"On numerous instances the representatives of the people of Washington have pled with the Superintendent of the Police, Major Ernest W. Brown, and the Commissions of the District of Columbia to take effective action to curb these illegal invasions of the lives and liberties of American citizens by the police.
These pleas have been to no avail. Police brutality has continued...We have been forced to conclude that the responsible officials of the District of Columbia will not or cannot act to protect the lives and liberties of American citizens living under their jurisdiction. Our lives, our homes, our liberties each day are made less secure because of unrestrained and unpunished police brutality." -
 |
| A.Philip Randolph, President NNC |
Petition jointly issued by the Negro National Congress (NNC) and the Interdenominational Ministers' Alliance addressed to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1938
"If you do not know us, you also refuse to hear us because you do not believe what we say. You have decided that enough is enough. If the police must kill us for no good reason, then so be it because most of us are guilty anyway. If the black person they kill turns out to be innocent, it is an acceptable death, a sacrificial one...
Terror was visited on Dallas on Thursday night. Unspeakable terror. We are not strangers to terror. You make us afraid to walk the streets, for at any moment, a blue-clad officer with a gun could swoop down on us to snatch our lives from us and say that it was because we were selling cigarettes, or compact discs, or breathing too much for your comfort, or speaking too abrasively for your taste. Or running, or standing still, or talking back, or being silent, or doing as you say, or not doing as you say fast enough...
Day in and day out, we feel powerless to make our black lives matter. We feel powerless to make you believe that our black lives should matter. We feel powerless to keep you from killing black people in front of their loved ones. We feel powerless to keep you from shooting hate inside our muscles with well-choreographed white rage." -
Michael Eric Dyson, Prof., Georgetown University, in an Op-Ed essay published in the New York Times, Sunday, July 10, 2016
"We black folk, our history and our present being, are a mirror of all the manifold experiences of America. What we want, what we represent, what we endure is what America is. If we black folk perish, America will perish. If America has forgotten her past, then let her look into the mirror of our consciousness and she will see the living pass living in the present, for our memories go back, through our black folk of today, through the recollections of our black parents, and through the tales of slavery told by our black grandparents, to the time when none of us, black or white, lived in this fertile land.
 |
| Richard Wright, 1928 |
The differences between black folk and white folk are not blood or color, and the ties that bind us are deeper than those that separate us. The common road of hope which we all have traveled has brought us into a stronger kinship than any words, laws, or legal claims.
Look at us and know us and you will know yourselves, for we are you, looking back at you from the dark mirror of our lives!" -
Richard Wright, 12 Million Black Voices, 1941
(I could go on but that would probably annoy Herr Schopenhauer even more than he already is especially since the old boy did miss out on Dr. Dyson's passionate directness and Mr. Wright's timeless eloquence - if he needs placating I can always call Willie, our lab mix)
So if you didn't cry last week you're not someone I wish to know; cried not just for the five policemen cut down in Dallas; not just for Alton Sterling in Louisiana or Philando Castile in Minnesota; not for all their respective families and loved ones; nor just for the families of even the killers in some all-encompassing religious inspired quake and god bless you if you did; but also cried for the disgracefully arrogant and demeaning response by a goodly portion of our fellow Americans or what reader(s) of this space would recognize as the usual suspects; cried for America when the TV news stations once again showed their upright cynicism and unhidden loathing when they had "as a guest" commentator America's most despicable politico, Rudolph Giuliani, express his unbridled denigration of African Americans by ignorantly castigating BLACK LIVES MATTER for being racist; I believe he phrased it "inherently racist" - the programs that featured him (along with some (white) criminologists held over from Denmark Vesey's time) - and there were plenty and his remarks were dutifully replayed on the evening's local and national news telecasts- at least the ones I was clicking to on and off -never bothered to challenge him or offer an intelligent response to such prattle, treating the very words themselves as THE News itself-
as if there was much wisdom in the words coming from the sigmatic mouth of "America's Mayor' who after feigning such concern and consideration for the people of NYC during his 9/11 days - made a tidy bundle on the murder of over 3000 souls when, after, he went into the anti-terrorism/security consultancy business as a "terrorism expert"- a mayor who exploited the hard "racial divides" in NY for his political success, by all means, weep America when he's asked for his sordid opinion on "Race" in this country; and cried because Giuliani's response was by far not the only right-wing Republican response to try to exploit the tragedy :
 |
| Homeland $$$Buddies |
"In Texas, several state officials, including Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, lashed out at the group, directly linking its tone and tactics to the killings. Mr. Patrick acknowledged that the demonstration in Dallas on Thursday night had been peaceful until the gunman struck, but he accused the movement of creating the conditions for what happened. “I do blame former Black Lives Matter protests,” he said.
