I’ve been reading through the Ferguson grand jury doc dump released by Mr. McCullough; the documents are housed at the St. Louis public radio station here. The oddest thing I’ve seen so far is the account of Witness #40, who just happened to set out on a journey of racial self-discovery on the very morning of August 9, 2014, the day Mike Brown was killed.
By a series of amazing coincidences, this person magically ended up witnessing events, and his or her perspective aligned perfectly with Officer Wilson’s account. Witness #40’s testimony comes in the form of handwritten journal entries, which you can view for yourself here. Here’s how it starts:
August 9th Saturday 8 am
Well I’m gonna take my random drive to Florissant. Need to understand the Black race better so I stop calling Blacks Niggers and start calling them People. Like dad always said you cant fear or hate an entire race cause of what one man did 40 yrs ago.
The “journal” goes on to recount how Witness #40 takes a series of wrong turns and coincidentally turns up at the scene of the Brown shooting moments before it happens and sees the whole thing unfold. His or her account includes the following:
The cop just stood there dang if that kid didnt start running right at the cop like a football player. Head down.
The story is helpfully populated with “sweet” and “nice” local people whose wonderful qualities Witness #40 notes in the journal, qualities a racist who was attempting to create a post-hoc justification for a widely publicized police shooting would totally NOT appreciate, let alone record in a personal diary that later inexplicably found its way into evidence files. (wink-wink-nudge-nudge)
The diary entry for that day concludes with a 9 PM post-script in which the author recalls being admonished to “keep my mouth shut” and notes that “no one will believe me anyway.” Sadly, he or she is probably wrong on that last point.
I haven’t read the entire doc dump, but no other files are labeled “Witness #40,” so it’s unclear if this person was deposed or interviewed. Have y’all seen anything else about this alleged witness? This “journal” story sounds for all the world like a fairy tale concocted by Jim Hoft or some other sub-sentient asshole with an ax to grind who lacks the wit to construct a plausible lie.
Can it be that it was submitted for grand jury perusal without an accompanying investigation into its veracity? Some of y’all will say OF COURSE since it backs the cop’s account, but let me clarify my bewilderment: I’m not doubting the lengths to which officials and random yahoos will go to cover up police malfeasance; I’m just astonished at the rank amateurism of this effort. Funny how McCullough didn’t allude to the unreliability of that witness during last night’s soliloquy…
Chopper
This sounds about as authentic as a letter to Penthouse.
debbie
This just gets no better. Thanksgiving with my GOP family is going to be a misery.
beltane
The effort was amateurish because they didn’t feel the victim was worthy of professionalism. The blatant nature of it was an intentional F-U to the Brown and his family, the bureaucratic way of pissing on someone’s grave.
kc
I don’t get it. If the whole thing was fabricated, why insert gratuitous racist comments?
kc
Did Witness 40 testify at the hearing or no? If not, how did those journal pages get introduced?
beltane
If you read accounts of people seeking redress from authoritarian governments, you’ll see that this kind of mocking indifference is standard. Fascist and quasi-fascist regimes (such as the US is for people of color) don’t just pervert justice, they like to laugh at you in the process.
Randy Khan
This is reinforcing my resolution not to dive into the grand jury materials. I’ll just get more and more angry.
ruemara
@kc: to show how real it is because he came to a revelation of the humanity of THOSE PEOPLE.
Mandalay
A poster on Gawker has kindly transcribed the handwritten fabrication:
kc
@ruemara:
This whole thing is just bizarre. Unbelievable.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
just stood there firing twelve shots?
I suspect there’s gonna be a lot of curiosity about how McCullogh’s office interacted with this witness.
OT: but… Holy mother of fuck. I listen to Stephanie Miller when she has Charlie Pierce on Tuesday mornings. This morning she has some guy (Carlos Alazraqui. from Reno 911) in the studio with her who’s giving the “Michael Brown was no angel/ we don’t know what was in Darren Wilson’s mind/ both sides bear some responsibility/ have you ever been on a ride-along?” schtick. I thought Pierce was gonna stroke out. And besides the sickening tone of pseudo-reasonableness of the Reasonable Liberal, everything he is saying indicates to me (NAL) that this all should have been decided in a full court trial, not a grand jury.
kc
What a farce.
mai naem mobile
C’mon this is from The Onion right?
Also too, anybody else here think this is a long awaited huge dish of revenge served ice cold by McCullough?
kc
I wonder who green shirt guy is.
Mandalay
The handwritten notes give a very detailed account of what the writer claims to have seen when Brown was killed:
You’d think that if the writer was not called to testify before the grand jury then someone has some explaining to do, and is in deep shit, but I’m not holding my breath.
peach flavored shampoo
If this isn’t spoof, I dont know what is. This is DougJ-esque. Relatedly, what happened in 1974 that so upset this man?
Seriously, was this written in crayon and sent from the local KinderKare?
Betty Cracker
@kc: I don’t know. I haven’t read every document, but that’s the only one labeled “Witness #40” in the document dump. It’s also the only one that completely corroborates Wilson’s account that I’ve read thus far. I’ll update if I find anything else.
@ruemara: Yeah, that’s the impression I got too.
kc
@Mandalay:
SURELY the writer was called to testify. How the hell else would those pages end up in evidence?
I gotta get to work, so I can’t go combing through all those documents right not, but I sure would like to see some more info on this.
Mandalay
@Mandalay:
WTF??? McCulloch must have been pissing his pants with laughter when he dictated that bit.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
So in the time it took Michael Brown to charge at full speed with his head down, but not actually reach Wilson, DW had time to shake off his wobble, just stand there for a second assessing the situation (I assume this is meant to suggest), which was life-threatening, fire his gun three times, say something– presumably an order to stop running–, step forward, step back, fire his gun two more times at the top of the head of the charging but wounded but still a mortal threat Michael Brown.
CONGRATULATIONS!
About as believable as the crime scene guy forgetting the battery for his camera.
This is one big “fuck you” not just to Ferguson, not just to black people, but to anyone who gives a shit about maintaining a lawful society.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
and car has no radio and St Louis has no “time and traffic every ten minutes” type local news station?
kc
@Betty Cracker:
Thanks. I couldn’t even get the documents to load just now.
I did just do a quick google search and the only references I found to Witness 40 were stories about the journal – nothing about an actual live witness testifying.
Just Some Fuckhead
I was also a witness to the Michael Brown shooting. That particular day, I decided to fly a special wing suit I made with fairy dust and powered with unicorn farts. Of course, I got lost and had to ask for directions several times; once from a passing pigeon and once I yelled down to a very nice lineman and asked him where the Michael Brown shooting was going to be…
Punchy
I’m sure all the witnesses are this reliable, making careful note of 5 gunshots when 12 were actually fired.
I cant wait for the DA to explain how this level of disjointed, incongruous ramblings made it in as evidence in a grand jury investigation. Did he submit statements from the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, and Pablo Sandoval attesting to witness this shooting as well?
beltane
Exactly. It has been made abundantly clear these past couple of years that black people in this country can have their lives taken from them legally by just about any white person carrying a firearm. McCullogh’s behavior is a big “fuck you” to all Americans who do not wish to live in this type of white supremacist police state.
Cacti
I get to spend my Thanksgiving this year with my wife’s family full of Mormon crackers.
I can only guess at what sort of paternalistic, racist crap is going to come out of their mouths.
ira-NY
Does anyone know the racial composition of the grand jury?
Just Some Fuckhead
Witness #40 looks like a very big Fuck You from St. Louis county officials to people of color.
Cacti
@ira-NY:
9 white, 3 black.
ruemara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I tweeted him one of ABL’s go fuck yourself pictures. He’s the worst type of superliberal. Upset with Obama because of DRONES and angry about no eo fixing things; meh about a real abuse of power right in the public sphere.
Napoleon
Jesus Christ people, that journal was in the documents because they turned over everything, and that means good, bad, wrong, right and everything in between, which includes the obviously BS journal. There is going to be nothing on a witness 40 being called because why would they waste their time on such obvious BS and do you honestly think anyone on the grand jury did anything but roll their eyes when they saw it?
