Hands Off The Ferguson, Missouri Protestors-Stop The Police Killings Of Black Youth-Stop The Harassment Of The Press- Free All Protestors Now!  

Frank Jackman comment: 

It has always been easy for the American imperialist capitalist government and their police to treat black youth, especially black males and increasing Latinos like they have treated the peoples of Southeast Asia in the past, and in Iraq and Afghanistan more recently as so much collateral damage when they pulled the hammer down. Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, and a myriad of others shot down over the years by the police and/or vigilantes cry out for justice in Ferguson, Missouri this day and will not accept another whitewash. 

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THE WARS COME HOME

Some years back, at the height of the Iraq War – perhaps we should call it Iraq War II, as US troops are again returning to that country for the third time -- Dorchester People for Peace was involved in building a community-based coalition to cut military spending and redirect the funds to needs at home.  In the face of constantly trumpeted “security alerts” and the on-going “Global War on Terror” we were concerned to find effective messaging to justify reducing Pentagon spending when people were led to believe that it was meant to “keep them safe.” 

We decided to organize a workshop for coalition members to explore concerns about national security and come up with answers that would make sense in response to the attitudes among the public on the need for a strong military to counter terrorist threats.  It was our intention to develop effective arguments in answer to the expected responses that we needed a strong military to keep us safe.

Reflecting the neighborhood-based make-up of the coalition, the attendees at the workshop were predominantly people of color.  We started with an exercise of going around the room, asking people to answer the question: “What threats make you feel unsafe.”  Perhaps it should not have been a surprise that one after another, the answers were “THE POLICE”. . .

 

Left: Ferguson. Right: Iraq

Police in Ferguson, Missouri are treating the people they're supposed to serve and protect as the enemy. Armed with weapons and riot gear, the police officers look like they're coming from a war zone. Their equipment did. The Ferguson Police Department received military-grade equipment -- free of charge -- from the Pentagon as part of the 1033 program. And they've been using the weapons and gear against protesters following the police shooting of Mike Brown, and unarmed 18-year-old.

Ask your representative to stop the Pentagon from sending weapons of war to local police departments.

 

POLICE TERROR IN FERGUSON: 'This is a War and We are Soldiers on the Frontline'

The raw fury in this northern suburb of St Louis over the killing of Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old apparently walking back from a convenience store, may slowly fade in the coming weeks and months. But the underlying, bitter resentment among many in the local African-American community about their treatment at the hands of an almost unanimously white police force and local authorities, will likely continue to simmer.  More

 

Enough is enough in Ferguson

Anyone familiar with the history of race and policing in the United States had to suspect from the beginning that the shooting of Michael Brown was not just a tragedy, but a crime. Yet presumption of innocence prevails and sober minds know both the need to wait for an investigation and the reality that we may never really know what happened that fateful Saturday in Ferguson, Missouri. But watching events unfold Wednesday night in the St. Louis suburb, there can be no doubt that what happened on August 13 was an outrage.  The local authorities clearly have no idea what they're doing, and higher powers from the state or federal government need to intervene before things get even worse… Police officers, for some unfathomable reason, were pointing guns at unarmed civilians at twilight.  More

 

One Nation Under SWAT

Think of it as a different kind of blowback.  Even when you fight wars in countries thousands of miles distant, they still have an eerie way of making the long trip home… When police departments look to muscle up their arms and tactics, the Pentagon isn’t the only game in town. Civilian agencies are in on it, too. During a 2011 investigation, reporters Andrew Becker and G.W. Schulz discovered that, since 9/11, police departments watching over some of the safest places in America have used $34 billion in grant funding from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to militarize in the name of counterterrorism… Report by report, evidence is mounting that America’s militarized police are a threat to public safety. But in a country where the cops increasingly look upon themselves as soldiers doing battle day in, day out, there’s no need for public accountability or even an apology when things go grievously wrong. More

 

GREENWALD: The Militarization of U.S. Police

The dangers of domestic militarization are both numerous and manifest. To begin with, as the nation is seeing in Ferguson, it degrades the mentality of police forces in virtually every negative way and subjects their targeted communities to rampant brutality and unaccountable abuse… Police militarization also poses grave and direct dangers to basic political liberties, including rights of free speech, press and assembly… Law enforcement officials and policy-makers in America know full well that serious protests — and more — are inevitable given the economic tumult and suffering the U.S. has seen over the last three years (and will continue to see for the foreseeable future).  More

 

A nation of Fergusons: Why America's police forces look like invading armies

Although shocking, what is happening in Ferguson is merely a particularly severe example of a much broader and long-running phenomenon: the militarization of police weaponry and tactics in the US. In part thanks to federal programs that provide military equipment to local police (though not military training), and encourage its use as part of ordinary law enforcement, police are increasingly using SWAT-style tactics in routine policing. However, experts say, this phenomenon is extremely dangerous, and can make otherwise peaceful situations dangerous — as police appear to have done in Ferguson.  More

