The New York State report found students as young as nine years old subjected to sudden, painful, repeated electric shocks for ‘refusing to follow staff directions’, ‘failing to maintain a neat appearance’, “stopping work for more than ten seconds”, “getting out of seat”, “interrupting others”, “nagging”, ‘swearing’, ‘whispering’ and ‘slouching in chair’, and ‘‘moving conversation away from staff”. …

“These devices are much stronger than police stun guns (1-4 milliamps),” says Gregory Miller, former teacher at JRC. … In McCollins’ case, school staff used the powerfully painful electric shock device (45 – 91 milliamps, at 66 volts) on McCollins over the course of seven hours for not taking off his coat in class. After his “therapy” was over, McCollins was admitted to a nearby children’s hospital ….

(More.)

(*Sleme = slimy meme.)

GARY (chartier and charles) JOHNSON 2012. (Sorry.)

Check out two recent interviews, one with Charles and Gary and one just with Charles.

The United States was nearly destroyed last month.

Thankfully, alert public servants intervened to avert America’s destruction; like Gandalf facing down the Balrog they cried “you … shall not … pass!” – and sent Boris and Natasha scurrying back to their sinister overseas nation.

Oh, and Marilyn Monroe’s remains are safe also.

Dum dum dum da dum dum, I feel free ….

The politerati are all aflutter because GOP party hack Reince Priebus compared our President Incarnate to Francesco Schettino, the cruise ship captain who’s been charged with manslaughter in connection with the recent shipwreck off the coast of Italy.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Priebus’s counterhack on the Democratic side, called it an “unbelievable comparison,” opining that “for the RNC chairman to compare the president of the United States to someone who has been charged with manslaughter shows a dramatic level of insensitivity to the families of those victims.”

I agree. After all, Obama is guilty of actual mass murder against the civilian population of Pakistan. To compare him to someone charged with the lesser offense of manslaughter is dramatically insensitive to the families of Obama’s victims.

Today is the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. I have nothing much new to say, but you can check out what I wrote in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 (plus a follow-up), and 2008. And this year there’s excellent commentary from Darian Worden, Sheldon Richman, Tom Knapp, David D’Amato, and Jason Kuznicki.

On a cheerier note, today is also the ninth anniversary of the Molinari Institute – which has been a tremendous success. That success is due almost entirely to the Center for a Stateless Society division of the Institute (and thus due almost entirely to people who aren’t me), which has been placing market anarchist editorials every week in periodicals around the world (including some of the pieces linked to above). À bas l’état!

It’s also the ninth anniversary of this blog, which has likewise been a greater success than I anticipated. Thanks all!

I laughed when Nero’s minions sent
fire-tortured souls to the sky.
Without the walls of Pilate’s halls,
I shouted “Crucify!”

I roared my glee to the sullen sea
where Abel’s blood was shed.
My jeer was loud in the gory crowd
that stoned St. Stephen dead.

— Robert E. Howard

Even if the death penalty were morally legitimate (and I think it isn’t), and even if we could be justifiably confident that every one of those 234 executed prisoners was actually guilty of the crimes for which they were sentenced (and I think we can’t), it would still be grotesque to react to those executions with cheers and applause, as the audience did at this week’s Republican debate. Surely a mood of solemnity and regret would be more appropriate. These Republicans howling and hooting over executions are the kind who formerly reveled in seeing Christians thrown to the lions. The fact that they now have the effrontery to call themselves Christians only adds insult to injury (literally).