What will be more interesting/telling is if the prosecutor follows up on any possible charges against who submitted it.
Napoleon
@Punchy:
Here is how Punchy, because he said he was submitting everything to them they collected, which means he did not use any judgment in excluding evidence.
Librarian
“the author recalls being admonished to “keep my mouth shut” and notes that “no one will believe me anyway.”
This strikes me as the usual right wing-racist persecution-victim-martyr-self pity complex bullshit. The blacks are the real racists, dontcha know.
geg6
Thankfully, at least my family is all bleeding heart white liberals who are already all over FB stating their outrage. So happy that I have the family I have.
geg6
@ira-NY:
Nine whites, three black. Nine votes needed for indictment. Convenient, yes?
CONGRATULATIONS!
Guys with Thanksgiving issues: seriously. Don’t go. I stopped a few years back, Christmas and Turkey Day both, and life is a lot better. Oddly, so are relations with the psychopathic family conservatives.
The wife and I pick someplace nice to go and we leave town. Sorry guys, we’re on vacation.
Better for you, better for them.
Belafon
@Napoleon:
Yes, I do. As far as the grand jury was concerned, it was information given by the prosecution (or in this case, Wilson’s defense attorney). Would they have been tasked to prove the testimony true or would they, like most people, believe that what they got from the prosecution was true information?
Iowa Old Lady
I’m trying to articulate why the attitude shown by a lot of officials feels connected to the way they live and associate only with people like themselves. Everyone else is “other,” poor or AA people obviously so, but also people who disagree with them. Disagreement from a large number of people surprises them. They think they’re the vast majority.
Angela Natoli
@ira-NY:
9 white, 3 black … 9 have to be in agreement for a decision.
SatanicPanic
@Napoleon: You mean the same grand jury that decided not to indict? I don’t know if we can point to them as unbiased and/or particularly skeptical observers.
Cacti
@geg6:
It’s only fair that in a case involving white on black police violence, in a community that’s 2/3 black, that the grand jury hearing it should be 3/4 white.
Even if an indictment had issued, I’ve no doubt that some sympathetic white judge would have decided that Darren Wilson could only get a fair trial if the venue was changed to a majority white suburb, ex-urb, or rural holler.
dedc79
A well-timed reissue:
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/19997-public-enemy-it-takes-a-nation-of-millions-to-hold-us-backfear-of-a-black-planet/
Belafon
@Iowa Old Lady: They think they are in a position of authority and that you must listen to them because of it.
Citizen_X
@Napoleon:
True, just as they must have rolled their eyes when the 6’4″ Wilson testified “And when I grabbed him, the only way I can describe it is I felt like a five-year-old holding onto [a 6’5”] Hulk Hogan.” Which is why Wilson is under indictment for murder now.
At least here in Fantasy World.
Belafon
@Cacti: The one thing about the grand jury is that it is drawn from the county as a whole, which is majority white, and that it was sitting before it was chosen to receive this case.
ETA: I lay the failure to indict entirely at the prosecutor’s feet.
beltane
@Iowa Old Lady: It’s the Fox News syndrome. A large chunk of white America lives in a hermetically sealed information bubble, almost like North Koreans. Everything they know of the world outside their bubble was taught to them by Rupert Murdoch, Roger Ailes, and Rush Limbaugh.
I would prefer to spend Thanksgiving alone with my cats rather than deal with wingnut in-laws.
Elie
A bit off topic, but where was the National Guard ? How did we get so much burning and looting when Nixon made the big point of having a “State of Emergency” called — yesterday before the announcement he made a big point of their role to “protect property”?
Also, at different points it looked like there wasn’t much of a crowd and the few that were there were peaceful. Next thing, the police are lobbing tear gas. Then things start getting out of control with perfectly choreographed, right on time burning and looting. Van Jones talked about never having seen (in this venue previously), people running around with black and anonymous masks — that this was a departure from the community activists who had been educating and preparing the community for this.
I smell something real bad here. Right now, I have questions — lots of questions
Cacti
@Belafon:
I’m aware.
Napoleon
@Belafon:
You live in a fantasy world then. Anyone who would have bought that story would never vote to indict Wilson in a million years. Wilson’s testimony alone would have done it.
Your whole post reeks of living in a fantasy land.
Considering that apparently the written statement is in stark contrast with the vast majority of what the prosecutor presented did those same people believe all the other stuff the prosecutor gave them?
There is plenty to criticize in this matter, not the least of which is the prosecutor appears to have treated the grand jury as a trial instead of what it was, a probable cause hearing, but witness 40 is not one of them. Some yahoo walked in with a BS story and so they had him write it out. What are police and prosecutors suppose to do, just throw it out? I have way more problem with them deciding what does or does not get disappeared from their investigation files, not that some of it ends up being bad information.
peach flavored shampoo
I believe it’s entirely possible that some members considered it. If it’s so clearly a phony account, why is it submitted at all? Can my 4 year old submit a first-hand account as well, just to make sure everything has been considered?
More to the point: are you telling me there’s no minimal standard of credibilty that has to be surpassed before its given to the GJ? Literally anything and everything must be shown to them? I find that hard to believe.
The Dangerman
@Napoleon:
Truer words…
Secondarily to what I’d like to see happen to Officer Wilson (I’d have preferred a public trial but would settle for processes involving pliers and pipe hitting people)…
…I’d love to see this Prosecutor brought up on some sort of misconduct charge. Wilson’s career is done (his Cop days are done and whatever funds donated to him will evaporate in any Civil proceedings; see Zimmerman, George, and his ability to pay his bills these days) but McCullogh (sp?) needs to get taken down, too.
Cacti
Echoing the thread of how US media would portray Ferguson if it happened in a foreign country, here’s how the UK Daily Mail described the recent police shooting of the 12-year old in Cleveland:
“US Police Shoot Dead Boy, 12, Holding Toy Gun”
Which mainstream US media outlet would ever describe police violence so matter-of-factly?
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
I’ll be a contrarian and say that I can believe it was a witness account. But it might be wrong. Eyes aren’t cameras and people often see and remember things that are different from reality, especially when under stress. People also have weird ways of writing quite often, also too.
Real life isn’t an episode of Law and Order.
There are enough details that decent police work should have been able to determine whether he was there or not. Was it done? Given everything else that’s been reported, I have my doubts. :-(
To be clear, I don’t think, though, that this means that Wilson shouldn’t have been indicted. He should have been arrested and charged by the prosecutor without even going to the grand jury, IMO. There’s no way that Wilson didn’t show at least depraved indifference it seems to me (but IANAL). The place to get at the truth was at a trial, not in a grand jury. Especially not that grand jury (the way it was run).
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Belafon
@Napoleon: Remember the jury in the Zimmerman trial? Imagine some of those people on this grand jury.
Napoleon
@Citizen_X:
For anyone willing to give the police the benefit of the doubt all they needed was his testimony. Apparently though that testimony is backed up by people actually at the scene that day (ie, not witness 40). Maybe all or part of it was BS, but its the type of PS one could actually latch on to when making a decision without believing some obvious BS.
D's Squirrel Food
When was the detail about the shot to the top of the head widely known? The “journal” entry could have been submitted by some racist outsider, but if there are details included that were not reported, it’s an inside job.
scav
@The Dangerman: A bit of pointing, laughing at and suspicion of resumes that include working for any SLPD wouldn’t go amiss in my ideal world. Much like the suspicion surrounding a HS education involving any biological subject coming out of Kansas or history coming out of Texas and cohorts.
Mandalay
@Napoleon:
I think you are the one living in a fantasy land.
Yes! Those handwritten notes are completely worthless. The writer claims to have witnessed the killing so they should have testified to the grand jury. If they did, then there was no need for the handwritten notes to form part of the testimony. And if they didn’t testify then those handwritten notes should be ignored – anyone can go to the cops with handwritten notes.
Punchy
@Napoleon: The question is, did the grand jury members know that everything, including the insane fantasy ramblings of a bullshit artist, could be submitted? My guess is that many (if not all) assumed that the DA only presented them with credible accounts; that would seem (to a non-lawyer) to be the professional way to do things and thus why waste their time on complete bullshit?
