TheAgitator.com
Morning Linkfest
Friday, January 18th, 2008- The ACLU is suing on behalf of a paraplegic man who had his licensed, legal, therapeutic marijuana seized during a drug raid.
- Man shot in a Wilmington, North Carolina gambling raid. Police aren’t saying if he was armed, or what happened that led to the shooting.
- Mark Draughn notes that some overly sensitive DEA agents are suing over the movie American Gangster, because of some text at the end of the movie referring to a state drug enforcement agency the agents say could be mistakenly construed as the federal agency. Draughn points out that the damages the agents are seeking (”turn over all of its profits to a fund for federal DEA agents”) sounds like the product of some guys who’ve spent their careers doing asset forfeiture cases.
- More fun with maps: The top religions in America, broken down by county.
- Looks like there will be no indictments in the Hoboken SWAT-Hooters scandal.
- John McCain, after 27 years of making and voting on federal legislation:
“The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should.”
That would explain campaign finance reform.
Re: Wilmington Man….
Is SERT a friendlier name for SWAT or something different?
What do you mean “what happened that led to the shooting?” This man was inside a suspected gambling operation, so he probably got what he deserved. Sorry, Radley, you’ve made us all expect
the worst when these things happen. I think I’m willing to go with the old rule of thumb: if the police didn’t immediately announce that the guy they shot was armed, then he probably wasn’t.
Perhaps they will circle the wagons and announce that he was holding a gun to a babies head while snorting coke off of a corpse with a rolled up million dollar bill he stole from ‘unwitting’ gamblers in his establishment.
I’ll reserve judgement on the Amercian Gangster story. I don’t have any sympathy for the DEA and it’s kind of funny they would be concerned about damage to their reputation from a movie considering what they do in real life. In any case, it doesn’t sound like they’re really an injured party.
On the other hand, if the movie is claiming to be “based on a true story” and the text at the end talks about a bunch of convictions of NYPD officers, then those convictions should have really happened. The report doesn’t make it clear whether the convictions really happened or not.
As for the Hoboken SWAT-Hooters scandal, I’m not all that surprised by the behavior of the SWAT team, but I would have expected the Hooters girls to be far more discriminating in who they hang out with. The whole story has devastated my sense of respect for Hooters as an American institution.
Yeah, I can’t find a news report that actually says whether any real-life drug agents were convicted of anything after Lucas’ arrest. Lots of “the lawsuit alleges” and “producers claim” but no “we looked at court records and they show that.” Fuckin’ lazy reporters.
While the county-by-county predominant religion map is interesting, the break-down of sects is laughable in its ambiguity. How are any of those categories defined, and by whom? If it is an assessment of how people freely identify themselves, can two identical answers really be expected to mean the same thing (eg “reformed”)? How can there be a separate category for “Christian” when so many of the other categories clearly fall under that subject?
Statistics just might be the most misunderstood (and intentionally manipulated) discipline in the modern world.
There’s a reason the saying is “Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics”. People really need to take that to heart.
Here is a quarter for the aggrieved DEA criminals, call someone who cares.
“How can there be a separate category for “Christian” when so many of the other categories clearly fall under that subject?”
Easy; there are a number of churches out there with names like “First Christian Church of Podunkville” and the like. A Google result for that looks like a glitch in the matrix. I know some of them come from the Restoration Heritage tradition, which is quasi-denominational.
Not that I think a map made of statistics from self-reported numbers by various churches, who are pretty bad at telling who their adherents are anyway…
Matthew,
Specifically regarding your comment on the “Christian” category, this likely refers to the specific denomination Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) - website http://www.disciples.org . They have a theological seminary in Lexington, Kentucky, near some of the county hot spots for that labeling. This denomination often gets confused with Christians as a generic label. Methodist churches have Methodists, Baptist churches have Baptists, and Christian churches have Christians. Further confusing is that churches may be Smallsville Christian Church, for example, and be a member of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), or such a name may be used by a non-denominational church.
As to the study, it appears to be based on churches self-reporting their own membership numbers to this research organization, who then sums them up by county and compares it to the county population.
Dave Krueger: Would you snub people who are members of an organization known for hiring informants to make up evidence so they can go crashing through doors wearing body armor and wielding machine guns?
Ochressandro, I haven’t the vaguest clue how your comment even relates to anything I said.