SB 1070 really? Prison industry helped draft this debacle of a bill

Just saw this one and I’m not really happy about what I’ve read. The bill itself inflicts stupid holes in the ability of our police to do their jobs as well as provides dangerous leeway for arresting people who happen to be suspiciously not … white. There is a long held understanding that industries often assist with laws that would affect them, and the route to dangerous conflicts of interest is fraught there.

Over at NPR, there’s an article on exactly where this sort of conflict of interest can go.

I don’t think that the people who directly benefit from the arrest and seizure of persons should ever have any say in criminal law. Unless it directly indicates their behavior (in which case they should have a say) but if it’s about what constitutes a crime outside of their purview or how long a sentence should go, they aren’t welcome.

Connections to private prison interests are everywhere in lobbies for criminal bills, with politicians, and other elements of our government—it is an extremely powerful, deeply set, highly moneyed industry.

That’s not safe for anyone.

Link, via NPR.

Wannabe Vampires on Mill Ave

Cross-reported from Mill Avenue Vexations, wannabe sanguinarians Aaron Homer and Amanda Williamson trawl Mill Ave for potential victims among the itinerant culture. Not exactly the wisest choice for young-blood sangs but this pair doesn’t seem to have all their marbles.

The article writes about how they picked up some poor fellow off the street, offered him a place to stay, and then started inviting him to join in blood play (and drinking.) He tentatively accepted at one point, but quickly withdrew when the situation got beyond his tolerance. Unfortunately for him, the entire adventure ended badly when the boyfriend vampire, Aaron Homer, stabbed him a few times after he refused to give up blood the last time. Homer is now in jail pending bail.

According to Vex Harrow, anyone who wants to mess with the Millrats will have to go through her and “…if you bring harm to them, I will plant my boot so far up your ass you’ll taste the steel toe.”

Link, via Mill Avenue Vexations via FOX10.

Man Poked by Katana Wielder In Ann Arbor

So, Djenna just sent me possibly the funniest article for the beginning of this year yet. Some kid at a fraternity got “poked” by a katana.

Ann Arbor police said they arrested a man who poked an unruly partygoer with a sword Saturday morning.

Officers were called for an assault at the Lambda Phi Epsilon fraternity at 820 Oxford Road at about 3 a.m. and found a 23-year-old man with a small cut on his abdomen, Detective Sgt. Richard Kinsey said.

The man refused medical treatment and told police he was at a party at the location when a resident threatened him with a sword.

Yes, for some reason the journalist who wrote this article seems to want to use “poked” to describe the assault. Although, it seems to me that anytime a sword is brandished and pierces someone else's skin, that it was in fact a stabbing—isomuch however minor the wound.

I guess that the journalist just doesn't realize that there are more gradations of assault between jabbed at and ran through.

Yes, I am assuming it was a katana, I could be wrong. The writer describes it as a “samurai sword” and in American culture that's generally only katanas.

Link, via Mlive.com