It's Not a Happy Thanksgiving in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave

There is not a lot to be happy (not to be confused with grateful) about this Thanksgiving.  In case you've been living under a rock the United States of America looks like Syria, or some other place in the Middle East in need of some Free Dumb and Democracy quick, fast and in a hurry.  African Americans are under attack in the USA.  I can't confirm, but I suspect this is a black, I mean back lash because we dared exercise our civic duty and elect an African American President not once, but twice.  I know you are mad we have a black President, but please don't take it out on us.  If I had known white America was going to go this crazy I would have voted for Hillary.  

I don't know why white America is mad because we have an African American President, he's done more for them than he has black folks.  I kind of figured black folks were going to get screwed when candidate Obama threw his long time pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, under the bus so white folks would vote for him.  

My second clue was when President Obama backed down from saying a Boston policeman acted stupidly when they arrested Dr. Henry Louis Gates in his own damn house for being uppity. 

My third clue was when the white, male dominated media made him distance himself for Attorney Eric Holder's "America is a nation of cowards when it comes to discussing matter of race" statement during a Black History Month program at the Justice Department of all places

I could go on and on about my disappointment and disillusionment in America's first half black President, but that's not the topic I want to write about today.  I want to write about Ferguson Burning.

Ferguson burned. The police protected the White side of town while allowing businesses on the Black side to be robbed and burned. At least 12 buildings were on fire. Most protesters, though, were peaceful. At two in the morning the police held a press conference. They blamed protesters for tearing apart “the fabric of the community”.

Now you won't hear about this in the white, male dominated mainstream US  media, because it doesn't fit the media driven racial stereotype of "violent protest" out of control black brutes, angry because they can't have their way, but Mike Brown's fathers church was burned to the ground.

A Ferguson, Mo., church gutted by fire on Monday was targeted by white supremacists because the pastor had publicly called for Police Officer Darren Wilson to be arrested, Rev. Carlton Lee alleged in an interview.
Flood Christian Church was one of more than a dozen buildings and businesses damaged by arsonists in the St. Louis suburb overnight after a grand jury chose not to indict Wilson in the shooting death of a black teen.
Lee was an ever-present fixture next to Michael Brown Sr. in the months after his son, Michael Brown Jr., was killed in a violent confrontation with Wilson on Aug. 9. The elder Brown was even baptized at the church on Sunday.

 Let me put this black folks can't demand equal rights because of black on black crime meme to rest once and for all.  Black folks don't march when black folks kill each other for the same reason white folks don't march when white folks kill each other.  Black folks do not commit the most crimes because they are black, black folks are convicted of committing the most crimes because they are black.

What is wrong with this argument:

1. It is a deflection. The people who make it do not truly care about black-on-black crime.
2. It creates a false choice: Most who are truly concerned with black-on-black crime were upset about the Zimmerman case too.
3. It allows the white press to determine reality, which makes it seem like Zimmerman is an exception while no one is doing anything about black-on-black crime. As it turns out, on average there is a Zimmerman-style shooting (armed security person or vigilante killing an unarmed black person) once every 28 hours. Trayvon Martin is just what made the papers. His case is hardly the worst nor the only one to get protests. Likewise, there is plenty being done about black-on-black crime, like by the Nation of Islam, but the white press is not particularly interested in reporting that either. Even worse, the white press turns a blind eye to the bad policing that leads to a high black crime rate. Yet, somehow, it always seems to find time to show black male suspects on the 11 o’clock news.
4. Crime is mostly intra-racial. That means there will always be way more black-on-black crime than white-on-black crime. While it is true that 94% of black murders are black-on-black, it is just as true that 86% of white murders are white-on-white. In fact, most crime in America is white-on-white – yet for every web page that mentions “white-on-white crime”, there are 25 that mention “black-on-black crime”.
5. It makes the worth of black life conditional. Conditional on good behaviour, like low crime rates. Once blacks get black-on-black crime under control, then they can act as if their lives matter, then they can act as if they should have justice, then they can act as if they are human beings with human rights. Meanwhile the worth of white life is taken seriously, as absolute, as not being conditional. Compare Nicole Simpson to Trayvon Martin:
   • No one belittled the killing of Nicole Simpson by quoting white crime statistics, saying “white people kill each other all the time, what’s the big deal?”
   • No one deflected by talking about white parenting or violence in white films.
   • No one made Nicole Simpson posters for target practice.
   • No one pretended to be a dead Nicole Simpson for laughs.
   • No one questioned Nicole Simpson’s character – or her choice in clothing.

Ferguson is right to resist by any means and all means necessary.   We shall not remain calm while we're being attacked.  We shall Overcome.....

We didn't land on Plymouth Rock Plymouth Rock landed on us.

#Ferguson: "These people want a lynching"

@wewillnotbebeat @RedEyesPage @mechtild5 @GovJayNixon @Watchdogsniffer #Ferguson @OpFerguson pic.twitter.com/oBrOyBumrB
— INLady-Dem (@INLadyDem) November 21, 2014

Fox Nation Readers Want to Kill Ferguson Protestors

Fox Nation editor and O’Reilly Factor producer Jesse Watters has some ‘splaining to do about the racist, murderous comments we found on Fox Nation about Ferguson protesters. And then tell us again about how black people complaining about racism is “old, tired rhetoric.”
Aria found 42 extremely disturbing comments earlier this week. 
Some were on this thread with the inflammatory title, "Rep. John Lewis Calls for 'Massive, Non-Violent Protests' Nationwide if Wilson Isn't Indicted." This is the same John Lewis that Bill O'Reilly and Bernard Goldberg recently chided for being too civil rights-y.

