The Vietnam War Story Burns & Novick aren't telling

Tweet

-->

Having now watched the first five episodes of "The Vietnam War" as told by Burns & Novick, I find it a very detailed and sophisticated effort to normalize our collective history of the Vietnam War in such a way that even while we recognize the horror that it was, we feel no collective responsibility for it. Its mission is to prepare the US public to support future US wars wherever in the 3rd world the US may next conduct them. Vietnam need not worry this time; Korea, Iran and Venezuela should be concerned. Its mission is to create a national consciousness about the Vietnam War in which we can look back and see ourselves as "the good guys," flawed perhaps, but still "the good guys." Ken Burns want us to believe that the "better angels of our nature" were still at work in the Vietnam War.

Vietnam:American Holocaust 

To sell this mythology they have to obscure or avoid two important aspects of the Vietnam war story that fly it the face of this good guy image. The first is the sheer meanness and racism of the way the US conducted the war. For 30 years it thought that killing more Vietnamese was the answer. I addressed this aspect in my first blog post on this series and in my film Vietnam: American Holocaust.

The second is aspect I expect this series to continue to avoid is the hint of any larcenous motives for the US war in Vietnam. The motives so far presented are a need to fight communism and a desire to support an independent South Vietnam. These are presented as honestly felt motives even if they latter proved not to be all that. It is nowhere suggested that the US was in it for the money. The image of the United States during Vietnam War is one of an economy that was going well in spite of the burden of the war, when actually it was the other way round; the US economy was doing well precisely because of the war.

The bottom line truth is that US capitalism is addicted to war. The boom times of the '60s required a US war somewhere. It was just Vietnam's turn. Near full employment at home required up to half a million Americans working abroad killing gooks. While an economic and political analysis of why this feature of advanced monopoly capitalism is so well established is beyond the scope of anything I will present here, the temporal relationship is easy enough to illustrate.

To do that I will here present the first thing that comes up in a Google search for "US recession history," which is The History of Recessions in the United States, and add to it my commentary as it relates the corresponding US wars timeline. My comments are in blue type.

US Economy
The History of Recessions in the United States
Causes, Length, GDP, and Unemployment Rates

By Kimberly Amadeo
Updated August 22, 2017

The history of recessions in the United States since the Great Depression show they are a natural, though painful, part of the business cycle. 

Excuse me! They most certainly aren't "natural." Capitalist crises are caused by the economic inequalities of that system, but that is not the only way to do business.

The National Bureau of Economic Research defines when a recession starts. The Bureau of Economic Analysis measures recessions using gross domestic product.

1945 Recession

This recession lasted only eight months (February to October 1945). It seemed to last longer.That's because GDP continued to fall until it reached -10.6 percent in 1946. This was a natural result of the demobilization from World War II. That happened when the huge demand for military weapons fell off. Government spending dropped, although business spending was robust. Source: “Business Cycle Expansions and Contractions,” National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA, NBER.).

This recession timeline begins after World War II so it doesn't cover the period of the worldwide Great Depression of 1929-1939 or the fact that in spite of all the various government stimulus and social aid programs, it was ultimately the mobilization the for the war that brought prosperity to American capitalism. Amadeo's history of US recessions begins in 1945 with the recession the US economy immediately fell into as soon as war was not the answer to that central question of monopoly capitalism: How do we forestall economic collapse?

1949 Recession

This 11-month recession began in November 1948. It lasted until October 1949, when unemployment reached a peak of 7.9 percent. It was a mild adjustment as the economy continued adjusting to peacetime production.

There was a lot of pented up consumer demand right after the war, but that only carried the economy so far. In less than four years without serious war spending it found itself back in recession again. It's no accident that 1948-1949 saw the rise of the Cold War and its attended arms race. According to www.us governmentspending.com, the US defense budget, which had been as high as 41% of GDP during WWII, had dropped down to 7.2% of GDP by 1948, and the country started going into recession. Cold War and Korean War spending pushed the defense budget to nearly 15% of GDP, and it starved off recession again until that war ended.

