Police State USA
From
The Ramparts
Junious Ricardo Stanton
Police
State USA
"For numerous
decades the United States
has engaged in both high intensive and low intensive counterinsurgency and
counterterrorism wars around the globe. But now in the twenty-first century all
those same black ops wars have come home to roost right here in the land of the
not-so-free. To police state USA
all American citizens are the potential enemy. It’s also fair to say that the
police in countless jails and prisons have unlawfully beaten and killed
thousands of US citizens while in police custody over the years. Sadly, this
form of murder in covert black sites where inmates are literally tortured to
death takes police state brutality and slaughter to a whole new unprecedented
level. And of course those of color and poor are most often the victims.
Two years ago it was reported that a black man is killed by police every 28 hours. And with the deaths spiking last year, it’s more
apt to be closer to every 24 hours now." Totalitarian Rule
in America: False Flags, Secret Prisons, Extrajudicial Assassinations, Media
Censorship, The Rounding Up of Alleged “Terrorists” by Joachim Hagopian http://www.globalresearch.ca/totalitarian-rule-in-america-false-flags-secret-prisons-media-censorship-the-rounding-up-of-alleged-terrorists/5434238
Three weeks
ago I had the pleasure of serving as a moderator for a panel discussion on the
Chicago City police Homan Square
detention site where over seven thousand mostly Black and Brown people were
illegally detained, often beaten, tortured and held incommunicado from their family
and attorneys for days and weeks at a time. The panel consisted of former US
Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, Catherine Austin Fitts a former Wall Street
investment banker managing partner for Dillion Reed, former Assistant Secretary
for the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and myself. You can
listen to the audio of the discussion on my Soundcloud Internet radio program Akoben which stream at https://soundcloud.com/junious-ricardo-stanton/akoben-12-17-15-catherine-austin-fitts-cynthia-mckinney-junious-ricardo-stanton-solari-report
and/or my Digital Underground On Demand Internet radio program on the Harambee
Radio Network http://www.harambeeradio.com click the On Demand Icon and go to
12-20-2015 The Digital Underground Solari Report Catherine Austin Fitts. We had a robust discussion on the implications
of Homan Square
and the escalating police state.
The sad
part about this it took a British newspaper The Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/homan-square to do
a multi-month investigative report on Homan Square before people in Chicago and
the US even became aware this type of third world, banana republic police state
brutality was going on! That has to be one of the top censored stories of 2015!
Thanks to
the distractions and diversions of the corporate mind control apparatus most of
us sleep walk through life failing to see what is going on before us or worse
pretending not to know what is going on around us. But many of us know in our heart of hearts the
US has always been a paramilitary
police state for Native Americans, Africans in America and other people of color.
This is a crucial element in this nation's ongoing history of violence, racism/xenophobia
and domination that was inextricably woven into the fabric and sinew of both
our consciousness and the socio-political reality.
Every day
we hear more and more reports about police shooting white folks, police and
federal agents raiding white homes dressed in storm trooper outfits using
lethal force on the wrong people the elderly and babies and taking their
property via ever escalating "civil asset forfeiture" programs where
the feds, state, county and local municipality can confiscate (steal) your
property without ever officially charging you with a crime or any wrong doing!!
That's
right in the so called land of the free home of the brave, land of "civil rights"
and the sacrosanct notion of property rights, now the state can steal your
stuff without cause! And Philadelphia
under a Black mayor, Black police commissioner and sheriff is one of the most egregious cities when it
comes to taking our stuff.
"Under
Pennsylvania
state law, civil forfeiture depends on
preponderance of the evidence. This is a weaker
burden of proof than beyond a reasonable doubt, which is the standard used for
criminal cases. Little wonder the state earned a
D from the
Institute for Justice in
Policing for Profit, a survey of civil asset
forfeiture laws. Some cities in the
Keystone
State abuse civil
forfeiture more than others.
City Paper compared
Philadelphia
County, the largest county in the
state, with
Allegheny County, which is the second-largest and includes
Pittsburgh.
