8/20/15: Remembering Julian Bond, Social Security turns 80, A Year after Ferguson, The Most Important News from the Progressive Movement brought to you by the Agenda Project Action Fund 20AUG15

The Most Important News from the Progressive Movement brought to you by the Agenda Project Action Fund REMEMBERING THE LIFE OF JULIAN BOND -- Southern Poverty Law Center's first president and co-founder and longtime NAACP Board Member Julian Bond passed away Saturday night in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. NAACP Chairman Roslyn M. Brock commended Bond's legacy: "The grateful citizen heirs of the civil and human rights legacy of Julian bond can neither be counted nor confined to a generation. Many of the most characteristically American freedoms enjoyed by so many Americans today were made real because of [...] Julian Bond." READ "Julian Bond: Race Man, Poet, Movement-Builder--and Friend" over at Campaign for America's Future.   HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SOCIAL SECURITY! -- AFSCME, American Family Voices, Working Families, National People's Action and 13 Progressive organizations celebrated Social Security's 80th birthday with a petition to US Congress to protect and expand Social Security for millions of Americans. According to the Daily Kos, Social Security has cut the percentage of America's seniors living in poverty from 50% to 8%. SIGN the petition HERE and CHECK OUT Save Our Retirement, a website launched by AARP, AFL-CIO, Better Markets and Americans for Financial Reform HERE.   A YEAR AFTER FERGUSON -- The Economic Policy Institute released "The Making of Ferguson: Public Policies at the Root of its Troubles"--a report detailing the history of the ostensibly race-neutral public policies that disparately impacted Ferguson's African American residents--on the anniversary of Michael Brown's death. READ the full report HERE, CHECK OUT "Race and Beyond: White Privilege in the Age of Ferguson" over at Center for American Progress and SIGN a petition over at the ACLU demanding the Department of Homeland Security cease conducting surveillance on #BlackLivesMatter activists HERE.  THE CASE FOR DEBT-FREE COLLEGE -- According to a new report from Demos, while 96 percent of Americans believe it is important to have a college degree, almost 80 percent of Americans believe a college education is unaffordable to those who need it. READ "The Case for Debt-Free College" over at Demos and SIGN a petition over at the Daily Kos in support of free community college HERE.  COLOR OF CHANGE & PRESENTE AGAINST PRIVATE PRISONS -- Color of Change and Presente launched separate attacks against the private prison industry this week with petitions against predatory prison phone rates and private prison industry lobbyists. Presente called out Hillary Clinton for accepting almost $130,000 from Akin Gump, the primary lobbyist for the largest private prison company in the US. SIGN a petition demanding Hillary Clinton and the DNC cut their ties from the private prison industry HERE and SIGN a petition from Color of Change demanding an end to predatory prison phone rates HERE.   THE LEAGUE OF CONSERVATION VOTERS AGAINST SHELL -- The League of Conservation Voters organized a petition to deliver to President Obama and the Interior Department expressing their disappointment in their decision to allow Shell to drill in the Arctic Ocean. SIGN the petition HERE.  MOVEON'S NO WAR WITH IRAN -- MoveOn is organizing a No War with Iran action on Wednesday, August 26 at 12:00 PM in front of local offices of Congress across the US. REGISTER to host an event at your local Congress member's office HERE.  FROM THE WONK WIRE ...  ... RIGHTEOUS REGISTRATION: Voter Participation Center Founder and President and Top Wonk Page Gardner calls on unmarried women to channel their inner Susan B. Anthony and register to vote.   ... CANDID CANDIDATE: Harvard academic and Top Wonk Lawrence Lessig details why a run for presidency might be his best shot at fighting money in politics.  ... WATCHFUL WOMEN: Demos President and Top Wonk Heather McGhee warns female voters about GOP policies.  ... NOT INTERESTED IN HIGHER INTEREST: Center for Economic Policy and Policy Research Co-Director and Top Wonk Dean Baker questions the need for an interest rate increase in light of China's currency devaluation.  Find out more at www.TopWonks.org. ... ON OUR AGENDA ... ...Visit our website at www.PracticalProgress.org and our Twitter @PractProgress. Like what you see? JOIN the movement by sending tips, news, and reactions to PracticalProgress@agendaproject.org...

Between 2003 and 2009, the DOJ reported that 4,813 people died while in the process of arrest or in the custody of law enforcement. That's more than were killed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 15AUG14

THAT is right, more people have been killed by cops between 2003 & 2009 in the U.S. than were killed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. And the majority have been people of color. From +Mother Jones and +Sojourners .....

Exactly How Often Do Police Shoot Unarmed Black Men?

The killing in Ferguson was one of many such cases. Here's what the data reveals.

—By Jaeah Lee

| Fri Aug. 15, 2014 6:00 AM EDT

Jeff Roberson/AP

The killing of Michael Brown by police in Ferguson, Missouri, was no anomaly: As we reported yesterday, Brown is one of at least four unarmed black men who died at the hands of police in the last month alone. There are many more cases from years past. As Jeffrey Mittman, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Missouri chapter put it in a statement of condolence to Brown's family, "Unarmed African-American men are shot and killed by police at an alarming rate. This pattern must stop."
But quantifying that pattern is difficult. Federal databases that track police use of force or arrest-related deaths paint only a partial picture. Police department data is scattered and fragmented. No agency appears to track the number of police shootings or killings of unarmed victims in a systematic, comprehensive way.
Here's some of what we do know:

Previous attempts to analyze racial bias in police shootings have arrived at similar conclusions. In 2007, ColorLines and the Chicago Reporter investigated fatal police shootings in 10 major cities, and found that there were a disproportionately high number of African Americans among police shooting victims in every one, particularly in New York, San Diego, and Las Vegas.

