God's in His heaven.
All's right with the world.
Amen.

But, this poor middle schooler 'disrupted' his class with a belch.
.
Link to news article

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/student-arrested-for-burping-lawsuit-claims/
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overreaction much ?

him to say, "Excuse me."

There is one devil's advocate position I have to offer. Yes, Swats are oversued, but one of the reasons they came about is because certain gangs have miltary grade firepower. Yes, there are drug gangs that will indeed start showering the streets with lead, like they did in Miami. What should be arm the cops with?

Intelligence

What a depressing article. I'm so glad I'm not trying to raise children in this culture.

intelligence won't help much when the Zetas shoot military grade weapons into someone.

If the drug laws were different, if governments were not complicit in drug and arms trading all over the world. If there were better regulations on weapons (esp the militarized ones) etc. Then maybe we wouldn't need so many swat teams?

bullshit the cops came up with in the first place? Not every home has a weapon but thanks to the NRA and militarization of the police, because they have one everyone must have one correct?

Do you think it is okay to arrest those boys waiting for a school bus and threatening to arrest their coach for asking why in the hell are they being arrested for in the first place? Just For Waiting For A School Bus - like it's easy to get kids to go to school in the first place. I hope everyone of them become Civil Rights Attorneys.

The arrests and 4th Amendment violations are not aberrations but the norm these days. Along with judges who sign the warrants because they are afraid of losing their jobs because they aren't "tough on crime".

The government our government, is going to use the police to control the American people, they know that an upraising is coming. All the military trucks that are coming back from our mid-east wars are going to be put to good use against us "We the People".

The Revolution will have to go Old School.

will always be afraid. Of power in the hands of the few(1%ers).

all hit by the same hammer.
can we blame Bush for this?
or should we accept culpability?

Are there abusive cops? Yep. Is there an abdication of responsibility by schools? Yep. Is there an abdication of responsibility by parents? Yep.

Why don't we look at lawyers that will file a lawsuit against someone for putting their socks on backwards.

No sarcasm here... I enjoyed your response..

but he's still a pig. Americas enemies are right here in our own back yard. They are our protectors??

You can also take a very complex issue, subjectively pick out the things you don't like and blame whomever you wish. We certainly wouldn't need police whatsoever if all our brothers and sisters would simply abide by the laws of the land.

Cut the crap with the "doodling on desks." Misbehavior is much more severe than this...unfortunately, parents don't do the job of parenting so we have to. Wearing the 'wrong" colors? You meant to say gang colors didn't you? And throwing things on a bus can put someone's eye out just like it did a few years ago when a spitball was aimed at a kid in Northern CA. He lost his sight.
Turns out the kid throwing the spitball had numerous other problems as well as his brother and they were constant sources of problems in school with things like bullying.

Yes the militarization of the police is real but the economic segregation of schools is a worse problem because urban kids don't see models of success. They don't think of their teachers as "successes" and in fact see us put under the microscope constantly. Our superintendent in LAUSD disrespects us so why can't they? You people have no idea how bad the behavior is in the classroom and how the district send "classroom management" people who are just clueless around to teach us how to "manage our classrooms."

what exactly don't you understand about that?

all you did was post some hand waving distraction.

people really do come into contact with the police for far to many STUPID -- and worse -- maybe even perfectly legal reasons -- as we criminalize every thing -- from counties, municipalities and states.

it's a stupid brutal waste.

or peer generated BEFORE entering school or they won't learn it. This is the job of the parent.

If the parent hasn't managed to convince the child that sometimes it needs to listen rather than react, it's probably too late by the time they reach school. Why should the child listen to a teacher if the teacher's voice means nothing?

So, the police come in. Force becomes the rule. That's the result, yes... but we can't imagine that that should be our goal.

I blame the parents, fair and square. I also blame a society that places children on little pedestals while they're costing each other their sight and, in some bullying cases, their lives. Some kids, rarely, are just totally disrespectful, selfish little pieces of shit without a single wholesome emotion in them. They can be better... but that won't happen through the police.

It's the whole thing that supports itself that's the problem, the entire system needs to bw washed out with better ideas.

I agree that one of the first things we have to get hold of is that kids aren't always little angels, but we have to be very careful how we handle that. Children don't think in neat, straight cause and effect relationships like adults, they think in big mythic categories. They aren't fully aware of themselves at that age. Putting a policeman in charge of them carries the very real risk of encouraging them to identify positively with criminals early on entirely because they perceive that's the "side" they're on.

(Also, none of that's to say that the school won't contain the occasional stupid cop. Some cops are very, very stupid.)

which makes homelessness illegal! How is that possible when there is not enough shelter for all the homeless? When the city council, led by the mayor and a coalition of downtown businesses, decide people who, for whatever reason, do not have a place to live are not allowed to sleep outside, it becomes their responsibility to find a place for these human beings to sleep.
Occupy Denver has been hammering home the plight of the homeless in Denver. The following post was on their facebook page. Please note, the police were there in force, staying warm in their vehicles.

"Anons took to the streets of Denver the night of December 5th under the call out of Help the Homeless/OpXmas. Temperatures dropped to -5 as about 30 people handed out jackets and blankets to all who needed them. Across the country the elites and their protectors are criminalizing homelessness while robbing people of their homes. "Shits fucked up. Shits fucked up and bullshit" as well as chants of "Repeal The Urban Camping Ban" and "Sleeping Is a human right" echoed throughout downtown. Our high spirits kept us warm as over 25 cop cars idled near by to "protect and serve" the shit out of us. There was an abundance of donations, one passerby even took his jacket off and handed it to an anon for donations."

You aren't paranoid if they really are out to get you.

“Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you”
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22

Now it's coming home.

Look, this is a symptom of class warfare. As a country loses it's middle class and the institutions that they once trusted crumble, there is a backlash. These militarized forces are there for just that; to put down that natural uprising of the people who know that they are being screwed. It's not going to get better; it's going to get worse.

The rich own our government. The mechanisms of democracy have failed. We are going to lose our planet, and all of humanity will become extinct if we don't do something about it.

I have seen a new arrogance emerging. There have been several accounts where cops have shot innocent dogs who have done nothing aggressive. In fact one dog was running away from a policeman. I mentioned this to a cop- having two big lovable older dogs myself- one of which is blind. She asked where I saw this and I said I see it in the news, the internet, etc. The cop's response was "don't listen to the news or go on the net." Not even a denial that it is actually happening! And we see this attitude so much towards people also.
I used to trust cops- no more!
I am a senior citizen. It wasn't always like this. Times have definitely changed!

It honestly seems like many the worst attributes of the Fifties and Sixties have really started to come together during this past decade or so. There may yet be another social revolution on the horizon.....but when it does happen, the short term won't be pretty, I'm afraid. You think a few renegade cops with surplus military gear are scary? They certainly can be. But what has me *really* worried is the seemingly massive resurgence of far-right militancy in the days since Obama took office; I'm afraid this is only just the beginning of their shenanigans, ladies and gents. Much worse may yet come.....

This kind of thing has been done before in history, and it's not good.