It seems like it’s almost impossible to get through a day without reading or hearing something having to do with the killing of black men by cops. Whether it’s endless Facebook posts or NFL players running out on the field with their “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” gestures or protests blocking rush hour traffic, it seems to be everywhere. From what you see one would think that black men in America are being killed like dogs in the street across the country. While they might be, it’s not by racist white cops, but rather, by other black men.
One example was a video a friend posted on Facebook of a man named McKenzie Cochran, a black man who died at the hands of three white mall security personnel in Detroit last January. Like the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases, a grand jury decided not to indict the security officers.
According to the Huffington Post, Cochran had returned to the mall after being requested to leave, threatened to kill someone, refused when asked by security to leave once again and then continued to struggle with officers after being pepper sprayed.
Brown, Garner and Cochran were indeed black, and all three ended up dead at the hands of white police officers or security personnel. But this is far from a war on black men that Al Sharpton, Mayor De Blasio and Eric Holder seem to suggest exists.
The reality is, there were numerous opportunities for Brown, Garner and Cochran to change the outcomes of their interactions with police. Does anyone imagine that had Brown simply moved out of the street when told that he would have been shot? Does anyone imagine that had Garner simply allowed the police to arrest him that he would have suffocated? Does anyone who reads the story about Cochran imagine that he would have ended up dead at the hands of security officers had he simply left the mall when asked?
As painful as these situations are for the families, one wonders what might have happened had the police been more differential? Might Michael Brown have robbed another store – and maybe this time pushed someone so that they fell and struck their head on the floor – or might McKenzie Cochran have actually carried out his threat to kill innocents? Eric Garner is slightly different in that his crime was selling untaxed “loosies” or loose cigarettes, a viable pursuit because of New York’s $6.00 a pack taxes. Doing so is illegal. You can complain about the law being stupid, but it was the law and Garner was breaking it. The cops could have let him go, but just days before Garner died the city’s highest-ranking uniformed cop, Philip Banks, issued an order to crack down on loosie sales.
The point is, none of these cases, nor most of the cases the left throws up to demonstrate the institutional racism rampant in America, hold up to scrutiny. They simply demonstrate a confluence of events where people who chose to act badly had outcomes that resulted in their deaths. But such are the odds when someone chooses to act badly, regardless of the activity. Most drunk drivers don’t die behind the wheel, but some do. Most recreational drug use doesn’t result in an overdose, but some does. And the truth is, while police encounters sometimes turn out bad for black men – just as they sometimes do for whites, Hispanics, Jews, etc. – they also sometimes turn out badly for cops. This can be seen by the fact that fifty officers were shot and killed in the line of duty in 2014, a jump of 56% from 2013. The difference is, unlike Brown or Garner or Cochran, these officers were killed while seeking to serve and protect their communities rather than resisting arrest or threatening innocent civilians.
The tragic irony about the rioting and demonstrations and accusations seeking to turn Michael Brown et. al into martyrs for a false cause is the fact that it diverts attention from where it should be. There are no doubt bad cops out there. In any group numbering in the hundreds of thousands you will find some number who have betrayed their oaths. But when the left characterizes all cops as racist killers it makes it impossible to find and focus on the real bad actors. That’s the irony of the whole thing… by wrongly accusing the entire police establishment of being bad, protesters actually empower the cops who are to continue doing business as usual because their actions are lost in a sea of fictional claims of racism and oppression. It’s called hiding in plain sight… by ignoring the difference between bad actors and bad outcomes – admittedly, sometimes tragic outcomes – activists make it that much more difficult to truly weed out the bad cops that really exist. By making everyone a racist, then no one is a racist and real racism has no fear of detection. The result is that activists actually increase the odds of the exact outcomes they are seeking to eliminate by giving them camouflage with a sea of false accusations. But then this is liberalism… where rhetoric is more important than results.
See author page
“The result is that activists actually increase the odds of the exact outcomes they are seeking to eliminate by giving them camouflage with a sea of false accusations. But then this is liberalism… where rhetoric is more important than results.”
You could take it one step further –
“The result is that activists actually increase the odds of the exact outcomes they are seeking to eliminate by giving them camouflage with a sea of false accusations. But then this is THE LEFT… where rhetoric is DESIGNED TO MANUFACTURE RESULTS.”
Matter of interpretation.
They choked a man to death for selling cigarettes because of a tax law.
They CHOKED a man. To DEATH. For selling CIGARETTES. Because of a TAX LAW.
There is a LAUNDRY LIST of things grievously wrong with law enforcement encapsulated by that sentence. We wet the fields and hillsides of America with the blood of redcoats for less.
Absolutely right, Vince.
And the “mob” mentality disease has infected the MSM, making this statement even more pervasive.
