Why Do Police Feel It Is Their Job To Kill -- The San Francisco Thing and The San Bernardino Thing and the Paris Thing In Perspective

When I first saw news about the San Bernardino mass killing, the word was that it was at a hospital. Then the word was it was at a clinic. Then it was at a developmental center -- which didn't make any sense, as I didn't know what that was. Much later, the word was that the shootings happened at a conference facility at the Inland Regional Center where the San Bernardino Department of Health was holding a banquet and awards presentation (or a holiday party, it's not entirely clear).

From the first, though, the reports reminded me a lot of what happened in Paris. In other words, a mass shooting where people were gathered for no political purpose at all, intended -- apparently -- to inspire as much fear and dread in as many people as possible.

The authorities have been having a hard time calling it "terrorism" -- and I don't really think that argument matters in the least. The issue is that the actions of the (apparent) shooters did cause panic, fear and dread in a whole city, leading to furious reaction by police, media falling all over itself to get the story (mostly wrong) and commands from on high to OBEY.

Obedience. That's the key element.

Oh yeah, and the alleged shooters were killed by police after a high-speed chase from their home in Redlands and through the streets of San Bernardino, until they were cornered and a shoot-out ensued. Or something. Or so they say. We really don't know what happened, although whatever it was was apparently witnessed by the scrum of helicopter cameras overhead -- though not shown, and possibly not recorded by those self-same cameras. The NBC helicopter, for example, was focused on a vehicle (apparently shot up, not sure) some distance away from the "black SUV" that the (apparent) shooters were driving and in which one died, the other shot down in the street. Much of the coverage I saw that day was deliberate misdirection, "so as not to reveal" something, whether bloody corpses or police storming around town frightening the bejebus out of everyone. But eventually there would be the denouement so everyone could get back to normal.

Ah yes, the killers were killed by police.

Most Americans would say it was justified. No other choice.

In San Francisco, a video was posted on social media of a man being shot and killed by a swarm of police who formed a firing squad on a city street and shot the man in the presence of many witnesses.

The man appears agitated but not in any way threatening to the officers, all of whom appear to have their sidearms drawn and aimed at the man. As the man attempts to sidle away from them, one officer puts himself in the man's path. The man continues to attempt to inch away from the other officers. As he does, the officer in his path appears to open fire. Other officers join in. The man falls mortally wounded on the sidewalk while witnesses shout their outrage.

Police claim the man was armed with a kitchen knife 6"-8" long (not visible in any video of the incident so far released) and had "committed a felony" by stabbing someone previously. He was confronted by police but refused commands to drop the knife, and he appeared to be able to withstand several bean-bag rounds without being subdued sufficiently for apprehension.

Police claim that the witness videos show what happened after he was struck by bean-bag rounds and managed to get up again. Police claim he still had the knife and refused commands to drop it. Police claim he was moving toward an officer when they opened fire -- "fearing for their lives and the safety of others...." Bang, bang.

The "21-foot Rule" and all of that. In other words, whether or not the man was actually threatening officers, he was a threat to them simply because he was armed and so close to them. Never mind that all of the officers on scene were aiming their guns at him, and objectively represented a mortal threat to him. Beside the point, right? The fact that he was trying to inch away, slowly, without in any way threatening the officers, but he was moving toward an officer who had put himself in the man's path, was sufficient to justify opening fire on him -- according to the police.

Oh, and he was black.

Sigh.

Yes, well. This is the US of America, 2015, and in the US of America in 2015, a black man with a weapon, even if only an imaginary weapon, or armed only with his blackness, is considered an existential threat to be neutralized. Terminated if need be.

This is the almost automatic response of police throughout the land when they are informed of an armed black male on the loose. "Training" kicks in, and... they kill.

In this case, the young black man, Mario Woods, was alleged to have stabbed another man who sought treatment a nearby hospital and reported the attack to the police. Police scoured the area and determined that the young man they eventually shot and killed, Mario Woods, had stabbed the man being treated at the hospital (for a non-lethal wound to his shoulder -- apparently).

Mario Woods, apparently, refused to obey police commands to "drop the weapon" and submit to arrest. So far, there are three videos showing portions of the confrontation between Mario Woods and what look to be close to a dozen SFPD officers, guns drawn. There is no "weapon" visible in Mario Woods' hand in any of the videos. In one, it appears that Mario Woods is attempting to show the officers his hands -- to demonstrate he does not have a knife. But as is the way with these videos, the images are too grainy to say for sure.

At any rate, he is not threatening the officers in any way. He appears to be confused and frustrated, agitated but not threatening.

And when he takes a step or two away, toward an officer moving into his path (an officer he might not even have seen) he is subjected to a fusillade of gunfire, more than a dozen shots fired by five officers at close range. Mario Woods did not survive. Intentionally so.

While there were protests at the time he was shot -- distinctly heard on the videos -- and there has been a growing sense of outrage in the Bayview community and San Francisco where this police action took place, media has been intent on demonstrating that Mario Woods "needed killing" because of his criminal past and because of his alleged assault on the man who was treated at the hospital, and most of all for his

FAILURE TO OBEY.

Obedience being (almost) the sole criterion of whether one lives or dies in any confrontation with police. "Just comply" say the defenders of these actions, "and you won't be shot and killed." Of course that's not true, especially not true for black and brown males -- who may comply and be shot or brutalized anyway. It's simply a roll of the dice whether the police will kill a black or brown male in a confrontation, no matter what the subject is doing or not doing. Police will almost always get away with it, too, because all that matters at law is the officer's perception at the time of the killing. So long as the office can say the Magic Words, "fearing for my life and the safety of others" he or she will almost always be free of criminal liability for any execution they might commit. This is due to some very strange Supreme Court rulings protecting police action in the course of their duties (mostly having to do with the Drug War) and to cultures and policies of police departments that encourage fatal encounters.

