Posted on 08/16/2014 7:01:18 AM PDT by lwd
The "narrative" of Ferguson, Missouri changed somewhat today. But, amid the confusion, the blundering stupidity of the city's police department remains consistent.
This morning the Police Chief, Thomas Jackson, released security-camera shots of the late Michael Brown apparently stealing a five-dollar box of cigarillos from a convenience store. So the 18-year old shot dead by Chief Jackson's officer was no longer a "gentle giant" en route to college but just another crappy third-rate violent teen n'er-do-well.
{SNIP}
It's important, when something goes wrong, to be clear about what it is that's at issue. Talking up Michael Brown as this season's Trayvonesque angel of peace and scholarship was foolish, and looting stores in his saintly memory even worse. But this week's pictures from Ferguson, such as the one above, ought to be profoundly disquieting to those Americans of a non-looting bent.
The most basic problem is that we will never know for certain what happened. Why? Because the Ferguson cruiser did not have a camera recording the incident. That's simply not credible. "Law" "enforcement" in Ferguson apparently has at its disposal tear gas, riot gear, armored vehicles and machine guns ...but not a dashcam. That's ridiculous.
(Excerpt) Read more at steynonline.com ...
If I ran a department, all cops would wear Google Glass with all video recordings uploaded in real-time to a central server. There’s no reason nowadays for the police not to have footage of arrests.
To be clear the perp wasn’t shot for stealing cigars....assault of a police officer occurred before the shooting. Time will tell if it was a good shoot or not but the narrative being floated doesn’t jive with that video!!
Just think what the gentle, college bound giant could’ve accomplished if he had not run into that policeman.
Has the world perhaps been denied the developer of a cure against cancer, diabetes, depression and hangnail?
Naw. Plenty of stupid all around. From the local PD to Federal interference, to a mud-racking press and the professional grievance mongers.
Nobody’s wearing absolute halos in this tragic story.
It has been said that truth is one of the first casualties of war, and many people have seemingly resigned themselves to a state of war. The only imperative is to personally survive, and always better me than you.
As far as Satan is concerned, that makes it time for a part-eh. (And don’t you think that God is grieving?)
No technology served up by man will be perfect, but it usually is an improvement over the prior status quo. I agree with Steyn about the cameras. And yet myriad things have gone wrong here and if blame were blue, just about everybody here would be fairly dripping blue.
GOD has been forgotten. Will it take lots of incidents like this before people begin to get the idea that He should be sought to honor, day in and day out?
Someone reported it though, because it was broadcast to the police.
I'm not sure if a dashcam would have recorded the actual shooting because the action was on the driver's side of the vehicle.
PING
First we were treated to Saint Trevon, now we have Saint Michael.
To be accurate about people’s sentiments, now people are resigning themselves to a state of siege, of prolonged earthly war, and are considering what used to be unthinkable, thinkable.
There was a greater light illuminating your community than illuminates many communities today. And the trouble is, very few people are willing to identify that light as God. Hypostasized nouns fall short. A serious relationship with God will always show us newly how to improve our situation, hence has a progressive side. And yet it calls us to keep on remembering fundamental principles that are not negotiable, hence has a conservative side.
I think that was a reasonable decision.
Seems the idiots we support and pay with our tax dollars see us - the public - as the enemy. It's mentally ill paranoid stuff. It fueled Lois Lerner. Kept the FBI from interviewing Tea Party member. Armed up Social Security with millions of bullets. It's nuts.
It's not just Ferguson it's happening around the country. Cops being told they're soldiers in a hostile country. That 'lone wolves' are out to get them.
Democrats are behind this paranoid police state mentality - with ONE exception. Democrats have exempted the people who protect our borders. I'm surprised they allow border agents to have guns. (Do you sense something's wrong?)
Brutal 'police as occupying force' was designed to intimidate middle class Americans. It started with lies put out by the Southern Poverty Law Center that conservative Americans wanted to kill police officers. That's where the militarization started. Totalitarian idiots like Holder and Jef took it to new heights... pushing lies about 'conservative lone wolves'... paranoia in the minds of these fools. So here we are sixteen years later with pictures that look more like a war zone than an American city.
I agree that the police are becoming too militarized, but I think Steyn is underestimating the type of feral crowds that exist in Ferguson as opposed to areas of Europe. Europe can get away with their socialist societies because almost everybody contributes and pays taxes. With ‘47%’ of Americans uneducated, uncivilized and unproductive, it leads to powder keg situations like Ferguson.
I think it started with Rudy Giuliani in NYC. He "cracked down" on crime in NYC. Had an effect too. Crime went down, people started feeling safe. Everyone, including me, applauded. Other cities copied NYC.
We are now finding there was a price to pay for that order. Now EVERYONE knows what if feels like to have a cop scowl at you, challenging your right to be in a public place. Being pulled over for no good reason and challenged to prove you are not breaking the law. And the never ending stories of police brutality, even in "OUR" neighborhoods.
Secondly, if you think the police are so bad, take a look at what happened when there was no police.
I have no idea what actually happened, but it seems like there was a struggle in the police car (and I’ll assume it was the perp who started it, but I don’t even know that), this freaked the cop out as he was suddenly fighting for his life, the perp made a break for it, and in a panic the cop shot him dead.
If, as I describe above, my story is accurate, then the police officer is guilty of murder of some degree. When the mind panics, it essentially stops thinking and goes into survival mode. While this understandable on the human level, police officers are supposed to be trained to avoid panic and staying cool.
This does not mean the Perp was a good person. It does not mean the looting is justified. It only means the cops might have made a terrible mistake so bad, it cost a teen of questionable character his life. Not Good.
From a political standpoint, most black teens and young black adults are killed by other blacks. This, as we know, gets zero attention although it happens all the freakin’ time. When, however; a white dude kills a black dude, the left wing politicians try desperately to pull us back into 1950’s Selma Alabama. One of these days, I hope we can finally tell the ‘race hustlers’ to go blow.....the system is a a good one.....it’s in place.....and, all this will be sorted out in a court of law.
One very good point almost made here is, how about passing a law that all police departments install dash cams in the cars and the images are sent in real time to a secure site that the cops can’t get to when said images are ‘inconvenient’. Penalty, among others, all involved are fired for non-compliance including the chief or sheriff. Cops shouldn’t get in the car if the cam doesn’t work.
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