Bank of America now in the business of home invasions?!

Reading the Wall Street Journal today, an article on the 3rd page caught my eye. Apparently, Bank of America has gotten into the business of home invasions and parrot-napping (NY Daily News).

Angela Iannelli, a 46 year old from the Pittsburgh area, came home to find her door padlocked, her house ransacked, and her 11-year old parrot – Luke – missing. A Bank of America employeed royally screwed up, believed her property to be vacant (it wasn’t, nor was she behind on her payments), and sent a contractor over to install a new lock and “secure” the property. I guess in Pittsburgh, the method of securing a property is to cut the power and water, cut electrical lines inside the house, damage floors, damage furniture, pour anti-freeze into the toilets, and take animals. Maybe the contractor should be lucky it was caught after the fact, because there is a good chance that somebody might have gotten shot.

When Ms. Ianelli returned home, you can imagine what went through her mind. The biggest thing to her was that her parrot was missing. She claims to have stayed with friends until he was returned.

Bad enough that the bank goofed, even worse was the lack of response or helpfulness from the bank when she called. They denied knowing where he parrot was, then eventually was told she could drive the 80 miles to the contractor’s office and retrieve Luke herself.

Needless to say, she is suing the bank for more than $50,000, and she rightfully should. If I had been her, I would’ve wanted to make sure that I received enough to repair all of the damage, pay my lawyer, give myself a little, and, most importantly, had them wipe away my mortgage. Why? Just as we are judged by trustworthiness by the bank (i.e. credit score), we need to have trust in the bank too. Just because they hold the lien doesn’t give them to right to waltz in and out whenever they please, especially when it involves damaging the property.

The bank issued an apology this week after the lawsuit went public. Too little, too late. I’m rooting for you, Ms. Iannelli. Did I mention I have a Bank of America mortgage too?

We have a date with Casey Anthony

May 9th, 2011. Judge Strickland has made that the start date for Casey Anthony’s trial. But with the way her defense team works, I bet it’ll be 2012 or 2013. She might as well confess to the damn thing and get a life sentence at this point, jeeze.

She’s also requesting that the state, err, the Florida taxpayers, pick up her tab for legal costs. Uh, yea, sure thing there, let me write a check. And stuff it in a shotgun shell All I can say is I’m glad I’m not a Florida resident. I’d rather piss my money away to political pork barrel spending. Better than giving it to a child murderer.

And for those people who go on with the crap “oh, this is America man, innocent until proven guilty/” yea sure, we’ll buy that. I’m all for that, but when you supposedly haven’t seen your own young child for a month before you file a missing persons report? I don’t care if you are innocent or not, you are guilty. You failed as a parent to worry about your child even in the slightest bit. We won’t go into all of the other things that tattoo a big fat “I DID IT” on her forehead.

Going through, here are some more evidence photos of Casey, including probably one of the few that affect me: Casey playing with Caylee. Just makes this so much more sickening.

McDonald vs Chicago – 2nd amendment at stake

As much as I love Chicago, I couldn’t live there. No point moving to a city where the bad guys (correction, kids) can shoot you, and you can’t do much about it. That’s right, the wonderful 1982 handgun ban. Obviously these kids never got the memo, because murders committed by handguns has only increased since the ban was enacted. Imagine that.

Otis McDonald is challenging this ban in the U.S. Supreme Court. The big question is if the 2nd Amendment applies to states as well. Uh, yea. Hopefully the court will agree with my position.

Now don’t confuse me with the gun radicals, who think anyone and everyone should be allowed to own any gun that they damn well please. Obviously guns should be kept out of the hands of convicted felons, mentally deranged/depressed/etc., and we have no need for fully automatic guns. But we do have a right to protected, or to protect ourselves. It is not the police department’s duty to protect individual citizens. As one Illinois court put it, such a duty “would put the police in the position of guaranteeing the personal safety of every member of the community.” (Detroit News). Banning legal citizens from handgun ownership, yet not giving provisions for the protection of those same citizens. It’s a recipe for disaster.

For the moral crusaders who support the gun ban, put this in your pipe for a moment. Pretend I’m a person planning on killing someone. I shoot them dead. Am I concerned about possessing a handgun? Probably not.

Now consider the other side of the equation. You have Otis McDonald, a 76 year old from Chicago. His house has been burglarized, his life’s been threatened. What can he do to protect himself and his property? They have the guns. Maybe the police can stake out his place for a while, right? Good luck on that one. If you want, go hold your breath and I’ll come and get you when the police arrive.

