Are the police using too much force? Gee, ya think?

Courtesy of The Washington Post:  

Recent deaths at the hands of police in Ferguson, Mo., and on Staten Island, N.Y., have rightly raised questions about illegal force and racial bias in law enforcement. But a more basic question also needs to be weighed: Should police be permitted to initiate force when confronting misdemeanors and other non-serious crimes? The answer should be no. 

The existing rules of engagement for police in the United States invite violence, not just when officers act abusively but also when their conduct falls clearly within the limits of the law. There is no question that police in the United States can lawfully arrest anyone they see jaywalking or selling single cigarettes. And there is equally no question that any American who refuses a police order to come to the station can be forced by violence to comply. 

But should police be permitted to initiate force in such cases?

Well considering that our police now look, act, and equip themselves as if they are on the battlefield I think the fact that they seem to be constantly initiating conflict, and then overreacting with excess force, is really not that hard to understand.

If you dress like a warrior you expect to be in a war. It's just that simple.

You know when I began my martial arts training as a kid, the very first thing that was drilled into my brain was that I was never allowed to use more force than was absolutely necessary. And that I could only use that force in self defense, either in response to aggression directed at myself or at somebody else who could not defend themselves.

Simple right? That should be the mantra of law enforcement as well, don't you think?

I currently work with troubled kids, many of them suffering from some debilitating mental or behavioral problems. It is not at all uncommon for one or more of my charges to act out in a violent manner.

In response to those clients I am ALWAYS expected to attempt deescalation before putting my hands on them. And every time it does get physical I am expected to fill out reams of paperwork to justify my actions.

So trust me when I say it rarely gets physical. And if you do your job right, no matter who you are working with, you should rarely ever have to put your hands on anyone.

And certainly never have to use deadly force. 

I think it is time to return to the not so distant past when a cop was there to protect and serve, not shoot first and ask questions later.

Exceedingly appropriate cartoon.

I'll tell you when.

When assault weapons and military style flack jackets became widely available to the public at large, and suddenly the police found themselves out gunned and sometimes under siege.

In response they purchased their own military style weaponry and body armor and the next thing you know we are all living in the US version of Beirut.

And the weapons manufacturers just keep raking in the green.

Ferguson, Missouri now looks like a war zone.

The above picture is of police officers aiming automatic weapons at PEACEFUL protestors in the United States of America!

I have not blogged about this situation in Ferguson because it is already getting all kinds of coverage, but what I saw last night has compelled me to weigh in.

Here is a taste:  

Protests racked this St. Louis suburb for a fifth straight night Wednesday as anger flared anew over the police killing of an unarmed young black man. 

Armored personnel carriers and officers wearing body armor and carrying assault rifles greeted demonstrators. When the crowd ignored orders to disperse, officers unleashed tear gas and rubber bullets, witnesses said. 

Police sealed off the area that was the scene of vandalism and looting Sunday night. 

“We’ve done everything we can to demonstrate a remarkable amount of restraint,” St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar said in an interview outside the command post. “If there was an easy way to fix this, we would have already solved the problem.” 

Officers had heard sporadic gunfire, he said. At least 10 people were arrested.

Of course the protests are in response to the shooting death of 18 year old Michael Brown at the hands of the police, which at least one witness has said was completely unprovoked.

This has caused an incredible outpouring of anger among Ferguson residents, who have had many troubling encounters with the police.

And the police are not doing themselves any favors as indicated by the fact that they arrested two reporters at a local McDonald's restaurant for filming them as they cleared the place out:

Reporters Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post and Ryan Reilly of The Huffington Post said on Twitter that police told them to stop recording the events, then took them into custody. 

Reilly tweeted that police asked him for his ID when he took a photo. He said he and Lowery were arrested for "not packing their bags quick enough." 

Lowery tweeted, "Officers slammed me into a fountain soda machine because I was confused about which door they were asking me to walk out of."

