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#Ferguson protests boil over

#Ferguson protests boil over

Ferguson is broken.
Posted by Tuesday, November 25, 2014 at 06:30am
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Last night’s grand jury verdict vindicating officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown sent the people of Ferguson, Missouri into a tailspin. Even as the verdict was being read, reports began to trickle in of vandalism, looting, and violence against police officers attempting to keep the peace.

The racially charged case in Ferguson has inflamed tensions and reignited debates over police-community relations even in cities hundreds of miles from the predominantly black St. Louis suburb. For many staging protests Monday, the shooting was personal, calling to mind other galvanizing encounters with local law enforcement.

Police departments in several major cities said they were bracing for large demonstrations with the potential for the kind of violence that marred nightly protests in Ferguson after Brown’s killing. Demonstrators there vandalized police cars, hugged barricades and taunted officers with expletives Monday night while police fired smoke canisters and pepper spray. Gunshots were heard on the streets.

(added) Mark Levin notes how the lawlessness is a symptom, not the cause:

Ferguson burns and violence has been unleashed thanks to the reckless liberal media, the lawless administration (especially Eric Holder) exploiting the shooting to smear police departments across the nation, phony civil rights demagogues, race-baiting politicians, and radical hate groups.

The lies about why and how Officer Darrin Wilson shot Michael Brown started on day one and never ended. The indisputable facts are that Brown was shot because he assaulted a police officer, attempted to take the officer’s pistol resulting in two close range gun shots in the police cruiser, and then turned around and charged the officer as he was being pursued. The entire event was precipitated by Brown earlier stealing cigars from a local store and assaulting the owner.

What we are witnessing now is the left’s war on the civil society. It’s time to speak out in defense of law enforcement and others trying to protect the community and uphold the rule law.

Michael Brown’s mother was caught on camera lashing out both against the grand jury verdict, and against repeated calls for calm from officials. Rebel Pundit has the video:

Across the country, activists and average joes took to the streets to protest the verdict, and speak out against the alleged racism and institutional violence they believe led to the death of Michael Brown.

Oakland:

Seattle:

New York City:



Los Angeles:

Chicago:

Washington, D.C.:

It was chaos, and it apparently isn’t over yet:

I could do a lot of pontificating about race in America, or about how it isn’t productive to burn down your own neighborhood, but at this point all I’ll say is, please pray for the people in and around Ferguson.

All the reason in the world isn’t going to bring back what was lost in Ferguson this year. The only thing left to do is drag Ferguson out of the dark, and rebuild.

Featured Image from Reuters

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Comments

walls | November 25, 2014 at 6:44 am

Why rebuild Ferguson? Keep it “as is” as a shrine to Obama’s sons.

rdm | November 25, 2014 at 7:39 am

The inevitable Endgame of leftist racial politics. Self destructive temper tantrums.

MaggotAtBroadAndWall | November 25, 2014 at 7:55 am

Big wins for the media and Al Sharpton. The media got the riots they’ve been promoting – er uh, I mean warning about for several days – which is good for ratings. And Al Sharpton get’s to take all the donations he raised on the back of Brown’s death to the bank.

Now maybe Rev. Al can afford to make a modest down payment toward the $millions in back taxes his organizations owe.

Observer | November 25, 2014 at 8:01 am

Want us to treat you like your lives matter, black people? Then start acting like you believe your lives matter. Show us you believe it, and we’ll believe it. Stop spending your lives in a drugged stupor. Stop getting high on marijuana and then running around looking for something to steal, or somebody to punch. Don’t walk up to strangers in the dark and knock them down and try to beat them into unconsciousness. Don’t punch cops and try to take their guns from them and then run at them and challenge them to shoot you. In other words, stop acting like reckless idiots. If you want respect, behave respectfully.

Midwest Rhino | November 25, 2014 at 8:13 am

Even Brian on FOX says “in the end there wasn’t enough to indict”.

How about … “in the end evidence clearly vindicated the officer.” Wilson was given no choice, as Brown again was attacking him.

So many try so hard to add a little moral equivalence to the story. Obama on the other hand, can hardly blame the black gangster culture at all, he thinks it’s the police that need more work.

