The force-feeding room and restraint chair being used at Guantanamo Bay in response to the detainee hunger strike.
Hi, I'm Bonnie.
My site is bonniekristian.com, which Google determined was a good result for searches of "hipster libertarian." I thought it was funny. Thus this tumblr.
If you have a question, please check over my FAQ page first. That's also where you'll submit your query.
My other tumblr is [ˈkɾeːdoː].
5x04 - Detour
From my new little project here on Tumblr, scullydisapproves. (Bonus: All her expressions are great reactions to 90% of politics news.)
“The missile hits, and after the smoke clears there’s a crater there and you can see body parts from the people. [A] guy that was running from the rear to front, his left leg had been taken off above the knee, and I watched him bleed out.
These guys had no hostile intent. In Montana, everyone has a gun. These guys could have been local people that had to protect themselves. I think we jumped the gun.”
—
Former drone operator Brandon Bryant, on his first drone strike.
Bryant quit the drone program after realizing its disregard for life and how numb strikes made him feel, saying he “couldn’t do it anymore.”
Houston police: If we "feel" threatened, we can shoot your dog; and every dog we've shot deserved it.
[The Houston Police] department said it has ruled all 187 officer-involved shootings of dogs since January 1, 2010 as justified.
According to departmental records, 121 of those dogs died.
In many police departments, Houston evidently included, officers need only “feel” threatened by the dog — an extremely subjective standard, to say the least — to shoot it. If your dog has an aggressive look (e.g. has bull terrier, shepherd, or doberman blood in him), or even if the officer just happened to be bitten by a dog as a kid and now has a phobia, you may find yourself with a dead dog for no real reason.
The ASPCA has commented that this “feeling threatened” standard “set a very low threshold for justifying the killing of dogs,” and it provides nearly blanket cover for officers’ behavior.
A few years back, a dog being fostered by the animal rescue where I adopted my dog was killed by a DC police officer who got off scot-free. The dog had gotten into a scuffle with another dog but was quickly restrained by the man fostering him.
That’s when a D.C. police officer took over, putting his knee in the middle of Parrot’s back while he pulled the dog’s forelegs behind him, Block [the foster owner] said. He said that the officer then grabbed Parrot by his neck and threw him over a banister at the Brass Knob antique store and that just as the dog righted itself, the officer pulled out his gun and fired. Parrot was “a full 12 to 15 steps away,” Block said, and was “making no aggressive overtures.” The dog, he noted, “doesn’t handle stairs well.”
Making the understatement of the year, the ASPCA adds, “Such incidents not only jeopardize the lives of companion animals, but also undermine the reputation of law enforcement agencies in the community.”
Indeed.
Change.org hosts a petition with 50,000 signatures seeking justice for Parrot — and if there’s anything to be learned from Hollywood about Americans, it’s that we’ll watch passively as people die by the dozen, but kill the dog and you’re definitely the bad guy now.
If any of you are X-Files fans, I've got a new project here on Tumblr.
From me and zsazsasays to you: Scully Disapproves.
Pentagon official sees "at least 10 to 20" more years fighting al Qaeda. Welcome to America’s Thirty Years War.
It was just two months ago the top U.S. intelligence official testified that al-Qaida had been battered by the U.S. into a state of disarray. A year ago, the current CIA director, John Brennan, said that “For the first time since this fight began, we can look ahead and envision a world in which the al Qaeda core is simply no longer relevant.” Just this week, the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command, Army Lt. Gen. Joseph Votel, told a Florida conference that he was looking at missions beyond the counterterrorism manhunt.
Yet a spokeswoman, Army Col. Anne Edgecomb, clarified that [the official] meant the conflict is likely to last ten to twenty more years from today — atop the 12 years that the conflict has already lasted. Welcome to America’s Thirty Years War.
“In a few short weeks, [the Obama administration has] managed to show that when [government] wants to do “good” things, [its] managerial competence falls somewhere between David Brent and a cat chasing a laser pointer. But when government wants to flex its more malevolent muscles, [it’s] f*cking Iron Man!”
— Jon Stewart (via laliberty)
The many combinations of colours are so inspiring… Must check out her artwork!
(via Claire Desjardins)
![UPDATE: Kohenari did a little digging and found a better translation of this statement from Plato’s Republic. It’s perhaps less quotable, but I thought it should be added here:
“Shall we, then, portray the happiness,” said I, “of the man and the state in which such a creature arises?”
“By all means let us describe it,” he said.
“Then at the start and in the first days does he not smile upon all men and greet everybody he meets and deny that he is a tyrant, and promise many things in private and public, and having freed men from debts, and distributed lands to the people and his own associates, he affects a gracious and gentle manner to all?”
“Necessarily,” he said. “But when, I suppose, he has come to terms with some of his exiled enemies and has got others destroyed and is no longer disturbed by them, in the first place he is always stirring up some war so that the people may be in need of a leader.”
“That is likely.”
If we wanted to use the more accurate translation in a shorter, more graphic-friendly form, the end result would likely be:
[When the tyrant] has come to terms with some of his exiled enemies and has got others destroyed and is no longer disturbed by them, in the first place he is always stirring up some war so that the people may be in need of a leader.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/ad6842d382e7b020047d558c54d5687b/tumblr_mmuoxe9Hjl1qcfvc7o1_500.jpg)
UPDATE: Kohenari did a little digging and found a better translation of this statement from Plato’s Republic. It’s perhaps less quotable, but I thought it should be added here:
“Shall we, then, portray the happiness,” said I, “of the man and the state in which such a creature arises?”
“By all means let us describe it,” he said.
“Then at the start and in the first days does he not smile upon all men and greet everybody he meets and deny that he is a tyrant, and promise many things in private and public, and having freed men from debts, and distributed lands to the people and his own associates, he affects a gracious and gentle manner to all?”
“Necessarily,” he said. “But when, I suppose, he has come to terms with some of his exiled enemies and has got others destroyed and is no longer disturbed by them, in the first place he is always stirring up some war so that the people may be in need of a leader.”
“That is likely.”
If we wanted to use the more accurate translation in a shorter, more graphic-friendly form, the end result would likely be:
[When the tyrant] has come to terms with some of his exiled enemies and has got others destroyed and is no longer disturbed by them, in the first place he is always stirring up some war so that the people may be in need of a leader.
