Four Members of Congress Put Their Hands Up in Solidarity With Ferguson Protesters, None Voted to Limit Police Militarization

C-SPAN

Michael Brown was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, in August. Protests over the shooting yielded a militarized response from police. Renewed protests continued in October and again after a grand jury declined to indict Darren Wilson, the officer who shot Brown. The Brown shooting may have been a flash point for civil rights protesters. It's also provided an opportunity for politicians to attach themselves to the highly publicized incident and score political points for themselves.

Yesterday, for example, four members of Congress raised their hands on the House Floor to "show solidarity with the protesters" in Ferugson. Those four are Reps. Yvette Clarke (D-NY), Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.), and Al Green (D-Tex.). All four voted AGAINST an amendment in June that would've limited the transfer of military equipment from the Department of Defense to local police agencies.

It's just another reminder for protesters more interested in policy reforms than partisan agendas that elected leaders, by and large, are only interested in how they look vis a vis police issues and not what they can do to improve the situation.

President Obama's announcement on police militarization, for example, included no roll backs, just more bureaucracy, which promises more inertia. Nevertheless, the move was hailed as some kind of progress on the state of policing, including by Rep. Lacy Clay (D-Mo.), who represents Ferguson and also voted against limiting police militarization in June.

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Comments

[kinnath]

Fuck these people.

[timbo]

4 members of congress acted like the ignorant whores that they are.

[Fist of Etiquette]

All four voted AGAINST an amendment in July that would've limited the transfer of military equipment from the Department of Defense to local police agencies.

I've yet to see a leftist who doesn't at least secretly like the idea of a police state. In this case, they can use the result to feign solidarity with its victims, their constituents.

[Wicked Skin]

As long as those boots are on the right necks they'll happily let the pigs stomp till they drop

[Loki]

Surely you're not expecting these fuckers to do something actually useful, do you? Especially when that something would reduce the amount of pork for their home district and/ or potentially cost them the support of the public sector police unions?

[Notorious G.K.C.]

And another teachable moment collapses into farce and retardation.

[Mint Berry Crunch]

This Ferguson thing hasn't yet reached the retarded-ness of the Duke Lacrosse scandal, though, and I doubt it ever will.

I still can't believe how badly that one blew up in the faces of the self-appointed teachers. They lectured me about "rape culture" and "privileged white males" - but in the end, the main lesson I learned is "sometimes people lie about being raped."

[Rhywun]

This Ferguson thing hasn't yet reached the retarded-ness of the Duke Lacrosse scandal

It hasn't? At least that one seemed a lot easier to ignore.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

unless you were one of the accused.

[C. S. P. Schofield]

The lesson I drew from the Duke case was "In any instance where the Liberal Professoriat is united in denouncing one side, that is the side that should be adjudged innocent until further evidence emerges."

They are such LOUSEY judges of character.

[bendover]

How does one say "Don't beat me to death with a hammer" in Serbian?

I'll send the info to my congressman

[Swiss Servator, Winter kommt!]

*narrows gaze*

/Bosniak

[Warty]

Well you better learn, since you just called a Bosniak a Serb. YOU GONNA GET ETHNICALLY CLEANSED

[SERENITY NOW!]

Nemojte me tukli do smrti ?eki?em.

[Mike M.]

You're not allowed to talk about that incident. If you do, you might be a racist.

And whatever you do, don't you dare even so much as suggest that it might have been a mindless, racially motivated retaliation killing. If you do, you might be even more of a racist.

[SERENITY NOW!]

Eyewitness Claim: 'Black People' Yelling 'Kill The White People' Before St. Louis Hammer Attack

A video provided to St. Louis blogger Bob McCarty of the crime scene at the South St. Louis Bevo Mill neighborhood where a group of black teenagers bludgeoned Bosnian immigrant Zemir Begic to death with hammers, strongly suggests the motive for the attack - retaliation for the Michael Brown shooting.

At the beginning of the one minute video, the woman who recorded the scene, expressed her profound and at times profane disgust with what had just happened in her neighborhood.

"Arrest them all," she sneered. "F*ck this sh*t."

At the 45-second mark, she said, "And, of course, it's a white kid, right after black people running up and down the street saying, 'Eff the white people, kill the white people.' This is what we have."

http://www.breitbart.com/Insta.....ite-people

[GILMORE]

i had not heard of this incident until now.

