Buy the Rights-Abusing Cops Lunch Says Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick
By Adam Dick | Ron Paul Institute | September 3, 2015
Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick issued a statement Wednesday that says that, to counter “America’s negative attitude toward our law enforcement officers,” people should all-but grovel at the feet of any police they come across. Patrick even suggests that “financially able” individuals (who presumably are already paying cops’ salaries via taxes) pay for the lunches of any cops they may see in a restaurant.
Here is Patrick’s complete list of groveling suggestions:
Join me in changing this negative attitude toward those that protect us, by practicing the following:
Start calling our officers sir and ma’am all of the time. It’s a show of respect they deserve.
Every time you see an officer anywhere, let them know you appreciate their service to our community and you stand with them.
If you are financially able, when you see them in a restaurant on duty pick up their lunch check, send over a dessert, or simply stop by their table briefly and say thank you for their service.
Put their charities on your giving list.
If your local law enforcement has volunteer-citizen job opportunities, sign up.
Interestingly, Patrick never mentions in his statement that a major contributor to the negative attitude many people in Texas and across America have toward cops is the many times cops act in manners bereft of respect for the rights, property, health, and lives of the individuals they encounter.
How about the cops who abused Sandra Bland or Angel and Ashley Dobbs in Patrick’s home state? “Thank you sir. Thank you ma’am. Please, let me pay for that sandwich!”
While some people would say that these abusive cops are just a few bad apples, reading through articles by Rutherford Institute President John W. Whitehead or journalist William N. Grigg, it becomes clear that the basket contains many bad apples. The fact is that many cops are more intent on harassing, abusing, and dominating people they encounter than on serving and protecting them. Rather than disrespect for cops being, as Patrick seems to believe, some irrational, mystical belief that showed up out of nowhere, the disrespect is a logical response to the horror show of abusive cops that plays out again and again in this age of police militarization.
Though often overlooked, the war on drugs is an underlying cause of the worsening police conduct. Because the growth, manufacture, sale, transfer, and use of drugs are nonviolent and victimless activities, with no complaining victim, police have resorted to all kinds of invasive, deceptive, and destructive tactics in fighting the war. For example, the drug war has been used as an excuse for vast expansion of police practices including covert surveillance, sting operations, pretext traffic stops, asset seizures without any court hearing whatsoever, and SWAT team raids on homes and businesses. All of this is supposedly justified to protect people from themselves.
Of course, the drug war, like alcohol prohibition before it, has also spawned gangs fighting over turf. This violence, in turn, is used as an excuse for the further militarization of the police — in equipment, tactics, and mindset.
But, according to Patrick, we should be thankful for the SWAT team members who raided a home last night, pointing guns at all the suddenly awoken family members, turning the place upside down in an effort to find even a fraction of an ounce of a forbidden drug, and maybe shooting someone or the family’s pet dog to boot.
The drug war corrosion runs even deeper. Beyond the SWAT team members, there are also the undercover cops trying to snag individuals in drug sale stings, the traffic cops who make up pretenses to conduct drug searches without consent or pressure drivers to “consent” to searches, and even the desk-bound cops who handle the paperwork that allows the drug war machine to relentlessly move forward.
Patrick laments that “America’s negative attitude toward our law enforcement officers” may result in less people choosing to become cops. Yet, having less cops around can actually lead to much enhanced safety.
Let’s call off the war on drugs, its danger-enhancing police practices, and the related drug war exception to the Fourth Amendment. Let people exercise their right to grow, manufacture, sell, transfer, and use drugs as they see fit. Let the violence prohibition engenders wither. Free the drug war prisoners.
With the end of the drug war, the number of cops can be significantly reduced. Ending the war may also be the single biggest step that may be taken immediately to increase Texans’ and Americans’ respect for police.
Dashcam Video Released in Sandra Bland Traffic Stop Shows Aggressive Abuse by Texas Cop
By Matt Agorist | The Free Thought Project | July 22, 2015
Waller County, TX — As more details emerge about the incident involving Sandra Bland, the story gets more and more suspicious. On Tuesday night, dashcam footage was released that highlights the terrible abuse inflicted on Ms. Bland for a routine revenue collection stop — for a turn signal.
According to Waller County Sheriff’s Department officials, Bland was pulled over for “improperly signaling a lane change” and charged with “assault on a public servant.” However, after watching the dashcam, it is quite clear that Bland was the only one being assaulted in this scenario.