I read that, in most police departments, any potential recruit with an IQ over 108 is automatically turned away from that career.
The ”rationale” is that police work is too boring for a smart person.
Sadly, then you are left with only average intelligence types all the way up the ladder later.
Tragically you are stuck with officers who cannot learn principles as opposed to memorizing laws and statutes, cannot practice the art of detecting so they scoop up the obvious criminals.
Thus, if a senior officer tells them to concentrate on stopping ”loosie” sales on the streets, they go out and round up the usual suspects.
Eric Garner, it has been claimed, was not even in possession of any ”loosies” the day he resisted arrest and died.
But he had been selling ”loosies” often enough in the past to be an easy and obvious target to a police force incapable of waiting for an overt act of selling a ”loosie” then arresting the seller.
Is the dumb’ed down average cop part of this problem?
I think so.
Will all of this protesting lead to smarter people wanting to become police?
I seriously doubt it.
Part of the ”tragic irony” in this whole thing is that blacks’ protests are defeating their own stated goals, (well, one of them) for a smarter, more nuanced police force.
@RHJunior:
No, they choked a man for RESISTING ARREST while a BLACK FEMALE police sergeant supervised.
Michael Brown was a thug.
“Hands up, don’t shoot” is a lie.
Eric Garner had a rap sheet as long as your arm.
Garner resisted arrest.
For every action there is a reaction. Brown and Garner’s actions caused the reaction that brought about their deaths.
Damn, I’m so sick of you nitwits pushing a false narrative.
@Nanny:
I don’t know where you read that, but just going from the police officers I know, that doesn’t bear out. Most of them are college educated or at least have had some college. Many are former military since PDs give extra points on an academy exam if you were military. And I would put money on them having having a higher IQ as the average teacher that has so much influence over our children.
Or maybe you think they are dumb because few people are willing to wear an identifiable uniform with a target on their chest?
@retire05:
not me.
http://politicalblindspot.com/police-officially-refuse-to-hire-applicants-with-high-iq-scores/
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_56314.html
Back in 1999, a Federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by a police applicant who was barred from the New London, Connecticut police force. The reason for the disqualification was literally because he had scored “too high” on an intelligence test. The department made it clear, they didn’t want the bottom of the barrel in terms of intelligence, but they didn’t want anyone “too smart” either.
The ruling made public in September of the same year, with the ruling judge Peter C. Dorsey of the United States District Court in New Haven confirming that it was in fact the case that the plaintiff, Robert Jordan, 48, who has a bachelor’s degree in literature, was denied an opportunity to even interview for a job with the New London Police Department, solely because of his high test scores.
@Nanny… quoting a 1999 article? Really? I’ll bet you didn’t know in the 80’s through to the present, many, if not most police departments require at least a two year degree, and many require four year degrees. In lieu of a degree, some departments will consider military experience, prior law enforcement experience or life experience. I do not have a degree, I got lucky getting my first police job and my experience carried me to my second. Not once have I ever heard of someone not getting a job due to a high IQ, this is a first. So whatever you “heard” about police departments turning people away for being too smart is bullshit; I never heard IQ mentioned anywhere, and I was pretty good friends with the recruiter at my last PD. Also let me say this… the best cops I worked with were not college educated, but they are the most naturally intelligent and instinctive people you will ever meet.
Your underestimation of cops is sad and despicable, for along with those feeling of superiority you carry towards cops comes a large measure of disrespect.
I’ll tell y’all what we’re going to end up with in law enforcement, and it isn’t good at all. The good cops that I know are all looking for a way out; early retirement or better jobs that will allow them early retirement without taking an income beating. The new folks considering law enforcement for a career are going to look for risk vs. return, and seeing what’s going on now will lead them to find other careers. So what we will end up with are exactly the kind of cops many people fear and we surely don’t want; the ones in it for the power trip, the opportunities to steal, the opportunities to continue to be bullies. Look at what happened in Miami Florida after the Cuban Boat Lift, when they hired people to be cops with minimal training and criminal records. And you asked for that Nanny, by your lack of support for the people out there today.
@Scott in Oklahoma: And the sad reality is that county prosecutors, in order to protect their own jobs, will appease these very newly recruited thugs you speak of. That’s the way the law works, which is the very culprit of today’s woes.
@RJW… it isn’t quite as simple as that, and I don’t believe our legal system is the culprit at all in this mess. I do believe decades of growing the entitlements for blacks, while encouraging them to further destroy their own families has done far more damage than our legal system. Do you realize how easy it is to NOT get into a confrontation with the police? It’s really simple… obey and respect the law. Damn, how tough is that? Don’t like the way a law reads? There are methods in place to get them changed, which don’t include destroying neighborhoods and people’s property, or killing cops. Don’t like the way laws are enforced? There are ways to address that too, legal and legitimate ways. Not rioting, killing people doing their jobs, destroying peoples hard earned businesses. Want to fix the black crime problem? Well, that isn’t up to us, that is up to the black people. Theirs is a culture in dire need of change, but they have to change it.
