Lachlan Markay

January 26, 2012 at 4:38 pm

George Soros, a billionaire investor and major backer of President Obama, stands to reap a windfall from legislation promoting natural gas-powered vehicles. The White House unveiled a proposal on Thursday that would do just that.

The proposal would offer incentives for companies to buy and use trucks powered by natural gas. Obama announced the effort at a UPS facility in Las Vegas that received stimulus funding to buy natural gas vehicles and build a fueling station for them.

The proposal is remarkably similar to the New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions (NAT GAS) Act.

One company that stands to benefit handsomely from the president’s proposal is Westport Innovations. The company converts diesel engines to be fueled by natural gas. Wall Street analysts predicted a boom for the company if the NAT GAS Act were passed. CNBC analyst Jim Cramer said he “expects shares to absolutely explode” in the event the legislation were to pass.

Jim Cramer made positive mention of Westport, calling it a solid play on natural gas should Congress pass its pending Natural Gas Act. Westport converts diesel engines (i.e. – those found in semi trailers) into ones that run on natural gas.

Benefiting Westport is that it’s: A) basically first to the market, at least in terms of mass production, and B) high barriers of entry for competition because of the complex technology involved in the transformations.

If Westport reaps the predicted windfall, one of the chief beneficiaries will be George Soros, a major Obama donor and supporter. Soros’s hedge fund holds 3,160,063 company shares (as of its last SEC filing).

For the first time, the Justice Department has made public a series of sensitive messages that passed to the highest levels of the agency within hours of an ambush that killed a U.S. border patrol agent…The email messages show the former top federal prosecutor in Arizona, Dennis Burke, notifying an aide to Holder via email on Dec. 15, 2010 that agent Brian Terry had been wounded and died. “Tragic,” responds the aide, Monty Wilkinson. “I’ve alerted the AG, the acting Deputy Attorney General…”

By Jason Buch/San Antonio Express-News
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Zeta-camp-slayings-described-in-Laredo-trial-2612618.php

This undated photo provided by the Laredo Police Department shows Gerardo Castillo Chavez “el Cachetes” in Laredo, Texas. Castillo is a Zeta hit man and drug trafficker on trial in Laredo, Texas on drug conspiracy charges.

LAREDO — A Zeta hit man on Wednesday offered a peek into the slaughter that took place in the small Mexican town of San Fernando, where the remains of 200 bodies were unearthed last year, testifying how new cartel recruits were trained to kill there.

“They would show new recruits how to kill,” testified Wenceslao Tovar, 26, an admitted Zeta sicario, or hit man. “They would give them a machete. If not, they’d give them a sledge hammer and they’d tell them to kill the people they had tied up.”

Those who successfully completed the training were treated to a party that included a raffle with winners getting watches, vehicles and cash, Tovar said. Those who couldn’t kill were made halcones, the Spanish word for “hawks,” used to describe cartel lookouts, he said.

Tovar’s testimony came in the trial of Gerardo Castillo Chavez, a 25-year-old from Mexico, on charges that he took part in killings and assaults in 2006 as part of a drug conspiracy. But testimony in the first day of trail went far beyond Castillo Chavez’s alleged involvement with the Zetas.

Mexican authorities deport and hand over Wenceslao Tovar Jr., a 26-year-old U.S. citizen, to U.S. Marshals at the International Bridge I in Laredo, Texas on July 21, 2011.

Tovar said he met Castillo Chavez, who he knew only as “Cachetes”, or “cheeks” in Spanish, as they went through training in Mexico.

Tovar said he was with about 300 Zeta recruits, members and leaders who trained in late 2005 near San Fernando. It was the second time he’d been sent to such a camp, where Zetas learned military tactics and recruits were forced to prove their mettle by slaughtering bound men, Tovar said.

Defense attorneys challenged his testimony, pointing out that he’s trying to get a reduced sentence and that Tovar, when initially shown a picture of Castillo Chavez by police, said he didn’t recognize the defendant.

Tovar testified Wednesday that he didn’t have his glasses on and couldn’t see the picture well. Later, he backtracked and said he was trying to protect the man he’d met only briefly at the training camp. Defense attorneys also pointed out that Tovar, as well as admitting to killing in the U.S, took part in kidnappings that resulted in dozens of slayings in Mexico.

“You participated in all those murders, and they were still willing to come to an agreement with you?” defense attorney Oscar Vela asked.

In testimony that began midmorning and lasted well into the afternoon, Tovar, a U.S. citizen who was recently deported from Mexico, described how he smuggled drugs for the Zetas in Nuevo Laredo and was recruited as a hit man for the cartel.

Among his revelations were that he and another admitted Zeta sicario committed an until-recently unsolved homicide in 2005 in Laredo.

The two were tasked with killing someone named “Pompoño” who lived in the South Laredo subdivision of Los Presidentes, he said on the witness stand.

Tovar testified that he drove Gabriel Cardona, 25, a co-defendant in the drug conspiracy case who’s serving 80 years in state prison for five killings here and a life sentence in federal prison for killing two U.S. citizens in Mexico, to Pompoño’s house.

Cardona “knocked on the door and he shot the person who came out,” Tovar said. “He killed him. We changed cars and we left to go to Mexico.”

But police said the person killed on May 11, 2005, wasn’t the Zetas’ target but his son, 13-year-old Rogelio Rodriguez III. The case had remained unsolved until Laredo police interviewed Tovar after he was brought to the U.S. in July.

Tovar went on to describe how he and two crews of Zeta sicarios, including a former U.S. Marine pretending to be a police officer, killed a former Nuevo Laredo police officer who was living in the U.S. after joining with a local drug trafficker’s fight against the Zetas.

Tovar pleaded guilty earlier this month to charges related to that killing. He faces up to life in prison.

After the killings in the U.S., Tovar said, he went to work for Miguel “El 40” Treviño Morales and his brother, Omar “El 42” Treviño Morales in Mexico. He attended training camps and worked in the brothers’ bodyguard and enforcement details.

From July until November 2005, Tovar said, he and other Zetas kidnapped 10 to 15 people a week in Nuevo Laredo and turned them over to Miguel Treviño Morales for execution. When he first met Treviño Morales, now believed to be the organization’s second in command, the Zeta commander was in the process of decapitating three people, Tovar said.

At the end of 2005, those who completed the training camp in San Fernando were treated to a party with Gulf Cartel and Zeta leaders — at the time the two organizations were allied — that included the raffle for watches, vehicles and cash.

Tovar said his career with the cartel ended in April 2006, when he had an auto accident that left him confined to a wheelchair.

Testimony in the trial is expected to continue Thursday morning.

WHEN IS AMERICA GOING TO DEFEND THEMSELVES, THEIR JUDEO/CHRISTIAN SELVES.  WE ARE LETTING OURSELVES DEGENERATE  INTO MEXICO.

American Thinker

Three Jihadis
Pamela Geller

It is almost every day now. Jihadi attacks in America. This past week there were three attempted jihad attacks. And what does the media consider the problem? Racistislamophobicantimuslimbigots, of course.

On Saturday, a Muslim named Sami Osmakac was arrested in Florida on charges of plotting to go jihad on nightclubs and the Tampa, Florida, sheriff’s headquarters. “We all have to die,” Osmakac said, “so why not die the Islamic way?”

Osmakac is from Kosovo, making his jihad another thank-you for U.S. involvement in Bosnia. And the U.S. still supports an independent Kosovo state, a militant Islamic state, in the heart of Europe. That is our policy. America refuses to own up to the terrible mistake we made in Europe — worse still, we continue to prosecute the Christian Serbs.