Recession of 1953 

This recession lasted ten months (July 1953 - May 1954). It resulted from the demobilization after the Korean War. Unemployment didn't reach its peak of 6.1 percent until September 1954, four months after the recession ended.

GDP contracted 2.2 percent in Q3, 5.9 percent in Q4, and 1.8 percent in Q1 1954.

As soon as the Korean War ended, US capitalism began to falter again.

Recession of 1957 

It lasted eight months (August 1957-April 1958). GDP fell 4.0 percent in Q4 1957. It immediately plummeted 10.0 percent in Q1 1958. Unemployment didn't reach its peak of 7.1 percent until September 1958

The Fed's contractionary monetary policy caused it.

Actually, the lack of war caused it, although there was never a total lack of war. In this period the US was already paying for about 80% of the French war in Vietnam, and there were always other military expenditures. They just weren't enough to keep the economy humming along. The contractionary monetary policy was a vain effort fix an inherently broken system with monetary patches. Since the end of the Korean War the economy had been troubled, it would take the Vietnam War to deliver the next decade of prosperity. It would be a prosperity paid for by blood, 98% Vietnamese, 2% American.

1960 Recession

Starting in April 1960, the recession lasted 10 months, until February 1961. GDP was -1.5 percent in Q2, rose 1.0 percent in Q3, but was -4.8 percent in Q4. Unemployment reached a peak of 7.1 percent in May 1961. President Kennedy ended the recession with stimulus spending. His opponent, Richard Nixon, said the recession cost him the election. That's because he had been Vice-President so voters blamed the Republicans for causing it.

This economic survey doesn't delve into what Kennedy's stimulus spending was for. Much of it involved the startup costs for America's direct involvement in Vietnam. It would prove to be just a small down payment for the billions in "stimulus spending" that would use the Vietnam War as its justification and keep the US economy humming along for the next decade.

1970 Recession

This recession was relatively mild, lasting 11 months (December 1969 - November 1970.) GDP was -0.7 percent in Q1, then rose 0.7 percent in Q2, 3.6 percent in Q3, and fell 4.0 percent in Q4. Unemployment peaked at 6.1 percent in December 1970.

The war was wining down and already the effects were being felt.

1973-1975 Recession

This recession lasted 16 months (November 1973-March 1975). The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is blamed for quadrupling oil prices, but the OPEC oil embargo alone didn't cause such a deep recession. Several factors contributed.....

Certainly, Arabs asking a fair price for their oil makes for an easy target, but without a doubt the biggest "contributing factor" to this two year recession following the end of US direct involvement in the Vietnam War was the lack of war to "stimulate" United States capitalism. It would stay in the doldrums until Reagan brought it back with a fresh round of military spending. Now, Trump, who ran as a non-interventionist candidate, has ramped up existing wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, and is looking to start a big new one somewhere soon, while he brags that the anticipatory stock market is at an all time high.

This is the ugly. ignoble truth about US wars, both now and then. Let's see if Burns & Novick even touch on it in week two.

Syria is the Paris Commune of the 21st Century!

Click here for my posts on the 2016 US Election Click here for a list of my other blogs on Syria Click here for a list of my other blogs on Libya

Ken Burn's Vietnam Revisited: This was no Civil War!

Tweet

-->

When I say that the Ken Burns and Lynn Novick documentary epic "The Vietnam War" is no "Civil War," it has a double meaning. First, as a documentary film and a work or art, it doesn't hold a candle to that seminal work by Ken Burns, The Civil War, but most importantly, the American War, as the Vietnamese refer to it, was a war of independence and not a civil war, as Ken Burns seeks to frame it in his most recent piece.

Of course, in every war of independence, without exception, you will find some indigenous people that take the side of the colonial masters, so there is always room to frame the struggle as a civil war in which the great power is merely assisting one side, and the great power can generally be counted on to frame it that way.

That must be behind the documentary's early assertion that US involvement began in good faith. That is put out there without any proof and backing as though it is beyond dispute. Absent is any discussion of the requirement that the United States periodically make war somewhere just to maintain what we call a "healthy economy."