More MoJo coverage of the Michael Brown police shooting

• Ferguson Is 60 Percent Black. Virtually All Its Cops Are White.
• "Hands Up, Don't Shoot:" Peaceful Protests Across the Country Last Night
• 4 Unarmed Black Men Have Been Killed By Police in the Last Month
• A Few Horrifying Pictures From Ferguson Last Night
• Anonymous Posts St. Louis Police Dispatch Tapes From Day of Ferguson Shooting
• Incredibly Powerful Photo of Black Students at Howard University
• The Ferguson Shooting and the Science of Race and Guns

"We need not look for individual racists to say that we have a culture of policing that is really rubbing salt into longstanding racial wounds," NAACP president Cornell Williams Brooks told Mother Jones. It's a culture in which people suspected of minor crimes are met with "overwhelmingly major, often lethal, use of force," he says.

In Oakland, California, the NAACP reported that out of 45 officer-involved shootings in the city between 2004 and 2008, 37 of those shot were black. None were white. One-third of the shootings resulted in fatalities. Although weapons were not found in 40 percent of cases, the NAACP found, no officers were charged. (These numbers don't include 22-year-old Oscar Grant, who was shot and killed by a transit authority officer at the Fruitvale BART station on New Year's Day of 2009.)

The New York City Police Department has reported similar trends in its firearms discharge report, which shows that more black people have been shot by NYPD officers between 2000 and 2011 than have Hispanics or whites.

When you look at the racial breakdown of New Yorkers, black people are disproportionately represented among those targeted as criminal shooting suspects, firearms arrestees, and those fired upon or struck by police gunfire.

NYPD Firearms Discharge Report, 2011

Often, the police officers do not get convicted or sentenced. Delores Jones-Brown, a law professor and director of the Center on Race, Crime, and Statistics at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, has identified dozens of black men and women who have died at the hands of police going back as far as 1994. She notes that while these incidents happen regularly, it often takes a high-profile case, such as Brown's, to bring other recent incidents to national attention.

"For whatever reason, juries are much less likely to convict" police who kill.

"Unfortunately, the patterns that we've been seeing recently are consistent: The police don't show as much care when they are handling incidents that involve young black men and women, and so they do shoot and kill," says Jones-Brown, a former assistant prosecutor in Monmouth County, New Jersey. "And then for whatever reason, juries and prosecutor's offices are much less likely to indict or convict."
Between 2003 and 2009, the DOJ reported that 4,813 people died while in the process of arrest or in the custody of law enforcement. These include people who died before an officer physically placed him or her under custody or arrest. This data, known as arrest-related deaths, doesn't reveal a significant discrepancy between whites, blacks, or hispanics. It also doesn't specify how many victims were unarmed. According to the FBI, which has tracked justifiable homicides up to 2012, 410 felons died at the hands of a law enforcement officer in the line of duty.*

Bureau of Justice Statistics

But black people are more likely than whites or Hispanics to experience a police officer's threat or use of force, according to the Department of Justice's Police Public Contact Survey in 2008, the latest year for which data is available. Of those who felt that police had used or threatened them with force that year, about 74 percent felt those actions were excessive. In another DOJ survey of police behavior during traffic and street stops in 2011, blacks and Hispanics were less likely than whites to believe that the reason for the stop was legitimate.

The Justice Department has investigated possible systemic abuse of power by police in at least 15 cities. 

Police shootings of unarmed black people aren't limited to poor or predominantly black communities. Jones-Brown points to examples where police officers have shot unarmed black men and women in Hollywood, Riverside (California), and Prince Georges County—a Maryland suburb known as the most affluent US county with an African-American majority. "Part of the problem is that black people realize that you don't have to be poor, you don't have to be in your own community...and this can happen to you," she says. These killings occur against black people of varying socioeconomic backgrounds: "Actors, professional football players, college students, high school grads. They happen to black cops, too."

"You don't have to be poor, you don't have to be in your own community...and this can happen to you."

Yet, the lack of comprehensive data means that we can't know if there's been an upsurge in such cases, says Samuel Walker, a criminal justice scholar at the University of Nebraska in Omaha and author of The Color of Justice: Race, Ethnicity, and Crime in America. "It's impossible to make any definitive statement on whether there were more incidents in the last 5 to 10 years than in the past," he says. "We just don't have that kind of data." But what is certain, Walker says, is that the fatal shooting in Ferguson "was just the tip of the iceberg."

UPDATE (8/15/14): USA Today reported that on average there were 96 cases of a white police officer killing a black person each year between 2006 and 2012, based on justifiable homicides reported to the FBI by local police. As I reported above, the FBI's justifiable homicides database paints only a partial picture—accounting for cases in which an officer killed a felon. It does not necessarily include cases involving victims like Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and others who were unarmed when confronted by police. The data in this post has been updated with 2012 numbers, and the map has been updated to reflect that certain cases have been closed.

Jaeah Lee

Associate Interactive Producer

Jaeah Lee is the associate interactive producer at Mother Jones. Email her at jlee[at]motherjones.com. Follow her on Twitter. RSS | Twitter

If You Liked This, You Might Also Like...

