Charlotte, NC

Who do you think is telling the truth?

"Scott’s family who have insisted that he was disabled, sitting in his car reading a book, and had no gun. “He sits in the shade, reads his book and waits on his kid to get off the bus,” Scott’s sister told reporters. “He didn’t have no gun, he wasn’t messing with nobody.” He was the father of seven children.

vs.

"Police Chief Kerr Putney said during a news conference that officers were searching for a suspect Tuesday when they saw Scott exit a vehicle with a handgun at an apartment complex on the city's northeast side. "The officers gave loud, clear verbal commands which were also heard by many of the witnesses. They were instructing the subject, once he got out of the vehicle, to drop the weapon... Mr. Scott exited his vehicle armed with a handgun as the officers continued to yell at him to drop it." (Fox News). The police will not be releasing the web cam video.

And here is the spin all over cyberspace:

"I wish the rioters had brains..."

"What's going on is an act of #domesticterrorism & it should B stopped rather than throwing them a bone."

"Most of these people are thugs, lawless criminals and not protesters."

"Everyone we have on video destroying things should be charged with domestic terrorism #CharlotteProtest."

"#charlotteprotest is an excuse to go steal shit and not get arrested."

"What I will never understand is people trashing, burning, and looting their own neighborhoods...what does that solve??! #CharlotteProtest."

"Worthless savages #charlotteprotest #BlackLivesMatter"

Tip for #CharlotteProtest #BLM rioters: to change the so-called "oppression," STOP behaving like rabid gorillas

Am I the only one that sees these lines of militarized, heavily armed police dressed as Darth Vader as dystopic? This week: Tulsa, Columbus, Charlotte pigs shooting people dead. The police are the violent thugs here so why isn't anyone saying so?

Violence? Lobbing exploding tear gas canisters, shooting rubber bullets at near point blank range, thats violence. Breaking windows is a property crime. Shooting down people at traffic stops is violence.

In non-violent theory we debate the appropriateness of attacks on property during protests. Will anything ever be solved unless the rich feel the pain? Do people in occupied ghettos have a right to defend themselves by throwing tear gas canisters back at the Police, overturning their pig-mobiles, busting up Walmarts, liquor stores and payday loan outfits?

The only way things will change is if every protest such as the ones in North Dakota, Tulsa, Charlotte have parallel supporting protests across the USA. The corporate fascist pigs need to know that the people will no longer stand for state sponsered racism and classism. No longer stand for destroying the Earth for profit, No longer believe the lies

The server seems to be down so I can't finish this essay with the illustrations... which I have copied to FB.

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TheOtherMaven's picture

There it is, just that bald.

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

Steven D's picture

released the video of Terence Crutcher being killed. No "riots" occurred in Tulsa, even though it clearly showed the police had no reason to shoot him.

Charlotte police refuses to release video of the shooting. Sticks to their "guns" on their concocted story that no one in the community believes.

Anyone surprised that the outcome is different?

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/21/494900984/black-men-ma....

An "OH WOW" read from a State Supreme Court ruling on a Boston case. Maybe there is hope from the Judicial system after all.

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The court recognized reality on the street? That's a shock.

Of course, this is the court that introduced the concept of marriage equality into law, after the aborted attempt in Hawaii.

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Please help support caucus99percent!

riverlover's picture

has a photo of a cop back (dressed all riot) facing two terrified black women. I believe the photo. Context is right, but more photos would help in conclusions.

I read on FB some responses, more measured, saying that burning boxes was shameful, and I agree except for context. That is rage being vented. Anger reached boiling. Understandable to me.

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Alex Ocana's picture

Those of us who are not served by the police remember that the gun reportedly found on Che Taylor was traced to a sheriff’s deputy. We remember that officer Michael Slager was caught planting a weapon on the body of Walter Scott after he was shot in the back while running away. We remember that Samuel DuBose was politely interacting with police during a traffic stop when officer Ray Tensing shot him in the head and then immediately claimed to his superiors that DuBose had tried to run him down. We remember that officers claimed that 19-year-old Laquan McDonald was threatening them with a knife, until video revealed that he was running away from officers when he was shot 16 times.

