Anyone who thinks race does not skew the application of criminal justice in this country is just not paying close enough attention, Sen. Rand Paul writes for TIME, amid violence in Ferguson, Mo. over the police shooting death of Michael Brown
The shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown is an awful tragedy that continues to send shockwaves through the community of Ferguson, Missouri and across the nation.
If I had been told to get out of the street as a teenager, there would have been a distinct possibility that I might have smarted off. But, I wouldn’t have expected to be shot.
Poster Boy for demilitarization of the police?
Rand Paul is a mess. He is a confused conservative Tea Partier, with a mishmash of a few seemingly good stated positions and way too many restrictive, tight-butted, narrow-minded social positions.
I wouldn’t use him as the Poster Boy for demilitarization of the police or anything else. Neither would I promenade his voiced opinions in the media on it.
And yes, I knew about his “libertarian” views on drugs. However, conservatives have some historical streaks of libertarian views but they are always not enough.
Agreeing and disagreeing
Sometimes I agree with Rand Paul and sometimes I don’t. Since I almost never agree with anyone 100% on all things, I’m ok with that. In other words, if I disagree with some things a person says, I don’t allow that to negate everything they say. I allow myself to agree with them when I think they’re right.
Most people don’t take strong stands or say much of anything at all. The people who do dare to speak out are very often branded as kooks. It takes a cerrtain kind of person to dare to question certain things and that person may not appeal to everyone. But I have to give them credit for speaking up, just because frank speaking is necessary in a democracy, or else it isn’t a democracy at all. It’s just a weird form of social interaction where the only available option is to ‘Like.’ Not liking is not allowed, which simply means that contrary opinion is forced underground where it can fester.
The schizophrenic mess we’ve been living with....
I agree with you on some level about agree and disagree on some points. But that luxury I allow more for coffee table conversations. There I give them some credit. But when it comes to political office holders or seekers who make or want to make laws that affect everyone, my generosity of allowance is quite different. I simply don’t want a person with his imbalance of good and bad positions (as I see them) in a powerful office to make laws.
And, if you only knew how I wish we really did live in a democracy. I’m not even saying a democracy is better than our republic but after all the politicized schizophrenic mess we’ve been living with, I’d even give democracy a try.
Selectboards somewhat complicit
I have yet to hear any Selectboard say no to any request of equipment or training from the police. The “free money” provided by Homeland Security is readily accepted. If we had to pay with property taxes, the purchases would get more scrutiny, I’m sure.
It is equally rare that board members ask why a request is necessary, or how it will be used.
The boards have approved quite a slate of tools, equipment, and training over the years.
Keene’s “tank”
“We’re going to have our own tank.” That’s what Keene, N.H., Mayor Kendall Lane whispered to Councilman Mitch Greenwald during a December city council meeting. It’s not quite a tank. But the quaint town of 23,000 — scene of just two murders since 1999 — had just accepted a $285,933 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to purchase a Bearcat, an eight-ton armored personnel vehicle made by Lenco Industries Inc. (Huffington Post)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/16/police-tank-purchase-new-hampshire_n_1279983.html
It looks like this is a NEW vehicle, not Army surplus.
BEARCAT stands for Ballistic Engineered Armored Response Counter Attack Truck. Is this the future of “crowd control”? Are they afraid of the Free Staters or something? We can’t have terrorists putting money in somebody else’s parking meter!
But there’s more: But those plans are on hold for now, thanks to a backlash from feisty residents.
Does anybody know how this all shook out?
You covered it….
You reported on it here:
https://www.ibrattleboro.com/article.php?story=20120217084846434
We were funnier then
I just read the original story linked to above and reread the comments. We were a lot feistier bunch ourselves back then! What, are we afraid the NSA are going to report us to the militarized police if we say the wrong thing? (You don’t have to answer that.) I miss the bad old days two years ago when freedom wasn’t just another word.
Alzheimers?
You have a better memory than I have.
However, I couldn’t find out if they did keep it, or not.
If they still have it, how are they using it?
And then there’s the Pentagon’s 1033 Program
Small-town police departments across the country have been gobbling up tons of equipment discarded by a downsizing military — bicycles, bed sheets, bowling pins, French horns, dog collars, even a colonoscopy machine — regardless of whether the items are needed or will ever be used.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=207340981
From the Phoenix 1887 A new fangled police gun
Vermont phœnix. (Brattleboro, Vt.) November 25, 1887
“Dr. Gatling, the inventor of the famous
gun that bears that name, has invented a
“police gun,” for use in case of riots. It
is a brass gun, weighing 78 pounds, mounted on a tripod.
It works like a Gatling and will deliver 1000 shots a minute, up,
down, or sideways, and will clear streets
or house tops in a very short time. The
cities that are troubled with anarchist out
breaks are looking very sharp at this gun.”
Here is the link to that short story.
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn98060050/1887-11-25/ed-1/seq-2/
And here is a smaller, and earlier model of a Police owned Gatling gun.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ctarchives/4522698375/in/set-72157623860066040
VT State, local police stocking up with military equipment
VT State police have acquired 65 military rifles and an 18-ton armored vehicle through a federal program that allows state and local police to acquire surplus material from the military virtually without cost, records show.
Local police across the state also obtain everything from Humvees to shotguns to generators through a program known as 1033, according to the Vermont National Guard, which oversees the program in the state.
Police chiefs say the program allows departments on tight budgets to obtain vital equipment at a fraction of the cost, because they only have to pay shipping. They also say police need more protection from increasingly armed civilians.
The American Civil Liberties Union says 1033 and programs like it allow local police access to weapons they wouldn’t otherwise have.
Read full text: http://vtdigger.org/2014/09/04/state-local-police-stocking-military-equipment/