How does vandalism and looting accomplish anything???

[Gumbo4x4]

So if the police were trained properly, then why were they not "smart' enough to know that the press should not be arrested when not doing anything against the law? The situation in McDonald's was also not a tense environment.

It continues to baffle people why the Ferguson population is 70% black but only 5% of the police force is the same.

The NAACP asked the question & were told Ferguson didn't have enough black applicants to fill the positions. When they looked harder, they didn't find any evidence there was anything fishy there.

 

[sunshinehighway]

I'm beginning to feel like the word threat is overused. Saying you will expose bad behavior is not a threat.

 

[Airship Ariadne]

The NAACP asked the question & were told Ferguson didn't have enough black applicants to fill the positions. When they looked harder, they didn't find any evidence there was anything fishy there.

There are some cities that require the police officers to actually live in the city they work for...would be interesting to know how many of the officers on the force actually live in town, and how many don't. Thats one way to build a good relationship on both sides, if the officers have a vested interest in the community beyond the paycheck...helps them view people as neighbors, makes it harder to view them as less than human.

 

[bimshire]

The NAACP asked the question & were told Ferguson didn't have enough black applicants to fill the positions. When they looked harder, they didn't find any evidence there was anything fishy there.

Told by whom and what was the method of recruiting for the positions?

 

[Geoff_M]

I'm beginning to feel like the word threat is overused. Saying you will expose bad behavior is not a threat.

Sorry, but what the reporter said was a retort to what the cop said. I cut the quote too short initially... Here's the full back and forth:

“I hope you’re happy with yourself,” one officer told me. And I responded: “This story’s going to get out there. It’s going to be on the front page of The Washington Post tomorrow.”

And he said, “Yeah, well, you’re going to be in my jail cell tonight.”

That folks, is a whizzing match. He already had identified himself as a reporter for the WaPo, and he was wearing ID. He had already protested his treatment and had already asked to speak to a supervisor. Shooting that back at the cop added nothing other than to throw something back in the face of the officer.

 

[TAX GUY]

Clearly there are two distinct sides here. No matter what one side says, the other will not have it, and visa versa. Time to put this one out to pasture.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

The more I hear--even if we were to assume the police are in the right for their actions....they aren't doing themselves any favors at all.

If rocks and Molotov cocktails are being allegedly thrown---how many, how often and does it really warrant turning the entire town upside down with tear gas.

As for the reporters, their eyewitness testimony will be biased. If jury did nothing wrong, so be it. But if they were loitering all day long and management had enough, their press credentials didn't entitle them to do that. And it doesn't help their story if they mention that.

 

[RadioNate]

The more I hear--even if we were to assume the police are in the right for their actions....they aren't doing themselves any favors at all. If rocks and Molotov cocktails are being allegedly thrown---how many, how often and does it really warrant turning the entire town upside down with tear gas. As for the reporters, their eyewitness testimony will be biased. If jury did nothing wrong, so be it. But if they were loitering all day long and management had enough, their press credentials didn't entitle them to do that. And it doesn't help their story if they mention that.

Out of the 12 people arrested last 5 of 12 were people who brought greater visibility to Ferguson police tactics.

The only account of McDonalds management being "fed up" is on this thread.

Video isn't biased.

Those 5 arrested? An alderman who was recording, 2 of his staffers & 2 journalists. All detained and released with no paper trail. Police scare tactics at their finest.

I don't know why armored tanks & mine resistant vehicles are needed against mostly unarmed citizens in a residential neighborhood and the people bringing light to those actions are being arrested & detained.

 

[Gumbo4x4]

Told by whom and what was the method of recruiting for the positions?

Told by someone at Ferguson PD. In watching the NAACP press conference, they didn't harp on this but put it back on the local people to get educations & BE the qualified applicants.

 

[TLSnell1981]

Good Lord! I don't have a clue how many times he drove that boy home. Can you tell me how many times you have driven down a particular road or past a certain house?