“This has to stop,” Mr. Patrick said, adding of the police officers, “These are real people.”
State Representative Bill Zedler, a Republican, was equally blunt in his assessment of the group’s influence on the 25-year-old gunman, Micah Johnson.
“Clearly the rhetoric of Black Lives Matters encouraged the sniper that shot Dallas police officers,” he wrote on Twitter."
And cried because right-wing radio commentators- and I'm being too polite here - for its time to throw away the NY Times Style manual along with the Washington Post's one - if they had one- and call these propaganda programs what they have always been- Hate Radio - thats all they ever were and in the name of free speech and American
exceptionalism have done more harm to this country than we will ever know- Hate Radio led of course by Rush Limbaugh - have accused BLACK LIVES MATTER of being a terrorist group who have committed hate crimes. Cried for the knowledge that millions of soft-brained citizens listen to him and his cohorts every day - not quite numbering the audience of their predecessors of the 1930's whose virulent racism and antisemitism at the time would contribute to a political climate that would directly impact the lives of thousands of Jews trapped in Hitler's Europe. Words matter a lot. It also matters a lot that there are people in Congress like Representative Emanuel Cleaver from Missouri - who also happens to be a Methodist minister and for those who are still keeping a scorecard, was the first African American mayor of Kansas City:
from the Congressional Record, July 8, 2016
Mr. Cleaver: " Mr. Speaker, sometimes--not all the time, but sometimes--out of chaos we can find our purpose. It is going to be my prayer this night and for the next few nights that this body can see clearly that our purpose is to lead our Nation away from the edge of the mare's nest of fear and a response to fear that creates even more fear. We can do so by understanding that words matter.Words matter. They can do damage.
I grew up in public housing in Texas right outside of Dallas, Texas, and in the projects they would say: Sticks and stones may break my words(sic), but words can never hurt me. It wasn't true when I was a boy, and it is not true today. Words can hurt; words can horrify; words can hinder; but words can also heal. One of the things we need more today than we have in the immediate past, are words of healing instead of words of hate."
__________________
And cried for the citizens of North Carolina who when they are not fighting against the voter suppression laws that their governor has implemented have now to contend with his new law that removes the police body camera video
from the public record so there is even less transparency and accountability in matters of police actions and this at such a time as we are experiencing here in America is as if North Carolina and its oleaginous governor is giving BLACK LIVES MATTER and the rest of America a shit encrusted middle finger. And did you cry for having the inept leadership of Paul Ryan ideologically looming over a sham House legislature professing meaningless words of comfort when it is a resolved commitment to basic decency and human need that is required. Dry-eyed and infallible he seemed to lip-sync his words of outrage: "An attack,"
he said, "on the people who protect us is an attack on all of us." He then stated that "the perpetrators (mimic-ing police talk) of evil do not represent us (whatever that means). They do not control us (whatever does he have in mind?)The blame lies with the people who committed these vicious acts and no one else." Obviously he hadn't been paying too close attention to Dallas. You should cry because he never mentioned at this time the fatal attacks on Mssrs Sterling and Castile which I'm sure the Speaker would agree is an attack on all of us, too. He did manage to remark on how every Republican and Democrat "wants to see less gun violence." And I wept when I remembered how long and much it has taken to finally get him and his undistinguished colleagues to agree to put some kind of gun protecting measure to a House vote. But only after they return from a hard-won 7 week vacation.
I hope you saved some of your tears for the baseball All-Star game played in that bastion of American patriotism, San Diego, California for it was there during the heart tugging opening ceremonies that one of the singers for a Canadian group performing the Canadian anthem, O Canada, decided upon himself (we are told) to interpolate his own lyrics slipping in the catchy phrase "all lives matter" while holding up a handwritten sign in case nobody heard him-To most everyone's credit who was in attendance I didn't hear any cheering during this embarrassing white supremacist moment and that also brought tears to my eyes. A little earlier in the day and across the grieving country the languorous senator from Kentucky rose in the Senate, where he leads the crusading majority into more and more vacation weeks every year, to express his heartfelt condolence to the victims families and speak of "coming together to overcome these tragedies and allow healing to prevail." I cry when words like suffering and healing are allowed to escape from such uncaring and deceiving lips that Mitch McConnell smacks whenever the nation is in dire need of deliberative action and help - unless its sending young men and women off to another needless war. You should have cried, too, when realizing that all was not a lost cause on this still sad day as when the youthful Obama-hater, Senator Tom Cotton, yet more presidential material from the
trailer parks of Arkansas, and someone who has shown such little concern for poor and minority Americans ("Hispanic voters don't care about immigration") rose to put forward a senate resolution declaring September 25, 2016 "National Lobster Day"- which of course made all the lobster in Arkansas extremely nervous. And cried when hometown boy Jeb Hensarling graced the House floor with his unremarkable utterance about Dallas's proud "thin blue line" standing at the barricades, protecting one and all from "color-conscious" citizens. Congressman Jeb- and do we need to know anything more?- is the Republican guy in the House to be counted on to be against anything and everything that may compromise the republicans' basest ploys. I cried because this hypocrite can stand up in the House and evoke the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's name and famous speech in disparaging BLACK LIVES MATTER while offering suppositions to whatever god he imagines listens to him pray "may the God who gave us life and liberty" and I bet Jeb has never heard of that 1938 petition on behalf of the Black citizens of Washington, D.C.:
These pleas have been to no avail. Police brutality has continued...We have been forced to conclude that the responsible officials of the District of Columbia will not or cannot act to protect the lives and liberties of American citizens living under their jurisdiction.
