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What amounts to professional looters dragging the rest of the population along? Sounds feasible.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
If black lives REALLY MATTERED, there wouldn't be the number of black on black killings. As long as the AA community keeps being violent, destructive and unwilling to address their issues and inability to live in peace, what other ways can you treat them? THEY need to take responsibility for their own actions. The "Black Leaders" need to actually do something other than call for violence.
No, I agree she has useful power, but it seems she has failed. Hence, the political process failed.
If blacks can't even right the boat when people of their own race are in office, how in the hell can anyone else do anything? The process didn't fail because she obviously never even tried using it.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
If black lives REALLY MATTERED, there wouldn't be the number of black on black killings. As long as the AA community keeps being violent, destructive and unwilling to address their issues and inability to live in peace, what other ways can you treat them? THEY need to take responsibility for their own actions. The "Black Leaders" need to actually do something other than call for violence.
or give the populace a blank check to wreck the damned city, for frak's sake.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
If black lives REALLY MATTERED, there wouldn't be the number of black on black killings.
"They act like animals they deserve to be treated as such."
Originally Posted by Cap'n Tightpants
If blacks can't even right the boat when people of their own race are in office, how in the hell can anyone else do anything?
Considering 'anyone else' got them into this position I think those same people have the requisite power to reverse those policies. But I like the undercurrent of if blacks fail we should leave them to their suffer.
Considering 'anyone else' got them into this position I think those same people have the requisite power to reverse those policies. But I like the undercurrent of if blacks fail we should leave them to their suffer.
I agree, early racism, followed by Progressive entitlement overcompensation, have gotten them into this position. No one can fix this but them, and if holding the most powerful positions within the given political sphere isn't enough, then... **** it all, I have no idea what else can be done.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
REPORTER: As you know, the National Guard is now on the streets of Baltimore — the latest aftermath in a series of what have been high-profile confrontations between black men and police officers. And there seems to be growing frustration among African American leaders that not enough is being done quickly enough. Marc Morial of the Urban League said, “The U.S. is in a state of emergency of tremendous proportions.” The president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund says, “We are in the throes of a national crisis.”
Are we in the throes of a national crisis? What are you prepared to do about it, both in terms of Baltimore and the larger picture? And what do you say to critics who say that since the death of Trayvon Martin, you have not been aggressive enough in your response?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: With respect to Baltimore, let me make a couple of points. First, obviously our thoughts continue to be with the family of Freddie Gray. Understandably, they want answers. And DOJ has opened an investigation. It is working with local law enforcement to find out exactly what happened, and I think there should be full transparency and accountability.
Second, my thoughts are with the police officers who were injured in last night’s disturbances. It underscores that that’s a tough job and we have to keep that in mind, and my hope is that they can heal and get back to work as soon as possible.
Point number three, there’s no excuse for the kind of violence that we saw yesterday. It is counterproductive. When individuals get crowbars and start prying open doors to loot, they’re not protesting, they’re not making a statement — they’re stealing. When they burn down a building, they’re committing arson. And they’re destroying and undermining businesses and opportunities in their own communities that rob jobs and opportunity from people in that area.
So it is entirely appropriate that the mayor of Baltimore, who I spoke to yesterday, and the governor, who I spoke to yesterday, work to stop that kind of senseless violence and destruction. That is not a protest. That is not a statement. It’s people — a handful of people taking advantage of a situation for their own purposes, and they need to be treated as criminals.
Point number four, the violence that happened yesterday distracted from the fact that you had seen multiple days of peaceful protests that were focused on entirely legitimate concerns of these communities in Baltimore, led by clergy and community leaders. And they were constructive and they were thoughtful, and frankly, didn’t get that much attention. And one burning building will be looped on television over and over and over again, and the thousands of demonstrators who did it the right way I think have been lost in the discussion.
The overwhelming majority of the community in Baltimore I think have handled this appropriately, expressing real concern and outrage over the possibility that our laws were not applied evenly in the case of Mr. Gray, and that accountability needs to exist. And I think we have to give them credit. My understanding is, is you’ve got some of the same organizers now going back into these communities to try to clean up in the aftermath of a handful of criminals and thugs who tore up the place. What they were doing, what those community leaders and clergy and others were doing, that is a statement. That’s the kind of organizing that needs to take place if we’re going to tackle this problem. And they deserve credit for it, and we should be lifting them up.
Point number five — and I’ve got six, because this is important. Since Ferguson, and the task force that we put together, we have seen too many instances of what appears to be police officers interacting with individuals — primarily African American, often poor — in ways that have raised troubling questions. And it comes up, it seems like, once a week now, or once every couple of weeks. And so I think it’s pretty understandable why the leaders of civil rights organizations but, more importantly, moms and dads across the country, might start saying this is a crisis. What I’d say is this has been a slow-rolling crisis. This has been going on for a long time. This is not new, and we shouldn’t pretend that it’s new.
The good news is, is that perhaps there’s some newfound awareness because of social media and video cameras and so forth that there are problems and challenges when it comes to how policing and our laws are applied in certain communities, and we have to pay attention to it and respond.