Media reports said that Osmakac, a devout Muslim, was “self-radicalized.” You have to wonder if Western dhimmis stay up nights thinking up new terms for jihad.  Pathetic. Soon after his arrest, video emerged that showed how pious and violent Sami Osmakac really was, as he attacked and bloodied Christian street preachers. The pious Osmakac, who was completely the aggressor, then cried victim to the police, saying that he had been “insulted,” the same fictitious narrative that we are bombarded with daily by Islamic groups and Muslim Brotherhood organizations like the Hamas-tied Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

The police, in what has become standard practice in dealing with Islamic supremacists, treated the perpetrator and the victim with equal contempt, actually charging the bloodied Christian with battery. This was in the same town, Tampa, that classified what was obviously an honor killing of a Muslim woman, Fatima Abdallah, as a “suicide.”

Even worse, after the terrorism arrest, Hassan Shibly, director of the Florida chapter of CAIR, cried “entrapment.” This is, of course, typical of jihadis, but what is really outrageous is that the FBI briefed Shibly prior to Osmakac’s arrest.  Hamas-CAIR was briefed? Was Qaradawi briefed, too?

“The weapons and explosives were provided by the government. Was he just a troubled individual, or did he pose a real threat?” Shibly asked. Hey, Shibly, he was a devout Muslim. Watch the videos: he is preaching the word of Allah in one and head-butting Christians in another.

Also on Sunday, a Muslim in Alabama named Luis Ibarra-Hernandez (the media did not release his Muslim name) shot out store windows and tried to get into a shootout with police officers. Gadsden, Alabama Police spokesperson Capt. Regina May said: “After the man was taken into custody, he reported that he knew he must do something extreme to draw attention to Islam and himself, so he planned to shoot police officers.”

I think it is poetic that this Alabama Muslim wanted to call attention to Islam by shooting at police. He is right, of course. Such actions best illustrate the violent and true nature of jihad. He would have been richly rewarded in paradise, perhaps 73 virgins instead of 72. But as Islamic scholar Robert Spencer points out, “he did not, however, succeed in gaining the space that is guaranteed in Paradise for those who ‘kill and are killed’ for Allah (Qur’an 9:111).”

Meanwhile, the military jihad continues. Last Friday, a former U.S. Army soldier named Craig Baxam was arrested and charged with trying to join al-Shabaab, a jihad terror group in Somalia. Baxam converted to Islam while in the U.S. Military. He said he wanted to die defending Islam, and was “looking for dying with a gun in my hand.”

Late in the day of Sept. 11 10 years ago, someone asked me who I thought the United States would blame for what had just happened in New York and Washington.

Without thinking about it too much I replied: “They’ll attack Afghanistan, but they should bomb Riyadh.”

A decade later I don’t see much reason to change my off-the-cuff judgment that it is in the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh, that the real source of global Islamic radicalism and support for terrorism is to be found.

And it is not just that the Saudi royal family and government have financed and encouraged the worldwide export of their brutally puritanical Wahhabist form of Islam.

Members of the Saudi royal family and government were directly involved in financing and facilitating the 9/11 attacks on the U.S.

Three senior royal princes have been named by one of bin Laden’s lieutenants as key supporters of al-Qaida and the attacks on New York and Washington.

All three died within one week in July 2002. The implication is that they were put to death by Saudi authorities in an attempt to placate the U.S. administration and minimize damage to relations with American officials.

Details of the Saudi involvement with al-Qaida, bin Laden and 9/11 were first set out by author Gerald Posner in his 2003 book Why America Slept. Many other writers, journalists and filmmakers have added details to the Saudi charge sheet since then.

A new book examining the relationship between Saudi Arabia, the Sept. 11 terrorists and the Bush White House, The Eleventh Day, by Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan, has just been published. One of the things this book takes a close look at is the 28-page section of the 2004 Congressional Joint Inquiry into the attacks, which was censored on the orders of president George W. Bush.

Several newspapers have reported that blanked-out sections of the 396page report dealt with Saudi involvement in the attacks. The censorship of those 28 pages is being continued by the administration of Barack Obama.

Bob Graham, the co-chair of the Congressional committee, is quoted by Summers and Swan as telling them his panel found “that the Saudis were facilitating, assisting, some of the hijackers. And my suspicion is that they were providing some assistance to most if not all of the hijackers. It’s my opinion that 9/11 could not have occurred but for the existence of an infrastructure of support within the United States.”

Financial support for bin Laden and his terrorist objectives by elements within the Saudi royal family and government was well known before the 2001 attacks. The CIA noted bin Laden’s transition in the 1990s from an ally in the war against the occupation by the Soviet Union of Afghanistan to a freelance sponsor of jihadist terror against the U.S.

But when in 1996 the CIA set up its first unit dedicated entirely to bin Laden and al-Qaida, it got absolutely no cooperation from the Saudi General Intelligence Department, then headed by Prince Turki al-Faisal.

A former head of intelligence for the Taliban, al-Qaida’s hosts and protectors in Afghanistan in the 1990s, has testified that in 1998 Prince Turki did a deal with bin Laden.

Al Sharpton’s True Role in Crown Heights: Yankel Rosenbaum’s Brother Speaks Out

By Norman Rosenbaum and Isaac Abraham

On Sunday, Rev. Al Sharpton gave his version of what happened 20 years ago in Crown Heights. But although he purports to have reflected on and learned from the riots, the truth is his recollection is egregiously distorted and sanitized.

Sharpton’s motivation for expressing his opinion at this time is unimportant; the fact that he has chosen to do so bestows a responsibility on us all to ensure that the truth is not sacrificed in the telling of our history.

Sharpton says that with the virtue of hindsight, he would have done some things differently – stating that “we,” meaning protesters, “should have expressed more clearly” “the precious value of Yankel Rosenbaum, who was killed by a mob that night.” He says, “I would have also included in my utterances that there was no justification or excuse for violence or for the death of Yankel Rosenbaum.”

But he does not outright apologize for his conduct. And his conduct was reprehensible.

He makes only passing mention of the vile words that incited the anti-Semitic rioters, which made an already volatile violent situation much worse. It was Sharpton who repeatedly bellowed to the rioters, “No justice, no peace!”

And Sharpton claims his remarks at Gavin Cato‘s funeral were misinterpreted. Here is what he said, according to a 1993 report in the Jewish Forward by legendary reporter Philip Gourevitch: “Talk about how Oppenheimer in South Africa sends diamonds straight to Tel Aviv and deals with the diamond merchants right here in Crown Heights. The issue is not anti-Semitism; the issue is apartheid. . . . All we want to say is what Jesus said: If you offend one of these little ones, you got to pay for it. No compromise, no meetings, no coffee klatsch, no skinnin’ and grinnin’.”

Based on everything we have seen and read, Sharpton never called upon the rioters to stop their anti-Semitism-inspired violence. He never called on the rioters to go home. To the contrary, he stirred them up. And three days of anti-Semitic violence became the Crown Heights riots.

Sharpton’s revisionism only serves to perpetuate the fallacy that the riots erupted organically from some underlying ongoing issues between the African-American and Jewish communities of Crown Heights. In other words, that profound tensions were boiling just beneath the surface and were suddenly unleashed by the tragic death of Gavin Cato.

That is simply untrue. The riots were the product of anti-Semites taking advantage of the tragic death of a child to justify inflicting their violence on innocent people – the Jewish community of Crown Heights – and murdering Yankel Rosenbaum, a Jew from Australia, amid the cries of “Kill the Jew!”

It was a mob of about 30 who attacked and murdered Yankel, of which 28 have never been brought to justice. For 20 years, these people have lived free, and continue to do so, among the African-American community.

Instead of invoking the words of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel to legitimize and humanize his opinion, Sharpton would be far better received if he dedicated his efforts to bringing each and every one of those 28 people involved in the crime to justice – prosecuted, convicted and incarcerated.

But that is not a priority in Al Sharpton’s world.

He has given us no genuine expression of remorse. No real regret for what he did. It is not an apology, it is not the truth, and it certainly should not be interpreted as either.

