On Rule by Bullies and Their Toadies

It's gobsmacking how the bullies and toadies of the Trump regime are constantly able to pull victory from the jaws of defeat -- no matter what.

Even if the Impeachment Circus manages to culminate in Trump's removal -- I doubt it will -- the legacy of chaos, corruption, lies, fantasies, fabrications, and bullying will remain, not to be easily undone, perhaps forever more.

Some observers like to say that whatever is happening, whatever the regime is doing, whatever Trump is saying, and however much is disrupted, it's all "wonderfully clarifying," as if we wouldn't have known how rotten and diseased our politics and ruling paradigms are otherwise. Bollocks. Utter bollocks. We knew, we've known, I've been writing about it here since 2007 and before that in many other venues almost since the Internet began in earnest.

We knew. We know. "Clarification" is not the necessary element at this point. What's needed is action, profound and serious, to correct course, and I simply don't see that anywhere in the political firmament or in the increasingly captive realm of influencers and commentariats. It's almost all ruled by bullies and their toadies. No one else has a voice. And there is no goodness at or near the top anywhere.

Certainly there are no saviours. Not in today's politics, nor in academe, nor in any of the various sectors that rule us. Trump and his regime may represent the worst of it, though I'm certain there are worse examples we could dredge up from the depths of the muck, but taking them out of the picture, it's still really dreadful. As it has been for many a long year.

Yet we carry on because we must. It's instinctive.

Goodness may not be on the horizon no matter how hard we yearn for it, yet there are always escape hatches and alternatives.And they'll be turned to more and more as things deteriorate for the masses.

A key to understanding the situation is the realization that We, the Rabble are expendable. That's key to recognizing how bullies and their toadies are able to rule no matter how bad or incompetent or worthless they are. None of us, the Rabble, are necessary to their way of looking at things, and the only reason we're here at all is because they let us live. Period.

Some of us may have some utility some of the time, but none of us are necessary.

That is supposed to lead us to being grateful. If we're not, there are always things that can be done to make us feel appropriate gratitude or to relieve us of our mortal coil. It's just that simple at bottom.

Whoever/whatever replaces the Trump regime may or may not be qualitatively better, may behave less outrageously, may show some signs of competence and compassion, but at bottom will still believe what the Trump regime believes about the rest of us, and will still act on that belief one way or another -- though perhaps with more caution than the Trumpies have.

We will not elect a Good Emperor after this shitshow.

No, a dismal precedent has been set in concrete. Elections may continue indefinitely -- they did in Ancient Rome, after all -- but their meaninglessness will be made clear as well. The Emperor will be chosen, by whom is not entirely clear, but it won't be by the People. Neither will it be by a monolithic Ruling Class. That class is riven with factionalism, fractured and in disarray. The young-ish "disrupters" of Silicon Valley are jockeying for ultimate power, and so far, the Ruling Class resistance to them is more stylistical than substantive. As long as the disrupters are able to keep the masses from coalescing, so be it. Otherwise, though, no.

So Zuckerberg may be a strange, alienish, robotic something or other, and Bezos is a bizarre offshoot of the human race, and so many of the other would-be High and Mighty tech tycoons likewise, they are useful enough that they're kept around by the faltering and factional Ruling Class. They may one day emerge as the successors to today's Ruling Class, but they will be no better. Arguably, they will represent the continued devolution of the Class.

And they are no less devoted to bullying and toadying. It is how they've achieved what they have, and how they fully intend to expand and maintain it.

To the extent they are able to exploit the rest of us they will do so. Otherwise, enh.

What to do?


Tolstoy wrote a book (173pg pdf) that seems almost as pertinent today as it was 130 years ago.

I may have more on this topic shortly, but for now...





The Fires This Time

California burns. We  know this, right?

When I was a snot nosed kid in LA,  every year I'd sit on my back fence watching the San Gabriels burn about eight-ten miles north. One year the fire came up the hill down at the end of our street, and when it started burning on our side of the hill, neighbors  panicked and got their garden hoses out to wet down their roofs, and some packed their cars and made a hasty escape just before the fire trucks came and put the fire out. 

Sometimes ash and smoke was very heavy in the air, and I already had breathing problems from the smog which was crisis-terrible in LA in the 1950s. So Fire Season and the Santa Ana winds were not a good time for me healthwise, but it could be exciting.

Moving to Northern California in 1959, we at first lived in a rural community on the edge of the Sierra foothills. Our house was in an oak forest, which my mother called a firetrap. She worked up the hill in Auburn, and in those days, the I-80 freeway had not been built yet. Highway 40 got you up the hill and eventually over the mountains into Reno, but it was a haul. She didn't feel safe if there was a fire, because it would be too hard to escape, and she angled to get us out of there as soon as possible. 

Of course there were numerous fires in the foothills and mountains in those days, and every year, the rice growers would burn their stubble in the Valley.  It was  considered normal. It may not have been healthy, but what could you do? And in those days, too, it was understood that fire was part of the cycle of nature, and it was a bad thing only when people and houses and businesses were in the way and burnt got burnt up. That happened from time to time, but it was fairly limited. 

The tragedies were limited in part because there were fewer people in California, particularly in Gold Country --- the west side of the Sierras and the Sierra foothills. In those days, the Gold Rush communities were mostly ghost towns with a few  dozen to a few hundred people still living in them at most. They were not bedroom communities for people working in the Valley as many of them are today. They were not retirement communities as so many are now. They were not surrounded by extensive suburban style real estate developments as they are now. They were what was left after the gold was extracted and the miners and fancy women left for greener pastures.

Consequently, when forest and brush fires burned, as they were bound to do, it was fairly simple to protect towns that might be in their path. Volunteer fire departments were the pride of many small towns in the foothills, and they were generally sufficient to keep fires at bay and protect the towns from incineration. Many of these Gold Rush and mountain communities had buildings that dated back to the 1850s and 1860s, and there has been many fires since then. Residents coped.

Though there must have been some, I don't recall evacuations of whole towns in those days. If fire came close, some people in the way would get out of course, but many stayed to fight the fires and keep them from destroying the towns. And they were mostly successful.

The really bad fires seemed to be burning in Southern California in those days, and they were bad because houses burned and sometimes people burned with them. The population of Southern California was growing fast, and some were building and living on hillsides and ridges that were natural fire paths -- in other words, where they shouldn't have been building and living -- and so, year by year, there would be more houses burned to the ground when the annual Fire Season commenced. The Santa Anas blew the fires into firestorms and there was very little you could do about it except get out of the way.

And hope and pray. 

So there have been a few bad fires recently in both Northern and Southern California, with thousands of homes burned and many people killed and missing. The term "Apocalyptic" is hardly too strong for the scenes that have been playing out during the coverage of the fires. It's been terrible. Heartbreaking and gut wrenching.

Paradise above Chico was all but wiped out, but so were most of the towns and settlements up there: Pulga, Concow, Magalia, and so on. Most of the media attention has been focused on Paradise, partly for the name (even though Trump called it "Pleasure" several times; I wonder why... no, I don't), but also because it was the largest and easiest to reach fire location.

I've been to Paradise several times, and Ms. Ché and I briefly considered it for our own retirement. But no. No. The forest within which most of the town was built was beautiful and it smelled wonderful.... BUT it was an obvious and rather horrifying fire trap. There were too many houses built too close together and too close to the trees, there were too few ways out should an evacuation be necessary, and it was becoming too big a town (this was during the early '90s) for the area. If anything, Magalia was worse. Not so big, no, but even more of a firetrap. More and more real estate developers saw big money in putting up homes in both places, bugger the risks. Besides, the demographics were... how to put this gently? Inevitably terminal... Lots of old people, plenty of "rugged" types, not a few "sovereign citizens", druggies, and bikers. A mixed bag to be sure, but for the most part, not what one would think of as productive movers/shakers.

But it was the forest setting that put me off. Nice place to visit. Wouldn't want to live there.

Apparently there was a fire about ten years ago that took out a swath of homes west and south of the main part of Paradise, and it was discovered at that time that evacuation was darned nigh impossible. So they came up with a plan to order phased evacuations in the event of a future fire.

Problem was that the fire this time moved too fast and communications with residents were spotty or nonexistent. Too many people didn't know until too late that they needed to get out. And those who tried to get out were too often caught in hours-long traffic snarls... and some of them burned to death in their cars or trying to escape on foot.

Most people got out, but too many didn't/couldn't/wouldn't. The death toll so far (Tuesday morning 11/20//18) is about 80, but it is expected there will be more, perhaps many more, bodies found -- or what's left of them in the ashes. There are still 600 or so missing and unaccounted for. Some of those who perished in the fire will never be found.

More than 10,000 homes burned in the fire. This is unprecedented in  California -- with the exception of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire which destroyed 2/3rds of the city and left perhaps 3000 dead. For decades, the death toll was deliberately misreported as 360 or something like that. It wouldn't be surprising if the death toll in the Camp fire is underreported as well. The devastation is almost too horrible to imagine as it is.  Adding in hundreds and hundreds of dead -- if that's what happened -- is likely too much to bear.

Trump went and saw a bit of the devastation and said many stupid things and left to go "console" the survivors of the Borderline mass shooting in Thousand Oaks. Bless his heart.

