Why is it so hard to understand the current situation with the impeachment inquiry? Do not expect it to be like a court of law, it isn’t. It is an investigation. It is not a difficult concept folks. If you want to liken it to the criminal justice system, then look at it as being in the grand jury phase. No charges have been leveled yet. The grand jury is secret, the suspect (remember that they are not a defendant yet) does not sit in, nor do they have representation. This is all part of an investigation.
Stop trying to impede the process. If the president did nothing wrong, then the evidence will prove it right?
When the investigation phase concludes, the committee(s) may bring forth articles of impeachment. If they do, then they would be debated and voted upon by the full house.
For the sake of argument, the house votes to refer the articles to the Senate for trial.
If we had a Senate that still cared about the American system, and the rule of law, then the trial in the Senate would review the evidence, question and cross examine witnesses and review evidence.
When the trial ran through the process, the senators would vote. If guilty, then they move to the penalty phase.
In the penalty phase it could be censure, removal, or removal with disqualification from holding federal office.
The GOP needs to let the House do its duty and flow through the process. We know that Moscow Mitch is not going to let anything to happen to Trump, no matter what Trump does. He is a spineless piece of shit.
Remember, patriots believe in the justice system. They believe in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Impeachment is an accusation, not necessarily removal.
IntenseDebate
IntenseDebate
I have decided to run IntenseDebate for the time being.
It is a good platform and the only reason that I was looking to change was for Social Media inclusion. The commenting platforms are not living up to expectations so far.
Commenting systems
How important is it to have social media logins to comment here?
Is it too obstructive to have a login with Intense Debate, or any other system?
A whole new build
Well, for those that have with me for a long time, this may be a shock.
I have migrated to a new server and as I contemplated moving all of the old content, I decided against it. It seems like a good time to get a clean start with no excess clutter to troubleshoot as I develop the new page.
For those that had PissedOffPirate.com email addresses and they stopped working, please let me know if you wish to continue using them and I will set them up on the new server.
I am checking out new commenting systems as well. The biggest flaw with IntenseDebate is that they did not develop with the times. They did not adopt social media commenting, so those who were connecting via Facebook, LinkedIn etc had to create an account to engage. My desire is for a more inclusive commenting structure without the need to yet another login to remember.
Sextortion – Were you aware of it?
As so many are flocking to cell phones and the ages of the users are getting younger, there is a topic that parents need to be aware of.
Sextortion is a form of sexual exploitation that employs non-physical forms of coercion to extort sexual favors from the victim. Sextortion refers to the broad category of sexual exploitation in which abuse of power is the means of coercion, as well as to the category of sexual exploitation in which threatened release of sexual images or information is the means of coercion.[1]
We as a society need to be able to band together to combat this psychological attack against our youth. 83% of the victims are female, and 46% are minors. Like physical sexual assault, it is estimated that only a third or less of the victims report the crime. 60% of the perpetrators knew the victim before the incident.
I have reviewed the evidence of one of these cases personally. No, I will not share that data as the victim does not deserve that. The portrayal below is based on that incident but is sanitized for her privacy. This was properly reported to the appropriate authorities.
Here is how this abuse occurred:
- Victim received a text from an unknown source
- criminal claimed that they had nude photos of the victim
- They also recited her street address, including which room within her apartment was hers
- the pictures were going to be shared on all forms of social media unless she complied with the criminal
- the criminal wanted her to disrobe for more pictures
- on a the second day the criminal resumed texting with a more aggressive tone
- the same intent of getting more pictures
- Criminal escalated to calling the victim and pressuring her to an online video chat service in Scandinavia (I believe in Norway) to excuse herself from family to go to a bathroom to disrobe and put herself on display.
As I and my colleagues tried to trace the evidence and find the personal data exposure, we were impressed with the victim’s awareness of protecting her data. She does not have her college address shared with any databases other than Amazon, and even they did not have which room was hers.
Text messages are very hard to trace unless you are law enforcement. Even for them, they are not easy. Because of my role, I was able to provide the FBI with the owner (not the user) of the phone numbers used to text and call the victim. I was also able to alert the abuse team at the video chat service so that they could review the actions of their users. Since I did not have a subpoena, I was unable to get data to relay to the FBI.
When the victim returned to campus, she found that her roommates were also victims. Since the issue was clearly involving a local perp, the apartment management was advised. They had a very lame excuse that this was a data breach when someone restarted the internet. I am still stunned with how stupid this answer is. The apartment management company did say that seven women had come forward. This number ended up rising to twenty when published by a local media source. The article was a plea for other victims to come forward. It is my personal opinion that the apartment complex has a rogue employee that needs to be identified, arrested, and prosecuted. So far this particular incident is limited to the complex.
When I asked if the abuse has continued, the victim stated that there has not been a peep since the police report was filed. The situation is getting great exposure on campus so the student body is much more aware.
If you check the links below, you will find that this situation is not isolated, but becoming more and more common.
Parents need the same level of awareness. This is the tool that you need to arm your kids (regardless of how grown that they are) so that they can fend off these pond scum samples.
Obviously the first line is to make sure that they do not have these kinds of pictures TO BE shared in the first place. I also know that this is wishful thinking, just like abstaining from sex before committed relationships. It is talking to them so that they know if they do not have content for the criminals to share, then why co-operate with their demands. Do not delete the texts, call logs or any other evidence. The local police (and likely the FBI) need to be contacted. Take the time to file the report. The perp needs to be caught. This is nothing to be ashamed of. Even if your kids DID have content that could be exposed, this is not the time to blame the victim. They did nothing to deserve this. My thought is to treat that situation as you would when your kid calls form a party/bar after drinking. Get them to safety then discuss when it is more mentally safe to do so. If your kids know without a doubt that you will stand with them, then they will be more likely to tell you of the incident so you can help them through it.
I hope that nobody that you know has to go through this, but the numbers indicate that it will hit close to home.
Related useful links:
https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/sextortion
Prosecutors: ‘Sextortion’ Cases Targeting Young Women At Alarming Rate