Wow!
The articles referenced a 1999 legal case, one was from 2013, the other 2009.
Reading comprehension slip recently?
I have a four-year degree (BS) in Criminal Justice Administration.
I also have a masters degree in Criminalistics.
I can’t believe you attack me personally for pointing out a LEGAL case whereby a man with a 4-year degree was refused employment as a police officer simply because his IQ was so high he was at risk of quitting too soon (from boredom) to be worth training for the job.
When I was in college I was surrounded by smart officers getting units in college to assist them in getting promoted.
I never met an officer who couldn’t do the college work.
What’s been going on lately is new; cadets get trained for the long haul.
If a dept thinks it might be wasting its scarce resources it balks about training that person.
@Nanny:
So you found an article where an obviously left wing author said this:
“Judge Dorsey, however, ruled that Mr. Jordan that there was no protection offered to intelligent people from discriminatory hiring practices by individual police departments. Why? Because, Dorsey explained, it was proven that police departments held all to this same standard and thus rejected all applicants who scored high.”
That statement alone gives reason for pause. How can a judge, ruling in an individual case, determine that this was common practice among the thousands of police departments all across our nation? And how does one case, and one department, represent the thousands of PDs all across the nation? Bottom line: it doesn’t.
Your second link doesn’t work.
If you want to determine someone’s ability to do a job, perhaps we should have IQ test requirements for teachers. They have a greater impact on what our nation is like that police officers do, and believe me, I have met some really STUPID teachers.
@Nanny:
I guess you think it didn’t have anything to do with this statement of yours:
Now you want to back track and say that “When I was in college I was surrounded by smart officers getting units in college to assist them in getting promoted.”
That’s not what you initially inferred. You made it sound like you thought that if you’re smart, you can’t be a cop because of some vague law suit against one PD because some uninformed, moronic judge claimed it was a problem in ALL PDs. Just how the hell did he know that? You made a blanket criticism of police based on one case. Sorry, that dog don’t hunt for me.
@Nanny #11… if you think I am impressed by your educational claims, think again. All that tells me is you are an education snob who believes anyone who lacks a piece of paper from a college is below you in stature. You can also believe I didn’t make much of a “personal attack”, and I am not going to apologize if you feel butt hurt. Had I wanted to attack you personally, you would have known it, but I have enough respect for Curt to keep me from letting loose with what I am often tempted to say.
We can agree on one thing, almost every cop I know is easily capable of college level courses if they so desire. What I have also seen in a lot of cases is the higher most cops rise in rank, the less they respect those below them, forgetting where they came from and forgetting what the real world presents out in the street.
A happy new year to everyone.
I don’t think the left uses these instances as proof of institutional bias: the evidence of that is extensive and easily found. I would say the existence of institutional bias likely informs the reactions to these incidents. Most informed people are aware, for example, that young black males are 21 times more likely to be shot dead than their white counterparts. Or that the disparity in black peoples’ interactions with police can’t be chalked up solely to disparities in criminal activity.
I would say that’s a gross mischaracterization. I am not aware of any prominent liberal who considers all cops “racist killers”. It’s a strange charge to make considering most of the protests have been centered on specific instances and actors. The facts underlying the frustration of many blacks are stark. While, for context, grand juries not handing down indictments are exceedingly rare events for the population at large (“According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. attorneys prosecuted 162,000 federal cases in 2010, the most recent year for which we have data. Grand juries declined to return an indictment in 11 of them.”), in the matter of police shootings, it’s exceedingly rare for police to be prosecuted. (“In 179 fatalities involving on-duty NYPD cops in 15 years, only 3 cases led to indictments — and just 1 conviction”). Given that data, it’s certainly odd that the author feels that the “bad actors”, the bad cops. merely need to be the targets of attention. Are we to believe that only good cops are accused of crimes and bad cops are conveniently given passes by the very communities who bear the brunt of contentious interactions with police?
Given our countries fraught history with race, and the massive disparity of incarceration of blacks even today, it’s odd that conservatives have such a difficult time imaging that institutional (not actively “racist”) factors exist that might explain some of these statistical disparities. The author seems to insinuate that blacks end up dead, or in jail, at such a higher rate because of the accumulation of many bad decisions on the parts of individuals. Removing important context, the reasons why one person might be placed into difficult situations with law enforcement at a higher rate than another person, for example, based upon demographic and/or geographic factors, leaves a gaping hole where a reason for these disparities should exist. Is the author implying that blacks are inherently more “criminal”? I hope he will clarity his position and explain why, absent external factors such as institutional bias, so many more blacks per capita find themselves residing in prison.