Every night that he went in that neighborhood, he got pulled over. Plain and simple. Believe what you want.

Salt n Pepper...it used to happen to my sons when they were teens. Although, the cops, who pulled them over, weren't always white.

Wait there are hundreds that are murdered in inner cities such as Detroit and Chicago. Young African American people including toddlers are dead because of shootings by inner city gangs.

This kind of violence happens every day. Where is the outrage? Heck where is Al Sharpton? Enough said.

It doesn't fit his agenda.

I got the "dirt on the street"....

What happened was two boys shoplifted some cigarillos around five dollars worth at the QT.

QT called the police and the officer stopped the 2 boys walking that fit the description.

The officer got out of his car. The boys proceeded to assault the officer, pushing him back into the car. The boys tried to get his gun. The gun went off in the car not hitting anyone.

The boys took off running and the officer got out and fired shots killing the one of the boys.

The QT was targeted so hard because it was the QT that called the police on the boys.

"Snitches get Stiches" is being spray painted on many buildings. The QT employees are fearing for themselves.

May be from the street, but it's probably the most accurate account of the incident.

This will surely ruffle some feathers, but I believe profiling is not such a bad thing. It is criticized by PC folks, but really.
If we have had 17 hijackings in the last 5 years, and all the hijackers were Middle Eastern, wouldn't it make sense to pay closer attention to these (Middle Eastern) flyers and scrutinize them more than to check every 6th passenger in line at the terminals, be it a baby, 88 year old woman, etc?
Other countries are laughing at us these days.

Sense isn't very common anymore.

Hating is now the word people use if you have difference of opinion. This really has become an issue within the last 7 or so years. I don't hate someone if I disagree with them, I just don't agree. When you have people in the media, people doing speeches and so forth talking about hate when you disagree ..... that gets the ball rolling for others to join in.

Yes, disagreeing with an opposing opinion, will get you labeled as a hater or racist. Sadly, it inflames the masses and solves nothing.

See the following post:

But you have to understand that it's a very effective tactic to neutralize your opponent's side of the issue. By labeling it "hatred", you impeach the other person's opinion as being beyond any rational consideration. And if you can get others to agree with the label, then it's just all the more effective at shutting down any debate and you "win" by default as having the only rational position.

Thank you. You saved me the time and trouble of finishing my (see above) response.

 

[Geoff_M]

I think that you seem to be looking for any excuse to justify police actions.

No, and I have said quite explicitly said the opposite in this thread. What I've said is that it might not have been improper for the police to order the reporters to leave the restaurant.

By the way, I don't know where myth came from but it is false that it is illegal to film and take pics of the police. As long as a person is not obstructing the police, they can take as many pics and videotape as much as they want. It is the individual's right to it.

If you re-read my post #201, that's what I said too: "photography (or recording video) is not a crime".

 

[NotUrsula]

That was AFTER he was in the police car and arrested. Did you watch the Wash Post guy's video? According to the local news, people are being arrested just for being outside. One guy and his family had tear gas thrown at them because they would not get out of their own backyard (they videoed it). The police have gone totally nuts.

Someone asked what the police need to do. Tone down the riot gear for God's sake. Stop pointing guns at unarmed protesters with their arms in the air. Stop trying to close air space to keep the media out of the area. Allow the media in. Hire a new PR firm (their press releases are are pretty stupid). Ask for help from the FBI. Be more transparent about the investigation. The governor of MO and the local city officials are strangely silent about all of this. They need to stop ignoring it, and hope it all goes away. At this point, the police are inciting violence. They need to stand down.

Anonymous hacked the police computers and released the dispatch tapes, and if they are true, there has been some very serious misconduct here. The cop who shot the victim immediately called for crowd control, but did not report the shooting or call paramedics. What if he was still alive? He didn't call for aid. The 911 Dispatchers heard about the shooting from the local news. Paramedics was not called for over 4 hours. At the very least, this is some serious police misconduct.