Rosenbaum is the brother of Yankel Rosenbaum, who was stabbed and killed by a mob in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in August 1991. Abraham is a spokesman for the Rosenbaum family.
Photo Caption:The Rev. Al Sharpton’s recent reflections on the Crown Heights riots were egregiously sanitized (T.J. Kirkpatrick/Getty) – Read More: NY Daily News

We Can Do Better Than Al Sharpton

2    A close examination of Al Sharpton’s history of race or “victimologist” hustling.

Widely known is Mr. Sharpton’s role as one of the disingenuous ‘handlers’ of the now-infamous Tawana Brawley, a black teenager who concocted a story of being raped by a group of white men in order to obscure her own misbehavior and escape punishment from an oppressive stepfather.
Mr. Sharpton shares culpability, too, for riots that erupted in 1991 in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, a racially-mixed neighborhood of Hassidic Jews and blacks, after a black child was accidentally killed in an automobile accident involving a Lubavitch Grand Rebbe’s motorcade. Fomented with the vocal complaints and protests of Mr. Sharpton about the injustice of the Jewish “diamond merchants,” neighborhood blacks rioted against Jewish life and property, eventually murdering Yankel Rosenbaum, a young rabbinical student.

That was followed in 1995 with highly-charged protests at Freddy’s Fashion Mart in Harlem, a store—owned by a Jewish proprietor—which was finally burned to the ground, but not before a protestor, urged on by Sharpton’s protests, had opened fire and killed himself and seven others in the store.

Mr. Sharpton’s roles in these events, and his aggressive seeking out of victims to further his calls for justice, are widely known. Less known, and more significant now that Mr. Sharpton wants to be considered as a serious candidate for national office, are some of the other political alliances and victimist relationships he has established in his effort to widen his influence and recognition—leading him to the align himself with an assortment of sociopathic charlatans, criminals, race baiters, and virulent anti-American, anti-white, and anti-Semitic activists.

Politics Mondays: “The Real Al Sharpton (By The Real Lenora Fulani)” by Dr. Lenora Fulani

BlackElectorate.com

All the latest articles about Al Sharpton’s Presidential campaign miss the point. “Nightmarish complications” cries the liberal American Prospect. “The Sharpton nightmare” chuckles conservative columnist Bob Novak. “This strategy of appeasement…is devastating for the party as a whole,” admonishes The New Republic, referring to the legitimacy the white Democratic Presidential contenders are currently conferring on Sharpton. In other words, the shared obsession is about what he might do to the Democratic Party.

I have a different concern. I’m concerned not with what the Reverend Al Sharpton might do to the Democrats. My question is – what have the Democrats done to Al Sharpton?

During my nearly 20-year history with him, I have seen him become ensnared in a dangerous trap, one that is a political dead-end for him and, more importantly, for Black America. I have seen him set aside the visionary for the viable. I have seen him try to recreate himself as a progressive, out of expedience – not principle. I have seen him become what is, sadly, a second rate Black leader.

I know Al Sharpton. I probably know him better than any other Black leader in America knows him. I know him with the kind of intimacy that comes from being together in critical and formative times.

We did many things together in the 1980s and early ‘90s – things you’d expect, like marching for racial justice, sitting through courtroom trials, mourning at funerals for young Black men shot by the police or by local racists. But that was the public dimension. Privately, we’d become partners in a long-term enterprise to fill the vacuum in Black leadership. I bought him a good suit and my friends and I bought him an expensive watch.
We went to Los Angeles and stayed at the ultra-fancy Biltmore Hotel and held meetings with the Cripps and the Bloods. My close friend Jim Mangia and I took him into the gay community in San Francisco – his first public act of connecting to gays and the transgender community.

We’d sit in my offices – often with my political mentor Fred Newman, who funded some of Sharpton’s activities in the early days – plotting, scheming, and laughing about the backwardness of the handkerchief-heads, the white liberals, the phony Black revolutionaries. I brought white people out to Bensonhurst to march with us after the murder of Yusuf Hawkins in 1989 and we’d joke about how crazy the Black nationalists acted in response. Sharpton and I became a team. I was the socialist, he was the preacher. The Black community was curious, but supportive. We were so different from all the other leadership.

II.

Today Al Sharpton is seeking the Democratic nomination for President not simply as a Black candidate, but as an anti-war candidate, a progressive candidate – in other words, as a left candidate. But when I first got to know Sharpton he was not what you’d call a leftist. He was a Black Baptist conservative, fairly homophobic, politically incorrect, prone to nationalism, though smart as a whip. He was persona nongrata to Black leftists and white leftists, they considered him trash and a police informant. The Black establishment and intelligentsia were embarrassed by him. The New York media hated him. To them he was a charlatan, a showman, a publicity seeker with conked hair and a fat belly.

I was no bargain myself – according to the establishment. I was (and am!) a leftist, raised in the Baptist church but no longer religious, with my own brand of political incorrectness. The Black left and the white left hated me too, but for different reasons from the ones that made them hate Al. They snubbed him because he wasn’t a progressive. They snubbed me because I was, although I refused to join their club. (Being a woman didn’t help, either.) The media didn’t like me, but, contrary to how they dealt with Sharpton, they expressed their disdain largely by ignoring me – except when they figured out they could sell papers by calling me a Farrakhan Friend, an anti-Semite, or a cultist.

Sharpton and I both recognized how visionless and compromised the New York Black leadership was, although he saw this in purely racial terms and I saw it in more political terms; I believed (and still believe) that the Democrats had betrayed their progressive roots, abandoning the fight against poverty and injustice in favor of empty notions of Black empowerment. Our partnership was based to no small degree on finding ways to create a new politic for the Black community. Newman and I told Rev he’d have to move left to do that: he’d have to learn and embrace progressive politics much in the same way that Malcolm X, Dr. King and W.E.B. DuBois had; he’d have to be willing to challenge the Black community’s fundamental conservatism in order for it to grow as a force in New York and national politics.

Sharpton was a quick study. He knew Black history, although he was conflicted about the influence of socialists and socialism on these great Black leaders. Still, he was a pragmatist. He saw Jesse Jackson go from 3.5 million votes in his 1984 Presidential bid to 7 million votes in 1988, largely as a function of his own move left and his ability to speak for what became known as America’s Rainbow movement. He saw and he made note, in the brilliant and calculating way that Sharpton always does.

III.

When I ran for President as an independent in 1988 – becoming the first African American and first woman to access the ballot in all 50 states and the District of Columbia – my campaign slogan was “Two Roads Are Better Than One.” The first road was to support Reverend Jackson.

I backed Jackson in the Democratic primaries but I believed (as did Sharpton) that Jesse – and Black America – would be turned away by the Democratic gatekeepers and reminded to stay in our place. The second road was my independent campaign, a tactic to lay the groundwork for an independent political movement that would free up African Americans to re-negotiate partnerships and programmatics with other becoming non-aligned Americans.

In the summer of 1988 Sharpton was with me in Atlanta – where we staged four days of rallies, protests, marches and Black Agenda gatherings outside the Democratic National Convention. Inside, Jackson was being marginalized by Michael Dukakis and the party hierarchs.

Al was understandably circumspect about electoral politics. He saw how difficult the independent road was – I got only a quarter of a million votes in 1988. Like many, he was outraged over what transpired with Jackson, who arrived at the convention having come in second, polling 29% of the votes cast and with 1200 delegates, and who left without the vice presidency or any significant role in either the campaign or the Democratic Party. The party bigwigs were obsessed with trying to bring white Reagan Democrats back into the fold.

Sharpton continued to see himself as the social agitator to my independent electoral crusader. I ran for Governor; he lay down on the subway tracks. I ran for President; he championed Tawana Brawley. “Whatever happens, I don’t want to end up like Jesse Jackson,” he told me repeatedly. He once wrote that the Black community would “be a jackass to follow” the Democratic Party “donkey.”

IV.

But Sharpton, while rejecting the establishment in general and Jackson in particular, was also irresistibly drawn to the limelight. Carefully cultivating his public image as the voice of the Black citizenry, he was almost oblivious to whether the political base gathering around him could be empowered in new ways, rather than simply used to bolster his own political ascendancy. Jackson had done much the same thing.

