kpete

kpete's Journal

April 29, 2015

Police Reporter: "PROBABLE CAUSE WAS DESTROYED IN THE DRUG WAR"

Freddie Gray, the drug war, and the decline of “real policing.”
David Simon on Baltimore’s Anguish
By BILL KELLER

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What do people outside the city need to understand about what’s going on there — the death of Freddie Gray and the response to it?

DS: I guess there's an awful lot to understand and I’m not sure I understand all of it. The part that seems systemic and connected is that the drug war — which Baltimore waged as aggressively as any American city — was transforming in terms of police/community relations, in terms of trust, particularly between the black community and the police department. Probable cause was destroyed by the drug war. It happened in stages, but even in the time that I was a police reporter, which would have been the early 80s to the early 90s, the need for police officers to address the basic rights of the people they were policing in Baltimore was minimized. It was done almost as a plan by the local government, by police commissioners and mayors, and it not only made everybody in these poor communities vulnerable to the most arbitrary behavior on the part of the police officers, it taught police officers how not to distinguish in ways that they once did.

“If I had to guess and put a name on it, I’d say that at some point, the drug war was as much a function of class and social control as it was of racism.”

Probable cause from a Baltimore police officer has always been a tenuous thing. It’s a tenuous thing anywhere, but in Baltimore, in these high crime, heavily policed areas, it was even worse. When I came on, there were jokes about, “You know what probable cause is on Edmondson Avenue? You roll by in your radio car and the guy looks at you for two seconds too long.” Probable cause was whatever you thought you could safely lie about when you got into district court.Then at some point when cocaine hit and the city lost control of a lot of corners and the violence was ratcheted up, there was a real panic on the part of the government. And they basically decided that even that loose idea of what the Fourth Amendment was supposed to mean on a street level, even that was too much. Now all bets were off. Now you didn't even need probable cause. The city council actually passed an ordinance that declared a certain amount of real estate to be drug-free zones. They literally declared maybe a quarter to a third of inner city Baltimore off-limits to its residents, and said that if you were loitering in those areas you were subject to arrest and search. Think about that for a moment: It was a permission for the police to become truly random and arbitrary and to clear streets any way they damn well wanted.

MORE OF THIS PLEASE:
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/04/29/david-simon-on-baltimore-s-anguish?ref=hp-1-111

April 29, 2015

Class warfare exists.

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April 29, 2015

evolution

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April 29, 2015

Before you vote, please remember.....

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April 29, 2015

2 sides to every story?

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https://twitter.com/Bipartisanism/status/593289028524376065

http://www.myfoxmemphis.com/story/28908964/7-officers-hurt-riot

April 29, 2015

Hillary Clinton To Call For 'End To The Era Of Mass Incarceration' In Major Speech

Source: Huffington Post

Hillary Clinton To Call For 'End To The Era Of Mass Incarceration' In Major Speech
Posted: 04/29/2015 6:00 am EDT Updated: 2 hours ago

WASHINGTON -- Hillary Clinton will deliver a major speech on criminal justice reform Wednesday, calling for fundamental changes to how the United States punishes its citizens and an end to a system that disproportionately targets black men.

Clinton is scheduled to keynote the 18th Annual David N. Dinkins Leadership and Public Policy Forum at Columbia University Wednesday morning. It will be her most significant policy address since she launched her 2016 presidential bid this month.

Clinton will lay out her vision for criminal justice reform, centering around an "end to the era of mass incarceration," according to an aide who provided a preview of her remarks. Those changes include addressing probation and drug diversion programs, increasing support for mental health and drug treatment and pursuing alternative punishments for low-level offenders.

She also will call for body cameras for every police department in order to increase transparency and accountability in a way that benefits both officers and members of the public.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/29/hillary-clinton-mass-incarceration_n_7166970.html

i am trying to resist her, but........this is red meat for this liberal,
ooops, i need to remember i am a vegetarian,
kp

April 29, 2015

Ruth Bader Ginsburg eviscerates same-sex marriage opponents in court

At 82, the supreme court justice cut through the question of gay marriage’s constitutionality in a way that seemed to move even her most conservative peers

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“Marriage today is not what it was under the common law tradition, under the civil law tradition,” said Ginsburg when Justices Roberts and Kennedy began to fret about whether the court had a right to challenge centuries of tradition.

“Marriage was a relationship of a dominant male to a subordinate female,” she explained. “That ended as a result of this court’s decision in 1982 when Louisiana’s Head and Master Rule was struck down … Would that be a choice that state should (still) be allowed to have? To cling to marriage the way it once was?”

“No,” replied John Bursch, the somewhat chastised lawyer for the states who are seeking to preserve their ban on gay marriage.

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In the end, her bottom line – rejecting the notion that extending marriage rights would somehow weaken the institution – was persuasive enough that even chief justice Roberts appeared sympathetic.

“All of the incentives, all of the benefits that marriage affords would still be available,” said Ginsburg. “So you’re not taking away anything from heterosexual couples. They would have the very same incentive to marry, all the benefits that come with marriage that they do now.”