Police murders and militarization of US society a threat to all workers

by Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired

While things have no doubt changed since I lived in Europe over 40 years ago, one stark difference between there and the US is the power and role of the police. Here in the US, they can kill without recourse, this is particularly so when it comes to black folks, and young black men in particular.  Those who regret their lives are disrupted or their baseball game delayed because a freeway is blocked or some unruly people (more often than not white middle class youth) smash some windows, should consider that the racist cop who rained a barrage of racial epithets on Oscar Grant, the young black worker killed by Transit police, was fired due to these protests. 

The cop that shot Oscar Grant in the back as he lay on the ground surrounded by police would never have gone to jail at all had it not been for the street protests. George Zimmerman’s acquittal in the murder of Trayvon martin shows that the courts cannot be relied on to protect black youth.  The courts unfortunately cannot be relied upon to protect the rights of any worker as they are institutions designed to protect and further the interests of capital.

I saw three youngsters on a double decker in London last year getting in to it with two unarmed cops. They were not behaving properly I thought so myself, but the cops also didn’t approach them correctly.  Still, the youngsters gave the cops what for and as they were descending the upper deck for their stop one of them looks at the cops sitting in the back and called them “Baboons”.  The cops up and chased them and the last scene I saw was them giving a stern talking to the kids at the bus stop. I thought to myself, “They deal with cops here in the US like that they could be dead.” They got a bit too close to them and if a cop’s threatened here they can kill you no problem.  The same with the London riots last year.  Had they happened here, there’d be a lot more dead bodies.

You only have to watch US TV to see that we are a very violent society, young children see guns and shootings on TV daily and it’s portrayed in a way that it appears as natural as can be when we know that for a normal person, simply getting in to a tense and heated confrontation with another person is upsetting never mind killing them.

Last week, Reuters reported on the differences between the power of the police in Europe and here in the US.  According to Der Spiegel, the total number of bullets German police used in all of 2011 was 85.  Police in most other industrial countries are trained to avoid shooting with “fatal intent” whereas here in the US, “lethal force” is more often than not the norm. Of those 85 bullets fired by German cops in 2011, “…49 were warnings shots, 36 were aimed at criminal suspects, 15 people were injured, and 6 were killed”, Der Spiegel adds.

In the US, cops have to file a report every time they use their weapon in the line of duty but there are no statistics “readily available” according to RT.  But we have some idea of how things are from daily events.  Bruce Springsteen made a song “American Skin 41 shots to highlight the death of the New Yorker Amadou Diallo who was shot 41 times by cops while siting outside his apartment.  A 19 year old was killed by LA cops last month after being shot 90 times.  “The same month,” the New York Post reports, “…New York police fired at a suspected murderer 84 times.  While the man was wounded, “the punk incredibly survived,”.

Crime has declined in the US perhaps due to the incarceration of close to three million people mostly for petty crimes, people that capitalism has abandoned. But in the aftermath of 911 and the rise of the Occupy Movement as part of the rising opposition to US capitalism’s efforts to put the working class on rations, US society has become increasingly militarized beefing up the police and special fascist type units as well as using drones and massive surveillance methods to root out dissent. According to USA Today, “instances of excessive force or “other tactics to violate victims civil rights” increased by 25 per cent from 2001 to 2007.”

Other examples from RT

In another 2006 six case, plain clothes and undercover New York police shot at Sean Bell more than 50 times a day before his wedding. Bell was killed, and three of his friends were critically injured. The case was widely compared to that of Diallo.

The phenomenon is so common in America that the term ‘contagious shooting’ – the idea that cops reflexively open fire because others are doing so – has entered the national vocabulary.

Perhaps one incident that spurred experts to coin the term was a 1995 Bronx robbery where officers fired an incredible 125 shots at a suspect who did not even fire back. “They were shooting to the echo of their own gunfire,” a former police official told The New York Times.  

One officer told the daily in 2006 that “the only reason to be shooting in New York City is that you or someone else is going to be killed and it’s going to be imminent,” and thus you fire as many shots as necessary to “extinguish the threat.”