In the case of the San Bernardino Thing (Paris, too) the suspects were... brown. In San Bernardino, it was a matter of a brown married couple of the Muslim persuasion, he an American citizen, she, apparently, a Pakistani. He was an employee of the county health department that was holding the event at the conference facility. The story is that the man had an argument with someone else there and left the facility only to return shortly thereafter with his wife, both of whom were armed with assault rifles and both of whom opened fire into the assembly, killing fourteen and wounding another 20 or so before escaping in that "black SUV."

Motive unknown, but "workplace dispute" seems to be part of it. Stories of the couple's radicalization and devotion to ISIS (whatever it may be at any given time) are circulating, There is both a Pakistani and a Saudi connection of some sort. And of course the internet as a means of communication and radicalization are part of the story too (as is the case with the Paris Thing as well).

The response of the politicians is to forbid Syrian refugee resettlement in this country or in Europe, as the Syrian refugees, who had nothing to do with San Bernardino or Paris, are potential threats to guard against.

The San Bernardino couple (Sayeed Farouk and Tashfeen Malik) had acquired quite an arsenal of weapons and ammunition, all legally, only a tiny portion of which was (apparently) used in their killing rampage and later shoot out with police. The rest was discovered at their townhouse.

The Paris attacks were committed by heavily armed individuals, all or almost all of whom died in shootouts with police.

Few would question the need for killing individuals who are actively engaged in shootouts with police. Though it is reported to have been the case in both San Bernardino and Paris, these shootouts did not necessarily take place at all. Police have been known to declare themselves involved in "shootouts" when only they are firing. This was apparently the case in Watertown during the apprehension of one of the Tsarnayev brothers. Only the police were firing at their quarry who was hiding in a boat under a tarp, but the police claimed falsely that they were engaged in a shootout. This has happened many times.

Whether the couple in San Bernardino were shooting it out with police will probably never be known for certain. Same with the many suspects in the Paris Thing (I've read that there have been thousands of police raids in France and Belgium since the incidents in Paris. Some have involved killing, but how many? Who knows, and can we believe what we're told?)

Meanwhile, France and other parts of Europe are enduring a state of emergency which prohibits public demonstrations among many other normal activities and which requires obedience to authority.

There is a consistent theme through all these instances: one obeys or one suffers the potentially lethal consequences.

Command and obey.

The lesson? Terrorize a city, and the residents of the city shall be made to obey.

Be a black or brown man suspected of having committed a crime or of being armed in any way, and be shot down by police.

And then of course there are the white male mass murderers captured alive and treated with courtesy and respect, granted all the rights and privileges guaranteed to them by the Constitution.

America. 2015.

The Sound of Terror in Ferguson

This is the most gawdawful audio I think I've ever heard:



I couldn't hold back my own emotion as I listened to it.

Extreme. Exterminate. Horror.

This happened a couple of hours after the media was sent back to their quarters by the police staging point at about the time Captain Johnson was holding his 2:00am presser.

Mercs in Ukraine?

Sure. Why not?

There have been reports of merc sightings in the shadows of the upheavals in Ukraine from the beginning, and almost certain descriptions of the snipers in Kiev as mercenaries hired by Svoboda and the Right Sektor. Many observers have claimed they've been hearing unaccented English spoken among some of these shadowy forces, just before some Antimaidan dissenter is shot or otherwise incapacitated, and it is reported that the FBI and CIA -- among other US agencies -- are coordinating the crackdown on dissent and separatism in the East and throughout the country.

Given what has been noted so far in the efforts of the Kiev coup-regime to hold onto the East (Donbass) in spite of the people's defiance and refusal, there are no doubt death squads on the pattern of so many we've seen in the past) operating throughout Ukraine. They may be concentrated for now in the Donbass, but there's no reason to think their assignments and territory won't be expanded as resistance to the Kiev coup-regime's program of suffering and exploitation -- under the direction of the IMF, EU, USA, and NATO --  increases.

Mercs are an essential part of the program, especially when -- as in the case of Ukraine -- poorly paid and trained native "troops" refuse to fight their brothers and sisters.

Of course, media announcements of "The 400" or however many Academi (or are they Blackwater?) mercs there are in Ukraine look to be quite obvious propaganda to inspire terror among the refusniks and rebels. It's obvious they have no fear of the so-called "army" forces arrayed against them, as so many of the videos uploaded from the region testify. Perhaps they will fear the mercenaries, then, eh? The ones who have no qualms about liquidating the untermenschen wherever they encounter them. 

If Ukraine isn't already swarming with international mercs -- they don't have to be Americans, do they, hmm? -- ready to shed plenty of native blood for the cause of the bankers and exploiters and financiers and oppressor-class, it soon will be, no?

Monstrous.

From the AntiFa Trenches, c. 1938 (contd)

Spanish Antifascist Poster, c. 1938

The Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939, was one of the very few times when the People rose up against the fascist tide prior to World War II, and as we know, the fascist forces of Generalissimo Francisco Franco were victorious (not without the help of his good friends, Benito Mussolini and Adolph Hitler let it be said.)