No moral equivalence for Obama/Holder/Sharpton … white cops act stupidly, blacks need to “stay the course”. That’s the black liberation theology way.

This could/should drive a wedge between the black gangsters, and the blacks that want to save their neighborhoods FROM the gangs. But with Obama choosing Sharpton’s side, blacks in favor of building a safe neighborhood would have to rebuke Obama.

    Midwest Rhino in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 8:44 am

    Even Greta was getting in on the moral equivalence. She was insisted that EVERYONE was taking sides, instead of letting the system work.

    NO GRETA, people that took a thorough look at available evidence could see that Brown indeed had turned back and charged at Wilson. That shots were fired at the vehicle before that. That there was the stealing. And even then “we” were willing to see all the evidence and accept the grand jury (itself maybe unnecessary, except for Holder pressure) decision.

    The “side” we were on was the justice system, wherever it led, even with the Holder thumb on the scales.

    The other side was Sharpton’s “no justice (conviction), no peace”. That ‘s the lawless (Obama) side.

    I’m really tired of the spread of the Obama style moral equivalence of everything, as they view from above. O’Reilly can do that too, as he picks the middling position, which helps ratings I guess. But “fair and balanced” has to have a more solid center on which to set the scales.

    Of course most networks just do stagecraft and propaganda to present their leftist advocacy as “right”.

    Amy in FL in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 11:01 am

    Even Brian on FOX says “in the end there wasn’t enough to indict”.

    How about … “in the end evidence clearly vindicated the officer.”

    The Grand Jury is there to either indict or not indict, based on the evidence at hand. The reason they didn’t indict was because there wasn’t enough evidence to indict.

    They’re not there to either find guilt, or conversely to vindicate. That’s not their role.

      Midwest Rhino in reply to Amy in FL. | November 25, 2014 at 12:13 pm

      That’s a good point, but this was Brian’s analysis. Saying “not enough” would be fair if we didn’t get to see all the evidence ourselves.

      Maybe I’m being a little picky, but it seems that only saying “not enough” leaves too much room for “almost but not quite”. But the facts were laid out for us, so we can look at what they saw, not just go by the up or down decision.

      And people are burning and looting over whether a trial should have determined that. So listeners would be well served to get a more complete picture, which I believe is exactly why the prosecutor laid it all out so clearly. So people would not walk away thinking it was a close call.

        Midwest Rhino in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 12:21 pm

        More clearly “not enough” indicates there was some.

        But having the evidence laid out we can see “there was vindication”. The prosecutor wanted us (felt it best served the citizenry) to see vindication, as OPPOSED to just a bare “no true bill”.

        That is his job, (we didn’t actually hear directly from the grand jury anyway) and he did it.

        Then the next step is for Brian to communicate what the prosecutor communicated, which was that whole message, not just “not enough”.

        But thanks for making me make it clearer, to myself as well. I probably need an editor usually. 🙂

          Midwest Rhino in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 12:27 pm

          next edit … “prosecutor wanted”, in my opinion. It seems clear the point of this unique action by the prosecutor was specifically to remove a lot of doubt (which Brian reinserted, imo). But I can’t read his mind.

          Amy in FL in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 12:59 pm

          No problem – IANAL, so I may well be off-target 😉

          I /am/ getting a little bit confused about the number of people calling this a “verdict”, though. Even the author of this blog post. I had thought that /verdicts/ were for trials — Grand Juries announce /decisions/ or /indictments/.

          This wasn’t a trial, it wasn’t meant to meant to hand down a “guilty” or “not guilty” verdict, but a decision as to whether Wilson should or should not be indicted, and whether he should or should not face trial.

          Anyway, it’s not a big deal, but as I said I’m getting confused about all this imprecise terminology (and that’s just on blogs, news sites and Twitter, I don’t even have a TV!).

          In my opinion, the Grand Jury made the right decision, and I think that even if they had decided to indict and it then went to trial, that Wilson probably would have been found not guilty. And the looters and rioters would have been looting and rioting /then/, instead of /now/. C’est la vie.

