SHADMIA’S WORLD

Dr. Kevin Antario Brown, 37, was charged with a total of 19 counts, including rape, performing a lewd act on a 15-year-old child, sexual battery by fraud and sexual exploitation. All his victims were former patients including an undercover officer who was investigating the case. If convicted he could spend more than 25 years behind bars. See TV news coverage here.

Dr. Brown is a general practitioner medical doctor formerly practicing medicine at the Crenshaw Expo Medical Center, 3631 Crenshaw Boulevard, Los Angeles.

His problems all began when an unidentified 18-year-old girl complained to the police, in June 2007, that Dr. Brown had touched her inappropriately during a medical examination. The police launched a year-long investigation, using an undercover officer to pose as one of his patients. She was also molested.

Dr Kevin Antario Brown was arrested July 8 at his Los Angeles home and was initially charged with sexually molesting a female patient and a female undercover police officer. He was subsequently freed on $50,000 bail.

However, after his arrest more people came forward, claiming he also sexually molested them. Dr Brown was arrested again, this time on 19 felony counts including: performing a lewd act on a 15-year-old child, rape, sexual battery by fraud and sexual exploitation. The alleged crimes occurred between Nov. 6, 2006, and this May 31 2008. Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Ann Marie Wise, of the sex crimes division, said:

“Since we filed the charges, we have been flooded with phone calls, both from other alleged victims and from other agencies, saying: ‘By the way, we are looking at him for this.’”

Ann Marie Wise also said that there were more people involved than anticipated and that the investigation was not yet over and more charges were likely.

“We were certainly expecting additional women to come forward, but the number has been probably higher than we would usually expect in this sort of investigation. We didn’t want to rush and file all of them [alleged victims] all at once. We have finished interviewing some of the women, and others have come forward in the past two days and we haven’t spoken to them yet.”

Bail was set at $4 million as requested by the prosecution. They considered Dr Brown to be a flight risk. His father, Ewart Brown, is the premier of the island of Bermuda and they feared that he might try to flee there to avoid prosecution.

According to reports, an affidavit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court says that Dr. Brown is being investigated for allegedly over-prescribing the opiate painkiller Oxycontin. No charges have yet been filed in that case. Investigators are also probing Dr. Brown’s alleged role in a multi-million dollar medical fraud, the affidavit says. In recent years, doctors have been convicted of making fraudulent claims to Medi-Cal and Medi-Care - two bodies set up to provide medical aid to the poor.

Special Agent J. Timothy Fives, of the Medi-Cal Fraud and Elder Abuse unit in the California Attorney General’s Office, said that during a raid on another doctor’s home in October, investigators obtained a list of those allegedly involved in the fraud. Dr. Brown’s name was on the list, Mr. Fives said. He says that doctors already convicted of fraud have told him that Dr. Brown recruited them into the scheme adding:

“Physicians have stated during interviews that they paid Dr. Brown a percentage of their income from fraudulent Medi-Cal and Medi-Care claims in payment for him setting them up in business.”

On top of his work as a doctor, Dr. Brown runs the Urban Health Institute, a charity set up to provide disaster relief in the U.S., Africa and elsewhere. The charity attracted controversy earlier this year when it was revealed Premier Ewart Brown used taxpayers’ funds to help sponsor a party thrown to benefit the charity. The Premier was a guest of his son at the charity poker event, held at the Playboy Mansion in L.A.

Premier Ewart Brown of Bermuda continues to have faith in his son saying: “I have been in touch with him and he denies the charges and we trust that he will be exonerated.”

The René Oltra camp at Cap D’Adge in the Hérault is a resort for nudists. Located just a few miles from Montpellier in France. It is billed as  “One of the worlds best clothing-optional and naturism, naturist villages and resorts.”

Cap d’Agde naturism resort is an enclosed self-contained village, where anyone who enjoys this lifestyle can enjoy vacations or holidays and everything including going to the bank, post office, restaurants, launderette or for a walk along the 3.5 mile beach, as nature intended.

This may sound like the closest thing to heaven on earth for nudists. There is however trouble in paradise. It appears that the nudist camp has been keeping a black list of undesirables, people who will be refused entry to its facilities. This was discovered when a client was refused entry to the camp and went to the authorities to complain about being discriminated against. The unidentified person contacted the Commission nationale de l’informatique et de la liberté (CNIL) which is France’s data protection authority.