It's no secret to serious students of US capitalism that it was really the arms buildup for World War 2 that finally dragged the economy out of the Great Depression. It started to slump again as soon as the boys came home looking for jobs. Even post war domestic requirements were insufficient to keep things humming and everyone employed, so they hyped the so-called threat of communism and created a new arms race. They also staged two major hot wars, Korea and Vietnam, that were very profitable for the capitalists as a whole, not just the arms merchants, and very good to the US economy. Its no accident that when the Vietnam War ended, the US economy fell into any extended slump that didn't end until Reagan greatly stepped up military spending again. This is an economy addicted to war, which is why it is looking for another one now in Korea or Iran, perhaps Venezuela.

In the case of the Vietnam War, it was the Vietnamese civilians that paid the price. Burns and Novick put the number of civilians that died from the war at two million. They put the number of Vietnamese combatants killed at one million. They feel no need to be more precise - when speaking of Vietnamese deaths - or elaborate on who was doing the bulk of the killing. Who exactly was up to the task of creating such carnage. Who had B52's and the ability to drop napalm, for example,

Somehow it is considered okay to kill combatants, as though anyone who exercises a right to self-defense or rises to defend their homeland is fair game. South Vietnam was a French/American creation and the ARVN was paid by the US government so it could claim it was supporting one side in a civil war. There is good reason to hold the United States responsible for the vast majority of the deaths on both sides after 1962. So roughly three million Vietnamese were killed, overwhelmingly by US military might, and that didn't just include those bombed by B52s, it included children killed for sport by GIs riding around in trucks. We waged a very mean war. A My Lai every week.

The Vietnam War was a very racist war as it was conducted by the Americans. So far, in episode 1, this piece has done a very good job of hiding that fact. The United States didn't see itself as killing more than three million people in Vietnam, it saw itself as killing more than three million "gooks" in Vietnam, and that made it okay. If that word got mentioned even once in episode 1, I missed it. In anycase, the Vietnam War was carried out in a very racist manner in the way the Americans treated the Vietnamese on all sides and this so far hasn't even been hinted at. This may be were this piece performs its greatest disservice, given that we now have a white supremacist president that is picking a fight with another Asian country.

At every turn it seems to let the imperialists off the hook for this thirty year tragedy. The French took revenge by committing atrocities. Revenge for people standing up for their freedom no doubt.

Truman inherited a very different world than Roosevelt left, to explain their different approaches to the Vietnamese liberation struggle. Did that much change overnight?

The communists were every bit as ruthless as the French. Now that the communists have ruled Vietnam for a few decades, we can compare the treatment of the people under the French and under the communists and see the full extend to which Burns and Novick are willing to distort the facts.

US believe Diem would build a just government, but them he started running us. Until we had him killed,

"History will judge whether the war was worth the sacrifice." No, the Vietnamese people have already decided that independence was worth the extreme costs we imposed.

Economic development was designed to win "Hearts and Minds" not imperialist exploitation

And so is went in episode 1, endings with a salute to American bravery - Yes, the American soldiers in Vietnam were brave. So were the French soldiers that fought to keep Vietnam in imperial chains before them, and the Japanese soldiers before them. They were brave when they savaged Vietnam, raped Nanking and bombed Pearl Habor. Bravery is shown on both sides of a civil war, but again this was no Civil War. Ordinary soldiers ordinarily show extraordinary courage for very despicable causes. It is important that we remember that as this film celebrates American bravery in Vietnam.

Vietnam: American Holocaust

Nine years ago I produced a documentary that people might find useful as a counterweight to this current propaganda effort. I started producing it long before the Pentagon announced its current Vietnam War beautification campaign because I became aware of the developing movement to revise this history in a way that supports future wars. It is named Vietnam: American Holocaust. It was narrated by Martin Sheen and been called "The best documentary ever made on the Vietnam War." by Blase Bopane. David Swanson called it "a powerful documentary" and Ron Kovic said "Every American should see this film!" David Slaky of VFP said "It's the best thing I've seen. I've seen Winter Solider, Hearts & Minds, you name it, I've seen it. This is the best thing I've seen." Scott Camil of 1st Marines, Winter Soldier, VVAW and VFP said "I can't wait to get this into the high schools." David Zeiger, director of Sir! No Sir! called it "Very Powerful" and Stuart Chandler of Rotten Tomatoes said “This is the best political video on Vietnam and its historic relevance to our times I have ever seen.”

