Robert Stacy McCain reacts to the shooting of two Ferguson, Missouri police officers in the most predictable way imaginable: “Months of anti-police agitation produce the expected consequences.”
Scared Monkeys is a little less reserved: “ARE YOU HAPPY BARACK OBAMA, ERIC HOLDER, AL SHARPTON AND THE MSM? YOU FINALLY GAVE THE MOB WHAT THEY WANTED … BLOOD…THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN GOVERNMENT FANS THE FLAMES OF RACISM. ERIC HOLDER INCITED THIS BY HIS ACTIONS, RATHER THAN ACTING LIKE AN ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR ALL THE PEOPLE.”
As for the Justice Department report that supposedly motivated these attempted murders:
The open season on police officers in Ferguson, MO takes place following the over the top, scathing Justice Department report alleging bias in the police department and court and the resignation of Ferguson police chief Tom Jackson. However, this is what happens when you pander to the mob. This is what happens when Attorney General vows to dismantle the Ferguson police department and at the same time he and Barack Obama fail to mention that “Stand Up, Don’t Shoot” was based on a complete and total lie.
Another right-wing site says, “this is an entirely expected consequence after over half a year of anti-cop agitation.”
This reminds me of something I read in the BuzzFeed profile of Lindsey Graham’s neo-confederate advisor, Richard Quinn.
“King’s memory represents, more than anything else, the idea that institutional arrangement — laws, ordinances and tradition — should be subordinated to the individual’s conscience,” wrote Quinn. “The brand of civil disobedience he preached (and for which he is remembered) exhorts his followers to regard social reform as a process to be carried out in the streets.”
He concluded: “Ignoring the real heroes in our nation’s life, the blacks have chosen a man who represents not their emancipation, not their sacrifices and bravery in service to their country; rather, they have chosen a man whose role in history was to lead his people into a perpetual dependence on the welfare state, a terrible bondage of body and soul.”
The latter argument about welfare dependence is a familiar one, but the thing about subordinating respect for laws, ordinances and tradition to an individual’s conscience is refreshingly frank and revealing.
And if that tradition is Jim Crow and those ordinances are just fines issued to the black community to keep taxes low for white folks? That’s just the “institutional arrangement.”
The most important point may not even be strictly relevant here because we don’t know what motivated the shooting. But the idea, at least, is that since someone shot at the police they must have been reacting to anti-cop agitation. There’s no possibility that they were reacting to their dissatisfaction with the “institutional arrangement.” You can be blamed if you protest the police and then some policemen get shot, but you cannot be blamed if you treat your community inequitably and someone gets angry about it and shoots you.
This finger-pointing can be pretty high school, if you ask me. The right’s anti-government rhetoric puts politicians of all parties at heightened risk, but they think it’s worth the risk. I disagree, but I can tell the difference between expressing a political preference and inciting a riot. It’s not the hypocrisy that bothers me here so much as the idea that you fan the flames of racism if you fight for social reform in the streets, or if you tell people about racist policies they are mostly already well informed about.
I don’t know who shot these police officers or why they did it. They were in no way justified regardless of what motivated them. But if you feel like you have to place some blame, place it on the people who made the Ferguson police department the enforcement arm of a very bad “institutional arrangement.”
On the other hand
This is OK
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/11/1370303/-VIDEO-White-Michigan-man-on-open-carry-walk-prompt
s-school-lockdown-taunts-cops-and-lives
Everyone NOT in the RW Echo Chamber says: “Chickens coming home to roost”.
The Mayor, City Judge, City Clerk (City Clerk is essentially CFO for small towns), Police Chief, Police Administration and Police in cahoots for 50 years.
All the King’s Men meets the Sound and the Fury.
Color me skeptical but it seems peculiar that Ferguson has seen demonstrations for over 6 months where there was pushing and shoving, businesses trashed, looting and deep anger but no shootings, no deaths. This incident is being reported took place with shots fired 125-140 yards away from officers, fired from a handgun. At that range, to hit one officer in the head and the other in the upper body could be called pretty good shooting.
Firing from a distance could translate into a shooter from outside Ferguson who didn’t want what some would eagerly call protection from the community but instead feared being id’d by a community struggling to make sense of all this.
So for the moment I’m interested to see if this will play out as a shooter from outside the community stepping in to make big trouble.
St Louis Co. police chief Belmar practices that “immoral imagination” President Obama spoke about at the Selma March Commemoration.
The situation in Ferguson will just get worse if those in charge don’t start doing something different. The police department is acting like they are under siege. A self imposed one. Have you seen the pictures?…the police dept is surrounded by yellow tape and cars blocking off the streets. The police dept needs to be closed…layoff everyone and board the place up. Start over. If does not happen soon the stupid Gov. will call out the National Guard and we will be back to tear gas and flash bang bombs.
