薔薇語

Thanks Markdoc. I hadn't actually read the Pentagon's assessment before. La Rose.

That is some selective awareness you have going on there: According to which witnesses? Could it be that mythical juror number 40 who was never at the scene and a racist little monster? What about the two witness caught on camera at the same time Brown was murder saying his hands were up? As to the physical evidence supporting the cop, no it doesn't. The physical evidence says only that Brown was most certainly at distance when the next several shots were fired: including the killing shot and the shots that followed it. Most everything else is simply spin. La Rose.

Wow. Germans are some tall folx. I think the average male high in the US is about 175-177cm I am just under at 173 and fairly heavy at some 85ish Kilos. But I guess that does match up with most every example of a German male I have met. The girls, however, have tended to be shorter than me. Perhaps still taller than the average American woman, though. But not noticeably. Here in Japan the younger population has grown leaps and bounds over their parents and especially the grant parents. Most young adults are about my height and there is no shortage of men taller and some much taller than I. Women do still tend towards being shorter than their American counterparts but are still at a respectable height. La Rose.

Okay, one more. We are almost coming full circle. The first one was a Japanese group singing in Japanese. The next was a Korean one singing in Korean. Now we get to a Korean group (Girls Gen) singing in Japanese. La Rose.

Now it is time to go back to more normal music videos: This is a Korean pop group that also does some Japanese songs. La Rose.

Okay, so the following isn't exactly about sexism nor sexism in the gaming community, but I thought it was a cute video that has a good message about body image issues. And it is especially nice to see it coming out of Japan which takes the stick figure ideal to extremes. It has English subtitles to everything so please take a chance to watch. La Rose.

This group just came up in my recommendations box from youtube. It is a group of cute young Japanese girls with an infectiously cute song with a nice message about body image issues: It has English subtitles to everything so please give it a watch. La Rose.

Speaking of being forced to show ID without cause, all foreigners in Japan are expected to maintain state ID at all times no matter what. It is a punishable offense (normally a warning or very small fine but up to and including expulsion) if you don't. And while there is no such rule for natives (that I am aware of), there have been a series of issues with native Japanese being thought of as foreigners and being asked to show ID. When they couldn't they would be taken to the local police box until their ID could be verified. Normally that would end in an apology by the police of course but it is an awkward thing for natives, or worse yet for natives with non-100%-Japanese bloodlines to constantly be treated like 'others' by their own people. While foreigners might expect it, a native Japanese person experience it is a bit shocking. As a foreigner in Japan you don't have many rights when it comes to objecting to police action. And while natives would have more, they have been brought up in a culture that just doesn't question authority in the same way someone from the US might. La Rose.

That sounds kind of like the cop who murdered the Rice boy. He was already under heat for his bad actions at his last job but that didn't stop the next police agency from hiring him. La Rose.

Roter Baron, I think it is interesting that you don't see police on a regular basis in Germany. While it has never been my presumption that Germany is strictly policed and it would have never occurred to me that people would assume so, I am just used to seeing police on a regular basis. Actually, here in Japan it is extremely common to see police out and about on a normal day. I probably see more police here than I ever did in the US. But that might be because the police here are designed to be built into communities whereas in my home in the US they are designed to have one or two major headquarters from which everyone works out of. To give you an example, in just a 15 minute bike ride from my house I could visit at least 4 different police 'boxes'. Is this not the case in Germany then? Are you all more like the US in that you have one major depot that houses most police functions for a city / ward / district? As to the police from above getting his come-uppens, I don't think a simple civil suit is enough. Of course if some stranger strangles me on the street and tries to destroy my evidence of it, I will sue them for damages. But I also expect the police to arrest that thug and for there to be a criminal trial. The fact that citizen's only recourse against abusive cops is taking them to civil trials because the criminal justice system has abandoned us is disheartening at the very least. La Rose. Edit: Actually, if anyone is curious how many police stations and boxes there are in Japan, just hop on google maps and go to Japan. Then type in 交番 ( kouban ). Most of what pops up will be police boxes. You will think you are looking at a kid with chicken pox, or maybe one with some bad acne. ^^