Under that (incorrect) understanding of what they’re supposed to read and consider, they may have given this account way more crediblity and thought than it deserved.
Belafon
Fitting in my list of things that should disturb me but don’t any more: Someone in Ferguson smashed a Fox News camera because it was a Fox News camera.
Napoleon
@Mandalay:
Your a fucking moron and thank God your not in charge of deciding what to just disappear from official investigation files.
Steve from Antioch
The interesting part is that I saw a someone arguing last night that this sentence:
showed that the shooting was unjustified because there is no way you could shoot someone in the top of the head in self defense.
After the verdict, folks repeated their well-settled opinions without benefit of knowing what the evidence was. Now we’re into the next phase where some of the more industrious types will sift through the evidence looking for things that support their opinions.
This might be a fun exercise: Maybe people could post things from the evidence that do _not_ support their preconceived opinions.
SatanicPanic
@peach flavored shampoo:
Yeah, IANAL but I am highly skeptical about this.
ETA- great, and now Officer Wilson’s self-appointed defender decided to show up.
Napoleon
@Punchy:
They were not sequestered and the prosecutor publicly stated that they were going to get everything (although they may have been admonished not to read press accounts).
Mandalay
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: With respect to “depraved indifference”, throughout his testimony Wilson was at pains to point out that that he was afraid, that he perceived Brown as an immediate danger to him, other cops, and the public, and that he feared for his life.
A complete load of nonsense of course, but possibly enough to immunize himself against the accusation of “depraved indifference”.
lurker dean
wtf…
Chris Rock @ozchrisrock
How come black folks don’t riot and protest when black people kill other black people? #FergusonDecision #PrayForFerguson
Betty Cracker
@Napoleon: The prosecutor went to great lengths to impeach/clarify/verify the testimony of actual witnesses and enter that into the record — take a look at the second interviews of the witnesses at the linked doc dump site above. But we’re supposed to believe this uncorroborated horseshit “journal” was entered into the record as evidence and its veracity left to the jurors’ discretion?* I’m not a lawyer, but that sounds fishy to me.
*Wanted to note I have not read every document, but I haven’t found additional references to Witness #40. Maybe this is addressed somewhere else in the doc dump, which is why I asked the question in the original post.
Steve from Antioch
@lurker dean:
Next up: Chris Rock drugs and rapes women!
SatanicPanic
@lurker dean: I think that’s a fake. His official account has this latest tweet:
Chris Rock @chrisrock
” A system cannot fail those it was never meant to protect ”
W.E.B. DuBois.
Belafon
@lurker dean: Answer: Because the protest wasn’t about the killing, but the lack of justice. It’s the lack of accountability that leads to more killings.
Hob
@Mandalay: I think at this point Napoleon is just yanking our chain. Either that or he barely spent any time reading the post, since it clearly states that the evidence is supposed to be a journal that the witness had been keeping, not a statement that the police had him write down.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve from Antioch: There was no verdict. There won’t be a verdict. If you want to be the type of concern troll you are trying to be, you should get your terminology right.
beltane
@Belafon: During the Bush administration a cousin of mine grabbed a Fox camera at an anti-war protest and was charged with assault among other things. If he wasn’t a white kid with well-off parents he would have gone to jail with the rest of his life ruined.
Villago Delenda Est
Betty that witness is obviously white.
Instant credibility with the white supremacist grand jury, and the vile dogshit that is Robert McCulloch.
AxelFoley
Has Cole pulled his head out of his ass since his bullshit last night?
Provider_UNE_AndPlayersToBeHatedLater™
@lurker dean: that sounds a bit too simplistic (read stupid) to have been chris rock. Not that it would surprise me for a second.
He’s got his and may be looking to slide into bill cosby’s recently vacated seat as elder statesman/moral scold/victim blamer of the black community.
Edit: it would seem that SatanicPanic has confirmed my initial suspicion.
…
…
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: It’s the to-and-from as much as the on-scene account that I find questionable, and even that, as you say, could have been embellished and selectively, or just incorrectly, remembered to back up Wilson. But based just on what we/I know, the story is that this mess was presented to the grand jury as part of a document dump that I am seeing people say (again, NAL) is unusual, indicating a deliberate, determined, strategic incompetence on the part of McCullough, and I’m guessing his larger office.
Mandalay
@Napoleon:
Priceless.
Steve from Antioch
@Omnes Omnibus:
Maybe you could try not to be such a pretentious twat.
Maybe you could give us a couple of hundred words about whether an indictment is “handed up” or “handed down” next or wait is it that they did or did not “approve the bill”?
Villago Delenda Est
@AxelFoley: He can’t hide in World of Warcrack right now…still two more hours of maintenance in progress.
I think Cole’s reaction can be characterized as the result of shock. Perhaps once he gets past that he’ll be less cranial-rectal inverted.
We shall see.
Villago Delenda Est
@Steve from Antioch: I think Omnes was gentle with you.
My reaction was along the lines of “WTF? Verdict? Say whut?”
CONGRATULATIONS!
@peach flavored shampoo: Somebody’s never been through the discovery process.
You would not believe what gets submitted sometimes. And it all has to be gone through. Most of it won’t make it to trial, but during discovery, everything and anything can and MUST be submitted.
ETA: and since there won’t be a trial, this is all we get. Both the good and the crap.
JordanRules
@Provider_UNE_AndPlayersToBeHatedLater™: It’s not Rock.
lurker dean
@SatanicPanic: yeah, i tried to get my comment pulled before it posted because i double checked and found it was a parody account. glad to find out it wasn’t him.
Paul in KY
@Librarian: It sorta sounded like an excerpt of The Turner Diaries (although better written, IMO). and without as much murdering & executing of ‘animals’.
Provider_UNE_AndPlayersToBeHatedLater™
@JordanRules: yeah, got that. Thanks.
…
Paul in KY
@Citizen_X: I wish I lived in Fantasy World.
SatanicPanic
@Villago Delenda Est: Yeah, no one’s even told him to DIAF yet and he’s already whining. what a baby
Villago Delenda Est
@Just Some Fuckhead: I apparated back in time and saw the shooting, and it was very obvious that Michael Brown, a huge, hulking buck with a serious attitude problem, was about to charge at the quiet, studious Darren Wilson, take his gun, and use it to dispatch Wilson to Jesus.
Can I now get included in the Grand Jury evidence doc dump?
Steve from Antioch
@Villago Delenda Est:
So sorry for confusing you. Have a cup of tea.
Royce Buehler
@Mandalay: “the cop got out left hand on face right hand on gun”. They slipped up on this one. Maybe at the time the diary was written the “suborbital fracture” nonsense was rolling around the Internets? So “the cop” would have been holding the injured left side of his face. But the photos of the “injury” show a bruised red patch on the right cheek.
Doesn’t match physical evidence. By McCulloch’s own criterion, this “witness” should be completely disregarded.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve from Antioch: The word “verdict” indicates the result of a trial. Trials have a lot of features that a grand jury does not. Using verdict in this situation elides the two processes. The differences matter.
glory b
@debbie: Benefit of being African American? Minimal numbers of GOP relatives to deal with.
Have a happy if you can figure out how.
Steve from Antioch
@Omnes Omnibus:
Look, dumbass, I know what the differences are. I also know that the nomenclature in this instance is of interest only to some kind of tight-assed shithead.
Belafon
Y’all might enjoy (and by enjoy, I mean the opposite) this from the grand jury data (daily kos link). It’s the medical examiner’s testimony, and includes the following:
The Red Pen
@Chopper: I think it should have gone for broke and been presented as a draft of a letter to Penthouse Forum.
Dear Penthouse Forum,
I decided to take my random drive to Florissant…
Uncle Ebeneezer
Talked to [REDACTED] without telling him everything. He told me 1st I was nuts to taking drive up there and 2nd keep my mouth shut. He’s prols right noone will believe me anyway.
Sincerely, Poe
Cacti
@AxelFoley:
He was just angry that the POTUS acted like Bill Cosby instead of Tupac. Not sure which black entertainer Cole will want him to be today.
