Law & Order

Details: Written by: Rod Boyle; Category: Rants; Published: 11 July 2016; Hits: 2886

And I watched the Dallas shooting with some interest. It was to be expected, really, the knee-jerk reaction to the polices ongoing extra-judicial mass executions of blacks. The reaction, predictable, blaming the Sniper, the lone gunman, yes, this time, maybe, but I expect even as you lick your wounds from this there will be more and better planned, this policing of the United States, the empire of fear, well, your approach, your methods, your lack of accountability, while not addressed by the courts will be addressed by the people. This is fair, this is their right, they owe themselves their safety, security, their freedom. This is why there is a Second Amendment:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

I read the statements - from Obama, the biggest political disappointment of the last 2 centuries:

'Vicious, calculated, despicable attack on law enforcement'

From Hillary:

''We’ve got to do everything possible to support our police and to support innocent Americans who have encounters with police,'

and

"I mourn for the officers shot while doing their sacred duty to protect peaceful protesters, for their families and all who serve with them"

I was looking for Trump's answer to that, he has that affable half-wits charm about him, that shoot-from-the foot-in-the-mouth attitude, but clearly his handlers have got a firm grip on him:

'...an attack on our country...'

Addressing Obama's rhetoric first, there is no law enforcement in the USA. For there to be law enforcement you need laws, and laws that are applied equally to all people regardless of race, religion or wealth. That has clearly not been the case. What you have in the USA at the moment is a loose set of guidelines, rules, clearly set up to favor privileged white folks. Your very currency, the dollar bill, is hypocrisy: ornamented by George Washington, founding father and slave owner who despite the best of professed intentions profited from slavery his entire life. You've in your time in office overseen the extrajudicial murders of Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen, of Osama Bin Laden and countless other "Enemies" of the state and innocent civilians. You have assured us the ends justify the means. You have overseen the torture and captivity of innocent people in Abu Ghraib. I could continue, but this is not about your appalling moral legacy, this is about a war that is becoming 2 sided.

Respectfully, I must apologize. Law and Order that exclusively favors corporations and rich white folk is not law and order. It's oppression. Expect resistance. Your reaction suggests that a great deal more resistance must be made before you will open your eyes.

Hillary's response was politic and considered, and as much as I hate to say it the most reasoned. It's inclusive, as she acknowledges the reason for the shootings in her "support for the innocent Americans who have encounters with the police.", but she doesn't go far enough, she's a politician and is protecting her political interests. Acknowledge that "Innocent Black Americans are being MURDERED BY THE POLICE" and acknowledging that if there were fair and competent policing in the States this would NOT HAVE HAPPENED (retaliation demands a reason, after all) would have been strong and accurate statements, but the truth is too uncomfortable for white people to hear.

And the Donald. Sorry, Donald, it wasn't an attack on your country. It was a defense of the values you all profess to hold dear:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

You have denied these people their unalienable rights. Jeronimo is on paid administrative leave, while his crime (homicide is sill a crime, isn't it?) is "investigated" and likely - as in too many other cases like this - will go unpunished. The closing of ranks - the solidarity of all police forces, the lack of comment or criticism on what clearly was murder, twice in a week captured on video (and how many weren't I wonder? Those we won't be hearing about). The fact that after the shooting the fellow officers went up to "console" the murderer speaks worlds of the divide between the people and those they are paying to protect them. They are not their protectors, they're the jailers, the guards, the wardens.

The Emperor has no clothes. The Emperor has no clothes. The Emperor has no clothes. The Emperor has no clothes.

The unspoken, unacknowledged truth, is that the biggest threat to American safety at the moment is the Police.

The Police, they would have us believe they are heroes, that they are risking their lives for us, that they are there to "Serve and Protect".

(Link - Via BBC - http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36759711 image credit Jonathan Bachman)

I see only one hero here, and an army of scared, frightened, well armored and armed stormtroopers. Cowards.

The police are complicit in their closing of ranks and solidarity. This makes them culpable, this makes them targets. There are no innocent police. Distrust everything that they tell you.

I could go on, and on, and on, but we see now on the horizon, in the elections and the policing of the United States, the horsemen of the Apocalypse, namely greed, bribery, corruption, ignorance, fear and prejudice. There are more, I am sure, but these are the first. And Micah Xavier Johnson may be one day regarded as a hero, who knowingly went to to his death going to meet them. The Police don't need to tell us who are the heroes, we can decide for ourselves.

Read More. Educate yourself. And don't take my word for it.

LINKS:

AND MORE GENERALLY:

AND FINALLY, SOME GUIDELINES TO HOW POLICING SHOULD BE DONE:

http://kottke.org/14/08/policing-by-consent<

(Note that while I endorse the ideas in the last link, the UK has strayed a long ways from the path.)

**This is exhausting, which is why I try and stay away from current events. I'll try and make the next few posts a little more irrelevant.

Law & Order

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