Allegheny County had around 200 civil forfeiture
cases since 2008. But in just 2011 alone
Philadelphia County had 6,500. Incredibly, the
City Paper notes
that
“Los Angeles County, with a population more than
six-and-a-half times Philadelphia’s, also successfully sued to keep just $1.2
million in seized assets,” i.e., a fifth of what Philadelphia
County seized. http://ij.org/action-post/seize-first-ask-questions-later-philadelphia-police-take-over-6-million-a-year-in-civil-asset-forfeiture/
Nationwide
the statistics are even more egregious.
"Between 1989 and
2010,
U.S.
attorneys seized an estimated
$12.6 billion in
asset forfeiture cases. The growth rate during that time averaged +19.4%
annually. In 2010 alone, the value of assets seized grew by +52.8% from
2009 and was six times greater than the total for 1989. Then by 2014, that
number had ballooned to roughly
$4.5 billion for
the year, making this 35% of the entire number of assets collected from 1989 to
2010 in a single year. According to the FBI, the total amount of goods stolen
by criminals in 2014 burglary offenses suffered an estimated $3.9 billion
in property losses. This means that the police are now taking more assets than
the criminals." Police Civil Asset Forfeitures Exceed All Burglaries in
2014 Investment Watch Nov. 17, 2015
The
United States
always has been a armed police state for Black folks but now it is turning on
the average white family which is why they are buying guns and stocking up on
ammunition. White fear of government gun bans and confiscation is responsible
for a massive uptick in gun sales. "Gun
sales have more than doubled in a decade, to about 15 million in 2013 from
about seven million in 2002. More firearms are sold to residents in the
United States than in any other country,
according to Jurgen Brauer, a professor at
Georgia Regents
University. These
estimates undercount total sales because they omit some purchases in states
that do not require background checks for private sales. They also exclude
permits that allow people in some states to buy multiple guns with a single
background check. The increase is mostly due to higher sales of handguns, which
are typically bought for self-defense. Two of the fastest-growing segments of
the market are
women and gun owners with
concealed carry permits." What Drives Gun
Sales: Terrorism, Politics, and Calls for Restrictions by GREGOR AISCH and JOSH
KELLER DEC. 10, 2015 http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/10/us/gun-sales-terrorism-obama-restrictions.html
The ruling
class tries to keep us comatose, fearful and docile lest we wake up, rise up
and take action against the decadent and crumbling social order. But their plans
are backfiring on them as more and more people in the US confess they are more afraid of
their government than external terrorist threats. Which is why gun sales are at
an all time high with white citizens looking at the police with a distrustful
eye. They wonder why the police need all this military equipment when crime is
down and why the heavy handed responses to natural disasters, shootings and
demonstrations?
The ruling
class propagates a self-serving narrative that the police and military are the
good guys holding up American exceptionalism and they are above reproach. But
the reality says otherwise. "But
besides direct contradictions to the logic behind institutional myths of
heroic cops and dangerous bad guys, what are the implications of this FBI
report? First, that police are schizophrenic in their belief that they are in
danger (this fear is proven in the
recent Ferguson protests and
presence of the National Guard). The overzealous militarization of local cops
is enough to prove that they might as well be hiding under blankies from the
American populace in spite of the fact that
violent crime has been dropping for decades. However,
considering how well cops are armed and how efficiently the justice system
protects them from prosecution for their crimes, they prove to be paranoid. 27
police officers in a country with over 300 million people died last year.
Law enforcement deaths-by-murder are included in the 49,851 “assaults”
against officers, which means that .05 (half a percent) died as a result
of alleged attacks. Crime against cops has
dropped to a 50 year low.
It’s more dangerous to drive a car than be a cop (this is bolstered by the
fact that the number of cops who died in car accidents almost
equals the total number of cops murdered 23 to 27). Second, militarization
is working for the police. It is not working for the rest of us. Though there
is little reliable, official data about the number of people police kill every
year,
tenuous reports claim it is
around 400. This is already almost 15 times more than police who are
intentionally killed. However, the 400 figure is a result of 17,000 local
police agencies being allowed to self-report. The numbers could be far
higher." FBI Report Accidently Exposes the Severity of the Police State http://theantimedia.org/fbi-report-accidentally-exposes-the-severity-of-the-police-state/
Illegal
detentions, physical abuse, asset forfeiture abuse and theft are tips of the iceberg.
