Police brutality

France is at a crossroad. A fairly benign bread-and-butter protest has turned into a major popular dissent putting in question France’s political system. It is new, unheard of, and because we live in the digital age, with immediate communication, the world is not only watching, but there is a contagious factor to it, which in the Anglo-Saxon world is called “Yellow Vests Movement”. In what could be a healthy contagion of a social yellow fever of dissent, this polymorphic movement has already spread to 25 countries and counting.

CODEPINK protesters at the Women’s March on the Pentagon this October. (Photo courtesy of Jodie Evans)

If the freedom of speech be taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.
— George Washington, Address to the Officers of the Army, Saturday, March 15, 1783

Killer cops, socialist construction and administration alerts + this day in history w/the Chelsea/Seaside bombings and our song of the day by Sick Of It All on your Morning Monarchy for September 17, 2018.

The new Denver airport murals, another heiress and a wellness check + this day in history w/the downing of Flight 007 and our song of the day by Cursive on your Morning Monarchy for September 6, 2018.

A new study shows that militarizing police units has a reverse effect on communities, triggering higher levels of violence, distrust towards law enforcement, and discrimination.
Some 9,000 law enforcement agencies were under inspection in a recent analysis published by the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science Journal last week when a Princeton University professor gauged the real benefits of militarized units in communities.

There are always risks in challenging excessive police power, but the risks of not challenging it are more dangerous, even fatal.
— Hunter S. Thompson, Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century

Losing clearances, torture conditions and major contenders + this day in history w/Yellowstone's Black Saturday and our song of the day by Mudhoney on your Morning Monarchy for August 20, 2018.

It takes a remarkable force to keep nearly a million people quietly indoors for an entire day, home from work and school, from neighborhood errands and out-of-town travel. It takes a remarkable force to keep businesses closed and cars off the road, to keep playgrounds empty and porches unused across a densely populated place 125 square miles in size. This happened … not because armed officers went door-to-door, or imposed a curfew, or threatened martial law.