Of course there was a fire a couple of miles from there, too.

What a nightmare.

To the Trump regime, the problem is entirely one of "forest management." If the forest floors were raked and cleaned the way they do in Finland, there wouldn't be these problems, right? It's all the environmentalists' fault, right?

Well, no. Not exactly.

The problems in Paradise specifically  include a multi-year drought followed by one season of heavy rains followed by return to drought -- both of which can be attributed to climate change. Building right in the very stressed forest is a disaster waiting to happen anyway. There were few ways out and evacuation notices didn't reach everybody. High winds blew the initially small fire west at break-neck speed -- witnesses said it traveled horizontally burning everything in its path. Most of Paradise and Magalia were in flames before people could evacuate, and it wasn't because of poor forest management.

In fact, from the videos I've seen of the aftermath (kudos to the reporters who've gone back to document the destruction) many of the homes that burned had requisite "defensible space" around them. It didn't matter. The fire was being driven by the wind, and no amount of space seemed to be enough in many cases. Some of the houses that survived did not appear to have sufficient "defensible space," and yet they stand, some of them completely undamaged. It seemed to depend, more than anything, on the wind and whether or not embers were blown directly onto a building or not.

From what I could tell, there wasn't a lot of brush and small-tree cover that would result from "poor forest management." Instead, there was a lot of dry grass which burned fiercely and helped spread the fire very quickly. A controlled burn might have mitigated the dry grass problem, but you can't do it in high wind conditions. And given the long drought, it's conceivable that a controlled burn would quickly get out of control no matter what.

It was a perfect storm.

So what do you do?

There's been a settlement in Paradise since the Gold Rush, and it survived until now. A key to its survival was that it was very small until fairly recently. More than 90% of the homes in Paradise were destroyed in the fire and nearly that high a percent burned in Magalia. I would say the number of surviving homes is probably the maximum residential carrying capacity of the area for the foreseeable future, and that means that rebuilding should be very limited. From what I've seen, most of the forest withstood the fire, the way forests tend to do if they are maintained properly (which means brush clearance and periodic burns.) But houses should not be built among the trees the way they were.

What will be done, as opposed to what should be done, is still up in the air. We'll see.

In the meantime, I've been feeling as devastated by the fire as some of the survivors. It hit me hard, and I'm still in a state over it. All good wishes to the survivors. Respect for the dead.

Thanksgiving tomorrow. We're headed to an Indian casino to celebrate Indigenous People's Sunrise...👍👍

The Bill

Yesterday I got a more comprehensive bill for Rituxan infusion treatment that makes somewhat more sense than the previous summaries and payment demands.

Yes, it is criminally expensive treatment, far more expensive than I was told it would be, more than $46,000 vs $4,600, but what's billed and what's paid are completely different things, and as far as I can tell, the $46,000+ figure billed is nonsense, a place-holder at best, a figment of imagination mostly.

The more comprehensive bill (which says "This is not a bill" just to keep me on my toes) includes all the labwork and the preliminary medications (in case I had a reaction) and the various "pushes" to get the Rituxan into me. It includes the charges for all of this and how much the "Plan" paid for various things. Interestingly, the "Plan" paid nothing for most of it, and I will have no co-pay for it either.

Well, that's a relief, right?

But all these charges add up to get to the $46,000+ figure, and it looks to be little more than bill-padding. Something that has a long and inglorious history in the practice of medicine.

Where it gets interesting is the charge for Rituxan itself.

I thought that 5mg were being administered each time I had the infusion, but according to the bill ("This is not a bill") it was actually 50mg, and each time I had the infusion, the charge for Rituxan was $21,202.

For 50mg.

Whoo.

However. The "Plan" allowed $9,492 for Rituxan and paid $8,543, leaving me with a 10% co-pay for the drug each time, or $949, which adds up to $1,898.

And literally, that is all I am being billed for. Everything else is covered by the "Plan."

Well, who knew?

Obviously those who tried to find out for me didn't and couldn't.

We'll see what the charge actually ends up being when all is said and done. While Ms. Ché and I have too much income to qualify for Medicaid, our income is low enough (so I understand, but who knows) to qualify for financial assistance from the hospital, and I've applied for that. According to what I've been told, if the application is approved, the co-pay/cost sharing will be cut in half.

We'll see.

Nevertheless, I'm stunned at the cost for 100mg of Rituxan. It's outrageous, beyond belief truthfully, yet I'm sure there are plenty of drugs on the market which I don't know about that cost quite a bit more.

We know PhARMA has zero social conscience, but still, my question is why do "Plans" pay these outrageous amounts? How much mutual back scratching is built in to this system? Who benefits? Who ultimately pays?

And what can we do about it?

What Then Must We Do (Abolitionist Version)

[Apologies to Leo Tolstoy] (173 pg pdf)

Corrina Shoemaker's (Tenten's) talk at the demonstration last Saturday against yet another Killer Kop Kompetition in Albuquerque moved me more than I think I have been moved by any other testimonial I've heard during the decades I've been an activist against violent policing. She tore at my heart.

Tenten makes clear that she is not an abolitionist, that as a society we need the police, and we need them to be responsible. When they killed her brother they were not being responsible, they were being reactive -- as it happened to a non-existent threat. The Killer Kop Kompetition celebrates and reinforces that reactive tendency among police -- kill now, worry about the consequences later (or don't think about them at all). Thus, it's irresponsible, and it encourages irresponsibility among police.

On the other hand, I came to the conclusion some time ago, after witnessing too much police "reform" go nowhere or actually become an excuse for even worse forms of policing, that abolishing the police (or police departments, a distinction I'll get into in a bit) is the only responsible course at this point.

I say this even though I know that there have been serious efforts at reform of police departments, and I know that some of those efforts have resulted in significant decreases in use of lethal force by those departments (I often cite NYC, Oakland, and Albuquerque as examples.) It can be done, and it's not hard at all. Nor does it take forever.

Reducing the rate of police homicide can literally take place overnight. It doesn't require solving structural racism or economic inequality first. It takes changing the rules authorizing the use of force and an order from the chief.

Period.

It's happened in a number of cities, and it can happen all over once there is a will among police chiefs and city managers and mayors to reduce the killing.

That will is being developed, slowly, imperfectly, through agencies such as the PERF (Police Executive Research Forum) which produced the seminal "Re-engineering Training on Police Use of Force" Report (84 pg pdf) earlier this month. This is the direction police departments are going, but it is taking forever on the one hand, and there is so much resistance from certain elements such as police officer unions, DAs and courts on the other, that a reduction in the overall rate of police homicide seems constantly out of reach.

Nice talk doesn't really get you to the point you want to be.

So. What then must we do?

I say "abolish" -- abolish police departments, for that's where the problem lies.

In a sense, I agree with Tenten that we need police -- or at least a cadre of professionals that function to serve the needs of communities -- something like the police are ideally supposed to do. What we don't need are their departments that function as quasi-autonomous armies of occupation within -- but completely divorced from -- communities.

Police departments which are oppressive and destructive,  lack transparency and accountability, and are unable or refuse to behave responsibly toward the communities they are supposed to serve need to be abolished.

I've seen an awful lot of blame placed on individual police officers for their actions, as if their actions take place entirely independently, and that's simply wrong. Police officers do not operate independently or autonomously; they are employees of departments which operate as enforcers of a system of oppression. They do what they are told and what is expected by their commanders in a hierarchical organization.

In other words, when they kill or brutalize individuals, police are doing what they believe they are supposed to do -- their "jobs" as it were.

While there have been far more charges against individual officers in the past year (since protests began in earnest) than previously for crimes including murder, it is still surpassingly rare for officers to be held criminally liable for acts while on duty. Two things account for that fact: 1) law protects officers from criminal liability in almost all cases of use of force while on duty; 2) DAs and courts are loathe to hold officers directly responsible for acts while on duty no matter the consequences to communities -- for DAs and courts rely on police officers to function as reliable enforcers and testifiers of fact in criminal cases.

So it is nearly impossible to hold individual officers criminally liable for acts while on duty. On the other hand, civil cases against officers often result in multi-million dollar awards to victims, indicating that in fact police misconduct, brutality, and murder are recognized and sometimes compensated by civic authorities and courts -- but not as criminal acts. In other words, civic authorities and courts acknowledge that police actions can be/are a fiscal liability, but haven't yet come to a realization that something ought to be done about it...

The payouts to victims, which cumulatively amount to billions every year, are simply the "cost of doing business..."

The destruction of individuals, families and communities that result from violent policing doesn't enter the perceptions of those authorities willingly paying out fortunes to victims.

They're not about to change. Why should they?  As long as someone (else) is willing to pay for the misfortune caused by police...

Why indeed?

That's why abolition is the only real solution.

We need something like police in our communities -- but not an army of occupation or a slave-catching/Indian-killing militia. Those are the models for police forces in America, and they need to be set aside. The police as currently constituted and generally operated are an anachronism, and as such they have become an element of social and community destruction... In my view, they can't be reformed because the models they are following are antithetical to the needs of the communities and society they operate in.

Police departments need to be abolished.