This photo from Charlotte tells you all you need to know about policing in America Ijeoma Oluo

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From the Light House.

riverlover's picture

Since I do not hear US news, and never something about PR, I am getting this site now. Crap, not supported. You are on FB, check Euronews. Tell me what you think of the site. I am in the dark.

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elenacarlena's picture

I remember some of the incidents in the link from when they happened, yes.

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Raggedy Ann's picture

It's intimidation of the 99%.

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

Greyhound's picture

That is exactly the purpose. None of this has any effect on safety or crime, all of the facts tell us this.

This is about putting and keeping the rest of us down and afraid that they can and will do to the rest of us, what they've always done to black people.

Like the TSA theater in the airports, the title of the show is not the plot/purpose of the show.

I would say however that, until you acknowledge it, it can't be changed.

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RantingRooster's picture

notice the sign on the bus in the background, "Not in Service".

Think about that, not in the service of the community. Very telling indeed.

RR

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

http://www.mediaite.com/online/report-charlotte-protesters-tried-to-thro...

A protester was shot by other protesters. Now in critical condition. There are videos of attacks all over the web.

This is why the left will never get its revolution. It loves identity politics more.

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Aardvark's picture

in that the United States is a culture that subverts quite successfully any attempt to mass-market an alternative to consumption and greed.

That, I think, is what those who look back on this period of history will say about the United States and the system of global capital which it dominated in its prime: that it was the most subversive philosophy in the world at that time, far more effective in achieving its goals than any "communist dictatorship."

I suppose one cannot tell someone to look past the color of her own skin, when the powers which control every aspect of society refuse to do so, including those within these "communities of identity" who benefit from this kind of identity politics.

Only those leaders who are not willing to fold - at any personal cost - will have any chance at all. Senator Sanders, whom I did support, did not have that will.

In the end, who is willing to give her life for total strangers, for an abstract cause? I suppose that is the question I ask myself: would I be willing to be assassinated, or for my family to be assassinated, if there were any chance of causing a positive change through non-violence, for people I may not like personally?

Peace and love be with you, reader.

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elenacarlena's picture

city officials, not "other protesters". Secondly, there was an ongoing peaceful protest in a park, versus "rioting by agitators" downtown.

Can we please stop uncritically swallowing every media and cop BS story and blaming groups for the actions of a few?

http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/21/us/charlotte-police-shooting/index.html

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I had CNN on in the car this morning, and someone from Charlotte - police chief or such I believe - was laying the blame for last night on "outsiders". "Outsiders" from the metro area. Wtf? The 1st amendment guarantees Americans the right to (1) free speech (2) of the people to peaceably assemble and (3) to petition the government for a redress of grrivances.

Nowhere in there do I read that that right is limited to a neighborhood.

Why are our citizens exercising their 1st amendment rights met with police in riot gear?

And while I regret the vandalism & arson that takes place at some of these events , I will point out that Americans will burn couches and cars when their team loses - or wins- a championship. Yet somehow that isn't viewed as negatively as the reaction to 100scofvameficans bring shot by police.

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the backseat of a Camaro.

"Can we please stop uncritically swallowing every media and cop BS story and blaming groups for the actions of a few?"

I assume you're talking about both sides? Like the social media posters who react to a black cop working for a black police chief who shot an armed black guy with a prior weapon offense on his record by blaming white people or saying "all white people are devils?" Or the woman who blamed a white cop and started the story that the victim was just "reading a book," not realizing that her own Facebook posts from minutes before showed both the actual black cop and the victim's' weapon?

Yeah.

You know "Hands up, don't shoot" never happened, right?

In cases like these, we've had multiple examples of police lying about what happened as well as victims and witnesses lying about what happened, too. People are individuals. There are nice white people, nice cops, nice black people; and there are also white lying assholes, black lying assholes, and lying asshole police. To pretend all the truth is on one side all the time pretty much removes somebody from the realm of rational discussion.

Hillbots are as irrational, dogmatic closed-minded as Bush supporters were during the 'zeroes. But that behavior is not entirely exclusive to them. People are so in love with their narratives they don't want to see or hear anything that contradicts them.

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from the moment they first appear. Everybody's got something to prove, and nobody trusts the cops, or even the government to be truthful. Which is a shame because often they are. Or at least they often try to be, institutional corruption notwithstanding.

