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Kid Berwyn

Kid Berwyn's Journal
Kid Berwyn's Journal
October 1, 2022

A last meal, like.

When most everything in the world is winner-take-all, most everyone becomes a cheater by necessity.

September 30, 2022

Lot of LEO have a lot of explaining to do.

UNREDACTED FBI DOCUMENT SHEDS NEW LIGHT ON WHITE SUPREMACIST INFILTRATION OF LAW ENFORCEMENT

A 2006 intelligence assessment reveals that officials had concerns about the infiltration of police departments for years but failed to warn the public.


Alice Speri
The Intercept, September 29 2020

THE FBI HAS long been concerned about the infiltration of law enforcement by white supremacist groups and its impact on police abuse and tolerance of racism, the unredacted version of a previously circulated document reveals.

The FBI threat assessment report was released by Rep. Jamie Raskin, chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform’s Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Subcommittee, ahead of a hearing about the white supremacist infiltration of local police departments scheduled for Tuesday.

A heavily redacted version of the 2006 document had previously been published, one of a handful of documents revealing federal officials’ growing concern with white supremacists’ “historical” interest in “infiltrating law enforcement communities or recruiting law enforcement personnel.” A different internal document obtained by The Intercept in 2017 had also noted that “domestic terrorism investigations focused on militia extremists, white supremacist extremists, and sovereign citizen extremists often have identified active links to law enforcement officers.”

The unredacted version of the first document sheds further light on the FBI’s concerns, as early as 2006, about “self-initiated efforts by individuals, particularly among those already within law enforcement ranks, to volunteer their professional resources to white supremacist causes with which they sympathize.”

“Having personnel within law enforcement agencies has historically been and will continue to be a desired asset for white supremacist groups seeking to anticipate law enforcement interest in and actions against them,” the report notes in a section that was previously redacted.

Continues…

https://theintercept.com/2020/09/29/police-white-supremacist-infiltration-fbi/

Weird how Corporate McPravda failed to follow up on this story.
September 30, 2022

Con Jr smears Greta Thunberg with Nord Stream pipeline sabotage

The same guy who sicced rabid Texas nutjobs in trucks on Kamala Harris’ campaign bus wants to give the treatment to a kind-hearted young woman via his daddy’s bankrupt social media.



Donald Trump Jr shares meme accusing Greta Thunberg of Nord Stream pipeline sabotage

Johanna Chisholm
Yahoo News, Fri, September 30, 2022

Donald Trump Jr shared a meme accusing Greta Thunberg of being behind the Nord Stream pipeline explosions, echoing a conspiracy theory that has been picked up in conservative circles in the last week since the natural gas lines erupted.

The meme, which shows the young climate activist photoshopped in front of Nord Stream with explosives strapped around one of the pipelines, was shared by the former president’s son on Truth Social on Thursday night.

“I could be wrong but my understanding is this is not photo shopped,” wrote Mr Trump Jr alongside the meme, which has since gained traction on Twitter.

CONTINUES…

https://news.yahoo.com/donald-trump-jr-shares-meme-123719832.html

Greta Thunberg is a great human being.



Sad to be a Trump.



Really sad.

September 30, 2022

That's for sure. Ask Lyndon B. Johnson about the Gulf of Tonkin.

He swore up and down North Vietnam attacked the US Navy with torpedoes, officially.



Who knew he was lying? As JFK was dead, no one with authority to change policy.



LBJ Tapes on the Gulf of Tonkin Incident

Source: John Prados, The White House Tapes
(New York: The New Press, 2003)

Excerpt…

President Johnson: and he's saying you've got to study it further, and say to Mansfield, "Now the President wants us, you, to get the proper people." And we come in and you say, "They fired at us. We responded immediately. And we took out one of their boats and put the other two running. And we kept our..., we're puttin' our boats right there, and we're not running on in."

Secretary McNamara: And it's hard to destroy.

