Across the United States the police are under siege. For decades they have done their best to help keep order in our cities large and small and maintain regular training schedules in an effort to ensure that the police officers given the responsibility to enforce the law have the tools they need to assist all people in their cities.
They are honest and hard working people who have a passion for helping others and especially protecting people who need to be able to leave their homes so they can live the American Dream and enjoy the 'pursuit of happiness'. The police are not the enemy. They are not racists or any thing of the sort. They are intelligent and hard working. They are well educated and in most cases well trained.
In every well publicized arrest involving a black person, where police misconduct has been alleged, especially racism, the police have been found to be Not Guilty. That is because there has never been any credible evidence presented to show that they were guilty of acting out of race prejudice.
Henry Gates was made famous by President Barack Obama when he was arrested by the police in his own home. Without conducting any investigation at all the president said the police officers 'acted stupidly' and were probably racists; they wouldn't have arrested Gates if Gates had been a white man. The fact is that the police did not call themselves to the Gates residence. They were responding to a 911 call for service. The call stated that two black meh were breaking into a residence. The police were met by Gates at the front door to the residence and when they explained why they were there and asked to see a photo ID Gates immediately accused them of being racist and refused to provide any identification since he was in his own house and the police should somehow automatically know that. It was as if the responding officer had shouted "Hey! (fill in the probable racial slur here since I can't even to illustrate a point since liberals have all but killed the First Amendment) what are you doing in this white man's house. We have to assume they thought the house belonged to a white person since all police officers are racists who believe a black man can't own a nice home in Cambridge Massachusetts. After repeatedly accusing the police of racist behavior, "Why, because I'm black?" Gates did finally show them his Harvard photo ID. The fact is that criminals do break into other people's houses frequently. It is probably one of the most reported crimes. And some of those criminals happen to be black. The police didn't know who Gates was even though he told them he was a very important person, "You don't know who you are dealing with!"
Gates wasted precious time and resources by refusing the very reasonable request that he provide some proof that he lived at that location. How difficult would it have been to cooperate with the police, thank them for their response and then let them leave in peace? I know this will be hard to believe but sometimes the police receive burglary calls at houses that are actually owned by white people and when they arrive at the white person's home and the door is answered by a white person they asked to see ID from them too. And the white person then shows them their ID because they know the police don't really know who lives in that house. Once the ID has been made they thank the police for the response and let them go in peace. That may sound racist to some, but it is a fact.
But this highly educated professor couldn't do that. There is no evidence at all that the police acted out of racial animus, but there is ample evidence that Gates does not like the police simply because they are the police. And that is a liberal phenomenon. All a police officer has to do to be labeled a racist is stop a black person. The reason for the detention never matters, all that matters is race. Time magazine smugly asserted that Gates was arrested solely because he was black and they suggested that the police filed a false report, but were never punished. The charge against Gates was dropped and that was that.
Later in Ferguson, Missouri a black man was killed by a white police officer and there were riots across the city because obviously the police only killed the man because he was black. Nothing else mattered. There was nothing that man could have done to justify the use of deadly forced against him. The assumption always is that the police are out on a daily basis looking for black men to kill. No columnist ever publishes an opinion about why that particular black man was killed because no matter what he had done if he had been a white man the police would not have killed him. The police officer in Ferguson was brutally attacked by the black man. It didn't matter at all that the black man had tried to choke the police officer while the police officer was seated in his patrol car, or that the black man grabbed the police officer's pistol and tried to shoot him with it (when the investigation was finally conducted it was discovered that two shots had been fired from the service pistol inside the car) obviously if the bad guy had been white the police officer would have just shrugged it off and gone on to his next call. And he might have even given the white man the pistol! The police officer was fired and his reputation ruined because he was attacked by a black man and had to defend himself.