Ironically, one officer even said, “until we have some substitute for a firearm, there will always be a situation where more rounds are fired than in other situations.”

You get a lot of support for this macho culture from trolls that have found themselves a safe place in the Internet culture where they can play cop and more often than not espouse racist and anti-worker views. But beefed up police forces have never made life safer for the working class.  The police as well as troops have been used historically to break strikes, sometimes with the most brutal results. The social role of the police makes them naturally the enemy of workers and organized Labor as their entire existence is based on defending laws that are made by the capitalist class in the interests of the capitalist class.  Troops, as workers in uniform are somewhat different when used in this capacity, and much more likely to be won over when workers are on strike or in open struggle against the bosses and the police.. The police can be neutralized at best by the united power of the working class in action; they are not workers in the same way.

Recently cops shot a man's dog after the arrested him as he was on a public sidewalk videoing their actions.  Apparently he didn't turn the music down in his car quick enough.  The dog tried to defend its master so the cops shot it.  It is on film at the end of this commentary but it is a disturbing scene so be warned animal and human lovers, the dog appears to suffer.

In the recent labor disputes here in the Bay Area where we saw a four and a half day strike by BART (mass transit) workers, the issue of safety on the job and as well as the safety of passengers is an issue. This is an issue or all public employees (and some private like UPS drivers for example) especially teachers, transit and utility workers as well as USPS employees.  I worked in areas where youth unemployment was as high as 30% or more and crime was rampant.  For teachers, all the ills of capitalist society are brought in to the classroom. But the answer to these real problems from organized labor and workers as a whole is training programs run by the Unions in every community and a massive investment in social infrastructure, education, transportation and real public housing, not beefing up the state security forces.

Jobs and more jobs is the key.  Increased militarization of society and more police will be used against unionized workers as we are forced to strike to defend ourselves against the capitalist offensive.  We are not exempt from police violence, we never have been.  By defending our communities and especially the poorer communities, many of them communities of color, we can build a united and powerful movement to fight back against the austerity agenda of the 1%.

 We need this united movement for there is plenty of bullets for the rest of us if the 1% feels their interests are threatened.  US police will not only use plenty of bullets to halt our offensive, the Germans will abandon their tolerance for German workers and ammo consumption will skyrocket there too.

Let’s not fool ourselves. Let’s remember which sections of society are our natural allies and which are our natural enemies.

This what the occupation of America's urban areas really means.

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Opportunity knocks (again) for BART Unions. Trayvon Martin murder is a union issue

Trayvon Martin. Caused his own death according to Florida court

by Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired

As to be expected AFL-CIO and Change to Win leaders don’t have too much to say about the Zimmerman verdict and what I could find on the AFL-CIO website was pretty lame. I looked at the CTW website which while not quite so drab also had nothing on there about this defeat for workers in this country and for black workers in particular.  On the AFL-CIO page Randi Weingarten of the AFT issued the following statement:

 “While we believe in the rule of law and the jury has spoken, the implications of the acquittal are profound. It is very disappointing that a racially profiled, unarmed African-American young man wearing a hoodie can be shot dead and there be no consequences for the perpetrator. This case reminds us that the path to racial justice is still a long one, and that our legal and moral systems do not always mesh. The proceedings in the Sanford, Fla., courtroom may well have dealt with the criminal aspects of the case, as defined by Florida law, but we will continue to deal with the moral ones. As the AFT pledged in a resolution passed at our 2012 convention, we remain steadfast in our commitment to fight for laws, policies and practices that will prohibit racial profiling at the federal, state and local levels.

“The disposition of this case is the antithesis of what we teach our children in school—that the law protects innocent victims and that no one has the right to take the law into his or her own hands. Everyone’s child matters. We pray for the strength of Trayvon’s parents and loved ones in this difficult time.”

Lee Saunders, the president of AFSCME, my former Union says:

“AFSCME is calling for the Justice Department to immediately conduct an investigation into the civil rights violations committed against Trayvon Martin. We know that it will take federal intervention and a massive grassroots movement but justice and positive change is still possible.
Bottom of Form

“In the fight for justice, it is time to stand our ground. As we have throughout our history, AFSCME will work with faith leaders, community groups and civil and human rights activists to create a more just society for all.”

