Galt's Gulch
10

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse: Use RICO Laws to Prosecute Global Warming Skeptics

Posted by jceockwood 9 years, 5 months ago to News
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A better idea would be to use rico to prosecute those colluding to perpetuate this scam.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/sen-...

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  • Posted by khalling 9 years, 5 months ago
    RICO law is outrageous and most parts of it are unConstitutional. Not only are the statutes overly broad and vague, but for those charged with crimes they cannot divulge information with their own attorneys in most cases - disrupting the ability to know their accusers and get a fair trial.
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    • Posted by SaltyDog 9 years, 5 months ago
      A couple of years ago, I received a call from a detective from the sheriff's office in a neighboring county. It seems that a young man who was waiting tables at a local restaurant was increasing his tips on credit card receipts, and mine was one of them. Since he had done this more than once that day, the guidelines dictated that he would be charged under RICO since it was "an ongoing criminal enterprise". The detective thought that this was ridiculous, and asked if I would agree to restitution (10 bucks) and the assurance that he would agree to probation. The detective was asking each of the victims to go along with it, and I agreed.
      This is an example of how absurd these cases can become. RICO was intended to bust up organized crime (the kind that isn't government) and gets perverted into all kinds of nonsense.
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      • Posted by $ WilliamShipley 9 years, 5 months ago
        One of the skills of lawyers is to convert A to B by the use of skilled argument. A bill gets passed to manage organized crime and it's used for a waiter and his tips. A bill gets passed to manage navigable waters and it becomes a tool to manage all water that might go into navigable waters.
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  • Posted by $ allosaur 9 years, 5 months ago
    Prosecute this: NOAA caught spiking climate changer data.

    http://yellowhammernews.com/faithandcult...
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    • Posted by johnpe1 9 years, 5 months ago
      it's East Anglia all over again, but Here!!! -- j
      .
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      • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
        I remember reading in depth about East Anglia (ClimateGate) at the time. It had all the ingredients to make a great investigative story: a whistle-blower who was a techie (as I am) and first saw how the data was being faked in the models, also a treasure trove of emails indicating that "the truth" would hurt the "cause" and must be kept hidden. (In this sense it went beyond the UK, as it called into question Michael Mann's (in)famous "hockey-stick graph" purporting to show a recent spike in global temperatures, and he was included in the "circling the wagons" emails.)

        Perfect for an MSM expose, possible Pulitzer prize. Did it go anywhere beyond a few initial reports (other than in those pesky, "academically" unacceptable "truth and junk science" sites?

        Of course not...without global warming to replace discredited Socialism as the reason we need "global action" and associated world expansion of power, where would we be?
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        • Posted by johnpe1 9 years, 5 months ago
          that's a good point -- climate change is a cloak
          replacing socialism / communism -- and a good one
          by the way the sheeple are following ... this wizard
          of "smart" and "social conscience" ... sickening! -- j
          .
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          • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
            Yes: until if was discredited with both the resurgence of theoretical free-market economics in the early'70's (the Austrians, Friedman and others) combined with it's real-world collapse in the USSR and elsewhere, to be considered an "intellectual" and not a Philistine, you had to accept some form of Socialism,or be subject to thinly disguised ad-hominem attacks vs. argument.

            When the God of Socialism died, the God of Gaia or Environmentalism replaced it. If you are not with the Environmentalists, you are dismissed as a knuckle-dragging throwback. Pure bunk, but popular bunk.
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            • Posted by johnpe1 9 years, 5 months ago
              well, I'll just drag my knuckles over to the harley,
              get on and drive down to walgreen's for an Rx
              and some milk. . maybe someone will think of the
              50s as a result. . back when men were men and
              sheep were nervous. -- j
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              • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
                Ah, weren't those the days: in the 50's I rode my bike when I was 10 years old, to Smith's Drugs to pick up some cartons of cigarettes ($2/carton) and a bottle of my mother's prescribed "green medicine". No questions asked, they knew me from church.

