St. Louis Riots

[LongBlade]

Oh, boy. This isn't good.

Cleveland police officers use guns, Tasers, pepper spray and their fists either unnecessarily or in retaliation, while using excessive force on those "who are mentally ill or in crisis," the Justice Department announced Thursday.

As a result of this "pattern ... of unreasonable and unnecessary use of force," the city and Justice Department have signed an agreement "to develop a court-enforceable consent decree that will include a requirement for an independent monitor who will oversee and ensure necessary reforms."

The results of the federal review come as the Cleveland Division of Police is under fire for the November fatal shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice. The incident sparked outrage in an era when the Michael Brown shooting and similar situations have put police use of force under a microscope, though Chief Calvin Williams has defended the shooting, saying Rice reached for an air pistol that was "indistinguishable from a real firearm."

source: http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/04/us/cleveland-justice-department-police-excessive-force/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

[Swatter]

A very interesting, and quite frankly hard-to-argue-with, perspective on the NYC ruling

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/what-if-eric-garner-had-been-white/383420/

Hard to argue with? Its a hypothetical drawing on liberal prejudices about Fox News and the Tea Party. As noted and ignored in the article, Fox News commentators roundly wondered why an indictment was not handed down in the Garner case. I simply saw the article as an attempt to tar those that the author disagrees with on other issues.

[Swatter]

As far as the Garner case, I can see both sides. In the end though, the police did use excessive force. I think an indictment for some flavor of manslaughter would be justified, but whether it could be provided beyond reasonable doubt at a criminal trial is another question. I do think the "probable cause" standard for the grand jury should have been met, but I would like to hear what happened as to why they didn't.

As far as the Cleveland shooting, it is entirely and easily justified. It comes down to this: how lucky does the officer feel? When someone points what clearly looks like a firearm at an officer, if the officer doesn't use deadly force, he is rolling the dice about going home that night. He has the right to choose his own life. Having said that, the officer was new. Perhaps a more experienced officer would have preserved more options before the deadly force decision was forced. Of course, that is easy for me to say.

[Gusington]

Can I say something? I am sick of blacks blaming everyone else but themselves for their problems. While collecting welfare. Whitey is evil and an oppressor but hey I just bought some new Nikes and aan extra pipe bomb with my girlfriend's EBT card. It makes me ill.

With that off my chest, I do think that the Garner case is different than the Brown case, mostly because the whole thing is caught on tape. And the NYPD officer was using a banned choke hold, while the Ferguson cop was defending himself.

I do feel that the pendulum is swinging the other way in regard ls to the media and the protestors...a lot of people I have talked with about this are pretty much like 'enough already.' And I agree.

[BanzaiCat]

Even that kid in Cleveland, that makes me see red. Sure, the cop fired wayyy too soon, but the kid was a ficke IDIOT, pointing a pellet gun that looks like a real gun at people. They call the cops, fearing their lives. The cop ices the kid. It's a damn shame a kid died, but Jesus Christ, when does personal responsibility AND common damn sense step in?

The outrage that keeps getting sparked should be aimed at the ignorants raising kids to be ignorants - focus it within, not without, you damn morons.

It takes a LOT to get me good and pissed off, but this 1-2-3 bullsh!t storm of of "we want justice!" events in reaction to stupid damn decisions made by those that are now dead...God, you just want to throttle the crap out of people and yell "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU THINKING?"

[GDS_Starfury]

 ::)

[Swatter]

To be fair, I wasn't commenting on welfare in general. The media not reporting things that are inconvenient to their narrative is just a pet peeve of mine.

In St. Louis, I can tell you there was intense institutional racism for most of the 20th century. I have studied in the archives of the history museum in downtown St. Louis and the degree of the racism was hard for me to accept. Just going back to my parent's generation, they did not look kindly on the black communities, which by his generation were extremely poor and crime ridden. Present day things have changed with institutional racism almost completely abolished. Unfortunately, for reasons that I have mentioned earlier, black communities are collapsing and segregation is increasing overall.

There are reasons to protest, unfortunately they are not protesting them. Its just politically correct and convenient to protest police brutality. As I said, nothing will change. The out-of -town professional protestors aren't going to help anyone around here. If anything, white resentment is building up and their ears are closing.

[bayonetbrant]

Can I say something? I am sick of blacks blaming everyone else but themselves for their problems. While collecting welfare. Whitey is evil and an oppressor but hey I just bought some new Nikes and aan extra pipe bomb with my girlfriend's EBT card. It makes me ill.

