This article was first published on Vice’s blog.
California’s State Assembly dipshits should congratulate themselves for a job well done. They finally managed to pass a bill that will reduce the state’s prison population by 17,000. All it took was a riot that tore a prison in Chino apart from the inside. That, and a federal court ruling handed down in early August that said the state had to clear 25 percent of its 150,000 prisoner inventory.
(more…)
Exhibit A
Exhibit B
Compare these two photographs, which show two signs posted a quarter mile apart along a road right outside Victorville’s maximum security federal prison. (Click the pics for a close up.) (more…)
This is one of the clearest and most painful “going postal” rampage massacres I’ve studied, and I’ve looked at a lot of them. The reason is that the murderer, George Sodini, left behind a diary that makes everything as clear as can be–so clear, in fact, that the media is doing everything it can to avoid looking at what it really says. Because this massacre is really about the desperation and hate so common in America. You can’t understand yesterday’s health club massacre in Pennsylvania, leaving 3 women dead, 10 injured, and the male gunman with his brains blown out, without recognizing this misery and hate. Most Americans’ lives have grown worse over the past three decades: today, average American male workers earn less than they did in 1979 in inflation-adjusted dollars, while the top 400 richest Americans own more than the bottom 150 million Americans, a wealth gap only found in tinpot Third World kleptocracies, and not seen here since 1928. That alone is reason enough to hate.
Even Warren Buffet admitted it in a interview with the New York Times: “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” For some reason, only the rich have the courage to talk about it.
(more…)
An Eyewitness Account of the “Kerfuffle at Golden Pond Lane,” March 21, 2009
(This post was published on Playboy.com)
I was there when the so-called “Class War” went down. I saw the whole thing happen, on a cul-de-sac called Golden Pond Lane. Until now, no one has told the real story of what went on that warm spring day in Connecticut. So I will. Before I take you to that epic battle, bear with me for a brief digression–I promise it will pay off later.
I was born and raised a few miles away from what was known as “The Serial Murderer Capital of the World”–Santa Cruz, California circa early-mid-1970s. At one point there were three major serial murderers working the same beach town’s turf at once. Which probably explains why I was an inveterate bedwetter until I was about five.
(more…)
Juan Jose Luna was an early contender for to the “Class War Hero” category. Judging by the mug shot, the Ivy Leaguers would have nothing to do with him, but he was smart enough to see the crash coming way before anyone else did and took no time deciding to do something about it, too. His plan was simple: burn down his foreclosed home and collect fire insurance. All this was back in the summer of 2007. But the plan backfired, literally. (more…)
Today’s Defendant: Joe the Plumber
Statement of the Grand Inquisitor: Oh, this guy’s got to pay.
Joe the Plumber, aka Joe Wurzelbacher—or maybe his name’s actually Samuel and he isn’t a licensed plumber–but regardless he’s an arrogant bald-headed prick who’s become an overnight celebrity after John McCain made him the representative American Everyman. His humble concerns supposedly reflect the nation’s ills. (more…)
