Monthly Archives: February 2018

Feb 22 2018

Broward Coward – Armed County Sheriff Cowered Outside Building – Refused to Confront Parkland School Shooter…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 22, 2018 by

School Resource Officer (SRO) Scott Peterson, the armed deputy stationed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, stood outside the building during the shooting and refused to enter the building.   He listened as the kids were being shot.

Today Officer Scott Peterson resigned from the Broward Sheriff’s department.

Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel (pictured left) made the admission while answering questions from media.  According to Reuters reporting Sheriff Israel admitted to watching CCTV video of the cowardly officer remaining outside the building and taking no action.

SRO Scott Peterson responded to the shooting BUT NEVER WENT IN for “upward or 4 minutes” while the gunmen killed people, said Sheriff Scott Israel.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (Reuters) – The armed deputy assigned to the campus of a Florida high school during a deadly shooting last week stayed outside the building during the attack and failed to engage the shooter, the county sheriff said on Thursday.

As a consequence, Scott Peterson, on duty as the school resource officer at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, resigned from the department, said Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel, who earlier has suspended the officer from the force. He did not say if Peterson would face criminal charges.

Israel said he decided to suspend Peterson after viewing a video that showed the deputy’s actions during the rampage that killed 17 people. A former student Nikolas Cruz, 19, is accused of carrying out the attack with an AR-15-style assault weapon.

“What I saw was a deputy arrive at the west side of Building 12, take up a position and he never went in,” said Israel. The building is popularly known as “the freshman building.”

Israel said he would not release the video that shows Peterson’s actions at this time and may never do so, “depending on the prosecution and criminal case.”  (read more)

The lack of action by Broward County Officer Scott Peterson is not an outlier, it is the norm. His conduct and cowardly behavior reveals a larger sentiment within a heavily politicized law enforcement agency.  Politics is the filter for all decision-making.

REPEAT: Politics in Broward and Dade county is the filter for ALL decision-making.

Sheriff Israel is a political operative deep inside the Democrat political machine within Broward County.  He is not alone.  Israel is surrounded by similarly-minded police officers and law enforcement officials.  Many of them are political operatives.

CTH prior experience with the top officials within law enforcement, schools and the institutional systems of government, within Broward and Miami-Dade Florida has given us exclusive insight into the politicization of multiple agencies.   Not all of the line-level officers are as inept, corrupt and negligent as their supervisors; but the competent group is definitely in the minority.

After the shooting CTH warned about the political nature of the institutions of civic society in and around Broward and Dade county; and we predicted the underlying issues would begin to surface.  The Broward County sheriff’s office, and the negligent deficiencies therein, is simply a symptom of much deeper -and far more dangerous- institutional corruption at almost every level of local government.

It was not accidental we were confronted in 2013 (during our research into the scope of the back-story of school and LEO corruption) by very angry law enforcement officials.    We received direct threats from law enforcement officials to “back off”.  On two very specific occasions at government offices, while filing FOIA requests, we became targets of retaliation and threats directly from law enforcement officials.  A few of you might remember the details.

As bad as you might think the corruption within the Broward County School administration and Broward County Sheriff’s office might be, it’s worse.

Much, much worse than you can ever imagine.

Officer Scott Peterson standing outside the building while students were shot and killed is not unexpected.  The roles of SRO’s are political, not law enforcement.

Here’s what people don’t understand.  When the county policy is intentionally constructed to ignore criminal behavior in schools, the Sheriff and School superintendent cannot rely on “law and order-minded” SRO’s to carry out the corrupt policy.

The SRO must carry a political hat and be able to intercept behavior, modify the action based on a specific policy, falsify documents, manipulate records etc, and engage in the system with an understanding of the unwritten goals.  SRO’s are given political instructions NOT, I repeat, NOT given instructions to uphold laws and regulations.

The School Officers are the primary foot soldiers carrying out political policy.  Engaging an active shooter on campus is the furthest thing from their skill-set you could imagine.

Security of school students is just not their role.  The Broward County SRO is in place to protect the School System “policy”.

Make sense now?

It’s all FUBAR.

ps.  CTH has thousands of FOIA records to back up our statements:

 

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Feb 22 2018

Shooting Survivor Says CNN “Scripted Questions” During Politically Constructed Town Hall…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 22, 2018 by

CNN has a reputation for manipulating their production of Town Hall events to support very specific political advocacy. One of the more famous examples was CNN contributor Donna Brazille giving Hillary Clinton questions in advance of a CNN political town hall so Mrs. Clinton could prepare responses.