A Plot Summary

Vietnam: American Holocaust opens in the present day at the Veterans for Peace Arlington West Memorial to the fallen US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan in Santa Monica. Here the strong connection between our current wars and the war in Vietnam is first made. The question of what makes a holocaust is also raised. Then the scene shifts to the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington D.C. and while the narration continues it is revealed that the youngest US soldier to die in Vietnam was a Black Marine age 15.

A clip of Vietnam era Defense Secretary Robert McNamara in Hanoi in 1995 shows him saying that 3.4 million Vietnamese were killed during the war. Further news clips from the time reveal some of the horrors of that war and show that news commentators referred to it as a holocaust at the time.

This is followed by a brief history of the 19th century French conquest of Indochina and the Vietnamese liberation struggle from 1945 through the defeat of the French in 1954. This is done with archival footage, much of it very rare, and Martin Sheen's excellent narration and the voices of the principals on both sides of the conflict. Since the focus of the documentary is the American War in Vietnam the pace slows as more details are given about this part of the history.

The reasons for opposing the Vietnamese independence struggle are given by President Eisenhower in a clip from one of his speeches. Then the young Ho Chi Minh is introduced, with special attention to his time in Harlem, NY and his relationship with Marcus Garvey. Again very old and rare footage is used to illustrate these years while Mr. Sheen describes the crucial events.

The story of the lead up to the American war is presented with footage that also includes Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Diem, Gerald Ford, Joe McCarthy, Nixon, Senator Morse, and many others. We hear Bobby Kennedy question the NSC plans for a coup in South Vietnam only weeks before President Kennedy is assassinated. In another connection to the present conflicts, we learn of the role the Kennedy administration played in putting Saddam Hussein in power in Iraq.

Since the Tonkin Gulf incident played such a big role in promoting and justifying the war, the film goes into considerable detail about it. Through interviews with the captain of the US ship that was allegedly attacked, the chief gunner, a North Vietnamese general and the recollections of pilots that flew air cover on the fateful night, it shows that this attack never happened. Most significantly, using White House tapes released only a few years ago, it shows that McNamara and LBJ had foreknowledge of this phony attack that never took place. This material has never been used in a documentary before.

The next segment illustrates the incredible damage done to Vietnam by the massive US air war which included bombing, napalm and agent orange. With a particularly potent instrumental from the Mama's Boys blues band that provides the sound track for the film, we hear from LBJ, Curtis LeMay, a Hanoi doctor, Vietnamese victims, and American airmen among others in a way that really brings home the brutality of the air war. The agent orange section will send chills up your spine.

From there the film goes into the horrific ground war that was the real holocaust in Vietnam. This is done through the voices of American and Vietnamese soldiers and civilians that give you a real window into the tragedy of war on a human level. The Vietnam War was a My Lai every week and this point is driven home by recounting some of the many other massacres that took place. Extremely graphic images are used in this segment. You are witness to real deaths happening on the screen. You will understand why so many Vietnam vets came home with a great deal of mental anguish because of what they saw in this war.

Finally we return to Arlington West in the present and the Iraq War. Again the point is made that those that forget their history are doomed to repeat it and a plea is made both by Martin Sheen and the director, Clay Claiborne, to stop this madness. 

You may purchase your very own copy on DVD from the movie website: VietnamAmericanHolocaust.com or alternately, from Amazon. Today I also discovered that it is available for bittorrent download, which kinda makes me feel like I've arrived. [Anything worth stealing is worth something.] But you don't seriously expect me to tell you how to find that. In fact I am now seriously considering dropping my opposition to the Copyright Infringement Bill and reversing everything I have said on that subject. NOT!

