It would be foolish to deny that there’s a specific significance when citizens are unjustly killed by the police, as a jury in Minneapolis determined last week happened to George Floyd. Armed agents of the state funded by taxpayer money have special obligations, and that includes avoiding the unjust killing of citizens. When the killing is captured on video, an intense emotional reaction is doubly understandable.
Seriously, thank you for your coverage. I live in Minneapolis, less than a mile from where George Floyd was killed and to say that the coverage of this city has been skewed would be a gross understatement. The way people in the press and online talk about what has happened in this city is infuriating to the point of tears for me. This past year, I witnessed two men attempt to drag a woman out of her car in broad daylight on a busy street. Just one block from me, on 2 separate occasions, a delivery driver was robbed at gun point and in one case the takeout they stole was abandoned behind my house. And just a few months ago, a woman was carjacked in the parking lot of our infant son's daycare with her 2 dogs in the car. And I consider myself lucky. As the riots ensued last year, neighbors geared up each night, connecting hoses to put out fires and band together to fend off looters and arsonists (calling the cops, fire fighters, or ambulance wasn't an option since there was no one available to answer the call). During the day apartments and businesses boarded up and spray painted messages on the boards to make their case to the mob ("minority owned business " or a common one "children live upstairs"). Watching it unfold felt like a gut punch. More so when I went online to see people (mostly in NY and DC) post about how similar the riots here were to the Boston tea party. It seemed like everyone would only acknowledge facts of this situation which fit their narrative. Then our moronic city council announced that they would abolish the police and things went from terrible to worse. All summer, it was a free for all. Murders of mostly poor black neighbors, skyrocketed.When people in North Minneapolis spoke out about how dangerous the area had become, it fell on deaf ears. I remember seeing a woman in N Minneapolis post on Facebook about how her daughter asked to celebrate her birthday outside and then a bullet went through their house while they tried to celebrate outside. She posted a photo of the box of pasta that caught the bullet in her pantry.
As angry as I am with people who have justified all this from far away, I hope that that they never have to experience this. It's heartbreaking.
Still amazes me that a group like BLM can have so much grassroots support from Black people, when the most obvious product of BLM's actions is less policing in Black neighborhoods leading to more crimes being perpetrated against black people, especially violent crimes. Woke culture truly believes that ensuring Black people only get killed by other Black people is some kind of major social accomplishment, even when the violent death rate of Black people goes up as a consequence.
A close friend of mine teaches at a school in a poor area of Minneapolis. At the start of the school year, he asked how their summers had been. Every single one of his (very poor, mostly black) students knew someone who'd been shot. It's horrific.
“I don’t know what fool would think about defunding the police,” T.Y. — who was formerly in the Army — remarked. “Because once you do that, who’s gonna protect you?”
--------------------------
The fools who want to defund the police don't live in neighborhoods where the crime is and they have no interest in the people who do live there.
Wait, interviewing real people, eschewing experts? What sort of alchemy is this? Talking to white cops, Satan’s own minions on earth? Tracey is destined for Woke Hell, Dante’s 13th circle in which a Woke Twitter feed cannot be muted.
To put the 2020 homicides in perspective, scaled up for population this is about 1600 homicides in New York City. New York City had about 426 homicides in 2020. You have to go back to the early 1990's to see numbers like that in New York City. As you correctly point out, 8 out of 10 homicide *victims* were black during 2020. However, this is mainly black men as they were 8x more prevalent in homicide statistics than their share of the population.
I have been traveling to Minneapolis for decades. During a visit to downtown Minneapolis in the summer of 2019, my wife turned to me and said, "We never come back". She and I lived in New York City in the early 1990's when it set a record for homicides. She stood on subway platforms in the small hours of the morning with me. She walked through the Meatpacking District and Lower East Side after concerts. For her to say that we never return to Minneapolis was significant. It was reported that in early 2020, the Minneapolis Police Department was understaffed by 400 officers. This is part of the reason that the initial responding officers in the George Floyd incident were both rookies, with 3 out of 4 responding officers being rookies.
This didn't just start in 2020. Unfortunately I don't see it getting any better. Take a read about the death of Laneesha Columbus, killed on July 5, 2020 by Zachary Robinson. That killing says a lot about what is happening in Minneapolis and other major urban areas in the US.
Everyone, from the people in these communities, to the police serving them are victims of their own government officials. These stories are incredibly heartbreaking. And once again, Michael is the only journalist in the country who will seek them out and share them with us. I just don't get it.
Wow. Our "elite media institutions" are making it way too easy for you. First you report that there were actually riots last year and now you report that there are actually more Black people killed by individuals who are not police officers. Is your next piece going to be about how teenaged knife fights are actually a bad thing?
Yeah I know it's good reporting but remember, there is more work to be done fighting White Supremacy. It is the white, gun owning conservatives who are responsible for this. Now that Bad Orange Man Bad is gone, we must join in the Struggle to shed our White Privilege and work harder for St. George. #stopasianhate
But, propaganda and lies after lies everywhere....
