A SOLUTION TO INCOME INEQUITY: DEFUND WHITES AND GIVE THE MONEY TO BLACKS

Behind virus and protests: A chronic US economic racial gap

 

By Paul Wiseman 

 

Associated Press

June 8, 2020

 

WASHINGTON — The United States has been here before, staring into the deep chasm that divides white and black Americans. 

It happened after cities burned in 1967, after Los Angeles erupted with the 1992 acquittal of police officers who beat Rodney King, after the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

After those upheavals came talk of change — of reforming policing, yes, but also of expanding economic opportunity to black Americans who have been disproportionately left behind in one of the world’s richest countries. Yet despite big pledges and high hopes, economic progress has come slowly, if at all, for black America.

African Americans still earn barely 60 cents for every $1 in white income. They have 10 cents in wealth for every $1 whites own. They remain more than twice as likely to live in poverty. And they’re about as likely to own a home as they were when Richard Nixon was president.

Now, demonstrators are out in the streets again, this time to protest what happened in Minneapolis to George Floyd, dead after a police officer pressed a knee into his neck for eight minutes and 46 seconds. 

Once again, racial inequality underlies rage and despair, especially because the unrest coincides with an economic and health calamity, one that’s falling hardest, yet again, on African Americans.

“We’ve got a perfect storm,” said Cecelia Rouse, professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University. “COVID is wreaking economic havoc” for African Americans.

Black Americans are far more likely than whites to die of COVID-19. They work disproportionately in low-paying service jobs — the ones that were slashed when restaurants and movie theaters closed as a health precaution and customers stayed away from hotels and airports.

“We’ve been blindsided by the pandemic,” said Imani Fox of the Washington community group ONE DC.

Black workers who remain employed are more likely to work as front-line workers in warehouses, grocery stores and takeout eateries — jobs that leave them exposed to the virus.

“People are mad as hell,” said Monica Lewis-Patrick, president of the community group We the People of Detroit. “We can’t be the wealthiest nation or declare ourselves the wealthiest nation in the world and still have these major inequities and disparities that are glaringly based on race.’’

Rouse said she has reread portions of the Kerner Commission report, issued in 1968 to call for reform in the wake of the urban unrest of the late ‘60s. “It was so depressing,” she said. “What has changed?’’

A month after the Kerner report, for example, Congress passed the Fair Housing Act, meant to eliminate housing discrimination. Assessing the act on its 50th anniversary two years ago, Margery Turner of the Urban Institute wrote that African Americans and other minorities continued to face discrimination, though the “most blatant″ forms of bias had declined. 

“We still live in starkly segregated neighborhoods,” she wrote, noting that the typical white Americans lives in a neighborhood that is 75% white and 8% African American; a typical black American lives in a neighborhood that is 35% white and 45% black.

The coronavirus recession is especially disheartening because African Americans finally seemed to be making headway in the aftermath of the Great Recession of 2007-2009. The unemployment rate for black Americans hit a record low last fall. And black wealth, decimated by the financial crisis of the late 2000s, had in recent years outgrown white wealth.

Then came COVID-19.

“When something goes wrong for all American workers, it’s going to disproportionately affect African Americans, who are often the most fragile in the economy,” said Democratic Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey.

Amid the anger and anguish is optimism that policymakers will use this moment to find ways to narrow the economic gap between black and white Americans. Among the hopes is that political leaders can deliver reforms to America’s economic system: Paid sick leave. A higher federal minimum wage. Perhaps even direct payments to the needy — test-run, perhaps, by the $1,200 stimulus checks the government sent to many Americans as the economy shut down in the face of the pandemic.

But the United States has had watershed moments before. And the big changes didn’t come. 

Here’s a look at America’s economic racial divide and how it has and hasn’t changed after decades of protests:

INCOME 

From 1968 to 2018, median income for black households, adjusted for inflation, rose 37% from $30,155 to $41,361. In percentage terms, that outpaced the 31% growth in household income for whites (from $51,138 to $66,943), according to the Census Bureau. But black households still earn just 62 cents for every $1 earned by white households.

The income gap remains wide even though African Americans have vastly upgraded their educational attainment: The proportion of black Americans with a high school diploma has surged from 54% in 1968 to 92% in 2018. The share with a college degree rose from 9% to 23% over that period, according to government figures compiled by the Economic Policy Institute.

Yet black people are still more than twice as likely as whites to live in poverty. Their poverty rate has dropped from 55% in 1959 to 35% in 1968 to 21% in 2018. The white rate has barely budged at around 10%. The official poverty rate may understate African Americans’ progress because it excludes the effect of non-cash government programs such as food stamps and Medicaid.

JOBS

The unemployment rate for African Americans has typically hovered around twice the rate for whites. But beginning last year, the record-breaking economic expansion that began in June 2009 had finally begun to pay off for African Americans. Their jobless rate dropped from 16.8% in March 2010 to an all-time low of 5.4% in August last year.

That progress ended abruptly once the coronavirus recession wiped out tens of millions of jobs in March and April. Black workers, disproportionately laboring in low-wage service jobs, were less likely to be among the fortunate: The office workers who could keep their jobs while working from the safety of home. African Americans were likelier to either lose their jobs or to work as essential front-line employees who are more vulnerable to the virus.

On Friday, the government issued a surprisingly upbeat jobs report for May: The national unemployment rate unexpectedly dropped from 14.7% to 13.3%. But the jobless rate for African Americans ticked up, from 16.7% to 16.8%, the level where it had been 10 years earlier. 

WEALTH 

Black Americans face an even bigger long-term problem than lagging incomes and higher unemployment. They have struggled to build wealth — home equity and investment portfolios — that could be tapped in times of need, used as collateral for loans to start a business or passed on to children.

“Income helps you pay your bills,” said Olugbenga Ajilore, senior economist at the liberal Center for American Program. “Wealth moves you from poverty to the middle class to the upper class.’’

The median black family has wealth of just $17,200 — perhaps enough to buy a car — versus $171,000 for the median white family. The wealth gap persists even for African Americans in the top 10% of U.S. incomes: Their wealth comes to $343,160, less than one-fifth of the $1.79 million for whites in the top 10%, according to government numbers compiled by the Brookings Institution.

One ongoing culprit was the housing bust of the late 2000s. Commerce Department figures compiled by the Urban Institute show that black homeownership rose from 41.8% in 1970 to 47.3% in 2000 before being swept away by the financial crisis and the ensuing recession. As of 2015, black homeownership was 41.2% — lower than it had been 45 years earlier and far below the 71.1% for whites.