The interesting thing to me has always been that Franco's fascist Spain endured through WWII and for many decades thereafter, in some respects it endures today. Latin American dictatorships during and after the War were largely modeled on European fascism. And most of the anti-communist dictatorships supported by the United States, wherever they were found, were more or less fundamentally fascist throughout the Cold War era.

In other words, World War II did not actually defeat fascism. Depending on your perspective, it wasn't a war against fascism at all. (Soviets saw it a little differently of course.) Apart from the Soviets, it was a war of one faction of corporatist-imperialists against another for global hegemony. As the Nazi-fascist faction was defeated, the Enemy then became, almost instantaneously, the Global Communist Conspiracy centered in the Soviet Union, the chief enemy of the fascists, and the one the United States had focused on prior to WWII.

All of this long ago convinced me that a faction of the fascists actually won World War II, despite the hoop-lah and propaganda of Allied Victory. I grew up in an era of intense anti-communism and propaganda, a near absence of civil liberties (such as freedom of speech, assembly and association), and an ongoing civil crusade against "subversion." In the background was the constant drumbeat of immanent nuclear war of annihilation between the stalwart USofA and the perfidious Soviet Russians. It was many years before I understood that had it been up to the Soviets, none of this would have happened. There would have been no Cold War, no arms race, threat of instant incineration. It was all a fever dream and fantasy in a way.

So as I read "The Peril of Fascism" by A. B. Magil and Henry Stevens, the parallels between their view of what was going on in the USA c. 1938 and what we know today is more and more striking. The book is mostly contemporaneous reporting and an interweaving of various threads of knowledge. We see much the same kind of thing in the many news aggregators of today, each of which operates with a certain point of view and political bias, but each of which, if you apply critical thinking to them, can provide excellent insight into what's really going on.

The chapter called "Terror, Incorporated" seems to me to be particularly germane given recent events:

On May 22, 1936, the lifeless body of Charles Poole, an employee of the Works Progress Administration, was found lying in a ditch on the outskirts of Detroit. It seemed like another murder story. But before many days had passed, there grew out of that tale of death the ominous outlines of a far-reaching conspiracy whose victim was to be not that pitiful bullet-ridden body found in a ditch, but the rights and liberties of thousands of Americans. The Black Legion, flinging its shadow across the American scene, jolted the unwary and incredulous into a realization that it could happen here.

The Black Legion may appear in retrospect a bit fantastic and unreal, but no more so than Hitler's rowdies in the Munich beer hall days. The full truth about this brotherhood of hate and murder will perhaps never been known. Too many higher-ups of the industrial and political world were involved for complete candor. But enough has been revealed to indicate that while this terrorist organization may have been born in more or less spontaneous fashion, it was suckled and reared by the great automobile corporations of Detroit and Michigan. Of course, even the so-called spontaneous birth of such movements is possible only in a society which breeds fascism as filth breeds germs.

The two chief weapons of fascism are demagogy and terror. And in both, amateurdom gives way to science, the sporadic and haphazard are supplanted by system and organization. The lynch mobs of the South which spring up suddenly, live briefly and as suddenly melt away, the vigilante bands which function only during specific labor disputes, are the Black Legion in embryo -- but only in embryo. In the period of mounting disintegration and decay, when capitalism is beset by chronic ills it never knew before, these primitive forms of mob violence no longer suffice. Organizations of a more permanent kind, with a more stable membership and a more elaborate program are required. Hence, the modern Ku Klux Klan, the Black Legion, the Silver Shirts -- groups for whom terror is a profession and murder an art.

It is an omen of what can happen here that this country gave birth to one of the earliest semi-fascist terrorist organizations in the world, the modern Ku Klux Klan. Launched in November, 1915, it antedated the Fascisti of Mussolini and the Storm Troops of Hitler. It is significant, however, that not until after the World War, in the wake of the social dislocations that followed the conclusion of imperialist bloodshed, did the Ku Klux Klan, like the Fascisti in Italy and the various terror groups in Germany really come into its own. The Klan was, however, in its first stage less pronouncedly fascist than were the Italian and German murder gangs.

....

It will be noted that the period of the Klan's greatest strength coincided with the post-war crisis of capitalism and the first emergence of fascist tendencies throughout the capitalist world including the United States. Furthermore, the Klan, after its eclipse during the years of temporary capitalist stabilization, has been revived in another period of economic and social stress. It is significant, too, that while the Klan's main emphasis in the days of its great efflorescence was on anti-Catholicism, it soft-pedaled the anti-Catholic issue when it re-emerged during the economic crisis and directed its main energies against labor under the guise of combating Communism.

Thus the New York Sun of May 5, 1933, wrote:

The Ku Klux Klan, almost killed off seven years ago by the exposure of a series of flogging cases and other criminal activities attributed to it, has been revived in the South for the announced purpose of "educating" the Negro against Communism and other radical doctrines.

...

The shift in prejudices to which the Klan is appealing is a measure of the growth and deepening of those fascist tendencies which first manifested themselves after the war. The Black Legion, too, while its creed included attacks on Catholics, Jews, Negroes, and the foreign-born, made these subordinate to the fight against labor.

Yet it would be foolhardy to conclude that Catholics, Jews, Negroes, and the foreign-born would find any security should the forces which the Klan and the Black Legion represent gain power. In Germany the Nazi drive on labor merely constituted the hub of the wheel of repression that moved relentlessly against Jews, Catholics, Protestants, liberals and all who by any stretch of the imagination could be regarded as critical of the Nazi regime. The breadth of the orbit of hatred within which the Ku Klux Klan and the Black Legion moved offers no reason to suppose that fascist dictatorship in this country would be any less ruthless and sweeping.

