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TexasTowelie's JournalACLU Sues After Man Banned From Library Over Trump Poem
The Indiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is suing Jackson County because a Seymour man has been banned from the public library.
Richard England says he was banned from the library in November after he wrote what his attorney called a “short and unoffensive” poem about President Trump. England left the poem for a library employee with whom he was friends.
“When that individual was not there, he left it on a basket in the circulation desk,” said attorney Gavin Rose.
“When he got home, he had a voicemail from an officer with the Seymour police department saying the library essentially trespassed him,” Rose added.
Read more: https://indianapublicradio.org/news/2021/01/aclu-sues-after-man-banned-from-library-over-trump-poem/
Committee Debates Bill To Raise Cigarette Tax $1, Impose E-Liquids Tax
A House committee pulled back from a vote Monday on a bill to raise the state cigarette tax by $1 per pack.
That’s because several committee members want the bill to dedicate more of the increased revenue to public health.
Indiana hasn’t raised its cigarette tax in over a decade. And American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network Government Relations Director Bryan Hannon said numerous studies show raising the price helps people quit smoking.
“So, people want to quit smoking,” Hannon said. “They need some help to do it.”
Read more: https://indianapublicradio.org/news/2021/02/committee-debates-bill-to-raise-cigarette-tax-1-impose-e-liquids-tax/
Bill to protect businesses from COVID-19 lawsuits passes House, moves to Senate
INDIANAPOLIS—The much-debated civil liability bill, House Bill 1002, passed through the Indiana House with a 76-20 final vote Monday. Now it will move to the Indiana Senate for review.
This bill, which would ensure businesses and other entities cannot be sued in many cases when visitors believe they contracted COVID-19 on business premises, was named a priority policy for the 2021 session by Statehouse Republicans and Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb.
There was debate mainly from Statehouse Democrats about whether the bill unfairly limits the right to sue nursing homes and businesses in real cases where employees, patients and customers were exposed to COVID-19 due to negligence.
Those opposing the bill said it may be protecting employers who have chosen not to keep their employees and customers safe. They also said it could protect nursing homes from being held responsible for abuse and neglect of residents.
Read more: http://thestatehousefile.com/44280/bill-to-protect-businesses-from-covid-19-lawsuits-passes-house-moves-to-senate/
Republican-backed group calls on Sen. Ted Cruz to resign with billboards
KYLE, Texas — A conservative-backed group is calling for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to resign – and they're using billboards to do it.
One of them was recently spotted here in Central Texas in Kyle off of Interstate 35.
The Republican Accountability Project is said to be spending $1 million on similar billboards across the country.
The group is targeting members of Congress who they believe played a role in the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. They say they want to unseat lawmakers who tried to overturn the election.
Read more: https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/texas/billboards-ted-cruz-resignation/269-a855cd87-3a41-4379-8db2-c2e0e14a4f03
Proud Boy arrested in Texas, seen on video inside Capitol wearing MAGA hat, FBI says
A man with Denton County roots who is a self-proclaimed Proud Boy stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 and was arrested Friday in North Texas, according to the FBI.
Daniel Goodwyn, 32, posted about the insurrection on social media and showed up on the livestream of Anthime Gionet, a well-known neo-Nazi known also as “Baked Alaska,” according to a criminal complaint filed in the District of Columbia federal district court. On the video, Goodwyn is shown inside the Capitol building in a MAGA hat and dark sunglasses, the complaint says.
Goodwyn is charged with entering a restricted building and violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds. Goodwyn recently has worked in San Francisco and previously lived in Corinth in Denton County, according to public records.
On Gionet’s livestream, Goodwyn said his name before he was forced out of the building by a Capitol Police officer, the complaint says. He called the officer an “oathbreaker” and yelled for others to get the officer’s badge number, according to the FBI.
Read more: https://www.star-telegram.com/news/local/crime/article248927234.html
San Diego ex-mayor Faulconer to run for California governor
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer said he is entering the race for California governor, the first major Republican to formally step into the contest while a potential recall election aimed at Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom moves closer to qualifying for the ballot this year.
In an online video Monday, the 54-year-old centrist Republican depicted California as a failed state freighted with scandal and witnessing an eroding quality of life. He said he is running “to make a difference, not to make promises.”
“He’s failed us,” Faulconer said of Newsom. “I know we can clean up California.”
Faulconer planned to formally announce his campaign on Tuesday in Los Angeles.
Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/article/San-Diego-ex-mayor-Faulconer-to-run-for-15917221.php
Michigan police officer posts threatening remark on Facebook days after being fired
A northern Michigan police officer recently fired for allegedly getting in a physical altercation with the police chief posted a threatening remark on social media days later.