The CNIL sent inspectors to investigate the allegations and discovered that resort did in fact keep a list of people who were banned from their facilities. The list contained names of people who had been banned for various offenses including: non-payment of bills, making too much noise, lack of personal hygiene and the wearing of clothes etc…

Keeping a black list is not illegal but organizations who wish to exclude certain people from their facilities need the authorization of the CNIL. After concluding its investigation the CNIL gave the resort permission to keep its black list with the caveat that it informed potential and existing clients of the black list’s existence. Also, anyone charged with an “objective” offence could be banned from the resort for up to three years.

Cap D’Adge has rules that it expects all of its patrons to abide by. Violations can lead to expulsion from the resort (and of course being placed on their black list). Some of the rules include:

• Access to the quarter is reserved for naturists or those working there.
• Total nudity is obligatory within the quarter and on the beach, as soon as climatic conditions permit.
• Photo shots and filming are strictly limited to members of the family.
• There are also several laws banning any sort of lewd or crude behavior in the naturist quarter.
• Teenagers are allowed to wear clothes, if they feel uncomfortable with the environment.

To find out more about Cap D’Agde, visit their website at: http://www.capdagdefrance.co.uk

Baron “Scooter” Pikes, 21, died horribly on Jan 17th 2008. Handcuffed in police custody and pleading for mercy he was tasered 9 times by officer Scott Nugent who is white. Pikes is Black. The incident occurred between 1:28pm and 2:07pm. The official police report of what happened in those 39 minutes is starkly refuted by eyewitnesses and physical evidence.

The Police Report:

Nugent spotted Pikes walking along the street and attempted to arrest him on an outstanding warrant for drug possession, according to Police Chief Johnny Ray Carpenter. Pikes took off running, but another officer cornered him outside a nearby grocery store. Pikes resisted arrest and Nugent subdued him with a shock from a Taser.

Then on the way to the police station, Pikes fell ill and told the officers he suffered from asthma and was high on crack cocaine and PCP. The officers called for an ambulance, but Pikes later died at the hospital.

Six months later, the Winnfield police are standing by that story. Meanwhile, the Louisiana State Police are investigating the case, and no charges have been filed against Nugent or two other Winnfield police officers who assisted him in arresting Pikes, although the City Council did decide to fire Nugent from the force in May.

Contradictory Evidence:

There is plenty of contradictory evidence, including officer Nugent’s own report of the incident, the autopsy results and eyewitness accounts.

An autopsy determined there were no drugs in Pikes’ system and that he did not have asthma, according to Dr. Randolph Williams, the Winn Parish coroner. After consulting about the case with Dr. Michael Baden, a nationally prominent forensic pathologist, Williams ruled last month that Pikes’ death was a homicide. On the death certificate, he listed the cause of death as “cardiac arrest following nine 50,000-volt electroshock applications from a conductive electrical weapon.”

Moreover, Pikes did not resist arrest, and he was handcuffed while lying on the ground, according to Nugent’s police report of the incident. It was only after Pikes refused Nugent’s command to stand up that the officer applied the first Taser shock in the middle of his back, Nugent wrote.

Several more Taser shocks followed quickly, Nugent stated, because Pikes kept falling down and refusing to get back up. Grocery shoppers who witnessed the incident later told Pikes’ family that he had pleaded with Nugent: “Please, you all got me. Please don’t Tase me again.”

Williams said police records showed Nugent administered nine Taser shocks to Pikes over a 14-minute period. The last two jolts, delivered as police pulled Pikes from a patrol car at the police station, elicited no physical reaction because the suspect was unconscious, Williams said.

Only after Pikes was carried into the police station and slumped into a chair did police call for an ambulance. He was pronounced dead soon afterward at the local hospital.

“God did not just call this young man home,” said Williams, who has served as parish coroner for the past 33 years. “Fourteen minutes elapsed between the first shock and the last. If somebody can tell me anything else that killed this otherwise perfectly healthy young man in 14 minutes, I’d like to know it.”

“This case may be the most unnecessary death I have ever had to investigate,” Williams said. “[Pikes] put up no fuss, no fighting, no physical aggression. The Taser was not used to take him into custody. He just didn’t respond quickly enough to the officer’s commands.”