President Johnson: That's right

Secretary McNamara: Right. And we're going to, and I think I should also, or we should also at that time, Mr. President, explain this Op Plan 34-A, these covert operations. There's no question but what that had bearing on. And on Friday night, as you probably know, we had four TP [McNamara means PT] boats from Vietnam manned by Vietnamese or other nationals, attack two is lands. And we expended, oh, a thousand rounds of ammunition of one kind or another against them. We probably shot up a radar station and a few other miscellaneous buildings. And following twenty-four hours after that, with this destroyer in that same area, undoubtedly led them to connect the two events.

President Johnson: Well say that to Dirksen.

Secretary McNamara: That's what I know he'll like.

President Johnson: You notice Dirksen says this morning, that "we got to reassess the situation, do something about it." I'd tell him that we're doing what he's talking about.

Continues…

https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB132/tapes.htm



And that’s why I prefer to make up my own mind when it comes to the official version of fact.
September 27, 2022

Maybe it's the ever rightward lurch America's been on since 1981?



Reagan made racism “Acceptable Again” in the good ol' USA. Starting in 1980, when Reagan declared his candidacy in Philadelphia, Mississippi, the "community" where three Civil Rights marchers were murdered in cold blood.



Reagan, White As Snow

by Alec Dubro
www.tompaine.com/, May 13, 2007

EXCERPT...

Domestically, he opposed every legislative remedy for African Americans, betraying a meanness of spirit and an open racism. As Sidney Blumenthal wrote in The Guardian in 2003:

Reagan opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, opposed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (calling it "humiliating to the South", and ran for governor of California in 1966 promising to wipe the Fair Housing Act off the books. "If an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house," he said, "he has a right to do so." After the Republican convention in 1980, Reagan traveled to the county fair in Neshoba, Mississippi, where, in 1964, three Freedom Riders had been slain by the Ku Klux Klan. Before an all-white crowd of tens of thousands, Reagan declared: "I believe in states' rights."

It's hard to believe now, but in 1965, a higher percentage of congressional Republicans voted for the Voting Rights Act than Democrats. Reagan, then, wasn't following party tradition; he was making a grab for the white racist vote-and it worked. Southern Democrats abandoned the party en masse for one more welcoming to white supremacy. No wonder so many loved, and still love, the man: He validated people's whiteness.

It's true that Reagan knew enough to occasionally disguise his racism. He appointed Samuel Pierce to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development, where Pierce presided over the halving of housing subsidies. No matter. Reagan couldn't remember the man's name. Once, at a reception for the nation's mayors, he greeted Pierce with a '"Hello, Mr. Mayor." Despite this, a few black conservatives, such as Armstrong Williams, were willing to validate him as someone who knew better than the "civil rights establishment" what was good for African Americans.

But it was in foreign affairs that he showed that he could rise above mere opportunism and flaunt his racism for all the world to see. He was the best friend that South Africa's apartheid government had in the developed world.

CONTINUED...

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Ronald_Reagan/Reagan_WhiteAsSnow.html



Corporate McPravda didn’t say “peep” and went right along as he conflated "food-stamps, vodka, Cadillacs, and welfare queens.” So it’s no surprise when President, Reagan allowed his staff to refer to the slain civil rights leader as "Martin Lucifer Coon."



Is it any wonder why the United States has rotted from the head down?
September 26, 2022

Why is Pat Sajak Chairman of Michigan's Hillsdale College?

by Lauren Gordon
WKFR, June 27, 2022

Now that I once again live with my parents in Allegan I've fallen into a nightly routine of watching game shows with my folks. As a trivia lover I mostly stick through Wheel of Fortune to get to Jeopardy but as luck would have it, I've come to love "America's Game" just as much.

When I found out that Pat Sajak was serving as Chairman of the Board of Hillsdale College in Michigan I had one question: WHY?

Schooling Pat Sajak

Though he has served on Hillsdale's Board of Trustees since 2003, Sajak was never a student there himself! In fact, Pat Sajak is a Chicago-man who attended Columbia College before landing a job at local radio station WEDC. I'm not even sure Pat received a degree from Columbia as he left after only three years and joined the U.S. Army.