I checked the NYT, and all they have is an AP 1-paragraph mention of it. WaPo has it listed 30 stories deep in the National news section. To be fair... they just updated it with more info.

To their credit - the most detail i can find on this story is Huffpo. To their discredit = not one of their three stories bothers to suggest there is a 'racial' angle at all; they don't bother noting the race of the attackers at all. Not relevant, it is assumed.

All of them seem to be simply reprinting coverage provided by local st. louis print and radio news.

[Juice]

it is assumed

that says a lot

[BardMetal]

More theater. Which seems to be all that matters in politics. It's not like a democrat base is smart enough to know the difference between political theater and actually doing something meaningful. Fuck all these people.

What a waste of used military equipment too, why not just sale it to whoever wants it instead of giving it to a bunch of asshole cops?

[C. S. P. Schofield]

Hell, if the cops would show some kind of sense about when to USE military equipment, it would be a decent program. And maybe some police and some police forces DO. We wouldn't hear about them.

The ones we do hear about? The Authorizing person should be crucified in the public square, and the military toys confiscated.

[Bretzky]

And all four are perpetuating what is now a thoroughly debunked myth of the Ferguson incident: that Michael Brown at any time put his hands in the air in an act of surrender.

[Sudden]

The hope is that the idiots who are parroting this chant under the misinformed belief that that is what happened will practice the "hands up" mode of dealing with police in the future, thereby sparing us another farce.

[SoCal Deathmarch]

You would think one day it would occur to these folks that the foundation they rest their political ideologies upon (ever expanding government) is the very thing that creates, either directly or indirectly, the situations they claim to abhor.

But alas, it is not to be... so just keep raising your hands, morons.

[WTF]

Seems like a good place for this.

[C. S. P. Schofield]

Oh, it occurs to them. Some of them. The knowing ones. The ones who KNOW that they cannot possibly hold power in a rational society, because they don't have anything any rational person wants.

The evil ones.

[Ted S.]

Those four are Reps. Yvette Clarke (D-NY), Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.), and Al Green (D-Tex.).
Let them stay together.

[Spencer]

^^ I see what you did there!

[Ted S.]

Look what I did to you.

[C. S. P. Schofield]

The really depressing thing about this is that there are three Congresscritters - even Democrats - stupid enough to join Sheila Jackson Lee in ANYTHING.

[Loki]

^THIS^ If Sheila Jackson Lee supports something you support, that should be reason enough to reconsider one's position. That woman is dumber than a jar of old moldy mayonaisse.

[C. S. P. Schofield]

A jar of old mayo isn't anywhere NEAR as dumb as she is. She's a dumb as a jar of spoiled mayo packed in a picnic basket because "we don't have anything else".

[Notorious G.K.C.]

If only *all* Congress members kept their hands where we could see them at all times - they wouldn't stick their hands in our pockets.

[Idle Hands]

As an aside is there a single congresswomen/senator that is half as witted as Sheila Jackson Lee?

[Swiss Servator, Winter kommt!]

Hank Johnson? (Guam may tip over!)

[Suthenboy]

So you mean quarter-witted?

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

With groups of congressmen, the amount of 'wittedness' is an exponential inverse function that rapidly approaches zero, where Lee is equal to two congresscritters:

1/2^n, where n = number of congress;

:. 1/32 witted.

[T]

You have no idea how thrilled I am that once we move, she'll be my congresscritter. I will be donating to every person who runs against her until she's gone.

Of course, she'll be replaced by some equally loathsome POS like Garnet Coleman, so it's futile. But it'll make me feel good, and really, isn't that what politics is supposed to do these days? Make people feel good?

[Sevo]

Boxer's dumb as dirt, but I'm not sure where she stands given the competition.

[Super Kevin Horlock]

Louie Gohmert. Hands down.

[Michael]

Is the the same one that was offered a ride in one of those driverless smart cars and killed it by pushing the exact button that they told her not to push?

[LarryA]

Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.)

She's one of the few people the Onion can't parody.

[Curtisls87]

Barbara Lee, from Oakland fits the bill.