The militarization off police forces is an undeniable fact, and cop-culture tends to foster an adversarial relationship with the public it is meant to serve: Us against them. Meanwhile niggah-culture permeates and victimizes large swaths of the black community, where petty crime and gang-related violence are everyday facts of life. Handguns are everywhere... usually where they're not supposed to be.

Cops stop a car for a broken tail-light in certain neighborhoods, there's a fair chance a gun and/or a crack pipe will be inside. They profile instinctively - it's part of the job. Some of them get trigger-happy. Some of them are racists. Many are poorly trained, many are poorly paid. They form a brotherhood, loyal to one another above all.

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native

know to whom the car is registered and if the owner, but not necessarily the driver, has outstanding warrants. The dispatcher gets a reading on the plate as soon as the officer calls it in.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

elenacarlena's picture

happened yet.

I would also say, release the videos and let us see for ourselves. That's the only way we're going to be satisfied.

But no, I think "hands up don't shoot" did happen. I have read 100s of pages of testimony to the grand jury and I think they returned the wrong verdict and the DOJ was also wrong.

I won't go through it all, but Exhibit A: Excited utterance at the time by guys with no motive to lie, who didn't know they were being filmed by the guy hiding in the basement. The FBI/DOJ found them not to be credible. Really?:

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sblJdLcgXfU width:500]

Exhibit B: According to Wilson, he was punched in the face so severely that he thought the next punch would either knock him unconscious or kill him. He said his face was bruised and swollen. This is the photo that shows the most "damage". Does this look like the face of a beaten man to you? The FBI/DOJ found Wilson to be credible. Really?:

Darren Wilson beaten.jpg

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riverlover's picture

From what I have read and heard, a mob acts as a mob, no real thought. A scary thing.

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RantingRooster's picture

back in the late 1800's, in his work, The Crowd.

The masses have never thirsted after truth. They turn aside from evidence that is not to their taste, preferring to deify error, if error seduce them. Whoever can supply them with illusions is easily their master; whoever attempts to destroy their illusions is always their victim.
— The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, p. 110, Viking Press, 1960

There is a deep, very deep under current within our society, a psychological "control" mechanism at work, it's call propaganda. This short doc does a good job of explaining it.
[video:https://youtu.be/p8ERfxWouXs align:center]

Think about it...We are in a permanent state of war, against a “feeling”, ie terror. This definition is so vague that I could fart, and be accused of being a terrorist, for launching a Gas attack against unsuspecting civilians near by, get locked up and the key thrown away without any explanation, charge or the right to defend myself.

Can anyone say NDAA?

RR Drinks

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Steven D's picture

is not true. The video of that alleged incident shows no such thing. I watched the video which was claimed to show this and I saw no attempt to drag the photographer onto a fire. At best the video shows one person pushing a woman down while she attended to the photographer while on ground. Then it shows police (who had been standing around doing nothing) moving to assist and move photographer.

It doesn't help to inflame passions by claiming that things happened for which there is scanty evidence if any.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Alex Ocana's picture

In Bolivia and Venezuela whenever "dragging a white man" to "burn him alive" or "civilian shoots protester" you can safely bet on the perpetrator (s) to be paid by the "opposition" as agitators to discredit the protest or government. In Israel you can bet that even a 13 year old girl shot down in cold blood by the IDF it will be spun as her own fault. I have no information on these two incidents except what is being spun by MSM.

The core of the problem is that we have been lied to so many times by the media that we no longer can even guess at the truth. We have been mind-fucked so that we are (supposed to) always blame the victims for the violence perpetrated against them.

I have to hit the trail... see you all later.

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From the Light House.

Raggedy Ann's picture

They are handing out death sentences on our people of color, at will. We no longer live in a democracy.

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

WoodsDweller's picture

when the Patriot Act passed. That was a long time ago, now.

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"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone

travelerxxx's picture

In 2013, in Atlanta, Der Spiegel interviewed President Jimmy Carter. One of his statements (translated from the German article, which was never made available in English) was, "America does not have any functioning democracy."

Original article: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/nsa-affaere-jimmy-carter-kritisier...

Carter is right.

