Public Outrage Project

Wisconsin Taxes Job Creators to Pay for Its Unemployment Program

2011-11-02T11:29:00.000-07:00

File this one under "This is your government trying to understand economics." Even though times are comparatively less tough in Wisconsin these days &mdash the Badger State's unemployment rate was 7.8% in September, a full percentage point lower than the national average &mdash few observers think the private sector there is out of the woods. Unfortunately for the state's businesses, its government doesn't see things that way. In the eyes of the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development, those businesses are starving the government of needed resources, and, well, they have a weapon (forcibly confiscating resources under the threat of imprisonment) that private citizens lack. As such, businesses were surprised to get a tax bill from the Department last June, by which Wisconsin declared that they had to help the government pay off interest on debts owed to the Federal Unemployment Trust Fund. For 2010, this special tax cost employers $12,000 per worker, a figure that rises to $13,000 this year and keeps going to $14,000 in future years.

To put this in perspective, Wisconsin has so far sucked $42 million out of a private sector struggling to rebound from one of the nastiest recessions in recent memory. It's done so to pay back interest on money it borrowed from DC in order to fund benefits known for prolonging unemployment. If the government of Wisconsin wants to respond meaningfully to public demands for job-increasing activity, it could start by, you know, not taxing businesses for employing people and not subsidizing unemployment.

Fighting the War on Drugs in Brooklyn

2011-11-02T09:35:00.000-07:00

You've got to hand it to the NYPD: whenever they're faced with a difficult problem, they know how to get creative in finding a solution. Take the narcotics squads in Queens and Brooklyn South, for example. They were faced with the conundrum of meeting arrest quotas even though they couldn't seem to find any actual, you know, drug offenders. So they got creative: as revealed in bombshell testimony from former detective Stephen Anderson, these units began fabricating drug charges against innocent people to make up the difference. Anderson cooperated with investigators after being caught planting cocaine on four men in a Queens bar in 2008. Seven other officers have been caught in similar acts, either while actually planting drugs (a practice known as "flaking") or pilfering them from evidence lockers. In 2011, some 300 drug cases have been tossed out, and the costs of settling false-arrest lawsuits have topped $1.2 million.

As you might guess, this story is far from finished, but yesterday, a small measure of justice was done, as Detective Jason Arbeeny of the Brooklyn South squad was convicted of planting cocaine on two innocent people in early 2007. Yet in all, this story is just a sad reminder of the abuses of power that are certain to occur if police are given wide latitude for prosecuting victimless crimes.

Your Morning Outrage, November 2, 2011

2011-11-02T06:49:00.000-07:00

Some morning links:

Sez Cato: Defending the War on Terror is so difficult, the government needs to violate Wittgenstein's private language argument to do so.
Reason: Medical marijuana users challenge the Federal crackdown on dispensaries, on 10th Amendment grounds.
Where would we be without the NYPD overreacting again?
Florida man arrested for recording his interaction with Palm Beach Sheriff's deputies during a traffic stop.
Department of Justice uses obscure immigration law to coerce guilty pleas out of foreign business owners accused (falsely or not) of price-fixing.

Picking Apart the "Science" Underlying Arson Convictions in Texas

2011-11-01T16:14:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of the fine folks at the ACLU's blog, we have an interesting run-down on the report released last week by the Texas Forensic Science Commission. The report concerns the "fire science" that underlies many prosecutions for arson crimes in the Lone Star State. Their conclusion? Well, if you're going to convict someone for arson when you haven't really proven that the fire wasn't accidental, you should probably try really, really hard not to execute them.

The story of the report goes back to 2004, when the state executed Cameron Todd Willingham on charges that he'd murdered his three children by setting their home on fire. Prior to the execution, the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole received a report from a well-respected fire expert, Dr. Gerald Furst, who concluded that the testimony regarding the arson lacked scientific merit. His argument, essentially, was that the 20 so-called "arson indicators" used by fire investigators since 1991 don't actually constitute evidence of the use of accelerants. The report made it to Rick Perry's desk, but the execution went forward, even though the suspect testimony was the heart of the state's case against Willingham. In response, the Legislature created the Forensic Science Commission, and it took up Willingham's case in 2008. Its April report sided with Furst, and today, it issued a supplement stating that it lacked the authority to conclude whether the use of such junk science was due to misconduct or negligence on the part of fire investigators.