In February, researchers at the Brookings Institution reported other reasons for the wealth deficit: African Americans inherit far less money than whites. Even those who become top earners are likelier than whites to fall out of the ranks of the rich. And they are more likely to have to provide financial help to friends and family.

As a Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Booker pushed a plan for “Baby Bonds” to provide $1,000 to every American child at birth. After that, they would receive up to $2,000 a year, depending on their family income. The idea would be to create a nest egg that could eventually be used to finance a college education or buy a home.

Bradley Hardy, a professor in American University’s School of Public Affairs, said that researchers and activists are working on plans like Booker’s to narrow the divide between black and white Americans, between rich and poor.

The current protests could provide momentum for those efforts.

“It’s absolutely an opportunity,” Hardy said. “And, yes, it could be squandered.’’

GARCETTI CANNOT DENY HE CALLED COPS 'KILLERS'

LAPD union decries Garcetti’s ‘killers’ comment. He says he wasn’t talking about police 

 

By Dakota Smith and David Zahniser 

 

Los Angeles Times

June 5, 2020

 

Officials with the Los Angeles police union assailed Mayor Eric Garcetti on Friday for comments he made about cutting the LAPD budget, saying police officers have lost confidence in the mayor’s ability to lead the city after days of demonstrations.

Speaking at the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Los Angeles on Thursday, Garcetti said that his proposal to reduce LAPD spending and shift the savings to minority communities was getting attention from mayors across the country.

“That’s exactly the point,” he said. “It starts someplace, and we say we are going to be who we want to be, or we’re going to continue being the killers that we are.”

A Garcetti aide later told The Times that the “killers” remark referred to police agencies across the country.

The following morning, an official with the Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union that represents rank-and-file officers, accused the mayor of “political pandering” and called him “unstable.”

“He smeared every single police officer in Los Angeles and across the nation by calling us killers,” said Jamie McBride, a board member with the union.

Hours later, Garcetti said his “killers” remark wasn’t about police officers at all — but was instead a reference to society’s “collective burden” to address high mortality rates among black Angelenos.

“I absolutely did not say that about the league, about police officers,” he said. “And I won’t have those words distorted.”

The back-and-forth between the union and the mayor played out in the wake of Garcetti’s announcement that he would seek to cut up to $150 million from the Los Angeles Police Department and put the money toward funding new youth jobs, health initiatives and “peace centers” to heal trauma.

The move to scale back police spending followed days of pressure from activists, labor unions and community groups and nationwide protests against police violence, including a large demonstration outside his home, over the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

Union leaders said they were caught off guard by the announcements from Garcetti and council members about new cuts to the LAPD. As recently as last weekend, Garcetti gave no hint that he would consider decreasing funding when asked about the size of the police force.

McBride said his union is “honestly concerned” about the mayor’s mental health in light of the coronavirus pandemic and the protests.

“I think he should seek some help and maybe have somebody to talk to — a counselor or something — and reflect on some of his decisions,” McBride said.

Union officials also said they have no intention of reopening negotiations on their contract, which provides them with 4.8% in raises and nearly $41 million in education bonuses in the fiscal year that starts July 1.

When Garcetti ran for mayor in 2013, the union pumped about $1.5 million into the candidacy of his opponent, then-City Controller Wendy Greuel.

Garcetti and the union patched things up, and by 2016 the mayor was working with the league on a union-backed measure to change the LAPD’s disciplinary process. Last year, Garcetti and the City Council signed off on a lucrative package of raises and bonuses for officers that is expected to add $123 million to the LAPD’s budget.

LOUISIANA POLICE CHIEF ANNOUNCES OWN ARREAT

Grayson Police Chief says $3.6K in missing money was stolen from patrol car

 

By Ashley Mott 

 

Monroe News-Star

June 5, 2020

 

Grayson Police Chief Mitch Bratton is facing two counts of obstruction of justice and one count of malfeasance in office following a Louisiana State Police investigation.

Bratton announced his arrest in a Facebook post on Thursday.

"A few weeks back, I contacted an outside agency to come look into some concerns that I had with a town employee,” Bratton said. “Today, while cooperating with the state police investigators, they charged me with obstruction of justice and malfeasance in office. 

I won't debate the validity of the charge.  I wanted to be in full disclosure.  This does not affect me being the chief of police and I intend to be as accessible as I always have while I let the criminal justice system work this issue out.”

 

A warrant filed in connection with the case details three individual complaints investigated after Bratton originally contacted LSP’s Criminal Investigation Division on May 18.

 

In an interview with LSP, Mayor Melissa Bratton told LSP she was having problems with her clerk Rosetta Mercer and suspected Mercer was stealing money. No city officials could provide documentation to support the theft allegation. They said they were suspicious because of unpaid bills. 

On May 28, Mitch Bratton contacted LSP again and said he did not see anything indicating money was missing. He said there were discrepancies with Mercer’s salary that needed to be investigated and issues with reimbursement payments not matching receipts.

Complaint 1

In an interview, Mercer told LSP Mitch Bratton received approximately $8,000 in narcotics money in 2018 and 2019 and no arrests were made. The money was provided from the village general fund in various payments.

When Mercer asked Bratton about the payments, he told her “state police” audits him, a statement the warrant labels as a lie.

Mercer also told investigators various creditors would call the office because Bratton owed them money. She claimed Bratton used his influence as police chief to intimidate creditors into leaving him alone. The creditors later confirmed Mercer’s statements as did former city officials.

Village bank records showed Bratton used approximately $7,210 in 2018 and 2019 for narcotics investigations. The warrant states no documentation or witnesses were found to support that investigations occurred.

Bratton allegedly told investigators most of this work was performed outside Grayson city limits and implied the Caldwell Parish Sheriff’s Office would have most of the documentation. When asked for evidence vault access, Bratton said he lost his key on vacation in Florida. LSP opened the vault and reported no documentation or witness statements were found.

Complaint 2

An interview regarding a second complaint investigated by LSP was conducted on June 3. A woman told state police a man’s ex-wife offered her $5,000 to frame the man on a battery charge.

The woman contacted Bratton about the offer, and he started an investigation. The warrant states he told the woman he would fake the arrest so she could obtain the $5,000 bounty. LSP obtained pictures, recordings and a private investigator report confirming a false arrest report was prepared.

The woman collected the $5,000, and Bratton allegedly told her he only needed $2,500 to prosecute the case. Per the warrant, he asked her to drop the money off in the drop box at city hall and keep the rest. A recording was made of the delivery of the funds, and the woman provided a copy of her bank statements with the $2,500 deposit.