Ho hum! Reading this reminds me of Nina Simone’s words from Mississippi Goddamn:

Picket lines
School boy cots
They try to say it's a communist plot
All I want is equality
For my sister my brother my people and me

Yes you lied to me all these years
You told me to wash and clean my ears
And talk real fine just like a lady
And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie

Oh but this whole country is full of lies
You're all gonna die and die like flies
I don't trust you any more
You keep on saying 'Go slow!'
'Go slow!'

But that's just the trouble
'Do it slow'
Desegregation
'Do it slow'
Mass participation
'Do it slow'
Reunification
'Do it slow'
Do things gradually
'Do it slow'
But bring more tragedy
'Do it slow'
Why don't you see it
Why don't you feel it
I don't know
I don't know

Nina Simone

I checked the National Education Association’s website (NEA, the largest union in the country, and couldn’t find a word about Trayvon Martin and his murderer’s acquittal. I clicked on the link “Minority Community Outreach” and there was nothing there either. Like the Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden affairs where heroic individuals are being ruthlessly persecuted by the state for making the public aware of the violence, corruption and lies that are the norm for this government, Trayvon Martin is a non issue even on a page that deals with minority community involvement. This is as these issues are topics in every workplace, every coffee shop, every dinner table and drinking establishment.

And what does Ms. Weingarten mean by the “Rule of Law”. Laws are made by politicians of the 1% and in the interests of the 1%.  Would she say as a union leader in Nazi Germany that “we believe in the rule of law”? And what about the Jim Crow laws in the US Apartheid South? They were changed through direct action and violating the law not praying. One sees this term in the big business press all the time it means to respect laws that protect the capitalist class and their system, that’s what it means.  If those heroic figures that built the trade Union movement in this country had that attitude we wouldn’t have unions at all. We wouldn’t have sick leave or unemployment benefits, meager as they are; the UAW wouldn’t exist.  The Apartheid South would still be thriving if people had respect for the “rule of law”.

The union hierarchy is the only force that slavishly obeys the law except when it comes to dealing with their own members and the internal life of our organizations that they head.  Wall street crooks steal billions, politicians lie cheat and live off the fruits of bribery and the Union tops claim sainthood.  The bosses pass laws that are clearly against the interests of union members and all working people and the union hierarchy ensures they are not broken; anything to avoid a fight; send an e mail to the president and vote Democratic. They are terrified of a victory as it would increase expectations and inspire millions of workers drawing them in to activity after decades of savage attacks on our living standards.  Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is the trademark of the Union leaders atop organized labor.

Here in the Bay Area, a 4 day strike by Bay Area Rapid Transit workers galvanized attention for a

ATU members on strike

period.  Due to the ability of the BART workers to cripple the local economy contract negotiations between these two forces always makes headlines.  The bosses went on the offensive and demonized these workers in their media.  The union leaders as I explained in an earlier commentary have no answer to this as their general approach is that concessions have to be made. After all, we all have to share the pain, there is a need for “shared sacrifice”.

The decision to halt the strike for 30 days was a mistake as it is hard to get workers back on the lines once they’ve been taken off.  With a strike you either win one or lose one. The decision to end the strike for what is termed a “cooling off” period was in order for the union hierarchy and their political allies in the Democratic Party to make some deal that the members can accept, hopefully with minor changes that bring less aggressive concessions.  It is my view that they were forced to call one due to the anger from below and the pressure they were facing to let off some steam in case the pot boiled over. 

It is still not too late but the labor leadership will not act unless they are absolutely forced to from below or replaced. The anger in the ranks is significant for BART workers as they have not had a raise in five years but all workers have been savaged over the past period. There is a golden opportunity that must not be lost here.  The other transit workers that operate the buses have their contract up and could legally strike with the BART workers, they are also in the same union as the train operators, the ATU. SEIU 1021 also represents BART employees like station agents and janitors. The city of Oakland workers  also in SEIU 1021 have suffered serious cuts and can also strike.  Water workers are also in contract talks and their contracts expired at the end of May I think.