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I have no love for cops of our police state, but please do not make this racial. This is primarily a class problem. Treating it as a racial problem will result in the wrong solution which fixes nothing. The problem is that our police need to go back to protecting and serving the citizens, not being stormtroopers for the elite. Treating it as a racial problem will mean sensitivity training and quotas, but not fix the actual problem.

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pswaterspirit's picture

In Portland Oregon there was a string of shootings of black people by police. The regular folks demanded answers for what appeared to be a race problem in the police department. Heads rolled more than once. Now they shoot homeless people and teenagers who are having mental crisis.

They just find some one else to kill. Not sure why that isn't obvious to all.

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pswaterspirit's picture

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pswaterspirit's picture

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Alex Ocana's picture

"Its not about racism, its about white suprememcy." -- Craig G.

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From the Light House.

Cachola's picture

Don't forget executioners.

And the most enraging part is that those who scream constitution! the loudest while wrapped up in the flag are fine with this.

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Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur.

elenacarlena's picture

Amendment" when censored on a blog will turn around and say "Do what the cops tell you, don't talk back!"

Yet the First Amendment specifically protects the right to be free of government censorship and the cops, not private blogs, are agents of the government.

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Tea party was different than this, the retort I got was to stop bringing up ancient history.

They don't understand that it isn't ancient history. -------- without representation still exists.

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Azazello's picture

I heard Former Secretary Clinton say that on NPR this morning. I've heard President Obama say the exact same thing. "This is not who we are." Well guess what, this is who we are. How many more of these police murders do you have to see to understand that ? Ask 'em in Afghanistan who we are, or in Iraq, Libya, Syria. We can argue about how we got this way, but don't tell me that "this is not who we are."

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

if I could. Damn straight this is who we are.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

TheOtherMaven's picture

come back home to bite us on the ass. So it has always been, so it will always be, until and unless we stop committing crimes abroad. (Don't hold your breath.)

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

This indeed IS WHO WE ARE. And only someone speaking from a position of vast white and wealth privilege like Hillary Clinton could try and say that it is not who we are.

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1. Cops are out of control and killing people.
2. PoC, black people, are disproportionately the victim.
3. No one cares or is listening because of prejudice and msm spin.

This is why I maintain BLM made a mistake by focusing on the black community. While accurate, it alienates "others" and creates "all" lives matter. Imagine the gay community if they had just focused on lesbians instead of all gay people.

The tragedy is that raw numbers show more whites are gunned down by cops than PoC, and people with mental handicaps are the most likely to be killed by cop. Native Americans are equal to blacks as most likely shot by cop. If BLM had made the bigger and more inclusive case while stressing their numbers, they would have cut "all" lives matter off at the knees. Instead, we have just one more divisive argument to distract us from the point that cops are out of control, over armed, poorly supervised and under trained, and the war on drugs is the excuse that lets them do it.

Someone is now trying to claim that PTSD is why the cops are like they are. I'm not sure how I feel about giving them an excuse or crutch to achieve change. But if it saves a life, I guess they can make up all the alibis they need to quit acting like killers and assholes. I still say all this military equipment is a big reason for the dystopia. Maybe if they had to go out there naked and unarmed, they'd find a little humility.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

on potential new hires. That is supposed to catch people with disqualifying problems. Apparently it does not.
Training is supposed to emphasize the law and service to the community as well as teaching the new hires how to use the defensive equipment and other nuts and bolts of the job. Apparently, this isn't working either.

This problem does not seem to be in the process of being solved. Where are the special commissions studying the endless shootings by cops? Congressional investigations? Dept of Justice investigations? Nowhere as far as I can tell.

This seems to be another area where ordinary citizens have to put up and shut up and is yet another symptom of our failed capitalist democracy.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

budgets are the first ones they cut when they face financial pressure, which we know they do because of our stupid insistence on neo-liberal voodoo economics. Far easier, and cheaper, to just arm them to the teeth and send them on their merry way. And I'm sure many of them do suffer from PTSD but once again, why treat the guy or pull him off the street when you can just send him back out there and forget about all that additional cost of either getting him help or letting him go.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

correct.
And as for officers suffering from mental disorders, either developed on the job or brought to the job, my guess again is that this area would be among the first cut.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

I truly believe that they feel they can shoot anytime they feel threatened.

