Almost exactly four years to the day since he rode the golden escalator in Trump Tower to launch what ended up being one of the most improbable, and consequential, presidential campaigns in history, President Trump is planning to officially launch his re-election campaign during a rally in Orlando on June 18.
Trump will be joined by First Lady Melania Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and Second Lady Karen Pence during the launch event, which will be held at the 20,000 seat Amway Center in Orlando, Florida. The president included a link to a website where his supporters can register for tickets to the event.
I will be announcing my Second Term Presidential Run with First Lady Melania, Vice President Mike Pence, and Second Lady Karen Pence on June 18th in Orlando, Florida, at the 20,000 seat Amway Center. Join us for this Historic Rally! Tickets: https://t.co/1krDP2oQvG
As we’ve reported, Trump has already raised more than $30 million for his re-election campaign – more than the three Democratic frontrunners combined – and late last year he hired Brad Parscale to serve as his campaign manager. By holding the rally in Florida, Trump is getting a jump on campaigning in a critical swing state which he won in 2016, helping to cement his victory over Hillary Clinton.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2WhoKdc Tyler Durden
The Alabama legislature passed a bill Thursday requiring police departments and district attorneys to report how much property they seize, and how much of their budget comes from forfeiture revenues.
After passing the Alabama House and Senate unanimously, the bill now awaits a signature from Republican Governor Kay Ivey. If signed into law, the bill would increase the transparency surrounding the contentious practice of civil asset forfeiture, which allows police to seize property—cash, cars, even houses—suspected of being connected to criminal activity.
Specifically, AL.com reports that law enforcement will have to report “the date of the seizure, the person or entity that owned the property, a description of the property, a description of the suspected underlying criminal activity, any arrests in connection with the seizure, the case numbers of the civil lawsuits for forfeiture of the property, the disposition of the property, and the name of each entity receiving some of the property.”
“This bill will go a long way toward informing the people of Alabama how policing for profit affects their communities, small businesses, and law enforcement priorities,” Carla Crowder, executive director of the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice, said in a press statement. “Once this bill becomes law, Alabamians and our elected leaders will finally know which law enforcement agencies are profiting from forfeitures, how much they are taking in, and how they are using those proceeds. We look forward to finally having that data.”
More than half of all states have passed some form of civil asset forfeiture reform over the past five years in response to bipartisan concerns that the laws have too few protections for property owners and too many perverse incentives for police departments. Police groups, however, often oppose these reforms. They say civil asset forfeiture is a vital tool to disrupt drug trafficking and other organized crime by cutting off the flow of illicit proceeds.
Alabama had virtually no public reporting surrounding the practice until earlier this year when the Alabama District Attorneys Association announced a voluntary reporting program for civil asset forfeiture. The Institute for Justice, a libertarian-leaning public interest law firm that has challenged asset forfeiture laws in several states, gave Alabama an “F” grade for its asset forfeiture transparency.
As a result, Alabama police have among the least oversight in the country when it comes to seizing property. For example, Reasonreported on the civil forfeiture case of Greg and Teresa Almond, an Alabama couple who filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Randolph County Sheriff’s Office in March after a 2018 drug raid upturned their lives and left them homeless, all for misdemeanor marijuana possession:
The search only turned up $50 or less of marijuana, which the Almonds’ adult son tried in vain to claim as his, and a single sleeping pill outside of a prescription bottle with Greg’s name on it. The Almonds were arrested and charged with misdemeanor drug possession for personal use. However, deputies also seized roughly $8,000 in cash, along with dozens of firearms and other valuables, using civil asset forfeiture, a practice that allows police to seize property suspected of being connected to criminal activity.
The arrest came at the same time that the Almonds were trying to refinance the loans they had taken out to start a chicken farm, and as a result, they say they missed a crucial bank deadline, resulting in their house being foreclosed upon. They now live in a utility shed.
The Almonds’ suit claims the Randolph County Sheriff’s Department used excessive force; stole, lost, or failed to inventory their missing property; and violated their constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, as well as their right to due process.
A judge later dismissed the criminal charges against the Almonds and ordered their property returned.
Because of the lack of transparency, it’s hard to track exactly how civil forfeiture is used in the state, but a 2018 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice found that Alabama law enforcement raked in roughly $2.2 million through civil asset forfeiture in 2015. In a quarter of those cases, representing $670,000 in seized assets, no criminal charges were filed. In half of all asset forfeiture cases that year, the amount of cash was $1,372 or less—too little for most people to bother hiring a lawyer to recover.