@Tom:
Perhaps you should check the FBI stats, Tom. Who exactly is doing the most of the killing of black males? Other black males. Who is leaving their children to be raised by single mothers in greater proportion of any other ethnic/racial group? Black men. What ethnic/racial group has the highest percentage of high school drop out? Blacks.
I would like you to define “institutional bias” for me. Is that anything like institutional poverty, created by the Democrats via LBJ’s Great Society?
It is not white people leaving black mothers to fend for themselves, deserted by the baby daddy. It is not whites standing on black neighborhood street corners dealing drugs. It is not whites forcing black children, especially black boys, to drop out of high school. It is not white boys impregnating young black girls, killing any chance for advancement and raising the chance that the girl will live in poverty.
Federal attorneys don’t take cases like the Michael Brown/Eric Garner to a grand jury, so that is moot.
@Scott in Oklahoma: I went to college in the 1960’s before this judge in 1999 made his decision for the PD and against the college grad.
Back then ”professionalizing” the police force was in vogue.
Today it seems that departments have to take less qualified people so as to have their ”quotas” of women, various races and so on.
Back when I graduated college a woman (even with a relevant degree) was openly laughed out of the interview room.
@retire05:
Ok, now that’s funny.
@Scott in Oklahoma: Uh, yeah all that’s real nice and everything and I’m sure more trigger happy cops would be less inclined to unload their 9mm into a black young man if they’d only suck up to them more and as you say “simply respect” them more but I’m wondering why you responded at all to my comment when you didn’t respond at all to my comment.
You totally ignored a paramount argument of today’s problem which is that police officers are exempt from prosecution because they work hand in hand with the prosecution. Sure, there’s a cultural break down and yes, rioting and looting from a given percentage of the protestors indeed paint a negative image of their actual message and there’s plenty of blame as to why we’re where we are today but that’s all an aside. You can’t fix a problem simply by fingerprinting.
Until police are accountable for their actions, there’s not going to be any change in their actions. If they are allowed to beat and shoot people for minute infractions or for simply not being nice or “respectful” enough, even when it’s on tape, this problem will only escalate.
@RJW: I didn’t address your comments the way you wanted me too because your opinion is, to be perfectly honest, wrong. You’re buying into the liberal, hate the police narrative that isn’t based on anything even resembling factual. I’m not going to take up a lot of my time digging out all the statistics to prove how wrong you are because it would be a waste of my time; you have proven time and again that facts don’t matter to you.
Now I’ll briefly explain how wrong you are about police officers being exempt from prosecution, and accountability. In every use of force case, from the most minor touch to deadly force, a pile of reports are completed, passed up the chain and eventually end up in the prosecutor’s hands if there’s a hint of criminality by the police. In addition to the exposure to possible criminal charges for every physical action the police officer takes, there are possibly career ending internal rule and regulations scrutiny, possible civil suit exposure and last but not least there’s the federal investigation into possible civil rights violations. And you know what Richard? The cops know it, understand the accountability and the scrutiny, and still go to work every day. And in every single deadly force case in my memory that involved cops that I personally know (there have been many), the biggest fear that my brother officers carried after the dust settled was the fear of being prosecuted, fired, sued and drug through the mud by the FBI. And in every case, they were legitimate uses of force. And not one of those cops started their shift thinking they were going to end their shift that way; they responded to the call, and they reacted correctly when the shit hit the fan.
All the liberal, anti-police talking points in the world, not substantiated by facts, are not going to change the fact that that the cops are doing the right thing in 99.999% of the incidents they are involved in; a much better record than the general population has ever kept. The recent incidents that incited all the anti-police rhetoric were both clear of criminal action by the police, the Grand Jury’s both spoke. But hey, don’t let that pesky truth get in your way.
Oh yeah, one more thing Richard; you too are part of the problem, a large part, by continuing to spread the lies and deception of the anti-police anarchist.
@Scott in Oklahoma:
If there’s one thing that people have come to learn from these incidents is the relationship between police officers and the prosecutor. This rang loud and clear in Ferguson. You seem to be following a playbook that either that is untrue or that there is no problem to begin with.
@Ronald J. Ward:
What a hypocrite you are, as you push a narrative that you would be singing the praises of the relationship between the police and the prosecutor if they were investigating/prosecuting a man who raped your wife. Day after day, black Americans see justice for crimes against them due to that very relationship that you now bash.
Right. RJW knows better than someone (Scott in Oklahoma) who has walked the walk. Funny, you don’t complain about the many radical left wing groups like the CPUSA, Answer International (a Marxist group), et al, that have fomented the looting and riots, just as you ignored the fact that Eric Garner was a devotee of a prison gang related Islamic group. For you, facts are not only unimportant, they are inconsequential when it comes to pushing a narrative.