Winn Parish District Atty. Chris Nevils says he expects to present the case to a grand jury after he receives the results of the state police investigation.

Colorful History of Winnfield:

Winnfield is just 40 miles from Jena, La. the site of the racially explosive prosecution of six black teenagers charged with beating a white youth that last year triggered one of the largest American civil rights demonstrations in decades. In a bizarre twist of fate it turns out that Baron Pikes is the first cousin of Mychal Bell, the lead defendant in the Jena 6 case.

Winnfield is also the birthplace of two of Louisiana’s most colorful and notorious governors, Huey and Earl Long.

The police chief of Winnfield committed suicide three years ago after losing a close election marred by allegations of fraud and vote-buying. Just four months later, the district attorney killed himself after allegedly skimming $200,000 from his office budget and extorting payments from criminal defendants to make their cases go away.

The current police chief is a convicted drug offender who got a pardon from Edwin Edwards, the former Louisiana governor who is serving time in federal prison for corruption convictions.

All of that tangled history is now wrapped up in the Pikes case, because Scott Nugent, the officer who Tasered him, is the well-connected son of the former police chief who killed himself and the protégé of the current chief, who hired him onto the force.

In less than two years on Winnfield’s 20-officer police force, police records show, Nugent ranked as the department’s most aggressive Taser user. Among the recipients were a 15-year-old African-American runaway who was not charged with any crime and Pikes’ father, currently serving a prison sentence for a drug offense, who was Tasered by Nugent last year, according to Kayshon Collins.

Joe Heard said his 15-year-old son was Tasered twice by Nugent last August, after Heard reported the youth as a runaway and asked the police to help find him.

“He snuck out of the house to be with a girl,” Heard said. “I asked the police to bring him home, and they did, but in pieces–he was all scraped up and bruised. They told me the next time he runs, ‘You know we’re going to shoot him.’ “

Officer Scott Nugent, 21, declined to be interviewed for this story. But his attorney, Phillip Terrell, said that Nugent “acted within the ambit of his training and Winnfield Police Department policies”, an opinion seconded by police spokesman Lt. Charles Curry.

Taser Safety Guidelines:

The official Winnfield Police Department Taser policy appears to prohibit the weapon’s use against a nonviolent suspect who has already been handcuffed:

“The Taser shall only be deployed in circumstances where it is deemed reasonably necessary to control a dangerous or violent subject,” the policy states. It also requires that a suspect who has been Tasered should immediately be checked out at a hospital, which did not happen in Pikes’ case.

Safety guidelines issued by Taser International Inc., the manufacturer of the device that is now used by more than 12,700 law enforcement and military agencies worldwide, warn officers to “minimize repeated, continuous, and/or simultaneous exposures.”

Company officials, citing dozens of medical studies, insist Tasers are safe when used properly. But few of those studies examined the effect of multiple Taser applications over a short period of time. The U.S. Department of Justice, in a study released in June, concluded that “the medical risks of repeated or continuous [Taser] exposure are unknown.”

“We want the police officer to be prosecuted for what he done,” Pikes’ stepmother, Kayshon Collins. We got the death certificate from the funeral home in June, and it said the death was a homicide.”

The Louisiana ACLU said that police officers should be handled just as other citizens.

“Police must be accountable for their actions just as others are, and if excessive police force caused Mr. Pikes’ death, the officers must be held accountable,” Marjorie Esman, executive director, said in a prepared statement. “The Louisiana State Police are reviewing this unfortunate death and, if their review indicates that Mr. Pikes died as a result of police misconduct, we expect the District Attorney to prosecute as it would any other death that occurs in Winn Parish.”

“I cannot and will not judge a case before I have all the facts,” Nevils said in a statement provided to BlackAmericaWeb.com. “But I will assure you that if any persons are found to have committed a crime, they will be prosecuted without regard to who they are. On the other hand, if no crime has been committed, I’m not going to bring charges because it might be a popular thing to do.”

In what is seen as a victory for the right-to-privacy, the Washington State Supreme Court decided that the scent of marijuana coming from a vehicle is not sufficient reason to arrest all the occupants of that vehicle. The decision was unanimous. They did however uphold the right of the police to stop and search a vehicle that smelled of marijuana but without further evidence they could not arrest nor search all the occupants.