What’s also good news is the task force that was made up of law enforcement and community activists that we brought together here in the White House have come up with very constructive concrete proposals that, if adopted by local communities and by states and by counties, by law enforcement generally, would make a difference. It wouldn’t solve every problem, but would make a concrete difference in rebuilding trust and making sure that the overwhelming majority of effective, honest and fair law enforcement officers, that they’re able to do their job better because it will weed out or retrain or put a stop to those handful who may be not doing what they’re supposed to be doing.
Now, the challenge for us as the federal government is, is that we don’t run these police forces. I can’t federalize every police force in the country and force them to retrain. But what I can do is to start working with them collaboratively so that they can begin this process of change themselves.
And coming out of the task force that we put together, we’re now working with local communities. The Department of Justice has just announced a grant program for those jurisdictions that want to purchase body cameras. We are going to be issuing grants for those jurisdictions that are prepared to start trying to implement some of the new training and data collection and other things that can make a difference. And we’re going to keep on working with those local jurisdictions so that they can begin to make the changes that are necessary.
I think it’s going to be important for organizations like the Fraternal Order of Police and other police unions and organization to acknowledge that this is not good for police. We have to own up to the fact that occasionally there are going to be problems here, just as there are in every other occupation. There are some bad politicians who are corrupt. There are folks in the business community or on Wall Street who don’t do the right thing. Well, there’s some police who aren’t doing the right thing. And rather than close ranks, what we’ve seen is a number of thoughtful police chiefs and commissioners and others recognize they got to get their arms around this thing and work together with the community to solve the problem. And we’re committed to facilitating that process.
So the heads of our COPS agency that helps with community policing, they’re already out in Baltimore. Our Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division is already out in Baltimore. But we’re going to be working systematically with every city and jurisdiction around the country to try to help them implement some solutions that we know work.
And I’ll make my final point — I’m sorry, Mr. Prime Minister, but this is a pretty important issue for us.
We can’t just leave this to the police. I think there are police departments that have to do some soul searching. I think there are some communities that have to do some soul searching. But I think we, as a country, have to do some soul searching. This is not new. It’s been going on for decades.
And without making any excuses for criminal activities that take place in these communities, what we also know is that if you have impoverished communities that have been stripped away of opportunity, where children are born into abject poverty; they’ve got parents — often because of substance-abuse problems or incarceration or lack of education themselves — can’t do right by their kids; if it’s more likely that those kids end up in jail or dead, than they go to college. In communities where there are no fathers who can provide guidance to young men; communities where there’s no investment, and manufacturing has been stripped away; and drugs have flooded the community, and the drug industry ends up being the primary employer for a whole lot of folks — in those environments, if we think that we’re just going to send the police to do the dirty work of containing the problems that arise there without as a nation and as a society saying what can we do to change those communities, to help lift up those communities and give those kids opportunity, then we’re not going to solve this problem. And we’ll go through the same cycles of periodic conflicts between the police and communities and the occasional riots in the streets, and everybody will feign concern until it goes away, and then we go about our business as usual.
If we are serious about solving this problem, then we’re going to not only have to help the police, we’re going to have to think about what can we do — the rest of us — to make sure that we’re providing early education to these kids; to make sure that we’re reforming our criminal justice system so it’s not just a pipeline from schools to prisons; so that we’re not rendering men in these communities unemployable because of a felony record for a nonviolent drug offense; that we’re making investments so that they can get the training they need to find jobs. That’s hard. That requires more than just the occasional news report or task force. And there’s a bunch of my agenda that would make a difference right now in that.
Now, I’m under no illusion that out of this Congress we’re going to get massive investments in urban communities, and so we’ll try to find areas where we can make a difference around school reform and around job training, and around some investments in infrastructure in these communities trying to attract new businesses in.
But if we really want to solve the problem, if our society really wanted to solve the problem, we could. It’s just it would require everybody saying this is important, this is significant — and that we don’t just pay attention to these communities when a CVS burns, and we don’t just pay attention when a young man gets shot or has his spine snapped. We’re paying attention all the time because we consider those kids our kids, and we think they’re important. And they shouldn’t be living in poverty and violence.
That’s how I feel. I think there are a lot of good-meaning people around the country that feel that way. But that kind of political mobilization I think we haven’t seen in quite some time. And what I’ve tried to do is to promote those ideas that would make a difference. But I think we all understand that the politics of that are tough because it’s easy to ignore those problems or to treat them just as a law and order issue, as opposed to a broader social issue.
That was a really long answer, but I felt pretty strongly about it.
A "good" statement ... but definitely not a "great" statement IMO. Unfortunately, he decried how the riot "distracted" from the peaceful protests ... but then fell into the same trap by focusing solely on the relatively few looting and not at all on the hundreds battling the Baltimore PD. Think about this good people. We had hundreds of high school kids in rock battles with the police in the streets of Baltimore yesterday! Like this was the Intifada in Gaza or something! And the POTUS makes no mention of it??? Still too worried about CVS and some property damage than the complete deterioration of the relationship between black youth in Baltimore and the police that are supposed to "protect and serve" their communities. Anyone who thinks all these kids coming home from school are just a bunch of "criminals" and "thugs" is a fool. This is the result of constant harassment and oppressive police tactics.