Police claim that Bland hung herself with a plastic trash bag in her jail cell. They also claim that Sandra Bland assaulted an officer during her traffic stop. The newly released dashcam footage shows that these cops are not afraid of lying.
After Bland is pulled over for an arbitrary infraction, this abusive cop begins his assault. He starts by screaming at the young lady and then physically attacks her, attempting to yank her from the car.
The entire escalation of violence seems to be over this thug officer demanding Bland put out her cigarette. “I’m in my car, I don’t have to put out my cigarette,” says Bland just before this jackboot tyrant explodes and assaults her and threatens her with a taser.
“Get out of the car! I will light you up!”
It is quite clear who the aggressor was in this incident. If this video is any indication of what went on once Bland was in prison, it is no question why her death is being investigated as a homicide.
New Bill Would Have Teachers Diagnose Psychological Issues in Children and Report them to Police
By Jay Syrmopoulos | The Free Thought Project | March 24, 2015
Dallas, Texas – Texas State Representative Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) is once again in the spotlight after submitting yet another Orwellian proposal, H.B. 985.
Villalba first raised the ire of civil libertarians by proposing a bill, H.B. 2006, which would have eliminated the religious exemption for vaccination, essentially creating a forced government vaccination program without exception.
More recently, Villalba was thrust into the national spotlight when he proposed H.B. 2918, which would usurp citizens of the ability to hold law enforcement accountable for their actions. The bill would negate the people’s ability to create an accurate and impartial record of police interactions by restricting citizens from filming within 25 feet of an officer.
Now with H.B. 985, Villalba intends to give school officials the authority to force psychological screenings of students that teachers and staff diagnose as having mental health issues.
Once the process is set in motion by school officials, parents would be forced to take their child to a mental health professional within 30 days, under threat of suspension of the child from school.
“ …the requirement that the parent or guardian, before the expiration of the 30-day period, to avoid suspension of the student under this section, take the student to the nearest local mental health authority or a physician specializing in psychiatry to receive a mental health screening and a certificate of medical examination for mental illness, as described by Section 533.03522(c), Health and Safety Code, that contains the examining physician’s opinion that the student is not a danger to self or others.”
While under suspension the child would still receive an education, but they would be sent to an “alternative school.”
School administrators would be required under the law to provide the student’s name, address, and information regarding the complaint to the local mental health authorities and the police department upon verification of the complaint.
(i) A school counselor or a principal who receives notice
under. Subsection (b) about a student who subsequently is subject to
a notice of intent to suspend under Subsection (g) shall:
(1) provide the student’s name and address and
information concerning the conduct or statement that led to the
notice of intent to suspend to:
(A) the school district police department, if the
school counselor or principal is employed by a school district and
the district has a police department;
(B) the police department of the municipality in
which the school is located or, if the school is not in a
municipality, the sheriff of the county in which the school is
located; and
(C) the local mental health authority nearest the
school;
Teachers have enough on their academic plates without them being forced to become armchair psychologists in the classroom.
Also, it is highly inappropriate and dangerous for unqualified teachers to play the role of child psychiatrists. Unless they’ve had special training and are certified to diagnose the disorders, it can also be illegal.
We are already witnessing the damage caused by parents believing teachers who think that every child who acts out in their classroom has ADHD. It’s called The Ritalin Explosion.
The idea that students’ personal information would be submitted to mental health facilities and police departments for complaints initiated and investigated by only school officials also causes serious concern.
Is it really necessary to criminalize kids based upon a teacher’s unprofessional assessment of a kids mental health? And what about the student that is mentally healthy, but simply defiant?
Perhaps rather than attempting to legislate away this perceived problem by criminalizing “problem” children, there is a better way. Villalba would have been better served by using his position to help create a program to build sustainable bridges of communication between parents and administrators that assist in identifying and combating mental health problems in students.
Instead, like so many tyrants before him, Villalba tries to solve complex problems using the force of the state.
Witnesses against death row grandmother admit they lied following threats from prosecutors
Reprieve | February 16, 2015
Key witnesses against a British grandmother on death row in Texas have said that prosecutors in her 2002 trial threatened or ‘blackmailed’ them into testifying against her.