The US is a police state and has always been one because the European colonists
had to keep a weary eye on the indigenous people whose lands they were
stealing, the European convicts and indentured servants they were abusing and
working to death and the Africans they imported to do the dirty work to enrich
the trading companies and later the rich land owners.
Modern America
is a fascist police security state where ordinary citizens are spied upon,
targeted for government revenue generating campaigns (like in Ferguson and
Philadelphia), where growing numbers of local debtors prisons abound and a
national gulag system are used for social control where free or cheap prison
labor is used to enrich the state and corporations who run the prisons and
prisoner labor manufactures various corporate products. Welcome to Police State
USA.
-30-
Things We Need To Know
From The Ramparts
Junious Ricardo Stanton
Things We Need To Know
"The Catholic Encyclopedia states
that no-one knows the true date of the birth of Jesus Christ. The Roman Sun
God’s birthday was December 25. This celebrated the lengthening daylight which
begins on December 21 – the Winter Solstice or beginning of winter. The
Christians, seeking to convert believers in the sun god, chose that date for
the birth of Christ." http://www.heretical.com/miscella/origins.html
Many of us
will be hustling and running around like chickens with their heads cut off to
prepare for a "holiday" we really don't know anything about. Too many
folks will go into debt, paying hard
earned money for items designed and manufactured to last only a few years like
your flat screen TV's, video games and other consumer products. It's ironic so
much emphasis is placed on material goods and things these days, that the
purported message of the holiday, the "reason for the season" as some
say, is blocked from our consciousness. The "Christmas holiday" at
least in the US
has devolved into a phenomenon of crass materialism, mindless consumerism
motivated by Madison Avenue advertisers to create a profitable retail shopping
season that begins earlier and earlier as the corporations scheme, plot and
connive to get us to spend our money on their products.
At the root
of this "holiday" is the supposed birth of Christ, the Anointed, the
Messiah, the redeemer of the world. The truth of the matter is no one knows the
exact date when Yeshua bar Joseph (Jesus is the Latin variation of the name
Yeshua or Joshua) was born. Neither the Bible of the Roman Catholic Church nor
any of the various Protestant versions including the King James translation
state the exact day Yeshua was born. Little
is really known about the time of year it happened or exactly where it occured
because the Bible itself (or at least in the King James translation the writers)
differ on the details and happenings surrounding Yeshua's birth.
In a scholarly and well researched book by
Marcello Craveri entitled The Life of
Jesus many of the discrepancies
and contradictions amongst the Gospel accounts of Jesus' birth are examined. For example in Chapter Three
entitled The Gospel of The Nativity Craveri
says, "Luke tells us that in the
year in which Jesus was born, an event of major importance occurred in
Palestine: a census of the entire population ordered by Cyrenius the Roman
governor of e province of Syria of which Palestine was a dependency. Matthew
however reports that at this time Herod was king. The two accounts are not
difficult to check. The only census of Palestine
known to history was ordered by Publius Sulpicius Quirinus (whom Luke calls
Cyrenius) but it took place in A.D. 6
and 7-that is six or seven years after the date generally accepted for the
birth of Jesus. Therefore the Nativity would have to be re-dated as has been
proposed by among others H.J. Holzman. This creates serious problems, however
since the date of birth would no longer agree with the other dates supplied by
he Gospels (baptism, death etc); or else the life of Jesus which is
traditionally considered to have covered at least htirty years would be reduced
to barely twenty-three or twenty-four.