Day after day, cops do their jobs without incident. And while there has been a few bad apples among them, the percentage of bad apples among cops is amazing low. Not so with the bad apples that are among the ghetto male youth.
“Hands up, don’t shoot” is a lie. A lie started by Michael Brown’s friend who had previously lied to police in another incident and perpetrated by poverty pimps like Al Sharpton. What is funny is what a simpleton dupe you are for any false narrative.
@retire05:
So, uh, are you saying that this is some necessary evil or such? “Black Americans see justice for crimes against them due to that very relationship that you now bash”. Seems to be an admission of said relationship to me. And I agree that this relationship is needed to fight crime. Unfortunately, it’s a hindrance when that crime is committed by a cop. One can rely on that relationship to prosecute a man that has raped his wife or daughter unless of course, the attacker was a party of that relationship. That’s the problem. And it does indeed exist.
@Ronald J. Ward:
Yeah, a relationship between investigating police officers and a district attorney exist. Why would I deny that? But it is not the nefarious relationship you, and the radical race baiters you seem to want to emulate, claim it is. Basically, you are calling every prosecuting attorney a useful dupe for police officers that might have broken the law. That shows total disrespect for those that do their level best to not only protect your worthless ass, but those who will send anyone to jail for harming you.
If that is your opinion, then you obviously think that the blacks that sat on the Grand Jury were too stupid to determine the evidence themselves and they, also, were just trying to protect a cop that killed a thug who had beat him.
Why do you have such little respect for black people that sit on Grand Juries?
@retire05: Your argument comes up short on every front.
You start by making a false claim that I’m “calling every prosecuting attorney a useful dupe for police officers that might have broken the law, which I did not. You then build on that fabricated argument to convict me of showing “total disrespect for those that do their level best to not only protect your worthless ass, but those who will send anyone to jail for harming you”.
The Grand Jurors of Ferguson, black or white, can only apply the law as dictated by the court. The prosecutor gave them instructions that had been invalidated by the SCOTUS in 1985. He provided witness #40 who has come under considerable scrutiny. Your argument that I ” have such little respect for black people that sit on Grand Juries” is yet more concocted gibberish that has no merit in any reasonable dialog.
Weren’t you recently whining about being sick of those changing the narrative?
Take this dancer that was thrown to the ground this very Christmas season, at the very time police are down on the mayor for demanding accountability. Are these cops exempt from the law? Should the mayor and liberals simply turns their heads lest they be hating cops?
Looks like the commenters on that video answer your questions.
Even Mayor deBlasio warned his own son not to be acting stupid near cops.
Sheesh!
@Nanny: You actually validated much of my argument as well as a great deal of today’s problems. You seem to seriously assign some above the law justification for police officers to beat people at their discretion, based on what they deem to be stupid or such.
The officers in that video should be promptly investigated and after due process if found guilty of assault, among possible other charges, should be subject to whatever punishment you or I would receive for the same offense.
It’s utterly unreasonable to think otherwise.
Boy RJW, you sure do get around. You were there for the incident in Ferguson, then back in time to sit like a wallflower in the Grand Jury room. Then you were at Staten Island just in time to see some white cops choke to death a black man for no good damn reason, then back there again to sneak into the Grand Jury room and see what they saw. Then quickly back to New York for some other bad cop incident. Boy, you are some kind of expert. I also find it amusing that you know so much about how the system works from the inside, how real cops think and how that relationship with the prosecution really works.
Pretty amazing the way you have determined guilt, despite the findings of two Grand Juries, because you just know better than they do. The only way you could know better is if you were a witness to the original incidents. So far, you have stated your baseless opinions as facts, you have less credibility than Obama does. I would hate to call you an idiot, because real idiots don’t need the insult of a comparison to you.
@Ronald J. Ward:
Sure you did. You said:
You argue that police officers are exempt from prosecution due to their close relationship with prosecuting attorneys. You made that as a blanket accusation, not naming any one prosecuting attorney, or any one town except to say that Ferguson, Missouri was symbolic because “This rang loud and clear in Ferguson.” Now you’re trying to weasel out of what you previously said.
Jury instructions are given by the Court, NOT the prosecuting attorney. Obviously you have never sat on a Grand Jury.
So some brother is looking to do a “prank” video, and he got punked. Did you even bother to read the comments? And you wonder why police officers are on edge? Just days before that clown decided he wanted to be funny, two officers were assassinated by a man with relations to a prison gang Muslim group. Maybe he doesn’t think his “pranks” are so funny now.