With all due respect, Ferguson can't do those things -- they don't have the money. They have asked the St. Louis County Police Dept. to handle the investigation and direct the peacekeeping effort, and they are going to have to pay St. Louis County for every minute of the time clocked by the County officers. The police dept. doesn't HAVE a PR firm, and they cannot afford to get one. This whole debacle is likely to bankrupt Ferguson before the end of the year.

What most outsiders see as the city of St. Louis is actually 93 separate municipalities, and most of them have their own tiny police depts. The County Police Dept. has no jurisdiction in the City of St. Louis at all. It is also not a county Sheriff's office (though there is one of those; it supplies bailiffs to the courts.) The County Police Dept. was created to police unincorporated areas, and is also paid to supply law enforcement to those small municipalities that cannot afford to have a police force of their own (they run a detective division that assists where needed, for a price, as most of the small municipalities don't have a detective squad.). While the County officers tend to have decent training, the same cannot be said of the forces in the small municipalities; they can't afford much unless the state or county offers a freebie. That's problematic, because this *is* a metropolitan area, with metropolitan crime, and these guys are hopelessly outclassed and outgunned in most cases. Without solid training to fall back on, they go for instinct, which tends to drive them into shooting first and asking questions later.

FWIW, the Mayor of Ferguson has been speaking out, as has Charlie Dooley, the County Executive. The Mayor of St. Louis, Francis Slay, has been keeping his mouth shut because he doesn't have a dog in this fight. If I know the Governor (and I do, from way back when), he isn't going to touch this with a 10-ft pole. He hates conflict and goes to great lengths to avoid dealing with it.

 

[robinb]

I'm not sure if I am having a Sheldon moment but if you saying that it is the police's actions that cause criminals to misbehave - you sir are an idiot.

Not really.

My city sends police in standard "soft gear" into crowds to control them.

http://www.policeone.com/Crowd-Control/articles/3361291-The-Madison-Method-for-crowd-control/

The new police chief believes is that if you, as a police officer, go in looking for trouble and violence in your riot gear you are going to find it.

http://host.madison.com/news/local/...cle_a9877036-c105-5cea-ba98-81696b2d1aec.html

Our former police chief wrote a book called “Arrested Development” that covers this very thing.

So, no. bimshire is not an idiot for saying that the police have contributed to the violence. No one wants to live in a police state.

 

[lustergirl]

I think that you seem to be looking for any excuse to justify police actions. There are some people who give the police a pass simply because of what they respresent. There are also juries that accept the word of a police officer simply because of the uniform.

By the way, I don't know where myth came from but it is false that it is illegal to film and take pics of the police. As long as a person is not obstructing the police, they can take as many pics and videotape as much as they want. It is the individual's right to it.

You are absolutely correct, especially here in NYS. Currently there is an investigation into a Buffalo Police Officer who was caught on tape beating up a handcuffed man who was laying on the ground face down. This is the same officer who is also shown batting someone else's cell phone to the ground during a separate incident.

 

[pat fan]

It's time for an agency that knows what they are doing to take over. Calling in the national guard will mean a more appropriate & measured response. They are trained for this.

No way. No way in HECK! You want to de-escalate things, not ratchet them up more. Martial law? Is that where you want things to go? People need to take a day off from the craziness, let themselves and the police cool down. Right now everyone's nerves are stretched to the max, looking for and expecting the worst. When you look for the worst, you will surely find it.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Out of the 12 people arrested last 5 of 12 were people who brought greater visibility to Ferguson police tactics.

The only account of McDonalds management being "fed up" is on this thread.

Video isn't biased.

Those 5 arrested? An alderman who was recording, 2 of his staffers & 2 journalists. All detained and released with no paper trail. Police scare tactics at their finest.

I don't know why armored tanks & mine resistant vehicles are needed against mostly unarmed citizens in a residential neighborhood and the people bringing light to those actions are being arrested & detained.