Many are asking themselves just why would "journalists" do what Natasha Bertrand, Jeffrey Goldberg, Judith Miller, David Frum, zillion others that dominate NYT, WaPo, Atlantic, etc. do... Besides the obvious motives -- money and career.
A possible answer is -- "in shared interests" ---- easy to analyze how many among them are "beloved Bibi's" Likudniks, have they ever addressed the Gaza open air concentration camp, terror on Palestinians in apartheid Israel, expressed anything other than hatred for Iran.
The US administrations are sadistic regimes - irrespective if under Obama, Trump, or Biden -- that thrive on the misery of nations. Syria, for example, was once a self-sufficient country -- before America decided (remember 17 years ago !!) that secular socialist Syria needs “democracy and freedom”.
CIA aligned itself “patriotically” with Al Qaeda for regime change -- who, for years, has been weekly bombing Syria -- without hardly being even mentioned in the US corporate media..... But – there is a “genocide”, this time, in China – playing all of us like a violin.
For people to place identity politics or ideals above the thousands of years of epistemic knowledge that clearly shows that security is needed for society, and people to prosper is naive at best. Yes I absolutely commend and cheer for people dedicating their time and spirit to holding criminals with badges accountable, as they should be, and will be as technology and awareness rapidly increase. Can police be run better, more efficiently, most definitely.
Economic reform, is the only way we can reduce crime through reducing the demand for crime, instead of cracking heads, providing stability, and opportunity to families. This entire paradigm of White Fragility, White privilege and irreverent sociology babble, is a shell game. Identity politics and diction restrictions will not end racism. How many necks has Robin D’Angelo removed from the very real knee of systemic racism? Zero
Will breaking up the banks end racism? The same banks that prey on low income communities with high margin products and predatory lending, the same banks that created red lining, has refused black people their share of the American dream for centuries? It will do a whole hell of a lot more than firing tenured professors for using the term reverse racism, or thinking that any merit is inherently racist. This movement is theater, well rehearsed and orchestrated to foment maximum division.
After refreshing, honest writing as this I decided to subscribe to this author. I am familiar with his name and although our political views do not align, I have appreciated his insights.
Now that I subscribed,( and paid) I have to figure out what that means and how I access it in the future.
Don't fall into the anti/pro police binary. We need more clarity on how police just don't have the capacity to prevent crime or solve crime to a huge degree, no matter the funding. Interviewing the cop all sad, self-absorbed, zero self-reflection, so ironically fearful, is the story of policing today? More on that.
Seriously, thank you for your coverage. I live in Minneapolis, less than a mile from where George Floyd was killed and to say that the coverage of this city has been skewed would be a gross understatement. The way people in the press and online talk about what has happened in this city is infuriating to the point of tears for me. This past year, I witnessed two men attempt to drag a woman out of her car in broad daylight on a busy street. Just one block from me, on 2 separate occasions, a delivery driver was robbed at gun point and in one case the takeout they stole was abandoned behind my house. And just a few months ago, a woman was carjacked in the parking lot of our infant son's daycare with her 2 dogs in the car. And I consider myself lucky. As the riots ensued last year, neighbors geared up each night, connecting hoses to put out fires and band together to fend off looters and arsonists (calling the cops, fire fighters, or ambulance wasn't an option since there was no one available to answer the call). During the day apartments and businesses boarded up and spray painted messages on the boards to make their case to the mob ("minority owned business " or a common one "children live upstairs"). Watching it unfold felt like a gut punch. More so when I went online to see people (mostly in NY and DC) post about how similar the riots here were to the Boston tea party. It seemed like everyone would only acknowledge facts of this situation which fit their narrative. Then our moronic city council announced that they would abolish the police and things went from terrible to worse. All summer, it was a free for all. Murders of mostly poor black neighbors, skyrocketed.When people in North Minneapolis spoke out about how dangerous the area had become, it fell on deaf ears. I remember seeing a woman in N Minneapolis post on Facebook about how her daughter asked to celebrate her birthday outside and then a bullet went through their house while they tried to celebrate outside. She posted a photo of the box of pasta that caught the bullet in her pantry.
As angry as I am with people who have justified all this from far away, I hope that that they never have to experience this. It's heartbreaking.
Still amazes me that a group like BLM can have so much grassroots support from Black people, when the most obvious product of BLM's actions is less policing in Black neighborhoods leading to more crimes being perpetrated against black people, especially violent crimes. Woke culture truly believes that ensuring Black people only get killed by other Black people is some kind of major social accomplishment, even when the violent death rate of Black people goes up as a consequence.
Evil and stupidity are often indistinguishable.
Thank you for covering this. I wish more would.
A close friend of mine teaches at a school in a poor area of Minneapolis. At the start of the school year, he asked how their summers had been. Every single one of his (very poor, mostly black) students knew someone who'd been shot. It's horrific.
“I don’t know what fool would think about defunding the police,” T.Y. — who was formerly in the Army — remarked. “Because once you do that, who’s gonna protect you?”
