Two Questions
When did this become a small town police department?
And where are all those folks so damn upset about government overreach? Hiding out at the Bundy ranch?
So, it’s not Barack Obama who has para-military forces ready to come into your front yard and throw smoke bombs. It’s James Knowles, the Republican mayor of Ferguson, Missouri. How ’bout them apples?
White people can point loaded automatic weapons at the police on the Bundy ranch. Black people can’t point cameras at them in Ferguson, Missouri. See the problem?
“This will not end well.” (Not like it’s going all that great anyway. If this keeps up, I expect the Feds will be called in. Then watch the teabaggers scream.)
1Yeah, well, it is Missouri for God’s sake!!
2So let’s see – Patriot act with Outrageous amounts of money given to Local PD to Militarize and Minimal if any psyche screening before entrance into the Academy , ALEC and Stand your Ground laws, a Duly elected President of Color…..Yep, We have a new Reality show “The Caucasian Fear Factor.”
3Look who’s got himself involved now?
http://crooksandliars.com/cltv/2014/08/ferguson-police-chief-turns-foxs
4It’s way past time for Governor Jay Nixon to fire the entire Ferguson police force and move in State Police for the time being. Then get about hiring persons of color to better represent and police a city that’s 75% minority. This whole thing is starting to look like a misguided episode of Hill Street Blues, where the SWAT team runs amok.
5Where the hell is the governor in all of this?
Someone needs to protect the people of Ferguson from the people who are supposed to protect them.
6Washington Post reporter, on the scene reporter, slams Joe Scarborough!
http://crooksandliars.com/2014/08/arrested-washpo-reporter-blasts-smug
7IOIYAR
8It’s my understanding that yesterday’s police riot was brought to you by the Saint Louis County police, not the Ferguson PD. Not to say that that is any better.
9Upon viewing the pictures of law enforcement in Ferguson, more than one veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan noted that the police have better protective gear than soldiers did on the front lines.
If all you have is a hammer, all your problems look like nails.
This will not end well for anyone.
10Don’t expect the police to admit wrongdoing.
11The racial issues are so entrenched that this is turning into the 1960’s again. Now, however, instead of fire hoses and dogs, the SWAT teams have weapons of war. African Americans in the south are going to pay the price for having an African American President. The Civil Rights Movement, Part 2.
As a fantasy football type exercise, it would be darkly (sick) funny to pit the Bundy Vigilantes against the Furgusen Swaties.
12I read on another website, some guy screaming at liberals for wanting gun control; as if arming the protestors in Ferguson would end peacefully if only they had guns. Only in his whitey, wet dreams would it turn out similar to the Bundy outlaws “standing their ground”. It would more likely have turned out like ISIS massacring villagers.
13Anyone who think Martin Luther King achieved anything is smoking some of the legal weed in/from Colorado.
14There is a common myth that because the President has African ancestry and black skin that we have somehow transcended the racism which has permeated our nation since its inception. Emancipating the slaves did not end racism. The Brown decision did not end racism nor did the Civil Rights Act or the Voting Rights Act. Racism is institutionalized in the USA and it will continue to be as long as we fail to address it.
15This week’s Oliphant cartoon focuses on “The Dogs of War” being racism and right-wing religion. He is commenting on the Middle East. BUT, this is also true of the US of A.
16maryelle…. I hope you are wrong.
However, I fear you are right.
Two reporters sitting in a McD’s (most of them are WIFI Hotspots) one from Huffington Post, one from the Washington Post….. both roughed up, and arrested. Al Jazzera (?) camera crew and their vehicle tear-gassed. the Their equipment destroyed by the LEO….. (whomever they are at this time.) The Alderman who represents this district was jailed “because he didn’t listen”.
An entire community is under siege. People congregating in their own back yards, are tear gassed.
It’s way out of control. Don’t expect it will ever be made right. Too much lack of trust from one side, and a total lack of respect from the other. It will take generations to repair the damage….. if it can indeed be done at all.
Never been to Missouri, and don’t plan on ever going. It’s a third world country all its own.
17A lot of us have been wondering where the militia was and where the Second Amendment solutions are.
Thanks to the NRA everyone can shoot back. And it looks more and more foolish to expect that they won’t shoot back.
18I guess this is the so called “Peace Dividend” that we will be realizing with the wars in the Middle East winding down. The military industrial complex still has to produce the goods of war. If the army can’t use the stuff, let’s arm the police.