 

Pentagon fueled Ferguson confrontation

The Pentagon might not have boots on the ground in Ferguson, Mo., where 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot by police on Saturday, but it does have wheels on the street. Michelle McCaskill, media relations chief at the Defense Logistics Agency, confirms that the Ferguson Police Department is part of a federal program called 1033 that distributes hundreds of millions of dollars of surplus military equipment to civilian police forces across the United States. The materials range from small items, such as pistols and automatic rifles, to heavy armored vehicles such as the MRAPs used in Afghanistan and Iraq. "In 2013 alone, $449,309,003.71 worth of property was transferred to law enforcement," the agency's website states.

According to McCaskill, the most recent transfer of military equipment from the Department of Defense to small Ferguson was in November and included two vehicles as well as a trailer and a generator. Details on the vehicles and their intended uses have not been released by the Pentagon. Information on any prior transfers is also unavailable.  More

 

Rep. Hank Johnson to introduce bill to stop providing military equipment to local police forces

Democratic Rep. Hank Johnson of Georgia's 4th Congressional District will introduce a bill to end the federal government's program of providing billions of dollars worth of military equipment free to local police… “Our main streets should be a place for business, families, and relaxation, not tanks and M16s,” Johnson wrote. “Unfortunately, due to a Department of Defense (DOD) Program that transfers surplus DOD equipment to state and local law enforcement, our local police are quickly beginning to resemble paramilitary forces.”  More

 

Congress Isn't Ending the Pentagon-to-Police Weapons Program Anytime Soon

High-profile lawmakers are criticizing a federal program that puts military equipment in the hands of local law enforcement, a reaction to the chaos and police crackdown in Ferguson, Mo. But that doesn't mean Congress is going to do anything about it… The response from congressional Republican leadership, however, has been measured or nonexistent, suggesting the issue is unlikely to make the agenda when Congress returns from recess in September. And even if it does, the program that connects police forces to military equipment has well-placed defenders in Congress. At issue is the "1033 program," a Defense Department   Support Office, or LESO. "This program protects taxpayers, and it protects our nation's law enforcement men and women as they do a dangerous job," said John Noonan, a spokesman for the Republicans on the House Armed Services Committee, which has jurisdiction over the program.   More

 

Tear gas is a chemical weapon banned in war. But Ferguson police shoot it at protesters.

Despite its ubiquity across the globe and in United States, tear gas is a chemical agent banned in warfare per the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, which set forth agreements signed by nearly every nation in the world — including the United States. The catch, however, is that while it’s illegal in war, it’s legal in domestic riot control… Ferguson police chief Tom Jackson has defended the use of tear gas. “There are complaints about the response from some people,” he said, “but to me, nobody got hurt seriously, and I’m happy about that.”  While that appears to have held true as of Thursday morning, some scientists and international observers contend the tactic of spraying people with tear gas, which commonly uses the chemical agent 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile (CS), can pose serious dangers. “Tear gas under the Geneva Convention is characterized as a chemical warfare agent, and so it is precluded for use in warfare, but it is used very frequently against civilians,”  More

 

Palestinians share tear gas advice with Ferguson protesters

Local authorities in Ferguson have begun responding to nightly protests with tear gas and rubber bullets. Palestinians on Twitter could relate, and shared words and images of support with the US protesters… After images of Ferguson police using tear gas were disseminated on Twitter, Palestinians Rajai abuKhalil and Mariam Barghouti drew on their own experiences to express support with protesters in Missouri.

@MariamBarghouti

Solidarity with #Ferguson. Remember to not touch your face when teargassed or put water on it. Instead use milk or coke!

Dear #Ferguson. The Tear Gas used against you was probably tested on us first by Israel. No worries, Stay Strong. Love, #Palestine

 

Israel-trained police "occupy" Missouri after killing of black youth

Since the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown by Ferguson police in Missouri last weekend, the people of Ferguson have been subjected to a military-style crackdown by a squadron of local police departments dressed like combat soldiers, prompting residents to liken the conditions on the ground in Ferguson to the Israeli military occupation of Palestine.  And who can blame them? The dystopian scenes of paramilitary units in camouflage rampaging through the streets of Ferguson, pointing assault rifles at unarmed residents and launching tear gas into people’s front yards from behind armored personnel carriers (APCs), could easily be mistaken for a Tuesday afternoon in the occupied West Bank. And it’s no coincidence. 

At least two of the four law enforcement agencies that were deployed in Ferguson up until Thursday evening — the St. Louis County Police Department and the St. Louis Police Department — received training from Israeli security forces in recent years.   More