In the 1990s, it had been the right wing—particularly the far right—that was up in arms over police militarization. Recall the outrage on the right over Waco, Ruby Ridge, and the raid to seize Elián González. The left had largely either remained silent or even defended the government’s tactics in those cases. But the right-wing diatribes against jackbooted thugs and federal storm-troopers all died down once the Clinton administration left office, and they were virtually nonexistent after September 11, 2001. By the time cops started cracking heads at the Occupy protests, some conservatives were downright gleeful. The militarization of federal law enforcement certainly didn’t stop, but the 9/11 attacks and a friendly administration seemed to quell the conservatives’ concerns. So long as law enforcement was targeting hippie protesters, undocumented immigrants, suspected drug offenders, and alleged terrorist sympathizers, they were back to being heroes.
Just because legal and ethical overreach might coincide with your personal beliefs does not justify tolerating extrajudicial behavior.
Well said, good sir.
Danny Miller liked this on Facebook.
Trying to remember the last Republican President to kill a 16-year old non-combatant American citizen in a foreign country where the US was not at war. And trying to understand the end sought with that murder.
While some instances of overreach are more grave than others, how far do we let people overstep their bounds before it is wrong? The point to be made is that both political parties have wrongly leveraged the police for their own ends. The sins of one party do not justify the sins of another.
The core question here isn’t about who did worse, it’s about how we allow such manipulation and wrongs in the first place.
Well put love, it’s always easy to remember that human rights are important when it’s your rights at stake, but much more difficult to remember that it’s equally important when it’s someone else’s rights. Whether we agree with the people holding power or not should be less of an issue than whether we give that much power to anyone in the first place.
Brittny Hansen liked this on Facebook.
“We” allowed the murder of American citizens by reelecting the murderer.
“He’s not my king, I didn’t vote for him!”