Maybe he can put on some tap shoes and sing Swanee River at his next presser, just for JC.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Belafon: Wow. That is messed up.
:-(
Cheers,
Scott.
TooManyJens
@Belafon: Oh, holy shit.
glory b
@geg6: Yep, me too, except mine are black. I’m going to be thankful for them this year, out loud.
Sooooo sorry for you guys who have to put up with the conservo-relatives.
Mandalay
@Steve from Antioch:
Your posts show the opposite.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve from Antioch: Look, sport, the outrage in this matter stems from the fact that there will be no trial. I am not objecting inexact language in general; in this instance, it was flat out wrong in a way that does not help the dialogue. Besides, if you want take shots at other people, you should be able absorb them as well.
Mike Lamb
@Omnes Omnibus: Almost as if words mean things.
MomSense
I’m still trying to wrap my head around the excuse of dead batteries to explain why they couldn’t take photos of the crime scene. Mike Brown’s body was left in the street for four hours and that wasn’t enough time to go get some new batteries or charge the old ones?
glory b
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Channel Stephen Colbert and have Thanksgiving with a black friend. The collard greens and mac and cheese go great with turkey. Cornbread stuffing, food of the Gods!
beltane
@Belafon: Are we sure that Michael Brown’s parents haven’t been sent a bill for the bullets that killed their child?
Villago Delenda Est
I think the bottom line here is that a witness who support’s Darren Wilson’s bullshit is reliable, and anyone who disputes Darren Wilson’s bullshit is unreliable.
Have I summed up the McColluch POV succinctly here?
Steve from Antioch
@Omnes Omnibus:
I think it is you that needs to work on the concern trolling.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Steve from Antioch: You obviously didn’t know the difference. The difference is even more extreme than confusing “primary” with “general election”.
beltane
@MomSense: The only thing you need to wrap your head around is that the police department and the prosecutors office use excuses like this as a way to dehumanize the victim and the victim’s community. Michael Brown was not worth the cost of a battery and they want us to know it.
Villago Delenda Est
@Steve from Antioch: When you use the term “dumbass” you’re projecting.
TooManyJens
@Villago Delenda Est: That does seem to be the way it went down.
glory b
@scav: I dunno, i’d think that laying in the street for four hours in the middle of a sunny summer weekend would make it widely known right then.
Steve from Antioch
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
So sorry for confusing you. Have some tea.
Jason
The amateurism sounds about right. I have a police brutality case where officers broke my client’s arms when he was handcuffed. But the report actually uses the phrase “reasonable force” multiple times to describe the force used when moving him. They don’t have to be clever because they know a jury is reluctant to find police officers (and doctors) did something wrong.
MomSense
@beltane:
It is so transparently BS on the part of the PD. It’s like the dog ate my homework of bullshit excuses for not doing a proper investigation.
There are so many layers of BS in this case but this one just seems so in your face by the PD.
ETA I mean they are so confident that they will beat this that they don’t even try to hide the farcical nature of their investigation.
Paul in KY
@glory b: I have a few RW assholes at our Thanksgiving. Gonna avoid them as much as I can, but if they start spouting off…I’ve never been one to hold my tongue.
askew
OT – Much less important than Ferguson, but still enough to get my blood boiling. Chuck Schumer said in an interview that it was a mistake to pass Obamacare in 2010. Talk about learning the wrong lessons from midterm losses. Dem Party seems determined to return to an era where doing nothing while holding power is the goal. More welfare reform, school uniforms and less historic legislation like Obamacare.
I am pretty much washing my hands of the party after Obama. The entire apparatus is full of cowards.
Paul in KY
@MomSense: It’s a pretty complicated camera, Momsense. Lots of bells & whistles & things. Takes a long time to charge & you wouldn’t believe what Best Buy over in O’Fallon charges for new batteries. It was getting near the end of the fiscal year, & the budget was already technically in the red. I’m sure you see my point…
TooManyJens
Every other year, we go to see relatives in St. Louis for Thanksgiving. This year happens to be one of the years it’s hosted where we live instead. The only relatives who are coming up from STL are the ones who I expect to be reasonable, thank goodness.
@askew: Because, what, it would have been so much easier to pass health care reform after 2010? Or does he think it just shouldn’t have been done at all?
God damn it. Chuck Schumer’s got health care.
blueskies
@Napoleon: Oh, well, if you feel so strongly, then you must be right.
BTW, it’s “you’re a fucking moron,” not “your a fucking moron…”
Belafon
@askew: Your goal should be to remove the cowards, not ignore them. The only chance of changing any of this, including the stuff we’re talking about here, is through one of the major parties. And we’re definitely not going to change Republicans any time soon.
Cacti
@askew:
Both times Obama was actually on the ballot, he won big and so did the Dems.
It’s the rest of them who can’t seem to tie their shoes without him, but they imagine the opposite scenario being true.
Villago Delenda Est
@askew: Chuck Schumer is a minion of the parasites of Wall Street.
Betty Cracker
@askew: So will you vote for the Greens instead? Write in Obama? Stop voting altogether? Run for office yourself or get involved / get more involved on the local level so that better candidates have a chance to come to the fore?
Cacti
@Villago Delenda Est:
I haven’t thought much of Chuck since he couldn’t decide whether the First Amendment applies to Muslims in lower Manhattan.
Mandalay
@askew: I was just reading that as well. Shit slime Schumer must be positioning himself for a position in the Clinton Administration. He can go fuck himself with a rusty pitchfork…..
So our better knows what is important to the little people, and it isn’t health care.
Groucho48
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
is the info that was released include everything that the DA received? or just what was presented to the GJ? Does anyone know?
Also, While I’ve only skimmed the documentation, I haven’t seen other bits of “evidence” as far out as that. If they did include EVERYTHING, I would expect a lot more crazy stuff to be in there. May be it’s all lumped together somewhere, but, if so, that brings up the question…why did this one journal entry get its own section in the document dump?
Another thing…I skimmed through the dispatcher calls. No time stamps on any of the dispatches. Is that common? I think, for example, knowing just when the report of the cigar incident went out would be an important bit of evidence.
Steve from Antioch
@Omnes Omnibus: “Look, sport, the outrage in this matter stems from the fact that there will be no trial.”
I think what you mean to say is that there will be no trial on state charges. The jury is still out, so to speak, on whether there will be a trial in federal court for violations of 42 USC 1983. I am sure you want to be clear so you can “help the dialog.”
#getoveryourself
Suzanne
All of this is such completely unbelievable bullshit. Just unreal. I was completely pissed off and started drinking last night.
Like, FUCK. Do only rich white dudes count?! REALLY?! All this work, all these deaths, all this protesting and sitting in and suffering, and it STILL is not enough?!
I have been increasingly burned out for the last few months, and was already deflated by the midterms. Last night convinced me that I should give up completely.
Cacti
@Mandalay:
And why should Chuck care if other people die from treatable illness?
He has his gold-plated Federal Employee Health Benefits, with fully subsidized dependent coverage.
AxelFoley
@Villago Delenda Est:
Essentially.
eemom
@Steve from Antioch:
#stopdiggingasshole
Cacti
@Suzanne:
Yes.
Next question.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Steve from Antioch: I think OO’s been quite clear, myself.
YMMV.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Belafon: In Schumer’s case, it’s more about ego than cowardice. He goes on in his speech about how ‘we’ should have addressed jobs and the economy before health care, because the Stimulus never happened, and health insurance is unrelated to economic security. But yeah, it’s example 1 trillion and 2 of why it’s been so hard for Obama, and will be for the next Dem president, who will find Schumer, or whoever succeeds Schumer in that seat, blocking whatever s/he tries to do if Wall St (who I’m sure were blowing up Chuck’s phone calling for a bigger stimulus and more infrastructure spending back in ’09/’10) doesn’t like it, and Claire McCaskill, or Joe Manchin should McCaskill succeed Jay Nixon, concern-trolling from the Morning Joe-Politico-defined “Center”.
and if anyone cares, Steve from Antioch let the mask slip up above
I’m a poste ce que voudra kind of guy, can’t stand bloggy hall monitors, so play with the troll it’s fun, that’s what you’re arguing with
AxelFoley
@askew:
Been saying this for a while now. Come January 2017, the Democratic Party can kiss my black ass twice.
