Rev. Al Sharpton How Do We Look Funeral of Michael Brown Jr. 08-25-14 Mi...

No Rights That White Police Are Bound To Respect

In a short but powerful segment on Saturday August 16, 2014, Melissa Harris-Perry connected the recent police killing of Michael Brown to the deaths of other black men at the hands of police — and to America's history of injustice towards black people. Harris-Perry read the names of some of the hundreds of men who were killed by police across the country "in the past decade alone," from Sean Bell to Oscar Grant to Eric Garner to Brown. All of the men she mentioned were unarmed at the time of their death. In the past decade alone, these men and hundreds of others have lost their lives to police. "From 2006 to 2012 a white police officer killed a black person at least twice a week in this country," she said. She then noted that Ferguson, where Brown was shot dead, is close to the place from which the slave Dred Scott waged a legal battle for his freedom. She quoted from the notorious Supreme Court case which rejected Scott's claim because, in the infamous words of Chief Justice Roger Taney, he had "no rights which the white man was bound to respect."

Melissa Harris-Perry 'This Country Is No Place For Young Black Men'

Melissa Harris-Perry 'This Country Is No Place For Young Black Men'
Reaction to the shooting death of Jordan Davis RIP

TO MICHAEL BROWN'S MOTHER AND FAMILY

 LETTER OF ANGUISH FROM SABRINA FULTON, TRAYVON'S MOM, TO MICHAEL BROWN'S MOTHER AND FAMILY

To The Brown Family,

I wish I had a word of automatic comfort but I don’t. I wish I could say that it will be alright on a certain or specific day but I can’t. I wish that all of the pain that I have endured could possibly ease some of yours but it won’t. What I can do for you is what has been done for me: pray for you then share my continuing journey as you begin yours.

I hate that you and your family must join this exclusive yet growing group of parents and relatives who have lost loved ones to senseless gun violence. Of particular concern is that so many of these gun violence cases involve children far too young. But Michael is much more than a police/gun violence case; Michael is your son. A son that barely had a chance to live. Our children are our future so whenever any of our children – black, white, brown, yellow, or red – are taken from us unnecessarily, it causes a never-ending pain that is unlike anything I could have imagined experiencing.

Further complicating the pain and loss in this tragedy is the fact that the killer of your son is alive, known, and currently free. In fact, he is on paid administrative leave. Your own feelings will bounce between sorrow and anger. Even when you don’t want to think about it because it is so much to bear, you will be forced to by merely turning on your television or answering your cell phone. You may find yourselves pulled in many different directions by strangers who may be well-wishers or detractors. Your circle will necessarily close tighter because the trust you once, if ever, you had in “the system” and their agents are forever changed. Your lives are forever changed.

However with those changes come new challenges and opportunities. You will experience a swell of support from all corners of the world. Many will express their sympathies and encourage you to keep fighting for Michael. You will also, unfortunately, hear character assassinations about Michael which I am certain you already have. This will incense and insult you. All of this will happen before and continue long after you have had the chance to lay your son to rest.

I know this because I lived and continue to live this. I have devoted my life to the comprehensive missions of The Trayvon Martin Foundation – including providing support to families that have lost a young child to senseless gun violence regardless of race, ethnicity or gender. I will support you and your efforts to seek justice for your Michael and the countless other Michaels & Trayvons of our country. The 20 Sandy Hook children. Jordan Davis. Oscar Grant. Kendrick Johnson. Sean Bell. Hadya Pendleton. The Aurora shooting victims. The list is too numerous to adequately mention them all. According to The Children’s Defense Fund, gun violence is the second leading cause of death for children ages 1-19. That is a horrible fact.

Facts, myths, and flat out lies are already out there in Michael’s case. Theories, regardless of how ridiculous, are being pondered by the pundits. My advice is to surround yourselves with proven and trusted support. Through it all, I never let go of my faith, my family, or my friends. Long after the overwhelming media attention is gone, you will need those three entities to find your ‘new normal.’ Honor your son and his life, not the circumstances of his alleged transgressions. I have always said that Trayvon was not perfect. But no one will ever convince me that my son deserved to be stalked and murdered. No one can convince you that Michael deserved to be executed.

But know this: neither of their lives shall be in vain. The galvanizations of our communities must be continued beyond the tragedies. While we fight injustice, we will also hold ourselves to an appropriate level of intelligent advocacy. If they refuse to hear us, we will make them feel us. Some will mistake that last statement as being negatively provocative. But feeling us means feeling our pain; imagining our plight as parents of slain children. We will no longer be ignored. We will bond, continue our fights for justice, and make them remember our children in an appropriate light. I would hate to think that our lawmakers and leaders would need to lose a child before protecting the rest of them and making the necessary changes NOW
…
With Heartfelt Support,

 Sybrina D. Fulton

American Muslims view

Thu Aug 21, 2014 at 04:30 PM PDT

Forward this next time right-wingers lie about prominent Muslims not condemning ISIS violence

by Ian Reifowitz

attribution: Unknown

Muslims never condemn jihadi terrorism, right? Wrong.

Among many other lies, the right wing loves to claim that Muslims don't speak out against violence committed by jihadi terrorists like ISIS. Laura Ingraham recently pulled this shtick: "And it would be nice if more in the Muslim world coming out and condemning what the Islamic State is doing. You're not hearing enough of those voices, if any. I mean, where are those people?" Why do right-wingers do this? Because it allows them to perpetrate the fiction that all Muslims are terrorists, that they are all our enemy. That kind of thinking leads directly to Fox News' Andrea Tantaros recent comments, where, after discussing "the history of Islam," she declared that we should put "a bullet to the head" of "these people." There's no difference between ISIS and Islam, in that mindset.
Slight problem. The right-wingers are wrong. Even before Ingraham's rant, top Muslim religious leaders from around the world had already condemned ISIS' brutal treatment of Christians and other religious groups. And at home, there was this statement about ISIS from our country's largest Muslim civil rights group, the Council on American-Islamic Relations:

American Muslims view the actions of ISIS as un-Islamic and morally repugnant. No religion condones the murder of civilians, the beheading of religious scholars or the desecration of houses of worship. We condemn the actions of ISIS and reject its assertion that all Muslims are required to pay allegiance to its leader.

