July 2015: BLM activists seize the mic at a Democratic candidate forum to grill Martin O'Malley and Bernie Sanders on police violence.
Nov. 2015: A judge orders the release of dash-cam footage that appears to show McDonald walking away from police when he was shot. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel fires his police chief the next month.
Feb. 7, 2016: Beyonce's dancers adopt a Black Panther look for the Super Bowl halftime show. Police unions call for a boycott of the star.
Feb. 24, 2016: BLM activists disrupt a Hillary Clinton fundraiser, demanding she apologize for her racially charged comments about "super predators" during the 1990s. Clinton appears irritated, but the next day she does just that."
May 2016: The first state "Blue Lives Matter" bill passes in Louisiana. Attacking a cop is now a hate crime.
June 2016: The police-van driver in the Freddie Gray case is acquitted.
July 5, 2016: Alton Sterling is fatally shot by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, while officers have him pinned to the ground.
July 6, 2016: During a traffic stop, a Minnesota cop shoots Philando Castile as he reaches for his wallet -- that's according to Castile's girlfriend, who livestreams his demise on Facebook: "You told him to get his ID, sir!"
July 7, 2016: A black gunman kills five cops at a Dallas protest against police violence. He holes up in a parking garage, where police kill him with an explosives-bearing robot.
July 12, 2016: President Barack Obama defends Black Lives Matter at a memorial for the slain officers. "We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point," and "none of us is entirely innocent," he says. "That includes our police departments."
July 17, 2016: A black military veteran ranted online about the treatment of black people by police assassinates three officers (one of them black) in Baton Rouge.
July 18, 2016: At the Republican National Convention, Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke, who is black, proclaims that "blue lives matter." In an op-ed the same day, he calls Black Lives Matter the "enemy."
July 18, 2016: A police officer in Florida shoots a black caregiver who was lying in the street with his hands up. A union rep explains that the officer had been aiming at the man's autistic patient, whose toy truck he mistook for a firearm.
July 27, 2016: After further acquittals in the Freddie Gray case, charges are dropped against the remaining officers.
Aug. 2016: 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick starts sitting out the national anthem to protest police violence. A few pros and countless high school and college athletes follow suit.
Sept. 2016: Clinton debates Donald Trump: "I think implicit bias is a problem for everyone, not just police," she says. Critics pounce. "Yes, Hillary Clinton called the nation racist," writes a Washington Times columnist.
Oct. 2016: Attorney General Loretta lynch says the DOJ will (finally) start collecting national data on police use of force.
Dec. 2016: A jury of 11 whites and one African American deadlocks in the trial of Michael Slager. A new trial is slated for 2017. Slager is later convicted in a federal court for a civil rights violation.
Showing posts with label Sheriff David Clarke. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sheriff David Clarke. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 28, 2018
Wednesday, June 14, 2017
"NONE OF US IS ENTIRELY INNOCENT" (Continued)
July 2015: BLM activists seize the mic at a Democratic candidate forum to grill Martin O'Malley and Bernie Sanders on police violence.
Oct. 2015: Rapper Vic Mensa's video for "16 Shots," a song about Laquan McDonald, goes viral.
Nov. 2015: A judge orders the release of dash-cam footage that appears to show McDonald walking away from police when he was shot. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel fires his police chief the next month.
Feb. 7, 2016: Beyonce's dancers adopt a Black Panther look for the Super Bowl halftime show. Police unions call for a boycott of the star.
Feb 24, 2016: BLM activists disrupt a Hillary Clinton fundraiser, demanding she apologize for her racially charged comments about 'super predators' during the 1990s. Clinton appears irritated, but the next day she does just that.
May 2016: The first state "Blue Lives Matter" bill passes in Louisiana. Attacking a cop is now a hate crime.
June 2016: The police-van driver in the Freddie Gray case is acquitted.
July 5, 2016: Alton Sterling is fatally shot by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, while officers have him pinned to the ground.
July 6, 2016: During a traffic stop, a Minnesota cop shoots Philando Castile as he reaches for his wallet --that's according to Castile's girlfriend, who live-streamed his demise on Facebook: "You told him to get his ID, sir!"
July 7, 216: A black gunman kills five cops at a Dallas protest against police violence. He holes up in a parking garage, where police kill him with an explosives-bearing robot.