Trollhattan
@Cacti:
That sums things up rather tidily. The last midterm they did well was the six-year referrendum on GWBush, so their task was aided by the fact that nobody but GHW and Barbara Bush liked him, and I’m pretty sure Bar had her reservations by then.
Mandalay
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yep, and his biggest threat is none other than the enemy of the parasites….
AxelFoley
@Betty Cracker:
askew is probably like me–I won’t give money to Dems or canvas for them, but I will vote. It’ll be holding my nose, unless another outstanding candidate like Obama comes along, but I don’t expect that anytime soon.
AxelFoley
@Steve from Antioch: Let the hood slip off, I see.
Trollhattan
@Mandalay:
Did Chucky forget “The Stimulus,” which only failed in the sense that it was much smaller than actually warranted? Job loss halted the month after it went into effect and has never returnedack. Was there another “change they were hired to make” that I missed at that time? Different colors for the flag, or somesuch?
Mandalay
@Suzanne:
It’s not completely over. There is still the possibility that the DOJ aren’t entirely thrilled about the way things have been handled, and Wilson, McCulloch and Nixon get their comeuppance.
I’m not assuming that, or even expecting that, but it is possible. Life is full of pleasant surprises.
SatanicPanic
@askew: Obama still needed a supporting cast of people who included a lot of pols who were otherwise useless to get things done. The last couple years have shown there is only so much a president can do on his/her own.
mai naem mobile
@Mandalay: Just remember Chuck E Cheese was on that Time cover with Greenspan and Robert Rubin when they repealed Glass Steagall along with Phil Gramm.Also, Chuckie’s state has a high insured state so its not like he was going to win or lose based on O-care. For me the guy who is responsible for almost all the problems with O-care is Max Baucus who was paying more attention to how many bribes he could get off the legislation than how well it was going to work or lost opportunities with other legislation that wasn’t passed because he took almost 9 mos for what should have taken 2 mos to do.
Mary G
Surely the Brown family will file a civil suit. I’d love to see “Witness 40” subjected to a thorough deposition in that case. How much to bet that never happens?
scav
@Suzanne: It’s going to be very hard to “celebrate” the 4th of July less than I already do, but I will somehow manage it. Haven’t entirely given up on all the people, or the general principles of the thing but dislike the current instantiation of the object rather fiercely, especially the shabby, sordid version upheld by the loudest whiners clinging to “their” flagpole and fireworks. So, not wanting to wait that long, I may to invent an anti-Thanksgiving Day and ponder upon all that remains to be fucking fixed hereabouts rather than the enforced meditation upon being thankful for the scraps that fall from ”our betters’, more purely American” tables and institutions.
Steve from Antioch
@AxelFoley: @AxelFoley:
Let me break this down for you, home slice. Chris Rock tweeted* something chastizing black folks for not caring about black on black crime. Last black comedian to make news for doing that was Bill Cosby. Bill Cosby revealed to be drugging rapist. Hence the next up …
It was a joke.
But if it is easier for you to attribute that statement to someone who is a Klansman who has concealed his identity, why you just keep on keeping’ on Peanut.
*Apparently actually a spoof account.
Kathleen
@beltane: Also, too, Michael Brown should apologize to Officer Wilson.
Archon
@Mandalay:
To hear a high ranking Democrat like Schumer make those cowardly comments really rattles my faith in the Democratic Party and makes me think Republicans principles and priorities might actually end up winning.
Do you EVER hear Republicans talking like this? Even if we assume (for some crazy reason) that health care isn’t a middle class concern, pray tell Schumer, when’s the last time the Republicans addressed middle class concerns?
It seems like only Obama, Warren, and a socialist who isn’t even a Democrat(Bernie Sanders) are the only ones in the entire party that can articulate and stand up for democratic party values.
AxelFoley
@Steve from Antioch: Tell you what, fuck nugget–if there was any way to meet your bitch ass in the streets, I’ll show you what this “peanut” would do to you. Now, kindly eat a plate of full of dicks and die.
SatanicPanic
@Trollhattan: The economy recovered just in time for us to get our asses handed to us in 2014. People don’t understand how the economy works and pols running on the idea that a better economy will save them are fucking dumb.
Steve from Antioch
@AxelFoley: You know, I don’t think you are helping the dialog at all.
mai naem mobile
@Suzanne: i understand the sentiment. I can’t watch or listen to much political stuff anymore. Ive been watching a ton of HGTV. Better to hate watch some bimbo bitching about the black granite countertops being dated than watching hate Obama teevee.
Mandalay
@mai naem mobile:
Here’s a nightmare scenario for 2016: Clinton becomes president, Dems retake the Senate, and Schumer takes over from Harry Reid.
Wall Street and Israel will be jerking themselves into a frenzy.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve from Antioch: I thought his concern for your blood pressure in not suggesting that you eat a plate of salted dicks was very helpful.
Cacti
@SatanicPanic:
The Dems actually had some fairly compelling messages to run on in 2014: 3-4% economic growth in the last 2 quarters, 53 straight months of job growth, unemployment rate under 6% for the first time in 6-years.
Instead, they settled for, we’re sorry we’re not Republicans, please don’t hurt us.
Ripley
Steve from Antioch is a racist and poor debater, but he must be credited for his recent discovery of Wikipedia.
That is all.
Steve from Antioch
@Omnes Omnibus:
See there you go, just come out and be the insulting, degrading asshole that you long to be.
No need to dress up your petty little insults as some sort of concern about terminology not moving the dialog forward.
Please proceed, counselor.
Suzanne
@mai naem mobile: I can’t handle those entitled snotrags on HGTV. At least one of the Property Brothers is hot.
I just am so tired. I don’t have much money to donate, but I spend a lot if my time volunteering for political and community organizations, and trying to talk to people about issues so they don’t end up in an echo chamber. And I cannot even convince more than a quarter of dudes that 1) Rape is really, REALLY bad and the fear of it makes women attempt to avoid it to the point of living less freely, and 2) Men should talk to their sons/brothers/nephews/kids on whom they have influence about how to treat women respectfully.
I can’t even convince them of those two things. And black activists have it even worse. They can’t convince us whiteys that they are PEOPLE. They can’t convince us that BEING OWNED AND ROBBED AND RAPED AND KILLED has more effect than the nightmares kids have after accidentally watching a scary movie.
Like, fuck. I give the fuck up. Let all those fuckers starve and have no healthcare and no education.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Ripley: On the other hand, Cleek is a really good dude, ya know?
Cheers,
Scott.
SatanicPanic
@Cacti: I think they could have maybe run better campaigns, but I also kind of think that people weren’t going to give them credit no matter how much they claimed it. I mean, it’s like seeing someone do something you’ve always believed that they can’t do- either you go “wow, they did it! amazing!” or your brain just convinces itself it didn’t see it.
replicnt6
Why do I keep reading “Whiteness #40”? I need to get my eyes checked. Could only be dyslexia.
Citizen_X
@Steve from Antioch:
And the “I’m a fucking idiot” punchline…
SatanicPanic
@Citizen_X: hehe that was a great clownshoes moment from a guy who’s trying to call us too credulous
Trollhattan
@SatanicPanic:
We are not a reality-based nation, but we do so love our fables.
“Son, come over here and let me tell you about the time Ronald Reagan(pbuh) kicked the Soviet Union until it was dead.”
Trollhattan
@Ripley:
More in his natural element when there’s a mass school shooting; this serves as a hobby topic.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
At this point, what I’m really hoping for is a federal investigation and consent decree against not only the Ferguson PD, but every department in St. Louis County. From what’s come out so far about police abuses in the wake of Brown’s murder, I suspect there’s more than enough evidence to bring a civil rights case against the whole fucking county.
Steve from Antioch
Interesting summary of contradictions in testimony:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/26/us/ferguson-grand-jury-weighed-mass-of-evidence-much-of-it-conflicting.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=a-lede-package-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0
“The distance from the front wheel of the officer’s SUV to Mr. Brown’s body was 153 feet, 9 inches, an investigator said.”
