tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post997780402552062428..comments2024-03-28T16:08:29.578-04:00Comments on Sardonicky: Public Enemy Number One: The American PublicKaren Garciahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15612731479365562803noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-12768251435842746622014-08-15T09:48:02.519-04:002014-08-15T09:48:02.519-04:00Great Comment Anne!
Karen, thank you for watching...Great Comment Anne!<br /><br />Karen, thank you for watching CNN for us. That must have been quite painful. Whenever I get stuck in a place where CNN and CNN audio feed cannot be ignored, I can actually feel myself getting dumber.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13885335230151254931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-82002640171463393452014-08-15T00:18:44.522-04:002014-08-15T00:18:44.522-04:00Both siderism run amuck.
Always the prelude to ig...Both siderism run amuck.<br /><br />Always the prelude to ignoring the heart of any important discussion.<br /><br />And the interlude before the next, in this case, bloody, event.<br /><br />Thanks for your brilliant dissection, K.Cirzehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07070125217972397204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-18256726006750852842014-08-14T23:47:02.431-04:002014-08-14T23:47:02.431-04:00Irony is wasted on the stupid. The US is bombing ...Irony is wasted on the stupid. The US is bombing ISIS US equipment abandoned by Iraqis, while Ferguson police use the same equipment to intimidate American citizens. But never underestimate the value of irony. <br /><br />Stephen Klugewicz, “Barney Fife and the Rise of the American Police State,”<br /><br />“One of Fife’s most famous lines is “nip it in the bud,” by which he means that even a nascent whiff of unlawfulness must be met with the most draconian police enforcement measures lest chaos ensue…<br /><br />“As American society responds to its cultural, moral, and social meltdown by heavily arming its police forces and by training them to be aggressive in their enforcement tactics, it has abandoned the creed of the Sheriff of Mayberry and chosen what might be called “the Fife option.”<br /><br />“The danger in America is that our modern Fifes are not comic characters with single bullets and hearts of gold but deadly serious, heavily armed agents of the state bent on enforcing the letter of the law without regard to common sense or a sense of justice and mercy. Mayberry, the American Shire, is a symbol of our vanished past. Today the dark shadow of authoritarianism has crept into every corner of the land. We have sent away the Sheriff Taylors and replaced them with police officers whose hearts are too often like those of Tolkien’s Black Riders—once good but now deformed by their slavish obedience to the all-seeing eye. In the unenviable choice between unlawful chaos and authoritarian order, Americans have chosen the latter, and we are suffering the consequences.”<br /><br />http://www.theimaginativeconservative.org/2013/11/barney-fife-american-police-state.html<br /><br />David Couper, Arrested Development: A Veteran Police Chief Sounds Off About Protest, Racism, Corruption and the Seven Steps Necessary to Improve Our Nation’s Police, on what’s wrong with police today. Police continue to struggle with four recurring and major obstacles, which have literally ‘arrested’ their development: anti-intellectualism; violence; corruption; and discourtesy. “If these obstacles aren’t overcome, we are going to experience serious trouble controlling our police.”<br /><br />As Sheriff Taylor tells Barney, “When you’re a lawman and you’re dealing with people, you do a whole lot better if you go not so much by the book, but by the heart.”Denis Nevillenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-77576343501771238572014-08-14T21:35:05.646-04:002014-08-14T21:35:05.646-04:00I read the piece by Firestone...man, what an idiot...I read the piece by Firestone...man, what an idiot. That was a GREAT comment, Anne.<br /><br />I was watching CNN, like an idiot, and it is like they are panting with desire for blood and terror on the streets of The Heartland. If tonight is quiet, I am sure they will all pack up their gear in a flash and wait for the next "disaster."Karen Garciahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15612731479365562803noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-84755288320523164582014-08-14T20:11:02.793-04:002014-08-14T20:11:02.793-04:00Ok, I can't resist. Here's my word limited...Ok, I can't resist. Here's my word limited comment to the NYT Editorial 'In Ferguson, Focus on Police Action, Not Police Gear'. <br /><br />'We SHOULD focus on police gear. That is the crux of the problem!<br /><br />Did we vote for our police to become militarized? NO! The federal government decided to impose their 'military surplus' (defense contractor corporate welfare) on us. We CERTAINLY never asked for the free machine guns, tanks, helicopters, grenade launchers, bazookas, and armored personnel carriers be given to our local police and sheriffs departments, quietly and behind our backs, but that's what we got. <br /><br />Did we vote to allow the Feds to build Fusion Centers in every state for the purpose of collecting and sharing Suspicious Activity (Snitch) Reports on fellow citizens to the Feds? NO!<br /><br />Did we vote for the police to scan our license plates and submit those to the Feds for their files? NO!<br /><br />Did we vote for the NSA to collect every scrap of digital info on every one of us? NO!<br /><br />We now live in a burgeoning National Security Police State and there's a lot of money in it. Democracy only gets in the way, kind of like that pesky Bill of Rights and Constitution. Don't be fooled by the cozy 'Homeland' name they've given us. We didn't vote on that either, as if voting even mattered anymore.<br /><br />Welcome to The Homeland, seat of the American Global Empire.' <br /><br />annenigmanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-39246087065019197372014-08-14T19:06:50.391-04:002014-08-14T19:06:50.391-04:00This post and the comments that follow make it cle...This post and the comments that follow make it clear that, just as ‘clothes make the man,’ so do uniforms shape the operation. Dress cops up in SWAT gear and soon a wannabe Delta Force will be crashing through your front door like a foreign occupier.