U.S. attorney questioned about prosecution of 2 Border Patrol agents

End the Drug War NOW.... and these things wouldn't happen!

I got to tell you, they enjoy feeling the power.

Prosecutorial overreaction? I don't think so.

Senator Feinstein is walking a tight rope on this issue. One false move and she may lose one constituency or the other.

Bad move on her part.

repeating a snip from the article>

"They are not heroes," Sutton said of the agents. "They deliberately shot an unarmed man in the back without justification, destroyed evidence to cover it up and lied about it. These are serious crimes."

snip>

all the time.

If you're brown, you're Mexican until proven otherwise.

There have been incidents, let me tell you.

I've had more than my fair share of arrogant asshole-ery from the Border Patrol. Once while travelling out of town, I was passed by a BP vehicle. The 2 rednecks inside literally looked down on my & into my car as they passed. (did I mention I have a "few" liberal bumperstickers on my car? :evilgrin: ) When I got to the checkpoint, the agent on duty was about to wave me through when the 2 rednecks came out of the BP trailer & said I couldn't pass. They then waved over another drug dog, so there were 2 running around my car, they knocked on all the car panels & were basically harassing me because of my bumperstickers. When they asked me to pop the trunk, I was very happy that I had several law books in there. "Are you a lawyer?" "Yes, I am. Want to see my bar card?" "Oh no, everything's fine. You can pass." They couldn't get away from my car fast enough.

Assholes. :grr:

dg

I'll have to catch the repeat online.

of the callers. They approved of the border guards shooting an unarmed man who was running away--because they viewed him as an "illegal alien" and a "drug smuggler." Not convicted, of course. No arrest, no charges, no jury of his peers, no trial. The callers had convicted him, and applauded lethal force being used against him. They furthermore applauded the border guards lying about it and covering it up. What kind of Americans ARE these? Well, as Sutton pointed out, they are Americans who have been lied to and brainwashed by rightwing radio. But I think there's more to it than that. I think some kind of stacked deck was put together, BY fascist radio, not only to demonize brown-skinned "illegal aliens" and "drug smugglers" as subhuman, but also to demonize Sutton--a US attorney who was arguing for the rule of law! Jeez. One of the callers said he hoped that Sutton and his family would be hit by drug cartel violence!

I repeat: What kind of Americans ARE these? They are 'Lindy England' Americans whose leader has given them leave to hate, to torture, to kill, on the basis of their own presumptions about who someone is. Thus, they raped children in Abu Ghraib, and piled grown men naked into pyramids, and threatened helpless prisoners with dogs and beat helpless prisoners to death...because why? Prisoners who were often innocent of even the smallest crime. Prisoners who had had no trial, no charges asserted against them, or proven. And even if they HAD been convicted of something, by what right are they so abused, threatened, and, in some cases, killed?

Like this "illegal alien" and "drug smuggler," they are the generic "other." Could be anybody--blacks, Jews, the Irish, "witches," "communists," Italians, Gypsies, gays, the "gooks" in Vietnam. More often than not, it's crazy white people demonizing the colored--like the Nazis demonizing the "impure". It is a terrible vice that evolution is trying to breed out of the human race, obviously. But they don't recognize their own ugliness and stupidity dinosauric nature. They are all righteous and puffed up, this colossally outmoded species of bigot, that is so manipulable by the Bush Junta.

As for Sutton, he's trying to maintain some standard of decency, in an administration of monstrous fascists, who have given leave to the rightwing minority--and to cops, and border guards, and prison guards, and soldiers, and mercenaries--to be vicious and murderous, and to be self-righteous about it. Anyway, that's how the "debate" seemed to be framed, to my perception. But something about it makes me uncomfortable. I simply don't buy the murderous U.S. "war on drugs." I think it's yet another fascist milk-train--like the war-making machine. I think it's very corrupt, and an insanely wrong policy. And Sutton is an enforcer of that policy, who bragged about his thousands of drug convictions, and "illegal alien" convictions, to these vicious rightwing callers.

Finally, one lady called in and defended him and the "rule of law." God bless her! But the whole framing of the issue was wrong, or way, way, way too limited--dragged way over to the right, and off the cliff of the political spectrum, to fascism. Should we be shooting unarmed civilians on the SUSPICION that they are "illegals" or "drug smugglers"? Absolutely not. Obviously not. But why is that even a question? (Sutton made the interesting point that in 999 cases out of a 1,000, the "mules" who smuggle drugs don't carry guns--and further that there was overwhelming evidence that the man was unarmed, and no evidence that he was guilty of a crime.) So...he is "fair game" because why? BECAUSE he is brown-skinned and Mexican! And what kind of an America is it, in which that kind of brutality is considered to be a legitimate opinion, and a justifiable police action? What kind of an American is it that permits open threats of violence against a US attorney on our public airwaves?

Not mainstream America. Weird America. BushWorld America. Minority white bigot America. And the EXCUSE given them by BushWorld is the "war on drugs" and "illegal immigration." The excuse to be unamerican bastards. Yup, I think the caller lineup was stacked with them. Too bad real Americans tend to be less organized.

"One of the callers said he hoped that Sutton and his family would be hit by drug cartel violence!"

This was the first caller and it really upset me. The guy sounded as if he wanted to pull the trigger on Mr. Sutton himself. But Mr. Sutton was cool, calm and collected with these hateful callers that think they know all the facts when they don't know squat! He continously told these people they don't have all the facts and they are listening to talk radio. Out of all those calls, there were only 2 that supported him for what he is doing. Another thing I noticed is that, the moderator didn't say what line the callers were calling from nor did he care if the repukes were calling on the Democratic line. I don't know if Mr. Sutton is republican or a Democrat but if he is a republican, I'm glad he sees how his side react to propaganda.

of our three branches of govt. A jury found them guilty. The facts I have read support their verdict.There are extraordinary cases that perhaps need intervention but I am uncomfortable with everyone getting into each others branch of govt these days except congress for the past several years which abdicated their own responsibilities to be a rubber stamp but chose to interfere with the judiciary.

They should have been charged under hate crime laws IMO. They shot him in the back, left him to die and covered it up. They should get more time. One of them was already beaten up pretty bad in prison.