This is the kind of recognition which should be coming from the American government since it is largely responsible for the turmoil and carnage visited upon this Region during the past nearly 30 years.

Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 8.21.2019

Germany’s defense minister has met with female victims from the Yazidi minority group in northern Iraq. It is the German minister’s third and final day of her inaugural tour of the Middle East.

German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer concluded her three-day tour of the Middle East on Wednesday, full of admiration for the women and girls from the Yazidi minority group in northern Iraq who were enslaved and abused by “Islamic State” militants.

“These women have witnessed unspeakable things,” Kramp-Karrenbauer said.

The recently installed defense minister was wary of history repeating itself as she said: “They need more targeted help so that they are not victims of this terrorism a second time.”

The fight against IS has not finished, the German politician admitted.

“This was a very emotional moment for me this morning, and that alone is a good reason to say: We should continue acting here in this region,” she said.

Kramp-Karrenbauer expressed her gratitude to the Iraqi Kurdish fighters for their help in fighting the militants.

“We have a joint goal. This goal is to defeat the Islamic State terrorism in the long term,” she said.

The defense minister, also known by her initials, AKK, concluded that Germany would not forget the sacrifices made by Iraqi Kurds. “You have lost lives and fought this fight, not only for the security of your own region, but for the security of Europe and Germany as well,” she said.

The 56-year-old visited Jordan, in addition to Iraq, as part of her first trip to the region and said the mission was to help her gain a better understanding of the anti-terrorist mission the German troops are involved in on the ground there.

https://www.dw.com/en/german-defense-minister-meets-islamic-state-victims-in-iraq/a-50117977

The alleged assailant in two incidents has become political fodder in San Francisco. The Judge, following an outcry from law enforcement and a portion of the population, has decided to put the suspect behind bars.  The Judge may be correct procedurally speaking. But there is also a belief that she bowed to the pressure in making her ruling.  

It is distressing that a candidate for District Attorney in the November 2019 election has jumped into the fray for what can charitably be described as political purposes.

San Francisco Examiner 8.20.2019

The San Francisco Superior Court judge who came under fire for releasing a man charged  in a widely publicized attack near the Embarcadero has had a change of heart.

Judge Christine Van Aken decided Tuesday that Austin James Vincent would beheld in custody pending trial after prosecutors filed new charges against him.

Vincent, a 25-year-old homeless man, is said to have been suffering a mental health crisis when he allegedly grabbed a woman outside her Embarcadero condo building Aug. 11.

News that Van Aken, the judge, had initially released Vincent, upset the rank-and-file police union. The San Francisco Police Officers Association issued a statement calling for her demotion to Traffic Court.

“Van Aken should not be allowed to preside over any criminal cases,” said Tony Montoya, president of SFPOA . “She may have been a reasonably competent civil attorney, but she’s a catastrophe of a criminal judge.”

Unlike Van Aken, the District Attorney’s Office has largely not been blamed for the release. Yet court transcripts obtained by KPIX may raise eyebrows.

The transcripts show that Chang, the prosecutor, did not articulate the evidence included in the police report or video of the Embarcadero assault to Van Aken when she decided to release Vincent last Tuesday.

Van Aken did, however, have a copy of the police report, and Chang told her that Vincent had a criminal history from New York including a petty theft and a misdemeanor conviction for menacing with a weapon.

“You can present the evidence in a way that’s more persuasive,” said Nancy Tung, a prosecutor who is running for district attorney.

Van Aken did, however, have a copy of the police report, and Chang told her that Vincent had a criminal history from New York including a petty theft and a misdemeanor conviction for menacing with a weapon.

“I’m not discounting the fact that defendant might be — might have been at a point of crisis, but there is enough evidence to show that he’s a public safety risk,” Chang said at the initial hearing, according to the transcripts.

Tung was at the most recent hearing to see whether Van Aken would decide torelease Vincent again.

“She should have detained him in the first place,” Tung said. “This was heropportunity to right that wrong and she made the right decision this time.”

But after a widely shared video of the attack surfaced and outrage mounted overher decision, she ordered Vincent to be placed on GPS monitoring Friday.

Van Aken said his concerns about public safety grew when police obtained a warrant for Vincent’s arrest Friday night in connection with a February assault in the South of Market.

Vincent surrendered to authorities Monday morning at the Hall of Justice.