Bratton told the parties involved he would go forward with the prosecution of all involved in the framing operation and was discussing the case with a district judge. Per the warrant, LSP has not received any information confirming Bratton communicated with a district judge.

Per the warrant, Bratton said he received the $2,500, and it was in the evidence locker. After LSP obtained a search warrant for the locker, Bratton allegedly said he placed the money on the top of his patrol unit's console, and it went missing. He also said he did not allow the woman to keep $2,500.

Complaint 3

As LSP executed a search warrant at the police department, a resident entered city hall and asked for Bratton. The resident said her boyfriend was stopped by Bratton and two Xanax bars, one suboxone tablet and $1,150 in cash were seized.

Per the arrest warrant, Bratton said he also placed this money on his console, and it went missing at the same time as the other money.

When the drugs were not located in the evidence locker, a search of Bratton’s patrol vehicle followed. Xanax and suboxone were found in the cup holder along with suspected methamphetamine and other drug paraphernalia.

Per the report, Bratton told LSP he had not conducted a criminal investigation into the missing money or reported it missing.

LSP is accusing Bratton of intentionally concealing the missing funds.

The investigation remains active and ongoing.

Editors note: It is unknown whether the police chief and the mayor are related.

NY MAYOR CAVES IN TO CALLS FOR POLICE DEFUNDING

De Blasio to shift NYPD funding to local youth groups and social services

 

By Khristina Narizhnaya, Lee Brown and Aaron Feis

New York Post

June 7, 2020

Mayor Bill de Blasio has caved to calls to pull funding from the NYPD.

Hizzoner announced on Sunday that the city would reallocate an unspecified chunk of the department’s budget toward city youth groups and social services — days after dismissing demands to defund the police force, which has seen nearly 300 injured members amid recent unrest.

“Policing matters for sure, but the investments in our youth are foundational,” the mayor told reporters in a City Hall press briefing. “We will be moving funding from the NYPD to youth initiatives and social services.”

No particulars were announced — including how much money would be shifted, what cuts would have to made at the NYPD and which groups would benefit — with de Blasio saying the details would be hammered out in the coming weeks’ budget talks.

The fiscal year ends June 30.

De Blasio insisted that any cuts made by the NYPD would not be at the expense of public safety.

“I want people to understand that we are committed to shifting resources to ensure that the focus is on our young people,” he said.

“And I also will affirm while doing that, we will only do it in a way that we are certain continues to ensure that this city will be safe.”

The apparent compromise comes after activists, along with some City Council members and educators, have called on lawmakers to “defund” the NYPD as part of effecting a larger systemic change following the fatal arrest of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

As recently as Friday, de Blasio dismissed the idea of raiding the $6 billion budget of the nation’s largest police department.

“I do not believe it’s a good idea to reduce the budget of the agency that’s here to keep us safe,” he said at a Friday briefing.

Council Speaker Corey Johnson cheered de Blasio’s change of course on Sunday.

“I am happy that the mayor had been listening to the council’s calls to make substantial cuts to the NYPD and reinvest that money in communities of color and our young New Yorkers,” Johnson (D-Manhattan) said in a statement.

“The devil is in the details, but we are fighting hard for a budget that reflects our values and our priorities. As we have said, a less than 1 percent cut to the NYPD and a 32 percent cut to DYCD [the Department of Youth and Community Development] is not representative of our values.”

But in Albany, Gov. Cuomo warned against forcing police departments to tighten their purse strings, citing looting that has spun off from Floyd protests.

“You have New York City that is still reeling from the COVID virus, and now you have this night of looting that I’m telling you shook people in the city to the core,” Cuomo said in a briefing, speaking generally and not in response to de Blasio’s remarks.

“You don’t need police? You don’t need police?

“That’s what happens when you don’t have effective policing.”

Although he slammed the NYPD as “not effective” in stopping the looting last week, Cuomo later clarified to stress that he disapproved of de Blasio’s leadership and the way the police deployed resources.

“It was frightening,” Cuomo said of the looting. “[With] no police, you get looting. That’s what you get. Nobody wants that.”

De Blasio did seem willing to make one addition to the NYPD’s budget, calling the idea of funding more lawyers to expedite departmental trials for cops accused of wrongdoing “a very good use of taxpayer dollars.”

He repeated calls for the Albany to change the state’s 50-A law that shields officers’ disciplinary histories, saying it “broken and stands in the way of improving trust between police and community.”

He also announced that the NYPD would no longer handle street-vendor enforcement, with the role to be transferred to an unspecified civilian agency.

MAROONED

ART ACEVEDO AND JESSE JACKSON

Like Jesse Jackson, Houston's poor excuse for a police chief never passes up a photo-op

By Howie Katz

Big Jolly Times
June 7, 2020

A police chief is supposed to have the backs of his officers.  When they do wrong he is supposed to punish them.  And he is right in condemning the wrongful actions of an officer from another department like the deadly kneeing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis cop.

Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo was about to be fired from a scandal-ridden Austin Police Department when he was rescued by Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner.  Not the smartest move Old Sly ever made.

Like civil rights activist Jesse Jackson, Acevedo has never passed up a photo-op ever since he became Houston's top cop.  He made a compete fool of himself when he appeared before the TV cameras to address the botched Harding Street raid.

Lately Acevedo has been photographed marching arm in arm with the George Floyd protesters, kneeling with them and hugging them.  He is too stupid to realize the protests are not just about Floyd's death, but that the protesters are also demonstrating against what Black Lives Matter claims is systemic police brutality against blacks and institutional police racism.  By demonstrating with the protesters, Acevedo appears to agree with the false accusations by Black Lives Matter.

Acevedo's participation in the protests even got him an interview on NBC's Today show.  Now that was a photo-op he'll relish the rest of his life.  And it probably made Old Sly proud too.

As a former law enforcement officer and criminal justice professor, I worked with many law enforcement agencies, including the Los Angeles and Houston police departments.  Yes, there are racist cops, but I can assure you that there is no systemic police brutality or institutional police racism.  Some have accused me of being unwilling to recognize racism when I see it, but believe me, I do recognize bigotry and discrimination where and when it occurs.  .   

Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson and race-baiter Al Sharpton who coined the phrase "No Justice - No Peace" can be expected to march in lockstep with the protesters, but in his role as Chief of the Police, Acevedo is not a civil rights activist.