<br /><br />SEALS and Delta Force types don’t make the best first responders when there’s trouble in the neighborhood. Sure, we need warriors once in a while, but only as a last resort, not every day everywhere in Heimatland. Even less so when politicians spend their lives at closing the inequity gap, but that’s another post.<br /><br />So let’s stop suiting up and arming local police with hand-me-downs from the Pentagon. Bury that junk in the pit Karen described. Time to appeal to our closest ally, the UK, for “Custodian Helmets,” those funny hats worn by London bobbies on the beat. True, the hats were modeled after helmets once worn by the British Army, which were in turn influenced by Prussian dress-up-for-war gear; but bobbies on the beat thought and acted differently under that headgear. You witnessed that yourself in a hundred fog-filled movies from Great Britain (yes, I’m channeling St Ronnie). The money saved just might be used with better effect to train frontline cops in how to ally with their people and to encourage solidarity in the community.Jay–Ottawahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10360356126450612113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-81851411889457677532014-08-14T17:58:28.971-04:002014-08-14T17:58:28.971-04:00The other day, I linked to and commented about the...The other day, I linked to and commented about the FBI's "summer school" for high schoolers, just the latest attempt to propagandize, "Homeland"-ize, and militarize youth.<br /><br />Today I see a report on yet a different example, this one involving the Indiana state police:<br /><br /><br />http://www.foxsports.com/buzzer/story/high-school-football-players-posing-with-weapons-on-campus-sparks-outrage-081414<br /><br />"At the gathering’s conclusion, 15 seniors for the football team assembled to take a picture on the back of an armored vehicle. One player held a sign reading 'CHAOS 2014,' while some of his teammates clutched non-lethal weapons such as tear gas and beanbag launchers."<br /><br /><br />Well, at least there were some objections from the community afterwards.<br /><br /><br />And a bigger, much more general objection this afternoon. Senator Rand Paul has written in Time Magazine an editorial saying that "We Must Demilitarize the Police". <br /><br />http://time.com/#3111474/rand-paul-ferguson-police/<br /><br />As @Zee said above, "... I think there are important policy areas where the Left and the Right could find common ground if we could resolve—or at least declare a temporary truce over—at least some of our hot-button, “culture war” issues."Fred Drumlevitchhttp://www.freddrumlevitch.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-75105184218431460022014-08-14T15:33:29.560-04:002014-08-14T15:33:29.560-04:00A fine post, Karen. And good comments from everyon...A fine post, Karen. And good comments from everyone.<br /><br />It was good that the New York Times called attention to police militarization, but that was on June 8, 2014 --- a rather tardy article, I'd say, given that both progressives and right-wingers have been discussing the issue widely --- in many cases, for years. <br /><br />More currently, note how the New York Times tries to soft-pedal the Ferguson, MO. police assaults on, and arrests of, reporters:<br /><br />"Two reporters covering the protests also said they had been arrested inside a McDonald’s on accusations of trespassing and later released without charges or an explanation. The reporters, Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post and Ryan J. Reilly of The Huffington Post, <b>both said they had been handled roughly by the police."</b> [my emphasis]. The NYT description is more than a bit of an understatement of events, I'd say.<br /><br />There's no dateline on the NYT story, it's what's I saw on their web site just after 1 PM eastern time today, so I don't know when it was posted. In any event, the Washington Post coverage of this has long been up, and other sites (i.e. Politico, as per Karen's link) have also long featured the story, so at the very least, the Times could have delivered a comprehensive update on this. There's no reason (such as the story just breaking) for the Times to abbreviate and soft-pedal as they have --- except perhaps that they don't really understand the press' role --- indeed, obligation --- in a democratic republic to vigorously call attention to abuse of power. Instead, they seem to have chosen servitude to the plutocracy and its police enforcers.<br /><br />And my local paper (The Arizona Daily Star), which has gotten increasingly right wing this past year, has not even a mention today of the reporters' arrests. That may be fully excusable based on their print deadline. But when I called their newsroom to say that I expected coverage about it tomorrow, that if the press can't stand up for <i>press</i> rights, I can't trust them on coverage of anything, I basically got a song-and-dance reply, that by tomorrow there will be many other things to cover, that the reporters' arrests will be old news, yada yada... . Pathetic.Fred Drumlevitchhttp://www.freddrumlevitch.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-61941293222476185502014-08-14T14:02:44.028-04:002014-08-14T14:02:44.028-04:00@Kat--
Has the NRA ever offered any official endo...@Kat--<br /><br />Has the NRA ever offered any official endorsement of Cliven Bundy or the armed nutcases who gathered to "defend" him?<br /><br />I'm not aware of any such action on the part of the NRA, and would be curious to see the evidence.Zeenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-59805023812310414832014-08-14T13:18:27.252-04:002014-08-14T13:18:27.252-04:00I see the NRA does not find these protesters as wo...I see the NRA does not find these protesters as worthy of support as say, Cliven Bundy.Katnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-5904414394944122902014-08-14T12:40:14.482-04:002014-08-14T12:40:14.482-04:00Anne,
I just read your post before and thought wh...Anne,<br /><br />I just read your post before and thought what a shame nobody's gonna get to see it. Glad you bumped it up to today's thread!<br /><br />OK, on to the links. <br /><br />Gazans were tweeting advice on dealing with tear gas attacks to the residents of Ferguson last night. Let that one sink in for a second.<br /><br />http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/gaza-strip-tweets-ferguson-about-how-deal-tear-gas-light-michael-brown-shooting-1461124<br /><br />Great Deadspin article from Tuesday night with the most accurate & blunt title ever: America Is Not For Black People. <br /><br />http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/america-is-not-for-black-people-1620169913<br />Willnoreply@blogger.com