• The Ferguson Shooting and the Science of Race and Guns

  Studies have shown that racial bias can make people see things that are not there.

• Watch President Obama Deliver Remarks About the Violence In Ferguson, Missouri

  "We all need to hold ourselves to a high standard, particularly those of us in positions of authority."

• A Few Horrifying Pictures From Ferguson Last Night

  From an alderman's arrest to journalists getting tear gassed, things went really wrong in Ferguson Wednesday night.

• Anonymous Posts St. Louis Police Dispatch Tapes From Day of Ferguson Shooting

  "We are switching over to the riot channel at this time."

• Ferguson Is 60 Percent Black. Virtually All Its Cops Are White.

  And more shocking stats from a bitterly segregated city.

  When Terror Wears a Badge 14AUG14

  "Our common humanity is more important than all the things that divide us."
  - Mairead Corrigan
   
  IT is not excessive to keep posting about police brutality, especially police brutality, killings and racial profiling in communities of color. It is wrong, and it is high time this nation has an open and honest dialogue about the racism that infects our country. And here is something for many Americans to think about, racism and religion are not compatible, you are can be religious or you can be racist, but you can not be both, a serious review of the teachings of your faith, no matter what that faith is, will tell you that. This from +Sojourners .....
  

  When Terror Wears a Badge

  by Ryan Herring 08-14-2014 | 10:34am

  Over the past three weeks there have been four separate incidents that have led to the deaths of four unarmed black men at the hands of police. For many black people, myself included, the moments following these tragic events are filled with despair, sorrow, anger, and frustration. Each incident serves as a reminder that as a black man in America, my life holds little to no value in the eyes of the general public. To be young and black in the United States means to live under constant pressure, something most non-black American citizens know nothing about.
  

  
  

  Police train guns over protest of the shooting death of Michael Brown on Aug. 13 in Ferguson, Mo. Scott Olson/Getty Images

  For the majority of black people, the police do not represent protection or safety, rather they are a menacing force that terrorize those they are supposed to serve. I have never felt safe in the presence of law enforcement. In fact, whenever police are in close proximity to me, I feel in danger. Whenever a cop drives behind me or beside me I feel anxious, not protected.
  Is my paranoia justified?
  I have no criminal record, however I have had numerous run-ins with the police, none of which my actions provoked. The most common of course is being followed around a store. I have never committed a traffic violation, but I have been pulled over several times. A few of those times I was asked to step out of my vehicle to be frisked and forced to sit on the curb in humiliation while being verbally intimidated and having my car searched. The reasons I was given as to why this type of action was necessary or to why I was even pulled over to begin with were always made up out of thin air.
  Several years ago I lived in the suburbs of Louisville, Ky., where my parents had purchased a home in a newly developed subdivision. We lived there for a couple of years when one day, while driving out of the subdivision, I was signaled to pull over by two police cruisers. I was accused of burglarizing the home of a white neighbor. Being the only black kid in the entire subdivision, it came as no surprise that I was singled out. A few years after that, in the same subdivision, my brother and my best friend had their cars broken into outside of our house. When the police arrived, I was obtained and questioned as if I was a suspect.
  Constant harassment is dehumanizing, but I'm thankful to God that those are the worst of my experiences as many black Americans have had similar ones that resulted in arrest, injury, and/or even death. I'm well aware of the experiences of others and they add to the trauma. Oscar Grant, Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, or John Crawford could have easily been me ... or my brother ... or my father.
  Cornel West once said, 9/11 was "the first time that many Americans of various colors felt unsafe, unprotected, subject to random violence, and hated." Since then, through the "war on terror" and the influence of xenophobia in the mainstream media, the face of terrorism has been Muslim extremists. But as Dr. West also mentioned, "To be black in America for 400 years is to be unsafe, unprotected, subject to random violence, and hated."
  The terror that I experience as a black person in 21st century America is nothing new. Black people have been exposed to domestic terrorism for centuries. Slavery was a form of terrorism. Jim Crow was a form of terrorism. Lynching was a form of terrorism. The prison industrial complex/mass incarceration is a form of terrorism. Police brutality is a form of terrorism.
  More Americans have lost their lives at the hands of police since 9/11 than in acts officially classified as terrorism. A recent study showed that one black man was killed every 28 hours by police, security guards, or self-appointed vigilantes in 2012. The militarization of police departments nationwide and the over-policing of urban neighborhoods have had terrorizing effects on the black population. There are also programs like stop-and-frisk that make racial profiling and over-policing legal. At its peak in 2011, 685,724 people were stopped. Of those stopped 53 percent were black, 34 percent were Latino, and 9 percent were white. Eighty-eight percent of all people stopped were innocent. Gang injunctions are another method of enforcement that lead to racial profiling and the over-criminalization of youth.
  What am I to do? What are we to do? Often I'm reminded by others of respectability politics. I should dress nicer and talk more proper. But, I grew up with images of upstanding citizens in suits and ties being dragged by police dogs and hosed down during peaceful protests. The same people that think that my appearance will keep me safe also tell me that I should focus my outrage at blacks killing other blacks (as if I'm not already) because that's what's really harming the black community. But that only serves to derail the conversation at hand. Black-on-black violence is a myth. As Jamelle Bouie notes, "Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime — 86 percent were killed by white offenders. Indeed, for the large majority of crimes, you’ll find that victims and offenders share a racial identity, or have some prior relationship to each other. What [others] miss about crime, in general, is that it’s driven by opportunism and proximity."
  The reality is that we (black men and women) have multiple sources of forced coercion coming at us. The psychological and emotional toll this has on black folk can no longer be downplayed or ignored. My paranoia is justified. Our paranoia is justified. It doesn't matter how we dress, how we talk, what our socio-economic status is, if we are unarmed, or even if we are injured and seeking help, we are still seen as threats. We must protect ourselves. We must protect our communities. We must stand up in the face of brutality and fight to change the unjust conditions we are forced to live in.
  Ryan Herring is Marketing and Circulation Assistant for Sojourners. You can find more of his writing at The Ghetto Monk . 
  