Sharpton was so incorrigibly committed to promoting himself that on the day he was stabbed in Bensonhurst in 1991, he was already figuring out how to use his near-death experience to open the pearly gates of political acceptability while he still lay in his hospital bed. I know this because Newman and I were there – we’d been with him in the schoolyard staging area when Michael Riccardi thrust a knife into his chest; Newman took him to the hospital in his car because the ambulance was slow to arrive. Once he was out of danger, Sharpton regaled us with hilarious accounts of the solemn parade of Black officialdom that passed by his bedside. The Black hierarchs – from Mayor David Dinkins to Jesse Jackson himself – were eager to preside over his redemption. And Sharpton, for all his righteous fury, wanted to be redeemed. In retrospect, I realize this was the day that Sharpton decided to trade in his nascent independence to become a Democrat.

V.

A year later Sharpton took the plunge and decided to run for office himself. It was early 1992. Jackson had foregone a third run. I was in New Hampshire campaigning. It was my second Presidential try, and I’d entered the Democratic Party primary there to inject a pro-democracy message and to establish myself as a national Black leader who was willing to challenge the Democratic Party.

Sharpton drove up to Manchester to tell us about his decision to enter the Democratic primary for U. S. Senate. (Republican Senator Alphonse D’Amato was the incumbent.) Newman, with a distinct taste for the tongue in cheek, set up a support committee for the campaign that he called “White People for Sharpton.” The committee had a chairman, a treasurer, and, not surprisingly, no members. The media practically choked on the idea. (How the worm turns. Today Tucker Carlson looks like he’d head the committee if he didn’t have prior journalistic commitments.) But back in 1992, Sharpton was still radioactive.

VI.

Unlike Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson was no particular friend of mine. We’ve met in person only a handful of times. We both spoke at a labor rally in Detroit and have seen each other at various functions over the years. After the 1988 campaign Sharpton tried to put together a meeting with Jackson, Newman and myself but it never happened. In the one photograph Jackson and I posed for together we both look pained.

Our political relationship, such as it was, was a rocky one. I had been publicly and vocally critical of what I considered his obeisance to the Democratic Party, and I believe he squandered the force of the Rainbow movement by attaching it so unequivocally to the Democrats.

I wasn’t the only Black leader who thought so. Robert Starks, an associate of Jackson’s from Operation PUSH, once told journalist and author Marshall Frady that after Walter Mondale’s 1984 refusal to put him on his ticket, Jackson “should have organized a solid force to regenerate the Democratic Party, or formed his own independent party. For about two months there after the convention, you were ahead of the game, you could still get the agenda, and he could have put something together that could have made a great difference in this country.” (p. 368 Jesse: the Life and Pilgrimage of Jesse Jackson – Marshall Frady.)

Many people felt that way. I was perhaps the only one who said it publicly, and the only one leading an effort to create an independent party.

But, even with those differences, I will say this much for Jackson. His two Presidential runs were historic. Jackson was a protégé of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and in the hearts and minds of Black America he inherited the legacy of King’s profound mass movement for equality and fairness that still remains unfulfilled.

What’s more, when Jackson ran in 1984 there had not yet been a full blown Black presidential candidacy. Yes, Shirley Chisholm had launched one in 1972, but it was almost immediately buried by the National Black Political Convention in Gary, Indiana. The Gary leadership, looking to reap the benefits of the civil rights and voting rights movements, chose instead to pursue the path of getting more Blacks elected to local public office, for which they wanted the support of liberal white Democrats. They would not back Chisholm over the left’s choice for the Democratic nomination, George McGovern.

Twelve years later, however, there was much water under the Democratic bridge. There was a network of Black elected officials who were hitting the glass ceiling of minority representation. Ronald Reagan was in the White House. The new conservative political reality – combined with the impotence of the Democratic Party to reverse it – fostered a climate ripe for a challenge. Jackson had both the brains and the balls to grab the opening. In so doing, he not only galvanized Black America into having a new stake in the Presidential process, he also galvanized the American left – much of which had previously disdained electoral politics altogether. Dr. King was revered by the left as a true visionary, a man willing to stand alone on principle, who paid the ultimate price for his independence. The left, for the most part, was willing to accept Jackson as his political heir.

In return, Jackson took political risks. Like Dr. King before him, he brought white progressives into his inner circle and asserted a vision that went beyond the Gary assumptions of entitlement and demographics to issues of poverty, the structural defects of capitalism, the critical role of organized labor as an engine for progressive social change, and the dangerously destabilizing nature of U.S. foreign policy. Jackson allowed his entry into electoral politics to transform him from a rudderless vestige of the civil rights era into a full throated left winger. The more he moved left, the more his vote totals grew.

There was one element of the left that Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition did not embrace, however. That was me, Newman and the evolving independent movement we were building. White leftists had busied themselves penning diatribes about us. The most popular of these was entitled Clouds Blur the Rainbow. Newman and I were the clouds. At its Washington, D.C. convention in 1986, the Rainbow Coalition rebuffed efforts to open a dialogue on pursuing an independent strategy if the Democratic Party route failed. And in 1992, the Rainbow Coalition informally sanctioned an “independent” Presidential run by Ron Daniels, a Black long-time leftist, who got on the ballot in nine states and devoted most of his campaign rhetoric to attacks on me.

VII.

1994, the year Sharpton and I both entered the Democratic Party primary to challenge two of New York’s most powerful incumbents – I ran against Mario Cuomo for the gubernatorial nomination, and he went up against Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan – was a turning point in our partnership. We had a very public, very ugly political fight during the campaign. Sharpton and I had planned to endorse each other, but the weeks dragged on and he refused to announce his support for my candidacy. I was interviewed on a popular local talk radio show and suggested that his silence meant that he might have cut a deal with Cuomo.

Sharpton went ballistic. To this day, I do not completely understand what motivated him, but he went on a major public tear against me, accusing me of being Fred Newman’s puppet and a traitor to the Black community, mimicking the Rainbow Coalition’s criticisms of me. He dispatched a variety of proxies to attack me in the Black press. In effect, it was a red-baiting attack designed to undercut me with Black voters and, I presume, to demonstrate to the Democratic Party hierarchs that he wasn’t afraid to take me on. I responded aggressively. Even with the attacks, when the votes were counted, he outpolled me by only five percentage points – 26% vs. 21%.

Following the primary, I did not endorse Cuomo. Instead, I solidified my evolving connection to the Perot movement and accepted Tom Golisano’s request to endorse his independent bid for Governor, a run designed to win ballot status for what became the Independence Party. At one point Sharpton tried to negotiate his way onto the ticket but failed. He went on to conduct a voter registration drive for the Democrats, but Cuomo lost anyway to Republican George Pataki. We won ballot status (Golisano polled 217,000 votes, more than four times the number needed for ballot status) and I set out to bring my base of Black, Latino and progressive independents into the Independence Party.

An interesting, and not irrelevant, side note is a comparison between Sharpton’s and Jackson’s New York numbers. In 1984 Jackson polled 355,541 votes, coming in third behind Walter Mondale and Gary Hart. In 1988 he came in second, with 585,076 votes, beating out Al Gore, among others, in the face of a vicious and highly publicized campaign by then Mayor Ed Koch to tag Jackson as an anti-Semite, warning that any Jew who would vote for him was “crazy.”

In Sharpton’s two statewide primary runs in 1992 and 1994, he didn’t get anywhere near Jackson’s New York totals, polling 166,665 and 178,231 respectively. Most of those votes came from Black districts. My 1994 total — 141,918 votes — came from a cross-section of Black and white communities, dispelling the myth that Sharpton was a significantly bigger vote getter than me among Democrats and establishing that a progressive candidate who is Black could be competitive with a Black candidate whose message was largely nationalistic.)

VIII.