If that were not bad enough the police were also videotaped firing tear gas at reporters from AlJazeera.

Now as a rule I am usually on the side of the police,  I am at heart a law and order kind of guy.

However what is happening right now in Ferguson, Missouri is very troubling on a number of levels, and it also speaks to the militarization of the police, and their aggressive attitudes while dealing with the public.

Especially the African America public. 

There are a number of ways that this whole things could have been better handled, but it appears that the police are not utilizing any of them.

Made up of radicalized ex-military members, the Oath Keepers have decided to train their own "Special Forces" in response to the upcoming "Apocalypse." Do I even need to mention that they hate Obama?

Courtesy of Mother Jones:  

Up until now, Oath Keepers has mainly been a bunch of pissed-off white dudes talking tough and holding meetings and rallies and so forth, but now the group is setting out to train Special Forces-esque "civilian preservation teams" to contend with the apocalyptic future they see coming to America. "We are flat running out of time and we need to get as prepared as possible as fast as possible," the group's founder, a lawyer named Stuart Rhodes, wrote to the group's members. The Daily Beast's Caitlin Dickson has the update: 

"We think this is what Americans should do anyway, but now we see that we're seriously in a vulnerable position because most Americans don't," Rhodes told The Daily Beast. "After Hurricane Katrina and Sandy, we saw Americans dependent on FEMA, on a government that can't do anything. People have been desperate, vulnerable to crime and vulnerable to dying" in such emergency situations, he said. 

But it's not a natural disaster that Rhodes thinks will catapult the country into chaos. In his email announcing the launch of the plan, Rhodes lays out the course of action he predicts "the enemy"—the government—is preparing to follow, including "intentionally triggering a catastrophic economic collapse" as a means of creating disorder that they will then use as an excuse to impose martial law, destroy the constitution and use the billions of dollars in ammunition, armored vehicles and weapons he claims the Department of Homeland Security and local police have been stockpiling "to control and contain us." 

Rhodes, who has been somewhat measured in the past, is now straying into serious wack-job territory. The group's rhetoric is also pretty disingenuous, given Oath Keepers' tight relationship with the tea party movement, whose faction in Congress is the one holding a gun to America's head and threatening to put the economy at serious risk. (It's perhaps also worth noting that American civilians already pack far more heat than the government does.) 

A glimpse at the Oath Keepers' website will tell you what this is really all about: A large graphic bearing the president's face reads: "Snowden Honored His Oath...Honor Yours! Stop Big Brother!" And the site's "featured" posts include: "Mr. Obama, Tear Down Those Walls! Veterans, Oath Keepers, and Friends Tear Down 'Barrycades' In D.C.," which faults the White House for the closure of the WWII Veterans Memorial in DC while featuring a photo of tea party leader Ted Cruz—one of the federal shutdown's primary architects—speaking to the protesters as though he were some kind of hero.

They vilify the President, whole deifying Ted Cruz, and they are heavily armed and military trained.  And the sign for action that they are looking for as an excuse to take up arms against the government, "intentionally triggering a catastrophic economic collapse," is an action actively being pursued by the Tea Party faction of the Republican party.

Does anybody want to disagree with me about my Bill Maher post from yesterday now?

Believe me that just because we finally got a deal to reopen the government, and avoid default, these assholes are not going to suddenly be placated.

Their hatred for this President is deeply ingrained, and it will only take one or two more instances, that the Right Wing can unfairly or not lay at the President's door, for one of these wackos to break off from the pack and make a serious attempt on his life.

In my opinion this group, which openly attempts to convince military and law enforcement personnel to disregard their orders if they come from the President, are a domestic terrorist organization and they need to be treated as such. Because they ARE dangerous, and they ARE advocating a violent response to the government.

In Alaska we had our own "Oath Keeper" and we did what was needed to render him impotent. I think it behooves the Federal government to take a similar approach in dealing with this group of terrorists.