In a positive development, the Commission's new report includes a commitment from the Texas Fire Marshal to work with the Innocence Project to identify old arson cases that may have been founded on similar faulty evidence. It won't bring Cameron Willingham back, but it's a good thing.

Thousands of Naive Americans Ask Obama to Stop the "E-Parasites" Bill

2011-11-01T13:49:00.000-07:00

Over at the Wired Threat Level blog, we see that innocent trust in the good intentions of Barack Obama isn't quite a relic of the past. Apparently, thousands of internet users are taking advantage of the new White House petition site to ask the President to oppose Rep. Lamar Smith's Stop Online Piracy Act. Also called the "E-Parasites" Act, Smith's bill would dramatically expand the government's ability to shut down websites that appear to violate copyright and trademark laws. As of this morning, 4,400 people had signed the day-old petition; the White House site promises a response if it gets 25,000 signatures.

Of course, it's unclear what form such a response might actually take. This administration has already taken heat for its form-letter answers to petitions like these, and it's not clear whether Obama will see enough campaign mileage in the issue to take it seriously. Another petition currently up on the White House site probably hits more closely to the mark, asking Obama to "actually take these petitions seriously instead of just using them as an excuse to pretend you are listening." Besides, real opposition to the bill would imply that the President doesn't want greater control of content on the internet, particularly if that control is ill-defined enough to be exercised arbitrarily.

DWI Enforcement Under Fire in Texas

2011-11-01T09:41:00.000-07:00

Interesting things are afoot in Harris County, Texas, particularly with respect to the enforcement of DWI offenses. According to this report in the Houston Chronicle, we might soon learn more about the high rate of misdemeanor DWIs in the county, as District Attorney Pat Lykos has been called to testify after publicly questioning the reliability of the BAT vans used by the Houston Police Department.

During a recent interview with the Chronicle, Lykos said that her office is investigating allegations from a former HPD forensics supervisor, who claims that the results of blood-alcohol tests conducted using the HPD's mobile vans may have been contaminated by overheating. These tests, of course, have served as the basis of numerous DWI convictions in the county. Since then, the grand jury has focused on Lykos and her colleagues in its investigation of the claims about the BAT vans. And now, County Court at Law judge John Clinton has ruled that the District Attorney must testify in a DWI trial, after the defense argued that her opinions on the testing procedures are relevant to their client's case. One of the defense attorneys in the trial has said, "The reliability of the BAT vans has come into serious question by the chief prosecutor of Harris County herself. If they're so unreliable, then why are you prosecuting someone with evidence you deem unreliable?" If she appears, Lykos will likely be cross-examined by one of her subordinates. The grand jury's term has officially been extended, and it's possible that the results of Lykos' testimony could affect other DWI cases.

Disgraced California City Manager Sues City for Not Paying Him $1.5 Million

2011-11-01T08:25:00.000-07:00

Last year, one of the most stirring examples of citizen outrage against government excess took place in the California city of Bell. After the LA Times reported that City Manager Robert Rizzo, his assistant Angela Spaccia, and numerous members of the City Council had voted themselves outrageous salaries and pensions, levied numerous illegal taxes, directed the funds for various public projects into their own pockets, and used the city's DUI checkpoints to extract money from motorists on a massive scale. Criminal indictments followed, and the residents of this blue-collar burgh southeast of Los Angeles ultimately recalled most of the council members involved.

The worst of the bunch was Rizzo (pictured above). At the time of his indictment, he had made himself one of the highest-paid public "servants" in America, pulling down nearly $800,000 a year. But that's only the start of it. For one thing, Bell's beleaguered taxpayers are about to see their taxes go up even more, in order to pay off $50 million in parks bonds that largely went into Rizzo's pocket. For another thing, they have to contend with Rizzo's galling sense of entitlement. Back in July, the ex-City Manager actually attempted (unsuccessfully) to compel the taxpayers to reimburse the legal costs stemming from his indictment. And now, he's suing Bell for $1.5 million in unpaid salary, which he says he's owed because he hasn't been paid while awaiting trial. That's right: in the eyes of a government bureaucrat, unless you resign or you're convicted of a felony, you're entitled to your inflated salary and benefits for life.