It was a female cop that shot that fellow, and her husband was in the helicopter. I don't think immediate family should be allowed to work together. If you want a job and are related to an "administrator" in a job training program, you cannot participate because of laws against nepotism and conflict of interest. Doctors do not have family members for patients. So why are blood relatives allowed to be cops together? Here's another politically incorrect thought. Maybe most women are too small and some cops too fat to be considered physically fit. If you don't think you can defend yourself without a gun, well... When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

of any size or gender, to subdue a suspect who would not obey oral commands.

Courts have allowed deadly violence because of size disparity between suspect and officer.

You make a valid point here.

In Fire Departments, all applicants must pass the same physical requirements, such as getting a 200 pound person out of a burning building and carrying X number of pounds of hose up a ladder. I don't know how you would measure physical fitness in a fight situation that police must handle.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

tourniquet's picture

ask christian slater.

sorry, i think i had a mst3k stroke.

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GIANT ALL-CAPS SIG

CambridgePulsar1919's picture

The idea that cops should be allowed to 'do whatever they need to do to come home safely to their families' is at the root of the problem. Somewhere this false heroism becomes cowardice, because the cops aren't being asked to take any chance that can possible be avoided.
6'4", 370 lbs. and uncooperative? Kill 'em.

Not sure what that dark object is? Kill 'em.

Fits the description of a dangerous suspect, and refuses to stop and chat? Kill 'em.

Fuck it, when laying down in the street with your hands in the air screaming "please don't shoot me" isn't enough to avoid being shot, maybe we've got a police problem.

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Mark from Queens's picture

Great read.

The Police Are Still Out of Control

I should know.

By Frank Serpico

October 23, 2014

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/10/the-police-are-still-out-...

And with all due respect to today’s police officers doing their jobs, they don’t need all that stuff anyway. When I was cop I disarmed a man with three guns who had just killed someone. I was off duty and all I had was my snub-nose Smith & Wesson. I fired a warning shot, the guy ran off and I chased him down. Some police forces still maintain a high threshold for violence: I remember talking with a member of the Italian carabinieri, who are known for being very heavily armed. He took out his Beretta and showed me that it didn’t even have a magazine inside. “You know, I got to be careful,” he said. “Before I shoot somebody unjustifiably, I’m better off shooting myself.” They have standards.

And today the Blue Wall of Silence endures in towns and cities across America. Whistleblowers in police departments — or as I like to call them, “lamp lighters,” after Paul Revere — are still turned into permanent pariahs. The complaint I continue to hear is that when they try to bring injustice to light they are told by government officials: “We can’t afford a scandal; it would undermine public confidence in our police.” That confidence, I dare say, is already seriously undermined.

Things might have improved in some areas. The days when I served and you could get away with anything, when cops were better at accounting than at law enforcement — keeping meticulous records of the people they were shaking down, stealing drugs and money from dealers on a regular basis — all that no longer exists as systematically as it once did, though it certainly does in some places. Times have changed. It’s harder to be a venal cop these days.

But an even more serious problem — police violence — has probably grown worse, and it’s out of control for the same reason that graft once was: a lack of accountability.

I tried to be an honest cop in a force full of bribe-takers. But as I found out the hard way, police departments are useless at investigating themselves—and that’s exactly the problem facing ordinary people across the country —including perhaps, Ferguson, Missouri, which has been a lightning rod for discontent even though the circumstances under which an African-American youth, Michael Brown, was shot remain unclear.

Really, wise and clear-eyed observations throughout.

As far as I'm concerned, he's still America's only good cop.

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"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:

THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"

- Kurt Vonnegut

sojourns's picture

younger police officers are roided up Afghan or Iraqi war vets suffering from PTSD.

Thing of it is, soldiers at least have rules of engagement and, much of the time, have to get approval from an officer before firing their weapons. The police have no such rules.

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"I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones."
John Cage

civil service and many states. This makes it easier for a veteran to be hired to be a cop even though it may not be the best social policy. After all, you have to untrain the former soldier before you train him/her to be a police officer. The two jobs are not compatible.