The
Christian exegetes to avoid putting Luke in error, have been constrained to
postulate another census, earlier than that of
Quirinus. But no historical evidence confirms this and Luke himself says
explicitly that the census to which he refers was the first in Palestine: 'And
this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria' Other
translations 'this census was the first of those taken under Cyrenius' or 'this
was the census that was taken before Quirinius became governor of Syria'-
suggested by M. J. Lagrange and others are tendentious and false" from The
Life of Jesus by Marcello
Craveri translated by Charles Lam Markmann Grove Press Inc New York page pages
33-34
This is
just one of many inconsistencies and inaccuracies Craveri points out throughout
his book. The other important fact we need to realize is December 25 held great
significance in ancient times because it was directly related to the Sun, Sun
gods and astronomy/astrology. "As with Easter, the early Christians did
not celebrate Christmas. In fact, the first Christmas was celebrated in Rome in the fourth
century. It’s not surprising, then, that everything surrounding Christmas has
its roots in paganism and astrology. The list of sun gods throughout history is
very long. The list above is hardly exhaustive. Why were all these sun gods
born on December 25 after an immaculate conception? Again, we must look to an
astronomic phenomenon as an explanation. December 25 is the winter solstice.
The winter solstice is the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti (Birthday of the
Invincible Sun). During the winter solstice, the, the sun remains at 23
degrees/27 minutes from the South Pole. Because the North Pole is facing away
from the sun, it takes six months for full day light to reach it. Yet, it takes
three days and three nights for the southern tip of the Earth to pass the sun
and move toward the vernal equinox. To Earthbound eyes peering at the sky from
the northern hemisphere, it seems as if the sun is dead because even at its
zenith, it is very low and the days are very short and dark. This is what the
women were weeping over in the Bible (Ezekiel 8:14-15), the death of Tammuz, a
Babylonian/Sumerian/Mesopotamian sun god. After three days the sun begins to
rise higher in the sky each day. At that time, the constellation Virgo (not to
be confused with the sign Virgo) is at its brightest, so the sun appears to be
born from a virgin. See the similarities between the Egyptian nativity scene
and the constellation. This constellation was seen all over the world and is
the reason why so many sun gods are born of a virgin." http://hubpages.com/religion-philosophy/Christianity-is-a-Pagan-Religion-with-Deep-Roots-in-Astrology.
For an in depth examination of these and other
truths about ancient Sun gods/saviors read Black Historian John G Jackson's Christianity
Before Christ. I am not sharing this information to debunk anyone's
religion, undermine your theology, dogmas or embarrass anyone. I am sharing
this information so you know humans have thought about the universe, the nature
of existence, our place in it, our destiny and the deeper implications of
"reality" for thousands of years.
Throughout
human history unscrupulous men and women have high jacked the deep
philosophy/cosmology of the ancients and appropriated them for their own aggrandizement.
Kings, wanna be rulers and potentates have used ancient wisdom and teachings to
exalt themselves and their agenda over the masses. For example many of the
Roman Emperors and early Catholic Church founders' motives were more secular,
worldly and megalomaniacal than history suggests. They met in secret in informal
and official councils, synods and used conspiratorial deliberations to forge a
way to further their agenda and control the masses, propagate an orthodoxy and
establish themselves as the leaders and overseers of their work. "In times
of greater toleration, Christian leaders felt sufficiently secure to hold
councils governing their
see or
metropolitan area.
None of the councils of this period gathered representatives from all the
Christian churches, or even from those throughout the
Roman
Empire. Only of a few are the written acts preserved. Most are
known only from accounts in works of church historians and other writers. These
include: the Council of Rome of 155, the Council of Rome of 193, the Council of
Ephesus of 193 the
Council of Carthage of
251,the Council of Iconium of 258
, the
Council of Antioch of
264, the
Council of Arabia of
246–247, the
Council of Elvira of
306, the
Council of Carthage of
311, the
Synod of Neo-Caesarea of
c. 314, the
Council of Ancyra of
314, the
Council of Arles of
314. Such councils began to appear only in the middle of the 2nd century, at
first at local level, but from 175 onward they involved several communities
together, with such activity particularly marked in
Italy
and
Asia Minor. At the end of that century, it
became the practice to inform other communities of the decisions taken at such
assemblies. In the 3rd century, the meetings began to be held at regular
intervals, a custom that appeared first in the
Roman province of
Africa. In the second half of that century, councils were held at
Antioch that gathered representatives of Christianity
throughout the Middle East, from the Black Sea to
Egypt. These were a prelude to the
holding of the first assembly of all bishops, the
First Council of
Nicaea, the event that marked the end of the period of the ancient
pre-ecumenical councils. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_church_councils_(pre-ecumenical).