Among them is the only person who claimed to have seen Linda Carty (56) carry out the murder of Joanna Rodriguez, who has now admitted that Texan District Attorneys (DAs) “threatened me and intimidated me” into identifying Ms Carty as the culprit. Christopher Robinson, who was the key to the prosecution case, admits that he never saw Ms Carty kill anyone and his testimony to this extent at trial was a lie.
Mr Robinson has signed an affidavit, filed in September 2014, in which he testifies that prosecutors “told me I had to testify at Linda’s trial to avoid the death penalty, and they made it clear what it was I had to say.” Mr Robinson adds that they “[told] me I would get the death penalty myself if Linda Carty did not get the death penalty.”
Several other witnesses at Ms Carty’s trial have also admitted they were “blackmailed” by Texan prosecutors, and lied or omitted evidence as a result.
Charles Mathis, a former Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA) officer who was Ms Carty’s ‘handler’ during the time she worked as an informer for the Agency has stepped forward to reveal the lengths the prosecutors went to obtain the testimony they needed. Mr Mathis’ affidavit states that when he told the Texan DA that he “knew that Linda did not have it in her to kill anyone,” and so did not want to testify against her, the DA “threatened me with an invented affair that I was supposed to have had with Linda.”
“I felt that [Texas DA Connie] Spence was threatening and blackmailing me into testifying,” Mr Mathis concludes. “It struck me that Spence wanted a death sentence as a feather in her cap. She was far more interested in a death conviction that the truth.”
As a result of the Prosecutor’s threat to smear him and ruin his marriage with a fictional affair, Mr. Mathis omitted testimony regarding “misconduct during the investigation”.
The new testimony – which was unearthed by lawyers at international legal non-profit Reprieve following years of work and investigation – is currently being considered by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA). Ms Carty’s lawyers are asking for an evidentiary hearing to air this newly discovered evidence and ultimately seek a new trial.
Commenting, Clare Algar, Executive Director of Reprieve said:
“If Linda is not granted a new hearing, she faces the death penalty based on lies extracted by prosecutors desperate to secure an execution at any cost. The behaviour of prosecutors in this case has been so appalling it takes the breath away. They have stooped to targeting the marriage of one witness with invented slurs, while using the threat of death to force another to produce the lies they needed for conviction. Linda’s last hope is that Texas recognises that she deserves a new – and this time fair – trial.”
Houston P.D. Orders All Officers Turn Off Body Cameras During Protest
TheAntiMedia | December 20, 2014
Remington Alessi was arrested on Saturday December 13 in Houston, Texas. He was arrested while engaging in a nonviolent protest against police brutality. He gives us his account of what he learned in the back of a squad car.
“We’re going to go ahead and turn off the personal video devices going forward, so be sure all officers have them turned off when engaging the protesters.” The words cut through me and chilled my spine as I sat, helplessly handcuffed in the back of a Houston Police cruiser after being arrested in the midst of a protest.
As an activist who has been around the block a few times, I knew that little would endanger a crowd more than a crowd of officers who had just received an order from higher up to disable their own personal accountability.
Barely into the pilot program, the Houston Police Department’s commanding officers managed to brazenly display how easily the personal video devices can be misused. Per an earlier interview, “Capt. Mike Skillern, who heads HPD’s gang unit and is involved in testing the cameras, said his fellow officers act “a little more professionally” when wearing the devices.” But how do they act when they switch the devices off? If officers had their way, no one would know.
The biggest fault here lies in the physical design of the cameras themselves. The VIEVU LE3 model camera is employed by HPD and is worn by over four thousand police agencies, according to the company’s website. The camera’s most conspicuous feature is an easily operated off switch, which can functionally slide over the lens of the camera at any time an officer feels the need to remove any potential accountability. Hyperbole fails in describing how much of a problem it is for police to control when video is being recorded.
Allowing police to control the video stream will create a situation in which footage will appear only when it benefits the officer, while footage of police beating unarmed suspects, throwing incendiary devices at toddlers, and erasing civilians’ video records of police brutality will never appear, due to conveniently located off switches designed by VIEVU to make the devices popular among police.
When the order came across the radio to disable the cameras, I held my breath, hoping against hope that even a single officer would object to the directive that specifically commanded officers to stop recording their activities. My heart sunk as I was met with silence. Not even the friendly Lieutenant Troy Finner, who only an hour prior had waxed poetic about being concerned about protesters’ safety had a word to say about the order. Instead, he, like every other police officer assigned to ‘protect’ the nonviolent protesters, agreed to endanger them the moment a commanding officer gave the order.