"Reform," of course, will happen first -- as abolition is too radical a solution to the problems of American policing to be accepted right off. But "reform" won't work in the long run. The original impetus for police departments -- in the military conquest and occupation of the continent, in the militias sent to hunt slaves and kill Indians -- will always assert itself, no matter what else is done.

"Reform" can only achieve a somewhat milder form of occupation/oppression.

If we want the occupation and oppression to end, though, police departments need to be abolished.

I doubt we'll see it in my lifetime, but you never know....

What Then Must We Do?

It's the perpetual question, no?

Not all of us can do as much as we might want to do in the face of so much adversity, but at the same time, many more have been taking the risks to do something about what's been going on, so it's quite possible for some of us old folk to step back and let the young do what they must to bring about that Better World we know is possible.

When I saw the pictures of congressional staffers walking out and posing with their hands up on the steps of the Capitol yesterday, I knew the long-awaited tipping point had come. No more could the status quo of perpetual police murder with impunity be maintained. Something would change.

This doesn't mean that a resolution to the problem has been achieved or ratified, but it does mean that the Powers have noticed there is a Problem and have decided intervention is necessary. Police departments will follow certain orders, but they cannot and will not reform themselves absent firm and direct orders for change -- and perhaps not without a good deal of behavior modification along the way.

In that regard, I'm reminded of that insane freak (Lt Col) Dave Grossman who goes around in a kind of ecstatic religious trance speaking before large audiences of police officers, telling them that their highest accomplishment is "killing in righteous battle" -- essentially absolving them by declaring their actions "righteous" by nature. They are "sheepdogs" as he puts it, "protecting the flock" from the "wolves."

Dogs, even sheepdogs, can go rogue and start killing the sheep, and that's what's happened. There have been few or no controls on the behavior of the police with regard to their duties for many years, and the situation reached a crisis point with the execution of a homeless mentally ill man in Albuquerque in March. Many tried to blame the victim for his own demise, as almost always happens in the case of police murders and executions, but this time there was a significant push-back from the public.

Message: "No! Stop. The. Killing!"

There were months of demonstrations and protests against police violence in Albuquerque, some of which involved shutting down the freeway through town and other direct actions to discommode the comfortable and powerful. At times, these protests were met with militarized and violent police responses which drew national attention to the problems created by abusive police and the militarization of police.

The DoJ had been investigating complaints against he Albuquerque Police Department for many months, but there was little sign they would release findings any time soon. The persistent public protests appeared to affect the department's investigators enough to move process forward, and a scathing report was released in April documenting numerous cases of inappropriate use of force and deadly force in a pattern and practice of "unconstitutional policing" which would have to change.

There was a spate of police killings following the release of this report, most of them questionable if not completely outrageous, and then things started to change. There has not been a police killing in Albuquerque since August, and in October the city and DoJ entered into a consent decree to reform the Department, mostly focused on training and reporting, but including disbanding a notorious APD kill-squad and otherwise curbing the use of force and deadly force by the Department while building a genuine crisis intervention policy and program that would reduce police violence when dealing with mentally ill people in crisis.

So far, it's held.

The issue was police violence and murder and the complete impunity with which the police operated. It was obvious that the city administration was taken aback by the response to the killing of James Boyd in March. They had no idea that such a killing would trigger so much passion and outrage. Until the release of the DoJ report, the city's police and administration had insisted there was nothing wrong with what was going on. Business as usual meant that there would be a police killing to two a month, every one of them justified by the DA, and that would be that. Those who died obviously needed killing, or they wouldn't have gotten in the way of police bullets, amirite?

The way it was, according to police and civic officials, was the way it was supposed to be. When the People rose up in outrage and demanded change, however, Authority was non-plussed. When a greater Authority than the local police and civic officials said "You done bad," there seemed to be something of an awakening in City Hall and the Police Department.

Wait. They were doing it wrong? So it seemed.

Meanwhile, elsewhere the killing went on and on and on. Eric Garner, Mike Brown, John Crawford, Kajieme Powell, Vonderrit Myers, and so many more. The dead kept piling up. The People's outrage and fury kept growing.

"STOP. THE. KILLING!"

The plea from the People went largely unheard, however. Outside of Albuquerque, the official response was a blank stare, followed too often by a bullet, a taser, a chokehold. Someone would die, at the rate of two or three a day, day in and day out, as documented by the only resource that is compiling media reports of police killings in almost real time, "Killed by Police." More than a thousand have died at the hands of police so far this year, and that number tracks closely with reports of police killings in years past. The problem has been, however, that until Killed by Police started tracking media reports of police killings, there were no comprehensive national statistics on the matter; it was purely up to local police departments to voluntarily report to offices in Washington, DC, and the resulting numbers announced by the FBI each year were vast undercounts.

The casualty list is enormous, far greater by orders of magnitude than the number of police killed by gunfire or other acts of violence against them. FAR greater. No one knew. Further, as the dead piled up and reports of killings of unarmed victims were collected, it became clear that black men and boys were particularly vulnerable to police violence, being shot on sight -- often on video -- based on... what? Their gender and color and the intrinsic "threat" that represents to Power?

Further analysis has shown that Native American men are almost as vulnerable to police violence. The mentally ill and the poor of any gender, race or ethnicity face similar vulnerabilities.

I've long been convinced that most of these deaths are preventable, that 90% or more of police killings are not justified by the facts and necessity. They are matters more of convenience or willful acts of murder and terror.

Police kill because they can and because it suits their nature -- and they know they will get away with it almost always.

The People have risen up in their multitudes and demand -- yes, demand -- that the killing stop.

The People are doing what they must do. And yes, doing what they must do sometimes discommodes the comfort and convenience of the unvictimized, and it sometimes shames the powerful. Given the number of dead at the hands of police, a little inconvenience is a relatively minor cost to bring attention to and hopefully correct an out-of-control social problem.

What did the sign say during Occupy? "Sorry for the inconvenience, we're trying to change the world."

Photo by Ben Terrett, Creative Commons license

Actually, the inconvenience is necessary.

And I'm not sorry at all.

"They Think It's A Joke, They Think It's A Game"

They think it's a joke, 
They think it's a game...

Perhaps the primary direct action being taken during the ongoing #Ferguson protests is "shutting shit down" ("Who shuts shit down? We shut shit down!") most dramatically shutting down the freeways.

On the night that the Darren White Exoneration Jury's results were made public, 11/24/14, a good thousand or more demonstrators took over I-44 that runs through Shaw and Compton Heights. I haven't been in St. Louis for thirty years or so, but many memories of my time there have been triggered by the continuing demonstrations. Watching the events unfold on the livestreams has been remarkable -- both for the persistence and perseverance of the demonstrators and for all the memories that are being evoked... It's an odd and exhilarating experience.

Rebelutionary_Z was on the scene Monday night when the shut down of the freeway took place and his video documentation is striking. The freeway shutdown starts a little past 1:05:00 in the video below, and it's worth observing how it was done and how effective it was.



Broadcast live streaming video on Ustream

There have been dozens if not hundreds of similar actions all over the country as a result of the systemic failure of the injustice system. This is a significant escalation in the use of direct action to inconvenience the multitudes. It's not just the interstsate freeways that get shut down; intersections in towns all over the St. Louis area and well beyond are also subject to sporadic and almost randomized shutdowns, often for the purpose of holding "die-ins" which last for four and a half minutes to symbolize the four and a half hours that Mike Brown's corpse lay the middle of Canfield Drive while the authorities with their dogs kept the people  back from the scene.

I'll note in passing that shutting down the interstates is considered a National Security issue, and if these actions continue or spread, we're liable to see a furious reaction from authority. From such kindling do revolutions flare.

Police impunity and the many murders and executions that are the result of a culture of killing that has infected domestic policing from coast to coast for decades is the proximate cause of this uprising.

Killed by Police has recorded 1,010 police killings since January 1, 2014; 1,764 since the website began tracking news reports on May 1, 2013.

These casualty figures are almost entirely on one side -- the side of the people -- for police are very, very rarely killed by members of the public, despite hysterical and false claims by police departments that they are under extreme and growing levels of lethal threat from... who? The Criminal Class -- which is everyone who isn't them, it would seem.

The number of police officers deliberately killed by members of the public is extremely low, like crime in general, the lowest it's been in generations. Police can't acknowledge that. Most public officials can't either.

The public has to say it loud and clear and has to repeat it endlessly otherwise those in power will never hear.

Direct action is one way to make those voices heard...

Are We Asking the Right Questions?

All the indications suggest that the PTB are not about to budge with regard to the increasing levels of police violence against the population. So long as they -- the PTB -- feel protected from the Rabble by the police the killing and brutality and mass incarceration consequent to the various "wars" against the Proles will continue. It will arguably increase in bloodlust and cruelty.

There is no indication at all that the protests have had more than a marginal impact on the increasingly bizarre and freakish and murderous behavior of police in this country. In some cases we've seen the police redouble their violence against the Rabble and even on occasion use their snipers and armaments against the lower levels of the High and the Mighty.

Those who complain that the police behave like an occupying army have a point, but from the responses of elected and appointed officials in the face of these complaints, behaving like an army of occupation is the point of modern day "progressive" policing. We see it everywhere. It is now the standard.

What must be done to change it?