Oh, I imagine if I actually tried to go looking for cops who were abusing their power I might be able to find 30 links a week. But that is part of the problem. I shouldn't be able to find 30 a week, nor a month, nor a year. I shouldn't even be able to find 30 in a decade. But I could. And not enough people seem to be outraged that we allow thugs to be our police. Luckily, though, I make it a point to NOT go looking but even I can't ignore big story ones when they pop up - and I live in a different country and am far removed from the sensationalization that you all get. I wonder how bad it would be if I actually lived there still. La Rose.

I am doing many things but dehumanizing is not among them. I would really like to hear you defend some thug who tries to choke a perfectly innocent person. I mean, come one, that thug shouldn't be 'dehumanized' just because he choked someone. I mean we shouldn't be bitter and should feel empathy for that thug who committed assault on some young woman. And we should really open our hearts to that thug even though he and his partner tried to destroy the only evidence against him ASSAULTING an innocent young person. If that cop were anything other than a cop he would be in jail right now. But we have a nice and wonderful two tier justice system where you and I go to jail for putting a person in a choke hold and trying to destroy evidence but cops keep all their benefits and are simply asked to kindly go work somewhere else. That isn't justice. La Rose.

Oh cry me a river. I am not going to feel sorry for an abusive nimrod thug and I am not going to feel sorry for an abusive nimrod thug with authority. La Rose.

Here is some good news: The jerk that put a law abiding young woman in a chokehold for not respecting his 'authoritah' has resigned. He should have been fired and lost any benefits he had, but at least he isn't wearing the uniform anymore. Good riddance to filthy trash. La Rose.

TYT Story about the Justice Department and their assessment of the Cleveland police department. La Rose.

This time I will just post three quick videos of a nice Japanese singers I am listing to now. Relatively new single by Juice = Juice. A classic by Miwa - one way love. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzMH-UJvKk8&index=55&list=PLFSHAyJWYxKTP2_I_Nm4eI1tB4a3xuqg2&channel=juicejuicechannel A beautiful song by AAA - A Summer Memory in the Breeze. La Rose.

In the US, Seattle I think still holds the title for the most expensive real estate. New York comes in next. But neither of them are as expensive as Tokyo. And Tokyo doesn't even hold a candle to London. La Rose.

So is yours. But my bias is towards justice and has come about in direct response to the all too common problem of cops in the US being awful people. La Rose.

I think Markdoc's most recent post made an extremely good point. Justice needs to be done and needs to be seen being done. The public trust is extremely important and if the system ignores a fundamental aspect of our society (that people need to see justice being served), then it is no longer functioning. You think a typical prosecutor knows the burden of proof can't be met in this case? Really? If that were the case, then why did the actual prosecutor have to hardball all witnesses for the victim, soft ball the murderer, swear in and accept obvious perjury (obvious in that he, himself, knew it to be 100% fake) just to get the murderer off the hook? Those aren't the actions of a prosecutor who is confident in his belief that he couldn't meet a burden of proof, those are the actions of a man afraid that he could. Those are the actions of a spineless swine who has had and will only continue to have a tradition of protecting murderous cops from justice at all costs. I like how you think the physical evidence only corroborates the murderer's story - it doesn't. First, there were three completely distinct autopsy reports done. None of which were in complete alignment. But all of which agreed that the boy was shot several times. Most of the shots were at a distance and that the killing shot was followed up by additional shots after he was already dead. We also have witnesses who at the time of the event were caught on camera talking about how the boy had his hands up and was surrendering when he was gunned down. And that video and their testimony is worth a whole lot more than the racist, mentally unstable, perjurer that the prosecutor decided to rely on. So, Agent X, I don't think you really understand why people are so angry with this case and why it is so necessary that it goes to trial. Perhaps in the full course of a trial I could be shown to be wrong and the murderer could be shown to have been acting in the bounds of the law, but that is a little bit of justice we were all denied. The murderer is not obviously innocent and it is not clear that there is no way to meet the burden of proof. That is purely your opinion on the situation. And the best thing for the victim would have been to have an actual adversarial trial where his interests were given consideration - that did not happen. The best thing for society would have been to have an actual adversarial process where our basic need to see the system actively and righteously pursue justice did not happen. All that happened was that an old-boy prosecutor covered for his murderer friends as he has done so before. La Rose.