The thin blue line will be maintained, cameras or not.
Texas Cop Places Woman in Chokehold for Video Recording
UPDATE: Texas Cop Loses Job for Chokehold on Woman, 2nd Cop Disciplined for Ordering Footage Deleted
By Carlos Miller | PINAC | November 30, 2014
A Texas cop placed a woman in a chokehold because she was video recording some type of police activity in the parking lot of what appears to be a fast food restaurant after she refused to provide identification.
It started when Corpus Christi Sergeant J.E. Lockhart stormed up to Lanessa Espinosa, who was standing a good distance away from the investigation, accusing her of interfering – after a nearby cop from another agency accused her of being a “jailhouse lawyer.”
“There is a probable cause for us to be out here,” Lockhart said. “I want to know who you are, so I’m requesting your ID. You fail to ID, I’m going to take you into jail. And that’s law.”
“What’s my charge?
“You’re not being charged with anything.”
“Then I don’t have to show you my ID, sir.”
“You’re involved in an investigation. You want to interfere with an investigation, you’re going to jail for interfering with a police officer in performance of his investigation. Do you understand that? DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?”
Espinosa understood that Lockhart was out of line, so she said she was in fear for her safety and took a step back, which was when another cop placed her in a chokehold.
Espinosa turned the camera on herself as she was getting chokehold by the cop from the other agency, whose agency has not been determined because Corpus Christi runs into four counties and I haven’t been able to make the patch out.
That cop then turned her over to Lockhard, who handcuffed her.
Espinosa has not responded for comment from PINAC over the incident, but public records show she was not arrested.
UPDATE:
The video of a Texas woman getting placed in a chokehold and handcuffed for refusing to provide her identification ended up going viral where it was covered by a local television news station at the top of the news hour Monday night.
However, KIII-TV reporter Bill Churchwell finished the segment by providing misinformation about the law when it comes identifying yourself to police, informing viewers that citizens are required to identify themselves whether or not they have been lawfully arrested.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The Texas Failure to Identify law makes it a crime for people to refuse to identify themselves if they have been lawfully arrested or if the person provides false information if they have been lawfully detained.
However, when news anchor Joe Gazin asked Churchwell about this law, the reporter stated the following:
“Well that is required whether you are a witness or involved in an incident, you are required to tell officers who you are,” Churchwell said.
Churchwell is most likely getting his information from police without bothering to look at the actual statute, which is a big mistake because we all know police are clueless about the laws they are supposed to enforce.
But that is the norm for mainstream media reporters who don’t want to risk questioning their local police department and therefore lose access to the daily information that enables them to report the news without putting in much effort.
However, it didn’t take long for a viewer to set the record straight on KIII-TV’s Facebook page about the law.
Blogger ExCop-LawStudent, a former Texas cop turned law student, also elaborated about the law on his blog.
In the video, a police officer with an unknown police department† claims that Lanessa Espinosa is a “jailhouse lawyer” because she actually knows what the law says. She pointed out that she did not have to identify herself unless she was “being charged.” At that point Corpus Christi Senior Officer‡ J.E. Lockhart comes up and demands ID and tells her that he will arrest her if she doesn’t provide ID.
The problem is that § 38.02, Texas Penal Code, does not authorize an arrest for failure to ID on a mere detention unless the person provides a fictitious name. We’ve covered that several times, here, here, here, here (also in Corpus), here, here, here, and here.
There are several things wrong with the video. First, the officer from the unknown department is choking Espinosa with an arm-bar choke hold. If you look at the video at 1:12, you’ll see the officer’s forearm cutting directly over Espinosa’s adam’s apple in the same manner that killed Eric Garner in New York. The arm-bar choke hold is almost universally viewed as deadly force, and completely inappropriate here when the crime is at best, a misdemeanor under the officer’s mistaken idea of the law.
Second, it is a false arrest. Even more so, it is an arrest because she is exercising her right not to provide identification when he knows (or should have known) that the arrest is unlawful, and that he intentionally denied her of her freedom when he knew (or should have known) that his conduct was unlawful. Folks, that the definition of Official Oppression, § 39.03, Texas Penal Code, and is a Class A misdemeanor.††
Some states have what are called “stop and identify” laws, which requires citizens to identify themselves if they have been detained, but Texas is not one of those states, which is why it only requires a citizen to identify themselves if they’ve been arrested.