There was a moment ( a moment some would say that has lasted until now) when the crying subsided after the murders of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy (its always "Bobby" now) and the air that was let out after the blow to your solar plexis started to return and you realized that perhaps- just perhaps- nothing will ever be right again and the war and the injustices will go on -well, I may be overly stating a historical connection ( after all it was Dallas) but you had to have cried when you read an article by Michael Barbaro and Yamiche Alcindor (7/9/16) that related that with the "national revulsion" over the shooting videos of Mr. Starling and Castile, BLACK LIVES MATTER may have finally (finally?) "broken through"
with their message of "outrage and demands for justice." Then Dallas. The reporters cite a pastor from Chicago, Jedidiah Brown, a community activist who along with countless others immediately saw that with the murder of the five police officers there would be this large reaction by the movement's derogators who would blame them for inspiring this attack. "The thing I vividly remember thinking was," Pastor Brown said, "this is going to show exactly how divided this conversation is." The fear- if that's what it is - is that those who have always had animosity toward BLACK LIVES MATTER such as the police themselves ( and their unions) and so-called conservative leaders and mouthpieces will use the Dallas attack as a "cudgel that they will be all too eager to swing."
"In the days before the Dallas massacre, Aesha Rasheed, 39, an activist in New Orleans, felt that at long last, white and black America were watching the same images with the same horror: two Louisiana police officers tackling and then shooting Alton Sterling, 37, at point-blank range; the slumped, blood-soaked body of Philando Castile, 32, after a Minnesota police officer shot him through a car window, with his girlfriend and her daughter sitting inches away.
“It seemed like a national consciousness was sinking in,” Ms. Rasheed said.
After the massacre in Dallas, she said, “it turned on a dime.” She now worries that the episodes involving black men may be overshadowed and overlooked. "does this get ignored?", she asked. "Do five officers take center stage?"
Pastor Brown knew. Of course he did. A cursory viewing of our Congressional Record over the past week bears this out and quite frankly I have no tears left to shed on congress- but perhaps for a nation that is stuck with such a disgraceful legislature I may be able to find some and it is both as a thorn in the heart (and I am one who has a script for those little nitro tablets) and a balm in gilead or is it from gilead that such sources are still available to us; if I may further the connection the "balm" derives from a plant that is said to bleed "Balsam from Mecca" ( the region where it is most found today)- Go figure. The crying welled from the expectant hypothesis that during this time of our country's sorrow only Democrats in congress, if they expressed their personal and our collective sadness in the public forum, would mention the slain police officers in Dallas AND the two shooting deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile earlier and the mourning Republicans would express their equally felt sorrow for the officers but not mention Mr. Sterling and Castile at all. They truly do live in a different America.