…..we have concluded that where officers do not have anything to independently connect an individual to illegal activity, no probable cause exists and an arrest or search of that person is invalid….the arrest of one or more vehicle occupants does not, without more, provide “‘authority of law’ under article I, section 7 of our state constitution to search other, non-arrested vehicle passengers, including personal belongings.”

This ruling resulted from a case that had been brought up through the lower courts with split decisions. It involved two people, Jeremy Grande and Lacee Hurley, who were in a car which was stopped by the police in April 2006 in Skagit County. The car was driven by Lacee Hurley when they were pulled over by State Patrol Trooper Brent Hanger. Trooper Hanger said he stopped the car because the windows were too darkly tinted. He said he smelled pot in the car, so he arrested and handcuffed Grande and Hurley.

A search of Grande revealed a glass pipe with marijuana in his pocket. Hanger searched the car and found a joint in an ashtray, which Hurley said belonged to her. Both were charged with marijuana possession and Grande was also charged with possession of drug paraphernalia.

The case initially came before the Skagit County District Court, which found there was no probable cause for Grande’s arrest. But the state appealed the ruling and the county’s Superior Court reversed the order. The case was then appealed to the state Supreme Court.

Summing up the state Supreme Court’s decision, Justice Charles W. Johnson wrote:

“Our state constitution protects our individual privacy, meaning that we are free from unnecessary police intrusion into our private affairs unless a police officer can clearly associate the crime with the individual.” In the case of the Skagit County traffic stop, the court found the mere presence of the odor of marijuana was not enough probable cause to warrant the arrest of Grande.

Attorney David Zuckerman, who brought the case before the state Supreme Court, said the problem is that arresting someone based solely on the odor of marijuana can affect innocents.

“The smell of marijuana smoke can linger for weeks,” Zuckerman said. “You could have a perfectly innocent citizen get into a car where somebody smoked marijuana at some point … and an officer can just pull you out of a car and book you based on that.”

The decision doesn’t mean an officer must walk away from a vehicle that smells of pot. Trooper Hanger did have probable cause to search the car, the state Supreme Court decision said, just not to arrest Grande. Law-enforcement officers say it won’t greatly affect the way they make arrests.

“What this means is officers are going to have to be a little more keen in their investigative skills,” said Don Pierce, executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.

“Normally, if you come across the odor of marijuana … there’s something else going on that helps you identify who the responsible person or persons is.”

Advocates for drug-law reform cheered the ruling as a long overdue step in the right direction.

“As a general statement, it’s a step back from the direction that our government has been going as we’re veering into a sort of surveillance society,” said Alison Holcomb of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Washington chapter. “It strikes me as refreshing that the court has reaffirmed the values that our constitution calls for.”

When it comes to passengers, though, the scent of pot alone doesn’t give probable cause to arrest everyone in the car. Officers need additional evidence that each individual broke the law.

“Our cases have strongly and rightfully protected our constitution’s protection of individual privacy,” Justice Charles Johnson wrote for the court. “The protections … do not fade away or disappear within the confines of an automobile.”

In a pretrial hearing for Grande, the district judge found there was not specific probable cause to justify his arrest, and suppressed the evidence. But the Skagit County Superior Court overturned that ruling, pointing to a 1979 appellate ruling that said the smell of pot coming from a car was probable cause to arrest the passengers and driver. The State Supreme Court said subsequent federal case law has wiped away the legal footing of that 1979 decision.

I guess it goes without saying but Attorney David Zuckerman said Jeremy Grande was delighted with the decision.

Edson Godinez, 17, of the city of Newburgh, NY went before Orange County Court Judge Robert Freehill to be sentenced for assaulting police officer, Richard Hammer on Feb. 16, 2008. He had been charged with 3 felonies: Two counts of second-degree assault and a single count of attempted aggravated assault on a police officer. He also faced misdemeanor charges of fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon and resisting arrest.

It all began about 1:45 a.m. on Feb. 16th on Mill Street, Newburgh when police officer Richard Hammer saw a gang of at least twelve Hispanic males chasing another unidentified 23-year-old Hispanic male. They caught up with the fleeing man and began a vicious assault. That was when officer Hammer attempted to intervene. While trying to arrest the two ringleaders who led the attack, he was also assaulted by 5 or 6 others in the gang. During the altercation Hammer was stabbed by one of the two men (Godinez) he was trying to arrest. The other one and the rest of the gang escaped. The fight was believed to have stemmed from a dispute between two street gangs in Newburgh, the Barrio Benkard Kings (BBKs) and La Eme. In his defense Godinez claimed he didn’t know that a police officer was the one who was trying to break up the brawl.