There is no state where citizens are legally required to provide identification merely because a cop demands it unless the cop has detained you because he had a reasonable suspicion that you committed a crime.
That doesn’t mean cops won’t demand your identification because they do it all the time, many times under intimidating threats of arrest, which is why we must remain recording in these situations.
And if a cop tells you he has the right to ask you for your identification, tell him you have the right not to provide that identification. … Full article
Texas State Board Of Education Votes To Approve Biased Textbooks
By Sarah Jones | Wall of Separation | November 24, 2014
On Friday, the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) voted 10-5 to approve 89 new social studies textbooks for use in public classrooms. The vote, which split cleanly on party lines, ends public hearings on the subject. But controversy over the books’ content is likely to linger: Critics allege the books contain multiple errors and exaggerations designed to portray the United States as a fundamentally Christian nation.
As reported previously in Church & State, the textbooks as proposed overplayed the influence of Mosaic law on the Founding Fathers, cast doubt on the constitutionality of separation of church and state and skewed discussions of existing legal precedent on prayer in schools. Although publishers did make many corrections to the books – such was watering down inflammatory and inaccurate information about Islam – “Christian nation” myths unfortunately remain in the material.
And that’s thanks to the SBOE, which in 2010 passed a series of curriculum standards that mandated instruction that emphasized the country’s Christian heritage. Those standards, and the flawed review process itself, finally proved too much for one publisher. According to the Texas Tribune, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt pulled its government textbook from consideration after being asked to “add greater coverage of Judeo-Christian influence – including Moses – on America’s founding fathers.”
The SBOE also rejected curriculum from WorldView Software, and there’s evidence the decision was politically motivated. Prior to the final vote, WorldView issued a strongly worded statement in response to public testimony from Barbara Lamontagne, who informed the SBOE last week that the material called the late General Douglas MacArthur “racist” and lionized communist figures at the expense of President Ronald Reagan.
WorldView slammed the comments as “very serious and patently false allegations” and noted that Lamontagne admitted in her testimony that she had not read the material before preparing her remarks. Despite this, the SBOE ruled that WorldView had not done enough to address her criticisms, and rejected the company’s curriculum.
Even without the Houghton Mifflin Harcout and WorldView materials, the SBOE had hundreds of pages of edits to review in less than a week. As a few members noted, the vote’s timing made it impossible for the SBOE to read all edits under consideration. But a motion to delay the final vote failed, rejected by the fundamentalist Christian officials who dominate the board.
Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network (TFN), slammed the review process in a press statement. “And once again the state’s process for approving textbooks was revealed to be a sham, as state board members voted for last-minute changes that they had never even read,” she said. “Those changes were approved without any input whatsoever from historians and experts.”
TFN had appointed its own review panel to identify errors and suggest corrections in the books. Scholars expressed serious concern over the books’ slant, only for those concerns to be largely dismissed by the SBOE.
Americans United also opposed the books. We launched a petition in partnership with TFN and People For the American Way; our organizations combined collected over 30,000 signatures to demand that publishers produce accurate textbooks for Texas students.
Activist Zack Kopplin testified on our behalf before the SBOE earlier this month to reiterate our concerns that the books presented a flawed, fundamentalist version of American history with little to no basis in evidence.
The SBOE didn’t respond kindly to Kopplin’s testimony, with one member asking him if he’d been paid to testify (the answer, of course, is no).
With the board’s vote, the textbooks are set to enter public classrooms in 2015, where they will be used for the next decade. Local school districts do have the option to reject the books and use alternative curriculum, a move recommended on Friday by moderate members of the SBOE. Based on the evidence, it’s a move we recommend as well.
It’s clear that the SBOE has carefully constructed curriculum standards and a shoddy review process designed to erode the separation of church and state. Unfortunately, their latest victory means that thousands of students will receive biased and inaccurate information about the development of our democracy. And that, of course, has been the SBOE’s goal all along: Indoctrinating “culture warriors” has officially taken precedence over preparing students for higher education and work.
Healthy girl confiscated from parents who smoked pot, given to murderous foster mother
Police State USA | November 5, 2014
ROUND ROCK, TX — A little girl was confiscated from her loving parents because they smoked marijuana, and given away to a foster mother who put her into a coma and killed her. Alexandria “Alex” Hill, age 2, succumbed to her injuries after being “thrown to the ground.”