Unfortunately, despite a mood among bus drivers to support BART workers at a transit board meeting, the decision by union officials not to bring bus drivers out with the them was a serious mistake and made victory less likely for both. Both BART and AC Transit workers face aggression and acts of violence from the public. The same is true for teachers.  But labor’s response is not more policing. Increase policing never helps workers and the poor and certainly doesn’t help the most oppressed sections of our class. All the ills and pressure of society weigh heavily on public sector workers like transit, city, teachers and water workers as we deal with the public every day. Our response must be jobs for all, housing, education, urban renewal, wages and an end to racism and sexism.  This will strengthen us with the public and will unite the class rather than dividing it.  Unity is not an abstract thing.  What are we uniting around?  It has to be made concrete. We cannot win without building links with the communities in which we live and work.

A strike by BART, AC Transit and the City of Oakland workers would open the door to the transformation of the mood among workers in and outside the unions. You want public support?  Here’s your chance. Taking a major public stand against the Zimmerman verdict and against the ongoing murder and incarceration of black youth will get a tremendous echo in this community along with a call for community involvement and help to win the strike around such demands as:

No to the 1%’s austerity agenda

No more police, no more jails but a massive hiring and job training program under the direction of the unions and community organizations.

A $20 an hour minimum wage

Free public transportation for all seniors

Increased services in mass transit (especially buses) including for the disabled

Free public education at all levels, reopen closed schools reduce class sizes and hire one million teachers

For a national public health service

Organized the unorganized.

The money fro these basic things can come from making the rich pay, ending all wars an occupations and nationalizing the banks to suggest a few.

These are just a few small ways a movement can be built around such a strike that would undoubtedly challenge the 1%’s austerity agenda and drive back their offensive. The slogan should be No more business as usual, it stops here in the Bay Area, the home of two huge general strikes.  

No more Trayvon Martins—no more shared sacrifice. Jobs for all.

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Zimmerman murder. Capitalism wipes its brow and launches counter offensive.

Relieved that there were no mass riots after the racist verdict in the murder of Trayvon Martin US capitalism are wiping their brow and launching a new offensive to blame black people. In the Wall Street Journal today there are 17 items of worldwide news on the long column the regularly have down their front page. These cover the news in the US also. Yesterday these included at the top the news of the racist verdict. Today there is not a mention of it. The only mention of the case in the entire paper is a single column inside the back page which blames black people. Believe it or not this quotes Martin Luther King. Of course not where he says that there is something wrong with capitalism in the US and the country must move to democratic socialism.

This columnist who blames black people makes a lot of use of figures on crime. Of course he does not mention the criminality of the ruling class which keeps the system loaded against the working class and the poor and the majority of the black and Hispanic population. For this capitalist mouthpiece crime is okay as long as it is carried out by the bankers, the corporate class and their bribed politicians. For this capitalist mouthpiece it is okay to leave out how living in poverty and coming out of a history of centuries of repression can and does affect all of us.

But to go back to the arguments this mouthpiece makes about crime in black neighborhoods. For over 300 years black people were forced to work for no pay in this country. Their children were taken from them and sold. They were whipped and murdered and raped and lynched and their bodies burnt. Then when slavery was ended they were and still are forced to work for less wages than the rest of the working class. They were kept out of the skilled trades. This is the reality that exists for black people. The fact that the black revolt scared the capitalist class and saw it promote and bribe a few black politicians to hold down the black working class as a whole does not change this fundamental reality. Obama in the White House does not change the fact that the overwhelming majority of black people still live in poverty and at a lower standard than other workers and under the vicious racist repression of this racist state. Obama is a fraud for black workers and youth. He says of the racist verdict on Trayvon Martin that "We are a nation of laws" and calls on all to accept this racist verdict. I wonder when we became a nation of laws. Is the firing of drones to kill children in other countries the actions of a nation of laws. Is the torture in Guantanamo bay and the solitary confinement of thousands of prisoners a sign of a nation of laws.

