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Friday, September 28, 2012

News What Does a Police State Look Like? Is the US Becoming One?

Posted by Brendan Kiley on Fri, Sep 28, 2012 at 9:02 AM

It's a jarring, crazy-sounding question, but journalist Will Potter—author of Green Is the New Red—asks it.

And he asks it in an intelligent way. When most people hear "police state," they immediately think of Nazi Germany or Chile and Argentina under their dictatorships: jack-booted thugs, spectacular displays of power, people being hauled away in the middle of the night. Obviously, our country doesn't look like that.

So why would Potter even pose the question? What about the current relationship between the police and the population looks suspicious to him? He gives seven examples:

1. Raids, Harassment, and Intimidation of Dissidents by Police

When FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force agents raided multiple activist homes in the Northwest recently, they were in search of “anti-government or anarchist literature.” [Recognize that one?]

2. Militarization of Domestic Law Enforcement

As Arthur Rizer wrote for The Atlantic:

"In an effort to remedy their relative inadequacy in dealing with terrorism on U.S. soil, police forces throughout the country have purchased military equipment, adopted military training, and sought to inculcate a “soldier’s mentality” among their ranks."

3. Disproportionate Prison Sentences for Political Activists

The reason Marie Mason, who destroyed property, received a prison sentence twice as long as racists, who harmed human beings, is because of her politics.

Likewise Tim DeChristopher was sentenced to two years in prison for non-violent disrupting an illegal oil and gas lease auction because he cost corporations thousands of dollars.

4. Creation of New Laws for People Because of Their Political Beliefs

The Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act was created solely to prosecute activists who threaten the “loss of profits” for corporations.

And now 10 states have considered “Ag Gag” bills that go so far as to criminalize non-violent undercover investigations. The new bills have passed in two states, Utah and Iowa.

Not to mention that the US incarceration rate is the highest in the world by an embarrassing margin—we have a special talent for throwing people in prison.

Read the rest—with a link to a radio interview—here.

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Comments (30) RSS

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Pinochet was dictator of Chile, not Argentina.

Posted by Matt from Denver on September 28, 2012 at 9:10 AM

http://www.ipsnews.net/2012/06/liberal-b…

Posted by rob!

on September 28, 2012 at 9:19 AM

@ 1. Thanks for noticing that embarrassing error. Fixed now.

Posted by Brendan Kiley on September 28, 2012 at 9:27 AM

A dose of early morning depression

Posted by ryanayr on September 28, 2012 at 9:28 AM

It doesn't have to be we 100% are or 100% are not a police state. That list definitely highlights some alarming things though.

Posted by Urgutha Forka on September 28, 2012 at 9:33 AM

@ 3, no problem

Regarding this list... I didn't see anything which hasn't happened at least once in American history already. A lot of these happened with the Red Scare in the 50s, and also during the unionization struggles from the 1880s to the 1920s. Ultimately, America came out of it without devolving into what I would call a police state. But none of it was good, and the same old attitudes that permitted such conditions to arise in the first place are still around. So yes, we could be facing a new era of political repression, but it wouldn't compare to the horrors of Nazi Germany or the fascist dictatorships of South America.

Posted by Matt from Denver on September 28, 2012 at 9:39 AM

I found myself nodding along, but when I got to "In addition to Guantanamo Bay, which Obama has refused to close", I had to go back and reconsider the arguments (they still pretty much hold up), in light of the problematic nature of this characterization of the GB situation.

Posted by Obama Apollo Jist on September 28, 2012 at 9:40 AM

1, 3, 4, 6 and 7 are all things that have been done throughout the history of this country.

Posted by Unregistered User on September 28, 2012 at 9:41 AM

Marie Mason was an arsonist. She put lives in danger. She set back scientific progress. If the argument that this country is a police state relies on an ipso facto defense of her crimes, then yeah, the argument is jarring and crazy.

Posted by GermanSausage on September 28, 2012 at 9:42 AM

we only lead the world in incarceration because the chinese have such a penchant for execution

Posted by velour on September 28, 2012 at 9:46 AM

From the article on Marie Mason:

If that isn’t enough, let’s look at Mason’s sentence. Twenty-one years for arson that caused about $1 million in damage to genetic-engineering research at Michigan State University and didn’t harm anyone.

Didn't harm anyone? Harm does not have to be physical. Years of research down the drain and a whole department disrupted? Doesn't genetic-engineering also have medical uses?

Posted by Gay Dude for Romney

on September 28, 2012 at 9:47 AM

third grand jury resister jailed by 9th circuit prosecutor for investigation of yet unknown conspiracy to do something politically illegal. http://saynothing.noblogs.org/kteeo-impr… Not to mention what FBI police informants did to 5 young people in Cleveland http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news… see a pattern here?

Posted by pdonahue on September 28, 2012 at 10:03 AM

police are well on their way from being working class heroes to working class traitors...

Posted by think about it for a minute! on September 28, 2012 at 10:22 AM

Yeah, I'm going to third "fuck Marie Mason".