This is the most damning bit of evidence I have seen against the cop. Is there evidence to contradict this?
Another Holocene Human
Call me an idiot but:
http://thegrio.com/2014/11/24/rapper-cool-c-execution/
Corbett is twisting the knife before he leaves, heightening the contradictions and attempting to ensure the cop bloc votes GOP.
Plenty of white people get released on good behavior for a 1st deg murder after 18 years, nm the rap is actually armed robbery and the murder was probably not premeditated (but here we go justice system logic) but aggravated because it was during the commission of a felony but he’s going to be executed for being such a menace to society.
But get this, the man has a (weakish) alibi, and Philly cops and prosecutors never fuck up or toss the wrong Black dude in prison, right?
PA is no different from FL or MO except they’re even more self-righteous about their fuckups. In Gatorland they over-charge and over-sentence Black men but at least they charge the right fuckin’ guy. Their clearance rate is terrible but at least they’ve resisted the urge to cough up a suspect … any suspect. Phew. Didn’t know how good we had it.
kc
@Jason:
They were probably yelling “STOP RESISTING!” the entire time they had him restrained and were roughing him up.
Another Holocene Human
But wait, Kathleen Ann Powers committed a murder in the course of an armed robbery. She was part of a revolutionary leftist cell with extremely violent intentions. She went on the lam, changed her name, and had a family. SHE DID LESS THAN 10 YEARS.
Why is KA Powers deserving of life and not Cool C, assuming he did it? Yeah, she fucking fessed up … fucking decades later … woo, what a peach.
It’s funny, the cop family brigade who always calls for the heads of cop-killers made some pissy comments about her column appearing in the paper but didn’t try to pass a law like Penna is about felons in prison writing speeches … what could possibly be different between Powers and Mumia … both leftists … both writers … both accused of killing cops … what could it be ….
It’s a real stumper.
SiubhanDuinne
@beltane:
It really wouldn’t surprise me if this happened. After all, it was* the Ferguson PD that beat a prisoner about the head and then sued him for getting blood on their uniforms.
*(I’m going by memory, but pretty sure that story of egregious FPD actions surfaced back in August. If I’m misremembering, I expect one of you nice folks will let me know.)
Steve from Antioch
@SiubhanDuinne:
IIRC he was criminally charged with “destruction of property.” The property being the uniforms he bled on.
Gretchen
Why was the announcement at 9pm? You’d think if you were afraid of unrest you’d do it in the morning so you could see what’s going on in the crowd. But they planned it for 9 pm so the flames had time to reach their maximum just in time for the 10 o’clock news. It’s almost as if they put media coverage over public safety.
Steve from Antioch
@Gretchen:
I think they did that so kids would be home from school and people could be home from work.
Even with the late announcement, the “demonstrations” screwed up traffic going through Oakland last night.
I made sure I was safely on the other side of the hills before the decision was announced.
GailVortex
Charlie Pierce gave you a call-out, Betty. [Woo hoo, the big time.]
Tree With Water
I sat on a jury where the poor defendant was represented by a veritable Lionel Hutz of an attorney. The attorney produced not one, not two, but three admitted friends of his client to the stand and prompted their patently obvious perjury. In cross examination the young prosecutor asked one of the schmo’s to ballpark the temperature on the day and time in question. He replied wise guy-like,”I didn’t have a thermometer on me”. The DA’s timing in response was perfect. She paused just long enough for that remark to really register, and then said, “Very funny. Now answer the question”.
The difference being that unlike the Ferguson grand jury, the 12 of us promptly agreed to disregard the testimony of our three stooges. I believe it was the first order of business when we sequestered, and took all of 10 seconds to dispatch.
Lest We Forget: Missouri recently enshrined Rush Limbaugh into its much ballyhooed, state capital pantheon of great native sons.
askew
@AxelFoley:
Exactly my plan. I’ve already just about had it with the Clinton worship that has been happening within the Dem Party and this just is one more example of how worthless the party is going to be until the Clintons and their followers retire. They are out of step with the base of the party and the entire country. They think if they keep acting like Republicans white people will vote for them. Because that is all they care about, the votes of white people.
D58826
Congressclown P.King wants Obama to invite the cop to the White House.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
Would a kind front-pager be willing to put up an open thread? Even on 9/11 we eventually had to turn off the news and watch a rerun of “Mr. Show” so as not to go insane.
Sherparick
1. Just an observation; it is interesting how these blog streams become circular firing squads for Democrats and liberals to become (legitimately) peeved at the moderate and squishy members of our party and clan.
2. So it is good to remember who are real enemies are: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2014/11/celebrating-tragedy-with-snark-and.html
(P.S. I find it so sweet that Rich Lowery inserts the U.VA cavalier symbol onto his tweet. Simultaneously showing solidarity with racist cops executing black men and frat boys gang raping co-eds. The National Review, always standing up for the great traditions of the Ol’ Confederacy).
Pogonip
@Suzanne: You can’t convince 75% of the men that you talk to that RAPE is bad? Are you sure they aren’t just pulling your leg?
Amir Khalid
Darren Wilson has been negotiating with the Teebees, and now he’s ready for his close-up.
Villago Delenda Est
@Steve from Antioch: Pot. Kettle. The usual color named in this phrase.
Tree With Water
It Begins:
“@askew: So will you vote for the Greens instead? Write in Obama? Stop voting altogether? Run for office yourself or get involved / get more involved on the local level so that better candidates have a chance to come to the fore?”.
The first retail Xmas decorations appeared in mid-October, I heard my first Xmas holiday jingle at least 2 weeks ago, and someone wished me happy holidays a few days ago.
And now two years out the perennial “lesser of two evils” debate rears its inevitable head. It’s way too soon…
Mandalay
@MomSense:
Me too. But if that gets your blood pressure up, don’t read this, which for me is the most blatant and egregious example of how the game was rigged to ensure nothing happened to Darren Wilson. It is grand jury testimony from the medical examiner:
The DOJ need to go after every fucker who participated in preventing the medical examiner from doing his job.
ETA the link to the medical examiner’s grand jury testimony: http://gawker.com/read-the-ferguson-grand-jury-testimony-and-witness-inte-1663029540
Villago Delenda Est
@Sherparick:
Not to mention a certain country in Central Europe in the 30’s and 40’s.
Who some of them thinks we should have been allied to, not those Brits, French, or commie Russkies.
Dogshit like Lowery would have volunteered for the Condor Legion, not the Abraham Lincoln Brigade.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: I’m surprised he didn’t go with Fox.
@Tree With Water: Where have you been? There are people here who have been bemoaning the coming compromise since election day 2012…
Gene108
@Mandalay:
Shumer is not entirely wrong.
My mom, a liberal regular reliable Democratic voter, was thinking of sitting out the 2012 election because she wondered, “why are Democrats focusing on healthcare, when millions are losing their jobs.” Romney’s “natural charm” changed my mom’s opinion of sitting out and not voting.
In 2010, people needed jobs. The Democrats did not deliver, so people either became indifferent or voted Republican.
I disagree with Shumer that the PPACA was a mistake, as healthcare in this country was/is out of whack, where people paid double what they did 10 years earlier for less affordable access.
I think the passage of climate change carbon tax, for example, could have waited, as the number one issue back then for people was either getting a lob after getting laid off or not losing a job, if you had it.
Trying to overhaul so much, and thinking everything with economy would be fine after the ARRA, (I think there was a statement that with the ARRA’s passage unemployment would top out at 8%) did hurt the Democrats in 2010.
Business groups that backed Democrats, because Republicans crappies the bed, quickly decided to throw everything into beating Democrats by 2010, because Democrats wanted to change so much so fast, when businesses were facing a cratering economy and needed help.
Obama’s greatest failure was to grossly underestimate how bad things would become in 2009 and rather than focus solely on keeping people employed, he and the Democrats went all over the place.
askew
@Tree With Water:
I am sure you are referring to Betty trying to bully people into blindly supporting the Dems because that is what she’s doing. She’s been doing that to me ever since I said I didn’t support Hillary in the primary. Whatever.
Tree With Water
@Mandalay: It’s starting to look as if the question now is: will the DOJ do its duty, or not?