In Houston, the police have shot dead six men in six weeks, five of them black or Latino.  The cops did not shoot them because they were black or Latino, but because at the time they were perceived to be an imminent threat to the lives of the officers.  The families of the deceased claim the shootings were not necessary.

What did Acevedo do in his latest photo-op?  He hugged some of the family members of the six men killed by his officers.

Acevedo is too ignorant to realize that by hugging the family members he appears to be agreeing with them that his officers should not have killed the six men.  How do you think that makes Houston's cops feel? 

The poor excuse for a police chief should have been canned after the Harding Street fiasco, but it looks like as long as Sly Turner is mayor, we will be stuck with dickhead Acevedo.

PRAYERS FOR HOUSTON POLICE CHIEF ACEVEDO

By David Morefield

This morning, the Houston Fire  Department responded to Acevedo's residence after reports that a man was in distress. Chief Acevedo had been trying to leave the house when his head would not make it through the french doors he had installed to accommodate his inflated ego. 

After several harrowing minutes, Houston firefighters were able to free Acevedo so that he can continue his childish attention seeking behavior.

HPD has announced that they will be widening the doorways at 1200 Travis in order to assure the Chief's safety.

Last year, a rookie officer was seriously injured when he unknowingly stepped between Chief Acevedo and a television camera.

FORMER STUDENT FROM THE 70S MADE MY DAY

By Howie Katz

When you are 93- years old with only a dog for a companion, there are few things to brighten your day.  One of those things happened to me Friday when one of my former students from back in the 70s paid me a visit.

And that student was some one special.  He was truly one of my best students ever.  He is a former US Army Ranger with combat service in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was also a sergeant with Houston PD's SWAT team.  As a Houston police officer he exemplified everything an outstanding cop is expected to be.

Lee Lawrence really made my day. Actually he made my week ... no, make that my month.

We talked for two hours, mostly about the sad state our country finds itself in at this time.  We are especially concerned that the protesters are making it appear as though all law enforcement officers are racists and that the police beat up and kill blacks only because they are black.

Lee retired several years ago and moved with his family to the Hill Country.  I haven't seen him since, that is until Friday.  He used to visit me and my wife regularly before he retired.  My dear departed wife and my son always thought the world of Lee.

So, it was a most pleasant surprise when he came to visit me Friday.  And for sure, Lee really brightened my day!

SOMETIMES REASONABLENESS AND COMMON SENSE PREVAIL

by Bob Walsh

Colinford Mattis, 32, and Urooj Rahman, 31, are good buddies.  They are also lawyers in New York.  They are also in deep shit.

On May 29 they were out "protesting" in New York city when the cops spot them driving slowly thru a neighborhood in a minivan.  The car stops nad one of them jumps out with a Molotov cocktail that they just happen to have in the car with them and firebombs a police car.

They were initially let out on GPS home confinement and $250,000 bail each. The prosecutor screamed bloody murder and a federal appeals court agreed that their presence in the community was a danger.  Their bail was revoked.  

It will be interesting to see if the feds prosecute them on bombing charges once the locals are done with them. 

EDITOR'S NOTE: But aren't they Colin Kaepernick's freedom fighters attacking an oppressive occupying police force?

BUT SMOKING POT IS SUPPOSED TO MAKE ONE BENIGN

People who regularly smoke cannabis 'are nearly three times more likely to be violent', study finds

 

By Stephen Adams 

 

The Mail On Sunday

June 7, 2020

 

People who regularly smoke cannabis are almost three times more likely to commit a violent offence as those who abstain from the drug, new research has found.

Scientists involved in a landmark study of almost 300,000 teenagers and young adults believe that over time, prolonged cannabis use profoundly alters the brain, making the user less able to control their temper.

In addition, the research found addicts may also suffer from withdrawal symptoms, making them irritable and prone to lashing out.

Psychiatrist Professor Sir Robin Murray, a world-leading expert on the neurological impact of the drug, said the link between cannabis use and violence was a ‘neglected area’. 

Commenting on the study’s findings, he said: ‘This is not a surprise for those of us who follow the scientific literature or see patients who heavily use cannabis.

‘However, it may be a surprise to the many who think cannabis is a chill-out, anti-violence drug.’

 

Britain has been plagued by a succession of brutal killings linked to cannabis in recent years. 

In some of the cases, lawyers have argued the perpetrators should not be found guilty of murder because they were suffering from psychosis, a mental condition now understood to be exacerbated by smoking strong cannabis.

Among the killers was student Femi Nandap, who, in December 2015, stabbed public health expert Jeroen Ensink to death outside his home in North London. 

Mr Ensink, 41, had popped out to post cards announcing that his wife Nadja had given birth to their daughter.

Forensic psychiatrist Dr Samrat Sengupta, of Broadmoor Hospital, told the Old Bailey that the student’s heavy cannabis habit had triggered a genetic psychotic illness. 

Nandap, then 23, was given an indefinite hospital order after admitting manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

The researchers decided to examine 30 individual studies examining the link between cannabis use and violence because ‘the [scientific] literature has shown that cannabis use may lead to violent behaviours and aggression; however, this association has been inconsistent’ – with some studies showing a relationship and others not.

The team from Montreal University in Canada discovered 26 of the 30 studies showed a tendency towards higher levels of violence among cannabis users. 

When they pooled the results – meaning they were looking at a combined group of 296,815 teens and adults under 30 – they found users were more than twice as likely (2.15 times) to have committed a violent offence as non-users. 

Among ‘persistent heavy users’, the risk of violence was 2.81 times higher.

Writing in the American Journal Of Psychiatry, they said: ‘This study suggests that cannabis use appears to be a contributing factor in the perpetration of violence.’

Even when accounting for different life circumstances which might mean cannabis users were more likely to grow up in violent surroundings, they concluded that ‘the effect remained significant’.

Citing neurological research, they said cannabis use during adolescence ‘may cause deterioration of neural structures associated with inhibition and sensation-seeking’, adding: ‘Such neural deficits are expected to limit one’s ability to suppress the urge to act out violently and heighten the risk of developing antisocial behaviours in adulthood.’

THE CIVIL WAR DID NOT END AT APPOMATTOX ... IT WILL CONTINUE UNTIL THE LAST CONFEDERATE MONUMENT HAS BEEN TOPPLED

‘A long time coming’: Iconic Robert E. Lee statue in Virginia to be removed after 130 years

 

By Sarah Rankin and Denise Lavoie

 

Associated Press

June 7, 2020

 

RICHMOND, Va. – David Harris Jr., a nephew of humanitarian and tennis legend Arthur Ashe, tried for decades to get a street named after his uncle in Richmond, the hometown that once denied Ashe access to segregated public tennis courts.