July 12, 2016: President Barack Obama defends Black Lives Matter as a memorial for the slain officers. "We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point," and "none of us is entirely innocent," he says. "That includes our police departments."
July 17, 2016: A black military vet who ranted online about the treatment of black people by police assassinates three officers (one of them black) in Baton Rouge.
July 18, 2016: At the Republican National Convention, Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke, who is black, proclaims that "blue lives matter." In an op-ed the same day, he calls Black Lives Matter the "enemy."
July 18, 2016: A police officer in Florida shoots a black caregiver who was lying in the street with his hands up. A union rep explains that the officer had been aiming at the man's autistic patient, whose toy truck he mistook for a fireman.
July 27, 2016: After further acquittals in the Freddie Gray case, charges are dropped against the remaining officers.
Aug. 2016: 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick starts sitting out the national anthem to protest police violence. A few pros and countless high school and college athletes follow suit.
Sept. 2016: Clinton debates Donald Trump: "I think implicit bias is a problem for everyone, not just police," she says. Critics pounce. "Yes, Hillary Clinton called the nation racist," writes a Washington Post columnist.
Oct. 2016: Attorney General Loretta Lynch says the DOJ will (finally) start collecting national data on police use of force.
Oct. 2015: Rapper Vic Mensa's video for "16 Shots," a song about Laquan McDonald, goes viral.
Nov. 2015: A judge orders the release of dash-cam footage that appears to show McDonald walking away from police when he was shot. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel fires his police chief the next month.
Feb. 7, 2016: Beyonce's dancers adopt a Black Panther look for the Super Bowl halftime show. Police unions call for a boycott of the star.
Feb 24, 2016: BLM activists disrupt a Hillary Clinton fundraiser, demanding she apologize for her racially charged comments about 'super predators' during the 1990s. Clinton appears irritated, but the next day she does just that.
May 2016: The first state "Blue Lives Matter" bill passes in Louisiana. Attacking a cop is now a hate crime.
June 2016: The police-van driver in the Freddie Gray case is acquitted.
July 5, 2016: Alton Sterling is fatally shot by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, while officers have him pinned to the ground.
July 6, 2016: During a traffic stop, a Minnesota cop shoots Philando Castile as he reaches for his wallet --that's according to Castile's girlfriend, who live-streamed his demise on Facebook: "You told him to get his ID, sir!"
July 7, 216: A black gunman kills five cops at a Dallas protest against police violence. He holes up in a parking garage, where police kill him with an explosives-bearing robot.
July 12, 2016: President Barack Obama defends Black Lives Matter as a memorial for the slain officers. "We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point," and "none of us is entirely innocent," he says. "That includes our police departments."
July 17, 2016: A black military vet who ranted online about the treatment of black people by police assassinates three officers (one of them black) in Baton Rouge.
July 18, 2016: At the Republican National Convention, Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke, who is black, proclaims that "blue lives matter." In an op-ed the same day, he calls Black Lives Matter the "enemy."
July 18, 2016: A police officer in Florida shoots a black caregiver who was lying in the street with his hands up. A union rep explains that the officer had been aiming at the man's autistic patient, whose toy truck he mistook for a fireman.
July 27, 2016: After further acquittals in the Freddie Gray case, charges are dropped against the remaining officers.
Aug. 2016: 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick starts sitting out the national anthem to protest police violence. A few pros and countless high school and college athletes follow suit.
Sept. 2016: Clinton debates Donald Trump: "I think implicit bias is a problem for everyone, not just police," she says. Critics pounce. "Yes, Hillary Clinton called the nation racist," writes a Washington Post columnist.
Oct. 2016: Attorney General Loretta Lynch says the DOJ will (finally) start collecting national data on police use of force.
Sunday, October 16, 2016
Short Subjects From My Writer's Notebook
*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.
*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.
Wednesday, September 28, 2016
The U.S. Does Not Need Compulsory Patriotism
San Francisco 49er quarterback Colin Kaepernick has stirred up a major controversy by sitting, not standing, for the national anthem. There are two aspects of this controversy that should cause serious concern: 1.) the efforts by law enforcement to restrict the freedom of speech of U.S. citizens; and 2,) the attempt to label Kaepernick as disrespecting those military service members who were killed in armed conflicts.