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Video: What We Saw Before Being Kicked Out of the SWAT Convention & Pentagon and Other Agencies Slammed for Police Militarization at Senate Hearing & McCaskill Criticizes Programs That Supply Military Equipment To Police 9SEP14

THE militarization of our local and state police departments and the corresponding erosion of our civil rights and civil liberties started right after 9/11. Our nation has become a warstate, we are at war with everything, and because of this mentality pounded into us by the unrelenting propaganda campaigns by our politicians, corporate America, the military-industrial complex and too many of our religious leaders we have lost the dream of ever living in peace at home or abroad. We are a war weary nation yet continue to turn away from the basic teachings of our faith (after all, we do proclaim ourselves as a Christian nation) that offers the means to address our problems through peace and justice. Here are three articles concerning the militarization of our police departments and what it has done to our communities, and yes, this is very appropriate to consider on 9/11. From +Mother Jones and +NPR .....

Video: What We Saw Before Being Kicked Out of the SWAT Convention

—By Shane Bauer

| Tue Sep. 9, 2014 6:00 AM EDT

Inside Urban Shield: The World's Largest SWAT Training Event

This weekend, my colleague Prashanth Kamalakanthan and I attended Urban Shield, a first-responder convention sponsored by more than 100 corporations and the Department of Homeland Security. The five-day confab included a trade show where vendors display everything from armored trucks to sniper rifles to 3-D printable drones. (We documented a few of the more remarkable offerings here.) It also involved the largest SWAT training exercise in the world. Some 35 SWAT teams competed in a 48-hour exercise involving 31 scenarios that included ambushing vehicles, indoor shootouts, maritime interdiction, train assaults, and a mock eviction of a right-wing Sovereign Citizens group. The teams came from cities across the San Francisco Bay Area, Singapore, and South Korea and included a University of California SWAT team, a team of US Marines, and a SWAT team of prison guards.
But on Sunday, at a competition site near the Bay Bridge, our coverage was cut short. A police officer confiscated our press badges, politely explaining that his captain had called and given him the order. The captain, he said, told him we had been filming in an unauthorized location, though he could not tell us where that location was. (We'd been advised earlier that it was okay to film so long as we did not go on the bridge itself.) After several phone calls from both me and my editors, no one could tell us exactly what we had done wrong, but Sergeant J.D. Nelson, the public information officer for the Alameda County Sheriff's Department (which hosts the Department of Homeland Security-funded event) made it clear that we could not have our passes back.
We'll have a more in-depth report, and a lot more images and videos, in a few days.

Shane Bauer

Reporter

Shane Bauer is a reporter in Mother Jones' San Francisco bureau, covering criminal justice, social justice, and human rights. His work has also appeared in the Guardian, The Nation, Salon, Slate, the Los Angeles Times, the Christian Science Monitor, and many other publications. He is the co-author of A Sliver of Light, a memoir he wrote with his fellow hostages (one of whom is now his wife) about their two years as prisoners in Iran. Follow him on Twitter here. RSS | Twitter

Pentagon and Other Agencies Slammed for Police Militarization at Senate Hearing

—By Jenna McLaughlin

| Tue Sep. 9, 2014 5:07 PM EDT

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo) at the Senate hearing. J. Scott Applewhite/AP

In a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing Tuesday, Democratic and Republican lawmakers slammed officials from the Department of Defense, Homeland Security, and the Department of Justice for their handling of federal programs that help provide military grade vehicles, equipment, and weapons to local police departments across the country. The hearing was called in response to the events that took place in Ferguson, Missouri, after an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown, was shot and killed by a white police officer, and peaceful protests were met by a heavily militarized police force. "Aggressive police actions [were] being used under the umbrella of 'crowd control,'" noted Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.).
The panel grilled Alan Estevez, a Department of Defense agent dealing with logistics and acquisition of military equipment; Brian Kamoie, a federal grant regulator at the Department of Homeland Security; and Karol Mason, an attorney from the Department of Justice.
Senators questioned why certain military equipment was on the Pentagon's list of acceptable items for local police departments. Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) declared that police militarization gives him "real heartburn" and wondered "how did we get to the point where we think states needs MRAPS"—that is, mine-resistant ambush protected vehicles, which have been acquired by a large number of small police departments across the country. In Texas, McCaskill noted, police departments have more than 70 MRAPS, while the state National Guard has just six.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) questioned what police departments could possibly do with the 1,200 bayonets that have been issued in recent years. The Pentagon's Alan Estevez replied that he was unsure. Throughout the hearing, members of the panel underscored the point that police officers are often not adequately trained in how (and when) to use the military-grade equipment their departments acquire. The Pentagon doesn't require police departments to undergo any training before supplying them MRAPS and other military equipment.
Estevez testified that the Pentagon would reevaluate its list of acceptable equipment for police departments. But Brian Kamoie, the Homeland Security official, and the Justice Department's Karol Mason, both acknowledged that their agencies don't do much to regulate how police departments use the grant money they dole out to local law enforcement.
McCaskill condemned the Department of Defense and the other agencies for their lack of oversight over the use of military equipment by local police. "None of them know how it's being utilized," McCaskill said. She pointed out that a police department in Lake Angelus, Michigan, which employs only one police officer, has received 13 military grade assault weapons since 2011. "I think we need to get to the bottom of that," McCaskill said.
Watch the hearing here:

Jenna McLaughlin

DC Editorial Fellow

Jenna McLaughlin is an editorial fellow with Mother Jones in the Washington Bureau. RSS | Twitter

< McCaskill Criticizes Programs That Supply Military Equipment To Police

September 09, 2014 4:54 PM ET

Copyright ©2014 NPR. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

LISTEN to the story

ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST:
Lawmakers were away from Washington when protests erupted in Ferguson, Missouri. But now they're back and they're having their say in the aftermath of the police shooting that left 18-year-old Michael Brown dead. Today Missouri senior Senator, Democrat Claire McCaskill, led a hearing on one issue raised by the shooting - the federal programs that send military grade equipment like armored personnel carriers and assault weapons to police departments. As NPR's David Welna reports, the senators found a lot to criticize.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SENATOR TOM CARPER: This review by Congress is long overdue.
DAVID WELNA, BYLINE: That's Senator Tom Carper of Delaware, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. He opened today's hearing, but turned over the gavel to fellow Democrat Claire McCaskill, who requested the hearing. McCaskill quickly blasted programs being carried out by the Justice and Homeland Security Departments as well as the Pentagon.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SENATOR CLAIRE MCCASKILL: We are pushing, in wholesale fashion, military equipment to local police departments.
WELNA: The Pentagon's witness at the hearing, Alan Estevez, took issue with McCaskill.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ALAN ESTEVEZ: The Department of Defense does not push equipment on any police force. State and local law enforcement agencies decide what they need and access our access equipment through the respective state coordinators.
WELNA: But the Missouri Senator pointed out that the Pentagon has been giving away huge armored personnel carriers called MRAPS by the hundreds to local police departments, including to 13 police departments with fewer than 10 full-time sworn officers.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MCCASKILL: MRAPS can be very dangerous, correct, Mr. Estevez? They flip?
ESTEVEZ: They're very heavy vehicles.
MCCASKILL: And there is - yet there is no requirement for training for any of these departments that are getting these vehicles.
ESTEVEZ: We can't provide training to police departments, senator.
WELNA: Estevez also acknowledged that the Pentagon gives away things like assault weapons, but does not know how they're employed.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ESTEVEZ: The Department of Defense does not have the expertise in police force functions and cannot assess how equipment is used in the mission of individual law enforcement agencies.
WELNA: Kentucky Republican Rand Paul then pounced. He pointed to an analysis done by NPR of the Pentagon's so-called 1033 program.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SENATOR RAND PAUL: Mr. Estevez, in the NPR investigation of the 1033 program, they list that 12,000 bayonets have been given out. What purpose are bayonets being given out for?
ESTEVEZ: Senator, bayonets are available under the program. I can't answer what a local police force would need a bayonet for.
PAUL: I can give you an answer - none.
WELNA: There were also questions for Estevez about just what role the Pentagon plays in the decision about who gets what of the things it gives away. He insisted it had a decisive role.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ESTEVEZ: We do due diligence about numbers. If it's - an agency requests, you know, 100 rifles, and there's only 10 law enforcement officers, they don't get 100. They get 10.
WELNA: Senator McCaskill was not convinced.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MCCASKILL: In the Lake Angelus Police Department in Michigan, you gave them 13 military assault weapons, since 2011. They have one full-time sworn officer.
WELNA: The Department of Homeland Security has given $41 billion in grants over the past 12 years to local police forces. The department's Brian Kamoie pointed to police efforts following the Boston Marathon bombing.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BRIAN KAMOIE: Grant funded equipment, such as the forward-looking infrared camera on a Massachusetts State Police helicopter, enabled the apprehension of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, while enhancing the personal safety of law enforcement officers and protecting public safety.
WELNA: Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn shot back that federal grant money had nothing to do with the Boston bombing suspect's capture.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SENATOR TOM COBURN: Tsarnaev was found because a guy went out to check his boat, because he saw the end of it up.
WELNA: And, Robert, the witnesses did say they expected changes in their programs. Senator McCaskill, for her part, promised more hearings.
SIEGEL: Well, more hearings is something that Congress can certainly do. But what else might the Congress do here?
WELNA: Well, lawmakers won't have much time to do anything in the short-term since they only plan to be in session 10 more days before the November elections. But I think today's hearing did point to a real need for Congress to reassess the laws it passed that are the basis of these programs, funding Police Departments. In many cases, there are virtually no strings attached to how military-grade equipment is used and there's just no policy to guide these agencies and how they should keep track of what they give away. This is a tricky issue because a lot of lawmakers want to keep this money and equipment flowing to their local police forces. And at the same time, after Ferguson, there's a lot more awareness that police militarization is an issue Congress is going to have to deal with.
SIEGEL: Would you expect bans on specific types of weapons that could then not be transferred to Police Departments?
WELNA: Well, there could be. The bayonets we heard Senator Paul mention for example are clearly on the list of things that might be rolled out. He says that should have been done last week. MRAPS could also be ruled out. Senator McCaskill put police departments on notice herself today. She said, if we're going to give you money, we're going to make you jump through a few hoops.
SIEGEL: OK, thank you David. That's NPR national security correspondent, David Welna.