After 1994 our paths diverged dramatically. Sharpton ran for Mayor in 1997, almost forcing a run-off in the Democratic primary. The Democratic nominee, Ruth Messinger, lost badly to Republican Rudy Giuliani. Ed Koch came to Al Sharpton’s birthday party.

I continued building the Independence Party and the national independent movement. We backed Perot’s second run in 1996 and established the Reform Party on a national level. Sharpton got money from Bill Clinton’s Democratic Party for registration and get-out-the-vote activities. We were on distinctly different paths, but were friendly all the same.

In 1999, when Pat Buchanan entered the Reform Party’s Presidential primary and sought my support, I called Sharpton and told him I wanted to bring Buchanan to Harlem to meet with him. He agreed. Buchanan never came. In 2000, after U.S. Senate candidate Hillary Clinton publicly denounced me at an Independence Party forum as an anti-Semite and extremist (she wanted the Independence Party line without a primary and had been told she couldn’t have her way), Sharpton was the only Black Democrat to speak out in my defense.

Late in 2000, as the set-up for the 2001 mayoral contest was proceeding, Sharpton met with Newman and me to talk about his plans. He hadn’t decided whether to run himself, or whether to support Fernando Ferrer. He told us he was under a lot of pressure to join a Black/Latino coalition behind Ferrer’s candidacy, although he was still irked that Ferrer had supported Messinger in 1997 and not him. He was looking for a two-way street that hadn’t materialized.

Sharpton went on to endorse Ferrer, who won the first round of the mayoral primary but lost the run-off to Mark Green. The Ferrer defeat sparked a huge scandal over the Green campaign’s encouragement of white Democrats to back Green on the grounds that Ferrer was really controlled by Sharpton.

The Independence Party, meanwhile, had given our line to Michael Bloomberg, on whose behalf I campaigned in the Black community well before the Sharpton/Green incident played itself out. As soon as it did, Bloomberg gained traction among Black voters. Sharpton appeared at a unity rally with Green, but left early and sat out the rest of the race. The Independence Party went on to provide Bloomberg’s margin of victory, as 30% of the Black vote peeled away from the Democrats. Sharpton and Bloomberg had their picture taken together two days after the election.

IX.

Some have speculated that Sharpton’s idea of a Presidential run was being forced by his weakened circumstances on the ground in New York. The vaunted “Black/Latino” Democratic Party coalition had been deflated by Mark Green, and then undercut by Mike Bloomberg and the Independence/Republican coalition. It was regrouping behind the gubernatorial candidacy of Carl McCall, but Sharpton knew McCall was a loser. What’s more, Harlem Congressman Charles Rangel – not Sharpton – was its prime mover in the Black community. Plus, the Bloomberg win had repositioned the Independence Party in Black politics. The prospect of an African American break with the Democratic Party was “on the table” in a way it had not been before, which meant that I was in a stronger position than ever to challenge him over his role as a militant (albeit conflicted) front-man for the Democrats. Some observers thought he might be looking to disengage from the New York scene for a time.

Whatever his motives, though, Sharpton decided to make the run. That decision required him to come to terms with two things: the rationale for his candidacy, and his “crossover” appeal to white voters. Ironically, that meant he was finally going to have to deal with the issue that Newman and I had posed to him more than a dozen years earlier – the need for him to move to the left, politically, if he was going to be both relevant and significant. It also meant that he would have to face the specter that had haunted him for much of his political career. The man who did not want to end up like Jesse Jackson was about to follow in his footsteps.

X.

In the interviews Sharpton has recently given to the liberal and left press, he tells a story of how the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) reacted to Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow Coalition by pulling the Democratic Party to the right. His candidacy, he says, is about returning the party to its progressive roots. “I watched Jesse take this party to where it should go,” Sharpton told the Village Voice in a February 2003 interview. “This is a battle in 2004 of the children of the Rainbow versus the DLC. I think this is what it’s going to come down to, if I’m successful in what I want to do.”

In actuality, though, Jesse didn’t take the party where it should have gone. He tried, but failed. In 1988, the pinnacle of Jackson’s movement, the Rainbow vision was displaced by Dukakis’ “it’s not about ideology, it’s about competence” anti-vision. No wonder the DLC’s Bill Clinton became the party’s standard bearer in 1992. He was the perfect synthesis of Jackson and Dukakis – of vision and anti-vision. He cared for the problems of the working man and woman (especially the woman) but he was pragmatic. He was a product of the visionary 1960s, but he didn’t inhale. The vision hadn’t mastered him. He had mastered the vision.

Once in the White House – doubtless the beneficiary of Perot’s attraction for what would otherwise have been Republican voters – even Clinton was surprised by the “soullessness” of the Democratic Party. They had the White House and control of Congress. Yet his dream of universal health care for all Americans – virtually all that remained of the party’s historic connection to socialist principles – was shattered. By the midterm elections in 1994, he was nearly undone. Triangulation became the Clinton watchword. He could not pass health care reform. He could only enact welfare reform. There would be no more vision – only deals.

XI.

To follow Jackson, but not end up like him, Sharpton must not allow himself to be overdetermined by the Democrats. He is a smart man. He is a great communicator. He has a profound intimacy with the pain and humiliation of being Black in America. This I know. But over the years he has learned to trade on that pain, bartering whatever vision he had at the ultimate marketplace for commodified oppression – the Democratic Party.

Recently Sharpton told the American Prospect : “Even if I lose, I have the option to negotiate points with the Democratic Party.” What points, exactly? The ones even Bill Clinton – as President – couldn’t win? The poverty, underdevelopment and cultural deprivation of Black America are so great that the political, economic, and social restructuring required to address them go far beyond any “points” that the Democrats are willing to negotiate with Sharpton, or with anyone else.

That is Sharpton’s dilemma. To be a true power on behalf of Black America, he must become bigger and more radical; he must not allow himself to be encumbered by the culture of Democratic Party politics. But to be a player in the Presidential primary process, he must constantly prove his loyalty to it.

More than ten years ago, I moderated a dialogue on Black-Jewish relations in New York politics between Sharpton and Newman in Brooklyn. A young Black woman raised her hand to speak. Where is the vision in all you are doing, Reverend Sharpton? How do you use what you’re doing to achieve freedom and dignity and decent lives for the poor?

We’ll deal with that, said Sharpton forcefully. We have to achieve a level of power, and then we’ll deal with that. The sister, in search of a mainstream Black leader who could put forth a progressive vision without compromise, sat back down in her seat. She did not believe her question had been answered.

When I think about Sharpton going through the primary season – making his way to the Democratic convention, being sidelined by whoever becomes the nominee, being given a speaking slot to assuage the restlessness among the children of the Rainbow – I think of that young woman in Brooklyn, and his promise that with a requisite level of power in hand, he’d be ready to fully embrace a progressive social vision. I can picture Sharpton up at the podium – eloquent as ever. I can hear him calling America to a higher ideal of brotherhood, equality and peace. And then, my fantasy goes – as the convention applauds wildly and party bosses glance over at one another, eager for the display to be over – Sharpton suddenly catches sight of his own image. Lord Jesus, he says to himself. I’m about to end up just like Jesse Jackson. And so, he announces that he’s leaving: leaving the convention, leaving the party, leaving politics-as-usual to lead an independent people’s movement.

I know Al Sharpton. I know him well. I haven’t given up all hope that this is the real Al Sharpton.

Lenora Fulani, PhD chairs the Committee for a Unified Independent Party, Inc. She can be reached at 1-800-288-3201 or via e-mail at national@cuip.org.

Dr. Lenora Fulani

Monday, March 10, 2003

The Deeper Look Dialogue Room

Al Sharpton Officially Named MSNBC Host Of ‘PoliticsNation’

By John Perazzo
DiscoverTheNetworks.org
March 5, 2009

It seems to have escaped Sharpton’s understanding that Barack Obama, the man he claims is represented by the chimp, did not write a single word of the stimulus bill. That colossal dishonor belongs to none other than House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Appropriations Committee chairman David Obey, some fellow congressional Democrats, and a number of political lobbyists. In other words, in this particular single-frame New York Post cartoon, it was the incompetence and poor judgment of these (mostly white) individuals, and not of President Obama, that was the focus.