When a white man is killed by the police, where are the poverty pimps like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson then? Where is the NAACP when a black police officer shoots a white guy?
http://www.dothanfirst.com/story/d/story/robert-lawrence-shot-dothan-animal-shelter/81597/94qhSgMaT0e6AWCRkYKuSg
As a matter of fact, where are those bottom feeders when a little black girl is shot by a black drive by shooter in Chicago? Instead, you want to disparage prosecuting attorneys for being in touch with the very police officers that work with those prosecuting attorneys, EVERY DAMN DAY OF THE WEEK, to put bad guys behind bars so that the bad guys cannot harm any other blacks.
When a white guy is shot by police, there are no marches, no protests, no rioting, looting and burning of private businesses. That seems to be a cancer that is generally applicable to black communities. Nothing like burning your own neighborhood down to protest, is there, RJW?
As Scott said, you’re part of the problem. Either you are a black man who thinks “but, but…….slavery” or you are a self-loathing white guy who is just brain dead. I know you are too cowardly to admit which it is.
@Scott in Oklahoma: It’s a busy day back at the grindstone and I don’t have a lot of time to respond to such nonsensical gibberish. I, uh, what? Something about having an ability to use the Internet but since I wasn’t in the court room or something that disqualifies my opinions or something. Seems like by that logic, the same would apply to most everyone with the exception of about a dozen that’s ever commented. WTF exactly is your point? @retire05:
You’re trying to make an argument that the dancer spooked these officers and that their reaction was more of a safety reflex when in fact (or, at least what seems to be the case from the clip), they stopped the guy for what they considered irrational behavior, questioned him, determined him a nonthreat yet more of a nuisance, and promptly made a decision to return him to his freedom but stepped above the law to rough him up a but first. There’s a huge difference. How or why you and your cohort can approve of such lawlessness is beyond me.
As far as my stand, let’s consider the S.C. State Trooper shooting. Do I think this was racially motivated? No, Do I think the trooper should be prosecuted. Actually, no. I think he just got trigger happy. I do think he should be removed from that position and I think a sizable settlement is due to the victim. But I don’t think there was criminal intent. And there is a huge difference in intent and bad judgment. Obviously, throwing the dancer to the ground was intent and accordingly, those officers should be held accountsble.
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
And I said that exactly where? Oh, that’s right, I didn’t say that. That is just something you cooked up in that left wing indoctrinated head of yours.
I don’t approve of pranks, and someone acts like that around me, they just might get more than they bargained for. But you seem to think that cops should bear any insult, and unacceptable behavior, simply because they are cops.
@retire05: There you go again, denying your very own argument.
Ok, maybe you just like to create a hodgepodge of word salad for no apparent reason. Sounds like you might like to throw out insinuations that you can run away from when they fail to stand up to scrutiny. Or maybe, from you doubling down on cop’s freedom to beat, I misunderstood you and you were saying it’s fine for cops to beat anyone that crosses them when they can justify a reason for being in a bad mood to begin with.
To be clear, I expect cops to abide by the same laws as everyone else, particuraly when it comes to shooting or beating people just because their type annoys them.
@RJW babble some make-believe crap like this:
“To be clear, I expect cops to abide by the same laws as everyone else, particuraly when it comes to shooting or beating people just because their type annoys them.”
Gee moron, as I explained earlier, police officer have four time the exposure of civilian when it comes to accountability for their actions. If you believe otherwise, your ignorance is even deeper than I might have given you credit for.
@Scott in Oklahoma: There are 2 important factors that you seem to not recognize. 1 is that you seem to be confused with my response that you quoted as it was directed to Retire05’s nod to police brutality and not with whatever it was that you said earlier. The 2nd thing is that I don’t put as much as an iota of credence into whatever it was that you said earlier.
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
Obviously the voices in your head are working overtime since nothing I said even closely resembles what you claim I said.
When you have to make things up about what people say, or glean the total opposite from what they say, it is you that has the major problem, not the person who’s words you are twisting.
Actually, I think it is just a clear case of you being a liar and twisting other’s words to push your own anti-cop agenda.
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
Yep, you’re certainly a Democrat for no one can lie like the Democrats. So which is it, RJW? Are you just an angry black man or a self-loathing white guy who hears voices in his head?
@retire05: There you go again.
Did I misunderstand your position on the dancer? Did you not defend the cops? What’s your take on the S.C. trooper shooting.
If I misunderstood, perhaps you can elaborate on you position.
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
Let me be very clear. The clown in your video was trying to do two things; bring attention to himself and humiliate those he was dancing behind. Also, IMHO, the push he got from the police officer was not enough to make him fall to the ground and his fall to the ground looked intentional on his part. The police officers were minding their own business, he should have been minding his. Had he pranked me like that he probably wouldn’t have liked my reaction to his actions. I have no use for smartasses.