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• 10 Hours in Ferguson: A Visual Timeline of Michael Brown's Death and Its Aftermath

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• What Militarization Has Done to Our Police Departments

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• How Did America's Police Get So Militarized?

  Fancy weapons, 9/11 and fear of crime turned local forces into small armies.

(VIDEO 4MAI14) White man jaywalks with gun...guess what happens? & (VIDEO) THE END OF SILENCE 31AUG14

 
NO WAY any person of color would have survived this, and that is the very sad truth about the level of racism, especially in police and D.A. departments across the U.S. I am white and tired of this ignorance and ashamed. From +Daily Kos .....

Sun Aug 31, 2014 at 09:00 AM EDT

White man jaywalks with gun...guess what happens?

by Denise Oliver Velez

http://youtu.be/9-1UY9aMDWE

Published on Aug 24, 2014

K ALAMAZOO, MI — Police reports and recordings of a sometimes tense 40-minute encounter with a belligerent, rifle-toting man offers insight into how officers tried to defuse a volatile situa

When I saw this video posted here recently, I had to go back and look at it again.

I saw a white man with a gun.
I heard a policeman saying, "Place the weapon down on the ground, please. ... are crossing the street illegally ... I need you to put the gun down before I talk to you. ... You have committed a crime ... you are jaywalking. ... I don't want to shoot you, I'm not here to do that. ... Why are you so angry. ... Why are you cursing at me?"
Watching the whole incident all I could think of were those dead (unarmed) black men and boys who never had the opportunity to be "talked down," called "sir," and were murdered by police.
Or they were leaning on a toy gun in Walmart. Like John Crawford III.

John Crawford lll, gunned down by Beavercreek, Ohio police in Walmart, August 5, 2014.

http://youtu.be/LdMuEinPP_Q 

Published on Aug 26, 2014

The attorney for the family of 22 yr-old John Crawford III says the Walmart surveillance video shows the young man talking on a cell phone and leaning on a bb gun like a cane when Beavercreek Cops rushed around a corner inside the store shot him on sight. The police version was not what was depicted on the video and as in the other cases, police blantaly lie to the public about their actions.

I wanted to find out what happened to this white man who defied police, made obscene gestures at them and who cursed them out. The man, Joseph Houseman, is a gun rights advocate. He got his 15 minutes (more like 40 or 50) of fame and walked.

In the Department of Public Safety's decision not to pursue charges, Webster said later that even though Houseman did not have the rifle in a sling and was  "fidgeting" with it, it was not evident that he was "brandishing" it.

This news got covered as a "gun rights" story. From my perspective it's a "white rights" story.
Does anyone honestly believe a black man, or teen, or boy would have walked away from this alive?
Follow me below the fold for more.

I know what happens in this country to black men with guns.
See how fast gun laws were changed in the U.S. when the Black Panther Party decided to patrol the police in their community, after the police murder of unarmed black construction worker Denzil Dowell. In "Fear of a Black Gun Owner," Edward Wyckoff Williams wrote:

The Panthers responded to racial violence by patrolling black neighborhoods brandishing guns -- in an effort to police the police. The fear of black people with firearms sent shockwaves across white communities, and conservative lawmakers immediately responded with gun-control legislation. Then Gov. Ronald Reagan, now lauded as the patron saint of modern conservatism, told reporters in California that he saw "no reason why on the street today a citizen should be carrying loaded weapons." Reagan claimed that the Mulford Act, as it became known, "would work no hardship on the honest citizen." The NRA actually helped craft similar legislation in states across the country.

I know what is done to black men who arm themselves in self-defense against the occupying army you call police, and if you are white, you may not fear. You see, I remember Elaine Brown singing in "The End of Silence," "we'll just have to get guns and be men."

http://youtu.be/oC-JbT9ic7g

I also remember many Panthers shot down like dogs, some asleep like Fred Hampton.
The NRA is all about gun control. As long as those guns are in white hands.
From my black perspective, I get real angry when I watch the Bundy Bunch get away with whatever they fuc*ing feel like and nothing happens to them. I watch white serial killers, and mass murderers explained away as "loners," and "disturbed individuals." I watch my young brothers executed and shot down in cold blood by cops and vigilantes, and the media noise machine pumps up the vilification volume, 'cause we're just thugs and animals.
This white problem affects not just community members, but it affects officers of the law who are not white. See the case of New York State parole officers who were held at gunpoint by white cops in Ramapo while on duty. Blacks in Law Enforcement of America and other black and Latino police groups have spoken out. Far too often being a cop of color is a death warrant from other police, who are white. Police Departments call them "fraternal shootings," but there is nothing brotherly about white cops "accidentally" killing black and Latino officers.
Latinos also smell the cafe sin leche. Some national Latino groups are speaking up, and joining the outcry around Ferguson. In New York, Anthony Baez's family sees parallels with the recent police murder of Eric Garner.
There is no way in hell black people and Latinos and Native Americans can "fix" America's "race problem."
More white folks have to step up to the plate. Systemic racism in police departments across America, in the criminal injustice system, in housing, education, and health care has got to go.
I'm tired of hearing about "the race problem," as if we are an equal partner in this mess we didn't make.
America's got a problem with white racism, and y'all need to clean house.