...

Together with the growth of the Klan grew the trail of blood and terror that it left behind it in state after state. And the KKK learned to combine organized hooliganism with political action. Before long the three great Southwestern states, Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma, were completely under the thumb of the Klan. Elsewhere, too, the Klan became a power in city and state politics and entrenched itself in the police forces in many parts of the country. This expansion took place despite considerable opposition which the organization met not only from Catholics, Jews, Negroes and the foreign-born, but from many native white Protestants for whom the Klan represented everything reprehensible, stupid and reactionary in American life.

...

On its revival in 1931-32, the Klan left no doubt as to its militant anti-labor character. "The Klan Rides Again -- Communism Must Be Destroyed!" read handbills distributed throughout the South. In an Atlanta dispatch to the New York Post of September 14, 1934, David G. Wittels wrote:

The Ku Klux Klan has entered the strike picture in the South

Primed into new life by money from Anti-New Dealers, it is gathering strength for a battle against organized labor -- and eventually against President Roosevelt.

Rejuvenated three months ago, it has 30,000 members in Georgia, and 100,000 throughout the South.

In a few places in the South the Klan went so far as to adopt the Nazi trick of appearing to be pro-labor. At Columbus, Georgia, where 11,500 mill workers were striking, the KKK participated in a Labor Day parade. And at Griffin, Georgia, it was even instrumental in calling a strike. This will recall the Nazi "support" of the Berlin tramway workers' strike in the fall of 1932 on the eve of Hitler's accession to power.

In the mining town of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, the Klan in 1936 distributed printed cards -- with a union label -- listing the following program:

1. Deport illegal aliens
2. Drive out Communism
3. Restore Constitutional government
4. Keep church and state separate
5. Buy American-made products
6. White supremacy

It will be noted that anti-Catholicism has here been relegated to fourth place and euphemized into the inoffensive "Keep church and state separate." Number five shows that the Klan has taken over Hearst's "Buy American" campaign. In fact, the entire program, with the exception of points four and six, is identical with the public pronouncements of Hearst and the other big business reactionaries.

...

The revived Klan has been particularly active in Florida. Under the leadership of Kleagle Fred McLendon Bass, who was also a member of the executive committee of the Orlando, Florida, American Legion post, the Klan kidnapped and murdered Frank Norman, International Labor Defense organizer, in April, 1934. The most flagrant of the revived Klan's acts of violence was the kidnapping and flogging at Tampa, Florida, in November, 1935, of Joseph Shoemaker, Dr. Sam Rogers, and Eugene Poulnot, leaders of a liberal group known as the Modern Democrats. This outrage, which proved fatal to Shoemaker, was perpetrated with the connivance of the Tampa police whose chief, R. G. Tittsworth, was a member of the Klan.

While this excerpt has focused mostly on the violence of the Ku Klux Klan (and there is a great deal more documented than I have excerpted here), there were many other similar and affiliated fascist terrorist groups active in the United States during the period, many with the active complicity of the local authorities. It was not an easy time to be a labor organizer, a Negro, a Catholic, a Jew, or of foreign birth anywhere in the country. All were considered "suspect" by America's good-upstanding-white-christian folk, and many were considered a priori Communists. Terror tactics were commonly employed, much more widely and against a much broader cross-section of Americans than is generally believed. If you were a member of one of the designated and targeted out groups, there was essentially no way to avoid it. But this was one of the great benefits of "small government" back in the day. There was no way to protect people from this sort of constant terror by various groups, especially when the police were part of the terror-forces.

This is something Americans seem to have little collective memory of. Because there is very little collective memory of this domestic terror apparatus that operated as a public-private partnership in service to the financiers and capitalists, it's easy enough to revive it when conditions warrant. We've seen it already in some of the border control and other militias, in aspects of the Tea Party, and in the vast expansion of private mercenary forces at home and abroad. It's not an altogether new phenomenon. And as always, these domestic terror forces are in service to their sponsors and owners, the vaunted 1%.

Always.

Conspiracy Theory

Conspiracists are out in force on the Berwick/Breivik matter, and some of their hooey is going to be getting attention. I suspect Justin Raimondo may turn into Breivik's chief conspiracist. Obviously, he's relying on the Mainstream Media to provide him with tidbits he can then weave into "questions" which in turn become the basis for conspiratorial fantasies.

Much of what he claims has not been investigated has been, for example, and many of the things he claims are not known are known, at least through the published materials available. But by raising "questions" -- that are in many cases already answered -- he sets up a classic goose chase scenario which many people seem to love pursuing.

The Berwick log Raimondo links to strikes me as the work of a deluded, drug-addled paranoid obsessive-compulsive ("narcissist/sociopath," just to complete the metaphor). I've said that I don't think Berwick was insane, but reading his words in the logs -- just frantic about being able to prepare his explosives "in time" -- it's clear he is not in his right mind. Drugs -- primarily steroids -- are mentioned in the logs, but it appears he's taking others as well that affect his perceptions, increase his paranoia, and keep him obsessively "working" on his "project."

It reads very much like he's on methamphetamine. Which wouldn't be at all surprising given the extent and the detailed nature of the tasks he's set for himself.

But then, the underlying question is whether he set those tasks himself or they were set for him. And that's where it does get interesting. He refers to "investors" his work -- but what work, exactly -- is supposed to be paying off. He refers to maxing out his credit cards through cash advances to pay off landlord and his creditors in June but then being able to pay off all his credit cards in July. Where that money comes from (maybe 8,000 Euros or more) who knows?