There is a lot of mandated training given to officers in training about when it is justified to use deadly force and when it isn't. There are two problems: Officers often work alone with no supervisors present; and, supervisory and managerial controls seem to be absent much of the time as is meaningful oversight of police activities and the function of management.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

Thaumlord-Exelbirth's picture

in an essay I wrote some time ago, while at the same time trying to give some perspective on the "ALM" crowd. I'm sure that if the situation was a group of white people starting a "white lives matter" movement, with the same goals in regards to justice reform, instead of the "BLM" movement existing, the reaction among black americans would be very similar, and it would loudly be decried as a racist group among the left.

I suppose it could be possible that it's PTSD that makes cops kill people who aren't a threat. How many times have we heard that the cops who did the killings claim they were afraid for their lives? I think it may be the most common factor in these cases. The question is, why are they all fearing for their lives? Where could they be getting their PTSD from, if that's their excuse? If I were to guess, if it's actually true, I think it may be coming from their training.

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Mark from Queens's picture

there is no accountability whatsoever, for even the most heinous transgressions.

How many more blatant brazen examples of this, while the 99% are fined to death and priced out of comfortable living and imprisoned for the most innocuous and sometimes phantom non-violent crimes, while we watch the same routine played over and over and over. Cops, Wall St Economic Terrorists and corrupt, criminal politicians, even in the face of mountainous evidence of their crimes, continue to throw it in our faces and flout the law. The tinder can't get much higher, folks.

If the cornerstone of society is the law, then what if the law is a lie? The great radical lawyer William Kunstler, who defended everyone from the Chicago 7 to the Attica Prisoners Uprising to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation protesters, concluded that indeed it was. "The law is there to protect the Haves and their property from the Have-Nots."

Two-tiered justice system is firmly in place, as Glen Greenwld concluded in his excellent book "With Liberty and Justice For Some."

Taibbi wrote brilliantly in "The Divide" about the juxtaposition of a morally bankrupt and deadly law enforcement, judicial, correctional and financial system that has no qualms making life as miserable as possible for the poor while the rich keep getting richer. We saw this vividly played out in Ferguson, when the WaPo (having some credibility then, or more specifically the journalist Radley Balko, with help from citizen watchdogs ArchCity Defenders) uncovered that every household had an average of 3 outsanding tickets or violations. A brutal, dystopian feudal system was exposed as targeting black citizens.

Taibbi talks about this insane system in a chapter called "Little Frauds":

What's different now is that these quaint old inequities have become internalized in that "second government" – a vast system of increasingly unmanageable bureaucracies, spanning both the public and private sectors. These inscrutable, irrational structures, crisscrossing back-and-forth between the worlds of debt and banking and law-enforcement, are growing up organically around the pounding twin impulses that drive modern America: burning hatred of all losers and the poor, and breathless, abject worship of the rich, even the talentless and undeserving rich.

In one chapter he describes how the State vociferously pursues welfare recipients with unrestrained vigor, during unannounced visits, trying to determine if they're being defrauded for a couple of hundred dollars, and concludes:

In the 21 biggest federal settlements of a mortgage fraud abuses – $300 million from State Street for lying to investors, 150 $3 million from Chase and the magnetic her settlement, and so on – those companies and a few others paid a total of $26 billion in damages to the government. In every single one of these cases, the relevant companies were allowed to settle without admitting wrongdoing. Not a single individual was charged and any of those cases. Not a single individual had to pay so much is a dime of his own money and damages.

Not one home was searched. No banker ever had someone pick up his underwear by a pencil and and wave it in his face.

$26 billion of fraud: no felony cases.

But when the stakes are in the hundreds of dollars we kick in 26,000 doors.

In just one county.

Stay in the streets, Charlotte comrades.

As the great James Baldwin observed for all-time about his expatriated country in his 1964 Nation essay " A Report from Occupied Territory,":

 Now, what I have said about Harlem is true of Chicago, Detroit, Washington, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and San Francisco—is true of every Northern city with a large Negro population. And the police are simply the hired enemies of this population. They are present to keep the Negro in his place and to protect white business interests, and they have no other function. They are, moreover—even in a country which makes the very grave error of equating ignorance with simplicity—quite stunningly ignorant; and, since they know that they are hated, they are always afraid. One cannot possibly arrive at a more surefire formula for cruelty.