          Midwest Rhino in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 2:40 pm

          ianal either … lol. The grand jury had power to convict, but one guy on TV called this a “hybrid” since the prosecutor seemed to use them as back up for his decision, since he was declared biased due to his father being killed by a black guy.

          The verdict was announced by the mob weeks ago … GUILTY.
          So the kangaroo court now gets to see evidence that exonerates, but Wilson will still “serve time” since the SJW’s will try to hunt him down. heh

          It’s like the old TV show “Branded” … but you’re way too young for that. lol

    ConradCA in reply to Midwest Rhino. | November 25, 2014 at 1:57 pm

    Brown was shot in the hand while it was inside the car next to his gun. Thus he left a blood trail that shows his movements as he fled from the officer, turned and charged the officer. This supports the officers testimony.

creeper | November 25, 2014 at 8:29 am

I believe the picture of the store with the fire inside is a of a Walgreens. KMOV had a live helicopter feed of that store last night. They were looting it even while it was burning.

Insufficiently Sensitive | November 25, 2014 at 8:31 am

There hasn’t been a peep from the media about the relentless organization for this very debacle. ‘Activists’ in Ferguson doing ‘training’ sessions, publishing lists of buildings to target, offering a reward for the capture of Officer Wilson. Media prefers to reap the harvest of screen spectacle without acknowledging the organized (and funded) efforts to bring it into effect.

And what’s with the Mayor being refused his requests for assistance from the National Guard units that were brought to town some days ago in ‘preparation’ to keep order? Where’s the Governor? Taking orders from Eric Holder?

Who benefits from this example of unopposed lynch-mob behavior? What’s it a precedent for?

Pogo Hears a Who | November 25, 2014 at 8:44 am

The St. Louis population was 857K in 1950, 618K in 1970, and now stands at 318K.
Because of the race riots, Ferguson and St. Louis MO are dead.

It will take several years, but there is no recovery from this. A perpetually angry and aggrieved black population will be too unsafe to live by.

Who is going to chance tourism in St. Louis next spring?
Who will send their kids to colleges there?
Who will rebuild looted and burned businesses?
Who will move there to start a new life, to start a family?

No one.
They’ve been leaving by the thousands for 50-plus years. This just makes the exit more certain.

JohnC | November 25, 2014 at 8:46 am

Lesley McSpadden – “Some of you motherf*%kers think this is a joke!”

No Ma’am, we think you’re the joke.
Looks like the road apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

ss396 | November 25, 2014 at 9:43 am

One of the enduring Leftist memes is that poverty causes crime. How can they not look at these scenes and realize that they have it backwards: that crime causes poverty.

After decades of the War on Poverty, and over $20-trillion thrown at it, there is little money in these neighborhoods. What money there is gets sucked out through rioting, through drugs, through looting, through theft. The money taken in those crimes is not spent in those neighborhoods – it’s given to insurance companies, drug lords, crime bosses, gang leaders – none of whom invest one, stinking dime in these communities.

Poverty does not cause crime; at best it increases the temptations to crime. But crime sure as hell causes poverty.

    DanInMN in reply to ss396. | November 25, 2014 at 12:04 pm

    I don’t think it is that simple. Crime and poverty share a common cause, poor decision making ability. Taking a poke at a cop is a poor decision, one that has a non-trivial chance of getting one shot by the police. Thus, when I have a rare interaction with the police, a traffic stop for example, I choose not to take a swing at them. The encounter goes smoothly and we both go on our way.

    Likewise, dropping out of school because it isn’t as fun as sitting on the couch smoking pot and playing Xbox is a poor choice, one that leads to poverty and a life of crime in many cases.

    Ragspierre in reply to ss396. | November 25, 2014 at 1:19 pm

    The brilliant Heather MacDonald has debunked the poverty >>> crime canard.

    But let’s define terms a little more closely. Persistent, generational poverty comes of poor decision-making. But the NEXT question is WHY is poor decision-making so apparent in some demographics? It seems apparent that we have been training people to make bad, awful, terrible decisions. How do we stop that?

    A brief, transient episode of poverty can strike in the life of anyone, given a catastrophic misfortune. And there is absolutely no correlation between people who are impoverished and people who commit crime. The Great Depression proved that.