The above
list does not include all the subsequent councils, synods and meetings from the
Council of Nicaea
onward some of which are recognized by Rome,
the Greek Orthodox Church and later Protestant denominations while others are
not. Unfortunately oceans of blood have been shed over the various doctrines
and dogmas as well as who would be the leader, head and Chief Mucketty Muck of
the "Kingdom
of God on Earth".
Again I am
not sharing this to discredit anyone's religion. I am sharing the truth and
providing food for thought to make you think and reason for yourself.
Only a fool believes the universe created
itself out of nothing. There has to be a creator and a sustaining force out of
which everything else emanated and evolved. I share our ancient African
ancestors thinking that the CREATOR is unseen, intangible, it is an all powerful
SPIRIT/INTELLIGENCE/ENERGY/CONSCIOUSNESS that infuses and embeds itself into
all creation, thus it is intimately linked and involved in all creation. When
Aboriginal people attempted to explain this concept to the Johnny Come Lately
Caucasians they weren't able to comprehend it. The benighted Europeans irreverently
called in pantheism. Being without spiritual insight/wisdom the Aryans thought
it was non-sense because to them it defied their five physical sense
orientation of reality.
When our
ancestors tried to explain to whites how our rulers were priestly servant
leaders, the whites could not grasp that either. The wandering, marauding invaders coveted the
way our people gave deference to Aboriginal Elders, Chiefs, Kings and Queens and the whites envied the jewelry, regalia and
adornment they saw our leaders wearing not knowing its true symbolism,
significance or meaning. So they blindly copied it but without knowing it's
deeper meaning.
As the
corporate mind control apparatus lies and hypes our emotions to promote ever more
wars to enrich the military industrial complex and the 1%, let us be more discerning
about the various doctrines, dogmas and "traditions" the elites use
to manipulate and control us. Give yourself the gift of an open mind this season!
Spike Lee's Chi-raq
From The Ramparts
Junious Ricardo Stanton
Spike Lee's Chi-raq
"Some people are getting it twisted and
thinking Chi-raq is a comedy. Don't get it twisted, Chi-raq is not a comedy ,
Chi-raq is a satire and there is a difference between humor and comedy. In no
way shape or form are we not respectful of the situation that is happening in
Chi-raq. In no way, shape or form are we making light of the lives that have
been murdered with this senseless violence. So people don't get it twisted,
don't get it twisted, this film is about serious business. And there are many
films that we can look at in the history of American cinema that treated very
serious subject matter that had humor in them. There's an old statement 'I've
got to laugh to keep from crying. Well I think that is apropos with Chi-raq
don't get it twisted." Spike Lee filmmaker and director of Chi-raq
I recommend
you see Spike Lee's latest joint, Chi-raq. It is typical Spike Lee, he
takes a subject, in this case Black on Black fratricide, and examines it from a
multitude of angles using satire to bring his message home. Lee's film takes
place in Chicago
in a Southside section of the city that calls itself Chi-raq because it has
devolved into a war zone where the whole neighborhood is caught between warring
factions of two gangs the Spartans and Trojans.
The ongoing
war is taking a heavy toll on both the gang members and the community. The
victims of the violence are both civilians and gang bangers. Civilians are shot
dead and several gang bangers on both sides are crippled and maimed for life. In Lee's film, a young girl is murdered when
she gets caught in a cross fire between the Trojans and Spartans. Her mother
played by Jennifer Holiday is devastated by her daughter's death. But Holiday's character is not the only parent suffering from
the loss of their child's life. The senseless killings are a ravaging plague on
the whole community.
