'No-Knock' Searches Get People Killed
From the site:
“Meantime, a black man named Cory Maye was still sitting on death row in Mississippi, the last I heard, because he heard men trying to break into his Prentiss, Miss. home late at night in December of 2001, where he was alone with his 18-month-old baby daughter.
Mr. Maye, who had no criminal record, got the child down onto the floor and lay down beside her to protect her. When one of the men finally broke into the bedroom, Cory Maye shot and killed him.
The man was hit in the abdomen, just below his bulletproof vest, and died a short time later. It turns out the man who had failed to knock and identify himself before breaking in was a cop, who was really after suspects in the other half of the duplex where Cory Maye lived. Turns out the cop was the white son of the white chief of police. An all-white jury sentenced Cory Maye, who is black, to death for exercising his right to defend his locked home and family against violent invasion by an unknown intruder. The all-white jury took only a few hours to do so, at least one juror explaining he wanted to get home for supper.”
November 19, 1863: President Abraham Lincoln delivers the Gettysburg Address at the dedication of Soldiers’ National Cemetery.
The president’s two-minute speech, consistently entirely of 272 words, followed a two-hour oration by Edward Everett, then the governor of Pennsylvania and widely accepted to be one of the great public speakers of his time. According to those who attended the event, the brevity of Lincoln’s remarks so surprised the crowd that reportedly no one applauded when he finished because they didn’t think he was done. When they did applaud, it was said to be scarce yet polite.
But the next day, Everett wrote a letter to Lincoln that read in part: “I should be glad if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes.”
If Marijuana Production Were Legal: Projected Tax Revenues, by State
…this graphic illustrates the popularity of marijuana consumption, the federal tax dollars spent to keep marijuana illegal, and the possible tax revenues that could be generated if marijuana production were legalized and taxed like any other agricultural product.
(via brooklynmutt)
← Previous