Finally, in 2019, the City Council approved the renaming over the objections of some city residents. So it was gratifying, Harris said, to see Virginia’s governor announce plans to remove an iconic statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee after days of protests over the death of George Floyd.

“My hat is off to them for getting this done,” Harris said Friday. “It took me 25 years to get the street name changed. I commend these young folks for getting these guys to see it within a week and a half.”

In recent days, amid an extraordinary outpouring of grief over Floyd’s death, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam has pledged to remove the Lee statue, while city leaders have also committed to taking down the other four Confederate memorials along Richmond’s prestigious Monument Avenue.

The changes amount to a reshaping of how one of America’s most historic cities tells its story in its public spaces – and a rethinking of whom it glorifies.

“It’s been a long time coming. … We’ve tried marches, petitions, protests, going to city council” to get the Confederate monuments removed, said Phil Wilayto, a longtime community organizer and activist with the Virginia Defenders for Freedom, Justice & Equality. “And it took what is in effect a mass uprising of the community to say these things are not acceptable.”

Republican lawmakers, Confederate heritage groups and a Monument Avenue preservation group have criticized the decisions. Many have equated the monuments’ removal to erasing history.

“Attempts to eradicate instead of contextualizing history invariably fail,” Senate GOP leaders said in a statement.

 

Floyd, a black man in Minneapolis, died after a white officer jammed his knee into his neck for nearly nine minutes as other officers watched. Video captured Floyd’s arrest and final moments, and his death has sparked protests around the world that demonstrators have vowed to turn into a sustained movement focused on addressing racial injustice.

The Richmond monument decisions, part of a wave of Confederate monument removals around the country, has stunned some observers in this former capital of the Confederacy, a place where even three years ago many residents said they considered removing the statues impractical, or nearly impossible due to a state law that protected war memorials.

Late Saturday, a small group of demonstrators toppled a statue o f Confederate Gen. Williams Carter Wickham in Monroe Park, a Richmond police spokeswoman said. She said she did not know if there were any arrests or damage done to the statue.

The new Democratic majority at the General Assembly rewrote that law earlier this year, an effort led by black women lawmakers. It will take effect July 1, giving Richmond and other localities around the state permission to do as they please. The Lee statue, meanwhile, was on state property.

“Yes, that statue has been there for a long time,” Northam said Thursday. “But it was wrong then, and it is wrong now. So we’re taking it down.”

The idea to erect a monument to Lee originated “within hours” of his death, according to a National Register of Historic Places nomination form. Two rival campaigns to raise money for the memorial dragged on for more than 15 years, and the selected site was a gift of a prominent Richmond businessman, the documents show.

The statue was the first of five Confederate monuments to be erected on Richmond’s Monument Avenue. It was unveiled in May 1890, at a time when the Civil War and Reconstruction were long over, and Jim Crow racial segregation laws were on the rise.

The statue arrived in Richmond in pieces from France, where it was created. Thousands of Virginians used wagons to help pull the pieces for more than a mile to what was then an empty field. That field is now part of Monument Avenue, the city’s grandest boulevard and one that’s been visited over the years by dignitaries including then-British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Britain’s Queen Elizabeth.

To white citizens in the late 19th century, the statue of Lee, a Civil War hero and native Virginian, was a cause for celebration. Some even saved pieces of the rope used to haul the statue as souvenirs.

But black citizens felt a deep-seated animosity toward the statue, seeing it as a glorification of slavery, the Civil War and their treatment as second-class citizens, said Julian Hayter, a historian and professor of leadership studies at the University of Richmond.

Today, the 21-foot (6-meter) bronze equestrian sculpture that shows the general in military attire sits atop a 40-foot (12-meter) pedestal on whose side is featured a single word: “Lee.”

Northam emphasized the monument’s enormous size in his remarks Thursday, saying that at six stories tall, it towers over homes, businesses and “everyone who lives in Virginia.”

“And when it’s the biggest thing around, it sends a clear message: ‘This is what we value the most.’ But that’s just not true anymore,” he said.

Joseph Rogers, a descendant of enslaved people and an organizer with the Defenders who spoke with AP this week from a rally at the Lee monument, said he felt he was witnessing history when he learned the statue would be removed.

He also said the moment felt like “a fulfillment of prophecy,” a reference to words written by the black editor of the Richmond Planet newspaper who covered the unveiling of the Lee memorial.

“(The black man) put up the Lee Monument, and should the time come, will be there to take it down,” John Mitchell Jr. wrote.

Elsewhere on the broad avenue are statues to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, generals J.E.B. Stuart and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, and Confederate naval officer Matthew Maury.

Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney announced this week that he and a city councilman would introduce an ordinance removing the statues, and the Richmond Times-Dispatch has reported the city council has unanimously affirmed support for such a move.

Dr. Fergie Reid, who grew up in segregated Richmond and in 1967 became the first African American elected to the Virginia General Assembly since Reconstruction, called the monuments’ removal “long overdue.” But Reid, 95, said he thinks they still have historical value.

“I think they should go to a museum – just like the dinosaurs,” he said.

WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE, WHERE ARE THE PROTESTS?

'We lost a hero': 38-year-old deputy killed, 2 officers injured after ambush in Santa Cruz County, sheriff says

 

By Dan Noyes and Lauren Martinez

 

KGO-TV

June 7, 2020

 

BEN LOMOND, Calif. -- A Santa Cruz County deputy was killed and other officers were injured after an ambush on Saturday, Sheriff Jim Hart said.

Around 1:30 p.m., the sheriff's office received a report of a suspicious van on a turnout at Jamison Creek Road near Ben Lomond. The caller said they saw guns and bomb-making devices inside the vehicle.

When deputies arrived at the scene they saw the van leave and followed the vehicle. As the van pulled into a driveway on Waldeberg Drive, the officers were ambushed with gunfire and many improvised explosives, Hart said.

Sergeant Damon Gutzwiller, 38, was shot and taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.

"In my 32-year career, this is the worst day I've ever experienced," Sheriff Jim Hart said as he began the news conference.

Gutzwiller worked for the sheriff's office since 2006 and is survived by his wife, young child and another on the way. Hart described him as a courageous, intelligent, sensitive and caring man.

"Words cannot express the pain we feel for Damon and his family," Sheriff Jim Hart said, "He was the kind of person we all hope to be. Today, we lost a hero. We are grateful to have known him and we mourn with his family."