Indeed, who could forget the dulcet tones of Sharpton’s 1994 speech at New Jersey’s Kean College, where he lavished an audience of students and professors with pearls of eloquence and sensitivity like this:

“White folks was in the caves while we [blacks] was building empires … We built pyramids before Donald Trump ever knew what architecture was … we taught philosophy and astrology and mathematics before Socrates and them Greek homos ever got around to it.”[1]

Rev. Al Sharpton and the Communist Party front, Committee to Free Angela Davis

In the CPUSA newspaper Daily World, February 9, 1971, pages 1 and 11, several rallies concerning clergymen supporting the Communist Party USA front known as The Committee to Free Angela Davis (and by other similar names]] were written about by CPUSA member Stephanie Allan. A dual story entitled “Angela rallies held in churches” covered events in Chicago and White Plains, NY.

In the Chicago event, sponsored by the Chicago Angela Davis Defense Committee (one of several forms of that parent organization’s name), a number of speakers were heard at the Tabernacle Baptist Church on Chicago’s South Side. From the DW of 2/09/71 came the following paragraphs and names of speakers:

“Sponsors of the rally, the Chicago Angela Davis Defense Committee Angela Davis, brought together, under the theme of “The Fight to Save Angela’s Life is the Right for Our Own Lives,” a large program of speakers and other performers.”

“Included were”:

“The high spot of the meeting was provided by Rev. A. Sharpton and Rev. J.L. Scott of Operation Breadbasket, who told about the struggle against A&P, and how the boycott movement could be developed in the Black community. These speakers – the 16-year-old Rev. Sharpton and the older Rev. Scott – spoke in simple, eloquent but politically profound terms. They exposed the connection between A&P, U.S. monopoly capitalism, racism and imperialism, and related these to the Angela Davis case and the threat to the vital rights of the Black people.”

“There are five functioning Free Angela Davis Committees in Westchester, with two more in process of organization.”

Steven Pagones is a former Assistant District Attorney in Dutchess County, New York who was accused in 1987 by Tawana Brawley of raping her. A grand jury investigation concluded that Brawley had not been the victim of an attack and may have simulated the appearance of an attack herself.

Pagones subsequently filed a civil suit against Al Sharpton and lawyers C. Vernon Mason and Alton H. Maddox, seeking $395 million in damages for 22 alleged defamatory statements. On July 13, 1998, after an eight-month trial, a jury found Sharpton liable for defamation for seven of the statements, Mason for one, and Maddox for two. On July 29, 1998, the jury awarded Pagones a total of $345,000 in damages. Sharpton was found liable for $65,000 of the amount, Maddox for $95,000, and Mason for $185,000.^[1]

Pagones went on to become an Assistant State Attorney General.

COUNTY OF DUTCHESS

—————————————-X

STEVEN A. PAGONES,

Plaintiff,

DECISION

- against -

Index No. 4595/88

ALTON H. MADDOX, JR., C. VERNON

MASON, AL SHARPTON and TAWANA BRAWLEY,

Defendants.

—————————————X

HICKMAN, J.

On October 6, 1988, the Abrams Grand Jury released its extensive and thorough 170 page report concluding that Tawana Brawley (“Brawley”) had not been abducted, assaulted, raped and sodomized as had been claimed by Brawley and her advisors. The report further concluded that the “unsworn public allegations against Dutchess County Assistant District Attorney Steven Pagones” were false and had no basis in fact. To issue the report, the Grand Jury heard from 180 witnesses, saw 250 exhibits and recorded over 6,000 pages of testimony.

Sometime thereafter, Steven A. Pagones (“Pagones”) brought a defamation action against Alton H. Maddox, Jr., (“Maddox”) C. Vernon Mason (“Mason”) and Rev. Al Sharpton (“Sharpton”) and also sought damages against Brawley. The claims in paragraphs 336 through 364 of the complaint against Brawley were based on her alleged responsibility for “the acts, statements, accusations spoken or committed by the defendants, Maddox, Mason and Sharpton” on her behalf (paragraph 339) as wellas her specific statements made on or about June 12, 1988 on WABC-TV (Channel 7 News) as follows (paragraph 347):

“Our family is very strong and we know what we’re doing and approve of everything the Rev. Al Sharpton said and our lawyers said.”

“I know everything that is said in my name. I won’t actually say I’m in control, but I agree with everything they’re doing.”

Plaintiff further claimed that Brawley knew that the “accusations, statements and words were false and untrue” and that she subsequently ratified and reaffirmed the acts, conduct, statements and accusations made by defendants Maddox, Mason and Sharpton who were found on July 13, 1998 by the jury to have defamed plaintiff. Brawley was also alleged to have intentionally inflicted emotional harm upon plaintiff and to have been a part of a conspiracy.

Brawley and her family left the State of New York in 1988 having intentionally failed to cooperate with the grand jury process and having refused invitations (and/or disobeyed subpoenas) to testify under oath. Her advisors, although invited to do so, also failed to cooperate and counseled the family to be non-cooperative.

Maddox, Mason and Sharpton all appeared in the action; however, Brawley failed to appear. On or about May 2, 1989 plaintiff moved for a default judgment against her. Motion papers were personally served upon Tawana Brawley and her mother,Glenda Brawley, at 549 Diamond Plum Circle, Apt. 101, Virginia Beach, Virginia 23458 and upon Matthew Strong, as guardian ad litem, at 10 Garden Drive, Monticello, New York 12761. Strong had been appointed guardian ad litem for Brawley by order dated December 20, 1989. There was, however, no consent submitted by the proposed guardian ad litem. By decision dated May 6, 1991 Justice Beisner, noting that Brawley had attained majority, entered a default judgment against her on the issue of liability, reserving damages for future determination.

At the commencement of the liability phase of the trial with respect to the three remaining defendants, this Court noted the Brawley default on the record and formally indicated that the Court would permit her to appear on the issue of damages and in general would welcome her appearance. For more than ten years she had never signed an accusatory instrument under oath, participated in a proper identification procedure, nor appeared before a grand jury or in any other proceeding to testify under oath. This Court further indicated, in early December, 1997, that the Court would consider the trial proceedings, the evidence submitted and any other information called to the Court’s attention as the equivalent of an inquest and consider same in awarding damages in favor of Pagones against Brawley. Therefore the Court will review some of the pertinent information revealed during the trial insofar as the Court deems it relevant and helpful in reaching its ultimate conclusion.

In its decision of December 16, 1997, the Court noted “that although Tawana Brawley was not noticed as a witness by any party, and is in fact in default, the opportunity exists for her to now testify under oath with respect to this matter.”

Brawley did not appear during the liability phase of the trial although an affidavit dated March 7, 1998 and signed by her in Virginia was submitted, authorizing publication of certain partially nude photos to the trial jury. In that affidavit she refers to “the ongoing trial of the above-captioned defamation lawsuit”. Thus, there can be no question that she was aware of the continuing trial and therefore could have asked to come before the jury and testify under oath as she was invited to do in the Court’s December 16th decision.

After liability was determined by the jury and during the damages phase, defendant Mason submitted an offer of proof and requested permission, which was granted, to call Brawley as a witness for the stated purpose of “mitigating” damages. That offer constituted a representation to the Court that Brawley would appear and finally testify under oath. Mason alerted the media and everyone eagerly awaited her appearance, but Brawley failed to appear.

At the commencement of the trial plaintiff had tendered an offer in open court to discontinue his lawsuit against her and thereby relieve her from any claim for damages if she would appear and testify under oath. The Court was present and heardthis more than generous offer which was clearly a good faith, non-contingent offer.