    Why were the people of the Depression not ravening criminals? Because they had been taught values, and those values informed their conduct, as did their ability to think, which is ALSO a matter of training.

      Midwest Rhino in reply to Ragspierre. | November 25, 2014 at 3:10 pm

      some lost farms, my grandparents came close.

      I found an nice old footstool I remembered from my youth, in the basement here (on the old farm). Through a mouse eaten part I discovered it was just some old tin cans tied together, then covered with a newspaper pad and some fabric. That was likely from the 20-30’s, along with the grapevines for wine during prohibition.

      They made do, and worked a LOT. It’s almost sad how hard they worked at some periods, to survive. Now … Obamaphones and flat screens for free, or we riot. sheesh …

      randian in reply to Ragspierre. | November 26, 2014 at 12:03 am

      “But the NEXT question is WHY is poor decision-making so apparent in some demographics?”

      There are answers, but they are not politically correct so they must not be mentioned.

tom swift | November 25, 2014 at 11:58 am

“Law ‘n order” failure.

When you need a Korean shopkeeper, there’s never one around.

Henry Hawkins | November 25, 2014 at 12:47 pm

Not sure what it means, but winning a NBA or NCAA championship has caused worse rioting. I honestly don’t know what to make of that, but it seems to indicate something.

      Henry Hawkins in reply to Ragspierre. | November 25, 2014 at 3:10 pm

      Thanks for that. I’ll get that 1969 book cited by powerline. The excerpts were on the money.

      My father was a 20 yr vet patrol officer in Detroit at the time of the 1967 riots and I was just 12. As a city employee he had to live within the city limits. We got evacuated when the flames got within 5 blocks and spent the rest of the summer in Wheatley, Ontario 50 miles east of Detroit. Non-street officers and police supporters had a sort of underground railroad going, escorting officer families out of the city to safer grounds. I remember vividly when we returned in late August. We reentered the US by the Ambassador Bridge from Windsor Ont to Detroit and from the heighth of the bridge it was just block after block of burned out businesses and homes as far as I could see. Our house was 2 blocks on the good side of the outer burn line. A lot of the police and firemen refused to wear uniforms as they worked because of all the riot snipers shooting at anybody in a uniform or inside a marked city vehicle. ’43 dead, 1,189 injured, over 7,200 arrests, and more than 2,000 buildings destroyed’ per wiki. My father laughed at the official death count of 43, said he personally saw bodies floating in the Detroit River that weren’t counted, plus the local gangs used the cover of rioting to eliminate competitors while the DPD was otherwise ‘busy’, also not counted.

      A nasty riot, yes, but it served a purpose – Detroit is now a thriving, bustling wonderland, a blissful mix of top level culture and commerce, a true shining city on the hill and a powerful example for any American city to follow.

      Bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahahaha.

ConradCA | November 25, 2014 at 1:54 pm

Transcript of the Officers testimony:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-…hael-Brown.html

Milhouse | November 25, 2014 at 3:17 pm

Michael Brown’s mother was caught on camera lashing out both against the grand jury verdict, and against repeated calls for calm from officials. Rebel Pundit has the video.

So what was all that I kept hearing about the family calling for calm and peaceful protest?

    Ragspierre in reply to Milhouse. | November 25, 2014 at 3:56 pm

    His dad really has been trying to calm the troubled waters.

    His mother and step-dad just went ape-spit last night.

    Midwest Rhino in reply to Milhouse. | November 25, 2014 at 5:56 pm

    I don’t know what these Brown parents are like … but when Sharpton/Crump arrive, they offer them the jackpot, and a racist playbook.

    Kinda like drugs … get them hooked, lead them along, dealer makes the money, everyone else pays a high price. Very sad. Oh and yes, sad that Marion Berry dies early, and sad “they” re-elected a crackhead in DC even, for God’s sake. Or maybe that is truly “representative” of the “crackheads” on the hill.

randian | November 26, 2014 at 12:02 am

“The only thing left to do is drag Ferguson out of the dark, and rebuild.”

Sounds great, so long as I don’t have to pay to rebuild what these fools tore down. Let them rebuild it themselves.

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