It is hard to think of a more racist society in the advanced capitalist world than the US. It is hard to think of a more censored mass media in the advanced capitalist world than the US. And it is impossible to think of any society in the advanced capitalist world that is more racist and sexist. The most important leaders of black America in the past 50 years, Malcolm X, the Panthers, Martin Luther King all came to the conclusion that US capitalism had to be overthrown and a socialist society established. They were correct.

Sean.

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Martin Bashir tells the truth about Trayvon Martin's murder

You can't put it better than this.
Some comments from Zimmerman about Mexicans from his old MySpace page.

"Some of Zimmerman's apologists make the argument that he could not possibly be a racist vigilante as he is actually half peruvian and a self identified Latino. Here is what Zimmerman had to say about Mexicans on his old myspace page, "I dont miss driving around scared to hit mexicans walkin on the side of the street, soft ass wanna be thugs messin with peoples cars when they aint around (what are you provin, that you can dent a car when no ones watchin) dont make you a man in my book. Workin 96 hours to get a decent pay check, gettin knifes pulled on you by every mexican you run into!”

 Note: we haven't verified the source of this other than facebook

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Zimmerman. Racism and divide and rule and the working class.

In a previous blog we explained how the racist Zimmerman got off for murdering Trayvon Martin. I would like to add to this. The Wall Street Journal today lists some of the events leading up to the trial, which of course according to it was a model for civilized society. It even gets round to praising Obama with his calls for calm. That is one for the books. The Wall Street Journal praising Obama.  Obama's role in this is despicable. When it happened he said that if he had a son he would look like Trayvon now he says the jury has spoken so that is that. Class enters here also. If it had been Obama's son then there would have been a different response.

This was a racist jury. There was not a single Black person on it.  Only a racist could conclude that a young black child walking home doing nothing wrong could be murdered and the murderer was innocent. This verdict also in spite of what the law tries to say points the finger at  Trayvon Martin. If Zimmerman was not guilty then Trayvon was. Somebody has to be responsible for the death of Trayvon. It was not an accident.

What a despicable lot these attorneys, the local cops, the judge, the jury were. In our home we had to turn off the TV we were so nauseated by the dirty methods of the defense, the phony stare of Zimmerman, the gleeful celebrations of the defense attorneys when the verdict was read out, and not a single sign of or statement from Zimmerman or his family in sympathy with the Martin family. Obviously this racist family thought their son had done a good job in killing this black child.   The judge would not allow the jury to hear the many many times Zimmerman called the cops to report what he said were suspicious people every one of whom were black. If this is not a sign of racism in the attitude of Zimmerman what is. This judge by ruling these out shows her racism also. 

The Wall Street Journal tries to arm its racist readers with some arguments to defend the verdict. It säys that "police investigators made mistakes including failing to preserve the crime scene or to widely canvass the neighborhood in timely fashion." It was not racism see just some "mistake" the cops inexplicably made. They would not have made this mistake if the shooter had been black. He would most likely have been shot their on the street. There was a six week delay in arresting Zimmerman. And it only happened at all due to the pressure of the anti racist forces in the country. The local chief of police had to resign the role of the local racist cops was so bad. These events prove that the local cops supported Zimmerman with the exception of the one cop who in the first day or two said he should be charged.

This verdict strengthens the racist forces in this country who think it is open season on shooting young black males.

But let us look at who runs this country in the context of the murder of Trayvon Martin. . It is run by the major corporations which are dominated by the mainly white capitalist class. Their system is on a major offensive against the working class. All the gains made by the great revolts of the 1930's and 1960's are to be taken back. At the same time  their system cannot provide jobs for all. Full employment would mean a much stronger working class and with this would come a powerful thrust from the working class for a bigger share of the pie. This ruling capitalist class do not want this at all costs. So through the Federal Reserve they manipulate interest rates and through this unemployment rates to keep sufficient numbers of workers unemployed to weaken the working class. In this they particularly target the black working class and youth in order to con many white workers into thinking this is a question of race not a question of policy by the capitalist class. but what to do with these millions of mainly black workers and youth for whom their system will not provide jobs. The jail them, the US has 5% of the world's population and 25% of the world's prisoners, or they shoot them on the streets to intimidate those they cannot jail. This is the big picture of why Trayvon is dead.