19My ancestors appeared in Missouri before statehood. I lived near Ferguson till my dad lost his job and he got one on the West Coast. According to what I’ve read about my ancestors (one rode with Quantrill, another left his meager estate to the Klan) and know about my current relations, these Missourians’ views were/are thoroughly benighted.
20Sorry, Ralph, but don’t you know 2nd Ammendment solutions are only for white people?
Heck, a black man can’t even open carry a toy gun in Walmart without getting shot.
21This is going to seem harsh but please hear me out.
I can’t help but feel that part of the fault here is with the citizens of Ferguson. As I understand it, that community is 63% African-American. That should translate at the polls into an African-American majority of civic leaders. That is certainly not the case.
I may be totally off my rocker, but I have to wonder how many of the people standing in the streets in protest are registered to vote? How many of those people didn’t take the time to go to the polls and cast a ballot?
I think there is a lesson here people. I hope we learn it.
Vote.
22Here’s the WashPost reporter’s account of being roughed up and arrested for… sitting in a McDonald’s and being a journalist, apparently:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-ferguson-washington-post-reporter-wesley-lowery-gives-account-of-his-arrest/2014/08/13/0fe25c0e-2359-11e4-86ca-6f03cbd15c1a_story.html?hpid=z1
These… someone has to use the phrase… jackbooted thugs have all that hardware and are just itching to use it on somebody, anybody, who doesn’t look or sound like them. If there aren’t any brown people around, let’s snag us some librals.
23Mark, I’ll give you that. I wonder when some entrepreneurial gun dealer will recognize this huge new market that is opening up in Ferguson.
24Y’all done said it all, even maybe my comment which might have been gonna be that I heard that a bunch of armor and stuff was brought back from Iraq and given to local municipalities. I griped about it back then and one of my former friends said with a straight face, meaning it, “Don’t you think that police in cities NEED it?” Well, no. Local police do not need tanks or whatever. Maybe i shoulda said “SHOULDN’T” need weapons of war.
25Pure speculation on my part….. That’s one caveat.
The other is because my great-grandfather was a “newspaper person”….. I am as much a Tiger about the “Freedom of the Press” Amendement, and the gun nuts are about the “Right to Bear Arms” Amendment. I totally pisses me off, when reporters are harassed…. arrested, jailed….. whatever, especially in this country.. IT SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.
The speculation is simply this….. Michael Brown was a “big” man…. he was called a “gentle giant”. Interesting to me that the Chief of Police quickly….. tried to define his as (a) a thug… (b) a gang banger…. (c) the list is endless. He was none of those things….. He was a high school graduate, who wanted to go to a tech school and learn a trade.
I would speculate…. that the police officer who shot and killed him….. was nothing, compared to Michael Brown. Maybe even short, fat, and ugly, and became a police officer, so he could carry a gun and indiscriminately shoot people.
26JMHO.
Sorry folks, lots of typos. My arthritic fingers sometimes don’t want to do what I ask them to do. Happens when you get old.
27Well said, Ms. Juanitajean. You laid it out nice and neat and tied up into one big bundle.
28Oh Miemaw, you can blame the computer. I do that all the time.
29Edward Starsmith, in this day of elections bought and paid for by the 1%, it’s really possible that even if minority candidates tried to run for office, they got blown away by the right wing truth-or-dare machine, and the minorities have never had a chance to govern their own community. They may not have voted because no one on the ballot was going to stand for them, anyway.
I understand their plight; I live in Texas, and I’m not finding a lot of souls in our government who stand for me: my “representatives” are Bill Flores and Ted Cruz, and both of them are worse than worthless. I vote against the cr@p as much as I can, but sometimes it seems futile.
I really, really want to see Texas turn blue!
30Ferguson PD, man up! It’s time you used a bullhorn or a taser to get your pant-load officer into a shower. It’s been five days, so please don’t wait for his weekly Saturday night bath to wash the Nuge off of him. You could be sports, too and buy him some fresh boxers for after he showers. He needs to meet the public and explain why with all the firepower and communications on his side, he didn’t call for back-up, if he felt threatened. He deserves to be heard, and I doubt that anyone would begrudge him showing up showered and in some fresh boxers.
31Well, if those cops are so well-armed and ready, why weren’t they in position when the stores were being looted? Isn’t that what a police force is supposed to do instead of teargassing American citizens who are exercising their constitutional right to peacefully assemble??? Why are the business owners having to stand outside their storefronts with weapons???
32djw, There were election days when the only reason I got out of bed was to vote against Jesse Helms. I know how you feel.