He refers to gold as well. Is he speculating in gold or other futures? Is that how he makes money?

My own thought initially was that he was simply well off, had plenty of money from the get-go. But that doesn't seem to be the case, although there are indications from his tax records that though he had essentially no or very little declared income, he had plenty of money in the bank -- several hundred thousand krone much of the time.

Where did the money come from?

I'd say from his "investors" -- and they were investing in his "action" on July 22. Did they get their money's worth?

And who are they?

Check out Craig Murray, too.

Punishment for "Treason" -- ie: Sending a Message to the Norwegian Government

The Punisher: "Andrew Berwick"; his weapon: fertilizer

Isn't the Internet grand, though?

I was able to watch the court ruling in Oslo as it happened this morning on the NRK website. Breivik's hearing itself was closed to the public, which I think may have been wise given the nature of what was reported by the ruling judge Breivik said was his reason for the bombing in Olso and the massacre on Utoya.

(There was a police news conference afterwards during which the numbers of dead were revised: 68 on the island and 8 in Olso.)

The judge reported (in rough paraphrase) that Breivik claimed he did what he did -- so much death and destruction -- as notice to the Government that their "treason" would not be tolerated any more.

"Treason."

They are guilty of "treason" for opening up the floodgates of Muslim immigration to Norway, among other things, and Breivik would not tolerate it any more. He needed to make a dramatic statement -- murder and destruction -- to get his point across.

You see.

This is just the sort of Rightist rhetoric-into-action many have been warning of for years, warnings that seem to fall on deaf ears, as Western governments obsess on the threat of external Muslim terrorism to the effective exclusion and dismissal of the threats from within their own body politic.

Not only are the threats from the Rightists all but ignored, but the actions of Rightist terrorists within the body politic (the Poisoners, if you will) are almost welcomed by the Powers That Be.

And in the meantime, "eco-terrorists," "leftist radicals" (ha!), peace and social justice advocates are all spied upon relentlessly, rounded up, tried, imprisoned, and what have you.

Just as the economic policies of Our Rulers are backwards, so it appears are their anti-terror policies and actions.

Hm.

Odd, isn't it?

Rude -- I like it

I scarfed this up from American Everyman blog. It's pretty good! Worth the ten minutes or so to sit through.




There's more at http://www.corbettreport.com

What's Just Being Called "The Shooting"

[From the Arizona Star]


Yesterday in Tucson, some young fellow with a gun went Medieval on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and shot her in the head. Then, according to witnesses and news reports, he opened indiscriminate fire on the people who had gathered at the Safeway store to see her and killed a Federal Judge, a little girl, assorted bystanders, and one of Giffords' staffers and injured a dozen more.

Just another shooting in America; they happen every day. Of course, like all the other political shootings in this country, there is now a Big Fight over who -- whether the "Left" or the "Right" -- is responsible, and endless calls for "all sides" to tone down The Rhetoric. It goes this way every time. And the next time it will go this way the next time, too, for it is taken for granted that there will be a Next Time. There always is.

Political shootings and assassinations are as American and Mom's Apple Pie to the horror of most of the rest of the world, but that's the way it has always been in this country. Frustrated Americans, sane or crazy, from time to time take their frustrations out by violently assaulting or assassinating political figures.

And the rhetoric of violence and political assassination is so deeply rooted in the United States, though often denied or sublimated, that it is hard to imagine an America without constant allusions to gun play to satisfy one's anger, frustration or hatred. It's not just political rhetoric that's the problem. Gun play and killing is the foundation rock of so much American entertainment. No one remembers "The Sopranos?" Sure.

[Note: I only saw "The Sopranos" once, during which episode who knows how many poor sods were tortured and killed. I was horrified and disgusted that this television program had become the television program for all with it people to watch and enjoy and discuss endlessly. It was considered such a wonderful metaphor for Our Times, and so very well done. To my way of looking at it, "The Sopranos" was a celebration of violence, murder, torture and gangsterism and a relentless attack on any and all countervailing sense of morality or even common courtesy. It was monstrous. And it was a form of "permission" to those who wanted to behave that way.]

The Government will respond as it always does: retreating further behind its barricades and security apparat and expanding its surveillance of the rest of us. The media will go through its endless routine of "blaming both sides." The public, by and large, will go on as if nothing happened at all.

It's not unlike a scene I saw the other day of a security guard (an off-duty policeman) clubbing and pepper-spraying a citizen before dragging him off to a police substation (?!) in the gas station while the victim's friends (?!) watched placidly or stepped around the violence to retrieve things from the car beside which the beating and pepper spraying were taking place. They were simply too self involved to be concerned with what was happening right in front of them.

So it will be with this shooting.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but one of the things that Nazis did (and it wasn't just them, but it was more common with them) in Germany and especially in conquered territories was the spectacle of the public shaming, public beating, public summary execution or what have you. There were incidents of random summary executions on the street, of accused partisans being beheaded as passers by went about their business, of people being strung up to gallows or tied to posts and whipped or forced to parade around with signs around their necks describing their multitudes of crimes. This was one of the tactics used to frighten ordinary people into submission and compliance. And it worked remarkably well for a remarkably long time. The atrocities weren't just in the camps. They were on constant show in the streets. And people went right on with their business as if nothing was happening. But of course, they had witnessed what could happen to them or anyone if Authority so desired. So they kept their heads down and noses clean so as not to gain the notice of Authority.