That’s why all law-abiding citizens in Chicago, especially in the city’s highest crime districts, should be hoping that McDonald wins. In fact, those in other cities with tight handgun restrictions should be hopeful too. If the Supreme Court shoots down this ban, many places are going to have to make some major changes.

As they should. I am a law abiding citizen, and a handgun owner. I am thankful we have  laws here to provide for legal gun ownership. I’m not running around the hood shooting people because I’m an idiot who thinks its cool to be a gangbanger. But it someone tries to come bursting through my door, trying to put my family’s life and property in danger, they need to reconsider. I have a right, an unalienable right, to protect myself. It is a cornerstone that this country was founded on…

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. – Declaration of Independence

Gun bans go against this, signing away our rights to hoodlums and gangbangers, anyone who refuses to accept the laws that the common of the people agree to live by.  As law abiding citizens, we have a right to protect ourselves, and a right to reasonably choose how we would want to do so. As the old adage goes, “in order to have peace, you must prepare for war.”

A full transcript of the oral arguments made before the court in the case of McDonald vs. The City of Chicago (08-1521).

More information on the history and implications of this case and the ban in Chicago is available at CNN.

Knox guilty; Italy should be ashamed

I really haven’t kept up with the Kercher murder case that much, but getting the message that Knox was convicted disturbed me. The few details I remember from the case were that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito supposed had some type of sick and twisted sex murder thing, killing Meredith Kercher then trying to make it look like it had been an attempted robbery. Another guy, Rudy Guede, was also convicted of her murder. He was a known drifter from the Ivory Cost.

What concerns me is where most of the evidence came from. There’s strong evidence to show that Police botched up the sample collection, whether by not wearing gloves or hairnets, allowing evidence to sit for months in the open, even in one case smashing a window. This is obviously not America, since the prosecution’s response to that was that is wasn’t their job to prove the crime scene work was good enough. (Find out more info from CNN)

Since most of the evidence in this case is linked from the botched crime scene work, there isn’t any evidence really to show she did it. It’s all very suspect, and I surprised at how poorly the Italian justice system has handled it thus far, given the amount of international coverage this has received.

Is Knox guilty? I have no freaking clue. Her family has continued to stand by her (unlike my favorite murdering whore, Casey Anthony), and the evidence presented is unreliable, so at its current status, I’d have to say she is not-guilty (note: not-guilty and innocent are two COMPLETELY different things). There is not enough solid evidence to say she was there. The only bits of evidence that appear to be authentic, and they prove absolutely nothing. DNA evidence is harder to use in this case, given the mishandling of the crime scene and body, along with the fact that Knox lived in the same apartment.

At least Italy does have an appeal process, and her attorney has already stated they will be appealing. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like murderers, but I also don’t like people being convicted of murder when dipsh!ts from the police screw up the crime scene and make the evidence unreliable. They also used a old trick of defaming her character. Reminds me of the media sensation Cattle Kate from the Wyoming Ranch Wars. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out

Casey Anthony Revisited

It’s been a while since I’ve had the opportunity to read up on the case, but something sparked my interest today, so I went to the Casey Anthony headquarters to find out what’s been going on.

So apparently Roy Kronk, the prosecutions star witness, may be a blessing for Casey. He supposedly has a shady past according to his ex-wife, including abuse and duct-taping. In a video interview, she believes that he murdered Caylee. She has also been unable t0 provide proof thus far that she’s telling the truth instead of attacking her ex-husband. It’s a point to consider, but there needs to be further investigation.

Casey’s attorney, Jose Baez, also says he’s found two searchers who claimed to have searched the place where the body was found, and didn’t find anything. This was prior to the body being discovered. Baez wants EquuSearch – the non-profit group who handled the massive search for Caylee – to turn over all of its records, since the people he found were not on the list EquuSearch gave him. We can see the wheels spinning in Baez’s head, trying to show that Kronk murdered Caylee, then planted the body after the area was searched and then tipped off the police.

Unfortunately for Anthony, that take in the story has Texas-sized loopholes. Just remember that Kronk is supposedly an individual with wild-lashes, not well planned schemes involving hiding a decomposing corpse for over 5 months, just to plant it. The pieces of the puzzle just don’t fit right.

