Some things must be discussed, and when the justice system is failing, there is a lot to say. This was written before the protests of 2020, but I waited to post it.
Carpo 2020/4/23 Authority, Broken Oaths, and the Failure of Honesty
What does it take for you to feel secure in your home? Do you rely on the police and the government to protect you against crime and chaos? If we depend on others as our sole protectors, we are contributing to one of the biggest problems we have in our country, the excess use and abuse of power by those who have sworn to protect our constitution.
We have been immersed in the drug war, the culture war, and the slow creation of a police state for so long, the slow decay of our liberties has slipped by unnoticed. The consistent failures of every agency from local police departments to the ATF, from the courtrooms to the internal 'investigations' by police on one another, has made it clear that if we want to feel truly safe, it will only be as good as the illusion we create for ourselves.
Nobody has an issue with the legal system until they become part of it, and things quickly change once you walk through that door. I will not deny there are some people who do not belong in a civilized society, though it is unfortunate then many of them are the very people we pay to protect us.
To compare cults with police departments is not too far off base. In a cult, they control through fear. The only difference is that police are all their own leaders, for one team, and it often differs from what the people hired them to do. But this is not a hatred for police, nor government. When these elements operate properly, a safe and covil society can take hold. And for a time, we may have been headed there in this country. But something happened when we bagan arming police with tanks, greandes and automatic weapons. Then to add to the problems, officers who do not know the locals, or walk the beat any longer. There is a separation, the 'Us and Them' mentality that takes place.
But local police arresting you on the corner for smoking a joint, or slamming you to the street for jaywalking, or shooting you in the back for running.... these are merely the tip of the iceberg. When it comes to agencies like the FBI, the CIA and the ATF, the crimes comitted by these agencies through the years could make even the most hardened cartels cringe by their very nature. We have lists of assassination targets by our own government during the 1960's and beyond, radicals or protestors, rebels and troublemakers, anyone who dare speak up for their rights. We had project MK-ULTRA, our own government's mind control experiments, where unwitting patients were institutionalized and fed vast amounts of LSD and anti-psychotics, mere guinea pigs for new psychiatric drugs. Not just soldiers, but ordinary citizens. And these were not held by cartels, or Yakuza, but by our own tax dollars. Our own agencies. Our 'protectors' by definition, as pathetic as it may sound. These are all documented and declassified facts, that are hard to stomach for many, so they merely ignore them. In the past, not our problem, but do you think they just quit and moved to purely legal methods?
You can tell yourself that, if you want to. But we know it isn't true.
And all the while, White Collar America continued on their way ignorant of, or in spite of, the fact we were killing off any voices that dare dispute the status quo.
Then there are the stories of the lone crazies living in a cabin, where the official narrative is that a nutcase stocks up on guns and moves off to nowhere in order to.... fight with the government? This is hardly the case. You may have heard of Ruby Ridge, where a man named Randy Weaver was in just that situation. The ATF spent four long years trying to get him to work with them in a sting operation. He refused. He had moved to the woods with his wife, and three children. At one point, he sold two sawed off shotguns to an undercover agent, who had continually pressured him, as many cases of entrapment go. To tell the whole story here would go far off topic, but it is a story that all should know. They surrounded his house, shot his 13 year old son, then a sniper missed him and shot his wife while he was standing in the doorway. At the end of the standoff, he surrendered, and spent 18 months in jail for the weapons charge, in spite of losing half his family over nothing. In the end, he did win a settlement, but what good is money when you lose your family?
To save face, after the incident, the ATF was close to losing funding due to many past failures and poor results. It was at this time, they decided to find a bigger case to show they were worthy of keeping around. The story goes, there was this cult leader down in Texas, a little place called WACO. And the rest is history.
The same agents from Ruby Ridge also worked WACO, and if you only know what you have heard on the news, you would think that David Koresh was a completely insane cult leader. And, to be honest, I couldn't disagree with that assessment. However, I was born in the US. In this country, you are free to believe whatever you want, and be as weird as you choose, so long as you leave others alone to choose for thsemselves. A cult might be borderline when it comes to free choice, but it is still a choice.
And for the most part, the government would have agreed, had it not been for the fact he was said to have purchased and possibly altered a small arsenal of firearms in his compound at Mt. Carmel. Despite anyones' opinion on firearms, it is a second amendment right and therefore I would expect any large group trying to protect themselves to have the proper defenses. It may seem like I am an apologist for a cult, and in a way, I guess I am. But let's get to the point.
The seige lasted 52 long days. According to those in the compound, the police fired first, and they fired back, killing 4 agents. This started an almost two month long standoff, ultimately costing the lives of 76 of the Branch Didivians, including 25 children, not to mention $13 million in tax dollars. It was one of the biggest travesties by our givernment that was televised and had that kind of media sensation.
Why do I bring up this specific case? Because according to those who were in the compound, it was the tear gas that was pumped into the building by tanks which knocked over the lamps, and started the fire. The story goes, they intended to send the children out, but they were trapped by the fire, and they all perished.