I generally defend our police. They have an impossible job. How would you like to know that people hate you for no other reason than you wear a blue uniform and it is part of their culture to hate you, even when you are trying to protect their worthless asses? Why don’t you try walking a block in their shoes, instead of being part of that cultural disconnect that makes police held to a higher standard than (seemingly) you hold the race baiters and poverty pimps that convince black people that a blue uniform is a reason to hate someone.
Where are the protests, the looting and burning of businesses, after a black cop recently shot a unarmed white guy in Alabama? Oh, that’s right; burning your own neighborhood down is a black thing.
Every police officer in the United States should get a case of the “blue” flu if they are assigned to a ghetto neighborhood that harasses them for no other reason than they are police officers. Let anarchy reign in those neighborhoods and watch how quickly ghettoites decide that the police are really needed to protect them.
Most cops are good people and do a hard job that is rarely appreciated (by those like you).
@retire05: Ok, the dancer faked being tossed to the ground? Got it. But in case he wasn’t it was still ok (I think) because he was wanting attention and was humiliating, which I suppose you vindicate the cops for, even though the dancer faked the assault. And such a response from you, after learning you weren’t under any danger, would be legal as well?
Did that driver fake getting shot after reaching for his drivers license at the officer’s request?http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KeT_oSLtI-o
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
It appears to me that the cop didn’t push him hard enough to push him to the ground. It would be the first time someone faked an “insult” to make police look bad.
As I said, the clown would not have liked my reaction to his stupid actions. But he put his stupid video of him acting stupidly to garner sympathy for himself and to slam the police (read the responses which were exactly what he wanted to garner) who didn’t like him acting like an idiot any more than I would have. Hopefully, someone will punch his teeth out the next time he thinks he’s being so cute and put an end to his “pranking” stunts.
OK, we got it. You have no use for the police. Hopefully, you won’t have to deal with them if something bad happens to you. You can just get your fellow anarchists to deal with the criminal. After all, they’re so brave spitting in the faces of police, throwing glass bottles and rocks at the police. Yeah, that’s it, RJW. Get the anarchists to defend you and your family.
@retire05: It’s fine that your specialty is tap dancing and squirming but at the end of the day, it would seem that you could at least make some kind of a stand on precisely what you are arguing.
You say you’d hope someone punches his teeth out the next time he thinks he’s being cute. That’s certainly within you’re right to hope that. But what you seem so determined to be evasive on (aside from the S.C. trooper shooting ) is the legality of it. Maybe you hope he looses his teeth and the attacker doesn’t get prosecuted? Maybe you think it would be legal to punch them out? Maybe you think it is illegal but hope the one punching doesn’t get caught? I really don’t know as you fail to give a coherent response. Lacking the balls to at least confront the argument and state precisely what you’re position is while being contrary and argumentive just to be contrary and argumentive doesn’t exactly give you much credence.
@Ronald+J.+Ward:
Pot, meet kettle.
The guy’s a punk. Now, he seems intelligent enough to know that some day someone is not going to take kindly to his pranksterisms. But when it happens, and it will, he will whine and cry about how he was just having fun (at someone else’s expense) and didn’t deserve to get his chops busted.
Coming from a guy who refuses, for months, to answer if you are just an angry black guy or a self-loathing white guy.
OK, then. See your cognitive dissonance has kicked in again.
Get lost, loser. You continue to contribute nothing.
@retire05:
Yes, your projected bigotry has already been established. You don’t like him. Got it. “The guy’s a punk”. Your feelings understood. You’d kick his ass in a heart beat if he got on your nerves too. You’ve made that clear.
But what fails in your argument is that there are laws that penalizes people for assaulting other people simply because someone doesn’t like the way the other acts.
If you review our discussion, it started with me laughing at you because you actually said you were sick and tired of others “false narratives”. Yet here you are spinning and twisting and hiding to defend your very own throw-a-rock-and-run non sequitur gibberish in order to arrive at your desired narrative and you refuse to face realistic rebuttals when they destroy your strawman narrative. You often proclaim an allegiance to the Tea Party and their so-called strong Constitutional beliefs yet you seem to advocate stifling one’s freedom of speech, not wanting the law will on their side when they get their ass kicked because “someone is not going to take kindly to” what you have to say.
Now I understand the law allows you to defend yourself if threatened. But that wasn’t the case with the dancer as he was questioned and determined harmless- and then shoved to the ground. Now, you conveniently determined it to be a fraudulent fall, that in your “honest opinion”, it was staged.