It must be noted: these two officers were not Ferguson police officers. Both were from different municipalities within St Louis Co. It appears no Ferguson police were among those outside the department. At least 8 other municipalities PDs were there as if to show Blue allegiance to the racist Law enforcement of the region exemplified in the public eye at Ferguson. In fact, officers from outside Ferguson were manning the front of the department before the protest actually developed and continued to swell to as many as 70 POs.
Protestors and the DoJ report make it clear that Ferguson is not the only problem in St louis Co. Chief Belmar of the St Louis Co. police department is still “in charge” of Protest associated activities but was not on site at this protest apparently. Although this “officer involved shooting” incident investigation is under their authority.
Well check this out
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/jeff-roorda-dead-cops-ferguson
Did this guy attend the Patrick Lynch school for police union chiefs/presidents? Might want to enroll in a different school. Police union President Patrick Lynch gets hostile reception during Bronx precinct visit.
I predict the rightist response to this post will be: No one was killing cops before the protests. It wouldn’t have haened without them!
Ugh.
Are these the same “big brains” that were looking for dark skinned Muslims in the immediate aftermath of the OKC bombing?
The two officers have been treated and released from the hospital.
A nut or nuts that seized an opportunity to shoot police officers as payback for some real or imagined personal injury or injustice that cops or the justice system imposed on the individual(s)? Random shootings of police are somewhat rare. The three recent ones (NYC, PA, and Las Vegas) were different but the perps were all mentally unhinged. Most likely the case here.
However, wouldn’t exclude the possibility that this was a low-rent, “false flag” type provocation. The distance and use of a pistol suggests an intent not to kill but injure. Rightwingers blaming Ferguson protesters will look even more loathsome if it turns out that “one of their own” done it.
Witnesses saw light effects that indicate a rifle with the shots coming from a hill behind Protestors.
Chief Belmar’s crack investigation unit aided by a SWAT team this morning removed 3 people in handcuffs (according to neighbors) from a house in Ferguson and is searching the house for evidence- released already is a photo on line of blood on a gold carpet presumably in the house. ????
Witnesses saw light effects that indicate a rifle…
So much for eyewitnesses. As the officers were released from the hospital this morning, it suggested that the weapon wasn’t a rifle.
Marie2- Agreed that eye witnesses are not always reliable but take Chief Belmar’s truthiness with a grain of salt also.
Belmar said the officers (released within 10 hours) were seriously injured in a situation like the NYC December ambush. Reported by Matt Pearce today at 1:15 p.m. http://touch.latimes.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-83038098/
Wouldn’t expect reliability from Belmar or most police chiefs. However, wrt the weapon, too many bullet in too many hands at this point for Belmar lie about the weapon.
They would believe it was one of their own.
He would of course be FRAMED
The shooting victims last night got immediate medical attention, rather than having to lie where they fell for several hours. I haven’t heard the first word from police or other city officials about whether either of the victims has misbehaved in the recent or distant past, which might be the reason they were shot.
Baby steps, people.
How do we know the shooter last night wasn’t an outside agitator? Meaning a fellow traveler of the ginger Charles Johnson, Lindsey Graham, Sean Insanity and BillO the Clown?
Not to mention there is no evidence yet to conclude the shooter was aiming at Protestors or Police.
Meaning, of course, aiming at Protestors or aiming at armed police, or just shooting to scare the shit out of people because they want to make mischief.
This would have been the perfect time for a false flag.
that will be ignored:
before commenting on the motive behind a crime, first find out the facts surrounding the crime.
Maybe its the ex-Prosecutor in me, but having been involved in the prosecution a public case with media attention, I know first hand just how bad initial reports have been.
We have no idea who did this. We don’t know why.
urtis Holley, Joseph Kane, Gerald Kane, Brend Cole, Jerad Miller, Amanda Miller, Curtis Algier, …
all cop killers, all white.
They are right to blame you. You deserve much more than mere blame.
Too many cop fictionalized facts don’t add up in the shooting case.
A handgun shot 3 times, hits 2 people, from 125 feet away?
Watch for a railroaded citizen soon, before the rational questions about rifle or pistol & who were the targets-cops or Protestors-emerges larger than the shock and sympathy.
There is a reason Jeff Roorda has gone national screaming a new mantra: “Protestors want dead cops”.
Maybe also a reason no Ferguson cops were assigned “riot control” outside FPD that night.
Jeff Roorda: “Protestors want [any & all] cops dead”. Post DoJ script in St Louis County. The victim switcheroo.