on Twitter @nylefort. Darnell L. Moore is a writer and activist based in Brooklyn, NY.
[Illustration by Tara Jacoby]
Rescuers have been able to save 22 miners after a Thursday morning collapse left at least 26 trapped
The AP reports that First Lady Rosario Murillo said 20 of the miners were freed late Friday, adding to the two who were able to escape shortly after the collapse. From the AP:
Rescued miner Marvin Urbina, 34, said he and some of his fellow miners saw an avalanche of mud and rock coming their way. They stuck to the walls of the mine but at least four of their co-workers were crushed by the mud and rock streaming down the shaft, he said.
"I asked God to let me live and he listened to me and now I will serve Him," an emotional Urbina told Channel 6.
Interior Vice Minister Carlos Najar told Channel 6 that he expects more of the miners to be rescued overnight, saying,"They are coming out little by little, it's a slow process but we want to make sure they can get out safely.
Commander Javier Amaya of the rescue team spoke to the AP about the plan to save the miners, saying it involved groups "of five or 10 miners entering the mine on wooden ladders, tying themselves off and going in until they reach them."
The rescued miners were reportedly dehydrated, but otherwise in good health
[image via AP]
Officer Daniel Holtzclaw of the Oklahoma City Police Department was arrested last week on charges that he'd sexually assaulted and raped eight black women while allegedly threatening to arrest them if they did not submit to him. He has now been charged after his arrest in the middle of August
The twenty-seven-year-old police officer was charged Friday with a long list of infractions. Via USA Today:
Officer Daniel Holtzclaw, 27, was charged with two counts of first-degree rape, four counts of sexual battery, four counts of forcible oral sodomy, four counts of indecent exposure, one count of first-degree burglary and one count of stalking.
According to a report in the Associated Press, the investigation began when a woman alleged that Holtzclaw had sexually assaulted her during a traffic stop.
According to the charging documents, Holtzclaw told the women that if they didn't comply with his wishes, they would be arrested or physically harmed.
In one instance, Holtzclaw went to a woman's residence and made her sit in her car and expose her breasts to him, according to a probable cause affidavit.
"Holtzclaw then touched her breasts barehanded. (The woman) had warrants for her arrest but he advised to work with him and he could take care of her," the probable cause affidavit said.
Prosecutors in the case allege that Holtzclaw assaulted or raped these women while on duty, claiming that "he raped two women and either fondled others or forced them to expose themselves," according to the AP. Investigators believe there could be many more victims.
The maximum sentence for one count of first-degree rape in Oklahoma is life in prison. Holtzclaw is being held on a $5 million cash bond.
[Image via USA Today]
A 10-year-old in Guizhou, China nearly caused a worker to plummet to his death after cutting the rope on his harness. Why? Oh, because children are evil. Why else? Because the noise from the worker's drill interrupted his cartoon.
Metro reports Liu Mai was using a drill on the side of the apartment building in which 10-year-old Tang Chu was watching his cartoon. Annoyed with the noise, Tang decided to take matters into his own tiny, evil hands and cut the rope that was holding Liu 80 feet off the ground. From Metro:
Mr Liu said: 'I was using an electric drill to fit security lights to the outside of the building when I felt my safety rope shaking. I looked up to see what was wrong.
'Then I saw the boy cutting the rope with a knife. I shouted at him to stop but he didn't listen and soon after, the rope was broken. I was petrified.'
With a knife! Liu was reportedly left hanging by a single rope for 40 minutes while coworkers tried to pull him to safety.
The child's father, Tang Peng, said he gave the boy a good talking to and that he has apologized, telling Metro, "He has promised he will not do something similar again."
Uh-huh.
[image credit: Suzanne Tucker, Shutterstock]
Occasionally, against all odds, you'll see an interesting or even enjoyable picture on the Internet. But is it worth sharing, or just another Photoshop job that belongs in the digital trash heap? Check in here and find out if that viral photo deserves an enthusiastic "forward" or a pitiless "delete."
Image via Imgur
This image of a "real life dragon" popped up on social media this week, shared by generic "cool photo" accounts like @omgWorldImages and @SciencePx. But as the indispensable PicPedant pointed out, this picture isn't just fake, it's also super old.
CBC debunked the digital gecko/bat composite over a year ago, tracing the picture to the Reddit group /r/HybridAnimals. Below is the still plenty impressive original photograph, showing the lizard known (in real life!) as the satanic leaf-tailed gecko.
Given the Internet's love of bullshit palette-swapped animals, it was easy to believe the above photo was fake when it hit Reddit this week, but this electric blue lobster is completely real.
Caught earlier this month by a 14-year-old lobsterwoman, NBC reports the one-in-two million chromatic mutant has been donated to Maine State Aquarium, where it will live out up to 80 years of obvious Tobias Fünke jokes.
Image via Imgur
I can't believe I even have to say this, but no, this photo of Beyoncé and Tupac isn't real.
On Thursday, garbage "satire" site Huzlers.com published a story titled "After Nearly 18 Years, Tupac Shakur Now 43, Comes Out Of Hiding!" Illustrated with the above picture, many took this as solid proof that Shakur—not unlike the rose that grew from concrete—had risen. By Saturday almost 200,000 people had shared the article on Facebook.
As you may have suspected, the picture is just a crude cut-and-paste job. Here you can see the original photo from the 2009 MTV EMAs, featuring Jay-Z's much more appropriately proportioned head.
