I think that some see each one of these cases differently than others. Many angry, frustrated members of the African American community see each case as the same one again and again-each case may have its individual attributes but in the end they all fit the same narrative: you have a young Black man who ends up dead in an encounter with police; in Trayvon's case not even the police but someone, Robert Zimmerman, who wanted to be a policeman. Only after a real public outcry from the community do we get a Grand Jury trial which ends up electing not to acquit the officers in question.
I think other Americans see it differently. Conservatives often see it the opposite way: we have hard working policemen in a tough job who are continually second guessed and accused based on the basis of some playing the racism card.
I admit that I sometimes see each case individually-after all, logically speaking it could be that in some cases the police acted rightly and in some they crossed the line into excessive force.
I sometimes myself get tired of seeing each case in the same terms-isn't it too easy to always cry race if the victim is Black? In at least the case of Michael Brown, it does seem that the victim was quite belligerent in the events that led to his death.
Overall, though, it has to be admitted that there is a pattern that keeps repeating itself and that we has a country have to get to the bottom of. Thankfully, President Obama and AG Eric Holder are on the case as the Garner case is now being taken up by the feds and the President has begun a task force.
This is entirely in the vein that Al Sharpton has called for-he rightly argues that these cases need to be handled at the federal level-that at the local level the conflict of interest is just too stark. The task force enables this problem to be analyzed in the aggregate-whereas the local level gives us too much of a 'micro' view that will make it hard to see the overriding dynamic that makes it as Greg Sargent puts it 'impossible to get a guilty verdict against the police out of a grand jury.'
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/12/03/happy-hour-roundup-495/
We'll have to see what the task force uncovers and proposes, but one thing that seems clear right off the bat is that the whole grand jury system is flawed for cases when the accused is himself a member of law enforcement. Indeed, it's arguable that in general the GJ system is now too manipulated to be for the good anymore. It may have just outworn its usefulness. At this point the prosecutor just manipulates the GJ process and gets the verdict he seeks. Now normally that means an indictment. However, it's a different dynamic in cases involving a law enforcement officer being the accused. There the interest of the prosecutor is to get the LEO off. The reason is that they have to work with the police and the police department every day to get convictions. To indict one of the PD's own is akin to biting the hand that feeds them. For the most part, district attorney's don't want to do that. As it might lead to less cooperation and coordination with the PD in the future.
So in cases where there is a an accused LEO the case should be taken up by a special prosecutor-Governor Cuomo was asked to do this but he refused. Solving this problem would go along way to curing this epidemic.
Finally, while there is obviously a racial divide in public opinion, there is also a partisan divide.
"We already knew the American public was polarized along racial lines over the failure to indict Officer Darren Wilson. E.J. Dionne breaks down the numbers further:
I think other Americans see it differently. Conservatives often see it the opposite way: we have hard working policemen in a tough job who are continually second guessed and accused based on the basis of some playing the racism card.
I admit that I sometimes see each case individually-after all, logically speaking it could be that in some cases the police acted rightly and in some they crossed the line into excessive force.
I sometimes myself get tired of seeing each case in the same terms-isn't it too easy to always cry race if the victim is Black? In at least the case of Michael Brown, it does seem that the victim was quite belligerent in the events that led to his death.
Overall, though, it has to be admitted that there is a pattern that keeps repeating itself and that we has a country have to get to the bottom of. Thankfully, President Obama and AG Eric Holder are on the case as the Garner case is now being taken up by the feds and the President has begun a task force.
This is entirely in the vein that Al Sharpton has called for-he rightly argues that these cases need to be handled at the federal level-that at the local level the conflict of interest is just too stark. The task force enables this problem to be analyzed in the aggregate-whereas the local level gives us too much of a 'micro' view that will make it hard to see the overriding dynamic that makes it as Greg Sargent puts it 'impossible to get a guilty verdict against the police out of a grand jury.'
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/12/03/happy-hour-roundup-495/
We'll have to see what the task force uncovers and proposes, but one thing that seems clear right off the bat is that the whole grand jury system is flawed for cases when the accused is himself a member of law enforcement. Indeed, it's arguable that in general the GJ system is now too manipulated to be for the good anymore. It may have just outworn its usefulness. At this point the prosecutor just manipulates the GJ process and gets the verdict he seeks. Now normally that means an indictment. However, it's a different dynamic in cases involving a law enforcement officer being the accused. There the interest of the prosecutor is to get the LEO off. The reason is that they have to work with the police and the police department every day to get convictions. To indict one of the PD's own is akin to biting the hand that feeds them. For the most part, district attorney's don't want to do that. As it might lead to less cooperation and coordination with the PD in the future.
So in cases where there is a an accused LEO the case should be taken up by a special prosecutor-Governor Cuomo was asked to do this but he refused. Solving this problem would go along way to curing this epidemic.
Finally, while there is obviously a racial divide in public opinion, there is also a partisan divide.
"We already knew the American public was polarized along racial lines over the failure to indict Officer Darren Wilson. E.J. Dionne breaks down the numbers further:
Among white Democrats, only 37 percent approved of the grand jury’s decision not to indict Wilson, but 80 percent of white Republicans did. When it came to bringing federal civil rights charges, 60 percent of white Democrats approved of the move, compared with just 19 percent of white Republicans.
"Yep: Polarization on this is partisan, too."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/12/04/morning-plum-gop-leaders-betting-that-conservative-rage-will-sputter-out/
No comments:
Post a Comment