*Police union contracts and police bill of rights laws include officers reviewing evidence before they are interrogated, limits on how long they can be interrogated, and even erasing misconduct from their records.
*Milwaukee County (WI) Sheriff David Clarke has said Black Lives Matter (BLM) pours out violence and hate-filled messages. He has called BLM membes "subhuman creeps," "garbage," and""black slime." Clarke has also infamously said there is no police brutality in the U.S.
*The Equal Justice Initiative, headed by noted civil- and human-rights lawyer, Bryan Stevenson, has documented more than 4,000 lynchings of African-Americans across twelve Southern states between 1877 and 1950. Where the lynchings mostly occurred mirrors where most of the legal executions now occur.
*According to reports, Britain saw a 57 percent rise in reported hate crimes in the week following the Brexit vote; it seemed that a section of society felt free to express racist views. (Source: Aminnatta Forna, 'The Future of Citizenship," The New Yorker, August 22, 2016.)
*"One 2012 Pentagon estimate found that enforcing a no-fly zone would involve at least '70,000 American servicemen;' another estimate insisted such an effort would involve 'hundreds of aircraft, ships, submarines and other enablers.' " "Yet, no one calling for a ramped-up war in Syria has offered a clear indication of what it would entail." (Source: Adam H. Johnson, "Anguish Over Aleppo," The New Yorker, August 22, 2016.)
*North Carolina's House Bill 972 restricts the disclosure of police dash/body camera video and audio to the public, (including families of those affected) without a court order.
*The federal Bureau of Justice Statistics reported 4,446 inmate deaths in state prisons and local jails in 2013, an increase of 131 over the prior year. Suicides constituted 34 percent of the deaths. The number of decedents ages 55 or older has increased by an average of five percent annually since 2001. Nearly a quarter of the deaths occurred in California and Texas.
*"The average American child spends four to seven minutes a day playing outdoors and up to seven hours a day staring at a screen. Diabetes, attention deficit disorder, heart disease, depression, myopia, allergies, and asthma have all skyrocketed." (Source: Wendy Becktold, "Rewilding the Kids," Sierra, September/October 2016.)
*Scientists believe Earth has now crossed the threshold to a 400 ppm future.
*A recent study by the cybersecurity company, Norton, found that 76 percent of the women under 30 surveyed had experienced abuse or harassment online.
*"In a recent National Review piece, J.D. Vance, author of 'Hillbilly Elegy,' cites research that shows 'the average white person now feels that anti-white bias is a bigger problem than other forms of racial discrimination.' " (Source: Joe Klein, "Don't believe the new myths...," Time, September 12-19, 2016.)
*Nearly half a million households in the U.S. lack the basic dignity of hot and cold running water, a bathtub or shower, or a working flush toilet, according to the Census Bureau. In one Alabama county, 35 percent of homes had failing septic systems, with raw sewage on the ground. Another 15 percent had nothing.
*Forty-two states have voting machines in circulation that are more than a decade old and run on software no more sophisticated than that of an "old, stripped-down PC," says Lawrence Norden, an election expert at the Brennan Center for Justice.
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