Baez has also requested that all video of Anthony at the jail be destroyed, and that further videotaping be disbarred. I’m unsure if those wishes have been granted.

Baez also now believes that Florida’s death penalty procedure is unconstitutional, and that Anthony should be exempted from that possible ruling because of that.

So what does everything boil down to? Take a look at the original story. Casey Anthony filed a missing persons report 31 DAYS (yes, days) after Caylee supposedly went missing. She said she returned home to find her nanny (who never existed) and daughter missing. The body shows up 5 months later in an overgrown lot, discovered by a man who is a possible woman beater. There is compelling forensic evidence in her trunk to show that Caylee’s body had been placed in it, taped and bagged.

Honestly though, you can throw all of the technical evidence out. All that was important was the 31 days she waited to file a missing persons report. Anybody with kids knows what I’m talking about. There is no way I would come home, find my daughter and the nanny missing, and not freak out. We’re looking at more like 31 minutes, not 31 days. Then again, I, like Casey Anthony, do not have a nanny, but at least I don’t blame things on mine.

Even if she personally did not kill her child, she is just as responsible as the person who did. And yes, I do believe in the death penalty in the right cases. And she’s earned her trip to the chair. Unfathomable disregard for your own child’s safety, not to mention life…

Need anymore proof of her guilt. Even her family, the ardent supporters that they are, didn’t even come to visit her on Thanksgiving.

Who’s that annoying lil bitch? It’s Iran Man!

My favorite country in the whole wide world, Iran, is back at it, AGAIN! Favorite being the relative term, given that I if I were given control of the little red button, Iran would become the deepest geological pit on the planet. Yes, they are always at it, but of course, they made front page CNN.com again. It’s not enough that they are refining nuclear material for “peaceful energy purposes.” Peaceful energy being another relative term, since their 3/4 of a year supply incidicates that their idea of peaceful energy is harnessing a nuclear bomb to eliminate Israel off the map. Nor is it enough that Ahmadinejad and his cronies (including the “Supreme” Leader Khamenie, a position which sounds more like a member of Star War’s galactic empire than the ruler of a fundamental Islamic republic) rigged the recent election, and brought so much hell against the people that it suppressed their views. Never fear, that’s a pot that will probably boil over sooner than later. Its not enough to consider the treatment of the people who were arrested during those protests, including a journalist who was tortured and forced to give an old confession, and who was only recently released on a large sum of bail. He had a great quote too, “I knew I was in trouble, because the people who were in charge of my life were idiots.” Great stuff.

But nope, they done gone and done something else again. Now they are conducting military exercises, designed to protect their “peaceful energy” deposits. Read: Iran wants to try and make sure neither the Israelis nor the Westerners are able to destroy their weapons grade stash. According to CNN,

Iran’s regular military and its elite Revolutionary Guards were to participate in the exercise against aerial attacks, especially against Iran’s nuclear plants, according to Press TV.

The Iranians are also still up to their “honest truth” campaign. Iran has stated,” it intends to produce nuclear energy only for peaceful purposes, including civilian electricity and medical research.” Scouts honor dude, these Iranians would never lie to us. I think we should believe them. That’s why they only have 3/4 of a year’s worth of material, capability to enrich to weapon’s grade, and that used nuclear reactor fuel makes a good base stock for weapon’s grade enrichment, according to my sources.

The sooner we realize that we’ve just let a bunch of fundamentalists have control over a country, control over its military, and now has access to some of the most dangerous weapons material in existence, the sooner we can figure out a plan of action. They have absolutely no track record of truly caring for its citizenry. Iran has never demonstrated its interested in doing medical research and the like. Modern science slaps their form of Islam right in the face. They have presented their agenda, we know it clearly. They refuse to accept that Israel is even in existence. They have denied that the holocaust has even occurred. They refuse to embrace the rights of their citizenry, evident by the rigged election and the mistreatment and murder of many of its own people. They have continually accepted and embraced the evils of the world that keeps us at war.

We need to wake up and smell the bacon. Iran does not get solved by diplomacy. A crook will not relinquish his power because we ask him too. If Bernie Madoff had been caught before the recession, and the authorities asked him nicely to stop, do you think he would’ve? No! The only way to handle a crook is to take him down, whether by force or by pulling the rug right out from under him. The world and so many Persians know the truth about this regime, but knowing and doing are two completely different things. Are we just going to sit on the sidelines and wait until Ahmadinejad brings about WW3/Armageddon/etc., or are we going to stop him before he has a chance to make Adolf Hitler look like a sweet Annie Orphan?