Originally posted to Daily Kos on Sun Aug 31, 2014 at 09:00 AM EDT.

Also republished by Black Kos community, Barriers and Bridges, White Privilege Working Group, Police Accountability Group, and Support the Dream Defenders.

Police let their dog urinate on Michael Brown memorial, then drove over it & Plea To Ferguson's Leaders: To Help Heal, Acknowledge Our Hurt & CROSSING THE RACIAL DIVIDE 27&29AUG14 & 29MAR12

SOME people think the police in Ferguson, Missouri are being maligned, that the actions of one officer do not represent the whole department. I don't know how they can reach that conclusion considering the actions of the Ferguson police after Michael Brown was murdered by officer darren wilson, his body left lying in the street over four hours, the brutality of the police to protest following the murder. For me this confirms my opinion that the police department of Ferguson is lead and staffed by racist, fascist pigs and not only does the U.S. Dept of Justice need to investigate them, charges need to be filed against the Ferguson police dept for civil rights and civil liberties violations and the entire department should be replaced. THE wrongs of the Ferguson police do not, in any way, justify the violence and looting of some of the protesters, it does not justify anyone's racism and hatred. Michael Brown's family is to be commended for their tireless commitment to peace and reconciliation in Ferguson, and there are many other unsung advocates for peace, justice and reconciliation working hard in the community. The Crossing The Racial Divide discussion and study guide (released by +Sojourners on 29MAR12 after Trayvon Martin's murder) might be a resource for those interested in peace and justice to consider.  From +Daily Kos and +NPR 

Wed Aug 27, 2014 at 10:11 AM PDT

Police let their dog urinate on Michael Brown memorial, then drove over it

by Hunter

Why have the residents of Ferguson, Missouri reacted with such anger to the still-unexplained shooting of Michael Brown? It is a mystery.

As darkness fell on Canfield Drive on August 9, a makeshift memorial sprang up in the middle of the street where Michael Brown's body had been sprawled in plain view for more than four hours. Flowers and candles were scattered over the bloodstains on the pavement. [...] Soon, police vehicles reappeared, including from the St. Louis County Police Department, which had taken control of the investigation. Several officers emerged with dogs. What happened next, according to several sources, was emblematic of what has inflamed the city of Ferguson, Missouri, ever since the unarmed 18-year-old was gunned down: An officer on the street let the dog he was controlling urinate on the memorial site.

And:

[Missouri state Rep. Sharon Pace] purchased some tea lights for the family, and around 7 p.m. she joined Brown's mother, Lesley McSpadden, and others as they placed the candles and sprinkled flowers on the ground where Brown had died. "They spelled out his initials with rose petals over the bloodstains," Pace recalled. By then, police had prohibited all vehicles from entering Canfield Drive except for their own. Soon the candles and flowers had been smashed, after police drove over them.

This is all in the first hours after Brown's body was finally removed, with the boy's mother and the rest of the crowd watching. So yeah, just a crackerjack job by St. Louis law enforcement on this one. Start out by letting dogs piss on the flowers, run over the candles in your cars, move on to tear gassing people for walking around after dark. The sixties never left Missouri.

Plea To Ferguson's Leaders: To Help Heal, Acknowledge Our Hurt

by

August 29, 2014 8:53 AM ET

The Rev. Willis Johnson (left), pastor of Wellspring Church in Ferguson, speaks to the Rev. Michele Shumake-Keller after the panel discussion in Ferguson, Mo., on Thursday. Johnson said he hoped the event would be a step to healing a "community in trauma."

Whitney Curtis for NPR

To listen to the community event, go to

(Editor's Note: NPR's Michel Martin was invited by St. Louis Public Radio to moderate a community conversation on Thursday around race, police tactics and leadership following the shooting death of Michael Brown. The following story is based on what happened at the event.)
, is a study in contrasts. It boasts spacious Victorians in its historic section, with lush green lawns, many featuring "I Heart Ferguson" signs. Just blocks away, there's a burnt-out QuikTrip. The signs here read "Hands Up, Don't Shoot." In some cases, there are boarded-up windows advertising plans to reopen, or decorated with the town's thanks for the love and support.
Not far from either: A mound of teddy bears and dried flowers marks the spot where 18-year-old fell after being shot by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. Brown's death not only put a spotlight on these contrasts, but has also encouraged people to try to address them.
That was the Rev. Willis Johnson's hope. He's the pastor of Wellspring Church, which hosted a community conversation Thursday night that drew about 200 people. In welcoming the audience, Johnson acknowledged he's "gone from feeling hurt to wanting to hurt," but he said he hoped the event would be a step to healing a "community in trauma."

The conversation drew about 200 people to Wellspring Church. Over the course of two hours, many members of the audience shared similar reactions to problems in Ferguson.