This is why those pious calls to “respect the law,” always to be heard from prominent citizens each time the ghetto explodes, are so obscene. The law is meant to be my servant and not my master, still less my torturer and my murderer. To respect the law, in the context in which the American Negro finds himself, is simply to surrender his self-respect.

The prolonged protest keep the conversation alive. By discussing the many points of intersection, from predatory lending and police ticketing of minorities to pay for municipalities duped by duplicitous Wall St deals to the prison industrial complex to the funding of both major parties' campaigns, we have a chance to enlighten the masses who only feel a malaise but haven't been able to connect the dots.

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"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:

THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"

- Kurt Vonnegut

Cable TV news reports indicated that there was a peaceful protest... until the arrival of large numbers of police dressed in riot gear. That's when the riot started.

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"We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."

Doesn't recognize the victim's 2nd amendment right to bear arms?

And with a few exceptions, North Carolna is an open carry state.
http://www.opencarry.org/state-info-n-s/north-carolina/

So if the police story pans out, open carrying in view of a police officer is now a crime punishable by summary execution in NC. No trial, no jury. Shouldn't the founders be spinning in their graves over these constitutional violations? Shouldn't the NRA be joining the protestors?

Less flippantly, have the police released the info proving that the victim owned a gun? (Of the same type he allegedly had in his hand)

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Damnit Janet's picture

Stalled car - death sentence.
Head injury from a car accident - death sentence.

FTP

I have to say though that the whole BLM movement is forgetting a lot of allies. Middle Eastern or just appears to be, Brown, First Nation, the disabled, the deaf.... the vulnerable, the homeless, those are all targets of the brutal pig squad.

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"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison

The Aspie Corner's picture

It's why I respect the cause itself rather than the movement, especially after that 'Librul White Supremacist' crap last year. The movement also backs a presidential candidate who will escalate the problems they claim to wanna solve. Sad state of affairs, that is.

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

Alex Ocana's picture

And Tulsa, Oklahoma:

Glen Ford at Black Agenda Report has this to say:

"The helicopter police voice-over of Terence Crutcher’s execution was a ghastly reminder of the video released by Wikileaks of a 2007 mass murder of Iraqi civilians by U.S. helicopter gun crews over Baghdad. The Americans were engaged in what I’m sure some of them called “hajji-hunting,” which is the same as what the good ole boys back home call “coon-hunting” -- searching for colored folks to kill. Circling unseen way above the city, the Americans opened fire at an innocent group of unarmed men on a street corner."

"These voices over Baghdad and Tulsa speak the same language: the language of Occupation. When spoken by Americans, this language is always racist, but it also has its own, particular quality of horror. Occupations are always justified as “peace-keeping” missions. Domestic occupiers are called “peace” officers. But their mission is war against a civilian population -- to inflict preemptive terror on an entire mass of people. Since the actual mission cannot be justified, the Occupiers lie to themselves and everybody else about the real nature of their mission. In the end, the Occupied peoples have no choice but to expel their tormentors, or become as insane and morally degraded as they are."

Murder by U.S. Occupation Forces: Tulsa 2016, Baghdad 2007

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From the Light House.

Alex Ocana's picture

Ok, yesterday this was all over the internet as the Charlotte demonstrators. I have confirmed that it was phony... its from the UK.

The mayor of Charlotte has walked back from "holding a gun", to say "nothing definitive". There are two eye witnesses, plus the family who say he was holding a book.

There is still a debate as to who shot the protester yesterday... the "civilian" perpetrator has not been confirmed and there are conflicting stories.

elderly.jpg

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From the Light House.

Alex Ocana's picture

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From the Light House.

"Who do you think is telling the truth?"

Not the cops.

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Vowing To Oppose Everything Trump Attempts.

Alex Ocana's picture

It is apparent from the video that people were getting shot with rubber bullets in the immediate area. No blood on the other victims = rubber bullets = police shooter. There were numerous eye witnesses. "Of the lethal injuries from this projectile, most are suffered to the head. Rubber-coated bullets ..."