Obviously, what has been done so far has not changed it.

Oh, make no mistake. Police culture has changed over the years, especially since 9/11, but it's not because of any demand or requirement by the People. The change has come due to the demands and requirements of the High and the Mighty themselves. They are so frightened that the Rabble might rise, that the poor and suppressed minorities might revolt, that the shrinking middle class might wake up from its torpor and arrange a real revolution, that they insist the police in their employ use whatever force they deem necessary to neutralize any perceived threat.

So long, that is, that the threat is seen to be Out There -- among the Rabble.

Having been given this sort of free rein, however, the police see threats to be suppressed everywhere. Everyone is a potential threat in their eyes, and neutralization is necessary in their eyes more and more often, despite the lack of crime, the lack of resistance, the lack of opposition. Yet the killing goes on and on, the brutality and cruelty is enhanced. This is emblematic of a broken system spiraling out of control.

The intervention of the Department of Justice is not intended to reduce the killing and brutality, it is intended to professionalize it.

What can the Rabble do about this state of affairs?

I argue that there is not much the Rabble can do directly beyond what is being done. The protests and lawsuits bring needed attention to the problem, but so far they have not had a positive effect on police behavior toward what they regard as threats.

There are those who say that the Rabble has to start shooting back. That may happen, but I doubt it, simply because the people are so massively outgunned. A killing spree -- far greater than the one under way now -- would ensue. There might be a positive outcome one day, but for the duration, there would be an overt civil war between the police and the Rabble (rather than the covert one we see now.) 

Instead of shooting back -- which would be attacking the symptom not the problem itself -- the answer may be in stepping back and stepping aside.

The police serve a necessary function on behalf of their employers -- and those employers are not the People. Police, by and large, are not supervised or controlled by elected officials. They are almost all under the authority of city managers and county executives. Those people, by and large, serve powerful local economic interests and very powerful national political and economic interests. They regard the People -- the Rabble -- with hostility and contempt. Often their hostility and contempt is quite openly expressed.

They are the ones who need to be confronted, but they will generally only respond to confrontations by people they consider their peers or superiors. Confrontations by people beneath them are ignored or dismissed.

The people they consider their peers and superiors are not elected officials. They are instead the "movers and shakers" in their communities, and the very richest and most powerful players in the markets. What those people demand is what their employees do, generally without objection or resistance.

The Rabble play no part in that game. At best, they are seen as little more than pawns, exploitable and expendable.

Consequently, when the Rabble rises, as they will from time to time, the initial response by Authority is bewildering in its excess and inappropriateness. That excess and inappropriateness can be used to de-legitimize police and civic authority, but what happens then?

So far, no one has quite figured out what to do then.

Perhaps a more important question than what to do, is  "What kind of community do we want?" And then to ask "How do we get that kind of community?"

De-legitimzing authority that is not serving the people has a role to play in answering the second question, but the first question often doesn't get asked at all, or if it is asked it is in the context of preserving the status quo, and responses are limited to stakeholders -- who often are not the ones who are being victimized by the out of control occupation force that the police have become.

What are the common interests between the so-called community stakeholders and the victims of police violence? I've never heard that question asked in the forums I've attended on the issue of police violence. To me, it is a key question, because it represents the "space between" where solutions can be found.

It's obvious that the police have no intention to listen to the victims of police violence and be responsive. They don't believe they have an obligation to do so. Given that city managers and county executives -- who are actually in charge of police forces -- are so frequently and so openly contemptuous of the people in general, it's no wonder police feel no obligation to the general public. The police don't serve them. The police serve the people in charge, starting with their chief -- who is often no more than a figurehead -- then the city or county executive, then the rich and powerful people those people serve.

Those are the ones who have to tell the police to back off.

I suspect they can and will do it when the victims of police violence expand beyond the Rabble. It's already begun.

Of course the High and Mighty protecting one another from police violence doesn't do much to protect the common people. That is only likely when it is in the interests of the elites to do so and order the police to stand down.

Getting to that point will require the elites to value the lowly and common folk much more than they do today.

Next time, I'll try to explore some ways to do that.

Now That We Know This -- And Have No Excuse For Not Knowing -- What Do We Do?

"Police killing ruled 'justified'" -- every single time. No matter what, if the officer says he (or rarely) she felt threatened, then any use of force including lethal force is almost always ruled "justified," and the officer is in essence rewarded for a job well done. Killing, crippling and maiming, causing any amount of emotional and psychological trauma on witnesses, survivors and victims, ruining lives, destroying communities, all of it and more is ruled "justified" if the officers says he or she felt "threatened." Or if, as is so often the case, the officer's absolute authority is questioned...

Now that we know this -- and we have no excuse not to know it by now -- the question is what is to be done?

Tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars in payouts to victims of police brutality and murder have had no negative affect on police departments or on elected and appointed officials who write off these sometimes extraordinary payouts as simply the cost of doing business, or as a necessary public safety expense. To them, all these millions are nothing; they are not coming out of the department's budgets or the officer's pockets, or the hides of city administrators. Ha! They're a levy on taxpayers, either directly or indirectly.

The protests don't have any perceptible effect on the culture of suppression, oppression, and killing that has routinized and professionalized among police forces nation wide. The public can rise and yak and yabber all they want about the brutality and killing. Officials and their officers don't care. It's nothing to them, except perhaps some welcome overtime for the officers on the line, and damn, isn't it fun to get out all those riot costumes and toys and threaten the crowds of protesters with immediate and lethal force when they get uppity? Heh. Put them in their place.

"Scathing" reports by the DoJ and investigative journalists haven't had much of an effect on the police killing spree, except for this: when the DoJ issues a "scathing" report, the police undergo a "progressive professionalizing program," in which their rules and their training is coordinated with the "best and most progressive" national policing standards. It doesn't necessarily cut down on the killing for it isn't necessarily meant to. The killing and brutality may get the Rabble riled up, but that's rarely the problem. The problem is that the police aren't doing it right. Once they have the rules and the tools and the training that meets national standards, they're home free. Use of force, especially lethal force, is now routinized. Have at it.

As long as the Right People are served and protected, what's to worry? What's to complain about?

If that means a thousand or more of the Rabble are gunned down by police every year -- 3 or 4 a day, every single day -- so what? If that means tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of the Rabble are brutalized and traumatized by police every year, often arbitrarily -- so what? If that means millions upon millions of Americans are sent through the bloated prison industrial system -- so what? As long as it's primarily the Rabble who's subjected to this, why should anyone who matters care? They don't. They won't. It doesn't bother them because it doesn't involve them.

The way the officials in Albuquerque have behaved toward the problem of police violence and killing is instructive and it should be seen as exemplifying the point of view of most officials faced with growing outrage and protest by the Rabble toward police.

The only time they concern themselves with the opinions of the Rabble regarding the conduct of the police -- or really regarding much of anything else -- is when the Rabble interferes with comfort, convenience and routines of those in charge. The response then is always the same: suppression. If need be: oppression. Otherwise the Rabble is really rather free to carry on as they choose, but no one (who matters) is listening, and no one (who matters) gives a good god-damn. Even if they put on a show of "concern..." Sure. Right. Whatever. They have more important things to do, and a far more important clientele to serve.

The mayor and city manager of Albuquerque have been quite clear that they are not interested in hearing from victims of police violence. The mayor refuses any but the most distance-keeping contact, and the city manager's interactions are typically filled with bluster and threats toward those who seek justice. He was, after all, the chief officer of the New Mexico state prisons. (A whole long other topic, but it is informative to understand where he is coming from, and to understand that his state prison tenure was considered "progressive.")  It's useful, too, to understand that the mayor and city council of Albuquerque are not in charge of the police. As is the case in most cities around the country, the police are not accountable to nor are they supervised by elected officials. They are only accountable to the city manager or the equivalent, an appointee who often holds the mayor and council hostage to an agenda that the public is essentially unaware of. In Albuquerque, too, the appointed police chief appears to be a figurehead, nothing more. From appearances, he has no authority and very little knowledge. The police department appears to be run directly out of the City Administrator's office with little or no consideration of the "chief." That, too, is not all that unusual in city administrations around the country.

How city governments actually work is another topic that I could go on about at great length but not here, not now.

To these people and especially to those whom they serve, "justice" means suppression of the Rabble by any means necessary, including killing and brutalizing them routinely for any reason at all -- or no reason but to keep them in a state of fear, panic and terror.

For whatever reason, many of the Rabble are convinced they can get justice by appeal, but most often they can't. There is no one to appeal to who cares. There are very few who the Rabble might appeal to who see justice in the same way the Rabble does.

That's a major problem right there: "justice" to the victim/citizen is one thing, "justice" to the perpetrator/ruler is quite a different thing. "Justice" to the perpetrator/ruler protects them from the Rabble; "justice" to the Rabble is something else again: a brake on excess, exploitation, and oppression and an expression of social fairness.

So how does the Rabble deal with this situation? What will it take to change the dynamic sufficiently to reduce the rate of killing and brutalization by police on the one hand and ensure fairness on the other?

Is it even possible or have we reached the point where the Powers That Be have so divorced themselves from the interests of the People, there is no longer any way to heal the divide?

What then must we do?