Whitney Curtis for NPR

Over the course of two hours, many members of the audience — black, white, young and old — shared similar reactions.
Ferguson resident Jeff Schultz said the problems that came up in the course of the weeks of disturbances were "invisible to white people like me." He urged the group to find ways to begin to talk about these issues in a way that would keep other whites from getting defensive. But a number of the African-American attendees repeatedly described feelings of being disrespected by institutions and individuals that were supposed to serve them.
"My people are not respected. ... Look at the schools: Which schools are in trouble?" said former Missouri state Sen. Rita Days. "Those are schools with predominantly people that look like me."
She urged the group to acknowledge those divisions.
A panel of community leaders — which included Days; top law enforcement officer Daniel Isom, a retired St. Louis police chief and the incoming director of the Missouri Department of Public Safety; and Kimberly McKinney, a Habitat for Humanity executive — wrestled over questions about the police tactics used during the demonstrations, but also about those used on a regular basis, which some observers have suggested is tied to raising money for fines and fees.
Many people expressed particular disgust at the treatment of Brown's body, which remained on the scene and uncovered for more than four hours after the shooting. Much of the anger was directed at Ferguson Mayor James Knowles and others, who attended the event.

Ferguson resident Frankie Edwards shows a rubber bullet wound he suffered during one of the nights of protests to NPR's Michel Martin (right) and Ferguson Mayor James Knowles (second from right) during the community conversation at Wellspring Church.

Whitney Curtis for NPR

David Jackson, a member of the St. Louis Board of Education, was blunt.
"I am so disappointed in you as a leader," he said. "The buck stops with you. It starts with you."
Among the more remarkable developments of the evening was the emergence of an increasingly vocal group of young people who, prompted by social media and word of mouth, arrived at the event to share their experiences and demand accountability. They spoke of being tear-gassed, spoken to roughly by authorities and shot by rubber bullets.
One of the more dramatic moments came as a young man who introduced himself as Frankie Edwards pulled up his shirt to show the mayor a freshly scabbed scar from a bullet wound he received while protesting in Ferguson. He asked Knowles to apologize on behalf of the police, and asked the mayor whether he would step down.
Knowles pointedly said he would not.
"I'm not stepping down," he said. "The voters have an opportunity to relieve me when the time comes."
But African-Americans were not the only people to express disappointment with Knowles' leadership through the crisis. Emily Davis, a white mother of three who lives in Ferguson, said her first emotion after Brown's death was deep sorrow, "but now I am angry," she said.
She had been out protesting or volunteering daily with her children, but "I still don't see any engagement [from the police]. And my kids are confused. My son said, 'I thought police were the good guys.' "

Corinna Anjali (left) speaks to Mayor Knowles after the event. "You're in the hot spot as the one person in power," Anjali said to Knowles. "It's important for you to say 'I hear you' to the people who have been hurt."

Whitney Curtis for NPR

Another attendee, Geoffrey Higginbotham, said this was his third riot, after the 1965 Watts riots in Los Angeles following the murder of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
"I came here to the city of Ferguson about 2 1/2 years ago to speak about economic development and how we address these issues," he said. "They were not ready for it."
Both Johnson, the pastor, and Isom, the former police chief, concluded the evening on pensive notes.
Isom asked for the community's ongoing engagement in addressing the issues raised over the course of the evening.
"I just feel sorrow. I feel sorry that as a leader in St. Louis, we haven't done a really good job," he said. "I'm redoubling my effort to hold myself accountable, and see what I can do to make it better. But I can't do it by myself."
Johnson added: "I am hurt. Sometimes I feel a little helpless. But I am hopeful, because I know there's a better day."

Our communities are not war zones 28AUG14

 
THE militarization of our community police departments must end. Our villages, towns, counties, and cities do not need tanks and armored vehicles, they need more police better trained in community policing and paid a salary due public servants charged with serving and protecting. With police forces trained to protect us from crime while respecting our civil rights and civil liberties, and community policies that actually address the root causes of crime (neglect of communities by all levels of government, economic inequality, education inequality, racism and discrimination) the people will have a partner in their police departments to keep our communities safe and not one acting like they have license to detain, maim, shoot and kill a la the Third World. Please sign this petition from the ACLU calling on the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Justice to stop funding and supplying the militarization of our community police departments....

Tell the DOD, DHS and DOJ: Our communities are not war zones It’s not too late to add your name. Over 44,000 ACLU supporters have signed our petition demanding that the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Justice stop funneling billions into the militarization of state and local police forces — will you join them? Two weeks after Mike Brown was shot and killed in Ferguson, Missouri, the tanks have left the streets, and there are fewer cover stories in the media. But the problem still remains: too many neighborhoods – particularly those inhabited by black and brown people – are being policed like war zones. It’s time to tell the feds to stop funding the siege on communities of color. Sign today to add your name calling for an end to the militarization of local police. President Obama gets that there is a serious problem here. On Saturday, he announced a review of federal programs that fund wartime arsenals for local police forces. “There is a big difference between our military and our local law enforcement, and we don’t want those lines blurred,” he stated. Those lines were definitely blurred in Ferguson. Peaceful protesters were met by snipers, tanks, and tear gas. Let’s ramp up the pressure and tell the DoJ, DoD, and DHS: We’re tired of being treated like the enemy by those who are supposed to protect and serve us. Send a clear message to the feds: our towns don’t need tanks. The ACLU has been on the ground in Ferguson from the beginning. We filed two Missouri Sunshine lawsuits to obtain incident reports for the shooting from Ferguson and St. Louis county police departments, secured an agreement for the public and media to document police actions, filed a civil rights complaint when protestors faced arrest if they stopped moving, and helped organize legal observers to document First Amendment violations. But our work is not over. Sign now. Thank you for taking action, Anthony Romero for the ACLU Action team