It seems like the Russian government must be seriously worried about a few dozen peaceful protestors.
Peaceful Russian Protestors in Krasnoyarsk
Category: Police Brutality
Government Atrocities: Portland and Lansing
Here is an article about Jennifer Kristiansen, a 37-year-old Portland mother and attorney who was arrested. She was not read her rights. Her crime: standing in solidarity with other protestors in Portland. Apparently anonymous troops in battle fatigues, without nametags, without badges, without identifying insignia, can just pick people up off the streets on American cities now and our government seems to think this is acceptable. Not only is it unconstitutional, it is immoral, and it is offensive.
Are they seriously asking us to “pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and the republic for which it stands?”
This republic?
Here is a picture of another victim in Portland. This is Donavan La Bella, a 26-year-old peaceful activist in Portland, shot in the face by United States officers. He may have brain damage, and a bad right eye for the rest of his life. He will definitely need reconstructive surgery in his face. Was this necessary?
There are people in this country who think that he deserves it, that he should not have been there. He should not have stood up for this ideals and protect the republic for which the flag stands.
What kind of “officer” shoots an unarmed young man point-blank in the face. What kind of government orders its law enforcement officers to commit atrocities against its own people?
Syria’s Assad did that, and we sent dozens of missiles into his country. After this, we no longer have the moral authority to suggest to any other country to get its human rights policies corrected. We have no more moral authority, and it will hurt our leadership for decades, maybe forever.
This same government of ours was not indignant when this happened:
While the protestors in Portland are unarmed, while the wall of moms are simply concerned citizens with nothing but the clothes on their backs and facemasks, these protestors in Lansing, Michigan just two months ago stood in front of the governor’s office in the Michigan State Capitol. Their protest was not about the rights of oppressed minorities. Their protest was about having been ordered to stay home to shelter from infection and wear masks in public. They, however, were allowed to be fully armed with military assault rifles. Where were the federal DHS officers in that protest? Why didn’t they shoot rubber bullets into their faces?
Something tells me things would not have ended well for the officers if they’d started shooting at them.
I have to say that they look way more dangerous and menacing to me than the wall of moms in Portland did:
Our government now raises arms against its own people in its own country, against those who do not agree with the government’s policies and the morality of its actions.
How can I pledge allegiance?
Terrorizing Ourselves in America – Welcome to Fascism
For decades, the American military has invaded and terrorized other countries. We have blasted drone bombs into weddings in Yemen, shot up villages of civilians in Vietnam, went house to house in cities in Iraq, and occupied many countries for decades. That’s why we need a military budget larger than that of the next eight nations combined.
When you’re that kid at a wedding in Yemen and your entire family is wiped out by some malign robot high up in the sky, you are completely powerless. You can grieve, you can hate, you can become a terrorist to get even, but you can’t change what was done to you and your loved-ones, you are a victim of state-sponsored terrorism.
We have watched these scenes on television since the Vietnam years in the 1960s. We are used to them. We have become numb to our government committing atrocities in our name all over the world. After all, it’s been good for the economy.
Back in the Nazi days in Germany, just such officers, heavily armed, would break down doors of ordinary citizens at 3:00 in the morning, and taking them away, never to be seen again, no reasons given, no accountability. When military or paramilitary operators start terrorizing their own citizens in their own countries, things usually don’t take too long to go completely out of control. That happened in Germany in the 1930s, not so long ago. Oh how quickly we forget.
Our military terrorism has come home to roost in our own nests. Perhaps we have run out of Afghanistans, and Yemens, and Sudans. We need new fresh meat in Portland and Chicago. There are plenty of young black kids who can watch their parents be beaten and hauled away, hopeless, powerless, victims without recourse.
We have started terrorizing ourselves in America, setting up our own federal troops against our own citizens, forcibly dividing the country. Are we trying to foment a civil way? It sure looks that way to me.
Here is the definition of fascism:
Fascism: A governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.
Welcome to fascism, America. You thought socialism was bad?
Police Brutality: Shooting Homeless Man in Wheelchair
The Los Angeles Police Department apparently was threatened by a homeless man in a wheelchair. He was not part of any protest. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
16 armed police, in riot gear, were threatened enough by this man to shoot him in the face with rubber bullets. See this post for graphics on what a rubber bullet in the face does – if it misses your eye. You can see in the picture the blood streaming from his face.
They could not walk up to the man and talk to him? One of them could not push him away to safety?
They had to shoot him?
I could be this man. You could. The thugs in black battle gear, paid by the public, have license to hurt, maim, and kill.
I think we need protests!
Trump and his S.S.
Probably not the best idea Trump has ever had, calling the United States Secret Service the S.S.
Police Brutality: Minneapolis Police Shooting at People on Their Own Porch
Since when is it ok for police to shoot at people on their own porch at home? This looks like we’re now living in a police state. History has shown that very bad things start happening when this is permissible and acceptable police behavior.
Police Brutality: Police Biker Gang Beating up Unarmed Protestors in Philadelphia
A biker gang brutally beat these protesters in Philly today. pic.twitter.com/r1TzXrOpNW
— Morgan J. Freeman (@mjfree) June 5, 2020
Police Brutality: NY State Senator Myrie
Here is a picture of New York State Senator Zellnor Myrie, pepper sprayed and handcuffed.