Let's explore the topic next time....

Normalizing the Pathologies of Power

Things have been relatively calm in Ferguson recently, and the situation in St. Louis proper, following the police execution of Kajieme Powell and release of the video showing what happened, has never been as overtly rebellious and resistant as it has been in Ferguson. 

The police killings of black men in New York and Los Angeles have resulted in protests and demonstrations, marching in the streets and calls for change, actions which continue, as do the protests in Ferguson, but they have never had as high a media profile as the rebellion in Ferguson. There is a reason for that which I'll get to or at least try to as I weave this story together. 

This summer's anti-police-murder protests have been characterized by a certain militancy that often seems to arise against the Powers That Be these days, but then it dissipates in the face of overwhelming force or simply due to the exhaustion inherent in non-violently fighting the System and getting nowhere. Minor cosmetic changes may come in due time, but in the end, nothing substantive happens as a result of popular outrage at police misconduct (misconduct from the point of view of the victims at any rate, not misconduct at all by the standards of the police and the Powers which protect them). The problem often remains unchanged, the killing continues without let up. It might even intensify as a result of the protests against it.

I was involved peripherally in the movement against police abuse in Albuquerque starting well before the police execution of James Boyd in the foothills of the Sandias in March of this year (though it seems an age ago now). I don't live in Albuquerque, so it's not really my ballywick,  except that one of the police snipers -- a state police officer, not an APD officer -- was sent out to the area where I live to deal with a local man who was having an episode with a gun at his parents' home. As I understand it, the situation was under control by the local sheriff's deputies and the sheriff himself was on scene. The state was called as back up. 

They sent their sniper -- who'd killed a man in Albuquerque a couple of months before, a man who witnesses and relatives say was not the culprit the police were after, but who's counting, right? -- and within twenty minutes of his arrival, he executed the man holed up in his parents' house, executed him as his parents and the sheriff were negotiating with him to put his gun down and come out. The negotiation was a long, involved process, but the situation was under control. The sheriff, the parents, everyone was shocked and appalled at the state police sniper's action. It wasn't really called for. And it was not why the sheriff had called the state police for backup. But it was done, and once it was done, all those involved could do was carry on as best they knew how.

One more trouble maker had been eliminated, and that's a good thing, right? That's what the police are for, right? Get rid of the problem people, lock them up or shoot them, their choice. It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it. Be thankful, be proud of the protection the police provide, and shut up. What's done is done. And it is good.

Right?

Well, no. It's not right. It's very wrong. But this wrong has been so normalized over the years to the extent that most people accept it as the way things are supposed to be, and only a minority protests and says no. 

The protests in Albuquerque against police brutality, murder and misconduct became quite intense after the release of video of the murder of James Boyd, and those intensified protests -- which included Anonymous hacking attacks and anarchist direct actions on the ground -- were met with a heavily militarized police response, including armored vehicles, mounted officers, tear gas and other "less lethal" means. The intense and militant protests were broken up and dissipated by these means, but other protest actions continued through the spring, culminating with a big march and demonstration on June 21, after which it seems the movement went into a kind of hibernation. 

The protests had accomplished something. They got the DoJ involved and they got a scathing report issued regarding APD violations of standards of Constitutional policing including numerous unjustified killings of Albuquerque residents. Once the report was issued it seemed the police went into a kind of overdrive, almost a killing spree, before they backed off a bit and helped other agencies including -- federal marshals -- conduct the necessary summary executions while "reform" of the APD was under way. Or negotiations for "reform." Or something.

The killing continued, initially under APD auspices, but now apparently all the agencies of the Law are participating equally, and the shootings and shootouts are routinized and normalized like so many of the rest of the pathologies of power.

Is this the inevitable result? I don't know. But I know that the concept of policing that has led to all these police killings of mentally disturbed, drug-addled, or acting out "troublemakers" is wrong, through and through, and it must change.

It won't, though, as long as we the people, or the rabble as the case may be, continue to enable the Powers That Be through devotion to process rather than action.

The people of Ferguson rose up in righteous outrage against the police murder of Michael Brown and they were met with a savage and extraordinarily violent response beginning the afternoon that Michael Brown was killed. Dogs and assault weapons were deployed that afternoon against the angry and deeply wounded residents of the apartment complex where Michael Brown's grandmother lives. They were angry and hurt, but they were not committing violence. The use of dogs and assault weapons that afternoon and later that night was a matter of intimidation and control, nothing more. It was to make clear to Those People, the Negroes of Ferguson, that they would not be allowed to get out of line, no matter what the police did to one of them or what Those People thought they could do. 

It was a threat which would later be carried out with ever greater displays and deployments of armor and firepower in the streets of Ferguson, ultimately involving a kind of randomized terror of the community documented chillingly in Elon James White's recording of his encounters with this random terror posted below. 

And lies. Oh My God the lies.

Lies about shootings and guns and gangs, lies about firebombs, lies about agitators, lies about looters, lies about a whole community in distress, anguish and pain. The lies were -- and still are -- constant from the authorities. Ultimately, the community was beaten down. The increasingly violent and militarized police response happened night after night. The worst episodes of police violence happened after "Magic Negro" Captain Ron Johnson was appointed to oversee the suppression of the Negroes of Ferguson, after the President spoke, after the DoJ was assigned and Holder announced that he was on his way. The violence by the police wore the people down, terrorized them into submission. Or at least into an exhausted stalemate.

This is the routine, though the level of violence employed in Ferguson, together with the barrage of propaganda and lies about what was going on was something new, at least new in the sense that we haven't seen anything quite like this .... Except we have. We've seen it many times since the civil unrest of the '60s.

The claim is made that he Negroes of Ferguson were rioting, but they never did. The police rioted, much as they did at the Democratic convention in Chicago in 1968; the people of Ferguson did not, not once. 

But what about all the looting and the shooting and the firebombings and the urine being thrown at the cops? 

Yeah, what about it? The fact is, there was very little looting and property destruction, and from the very first instance, the people of Ferguson were puzzled because it was not them doing it.  It appeared to be targeted symbolically, starting with the QuickTrip where it was alleged Mike Brown had been accused of shoplifting or some other minor crime before he was shot by Darren Wilson. Only it turned out the accusation hadn't come from the QuickTrip, it didn't involve the QuickTrip at all; but the looting and burning of the QuickTrip -- by elements unknown -- a very telegenic and symbolic act of destruction by Those People. 

Then something amazing and unanticipated happened. The ruined QuickTrip became the hub of the community, its parking lot became the Ferguson public square, and the people of Ferguson acted on their own volition to clean up and protect the property -- or what was left of it -- as a symbol of their own grief and determination. But also of their belief in something better to come.

The symbol changed from destruction to creation. 

This had to be stopped, and it was. Gathering at the QuickTrip was forbidden, prohibited on pain of immediate arrest, and the site was and is fenced off. No access permitted, even pausing on the sidewalk was verboten. Why? Well, because. The popular transformation of a space like that, from the scene of destruction to the site of the creation of a strong and resistant community was a direct threat to Power. The fact is that people gathered there, discussed their situation, planned their actions, built a sense of common purpose and community and by doing so, they threatened to create their own narrative and exert their own power against the forces arrayed against them. 

It's come to light that the government of the City of Ferguson and the police in concert with the almost all-white ownership class was engaged in what could be called "Negro farming." That is to say, they regarded the majority of the population of Ferguson as a cash crop to be harvested from time to time through traffic citations, fees, fines, and endless warrants. Someone did a statistical analysis and found that there were three warrants issued for every household in Ferguson, and the warrants were strongly concentrated among the 67% of the population that is black. This "farming" produced more than $2 million in revenue for the city every year, helping to keep the taxes on the mostly white-owned properties in town remarkably low. Given these facts and statistics, there is little wonder that Officer Wilson approached Michael Brown and his friend Dorian Johnson who were walking in the middle of Canfield Dr. He could have cited them then and there and put them on the city Negro farm treadmill. Instead, he ordered them onto the sidewalk, and when they didn't immediately comply, he apparently decided to challenge them and threaten them. Things deteriorated quickly from that point, and Officer Wilson, rather than citing Brown and Johnson for jaywalking instead chose to shoot Michael Brown dead in the street.

The "farming" aspects of city government certainly were not unique to Ferguson; they're rather typical of many small towns and not a few larger cities which see segments of their populations as exploitable crops and financial resources rather than as citizens, but from the testimonies I've seen, the residents of Ferguson considered the practices of the police and the city government and courts to be harassment to the point where some felt they were under siege by an almost all-white civic authority. This was a particular problem for poor people, but it affected all. 

There was resistance prior to the killing of Michael Brown, but apparently it was relatively low key and subtle. The killing of Michael Brown unleashed a much more overt and assertive resistance to the police that was met with increasing, indeed absurd, levels of police violence against the people.

Teri49 emailed me with some of her findings in the #Ferguson Twitter stream, findings which show that the police response to resistance in Ferguson is part of a much broader pattern and practice, one that really affects everyone everywhere in the country, and it should be deeply troubling. 