In the wake of the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, four or five St. Louis Rams football players ran to the playing field, stopped, and assumed the surrender position: "Hands up! Don't shoot!" The president of the St. Louis police union, representing both county and city officers, demanded an apology from the St. Louis Ram's management; furthermore, he wanted a series of meetings to set norms on how the players should interact with law enforcement.
The president of the New York City benevolent police association blamed protesters of excessive use of force by police for the assassination of two NYC police officers sitting in a police vehicle.
When David Clarke, the sheriff of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, spoke at the Republican Convention, he said the major point he wanted to make was that "Blue Lives Matter." Clarke, and those who unconditionally support him, don't seem to understand that for a long stretch of U.S. history, black lives didn't matter, or mattered very little. In recent history, the nation has seen and heard numerous instances in which law enforcement officers mistreated minorities, especially African Americans. There have been too many cases in which officers have fatally shot unarmed people. Sheriff Clarke certainly disrespects Black Lives Matter, as he has called members "sub-human creeps," "garbage," and "black slime." Clarke has also infamously said that there is no police violence in America.
Most recently, the San Francisco Police Officer's Association demanded an apology from the San Francisco 49er's management, because Kaepernick had worn socks depicting pigs wearing police officer hats to practice. Some Santa Clara police officers threatened not to do security for the 49er football team, until deterred by a police chief who had a greater understanding of protected civil liberties than they did.
The bottom line here is that law enforcement should not be the arbitrator of what U.S. citizens can say and do in exercising their freedom of speech.
Another aspect of the attacks on Colin Kaepernick is the charge that he has disrespected those who died defending the U.S. in armed conflicts. He did this by sitting, not standing, an act not violent, histrionic, nor damaging to person or property. Are we to assume that that those in the armed forces wanted the outcome of their sacrifices to be a conformist society, in which there was compelled patriotism and specific rules on how that patriotism must be expressed?
Even if we disagree with Colin Kaepernick's contention that law enforcement officers mistreat minorities and criticize him for having no remedy for the problem -- although he did contribute $1 million to social agencies working on the problem -- we should respect his right to express his concern, even if it was done through a change in his bodily position.
In the wake of the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, four or five St. Louis Rams football players ran to the playing field, stopped, and assumed the surrender position: "Hands up! Don't shoot!" The president of the St. Louis police union, representing both county and city officers, demanded an apology from the St. Louis Ram's management; furthermore, he wanted a series of meetings to set norms on how the players should interact with law enforcement.
The president of the New York City benevolent police association blamed protesters of excessive use of force by police for the assassination of two NYC police officers sitting in a police vehicle.
When David Clarke, the sheriff of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, spoke at the Republican Convention, he said the major point he wanted to make was that "Blue Lives Matter." Clarke, and those who unconditionally support him, don't seem to understand that for a long stretch of U.S. history, black lives didn't matter, or mattered very little. In recent history, the nation has seen and heard numerous instances in which law enforcement officers mistreated minorities, especially African Americans. There have been too many cases in which officers have fatally shot unarmed people. Sheriff Clarke certainly disrespects Black Lives Matter, as he has called members "sub-human creeps," "garbage," and "black slime." Clarke has also infamously said that there is no police violence in America.
Most recently, the San Francisco Police Officer's Association demanded an apology from the San Francisco 49er's management, because Kaepernick had worn socks depicting pigs wearing police officer hats to practice. Some Santa Clara police officers threatened not to do security for the 49er football team, until deterred by a police chief who had a greater understanding of protected civil liberties than they did.
The bottom line here is that law enforcement should not be the arbitrator of what U.S. citizens can say and do in exercising their freedom of speech.
Another aspect of the attacks on Colin Kaepernick is the charge that he has disrespected those who died defending the U.S. in armed conflicts. He did this by sitting, not standing, an act not violent, histrionic, nor damaging to person or property. Are we to assume that that those in the armed forces wanted the outcome of their sacrifices to be a conformist society, in which there was compelled patriotism and specific rules on how that patriotism must be expressed?
Even if we disagree with Colin Kaepernick's contention that law enforcement officers mistreat minorities and criticize him for having no remedy for the problem -- although he did contribute $1 million to social agencies working on the problem -- we should respect his right to express his concern, even if it was done through a change in his bodily position.
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