MetaFilter posts tagged with testimony

Fading Away

reenum — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:13:01 -0800

Mark McGwire was one of the most feared sluggers in the game during his career. In 1998, the home run chase between McGwire and Sammy Sosa helped baseball recover from the 1994 strike. But, when a reporter found a bottle containing andro in McGwire's locker, some chinks in his armor began to emerge. The andro story wasn't enough to overshadow McGwire and Sosa's record breaking seasons. McGwire received many accolades, from having a highway named after him to having cameos on TV shows. After it became well known that baseball players had engaged in widespread steroid abuse from 1990 on, a public outcry began to overshadow the sport. McGwire was not immune to these allegations. The saga culminated with Senate hearings in 2005, where McGwire refused to discuss his alleged steroid use. After his Senate testimony, McGwire retreated to his home in California and refused to speak to the media. Once thought to be a shoo-in for the Hall of Fame, McGwire received only 23 percent of the vote in his first year of eligibility in 2008. With his recent hire as the Cardinals' hitting coach, McGwire will attempt to repair some of his tarnished legacy.

Iraq's New Surge: Gay Killings

Acromion — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 17:31:13 -0800

The lynching of gays in Iraq is on the rise, according to ambassador Christopher Hill's testimony before the house today."Hamizi, a computer science graduate, is at the cutting edge of a new wave of violence against gay men in Iraq. Made up of hardline extremists, Hamizi's group and others like it are believed to be responsible for the deaths of more than 130 gay Iraqi men since the beginning of the year alone." WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGE, POSSIBLY NSFW

So let go of your balls

swift — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 18:44:34 -0800

The origin of the word testimony probably has nothing to do with Romans taking oaths while holding their testicles, though interpreting the Bible in a certain way might make you think so.

Pretty Good Pornography

The Bellman — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 15:18:01 -0800

A Magistrate Judge in the U.S. District Court in Vermont has ruled that a man allegedly caught with child pornography on his laptop need not reveal his PGP password (yes, authorities shut down the laptop and now can't get at the alleged porn) pursuant to the Fifth Amendment's protections against self incrimination. The decision is here[PDF]. A decent write-up (from CNET of all places) is here. This appears to be the first decision ever to directly address this issue, and many commentators had thought it would come out differently. The major question is whether revealing one's PGP key is "testimonial" or not. According to the Supreme Court, giving up fingerprints or blood samples isn't, nor is standing for a lineup, nor is handing over the key to a safe, but if it's combination safe, well maybe that's different. Never let it be said that your Fifth Amendment rights are easy.

"I am not the attorney general. That's the attorney general."

orthogonality — Wed, 16 May 2007 02:54:48 -0800

Comey made frantic calls to his own chief of staff and to Robert Mueller, then FBI director, while he raced to the hospital, sirens blasting. He sprinted up the stairs of the hospital to get to Ashcroft's room before Gonzales and Card did. . . . "I couldn't stay if the White House was engaging in conduct that had no legal basis." Comey testifies that there was something of a line to resign that day: Mueller; then Comey's chief of staff; and then Ashcroft's chief of staff—who asked only that Comey wait until "Ashcroft was well enough to resign with me."

A ~~Saturday Night~~ Tuesday Morning Massacre narrowly averted by an illness and the Madrid Train Bombings? Is it a High Crime and Misdemeanor if "the president was quite willing to forge ahead with an illegal program"?
Absoluelty riveting, it reads like a tale out of paperback thriller: in a darkened hospital room, a White House consigliere barges past the sick man's wife, and demands the disoriented Attorney General official sign a paper.
"First, they tried to coerce a man in intensive care -- a man so sick he had transferred the reins of power to Mr. Comey -- to grant them legal approval. Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation's chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice's authorization." I'm waiting for the movie, but you can watch the video now.

On Atrocities & Vietnam: The Winter Soldier Investigation

y2karl — Mon, 30 Aug 2004 20:42:39 -0800

My name is Scott Camile. I was a Sgt. attached to Charley 1/1. I was a forward observer in Vietnam. I went in right after high school and I'm a student now. My testimony involves burning of villages with civilians in them, the cutting off of ears, cutting off of heads, torturing of prisoners, calling in of artillery on villages for games, corpsmen killing wounded prisoners, napalm dropped on villages, women being raped, women and children being massacred, CS gas used on people, animals slaughtered, Chieu Hoi passes rejected and the people holding them shot, bodies shoved out of helicopters, tear-gassing people for fun and running civilian vehicles off the road. Here is the Swift Boat related back story from The Sixties Project: Winter Soldier Investigation - Testimony given in Detroit, Michigan, on January 31, 1971, February 1 and 2, 1971. Sponsored by Vietnam Veterans Against the War. This testimony was published in the Congressional Record, "Extensions and Remarks," April 7, 1971: 2825-2900, 2903-2936. (Much More Inside)

Neverland

lagado — Thu, 13 Feb 2003 15:03:36 -0800

Neverland : The testimony that Michael Jackson paid between $15 and $40 million to suppress.

hama7 — Sun, 27 Oct 2002 03:09:51 -0800

North Korea: The Bright Eyes of Tailless Beasts: testimony of Sun-Ok Lee.
Inside the Gulag from the Hoover Digest.
Human Rights Without Frontiers: Concentration Camp Analysis

precipice — Wed, 10 Apr 2002 08:12:27 -0800

Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge won't testify before Congress (NYTimes link) but will testify before Lou Dobbs Moneyline?

OneBallJay — Wed, 02 May 2001 09:15:59 -0800

And now for something really depressing - the Texas Department of Criminal Justice maintains a database including the 'last statements' of all inmates executed since 1982.

OneBallJay — Thu, 05 Apr 2001 18:17:22 -0800

Girl dies during radical therapy session. The mother has been given limited immunity for her testimony against the therapists. This is some scary beans -- does anybody have any experiences with this kind of therapy?