Malcolm X said you cannot have capitalism without racism. this is what he meant. The working class  have to unite against the racist capitalist system. Those who think they can maintain a racist attitude or can sit out the struggle against racism are making a bad mistake. In the last analysis racism and the divide and rule tactics of the capitalist class that go with it are aimed at the working class as a whole.

Sean.

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Christopher Dorner: The Defector Who Went Out With A Bang

We share this piece from Glen Ford of the Black Agenda Report for our readers interest.

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford

The ghost of Nat Turner did not descend on LA over the past week, although lots of Black folks imagined as much. Christopher Dorner’s fans “embraced his death-throe defection from the LAPD, and imbued him with qualities they wish were reliably available to the struggle: a Nat Turner, or a Spook Who Sat By the Door.”

Christopher Dorner: The Defector Who Went Out With A Bang

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford

“Dorner is best described as a disaffected soldier in the ranks of the U.S. global and local Los Angeles occupation armies.”

Although his fans will argue otherwise, Christopher Jordan Dorner was neither a Nat Turner nor a Spook Who Sat by the Door.

Nat Turner was a leader of men, who inspired approximately 70 enslaved and free Black men in a glorious attempt to overthrow the slave system in Virginia, in 1831. The rebellion that goes by his name was a collective struggle that shook the slavocracy to its core, and one of the few U.S. slave revolts that was not betrayed by informers. Christopher Dorner enlisted no one in his fatal and solitary vendetta against those he felt had done him personal harm. He died alone trying to hide his huge Black self in a mostly white mountain recreation area, leaving behind a “manifesto” that was mainly about himself and his service to the national and local armed forces.

Chris Dorner was no Dan Freeman, the protagonist “Spook” of the 1973 movie about an urban Black rebellion in the United States. Freeman is a Black nationalist who joins – infiltrates – the CIA, learns all he can about their evil arts, then returns to the Black community to train a cadre of urban guerilla fighters. The war of liberation catches fire. Christopher Dorner’s manifesto reveals a man who – until the unraveling – had been wholly captured by the myth and mystic of superpower America, a proud reserve lieutenant in the imperial Navy and officer in the LAPD who wanted only to serve with personal honor as a man-at-arms.

Dorner is best described as a disaffected soldier in the ranks of the U.S. global and local Los Angeles occupation armies, who made his psychologically break with the forces of racial oppression – or, was broken by them – only after having first been ejected. He transformed his ejection into a bloody defection, and flamed out – effectively, a suicide-by-cop (and, almost certainly, a victim of execution by white phosphorous-like incendiary).

“He transformed his ejection into a bloody defection, and flamed out.”

His self-definition could not survive separation from the institution that became his personal nemesis. In the end, he was as lonely as Rambo in First Blood, and just as politically lost.

A public death belongs to the public. Dorner’s fans, his African American public, whom he did not serve but who would inevitably embrace his weeklong death-throe defection from the LAPD, imbue him with qualities they wish were reliably available to the struggle: a Nat Turner, a Spook Who Sat by the Door. The Bronx, New York dope dealer, Larry Davis, who in1986 succeeded in shooting six of seven cops who came to his sister’s apartment to arrest or assassinate him, achieved similar fame. Davis eluded capture for 17 days, negotiated a surrender at his public housing hideout as residents chanted "Lar-ry! Lar-ry!" – and beat the charges of attempted murder of cops. (William Kunstler and Lynne Stewart were his lawyers.) His fans forgave Davis’s dope dealing ways, just as Dorner’s fans forgave his previous service to the Los Angeles Occupation Army.

The enduring lesson of Dorner’s saga is that the transformation of the LAPD into a majority-minority police force does not change its nature as an army of occupation whose mission is racist to the core, regardless of its ethnic composition. That fact finally dawned on Christopher Dorner – and it killed him.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

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