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Las Vegas Police Union Fire Off Whining, Flag-Dripping Request To The NFL To 'Investigate' Michael Bennett For Saying Things

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If you have even a passing interest in American sports, you will likely already be aware that Seattle Seahawks player Michael Bennett has been in the news of late due to an incident that occurred in Las Vegas during the Mayweather v. McGregor fight. Police responded to reports of shots being fired in a casino where Bennett also happened to be and, in the chaos that ensued afterwards, officers put Bennett on the ground and cuffed him as he ran away from the shooting. For his part, Bennett claims the officer pointed his gun at him and threatened to "blow his fucking head off" and that the entire detainment was done without any reason other than his being a large black man. He was quite vocal about the incident on Twitter and during press interviews.The Las Vegas police, not surprisingly, aren't loving how Bennett is characterizing what occurred. During a press conference of their own, LVPD representatives couldn't answer as to why Bennett was detained at all during the incident, nor could they explain why the detaining officer's body camera was off during the incident. Despite these shrugs at fairly apropos questions, the union representing the police officers, the Las Vegas Police Protective Association Metro, did manage to fire off one of the whiniest letters to the NFL asking them to "investigate" Bennett for... saying things?



There's a great deal there to unpack. The first thing that struck me was how badly the letter attempts to wrap Las Vegas police officers in the American flag. The NFL is currently going through a series of kneeling protests during the national anthem, an expression of rights that has some people quite upset. I'll leave that debate to the side for this post, but by calling the league out for that in the letter before saying it hopes the league won't ignore Bennett's comments about the LVPD, it sure sounds like Las Vegas police seem to think it deserves more respect than the American flag. Which is sort of a weird argument to make.But the crux of the silliness here is that this is a letter from a police union asking a person's employer to investigate an employee for speech it claims is "false and defamatory." It should be obvious that there are legal relief avenues for the police if they feel they have been defamed. It rings as strange for the same police that detained Bennett to be whining to his employer, begging it to then investigate Bennett's conduct, which consists entirely of speech. The NFL has built a name for itself for its heavy-handed, top-down, overtly political approach to investigating its players. It seems pretty clear that this was a petty attempt by the police to then harass Bennett through his employer as a result of his choosing to speak out about his perspective on the incident for which the LVPD itself could not provide the relevant answers to pointed questions.To be clear, I am making no judgment on the nature of the incident itself. Whether racism was a factor or not is an open question. That said, harassing a citizen for his speech on Twitter and in interviews by appealing to the authority of his employer is both weak and underhanded.Update: This post has been updated to clarify that it was the police union that sent the letter, rather than the police department itself. We apologize for the original error.

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posted at: 12:00am on 13-Sep-2017
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Another Craft Beer Brand Gets Bullied To Death Over Shaky Trademark Claims

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The warning bells for the craft beer industry have been sounding for some time now, but the trademark disputes keep on coming. Even as trademark registrations in craft beer grow exponentially and intellectual property attorneys themselves are predicting an explosion in disputes on the horizon, the legal cases and threat letters have begun to grow. What once was an industry known for cooperative and congenial attitudes on trademark issues has devolved into corporate protectionism. But inter-industry disputes aren't the only concern, as the explosion in the craft beer industry has also invited trademark disputes from those outside of the industry.Trademark protectionists can now put another pelt on the wall, that of the Dark and Stormy Night beer made by Picaroons Traditional Ales.

The Fredericton-based craft brewery announced through social media it's putting the popular organic dark wheat beer "to rest" after losing a lengthy legal battle with another company over trademark infringement. The Facebook post does not name the other company, but Picaroons Traditional Ales owner Sean Dunbar confirmed it's liquor giant Goslings.Picaroons received a cease and desist order from Goslings, saying the beer infringed on its Dark 'n Stormy cocktail, made with Gosling's Black Seal Rum and Gosling's Stormy Ginger Beer."We tried, you know, saying 'Please,'" Dunbar said. "We tried arguing that the two products really didn't have anything to do with each other."
Those arguments didn't work. And I would think such arguments shouldn't even be necessary for a couple of reasons. First, and, damn it, I'm going to keep shouting about this until the USPTO finally listens: not all alcoholic drinks compete in the same marketplace and trademarks should afford more subtelty to those market distinctions. Wine, beer, liquor, cocktails are all distinct items for a shopper. With sufficient differences in names and branding, nobody is going to mistake a wine company for a beer company, or a beer company for a liquor company. "Dark 'n Stormy" and "Dark and Stormy Night" aren't completely distinct, but they're distinct enough when placed on different types of drinks to be discernable to the common consumer.And about that "Dark and Stormy Night" brand name itself. Dunbar claims he got the term for his beer from a Peanuts comic strip, which is perplexing to me because "It was a dark and stormy night" is a cliche opening for a work of fiction. That's what it's known for and, in some circles, it's used essentially as a joke that references a lack of creativity. A dark 'n stormy cocktail, however, references the stormy weather in the Carribean where the term was coined. I personally never would have made the connection from the beer's name to that of the cocktail, and I'm not sure many others would have either.But, rather than fighting this out in court, Picaroons decided to cave and kill the brand.
Picaroons said in its Facebook post that the brew at the centre of the dispute had been in production for 11 years."We certainly did not go out without a fight, though after months and months we've officially lost the battle and are now retiring our lightest dark beer."Dunbar said the company worked with a local trademark lawyer and "would have loved to defend it to the hilt," but decided taking it all the way to court wasn't worth the expense."Good bye old friend," the Facebook post said. "RIP."
And so another craft beer brand commits suicide rather than fight for its life in court, proving once again that trademark bullying works.

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