Last night CNN hosted another heavily manipulated production in the aftermath of the Parkland Florida school shooting. One student from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School refused to use the “scripted questions” and backed out of the event.

Student Colton Haab said he was invited by CNN to participate, but he refused to accept their script:

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CNN broadcast the town hall last night with Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL), Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel and NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch. The event was moderated by Jake Tapper who was also the moderator in the infamous Hillary Clinton “scripted questions” town hall event.

Jake Tapper is the common denominator.  Additionally, Broward County Sheriff Israel, a staunch Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama supporter, was part of the policy cover-up who refused to arrest violent students.

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Feb 22 2018

Common Sense as a Priority – President Trump Hosts White House Roundtable Discussion on School Safety…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 22, 2018 by

Earlier today President Trump held a roundtable discussion on school safety with federal and local officials, state attorneys general, law enforcement, education officials and administration officials within the healthcare and mental health field.

The topic is overall school safety in the aftermath of the Parkland Florida school shooting. Many ideas are common sense and surround identifying ‘at risk’ behaviors, and changing the downstream processes when law enforcement intercedes with an individual exhibiting unstable behavior.

The U.S. mainstream media are exhibiting signs of frustration because the prudent and thoughtful responsiveness of the White House is not allowing POTUS Trump’s political opposition enough fuel to create antagonistic narrative.  One of the topics the President Trump has focused on is ‘hardening schools’ through stronger security to include empowering trained school officials to carry concealed firearms.

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Feb 22 2018

Schoolboy Cameron Kasky…


RE-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 22, 2018 by

The U.S. media apparatus -specifically for current events, CNN and Jake Tapper’s narrative engineers- consistently indoctrinate and manipulate children. Indeed, in the history of Fabian political advancement children have always been a focus point for advancing their authoritarian control objectives.

However, today – as with prior history, the media’s ideological lust intoxicates them, and the engineers have a tendency to go too far.   Cue the audio visual:

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As awkward as it is to see a boy utilized as a political tool, note the nuance, comfort, preparation and defensive narrative positioning of the moderator, Jake Tapper.  The aggregate event was a very carefully orchestrated pantomime.  The boy, Cameron Kasky, is nothing more than a puppet on a string playing a role.

As much as CTH dislikes Marco Rubio, I give him great credit here. Senator Rubio could have very easily deconstructed the child, but he took the high-road. Tough to do under these circumstances.

Years from now this boy will be found as all children are who go through this process; laying amid the junkyard of no-longer useful tools.  Smug, arrogant and condescending character traits only survive when they can be excused as childish immaturity; once they become fully matriculated and embedded traits – they are better known as toxic personalities.

[There’s a metaphor here with a Scott Farkas doppelganger in the background.]

Prior to appearing on CNN schoolboy Cameron Kasky scrubbed his Facebook page.  However, the internet is forever.

I can’t even fathom the ideological mentality and immaturity of the boy’s parents.  This is exactly what setting up a kid for a life of misery and shallowness looks like.

Sad.

Feb 22 2018

The Coming Banking Crisis & The End of Bailouts


Armstrong Economics Blog/Banking Crisis

Re-Posted Feb 21, 2018 by Martin Armstrong

Behind the curtain, there is a growing concern about a serious banking crisis beginning once again in Europe. Many governments are talking about the crisis behind-the-curtain and we are now beginning to see steps that are being taken to end the TO-BIG-TO-FAIL policies that dominated the 2007-2009 Crash.

The United States is looking at a new radical bank rescue policy where the government is proposing to revise a central pillar of the idea of bailing out banks creating new financial regulation with a new Chapter 14 bankruptcy procedure. They are looking at eliminating the risk of taxpayers’ costs to bail out banks. They are investigating the means for an orderly resolution so that the taxpayers do not have to bail out the banks. This development is causing some concern among the high-flying Wall Street banks, for if that is the case, then another crisis as 2007-2009 will result in even Goldman Sachs closing. The proposal looks to shift the burden to the shareholders and creditors of that bank. This means depositors who are thus creditors.

In Australia, we see similar legislation being proposed. This is the Financial Sector Legislation Amendment (Crisis Resolution Powers and Other Measures) Bill 2017. This also authorizes bail-ins bringing an end to the bailout.