If you listen to the official narrative, you will hear that the Dividians fired first on officers, and after 52 days they started a fire and burned themselves alive. This hardly sounds plausible, considering how adamant they were to defend themselves, and being Christians, suicide is not acceptable. In this case, their beliefs play an important role in determining what may have really happened.
In both cases, Ruby Ridge, as well as WACO, the overreach of government police and a lack of proper procedure led to the loss of lives, with no rhyme or reason. It seems that once a team of police, the FBI, the ATF or any other agency has their sites set on someone, they will never back down, and must save face. You will never hear an admission of failure, and very rarely will anyone be punished for poor choices. And these are choices that cost lives, and livelihoods.
When Timothy McVeigh detonated a bomb in Oklahoma city in 1995, he said it was in response to the abuse and overreach of the federal government, after seeing what happened in WACO and elsewhere. And the cycle continues, an eye for an eye, a few pissed off groups, a lot of angry people who lost loved ones, then it all fades from the public eye. And this is not random, it is a recurring pattern. Remembering the failures of our own government has never been a strong point for us.
The blame is always on the criminal, regardless of fault, as the police will almost never admit a mistake, and they have little oversight. But those who are in charge most often side with the officers.
The ATF for example has not had a director in over 10 years, due to congress and holdups, but they like it that way. These agencies have free reign to do whatever they feel, without any observance from the public. Some of these three-letter-agencies are so far outside the legal system, they have no requirements to follow the law, or the very constitution they are sworn to uphold. Just as large companies are said to be 'Too Big to Fail', many irrelevant and outdated agencies like the ATF merely change to a new acronym, and start all over again.
The public, for what it's worth, have ignored these injustices for too long. Unless you have personally been in the 'system', spent time in jail, or the courts, you may have no idea how corrupted and disgusting the justice system really is. It is beyond a mess. It has become about funding, and seizing property, instead of making the country safer. In fact, the ATF has been accused several times of seeking out and confiscating collectors guns, rather than street weapons, because they can be sold for more at auction, giving more funding to the agency.
This is all too common in local police forces as well, as civil forfeiture allows them to take your money, your car, or any valuables, without charging you with any crime. And you may or may not get it back. I will repeat that- the police can pull you over, ask if you have a large amount of money, and if you answer yes, they can take it from you, send you on your way, and claim it was for drugs. This happens all the time.
In some places it is so bad the federal government eliminated the ability for departments to keep what htey seize, as it promotes harassment for profit. I don't know why people would tell police how much money they have, but then again, I don't know why a cop would ask a stranger that either. When civil forfeiture comes into the mix, it becomes clear what is happening. The courts continue adding fines, keeping people in perpetual debt, and the cycle continues. I won't even get into the cost of private prisons, policing for profit is just part of the big picture. Nobody cares until it happens to them.
To live in a civil society, however we may define it, requires a few basic rules we can agree on. And while we will never agree on all ideas, we should start with what we expect from those we pay to protect us from danger.
For one, all police as well as federal police agencies should have as much, if not more, training in de-escalation as they do in using their firearms, as it seems that mentally ill people are killed far too often without any discussion.
Victimless crimes, such as drug use, are never a reason to physically harm someone during an arrest. It is totally unacceptable.
Running away from a store after shoplifting should never be an excuse to punch and beat you down when you are caught.
Selling loose cigarettes can get you choked to death.
Driving erratically or stealing a car is not a reason for ten cop cars to chase them through town at 100 miles per hour on the freeway. Often, the police are more concerned with being shown up or proven wrong than actually saving lives, and under pressure this can become very clear.
No agency should be able to keep funds they confiscate, that is a complete conflict of interest. As well as quotas to fill, and profiling junk cars because those with no means cannot fight back, and might, just might, have some drugs in their pocket.
On top of all this, we find that officers lie about their reasons for harassing people, and when caught they lie on the stand. Police are caught planting drugs to make an arrest, or creating traps in small towns to pull over anyone going one mile over the speed limit, to fill the town's lack of funds to operate. Policing for profit is a very common practice especially in smaller communities. In the cities, we just fill the jails and prisons so we can ask for more tax dollars. Without restitution, or education, sending people to prison for minor offenses only makes matters worse.
For a nation that has only 5% of the world's population, the US holds 20% of the worlds prisoners. Think about that for a minute.
And most people give it no thought until they themselves are a victim of abuse by authority. One random day you are accused of something you did not do, treated like a criminal, and sit in a concrete cell. It is not fun, and seldom does anything to fix the underlying problem. The people who are most marginalized and have no power are used by the system as pawns to gather more tax dollars, or fill a quota. Those who have enough money however can merely buy their way out of jail, or lobby the courts to change the laws.
But although many of the problems stem from local and state police, What about these three-letter agencies that use up our tax dollars? How can we make them accountable, and be sure they will not use excessive force on those who do not require it. How do we monitor and grade these agencies, and hold them to the standards they took an oath to uphold?
