Month: December 2014

I don’t have a complicated relationship with The New Republic, so I don’t need to add a bunch of full disclosures to this piece. All I know is I had a subscription to the magazine that I let lapse sometime around 2000 because I just couldn’t take the condescending abuse anymore. By 2002, the magazine was a punch line to me. By the time I became a blogger in 2005, I wouldn’t have used its pages to wipe my own bottom.

Ever since Chris Hughes bought the magazine, however, I have regularly found quality, interesting content at the online site, and I’ve been linking to them with increasing frequency, usually with approval. As far as I am concerned, the magazine is back from the dead and it seems to have completely lost its interest in insulting me as a progressive.

It could be that this turnaround will abruptly end with the departure of editor Franklin Foer, but however great he is as an editor, he appeared to be doing much better lately under Hughes’ watchful eye.

I don’t really have an opinion about their business model or any direct knowledge of their management style. What I do know is that The New Republic‘s “immense role in shaping American liberal thought” was trashed long ago. Marty Peretz made sure of that.

So, forgive me if I’m not playing Taps for the magazine. It had fallen so low under the previous ownership that I find it impossible to be nostalgic for the “Good Old Days.” If it goes under, at least now we will have some reason for regret.

“We” make laws.  “We” hire LEOs to enforce those laws.  When that enforcement goes wrong, some people blame the victim for violating the law(s) and not passively accepting being cuffed, and some people blame the LEO for real or perceived excessive use of force and often in combination with racism on the part of the LEO.  Militarizing local police forces has likely contributed to a heightened sense of “us” against “them” mindset among LEOs.  Steroid use among LEOs to bulk up is likely another contributing factor to the excessive use of force.  

The big picture that this country arrests, convicts, incarcerates and paroles at a rate something on the order of four times what it was back in 1970 garners little or sustained attention.  And cops back then weren’t noted for being “to serve and protect” public employees in most communities.  Nor does a majority in this country comprehend that the criminal justice system disproportionately targets minorities – white people are very good at rationalizing such statistics.  They are less good at rationalizing killings within US borders.  

What makes any discussion of killings by police difficult is that too much of the data is missing or non-existent.  While we know incarceration rates over the decades, we don’t know the actual incidence rate for police homicides in the past or present.  From the Wall St. Journal, Hundreds of Police Killing are Uncounted in Federal Statistics.

Law-enforcement experts long have lamented the lack of information about killings by police. “When cops are killed, there is a very careful account and there’s a national database,” said Jeffrey Fagan, a law professor at Columbia University. “Why not the other side of the ledger?”

Why not indeed.  Can this not be changed right now?  Mandatory federal reporting of all homicides and shootings perpetrated by police officers is not unduly burdensome.  Within twenty-four hours to the FBI.  The FBI would in turn report every incident within twenty-four hours to the CDC and Bureau of Justice Statistics.  Then mandatory reporting of the disposition of the case to the FBI.  All three agencies would have authority to seek additional relevant information and communicate with the other agencies of the requests and answers when received.  

It’s known that almost all of these cases will be closed as justifiable homicide in the line of duty.  But let’s see the numbers.  Let’s allow other agencies the ability to audit and provide some oversight.  

Racism in this country is endemic.  Everybody knows that.  And that much of the brutality towards our fellow citizens is far too easy to cover-up and hide it from the nation.  However, every once in a while, the conscience of fair-minded peoples is shocked into doing the right thing.  Never enough.  Never as thoroughly or completely as it should be.  But a small step forward.  For those of us of a certain age, we did see that during the Civil Rights movements in the 1950s and early 1960s.  Congress and LBJ weren’t acting without the consent of the governed when the Civil Rights Acts were passed.

We saw it twice in the election of Barack Obama.

If all those unreported killings by police are minorities and mostly African-Americans, it completely changes almost everything that has been said about the recent killings of African-Americans by LEOs that have made national news.

We need the truth NOW.  Just as we needed to see this:

And this:

 

Yes, that headline is correct. Erick Erickson is encouraging his readers to buy three balls on Amazon and mail them to one of John Boehner’s district offices in Ohio where his staffers will look at them and go, “these people are idiots.”

Also, “Why are they blue?”

This isn’t supposed to indicate that Erick Erickson thinks that John Boehner is sexually frustrated. It is supposed to tell John Boehner to stop playing with Barack Obama’s balls and instead play with his own.

But, again, “Why are they blue?”

I know Erick Erickson is supposed to be some kind of Uber-Christian patriot, but I haven’t detected the influence of The Savior on these actions as of yet. It seems to have something to do with keeping brown people from thinking this country wants them here, but I’ve forgotten what Epistle that was in.