Republican state Sen. Arthur Orr’s bill, as originally introduced, would have required a criminal conviction before property could be forfeited. Had it passed in that form, Alabama would have joined four other states that have essentially abolished civil asset forfeiture.
However, the bill was pared down to include only the new reporting requirements.“The original version of this bill showed the path to real reform,” Robyn Hyden, executive director of Alabama Arise, an organization that supports civil asset forfeiture reform, said in a press release. “It would have required a felony conviction before property became subject to forfeiture in most cases. It also would have required the state to meet a higher burden of proof in connecting property to a crime. And it would have mandated a detailed, publicly searchable database laying out the full scale of seizures in the state. These reforms are still needed, and we’ll continue to fight for them.”
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/317HfQ6
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The Alabama legislature passed a bill Thursday requiring police departments and district attorneys to report how much property they seize, and how much of their budget comes from forfeiture revenues.
After passing the Alabama House and Senate unanimously, the bill now awaits a signature from Republican Governor Kay Ivey. If signed into law, the bill would increase the transparency surrounding the contentious practice of civil asset forfeiture, which allows police to seize property—cash, cars, even houses—suspected of being connected to criminal activity.
Specifically, AL.com reports that law enforcement will have to report “the date of the seizure, the person or entity that owned the property, a description of the property, a description of the suspected underlying criminal activity, any arrests in connection with the seizure, the case numbers of the civil lawsuits for forfeiture of the property, the disposition of the property, and the name of each entity receiving some of the property.”
“This bill will go a long way toward informing the people of Alabama how policing for profit affects their communities, small businesses, and law enforcement priorities,” Carla Crowder, executive director of the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice, said in a press statement. “Once this bill becomes law, Alabamians and our elected leaders will finally know which law enforcement agencies are profiting from forfeitures, how much they are taking in, and how they are using those proceeds. We look forward to finally having that data.”
More than half of all states have passed some form of civil asset forfeiture reform over the past five years in response to bipartisan concerns that the laws have too few protections for property owners and too many perverse incentives for police departments. Police groups, however, often oppose these reforms. They say civil asset forfeiture is a vital tool to disrupt drug trafficking and other organized crime by cutting off the flow of illicit proceeds.
Alabama had virtually no public reporting surrounding the practice until earlier this year when the Alabama District Attorneys Association announced a voluntary reporting program for civil asset forfeiture. The Institute for Justice, a libertarian-leaning public interest law firm that has challenged asset forfeiture laws in several states, gave Alabama an “F” grade for its asset forfeiture transparency.
As a result, Alabama police have among the least oversight in the country when it comes to seizing property. For example, Reasonreported on the civil forfeiture case of Greg and Teresa Almond, an Alabama couple who filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Randolph County Sheriff’s Office in March after a 2018 drug raid upturned their lives and left them homeless, all for misdemeanor marijuana possession:
The search only turned up $50 or less of marijuana, which the Almonds’ adult son tried in vain to claim as his, and a single sleeping pill outside of a prescription bottle with Greg’s name on it. The Almonds were arrested and charged with misdemeanor drug possession for personal use. However, deputies also seized roughly $8,000 in cash, along with dozens of firearms and other valuables, using civil asset forfeiture, a practice that allows police to seize property suspected of being connected to criminal activity.
The arrest came at the same time that the Almonds were trying to refinance the loans they had taken out to start a chicken farm, and as a result, they say they missed a crucial bank deadline, resulting in their house being foreclosed upon. They now live in a utility shed.
The Almonds’ suit claims the Randolph County Sheriff’s Department used excessive force; stole, lost, or failed to inventory their missing property; and violated their constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, as well as their right to due process.
A judge later dismissed the criminal charges against the Almonds and ordered their property returned.
Because of the lack of transparency, it’s hard to track exactly how civil forfeiture is used in the state, but a 2018 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice found that Alabama law enforcement raked in roughly $2.2 million through civil asset forfeiture in 2015. In a quarter of those cases, representing $670,000 in seized assets, no criminal charges were filed. In half of all asset forfeiture cases that year, the amount of cash was $1,372 or less—too little for most people to bother hiring a lawyer to recover.
Republican state Sen. Arthur Orr’s bill, as originally introduced, would have required a criminal conviction before property could be forfeited. Had it passed in that form, Alabama would have joined four other states that have essentially abolished civil asset forfeiture.
