A new
PBS documentary exposes the tasing and
beating death of a Mexican immigrant by U.S. border agents in
California, and has renewed scrutiny of what critics call a culture of
impunity.
In May 2010, 32-year-old Anastasio Hernández Rojas was caught
trying to enter the United States from Mexico near San Diego. He had
previously lived in the United States for 25 years and was the father of
five U.S.-born children. But instead of deportation, Hernández Rojas’
detention ended in his death.
A number of border officers were seen
beating him, before one tasered him at least five times. He died shortly
afterward. The agents say they confronted Hernández Rojas because he
became hostile and resisted arrest.
But previously undisclosed videos
recorded by eyewitnesses on their
cell phones
show a different story. “All eyewitnesses that we spoke to basically
tell the same story of a man hogtied and handcuffed behind his back, not
resisting, being beaten repeatedly — by batons, by kicks, by punches,
by the use of a taser — for almost 30 minutes until he died,” says
reporter John Carlos Frey, whose exposé aired in a national television
special last Friday night, as part of a joint investigation by the
PBS broadcast, "Need to Know," and the Investigative Fund of the Nation Institute.
PBS late-night talk show host and bestselling author Tavis Smiley and
educator and philosopher Cornel West will promote their new book, “The
Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto,” on the S.C. State
University campus Wednesday evening.
Smiley and West will appear at 7 p.m., with more details to be released later. The event is free and open to the public.
In their book, published by SmileyBooks, Smiley and West
advocate a new socioeconomic system based on a foundation of
“fundamental fairness.” In the book, they support “good public policy
that prioritizes and delivers living-wage jobs, support for single
mothers and pragmatic
training and employment of low-skilled and unskilled workers so that all Americans will have a chance to lift themselves out of poverty.
Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/2012/04/24/3919278/sc-judge-rules-against-catawbas.html#storylink=cpy
A judge has ruled against the Catawba Indian Nation in its attempt to
build a casino on its York County reservation, but even opponents of
the casino expect the tribe to appeal the ruling.
Judge J. Ernest
Kinard ruled against the Catawbas in their lawsuit against South
Carolina and the state's top law enforcement officials over the tribe's
gaming rights, Kinard’s law clerk Wilson Davis said.
Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/2012/04/24/3919278/sc-judge-rules-against-catawbas.html#storylink=cpy
For certain rural residents of the Carolinas during the Cold War,
apocalyptic anxiety hit disturbingly close to home. In 1958 and 1961,
the American Air Force lost nuclear weapons over the skies of South and
North Carolina, respectively, raining potential apocalypse on the folks
below.
In both incidents, complete catastrophe was avoided thanks to that
ever-potent combination of foresight and unmitigated dumb luck. And in
the former incident, the bomb fell square on some unsuspecting
children's playhouse.
The first accident occurred over Florence, South Carolina on March
11, 1958, slightly after 4:30 in the afternoon. An American B-47E bomber
was flying from Savannah, Georgia to Bruntingthorpe Air Base in England
for exercises — onboard was a Mark 6 30-kiloton fission bomb.
Boeing has secured an option to buy 94 additional acres near
Charleston, S.C., an option that if exercised could significantly
increase Boeing’s presence in that region.
An April 23 story in the Charleston Regional Business Journal said
that Boeing paid $10 to Stone Mountain Industrial Park for an option on
the land, and right of first refusal until July 30, 2014.
The land is adjacent to the Boeing Interiors Responsibility Center,
about five miles north of Boeing's final assembly plant for 787. The
interiors center builds interior parts for 787s.
In a case of life imitating art, a pair of young Cuban actors who were
expected at the New York premiere of their film about defecting to the
U.S. have disappeared after landing in Miami.
The film "Una Noche" is about three young Cubans who decide to flee the
country on a raft after one of them is accused of assault. The film
follows the day they attempt to make it 90 miles across the ocean to
Florida.
All three of the film's stars—Anailin de la Rua de la Torre, Javier Nunez Florian and Dariel Arrechaga—were expected to appear at New York's Tribeca Film Festival for the premiere. But Torre and Florian, both 19, were nowhere to be found the night of the event.
Report Says Program Will Exhaust Reserves Three Years Earlier Than Expected
Social Security, which pays retirement and disability benefits to 56
million Americans, will exhaust its reserves by 2033, three years sooner
than previously estimated, a new government report said Monday.