As I said-- the police are doing themselves no favors. It seems each day they lose more credibility erasing any opportunity for giving them the benefit of the doubt.

And that is being generous and pretending for a minute that things are as the police perceive. Their actions are giving the public quite the opposite perception of them. It's like--there has got to be a reason. Only, no reasons are popping up. Disgraceful.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

No way. No way in HECK! You want to de-escalate things, not ratchet them up more. Martial law? Is that where you want things to go? People need to take a day off from the craziness, let themselves and the police cool down. Right now everyone's nerves are stretched to the max, looking for and expecting the worst. When you look for the worst, you will surely find it.

They are called out in disaster situations. Is this not a disaster? If anything, maybe the national guard can keep the police in check. It seems by the day, they are doing a good job of escalating matters.

 

[pat fan]

If the President won't send them to the border (a REAL disaster) they shouldn't be sent there. Like I said, I would rather e3veryone take a breath and chill for 24 hours.

 

[RadioNate]

No way. No way in HECK! You want to de-escalate things, not ratchet them up more. Martial law? Is that where you want things to go? People need to take a day off from the craziness, let themselves and the police cool down. Right now everyone's nerves are stretched to the max, looking for and expecting the worst. When you look for the worst, you will surely find it.

Who said anything about Martial law? A measured and appropriate response using the training and manpower of something like the national guard doesn't' mean martial law. It is why you see soldiers in Iraq passing out water and candy to kids. To DE-escalate the situation. They are TRAINED to do that.

The Ferguson and St Louis Country have already started a botched martial response. They are driving armored tanks with guns on tripods with what looks like zero appropriate training. It is ridiculous.

Heck, send in the Madison police that robinb talked about. But these people are going to end up killing someone else.

 

[Jedana]

That was AFTER he was in the police car and arrested. Did you watch the Wash Post guy's video? According to the local news, people are being arrested just for being outside. One guy and his family had tear gas thrown at them because they would not get out of their own backyard (they videoed it). The police have gone totally nuts.

Someone asked what the police need to do. Tone down the riot gear for God's sake. Stop pointing guns at unarmed protesters with their arms in the air. Stop trying to close air space to keep the media out of the area. Allow the media in. Hire a new PR firm (their press releases are are pretty stupid). Ask for help from the FBI. Be more transparent about the investigation. The governor of MO and the local city officials are strangely silent about all of this. They need to stop ignoring it, and hope it all goes away. At this point, the police are inciting violence. They need to stand down.

Anonymous hacked the police computers and released the dispatch tapes, and if they are true, there has been some very serious misconduct here. The cop who shot the victim immediately called for crowd control, but did not report the shooting or call paramedics. What if he was still alive? He didn't call for aid. The 911 Dispatchers heard about the shooting from the local news. Paramedics was not called for over 4 hours. At the very least, this is some serious police misconduct.

The riot gear? Well, I'm sure it protects better than a uniform shirt against stones and flying glass bottles.

The news said today that they closed the airspace because their police aircraft were being shot at. Not sure if this is true or not, but if it is, then it makes sense to keep civilian aircraft (including news choppers) from the area--fewer targets to be shot at.


Also, I am wondering if the thought process might be--remove the media presence, the situation may cool down quicker. People see a video camera and go nuts when they are simply filming a shot about school starting...seeing the news outlets during the protests/riots might just incite some people to the next level. KWIM?

They've asked for the FBI to come in. They're handling the investigation.

Last of all, the police can't stand down until there is some other law enforcement there to take over. People do not have the self control to keep things calm and peaceful--we saw that the first night, when they were looting a tire store and a dollar store, when they burned down the QT. Someone has to stand in front of those people and stop the destructive behavior. Someone has to protect the businesses, the people not involved in the protests, the guys just driving by. FBI cannot do it, that isn't what they are trained for. National Guard could come in, but that would bring more flashbacks to the 50s and 60s, wouldn't it? The state police would work, but I don't know if Illinois has any--or if they have the training for this.