patrick.net

So really, the militarization of the police essentially started with Clinton and continued with Bush and Obama

Yet 2/3 push for more gun control for plebes.

Not a single one of the posters could make a connection between Clinton, Bush and Obama, DoD and the militarization of the police. 473 comments and no mention whatsoever. One guy said it was a natural result of all the Americans who have guns that seem appropriate in a war zone

"In the first majority-Muslim U.S. city, residents tense about its future
***
The blue-collar city that has been home to Polish Catholic immigrants and their descendents for more than a century became what demographers think is the first jurisdiction in the nation to elect a majority-Muslim council.

At one point as she spoke, a mosque close to Dunn’s house began broadcasting the call to prayer. “You try reading a book in your back yard while your dog is barking to that,” Dunn said, clearly exasperated."

Just wait until the "slaves of Allah" acquire federally funded SWAT teams and tactical gear. Who will dare to criticize Islam knowing that most of the city government believe in a doctrine that commands believers personally to kill all blasphemers? What about vigilante Sharia patrols? Will the district attorney prosecute anyone for doing what Islam says to do, knowing that even one believer on the jury would likely result in acquittal or at least a hung jury?

Ironman says

All this equipment isn't for normal, everyday police work in small towns.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/06/20/the-overuse-of-s-w-a-t-teams/#74acd49b46a2
http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21599349-americas-police-have-become-too-militarised-cops-or-soldiers

Serving warrants, credit card fraud, breaking up poker games, under age drinkers, barbering without a license, breaking up cockfights (with a tank), patrolling the pumpkin festival (with an armoured personnel carrier). I realize in your bizarre delusional world where you sleep with your guns and masturbate to the big weapon of the month centrefold those kind of things aren't normal, everyday police work. But everyone who actually lives in the real world believes they most certainly are perfectly normal everyday police work.

Not to mention the for profit part. Raids are big business that fund a big chunk of many police forces. Civil asset-forfeiture lets police keep anything they grab in a raid, including the house they are raiding. No arrests, no warrants, no oversight needed. You have to prove in court (at great expense assuming you can afford paying a lawyer, can't afford a lawyer the police keep it) that what they grabbed wasn't part of a crime. To the tune of 6 billion dollars plus a year going to the cops. Can anyone say conflict of interest? That's on top of the 35 billion DHS doled out to police forces 2002-2011 and all the free gear from the military. Follow the money.

MMR says

Not a single one of the posters could make a connection between Clinton, Bush and Obama, DoD and the militarization of the police.

Google doesn't work on your computer somehow?

Let's start with the Clinton administration, NDAA of 1996 section 1033
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/2/24/1490433/-How-the-Clintons-Militarized-the-Police-and-Expanded-Military-Industrial-Complex

Then there was that 9/11 thing (you've heard about that haven't you) under bush.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/police-militarization-9-11-september-11_n_955508

and things accelerate even further under Obama.
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=10231

The DOD has no connection with militarization of police? Curiosity overwhelms me, where exactly do you think all the billions of dollars worth of surplus military equipment going to the police forces comes from? I can't wait to hear this.

Stillbob2356 says

The DOD has no connection with militarization of police?

Geez Bob, first I do want to say thank you for the links. It's actually appreciated.

Secondly, I was referring to the article that I posted from NY Times and the people who posted comments on it. Obviously, there IS a connection between the DoD, Bush, Obama and Clinton and the militarization of the police and yet none of the NY Times or Readers picks reflected that.

MMR says

yet none of the NY Times or Readers picks reflected that.

The key phrase is NY Times readers. Actually I read the NY times some, but only as the liberal outlier. I read fox sometimes too as the conservative outlier. The US media for the most part is so clueless, incestuous, and insular that it's pretty much useless. It's been more and more entertainment rather than news since 60 minutes started the trend 40 years ago. There will never be the walter cronkites or edward r murrows in the news as entertainment era.

Funded by Republican votes in the House,the funding body of their big govt., who love the military industrial complex & the profit made from surplus production supported by Republican voters.

Ironman says

Gee, how did police departments do those jobs 20 years ago without all this fun equipment?

They did it quite nicely without swat teams or military equipment. Thanks for proving my point.

Ironman says

What the fuck is wrong with you?????

You are the one that said police weren't using swat teams and military equipment for day to day police work. I gave numerous examples, from forbes and the economist no less, where the police were doing exactly that. Try to keep up with the conversation. Would it help you if people typed slower?

What the fuck is wrong with you????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Ironman says

Really, SWAT teams are a new thing and just started recently with all this new military hardware?

Keep on shucking and jiving. Bullshit R us. Using swat teams and military hardware for day to day police work is a new thing the last 20 years.

You spend way too much time with your head up your ass if you haven't heard about any of this. Big gun monthly doesn't write about this stuff or do you just look at the centerfold spread? Check out the trigger guard on that baby. Now that's sexy, stroke it baby. Best sex you've had in decades.

You should consider re-joining reality. Oh wait. to rejoin you would have to belonged in the first place. Never mind.

bob2356 says

The US media for the most part is so clueless, incestuous, and insular that it's pretty much useless.