Syria is the Paris Commune of the 21st Century!

Click here for my posts on the 2016 US Election Click here for a list of my other blogs on Syria Click here for a list of my other blogs on Libya

Red Elephant's lament after Santa Monica CRJ victory

Tweet

-->

Red Elephants is a white supremacist group that wants to turn the United States into a whites-only country. Recently, they have targeted the Santa Monica Committee for Racial Justice for destruction. CRJ has been meeting peacefully one a month for more than six years. In July and August "Trump supporters" from the Red Elephants and other "Alt-Right" groups had limited success in disrupting the meeting. They vowed to return in September with "hundreds," but when they saw how the community had turned out to support the committee, they decided to send a few spies instead. The day after this very successful meeting of the Santa Monica Committee for Racial Justice, Vincent James, the Red Elephant, posted this video, Anti-White Organizers of White Privilege Seminar Trying To Slander Me, in which he complains about what he feels is mistreatment by his critics. Oh, woe is he! Since he used a clip from an interview he did with me after the August meeting in his "slander" protest, I have crafted a response:

Red Elephants Lament


BTW, these people are obviously well funded. As I publish this, Vicent James and the Red Elephants are Live Streaming the "pro-Trump" MOAR in Washington, DC this morning.

See also:
Progressives rallied & racists ran from September meeting of CRJ
Santa Monica Committee for Racial Justice needs you this Sunday!
Join us in Santa Monica September 10 to defend Racial Justice
Protest against fascism in Venice now!
Six days before Charlottesville, the same racists came to Santa Monica
White nationalists disrupt Santa Monica anti-racist meeting

Syria is the Paris Commune of the 21st Century!

Click here for my posts on the 2016 US Election Click here for a list of my other blogs on Syria

Progressives rallied & racists ran from September meeting of CRJ

Tweet

-->

As this picture shows, these racists brought their foul stench to the July meeting. They came to broadcast their dislike for African Americans, Jews, immigrants, in fact all of humanity. They acted like children, blurting out misplaced statements, and holding up misspelled signs.

In August some of the leaders of this Santa Monica assault marched with the plainclothes Nazis and Klansmen in Charlottesville. The week before they went to Charlottesville, they again tried to invade the Committee for Racial Justice meeting. They did not succeed. Although they came with much greater numbers to the August meeting and tried to bully their way into the meeting, the committee members were able to fight them off and go forward with the meeting as planned.

In their anger and frustration, they promised to return in September with "hundreds." They vowed to "shut the meeting down." They said they were going to make Santa Monica their new "Berkeley."

The CRJ Steering Committee responded by making a broad call to the progressive public to come to Virginia Avenue Park and show their support for the anti-racist struggle by their numbers, and the community responded. The Santa Monica community really turned out, even the Mayor was there, and activists came from as far as San Diego. It was us that came with hundreds, maybe as many as a thousand. Our security reported that a group of plainclothes neo-Nazis were lurking a few blocks away, and a few people thought they saw a red pink elephant scouting the park early on. No doubt, when the racists saw what was waiting for them, they beat a hasty retreat.

Racial Justice Won the Day!

Video report on September meeting of Santa Monica CRJ | 10 Sept 2017

We had a very successful meeting with a packed room while hundreds of supporters celebrated in the park. The Santa Monica Police again showed up in large numbers. I never knew they had a cavalry before! They also brought in help from the sheriff's department and from other local police departments as far away as Alhambra, but they were unneeded. We, the people, had the situation well under control.

Here is the CBS News report on the meeting. Notice that they used my footage of the July and August meetings, without either credit or permission, I should add.