[Juice]

Erm, I disagree with her on many things but I wouldn't consider her dumb. Being the only member of the House, including Ron Paul, to vote against the blank check AUMF against Al Qeada and "affiliated forces" buys her a lot of credit in my book.

[Harvey_birdman]

No, she's definitely dumb. Just because she made one right vote (and for the wrong reasons) doesn't make her smart.

[kinnath]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v4ZLwevXAI

Old Shoe

[Spencer]

Lowest of the low.

[Andrew S.]

People like this aren't against police militarization. They're just against the racial aspect. If it happened to white people as much as black people, they'd be completely okay with it.

[Suthenboy]

They don't give a shit about race either Andrew. They are part of the political class and they are love being insulated from the populace by militarized thugs.

Everything they do publicly is to get the support of the very people they want under the boot. They raise their hands and then vote for more guns for cops.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Put your hands in the air, now wave them about like you just don't care (which, as it happens, you don't)

[sarcasmic]

Word Up!

[Notorious G.K.C.]

SFed link.

[sarcasmic]

better?

[Frank Frankelson]

Well this has snuffed out what little hope I had that the problems of police militarization and over-reach were going to be addressed. Its all about meaningless twaddle like "race relations" and "community outreach" now.

Shit.

[bassjoe]

They're also members of the Congressional Black Caucus, a group that has historically used its 'reputation' to completely fuck over the people they supposedly represent and identify with.

[Super Kevin Horlock]

Democrats will do nothing about police militarisation for the same reason they will do precisely fuck-all about drug legalisation/sentencing reform.

When your principal sugar daddy is the Public Employee Union lobby, you as a party learn not to bite the hand that feeds.

[some guy]

Four Members of Congress Put Their Hands Up in Solidarity With Ferguson Protesters, None Voted to Limit Police Militarization

The two points seem to have only a very tenuous connection. Wilson wasn't very militarized when he shot Brown and there is no evidence that militarization caused Wilson to shoot Brown. The two issues of militarization and officer responsibility aren't really connected. Have there been any bills up for a vote that involve making officers wear body cameras or making all cops involved in violence face an independent third-party review?

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

The huge blow up that immediately followed this incident had almost everything to do with police militarization, though.

The Ferguson PD hunkered down, armored up, and further alienated the people they're supposed to protect.

[jmomls]

I'd hunker down and armor up to if I were surrounded by people who wanted to kill me.

[Harvey_birdman]

It's more than just equipment, it's a mind set. Militarizing the police makes them feel like it's them against us and that we're enemy combatants.

Although it's unclear that was the case here if you accept the race-baiters' logic then Wilson was looking to gun down "the enemy". That's the kind of mentality militarizing police creates.

[jmomls]

Did these four racist fools also wear hoodies on the floor of the HOR after St. Travyon got gunned down for charing an armed man?

Betcha they did.

[Curtisls87]

Would it be racist to call them, "jazz hands?"

[Sunken Idaho]

Jackson Lee is truly, one of the dumbest individuals to ever hold office. She ever figure out that nobody landed on Mars yet?

[userve32]

Lets rock with it dude. WOw.

http://www.Anon-Rocks.tk

[Alan@.4]

Making gestures,as in raising one's hand is one thing. Taking a recorded vote is quite another. Seems strange that these "congress critters" were big on gestures, but among the missing when it came to a recorded vote, or what might have been a recorded vote.

[chenoacorksduu]

Google pay 97$ per hour my last pay check was $8500 working 1o hours a week online. My younger brother friend has been averaging 12k for months now and he works about 22 hours a week. I cant believe how easy it was once I tried it out.
This is wha- I do...... ?????? http://www.jobsfish.com

[TxJack 112]

Sure funny they are all so worried about pushing a false narrative related to the killing of someone who already had an extensive police record before he was an adult. Someone who on video is seen committing a robbery, not shoplifting. Shoplifting is stealing without the knowledge of the person being victimized. Robbery is taking property from someone by force which is EXACTLY what Brown did. The item is irrelevant, the action speaks volumes. However, funny how NO ONE is talking about the gang of black teens who beat a white man to death in St Louis a couple days ago for fun. Black men account for 12% of the population, yet commit 68% of the violent crime in the US. Yeah, the problem is all related to the cops...