“We never hurt our daughter. She was never sick, she was never in the hospital, and she never had any issues until she went into state care,” said the girl’s father, Joshua Hill, to KVUE.
Alex was seized by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Service (TDFPS) after her parents were accused of smoking marijuana while the girl slept. She was taken into state custody in November 2012.
Mr. Hill said that she was put into more than one dangerous foster home.
“She would come to visitation with bruises on her, and mold and mildew in her bag,” Mr. Hill told KVUE. “It got to a point where I actually told CPS that they would have to have me arrested because I wouldn’t let her go back.”
The girl’s final home was with Sherill Small, a foster care contractor in Rockdale, Texas. The TDFPS trusted Ms. Small enough to take custody of multiple children displaced by the agency.
On the evening of July 29th, 2013, Mr. Hill got an urgent call to come to the local hospital. When he got there, he found that Alex was in a coma. The girl had suffered traumatic head injuries after being thrown to the ground. She was also bruised on her buttocks, arm, and chin, and had so much hair ripped out that she was “nearly bald.” Alex died 2 days later.
“I was blown away to find out she was in a coma,” Hill told KXAN. “That’s not what you expect, especially when your child is in state custody for ‘safety,’ and now they’re suffering more injuries and more harm than they ever have in their entire life before that.”
Mr. Hill was 4 months away from getting his daughter returned to his custody.
This tragic case illustrates a widespread injustice perpetrated regularly in the United States in the name of child welfare. Healthy, happy children are commonly stolen from loving families who have never once caused them harm. Once in the care of the state, they are traumatized by familial separation, forcibly drugged, and placed into questionable situations with complete strangers.
As was the case for Alex and her family, the state intervention comes without a trial, without a conviction, and without due process for the parents. The state’s accusation of “neglect” (a loosely defined term) can result in armed agents of the state forcibly entering a home to abduct the child — ostensibly for his or her “safety.”
* * * * *
FOLLOW-UP:
Sherill Small was charged with the murder of Alex Hill. In November 2014, she was convicted and sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Although she claimed that she “does not shake babies,” a jury found the evidence against Mrs. Small to be overwhelming.
Alex’s mother, Mary Sweeney, has chronicled updates on the case on a Facebook page, “Justice 4 Alex Hill.”
The Texas DFPS was not found to be at fault for placing Alex in the home of Sherill Small. After numerous complaints statewide, and ten Texas children killed in state care in 2013, the Office of the Inspector General became involved, and found that the meddling bureaucracy was often dishonest and reckless in its placement of children.
Although new rules imposed in 2014 make it more difficult to be a foster parent, the agency itself remains dangerously powerful and unaccountable when it comes to snatching children. In 2013, over 30,000 children in Texas spent time in foster care — many for absurd reasons such as parents using marijuana. A major overhaul of child welfare agencies is needed in Texas and across the country.
Texas drivers pulled over at random, told to turn over blood, saliva samples
RT | November 20, 2013
Dozens of Texas drivers have been stopped at a police road block, where they were then directed into a parking lot and forced into surrendering blood, saliva and breath samples in a study that has upset civil liberties advocates.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration admitted it was attempting to conduct a government study meant to determine the number of drunk or drug-impaired drivers on the road at any given time.
“It just doesn’t seem right that you can be forced off the road when you’re not doing anything wrong,” Kim Cope, who said she was forced to the side of the road while making her way to lunch, told NBCDFW.com. “I gestured to the guy in front that I just wanted to go straight, but he wouldn’t let me and forced me into the parking spot.”
The tests were made even more mysterious when reporters, alerted to the situation by concerned drivers, were unable to find any officers in the Fort Worth Police Department who had been involved. The NHTSA only admitted its involvement after local media sought answers.
The department, which says its mission is to “save lives, prevent injuries, and reduce vehicle-related crashes,” maintains that participation in the research was completely voluntary. But Ms. Cope said she felt trapped during what seemed to be an investigation.
“I finally did the breathalyzer test just because I thought it would be the easiest way to leave,” she said. “It just doesn’t seem right that they should be able to do any of it. If it’s voluntary, it’s voluntary, and none of it felt voluntary.”