The cops were given a beautiful memorial-tribute. I cried. Two U.S. Presidents and their First Ladies, the Vice-President and his wife, two U.S. Senators, Representatives from all over, the Mayor, the Police Chief- religious leaders of all faiths, an inspiring choir - no soldier killed in action, so I believe, ever received such a national tribute (write me if I'm wrong here) - the outpouring of the nation's grief was great. Circumspection was the order of the day. I don't get out much anymore but I remember another time when there were protests both vehement and fatal and the voices of reaction and order displayed signs and bumper stickers exhorting us to support our local police and other remonstrances to authority. Politicians can always count on exploiting the public's need to hear how much they love our cops and how they always, always support our troops. Like kissing babies. Also what better time for our do nothing congress to show their fierce teeth in fighting the terrorists who it seems are here now and killing our cops. Why just this Monday last they put aside any potential gun control bill and instead passed or tried to pass something called the National Strategy for Combating Terrorist, Underground and Other Illicit Financing Act- directing the President to develop a national plan for "combating the financing of terrorism; there was the "Anti-terrorism Information Sharing Is Strength Act" -
I'm not quite sure what they had in mind with this but I'm certain it had nothing to do with Mrs. Clinton's e-mails; and the "Enhancing Treasury's Anti-Terror Tools Act" - which may or may not be the same strategy they used to finally nab Al Capone; also, the "Terrorist and Foreign Fighter Travel Exercise Act" which will probably prolong those airport wait lines even more- the sacrifices we're willing to make however don't compare to those of our police and troops. And those sacrifices made by them are made in the face of Congress's shameful surrender to the Gun Lobby- Everyday our nation's cops which number about 1.1 million- not including federal or correction officers- most in uniform working in their local precincts leave their homes in the morning, say goodbye to their families, go to their local precincts and - so I imagine- are sent out on their daily assignments with the late Michael Conrad's words ringing in their ears: "Lets be careful out there"- and once outside their precinct doors are faced with at least 300,000,000 plus guns already on the streets of our nation. The Congressional Research Service put the number at 357,000,000 three years ago (U.S. gunmakers now manufacture over 10 million guns per year). Shane, come back! How could you not cry for your local policemen and women? There are more guns than there are people- men-women-children-in the United States. I myself don't own a gun and now knowing this harsh statistic I amaze even myself by daring to get out of bed in the morning. I walk my faithful dog to the end of the driveway and then we rush back to the safety of our automatic coffee and all the fear news we can stand.
Last week you should have cried when Congresswoman Jackie Walorski, a proud patriot from V.P. Pants' home state rose among the mourners in the House to denounce once again the evils of the EPA and "Obamacare" and then spoke about the Republican's big plan to "restore the Constitution" and to give power back to the people. They're calling it The Better Way. I always shudder at the thought of Republicans screwing around with such an important bulwark of our freedoms when they seem never to have taken the trouble of reading it in the first place - or worst, they have read it or had someone read it to them. Rep. Walorski attended Jerry Falwell's "college" and my ad hominem-ish self can't seem to get the comparison with Mr. Trump's "university" out of my woozy head.
Now if I had used a different adjective I could have attracted the attention of those hard-working cops down in Fruitland Park, Florida who have been hiding(?) their memberships in the KKK, one of whom was a deputy chief. Of course its not a criminal offense to belong to the Klan and our recent history shows that for a while it was even sort of a tradition for southern cops to be members. And - for those who wish to pursue a teaching career- there has recently begun a new field of historic inquiry anent slave patrols and the origins of southern police departments.
As long as I live I'll never understand Wisconsin. How its citizens can elect neanderthals like Scott Walker and Ron Johnson and Paul Ryan - there are not enough tears produced in a Restasis warehouse -
is beyond me and yet, they go and elect Tammy Baldwin - the first openly gay senator ever elected (although some of Lindsey Graham fans may take issue- hey I'm kidding ok?) and a progressive ( was she vetted by Hillary?) also stood up in the Senate last week to bring our attention not to the horrors in Dallas or Baton Rouge or St. Paul but to the 5 million Americans suffering from gastroparesis, a chronic condition in which
"the stomach cannot empty properly in the absence of any observable blockage. The condition can affect people of all ages, but it is four times more likely to affect women than men. The symptoms include nausea, vomiting, and inability to finish a normal-sized meal, can be debilitating and sometimes life threatening. The condition can lead to malnutrition, severe dehydration and difficulty managing glucose levels."
And so I knew right away what was wrong with me when a week later at the convention in Cleveland, those Republican comrades roared their overwhelming approval when it was announced from the rostrum by Milwaukee Sheriff, Dave Clark, that the fourth Baltimore police officer was not guilty in the death of Freddie Gray. It may have been fitting and even fun for the Republican committee or as its known now, the Trump Family, to have Sheriff Clark make this announcement to the mob of delegates for he follows in a long line of African American officials and spokesmen whose driven demons seem to make them a driver of sorts for the right and thus beyond my ken and right to speculate. My tears would fall briefly because last week Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson - who has had many firsts in her distinguished career, one of them just happens to be she is the first registered nurse to serve in the House and she had something to stop the tears when she spoke last week of her prayers and sympathy going out not only to the families of the slain police officers " not just in Dallas, but across our nation. My thoughts and prayers are also with the families of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, who violently lost their lives this week as well." The killing of the officers happened in her district, five minutes from her house. Ms. Jackson Lee and Mr. Hoyer ( who I always want to call Stony) spoke of respect and dignity and justice also for all the week's victims too. And as its always the case there were quite a few malcontents ( see under: racists) who thought President Obama wasn't "pro-police" enough in his brilliant memorial oration. How could anyone but a Republican listen to that speech and not be moved and, in a way, proud that we are led by such a man as he is able to express what we all should be expressing in our pathetic ways and yet the Republicans never get it. Don't really want to. America has always paid attention to our cops - we may not have offered enough recompense for their life and death labors at times (Republican budgets?) they have been part and parcel of our landscape from their beginnings- and it continues every week and month in some public forum in which we openly proclaim our thanks- the very week of these killings there was still time to appreciate in the Congressional Record, police sergeant Teresa Dougherty's 30 years on the police force in her Colorado town and to wish the very best to Sergeant John Savage of Syracuse, New York upon his retirement after 30 years, too.