On Tuesday, Van Aken said she was too concerned about public safety to release Vincent again after learning that the new allegations involved criminal threats and a knife.

“I take this very seriously,” Van Aken said.

Vincent shook his head in court as the judge decided to hold him in custody.

His attorney, Saleem Belbahri, had argued that Vincent should be let out because he was a “model client” in the treatment program Van Aken initially released him into.

“He’s been open to getting treatment,” Belbahri told the judge.

Belbahri told reporters outside the courtroom that he was disappointed in the decision.

“He was getting the help that he needed,” Belbahri said. “He was having the root causes of his issues being addressed and now he’s in jail where he’s not going to get help with those issues”

District Attorney Assistant Edward Chang had argued for Vincent’s detention.

https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/judge-decides-to-hold-embarcadero-attack-suspect-in-jail/

Right here in Deep Blue California.  This is disturbing. Ignoring the reality of a strong and growing Nazi sentiment in America is a recipe for Disaster.

The Guardian 8.19.2019

High school students in southern California appeared to give the Nazi salute in disturbing video footage taken at a sports team awards ceremony.

Among outraged reaction on social media, the musician and activist Bill Madden blamed the president, writing on Twitter: “This is America. Trump has made the Third Reich family friendly.”

A video purportedly shows around 10 members of the boys’ water polo team at Pacifica high school in Garden Grove giving the salute while facing a figure at a lectern who is saluting and singing.

According to the Daily Beast, which published the video, the incident occurred before an awards ceremony late last year. The website reported that the song is an obscure Nazi marching song from the second world war.

The video was reportedly shared on Instagram by a student, who allegedly also posted lyrics to the song in his bio on the social network which he later removed.

It is the second incident involving Nazi depictions and high school students in the region to come to national attention this year. In March, pupils from nearby Orange county appeared to do the Nazi salute while surrounding cups arranged in the shape of a swastika.

The Garden Grove Unified School district, which oversees Pacifica high school, said both organizations “strongly condemn” the video, which it said was “recorded last year of some students who engaged in offensive Nazi-related gestures”.

A district spokesperson told the Guardian that the incident took place before an “after school hours, off-campus” student athletics banquet and shared with “a small group of students” on Snapchat.

“It was not brought to the attention of the administration of Pacifica high school until March of 2019, four months following the banquet, at which time school administrators took immediate action and addressed the situation with all students and families involved,” she added.

The district declined to comment on whether any disciplinary measures were taken, citing the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act. But the spokesperson said following the incident, the school has “reached out to community organisations to provide support that will continue to ensure an anti-bias learning environment and address issues of hate, bias, and exclusion with all staff and students”.

She added: “Pacifica high school, along with our other district schools, will be working with students, staff, and parents to continue to address these issues in the fall in collaboration with agencies dedicated to anti-bias education.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/19/nazi-salute-high-school-students-video-california

 

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Jack Ohman – Sacramento, California Bee 8.8.2019

Published in San Francisco Chronicle Insight section

Fox & Friends: Red Meat

Hooded Viper: White Supremacists

Bloviating Chartreuse-Thatched Warbling Twit

NRA Eagle

Bottom-Feeding Carping Sucker: The Base

The chaos of senseless violence and mayhem continues to spread.

The Guardian 8.18.2019

A customer fatally shot a waiter at a pizzeria on the outskirts of Paris, apparently enraged at being made to wait for a sandwich, according to witnesses.

With the shooter still on the run on Saturday, shocked residents gathered outside the pizza and sandwich eatery. “He was killed for a sandwich?” one asked, unbelievingly.

The waiter’s colleagues called police after he was shot in the shoulder with a handgun in the Noisy-le-Grand suburb, 15km east of Paris’s city centre on Friday night.

Attempts to revive the 28-year-old failed and he died at the scene.

The gunman, who a witness said lost his temper “as his sandwich wasn’t prepared quickly enough”, fled the scene.

Police have opened a murder investigation.

“It is sad,” said a 29-year-old woman. “It’s a quiet restaurant, without any problems. It just opened a few months ago.”