That's very much what the American penchant for violence, shootings and assassinations is all about. Inculcating a herd mentality in the majority, while predators run free.

Aux Barricades!

From time to time, I mention that the Government of the United States has retreated behind a security perimeter of walls, gates, guards, surveillance, biometrics and so on, practically endlessly. The Government is actively working on all kinds of new and improved self-protection authorities and weapons, too. This has been an ongoing project for many a long year, pre-dating 9/11 to be sure, but put into hyper-drive in the aftermath of the attacks on that date.

Your Government is now behind its own barricades, and it is on those barricades ever watchful of the Enemy. And that would be whom, exactly.

Yeah. Right. That would be you. And me. All of us. We. The People.

Yes, we are the Enemy which the Government is protecting itself from.

It became abundantly clear during the TSA Uproar that that's what was really going on. There was no pretense at all about it: You -- and I -- we are ALL potential Terrorists in the eyes of the Government as expressed through the probes and scans of the TSA during passenger processing at airports. Not everyone, of course, would ever be in a position to experience the intimacy of the scanning and probing and groping that went into the New Procedures that were instituted just before the Thanksgiving Holiday Travel Rush. Not everybody takes an airplane to their destination. But everyone can relate to those who do, because traveling by air is such a common means of transportation that it is taken for granted.

[I'm so old, I can well remember my first trip on an airplane -- it was a DC-3 flying out of Chicago's O'Hare -- and how very exciting and hoity and toity it was, and how rare it was for most people. Imagine.]

What passengers and crews were experiencing at the airports before the OUTRAGE!!!™ got up full steam was only the tippy-tip of the iceberg of Government fear and surveillance of you and of me. And it was pretty bad.

Imagine what goes on internally.

What is the point of it, you might wonder. They cannot track us all, and furthermore, there are damned few who have any intention of damaging the Government or Overthrowing the Beast. So what's all this Stasi-Business all of a sudden?

Good question.

One of the projects that was attempted after 9/11 -- but as far as I know, it was abandoned -- was a very East German/Nazi style "block watch" program in which neighbors would be recruited throughout the land to literally spy on and report on the "suspicious activities" of their friends and neighbors. People were signing up for it, and there still may be "block watch" neighborhood spies on duty. Who they are reporting to is a mystery though, since I'm not sure there's Office of Neighborhood Spy Results in the Government.* But who knows. There's probably a voicemail number and an email drop. Neither of which is ever monitored. But that's as may be.

The point is that totalitarian-style surveillance policies, programs and projects were put in place literally as soon as Bush ascended the Throne, and they were turbo-charged after 9/11. They've been reviewed and refined ever since. They are still very much in place.

Note the date this started: as soon as Bush ascended the Throne, NOT "after 9/11". The process of barricading the Government behind its walls and gates and surveillance activities merely speeded up after 9/11.

The TSA Uprising was the first real indication that The People had reached their surveillance tolerance breaking point, and you will notice that the TSA -- while blustering that it wouldn't do so -- promptly backed off and put its New Procedures in the cooler for a while. How long this will last, I don't know. There are indications that they are slowly ramping up the scans and probes again, but I can't really say.

The point was that when there was a credible threat of systems shutdown, the Stasi-Nature of the whole thing collapsed momentarily.

That's a lesson to be savored, and the tactic, I'm sure, will make many more appearances after the New Model TeaBagger Congress is seated in January.

It won't be about pulling the plug on surveillance of the People, it will be about who controls the mechanics of it and to what purpose.

The Government is Afraid of You. The Government is Terrified. Of You. I can't begin to tell you how strong the internal Fear level is in Government. And besides barricading themselves and surveilling the shit out of EVERYONE, they really don't know what to do. You see this in the periodic revelations of the military and civilian police agency spying on Grannies for Peace and such. You see it in the continuing -- and pathetic -- roundups of Leftist dissenters, protesters, and -- as they say -- "Eco-terrorists." The focus of Government domestic police action is still largely where it was decades ago, on the Left and on the Druggies. Periodically, there are roundups of slow-witted Muslims who have been entrapped by the FBI or paid informants or whomever to assert an intention to mayhem. Some of them, no doubt, are actually inclined to the terrorist-jihadist path, but most really seem to be patsies, set up -- and then railroaded -- for Show, for statistics.

And in the meantime, everyone is being Watched. With a more and more sophisticated surveillance apparatus.

The main point of this is Government self-protection against You.

The problem is that they seem to be incapable of recognizing the true threat the Government is under. They don't seem to realize the domestic subversives they are protecting themselves from are already well inside the gates, and they are sapping the walls from within.

Sometimes you almost want to scream out like Kevin McCarthy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

Dr. Miles J. Bennell: Listen to me! Please listen! If you don't, if you won't, if you fail to understand, then the same incredible terror that's menacing me WILL STRIKE AT YOU!

Nah.


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[*If memory serves, actually part of this hands-on, field level surveillance is still in place, and I'm a little leery about bringing up what it is. I know that many people are aware of it, but many people are not. And there's been a lot of confusion and denial about it from the local agency and Federal level. Do you know who is spying on you, directly? Someone is.]

The Blowout (now with Updates!!); The Fizzle; and The Swindle

First the Blowout: It appears, and I could be wrong, that the blowout of the oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, bad as it is, isn't quite as bad as the Doomsayers would have you believe.