In the
beginning of the film we see Samuel L. Jackson dressed to the gills, dapper
like a modern day hustler/pimp/preacher playing the role of Dolmedes the
narrator who sets the stage for the action by explaining the Greek origin of
satire as social commentary. In the ancient
Greek play Lysistrata, the women
deliberately withhold sex in a desperate means of protest and social change
forcing the men to end the Peloponnesian War. In the film Chi-raq an actual
modern version of this tactic used by Liberian women to prompt the end of the
second Liberian Civil War from April 2003 to December 2003 is the model the films female characters use
to put an end to the violence and killing that is ravaging their neighborhood.
Samuel L. Jackson's
character Dolmedes reappears throughout the film to give his take on what is to
come and offer poetic commentary on the action of the females led by Lysistrata
played by Teyonah Parris. While the film
is humorous and funny it is not a comedy. Lee uses what the Liberian women did
to bring peace to their war torn country as the premise for a solution to
ending the violence in Chicago; and by extension
other cities and towns in America.
Spike Lee pulls it off in a truly genius way using a dialog of constant rhyme
(poetry), dark toned camera shots and
imagery to paint a gruesome picture of how poverty, violence, hopelessness and
despair have set the tone and tenor of the neighborhood.
Nick Cannon's character looks like Tupac
Shakur. I don't know if this was intentional, knowing Spike Lee it probably was.
Cannon's character whose "government name" is Demetrius is a dope
smoking rapper and Spartan gang leader who goes by the name Chiraq. Wesley
Snipes' character Cyclops is Chiraq's nemesis. He plays a one eyed gangsta, the
head of the rival gang Trojans. While his character is a killer he is subject
to a lot of one eyed jokes and disses by his own crew. The two gangs Trojans
and Spartans (harking back to the Greek Peloponnesian War and the play Lysistrata) have a long running war that
is taking a heavy toll on the entire neighborhood leaving too many innocent
bystanders including babies in the cross fire.
As usual Lee
mixes numerous sub-plots: gang violence, poverty, social dysfunction,
"culture", politics, apathy and powerlessness, activism and hope all brilliantly
juxtaposed and blended within the parameters of violence, sex, economic class,
emotional pain, personal and collective redemption.
Lee is not a linear film maker so you'll have
to pay close attention not only to the dialogue which is mostly in rhyme, but
also remain alert to catch all the messages and subtle images in the scenery,
subplots and personalities of the characters major and small. If you are not
attentive you'll miss something and there is so much to see in this film you will
probably have to watch it several times to get it all.
Spike Lee's
movies and documentaries always have a unique point of view, they make you
think and ponder the subjects he presents. Chi-raq is no different. Early in
the film one couple in the theater got up and left. Those of us who stayed to
the end applauded when the film was over. If you are looking for mindless escapism
Chi-raq is not the film for you. Chi-raq is a deep film, it examines a
pervasive problem in our community but with the audacity to imagine that it can
be solved.
The film is
not soapy or campy in any way. It looks
at the hood shows the carbuncles, the dirt, pain and pathology but also offers
the potential for radical change. Angela Bassett's Miss Helen character is the
catalyst who sparks the sex strike. After another young child is killed in the
neighborhood, Nick Cannon's girlfriend Lysistrata played by Teyonah Parris
house is firebombed by the rival gang. She becomes homeless and she seeks
temporary refuge in the home of Angela Bassett's character who used to live in
the Cabrini Green housing project, she lost her daughter to a drive by shooting
but now lives in a nice home and is the neighborhood intellectual and moral
compass.
She takes Teyonah Parris' character in and lectures
her about her relationship with Cannon character Chiraq. Bassett's home is
filled with books and she encourages Parris to read while simultaneously
pressing her to do something to stop the violence.
I'm not
going to share any more of the film's
plot or its twists and turns; I just encourage you to go see it. While it is very funny at times it also
tackles a myriad of serious and devastating problems in our community the least
of which are: indifference, passivity, fear and learned helplessness.
Spike Lee
uses the medium of film to spark debate and action to solve very real problems
devastating Black America! Chi-raq is a powerful film, one that does not shy away
from tough subjects but it is done well in a way that makes you think outside
the proverbial box for solutions; as far fetched as the one proposed by Lee.
The
interesting thing about Chi-raq is, the solution proposed in Lee's film is not
new, it has actually been tried and it worked!
-30-