In court Godinez pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of attempted aggravated assault on a police office. The prosecution recommended 9 years in prison but Godinez’ lawyer, Gary Abramson of the Orange County Legal Aid Society, argued for a lesser sentence.The maximum sentence was 15 years. In the end Judge Robert Freehill sentenced Godinez to five years in state prison. The judge also denied Godinez youthful offender treatment, which would have sealed his record. Godinez apologized for his actions in a barely audible voice, wiping his eyes as he spoke.

It never fails to amaze me how asinine and full of bigotry some people can be. The following racially-charged story is set in an institution of higher learning……yes, a university!! It involves a student, Keith John Sampson, working as a janitor; a co-worker, Nakea William; a book: Todd Tucker’s “Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan”; the school’s affirmative-action officer, Lillian Charleston, and the school’s administration. Before the situation is resolved the ACLU, FIRE (the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) and the Wall Street Journal all got involved.

It all began at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI), when Keith Sampson, a white man, brought a history book to read in the break room of the university where he studies and works as a janitor. The book was about the defeat of the Ku Klux Klan by Notre Dame students in a 1924 street brawl. Sampson, who is part Irish explains it this way:

The book was Todd Tucker’s “Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan”; I was reading it on break from my campus job as a janitor. The same book is in the university library.

Tucker recounts events of 1924, when the loathsome Klan was a dominant force in Indiana - until it went to South Bend to taunt the Irish Catholic students at the University of Notre Dame.

When the KKK tried to rally, the students confronted them. They stole Klan robes and destroyed their crosses, driving the KKK out of town in a downpour.

I read the historic encounter and imagined myself with these brave Irish Catholics, as they street-fought the Klan. (I’m part-Irish, and was raised Catholic.)

One of his co-workers, Nakea William, complained about his reading material which started the following ridiculous chain of events in motion:

• Mr. Sampson was in short order visited by his union representative, who informed him he must not bring this book to the break room, and that he could be fired. Taking the book to the campus, Mr. Sampson says he was told, was “like bringing pornography to work.” That it was a history of the battle students waged against the Klan in the 1920s in no way impressed the union rep.
• The assistant affirmative action officer who next summoned the student was similarly unimpressed. Indeed she was, Mr. Sampson says, irate at his explanation that he was, after all, reading a scholarly book. “The Klan still rules Indiana,” Marguerite Watkins told him – didn’t he know that? Mr. Sampson, by now dazed, pointed out that this book was carried in the university library. Yes, she retorted, you can get Klan propaganda in the library.

The matter was brought to the attention of Lillian Charleston, the school’s affirmative-action officer who responded to the incident by writing Sampson the following letter:

Upon review of this matter, we conclude that your conduct constitutes racial harassment in that you demonstrated disdain and insensitivity to your co-workers who repeatedly requested that you refrain from reading the book which has such an inflammatory and offensive topic in their presence. You contend that you weren’t aware of the offensive nature of the topic and were reading the book about the KKK to better understand discrimination. However you used extremely poor judgment by insisting on openly reading the book related to a historically and racially abhorrent subject in the presence of your Black co-workers. Furthermore, employing the legal “reasonable person standard,” a majority of adults are aware of and understand how repugnant the KKK is to African Americans, their reactions to the Klan, and the reasonableness of the request that you not read the book in their presence.

During your meeting with Marguerite Watkins, Assistant Affirmative Action Officer [sic] you were instructed to stop reading the book in the immediate presence of your co-workers and when reading the book to sit apart from the immediate proximity of these co-workers. Please be advised, any future substantiated conduct of a similar nature could result in serious disciplinary action.

After the official judgment against him, Mr. Sampson turned to the Indiana state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, whose office contacted university attorneys. The case also got some sharp local press coverage that threatened to get wider……it was a great story:  A university had brought a case against a student on grounds of a book he had been reading.