 

Feb 22 2018

Rising Interest Rates


Armstrong Economics Blog/Interest Rates

Re-Posted Feb 22, 2018 by Martin Armstrong

While the stock market crashed as the pundit looked in their bag to try to come up with an excuse, they blamed rising inflation and interest rates. Yet, nobody is really paying attention to the underlying trend. The cost of carrying debt has been rising gradually and there are noticeable measurable impacts that the pundits are of course oblivious to since they have to explain every day’s movements and not the real trend.

Already, the 10-year rate is piercing above the 2.6% area. There is an impact on the currency once people begin to comprehend the trend. The 10-year German bond rate is 0.70%, and this has been maintained by the ECB buying 40% of European government debt to no avail for nearly 10 years.

The real crisis comes when they realize that the ECB will not be there to buy government debt. The bidders will demand a higher yield so rates will rise very rapidly.

Meanwhile, the Fed will pursue higher interest rates as they need to be normalized to help pensions funds that are rapidly collapsing. This idea of a lower dollar will raise the price of imports and with tariffs, inflation in consumer products will rise.

Mueller is still not ending his investigation. Why should he? He would have to go get a real job in the private sector. Keep the investigation alive to pay the light bills. He shows no sign of embracing unemployment. His pretend indictment is dancing between raindrops, indicting people in Russia knowingly there will never be a trial. We cannot count him out yet as a factor that will undermine the economic confidence.

So we stand at the threshold of rising rates that will then feed into the market and create a bid for the dollar it appears after March.

 

Feb 22 2018

India Enters the Sovereign Debt Crisis


Armstrong Economics Blog/India

Re-Posted Feb 22, 2018 by Martin Armstrong

I have warned continually that the Sovereign Debt Crisis will unfold not so much by people selling government debt, but by the lack of people buying new debt. The greatest peril is when there is NO BID for the new issues because all governments are operating a PONZI scheme. The sell new debt to pay off maturing debt. Currently, holders of Indian government debt have been dumping 4.7 billion rupees ($73 million) of government bonds on average every day this year, according to data from the Clearing Corp. of India. Last year, their net daily sales totaled 368 million rupees.

The Sovereign Debt Crisis emerges when the government is unable to raise enough cash to pay off the maturing debt. India has crossed that threshold so as we have warned, the Sovereign Debt Crisis will begin from outside the USA and spread to the core. This is how all Empires, nations, and city-states collapse.

Feb 21 2018

It’s Too Late – Broward County School Board Beginning to Admit Their Mistakes?…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 21, 2018 by

As expected – buried deep inside a Miami Herald article about the Parkland school shooter, Nikolas Cruz, and a school board questioning their progressive policies, we find the following:

[…]  Absent Cruz’s school records, it is hard to say precisely when Cruz’s behavior became an acute problem for teachers and administrators. Disciplinary reports obtained by the Herald show that at Westglades Middle School, which he attended in 2013, he’d been cited numerous times for disrupting class, unruly behavior, insulting or profane language, profanity toward staff, disobedience and other rules violations.

Records show the behaviors continued at Marjory Stoneman Douglas [High School], which he attended in 2016 and 2017 before being transferred, with discipline being dispensed for fighting, profanity, and an “assault.” It appears the Jan. 19, 2017 assault resulted in a referral for a “threat assessment.” A few months later, Cruz landed at an Off Campus Learning Center, where he remained for only about five months.  (read more)

Well, there it is.

This is what Jack Cashill was writing about yesterday: “Did the Progressive ‘Broward County Solution’ Cost 17 Student Lives?” –

Yes Jack, yes it did.

Jack Cashill knows all too well, because he watched us follow a similar 2012 Trayvon Martin trail into the rabbit hole of manipulated diversionary school discipline to avoid criminal arrests.  Just so the school system could “improve their statistics.”

Broward County schools intentionally created polices from 2011 through 2015 that culminated in the 2018 mass school shooting in Parkland. We know this with great specificity because five years ago we warned Broward County Florida school board members this could happen.

In 2012 and 2013 while doing research into the Trayvon Martin shooting we discovered an alarming set of school policies being enacted in Miami-Dade and Broward County Florida. The policies were called “diversionary programs” and were essentially about stopping High School students from being arrested. Law enforcement was instructed to avoid arrests and defer criminal conduct to school administrators.

Students who engaged in violence, drug sales, robberies, burglaries, theft and other various crimes were intentionally kept out of the criminal justice system. County administrators and School Superintendents told local and county law enforcement officers to stop arresting students.