Iran saves face

In an odd move by the Iranian government, the authorities fired and arrested the warden and a security official at the Kahrizak prison facility that was closed late last month. They are purportedly being held for mistreatment of detainees, this coming in the wake of the death of two detainees that were being held for protesting the June 12th election there. The prison was ordered to be shut down by Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, amid reports that the prison did not meet the required standards. You can read the full story at CNN.

No offense to the people who were detained there (as Kahrizak may be home to more human rights violations than we’ll ever know about), but I find the matter rather amusing. After the recent display of self-destructive protests in Iran, the government is in a position where it needs to restore some faith from its people. The supreme leader has had a taste of how truly insignificant his position is in Iran. He is supposed to be a direct link to Allah himself, his word being final. Yet those protests of the (rigged) elections, which saw President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad being re-elected under “curious” circumstances, were condemned by the Ayatollah, yet continued on with full force. I hate to saw I’ve lost my best for now: I was betting on a civil war.

But this move shows just how fragile the power hold on the Iranians is right now. Most of the time, the regime would’ve swept this under the rug, even if it were students as in this case. Anyone who would have spoken out would have been foolish, like playing Russian roullete with a Colt 1911. Yet had this story had surfaced, and the regime behind the game on it, oh boy what a mess.

I believe that we will see even more divisive cracks like this in the coming months. The Islamic Iranian government had unwittingly provoked the Persian soul of its inhabitants, and has quickly learned to respect a culture that is older than Islam itself.

So for those Americans (or anyone else for that matter) who are afraid that we are going to pick another fight and go to war with Iraq’s neighbor, I wouldn’t be too concerned. There will probably be a war there at some point, but we’ll probably be on the sidelines. This election may well be the straw that broke the Iranian camels back.

Russians, clunkers, and hackers

Seems like Russia wants the world to know that it is supposedly back on top of its military game. The U.S. has been tracking two Russian submarines off the east coast of the U.S., hanging around in international waters. That’s comforting to know given that A) I don’t trust Russians and B) I live on the east coast. Of course, I’d be a maniacal conspiracy-theorist to believe that they are out there sitting for me, but it still isn’t comforting. Russia has been showing signs of wanting to reunite its former soviet states, and has been showing that this new “democratic” government – lead by Medvedev, prime minister Putin’s puppet – is still built a lot like it’s former socialist self. I’ll save my evidence for another day though, I’m sure I’ve pissed enough folks off saying I don’t trust Russians.

Aside from Russians, wtf is this about clunkers? If you guessed CARS – Cash for Clunkers – then you’d be absolutely right. This geniously little program, which is about to run about $3 billion once Obama signs the latest bill, has done more to stimulate than the $750 billion+ economic bailout/stimulus. They are estimating 750,000 cars sold. Even if half of the buyers were planning on buying anyways (according to economists), that’s still hundreds of thousands of new car buyers out there.  That’s billions of dollars worth of new loans flowing into the market place, hundreds of millions if not billions being pulled out of savings to pumped back into the economy. That’s salesmen who finally are getting a decent check, sales managers who have work to do. A definitely positive shot to the economy. So for all you naysayers, complain once you kiss your elbow.

So now what does the 1st part, and this last part, hackers, have in common? Is it that they are both listed using an odd number, or that putting the numbers together makes an unlucky American number (13) ? Well, its true and all, but the meaning is much deeper than that. Russians = hackers. Maybe. At least some who manage to stay away from the Vodka water fountains long enough =)

As I said, it could be. If you haven’t heard, someone or a group of someones led a distributed denial-of-service – DDoS – attack against twitter and some other services yesterday. Turns out that this attack was launched specifically at sites by a man named “George”, including his twitter page, livejournal, and facebook. As of this writing, his Livejournal and Facebook page is still down. But why him? To quote CNN:

His recent posts include: “How Russia was preparing military agression (sic) against Georgia, how they were training soldiers and mobilizing military equipment, what kind of provocations were carried out by the separatists prior to the war.”

“Seems somebody did not like such a chronicle of events,” he [ "George" ] told CNN.

So was it Russians? Was it someone in Georgia who is pro-Russian? Hopefully the world may end up finding out. Given that this dipshit(s) didn’t just take out one page, but knocked out Twitter, numerous groups are now involved with this, including the Georgian government. But I would be more concerned with the hackers that use Twitter.