The story that Justin was killed by an unnamed, not arrested civilian near a hotel has turned out to be more lies. It originated at the Daily Beast. As far as I know the MSM never showed the footage of other close by people being shot. This is the first I have seen footage of the prequel.

http://heavy.com/news/2016/09/justin-carr-jroc-charlotte-riots-shooting-...

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From the Light House.

The Aspie Corner's picture

I avoid Youtube, Facebook and pretty much anything with a comment section (Except here, of course). Most of the people making said comments have never experienced things like this so it's easy for them to trivialize the situation, the experiences and the tragedy for the sake of their own heavily propagandized confirmation bias.

There's a reason Dr. King referred to rioting as the 'Language of the Unheard'. It's just too bad that the image most people have of him these days is also heavily twisted and propagandized.

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

I have been very concerned about just what is happening here after reading this:

Hacked Soros Memo: $650,000 to Black Lives Matter

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/08/16/hacked-soros-memo-bal...

George Soros’s Open Society Institute viewed the 2015 Baltimore unrest following the death of Freddie Gray as opening a “unique opportunity” to create “accountability” for the Baltimore police while aiding activists in reforming the city, according to hacked documents reviewed by Breitbart Jerusalem.

He's also pumped a bunch of money into Ferguson, and this:

Black Dallas Cop Sues Black Lives Matter, Soros for Inciting Race War
http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/09/16/black-dallas-cop-sues-black-li...

The 66-page federal complaint alleges that each defendant individual and organization “repeatedly incited their supporters and others to engage in threats and attacks” against police officers around the nation, culminating in the July killings of five Dallas area officers with nine others wounded at a Black Lives Matter gathering. The complaint singles out George Soros as “the financier of the BLM Defendants and similar organizations with the goal of inciting a race war” and advocating violence against whites and Jews.

Defendants Obama and Clinton are blamed for repeatedly endorsing behaviors carried out and surrounding Black Lives Matter.

From 2012: http://www.newsweek.com/george-soros-coming-us-class-war-64271
GEORGE SOROS ON THE COMING U.S. CLASS WAR

In spite of his warnings of political turmoil in the U.S., he has no plans to engage in politics directly. “I would prefer not to be involved in party politics. It’s only because I felt that the Bush administration was misleading the country that I became involved. I was very hopeful of a new beginning with Obama, and I’ve been somewhat disappointed. I remain a supporter of the Democratic Party, but I’m fully aware of their shortcomings.” Soros believes Obama still has a chance of winning this year’s election. “Obama might surprise the public. The main issue facing the electorate is whether the rich should be taxed more. It shouldn’t be a difficult argument for Obama to make.”

Soros insists the key to avoiding cataclysm in 2012 is not to let the crises of 2011 go to waste. “In the crisis period, the impossible becomes possible. The European Union could regain its luster. I’m hopeful that the United States, as a political entity, will pass a very severe test and actually strengthen the institution.” Nor has he quite given up hope that the central bankers and prime ministers gathering in Davos this week have got what it takes to rally round and prove him wrong. This time, being wrong would make him happy indeed.

An opportunity? I know Soros has been in the background of the Democratic Party for a long time, but why is he funding this? In those Soros documents that were leaked a few weeks ago, this came to light. He has been chased out of Russia for too much "meddling", there is at least one of the Clinton emails where George Soros is telling her, as SOS, the way he wants her to handle a specific thing/country. I've also read that he is responsible for much of the European refugee crisis.

I know there is a great deal of unrest everywhere in this country at this point, but is someone stoking these things? I've even read a few things suggesting martial law. And, their seems to be an air of desperation about the election, and is the spread so wide that they know they can't rig it as they wish?

Then, I saw this video at the Investmentwatchblog, which often talks about conspiracies, a few of which turn out to be realities. I've seen legitimate stuff there, like Charles Ortel interviews. I was curious, because the subject is something I've been thinking about. It definitely plugged into many thoughts that I have had of late. At times, I really wonder who is in charge of the country, and who can be trusted? I know that the economy is extremely fragile, and the lies are wearing very thin about that. Something ominous is in the air, I can feel it. These people are playing a high stakes game, and are desperate to get Clinton in there, and I honestly don't think they are limited in any way as to what they will do. The Russia angle is very disturbing. What is the next play?

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