It took a cop pepper-spraying a bunch of peaceful protesters to get the media to show up, but at least the NY Times has finally posted a story about the Wall Street protests. Here, again, is the video of the pepper spraying incident, helpfully slowed down at key moments.
Now, having watched that, can you take at all seriously this statement by the NYPD?
The Police Department’s chief spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said the police had used the pepper spray “appropriately.”
“Pepper spray was used once,” he added, “after individuals confronted officers and tried to prevent them from deploying a mesh barrier — something that was edited out or otherwise not captured in the video.”
Now, unless there was some very super-sophisticated editing going on in that video, and I frankly doubt that, the statement just seems ridiculous, doesn’t it? The mesh barrier was already up long before the pepper-sprayer walks up. The cop himself (apparently named Anthony Bologna, and apparently with other civil rights complaints against him) wasn’t even involved in the mesh barrier – he walks up, sprays the protesters who are already penned in, and then walks away.
I trust someone is going to call the NYPD on this. Mr. Mayor?
Multiple videos caught the police officer in question. As Digby eloquently wrote on her blog, the police officer committed an act of thuggery and violated nearly every single NYPD rule on the use of mace/pepper spray, and then the policies of what’s supposed to happen AFTER people are sprayed. He simply walked up, sprayed them, then left. He didn’t ensure they had water to rinse out their eyes, call an ambulance to come and make sure they were okay (per the NYPD’s guidelines) or anything of the like. It was simply an act of corrupt thuggery.
Police have a tough job, but they have to be held to not only higher standards in society — but the highest of standards. Those standards are what seperates a free society from a police state, or a state where corruption rules supreme. Cops that commit acts of thuggery like that need to be fired and charged with whatever crimes they’ve committed, which in this case must at least be assault.
Finally, it’s important to note that this officer has a history of abuse of protesters going as far back as the Bush protests at the national republican convention years ago. T
hat he was even allowed out there is unbelievable. He simply must be removed from active duty, and the NYPD must seriously look into itself to see why it’s own regulations weren’t practiced on that day — and why they’d then go and lie about it, suggesting it was all somehow kosher and that it must have been the video editing. Yeah, right. Thankfully, everyone has a video camera at their fingertips nowadays… and the forces that be don’t have to just worry about the one video, but several.
I forgot to include the link to Digby’s blog, which explains all of this far better than I could. http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/nypd-pepper-spray-procedure.html
list of NYPD ranks, it looks like the white shirts are administrative supervisors. If Bologna is a deputy inspector, he was appointed by the Police Commissioner, not through the civil service exam. Does he have a guardian angel?
Are these guys in white taking extra duties? Supervising?
There are good cops and bad cops and some good cops who are bad at some things. I don’t know what this guy is, but after having watched the video several times and now in slow-motion, it looks like the cover story won’t cover more than a thong on a Brazilian beach. There’s a guy who rushes the fence and is pulled back, he looks like the only violator.
Lawrence O’Donnell absolutely slams the police actions in NYC, and makes a harsh assessment of U.S. police in general.
A man’s head smashed into a car just for carrying a video camera. Marvelous.
A primer of what’s to come if we Democrats continue to be Serious Responsible Adults. 18 years of triangulation, and here we are.
Metro September 27, 2011 coverage of Occupy Boston
(Warning: Serious, Responsible Adult Democrats please read no further.)
This is about Wall Street. Wall Street has all of the money now, politicians can be purchased for a few shekels these days, and thus Wall Street has almost all of the power. Therefore, the politicians (and of course the police) will push back hard against any disciplinary action that might slow police activities in the future that may be needed to protect Wall Street.
This is what we’re dealing with today. We can no longer look to our current crop of politicians for help. Instead, to turn this around:
1. We need a ground-up movement that scares the bejesus out of Wall Street. They need to know that if their rapacious behavior continues, they will be in severe pain. The Bankers need jail time, not more taxpayer bailouts.
2. We must elect new politicians, ones that work for the other 99%. The only thing that the 99% have left in our arsenal is the vote, and even that’s become suspect in some parts of the country (Diebold shenanigans, etc.)
Until we face up to these responsibilities, we continue into the abyss. The video in question and the response to date are a clear illustration of where we’re headed.
Noam Chomsky supports Occupy Wall Street
Michael Moore has arrived in Liberty Plaza which is what the Occupy Wall street folks, who are now into their second week, have remaned a park.
During the Vietnam War, the armed forces were directed to bomb dikes. Civilians not sympathetic to the South Vietnamese government were being systematically murdered. Napalm rained from the sky. There was plenty to be outraged at — and it was clear what the outrage was about. Protests made explicit sense.
Likewise during the Civil Rights movement in the 50s and 60s. The sources of outrage were on everyone’s television screen.
Moral witness was just what was needed. The protests conveyed a message. And even then, the message had to overcome a lot of dismissive noise.