During the ambush, another officer was struck by either gunshot or shrapnel from the explosives, then struck by a getaway vehicle, Hart said.

Calls of carjacking soon followed as officers from other departments arrived to the scene.

Hart said another officer was shot in the hand and taken to the hospital. The two officers have not been identified and officials say they are hopeful they will recover.

The suspect, Steven Carrillo of Ben Lomond, was shot during his arrest and transported to the hospital. Hart said Carillo is expected to survive and will be arrested for the murder of Sergeant Gutzwiller and other felonies.

The ABC7 I-Team has new information on Carillo since officials identified him. The I-Team has learned he is 32 years-old and an active duty US Air Force sergeant based out of Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield.

Sources tell ABC7 News' Dan Noyes that investigators found many improvised explosive devices inside Carillo's home Saturday and that the FBI has taken over the case. The working theory is the sheriff's deputies "interrupted something big that was about to happen."

On his Facebook page on May 31, Carillo reposted a meme that said, "I'll never let racist white people make me forget about the dope white people I know exist. I love y'all." The post includes fist emojis of different skin tones, and both of the "whites" in the meme were crossed out. Carillo wrote, "The only race that matters, the human race."

Carillo has two children. His wife, Monika Carrillo, was a First Class Airmen in the Air Force, but she died in an off-base hotel in South Carolina in 2018. Authorities said at the time her death was not suspicious.

The District Attorney's Office is investigating the case and the Santa Cruz Co. will release more information about the incident early next week.

Governor Gavin Newsom issued the following statement regarding the death of Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office Sergeant Damon Gutzwiller:

"Jennifer and I extend our heartfelt condolences to the family, friends and coworkers of Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Sergeant Damon Gutzwiller, who was tragically killed while on duty today. He will be remembered as a hero who devoted his life to protecting the community and as a loving husband and father."

In honor of Sergeant Gutzwiller, Capitol flags will be flown at half-staff and a vigil will be held on Sunday. 

POLITICIANS INSIST IT'S TIME TO DISBAND THE POLICE

Ilhan Omar says it's time to disband Minneapolis Police Department

 

by Andrew Mark Miller

Washington Examiner

June 5, 2020

Rep. Ilhan Omar called for the Minneapolis Police Department to disband following the highly publicized death of George Floyd while in its custody.

“The Minneapolis Police Department has proven themselves beyond reform,” the Minnesota Democrat tweeted Friday. “It’s time to disband them and reimagine public safety in Minneapolis. Thank you to @MplsWard3 for your leadership on this!”

Omar introduced four bills this week aimed at addressing police accountability, governmental response to police brutality, and providing funds for communities affected by police brutality.

Omar’s call for disbanding the police comes as high-profile figures across the country are starting to push for abolishing and defunding police departments as a response to the death of Floyd and police brutality in general.

Singers Lizzo and John Legend joined women’s soccer star Megan Rapinoe in signing a letter this week demanding “divestment from police.”

“Every police department violating people's civil rights must be stripped of federal funding,” Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders tweeted this week in a post that was retweeted by Omar’s “Squad” colleague Rep. Rashida Tlaib.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti expressed support for stripping police funding after the city council introduced a bill that would slash the police budget by up to $150 million, with those funds being reallocated to communities affected by police brutality.

EDITOR'S NOTE: AOC declared she backs the "Defund the Police" movement and demanded that $1 billion be slashed from NYPD's $6 billion budget to be used for children's books and public housing.

JUDGE: "THE THREAT TO PHYSICAL SAFETY AND FREE SPEECH OUTWEIGHS THE THREAT TO PROPERTY"

A federal judge says smashing windows and spraying graffiti is a 'fair trade' if it means protesters' bones aren't broken by the police

 

By Sinéad Baker

 

Insider

June 6, 2020 

 

A federal judge has limited the force police in Denver, Colorado, can use against protesters, saying that breaking windows and spraying graffiti is a "fair trade" if it means protesters are not injured.

U.S. District Court Judge R. Brooke Jackson ruled on Friday night to block the use of chemicals like tear gas and non-lethal weapons like plastic bullets on protesters, saying that their right to free speech was more important than protecting buildings.

"If a store's windows must be broken to prevent a protester's facial bones from being broken or eye being permanently damaged, that is more than a fair trade," Jackson wrote in his page ruling," Reuters reported.

"If a building must be graffiti-ed to prevent the suppression of free speech, that is a fair trade. The threat to physical safety and free speech outweighs the threat to property."

Protests have spread across the country following the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man who died after a police officer in Minneapolis kneeled on his neck for almost nine minutes on May 25.

Jackson temporarily limited the circumstances in which police can use force on protesters, and ordered a clear chain of command regarding its use.

Jackson said that police officers have a "very difficult and often thankless job," but that protesters "have an absolute right to demonstrate and protest the actions of government officials, including police officers."

"It is one of the many freedoms on which this country is built," he wrote.
He said he believed that the mistreatment of protesters and people of color has been committed by a "minority" of police officers in Denver and across the country, but said that some police action has been "disgusting."

He said that Denver police "failed in its duty to police its own."

Reports and video footage from across the country have shown police appearing to use excess force on seemingly peaceful protesters, including shooting at and arresting journalists, shoving a 75-year-old man to the ground so that he then bled from his ears, and punching, kicking, teargassing and firing at protesters.

Videos of such incidents were shown at the court.

Jackson's ruling came after four protesters filed a lawsuit, The Denver Post reported. The lawsuit claimed that Denver police "have engaged in injurious riot control tactics without issuing clear warnings and orders to disperse."

Jackson's ruling is temporary and will last for 14 days, The Denver Channel reported.

The measures the judge imposed, included:

__An officer ranked captain or higher has to give permission for projectiles or chemical agents to be used. They can only do so if they have witnessed acts of violence or destruction that justify that level of force.

__Chemical agents like pepper spray tear gas can only be used after officers order protests to disperse.

__If it seems like protesters cannot hear the order, officers must repeat it before using the chemicals.

__Projectiles cannot be shot at peoples' the head, pelvis or back.

__Projectiles cannot be fired indiscriminately into a crowd.

__No officers from outside Denver can use force in the city where Denver's officers are allowed to use.

__Officers have to keep their body cameras running at all times and are not allowed to block them.

Tyrone Campbell, a Denver Police spokesman, said the police would comply with the judge's order, Reuters reported.

Denver police said on Twitter that it would "comply with the judge's directions, many of which are already in line with our community-consulted Use of Force Policy."

But The Denver Post reported that police said it would seek modifications "that would account for limitations on staffing and body-worn cameras so the directions can be operationalized."

