Hell, Even Nancy Grace Gets It. Ferguson Grand Jury Was a Sham.

Never thought I'd see the day but the Ferguson grand jury that refused to indict Darren Wilson was so ginned up even Nancy Grace won't buy it.



I feel that the district attorney, as much as I respect him in other ways, used the grand jury to do as he wanted them to do as his tool. He didn’t want to drop it. He presented it in such a way that this grand jury would not bring charges and I don’t like that.

The grand jurors are like sheep, they’re babes in the woods. The prosecutor’s duty is to seek the truth. I am telling you that the prosecutors, if they want an indictment, they will get an indictment.

Taking America Back to a Darker Time

The aftermath of the police execution of a black teenager, Michael Brown, in Ferguson, Missouri continues.  The Policy.mic web site has a report on public generosity that has raised $200,000 for - wait for it - the shooter, officer Darren Wilson.

Follow the link to read the remarks left by some of officer Wilson's supporters.

 

Michael Brown - Ferguson, Missouri - The War on Drugs

What does America's War on Drugs have to do with the execution/killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and the riots it spawned?  The New Republic's John McWhorter believes they're inextricably linked and contends that the way to avoid future Ferguson riots is to end the War on Drugs.

We don't know the details yet, but it's apparent that, in spite of all we went through with [Trayvon] Martin so recently, in a clinch - the mean, messy place where these things always happen - the Ferguson cop Darren Wilson assumed that a big black guy was trouble, serious trouble, and shot him dead.  It's what happens in that clinch that matters and we can now see that no amount of articulate protest can cut through such visceral human tendencies as bias and fear.

...I'm the last one to say there should be no protest, but I am dismayed that we are at a point that it can serve only as a statement, not as a tool.  The rate is no longer such a novelty that white America will be scared into some concessions as it was in the late sixties.  Watching black Ferguson burn and wreck its own neighborhoods is not going to make America suddenly "get it."

If the looting and anger are the "it," it that's what we have up our sleeve as an indication that Brown's death was "the last straw," then we're nowhere.

...So, what will really make a difference?  Really, only a continued pullback on the War on Drugs.  Much of what creates the poisonous, vicious-cycle relationship between young black men and the police is that the War on Drugs brings cops into black neighborhoods to patrol for drug possession and sale.

...But that's the long game.  In the here and now, we are stuck.  Michael Brown was not "it."  The journalists assiduously documenting the events in Ferguson can serve as historians, but not as agents of change.

We can be quite sure that by next summer, another unarmed black boy will have been shot dead by a white cop scared in the moment.  Upon which in another hitherto obscure town there will be protests, something about the episode will be enshrined as a totemic gesture, the right-wing will hope the cop turns out to have been black (as they did this time for a blink) or will revel in predictable evidence that the victim was not always a choirboy in his behavior, and good-thinking people will hope that this time is finally "it."

That Shining Bunker on the Hill

What else is there for a genuine, honest to God-Fearin', Warfare State?  Once you've militarized your economy, militarized your foreign policy, militarized your society with M-16s under every other bed, why would you not militarize your law enforcement agencies?  What is that beyond a sign of progress toward the evolution of illiberal democracy, nascent oligarchy as prescribed by the ascent of corporatist rule? 

Ferguson, Missouri is not an aberration.  It's no fluke. That's what they tell you but it's not true.   It's a calculated atrocity that lies in wait in any number of hot spots across modern America.  There's a reason why America's national security apparatus, in collaboration with the private sector, spies on ordinary citizens, evaluates them via algorithms as either complacent stooges or potential resistors, threats.  It's the same reason why the Pentagon gives IED-resistant armoured vehicles and oodles of combat gear to the country's police departments. This is a nation that has lost its moorings; a country that takes to itself the right to execute its own citizens abroad without due process, a state that believes it has an inherent right to imprison and torture individuals permanently without charge or trial.  With that in mind, how can anyone get all queasy about cops reprising the role of storm troopers, a 21st century Waffen SS for unruly street corners?

No, That's Not a Soldier and He's Not in Afghanistan Either.

I had hoped that Ferguson, Missouri would be the event that pricked America's conscience, that generated an unstoppable reform of the Warfare-Security State. That's not going to happen.  From the execution-style shooting of young Brown to the rampaging iron fist of a small-town Sturmabteilung, it was all a mistake, one giant screw-up.  For a brief moment the world was allowed to see what's lurking in the basement recesses of police stations across America - nests of body-armoured vipers armed with war-fighting weapons and an inclination to unleash them on ordinary Americans.

We got a glimpse at what we were never supposed to see.  The optics were terrible.  The mistake must never be repeated - until the next time.

Americans are brought up believing that United States citizenship is a blessing, a precious gift.  It is - until the day the state turns on its people, monitors their activities for signs of anything unusual, keeps lists.

Roxane Gay, writing in The Guardian, says that Ferguson has been a demonstration of an "occupation ...in plain sight."

An alderman was arrested.  Reporters from the Washington Post and Huffington Post were arrested.  An Al Jazeera America news crew was attacked with tear gas and had their equipment dismantled. Nonviolent protestors were confronted by a police department that is, in fact, an armed militia. The crowd stood before armored personnel carriers and men wearing Swat gear.  There were snipers, aiming their rifles at unarmed, nonviolent citizens. 

According to The New Republic, not all Americans were horrified at the outrages in Ferguson, including some of the residents of nearby, largely white community of Olivette.

We're Going to Missouri.  Some Place Called Ferguson.

Is Missouri America's New Mississippi?

Damn but this sounds like the south in the turbulent 50s and 60s.  The governor of Missouri has ordered St. Louis County police out of the community of Ferguson, the site of the recent killing of a young black man, Michael Brown.

"The governor [Jay Nixon] just called me and he's on his way to St. Louis now to announce he's taking away St. Louis County police out of the situation," Clay, a Missouri Democrat, said in a telephone interview.  He added that Nixon may ask the US Federal Bureau of Investigation to step in.

Clay said that he has been urging US Attorney General Eric Holder to "take over the entire situation because we will not get justice for Michael Brown and his family and friends if the St. Louis County police and prosecutor have a say."

Meanwhile, images of cops in Ferguson clad in full war-fighting gear have even military veterans uneasy.

Afghan veteran Paul Szoldra writes:

"While serving as a US Marine on patrol in Afghanistan, we wore desert camouflage to blend in with our surroundings, carried rifles to shoot back when under enemy attack, and drove around in armored vehicles to ward off roadside bombs.

We looked intimidating, but all our vehicles and equipment had a clear purpose for combat against enemy forces.  So why is this same gear being used on our city streets?

In Afghanistan, we patrolled in big, armored trucks.  We wore uniforms that conveyed the message, 'We are a military force, and we are in control right now.' Many Afghans saw us as occupiers.

And now we see some of our police officers in thius same way. 'The militarization of law enforcement is counter-productive to domestic policing and needs to stop.'