And today? Yes, there are outrages committed by Wall Street. The outrages people know about are the executive bonuses and maybe TARP. The outrages people don’t seem to know about are worse (mortgage-back securities, regulatory capture, and illegal foreclosures say).
But if we compare napalm maiming children and police dogs attacking Freedom Riders, the outrages of Wall Street are obscure. Whatever message the protesters are attempting to convey, the dismissive noise will overwhelm it much more easily. Conventional Wisdom, after all, is that we’re all just envious of the rich. We should just get over it because they’re why we have jobs.
There’s something frighteningly, terribly wrong about how wealth is concentrating and about how the financial sector insists on taking undue risks with everyone’s happiness and prosperity. I just don’t think that’ll be conveyed by “If you’re hungry, eat a banker” and a whole lot of incoherent rage.
We could look back and clearly describe the “message” from protests in the past, but I have the sneaking suspicion that, just like at these protests, individuals had their own reasons for being their, their own messages. In other words — the unified message you speak of is, in part, owing to hindsight.
During the Vietnam days, some may have been there because they were angry about our youth dying, others because they didn’t want to be drafted, others because they thought it was a waste of resources, some who were mostly upset with the atrocities being committed in our name and still others because, well, everyone else was doing it — and so on and so forth.
I don’t see how that’s different from what we have today, if you look at it from that lens. Some people are angry that they’re unemployed and can’t find work. Others are angry that they’re stuck in a shitty job that they’d like to leave, but there’s no other options. Others lost their home, or had their interest rates doubled on their credit cards even if they never made a late payment. Still others are pissed about Wall Street’s greasy hands controlling government. Etc. Etc. Etc.
The “unifying message” of the protests will, in any ways, come later — the anger and the action has to come first.
I think the American people, when it’s all said and done, will “get” the message just fine. Why? Well, 99% have similar experiences to these protesters. These protests are all about having a society that works for people and not just corporations. If the media actually covers the story and does so honestly, no one should have trouble getting that. After all, it’s not all that complicated.
Well, yes, there was a lot of opposition to the Vietnam War based solely on the effect of the draft: lots of young men were dying from a broad cross-section of the country. But all these motivations had one goal: to get the U.S. out of the war. Multiple meanings but simple goal. Also the protests against the Seabrook nuclear reactor and against Reagan’s support for the brutal Salvadoran government and the Contras in the Nicaragua. Again the goals were crystal clear. These kinds of protests made a statement; they had a clear purpose.
What do we want someone to do as a result of the Wall Street protests? Campaign finance reform? End of regulatory capture? Reinstitution of Glass-Steagall? Changes to charters on corporate governance?
These would all be good things, but eat-the-bankers, I’m-mad-at-rich-people protests don’t communicate that.
To make demands, one must have demands.
Sadly, the primary effect of the anti-war demonstrations was to re-elect Richard Nixon. At Mr. Nixon’s direction, Spiro Agnew used the “hard hats” and sympathetic police departments to bait the protest movement into front-page violent confrontations with police. Mr. Nixon and his re-election committee correctly calculated that the immediate political effect would be to drive mainstream voters away from the “liberal” Democrats and into the Nixon camp. The result was that George McGovern lost in a landslide of historic proportion.
I think protests like these in New York (was there one in Boston yesterday?) are important and I hope they continue. I also think that they will drive away votes at the beginning. In my opinion, we are past the point where voting or politics will solve this problem. The now-dominant arch-conservative right wing lost elections for nearly 20 years between the 1964 candidacy of Barry Goldwater and the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan.
It appears to me that we are now entering the second dip of a catastrophic double-dip recession. We have ignored the lessons of 1937 America and 1997 Japan and done precisely the WRONG thing in response to the immediate aftermath of the 2008 crash. We are entering a devastating “deleveraging recession” and our current policies — led by our clueless and directionless President — are worsening the crisis.
I’m glad to see these protests. I do not expect them to change votes or (immediately) policy. It’s going to get much worse before it gets better.
I’m sorry to be so negative this morning.
The corporations own the government, have Public Affairs and presstitutes to ignore or bend truth to their purpose, and have force that can destroy any opposition with unimaginable fury, should they so wish to release it. (Anyone so naive as to believe the violence now rained down on people on the other side of the world wouldn’t be released here?)
(Now, what did Mayor Bloomberg do before he was mayor? Does anyone think he works for the people of NY now?)
Yes, we need to turn this around. The future looks bleak as I write this. The largest number of our federal elected are merely money pits for the corporations. Party affiliations don’t even matter.
Where are the people to replace them? Heck, it looks like our “Part of the Problem” President isn’t even to face opposition for his nomination. That should make your jaws tight.
Your right, but it will be a long, dangerous struggle to bring the ideal of freedom back to the people.
“Educate and inform the whole mass of the people… They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.” –Thomas Jefferson