Maybe it was Titus?

It’s awfully big of Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington to ask people to support Sen. Mary Landrieu in her runoff election when Landrieu is using Cantwell’s positions on energy issues as one of the main reasons why Louisiana voters should send her back to D.C. for another six-year term.

“If I don’t get back there as a senior member of the [Energy] committee, we’re gonna have a woman who I like very much (but) I’m not sure Louisiana is going to think very much of a senator from Washington state who’s all for windmills and alternative energy, and doesn’t support the oil and gas industry.”

To begin with, the importance here is exaggerated because the Democrats have already lost control of the Senate. Neither Landrieu nor Cantwell will actually chair the Energy Committee, and as Ranking Members their influence won’t be all that great. The biggest impact is more theoretical. Should Cantwell become the Ranking Member then she would be in position to chair the committee in two years if the Democrats win back control of the upper chamber.

Personally, I’d much rather see Cantwell setting energy policy in the Senate than Landrieu, but I guess most people in Louisiana probably see things differently. And, while I don’t like to cede six-year seats to the Republicans, the way Landrieu attacks any threats to the oil and gas industry makes it very hard for me to regret her political defeat.

I understand that this is pretty much how any Louisiana politician would behave and that Landrieu is better than the Republicans on almost every other issue. I know that Cantwell understands this, too, which is why she’s shrugging off the disrespect and working to get Landrieu reelected.

I just don’t think we can play this game anymore on climate change. We need to get politicians like Landrieu and Joe Manchin from West Virginia to start thinking about how they can protect the economies of their states without standing in the way of addressing the problem with carbon emissions. I remember when nothing could be done about tobacco because of the impact on local and state economies. But we got through that and Virginia and Kentucky and North Carolina survived. We can do this if we can just get the right kind of leadership.

Unfortunately, Landrieu has shown absolutely no signs of getting that.

Things not to do if you are a black member of the St. Louis Rams of the National Football League: Express solidarity with protests over the shooting of Michael Brown by coming onto the field before a game with your hands in the air. Doing so will upset the police in St. Louis and “other people” who consider your actions worthy of a threats to your life:

[Jared] Cook [designated spokesperson for the five Rams players – Stedman Bailey, Tavon Austin, Jared Cook, Chris Givens and Kenny Britt – who displayed the “Hands up” gesture as they took the field immediately before their game last Sunday]said he’s “absolutely” received threats.

“It’s all on the computer,” Cook said. “How can you really tell if somebody’s typing keys?”

Jared Cook’s wife, Lana Cook, showed a little more emotion about the threats her husband and his teammates have received, in this message she sent via her Twitter account:

Unfortunately, I have no trouble believing why the actions of five young black men who just happen to play professional football led to so much ‘negativity,” for I have seen it everyday in my interactions with otherwise normal, helpful and generous people. For many of them (and it goes without saying they are all white), Michael Brown was a thug who got what he deserved and Darren Wilson was just doing his job when he chased after and emptied the magazine to his semiautomatic pistol into Michael Brown. The fact that other African American men (and boys) have been gunned down by the police, or in the case of Eric Garner choked to death by the NYPD for the crime of selling loosely wrapped cigarettes, cuts no ice with these people. They have completely bought into the idea that the police are the victims, not the unarmed young men who were killed.

Mention any facts that do not support that narrative, and they refuse to accept them. In their minds, the black communities who have risen up to protest these deaths are not only wrong, they are composed of criminals, thugs, drug dealers and welfare queens. Nothing I or anyone else can say about the grievances African Americans have expressed regarding the unfair legal process by which these killer cops (and yes, make no mistake they were killers, for not even they deny what they did) were allowed to escape indictment for their use of fatal force against unarmed black males, will change the minds of so many white people I know.

At least Jared Cook and his family can take some comfort in the fact that members of the Ethical Society of Police, a black police organization in St. Louis, which had this to say about the massive condemnation of the five Rams players:

“We think that their actions were commendable and that they should not be ridiculed, disciplined or punished for taking a stand on this very important issue which is of great concern around the world and especially in the community where these players work,” Ethical Society of Police General Counsel Gloria J. McCollum announced on Facebook.

“The statement of the St. Louis Police Officers Association do not reflect the opinions of the majority of African American police officers in the department because there are no African American officers on their governing board and they have a minimal amount of African American members,” Ethical Society of Police noted.