Let's just be careful how wide we wield the brush.  :-\   There are a lot of people you just roped into that statement that, honestly, don't belong there.  I understand the sentiment, given the current stupidity we're seeing in Ferguson, but broad generalizations aren't going to advance the conversation toward any sort of resolution.

[GDS_Starfury]

I think a certain amount of frustration and push back is going to happen.  America has had generations of social change, social engineering, outreach, affirmative action, school programs, work programs and so on.  hell, I even hear we have a black President now.  and the problem is that when shit hits the fan its always someone elses fault and those people are white America.  the Black community at large needs to get its collective shit together.

[Gusington]

I hate when this happens but I totally agree with Star. Nigeria please indeed.

[LongBlade]

::)

As a comparison per capita whites probably outnumber blacks 3:1 so if we put those number in context they're probably close to 1:1 per capita.

Probably.

Simple numbers are rarely simple. We also need to determine the underlying causes of those stats. The overwhelming majority are likely to be justified. What we're looking for is the aberrations - where a killing by law enforcement is not warranted.

Those cases, I suspect, will be few and far between. Even so, patterns may yet emerge.

It is there we want to dig.

[JasonPratt]

There are reasons to protest, unfortunately they are not protesting them. Its just politically correct and convenient to protest police brutality.

Sometimes there are even reasons to protest police brutality! -- but Ferguson wasn't one of them. (Not sure about the cigarette guy in New York.) And protest does not license looting etc. Nor do legitimate grievances with occasional police oppression excuse unfair assessments of physical evidence and the (somewhat folk anthropological) complexities of witnesses.

I love my liberal friends and family so much (most are conservative), I'm not even kidding, I would have gladly married one; but sometimes I have to forcibly remind myself they say what they say because they really do care about justice for oppression even when they aren't thinking out the implications of what they're saying.  :-\

[Jarhead0331]

The black community is in desperate need of strong leadership. It needs to stop idolizing race baiting hustlers like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and our very own President, and start listening to the sage advice of men like Dr. Ben Carson and Congressman Allen West. These leaders, and others like them, want to teach self-reliance, independence, and success through hard work. These men understand the key principles that made America thrive and believe that those same principles apply to African Americans. The only thing keeping African Americans down is other African Americans who continue to preach a victim mentality which is based upon dependence of government aid and assistance.  It does not help that there is an ever increasing number of white, affluent, over-educated and under-skilled individuals who also propagate the victim mentality on behalf of minority communities.   

Meanwhile, it is shocking how people will rally around a cause and completely be wilfully ignorant of the actual facts. How did this whole "hands up, don't shoot" movement start? It is completely ignorant of the actual events of the shooting. Not a single credible witness testified that Michael Brown had his hands up at any point in the confrontation. Yet, there are congressmen, on the floor of the Capital repeating this sound bite and raising their hands in solidarity. It is blind to actual fact and merely spreads a notion of "justice" that flies in the face of the truth. A very dangerous trend. 

[GDS_Starfury]

It does not help that there is an ever increasing number of white, affluent, over-educated and under-skilled individuals are also propagate the victim mentality on behalf of minority communities.

generally I like John Stewarts program and comedy but hes been a prime example of your comment during this whole debacle.

[Nefaro]

The black community is in desperate need of strong leadership. It needs to stop idolizing race baiting hustlers like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and our very own President, and start listening to the sage advice of men like Dr. Ben Carson and Congressman Allen West. These leaders, and others like them, want to teach self-reliance, independence, and success through hard work. These men understand the key principles that made America thrive and believe that those same principles apply to African Americans. The only thing keeping African Americans down is other African Americans who continue to preach a victim mentality which is based upon dependence of government aid and assistance.  It does not help that there is an ever increasing number of white, affluent, over-educated and under-skilled individuals who also propagate the victim mentality on behalf of minority communities.   

Well stated JH. 

+1. 

Meanwhile, it is shocking how people will rally around a cause and completely be wilfully ignorant of the actual facts. How did this whole "hands up, don't shoot" movement start? It is completely ignorant of the actual events of the shooting. Not a single credible witness testified that Michael Brown had his hands up at any point in the confrontation. Yet, there are congressmen, on the floor of the Capital repeating this sound bite and raising their hands in solidarity. It is blind to actual fact and merely spreads a notion of "justice" that flies in the face of the truth. A very dangerous trend.

Between the race hustlers and the media outright twisting the facts to their own purposes from the start, such nonsense has propagated.  I would blame the latter for the biggest part of the blame.