Others noted high crime levels in the area, notably drug-dealing and public drunkenness.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/18/french-waiter-shot-dead-paris-too-slow-with-sandwich

 

August 18, 2019

Every Picture Tells a Story.  Ongoing Series

I received this apt Photo (shown above)  from my sister-in-law who lives in Missoula, Montana.  Someone in Big Sky Country is on to Something.

https://reedsy.com/discovery/blog/best-post-apocalyptic-books

AfD is the proverbial wolf in sheep’s clothing hiding its anti-semitism in respectable rhetoric while actively pursuing an alliance with one of Germany’s mainstream conservative parties. This is the  strategy used by the Nationalist Socialists nearly 100 years ago during the Weimar Republic as it ultimately rose to power in 1933 via the ballot box.

De Welt 8.17.2019

The President of the Central Council of Jews warns against government participation of right-wing populists in Saxony and Brandenburg. The AfD incites against minorities and thus also fuel a climate against Jews.

 

https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article198711427/Antisemitismus-AfD-viel-enger-mit-Rechtsextremismus-verwoben-als-sie-es-darstellt.html

 

It’s nice to see that the stodgy, uber Conservative Department of Justice has some rock and roll vibe.  Led Zeppelin  the fantastic band  is still staple for millions of fans.  These Republican attorneys must have been rock and rollers back in the ’60s before joining the Reagan Revolution.

Original band member Robert Plant will be appearing at this year’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass at San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park in October

NBC News 8.16.2019

The legal dispute centers on whether the famous opening of “Stairway to Heaven” was ripped off.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is coming to the defense of Led Zeppelin in a copyright dispute over the opening passage from one of rock’s best-known anthems, “Stairway to Heaven,” a melody and chord sequence that nearly every aspiring guitarist tries to master.

The Justice Department filed a friend of court brief late Thursday supporting Led Zeppelin against a claim that it stole the musical passage from an earlier recording, “Taurus” by Spirit. The legal battle of the bands has played out in federal courts in California for the past five years.

Trustees for the songwriter of “Taurus,” Randy Wolfe — who called himself Randy California and has since died — accuse Led Zeppelin of violating his copyright by appropriating the “distinct plucked guitar line and melody.” The case went to a jury, which ruled for Led Zeppelin in 2016.

At the trial, the jury heard from a member of Spirit, Led Zeppelin musicians Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, and musical experts — but jurors never heard the actual recording of either song in court. The judge ruled that because “Taurus” was written in 1967, it fell under an older version of federal copyright law, which protected only the sheet music for the song, not the sound recording.

A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ordered the case sent back for another trial, ruling that the jury should have heard the recordings to demonstrate that Led Zeppelin had access to “Taurus.” But in June, the full Ninth Circuit said it would hear the appeal again.

In its brief filed Thursday, the Justice Department said the trial judge got it right when he ruled that the only work subject to copyright protection was the sheet music, because the song was written before Congress changed the law in 1972, which gave protection to sound recordings.

The similar-sounding qualities of the two passages, consisting of an A-minor chord and descending bass line in a chromatic scale, deserve protection only if they are virtually identical, the government said. And under that test, the brief said, Led Zeppelin should prevail.

A victory for Spirit would re-write a chapter of music history, involving bragging rights to one of rock’s most famous guitar passages. “Stairway to Heaven” is number 31 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.

The appeals court will hear the case in September.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/ag-barr-s-justice-department-has-whole-lotta-love-led-n1043361?cid=eml_nbn_20190816

Netanyahu and Trump. Two vile and reactionary men whose despotic policies and world view are toxic, counter productive and move against the tide of multi ethnic inclusion.

Excerpted from The Guardian 8.15.2019

Israel’s decision on Thursday to block two American congresswomen from entering the country amid pressure from Donald Trump drew widespread criticism in Washington, with some Democrats warning the move threatened to erode US support for its longtime ally.

“Banning Congresswomen Omar and Tlaib from entering Israel and Palestine is a sign of enormous disrespect to these elected leaders, to the United States Congress, and to the principles of democracy,” the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders tweeted.

Bernie Sanders said: “It is disgusting that a bigot like Trump is attacking @RashidaTlaib and @IlhanMN in this way. Opposing Netanyahu’s policies is not ‘hating the Jewish people.’ We must stand together against those who promote hatred and racism in Israel, Palestine, the US and everywhere.”

The Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren decried the move as “shameful” and “unprecedented”.

“Israel doesn’t advance its case as a tolerant democracy or unwavering US ally by barring elected members of Congress from visiting because of their political views,” she said.

In an unprecedented chain of events, the Israeli government declared it would bar entry to representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, the first two Muslim women elected to Congress, ahead of a planned visit to the West Bank. The move came just hours after Trump publicly urged Israel not to allow the two Democratic lawmakers into the country in a highly unusual effort to influence a foreign government against his political opponents.