Considering 'anyone else' got them into this position I think those same people have the requisite power to reverse those policies. But I like the undercurrent of if blacks fail we should leave them to their suffer.
Additionally ... police departments just like city administrations are institutions. And institutions don't magically change overnight because the pigmentation of the person(s) at the top changes. For decades the rank and file of the Baltimore PD were Irish-American (and later Italian-American). Today the department seems to be approximately 43% African-American. But many of them are knee-deep in the same "blue" culture that has long had "strained" relations with the urban black communities. From the 1988 Hip Hop classic "F*ck tha police" ....
Originally Posted by N.W.A.
But don't let it be a black and a white one
Cause they'll slam ya down to the street top Black police showing out for the white cop
The exact same sentiment expressed more "academically" ....
At those times when African Americans have loudly confronted the issue of police brutality, they have frequently turned it into an employment issue, singling out the lack of minorities within various police departments as the root of the problem, rather than the behavior of the officers overall. The hiring strategy is an outgrowth of old-school Civil Rights and Black Power movement logic, which argues that African Americans will be more sympathetic to issues facing minorities than whites in the same jobs will be. When applied to law enforcement, the logic seems especially potent, given the history of black America's interactions with the police. It was the fallout from the Rodney King explosion that produced Willie Williams, the first African-American police chief in the history of the LAPD.
By such logic, affluent, black Prince George's County should have virtually eradicated police brutality. But this presumption ignores many of the nuances of African-American identity. In black America, race and ethnicity don't trump other things like class, gender, or sexual orientation, arguably because black identity is not just seen as an object of pride, but still as an obstacle to be overcome.
Indeed, outside of Prince George's County, the fault lines in the "minority representation" argument are causing tremors where you'd least expect them---in minority communities. Already, many big cities are evicting the first wave of black mayors, for whom race was a campaign bonus, and replacing them with white ones. Ditto for law enforcement: Los Angeles still has a black police commissioner, Bernard Parks, yet the city is currently embroiled in one of the biggest corruption scandals in the department's history.
The diversity approach is not completely flawed. Police brutality is an issue fraught with racial implications, if only because most of the victims are black, and black officers on the street may mitigate racial tension. But diversity in police departments is not a cure-all for brutality as long as African-American officers are bred on the same stereotypes as their white colleagues. As Jesse Jackson has noted, little old white ladies aren't the only people clutching their pocketbooks at the approach of a group of black males.
"I get more requests for police support than I get complaints," says Rep. Albert Wynn. "I get far more inquiries about how we can get more police out on the streets. People are very concerned about police brutality, but they're also concerned about safe streets and that issue can't be lost."
The situation in P.G. County suggests that police brutality is not the product of racism alone. Police forces are paramilitary institutions which by their very nature are prone to abuse of power---the psychological dynamics so dramatically illustrated 20 years ago by Phillip Zimbardo of Stanford in his study of prisons. Using student volunteers, Zimbardo showed convincingly that ordinary people put in positions of authority within a criminal justice setting would behave brutally as a way of controlling others. It was the circumstances which brought out the worst in people, rather than specific defects in the individuals themselves. Abusiveness, in fact, seemed the default position.
That's why, argues Ronald Hampton, executive director of National Black Police Association, diversifying police departments like P.G. County's won't make them any less violent. "Not if we are going to send [black officers] through the same training academy that [white officers] have been going through all along. The policies and practices will change when the philosophy changes. Why do we think that if we hire more blacks and women, that if we send them to the same institution, that things will change?"
Wolf Blitzer gets schooled on CNN by a community activist. This young brother was on point!
Some notable excerpts ....
Wolf Blitzer: But you want peaceful protests right?
Deray McKesson: Yes for sure. And remember the people that have been "violent" since August have been the police. When you think about the 300 people that have killed this year alone like that is "violence". There's been property damage here that's been really unfortunate for the past couple of ... for a day or so here. But remember there had been many days of peaceful protests here in Baltimore city and in places all around the country.
Wolf Blitzer: But at least 15 police officers have been hurt, uh 200 arrests, 144 vehicle fires ... these are statistics local police have put out 15 structure fires there's no excuse for that kind of violence right?
Deray McKesson: And there's no excuse for the 7 people that the Baltimore city police have killed in the past year either right?
Wolf Blitzer: We we’re not making comparisons, obviously we don't want anybody hurt but I just want to hear you say there should be peaceful protests, not violent protests, in the tradition of Dr. Martin Luther King?
Deray McKesson: Yeah there should be peaceful protests and I don't have to condone it to understand it right? The pain that people feel is real. And you are making a comparison. You are suggesting this idea that broken windows are worse than broken spines, right? And what we know to be true is that the police are killing people everywhere. They're killing people here. 6 police officers were involved in the killing of Freddie Gray and we're looking for justice there. Umm and that's real right? The violence that police have been inflicting on communities of color has been sustained and deep.