Bowing to the pressure of the publicity surrounding the case, Lillian Charleston decided to revise her comments and wrote another letter to Simpson to clarify the first one:

And so the new letter to Mr. Sampson by affirmative action officer Charleston brought word that she wished to clarify her previous letter, and to say it was “permissible for him to read scholarly books or other materials on break time.” About the essential and only theme of the first letter – the “racially abhorrent” subject of the book – or the warnings that any “future substantiated conduct of a similar nature could mean serious disciplinary action” – there was not a word. She had meant in that first letter, she said, only to address “conduct” that caused concern among his co-workers.

What that conduct was, the affirmative action officer did not reveal – but she had delivered the message rewriting the history of the case. Absolutely and for certain there had been no problem about any book he had been reading.

What, then, was the offense? “Harassing behavior.” While reading the book? What the behavior was, one learned, could never be revealed. There was, of course, no other offensive behavior.

University Chancellor Charles R. Bantz, after being pressured by FIRE (the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) as well as the ACLU, finally sent them a letter expressing regret over this affair, and testifying to his profound commitment to freedom of expression. After it was pointed out that the Chancellor “forgot” to express his regrets to the person most affected by the entire incident……Keith John Sampson, he also sent the following letter address to Sampson:

I want to offer you my apology for the problems associated with the letter you received from the Affirmative Action Office………A recent column in the Wall Street Journal reminded me that while I had expressed my regrets to……the Indiana Civil Liberties Union and the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education…..I had not done so to you personally.

I can candidly say we regret this situation took place….

Budweiser “The King of Beers” born in 1876 and one of the iconic American brands is no longer an American brand. It now belongs to a Belgian company. In a deal worth $52 billion, InBev, based in Leuven, Belgium, and run by a Brazilian management team, now owns the 130-year-old Anheuser-Busch founded by Eberhard Anheuser and Adolphus Busch. For an historical timeline and brief history of the company click here.

The deal, which amounts to $70 per share, was approved by the board of Anheuser-Busch but must still be approved by regulators and both companies’ shareholders. The deal, which is expected to be approved, would be the biggest in the industry and the third-largest ever foreign takeover of a US company.

It will make the new company, Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s third-largest consumer products company by market capitalization after Procter & Gamble of the United States and Nestle SA of Switzerland. It will easily become the world’s largest brewer, eclipsing SAB Miller, producing 12 billion gallons of beer per year. Anheuser’s home town of St. Louis, Missouri, will be the headquarters for the North American region and the global home of the flagship Budweiser brand.

InBev CEO Carlos Brito will be chief executive officer (click here for interview) of the combined company. The Board of Directors of the combined company will be comprised of the existing directors of the InBev Board, Anheuser-Busch President and CEO August Busch IV and one other current or former director from the Anheuser-Busch Board. Anheuser-Busch will become a wholly owned subsidiary of InBev. See the entire press release here.

Carlos Brito, CEO of InBev, said:

“We are very pleased to announce this historic transaction today, bringing together two great companies that share a rich history of brewing traditions. We are extremely excited about the opportunities that this combination will create for consumers worldwide, as well as our shareholders, employees, business partners and wholesalers. Together, Anheuser-Busch and InBev will be able to accomplish much more than each can on its own. We have been successful business partners for quite some time, and this is the natural next step for us in an increasingly competitive global environment. This combination will create a stronger, more competitive global company with an unrivaled worldwide brand portfolio and distribution network, with great potential for growth all over the world.”

August Busch IV, Anheuser-Busch President and CEO, stated:

“Today’s announcement brings new opportunities for Anheuser-Busch and its business, brands and employees. This agreement provides additional and certain value for Anheuser-Busch shareholders, while enhancing global market access for Budweiser, one of America’s true iconic brands. We will leverage our collective strengths to create a truly diversified, global company to sustain long-term growth and profitability. In the United States and Canada, both InBev and Anheuser-Busch have seen significant benefits from our existing relationship and we look forward to replicating this success in other parts of the world.”

The sale of Anheuser-Busch has had mixed reactions, a nostalgic sense of loss coupled with a feeling of powerless resignation, among the American public:

“It’s a crime,” Billy Arr said, sitting in Bobby’s Idle Hour Lounge on Nashville’s Music Row on Monday, a cold Budweiser in one hand and a cigarette in the other. “I’ve been drinking this stuff since the 1960s, and this is hard to take,” said Arr, 65, a successful songwriter and artist whose compositions have been recorded by some of Nashville’s most famous performers. He continued “I just hate to see another American company bite the dust,” he said. “Soon there’s not going to be anything left that’s American. But I doubt they’ll change anything about the beer except for raising the price. I’ll keep drinking it for now, but if they take that American eagle off the label, then I’m out.”