With her permission, I'm posting what she found:

********

Ryan Devereaux @rdevro

 · 

5s aug 20 11:30 am

Claims of police raid on an activist center at a church providing supplies for activists -- particularly for tear gas exposure -- developing

Response to above:

J H ‏@JrGothDetective 3m

@rdevro it's true. Just keep reading #staywoke

****************

Then there's this:

***************

42mRa ‏@Ra__ 

RT Capt Johnson of #FERGUSON was walking in middle of road pointing out journos to be arrested

re: @rambobiggs

Here's an article about the above.  I know, prison planet, geez, but one of the  guys in that twitter feed is a reporter with prison planet and supposedly witnessed this in person.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/police-captain-unleashes-ferguson-riot-cops-against-journalists.html

*************

Now here is a really interesting thing.  These guys can't spell worth shit, but it appears that they are a real mercenary group operating a training center in St. Louis.  The right-wing blogs are all busting at the seams with the news that mercenaries are to be deployed to Ferguson.  However, their second "tweet" clarifies that they are being sent in to protect an individual, not to assist the police.  No mention made of who they are protecting.  It's doubtful it would be Holder, as he would have Secret Service.  Maybe some celebrity hired them?  Such strange goings-on, and none of them good.:

Asymmetric Solutions

‏@AsymmetricUSA  aug 19 1:04 pm

We've been to Baghdad, Kabul, KL, Manilla, Peshwar, Bogata.  Never guessed we would deploy a high threat team in our own city.  #furgeson

Asymmetric Solutions @AsymmetricUSA

 · 

9h  aug 20 3:16 am

To clarify we are not protecting state, law enforcement or those exercising their right to assemble. Escort detail augment for individual.

https://twitter.com/AsymmetricUSA

Asymmetric Solutions

@AsymmetricUSA

1800 Acre Special Operations Training Facility Staffed by combat experienced SpecOps vets - Army Green Berets, Army Delta, Navy SEALs, SEAL 6, and Agency SOF.

St. Louis, MO

asymmetricsolutionsusa.com

***************

Thought you might find some of this interesting.

Yes, well I did. Find it -- and so many other things going on in and around Ferguson -- interesting. Clearly, something is going on there that has been built on the lessons learned from previous episodes of suppression of civil disturbances and imposition of quasi martial law, including the suppression of Occupy, the Boston Lockdown -- er, "Voluntary Shelter In Place" -- and so on. They are all built on the premise that a National Special Security Event is taking place, such as the WTO conference that resulted in the infamous "Battle of Seattle" in 1999.

During these events, the Constitution is suspended and for all intents and purposes, residents and activists have no rights the authorities are bound to respect. Protest may or may not be "permitted," but protest and activism is extensively surveilled and is controlled with often ridiculous levels of brutality. Mass arrest of innocent people is commonplace, "snatch and grab" actions by police frequent, tear gassing, LRAD deployment, and so forth used to break up crowds. Deployment of military-style hardware amid masses of police is routine.

This has been going on for many years, and Americans are pretty used to it by now, though it seems that there is little or no understanding that what takes place is due to the declaration of a National Special Security Event and is led from the top -- typically DHS. It's not a spontaneous local police reaction to crowds of protesters at all. It's all planned at the top over months or even years. Many times, crowds have been seeded with provocateurs, some of whom have been caught and exposed. The point being that peaceful -- or at least nonviolent -- protests are often disrupted by the actions of a few provocateurs working on behalf of the police or other authority. Such disruptions are part of the plan.

Note also that disruption of political activism is part of the plan from the outset. Prior to the 2008 Republican Convention in Minneapolis/St. Paul, there were raids on houses where political activists were gathering in preparation for the Convention, and many arrests on bogus charges were made. The harassment of these activists has continued to the present day, with numerous arrests and property seizures ongoing.

Media is targeted for special treatment as well. There is typically an attempt to separate "credentialed" from independent media, and to confine media to particular locations, as well as embedding selected media with the authorities and police. This is obviously an effort to control what the public sees and knows of what is going on, and this overt control of the media is one reason people don't understand what is really going on and it's part of the reason why even now, a majority of people often believe that the protesters get what they deserve from the police.

There is often an effort to portray protesters as "rioters" and protests as "riots," even when -- or maybe especially when -- the police are the ones who are rioting (a la Chicago 68). Instigators are commonplace, as they seem to have been in Ferguson when "riots" were happening. The looting and property destruction that took place in Ferguson, like similar actions in other cities under the quasi-martial law of a NSSE, is questionable on a number of levels. Often it -- looting and rioting -- seems to be part of the plan of action by the authorities.

In Ferguson the authorities, for example, did nothing whatever to interfere with looters and those who were engaged in property destruction. In fact, they seemed to be encouraging looters and destroyers while they were arresting paramedics, media, and community activists. Interesting priorities.

The authorities in Ferguson were constantly complaining about gunfire aimed at them, and they repeatedly whined about all the bottles, rocks and Molotov cocktails thrown at them. But interestingly, when people were shot as a few were (but not, note well, police) they did nothing. No investigation, no follow up, in some cases no reports were taken. This gave rise to questions regarding who was actually firing guns in Ferguson. The only ones anyone was sure was firing was police. Police were never known to be wounded by gunfire in Ferguson, only random people on their way home or whatever. The shooters were never identified or found. There was apparently never any attempt to locate or arrest them. This understandably gives rise to speculation that the shooters were either police themselves or were provocateurs working for the police.

Only five guns are known to have been confiscated. Five. In a place supposedly filled with murderous gangstas and rampaging savages. Right. Until Michael Brown was killed, there hadn't been a murder in Ferguson for years. Not one. If there were gangstas, they were sure circumspect. None of the guns confiscated were the property of members of the protest crowds, they were all seized from motorists stopped at checkpoints. In other words, there is no evidence at all, despite the repeated claims of the police, that participants in protests in Ferguson were armed, or if they were armed that they intended to use their weapons against police.

There is not a shred of evidence that even one Molotov cocktail was thrown at police despite nightly claims by the police that they were being barraged by "firebombs" and so on. Nor is evidence that more than a very few bottles of any kind were thrown at police, and then typically only after police began an action against the crowds, though there were a few instances where a single bottle thrown by someone unknown within the crowds which were triggers for police action, and thus were suspected to have been thrown by provocateurs.

Police raids on safe places and gathering places, such as the church mentioned in the tweet above and various parking lots along W. Florissant, were clearly intended to make it difficult or impossible for people to feel safe anywhere or to be able to create and maintain any public space. During one police rampage in Ferguson, neighborhoods were being teargassed and people were being targeted and shot with rubber bullets at random. This is documented in the audio posted below, but there were many other reports as well. But these incidents happened after the media was ordered out of the area. Many of the reporters sent to Ferguson still don't know about the gassing of neighborhoods -- they weren't there.

I could go on and on, but all this and more is a matter of routinizing the pathologies of power. From the killing of Michael Brown onwards, the authorities in Ferguson acted belligerently and contemptuously toward the residents. Toward the Black residents. While there have been many white participants in the protests, some of them residents of Ferguson, the police have been mostly concerned with controlling the Blacks -- but strangely they have not interfered with looting and property destruction. The very worst and most brutal nights of protest suppression have taken place under the command of Captain Ron Johnson -- who became something of a rock star and hero briefly -- but under whose command some of the worst abuses happened. I wondered whether he was a Judas goat, but now it's likely he will be made a scapegoat. Put a Black man in charge of the suppression of Blacks, and there are liable to be unforeseen consequences. That kind of cynical action is part of the pathology of power as well.

The displays of military style hardware and camo-fatigue wearing "troops", the automatic rifles pointed directly at people, the machine gunners, the tear gas and smoke grenades launched at defiant but nonviolent crowds, the rubber bullets that wounded so many (numbers unknown at this point), the raids on safe places, the snatch and grabs, the assaults, the threats, the lies, all of it is part of the normalizing of ever greater levels of power pathology. The assignment of the National Guard to protect the police is a fascinating development that I can't recall any precedent for.

Something else was going on too. The authorities -- apparently under the command of Captain Johnson -- recruited "community leaders" to help police and control the crowds. They seemed to be relying principally on recruits from the Nation of Islam and the New Black Panthers, which is interesting as can be, and which I may have more to say about in a subsequent post, but it is worth pointing out at this point that police conducted raids on a well established local church and community center where help and safety were available for residents, while the police were recruiting and utilizing the services of the New Black Panthers and Nation of Islam which, so far as I'm aware, had no deep roots in the community. Further indication of the pathology of power? I'd say so, yes.

The summer media frenzy was concentrated in Ferguson, at least while the protests and their telegenic suppression was on display. Most media left when the action died down. The media was being very cynically and consciously used to spread a message of terror to anyone else who might rise against the power of the state and authority. Most of the mainstream was content with spreading official lies and images of terror as far and wide as they could. Effectively, they were acting as propagandists for the State. Independent media tried to find, state and show the truth as best they could. But it was a losing effort in my view as the major mass media has a much greater reach. The truth is out there, and an honest picture is being assembled, but it will take years I think before what is really going on is widely known, and by then, something else will be going on, perhaps quite a bit worse.