Wolf Blitzer: But you agree I assume with President Obama who just said a few moments ago that "There's no excuse for the violence that erupted yesterday. There's no excuse for the stealing ... no excuse for the arson. You agree with the President?
Deray McKesson: What I agree with is that I advocate people to peacefully protest. I also know that pain manifests in different ways and I don't ... again I don't have to condone it to understand it. People are grieving and people are mourning. And I would advocate personally for people to do it in ways that you are calling "peacefully". But again I also know that Freddie Gray will never be back. And that those windows will be.
Blatantly leading questions by Wolf Blitzer aside ... this is a quick analysis of that excerpt alone:
# of times Wolf Blitzer asked Deray McKesson if he wanted "peaceful protests" in one manner or another?FOUR
# of times Wolf Blitzer asked Deray McKesson if he wanted "peaceful protests" AFTER he already said "Yes for sure."?THREE
# of times Deray McKesson explicitly stated he wanted "peaceful protests".FIVE
# of times Wolf Blitzer even acknowledged the existence of the points Deray McKesson was making about police violence against communities of color? Let alone assigned it any credence?ZERO
And that good people is the crux of such "debates" about rioting in the aftermath of police brutality in a nutshell.
Sometimes humor can drive a point home better than anything. I especially loved the part ...
But it isn't playing the race card. My best friend is white. My mother is actually white. My prom date in high school was a white woman. She was very white actually she uh ... used to ride horses and do that whole thing.
What's the claim here. He was living with an 80% severed spine or that he was prone to injury? Because if its the latter, that falls under 'don't put a guy with breathing problems in a chokehold'.
Under the legal agreement, the Sheriff’s Department does not admit or agree with the DOJ’s findings, but Sheriff Jim McDonnell said the settlement would allow his department to build on progress it has already made as it “seek(s) to strengthen the bonds of trust with the community we serve in the Antelope Valley.”
The agreement requires the department to provide “bias-free policing” and to train its deputies on stops, searches and detention so that they do not make arbitrary searches and only make stops warranted by “reasonable suspicion.” That suspicion cannot be based on race, color, ethnicity, national origin, religion, gender, gender identity, disability, sexual orientation or perceived immigration status.
Federal officials accused the county and the cities of Lancaster and Palmdale in 2013, after a two-year investigation, of waging a campaign of discrimination against African-American residents, particularly those living in low-income subsidized housing.
That discrimination often took the form of teams of armed sheriff’s deputies accompanying county housing agency investigators on surprise inspections of Section 8 housing, looking for violations of housing rules. Tenants told stories of being intimidated by as many as 10 armed deputies and Public Counsel said the crackdown created a climate of fear and hostility.
The media is leaving out much of the career criminal history of Freddie Gray in their reporting. It seems now that they may also be failing to discuss his very relevant medical history, one which MAY have included multiple surgeries for spinal injuries incurred in a car crash.
Health privacy laws limit the availability of medical information, but a public records search in the Howard Court Civil System website provides evidence that Gray had received a settlement and had engaged with Peachtree Funding to obtain a lump sum payment.
The media has been remiss in reporting this information, preferring to portray the career criminal as the victim of police misconduct. Other ANONYMOUS sources indicate that Gray may have had surgery as recently as ten days prior to the incident in which he was involved in a forty-five minute flee to evade the authorities. He could have easily re-injured himself in his reckless attempt to avoid capture.
Regardless of the amount of time that has passed since his most recent spinal surgery, it was clearly not an action by the officers involved that severed his spine. It was his own actions in combination with his earlier accident that led to his re-injury and ultimately to his death.
Some random right-wing blogger talks about how Freddie Gray "may" have had some sort of spinal injuries from a car crash. "May have" ... because as he acknowledges "Health privacy laws limit the availability of medical information". "Anonymous sources" said this or that. The only thing ... I repeat ... the ONLY thing this guy has documented is the evidence of some sort of legal settlement. What that settlement doesn't indicate in any way is what it is about. The rest of the article is just rank speculation on the part of the writer.
It doesn't matter OAW. The reason we have policies against excessive force is because you can't always know when it 'safe' to exert said force. When you use excessive force, you open yourself up to the possibility of giving a potentially fatal 'rough ride' to a guy with spinal problems. Anyone who cares that he had pre-existing spinal problems is looking at some high level victim blaming for his death.
Some random right-wing blogger talks about how Freddie Gray "may" have had some sort of spinal injuries from a car crash. "May have" ... because as he acknowledges "Health privacy laws limit the availability of medical information". "Anonymous sources" said this or that. The only thing ... I repeat ... the ONLY thing this guy has documented is the evidence of some sort of legal settlement. What that settlement doesn't indicate in any way is what it is about. The rest of the article is just rank speculation on the part of the writer.
OAW
So we should accept YOUR opinions instead of others? Why?