At least that’s a question republican senators will soon enough be asking Ms. Lynch, don’t you think?
Betty Cracker
@askew: That’s a load of horseshit. I don’t even support Hillary in the primary.
Geiiga
I was a little upset that McCulloch even screwed up the document dump, so I’m putting OCR-transcribed versions of all the documents on Google Drive. I wish I’d seen the Gawker transcript of that letter before I made my wife type it up (I had trouble deciphering the chickenscratch).
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B475Q0tlVvC5SHQ0OTZsYjJsVWM&usp=sharing
My computer is chugging away at the last few bits of forensic reports and then it’ll go to the transcripts of law enforcement interviews. But all the grand jury transcripts are there in searchable format if anyone feels up to looking for Witness 40 there.
Gene108
@mai naem mobile:
The reason Baucus was there, is because Ted Kennedy had brain cancer. It should have been Kennedy’s baby in the Senate, but he was out, so his replacement turned out to not be up to the task.
The greatest “what if” with regards to the PPACA will always be how things would have been different, if Kennedy did not get brain cancer.
Linnaeus
@Sherparick:
Ah, I’m not the only one who noticed that. What a fucking shitbag.
Omnes Omnibus
@askew: Patently not true.
Gene108
@SatanicPanic:
People are still pretty scarred from the Great Recession. People still do not have a strong feeling of economic security.
Things maybe better, but a lot of folks are just hanging on waiting for the economy to sock it to the again.
Tree With Water
@askew: No, not at all. She’s got nothing to do with it. I’ve been mouthing off in the great “lesser of two evils” debate for decades, long before B.C. ever came to my attention. I’ve even switched sides a couple of times, too. It’s simply way too early to start kicking that dead horse of a conversation again, that’s all. Way, way too early.
Mandalay
@Gene108:
Being right or wrong is not the point. I get it that Wall Street, Israel and the middle class are Schumer’s priorities, and TBF he does not generally pretend otherwise. Schumer does not care about the poor and disadvantaged any more than Mitt Romney (i.e. not at all), and good luck to him.
But what pisses me off is that Schumer is yet another opportunist Democrat choosing to stab President Obama in the back in order to advance his own career. How does it help Democrats for Schumer to say that focusing on the ACA was a mistake now that it is law, and Republicans are still attacking it at every opportunity?
I just hope that Hillary Clinton – otherwise a pretty close ally of Schumer on the issues – heard his remarks with considerable displeasure. I doubt if Clinton gives a shit about President Obama being thrown under the bus by a fellow Democrat, but she may not take so kindly to his bad-mouthing the ACA.
Mandalay
@Mandalay: From Chuck Backstabber’s web site, his comments on the ACA that he now thinks was a mistake:
I honestly have more time for shitbag wingnuts like Ted Cruz and Sean Hannity than self-serving hypocritical DINOs like Schumer, Schweitzer, Ford, Bayh et all.
Gene108
@Mandalay:
The last quote of Shumer’s, you quoted, about people wanting an end to the recession and jobs is a correct post-mortem analysis of why the Democrats went from such highs in 2008 to such big losses in 2010.
I think he’s wrong in stating healthcare reform could wait, and if Baucus had done his job, the Dems would not be dealing with it in 2010, as it would have passed in 2009.
There’s a good bit left wanting with regards to the Obama approach to handling the Great Recession, which basically boils down to his economic team grossly underestimating the scale of the Great Recession and not having any more plans to fire anymore “big guns” to tackle the economy after the ARRA passed.
On the other hand, his response is light years ahead of what’s been done in Europe.
To say Democrats did not make tactical mistakes in 2009 and 2010 ignores how the last two mid-term elections played out. Though I think what would have been popular and effective, such easier home refinancing so people could avoid foreclosure, would probably not sit well with Shumer and his banking buddies.
Also, Democrats ran away from Bill Clinton, in 1993, when he tried to get gays to serve openly in the military and when 19 American servicemen died in Somalia. Compared to the lack of support Clinton had, with regards to a unified Democratic coalition, Obama has done much better.
Also, too I thought liberals did not want Democrats to follow in Republican/Consevative foot steps, with regards to right-wing group-think and group-speak.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Gene108: It has taken far, far too long, but the economy is getting better. As CR indicated today, households have finally finished deleveraging. 2015 should be substantially better, and who knows, average wages may actually start going up again.
Cheers,
Scott.
Bill
I read the Wilson transcript from the Grand Jury. (http://digg.com/2014/darren-wilson-testimony-transcript. His testimony starts at page 195.) To be honest, I don’t find many parts of his story credible, but I think we can all agree that his rendition of the events presents the facts in the best possible light for him.
Here’s a short, but I think fair, synopsis of what he said:
1. Wilson was on a call with a sick kid when he got a call of a “stealing” of cigars from a local store.
2. A while later in his car Wilson saw two black men walking in the street and told them to get out of the street.
3. One of them – Michael Brown who was very large – responded rudely, including swearing at him.
4. He noticed cigars in Brown’s hands, put two and two together, and concluded that he was involved in the stealing.
5. Wilson radioed for backup.
6. Wilson backed up his car and called Brown over.
7. Brown came over to his car, swore some more and began assaulting Wilson. Including punching him in the arm and face.
8. Wilson – who is himself 6 foot 4 and 210 pounds – said Brown seemed like “Hulk Hogan” assaulting a kid.
9. Wilson thought of reaching for his baton or flashlight but decided they were too inaccessible, and instead unholstered his gun.
10. They struggled for the weapon.
11. Wilson threatened to shoot Brown, but Brown didn’t step away. Wilson tried to fire the gun but it misfired a few times.
12. Finally he got off two shots, at least one of which went through the door.
13. Brown backed away and retreated from the car.
14. Wilson got out and pursued with his gun drawn.
15. After a short pursuit Brown stopped and turned toward Wilson. Brown stutter stepped and started to run toward Wilson.
16. Wilson Fired a number of shots and stopped. He’s not sure how many shots he fired.
17. Brown did not stop and as he got closer Wilson fired again, at which point Brown fell to the ground.
18. Wilson fired the shots because he was afraid that if Brown got him he would beat Wilson to death.
Effectively, his testimony is that he was so fearful of the suspect in front of him he had no choice but to shoot him to death. If we truly live in a world where a 210 pound cop cannot subdue a single suspect without killing him, and his subjective fear of that suspect is an excuse for the killing, we are all fucked.
Here’s what Missouri law says on the use of deadly force: “Law enforcement officers are justified in using deadly force in self defense or in defense of a third person if, under the circumstances, a reasonable person in similar circumstances would believe that it is necessary.” Fitzgerald v. Patrick, 927 F.2d 1037 (8th Cir 1991)
I just cannot see how it’s “reasonable” to kill someone because they are charging at you in the street. Particularly when you are trained in methods to subdue them, have other non-lethal methods available, and you know that backup is on the way. If the standard is really “Oh he charged you? Sure you can kill him” Resisting arrest just became a death penalty offense.
Also, as a lawyer I’m personally offended at what a shitty job this ADA did. The people of Missouri should immediately have her and her superior removed from their positions. The transcript reads like a direct examination of Wilson by his defense counsel. There is no cross despite ample opportunity to shred his testimony. It’s appalling.
Sad_Dem
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Yes, that’s what it is. Reminds me of the picture of Sheriff Rainey and Deputy Price. There’s a nasty grin behind that obvious forgery. Supplying false evidence to a grand jury–ain’t that a crime?
LanceThruster
That’s the problem with ‘shape-shifters’…after you kill them, they revert to looking just like ‘normal’ people which makes it harder to get people to believe your incredible story devoid of corroborating facts.
/s
D58826
@Bill: Two of your points are things that I have wondered about from the beginning:
1. Did they find the cigars at the crime scene or are we just talking Wilsaon’s word that he saw them?
2. Why would anyone in their right mind, esp. a young black man who has just committed a robbery, start bad mouthing a cop and then lean into the police car to try and grab the cops gun? I would think the more natural inclination would be to take off.