Well, in short, we can't. At this point the separation of people and their government is so vast, one can hardly see the other side of the valley. Voices and complaints go unheard, lawsuits over false arrests and raids are ignored or denied. There is an unspoken delusion out there among many that the cops are always right, and if you don't wanna get in trouble, don't break the law. But that argument is so weak I can barely address it. I guarantee each of you know someone who has been wronged by the courts, or the police, or you know many. It is just one of those 'facts of life' for too many citizens, and is much worse in areas with a lower income. Sure, with poverty comes crime.
But why is there poverty? Please ask yourself, who are the real criminals out there? The ones who buy and sell drugs in the streets, or the ones who sell them in a package on the shelves? When was the last time you saw a pharmaceutical CEO go to jail for misrepresenting a dangerous product? It doesn't happen very often.
Too big to fail is what we are told.
And when the police are fired for misconduct, as rare as it is, they keep their pension and salary. I see a problem there, as if any other citizen broke the law or wronged another, they would be charged and fined. Not given more money.
The real criminals out there more often wear uniforms, as well as suits and ties, not street clothes. And not only do they know better, but they seldom even need the money. The reason we have petty criminals is partially due to a system that rewards white-collar crime with a handshake, and uses the poor as pawns for tax revenue. This may sound dark, and it is, but reality is reality. If you don't have a good lawyer and enough for bail, good luck to ya. Enjoy your stay. Most of the low level criminals and drug dealers are merely trying to make it by in a society that has fewer options every year. This does not excuse bad behavior, or selling poison, but it does bring to light the reality that drugs always find their way to the user. And punishing drug dealers may have some merit, but throwing people in jail for using drugs is a travesty, and goes nowhere. Oregon recently decriminalized all drugs, so we will see how that turns out, but I would imagine the policing resources could be better used looking for crime than harassing a guy smoking a joint.
These inconsistencies in how we treat our citizens, and the way that those in charge always get away scott free, makes on wonder if things can ever change. The system is far too complex today and we have no recourse if we get eaten up by it. Unless, of course, you have enough money. With enough of that stuff, you can buy your way out of about anything.
Is this Justice? I am not so sure if we know what justice is anymore, and what's worse, many do not concern themselves with it until they are personally affected.
But in my view, it is a travesty.
Remember this, even the strange guy down the street has a story. It is not that the police seek out people by chance, it is us telling on one another. This guy seems unstable, or that guy has a lot of wives. regardless of the reasons, consider that being odd does not equate to being a danger, nor does being a drug dealer, or selling counterfeit products. We have to use caution before we ask the police or any agency for help. US citizens depend far too often on another authority to solve their problems, and that is a weakness. Cops don't always solve problems, so if you can, at least try to deal with it yourself.
An example of this is how people have been caling the police on groups of people who are 'breaking quarantine' and going out to the parks, or gathering in groups. To clarify, this is written durinng the coronavirus pandemic of 2020. And to what end do we call them? So the police can show up, arrest them for breaking the law, and throw them in jail with more potential for interaction? It makes no sense, and is just one example of many where people just need to learn to deal with things themselves, or mind their own business; Because we can solve our own problems, but if we rely on others to do it for us, we all pay the price of a police state before we realize what happened. And many times the things we consider problems are merely misunderstandings. Talking with people goes a long way.
When police are bored, they tend to find even the most minimal infractions worthy of their time, and likewise, in larger cities, they spend less time on trivialities. There is no consistency, because being an authority is complicated, and one has a lot to deal with. So I do understand that being in that position brings some risks and difficulties, but it is never an excuse for excessive force. Ever. Whether it be a guy smoking a joint, or a whole compounds full of children. If you are hired to do a job, you owe the people you work for to understand how to do it efficiently, and lawfully. There is no excuse to have only 2 hours of de-escaltion training each year, when so many police lose their cool under the slightest of pressure.
I suppose one might mention the military surplus that police departments have been buying over the past few decades, to the point where even some small towns have a tank for their SWAT team, and when you have that kind of firepower it is only a matter of time until you find somewhere to use it. Far too many people have been killed in poorly executed raids, many times at the wrong house. Or on bad intel.
So let's try and do better. Let's demand responsibility and accountability by those in charge, and work harder for a better future. Maybe we bring back the stockade for small infractions, and the guillotine for the Bankers.
Just kidding.
But not really. I am not sure what we can do about a police state, if anything, if we cannot recognize that the system works for itself. It is not some conspiracy, or hatred for authority, but rather a recognition that any time power is concentrated in the hands of a few, it is abused. History repeats itself, as it always has, until society becomes aware of its own needs. And failures.
Remembering that the police, FBI, DEA, CIA and every other agency is paid with our hard earned tax dollars, we deserve transparency, and honesty. When a sworn officer makes a mistake, or breaks the law, they need to be charged just like any other citizen. Otherwise, the power structure is not with the people any longer.
And without accountability, we are merely a police state.
Is that what we really
want?
I don't think so.
Be safe out there.