Jackson wrote in his ruling: "Although I do not agree with those who have committed property damage during the protests, property damage is a small price to pay for constitutional rights — especially the constitutional right of the public to speak against widespread injustice."

VIOLENT PROTEST AND THE INTELLIGENTSIA

Scholar Gary Saul Morson sees disturbing parallels between Russia before the Revolution and contemporary America

 

By Barton Swaim 

 

The Wall Street Journal

June 5, 2020

 

The similarities between this week’s riots and the Los Angeles riots of 1992 are obvious. Both were occasioned by appalling video images, and both divided the nation along partisan and ideological lines. The differences between the two events, however, are more revealing. The violence in 1992 came after a court verdict; the beating and arrest of Rodney King had happened more than a year before. This year’s riots came within days of George Floyd’s killing by Minneapolis officers. The riots of 1992 were mostly confined to poor and working-class areas of Los Angeles. This week saw mayhem all over America, and in Los Angeles, New York and elsewhere the rioters targeted wealthy streets and neighborhoods.

But perhaps the most striking difference is the rationalization, and sometimes full-throated defense, of violence from left-wing elites: the glorification of havoc, the vilification of cops and their middle-class admirers, highfalutin defenses of vandalism. The sense of revolution and class warfare was everywhere this week: the cognoscenti and underclass arrayed against the petty bourgeois shop owners; the elite and those they claim to represent against everybody else.

Gary Saul Morson says he has no special insight regarding police actions and the death of George Floyd. But he does have a provocative thesis about America’s current political moment: “To me it’s astonishingly like late 19th-, early 20th-century Russia, when basically the entire educated class felt you simply had to be against the regime or some sort of revolutionary.”

Mr. Morson, 72, is a professor of Russian literature at Northwestern University and an accomplished interpreter of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Anton Chekhov and Leo Tolstoy. Obviously we haven’t arrived at anything like what Lenin called a “revolutionary situation,” Mr. Morson says, but we have arrived at a situation in which well-intentioned liberal people often can’t bring themselves to say that lawless violence is wrong.

In late czarist Russia, some political parties and other groups—the Social Democrats, the anarchists, the Marxists—explicitly endorsed terrorism. “The liberal party—the Constitutional Democrats, they called themselves—did not condone terrorism,” Mr. Morson says. “But they refused to condemn it. And indeed they called for the release from prison of all terrorists, who were pledged to continue terrorism right away. . . . A famous line from one of the liberal leaders put it this way: ‘Condemn terrorism? That would be the moral death of the party.’ ”

The lesson seems highly relevant today. “When you’re dragged along into something you don’t really believe yourself—because otherwise you are identified with those evil people, and your primary identity is being a ‘good guy,’ not like those people—you will wind up supporting things you know to be wrong. And unless there is some moral force that will stop it, the slide will accelerate.”

Mr. Morson, ensconced in his delightfully untidy and book-laden office in Chicago as we chat on Zoom, concedes that a scholar who spends much of his time thinking and writing about Russia’s revolutionary period will tend to look for parallels between that time and our own. The parallels don’t obtain in every way.

But some of them make the analogy worth considering. One is that many of today’s revolutionaries are wildly successful and privileged. Take Colinford Mattis and Urooj Rahman, both New York lawyers in their 30s, who have been criminally charged for attempting to firebomb a police vehicle with a Molotov cocktail. Mr. Mattis was educated at Princeton and New York University, Ms. Rahman at Fordham.

Why do people at the top want to destroy the system that enabled them to get there? “No,” Mr. Morson says, “you have it wrong. When you’re such a person, you don’t feel you’re at the top. The people at the top are wealthy businesspeople, and you’re an intellectual. You think that people of ideas should be at the top.”

The word “intelligentsia,” he notes, comes from Russian. In the classic period, from about 1860 to the First Russian Revolution in 1905, “the word did not mean everybody who was educated. It meant educated people who identified with one or another of the radical movements. ‘Intelligents’ believed in atheism, revolution and either socialism or anarchism.

“The idea was that since they knew the theory, they were morally superior and they should be in charge, and that there was something fundamentally wrong with the world when ‘practical’ people were. So what you take from your education would be the ideology that would justify this kind of activity—justify it because the wrong people have the power, and you should have it. You don’t feel like you’re the establishment.”

Is American society, shaped by Protestant Christianity and dominated by a kind of dovish, humanitarian left-liberalism, ever likely to fall into the barbarity of the Russian Revolution? Aren’t we too—I fumble for a word as I formulate the question—soft for that sort of totalizing violence?

“I don’t know,” Mr. Morson answers after a long pause. “I don’t know if that means people won’t go as far as they did in Russia, or if it just means there will be less resistance to it.”

The danger begins, he thinks, when complex social and political problems can’t be debated any longer. “You get into a revolutionary situation because people can’t hear,” he says. “Can there be a dialogue on important questions, or is there only one thing to say about every question? Are people afraid to say, ‘Well, yes, but it’s not quite as simple as that’? . . . When you can’t do that, you’re heading to a one-party state or a dictatorship of some sort. If one party is always wrong and another always right, why not just have the right one?”

Mr. Morson speaks with conviction about the peril of “ideological segregation”: “It was very easy for white people to believe evil things of black people when they never met any. But when you live with somebody, you realize that they’re no worse than you are. . . . We’ve increasingly had ideological segregation on both sides. Each side has caricature views of the other.”

The assumption of historical inevitability may play a part here. You hear it in our political language: A favored policy is “an idea whose time has come,” a disfavored one is “on the wrong side of history.” This sort of teleological thinking—history has a direction, and that direction is identical with our political views—is fervently, if unconsciously, embraced by highly educated people today. It was also “one of the central arguments of late-19th-century Russian thought,” Mr. Morson says.

“Does history have a direction? And is later necessarily better? The greatest thinkers—Tolstoy, Alexander Herzen—answered no, later is not always better. They believed that sort of thinking was an importation of religious providentialism into history—the determinism of Hegel and Marx. The difficulty of this form of thinking is that it paralyzes you from acting. Between the wars, it was common for people to say: ‘Yes, you may like liberal democracy, but that’s of the past. We fascists are of the future.’ Or ‘We communists are of the future.’ People would resign themselves to the inevitable and conclude, ‘Well I can’t fight the future, I can’t resist the fascists or the communists.’ ”

I suggest that the American left is very fond of this teleological language—Barack Obama spoke in his first inaugural address of the “worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics.” But Mr. Morson reminds me that Ronald Reagan used similar rhetoric. “Part of being a revolutionary is knowing that you don’t have to acquiesce to the tired, old ideas of the past,” he said in a 1985 speech.

