Thursday link roundup

• This Agitator post illustrates in perfect detail why it's not even worth trying anymore. Short version, a noble citizen does soemthing that would save the fovernment 2.2 million dollars and deliver a higher quality. The feds refuse, and take years in doing so. Your tax dollars at sloth.
• Putin's Rise to Power
• MaoPost.com - really cool
• Oil Econ 101 - and oldie but a goodie
• This little nugget from Marginal Revolution

  In Brazil, they segregate their prisons according to gang membership. No exceptions. Not even for individuals who in fact are not members of any gang.
  
  How does that work? Easy. Upon being admitted to the prison system, unaffiliated prisoners are required to join a gang.
  

Your saturday morning reading

• Dead Left - Jon Chair on Naomi Klein
• The Atlanta PD and their odd hat history
• Radley Balko and the non-existent presidential crime policies of the candidates
• American Murder Mystery - everyone should read this, it's about the current and future face of crime.
• Report: Rich Consistently Outearning Poor

  Armbrister stressed that it would be premature to draw any final conclusions from the 550-page report, cautioning that "much supplementary research must still be done."
  
  "Yes, we do need more data," she said. "But regardless, it is apparent that a severe gulf exists between rich and poor. And this cannot be mere coincidence. There is clearly an unknown mitigating factor at work here, and I strongly suspect it may be financial in nature.

  
  

Update on the two murders across the street

A news update here. It seems that there were two killers, and also that they planned to torch the house when they were done. Scary business.

A good article

On gang life in Los Angeles

The cyber-crime map of the world

Check out this article in Forbes.

Sunday rapid fire

• The wealthiest Americans in history
• Lead exposure and crime - interesting if not convincing
• A preachy CNN.com article on vacations - and why some people don't like them. Evidently any deviation from the middle class norm is unhealthy
• The Battle of Omdurman by the War Nerd
  

Flying Squads

Unbeknowst to me, before now, the Justice Department sends out teams to fight street level crime in cities around the country. The Yahoo News article lists it's failures, which are to be expected. It's hard to see how it could be successful when all of it's efforts and managements are so insulated from feedback. Sending out federal people to deal exclusively with local crime is a troubling trend.

If Granny had wheels, she'd be a trolley

Starting with this review of a CNN.com Michael Moore's movie "Sicko is Socko". It prattles on and on about the inequalities and suffering that result from illness. All true most likely. Read that and ask yourself, "So What?" Is the same leviathan that brought you the Iraq War (or "Peace" if you prefer) likely to improve matters? Or for that matter, one that couldn't even find a way to discreetly have sex with interns?

The second one is "What if Lincoln Had Survived?", also on CNN.com. If they had the medical technology of today but not the 25th Amendment, what would have happened?

Isn't there some news site that caters to the person who is interested in news?

For far better non-news brain candy, check out this history of the 1920 Wall Street bombing. The perpetrators of that attack, much like the anthrax mailer, were never caught.

Interesting...

Possible breaks in the Erie Collar Bomb Case. Of course, the cops are being coy.

A rise in crime

Personally I think Katrina and meth have something to do with it but Tom Barnett might have it, specifically

the three-strikes and other harsh-penalty laws of the previous decade had surged the prison population, but soon the number of ex-cons being released (about 600k, if I remember) would surpass the number of new cons going in (about 500k). A simple prediction: urban crime was going to go up all across America.

Food for thought.

Atlanta cop update

See Report: Lies involved in no-knock warrant and Town hall meeting to discuss "no-knock" warrants. The systems seems to be working, albeit quite slowly. I'd assumed that since this feel out of the news for a month that it was being covered up, it's nice to see that I might be wrong about that.

Not surprising

Cop wounded in drug raid that killed woman to retire

Curiously, the name of the APD spokesman is James Polite, which is just kind of eerie. If that's your name, are you destined for some kind of PR occupation?

We all knew cell phones could spy on you...

Now it seems to be confirmed

The FBI appears to have begun using a novel form of electronic surveillance in criminal investigations: remotely activating a mobile phone's microphone and using it to eavesdrop on nearby conversations.

And if the FBI can do it, talented hackers can do it too. One can be tracked (more or less) by a cell phone too.

Classic movies everyone should see

• Ivan the Terrible Part II - Quite good, interesting insight into the Russian character and the central role autocracy has always played in Russian history. Visually it's quite stunning too.
• The Seventh Seal - Man's struggle with God and Death come across much more believably in subtitles.
• I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang - Life on the chain gang comes across as more believable than realistic, an excellent piece. The final few minutes are particularly jarring.
  

Scary

First Michelle and Luke get their car broken into, and now this. I ride the Silver Comet at least a couple of times a month, and some other, probably more dangerous routes as well. I think the Comet is the only route where one would stay missing though. From Today's AJC

Woman missing from Silver Comet Trail
Searchers are combing the Silver Comet biking trail in Cobb County today for a missing Sandy Springs woman last seen Monday afternoon.

Two helicopters and about 100 family, friends and law enforcement officials are hunting for Jennifer Ewing, 54, who left from home in a Honda minivan with her red bike about 2 p.m. Monday to ride the trail.

The helicopters are equipped with infrared radar, a heat-seeking tool that allows searchers to see through dense woods and differentiate bodies on the ground, said Georgia State Trooper Larry Schnall.

...

Jennifer Ewing makes the outing on the 50-mile wooded path through Cobb and Paulding Counties about four days a week, said Smyrna police Sgt. Robert Harvey.

Update: Police have found a body along the trail, somewhere in Paulding Country.

A site for my many readers

As my brain is soft and fuzzy right now, I'll suggest this one without much comment.

Crime Library - tons of great history.

Merits a read

This story about a carjacking in North Cobb is quite worth the read.

When I just ran the spell check the Blogger software wanted to replace "carjacking" with "churchgoing".

Statement of no progress

The Erie PA pizza bomb case remains unsolved with no leads. It's good people are still paying attention to it. My original post about it was here.

Rapid Fire

• Anti-rape condom aims to stop sexual assaults - it's a female condom, and it would be quite effective
• Storms Vary With Cycles, Experts Say
• Reality is nothing but a collective hunch.
• Pizza Man Bombing Remains Odd Mystery - This is still the strangest crime of the new century.