--------------------------
The fools who want to defund the police don't live in neighborhoods where the crime is and they have no interest in the people who do live there.
Wait, interviewing real people, eschewing experts? What sort of alchemy is this? Talking to white cops, Satan’s own minions on earth? Tracey is destined for Woke Hell, Dante’s 13th circle in which a Woke Twitter feed cannot be muted.
To put the 2020 homicides in perspective, scaled up for population this is about 1600 homicides in New York City. New York City had about 426 homicides in 2020. You have to go back to the early 1990's to see numbers like that in New York City. As you correctly point out, 8 out of 10 homicide *victims* were black during 2020. However, this is mainly black men as they were 8x more prevalent in homicide statistics than their share of the population.
I have been traveling to Minneapolis for decades. During a visit to downtown Minneapolis in the summer of 2019, my wife turned to me and said, "We never come back". She and I lived in New York City in the early 1990's when it set a record for homicides. She stood on subway platforms in the small hours of the morning with me. She walked through the Meatpacking District and Lower East Side after concerts. For her to say that we never return to Minneapolis was significant. It was reported that in early 2020, the Minneapolis Police Department was understaffed by 400 officers. This is part of the reason that the initial responding officers in the George Floyd incident were both rookies, with 3 out of 4 responding officers being rookies.
This didn't just start in 2020. Unfortunately I don't see it getting any better. Take a read about the death of Laneesha Columbus, killed on July 5, 2020 by Zachary Robinson. That killing says a lot about what is happening in Minneapolis and other major urban areas in the US.
Thank you for covering the story.
Everyone, from the people in these communities, to the police serving them are victims of their own government officials. These stories are incredibly heartbreaking. And once again, Michael is the only journalist in the country who will seek them out and share them with us. I just don't get it.
Wow. Our "elite media institutions" are making it way too easy for you. First you report that there were actually riots last year and now you report that there are actually more Black people killed by individuals who are not police officers. Is your next piece going to be about how teenaged knife fights are actually a bad thing?
Yeah I know it's good reporting but remember, there is more work to be done fighting White Supremacy. It is the white, gun owning conservatives who are responsible for this. Now that Bad Orange Man Bad is gone, we must join in the Struggle to shed our White Privilege and work harder for St. George. #stopasianhate
But, propaganda and lies after lies everywhere....
Many are asking themselves just why would "journalists" do what Natasha Bertrand, Jeffrey Goldberg, Judith Miller, David Frum, zillion others that dominate NYT, WaPo, Atlantic, etc. do... Besides the obvious motives -- money and career.
A possible answer is -- "in shared interests" ---- easy to analyze how many among them are "beloved Bibi's" Likudniks, have they ever addressed the Gaza open air concentration camp, terror on Palestinians in apartheid Israel, expressed anything other than hatred for Iran.
The US administrations are sadistic regimes - irrespective if under Obama, Trump, or Biden -- that thrive on the misery of nations. Syria, for example, was once a self-sufficient country -- before America decided (remember 17 years ago !!) that secular socialist Syria needs “democracy and freedom”.
CIA aligned itself “patriotically” with Al Qaeda for regime change -- who, for years, has been weekly bombing Syria -- without hardly being even mentioned in the US corporate media..... But – there is a “genocide”, this time, in China – playing all of us like a violin.
For people to place identity politics or ideals above the thousands of years of epistemic knowledge that clearly shows that security is needed for society, and people to prosper is naive at best. Yes I absolutely commend and cheer for people dedicating their time and spirit to holding criminals with badges accountable, as they should be, and will be as technology and awareness rapidly increase. Can police be run better, more efficiently, most definitely.
Economic reform, is the only way we can reduce crime through reducing the demand for crime, instead of cracking heads, providing stability, and opportunity to families. This entire paradigm of White Fragility, White privilege and irreverent sociology babble, is a shell game. Identity politics and diction restrictions will not end racism. How many necks has Robin D’Angelo removed from the very real knee of systemic racism? Zero
Will breaking up the banks end racism? The same banks that prey on low income communities with high margin products and predatory lending, the same banks that created red lining, has refused black people their share of the American dream for centuries? It will do a whole hell of a lot more than firing tenured professors for using the term reverse racism, or thinking that any merit is inherently racist. This movement is theater, well rehearsed and orchestrated to foment maximum division.
After refreshing, honest writing as this I decided to subscribe to this author. I am familiar with his name and although our political views do not align, I have appreciated his insights.
Now that I subscribed,( and paid) I have to figure out what that means and how I access it in the future.
“He is shortsighted, and said the eyeglasses store he used to go to down the street has been permanently shuttered since last summer.“
Well played, sir.
Thanks for going to Minny instead of just re-tweeting the usual twitter b.s. The US is bereft of statistics competency.
Don't fall into the anti/pro police binary. We need more clarity on how police just don't have the capacity to prevent crime or solve crime to a huge degree, no matter the funding. Interviewing the cop all sad, self-absorbed, zero self-reflection, so ironically fearful, is the story of policing today? More on that.