Do you not see your very own prejudice here? You defend the officers because they assaulted a defenseless man because they didn’t particularly like the guys action. And if that doesn’t work, the guy was a “punk” and therefore, it was still okay to assault him (I suppose “punks” are exempt from due process or something?). And if that doesn’t work, the guy was being humiliating. And if that doesn’t work, hell, the guy faked his own assault. And if that doesn’t work, you cling to justification of it by saying I hate cops or have an “anti cop agenda” or other unrealistic accusations. You cannot and will not admit the reality of what’s legal or not legal because it renders you fabricated narrative invalid and because conceding that I’m right and you’re wrong on anything, ever, regardless of validity, is something you can’t allow. You are an argumentative fraud with absolutely no interest in reality or facts.
@retire05:
Once again, that’s indeed funny stuff.
@Ronald J. Ward:
Coming from you, who is anti-white and anti-cop, that seems really funny.
He is a punk. He thinks humiliating other people with his stupid antics is cute. Obviously, you do, too.
And I said that where? Oh, that’s right. I didn’t and once again you are hearing voices in your head, attributing to me words I never said. I said he wouldn’t like my reaction to his actions. How does that connote “kicking his ass”? You really should get help for those voices you’re hearing in your head.
I suggest you read law when it comes to assault and battery. People have a right to defend themselves against other people who are acting threateningly and committing battery.
The rest of your post is just so much standard RJW blathering. Not worth the time it takes to respond. You’re a moron, someone who refuses to answer questions posed to you but is quick to call others names and accuse them of the very biases you, yourself, are guilty of.
Go visit your friends over at DailyKos. They appreciate your kind of insanity.
@retire05: @retire05: Yeah, I’m a “moron” and by your logic I find humiliating people cute and Daily Koes and somehow in your creative world I’m anti cop and all and all these other fabricated non sequiturs somehow validate your argument (as undefined as it is) and all that’s real nice but anyone of reasonable intellect that wades through your sea of nonsensical rhetoric can quickly deduce, you’re too much of a coward to even take a legitimate stand on what you seem to advocate. You exonerate police officers who swore to uphold the law when they obviously break the law. And you do so by creating false narratives which do not exist, which only amplifies your dishonesty and hypocrisy.
Okay, I’m in agreement with you. And I think I already addressed that in #43.
Catch where you tried to weasel your way out by changing reality to suit your agenda? You still seem to want 2 ways out of your failed argument or 2 scenarios which makes the cops actions appropriate: 1 being that being thrown to the grown was staged by the dancer and the other that the cops “have a right to defend themselves against other people who are acting threateningly and committing battery” even though neither of those conditions were there. And then you keep a tertiary justification in your hostler that it’s OK because the dancer is a “punk” (whatever that’s suppose to mean and how that plays into the “narrative” is unclear).
I can appreciate how being exposed as such a blatant dishonest hack with no substance to your argument is distasteful but you would have been better served by simply moving on as you’ve passed up several excellent opportunities to seriously shut the hell up.
@Ronald J. Ward:
You want to talk about blatant dishonest hacks? Look in the mirror and talk to yourself. You come on this forum board and criticize every one who doesn’t see things through your jaded lenses. You diss conservatives, police officers, TEA Party supporters, the owners of this web site, those who post here and everyone who is not lock step with your damnable Socialist/radical view points and twist what others say beyond recognition. You refuse to answer any question that might discredit your rants and ravings. Then, when someone does give you an opinion, you bastardize it to the point that the person’s opinion is no longer recognizable. You, not me, RJW, are the dishonest hack.
Get lost, RJW. I have become quite bored with your mind numbing insanity.
@retire05:
To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, there you go again.
The only reason I’ve toyed with you is to simply watch you twist and spin from the obvious shortcomings of your failed arguments (more so after you bellyaching about “false narratives. That’s still funny). It’s kinda like a game as resident trolls are always so predictable. They are driven, for whatever reason, to get that last word in, even when they dig themselves deeper in their hole of stupidity. And when they suffer ultimate defeat, it’s always the same ole “get lost” response. I’ve actually pulled that from you in your last 3 responses.
It’s also common for the resident troll, after taking an ass kicking like you did, to cry to the moderator gods (“you’ve dissed the owners of this web site”) for relief. It’s really quite funny stuff when you cry this “leave me alone, go away! Moderators, make him quit picking on me!!!”.
Don’t ya just hate it when people change the narrative?
Way too funny!
A ‘mock’ all-black grand jury with no legal standing decides that former Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson should have faced charges for shooting and killing Michael Brown.
12 people heard evidence from the Brown case over the weekend and decided 11 to one that Wilson should have been indicted for first degree murder.
Nice proof of what would happen if police ever abandoned their posts.
“Black justice” would be crazy.
The real Grand Jury released all of the interviews.
Reading them makes it difficult to vote to indict officer Wilson.
Adding in all of the forensic testimony and it becomes impossible….for a rational human to do so.
“Black justice,” obviously, would not be rational.
It would be emotion-based.
Flashback: Sweeping Gun Control Signed After 1968 Protests