Palestinian hip-hop trio DAM, above, wield the power of hip-hop as a force against the Israeli occupation of their homeland—the world’s longest—and their minds as well.
Formed in 1998 by brothers Suhell and Tamer Nafar, center and right (friend Mahmoud Jreri, left, was added later), they initially sought to make party records that would earn them cool points with peers and the ladies. Then it was still “just for fun,” says Tamer. They completed a six-track EP titled Stop Selling Drugs, the first time any Palestinian had ever recorded rap music.
Feds raided the nation’s largest kosher slaughterhouse last week when, after a six-month probe, they established that a crystal meth lab was being operated out of the plant, and that employees were bringing weapons with them when they came to work.
a former plant supervisor told investigators that some 80 percent of the workforce was illegal. They included rabbis responsible for kosher supervision, who the source believed entered the United States from Canada without proper immigration documents. The source did not provide evidence for his suspicion about the rabbis. …
At least 300 people were arrested Monday during the raid, for which federal authorities had rented an expansive fairground nearby to serve as a processing center for detainees.
Beats dogfighting any day: Three of Sean Bell’s five killers
This past December, former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick was sentenced to 23 months in Federal prison for dogfighting.
Of what significance is the fact that, for that cruel sport, he will serve far more time than New York Police Department detectives Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora, and Marc Cooper, above, will do for killing Queens resident Sean Bell, in a hail of 50 bullets, the morning of his wedding day? Continue reading →
An estimated 5,000 Black human beings were lynched in the United States between the years 1890 and 1960. By averages, that’s one African-American dying horribly, in racist mob violence, every five days for seventy years. In almost all of these cases, no one was ever charged for the crimes. So affirms the guest on my WBAI-NY / 99.5 FM radio show, NONFICTION, this afternoon, Friday, April 25, 2 pm ET.
Intriguing article in the New York Times a week ago—as part of Dan Barry’s fascinating “This Land” series—on “double-proxy weddings,” performed only in Montana. Through the process, couples who cannot meet physically in order to be married have stand-ins do the job for them.
“Ceremony No. 1,” says the judge, Heidi Ulbricht. That would be the marriage between two members of the Air Force far, far removed from this room in the Flathead County Courthouse. The real groom is 7,300 miles away, in Qatar, while the real bride is merely 1,700 miles away, in Kentucky.
“We are gathered here today in the presence of these witnesses to join in holy matrimony this man and this woman, who have applied for and received a marriage license from the state,” the judge says.
Turning to Sarah Knapton, 22, college student and professional proxy bride, she asks: “Will you have this man by proxy to be your lawful wedded husband, and with him to live together in holy matrimony pursuant to the laws of God and this state?”
“I do,” answers Ms. Knapton, elbow on table, chin in hand.
Two years and 142 cases have passed since Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas last spoke up at oral arguments. It is a period of unbroken silence that contrasts with the rest of the court’s unceasing inquiries.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas says he’d like to be known as the “listening justice.”
Hardly a case goes by without eight justices peppering lawyers with questions. Oral arguments offer justices the chance to resolve nagging doubts about a case, probe its weaknesses or make a point to their colleagues.
Left, right and center, the justices ask and they ask and they ask. Sometimes they debate each other, leaving the lawyer at the podium helpless to jump in. “I think you’re handling these questions very well,” Chief Justice John Roberts quipped to a lawyer recently in the midst of one such exchange.
Leaning back in his leather chair, often looking up at the ceiling, Thomas takes it all in, but he never joins in.
The Associated Press reports Clarence Thomas’s 