Speaking of all the fun statics about how our police murder us, if I recall correctly there hasn't been a single death by cop in Japan in the better part of President Obama's time in office. And that is in spite of some cops here being out and out racists. The US has some real problems it needs to solve. La Rose.

The Prosecutor has prosecutorial discresion and can choose what he wants to take to court. If the prosecutor really thought that there was no chance in heck that the officer was guilty of any crime, then he should have never indicted him and stood up for his beliefs. But he didn't. No, he created a show trial of the Grand Jury for the sole sake of fooling stupid people who think a Grand Jury is anything like an actual trial - it isn't and is never meant to be. He purposely allowed people to perjure themselves in front of the court to throw the case. He purposely deflated every possible aspect of the state's (HIS!) case so as to destroy his case. He purposely made the entire event last longer than many trials just to wear down the jurors so that they would be too fed up to care anymore. Yes, it is true he has prosecutor discretion and he could have used it to never take it to trial. But he used it to convene a Grand Jury. Once he made that choice he should have had to follow through with it but he chose not to. He chose to cover for his murder friends and deny anyone of any chance of justice. If you so strongly believe that the officer was innocent, then he could have had his day in court where he could defend himself. As the old saying goes: innocent people don't need to fear the law. Darren wasn't innocent and the prosecutor knew it. That is why he did everything he could to prevent it going to trial. Do you know whose case wasn't represented at the Grand Jury - the murdered boy. That boy had no one there to advocate for him. That boy was denied even the slightest semblance of justice. The officer would have had his chance to defend his actions with all the vigor the law allows had it gone to trial. But you know what is even better than that, having the prosecutor do that job for you at a Grand Jury hearing. La Rose.

I have a hard time believing that the Grand Jury indictment process is that big of a financial burden on the defendant given that they don't actually do anything during the process other than show up. They are not expected to give testimony or provide a defense so they have no need to secure a lawyer who go through the whole process of procuring witnesses, discover, and such. And given that truly financially needy individuals can have a public defender, I don't see it as that terrible. Perhaps there is a case to be made for it being a ruinous burden but I would have to see strong evidence of that and that it is a consistent problem in the system before we go about changing it. La Rose.

Probably because the LAPD has hearts blacker than the guns they use to murder people? Just a guess, though. La Rose.

Agent X, do you mind expanding on what you mean. Perhaps it is just me, but I think that while it may seem like what you want to say has been well enunciated I feel as though your point is quite murky at best. This isn't an argument one way or the other on what you had to say just an admission that I don't know what it is you are trying to say. As to how easy it is to get a Grand Jury ruling, I agree. But I don't think that is a bad thing on whole. Again, Grand Juries only exist to ensure that prosecutors aren't wildly over stepping their bounds. Actual Trials are where citizens determine guilt and can judge the true value of the state's case. But a Grand Jury only exist to agree or disagree with a basic statement: The person who has has been accused is clearly innocent and no reasonable person could contemplate any culpability on the accused's part. La Rose. Edit - As a follow up to the Perjury issue - The prosecutor in the Ferguson case willfully allowed sworn in testimony of a woman he knew not to be on the scene, whose statements were not made until after the police published theirs, to stand. He allowed a woman he knew to be committing perjury to testify against his case. And now he says he will NOT seek any kind of action again her despite his absolute knowledge that she committed perjury. And the Missouri Bar has made no comments about punishing him despite his willful disobedience to the law he is sworn to uphold. To H*** with all of them. I can't believe my state, my home has devolved so badly.

Then please forgive me if my response wasn't actually tackling what you were commenting on. La Rose.