It is not -- yet -- the end of the world as we know it, and apparently, for all its many faults, BP is actually behaving like a Corporate Citizen to clean up the mess, close the hole, and get things back to "normal" as quickly as possible. They have done some reprehensible things to be sure -- such a coercing the survivors of the explosion to sign papers assuring all and sundry they weren't injured and that they are satisfied with a maximum claim against the company of $5,000, etc. Also they apparently were not aware of or lied about the amount of oil coming out of the well into the Gulf initially. Their CEO is quite a piece of work.

The White House is being criticized by the likes of Karl Rove and the entire hate radio brigade for their languidity in the early days of the disaster, turning the tables on the critics who continue to lambaste the Bush Regime for its utter indifference to the sufferings in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast in the first few days after Hurricane Katrina. "This will be Obama's 'Katrina!'" thunders Rove. Yeah, right. Like the Health Care was Obama's Waterloo. Whatever.

In fact, the Administration appears to have been on the ball from the get-go, and where they failed was in relying so heavily on BP for their information and not surveying the situation more fully themselves. This is clearly one of the inherent problems of deregulation: when your only source of information is the entity responsible for the disaster, it's only natural that you won't have the full picture.

Interesting that the media narrative went into a kind of hyper-romantic "Quest-mode" in reporting about the "hundred ton cap" to be assembled and put over the leak and other efforts to control the oil. Practically every bit of reporting became a bodice-ripping novel of derring-do and bravery in the face of adversity, and love for the men in Oil, yadda, yadda, which should have been embarrassing to any journalists still out there, because the real stories were either absent altogether or were buried by this Romance. I'm always fascinated to see narratives developed and then go universal so quickly and thoroughly. Finding out what actually happened, how to fix it, and how to prevent it from happening again will probably have to wait until the book is published.

But it appears that there has been a mobilization all along the Gulf to contain the oil, clean up what they can, and to preserve as much of the ecology and environment of the Gulf as humanly possible. That, to me, is the real story. The one that needs to be told in detail and hammered home constantly. Unfortunately, our media has chosen an alternate reality in which BP is the Big-Muscled hero of the piece and the clean up crews are greedy proles exploiting the situation to feather their own nests. (Have you heard, for example, that the fishermen are being paid $48 an hour for clean up chores??! I mean really!!! They don't deserve that!)

Thankfully (I guess), the oil is light-sweet crude, not the tarry gunk that comes up off the California coast, so the damage, while substantial, is not nearly as horrific as it might otherwise be, nor as bad as it would be if a similar event happened off California.

Meanwhile, the question is how do we get off oil? That's the problem right there. So far, there is no answer -- except for individuals who can and choose to take their leave from the oil-driven economy. As oil-derived products become more and more expensive, though, the ("greedy") proles are finding it impossible to keep up. Their continued impoverishment is assured by the facts on the ground while the Plutocrats revel in ever increasing revenues from other sources (expanding economies in India and China for example.) Wherever they can extract revenue, so the Plutocrats go.

Time to rethink that picture, but Our Rulers simply have no will to.

UPDATE: With the failure of the containment dome due to the presence of hydrate crystals and other consequences of depth and cold, it is looking like this incident will turn into something like Chernobyl, with perhaps, somewhat less environmental damage (let's hope.) While the Government will be blamed, in this case, it is the essentially unregulated oil industry in the Gulf of Mexico that is to blame. The question is whether, finally, the People will take charge and rein in the wilding private sector, through the agency of their Government.

UPDATE II: Seems I'm not the only one to see the Chernobyl parallel. This piece at dKos by Stranded Wind takes the metaphor considerably farther than I have and provides a number of people's action and education items. Worth the read.


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The Fizzle in Times Square may turn into an instructive tale yet. I'm assuming the guy who was arrested did it and it wasn't a Black Op -- big assumptions, I know, but one has to start somewhere. The idea apparently, executed poorly, was to cause a big explosion in Times Square, killing/injuring a substantial number of oblivious tourists and random New Yorkers for the purpose of... revenge?

That seems to be the case. The man in custody was apparently outraged by the continuing extermination by Predator drones of random Pakistanis -- some of whom apparently were killed while he was on his most recent visit to Pakistan where he was born and where his father was a high ranking military officer before his retirement. I've written about the Death From Above cult before, and I've tried to give some idea of what it must seem like to the people on the ground, who, for all intents and purposes are chosen for Death randomly and are exterminated by the dozens as the spirit moves the pilots of the Death Machines flying constantly over their heads.

Shahzad, a naturalized American citizen, apparently took it upon himself to Do Something about this upon his return to the US. He bought an old SUV, filled it with incendiary and explosive materials, set it alight and got out of there. An alert street vendor, a Muslim as it happens, noticed the illegal parking of the vehicle in Times Square, noticed the smoke, alerted others and so the area was cleared, no bombs went off, and eventually a culprit was captured.

Karl Rove and ilk are pathetically trying to politicize this event, too, using every trick they can think of to "blame" it on Obama -- except for pointing out that the drone attacks in Pakistan may have had something to do with it. They are absolutely livid that he was read his rights. "Terrorists have no rights!" they scream. Strangely, you'll note, the Cheneys have been lying low and haven't been parading around spitting their venom and hurling their accusations the way they used to, but I expect them to pop up if Shahzad actually does go to trial. We'll see. But maybe they're spent as it were. We should only be so lucky.

I'd just point out that Rove's efforts (and before him, the Cheneys') to politicize this event (as well as others) in many ways mirrors the criticisms leveled at the Bush Regime from the (so-called) Left during its many years of disastrous rule. Disasters and terrorists triggered huge amounts of criticism then as they do now. And it is basically tribal.