There was a celebrated newspaper story that - for awhile at least was included in many Journalism 101 classes- was written by a Frank Ward O'Malley, a reporter for the old New York Sun about the death of a New York City policeman named Gene Sheehan.
The article was dated October 23, 1907 and the headline was "A Policeman Walks East To Death"; Officer Sheehan was shot in the head by a local thug named Billy Morley under the elevated train station at Chatham Square ( right near the present day headquarters of the NYPD) on Tuesday morning , Oct.22. The story is mostly told through an interview with the slain officer's mother, Mrs. Catherine Sheehan, and a more poignant "sob story" (thats how the textbook describes it) would be hard to find even among the Warner Bros, backlots. However, what I have always found memorable is a comment O'Malley records Mrs. Sheehan makes upon learning of the death of her good son:
"Gene's mother was thankful that her boy hadn't killed Billy Morley before he died, "because," she said,"I can say honestly even now that I'd rather have Gene's dead body brought home to me, as it will be tonight, than to have him come to me and say, "Mother, I had to kill a man this morning."
"God comfort the poor wretch that killed that boy," the mother went on," because he is more unhappy tonight than we are here. Maybe he was weak-minded through drink. He couldn't have known Gene or he wouldn't have killed him."
God knows there will be plenty to cry about with the RNC Convention convening this week in Cleveland- not for the fatheads and haters that constitute the Republican party but for the horrific fact that between 40 and 50 million of our fellow Americans think their candidate has something to offer our country- has something other than a open hatred toward non-white and non-christian people who share an equally endowed hope of life, liberty and a pursuit of happiness from sea to shining sea ( as Melania would say). As it is the delegates and visitors to Cleveland will be protected by Cleveland's finest- and I don't mean the Cavaliers- and their finest are represented by a police union leader named Steve Loomis, who has already made a lasting name for himself with his involvement in the Tamir Rice execution by a couple of his union brothers in blue:
Before all of the facts were even in following the shooting deaths
of three Baton Rouge policemen on Sunday, the head of Cleveland Police Patrolmen’sAssociation
blamed President Barack Obama for the spate of cop killings.
Detective Steve Loomis, who made national headlines when
he called 12-year-old Tamir Rice “menacing” after the pre-teen
was gunned down in 2014 by a fellow Cleveland cop, was quick
to get on the phone with Fox News and tell the country
that Obama has “blood on his hands.”
Det. Loomis has already taken it upon himself to make sure we all know not to buy in to the false narrative being dished out by BLACK LIVES MATTER, their allies and the President:
"How the hell did we ever become the bad guys in this country?
I can not imagine how we got here. It is the irresponsible reporting
of the media and irresponsible statements from people who are
credible - like the president, like celebrities."
 | ||
| Father Coughlin |
from the Congressional Record, July 8, 2016
Mr. Cleaver: " Mr. Speaker, sometimes--not all the time, but sometimes--out of chaos we can find our purpose. It is going to be my prayer this night and for the next few nights that this body can see clearly that our purpose is to lead our Nation away from the edge of the mare's nest of fear and a response to fear that creates even more fear. We can do so by understanding that words matter.Words matter. They can do damage.
I grew up in public housing in Texas right outside of Dallas, Texas, and in the projects they would say: Sticks and stones may break my words(sic), but words can never hurt me. It wasn't true when I was a boy, and it is not true today. Words can hurt; words can horrify; words can hinder; but words can also heal. One of the things we need more today than we have in the immediate past, are words of healing instead of words of hate."
