While the rebellious streets in Charlotte seem to have quieted by a curfew and threats of National Guard deployment, and extra security at today's Panther's game against the Vikings hindered a planned protest, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department is no closer to telling the truth.
A recent internet furor has been had over the increase in the price of an Epipen. The drug's manufacturer, Mylan has raised the wholesale price from $56 to $461 since acquiring the patent eight years ago. An Epipen is life saving emergency medication for the severely allergic. If a person has allergies serious enough, they need the auto-injector within minutes or they are dead. There have been no new techniques for manufacturing, new research or nor costs for the drug. The price increase is simply a ransom on the lives of millions of people.
The now under construction Bakken pipeline, also termed the North Dakota access pipeline, is slated to stretch from the Bakken shale fields of North Western North Dakota to a terminal in Illinois. The oil that will flow down the pipeline will eventually feed Southern and Eastern markets, specifically including Ohio. The oil will be blasted out of the ground via hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking.
On August 26th hundreds of activists from Columbus and around the country will gather at the Barak Recreation Center to set the ground work for supporting a national prison work stoppage both in Ohio and in their local communities. Over 100 conference attendees have registered for the three day event from out of town alone. Local organizers from the Red Bird Books and other groups formed an adhoc committee to put together the event which is called Bend the Bars.
The Department of Justice recently announced that it would examine and not renew it's contracts for privately built and operated prisons. This was hailed by some reformers as a major victory for human rights, the federal budget and the Democratic Party's election efforts. Hillary Clinton is attempting to shore up her flagging support from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
It seemed like “just” another police shooting of a black person. By the incomplete statistics available, #SylvilleSmith in Milwaukee is number 183 this year. At the time of this writing that number has grown to 185 in 229 days or one every 29 hours. The total number of deaths by police violence will go up from 730 before this article is prosted. A 23 year old man's life would have been condensed to a blip on the late news as a local story.
Calling something a war is often an exercise in hyperbole. The Greek philosopher Aeschylus once said “In war, truth is the first casualty.” This has extended to the naming of wars “police actions” or calling them “operations” with names like “Restore Freedom” and “Inherent Resolve.” To cut through the Public Relations fog, one could define war as the late Jesse Helms defined pornography, “I know it when I see it.” One sees war in terms of casualties, and when using casualties for a lens to describe what American policing is doing the American public, one clearly sees a war.
Rodney King was the first break in the dam. The beating that sparked the rebellion in 1992 was not new. What was new was video cameras. Now everybody could see the unrestrained violence against the defenseless that America calls “law enforcement.” Consumer electronics have advanced. There are cameras in every phone. Video has now recorded the recent deaths Philando Castile and Alton Sterling. It did not record the less nationally known case of Henry Green V here in Columbus.
The door came down, the SWAT team came in, and Chad Moore went to prison. The Licking County based Central Ohio Drug Enforcement Task Force (CODE-TF) claims they found a box with bagged methamphetamine in the house, methamphetamine residue in a trailer on the property on Columbus Road in Granville, a marijuana grow operation and a cache of firearms. Four people were detained, only Moore was prosecuted and seizure proceedings were begun by the CODE-TF against the property to finance their paychecks and the purchase of military hardware from the United States Military.
On Wednesday July 27th a white supremacist militia threatened a planned rally to protest the death of Philando Castile in suburban Minneapolis. The rally and march had a Facebook events page that the group, The Twin Cities General Defence Committee of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW-GDC), was using to promote the protest. That page became littered with threats from white supremacists claiming allegiance to the Three Percent Militia, which has a history of physical confrontations with black lives matter protestors in the Minneapolis area.