Shortly thereafter, Brawley appeared at a rally on December 2, 1997 in Brooklyn, New York, which was videotaped by Regional News Network and admitted in evidence as plaintiff’s exhibit 35. At that rally she caustically referred to plaintiff’s offer as a “bribe” and said she would not do anything to hurt her friend and attorney Mr. Maddox. She vocally maintained before a partisan audience that the things she said happened really did happen. The Court was appalled that Brawley would see fit to travel from the Washington, D.C. area to a rally in Brooklyn, but did not see fit to travel to Poughkeepsie to testify under oath before the jury.

During the early days of the trial, Mason and Maddox strongly objected that this Court’s ruling dated October 22, 1997 which precluded them from proving truth was prejudicial.1They steadfastly maintained that, if given the opportunity, they would prove the truth of Brawley’s allegations.

In the meantime, during Mason’s testimony, it became apparent that the truth was inferentially being explored bytestimony relating to his state of mind. Thus, it seemed appropriate, in light of the anticipated range of testimony from all the defendants and other witnesses, to allow Mason and Maddox to attempt to prove the truth as they had pleaded it as an affirmative defense in their answers to the complaint. For these reasons, the Court amended its prior decision on December 16, 1997 to permit them to prove the truth of Brawley’s accusations. The door was opened wide and Mason and Maddox were afforded every reasonable opportunity to produce relevant evidence including testimony from Brawley, who this Court ultimately determined during the course of pre-charge conferences was subject to Maddox’s control.

Reverend Sharpton, unlike defendants Mason and Maddox, had consistently taken the position that in a constitutional case with first amendment issues, he had no burden of proof and intended to call no witnesses. The Court honored this position and so charged at the conclusion of the liability phase of the trial.

This information has been set forth to illustrate that while Brawley defaulted and did not choose to appear at the trial, her interests to some extent were in fact represented and protected by Mason and Maddox.

The Court throughout the trial assisted Mason and Maddox in acquiring records and information from the Attorney General, the Medical Examiner, the ambulance personnel, theSheriff and many other sources. In addition, the Court issued numerous subpoenas. The Court even worked out a special arrangement with the Department of Corrections to produce Edwin Garcia from prison. He was a former state trooper and convicted felon who had been friendly with plaintiff during the 1987-88 era and whom Maddox claimed had relevant evidence. In addition, the Court arranged for the appearance of Hilda Kogut, the FBI agent in charge of the investigation into the alleged violation of Brawley’s civil rights. These are only a few of the examples of assistance afforded by the Court to insure a fair trial and to provide Mason and Maddox every reasonable opportunity to prove Brawley’s allegations were true.

Mason and Maddox continued to represent throughout the trial that they would prove the truth of Brawley’s allegations. On repeated occasions, having subpoenaed witnesses to the courthouse, they withdrew their subpoenas and the witnesses never testified. 2The attempt to prove that Harry Crist, Jr. wasmurdered by Pagones was unsupported by any credible evidence. Mason’s attempt to relate Brawley’s chlamydia infection in 1987 to Pagones’ common type urinary infection in 1993 was without any reliable basis in fact. Mason’s early claim that medical records at Westchester Medical Center revealed five separate types of sperm found on Brawley turned out to be totally false. There was absolutely nothing in those records to substantiate this claim.

Meaningful medical evidence that Brawley was raped and as Mason claimed, sodomized in two ways, was totally lacking. It is inconceivable, even to lay persons without medical expertise such as those serving on the jury, that Brawley, a fifteen year old, could have been repeatedly raped and sodomized in two ways by six men over a four day period without significant physical evidence to support her allegations. The extensive cross-examination of those who treated and those who observed Brawley after she was discovered produced nothing of substance to sustain these allegations.

Extensive cross-examination of Dutchess County DistrictAttorney Grady and members of his staff and John Ryan, the experienced and able assistant attorney general in charge of the Abrams Grand Jury, accomplished nothing of substance to cast doubt upon the conclusions reached by the Grand Jury in its report, which determined Brawley’s allegations to be false. 3

The Grand Jury’s report indicated a thorough analysis was done of the former Brawley apartment and of Brawley’s clothes and that the tests revealed that she was in the apartment and could have written the racial slurs herself. Materials found in the apartment matched materials found on her person. Since there was no forensic evidence of rape, the Grand Jury found “nothing in regard to Tawana Brawley’s appearance on November 28 that is inconsistent with this condition having been self-inflicted” (Grand Jury report page 168).

Defendants were all afforded broad opportunity to examine former Assistant Attorney General Ryan and to otherwiseattack the efficacy of the Grand Jury report. In fact, the Court also signed a subpoena presented by Maddox for the appearance of Michael Baden, an expert in forensic pathology who testified before the Grand Jury. At the last moment, that subpoena was withdrawn. No other expert witnesses were called by Mason or Maddox to contradict the analyses of the various experts presented to the Grand Jury. Among these were psychological opinions, including one by Dr. Park Elliott Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist and professor of behavioral medicine and psychiatry at the University of Virginia. In the report at page 115, it is stated that “Dr. Dietz concluded that Tawana Brawley’s physical appearance when she was found is consistent with self-infliction and a false allegation.”

Finally, all the defendants had a collective period of approximately twenty-five days to cross-examine plaintiff Pagones about every possible relevant aspect of the case.

For the reasons noted above, as well as many others reflected in the record, Mason and Maddox failed in a lengthy trial, with full opportunity to present evidence and to cross-examine witnesses, to establish the truth of Brawley’s allegations. Quite to the contrary, after a thorough review of the evidence, the jury determined that plaintiff had proved the falsity of Brawley’s allegations against him by clear and convincing evidence, an extremely heavy burden of proof.

One thing is certain, that Brawley did not foresee thatMrs. Joyce Lloray, a neighbor, would be observing her sneak around the corner of the building opposite the Lloray apartment, climb into the garbage bag and lie down. Mrs. Lloray was judged by this Court and obviously by the trial jury as well as the Grand Jury to be an extremely credible witness with no reason to testify to anything other than what she saw and observed. It was her call to the Dutchess County Sheriff, out of concern for Brawley’s welfare, which detailed her observations. These observations were entered in the Sheriff’s official records for anyone to see who took the time to request a copy of the Sheriff’s report, a public record. Mr. Lloray, her husband, testified that when he went to Brawley, she looked at him and then closed her eyes.

In this setting it is now the Court’s function to determine what damages to award against defendant Brawley infavor of plaintiff. 4

At the end of the damages phase, the jury determined that compensatory damages in the amount of Five Thousand Dollars ($5,000.00) should be assessed against each of the defendants, namely Mason, Maddox and Sharpton. This Court sees no reason to deviate from the considered judgment of the jury and therefore awards plaintiff Five Thousand Dollars ($5,000.00) in compensatory damages against Tawana Brawley.

The more difficult determination relates to the amount of punitive damages, if any, to be awarded in favor of plaintiff against Tawana Brawley. It is probable that in the history of this state, never has a teenager turned the prosecutorial and judicial systems literally upside down with such false claims. The cost of the lengthy, thorough and complete grand jury investigation was reportedly estimated at one-half million dollars. The Grand Jury was supervised ably by Justice Ingrassia who carefully reviewed over six thousand pages of testimony by 180 witnesses as well as 250 exhibits. He accepted the extensive grand jury report as being supported by a preponderance of the credible evidence.

The total costs and expenses of the lengthy trial before this Court must be staggering. All of this was presumably unnecessary had Brawley come forward to cooperate with authorities. Even absent initial cooperation, once the Grand Jury report was released and it revealed in detail that Brawley had been personally observed by a credible witness crawling into the garbage bag, it would have been most appropriate for Brawley as a young teenager to come forward, admit the allegations were not true and apologize for the pain and upset she had caused Pagones, the Crist family and State Trooper Scott Patterson by her false accusations. In all likelihood, plaintiff would not have commenced this civil lawsuit nor felt the need to hold the four defendants accountable for their wrongful and false accusations had an apology been forthcoming.