2013 […] Broward, the nation’s seventh largest district, had the highest number of school-related arrests in Florida in the 2011-2012 school year, according to state data. Seventy-one percent of the 1,062 arrests made were for misdemeanor offenses. (more)

Unfortunately, the school board mandated policies came into conflict with law and order. The problem of the conflicted policy -vs- legality worsened over time as the police excused much more than misdemeanor crimes. Over time this culminated in police officers falsifying documents, hiding criminal activity, lying on official police reports and even hiding stolen merchandise police retrieved from high school students.

In 2012 Trayvon Martin was one of those students. –SEE HERE–

It was our initial FOIA requests to the Miami Dade School Police Department which revealed the secret discipline and diversionary program Trayvon Martin was granted to avoid a criminal record. The School Board and M-DSPD kept trying to hide the issue; they delayed responses and charged us thousands for FOIA information; but we knew this story was huge… so we kept going.

Specifically Trayvon Martin’s criminal conduct was hidden behind school discipline. Stolen jewelry was recorded as random ‘found items’ (the jewelry just intentionally placed in storage with no investigation), Trayvon’s possession of marijuana was similarly obfuscated, and all of the incident reports were intentionally falsified by officials and School Resource Officer, Daryl Dunn, to avoid the Criminal Justice system.

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It is all well documented. None of this is supposition. Our research discovered sworn affidavits from the police department HERE. No-one was ever been held to account – it was just too politically dangerous an issue.

SRO Dunn never filed a criminal report, nor opened a criminal investigation, surrounding the stolen jewelry. Instead, and as a result of pressure from M-DSPD Chief Hurley to avoid criminal reports for black male students, Dunn wrote up the jewelry as “found items”, and transferred them, along with the burglary tool, to the Miami-Dade Police property room where they sat on a shelf unassigned to anyone for investigation.

A separate report of “criminal Mischief” (T-08809) was filed for the additional issue of writing “WTF” on a school locker. [It was the search for the marker used to write the graffiti that led to the backpack search].

The school discipline, “suspension”, was attached to the graffiti and not the stolen jewelry.

oCTOBER 2011 - 1

The connections between the Police Burglary report and the School Report of “found items” were never made because the regular police detective in charge of the Burglary case had no idea the School Police Dept. had filed a “found items” report.

Two differing police departments, and the School Officer, Dunn, intentionally took the criminal element out of the equation – instead preferring “school discipline” and not “criminal adjudication”. (more)

And it wasn’t just Trayvon Martin, there were hundreds of similar actions taken by conflicted School Resource Officers – totaling thousands of crimes over the course of just the first few years of these programs (2010 through 2013).

CTH contacted the Miami-Dade School District, every single school board member, and the Broward County School District – to warn them of what was taking place.

We provided thousands of pages of sworn affidavits and transcribed testimony from law enforcement. We spent several thousand dollars locating, transcribing and assembling the documents and evidence; and hundreds more hours compiling all the information. –SEE HERE– We sent all of it to both school districts and both school superintendents.

Their response: “go away”.

The school board’s in Miami-Dade and Broward County had created a disastrous scheme and it didn’t take long to see where this was going. The scheme was supported by President Obama’s federal education policy, and executive orders –SEE HERE– and people like Jesse Jackson –SEE HERE– In August of 2012 President Obama issuing an “executive order” establishing the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence. Effectively placing “quotas” on school discipline based on race:

https://www.scribd.com/embeds/371916407/content?start_page=1&view_mode=&access_key=key-r2SUUV9Av9ximUQATiXw

Broward County, even went one step further. They stopped arresting students and then changed the policy of suspension. Broward enhanced their program in 2013:

Broward’s Collaborative Agreement on School Discipline was announced in early November. Instead of suspensions, students can now be referred to the PROMISE program, where they receive counseling for several days and then return to school. A host of non-violent misdemeanors no longer require an arrest, though officers can sometimes override that if they feel it is necessary (“I wanted to make sure deputies always had discretion,” says Scott Israel, Broward County’s sheriff). The school district’s Office of Minority Male Achievement reviews data to ensure that punishments for minor infractions and racial disparities are on the decline. (read more)

In 2015 School Superintendent Robert Runcie then began bragging about it.

“Our goal can’t be to have students go into the courtroom,” Runcie said. “Our focus has got to be keep them in the classroom and out of the courtroom.”