After the vicious beheading by ISIS of American journalist James Foley, the Muslim Council of Britain, the biggest Muslim organization in that country, denounced it:

Not in our Name: British Muslims Condemn the Barbarity of ISIS We are horrified at the abhorrent murder of James Foley, a reporter who initially went to the region to expose the human rights abuses of the Syrian regime. ISIS has murdered this man for no reason at all....ISIS does not speak for Islam.

Let's be clear, violence committed in the name of religion, racial superiority, ideology, or any other form of hatred is evil. Smearing a whole group because of the actions of some who claim membership may not be as evil, but that's an awfully low bar to clear. I hope Laura Ingraham is proud of herself. 

Staten Islander Eric Garner's Death - Panel Discussion on NY1

A Eyewitness Explains How Ferguson, Missouri Teen Mike Brown Surrendered...

Another ey--witness account that gives the pulse of the community about this merciless murder in the streets of this young African-American man.

The Mike Brown Shooting What You're Not Being Told

Here is another person's point of view of what we must learn from this tragic situation that has occurred in Ferguson, Missouri and has implications that spread across the 50 United States of America.

DAILY KOS  -   Tue Aug 19, 2014 at 01:21 PM PDT

Missouri GOP Outraged About Voter Registration Booths In Ferguson

 

 

It seems that some citizens of Ferguson want to increase the extremely low voter participation rate in Ferguson, and the Missouri GOP (or, at least the leadership) is not happy about that effort at all. From The New Civil Rights Movement:

In an interview with Breitbart News, Missouri RNC executive director Matt Wills expressed outrage about the reports of voter registration booths popping up in Ferguson, Breitbart reports. “If that’s not fanning the political flames, I don’t know what is,” Wills said, “I think it’s not only disgusting but completely inappropriate.”
Wills explained that the shooting death of Michael Brown was a tragedy for everyone.
“This is not just a tragedy for the African American community this is a tragedy for the Missouri community as well as the community of what we call America,” he said. “Injecting race into this conversation and into this tragedy, not only is not helpful, but it doesn’t help a continued conversation of justice and peace.”

While the event(s) in Ferguson was very tragic, I'm glad that it has at least awakened the community of the importance of the political process and elections. The (far) right wing site, "Daily Caller," is also doing a bit of fear-mongering of its own. From the same article:

Liberal activists — including from the George Soros-funded Center for Constitutional Rights — have promoted voter registration booths at multiple locations in Ferguson, including at the roadside memorial marking the spot where Brown was shot.

African-Americans are extremely under-represented in the racial makeup of elected officials and policemen in Ferguson. Salon gives us some of those statistics:

Ferguson is majority black, but the mayor is white, and five of the six city council members are white. For members of the community who feel their interests aren’t being represented, the first step towards changing that is registering to vote. Also, reportedly, only three of the 53 Ferguson police officers are Black.

 ______________________________________________________________________________

Commentary:

       .The whole country is wondering how it can be that a town that is 65 percent or more African-American can have so few Black people in the government of the city and on the police force.  Surely they could not have put those white people in office and then object to their being there.  It is obvious that the African-American population of Ferguson, Missouri does not vote.  This is unimaginable in this day and time.  What type of  height of indignation, perplexity, or degradation could cause nearly an entire township to not to vote.  The answer is that they obviously must have completely lost confidence in the voting process and the outlook of achieving a fair, open and advantageous result from their elections.   Similarly, too few are obviously even motivated enough to run for office.  Yet no people is monolithic; so there must have been some African-American voters somewhere sometime.   There are a few Black political representatives.at least on a state level; but what about at the local?  It is also obvious that Change must finally come to the town of Ferguson.

      It is therefore gratifying to learn that voter registration efforts are now being made in Ferguson in earnest, which indicates that the residents must have now taken heart and have been convinced that it is indeed their responsibility to be part of the Change that must be made. 

      Another tangent benefit that appears that may be developing is the long over-due discussion of what the nature of community policing must begin to become in these United States of America.  We cannot loose this fertile opportunity to bring this vital issue to the forefront.  People everywhere must help place pressure upon our elected officials to ensure that such changes are being studied, advocated , and instituted.  We must insist that local law enforcement officers begin to be trained to maim rather than kill.  No one has to shoot to kill a man holding a knife who is several feet away from you even if he is advancing as was actually done today in a close-by area of the City of St Louis, not that far from the Ferguson community.  Even if that act did not (thankfully) add more "fuel to the fire" in Ferguson, those residents became aware of it and used that act to confront the news media to underscore what they are fighting against.  Such is the open evidence -- which was also videotaped -- for all the world to see.  This is an era wherein the United States' racism and evil use of excessive force has been laid open to other nations.  It becomes an indictment upon the very soul of our American society, as we go about "policing" and attempting to persuade other countries around the world.

         Nevertheless, the residents of Ferguson must be convinced that their only recourse is to register to vote, which is their fundamental right, so they can begin to control the outcomes of these types of pressures among the people and elements of their society for the benefit of generations to come and thereby for people all over the world.  The eyes of the world will continue to be on this neighborhood for years to come as it should be.

Freedom for Palestine - OneWorld