Police State America

A callous and cruel system. By Abbey Zimet Common Dreams (11/23/18) Thanksgiving weekend, but the barbarism of the Trump regime goes on apace. On Friday, plainclothes ICE officers in North Carolina ambushed and arrested Samuel Oliver-Bruno, a 47-year-old undocumented construction worker from Mexico in the U.S. for over 20 years who’s been living in the basement of a sanctuary church for 11 months while he petitions to stay here with his sick wife and teenage son. Oliver-Bruno left Durham’s CityWell United Methodist Church, part of the state’s growing faith-based sanctuary movement, for an alleged meeting with immigration officials, who told him he had to come in person to provide fingerprints for his…

  By Tom McCarthy The Guardian (10/15/18) One of the insidious ironies of fascist politics, the philosopher Jason Stanley writes in his arresting new book, is that talk of fascism itself becomes more difficult because it is made to seem outlandish. The normalization of the fascist myth “makes us able to tolerate what was once intolerable by making it seem as if this is the way things have always been”, Stanley writes. “By contrast the word ‘fascist’ has acquired a feeling of the extreme, like crying wolf.” “My family background has saddled me with difficult emotional baggage, but it also, crucially, prepared…

  By Julia Conley Common Dreams (9/6/18) Attempting to change two decades of precedent, the Trump administration announced its intention Thursday to lift court-ordered limits on how long migrant children can be detained—a proposal multiple critics promptly denounced as “Gitmo for children.” The administration said Thursday it intends to enter into the Federal Register new regulations that would allow it to hold families who have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border indefinitely, for the duration of their immigration proceedings—a period that could last years. “Locking up children indefinitely is cruel and heartless, even for the Trump administration,” CREDO Action campaign manager Nicole Regalado…

“The future of the country is up to you.” By John W, Whitehead The Rutherford Institute (8/30/18) WASHINGTON, DC — “What’s the greatest threat we face today? Our own government!” warned constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, in a chilling message delivered at the third annual Ron Paul Institute’s Peace and Prosperity Conference. Whitehead spoke on the far-reaching ramifications of domestic militarization and the transformation of America into a war zone. Whitehead’s speech can be viewed at www.rutherford.org. “Our founding fathers warned us not to have a standing army on American soil. We did not heed that…

  Lesson 17. Watch out for the paramilitaries. When the men with guns who have always claimed to be against the system start wearing uniforms and marching around with torches and pictures of a Leader, the end is nigh. When the pro-Leader paramilitary and the official police and military intermingle, the game is over. — Timothy Snyder, ‘On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century’ ***** ACLU Of Oregon Comment On The Portland Police Bureau’s Response To Protests ACLU of Oregon (8/5/18) PORTLAND, Ore. — After the violence against protesters and observers yesterday [8/4] in Portland, David Rogers, executive director of the…

  By Duaa Eldeib, Jodi S. Cohen & Melissa Sanchez ProPublica (8/2/18) Soon after Christmas 2015, three boys were left unattended in the TV room of a Des Plaines shelter that houses immigrant children and is operated by Heartland Human Care Services. One boy performed oral sex on an older boy, state child welfare records show. The older boy then tried to penetrate him from behind. When that was unsuccessful, the younger boy performed oral sex on the older boy a second time. The third boy in the room, the youngest, had been playing video games. He then walked to the door to…

By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (6/25/18) Even by Donald Trump’s bottom-scraping standards, the past week has been a head-spinning, heartbreaking gut punch to the nation. As Trump, Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions II and White House resident Hitler Reich Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels look-a-like Stephen Miller ramped up the federal child kidnapping and imprisonment scheme any doubts about what we are facing should have gone up like an out-of-control dumpster fire. In case you haven’t noticed, we have spun far, far beyond the run-of-the-mill Republican vs Democrat, conservative vs liberal, right vs left paradigm of usual American…

[Editors Note: The accompanying video to this story is agonizing to watch. The once-through routine is bad enough but then we see the TSA agent go over the same already felt-up areas of the body a second time. Apparently, one-time molestation and humiliation isn’t good enough these days. I believe the “wand” that is used is to detect evidence of explosive residue. Until we see the parents and grandparents of White House staff and congressional enablers get this kind of treatment we can only expect to see things get worse. Meanwhile, avoid flying whenever possible. Road trip! — Mark L….

  By Julia Conely Common Dreams (2/9/18) Defense lawyers for anti-racism activists who staged a counter-protest at a white supremacist rally in California in 2016 say that state police demonstrated sympathy for the neo-Nazis who organized the event and worked with them to arrest the counter-demonstrators. Documents related to the court case of three anti-fascist activists, who were charged with felonies for attempting to disrupt the Traditionalist Workers Party’s (TWP) rally, show that a California Highway Patrol (CHP) investigator assured a white supremacist that he would protect his anonymity and told another he was being seen as a victim in…

  (Editor’s Note: Whenever the majority permits the abuse and persecution of some, it is just a matter of time before that creeping totalitarian abuse affects everyone. History has shown that over and over. Beware my fellow citizens — the freedom of you and your children are at risk. – Mark L. Taylor) By Andea Germanos Common Dreams (1/10/18) Immigrant rights advocates denounced the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids carried out Wednesday at nearly 100 7-Eleven stores across the nation. According to Cristobal Gutierrez, employment legal advocate at Make the Road New York, they are “yet another example of the escalating attacks…

  Southern Poverty Law Center (11/30/17) SPLC President Richard Cohen testified Thursday [11/30] before the U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security about the need to focus on domestic terrorism from the radical right. Cohen delivered the following oral remarks to the committee chaired by U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul, in addition to written testimony. Thank you, Chairman McCaul, and thank you, Ranking Member Thompson. Members of the committee, it’s an honor to be here today. Charlottesville truly was a wake-up call for our country. It was a reminder that the oldest form of terrorism our country has ever known is still with…

  By Samayia Taylor Nation of Change (9/30/17) In America, college students are just arriving on their campuses- some for the first time- ready to start the new academic year. They have a wide range of interests and goals, from bringing about the latest medical breakthrough to wanting to change U.S. foreign policy. Some may even want to become President. One thing they all have in common though, is that they have just entered a time in their lives where they will explore, learn, and- most importantly- be able to express themselves. At the same time as millions of American college…