From Pine View Farm

Enforcers category archive

Shoot the Messenger 0

At the Bangor Daily News, a guest blogger marvels at the difference in police tactics in responding to the violent riot in Keene, New Hampshire, and the almost-entirely peaceful demonstrations in Ferguson, Missouri. She offers a theory of causation; here’s a snippet:

It seems to me that the “Pumpkin Fest Riots” were met with restraint because A) the rioters were white men, and B) the riot was infused with alcohol, and not infused with a message. Imagine if these rioters were actually protestors carrying signs stating, “We are the 99%” or “Justice for (insert name of young black teen)”!

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TSA Security Theatre 0

Thoreau.

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On Being while Black 0

Thom and Joe Madison discuss events on Ferguson.

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Keystone Kops in the Keystone State 0

Shaun Mullen has an update on the fustercluck search for a domestic terrorist in Pennsylvania.

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Officer Lynch 0

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Why Elections Matter 0

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Raiding for Money 0

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Filters, Reprise 0

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Filters 0

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“The Talk,” Reprise 0

Another black man shares his memory.

When I was 14, my grandfather sat me down for “the talk” – not the birds and the bees, but “the billy clubs and the bullets.”

I brushed him off. I thought that in my majority-black hometown of Newark, racism would not reach me. Little did I realize that a healthy fear of the police would become a survival skill for a young black man.

My wake-up call came at 16.

Follow the link for the rest of his story.

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TSA Security Theatre 0

What you don’t know won’t hurt them.

San Jose officials who demanded an accounting of airport security breaches that have raised questions about passenger safety in the post 9/11 era were frustrated Thursday after the city’s aviation director said federal authorities wouldn’t let her discuss them.

Director of Aviation Kim Aguirre told council members on the city’s public safety committee that two highly publicized stowaway incidents at Mineta San Jose International Airport this year were the only “major” breaches in her 19 years at the airport. But she said the federal Transportation Security Administration prohibited her from releasing more information about those or any other incidents.

More “What you don’t know can’t hurt us” at the link.

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Frozen Assets 0

In the light of recent news stories, this is easy to believe.

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If One Standard Is Good, Two Must Be Better 0

Aside:

Thom seems to have forgotten what century this is.

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Facebook Frolics 0

Speed trapped.

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Boys Being Boys? 0

Werner Herzog’s Bear posts another in his continuing and only slightly tongue-in-cheek series exploring white pathology. It’s his effort to debunk what he describes as “the false narrative that the pathologies of black people are what’s to blame for their economic and social inequality in American life, not systemic racism.”

A nugget (emphasis added):

Of course, Americans like to point to the embarrassing violence and hate they see among European soccer fans and feel smug, as if that kind of thing doesn’t happen in this country. It does, but in a much more random and less organized fashion. Just take a look at our college campuses. Michigan State University is infamous for its post-game rioting, where students have a tradition of lighting couches on fire in the street after big games. Earlier this year a student mob at the University of Arizona had to be dispersed by riot police after their team lost a basketball game. When Penn State fired Joe Paterno for having protected serial abuser and rapist Jerry Sandusky, students rioted, tearing down lamp posts and throwing rocks at police. (Guess what? The police did not bring in military vehicles, point rifles at the students, or use tear gas. Gee, I wonder why?) If it were young black men and not white men doing this you can bet that couch burning would be turned into an epidemic by Fox News along the lines of the bogus “knockout game.”

Please do read the rest.

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Rousted 1

At Psychology Today Blogs, Lynne Soraya remembers when, after she packed up her belongings in a rented van and moved across the country, she was lost and confused on a strange road in unfamiliar territory and a cop decided that she was driving in a suspicious manner.

Convinced I was attempting to flee, the officer had whipped his car around in front of my half-turned vehicle, T.J. Hooker-style, lept out and drew his gun, screaming. Terrified, I stopped cold and put my hands in the air. The officer, it seemed, had begun to suspect that I was a thief, attempting to make off with a vanful of stolen goods. And when I failed to respond appropriately to his siren (which I couldn’t hear), that was his signal that I was spooked and attempting to flee capture. So, he’d taken immediate action to head off my escape.

Given that level of intensity that had developed in a matter of minutes, the intensity that left me staring down the barrel of a gun, it’s interesting what happened next. Nothing. The gun dropped as quickly as it had been raised. The officer’s manner changed in a split second.The very second he saw my face. I didn’t even have to speak. His utter confusion at seeing me was evident, even to me. Even in that moment. So why was that?

Follow the link to find out her answer.

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Public Relations, International Black Eye Dept. 0

The first half-hour or so of this week’s Linux Outlaws, hosted by an Englishman and a German, was all about events in Ferguson, Mo.

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Community-Based Policing 0

Oh, yeah. There’s an app for that.

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The Right Can’t Handle the Truth . . . 0

. . . because the facts lean left.

(Video moved below the fold because it autoplays on some systems. Autoplaying is rude.)

Read more »

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Chemical Weapons 0

Part One:

Part Two:

Also, please read Der Spiegel’s report from Ferguson.

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