__________________
And cried for the citizens of North Carolina who when they are not fighting against the voter suppression laws that their governor has implemented have now to contend with his new law that removes the police body camera video
from the public record so there is even less transparency and accountability in matters of police actions and this at such a time as we are experiencing here in America is as if North Carolina and its oleaginous governor is giving BLACK LIVES MATTER and the rest of America a shit encrusted middle finger. And did you cry for having the inept leadership of Paul Ryan ideologically looming over a sham House legislature professing meaningless words of comfort when it is a resolved commitment to basic decency and human need that is required. Dry-eyed and infallible he seemed to lip-sync his words of outrage: "An attack,"
he said, "on the people who protect us is an attack on all of us." He then stated that "the perpetrators (mimic-ing police talk) of evil do not represent us (whatever that means). They do not control us (whatever does he have in mind?)The blame lies with the people who committed these vicious acts and no one else." Obviously he hadn't been paying too close attention to Dallas. You should cry because he never mentioned at this time the fatal attacks on Mssrs Sterling and Castile which I'm sure the Speaker would agree is an attack on all of us, too. He did manage to remark on how every Republican and Democrat "wants to see less gun violence." And I wept when I remembered how long and much it has taken to finally get him and his undistinguished colleagues to agree to put some kind of gun protecting measure to a House vote. But only after they return from a hard-won 7 week vacation.
I hope you saved some of your tears for the baseball All-Star game played in that bastion of American patriotism, San Diego, California for it was there during the heart tugging opening ceremonies that one of the singers for a Canadian group performing the Canadian anthem, O Canada, decided upon himself (we are told) to interpolate his own lyrics slipping in the catchy phrase "all lives matter" while holding up a handwritten sign in case nobody heard him-To most everyone's credit who was in attendance I didn't hear any cheering during this embarrassing white supremacist moment and that also brought tears to my eyes. A little earlier in the day and across the grieving country the languorous senator from Kentucky rose in the Senate, where he leads the crusading majority into more and more vacation weeks every year, to express his heartfelt condolence to the victims families and speak of "coming together to overcome these tragedies and allow healing to prevail." I cry when words like suffering and healing are allowed to escape from such uncaring and deceiving lips that Mitch McConnell smacks whenever the nation is in dire need of deliberative action and help - unless its sending young men and women off to another needless war. You should have cried, too, when realizing that all was not a lost cause on this still sad day as when the youthful Obama-hater, Senator Tom Cotton, yet more presidential material from the
 | |
| Oddly the nation had just celebrated this glorious day on June 15.Tom Cotton must really love lobster |
These pleas have been to no avail. Police brutality has continued...We have been forced to conclude that the responsible officials of the District of Columbia will not or cannot act to protect the lives and liberties of American citizens living under their jurisdiction.
There was a moment ( a moment some would say that has lasted until now) when the crying subsided after the murders of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy (its always "Bobby" now) and the air that was let out after the blow to your solar plexis started to return and you realized that perhaps- just perhaps- nothing will ever be right again and the war and the injustices will go on -well, I may be overly stating a historical connection ( after all it was Dallas) but you had to have cried when you read an article by Michael Barbaro and Yamiche Alcindor (7/9/16) that related that with the "national revulsion" over the shooting videos of Mr. Starling and Castile, BLACK LIVES MATTER may have finally (finally?) "broken through"
 | |
| Pastor Brown protesting |
"In the days before the Dallas massacre, Aesha Rasheed, 39, an activist in New Orleans, felt that at long last, white and black America were watching the same images with the same horror: two Louisiana police officers tackling and then shooting Alton Sterling, 37, at point-blank range; the slumped, blood-soaked body of Philando Castile, 32, after a Minnesota police officer shot him through a car window, with his girlfriend and her daughter sitting inches away.
“It seemed like a national consciousness was sinking in,” Ms. Rasheed said.
After the massacre in Dallas, she said, “it turned on a dime.” She now worries that the episodes involving black men may be overshadowed and overlooked. "does this get ignored?", she asked. "Do five officers take center stage?"
Pastor Brown knew. Of course he did. A cursory viewing of our Congressional Record over the past week bears this out and quite frankly I have no tears left to shed on congress- but perhaps for a nation that is stuck with such a disgraceful legislature I may be able to find some and it is both as a thorn in the heart (and I am one who has a script for those little nitro tablets) and a balm in gilead or is it from gilead that such sources are still available to us; if I may further the connection the "balm" derives from a plant that is said to bleed "Balsam from Mecca" ( the region where it is most found today)- Go figure. The crying welled from the expectant hypothesis that during this time of our country's sorrow only Democrats in congress, if they expressed their personal and our collective sadness in the public forum, would mention the slain police officers in Dallas AND the two shooting deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile earlier and the mourning Republicans would express their equally felt sorrow for the officers but not mention Mr. Sterling and Castile at all. They truly do live in a different America.