Psst President Obama, protestors aren't the ones using Ferguson as an excuse for violence, Sir.  

The protests have been peaceful and the fact is civilians aren't the ones perched atop armored vehicles with military rifles, clad in riot gear firing rubber coated bullets and making violent arrests -- that's law enforcement.

If you believe that federal officials must protect peaceful protestors from local, county and state law enforcement then take action and demand that President Barack Obama and A.G. Eric Holder do everything in their power to keep peaceful protesters safe from a militarized crackdown following the indictment decision: http://act.colorofchange.org/sign/mikebrownpresobama/

And so we wait to see if The United States of America is the the land of the free and the home of the brave, or the land of the suppressed and the oppressed.

Who is preparing for violence in #Ferguson Governor Nixon?

Wow, powerful! RT @ShaunKing: Who's preparing for war? Protestor training on the left and gun lines on the right. pic.twitter.com/H6IPFmIdmL
— stella (@dsstella) November 20, 2014

#FergusonSpeaks

You won't see this on TeeVee.

Ferguson Speaks: A Communique From Ferguson from FitzGibbon Media on Vimeo.

In Ferguson, Tactics Set for Grand Jury Decision in Michael Brown Case

Now, with the grand jury’s decision expected in the coming days, the groups are preparing with intricate precision to protest the no-indictment vote most consider inevitable. Organizers are outlining “rules of engagement” for dealing with the police, circulating long lists of equipment, including bandages and shatterproof goggles, and establishing “safe spaces” where protesters can escape the cold — or the tear gas.

And they want us to sing God Bless America?

And the United States of America government, when it came to treating her citizens of Indian descent fairly, she failed. She put them on reservations. When it came to treating her citizens of Japanese descent fairly, she failed. She put them in internment prison camps. When it came to treating her citizens of African descent fairly, America failed. She put them in chains, the government put them on slave quarters, put them on auction blocks, put them in cotton field, put them in inferior schools, put them in substandard housing, put them in scientific experiments, put them in the lowest paying jobs, put them outside the equal protection of the law, kept them out of their racist bastions of higher education and locked them into positions of hopelessness and helplessness. The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing "God Bless America". No, no, no, not God Bless America. God damn America — that's in the Bible — for killing innocent people. God damn America, for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America, as long as she tries to act like she is God, and she is supreme. The United States government has failed the vast majority of her citizens of African descent.

No.  No.  And NO!

"Protestors, Rioters, and Looters" code for Black folks exercising their 1st Amendment Rights in "My Country Tis of Thee"

It's dangerous and wrong to treat Ferguson MO as a warzone

As the world braces for the secret grand jury decision in #Ferguson, area police, homeland security, and the National Guard stand ready to rock and roll out their government issued, taxpayer funded, Weapons of Mass Destruction, on protestors  if  the grand jury decides not to indict  officer Darren Wilson , for the execution of #MikeBrown, in the middle of the street, for the crime of jaywalking/ talking back while black.

For some reason African Americans are supposed to accept the decision of the secret grand jury without question.

 Even as verdict after verdict continues to excuse White authority figures of their wrongdoing, the Black community is expected to understand that police officers have a very hard job. The Black community is expected to understand that approximately 150 police officers are killed in the line of duty each year, the Black community is expected to understand that police officers are human too, the Black community is expected to understand that police officers are just doing their job and the Black community is expected to understand that even if a police officer is in the wrong, you are supposed to remain submissive and never talk back.

For some reason when African Americans peacefully assemble to voice their outrage, or, to plead for justice, it's called a riot.

  During questioning, she referred multiple times to "riots" in Sanford after Trayvon Martin was killed. "I knew there was rioting, but I guess [the authorities] had it pretty well organized," she says at one point. In fact, despite a great deal of salivating anticipation by the media both before and after the trial, there were no riots in Sanford, Florida.

I believe the reason is rooted in what is known as Slave Codes ,  laws in each U.S. state, which defined the status of slaves and the rights of masters. These codes gave slave-owners absolute power over the enslaved.  For example, the Alabama Slavery Code of 1833 made it illegal for more than five male slaves, with or without passes, to assemble at any place off the proper plantation to which they belong, and if any slaves do assemble together, the same shall be deemed unlawful assembly.

Protestors are being warned by the Governor, a United States Senator, the local District Attorney,  and ironically,  the Klu Klux Klan, violence will not be tolerated (excuse me while I laugh out loud).

Terrified whites are arming themselves, prepared to protect their lives and property from the looters and rioters masquerading as peaceful protestors.   There's just one problem with this scenario, how are they going to differentiate the peaceful protestors from the looters and rioters when they all look alike?  It seems like they are preparing to put down a slave rebellion to me.

I HOPE and pray our government isn't allowed to treat peaceful protestors like "rioters and looters" again.

I HOPE and pray America lives up to it's promise of liberty and justice for ALL.

I HOPE and pray for justice, peace, and reconciliation in the Sweet land of liberty.

#BlackLivesMatter