When pressed, the FWPD said it was “reviewing the actions of all police personnel involved to ensure that FWPD policies and procedures were followed.” The NBC affiliate was able to determine that the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, a government contractor, was hired to conduct the check.
An NHTSA spokesperson admitted similar programs were being conducted in 30 other cities throughout the US.
But civil liberties attorney Frank Colosi does not accept the rationale.
“You can’t just be pulled over randomly or for no reason,” he said. “They’re essentially lying to you when they say it’s completely voluntary, because they’re testing you at that moment.”
He added that drivers who refused may have been targeted by police for inadvertently giving the impression they were operating a vehicle under the influence. He also told NBC that fine print on the form told drivers their breath was being tested by “passive alcohol sensor readings before the consent process has been completed.”
This oddity comes just months after Texas state troopers were caught on video conducting vaginal and cavity searches on female drivers at the side of the road. The videos quickly went viral, and attorneys for the women filed federal lawsuits against the troopers.
“It’s ridiculous,” Peter Schulte, a former Texas police officer and prosecutor, told the New York Daily News earlier this year. “I was a law enforcement officer for 16 years and I never saw anything like it.”
Christian Zionists Plan to Open University in Nazareth
By Richard Edmondson | Fig Trees and Vineyards | October 27, 2013
Christian Zionists are apparently planning to bring “enlightenment” to the poor, benighted indigenous inhabitants of Occupied Palestine. Governor Rick Perry of Texas, with help and assistance from John Haggee of Christians United for Israel, has struck a deal whereby Texas A&M University will open a branch campus in Israel.
The campus is to be located in Nazareth—populated largely by Palestinians, both Christian and Muslim. In fact, the area contains one of the largest concentrations of Palestinians inside Israel’s 1967 borders.
Nazareth presently has an institution of higher learning—called the Nazareth Academic Institute or NAI. It was founded in 2010 by local academics, and while it has applied for funding from the Israeli government, it has never received any. What is more, the NAI is the only college of higher education in Israel that receives no state funding. This means it has been financially strapped from day one. Texas A&M plans to take it over with a cash infusion of $70 million and rename it “Peace University.” Once the deal goes into effect, classes will be taught in English only—and there are concerns that the school’s Arab culture and character will diminish as a result.
The takeover has been written about by Jewish blogger Richard Silverstein and by Jonathan Cook, who lives in Nazareth. Both are deeply cynical about the motives behind the scheme. Writes Silverstein:
Who participated in this consortium? Pride of place goes to John Hagee, the international Christian Zionist apocalyptic firebrand who blamed the Jewish victims of the Holocaust for their own martyrdom. Hagee, an avid proselytizer of the heathen, also is known as an avowed Islamophobe. Presumably he’s delighted to plop a U.S. Christian Zionist university in the middle of tens of thousands of Israeli Palestinian Muslims. One wonders whether Hagee and his followers would play some role in the institution and use it as a base for preaching to the “heathen.”
Another participant was former Texas governor, Rick Perry, a Christian Zionist perennial presidential candidate. He used a recent political pilgrimage to Israel to announce the deal with a flourish together with Israel’s nonagenarian president, Shimon Peres. It’s no accident that Texas A&M’s chancellor was a college roommate of Rick Perry. Though not an evangelical (he’s Catholic), he uses the Christian Zionist lingo when he boasts of his “kinship” with Israel…
The new campus for this mongrel educational institution will sit on land donated by the Israeli Lands Authority. No one mysteriously has identified where the site is located (if anyone in Nazareth knows, please contact me). The ILA is the same institution that is working to expel Israel’s 40,000 Bedouin from their native Negev communities and move them to government-sponsored “reservations.” This is also known as the infamous Prawer Plan. This land transfer would enable the Judaization of the Negev, just as settlers are gradually expelling East Jerusalem Palestinians from their homes in neighborhoods like Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah.
Perhaps the crowning glory in all this is the identity of the Sugar Daddy who’s going to finance the construction of this munificent educational palace. He is none other than Munib al-Masri, the wealthiest Palestinian in the world. Numerous media profiles of him invariably feature his weirdly out-of-place Italian palazzo in the middle of the West Bank. Al-Masri has a far-flung empire that includes a construction company that will likely undertake building the campus. He is a key power player in the PA and Fatah and undoubtedly seeks to curry favor with Israel, which could lead to further business opportunities.