After Baltimore police and a crowd of teens clashed near the Mondawmin Mall in northwest Baltimore on Monday afternoon, news reports described the violence as a riot triggered by kids who had been itching for a fight all day. But in interviews with Mother Jones and other media outlets, teachers and parents maintain that police actions inflamed a tense-but-stable situation.
The funeral of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died in police custody this month, had ended hours earlier at a nearby church. According to the Baltimore Sun, a call to "purge"—a reference to the 2013 dystopian film in which all crime is made legal for one night—circulated on social media among school-aged Baltimoreans that morning. The rumored plan—which was not traced to any specific person or group—was to assemble at the Mondawmin Mall at 3:00 p.m. and proceed down Pennsylvania Avenue toward downtown Baltimore. The Baltimore police department, which was aware of the "purge" call, prepared for the worst. Shortly before noon, the department issued a statement saying it had "received credible information that members of various gangs…have entered into a partnership to 'take-out' law enforcement officers."
When school let out that afternoon, police were in the area equipped with full riot gear. According to eyewitnesses in the Mondawmin neighborhood, the police were stopping busses and forcing riders, including many students who were trying to get home, to disembark. Cops shut down the local subway stop. They also blockaded roads near the Mondawmin Mall and Frederick Douglass High School, which is across the street from the mall, and essentially corralled young people in the area. That is, they did not allow the after-school crowd to disperse.
Meghann Harris, a teacher at a nearby school, described on Facebook what happened:
Police were forcing busses to stop and unload all their passengers. Then, [Frederick Douglass High School] students, in huge herds, were trying to leave on various busses but couldn't catch any because they were all shut down. No kids were yet around except about 20, who looked like they were waiting for police to do something. The cops, on the other hand, were in full riot gear, marching toward any small social clique of students…It looked as if there were hundreds of cops.
The kids were "standing around in groups of 3-4," Harris said in a Facebook message to Mother Jones. "They weren't doing anything. No rock throwing, nothing…The cops started marching toward groups of kids who were just milling about."
A teacher at Douglass High School, who asked not to be identified, tells a similar story: "When school was winding down, many students were leaving early with their parents or of their own accord." Those who didn't depart early, she says, were stranded. Many of the students still at school at that point, she notes, wanted to get out of the area and avoid any Purge-like violence. Some were requesting rides home from teachers. But by now, it was difficult to leave the neighborhood. "I rode with another teacher home," this teacher recalls, "and we had to route our travel around the police in riot gear blocking the road… The majority of my students thought what was going to happen was stupid or were frightened at the idea. Very few seemed to want to participate in 'the purge.'"
A parent who picked up his children from a nearby elementary school, says via Twitter, "The kids stood across from the police and looked like they were asking them 'why can't we get on the buses' but the police were just gazing…Majority of those kids aren't from around that neighborhood. They NEED those buses and trains in order to get home." He continued: "If they would've let them children go home, yesterday wouldn't have even turned out like that."
Meg Gibson, another Baltimore teacher, described a similar scene to Gawker: "The riot police were already at the bus stop on the other side of the mall, turning buses that transport the students away, not allowing students to board. They were waiting for the kids.…Those kids were set up, they were treated like criminals before the first brick was thrown." With police unloading busses, and with the nearby metro station shut down, there were few ways for students to clear out.
Several eyewitnesses in the area that afternoon say that police seemed to arrive at Mondawmin anticipating mobs and violence—prior to any looting. At 3:01 p.m., the Baltimore Police Department posted on its Facebook page: "There is a group of juveniles in the area of Mondawmin Mall. Expect traffic delays in the area." But many of the kids, according to eyewitnesses, were stuck there because of police actions.
The Baltimore Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.
Around 3:30, the police reported that juveniles had begun to throw bottles and bricks. Fifteen minutes later, the police department noted that one of its officers had been injured. After that the violence escalated, and rioters started looting the Mondawmin Mall, and Baltimore was in for a long night of trouble and violence. But as the event is reviewed and investigated, an important question warrants attention: What might have happened had the police not prevented students from leaving the area? Did the department's own actions increase the chances of conflict?
As Meghann Harris put it, "if I were a Douglas student that just got trapped in the middle of a minefield BY cops without any way to get home and completely in harm's way, I'd be ready to pop off, too."
When school let out that afternoon, police were in the area equipped with full riot gear. According to eyewitnesses in the Mondawmin neighborhood, the police were stopping busses and forcing riders, including many students who were trying to get home, to disembark.
I read this yesterday and I'm not really sure what to make of it. I'd like to hear the department comment on the veracity of the claim they were actually disembarking kids leaving the school, and the reasoning behind it.
So we should accept YOUR opinions instead of others? Why?
You seem to be confused. My commentary on the nature of that article was not a matter of opinion ... it was a matter of fact. Dude is a right-wing blogger. He self-identifies as such. His article was full of "may have". He cited "anonymous sources". The public records he cited only indicated some sort of legal settlement ... not what it was about. He has no factual basis to make any commentary whatsoever about Freddie Gray's actual medical history as he acknowledged the health records are not available ... so what else is he doing other than engaging in "rank speculation"?