The only way I know of to alter the situation is through intervention. There was a moment when something of the sort took place in Ferguson, when clergy and media together formed a line to prevent a police attack on the crowd, and they succeeded in defusing the situation for at least a few minutes. That can happen again, it needs to happen again on a much broader scale. The massive demonstration on Staten Island yesterday in honor of Eric Garner and Michael Brown and others killed by police was -- perhaps -- another example of how an intervention might occur. It takes a lot of dedicated people putting their bodies -- and perhaps their lives -- on the line to stand between the police and the people to prevent violence not instigate it. On the other hand, the mass demonstration may become just another routine signifying nothing, while the pathologies of power continue their march into madness.

Ferguson Calm?

Oh.

I was up in Santa Fe, away from the "news" much of yesterday and last night, but the signs were that things had calmed down in Ferguson, and there was little or no police violence for once. It's only been eleven days since Michael Brown was shot down in the street by a Ferguson policeman, and there were only 10 days of "unrest."

I wish I could say that they were 10 days that shook the world, but despite the outrage and the continued police violence against the people of Ferguson, it doesn't look like anything has changed or will change soon.

That's not the way this game is played -- and I really hate to say it, but it is a game.

Black folk get arrested, jailed and killed in the streets disproportionately to their numbers in society, vastly disproportionately, and it's been this way for many a long year. It is my view that the current and continuing War on Blacks was part of the trade off for the passage and enforcement of Civil Rights legislation. De jure segregation would end, but the pressures on African Americans in general and their communities specifically would increase. Their men would be sent to jail and/or killed, families destroyed, communities uprooted and their economies broken. But there would be no legal separation of the races any more, no legal racial discrimination allowed.

It's a trade off that has allowed a black middle class to emerge and grow, so there is that. Opportunities for blacks are greater than they once were, but the counter-pressure is relentless, and the killing goes on and on and on.

Police, as we see, are on a hair-trigger, particularly in black communities, and they will harass, arrest,  and shoot to kill on any provocation or none at all, and if the people in these communities resist and rebel -- as they've done in Ferguson -- the entire weight of the police state will come down on them hard, fast, and viciously.

They got the dogs out in Ferguson the very afternoon that Michael Brown was murdered. While his body lay broiling in the sun for hour after hour and people gathered at the police tape to complain and shout and cry and commiserate with one another, the police in St. Louis County arrived with dogs and assault weapons at the ready to suppress any rebellion that might arise while they went about their police business at a rather languid pace. The Nigras would be kept in line.

Later that night, the police (St. Louis County again) came back with their dogs and assault rifles at the ready when the community murmured and said, "This ain't right." There was great upset, but there was no riot, not yet at any rate.

A march and demonstration took place the next day and into the night, and it was met with growing force by the police, but strangely, the looting that night was practically unopposed by the authorities. They used their force against the marches and demonstrations, not the looters. How strange.

This happened again and again, with ever greater displays of firepower against loud but unarmed and peaceful marches and demonstrations, and no action at all against the those who looted and destroyed. Nothing.

This was obviously not right. Authority was sputtering and flailing out of control -- or was this the plan?

Conspiracy theory has abounded in the face of continuing repression, revolt, and wildly inappropriate police conduct during the circus and crisis in Ferguson. The militarized response to a popular outcry against police brutality and murder looks very much like a chaotic implementation of previously planned actions should there be an outbreak of civil unrest.

We saw an inkling of it in Albuquerque in response to the unwarranted killing of James Boyd in March, and before that we saw many similar police actions against popular protests throughout the suppression of Occupy.

These are practiced maneuvers; they are not spontaneous police responses to civil unrest. In fact, the police actiona provoke unrest and rebellion which is then suppressed with ever greater levels of fury, brutality and blank-faced cruelty. Many observers have pointed out that this is "Israeli" practice and that many police forces are trained by Israeli advisers on these very tactics. If I get around to it, I'll put up some links, but it's easy enough to find the information on the Google Machine.

Last night, apparently, there was very little unrest. Much of the militarized hardware that had been on display night after night and all of the tear-gas and grenades that had been used repeatedly against peaceful protests were held in reserve; I saw a report that indicated there was only one instance of "snatch and grab" by police and it seemed to be in response to a fight among the people, not a simply arbitrary power action as was witnessed repeatedly on Tuesday night when approximately 40 people were grabbed from the crowd seemingly at random.

What calmed things down last night? Several factors may have played a part. For one thing, the crowds were reported to be smaller than on previous nights. There was a thunderstorm which interfered with the demonstrations for a time. Many people were exhausted and they stayed home. The police, according to reports I've seen about last night, did not provoke the crowd with displays or use of force, they did not use gas and grenades and armored personnel carriers. There were few or no police on the streets in riot gear or military camouflage, and so far as I'm aware, no one had an assault rifle pointed at them with threats to kill shouted from some roided up freak like happened the night before.

It made an obvious and apparently surprising difference.

But only surprising if this has all been a trial of tactics of suppression.

Some observers seem to think that even the killing of Michael Brown itself was part of a plan of suppression. Get the community roiled up over yet another killing of a black man, and see what happens. Test out tactics, debrief, try something else, see what gets people into a fury, see how the police handle it, debrief again, and so on.

Social manipulation on a grand scale.

The people of Ferguson are the pawns in this game.

Provocation was part of the military practice in Iraq as well; the troops would try to provoke an armed response to their presence and actions, and thus they believed they would be able to identify and suppress rebels and contain revolt against the occupation. It didn't work. There were unanticipated consequences including increasing casualties among military and civilians, ultimately turning into a still-raging civil war which has resulted in the destruction of a nation and society.

The Powers That Be seem wedded to this doctrine and practice of provocation though, and so we saw it again and again in Ferguson.

And then, last night, for the first time in a long time, we didn't.

Calm, though? Has civic calm been restored? If past experience is any guide, the answer is no. What's happened is a prelude. Civic authority has been almost completely discredited in Ferguson, and that discredit has extended far beyond it to include the County of St. Louis, and many of the localities that sent police-troops to suppress the "riots" in Ferguson. Actually, the police were rioting, but that's something the PTB like to ignore.

Civic authorities in Ferguson cannot restore their authority under the circumstances, and so something that more or less parallels the established civil authority will be established in the community. People will run their own affairs and will do their best to ignore the city authorities, and they will probably figure out ways to passively defy them too. The stories of what amount to extortion of the people of Ferguson by the city and the courts are legion, and defiance of that extortion is liable to be one of the first areas of defense.

Something like this has happened in a number of cities I can think of, including Detroit and Oakland.

There was a stark murder by police of a black man in St Louis a couple of days ago that has not sparked more than muted outrage, but that killing may have a broader and more lasting effect than the killing of Michael Brown.

The man was shot down in the street in front of witnesses seconds after police arrived after being called due to shoplifting of some soda or cookies or what have you. Police claimed the man charged at them with a knife held in an "overhand grip", but video shows nothing like that happened. The video shows that the man did not obey immediately and was shot down within seconds -- for failure to obey. Nothing more. Well, perhaps there was more. Police appeared to be so terrified of a disobedient black man, they panicked and killed him because they were... scared.

James Boyd was shot and killed for failure to obey as well, but it took Albuquerque police hours to act rather than seconds as in St. Louis. They weren't afraid of Boyd, they simply had to execute him.

In Ferguson, it took at least a minute or two for Officer Darren Wilson to execute Michael Brown for failure to obey. And perhaps because he was too frightened to do anything else.

The militarized, brutal and cruel actions of the police against the people of Ferguson (as before in Albuquerque, and before that in dozens of cities where Occupy had been) was also a response to failure to obey.

And fear. And most especially cowardice. Many are beginning to point to the utter cowardice of police in these situations, so frightened and terrified of what might happen -- to them -- if they don't kill the suspect or dehumanized object of their fear, that they can think of nothing else. It is cowardice so often, though. To assume the worst of everyone, to fear black and brown men especially, to respond inappropriately over and over again, to commit summary execution routinely, all of this brings dishonor and discredit to the police and to those who enable and encourage this behavior.

It has to stop.

What it will take to stop it is yet to be discovered, but more and more Americans are seeking the answer.

Deep Into Tolstoy

Count Lev Nicolayevich Tolstoy in Peasant Garb, by Ilya Repin, c. 1901

I've been quite deep into Tolstoy lately -- carry me back in time and memory! -- and so have not really been keeping up with either posting here or the Events of the World Today. It's too much. One can do one's Tolstoy or one can do the other, and I've chosen, for what it's worth, to stick with my Tolstoy for the time being, in part because it seems to me he was seriously on to something back when time was, and that even now, much of his thinking -- as traditionalist and backward looking as it sometimes seems to be -- was remarkably advanced when he wrote, and much of it still is.

Times have changed, but they haven't changed that much.

The work I've been reading and writing a long commentary on (much in the manner of Tolstoy himself, come to think of it) is "What Then Must We Do?" (173pg pdf, be warned) a polemical essay on the vexing Problem of the Poor which was very much on his mind when he was at his Moscow townhouse but rather less so when he was at his country estates near Tula, a couple of hundred kilometers south of Moscow.

Of course being Tolstoy he goes much further than merely fretting over the condition of Moscow's multitudes of poor people. Much of the polemic is about himself, and what he must do to change himself if he truly wants to aid the poor. His anecdotes about what he finds as he attempts to be a philanthropist and fails are instructive, for very much the same problems and failures afflict much of the philanthropic community in our own time. Today, we've figured out how to make nice little careers out of being philanthropic. Progress!

