Media Watch

Mass shootings are complex and tragic events with no single cause. While there's no simple explanation for why someone commits such an act, understanding the contributing factors can help us prevent future tragedies. Here are some key areas to consider: Individual factors: Mental health: While not all mass shooters have diagnosed mental illnesses, some may experience conditions like depression, anxiety, or psychosis. These can exacerbate existing problems and impair judgment. Personal experiences: Traumatic experiences like abuse, neglect, or violence can leave lasting scars and contribute to feelings of hopelessness and rage. Social isolation: Feeling disconnected from others and lacking a support system can increase feelings of alienation and despair. Ideological extremism: Exposure to extremist ideologies that promote violence or hatred can fuel harmful beliefs and justifications for violence. Social and environmental factors: Access to firearms: The easy availability of fi

 In the old days, the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution required police to establish "probable cause" to lawfully conduct certain searches and seizures or perform arrests. As of 1968, police may stop you even without probable cause to believe you committed a crime. In the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision Terry v. Ohio, justices formulated from whole cloth the less-than-probable-cause standard they called “reasonable suspicion,” aka "RS", which was comically and pedantically defined as the totality of specific and articulable facts and circumstances, taken together, that leads an officer to reasonably suspect a person may be engaged in criminal activity. Cops never even need to name a specific law they think has been broken, nor do they even have to tell the “subject” the basis for the stop, unless he’s arrested or cited. The court pretended to establish some boundaries by requiring that an officer’s suspicion must be “particularized” and not generalized,

We as Americans tend to turn the other cheek on undocumented migrants because they contribute significantly to our local economies by depressing labor costs, but the migrants are often mistreated. Back in May, an 18-year-old Guatemalan migrant, gainfully employed by St. Augustine, Florida area agricultural producers, was being detained by a St. Johns County Sheriff's deputy for unknown reasons. Sgt. Michael Kunovich rolled up on Vergilio Aguilar-Mendez, who doesn't speak English, in front of Super 8 Motel, and began questioning him. Kunovich quickly escalated the encounter and began applying physical force against Aguilar-Mendez. During a struggle, Kunovich, a 25-year veteran of SJSO, tased Aguilar-Mendez 4 times. After backup officers arrived and while Aguilar-Mendez was being handcuffed, Kunovich suffered a medical event and was pronounced dead a short time later. Aguilar-Mendez is being charged for his death and has been locked up ever since, even though he had not committed

  This morning I received an email from Google advising me that I had been welcomed into the Bard research project, so I started asking questions. Here's one question I asked, followed by Bard's response. Question: "In the Iowa Supreme Court case STATE V. SMITHSON, the court ruled that Iowa Code 719.1 interference with official acts only applies in the case of active interference, and not for merely refusing to cooperate. Based on that ruling, would refusing to identify to a police officer be considered active interference?" Answer: "No, refusing to identify to a police officer would not be considered active interference under the Iowa Supreme Court's ruling in State v. Smithson. In that case, the court ruled that Iowa Code 719.1 interference with official acts only applies in the case of active interference, and not for merely refusing to cooperate. The court defined active interference as "an act that obstructs or impedes the officer's ability to c

If I can boil it down to the brass tax, my wrongful-arrest case against Des Moines officers is a case where city hall would rather go to extraordinary lengths to put one of its residents in the dangerous predator bucket than to admit its own wrongdoing. Quick background. I grew up in a small, rural town in Iowa. I earned an AAs in broadcasting and broadcast engineering and have since been a member of the broadcast media in this state for four decades. I worked as a radio news director, meeting regularly with community & civic leaders. I volunteered as a board member, as well as 2-term president, for my neighborhood association. I’ve been a communications volunteer for the county’s Emergency Management, and the state, as a member of the A.R.R.L. (Amateur Radio Relay League). I served as a communications N.C.O. in the Iowa National Guard, 194 th Field Artillery, with an honorable discharge. I was raised around people who honorably served in the police profession. My grand dad wa

 The laws & institutions that are insensitive to or cause of fatherlessness can do more to address violent outcomes than all the mental health programs and gun laws on the planet.  What Representing Men in Divorce Taught Me About Fatherhood The Crisis of Fatherless Shooters Mike Lee Wonders If ‘Fatherlessness’ Is Behind Mass Shootings

If you want to know in as few words as possible how to avoid common mistakes when shooting video, try these 5 quick & dirty ideas. Buy a $50 mic/recorder and learn how to use it Terrible sounding audio will destroy an otherwise amazing video. On-camera (built-in) microphones are almost always too far from the subjects you’re recording and end up “hearing” too much environmental noise and “room bounce” reverberating throughout a speech. For the kind of up-close presence heard from radio & television presenters, you’ll need your microphone set a few inches from the mouth. Because it’s just not that feasible to hold your camera 3-10 inches from subjects’ mouths, I recommend lavalier and handheld microphones priced between $30 and $50 as a starting point. Budget mic reviews are plastered all over the internet, so you shouldn’t have too much trouble identifying a few suitable candidates for your purpose. Also, use headphones (or earbuds if you must) to identify & mitigate wi