“Bud’s the biggest brand here, and we don’t even have any imported beer in the house,” said Bobby’s owner, Dianne Herald, 58. “I know the Budweiser folks, and they’re good people. But I don’t like them selling out to foreigners.”

Standing in the parking lot inhaling the thick smell of malt, Dale Anderson of Iowa, who is in St. Louis to take the famous Budweiser brewery tour, will never forget the timing of his visit.

“I’m a third-generation Budweiser drinker, and ironically, it’s kind of a sad day, a bittersweet day,” he said. “But I’ll continue to drink it if they make the same product. … I just wish it could have stayed American.”

On the cover of the July 21, 2008 issue of The New Yorker magazine is the picture above. It depicts Barak Obama in Muslim clothes doing a fist-bump with his wife, who has one hand on her hip and is dressed up as a Afro-wearing, gun-toting terrorist. The scene is set in the Oval office with the American flag burning in the fireplace. Above the fireplace is a partially hidden picture of a bearded Muslim resembling Osama Bin Laden. The New Yorker magazine describes the cover as satire:

“Satire is a part of what we do, and it is meant to bring things out in the open, to hold a mirror to prejudice, the hateful and the absurd.”

Well if that was the intention……Boy, did they miss the mark! When people were shown the picture, the vast majority thought it was in bad taste. The Obama campaign said: “…..most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree.” John McCain said “I think it is totally inappropriate and frankly I understand if Senator Obama and his supporters would find it offensive.”

Below are two video clips that examine the controversy from different perspectives:

When Eileen Hafner looked at the political cartoon on the cover of the New Yorker magazine, her jaw dropped:

“I’m really offended by it,” Hafner, 55, of Bay Shore, said. “I plan on voting for McCain, but even still, I can’t believe they would go there,” she said of the magazine.

Others had similar reactions:

“There is nothing funny about it,” said Valerie Melhado, 47, of West Babylon. “And the Osama bin Laden painting on the wall in the corner — that just gave me chills.”

“If they did something of equal tastelessness about Bush or Cheney, I could say that I liked it,” Zipkin, of Bay Shore, said. “A lot of people are just gonna see the turban and think poorly of Obama and his wife. Quite honestly,” Zipkin added, “I find it offensive to my intelligence.”

However, some people saw it differently:

“I think it’s pretty comical,” DiMaggio, 84, said. “I don’t know much about his background, but he’s not going to win anyway. This won’t change that.”

“I think the picture depicted them the way they really are,” said Denise Demichele of Bay Shore, who plans to vote for McCain, the Republican candidate, for president. “They’re way too militant.”

In a published email to The Huffington Post, cartoonist Barry Blitt wrote, “I think the idea that the Obamas are branded as unpatriotic [let alone as terrorists] in certain sectors is preposterous. It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is.”

I want to know what you think. Is it, in the words of Shakespeare “Much ado about nothing” or were you offended by the imagery? Please post your thoughts in the comments section of this blog.

Elisabeth Fritzl, 42, who was imprisoned for 24 years by her father, Josef Fritzl, and bore him 7 children; has been given medical clearance to begin testifying about her ordeal. She has already begun to answer questions and will continue to do so in the coming week. Elisabeth has said that she never wants to see her father ever again…..not even at trial. So in order to accommodate her wishes, all of her testimony is being videotaped so that she will not be forced to confront him in court.

The trial of Josef Fritzl is scheduled to begin later this year in front of one of Austria’s most senior female judges, Andrea Humer, 48, who is considered to be an expert in sex crimes. However, under Austrian law, Elisabeth is being questioned by the investigative judge Christoph Bauer, and not the trial judge Andrea Humer. Neither the contents of the questioning nor the upcoming trial will be open to the public.