Follow a simple timeline:  ♦In 2011/2012 Broward County School administration made a policy decision to block the arrests of students in order to improve their education statistics.  ♦In 2013 that same school board was warned what was happening as a result of that policy.  ♦In 2015 the School doubled-down on the diversionary policies and allowed students to break the law, including physical violence, without legal consequence.  ♦In January 2017 Nikolas Cruz criminally assaulted someone; again, law enforcement engagement was blocked by policy.  ♦A year later in February 2018 Cruz killed seventeen students.

What happens when you stop arresting students for clear criminal conduct and then lessen the school punishment therein?…. You get this:

The Department Of Justice – Civil Rights and School Discipline October 21st 2010

2010 – In recent years, many school districts across the country have begun to adopt strict zero-tolerance discipline policies that impose increasingly harsher punishments for seemingly minor infractions. These disciplinary measures – in-school or out-of-school suspensions, alternative school placements, expulsions, and referrals to police departments and juvenile authorities – disrupt a student’s education and diminish their chances for success.

For too many students, these school-imposed sanctions lead to the criminal justice system, a pathway commonly referred to as the School-to-Prison Pipeline. Regrettably, studies have shown that children of color are disproportionately affected by zero-tolerance policies, a trend that increases already significant disparities. (read more)

2010 – ERIC HOLDER – Never before have our two agencies come together in this way – or brought together such a large and diverse group of partners – to discuss the best ways to ensure that civil rights and educational opportunities are protected for every student, at every level, and in every community…But it is just the beginning of what I know – and I pledge – will be an ongoing conversation about how we can better understand the causes, and most effectively remedy the consequences, of disparities in student discipline. I want to assure all of you that for me, for Secretary Duncan, for the agencies we lead, and for the administration – this work is a top priority.

US DOJ October 2010

 

Resources:

Broward County schools superintendent Robert Runcie

♦2013 Broward County Schools were warned here.

♦2013 Broward County Policies Explained HERE

♦2013 Six School Police Affidavits HERE

♦2013 Example the way the Police Covered-Up Crime HERE

♦2013 President Obama’s Executive Orders HERE

♦2015 Broward County School Superintendent brags about statistical success.

♦2017 Article on the Broward County policy

♦2018 Article on Broward County rethinking

Feb 21 2018

President Trump Hosts Meeting With Parents, Teachers and Students Affected by School Shootings…


RE-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 21, 2018 by

Earlier today President Trump hosted a meeting with teachers, student and parents affected by recent school shootings.  The President began the session by stating his intent to listen to each view and perspective and then move forward.

The stories told by some meeting participants were quite emotional; others were very deliberate and focused on both short-term and longer term issues. Outside the room both sides of the political continuum are very passionate on this issue; and it doesn’t help to have the deafening drumbeat of ideological U.S. media politicizing the discussion whenever possible.

Feb 21 2018

NAFTA Watch Twitch #1 – Close Emissary To Meet Moon Jae-in…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on February 21, 2018 by

Just ‘twitches’ – We explained yesterday how Moon Jae-in relates to the NAFTA exit (SEE HERE).  We showed last year how President Trump uses specific emissaries, only the most trustworthy, for critical geopolitical messaging in advance of big action. Well…

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump, a senior White House adviser, will meet South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Friday as part of a weekend trip to lead the U.S. delegation to the closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics. (read more)

A senior administration official, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said Ivanka Trump will dine with Moon at the Blue House in Seoul on Friday night. She has no plans to meet with North Korean officials, the official said.

White House Delegation Announcement HERE.

Ivanka Trump carries the diplomatic message.

[…]  Justin from Canada recently signed up to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.  With that decision the fatal flaw -from a U.S. perspective- just became the final straw to end the U.S. participation in NAFTA.

The U.S. cannot make any bilateral trade deals with TPP nations while those same TPP nations have an alternative access route to the U.S. market through Canada via NAFTA.

Therefore the only way for President Trump to finish a trade agreement with South Korea (current tense negotiations – see Samsung etc.) is to first remove their NAFTA alternative. Anticipating this reality S-Korea also filed a WTO trade challenge earlier today.

Understandably, South Korea is currently hosting the U.S. Olympics and it would have been extremely poor form, very impolite, and economically very destabilizing for Moon Jae-in if POTUS Trump had made the NAFTA announcement in the months/weeks leading up to their international spotlight event.  (more)