Hob
My favorite part is “Home has no cable so not sure whats on news.” I should follow this writer’s example whenever I’m writing in my journal, and be sure to always mention to myself facts I’ve been aware of for months or years like whether I have cable TV or not.
gocart mozart
As an attorney, I have a lot of sympathy for Robert McCulloch because of the situation he was put into. It must have been very difficult for a defense attorney to also have to play the role of a prosecuting attorney for the benefit of public perception. On the one hand, he had to pretend to want an indictment and at the same time, he had to vigorously defend the rights of his client, Darren Wilson. There is a reason why this dual role procedure is rarely performed any more.
gocvart mozart
The notes are hearsay and could not be introduced as evidence at trial, not sure about in a grand jury proceeding, Ol’ #40 would have to testify himself from memory, the most the notes could be used for is to refresh his memory.
D58826
@gocart mozart: Well he could have graciously bowed to public demands and asked to gov. to appoint a special prosecutor.
Omnes Omnibus
@gocart mozart:
I believe they call it conflict of interest.
Cervantes
@Hob:
Pretty funny. Plus I like your “Scraps,” too, EB. Thanks for sharing.
Cervantes
@gocvart mozart:
Your caveat is appropriate: ordinary rules of evidence do not apply in grand-jury proceedings — hearsay is allowed — which, in part, is why grand-jury testimony is often not admissible at trial.
Joe
I’m looking for more evidence and statements from Witness 40. Anyone know where I can find any?
Bill Arnold
@Geiiga:
What tool(s) do you use to do this (OCR work)?
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Gene108:
IIRC, your memory of why the Democrats lost in 2010 is faulty. They lost because of very high turnout by elderly people convinced that PPACA was going to kill Medicare. I can’t look them up now, but Kevin Drum had the exit polls.
g
Why would they present the diary as evidence instead of having the author/witness give his/her testimony?
lawguy
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: A full court trial would have had two defense attorneys, it’s just that one would have been called a prosecutor for forms sake.
dopey-o
i have been scribbling notes throughout the day on apparent contradictions and inconsistencies… now comes this ‘black’ woman who goes to Florissant and ends up in Ferguson by mistake, just in time to witness the attack on DW. and she notes various items of clothing. and she’s only 1 of the 60 witnesses! where were all those people? must have been really crowded on Canfield Drive that saturday afternoon.
Someone (cough …Marcy Wheeler) might want to sit down with the grand jury’s evidence, produce a timeline, assemble a matrix of the witnesses’ accounts, showing concurrence and divergence.
And then we conduct a peoples’ grand jury and see what conclusions can be drawn. we can’t touch darren wilson now, but maybe we can shame the Prosecuting Attorney and his staff into a.) coming clean, b.) resigning or c.) re-opening the case against wilson.
Cervantes
@Geiiga:
The grand jury transcripts are searchable already.
Leo
Witness 40 seems to have testified in person. The testimony is in Vol. 18 of the transcript. Discusses the journal entry at p. 100.
Leo
Per the transcript, Witness 40 is mentally ill, unmedicated, and has memory problems as a result of a head injury. So he’s a sad case.
Why the fuck was the grand jury’s time wasted with this nonsense?
Edit:
Here’s a nice q & a:
13 Q . . . And did you
14 also then on the phone tell me that, you know,
15 thinking about it and rereading the entry made you
16 wonder now if maybe some of the details that you
17 testified that you have a memory of you might have
18 gotten those off the internet ?
19 A Correct .
Leo
So, on review of the transcript, Witness 40 was questioned by prosecutors and admits to being a mentally ill racist with memory damage who has difficulty distinguishing between what he experienced and what he read on the internet and gave previous testimony that wasn’t true. That’s about as thorough a discrediting as you can do and I highly doubt anyone on the jury thought his testimony was of any weight.
The real question is why the hell the prosecutor was presenting this junk at all rather than focusing his case on the evidence that had some probative value.
Cervantes
@Leo:
That’s the second part. (Yes, they actually called this witness back.) The first part is at the end of Volume 15, beginning p. 184.
And by the way, it’s a woman.
Jamey
What happened in America? Tom DeLay himself said it: “You can indict a ham sandwich.” And yet Officer Wilson skates away free without trial.
Remy
@Gene108: And don’t forget what happened after the 2012 election.
We got sucked into an unwinnable fight over gun control because of that Connecticut school shooting, and dissipated all the energy the election victory had built up.
And I was sitting there screaming “No, don’t DO this!”
karen
When the prosecutor is basically defending and basically giving carte blanche to the police officer defendant then we know it’s even more of a joke than Trayvon Martin. When Nixon ordered the National Guard to keep order before the jury decision was even made, you knew the fix was in. The problem now is, I understand why they’re doing it. They’re reasonably enraged and tired of the game called “Justice.” But by looting and setting things on fire, all they’re doing is feeding fuel to the point of view that already look at them like “animals.”
karen
@Cervantes:
Is that the cop’s ex girlfriend?
karen
@Pogonip:
If Obama was to say, “Rape is bad, evil, (or whatever negative adjective you want to use)” the Teahadi Rethuglicans would be falling all over each other, saying how women deserve it for working, wearing “provocative clothing,” or demonized for having sex before marriage or even sex for anything other than procreation so if she has birth control then she’s a whore who’s asking for it.
If Obama was to say, “Incest is evil” then the GOP would be saying things like, “If the daughter doesn’t stop him, she’s a little slut.” or there would be a new bill written in the house that would legalize incest as long as the daughter is sterilized to prevent an inbred kid.
That’s just how it has to be now. Everything he says, the GOP have to have opposite talking points.
phillygirl
The grand jury heard an audiotape of Witness #40 being interviewed by an FBI agent and DOJ attorney. The transcript is in vol.15 of the grand jury documents and is marked as grand jury exhibit 50. She is a real person, not a concoction of the prosecutor’s office. Please read it before getting too exercised.
Cervantes
@phillygirl:
Yes, that recording was played for the grand jury: a redacted transcript is included in Volume 15 introduced near the top of page 85. The grand jury then heard from her twice in person.
spiritfilled
Betty Cracker?……Really Cracker?!?
Marcia
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He didn’t actually say “everybody sit down and shut up” but came pretty damn close. And Ms. Miller was absolutely clueless about a certain lack of enthusiasm for that on the part of callers.
Richard
If you’re going to fabricate a witness who will support the cops version of what happened, you have to invent a reason for that person’s presence at the scene. She went there because she wants to overcome her hatred for Black people. Laughable. The racist language intends to validate her legitimacy.
Of course, nobody can prove when exactly her “journal” was written. A fabricated story for sure.
Michael
@Mandalay: He spelled “moran” wrong.
sponson
I believe Witness #40 was meant to be NON-credible, provided by McCulloch as a “balance” so that grand jurors would get the exercise of discounting 40’s testimony along with several non-credible witnesses who lied about being there and told a version critical of Wilson’s actions, which they didn’t see. It was part of McCulloch’s scam in rigging the grand jury process.
Jeff
if not mentioned yet, this witness was also questioned in volumn XVIII starting at about p. 90. Per the prosecutor’s questions, it seems they believed this witness imagined the whole thing.
Arun
http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1370649-grand-jury-volume-18.html
page 96, volume 18.
Bipolar
smartalek
@kc:
” I don’t get it. If the whole thing was fabricated, why insert gratuitous racist comments? ”
For the same reason so many trolls start their comments with, “I yoostabee a liberal, UNTIL…”
They think their readers are as stupid as they themselves are.
Hogart
There’s a new diary up on DailyKos with annotated (bold) transcripts from Witness #40’s interview by the FBI and her testimony before the Grand Jury. Read it: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/12/02/1348854/-Please-read-Witness-40-s-FBI-interview-and-grand-jury-testimony-Just-read-it
The grand jury farce was even worse than we thought.
Much, much, much worse.
Witness 40 should never have been taken seriously, and should have been kept far away from the grand jury — including her bogus, after-the-fact ‘journal’ (which was clearly written after she’d read various online reports). It does not seem she drove to Ferguson, at all — the FBI couldn’t find video of her or her car in the gas station she said she went into. She just plain lied, all the way through, from start to finish.