@bob2356, experience has taught me to respect you and to appreciate many of your comments. I feel sorry for past occasions when I overreacted to your sarcasm, and I apologize sincerely for those. Honest question: I continue to search in vain for a reliable source of unbiased news; might you have any suggestions?

curious2 says

Honest question: I continue to search in vain for a reliable source of unbiased news; might you have any suggestions?

No I don't. All news is biased by culture of the society and the political leanings of the news organization.

I don't have or watch television and rarely watch a news video so I can only comment on print media. Check out the big project uk which has pretty much every english language news source on the planet listed. http://www.thebigproject.co.uk/news/

The closest I come is BBC simply because their people move around so much and work in so many societies. The downside is BBC is both self absorbed and self important. Reuters suffers from this also. UPI died in the 80's and is nothing today, AP is far too political and US biased. NY Times is good for US centric liberal viewpoint, Fox "news" for the right wingnut views and pure laugh out loud entertainment. The Washington Post spends far too much time trying to make news rather than reporting it for my taste. US print sources in general are stunningly parochial, shallow, and uninformed.

Oddly enough Al Jazeer based in Qatar is very good. They usually have surprisingly in depth understanding of, as well as being able to provide an explanation of, what the news means in terms of the local society. They try very hard not to put their own spin on news. I sometimes counter point their news with Isreal Today's version of the same event. That's frequently interesting.

France 24 is very good with euro and international news. It also lets me keep up with day to day life in france where I've lived and probably will retire to. My french has faded to the point I need to read the english version which is too bad since english frequently doesn't translate the same meanings clearly.

Gulf News out of UAE has an pretty unbiased take on the middle east and an interesting view of world events. I really liked living in the UAE and like keeping up with it. Pakistan and Gulf Economist is a surprisingly good read also.

Asia Times went under in 1997 but is publishing again the last few years. Good source for asian based views as is Asia One out of Singapore.

Russia Times is a fun and interesting look at russia, but not all that unbiased. They don't have that many overseas bureaus so many of their international stories are just published off Reuters wire directly.

Have never found any news organizations worth bothering with in Africa or South America except an occasional look at the local coverage of a story specific to a country.

Oceana, sad to say, is also useless. There is very little local news in either Australia or New Zealand. They make up for this lack with very poor reporting and british tabloid sensationalism that carries through to their international reporting. The motto there is never let facts stand in the way of a good story. I didn't read much of the local papers when I lived there. I really don't bother now I don't.

I obviously don't read everything every day. Just hit on stories that interest me from a couple different viewpoints. The only consistent read for me is The Economist. As in the physical magazine, not online. It's britsh centric but the depth of the articles in The Economist is hard to beat. Their people really know their subject matter. They frequently have much more in depth and accurate reporting of US news than any US source.

Why would the publish such information?
If you think about the people that they would need that kind of hardware for, can plan on how much hardware they will need.
This is the type of stupid leadership the current administration system wide represents.
I don't mind a local armory where tactical gear for any law and or militia can store hardware for when the shit goes down.
You don't want to put it in the news.

Unless it's just more intimidation from the Liberal Democrat government that want's people to passively surrender, and accept the defeatist narrative.
"Oh it's better than what Bush did."

Most Cities has S.W.A.T. teams in America since the 70's I can remember. They were loading them up with surplus Nam troop carriers and urban tanks.
Now it's just publicized to intimidate everyone into an eventuality.

Tenpoundbass says

Most Cities has S.W.A.T. teams in America since the 70's I can remember. They were loading them up with surplus Nam troop carriers and urban tanks.

Now it's just publicized to intimidate everyone into an eventuality.

So there is no difference between 500 swat teams executing a couple hundred swat raids a year at most in the 70's to thousands of swat teams (no one has an accurate number) executing 80,000+ a year today? It is just simply a matter of being publicized to intimidate everyone? Back on crack again are we?

Eventually the universe will collapse onto itself and we all will be part of the regenerative singularity.
So What difference does it make???

bob2356 says

The US media for the most part is so clueless, incestuous, and insular that it's pretty much useless

Yeah fair enough, reading between the lines is a more important skill today than it ever was, I supposebob2356 says

There will never be the walter cronkites or edward r murrows in the news as entertainment era.

They are a bit before my time, but what I've read of them is exceedingly positive.

curious2 says

knowing that even one believer on the jury would likely result in acquittal or at least a hung jury?

I didn't realize Hamtramck was more muslim dominant than Dearborn.

From the article:

“I don’t know why people keep putting religion into politics,” said Almasmari, who received the highest percentage of votes
(22 percent) of any candidate. “When we asked for votes, we didn’t ask what their religion was.”

-Does this guy really need to ask. More often than not, he could probably figure it out simply by looking at their face.

The mosque’s leaders plan to put a minaret — a spire — on the building and use it to continue broadcasting a call to prayer five times a day.

-Nice, no need to worry about noise ordinances or state imposing religion on others. Comparably, church bells, let people know the time of day, a secular function.

.....He and other residents are “concerned about what they would want to change, that they could mistreat women,” said Bugaj, who wore feather earrings and a T-shirt with wolves on it. “Don’t come over to America and try to turn people to your way of thinking.”

That's the big difference between the Poles who assimilated over time and the new wave. Ghettoization, almost certainly retards assimilation. Proof? western Europe