But people still need to vote. It might seem useless. But not voting is giving up.
33Very true, Edward Starsmith, we need to vote. But as Emily’s List does, we also need to groom and encourage good candidates to run for office at every level.
Best example I can think of is Leticia Van de Putte. She has the sense, the fire in the belly and all the abilities to make Texas proud. Without a doubt, there are similar men and women in Missouri who need to be encouraged to run for office and supported.
Voting is great, but we need candidates, too.
34I watched the coverage on MSNBC last night. It looked like cops run amok to me.
Then I watched the ABC snippet tonight. They didn’t say, but distinctly implied, that the protesters ran amok as soon as darkness fell, and that it was at least 50% their fault.
That is not what I saw or heard reported as it was happening.
ABC also aired a statement from a police representative coming right out and saying same. IIRC, no statement was taken from any protester.
I am no journalist, but it struck me as an extremely gullible and biased report.
Looks like there’s a movement afoot to de-militarize police departments. I certainly hope so. Those photos of the jackbooted thugs were terrifying.
35Well, darn, the media finally got the gov’s attention: he has backed up the po-lice by ordering out the HIGHWAY PATROL! That’s oughta do it!
36This might be a good time to remember that the Supreme Court over turned part of the Voting Rights act because there is no more racism in America.
Ferguson can sleep peacefully tonight. The Supremes have your back.
37Gov. Nixon has tapped Ron Johnson and the highway patrol to take over the policing activities. It took him some time but he got the right guy. Look at the difference between the protests tonight and in the two prior nights. A friend’s son works with Officer Johnson and speaks real highly of him. As for Jay, well Nixon tends to be slow, under other circumstances I would refer to him as deliberative but I’m not feeling kindly tonight so I’m going with slow, but he does get things done and as the lone democrat riding herd on a pack of rabid republican legislators he does a fairly good job. He is also trying to rope the prosecutor, McCullogh who never met a problem too big to sweep under the rug. Nixon is dealing with HUGE cross pressure and he is trying to do so behind the scenes that is how works. He wants to help the prosecutor to “see the light.” and to make him think he saw it on his own.
While his press conference reminded me of that great scene in “The Best Little Whore House” …. You know the one where the Governor sings, “Ooh, I love to dance the little sidestep / Now they see me, now they don’t / I’ve come and gone / And ooh, I love to sweep around a wide step / Cut a little swath / And lead the people on!” Generally speaking he is a pretty good guy.
I have to tell you, the St Louis county police department has tremendous political power. My gut says Nixon is walking a fine line and his first goal is to calm things the hell down. That is what his goal has to be, as the last thing we want is further escalation. The next move will be to get justice for Michael Brown. Nixon is a former prosecutor, he isn’t going to do anything to louse stuff up. Having said that, two of my best friends in college were from Ferguson Florisant in North County, one of them is a former state rep from there, whom I campaigned for. As a consequence I have spent a lot of time there and I can tell you categorically that the vast majority of folks from there are decent people. The folks who were arrested didn’t live there, they were thugs looking for an opportunity.
The real issue is hyper armored police playing dress up. We have a racial problem, you are way more likely to be searched if you are black, way more likely to be pulled over, in Missouri and everywhere else in the US.
Those of us in Missouri would respectfully ask that you say your prayers or send your positive thoughts to the remarkable family of Michael Brown that they may continue to demonstrate such amazing grace in the face of their horrific loss, and for Officer Johnson who has been handed a God awful mess to clean up. While you are at it, say your prayers for the witnesses who have been brave enough to come forward my gut says they can use it as well!
38It’s easy to act all shocked an appalled now, but people can’t claim they weren’t complicit in turning police into a paramilitary. U.S. “liberals” only seem to notice when the chickens come home to roost. When the U.S. began propping up the cop hardware biz by sending it to us down here in Mexico (and, now… Plan Merida was not money for Mexico to “fight drugs”… it was money for U.S. suppliers and “trainers” to spend money for stuff sent to Mexico, whether it was needed or not) somewhere between 60 and 100,000 people ended up dead. With that same equipment being “donating” to your local police, what did you think it would be used for?
39I’m not acting, I *am* all shocked and appalled. The equipment is (was) being used for exactly what I thought it would be used for someday. And our hands aren’t clean outside the U.S. either, I am fully aware.
40Part of the problem is: “We got all these great toys, and never get to play with them…”
Pretend and dress up never should overrule common sense.
41