Truth be told, the average middle class person benefits from more law enforcement, not less, blacks included.

For every gangbanger, there are 100 kids trying to walk to school in safety who only wishes there was a police on every corner and parked on the street.

One of the big lies of the 30 year regime that has decimated our middle class is to turn police and citizens against each other.

This allows decay, fear and crime to seep in under the anarchy.

Effective policing can turn ravaged and impoverished areas back to health. This is why the elites fear an ordered society.

@2: really? 30 years ago police and citizens were united? "elites fear an ordered society"? "seeping in under the anarchy"?

How about SPD starts hiring officers who actually live in Seattle, rather than hillbillies like Randy Jokela who live an hour away in Enumclaw?

@4: Well, if all SPD had to be live in Seattle there wouldn't be much of force. In case you haven't heard, housing is very expensive in the city.
Please don't bash Enumclaw. It's a fine community with fine people.

#5

I have proposed that cities offer police free housing in high crime areas if they make it their primary residence.

#3

"really?" ?

Ms. Thompson's thesis is quite fantastic. I am very dubious of this: "historians would agree (what) happened is that, in so many cities, the police became the proxy for what the white community wants." No, I don't agree with that and many Americans don't know that anyway. They still believe by & large, that the police "serve and protect" the community.

On the other hand, I am definitely more for "community policing". I like beat cops who walk or ride a bike in neighborhoods. I don't believe police in cars benefit "community policing". I also believe police "should" (I can't compel) reside in the cities/communities they serve. Granted, that's difficult for some officers. But, efforts should be made to reside in those cities/communities. It is very important for officers to live close to where they serve.

One other thing is necessary, a better community to serve. Juan Williams is spot on:

http://online.wsj.com/articles/juan-will…

I don't believe Michael Brown should have been shot. And, the incident must be investigated thoroughly. But, to paraphrase Bill Cosby, "What the hell was Brown doing with a box of stolen cigarillos?"

Shorter lark: he didn't deserve to be shot, but come on, he asked for it.

Well, here we have a good sampling of the excuses white America makes when the reality of racist policing makes them uncomfortable.

@3 - "this wasn't a problem back in my day, the only answer is more police"

@8 - "black people commit crimes against other black people, therefore the cops are blameless"

@9 - "those blacks are just asking for trouble, no wonder they get shot [obligatory disclaimer that this black person should maybe have not been shot]"

The sum total of these arguments and the people that buy into them is our current situation in which it's OK for police officers to execute black men on suspicion of petty crimes, but if a white man commits an act of mass murder (McVeigh, Holmes, Loughner, etc.) we make sure to take them alive and give them due process under the law.

@5 i'm sure you don't know this, since you don't know anything, but cops make a lot of money. Jokela makes almost twice as much as I do, and I seem to be living in the city.

@11: you've mistaken me @3 for Bailo @2. don't ever do that.

@5: Randy Jokela made $172,000 last year as a cop. That's more than enough to live in Seattle.

The reason Seattle cops don't live in Seattle isn't because Seattle is too expensive, it's because Seattle cops don't like our kind.

@11

Try and hold-on to one simple fact:

Nobody is saying Michael Brown was due for a bullet because of his cigar misadventures. (But, please, let's not frost over it as a petty crime. It was a felony strong arm robbery, not sampling a few grapes in the produce section).

Offc. Wilson's side of the story is that the behavior of Brown (following a lawful request) necessitated the use of lethal force.

There will be several enquiries into this – county and Federal, criminal and civil – so let's not pretend that white cops are tooling around town picking off black kids without the balance of the justice system weighing in.

If you're going to be pissed off that Wilson is exonerated for ANY reason, then just be self-aware that you'd be no better than the worst racist cop (and there are some) for judging and sentencing Offc. Wilson without the benefit of the full evidence.

You might (might) make the case, in looking at arrests and convictions that blacks are unfairly targeted by the criminal justice industry.

But if you simply look at crimes committed, the greatest danger to Michael Brown isnt' a cop. It's another "Michael Brown." It's not like the murder rate is high in white communities and they just hide the bodies better. Black America is a dangerous place to be, largely and regrettably due to the culture of violence in Black America.


Clearly, the urban black "community" is in crisis. Since Brown's death there's been another dozen plus killings in Chicago.

http://homicides.suntimes.com/2014/08/18…

And here comes the weekend...

We can and should celebrate the many great things about black culture. And there are many. But we should be equally critical of the fucked-up family structures, rhetorical nonsense of union bureaucrats fluffing their nests, coercive politicization of religion. (Notice Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson race to Missouri, but respect each other's fundraising turf while the slaughter continues in the communities their alleged to represent.)