Senator Myrie has a masters degree in urban studies, and a law degree from Cornell University. At Cornell, he served as student government president, prison law instructor, and pro bono scholar.
After law school, he joined the law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell where he worked pro bono to fight police brutality.
I think the NYPD picked the wrong guy to mess with. But worse, for every Zellner Myrie, there are thousands of other peaceful protesters who are being violated right now that will not make headlines.
I think this will not end well.
The Nazi Salute and the American NFL
In 1934, the leadership of Germany made sure that every sports team exercised the salute of the dominant political party.
Not doing the salute was considered unpatriotic, and as time progressed, it had more and more serious repercussions.
Today members of American NFS teams are using their spotlighted status in society to protest injustice perpetrated on American citizens based on the color of their skin. See the video below as an example, where a young black man is dragged out of his own car, in his own driveway, because he has a broken tail light. Good grief!
Now our American government, led by the American president, is verbally attacking the NFL and its players for “disrespecting the National Anthem.”
Seriously? We are concerned about a piece of music? A flag? A ceremony?
One group of society, in this case the leadership of the government, decides it attaches some meaning to a ceremony, and then harasses citizens when they use their right to protest an injustice, and claims they are disrespecting the country.
The logic just does not work.
This is the same logic that Christians usurped in medieval times against people who didn’t buy into their religion – heretics.
It is the same logic many contemporary religions still use today in many places of the world to cast out, or chastise and punish those that do not accept that religion. Examples are radical Islamic factions in a number of countries and fundamental Mormons in the United States, and there are many others.
The video below shows police injustice, and humiliation of private citizens, which is the very thing the NFL members are protesting, the very occurrences our leadership should be working on to eliminate.
Instead, our leadership bullies.
How do they expect us to treat them with any respect?
The Slippery Slide of How Fascism Starts
So two yahoos from Southie in my hometown of Boston severely beat up a Hispanic homeless guy earlier this week. While being arrested, one of the brothers reportedly told police that “Donald Trump was right, all of these illegals need to be deported.”
Then, further in the article, here is what Trump is quoted as saying:
“I will say, the people that are following me are very passionate. They love this country. They want this country to be great again. But they are very passionate. I will say that.”
Statements like these, and movements like these, have often in history been the beginnings of very bad eventual outcomes.
For example, in the 1920s, Germany was not doing very well. The economy was a disaster, people were hungry, humiliated from World War I, and hopeless. Decades of abuse by bad leadership had created a vacuum.
Then came an unlikely little man with a powerful speaking voice. Whenever he spoke, he incited passion in his listeners. He spoke of new hope, of national pride, of honor, of making his country great again. He also started to spread the seeds that much of the economic demise of the country was due to the Jews.
With his upbeat and passionate message, he gathered more and more followers and eventually he managed to get himself elected through crafty and actually illegal maneuverings.
Within weeks of being elected, he outlawed other political parties and systematically took over police and security. Suddenly, those that earlier were just blamed for the demise of the country, no longer had the protection of the system. The police had turned against them. Jews started to flee while they still could.
But the country was “becoming great again.” There were massive public works projects and everyone was employed. Industry boomed. The people were proud. The country hosted the 1936 Olympics. The people were passionately behind their leader, their Führer.
Pretty soon, Jews could openly be abused, beaten, robbed, raped and killed without any recourse. The German Third Reich was supposed to last 1000 years, yet it rose for only about six or eight, and then went down in a spectacular firestorm of world-wide disastrous proportions. As we so say, the rest is history.
But let’s remember how it all started.
There was a man who fired up his listeners. They came to listen to him to beer halls and stadiums by the hundreds first, then by the thousands, and always left with fire in their bellies.
There was a man who said he knew how to make the country great again, and he started cranking the economic engine unlike anything seen before. He kept saying he knew what he was doing.
There was a man who, probably with all good intention, thought he had figured it all out: It was the fault of the Jews. Too many of them were usurping the power and money from the country and its people.
Trump does all those things today. He says that 7.5% of all births in the United States are by illegal parents and he wants to take away the birthrights of those United States citizens. Note that he is already setting himself up to perform illegal acts, all in the name of the country. After all, we’re being “stupid, right?” And his listeners with fire in their bellies applaud.
By targeting illegals, he is creating an atmosphere of making them at least one of the scapegoats of our demise. It’s the Mexicans’ fault. Whether those “Mexicans” are illegal or legal, you can’t tell from the outside. So an entire class of our society is becoming a target of hate without any solid ground. When idiots like the guys in Boston (article above) beat up immigrants, Trump, rather than being outraged like any decent citizen would be, he dismisses it as “passionate” and thus we have it:
A leader is officially condoning violence against an arbitrary subset of the population that he has identified as being “the problem” of the country that we all must make great again. He is encouraging this behavior.
It’s beginnings like these that have paved the road for some of history’s greatest thugs, it’s beginnings like these that have resulted in entire countries of decent, hard-working, pious people being hijacked and forced to commit unspeakable crimes and atrocities, all in the name of country and leader.
This is how it starts.
Just saying.
Full disclosure: I am an immigrant.
Police Brutally Assault 17-Year-Old
This is pretty tough to watch.
A random traffic stop turns into a police assault on two teenagers. No Miranda rights read. The crime? The police smell marijuana in the car.
Then the police take the recording and delete it.