The actual questioning of Elisabeth is taking place in two separate rooms of the same building via a video link up. In one room will be Elisabeth and her lawyer Eva Plaz, along with judge Christoph Bauer. In the other room will be state prosecutor Christiane Burkheiser and Josef Fritzl’s lawyer Rudolf Mayer. Defense lawyer Rudolf Mayer is allowed to ask questions, but his client, Josef Fritzl, who is also entitled to attend, has waived his right to be there. Rudolf Mayer, said: “My client will definitely not attend the questioning.” Elisabeth’s two oldest children, who spent their entire lives in the cellar, Kerstin, 19, and Stefan,18, will also be questioned by the court as soon as doctors give their approval. Josef Fritzl’s wife Rosemarie, 68, is also expected to be questioned.

In what may be a surprising development, it turns out that Austrian law, does not allow for cumulative convictions. This means that even if Josef Fritzl is convicted of multiple crimes he will only effectively serve one punishment, for the offense that carries the longest prison sentence.

Fritzl is facing potential charges of manslaughter for the newborn that died, as well as rape, coercion, deprivation of freedom and incest. But prosecutors told The Times that since the baby died in 1997, the manslaughter charges would be “extremely difficult” to prove. Even the rape charges, which carry a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison, could be impossible to probe because of a lack of forensic evidence.

What this means is that the only charge that is certain to be proved in court is deprivation of freedom, a crime that can only be punished with ten years in prison under Austrian law. Josef Fritzl could be a free man after only 10 years in prison.

However, here’s the irony in the situation….. Josef Fritzl, who incarcerated his own daughter in a windowless dungeon for 24 years, has admitted that he can’t stand being locked up after only two months in prison. In spite of his fear of being beaten up or killed by other inmates, who routinely target child sex offenders, Josef has demanded his right to 30 minutes exercise outside every day. At night fellow inmates bang on the walls and shout: “Come on out Satan, we want to play.”

Fritzl, who remains held in pretrial detention in St. Poelten, about 50 miles west of Vienna, now has half-hour walks, protected from other inmates by a close guard of prison officers. Fritzl even told prison guards he enjoyed having the sun on his face during his walks.

“Mr Fritzl is accommodated in a cell for two and recently he has made use of his right to go outside for half an hour per day,” the Telegraph quoted prison spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Erich Huber-Guensthofer, as saying.

A source is quoted as saying: “He usually sits there watching television all day, especially news programs about him. He’s terrified that someone will attack him or try to kill him.”

In encouraging news about the Fritzl family; Lisa, 15, one of Elisabeth’s daughters, was sneaked out of the compound where the family has been staying to attend a summer camp. It is reported that the girl enjoyed four carefree days of outdoor fun under an assumed name with 4,000 other young campers. Armin Blutsch, who commands Amstetten’s fire brigade, and Hans-Heinz Lenze, a local official, said camp organizers took it upon themselves to include her after she said it was her “ardent desire.”

Other family members also have ventured, always in disguise, from the Amstetten-Mauer psychiatric clinic where they have been recovering to make day trips, including swimming outings. The clinic however remains under police guard to shut out the paparazzi who have laid siege to the building in an effort to photograph Elisabeth and her children.

“Fortunately, everything is going very well,” said Christoph Herbst, a lawyer representing the victims. He said they were spending some time each day trying to answer the hundreds of letters sent by well-wishers from around the world.

For the complete story of Elisabeth Fritzl and her ordeal at the hands of her father click the following link for a 5-part video presentation of The Josef Fritzl Story.

We are told that ignorance of the law is no defense. Well here are some sex-related laws that are on the books in various states that may just shock, surprise or entertain you. The following list was compiled by the College Times.

1. In Arizona and 18 other states oral sex is illegal
2. In Virginia, it is illegal to have sex with the lights on
3. In Willowdale, Oregon, it is illegal for husbands to talk dirty during intercourse
4. In Georgia, it is illegal for unmarried couples to have sex
5. In Washington, DC, it is illegal to have sex in any other position than “missionary”
6. In Connorsville, Wisconsin, it is illegal for a man to fire his gun while his female partner is having an orgasm
7. In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, it is illegal to have sex with a truck driver inside a toll booth
8. In Florida, it is illegal to have sex with a porcupine
9. In Utah, it is illegal to marry your first cousin if she/he is under the age of 65
10. In Washington state, it is legal to have sex with animals as long as the animal weighs less than 40 pounds

Remember that if you have committed any of the above offenses, you need to get a good lawyer, because you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.