There have been other accusations of racism in other cities. In Baltimore a black man died in police custody after being injured while being transported in a police van after his arrest. Once again there is no evidence that race played any role in the man's death. The facts usually don't matter when a black man dies while in police custody and the violence, murder, and mayhem that follow is always justified. After all a black man died after being arrested by the police what more evidence do you need? The fact that the black man significantly contributed to his own death by failing to follow common sense rules like sitting in the chair of the vehicle while it is in motion doesn't matter. Neither does the fact that the police immediately took him to the hospital when they realized he had been injured. A black man died in police custody so it was necessary to destroy property loot stores and vandalize everything in sight.
Then in Minneapolis another black man was accidentally killed by a white police officer so of course there was a peaceful protest during which windows were smashed buildings and vehicles were burned and there was the mandatory theft of merchandise from the local department stores. Such things can be justified if a black man is killed by the police. And it gets even more ridiculous when you consider that riots condemning police brutality are justified in every major city in the country. Peaceful protest? In Dallas five police officers were shot dead. Evidently that's ok because they were white. Of course eleven other people were shot by the same bad guy, I'm not sure what their crimes were. Collateral damage I guess.
The rioting lasted for days. A lot of people were killed or injured and many millions of dollars in property damage occurred all across the nation and it is still going on in places like Portland Oregon and Seattle Washington, and to a lesser degree in other major cities.
I guess it all has my attention now because the officers accused of killing George Floyd are now finally facing their trial dates a year after the event. Nobody seems to care that the police came in contact with Floyd because they received a call about a possible crime and they had a duty to investigate. The undisputed fact is that if Floyd had cooperated with the police instead of choosing to fight them he might have still died that day, but not at that time by those police officers. The other undisputed fact is that he did die as a result of the actions taken by those police officers that day. And the undisputed fact a year later is that it will be just about impossible for those police officers to get a fair trial anywhere in America right now except possibly in a small rural community where there was no rioting and people won't put up with any rioting no matter how peaceful it is.
As far as I know the entire Minneapolis city council immediately condemned the entire police department. They voted to defund the police and spent weeks telling the world how bad police officers are. I think they even named streets or other public places after Floyd in his 'honor'.
This assault on the police disgusts me and I cannot remain silent. From East to West Americans have condemned all police officers as racist thugs who only want to kill black men. There is not a shred of evidence to support that patently absurd claim. Some police officers may harbor some feelings against black people so all police officers are racists or Uncle Toms? Are Americans really that stupid?
I watched the video of Floyd claiming he couldn't breathe and the police officer did continue to choke him for a long time and it is disturbing to watch. And there is a possible case to be made claiming that in the heat of the moment the police officer exercised bad judgement and possibly committed a negligent homicide. But there is no evidence at all that race played a role in the actions of that police officer. Poor training could be a factor. So could lack of proper supervision.
If the police officers are found guilty as charged it will be a lynching, not a trial. Any rioting going on in Minneapolis should be put down has hastily as possible and order should be restored immediately in order to help ensure those men receive a fair hearing.
As a police detective in Los Angeles for over thirty five years I had to accept the fact that I was a racist. Not because I hated black people, anyone who knows me knows that I don't hate anybody, especially because of their race. Stupid people do that. But the fact remains that sometimes white police officers are forced to kill bad guys who are black and to a large segment of Americans, especially those claiming to be 'Liberals' the only reason why that can happen is because the police are racists.
Liberals have been trying to prove for decades that the police are out on the street every day looking for black people to kill. And for reasons that no one can explain a lot of people believe them.
The last training session I attended as a police detective was taught by a black man who had a Ph. D. in something, I think he even had a book published, and was claiming that all white people, especially police officers, were racists even if they didn't realize it. He was a very pleasant man to talk to, I questioned him at length and he patiently explained that the very issues I raised were a result of my own latent racism. A racism so subtle that no one can see it, but they know it's there.
Fortunately my retirement date arrived shortly after that. I really don't see why the police in large liberal run cities even get out of their patrol cars except to eat and exercise. They get paid the same amount for doing nothing as they do for trying to help people, only the Los Angeles County District Attorney, a real beauty himself, can't charge them with a crime if they don't do anything.
To all of my brothers and sisters in uniform I salute you! I do miss the job in very many ways.
Be safe.
