If you are a black man charged with burglary in Iowa, your mugshot hits the paper. But if you're white.....

Courtesy of So Let's Talk About It:  

Why did this story get run with these criminals’ school photos, where on the same day, same situation, the article of another group of burglars featured their mug shots? 

Same day. 
Same channel. 
Same crime. 
Same author. 

So why weren’t mugshots good enough for the white guys who got arrested? Who already looks guilty before their trial? Which story plants the seed into a potential jury pool that this is a group of good kids versus this is a group of criminals?

Here are the two Gazette stories, one for the black suspects here, and the white suspects here.

As you can see the article about the white suspects now shows their mugshots, and not their yearbook pictures, but the screenshot up above shows it as it was originally published.

It is also worth noting that the three white suspects are described as "wrestlers" throughout the Gazette article, and not once as "suspects." As if this were simply a departure from their usual upstanding identities.

However the four black men are only described as "suspects."

But don't let this bother you because remember the Republican party has assured us that racism is dead.

CNN describes Watertown. Massachusetts during police lock down thusly: “It’s as Though a Bomb Had Dropped Somewhere” Doh!

Courtesy of Slate:

At 5:38 p.m. ET, CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer threw it to his colleague Susan Candiotti to ask her to describe the scene in Watertown, Mass. Her explanation was a bit on the nose.

Seriously, WTF?

You know this bombing at the Boston Marathon was a truly horrible event, but if anything could be described as a positive, it is that it REALLY helped to identify exactly which news outlets could be trusted and which ones could not.

While CNN was running around saying "We see brown people," and Fox News was desperately trying to drive home the point that the suspects were Muslim, and not, repeat NOT, Christians, MSNBC was carrying the banner of journalistic integrity.

It was Pete Williams who put the brakes on when everybody was reporting that the suspects were already in custody, and was the first to report that suspect number two was hiding in a boat.

In fact his consistently careful and accurate reporting led to Kelly O'Donnell tweeting the following:

Can we just make @petewilliamsnbc "employee of the month" now in our DC bureau at @nbcnews ??
— Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) April 19, 2013

I think at one point EVERYTHING that NBC or MSNBC thought they knew about the situation was being run past Williams first for his seal of approval before being reported to the public.

A policy that I think might just serve them well in the future.

Especially since the Right Wing is absolutely convinced that the entire Boston police department, FBI, Homeland Security, and White House have conspired to fool the American people into believing that that these two people were the suspects.

When, according to them, the Saudi National, that was once a suspect and now cleared, was the actual perpetrator of the horrific event.

In fact Glenn Beck is so convinced that he has the goods he is threatening the United States government with an expose on Monday.

All I can say is that I am VERY glad that I am an ardent viewer of MSNBC, and will continue to be a loyal viewer going forward.

And yes I certainly DO hope that Pete Williams gets employee of the year, as well as the many other accolades that he clearly deserves.

Well this should save the authorities time in identifying the people responsible for the next gun massacre.

I cannot tell you how embarrassed I am that BOTH of my Senators are represented in this graphic.

One Boston Marathon bombing suspect dead, the other still at large after massive shootout. Update!

Suspect on left has been killed, suspect on the right, Dzhokar Tsarnaev, remains at large.

Courtesy of ABC News:

One suspect in this week's deadly Boston Marathon bombing was killed after a police shootout, and a second suspect, identified by officials as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, remains at large and the subject of a manhunt, police said early this morning. 

Tsarnaev, the man the FBI identified Thursday only as Suspect 2 in photos related to the marathon bombing investigation, is on the loose and is armed and dangerous, police said. He is the target of an "active search by tactical teams." 

"We believe this is a terrorist, we believe this is a man that's come here to kill people," Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis said in a brief news conference this morning. T

he first suspect was killed after exchanging gunfire with police officers, during which multiple explosive devices were detonated, police said. Officials at Beth Israel Hospital reported they received one patient who later died, but would not confirm it was the first suspect.

The first suspect had an IED strapped to his body, and reportedly was run over.

I am watching Morning Joe right now and the video of the police shootout is unbelievable.