And then there's the federal dependency schemes, the lack of school choice, the pervasive racism of low academic expectations, the institutional employment traps, the regulatory state which crushes urban entrepreneurship. (Watch a young black woman try and open a hair weaving and nail studio and you'll see the boot of the State come down.)

If Wilson is shown to be a racist cop, jail him. But let's not let Ferguson serve as distraction from the real and insidious attacks on the black community, which result in young black men killing each other in staggering numbers.

It starts with self-empowerment and a will to live free of systems, belonging to "community" out of choice, not necessity.

Efforts to couple African Americans to subsidies, government jobs, assistance programs, loans and artificial "communities" appear to provide well-meaning help (at first), but typically result in a sort of enslavement.

Zok You've been spinning your speculative narrative of what is going on in Ferguson on here for days. *yawn* You've also demonstrated a complete lack of ability to self reflect. So I choose not to comment on any of that drivel.

I'll simply say this: The Grand jury hearing that begins today has already been tainted by the DA. Why do I say this? That is simple, the DA has offered to allow Officer Wilson to testify. It is extremely rare for suspect to testify at Grand jury hearings for reasons I'll allow others to explain to you. If it is that important to the DA that Officer Wilson be allowed to testify he could of opted for a Pretrial instead which unlike a Grand jury hear is open to the public. But no he choose instead to add to the pile of missteps that have occurred.

There is something happening here what it is ain't exactly clear.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEHgxzi9…

I've been reading a lot of history of the implementation of segregation in 20th-century America, and Thomson is absolutely correct. The "Great Migration" of black people from the South to the cities of the North was greeted with literally thousands of riots, bombings, fires, home invasions, and plain beatings in the street -- and in black families's living rooms. All of this violence was perpetrated by white people against black.

This is, of course, on top of the extraordinary amount of economic violence perpetrated against black people by white people in virtually every city in the North, and also of course the violence that permeated the South as well.

The history of the US is in large part the history of white violence against black people. Our country was BUILT on violence against black people.

What is new about the way it has been done since the civil rights era is that this violence is not now committed by white citizens. It is committed by the police.

Correction, I don't have a speculative narrative, as there isn't -- yet - the full evidence of the case.

Those that have convicted Wilson, or sentenced Brown, are the speculators.

@11Hernandez,
Again, I respectively and strongly disagree with you. These words:

"@9 - "those blacks are just asking for trouble, no wonder they get shot [obligatory disclaimer that this black person should maybe have not been shot]""

are not in the text of my posting or the attached article. It isn't necessary to infer what one could say. Why? Because clearly, I don't mean what you conclude at all. Mr. Brown didn't deserved to be shot and killed by the police from what little I know. But, I do know that Mr. Brown didn't need to rob a convenience store nor accost its clerk.

@15Zok,
Again, spot on. I like your analysis. It is fair.

Finally for all, here's an interesting perspective from a police officer:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteveryt…

I'm not saying I totally agree with him but it is worth reading.

@24: Here is the issue: You state @9 "I don't believe Michael Brown should have been shot." That sentence doesn't need a qualifying "but". That you feel it necessary to add one - as you do again @24 - suggests that in some corner of your mind, just maybe you do think he should have been.

Why is it necessary to underline that Brown is alleged to have committed a crime - at a time and place different from when and where he was killed - when decrying his killing, unless you think the two things are somehow related?

"According to the well-placed source, Wilson was coming off another case in the neighborhood on Aug. 9 when he ordered Michael Brown and his friend Dorain Johnson to stop walking in the middle of the road because they were obstructing traffic. However, the confrontation quickly escalated into physical violence, the source said..

“They ignored him and the officer started to get out of the car to tell them to move," the source said. "They shoved him right back in, that’s when Michael Brown leans in and starts beating Officer Wilson in the head and the face.

The source claims that there is "solid proof" that there was a struggle between Brown and Wilson for the policeman’s firearm, resulting in the gun going off – although it still remains unclear at this stage who pulled the trigger. Brown started to walk away according to the account, prompting Wilson to draw his gun and order him to freeze. Brown, the source said, raised his hands in the air, and turned around saying, "What, you're going to shoot me?"

At that point, the source told FoxNews.com, the 6 foot, 4 inch, 292-pound Brown charged Wilson, prompting the officer to fire at least six shots at him, including the fatal bullet that penetrated the top of Brown's skull, according to an independent autopsy conducted at the request of Brown's family."
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/20/mis…
Sounds about right.

Here's the heart of truth in the Vox article:

Most people are not being arrested for raping and robbing, murdering and stealing. It's this low level, oppressive policing of communities on the basis of marijuana possession. Low-level drug busts. Riding up on people. Throwing them against cars. Not because blacks do drugs more than whites, not because they possess it more, but because that's where the policing is.