The cops were given a beautiful memorial-tribute. I cried. Two U.S. Presidents and their First Ladies, the Vice-President and his wife, two U.S. Senators, Representatives from all over, the Mayor, the Police Chief- religious leaders of all faiths, an inspiring choir - no soldier killed in action, so I believe, ever received such a national tribute (write me if I'm wrong here) - the outpouring of the nation's grief was great. Circumspection was the order of the day. I don't get out much anymore but I remember another time when there were protests both vehement and fatal and the voices of reaction and order displayed signs and bumper stickers exhorting us to support our local police and other remonstrances to authority. Politicians can always count on exploiting the public's need to hear how much they love our cops and how they always, always support our troops. Like kissing babies. Also what better time for our do nothing congress to show their fierce teeth in fighting the terrorists who it seems are here now and killing our cops. Why just this Monday last they put aside any potential gun control bill and instead passed or tried to pass something called the National Strategy for Combating Terrorist, Underground and Other Illicit Financing Act- directing the President to develop a national plan for "combating the financing of terrorism; there was the "Anti-terrorism Information Sharing Is Strength Act" -
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| Hjalmar Schacht |
I'm not quite sure what they had in mind with this but I'm certain it had nothing to do with Mrs. Clinton's e-mails; and the "Enhancing Treasury's Anti-Terror Tools Act" - which may or may not be the same strategy they used to finally nab Al Capone; also, the "Terrorist and Foreign Fighter Travel Exercise Act" which will probably prolong those airport wait lines even more- the sacrifices we're willing to make however don't compare to those of our police and troops. And those sacrifices made by them are made in the face of Congress's shameful surrender to the Gun Lobby- Everyday our nation's cops which number about 1.1 million- not including federal or correction officers- most in uniform working in their local precincts leave their homes in the morning, say goodbye to their families, go to their local precincts and - so I imagine- are sent out on their daily assignments with the late Michael Conrad's words ringing in their ears: "Lets be careful out there"- and once outside their precinct doors are faced with at least 300,000,000 plus guns already on the streets of our nation. The Congressional Research Service put the number at 357,000,000 three years ago (U.S. gunmakers now manufacture over 10 million guns per year). Shane, come back! How could you not cry for your local policemen and women? There are more guns than there are people- men-women-children-in the United States. I myself don't own a gun and now knowing this harsh statistic I amaze even myself by daring to get out of bed in the morning. I walk my faithful dog to the end of the driveway and then we rush back to the safety of our automatic coffee and all the fear news we can stand.
Last week you should have cried when Congresswoman Jackie Walorski, a proud patriot from V.P. Pants' home state rose among the mourners in the House to denounce once again the evils of the EPA and "Obamacare" and then spoke about the Republican's big plan to "restore the Constitution" and to give power back to the people. They're calling it The Better Way. I always shudder at the thought of Republicans screwing around with such an important bulwark of our freedoms when they seem never to have taken the trouble of reading it in the first place - or worst, they have read it or had someone read it to them. Rep. Walorski attended Jerry Falwell's "college" and my ad hominem-ish self can't seem to get the comparison with Mr. Trump's "university" out of my woozy head.
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| Last year a police detective in La refused to step down after he was exposed as member of KKK |
As long as I live I'll never understand Wisconsin. How its citizens can elect neanderthals like Scott Walker and Ron Johnson and Paul Ryan - there are not enough tears produced in a Restasis warehouse -
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| The Restasis doc |
"the stomach cannot empty properly in the absence of any observable blockage. The condition can affect people of all ages, but it is four times more likely to affect women than men. The symptoms include nausea, vomiting, and inability to finish a normal-sized meal, can be debilitating and sometimes life threatening. The condition can lead to malnutrition, severe dehydration and difficulty managing glucose levels."
And so I knew right away what was wrong with me when a week later at the convention in Cleveland, those Republican comrades roared their overwhelming approval when it was announced from the rostrum by Milwaukee Sheriff, Dave Clark, that the fourth Baltimore police officer was not guilty in the death of Freddie Gray. It may have been fitting and even fun for the Republican committee or as its known now, the Trump Family, to have Sheriff Clark make this announcement to the mob of delegates for he follows in a long line of African American officials and spokesmen whose driven demons seem to make them a driver of sorts for the right and thus beyond my ken and right to speculate. My tears would fall briefly because last week Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson - who has had many firsts in her distinguished career, one of them just happens to be she is the first registered nurse to serve in the House and she had something to stop the tears when she spoke last week of her prayers and sympathy going out not only to the families of the slain police officers " not just in Dallas, but across our nation. My thoughts and prayers are also with the families of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, who violently lost their lives this week as well." The killing of the officers happened in her district, five minutes from her house. Ms. Jackson Lee and Mr. Hoyer ( who I always want to call Stony) spoke of respect and dignity and justice also for all the week's victims too. And as its always the case there were quite a few malcontents ( see under: racists) who thought President Obama wasn't "pro-police" enough in his brilliant memorial oration. How could anyone but a Republican listen to that speech and not be moved and, in a way, proud that we are led by such a man as he is able to express what we all should be expressing in our pathetic ways and yet the Republicans never get it. Don't really want to. America has always paid attention to our cops - we may not have offered enough recompense for their life and death labors at times (Republican budgets?) they have been part and parcel of our landscape from their beginnings- and it continues every week and month in some public forum in which we openly proclaim our thanks- the very week of these killings there was still time to appreciate in the Congressional Record, police sergeant Teresa Dougherty's 30 years on the police force in her Colorado town and to wish the very best to Sergeant John Savage of Syracuse, New York upon his retirement after 30 years, too.