I will update this post as new information comes in.

Update: This from The Boston Globe:

Police are warning residents in East Watertown to stay in their homes, and not to answer the door unless they see a uniformed police officer outside. They said drivers should not stop in the area roughly bounded by Dexter, Laurel, and Arsenal streets. 

According to Alben, the night’s outbreak of violence began when police received reports of a robbery of a convenience store in Kendall Square near MIT. A few minutes later, an MIT police officer, who has not been identified, was shot multiple times while in his cruiser at Main and Vassar streets, near Building 32, better known as the renowned Stata Center on the MIT campus. 

The officer was pronounced dead at Massachusetts General Hospital. A short time later, two men carjacked a Mercedes SUV at gunpoint, and the owner of that car was able to flee at a gas station on Memorial Drive. 

The SUV proceeded out Memorial Drive toward Watertown followed by a long train of police vehicles in pursuit. At one point during the pursuit, the two suspects opened fire on Watertown police and a Transit Police officer, who was shot and who remains in critical condition at a Boston-area hospital this morning. 

During the gunfight, the man known as Marathon suspect No. 1 was wounded and was taken into custody. This morning, Dr. Richard Wolfe said the man was brought to the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center emergency room about 1:10 a.m. with multiple traumatic injuries. “It was more than gunshot wounds,’’ Wolfe told reporters about 5:30 a.m. today. 

“It was a combination of injuries. We believe a combination of of blasts, multiple gunshot wounds.”

Reports are that the suspects have been in America since 2001 and 2003. (The older brother became a permanent resident in 2007.)

Update 2: Here is video of the firefight between the suspects and police.

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It sounds like a war zone.

 Update 3: MSNBC has a pretty good rundown of what we know so far.

Update 4: The suspects are brothers, the other brother's name is Tamerlan Tsarnaev, here is information about his Facebook page.

They are indeed Islamic, but at least one of them is from Chechen (Fixed).

Update 5: Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick held a press conference urging residents to "shelter in place:"   

“We’ve had a very rapidly developing situation over the course of the night,” Patrick began. “Suspect one is dead. Suspect two is on the run.” 

“We have an MBTA officer who is seriously wounded and he’s in surgery right now,” Patrick added. “We have an MIT security office who has been killed.” 

He said that the Boston transit service has been suspended in order to facilitate a massive and ongoing manhunt. “We’ve got every assed that we can possibly muster on the ground right now,” Patrick said. He asked for the public’s assistance to help them keep safe. 

Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis said that the “shelter in place” request from police to the public has been extended to the entire city of Boston.

Our hearts go out to the citizens of Boston right now, and hope that everybody remains safe.

Update 6: This is what greeted one resident of Watertown this morning. Seen outside her window.

Those are SWAT members surrounding a home in Watertown.

Update 7: According to Pete Williams the police have the other suspect's location.

.@petewilliamsnbc: Police believe they know where the surviving #BostonMarathon suspect brother is located. on.msnbc.com/Z3I2ON
— msnbc (@msnbc) April 19, 2013

However there has also been a THIRD person taken into custody as well. There may be more people involved than previously believed.

Update 8: Here is a much better photograph of the suspect still at large.

Update 9: A photo to chill the blood.

Bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev strolls behind bombing victim Martin Richard minutes before explosion.

Here are the suspects identified by the FBI in the Boston Marathon bombing. Update!

I just finished watching the news conference, and above is the video they provided and the images we need to exam can be found here.

The FBI was adamant that only THESE photographs should be used to help identify the suspects and that all other photographs should be considered suspect.

I do not want to read too much into these, but one thing I will point out is that they are certainly NOT the brown skinned people that John King identified on CNN.

Update: Here are the suspects for those having trouble accessing the FBI page.

Update 2: If you do recognize them please call 1-800- CALL FBI (225-5324)

Update 3: It looks like the folks on Reddit may have already identified the hat worn by one of the suspects. 

Look familiar?

Update  4: Here is link to all of the photos.

If I were these guys I would be crapping myself right about now.