And "Activists who threaten loss of profits" are, you know, criminals. They belong in jail. I don't have a problem with that. If you think putting people in jail for breaking reasonable laws amounts to a "police state", well, then, hello Sgt. Doom.

Posted by Fnarf

on September 28, 2012 at 10:28 AM

There is one crucial difference between the US system and a true police state: the police and the courts are not the same thing.

True, you can point to injustices, but there IS due process. And the cops/prosecutors/state lose in court all the time when they break the rules.

In a police state, those in power ARE the law.

Posted by Westside forever on September 28, 2012 at 10:30 AM

The answer quite clearly in the US has and is no.

No we are not a police state, more like the opposite. Even though crime levels has decreased anyone alive from 1980 to 2010 has seen our entire nation held hostage by criminals who destroyed neighborhoods and turned cities into war zones.

This played into the hands of real estate developers who were able to sell "good neighborhoods" at a premium while square miles of urban land became no mans lands (South King County and Seattle are examples here).

What the International Middle Class wants is police protection, not curtailment. The harassment and curtailing of police only benefits the restricted few.

Posted by Supreme Ruler Of The Universe

on September 28, 2012 at 10:33 AM

#15 http://saynothing.noblogs.org/kteeo-impr… these people are being held without due process for REFUSING TO TESTIFY. In this case the prosecutor is casting around trying to hang a case on somebody and jailing two of them at the federal facility in Seatac, does that sound like a judicial system that is acting like a neutral arbitrator?

Posted by pdonahue on September 28, 2012 at 10:56 AM

Oof and the comment thread on that website is like the leftist equivalent of an obnoxious conservative blog, complete with personal attacks, paranoia, confirmation bias and "la la la I'm not listening"

Posted by Unregistered User on September 28, 2012 at 10:59 AM

The problem with the Marie Mason case is not that people think she should not have been punished, but rather find it alarming that she was given such a harsh sentence when other people who commit worse crimes are given lighter sentences. Fuck arsonists, but still, sentencing needs to make sense.

@10: Also, only the prisoners that China will admit to get counted. The millions they have in secret labor/concentration camps are not counted.

Posted by Theodore Gorath on September 28, 2012 at 11:20 AM

@ 15,

...there IS due process

Unless the government decrees that you are a terrorist based on secret evidence they don't have to disclose. In which case, they're allowed to lock you up forever without charges or trial, and probably torture you, since there are different opinions about what constitutes "torture," including anything goes up to causing death, and even then it would be an "accident."

Posted by Original Andrew on September 28, 2012 at 11:30 AM

Fuck me, GDfR said something with which I completely agree.

Posted by bleedingheartlibertarian on September 28, 2012 at 11:38 AM

Yes, we are one.

If anything forces a Cascadia or Ecotopia split off, it will be this.

Posted by Will in Seattle

on September 28, 2012 at 11:53 AM

@17: you left out that this is a grand jury investigation--no charges have been filed, and this is not a trial. If it were, the prosecution could not compel her to testify against herself.

@20 you have an excellent point, and there are injustices in our system. However, name one police state where a similar policy has been debated in public. The policy may be wrong, but at least there is the means to challenge it in court and in the media

Posted by Westside forever on September 28, 2012 at 1:08 PM

Being able to debate does not mean being free.

Serfs could debate all they wanted, but their lords still raped and pillaged them, and left them swinging in the wind.

Posted by Will in Seattle

on September 28, 2012 at 2:00 PM

Arguing that we might not be quite as bad as China is rather telling.

Posted by K X One on September 28, 2012 at 2:32 PM

#23 my bad- this is a grand jury-- no lawyer, no burden of proof, heresay accepted; and you sit in jail if you refuse to cooperate. Sounds like a gitmo trial to me.......

Posted by pdonahue on September 28, 2012 at 2:55 PM

@25: exactly what I was thinking. Suggesting that we can't be that bad because we're not as bad as China is pretty fucking shameful.

Posted by stirwise on September 28, 2012 at 3:07 PM

Is this really a jarring, crazy sounding question for anyone who has been paying attention for the last decade? I pretty much take it for granted. We need to fight against it, of course - I don't mean to suggest apathy.

Posted by Tent_Liberation_Army on September 28, 2012 at 4:25 PM

At this point, I'm pretty sure that the only reason Brendan reblogs randomly from greenisthenewred every couple of weeks is to maintain credibility with his contacts in the local anarchist scene.

With any luck, this will pay off in the form of some great new quotes on May 2.

Posted by robotslave on September 28, 2012 at 9:36 PM

Is America becoming a Police State? Why not follow the campaigning candidates of the two major parties this election and see if they give any peep of protest against the Patriot Act, or NDAA, or drones... ask the good folks who regularly attend their legislative district's political party meetings how thrilled they are with those surveillance or national security developments, and ask them why their national candidates don't make more mention of those wonderful, wondeful pieces of legislation and technology on the campaign trail. There must be some partisan American SLOG readers whose hearts leapt with joy when the Patriot Act was renewed, or when TSA added more security theatre while people managed to bring their guns with them on domestic flights anyway...

Posted by Keister Button on September 28, 2012 at 10:26 PM