See also:
Join us in Santa Monica September 10 to defend Racial Justice
Protest against fascism in Venice now!
Six days before Charlottesville, the same racists came to Santa Monica
White nationalists disrupt Santa Monica anti-racist meeting

Syria is the Paris Commune of the 21st Century!
Click here for my posts on the 2016 US ElectionClick here for a list of my other blogs on SyriaClick here for a list of my other blogs on Libya

"We only shoot black people"

Tweet

-->

When Lt. Greg Abbott told the white woman he arrested for DUI "We only shoot black people," he wasn't cracking a joke or being sarcastic. He was seriously trying to comfort this woman by clarifying a police lieutenant's understanding of a police policy that has been obscured by the mainstream media. This was only days after the police murder of Philando Castile had been livestreamed on facebook by this girlfriend. That video then made its way to a mainstream media so intent on denying the racist nature of the killing that this white woman could conclude the police treat everyone that way. Abbott was telling her not to worry. They don't kill white drivers for no good reason. Unlike black lives, white lives matter to police.

While the incident happen over a year ago, Abbott's dash cam of the traffic stop only became public 30 August 2017 when WSB-TV aired it. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution also reported on it:

The date stamp on the video is July 10, 2016 — just a few days after Minnesota police shot and killed Philando Castile, whose girlfriend recorded his death with her phone.

Channel 2 Action News first reported the existence of the Abbott tape in its newscast Wednesday night. The footage shows the officer speaking through the car window to a female passenger in a vehicle that had been stopped for suspected DUI.

The woman tells Abbott that she is afraid to reach for her cellphone because “I’ve just seen way too many videos of cops ... ” At that point, Abbott cuts her off.

“But you’re not black,” he says. “Remember, we only shoot black people. Yeah. We only kill black people, right? All the videos you’ve seen, have you seen the black people get killed?”

This wasn't being said by some rogue rookie. Abbott was a Lieutenant, high up in the command staff and a part of department management. He had been with the force for 28 years so he certainly was in a position to know what department policy was on the ground.



This raises the very serious question of just what Cobb County Chief Mike Register meant when he said:

"I have known Lt. (Greg) Abbott for years and perceived him as honorable, but he’s made a mistake. I don’t know what is in his heart, but I know what came out of his mouth. We recommend that he be terminated and we are moving forward on that.”

Why did Chief Register decide to fire Abbott only after the video became public? He knew about it earlier.  Suri Chadha Jimenez, the driver's lawyer in the DUI case saw the video while preparing the case. A good attorney certainly would have brought it to the attention of the department if only to cut a better deal for his client. If Register wasn't aware of it then, we became aware of it when WSB-TV made the FOIA request. Apparently Abbott's statement was acceptable to the chief but the chief knew it was unacceptable to the public. That is why he had to go now that it became public.

Chief Mike Register needs to clarify just what mistake he thinks Abbott made. Was his mistake that of making such a blunt statement about the homicidal racism of his police department, or was he mistaken to think that was department policy?

Since Abbott was a ranking member of the police force, as a lieutenant he was high up in the chain of command and a part of management, and Register was his supervisor and "known [him] for years and perceived him as honorable," No matter how Chief Register answers that question he needs to resign if he is to be perceived as honorable.

Register showed that his concern was for the statement Abbott made on tape and not the reality behind it or even Abbott's perception of that reality, if they thought it was wrong. The mistake he made, as far as they were concerned was saying it outloud. Chief Register would say at the press conference.

“There is no place for those types of comments."

And later:

“No matter what context was, the statements were inexcusable and inappropriate.”

It isn't clear just when Chief Register and Commission Chairman Mike Boyce became aware of Abbott's comments of July 2016, but the day after WSB-TV aired it they held a press conference to denounce this revelation and announce their intention to fire him. It remains to be seen if this will come to pass. Even as they were making their announcement, Abbott was sending an email announcing his retirement.

Abbott was already preparing his defence. AJC reported:

Lt. Abbott’s attorney, Lance LoRusso, argued in a statement that Abbott’s “comments must be observed in their totality to understand their context. He was attempting to de-escalate a situation involving an uncooperative passenger.”

LoRusso said Abbott was trying to “gain compliance by using the passenger’s own statements and reasoning to make an arrest.”