However, the bill was pared down to include only the new reporting requirements.“The original version of this bill showed the path to real reform,” Robyn Hyden, executive director of Alabama Arise, an organization that supports civil asset forfeiture reform, said in a press release. “It would have required a felony conviction before property became subject to forfeiture in most cases. It also would have required the state to meet a higher burden of proof in connecting property to a crime. And it would have mandated a detailed, publicly searchable database laying out the full scale of seizures in the state. These reforms are still needed, and we’ll continue to fight for them.”
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/317HfQ6
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Digital voice assistants such as Siri and Alexa are tools of oppression used by the patriarchy to keep women down, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) along with the German government and the EQUALS Skills Coalition, according to the Wall Street Journal editorial board.
According to a 146-page report, the authors note that “most leading voice assistants are exclusively female or female by default, both in name and in sound of voice,” which sends sexist signals that “women are obliging, docile, eager-to-please helpers, available at the touch of a button or with a blunt voice command like ‘hey’ or ‘OK.’”
If you tell Cortana she’s hot, the report frets, she’ll quip that “beauty is in the photoreceptors of the beholder.” Digital assistants “greet verbal abuse with catch-me-if-you-can flirtation” and “give deflecting, lacklustre, or apologetic responses to verbal sexual harassment,” the report says. This response fails “to encourage or model, let alone insist on, healthy communications about sex or sexual consent.”
So – Siri and Alexa are basically training men to be rapists, according to that last part.
What’s more, “The assistant holds no power of agency beyond what the commander asks of it. It honours commands and responds to queries regardless of their tone or hostility,” which reinforces “gender biases that women are subservient and tolerant of poor treatment.”
According to the report, this all has something to do with the lack of women in the tech industry. To fix the problem, the UN report suggests mandatory tech education for women and gender quotas in tech industries, with ample government funding of course.
Better not tell them about “Okaeri”
Will the Silicon Valley sexists do anything about these digital tools of oppression?
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2Z1noAe Tyler Durden
Beloved former Reasoner and current Vice News Tonight correspondent Michael C. Moynihan is not the world’s best driver or most law-abiding citizen. So it may not come as a big surprise to his friends and acquaintances to hear that the man famous for catching plagiarists was himself nabbed by New York’s finest for coloring a wee bit outside the lines.
But would you believe he was stopped at a random checkpoint, told to summon a friend to pick up his young daughter, then handcuffed and jailed for nine hours, all over an unpaid parking ticket from…1998?
Thus begins an infuriating, educational, though mostly hilarious story on the latest episode of The Fifth Column, the podcast I co-host with Moynihan, Kmele Foster, and Anthony Fisher. We cover the non-applicability of Miranda rights, Judge Andrew Napolitano’s old Reason feature about checkpoints, and the ethics of jailhouse snitching, but mainly sit back and laugh at a crazy story well told. It’s at the top of the show here:
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/2YXtGAF
via IFTTT
Beloved former Reasoner and current Vice News Tonight correspondent Michael C. Moynihan is not the world’s best driver or most law-abiding citizen. So it may not come as a big surprise to his friends and acquaintances to hear that the man famous for catching plagiarists was himself nabbed by New York’s finest for coloring a wee bit outside the lines.
But would you believe he was stopped at a random checkpoint, told to summon a friend to pick up his young daughter, then handcuffed and jailed for nine hours, all over an unpaid parking ticket from…1998?
Thus begins an infuriating, educational, though mostly hilarious story on the latest episode of The Fifth Column, the podcast I co-host with Moynihan, Kmele Foster, and Anthony Fisher. We cover the non-applicability of Miranda rights, Judge Andrew Napolitano’s old Reason feature about checkpoints, and the ethics of jailhouse snitching, but mainly sit back and laugh at a crazy story well told. It’s at the top of the show here:
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/2YXtGAF
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Happy Friday everyone. Here’s our weekly roll-up of some of the most bizarre (and occasionally happy) stories from around the world that we’re following:
NYC schools training teachers to discriminate against white students
A new mandatory, $23 million “anti-bias” program is training New York City school teachers to discriminate against white children, no matter what.
The New York Post recently published remarks from one training session, in which the instructor defined ‘racial equality’ as favoring non-white students over white students, regardless of any other circumstances.
In another session among NYC school superintendents, attendees were asked to discuss various life experiences that inspired them to fight for social justice.
One high-ranking school official– a white, Jewish man, described his family’s experience in the Holocaust and Nazi concentration camps.