In 2019 Pat was promoted from Vice-Chairman to Chairman of the Board of Trustees after then-Chairman William Brodbeck decided to step down. Brodbeck told Hillsdale's campus newspaper The Collegian that Sajak's lack of degree would not hinder his ability to move the school forward saying,

“Pat is a brilliant mind. He brings a sound knowledge of the school...He can dramatically move Hillsdale forward, both on campus and around the country.”

Continues…

https://wkfr.com/why-pat-sajak-chairman-hillsdale-college/



Anyone have the answer?

September 25, 2022

I know one.

September 25, 2022

Profound band, that Rage Against the Machine.



Doing the work of America’s vaunted press and all. While MIA from CNNBCIABCBSNoxFewsNutworks, details on the situation via Reuters:



Prevalence of white supremacists in law enforcement demands drastic change

By Hassan Kanu
Reuters, May 12, 2022

(Reuters) - A Reuters investigation on May 6 indicates that a significant number of U.S. police instructors have ties to a constellation of armed right-wing militias and white supremacist hate groups, a report that adds to a fast-growing body of evidence showing a deadly threat inside U.S. police departments.

The analysis found that some of the instructional information presented by police trainers was explicitly racist, and that some instructors endorsed and interacted with white supremacist criminal groups such as the Proud Boys.

The investigation adds to mounting academic research, government audits and news reporting that demonstrates the pervasiveness of white supremacy in U.S. law enforcement, and a continuing series of incidents documenting the presence of extremist groups and views among law enforcement.

More and more, the evidence suggests the “white supremacist infiltration of law enforcement” that the FBI warned about back in 2006 is getting worse. And it points to a desperate need for policies – departmental and legislative – to prohibit people who engage in racist conduct or join white supremacist groups from becoming police officers or remaining on the force.

Lawmakers in Washington state, for example, enacted legislation last year that requires departments to inquire into police candidates’ ties to extremist groups and allows the state to revoke their certification if they are affiliated with those organizations, as NPR reported in November 2021. And California legislators are considering a similar measure.

The analysis by Reuters found at least 15 self-identified law enforcement trainers and dozens of retired instructors listed in a database of members of the Oath Keepers, one of several violent anti-government groups that led the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Continues…

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/prevalence-white-supremacists-law-enforcement-demands-drastic-change-2022-05-12/



Thanks, Initech. Darkness of Greed.
September 24, 2022

MAGA Secret "Sheriff Fellowship" Curriculum Smells NAZI



Here’s the Secret “Sheriff Fellowship” Curriculum From the Country’s Most Prominent MAGA Think Tank

BY JESSICA PISHKO
Slate, SEPT 21, 2022

Last November, the Claremont Institute hosted its inaugural class of “Sheriff Fellows.” Over the course of a week, eight sheriffs—all white men—chosen from the more than 3,000 in the country stayed at the Waterfront Beach Resort in Huntington Beach, California, attending a series of discussions, lectures, and fireside chats steeped in the far-right-wing think tank’s heady intellectualism and radical ideology. While the Claremont Institute restricted public access to the fellowship, a review of the fellowship’s previously unreported curriculum reveals a program that presented for the sheriffs two sets of people in America: those communities sheriffs should police as freely and brutally as they see fit, and those “real” Americans who should be considered virtually above the law.

Public information requests and other reporting have provided insight into the stated and unstated reasons behind the Claremont Institute’s recruitment of county sheriffs, and revealed the curriculum of the fellowship. (You can read the full curriculum at the bottom of this article.) What emerges in reviewing this information is a portrait of the far right’s deep investment in sheriffs. They seem to be a key target of the movement because the office is already vulnerable to extremism and because sheriffs can enable other extremist actors like vigilantes and militias to wreak havoc on society. Claremont provides a historical and intellectual cover for selected sheriffs to continue a march into white Christian nationalism; for Claremont, the sheriffs are elected influencers who can push their message into the mainstream, far from the coterie of intellectual elites. They also have the authority to use violence under the color of law to enforce these principles in their communities.