Even though I despise Abbott, I recommend he get a new attorney. This one is clearly incompetent. In the first place nobody was trying to arrest a "passenger" for DUI, in the second place, the driver, who was the only one in the car, never brought up race,  Lt. Abbott did that. LoRusso is right that he did this to de-escalate the situation and gain her compliance. He was trying to do that by making it clear to this white woman that the wave of police killings that so unnerved her was part of a genocidal policy that targeted black people, and so she didn't have to worry.

LoRusso also turned up as the cop's attorney in at least one other recent case that brought charges of racism to the CCPD.  On 6 November 2016 ex-Cobb County officer James Caleb Elliot fired eight shots at a 16-year-old after the cop caught him and three others in a stolen car. The car had been stolen 3 days before, so there was reason to believe the four teenagers inside weren't the violent felons Elliot would later claim he thought they were. He ordered the teens out of the car and knew that they were unarmed. When one of the teens ran away, Elliot went after him with his gun blazing in this residential neighborhood. He fired eight shots and hit two houses before he bought down the youth with a bullet in the leg. Technically Elliot had resigned two days before, so this may have been something of a parting shot.

Elliot was allowed to retire in that case, which raises suspicions of how Abbott's 28 year career will be ended. It should be ended with his immediate firing followed by a through investigation of what his racist attitude has meant for the cases he's handled and the leadership he has provided in all those years, but there is reason to fear he will be allowed to end it with honor. AJC reported:

But Lt. Greg Abbott sent an email to the county announcing that he plans to retire, even as the police chief was on live television saying Abbott would be terminated, according to Commission Chairman Mike Boyce. Boyce said he was unsure how that development would affect the decision to fire the lieutenant.

Cobb County Public Safety Director Samuel Heaton said 1 September that Abbott will be allowed to retire and by doing so he will escape any disciplinary actions. Apparently, this is what they do with racist cops once they have been "outed." They are allowed to retire with their pensions.



Cobb County Police Department was investigated for racism last year after this same cop was accused of harassing Cobb County Commissioner Lisa Cupid, who is African American. She filed a seven-page complaint with the county police in 2012 after Elliot, who was working undercover, followed her into her subdivision late one night. The Cobb County Board of Commissioners responded to these incidents by paying the the International Association Chiefs of Police $93.000 for a police policy assessment of the county’s police department. The study pointed to a histpry of racial profiling in Cobb County.

Of course, everybody doesn't see it that way, as this comment from a Washington Post reader of their report on this story shows:

The real tragedy is this happened OVER A YEAR AGO. Some reporter went back in time to dig up old footage using the FOIA to smear a decent police officer who was only being sarcastic. Damn. Now ANYTHING you have said in your past will come back to haunt you if a reporter wants to smear you just so they can get a news story out of it. THIS is why America hates MSM.

Sarcasm is a form of humor and there was nothing funny about this. When I first heard the abbreviated version of this story on the CBS Morning News, I thought sarcasm too, but then I assumed he was talking to a black person. Once I heard the fuller version and learned those words were directed towards a white suspect, and that it was the white cop, not the white DUI suspect that interjected race into the event, those claims of sarcasm seemed baseless.

Merriam-Webster defines "sarcasm" as humor "designed to cut or give pain" and "is usually directed against an individual." So if this was sarcasm, was the woman the target? She was the only other person there.  Why would he think that bringing in race would help him hurt her feelings?

"Sarcasm" is the universal explanation of all the racists that support for this cop. Which is not so say that everyone who says the cop was being sarcastic is a racist, just that this is the explanation put forward by those looking to excuse his behavior.

Only Abbott knows if he was even trying to be funny with these comments, and while we haven't heard directly from him on that score, we have heard from his mouthpiece, his lawyer. His lawyer says Abbott was trying to "de-escalate a situation" and "gain compliance." In other words, he wasn't trying to be sarcastic at all. That's why he never gets to the punchline. He really was trying to take away her fear by pointing out to her that she was privileged not to be subjected to the same level of police violence as African Americans.

Syria is the Paris Commune of the 21st Century!

Click here for my posts on the 2016 US Election Click here for a list of my other blogs on Syria Click here for a list of my other blogs on Libya