He was publicly chastised by his own colleagues, with one woman saying “This is not about being Jewish! This is about black and brown boys of color only. You better check yourself.”
According to a middle school teacher interviewed by the Post, the training teaches ‘replacement thinking’ and encourages educators to become ‘liberated’ from their ‘whiteness’.
Australian man fined for giving money to a homeless man
A motorist from Perth, Western Australia named Luke Bresland was fined A$50 earlier this year when he gave A$1.50 (that’s a little more than 1 US dollar) to an apparent homeless man who washed his windshield while stopped at a traffic light.
When the light turned green, Mr. Bresland continued on his journey, only to be pulled over by a local policeman.
The policeman asked him if he had given money to the homeless man, and then cited him for violating a local ordinance.
Under local law, it is illegal for anyone in a vehicle to buy or offer to buy an article or service from a person who is on the road.
Citations under this law are so rare that one prominent local lawyer in Perth claimed he had never heard of it, and congratulated the police for finding a law that even lawyers were unfamiliar with.
Mr. Bresland entered a NOT GUILTY plea and prepared to fight against this absurdity in court, prompting local police to withdraw the charges and rip up the citation.
It’s official: You can record the police in public places
You’d think it would be obvious that you can record anything in a public place– people, plants, pets, even police.
But there have been countless arrests of people who were charged (and subsequently manhandled) for recording police, even in public spaces.
The arrests finally subsided last December after a federal judge in Boston ruled that it is unconstitutional to arrest anyone for recording public officials, even if they are doing so (or attempting to do so) in secret.
Since 2011, in Boston alone, at least eleven felony cases were filed in court against people who were recording the police in public; they were all charged with violating an obscure state wiretapping law.
Last week the same judge reinforced that decision and ordered the Boston police department to inform all of its officers that people have the right to record the police anywhere in public during the performance of their duties.
CPS agent strip searched young children in their own home
In 2017, a Kentucky mother named Holly Curry popped into a local cafe to buy some muffins. She left her children in the car– it was a cloudy, 67 degrees (about 19C).
Within 10 minutes, the cops were already on site, telling Curry that they were calling in Child Protective Services.
The next day, a CPS official arrived to Curry’s home and demanded entry, claiming that any refusal would result in the forfeit of her children.
The official was allowed inside and began to ask questions of Curry. Then, without asking for Curry’s permission, the investigator took the three children and undressed them all, down to their genitals, to check for bruises and signs of abuse.
Curry was eventually found not guilty of child neglect. But she filed a federal lawsuit to protest this gross perversion and invasion of privacy on the part of government officials.
We’re particularly interested in the outcome of this as it may be an important precedent in either reining in this sort of disgusting abuse of power… or additional license to let it continue unchecked.
Illinois legislators passed a pot legalization bill on Friday. The legislation allows adults to possess up to 30 grams of recreational marijuana, and it grants clemency for those convicted of lower-level pot-related crimes. The bill is now headed to Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who is expected to sign it.
While the state House was in debate hours earlier, Rep. Anthony DeLuca (D–Chicago Heights) whipped out a pan and an egg in an effort to convince his colleagues to vote against the bill. Cracking the egg open, he compared the scrambled display to someone’s brain while under the influence.
State Rep Anthony DeLuca pulls out an egg, a frying pan, and and the old "this is your brain on drugs" argument during debate on the marijuana bill, before urging a no vote. Sponsors argue there is public education piece included in the legislation. pic.twitter.com/C22LsiPsSk
DeLuca is referring to an infamously dumb anti-drug video of the ’80s. (If you haven’t seen that one, you may have seen the over-the-top follow-up starring Rachael Leigh Cook. No worries, she’s since made up for it.)
DeLuca added that his colleagues should think. Think of the children. His children and their own. Ah, yes. Opposing compassionate reform for the sake of the children.
He also urged colleagues to consider the impact that the bill will have on black and Latino communities. OK: Though white people have similar usage rates and higher rates of drug dealing, blacks and Latinos are far more likely to be searched, arrested, and receive harsh mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes. Sounds like a good reason for those communities to support reform.
Even though a majority of Americans support legalization, a vocal remainder that can’t help but accept the anti-drug tactics of the 1980s as gospel. Think of President Donald Trump’s suggestion that “really tough, really big, really great advertising” could prevent kids from using drugs. Hey, that sounds familiar!