I mean if that's what you want to roll with anyway then by all means knock yourself out! And I'll simply continue with the way I roll around here. You know where I back up what I have to say with much more credible sources. You know with little things like actual video footage and what not.
In the meantime, here's something that actually is my opinion that I think aptly captures your mindset on this particular issue:
The blindest man is not the one who can't see ... but the one who simply does not want to.
I read this yesterday and I'm not really sure what to make of it. I'd like to hear the department comment on the veracity of the claim they were actually disembarking kids leaving the school, and the reasoning behind it.
Indeed. Thus far they are keeping quite mum about it. It seems very similar to what happened in Ferguson. Where the crowd became violent as a response to police tactics. But let's say for the sake of discussion that every single parent and teacher quoted in that article is completely full of it .... doesn't it seem odd that the Baltimore PD wouldn't put out evidence to counter such claims? And if the parents and teachers quoted are telling the truth .... is it a surprise that the Baltimore PD is choosing to conveniently leave that part out of their public statements as a means of controlling the narrative about what happened? As the article indicated ... "The Baltimore Police Department did not respond to requests for comment."
Baltimore is run by lying Democrats, and has been for decades. What do you expect except a fictional narrative. Nobody is to blame. Its the 'system' (devised by Democrats).
It doesn't matter OAW. The reason we have policies against excessive force is because you can't always know when it 'safe' to exert said force. When you use excessive force, you open yourself up to the possibility of giving a potentially fatal 'rough ride' to a guy with spinal problems. Anyone who cares that he had pre-existing spinal problems is looking at some high level victim blaming for his death.
Not to blame the victim, but if this is true, then the amount of INTENTIONAL abuse the cops are responsible for is less outrageous, and could change the perception from police brutality to accident.
Not to blame the victim, but if this is true, then the amount of INTENTIONAL abuse the cops are responsible for is less outrageous, and could change the perception from police brutality to accident.
You're forgetting that how much force was used to capture him is a big fat question mark.
Still, supposing you're right, conversely it increases the likelihood that they ignored he was already hurt when they put him in the truck.
The modern day GOP has traditionally consisted of conservative "law and order" voters. But since the 1990s the Dems have fallen all over themselves trying to outdo the GOP on this front and inoculate themselves from "soft on crime" charges levied against them in an attempt to appeal to white suburban voters. The Willie Horton political attack ads utilized by George H. W. Bush against Michael Dukakis in the 1988 presidential campaign were devastatingly effective. So what we ended up with was "war on drugs", "3 strikes", "mandatory minimums", and "mass incarceration" polices supported by both major political parties. The Dems co-signed onto all of that under Bill Clinton in 1992 as part of his "triangulation" political strategy. Thankfully politicians such as Hillary Clinton, Rand Paul, and even Rick Perry are finally coming to their senses ....
As the officers continue wiping Dents blood off them, an officer decides to do a little acting. He lies down on a bench and imitates Dent being on the ground at the scene choked by Officer William Melendez. His acting seems to thrill rather than disgust his audience.
At the same time, Dent is suffering from a closed head injury, broken ribs, and a fractured orbital but had not been allowed to see a doctor for his injuries.
When a judge looked at the video of the vicious beating following a traffic stop, she was appalled. She threw out multiple charges against him.
When Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy saw the video she dropped the rest of Dent’s charges and issued criminal charges against Melendez, the now-fired officer caught on tape choking and punching Dent in the head.
The Inkster Police officials watched the videos didn’t think Dent deserved to have them as part of his defense against serious felonies he was charged with at the time. They claim these videos were not specifically requested.
Dent’s attorneys say the second someone in authority observed officers making fun of an injured prisoner, they should have notified the prosecutor. They also say the defense should have received copies of the tapes.
…
Inkster’s chief of police has since resigned and others caught on tape both at the scene and in the police station are finally being investigated, almost two months after the incident.
“And what about the other officers in that video? The answer to you is they will be under investigation as well,” Inkster city manager Richard Marsh said during a recent news conference.
The modern day GOP has traditionally consisted of conservative "law and order" voters. But since the 1990s the Dems have fallen all over themselves trying to outdo the GOP on this front and inoculate themselves from "soft on crime" charges in an attempt to appeal to white suburban voters. So what we ended up with was "war on drugs", "3 strikes", "mandatory minimums", and "mass incarceration" polices supported by both major political parties. The Dems co-signed onto all of that under Bill Clinton as part of his "triangulation" political strategy. Thankfully politicians such as Hillary Clinton, Rand Paul, and even Rick Perry are finally coming to their senses ....
It reminds me of Dems on national security. They try to compete with conservatives and just make a worse system.
The ****ed up question is, has it been worth it? Have Dems embracing terrible policy resulted in them getting more wins, allowing them to promote more liberal policy (or prevent more conservative policy) in other areas, or has their spinelessness basically lowered the quality of life for everyone by accepting bad policy?