As a teenager Brawley might well be entitled to and deserve some special consideration for her actions. This Court would certainly consider judging a teenager’s actions in that context, if appropriate. However, that is not the case here. The Court is now dealing with a twenty six year old woman who isunderstood to have a college education and to be employed in a responsible position. She continues to deny the truth which has now been determined not only by the Grand Jury but also by a dedicated and committed trial jury whose members sacrificed eight and one-half months of their lives to do justice and to make our system work. Every opportunity was afforded Mason and Maddox to prove that Brawley’s allegations were true. The jury found them false by clear and convincing evidence, a high burden of proof.

The failure of Tawana Brawley to appear before this jury cannot be condoned nor can her actions of leaving the state, changing her name and still as a mature adult avoiding the truth and perpetuating a lie. These acts alone are very serious, but it was an absolute affront to this jury for Brawley to appear at a rally in Brooklyn during the trial and not to appear in Poughkeepsie to testify under oath.

In papers submitted by plaintiff to the Court on the issue of damages, it appears from an article in the Poughkeepsie Journal of August 15, 1998 that Brawley received an award of some sort in Brooklyn on or about August 14, 1998. Brawley is quoted as still claiming “a crime was committed on me”. She also claimed “it’s not over, it is just beginning”. It is indeed a sad day when one receives an award for seeking to perpetuate lies and falsehoods.

Brawley is further quoted as stating “[w]e will not stop trying to get justice until we get it”. This is also an absolute affront to the citizens who gave of their time andtalent to sit as members of the Grand Jury and especially to the members of the trial jury, who afforded a fair trial and rendered a true verdict at great personal sacrifice while Brawley literally thumbed her nose at the jury by not appearing to testify under oath.

Punitive damages are appropriate to deter others from wrongdoing. To wrongfully accuse plaintiff Pagones and others of serious crimes that never occurred cannot go unpunished. The benefit that this Court might accord a teenager who makes a mistake cannot be accorded to an educated twenty-six year old who will not admit the truth and who accepts the role of a heroine after the grand jury and the trial jury have determined she was not telling the truth. Nor can consideration be given to a person who leaves the jurisdiction, seeks to avoid and does avoid the trial process. This Court therefore determines that punitive damages should be awarded to send a clear message to others that false allegations of abduction, rape and murder or any other crimes against innocent persons will not and cannot be tolerated.

In determining the amount of punitive damages, the Court could well award a very high amount in the hope that such award would assure that never again will individual citizens and the people of the State of New York be subjected to such false
claims. 5

A countervailing consideration is the sense that on a continuing basis, Brawley may well have been subject to manipulation by her parents and her advisors who have used herfor their own purposes. Tawana Brawley appears caught up in her own fiction and unwilling or unable to recognize the grief and hurt she caused those she wrongly accused, especially the Crist family, who the Court hopes has found solace in the verdict of the jury after all their suffering.

In establishing the amount of damages, the Court believes it would be inappropriate for the reasons noted to award a huge sum. On the other hand, Brawley is the one person most responsible for the false charges; therefore, the Court believes she should be held at least as accountable as Mr. Mason, the defendant held most responsible by the jury. Accordingly, the Court makes a punitive award in the amount of One Hundred Eighty Thousand Dollars ($180,000.00) against Brawley in favor of Pagones.

At the end of the trial this Court stated “Let us hope after 10 ½ years, the Tawana Brawley matter is finally laid to rest and we can move forward at last to promote healing and racial harmony.” Unfortunately, the continuing rhetoric by Brawley and her supporters refusing to accept the verdict does nothing to further racial harmony. In fact, in this particular case it is a disservice to the African American community since it diminishes credibility and may adversely affect other viable complaints. This Court recognizes that it is perfectly proper in appropriate circumstances to speak out against any legitimate racial injustice. In this case, the injustice was against those wrongfully accused of heinous crimes that never occurred. Thejury did justice by righting that wrong. Brawley and her supporters have no right to claim that justice was not accomplished by this jury.

Monday, August 22, 2011 | Borderland Beat Reporter Buggs

By José Luis Sierra
New America Media

They are the Drug Lords of Mexico and, according to journalist Anabel Hernandez, they have succeeded at infiltrating the highest circles of financial and political power in the countries where they now operate and even might have a say in deciding who the next President of Mexico might be.

But who are they exactly?
“Most people in Mexico and in this country believe that the Drug Lords is a men’s club being lead by “El Chapo” Guzman, “El Mayo” Zambada –leaders of the well known Cartel de Sinaloa— as well as the handful of replacements who have taken the place of those who used to control Los Zetas in the Gulf [of Mexico], and Los Templarios that now have taken over the cartel of La Familia in Michoacán and El Cartel de Tijuana. But in fact, these renowned gangsters are figure heads, eventually fall guys,’’ says Hernandez, during her second trip to Los Angeles promoting her book The Drug Lords —the result of a five-year investigation into the Mexican drug cartels, their close ties to Mexican officialdom, and the expansion of their influence in Central and South America.

“How else can you explain how individuals running the cartels with almost no education can outpace the US and Mexican intelligence agencies, the Mexican Army and Mexican law enforcement at all levels? There is only one explanation,” says Hernandez with a dramatic pause— “corruption.”

From Top to BottomFor the 39-year-old Hernandez—now working on a follow-up book focused on US policies toward Latin America in its war on drugs — corruption in Mexico is so pervasive that it jumped the US border many decades ago, back in the 1980s, during the Reagan administration, when senior officials facilitated the sale of arms to Iran and through back-door funding of the Nicaraguan Contras, thereby bypassing the oversight of Congress.

Much of the funding for the Contras, according to Hernandez, came from illegal trafficking of cocaine through Central America en route to the United States, with full knowledge of top CIA officials. Most of these events were well documented by several congressional commissions, as well as independent reports. Yet, only a handful of the US government officials involved got prosecuted. They ended up being pardoned or with commuted sentences.

At that time, Mexico’s ruling party, the PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) had total control of the political power in Mexico and the drug cartels were left to mind their own business with no interference, as long as they paid a cut of their profits to key government officials, who in turn would spread some of that money around to make sure the drug operations would run smoothly.

Things began to get shaky in 1985, with the execution of Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, a US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agent who had investigated a 1,000-hectare marijuana plantation in the state of Chihuahua. The killing of Camarena unleashed outrage from the US government and pressured Mexican officials to punish those responsible for the murder. Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo and Rafael Caro Quintero —at that time two very well know drug lords— were apprehended and are still in prison. Four others, including a relative of former Mexican President Luis Echevarria, were also found guilty in a federal court in Los Angeles.

“The official records are there,” declares Hernandez in an interview with New America Media. “Then and now, US and Mexican officials had been involved in deals with the drug lords and they are playing a double moral standard in this so called “war’’ against drug trafficking that already cost Mexico more than 40 thousand victims.’’

She cites a more recent case when the son of “El Mayo Zambada,’’ Jesus Vicente Zambada-Niebla (aka “Mayito”) claimed immunity from prosecution early last week in a federal court in Chicago, alleging that in 1998 he had an agreement with top DEA and US officials, in exchange for his services as an informant on the activities of the Sinaloa cartel, led by his father and Joaquin “Shorty” Guzman.

According to reports from Reuters, US government officials in Mexico declined to comment on Zambada’s allegations, and US prosecutors have denied that Zambada had been granted immunity. They have until September 9 to file a response with the court. But if Zambada-Niebla’s claim is upheld, it can potentially turn into another embarrassment for the US government, on a par with the scandalous Operation “Fast and Furious,’’ in which U.S. officials deliberately allowed the export of high-power firearms into Mexico, then lost track of the arms.

“The only winner in this drug war is the Sinaloa Cartel and they can thank [Mexican] President Felipe Calderon for that,’’ says Hernandez.

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