Drug hysteria has long permeated the culture. But as more people understand how the drug war has created a harsher criminal justice system and a larger prison population, the legalization side has gotten stronger, at least when it comes to marijuana.
Fearmongering is so Reagan-era, but we advise you heed the following warning the next time a politician tries to use scare tactics to stop a long overdue reform:
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/2Mna2N7
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Illinois legislators passed a pot legalization bill on Friday. The legislation allows adults to possess up to 30 grams of recreational marijuana, and it grants clemency for those convicted of lower-level pot-related crimes. The bill is now headed to Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who is expected to sign it.
While the state House was in debate hours earlier, Rep. Anthony DeLuca (D–Chicago Heights) whipped out a pan and an egg in an effort to convince his colleagues to vote against the bill. Cracking the egg open, he compared the scrambled display to someone’s brain while under the influence.
State Rep Anthony DeLuca pulls out an egg, a frying pan, and and the old "this is your brain on drugs" argument during debate on the marijuana bill, before urging a no vote. Sponsors argue there is public education piece included in the legislation. pic.twitter.com/C22LsiPsSk
DeLuca is referring to an infamously dumb anti-drug video of the ’80s. (If you haven’t seen that one, you may have seen the over-the-top follow-up starring Rachael Leigh Cook. No worries, she’s since made up for it.)
DeLuca added that his colleagues should think. Think of the children. His children and their own. Ah, yes. Opposing compassionate reform for the sake of the children.
He also urged colleagues to consider the impact that the bill will have on black and Latino communities. OK: Though white people have similar usage rates and higher rates of drug dealing, blacks and Latinos are far more likely to be searched, arrested, and receive harsh mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes. Sounds like a good reason for those communities to support reform.
Even though a majority of Americans support legalization, a vocal remainder that can’t help but accept the anti-drug tactics of the 1980s as gospel. Think of President Donald Trump’s suggestion that “really tough, really big, really great advertising” could prevent kids from using drugs. Hey, that sounds familiar!
Drug hysteria has long permeated the culture. But as more people understand how the drug war has created a harsher criminal justice system and a larger prison population, the legalization side has gotten stronger, at least when it comes to marijuana.
Fearmongering is so Reagan-era, but we advise you heed the following warning the next time a politician tries to use scare tactics to stop a long overdue reform:
from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/2Mna2N7
via IFTTT
Global Equity markets lost almost $5 trillion in May, more than they did in December!
Everything was going so great too…
All major US equity markets were ugly in May…
But, on the week, spot the odd one out…
Big week for China, thanks to a huge PBOC-panic liquidity injection…
Europe’s worst month since early 2016…
Not helped by Deutsche Bank closing at record lows…
All major US equity indices were down this week, led by Trannies and Small Caps… (today was a one-way street lower after Europe closed)
Biggest weekly drop for the S&P 500 since December
US equity markets had an ugly month – the first losing month of the year and worst May since 2012…
This was the Dow’s 6th straight weekly loss (longest losing streak in 8 years)
But still remain comfortably green on the year…
All the major US equity indices are back below their 200DMAs…
The S&P broke below the key 2800 level…
Semis suffered their worst month since Nov 2008…
As the broad S&P tech sector tumbled…
S&P Energy sector plunged…
Credit markets blew wider in May (led by HY) and for now, VIX is holding in (even with its curve inversion)
HY Spreads are shouting their warning that something is up…
Treasury yields collapsed around 35bps on the month and accelerated lower this week despite talking heads claiming pension rebalancing would bid stocks and offer bonds into month-end…
This is the biggest May drop in yields since 2010, slamming yields to their lowest in years…
10Y hit 2.13% intraday as the yield plunge accelerated…
The yield curve crashed in May, inverting out to around the 15Y maturity…
With 3m10Y plunging to -22bps…
Inflation breakevens collapsed – the biggest monthly drop since December…
The Dollar Index rose for the 4th month in a row
And as the Dollar surged, EM FX cratered…
Cryptos managed to hold on to the week’s gains after yesterday’s ugliness…
This was Cryptos best month since August 2017…
Ugly week for commodities broadly with crude getting crushed but gold managed solid gains…
And Gold managed gains on the month as WTI collapsed…
WTI’s worst month since November, tumbling back below $54…And worst May since 2012
Gold’s best month since January, soaring back above $1300…
And finally, the market is pricing in 1 rate-cut in 2019 and 2.5 rate-cuts by the end of 2020…
Stocks will have to sink considerably for those expectations to come true…
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2EL9TNs Tyler Durden