Another marker of the Russian intelligentsia was the sheer contempt its members had for the peasants and workers they claimed to represent. “How many workers, how many peasants, were even in the Bolshevik Party? Very few. . . . Lenin’s whole idea was that ‘the working class, left to itself, will never develop more than a trade-union consciousness.’ That’s his famous phrase. They had to be led by the intelligentsia and completely disciplined. No matter what you say, they will do it, no matter how violent. They don’t have to understand the reasons, they’ll just do it. Because they’re the agents of history, as Marx described them. . . . That implies a contempt for the working class and a greater contempt for the peasantry.”

The supposition that America is moving toward anarchy or revolution because we’ve had a week of riots—or three years of bad faith and acrimony, or three decades of polarization—still seems hard to accept. Mr. Morson is careful not to predict the course of events. He uses the phrase “insofar as the Russian example applies” more than once.

But, he says, “we have a major depression, we have terrible fear from the illness, and now we have mass riots in the street, which our leaders do not seem to know how to handle. That’s a very rapid slide from only a year ago. And there’s no reason to think it will slow down. The slide could well continue.”

And history can unfold in unpredictable ways. Who would have guessed 20 years ago, he asks, that the First Amendment’s free-speech guarantee would become passé on the liberal left? “I used to get a laugh from students by quoting a Soviet citizen I talked to once. He said to me, ‘Of course we have freedom of speech. We just don’t allow people to lie.’ That used to get a laugh! They don’t laugh anymore.”

THE OLD LIBERAL ORDER IS UNDER SIEGE

In the past two weeks, Black Lives Matter has essentially converged with the entire modern U.S. establishment, from academia to the media to corporate leaderships

 

By Gerard Baker

 

The Wall Street Journal

June 5, 2020

 

History mocks us all eventually. It’s the rare pundit or politician who doesn’t find that once passionately held verities are eventually undone by the steady march of inconvenient events.

This week I listened to prominent Republican Never Trumpers—who took the U.S. into perhaps the worst foreign policy adventure in its history, promising to impose democracy in Iraq through the deployment of the U.S. military—as they denounced a president for destroying democracy by threatening to deploy the U.S. military. It brought a bitter smile to my lips.

The main lesson—one that those of us who supported the Iraq war have learned with humility and regret—is that the U.S. military isn’t perhaps the best tool for imposing democracy, in Firdos Square or Lafayette Square.

But an even larger historical lesson is being taught now in the tumult of current events. It resonates across the years to those innocent days when Americans believed in a world that could be united under the banner of a patented liberal democracy that seemed to have triumphed over all other systems and ideologies.

The battle being waged in the country is about many things—race, justice, inequality—but it is at root about the rapidly accelerating unraveling of the liberal consensus. This isn’t a partisan phenomenon, as some people would have us believe; it’s not all the fault of a would-be dictator issuing threats of violent domestic repression from the White House. It’s a broad-based collapse of confidence in the system that America has pioneered, propagated and led for the last half-century.

It’s only by recognizing this deeper crisis that we can understand a particular curiosity in the fight being waged in the wake of the killing of George Floyd last month. On what appears to be the principal point of contention, the nation isn’t really that divided at all.

The vast majority of people in the U.S. seem to agree not only that there was a specific injustice done to Mr. Floyd, captured in the video of that depraved act by a police officer in Minneapolis, but that there is a larger injustice that African-Americans face. A Pew Research poll conducted in late May found that almost two thirds of white Americans thought black Americans were not treated fairly by the criminal justice system.

But the struggle clearly concerns a much more radical disagreement over what this country is and what it ought to be. The protesters proclaim that the injustices are a reflection of “systemic racism,” derived from the original sin of America, and the remedies they propose are revolutionary. The Black Lives Matter movement wants to “defund the police,” redistributing those funds to programs for social injustice.

These arguments have been raging for years, but what’s different about the current climate is the much wider acceptance of the critique and the remedy. In the past two weeks, Black Lives Matter has essentially converged with the entire modern establishment, from academia, to the media, to corporate leaderships. More Democrats for the first time openly expressed support for the movement’s key policy objective. In New York and Los Angeles, controlled by Democrats, city councils are considering measures for steep cuts in police budgets.

This radicalism is a threat to the fading liberal order. One of the new things this week was the sight of major companies across America rallying to the cause of Black Lives Matter, while others found themselves challenged by activist employees. At the New York Times, a revolt by reporters forced the company into an abject renunciation of an op-ed by a leading Republican senator. At Facebook, employees are trying to force their CEO to censor presidential pronouncements they find objectionable.

 

A basic tenet of the old liberal order is the toleration of views we find detestable, not least because airing them enables them to be examined and rebutted. The larger illiberalism on today’s left involves the deplatforming and denunciation of those who won’t sign up for the prevailing orthodoxy.

America now finds itself facing authoritarian nationalism on the one side, led by a Trumpian Republican Party that angrily rejects plurality and deviation, and on the other side, an increasingly illiberal liberalism that compels submission to identity politics.

There was once a comforting hope among some Americans in the political middle ground that the Trump years would mark some sort of aberration, that after four years of a bracing, terrifying experiment, the old order would assert itself. Not anymore. Fasten your seat belts. The order itself is under siege.

ROGER GOODELLSUPPORTS DISRESPECT FOR FLAG AND COUNTRY ..... BOYCUT THE UNPATRIOTIC NFL!

By Howie Katz

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell now support's Colin Kaepernick and encourages NFL players to take a knee during the playing of the National Anthem.  What a worthless piece of shit!

Here is what Goodell said on Friday:
 
“We, the National Football League, condemn racism and the systematic oppression of black people,” Goodell said. "We, the National Football League, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. We, the National Football League, believe black lives matter. I personally protest with you and want to be part of the much needed change in this country. Without black players, there would be no National Football League. And the protests around the country are emblematic of the centuries of silence, inequality and oppression of black players, coaches, fans and staff. We are listening. I am listening, and I will be reaching out to players who have raised their voices and others on how we can improve and go forward for a better and more united NFL family.”

It looks like everyone of note is getitng on the BLM bandwagon.  With Goodell joining in, look for Kaepernick now to land a job with one of the NFL teams.

Kaepernick inciting the 'freedom fighters' to riot, burn and loot has been completely disregarded.

We should boycut the NFL, but that will never happen with our sports-hungey fans.