Claremont is currently recruiting a second class, with a plan to announce the lucky few this fall. The five-decade-old Southern California institution announced in an email sent during the fall of 2021 that the goal of the fellowship was to connect with sheriffs as “uncorrupted law enforcement officials … not beholden to bureaucratic masters,” whose “jurisdictional latitude … places them on the front lines of the defense of civilization.”

While the Claremont Institute hosts a variety of other fellowships, the Sheriffs Fellowship is the first program to focus on elected officials who are currently serving. For that reason, information about the fellowship and the program is important for voters who live in counties where these sheriffs run jails, serve warrants, detain individuals at traffic stops, and help federal officials enforce immigration laws. Sheriffs also have a great deal of discretion in important contested legal areas like the enforcement of gun laws, where they are often in charge of issuing permits and confiscating weapons under red flag laws, and in how to handle health orders, including enforcement of anti-COVID-19 measures like mask mandates, business closures, and vaccination policies. At least some of the Claremont sheriffs were recruited because of their resistance to COVID orders from state and federal governments. Sheriff Chad Bianco of Riverside County, California, was specifically praised by the institute for “the courageous stand taken over the past year,” clearly a reference to Bianco having allied himself early in the pandemic with anti-vaxxers and with right-wing anti-abortion advocates in Southern California. Most recently, Bianco accused a Latina Riverside city councilmember, Clarissa Cervantes, of defacing the county courthouse because of her presence at in a pro-choice protest, spurring calls for his resignation. “You are lucky we couldn’t arrest you!” he threatened Cervantes through social media.

Sheriff Kim Cole of Mason County, Michigan, was recruited through Hillsdale College, whose chairman, Pat Sajak, took controversial positions against stay-at-home orders early in the pandemic and was recently photographed with anti-vaxxer Marjorie Taylor Greene. A Claremont program director explained the reason for the invitation in an email to Cole: “In our research on who to extend invitations to we took recommendations from friend [sic] of the institute and organizations but one thing that I know stood out to us about your leadership in these times has been how you courageously stood up to unconstitutional covid mandates.” During the peak of COVID deaths, Cole appeared regularly on Fox News to critique Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s stay-at-home orders and signed a letter promising not to enforce COVID protections that said, in part, “We believe that we are the last line of defense in protecting your civil liberties.”

Continues…

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/09/claremont-institute-secret-sheriff-fellowship-curriculum-revealed.html?hwystvwidotkenxjshwb
September 24, 2022

Lie Honig: Gaetz decision is 'atrocious prosecutorial practice'

Legal analyst says Matt Gaetz decision is 'atrocious prosecutorial practice'

Justin Klawans
Raw Story, September 23, 2022

Elie Honig, a former federal prosecutor and senior legal analyst for CNN, explained the problems with the DOJ's moves on Twitter. "The problem with DOJ’s approach to the Gaetz case is you don’t cooperate with a horrible person like Joel Greenberg *unless and until* you know for sure you can and will rely on his testimony. To flip Greenberg and decide later that he’s unusable is atrocious prosecutorial practice," Honig said.

The person Honig is referring to, Joel Greenberg, was a former tax collector previously associated with Gaetz. He was charged in 2020 and pleaded guilty to sex trafficking of a minor, in addition to a host of other charges.

In cooperating with the DOJ for a deal, Greenberg provided evidence that pointed toward Gaetz allegedly committing similar crimes with minors. This evidence reportedly pointed toward Greenberg allegedly paying a 17-year-old girl to have sex with Gaetz.

Snip…

Prosecutors flip bad guys all the time; I've flipped killers. But you don't give a cooperation deal until you have fully vetted them and are sure they are strongly corroborated," Honig added. "To do otherwise is to cut Greenberg a huge break, without making other big cases from his testimony.

Continues…

https://www.rawstory.com/matt-gaetz-doj-investigation/

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About Kid Berwyn

I am the DUer who once posted as Octafish. Ask me about the BFEE.
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