What this all boils down to is more Russians or pro-Russians afraid of the truth. They should’ve just stuck with the vodka.

Oh, and for one last jab. I just noticed that if you look at Medvedev and Putin side by side, Medvedev looks like 007, while Putin fits the bill for one of his Russian enemy masterminds.

Sorry it’s been soooo long!

I’ve been slacking off here! Sorry I’ve been ignoring this site, but life has been busy. In-laws in town, redoing the backside of my house (unfortunately with little help), and dealing with life in general.

And my god, so much has happened over these last couple of weeks. Michael Jackson dies, his mom aks for temporary custody, his dad puts his foot in his mouth and shows once again what an ass he is, Madoff get’s 150 years in prison, a plane crashed straight down into the indian ocean, with the only survivor a 15 year old who can’t swim. Oh, almost forgot about Billy Mays, my favorite TV commercial pitchman, dying. Then Sarah Palin, a wonderful MILF yet a hapless politician, has announced she’s resigning.

And Michael Jackson. I’ve never been a huge fan, although I did like his stuff. But he did, in many ways, shape our current pop culture. Even though I still thought he was a pedophile, I hated to hear that he passed away. I will say I am shocked with the numerous suicides that have been committed because he died. People get a little too caught up in things. It’s truly amazing that we idolize people who have more issues than we do.

And Joe Jackson. I’m kind of waiting for the bolt of lightning to strike him: I’m surprised the Rev. Al Sharpton would be willing to stand so close! Using his son’s death as an opportunity to market new material. I always heard he was a dick, but man, I think they were being nice calling him that. A monster is a better term. And with Al Sharpton tagging along for his few words, it lowers my stock in him as well, and I didn’t care much for him in the first place.

And Sarah Palin. Hah! She figured that her lame duck status would just make it “politics as usual.” What a load of crap. Palin said she planned to make a “positive change outside government,” without elaborating. Maybe she’s about to go visit Hugh Hefner, and become the first Governor/almost Vice President centerfold the magazine has ever had. That may be about the only positive change she could make outside of government. And before you feminists start blasting, I have nothing against a woman as governor, vp, president, secretary of state, etc. etc. I have a problem with a woman who lives in Alaska and believes she can see Russia outside of her window being in power. Or someone who has more political flip-flops than my wife owns! How she’s “Drill, baby, drill!” yet has fought hard against the big oil companies, when they are the ones that are needed to make the plans successful. The same Sarah Palin who gave $500 million to a CANADIAN company to do a feasibility study of the proposed new pipeline. That’s 1/2 a billion to a non-American company just to let us know if we should build it. All the while, big oil was running their own studies, at fractions of the cost, and keeping the work for AMERICAN workers. Imagine if she had gotten to be VP?!

As for Madoff, I hope they keep his body there for the full 150 years. When he dies, preserve it, and put it for public display. A warning to anyone else who wants to play his game. We won’t even give you a proper burial till you’ve served your bloody sentence. Son of a bitch.

Well, that’s about it for now. I’m redoing the whole backside of my house (new sheating, rigid foam insulation, fiber cement siding, energy star windows and doors, rebuilding the chimney chase, etc.), so I’m whooped, and not sure when I may get a chance to post some more. But in the words of General Douglas MacAuthor, “I shall return.”

David Carradine’s “accidental” death

If you haven’t heard already, David Carradine, Kwai Chang Caine from the Kung Fu movies, and Bill from Kill Bill 1 and 2, was found dead in his hotel room in Bangkok, Thailand. What’s interesting is the circumstances concerning his death.

To put it bluntly, they found in naked, in his closet, with a rope tied around his neck and penis. He was hanging from this rope. His death was ruled an “accidental” death by the Thai police.

Is it just me, or does that just sound a bit fishy? Interestingly enough, the did locate one footprint in the room that didn’t match up to his. We’ll see what they make of that.

Want my opinion? No? Here it is anyways I think he was murdered. I don’t know, maybe a hooker. Who knows. The sad truth of the matters is, his death of one of many mysterious deaths that occur in Bangkok every year. The police always have some sort of lame reasoning behind it, and never investigate further. Hopefully his family will hire their own investigators and look into the matter. Things don’t add up right, and if he were murdered, then whoever is responsible needs to be held accountable.

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