I've said it before and I'll say it again. They may be "Officer Friendly" in suburban white neighborhoods ... but in urban black neighborhoods in all too many instances they are anything but.
It reminds me of Dems on national security. They try to compete with conservatives and just make a worse system.
The ****ed up question is, has it been worth it? Have Dems embracing terrible policy resulted in them getting more wins, allowing them to promote more liberal policy (or prevent more conservative policy) in other areas, or has their spinelessness basically lowered the quality of life for everyone by accepting bad policy?
That is the million dollar question. I'd say the answer is "both". Overall policy is much better than it would have been. Everyone gets a lower quality of life because mass incarceration costs a sh*tload of taxpayer's money and it has very negative long-term impacts on the nation's economic competitiveness. And the most loyal Dem voting bloc (i.e. African-Americans) gets the short end of the stick.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. They may be "Officer Friendly" in suburban white neighborhoods ... but in urban black neighborhoods in all too many instances they are anything but.
OAW
And you still can't connect the dots? White folks don't tend to riot, trash things and kill everyone. The police are reacting to a different set of circumstances.
And you still can't connect the dots? White folks don't tend to riot, trash things and kill everyone. The police are reacting to a different set of circumstances.
For the life of me I'll never understand the eagerness of some people to say the most demonstrably false things on a public forum.
Mass racial violence in the United States, also called race riots, can include such disparate events as:
attacks on Irish Catholics, the Chinese and other immigrants in the 19th century.
attacks on Native Americans and Americans over the land.
attacks on Italian immigrants in the early 20th century, and Mexicans and Puerto Ricans in the later 20th century.
attacks on African Americans that occurred, as in 1919, in addition to the lynchings in the period after Reconstruction through the first half of the 20th century.
frequent fighting among various ethnic groups in major cities, specifically in the northeast and midwest United States throughout the late 19th century and early 20th century. This example was made famous in the stage musical West Side Story and its film adaptation.
unrest in African-American communities, such as the 1968 riots following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
The one highlighted above ... you know the only one that seems to register with you ... has generally always been community eruptions after decades of police brutality. The assassination of MLK being a notable exception. The rest of them have been dominant white ethnic groups attacking other people because they could. Or tearing up sh*t after a freaking sporting event or pumpkin festival.
And you still can't connect the dots? White folks don't tend to riot, trash things and kill everyone. The police are reacting to a different set of circumstances.
And you still can't connect the dots? White folks don't tend to riot, trash things and kill everyone. The police are reacting to a different set of circumstances.
That's why I posted the "In Living Color" video. The first skit is about "white people looting the Galleria" after the LA 4 were aquitted in the Reginald Denny beating trail. "Former Mayor Ed Bradley" makes an apearence condoning/condemning the looting.
What's the claim here. He was living with an 80% severed spine or that he was prone to injury? Because if its the latter, that falls under 'don't put a guy with breathing problems in a chokehold'.
I guess they missed the sign around his neck saying that he had a almost-completely severed spine.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
So we should accept YOUR opinions instead of others? Why?
You can't handle the truth. Just Listen and Believe, dammit!
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
So you you see no difference between starting a couch on fire which is then contained by the very circle of people who started it and setting several city blocks of homes and businesses on fire? Or thwarting the attempts of the fire department to put these things out by slashing the hoses and trying to stone them into submission with bricks?
Because one is a misdemeanor and the other would be several felonies in this country.
And that isn't even getting into the issue of looting and assaults on news media that accompanies one but not the other.
It may be anecdotal but I remember the 92 Bulls win here in Chicago. My bestfriend's older brother who was just old enough to drive let us tag along with them to Michigan Ave to see all the revelry.... lots of drunkenness and car horns blaring but from where I stood all the people who began the looting and throwing garbage cans through store windows appeared to wander over from Cabrini Green.
Barack Obama: Four more years of the Carter Presidency
Not that I'm under any illusion that little things like facts will even remotely matter to this particular individual, but for the benefit of the thread at large I thought I'd point out that this nonsense has already been debunked ....
Online reports are swirling that Freddie Gray had spinal surgery shortly before he died in police custody, and had collected a payout in a settlement from a car accident. Those reports — which raise questions about the injury that led to his death in April 19 — point to Howard County court records as proof.
But court records examined Wednesday by The Baltimore Sun show the case had nothing to do with a car accident or a spine injury. Instead, they are connected to a lawsuit alleging that Gray and his sister were injured by exposure to lead paint.
Paperwork was filed in December allowing Gray and his sister, Fredericka to each collect an $18,000 payment from Peachtree Settlement Funding, records show. In exchange, Peachtree would have received a $108,439 annuity that was scheduled to be paid in $602 monthly installments between 2024 and 2039.
In her documents, Fredericka Gray checked "other" when asked to describe the type of accident. She also said that the date of the accident was "94/99" and that she was a minor when the case was settled.
In his documents, Freddie Gray checked "work injury, medical malpractice and auto accident" as the type of accident. When asked to explain, he also wrote something that is unreadable. He also wrote something unreadable when asked if he was a minor when the case was settled.