If Rove's efforts (which look more and more pathetic, and that may be why the Cheneys have backed off for the time being) help to demonstrate just how ridiculous political tribalism can be, then all to the good. But once people divide into tribal entities, it's very hard to overcome it. Americans have a long way to go to get out of their current tribalist morass, and I for one am not convinced Americans can do it. I actually am toying with the notion that tribalism has some excellent points in its favor...
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And let's consider Greece for a moment. I am so proud of the Greek masses for rising up against the banksters and their government lackeys who have swindled them and now seek to make them suffer as much as possible for their trouble. They actually rose up -- something Americans will not do, seem incapable of even considering. Of course, the uprising is -- at least for now -- ineffective. Mother Merkel over in Germany (which is funding much of the bailout, so-called, that will result in so much misery for the Greek masses) is displeased with her wayward Greek children, and makes no bones about it. (The linkages between Greece and Germany go back a long way, but are very little known in this country.) But the point is that the Greek masses are being made to suffer extensive hardship in order to pay off the banksters. In this case it is the European Central Banks, but they in turn are in debt to the same scoundrels and thieves who have been conducting an unprecedented campaign of looting and impoverishment of the masses throughout the world for years, the same banksters who continue to preen on Wall Street.

I say it is unprecendented, but the pattern was set and model was created and put in motion by Enron and those who followed its lead more than a decade ago. That kind of economic predation and looting has become the New Normal, and it has got to stop. We see that governments feign powerlessness to do anything about it, and we saw in California when Gray Davis actually tried to do something about it, his skinny white ass was booted out of office and he was replaced with a cartoon super-hero. Jeebus.

At any rate, the only way to stop it is to refuse, and that takes some preparation and some sleight of hand. It's widely assumed that Greece is going to default on its debts to the banksters, there is no way around it, no matter what Mother Merkel says. And if Greece defaults, it is widely assumed that Spain, Portugal, Ireland and possibly Italy will too. Which, apparently, will collapse the Euro, which will do... what? Nobody knows. But the trick is to refuse to pay off the banksters' gambling debts, and it's got to start somewhere. Greece will do.

Hopefully, it will start the global economy on a new, and better, path. But it's only the beginning.

The Doomsayers are claiming that by August or November at the latest, we will be living in A Different World. Hm. Could be. Rejoice!

Well How About That

According to today's notice over at the World Socialist Website, American Intelligence agencies stopped the State Department from revoking Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's US visa, unlike the situation with Britain which did revoke his visa once they were informed of derogatory information about the young Nigerian. Like he might have got hooked up with Teh Terrorists or something.

Apparently, the House Committee on Homeland Security (ah the Heimat!) developed this information at a hearing on January 27, a hearing that has so far only been reported on the website of the Detroit News. Interesting.

As the WSWS puts it:

The revelation that US intelligence agencies made a deliberate decision to allow Abdulmutallab to board the commercial flight, without any special airport screening, has been buried in the media. As of this writing, nearly a week after the hearing, the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times have published no articles on the subject. Nor have the broadcast or cable media reported on it.

This is despite—or perhaps more accurately, because of—the fact that this information exposes the official government story of the near-disaster to be a lie. President Obama, who has joined with top US intelligence, FBI and Homeland Security officials to insist that Abdulmutallab was inadvertently allowed to board the plane carrying explosives because of a failure to “connect the dots,” has from the start been deceiving the American people.

And that's being charitable.

That is not to say that the hearing was not reported on at all. It was. What wasn't reported -- except apparently in the Detroit News -- was that Abdulmutallab was apparently under surveillance by "intelligence" and when they were asked by the State Department whether they wanted Abdulmutallab to keep his visa, State was told "yes."

Another excerpt from the story:

Official testimony now records that US intelligence agencies deliberately let Abdulmutallab board Flight 253, putting the lives of hundreds of passengers at risk, in the course of an as yet undisclosed intelligence operation. Whether US agencies were unaware of Abdulmutallab’s plans, or consciously decided to allow an attack to proceed, remains unclear.

In this context, it should be noted that the reason for US inaction given at the hearing—that US intelligence did not want to alert Al Qaeda that it was watching Abdulmutallab—does not hold water. As congressmen noted during the hearing, US Customs and Border Protection had prepared to interrogate Abdulmutallab upon arrival in Detroit, as he was on the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment database. This would be counterproductive if US agencies were mounting a concerted effort to hide their interest in Abdulmutallab.

I see. Well.

On the one hand, we are being whipped to a frenzy of FEAR!!!™ over the incident in Detroit. "They're out to slaughter us all in our beds!!!!™" Yadda, yadda. On the other hand, yet again we are seeing the outlines of a deliberate action, one could even call it a plot, by "Intelligence" to Let It Happen On Purpose, the good old LIHOP theory that has also been applied to the 9/11 attacks.

On the other hand, breaking up utterly phony "terrorist plots" -- like the absurd Lodi Pakistani Ice Cream Truck Driver Plan to Blow Up The World -- are touted and paraded around as these Grand Successes in Great and Glorious (and Endless) War on Terror.

What a tangled web is woven.

Go read the story. Reach your own conclusions.



Update: And after all the screeching from the wingnuts that Abdulmutallab was ONLY interrogated for 50 hours minutes before being Mirandized, what to make of the stories that he's still talking and he waived his right to remain silent?

Detroit bomber 'providing intelligence about al-Qaida'

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to blow up plane with underwear bomb, is said to have waived right to silence

The cognitive dissonance is at EPIC on the dial.