Given that the Israeli government has never seen fit to offer funding to NAI, one must ask the question: why would the Israeli Lands Authority suddenly think it a wonderful idea to donate land for this new school?
Apparently the Palestinian administrators presently running the institute are feeling somewhat like the proverbial drowning victim suddenly tossed a life preserver. Cook supplies a quote from Dean of Students Suher Bisharat:
We hoped and wanted to be an Israeli academic institution in every respect, not a branch [of a foreign university]. But when we didn’t find a budgeting solution, and ran into many problems, we saw that cooperation with Texas, which is a respected university, was a solution.
Cook goes on to comment:
There are good reasons to be worried about this development.
The chancellor of Texas A&M, John Sharp, has this to say: “I wanted a presence in Israel. I have felt a kinship with Israel.”
Also behind this initiative stands the very unpleasant figure of Pastor John C. Hagee, a notorious Christian Zionist who has no love of Palestinians in Israel. He apparently sold the idea to Shimon Peres, who wants to get Arabs better integrated into the workforce to help Israel’s poor OECD rankings.
Lessons will be taught in English, not Arabic – and therefore will do nothing to stop the gradual erosion of Arabic language and culture in Israel. It also seems that the staff will be from Texas A&M, therefore doing nothing to help local Arab academics who are massively under-represented in Israeli academia (currently they’re about 1% of higher education staff).
It will be called the Texas A&M Peace University, reiterating the idea commonly expressed by Israeli Jews that “Arabs” need western education and values to curb their inherent terrorist impulses.
Doubtless, economically this move will be good for Nazareth. But there are reasons for great concern. It will destroy for another generation any hope of a real Arab university in Israel. The foreign staff, with their dubious agenda, risk subtly reinforcing racist colonial stereotypes among the local population. And with Hagee involved, there are good grounds for fearing that the campus could ultimately contribute to increased tensions between Muslims and Christians in the Galilee, one of Israel’s long-standing goals.
Cook has previously written about efforts to divide Muslims and Christians by enticing Palestinian Christian youths to join the Israeli military. Will the new facility, despite being named “Peace University,” endeavor to facilitate this drive? Will it also seek to inculcate a Christian Zionist ideology among the Palestinian Christians who enroll? Silverstein thinks there is a possibility that Palestinians will boycott the new school, but this, he says, will in reality further the Judaization process already under way. In other words, even if Palestinians don’t enroll at the university, Jews will.
This is a significant statement because Israeli ultra-nationalists have set their sights on “Judaizing” all of the territory within Israel with significant Arab populations including the Negev, Galilee, and East Jerusalem. This is part of a covert attempt to expel Palestinians through attrition. Trajtenberg is tacitly putting Nazareth further into play in this battle by suggesting that Israeli Jews from around the country may find attractive the opportunity to pursue English-language studies at a low-cost American university. In such a way, Texas A&M could become an advertent or inadvertent participant in this far-right campaign toward a Jewish majority in the Galilee.
See also:
Israel Seeks to Pit Christian Arabs Against Muslims in Cruel Clash
Israel Stokes Religious Tensions Between Palestinian Christians and Muslims
For more on Governor Rick Perry and his Christian Zionist leanings see my article The Hypocrite’s Masquerade.
Related article
- So called Christian Zionists help Jewish terrorists take Palestine lands (uprootedpalestinians.wordpress.com)
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From the Archives
The lies about the 1967 war are still more powerful than the truth
By Alan Hart | June 4, 2012
In retrospect it can be seen that the 1967 war, the Six Days War, was the turning point in the relationship between the Zionist state of Israel and the Jews of the world (the majority of Jews who prefer to live not in Israel but as citizens of many other nations). Until the 1967 war, and with the exception of a minority of who were politically active, most non-Israeli Jews did not have – how can I put it? – a great empathy with Zionism’s child. Israel was there and, in the sub-consciousness, a refuge of last resort; but the Jewish nationalism it represented had not generated the overtly enthusiastic support of the Jews of the world. The Jews of Israel were in their chosen place and the Jews of the world were in their chosen places. There was not, so to speak, a great feeling of togetherness. At a point David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s founding father and first prime minister, was so disillusioned by the indifference of world Jewry that he went public with his criticism – not enough Jews were coming to live in Israel.
So how and why did the 1967 war transform the relationship between the Jews of the world and Israel? … continue
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