There was a celebrated newspaper story that - for awhile at least was included in many Journalism 101 classes- was written by a Frank Ward O'Malley, a reporter for the old New York Sun about the death of a New York City policeman named Gene Sheehan.
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| O'Malley of the Sun |
"Gene's mother was thankful that her boy hadn't killed Billy Morley before he died, "because," she said,"I can say honestly even now that I'd rather have Gene's dead body brought home to me, as it will be tonight, than to have him come to me and say, "Mother, I had to kill a man this morning."
"God comfort the poor wretch that killed that boy," the mother went on," because he is more unhappy tonight than we are here. Maybe he was weak-minded through drink. He couldn't have known Gene or he wouldn't have killed him."
God knows there will be plenty to cry about with the RNC Convention convening this week in Cleveland- not for the fatheads and haters that constitute the Republican party but for the horrific fact that between 40 and 50 million of our fellow Americans think their candidate has something to offer our country- has something other than a open hatred toward non-white and non-christian people who share an equally endowed hope of life, liberty and a pursuit of happiness from sea to shining sea ( as Melania would say). As it is the delegates and visitors to Cleveland will be protected by Cleveland's finest- and I don't mean the Cavaliers- and their finest are represented by a police union leader named Steve Loomis, who has already made a lasting name for himself with his involvement in the Tamir Rice execution by a couple of his union brothers in blue:
Before all of the facts were even in following the shooting deaths
of three Baton Rouge policemen on Sunday, the head of Cleveland Police Patrolmen’sAssociation
blamed President Barack Obama for the spate of cop killings.
Detective Steve Loomis, who made national headlines when
he called 12-year-old Tamir Rice “menacing” after the pre-teen
was gunned down in 2014 by a fellow Cleveland cop, was quick
to get on the phone with Fox News and tell the country
that Obama has “blood on his hands.”
Det. Loomis has already taken it upon himself to make sure we all know not to buy in to the false narrative being dished out by BLACK LIVES MATTER, their allies and the President:
"How the hell did we ever become the bad guys in this country?
I can not imagine how we got here. It is the irresponsible reporting
of the media and irresponsible statements from people who are
credible - like the president, like celebrities."
Maybe by not listening to your mothers?
Trump got into this act too questioning President Obama's sincerity and the legitimacy of his grief- as if a Muslim from Kenya couldn't express and show genuine sorrow and feeling for American cops.
From the Congressional Record July 8, 2016
Rep. Cleaver Rises Once Again:
Mr. HONDA. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from
Missouri (Mr. Cleaver).
Mr. CLEAVER. I thank the gentleman from California.
Mr. Speaker, when a nation experiences a tragedy like
the one we have just witnessed, it can either further
polarize, weaponize, and fragmentize, or it can
harmonize and mobilize.
The House of Representatives of the United States must
choose the latter. When reason fails, as it sometimes does, in my world,
it is time to pray. We have multiple
religious affiliations in this body, but all of us believe in
something that would condemn any kind of violence,
even verbal violence. The world is watching what we do,
and we shouldn't waste time watching over our ideology.
A little boy closed his finger in the door and began
to cry. His name was Bob. He began to cry and cry
and cry, and his parents ran in. His other brother, Billy,
was also crying. The parents thought both of them
were hurt, but when they looked at Billy, they said, ``You haven't been hurt.
Why are you crying?''
He said, ``I am helping Bob cry.''
This whole Nation is crying, and those of us here, in our hearts,
are helping the people of Dallas cry.
(somehow I believe we ordinary citizens could use such a care facility in our lives. We first introduced the Soul Repair Center to you back in July 2012 in our "Game of Drones" page)
November 5, 2013
The Soul Repair Center at Brite Divinity School in Dallas, Texas has made many strides in helping to bring healing to military veterans and their families since its formal opening on November 12, 2012.
The center was launched with the help of Rev. Herman Keizer Jr., the former director of the Christian Reformed Church’s Chaplaincy & Care Ministry, which this Sunday is celebrating Chaplain's Sunday.
A press release marking the first anniversary of the Soul Repair Center says, “We have worked tirelessly to educate the public about moral injury.”