Both cases were filed at the same time by a New Jersey law firm.
A judge dismissed the case on April 2 when neither Gray nor his sister appeared in court, records show.
Gray's death has sparked more than a week of protests in Baltimore including some that turned violent and led to looting.
Baltimore attorney William H. "Billy" Murphy, who represents the Gray family, confirmed that the Howard County case was connected to the lead paint lawsuit.
Jason Downs, an attorney who is with Murphy's firm and represents one of Gray's relatives, said, "We have no information or evidence at this point to indicate that there is a prior pre-existing spinal injury. It's a rumor."
A 2006 injury case listed in online Maryland court records lists Freddie Gray as a plaintiff, but Downs said that case involves his father, who shares the same name.
As children, Gray and his two sisters were found to have damaging lead levels in their blood, which led to educational, behavioral and medical problems, according to a lawsuit they filed in 2008 against the owner of a Sandtown-Winchester home the family rented for four years.
While the property owner countered in the suit that other factors could have contributed to the children's deficits — including poverty and their mother's drug use — the case was settled before going to trial in 2010. The terms of the settlement are not public.
The Free Republic website said Wednesday that Gray's "life-ending injuries to his spine may have possibly been the result of spinal and neck surgery that he allegedly received a week before he was arrested." The article also said the injury was a result of a car accident and cited thefourthesate.com as the source of information. The story did not cite any court records.
Free Republic has since removed the story from its website and could not be reached for comment.
You see this is the same sort of bullsh*t from right-wing bloggers who were swearing on a stack of bibles all across the internet that Darren Wilson suffered an "orbital socket fracture" at the hands of Mike Brown ...
When Darren Wilson is a completely different person than the guy pictured above and whose "injuries" actually looked like this ...
The knee-jerk desperation of some of these wingnuts to find an excuse for any allegation of police brutality towards a person of color ... even to the point of manufacturing outright falsehoods ... is quite palpable.
BALTIMORE — A prisoner sharing a police transport van with Freddie Gray told investigators that he could hear Gray “banging against the walls” of the vehicle and believed that he “was intentionally trying to injure himself,” according to a police document obtained by The Washington Post.
The prisoner, who is currently in jail, was separated from Gray by a metal partition and could not see him. His statement is contained in an application for a search warrant, which is sealed by the court. The Post was given the document under the condition that the prisoner not be named because the person who provided it feared for the inmate’s safety.
The document, written by a Baltimore police investigator, offers the first glimpse of what might have happened inside the van. It is not clear whether any additional evidence backs up the prisoner’s version, which is just one piece of a much larger probe.
I guess they missed the sign around his neck saying that he had a almost-completely severed spine.
Now we're really rolling! Having a speculated rumored spinal injury has now morphed into walking around with an almost severed spine. By this time tomorrow we'll be hearing about how he planned to entrap cops with his condition.
As I indicated above, the right-wing media whips itself up into a frenzy with outright falsehoods whenever cops are accused of police brutality against a person of color ...
Baltimore talk-radio fixture Tom Marr aired outlandish theories about the death of Freddie Gray during his Tuesday morning show, suggesting that Gray’s severed spine could be the result of a botched burglary or a “pre-existing condition.”
“I’m hearing that Freddie Gray may have sustained an injury himself while fleeing from police on March 20th, 2015. What I’m hearing is that in order to try to elude police, he jumped from a window, possibly as high as three stories,” said Marr.
Marr serves a “slice of the conservative pie” on his morning show on Talk Radio 680 WCBM. Gray, an African-American 25-year-old, died from spinal cord injuries while in police custody earlier this month.
Marr drifted between alternative theories to suggest that police might not be responsible for Gray’s death. “Did [Gray] have a preexisting condition?” asked Marr, after running through Gray’s criminal drug record and floating the possibility that he died from running into a wall. “We just don’t know answers yet.”
Throughout the segment, Marr took calls and entertained a range of ideas to explain the unrest in Baltimore City, including the role of welfare, illegal immigration, and the “entitlement mentality” in the African American community. “Oh you want to use food stamps to buy illegal drugs, go ahead,” said Marr, claiming the welfare programs started in the 1960s have been “an utter and complete disaster,” particularly for “poor blacks.”
Marr also pinned the blame for Baltimore’s woes on Reverend Jamal Bryant, the pastor who delivered the eulogy for Freddie Gray’s funeral on Monday. Though Rev. Bryant repeatedly called for calm after the funeral and urged protesters to “go back home,” Marr singled him out for criticism.
“The young black males, the Al Sharptons of the world and the Reverend Jamal Bryants of the world, they’re not out on the streets demonstrating against the blacks shooting and killing other blacks,” said Marr. “They’re out to blame everything on whitey.”
This fool actually got on the radio and suggested that Freddie Gray jumped out of a 3 story window and ran into a wall to explain how he got his spinal injuries. And then of course there's the obligatory Al Sharpton reference. Sound familiar?
... this is a quick analysis of that excerpt alone:
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