In the previous essay in this series, we discussed how the police have become increasingly militarized, aided and abetted by US government policies that promote the hiring of veterans as cops, under the Vets to Cops program, and the outfitting of local police departments with surpl
As discussed in the previous essay, encouraged by grants from the Vets to Cops federal program, police departments have actively recruited Iraq and Afghanistan veterans as candidates.
For last week's Open Thread I wrote about the precipitous rise in police killings in the United States even though overall crime has been going down during the same time period.
Police are assassinating people at alarming rates and while overall crime has been going down, the rate of murder by cop is rising. This year, nearly 1,200 people have died at the hands of police officers, most of them shot to death.
Now that the Chicago Garment Workers Strike is winding down, citizens of Chicago are finding that crime is up in their city. The Day Book of December 17th cites evidence that this is due to the 600 to 800 sluggers and gunmen who have recently been released from duty by the private detective agencies and garment shops who had employed them as strikebreakers:
In the December 11th edition of Harper's, Edith Wyatt offers the following account of the Chicago Garment Workers Strike, now ongoing in that city, along with news regarding police brutality, and some history on the practice of arbitration in the needle-work trades:
The Chicago Clothing Strike
by EDITH WYATT"THE story of civilization,” says Norman Angell in Arms and Industry, “is the story of development of ideas.”
One of the most interesting chapters of that chronicle is the narrative of the development of the idea of industrial arbitration in this country, in opposition to the idea of industrial war. Chicago is now watching intently a bitter contest between these two principles in one of her greatest industries, her trade in men’s clothing, a business truly enormous, the value of its product in this city being rated in the last census at over eighty five million dollars.
This evening's music features The Godfather of Soul, James Brown. Enjoy!
James Brown - Papa's got a brand new bag
This evening's music features Texas by way of Louisiana multi-instrumentalist bluesman, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown.
This evening's music features pioneering Memphis r&b singer Rosco Gordon.
This evening's music features Chicago blues guitarist and singer Andrew Brown.