Image via YouTube
Georgia Legalizes Handgun Vending Machines http://t.co/ayvnZmkTm1 #MURICA ^_Q pic.twitter.com/Flp2OYQ4EA
— Jorge_Z (@Jorge_Z) August 29, 2014
Like the last photo, this fake comes from a confusingly joke-free "satire" story many mistook for real news. On Wednesday, the Daily Currant ran this picture with their article "Georgia Legalizes Handgun Vending Machines," which features (among other red flags) a quote from NRA spokesman "Elmer Fudd."
In reality, this photo comes from an ad campaign by South Africa's Gun Control Alliance. In its original, un-cropped iteration, the poster reads "This is how easy it is to get hold of a gun in South Africa."
So far, Antiviral's crack research team has been unable to definitively prove whether this tweet is real, fake, or if it even matters. Here are the facts:
In the end you'll just have to decide for yourself. X isn't gonna give ya everything.
Image via Twitter
A cat named Tucker who is being held at an animal shelter in Arlington, Washington has been dubbed "the world's saddest-looking cat" due to her droopy face and number of irreversible ailments. She is looking for a family, a family who can handle all that sad.
Tucker has genetic abnormalities that cause her face to droop, the NY Daily News reports. She also is forced to wear a t-shirt every day because her hair falls out and her skin scabs. Additionally, her skin is delicate, thin, and bruises easily. This is one sad, sad cat.
But her bio, on the adoption agency Purrfectpals.org's site, says this cat has a lot to give:
Tucker enjoys sitting on laps and playing with string toys! She also loves to be pet under the chin and behind the ears and is great with children!
Tucker is still up for adoption. Who will be the lucky owner to love the cat with the saddest face? Don't all speak at once.
[Images via Purrfectpals.org]
Worried about accidentally wearing the same thing as Mark Wahlberg to Donnie Wahlberg and Jenny McCarthy's wedding today? Well, don't be! He's allegedly not going, so wear whatever you want!
TMZ reports Mark Wahlberg, actor who would have stopped 9/11
According to multiple Wahlberg sources, Mark is not as close with Donnie and Jenny as Jenny has made it seem. Or at least, not with Jenny. We're told Mark's wife Rhea did not like a recent interview Jenny gave with Howard Stern where she talked about her relationship with Mark.
We're told brother Bobby won't be at the wedding either ... and ditto for mama W, but that's because she doesn't fly.
Of course, those hurt the most by Mark Wahlberg's alleged decision are those showing up to Donnie's wedding expecting to see an actual celeb. What a bummer. You could've rented a beach house for the long weekend!
[image via Getty]
Care for a dance? Ahh, don't mind if I do, young pup.
As the saying goes, life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass—it's about filming your cute dog squirmin' around in the rain, uploading it to YouTube, and hoping it becomes a viral success.
[h/t TastefullyOffensive]
In a decision by the highest immigration court in the U.S., it was decided that female victims of severe domestic abuse in their home countries will be eligible to seek asylum in America.
The decision was made on Tuesday after the Board of Immigration Appeals ruled that Aminta Cifuentes, a battered wife from Guatemala, would be allowed to seek asylum in the United States. The battle had been ongoing since 2005, when Cifuentes fled Guatemala and her abusive husband in search of asylum in the U.S. Her husband had beat her, raped her, and thrown paint thinner at her. Officials in Guatemala had not responded to her pleas to arrest her husband, so she fled across the border.
The New York Times reports that the decision to allow Cifuentes asylum came after a longstanding position held by the government was changed by the Obama administration, claiming Cifuentes as a part of a persecuted group. Battered women didn't factor under refugee law, as their cases were all perceived to be individual incidents.
Via the New York Times:
Since 1995, when federal officials first tried to set guidelines for the immigration courts on whether domestic abuse victims could be considered for asylum, the issue has been reviewed by four attorneys general, vigorously debated by advocates and repeatedly examined by the courts. With its published decision, unusual in the immigration courts, the appeals board set a clear precedent for judges.
Women's rights advocates have been arguing for years that under the legal definition of "refugee," domestic violence counts as a form of persecution. Residents of other countries can seek asylum in the U.S. if they have a "well-founded fear of persecution' based on race, nationality, religion, political opinion or 'membership in a particular social group,'" the New York Times reports.
Though the law currently will only apply to women from Guatemala, it is expected that women from any country who are victims of domestic abuse will now be treated as refugees from persecution and will be eligible to seek asylum. The likelihood of getting approved, however, is still slim.
According to the report in the Times, last year, immigration courts approved only 9,933 asylum cases throughout the country.
[Image via Getty]
After a long period without any severe weather, the atmosphere appears primed for a potentially dangerous severe weather outbreak tomorrow across areas from Kansas to Minnesota. Some areas could see tornadoes, baseball-size hail, and winds in excess of 75 MPH.
Enhanced instability and favorable wind shear through the atmosphere will allow for supercells to form across parts of the central Plains and Midwest during the afternoon hours on Sunday. In anticipation of some of the supercells growing quite strong, the Storm Prediction Center has about two million people between southeastern Nebraska and extreme southern Minnesota — including Omaha, Lincoln, and Sioux City — under the highest threat for "significant severe weather."
Significant severe weather includes the risk for hail larger than golf balls, thunderstorm wind gusts greater than 75 MPH, and/or tornadoes that could produce EF-2 or greater damage. The most likely hazards would be extremely large hail and damaging winds, although the SPC's latest discussion notes that the environment could be favorable for the development of "isolated strong tornadoes" in the highest risk area.
The agency's next forecast for tomorrow will be issued at 1:00AM CDT, complete with a fuller breakdown of the exact threat for different modes of severe weather. Remember that a 30% chance of severe weather is very different from a 30% chance of rain
[Map by the author]