Not that I expect the majority opinion among white Americans to be affected much by what Black police officers have to say, but its telling they felt the need to support Jared Cook and the other four players against attacks by the predominately white St. Louis Police Officers Association (SPOA). The SPOA spokesperson who has been adamant that the Rams players be punished by their team and by the NFL, Jeff Roorda, was on MSNBC last night discussing the Eric Garner case, and making the claim that Garner’s death was all his fault for failure to follow police orders, despite the video showing Garner not fighting back as he was assaulted by up to five NYPD policemen, one of whom had him in a banned choke hold that caused his death.

I can only say to that that Mr. Roorda may have a white face, but his heart is most definitely as dark as the Devil. As for Mr. Cook, he choked up when told of the support by African American police officers, belying his otherwise calm demeanor while being interviewed about this “controversy.”

[Jared Cook] teared up when told a group representing St. Louis black police officers had endorsed the “Hands Up” gesture, saying “that’s pretty amazing.”

I doubt that will alleviate the pain and fear the death threats he and his family, and the families of the other four men, received, however. He’s just another “thug” to too many Americans, albeit one who plays a game for the amusement of millions of them. And that isn’t amazing, at all. Sadly, it is all too predictable.

The TVs were on at the bar we ran to tonight. It was the annual lighting of the City Hall Christmas tree here in Philly, but tonight the event was interrupted by protestors. I know this because I was following on Twitter. Had I been watching TV, it would have been a different story.

I will have photos later -and perhaps the text of a phone call or two- but Philadelphia’s local media was live on the spot, and going to absurd lengths to ignore what was going on around them. It was truly bizarre: protestors chanting “No Justice No Peace” drowned out a kid singing “Silent Night”, while the bobblehead clowns from our local media yapped a lot about the ice skating rink while showing TONS of B-roll.

On another TV, “Christmas at Rockefeller Center” was airing. Same thing. No acknowledgement of the chaos in the streets, which as I write saw the Lincoln Tunnel shut down because of protests and swarms of angry people on the FDR Drive and the West Side Highway.

And I remembered how the media tried to ignore and suppress the Iraq War protests back in ’02 and ’03, and how complicit they were in what followed. It’s the same thing all over again… only this time I’m not sure how well it’s going to work. But the effort was fascinating. I largely believe Huxley was more accurate in predicting our future, but what i saw on my TV was nothing less than an Orwellian manipulation of the truth.

It’s nice that it’s possible for at least some people on the right to recognize a murder of a black man by white cops.

“From looking at the video, the grand jury’s decision here is totally incomprehensible.” – Charles Krauthammer

The thing is, it’s really not all that incomprehensible unless you’ve been living in the Fox News studio for the last fifteen years.

Here’s how it works: white cops kill a black man. Prosecutor doesn’t do shit, and the mostly white grand jury doesn’t do shit.

Why?

Because justice has nothing to do with it.

Trigger warning

Ferguson, MO. New York , NY. Cleveland. Jasper, TX. And countless other places. It ain’t just the south, this whole disgraceful country is starting to look like a fucking human orchard.

And I will add this as well:

I am so fucking sick of this shit. And not to incite anything, but I honestly don’t think peaceful protest is going to have any effect at all. It took a four-day riot to get the LAPD to change the way it did business. Maybe we need to see New York City in flames, since we seem to have unlearned the lessons of Rodney King.

All I know is this shit has to fucking stop.

A great piece … a must read!

Andrew Bacevich, Daydream Believers

The money should stagger you. Journalist James Risen, author of Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War, a revelatory new book about the scammers, counterterrorism grifters, careerist bureaucrats, torture con artists, and on-the-make privatizers of our post-9/11 national security state, suggests that the best figure for money spent on Washington’s war on terror, including the Iraq and Afghan wars, is four trillion dollars. If you add in the bills still to come for the care of American soldiers damaged in that global war, the figure is undoubtedly significantly higher.

…
Some recent figures from the Global Terrorism Index of the Institute for Economics and Peace give us a basis for thinking about what’s happened in these years.  In 2013 alone, deaths related to “terrorism” — that is, civil/sectarian conflict in areas significantly destabilized directly or indirectly by U.S. military action (mainly in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, and Nigeria) — rose by a soaring 61%.  The number of countries that saw more than 50 such fatalities (the U.S. not among them) expanded from 15 to 24 in the same period.  So raise your glass to GWOT.  If nothing else, it’s managed to ensure its own profitable, privatized future for years to come.

Book Review: James Risen’s Scathing Indictment of the Endless War on Terror | The Independent |

In an age of fear and secrecy, a democratic society will deteriorate unless there are people brave enough to tell the truth regardless of the consequences.

James Risen is one of those people.