St. Ignace Police fired officer Richard Cullen on Friday, a few months after he was placed on leave for the altercation with Chief Tony Brown.
Cullen, who was deployed in Afghanistan as a training coordinator for the Department of Defense, posted on Facebook Sunday, referring to his time overseas: “I experienced and learned more in that year+ than I did the entire 20 year duration of my now quasi closed Law Enforcement career. There’s no doubt I will call those lessons back into service as I enter a new Jihad against my oppugnant. #thinbluelinestrong #imcomingforyou”
St. Ignace Councilman Luke Paquin, Mayor Connie Litzner and Police Chief Brown told the Free Press that some city officials and residents perceive the post as a threat.
Read more: https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2021/02/01/st-ignace-police-richard-cullen-facebook/4342738001/
Rashida Tlaib blasts Robinhood app for protecting rich hedge fund investors in GameStop stock drama
By know you've probably heard of the drama surrounding the stock market, in which an army of amateur investors from Reddit's WallStreetBets board banded together to massively inflate stocks as a way to stick it to rich hedge fund short-sellers who were betting on them to fail.
We're no financial experts — hence why we wound up in the field of journalism — but The New York Times has perhaps the best explainer so far to help catch you up to speed (at least until filmmaker Adam McKay gets Margot Robbie to explain it while taking a bubble bath). Basically, as the stock goes up, short-sellers are forced to buy more shares, which can make the price go up even more, putting the squeeze on the short-sellers.
Ironically, the drama centers around GameStop, the strip mall video game reseller — highlighting just how much the stock market is actually itself just a giant video game. But the irony doesn't end there.
On Thursday, in response to the stock market volatility, the stock-trading app Robinhood said it was "restricting transactions for certain securities to position closing only" — in other words, people could only use the app to sell shares, but not to buy them, effectively shutting the amateur investors out.
Read more: https://www.metrotimes.com/news-hits/archives/2021/01/28/rashida-tlaib-blasts-robinhood-app-for-protecting-rich-hedge-fund-investors-in-gamestop-stock-market-drama
Rep. Meijer warns of 'dark path' for conspiracy-peddling Republican Party
U.S. Rep. Peter Meijer, a freshman Republican from Michigan, warned on Thursday that his conspiracy-peddling colleagues are taking the GOP down “a dark path” that could destroy the party.
“We can’t be a party of conspiracy theories,” Meijer, of Grand Rapids, said on CNN. “We can’t be the party of winking and nodding at the worst impulses that we have seen in the darkest corners of the internet. That’s not how you’re going to have a party that is trusted to govern. That’s not how we’re going to win over moderate independent voters.”
Meijer, an Army veteran, made the comments after he was asked about Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., a newly elected congresswoman and QAnon conspiracist who falsely suggested that space laser beams ignited California’s wildfires and deadly mass shootings were “false-flag” operations. Republicans recently assigned her to the House education committee.
“I think its important to stand up for truth, it’s important to stand up and stand by our oath to the constitution and to say there are better ways for us to govern that don’t devolve into threats of political violence and these illusions to just insane theories,” Meijer said.
Read more: https://www.metrotimes.com/news-hits/archives/2021/01/29/rep-meijer-warns-of-dark-path-for-conspiracy-peddling-republican-party
GOP candidate for governor calls Whitmer a 'dictator' despite alleged assassination plot against her
Governor Gretchen Whitmer is up for re-election in 2022, and she now has her first Republican challenger: Austin Chenge, a 35-year-old businessman and Army veteran from Grand Rapids who, like some of the governor's other critics, calls her a "dictator."
"There's a pandemic in Michigan, but it's not the coronavirus," Chenge says on his campaign website. "It's the dictator formerly known as Gov Whitmer who only cares about personal ambition & is burying Michigan families/hard working Americans to achieve it..."
Whitmer has repeatedly asked for her critics to turn down the "dictator" rhetoric, which has been used against her by ex-President Donald Trump and Michigan state Sen. Mike Shirkey. Metro Times asked the Chenge campaign via email if he thought it was a good idea to call her a "dictator" — especially considering the FBI recently revealed Whitmer was the target of an alleged assassination plot, which Whitmer later said she believed stems from the heated rhetoric from the right and foreshadowed the violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol earlier this month.
Plus, recent polling has found public support for Whitmer to be around 60%. Could calling her a "dictator" be bad for Chenge's political ambitions — and more importantly, dangerous for the Governor?
Read more: https://www.metrotimes.com/news-hits/archives/2021/01/28/gop-candidate-for-governor-calls-whitmer-a-dictator-despite-alleged-assassination-plot-against-her
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Gender: MaleHometown: South Texas. most of my life I lived in Austin and Dallas
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Current location: Bryan, Texas
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