Omar responded to Israel’s announcement by stating it was “an affront” for the country’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to acquiesce to pressure from Trump.

“Trump’s Muslim ban is what Israel is implementing, this time against two duly elected Members of Congress,” she said in a statement. “Denying entry into Israel not only limits our ability to learn from Israelis, but also the Palestinian territories.”

She added: “Sadly, this is not a surprise given the public positions of Prime Minister Netanyahu, who has consistently resisted peace efforts, restricted the freedom of movement of Palestinians, limited public knowledge of the brutal realities of the occupation and aligned himself with Islamophobes like Donald Trump.”

Later Tlaib responded to Israel’s decision to block her trip there, saying it showed “weakness”.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/15/israels-decision-to-block-congresswomen-omar-and-tlaib-draws-widespread-criticism

I am listening to the soundtrack for Blade Runner 2049.  This Orwellian tale right here in California fits in with the Dystopian mood of the music.  This technology is terrifying and fascinating.

SACRAMENTO — San Francisco Assemblyman Phil Ting has never been arrested, but facial recognition technology developed by Amazon links his image to a jailhouse mugshot.

Ting is one of 26 state legislators who were wrongly identified as suspected criminals using the technology, according to results of a test released Tuesday by the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California.

Matt Cagle, a technology and civil liberties attorney at the ACLU, said the organization ran its experiment using Amazon’s Rekognition software and screened 120 lawmakers’ images against a database of 25,000 mugshots.

Cagle said the technology poses “a public safety hazard and a threat to our fundamental rights” if used in police cameras.

“Body cameras were promised as a police accountability tool, not as a surveillance system,” he said. “People should be able to walk down the street without having their face logged into a government database.”

The program falsely identified 1 of 5 lawmakers, including Ting and two fellow San Francisco Democrats, Assemblyman David Chiu and state Sen. Scott Wiener, the ACLU said.

Critics of the software, including the ACLU, said the findings show the need to block law enforcement from using the technology in officers’ body cameras.

“Clearly, this software is faulty,” Ting said. “It really should not be used by any law enforcement agency at this point. Body cameras are there to build trust, not to tear it down.”

Ting’s bill is opposed by a host of law enforcement groups, including the California Peace Officers’ Association. They argue that the technology could be used to help identify criminals at large events, such as the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

Shaun Rundle, the association’s deputy director, said no California police agencies are using the technology now. But, he said, police should have a chance to show they could use it correctly.

 “We’re concerned that (Ting’s bill) is an attempt to wipe out something that could identify repeat offenders, could solve cold cases and old crimes and deter future crime,” Rundle said. Facial recognition technology “has the potential to be a real crime-solving tool.”

 

Supporters say police could use the technology like a red-flag system, to alert officers if an image captured on a body camera matches that of a suspect or someone in an arrest database.

However, Microsoft announced in April that it had denied an unnamed California law enforcement agency’s request to buy its recognition technology for body cameras.

Amazon said it believes its technology, if used correctly, can help identify criminals and find missing children. The company recommends on its website that law enforcement agencies using its software, “manually review the match before making any decision to interview or detain the individual.”

Amazon suggests police agencies set the software’s confidence threshold setting — a measurement of how accurate the software considers its suggested matches — at 99%. Cagle said the ACLU used the program’s default 80% setting in its experiment with California lawmakers’ photos.

“We continue to advocate for federal legislation of facial recognition technology to ensure responsible use,” the Amazon spokesman said in an email. The company wants Congress to mandate that government agencies using facial recognition follow guidelines to protect civil rights.

 San Francisco and Oakland have already adopted sweeping bans on the use of facial recognition software. Those bans prohibit its use by all city departments, including police agencies.

Critics of the technology say it raises civil rights concerns in part because many of the people it misidentifies are people of color.

More than half the 26 California lawmakers who were falsely identified in the ACLU’s experiment are people of color, Ting’s office said. Ting said that makes the technology especially dangerous for African Americans, Latinos and Asian Americans.

“This could lead to more false arrests in those particular communities,” he said.

Last year, the ACLU ran a similar experiment using images of members of Congress. It found that Amazon’s program incorrectly matched 28 of them with suspected criminals.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Facial-recognition-misidentified-26-California-14301190.php