Homeland Security: Big Brother is Tweeting You

2011-11-01T07:48:00.000-07:00

When the youth of Tunisia and Egypt used social networks like Facebook and Twitter to organize protests that ended decades of oppressive rule in both countries, it seemed like something to file under "it could never happen here." When the citizens of London used these tools to organize several days' worth of riots and looting during the summer, we thought, "well, maybe that could happen here." Even the Tea Party movement that's shaken up US politics in recent years began with Facebook groups. Well, apparently your favorite Big Brother and mine is concerned about the use of social networks to foment "potential threats": that's right, Homeland Security is at it again.

According to Undersecretary Caryn Wagner, the DHS is currently reviewing its policies for gathering intelligence from social networking chatter. Says she: "We're still trying to figure out how you use things like Twitter as a source. How do you establish trends and how do you then capture that in an intelligence product?" In other words, how do you analyze status updates in a way that enables law enforcement to act in response to a real threat? Which sounds great: after all, the fact that you opened an account on Facebook or Twitter clearly constitutes probable cause.

We're not sure where this will go: insofar as the President has spent lots of time in the past year making nice with technology entrepreneurs like Mark Zuckerberg, it's hard to believe that the people running these firms won't protest loudly at Homeland Security's efforts to mine their networks. These efforts will have a chilling effect on the flow of information over these services, which makes them less valuable to merchants and advertisers. More worrying, however, is that DHS lacks a clear idea of what they're doing. With an immense amount of data to sort through, their analysts may well be tempted to make up the logic as they go along, a process that's almost certain to lead to mistakes and abuse.

Welcome to the Public Outrage Project

2011-10-31T09:03:00.000-07:00

As I write this, the Occupy protests have filled the news in cities around the world for weeks. This follows a spring and summer marked by angry demonstrations throughout Europe, north Africa, and the Middle East &mdash London, Athens, Cairo, Damascus, and so on &mdash with more almost certain to follow. Prior to this, the Tea Party movement roiled the American political scene. This followed the collective malaise of the eight long years of George W. Bush's presidency, which we remember mostly for the bitter 2000 election, the September 11 terrorist attacks, the PATRIOT Act, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the financial crisis and economic recession that arrived with a bang in 2008. This malaise, of course, led Americans to embrace a charming but untested leader offering little more than vague promises of "hope" and "change." For many, the current crisis of faith in public institutions began with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008; for me, it began with protesters throwing eggs at Bush's limo on the way to his 2000 inauguration.

I'm not inclined to see the Occupy protests as an astroturf operation run by organized labor, even if unions are clearly there stirring the pot. Nor am I inclined to mock the protesters as privileged, clueless college students playing "revolutionary," even if that contingent is amply represented. These protests, much like the Tea Parties, have caught fire because a lot of people have suffered terribly over the past few years: losing their jobs, losing their homes, losing their life savings, and struggling through all the personal turmoil that these things create. Along with the scores of college students now entering the lousy job market with a mountain of loan debt looming behind them, many of these people are frightened that the limited economic opportunity and the social unrest they see around them could become a permanent feature of modern life. Unsurprisingly, they're angry about this, and they're looking to be part of something that seems to offer hope.

Trouble is, you have to direct your protests at the proper target to have the effect you want. The Occupy movement, of course, began on Wall Street. Yet, as James Altucher points out here, the people who actually go to work on Wall Street are in much the same boat as "the 99%": many of these people were completely wiped out in 2008, and have to deal with hundreds of protesters shouting at them as they try to get to crappy jobs that they need to feed their families. Meanwhile, the people responsible for the real-estate meltdown and the financial crisis, as well as those who actually got bailed out, are largely escaping the protesters' ire.

This Project, then, is an effort to help the outraged public of today understand exactly what they're angry about.