His rants against the parasitical classes into which he dumps everyone who does not work themselves but who force the Lower Orders to support them instead -- including scientists and artists -- became tedious and annoying. By work Tolstoy means the work the peasants do on his estates and in the villages nearby. Plowing, planting, tool-making, weaving, harvesting, animal husbandry, preserving, storing. That sort of thing. No other work at all seems worthwhile to him -- except now and then at the margins. His existence as a Russian nobleman is worthless on its face, and his "work" as a world-renown author of novels and essays has not much more value as long as Petya and Ludmilla and all the rest of his peasants and the poor in general are forced to carry the burden of his upkeep and the upkeep of so many other drones and parasites on their backs.

If he were writing on behalf of his peasants and the poor, that might be another question, but so long as he writes for his own pleasure and that of his class he is a drone and a parasite and a burden. Though he doesn't mention it, I can imagine his angst is over his masterwork novels such as War and Peace, and perhaps especially Anna Karenina, novels which one can argue have no value at all to the peasantry but which can easily capture the imaginations of his peers and those who seek to emulate them -- as they still do.

The only work Tolstoy seems to value implicitly is that at the base -- agricultural labor and that which supports agriculture. Nothing else at all that men and women do to make a living is of intrinsic worth in his mind.

This perspective is interesting and a little difficult to deal with in contemporary terms, given the fact that the agricultural sectors in most of the developed and developing world are largely mechanized and depopulated. Whereas in Tolstoy's time, 90% of labor was in the fields, now the percentage of agricultural labor is in the single digits, edging ever closer to zero. What then?

Almost everyone lives in towns and cities now, and those who work in them are all by Tolstoy's definition, parasites and drones. Agriculture is conducted by laboratories, patent attorneys, bank spreadsheets, machines and computers, and to the extent that there are people in the fields in this country any more, they are mostly migrants, many from Mexico and Central America, who work hard but generally in brief spurts to weed, cultivate and/or harvest and then move on.

There are few or no settled peasants any more -- not in the developed and/or developing world at any rate.

And yet the poor are still with us in their multitudes...

Tolstoy celebrates a peasantry that no longer exists and human labor that is no longer necessary in modern agriculture. Machines do the heavy labor, machines built on assembly lines in distant factories, transported to the fields by other machines, all intricately webbed together. Banks determine the need for machinery and loan certain farmers money to buy the machines and thereby keep these particular individuals in perpetual debt -- which often enough is not so bad, because even though they must pay the banks their due, there is generally enough profit from the farm (if you want to call it a farm) to provide the farmer and his/her family with a very comfortable living. They may always carry a heavy debt to the banks, but they can also have a very pleasant and abundant lifestyle at the same time. Nothing at all like the situation of Tsarist Russia's peasants who were forced into debt.

A way was found to deal with the rural peasantry -- get rid of them! Clear the land of people. Consolidate small holdings into ever larger ones. Mechanize every conceivable aspect of agriculture. Hire day labor as needed. Voilá! No peasants, no peasant problem, no rural uprisings! Yay! Progress!

The last wave of rural clearance and dispossession took place in this country about 30 years ago when numerous small farmers were foreclosed upon when they were not able to refinance their debts as they had long been doing. It was of course a calculated and deliberate move on the part of the financiers who held the farmers' debts, the obvious point being land clearance and agricultural consolidation.

So today, there is no viable peasantry to celebrate, and such manual labor as there still is in agriculture is done by hired hands, most of them Spanish speaking "foreigners" on temporary contract.

The dispossessed are forced into towns where those who can get ahead -- as most at one time could, and some still can -- do so, and the rest are left to fend for themselves as best they might.

While some of the uber-wealthy consider everyone who is not of their own class to be a "parasite", neither town-dwellers nor the highest of the mighty today are being carried on the backs of the rural peasantry any more. No such peasantry exists.

We have to be careful, though, in thinking that way. It may be accurate in the case of rural North America and Europe and more and more accurate with regard to most of the developing world, but there are still many hundreds of millions of rural peasants in the whole wide world, and many of them are still working as hard as any Russian peasant ever did in Tolstoy's time to feed and clothe and house Their Betters, the parasitical classes who burden them.

Today we may never see or be aware of this still extant -- but distant -- peasantry. It may be far away, but it's there.

Yet much closer to home, the poor are still with us in their multitudes and their numbers keep growing.

Many millions of Americans are forced into poverty in this country every year, and the current poverty rate among Americans is higher than it has been in decades. There is no public policy effort to reduce it. In fact, public policies act to increase poverty.

One might ask to what object is this so? Of course, it's obvious what the object is: to force down and keep down wages and benefits for those who can obtain and keep jobs. The more unemployment and poverty there is, the lower the wage and benefit base for workers. Very simple. It is government and industry policy  that makes it so, and no amount of agitation by the impoverished masses has any affect on the situation.

Oh, but what about all the efforts -- some of them successful -- to "raise the minimum wage?" All well and good, but they don't raise anyone out of poverty even when they are successful. The efforts to raise the minimum wage from (say) seven-and-a-quarter to ten dollars and change, for example, barely touches the poverty equation faced by so many millions of Americans, and merely demonstrates how very low the wage and benefit base has been allowed to fall over the years. Whereas at a time I can still remember, one modest income was sufficient for a household to get by on decently if not necessarily abundantly, now two or three incomes per household are necessary for subsistence. And still, even with everyone in the household who can work being employed, the household may remain in poverty. At ten dollars an hour, a household may still be in poverty, but at fifteen an hour, it may be possible to break through the poverty line, so long, that is, as there is more than one income earner.

Why should this situation be allowed, let alone be considered normal and natural as it is?

These are the kinds of questions Tolstoy asked about his own country in his own day, and one of the answers he came up with was the gross inequality of power between a toiling, or in many cases idle, impoverished multitude and a parasitical overclass who ruled and exploited the multitude -- ruling with fear and brutality and starvation and death.

Their cruelty, he said, was justified by tradition and by "science"  -- particularly the bogus "science" of economics.

Oh, how I laughed! Because it is so true. Just as in Tolstoy's own time, the contemporary "science" of economics is used to justify any kind of exploitation on behalf of capitalists and their power and their greed. The lot of the workers and the poor may be difficult, but -- according to think tanks peopled with economists -- it's not nearly as bad as it could be, not even close, so the toiling and/or idle masses should just take it with a smile and a grateful tug on their forelock, for, yes, if they don't, it could get very much worse for them, very quickly. You see? Good. Now that we understand how the world works...

I'm reminded of Frau Merkel and her buddy Sr. Draghi and his buddy Mme Legarde, chortling in the background as the remnants of the Old Soviet Empire are sliced and diced for the benefit of the European bankers and the Global Overclass even as we speak. I've actually heard of some of the chattering classes opining on the necessity of imposing "Greek Style Austerity" on the Ukrainians to get them into shape to participate in the European Periphery as it were. Jesus, Mary and Joseph. These people know no bounds to their cruelty, do they? No, actually they don't. They are so certain of their right and their righteousness that any level of cruelty they care to impose is justified in their own minds.

As some wag proposed, Frau Merkel is the daughter Adolph and Eva would have had...

May we theorize that unrestrained power -- by any faction -- inevitably leads to cruelty? And such cruelty leads to impoverishment?

Tolstoy, late in his life, set himself on a path of redemption by -- he said -- relieving his peasants of the burden of supporting him and carrying him on their backs. That, he believed, was what everyone of his position and class must do. He -- and they -- must learn to live in a manner which does not require the Lower Orders to carry them. They must learn to do whatever they can for themselves. They must work.

Tolstoy did this by working side by side with his peasants, learning their ways and crafts, taking care of his own needs rather than relying on corps of servants, and using whatever surplus he earned to enhance the lives of those Below rather than to add to his already overabundant luxuries.

Our own Neo-Aristos are nowhere near that self-aware, though. To the extent that philanthropy -- as opposed to cruelty -- enters their minds at all, they have no interest in relieving the burdens of the poor and of those being forced into poverty, they want to select winners and losers among them, and to increase, not reduce, the burdens they are forced to carry. To that extent they are innately evil.

I've gone back to Tolstoy in part because so much of the Overclass's recent propaganda barrage has been focused on Russia, Putin, Ukraine and so on, and I've always had a warm regard for the Russian and Soviet efforts to tame some of the worst aspects of their own society. I realized early on that the anti-Soviet propaganda was lies and damned lies and worse. So is the anti-Russian, anti-Putin propaganda today. It's remarkably similar in tone and content as well. To learn, as we did yesterday, that one of the high profile American plutocrats is funding revolt and revolution in Ukraine, in concert with the Government of the United States of America (Inc) and a plethora of American-funded NGOs merely confirms what instinct about these things suggests must be true.

The question remains, "What Then Must We Do?" when faced with such cruelty and such crimes?

So often I ask, "What did the Russians and the Soviets do? How did they cope, and how did they overcome?"

So many lessons yet to be learned.

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Lev Nicolayevich Tolstoy's funeral procession, 1910