Former NY Times editor Jill Abramson: Condoleezza Rice prevented NY Times from publishing CIA scoop

Malarkey on the Potomac   mirrored @Juan Cole's Informed Comment

“Iraq no longer exists.” My young friend M, sipping a cappuccino, is deadly serious. We are sitting in a scruffy restaurant across the street from the Cathedral of St. John the Divine on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.  It’s been years since we’ve last seen each another. It may be years before our paths cross again. As if to drive his point home, M repeats himself: “Iraq just doesn’t exist.”

His is an opinion grounded in experience.  As an enlisted soldier, he completed two Iraq tours, serving as a member of a rifle company, before and during the famous Petraeus “surge.”  After separating from the Army, he went on to graduate school where he is now writing a dissertation on insurgencies.

…
But when the United States invaded Iraq in 2003 and, as then-Secretary of State Colin Powell predicted, broke the place, any merit they previously possessed quickly dissipated.  Years of effort by American occupiers intent on creating a new Iraq out of the ruins of the old produced little of value and next to nothing that has lasted.  Yet even today, in Washington the conviction persists that trying harder might somehow turn things around.  Certainly, that conviction informs the renewed U.S. military intervention prompted by the rise of IS.

…
A similar inclination to fantasize permeates, and thereby warps, U.S. policies throughout much of the Greater Middle East.  Consider the following claims, each of which in Washington circles has attained quasi-canonical status.

• The presence of U.S. forces in the Islamic world contributes to regional stability and enhances American influence.
• The Persian Gulf constitutes a vital U.S. national security interest.
• Egypt and Saudi Arabia are valued and valuable American allies.
• The interests of the United States and Israel align.
• Terrorism poses an existential threat that the United States must defeat.

For decades now, the first four of these assertions have formed the foundation of U.S. policy in the Middle East. The events of 9/11 added the fifth, without in any way prompting a reconsideration of the first four.

The Presence of U.S. Forces: Ever since the U.S. intervention in Lebanon that culminated in the Beirut bombing of October 1983, introducing American troops into predominantly Muslim countries has seldom contributed to stability.  On more than a few occasions, doing so has produced just the opposite effect.

…
Arab Allies: It’s time to reclassify the U.S. relationship with both Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Categorizing these two important Arab states as “allies” is surely misleading. Neither one shares the values to which Washington professes to attach such great importance.

…
Israel: The United States and Israel share more than a few interests in common.  A commitment to a “two-state solution” to the Palestinian problem does not number among them.  On that issue, Washington’s and Tel Aviv’s purposes diverge widely.  In all likelihood, they are irreconcilable.

For the government of Israel, viewing security concerns as paramount, an acceptable Palestinian state will be the equivalent of an Arab Bantustan, basically defenseless, enjoying limited sovereignty, and possessing limited minimum economical potential. Continuing Israeli encroachments on the occupied territories, undertaken in the teeth of American objections, make this self-evident.

That terrorism threatens Americans is no doubt the case, especially when they venture into the Greater Middle East. But aspirations to eliminate terrorism belong in the same category as campaigns to end illiteracy or homelessness: it’s okay to aim high, but don’t be surprised when the results achieved fall short.

Eliminating terrorism is a chimera. It’s not going to happen. U.S. civilian and military leaders should summon the honesty to acknowledge this.

Israel and the Rise of Judeo-Fascism

It’s legal to kill black people in this country if you are a police officer. This is not hyperbole.

A Staten Island grand jury has voted not to bring criminal charges against the white New York City police officer at the center of the Eric Garner case, a person briefed on the matter said Wednesday.

The decision was reached on Wednesday after months of testimony including from the officer, Daniel Pantaleo, who used a chokehold to restrain Mr. Garner, who died after a confrontation. It came less than two weeks after a grand jury in Ferguson, Mo., declined to bring charges against a white officer who fatally shot an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown.

I am not talking about it being difficult to convict a police officer who kills a black person. I’m saying that no defense is even necessary. The whole thing can be captured on film. An illegal chokehold can be used. It doesn’t matter. If you’re a police officer, you won’t even have to explain yourself in front of a judge.

In this case, an asthmatic man was killed while being arrested for selling cigarettes. Was it murder? Was it manslaughter? Was it negligent?

No. Not legally, anyway. It wasn’t anything, actually. It was just a man dying on the street. On film. There is no need to file charges. No legal defense need be argued.

The police killed a man and it means nothing. Essentially, it never happened.

Sometimes, the police just kill a guy in the line of duty, and that’s pretty much the same as when they don’t kill a guy. No difference.

“Hi, honey, how was work today?”
“Pretty good. Killed a guy.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Choked him out.”
“…I made chicken.”
“Great. I’m hungry.”

Like that.

People are going to complain about this, but it’s pretty much just how shit goes these days.