                The other day I was out of the country and needed cash deposited to my checking account (no,not $10,000). I told my son to go with $60 cash, fill out a deposit slip with my account number, go to the counter and deposit the cash. Nope: he had to physically have my ATM card and put it in the machine, to make a cash deposit. So a few things bounced...grrrr...

                Sorry, not exactly on topic, mini-rant over...
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  • Posted by ProfChuck 9 years, 5 months ago
    One should always be skeptical when a scientific "finding" supports a political agenda. To the "progressive" true believer it makes no difference if AGW is real or not. It is a powerful political tool because it incites fear.
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    • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
      IMO, as they say,"follow the money". If a study comes out of any academic institution, public or private, and the study was paid for with a government grant, immediately discount it to a value of zero, or less. In particular if it incites fear and/or justifies and expansion of government/bureaucratic powers. Then it's called "propaganda"...
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  • Posted by wiggys 9 years, 5 months ago
    I just read that 0's trade agreement includes global warming crap. It just isn't going to go away no matter how bad the weather gets over the next 10 years. when we no longer have much of a summer and we can't grow enough food to feed the country these idiots will still be blaming the cold conditions on global warming.
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    • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
      I guess I would have to say "of course" it contains global warming crap. In today's "intellectual"/political environment, it would have to. In particular a trade agreement, with lots of secret clauses. Another educated guess is that the West will bear the brunt of any anti-Industrial eco-crap-regulations, "carbon caps" etc...while the poor "developing" countries, like China, will be exempt.

      But let's not let the other guilty parties off the hook: it is the RINO's in Congress who are supporting O on this, due to their misunderstanding of "free trade". While the Democrats, under pressure from the unions, based on THEIR own misunderstanding of free trade, are in this case, the opposition.

      Alice in Wonderland, anyone?
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  • Posted by MinorLiberator 9 years, 5 months ago
    Thus proving that true, irrational fanatics/true believers will stop at nothing to silence their critics. Why waste court time? Why not just burn them at the stake, or stone them to death in the public square? (RICO is a slightly more convoluted way of doing just that, of course.)
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  • Posted by NealS 9 years, 5 months ago
    The Senator should be burned at the stake. Next someone will want to burn at the stake anyone that doesn't believe in God, or maybe anyone that does believe in God. Where can I move to where all this idiocy is not taking place? Can I find the Gulch on Google Maps?
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  • Posted by strugatsky 9 years, 5 months ago
    In the past, I have held to the view that government should be limited to national defense and the legal system, only. I am now of the opinion that government has no legitimate business in the legal system and coming to a conclusion that it may not add much benefit to the national defense, either.
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  • Posted by fosterj717 9 years, 5 months ago
    This shows what an ignoramus this clown is! The RICO law is used to prove a criminal conspiracy. It is also appropriate when defending the Constitution such as in the 2nd Amendment case whereas a "wheel of conspiracy" exists between legislators, law enforcement and the judiciary (in some instances).

    The individual for instance, by being denied the right to carry (in NJ for example) is turned down after a valid application is submitted and is turned down with basically a simple "you don't have a need for it" response.

    The wheel of a conspiracy is basically denying a person their Constitutional right to carry a firearm. The conspiracy is between the legislative (passing laws that infringe), certain governors (Chris Christie in NJ) who sign this extra-constitutional legislation, law enforcement that rejects the applications without cause (and as in NJ, without showing the applicants what the criteria is). This is a conspiracy to deprive a person of their Constitutional rights.

    As such, the wheel of conspiracy can be demonstrated and redress should be available. The circuit court (3rd) could also be named in such a conspiracy because it out of hand rules without legal groundwork against the innocent individual hence ripe for a real RICO lawsuit.

    Senator Sheldon in addition to being an idiot is also totally ignorant as to what the RICO law actually hence the stupid statement from an ill-informed legislator (so what else is new?).
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    • Posted by strugatsky 9 years, 5 months ago
      I am not sure if the senator is stupid, but there's no doubt that he is convinced that the voters are stupid. And you know, come to think about it, he just may be right...
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