Cops don't pull over white kids for walking in the streets. They just don't. Because they know those kids' parents will call their elected officials and complain. White kids don't get busted for smoking pot, for jaywalking, for drinking in public. Cops view a group of young black males as a gang of criminals and view a group of young white males as rowdy-acting buddies.

Blacks in Ferguson don't see the cops as their friends and protectors. They rightly see them as an occupying force that will use any excuse they can to keep them down. Because they've always been kept down.

Zok @15: "If Wilson is shown to be a racist cop, jail him." Please point me to a single instance of a cop jailed for being racist. Ever.
"Efforts to couple African Americans to subsidies, government jobs, assistance programs, loans and artificial "communities" appear to provide well-meaning help (at first), but typically result in a sort of enslavement." And yet every corporation in America pursues these policies, often to great advantage. Hmm, I guess welfare only works for the rich.

Zok @15: "Efforts to couple African Americans to subsidies, government jobs, assistance programs, loans and artificial "communities" appear to provide well-meaning help (at first), but typically result in a sort of enslavement."

So Mississippi, which provides virtually none of these things, must be a comparative paradise for entrepreneurial African Americans who have thrown off the hobbling shackles of the welfare state.

@26, the "unnamed source" whom Fox claims is "well-placed" is telling a story you like. There is no corroborating evidence. Moreover, that story is contradicted by the testimony of at least three named witnesses. You are free to believe whatever you want, but don't pretend that your story has some logical primacy simply because it's the one that gives you a nice warm feeling. Evidence is evidence: witness testimony, with all its flaws, trumps un-named sources with unspecified axes to grind.

As a matter of belief, I find the idea that an 18-year-old black guy would charge a police officer who had, by your account, drawn his weapon, to be preposterous. There's no way that kid winds up anything but dead if he does that, and he damn well would have known that -- EVERY black person in the USA knows that, and every white person who isn't wedded to the idea that all black kids are thugs knows that too.

@28

Jailed racist cops?
Michael Daragjati in New York
Dennis Spaulding in Connecticut
....and so on...

@29

Mississippi has the highest dependency on Federal Government, as a share of total expenditure, of any state in the nation. It's a dependency economy -- creating systemic poverty. "Help" turns 'poor, into 'grinding poverty.'

http://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-lea…

Did you not notice the most significant month of job growth came in the month immediately after extended federal unemployment benefits expired?

@27
"White kids don't get busted for smoking pot, for jaywalking, for drinking in public."
Um... I'm lily white, and I've been "busted" for two thirds of those things...

@30
Given a choice between "shot on the back running from the cops" (remember that old yarn from just a few days ago?) and shot in the head while charging the cops it would seem the evidence (of the brown family's own autopsy) supports the later more than the former.

@20 "Correction, I don't have a speculative narrative, as there isn't -- yet - the full evidence of the case."

You most certainly do have a speculative narrative that you have been promoting, you are just careful in how you present it so as to grant your self plausible denial.

That aside Mr. Brown's death and the situation in Ferguson morphed into something far beyond whatever interaction occurred between him and Officer Wilson shortly after his death. That morphing was solely the result of the actions of Officer Wilson and the rest of the Ferguson police department and local Government.

Leaving the body lying uncovered in the street for 4hrs in and of itself is an extreme act of disrespect. (yes I know the police claim it was to preserve the integrity of the crime scene but that is what chalk outlines and cameras are for) It was an act of a police department saying to the community this dead thing in the street is not human.

Responding to the impromptu peaceful protest/memorial that sprang up as the body lay there by bring in cops in riot gear and police dogs borders on a terrorist tactic. At the very least it was demonstrative of a police force occupying the community it is suppose to be protecting and serving.

Those first four hours after Mr. Brown's death by themselves point to a systemic breakdown that not only predate the event in question but fueled the conditions that caused it. It is that reality that you are either blind to, willfully ignorant of or are actively denying the reality of. I'll leave it to you to commune with your own heart soul and god to decide which you are guilty of.

But I for one have grown tired of your relentless defensive posting on this topic. Give it a rest. Try listening for awhile. Only in silent contemplation with an open mind will you gain any understanding of what happened and why.

@35 What's "careful" about saying Let's wait until the facts are known. Not just those facts convenient to your political persuasion. The grand thing about the American Left is that the very foundational principles of science and reason is a healthy skepticism, study and abundant data. But you're all very quick to not be skeptical (except for one direction), disinclined to study the circumstances and wait for all the data.

But its your world you're creating. Have fun.