the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Dec 7, 2015
Workers at the three American auto companies came close to permanently rejecting the contracts negotiated by UAW leaders. First with Chrysler; then, GM; then, Ford. This had never happened before in the whole 79-year history of the UAW. And workers did it with little organization.
This was something extraordinary.
Certainly, they were outraged that all three companies, turning in record profits, were not ready to return most of the sacrifices workers made during the last decades.
They were fed up, frustrated by hours that kept them chained to the plants, drudging away under conditions not far removed from the ones that had once prompted workers to organize a union.
They were angry that their kids and grandkids will not have the same possibility they once had to find a stable job.
When they saw how current retirees were disregarded once again, they knew they would have little hope of retiring in any thing other than poverty.
And all of this in a period when the auto companies and their executives were rolling in money, billions and billions of dollars, tens and hundreds of billions of dollars in a few years time.
But what really steeped the workers’ anger was the stance of the union, calling on the workers to put the companies’ interest first.
Auto workers had come face to face with the reality of what most unions are today and have long been: henchmen for the capitalist class, an apparatus inside the working class to control workers who resist.
But even when unions try to fight for the workers’ interests—and there still are some, in some situations—even then, they run up against the hard fact that the decisions made about what happens are never made at one plant or by one company.
It is the capitalist class as a whole that today determines the fate of the whole society. This tiny minority, this minuscule class that has its hands gripped tightly around the throat of the whole country, settles our fate, every one of us.
But this capitalist class is only a minority, a tiny minority. What gives it power today is its ability to act as a single class on all important questions. That is, it has organizations that unify it. It controls and uses the two big parties, it has the whole state apparatus at its disposal: cops, courts, legislatures. It has armies, it effectively owns the dictators that run other countries.
In the face of this unified class, this organized class, the working class has only unions, organized by company or even by workplace or even by only part of a work place. Most workers aren’t organized at all.
The situation is absurd. The working class is by far the biggest class and the most important. Workers make everything run—factories, offices, banks, schools, even the prisons themselves. And yet the working class doesn’t benefit from its dominant role. It is not organized as a single class.
The working class needs its own party, a party whose aim will be to organize the fights and struggles of all working people, a party based on the conviction that “the working class and the employing class have nothing in common”—in the words of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World), 110 years ago—a party that understands that racism is a cancer inside the working class, dividing us.
More than 100 years ago, Eugene Debs spoke at every gathering of workers, up and down this country, calling for a single working class party that would organize “not to conciliate the capitalist class, but to organize to fight against it.”
Those words from over a century ago wait to be realized in our day.
Dec 7, 2015
There were 31 Illinois-based companies listed in the Fortune 500 in 2015. These included Archer Daniels Midland, Boeing, Walgreens, State Farm insurance, Sears Holdings, Kraft Foods, Caterpillar, Allstate insurance, giant pharmaceutical and healthcare equipment companies Abbott Labs and Baxter, tractor company John Deere, McDonald’s, Motorola Solutions, the giant electric company Exelon, United Continental Airlines, Illinois Tool Works, Sara Lee, and Navistar.
So how can Illinois be broke?
The answer, of course, is that these companies avoided paying taxes, by hook and by crook. And the Illinois state government, the Chicago city government, and the federal government help them do it.
Take the example of Boeing. In 2013, they were supposed to pay 1.65 billion dollars in taxes on 6.23 billion of profit–that they admitted to. But they “deferred” this tax into the future–and paid almost nothing. Caterpillar routed its profits through a Swiss company to avoid taxes. McDonald’s, Baxter, and Northern Trust used similar tricks to keep their money overseas. Exelon, the giant power company, avoided taxes by claiming “bonus depreciation”–meaning they said their power plants would lose value over time, so they shouldn’t pay anything. United Continental used “operating loss carry-forwards” to avoid taxes. They lost money in the past, so said that even though they made money now, they don’t have to pay.
All of these crooked maneuvers and many more are legal, because the tax law was written to benefit the big corporations.
There is an easy answer to the budget crises in Illinois–make these super-rich companies pay taxes!
Dec 7, 2015
The media gushed all over Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, for promising to give away 99 percent of his wealth. But that’s not what happened.
Zuckerberg created a “Limited Liability Corporation” that he controls. And these corporations can invest in regular, for-profit companies. So all Zuckerberg did was shift wealth from one pocket to another.
On top of that, Zuckerberg can use this new corporation to avoid taxes. So after amassing one of the biggest fortunes in the history of the world, 45 BILLION dollars, he will probably wind up paying almost NO taxes on it.
Worst of all, Zuckeberg, like Bill Gates, George Soros, the Koch brothers, and other billionaires who donate a lot to “charity,” will use his wealth to control society. The Gates Foundation is one of the biggest backers of school “reform”–the word they use for all the attacks we’ve seen on the public schools in recent years. Soros and the Koch brothers donate enormous sums to politicians. Other charities like the Ford Foundation use their money to influence politics in the direction THEY want, all over the world.
“Charity” from billionaires like Zuckerberg is no solution to the problems we face. Instead, workers will have to take that wealth back, control it ourselves, and use it to meet our needs.
Dec 7, 2015
Last month, UnitedHealth, the country’s largest private health insurer, said that because of the “continuing deterioration” of its profits, it may quit offering coverage through the Affordable Care Act system by 2017.
This is a company that pocketed more than 4.5 billion dollars in net profit already in first nine months of this year. But, in capitalism, only the sky’s the limit. And, UnitedHealth wants more profits. Otherwise, it threatens to dump its insured, who may already be sick and in need of treatment or may have a health problem in the future.
Simply, to increase its profits, UnitedHealth wants, for example, higher premiums, which would increase out-of-pocket healthcare costs for working people. Since UnitedHealth is the largest insurer, if it could get away with such threats and extract higher premiums, other insurers would follow suit, increasing the healthcare costs for all.
The actual threat to our health is these so-called health care companies. They are the sickness of this system!
Dec 7, 2015
Right before Christmas, new multimillion-dollar tax breaks for a Las Vegas corporation called Switch are being debated in Lansing.
The head of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation said to the Detroit News that “he could not say how much the proposed tax breaks for Switch would be worth annually.” Huh?! Won’t this blow a hole in the Michigan budget?
And speaking of holes, the Governor and Legislature just approved tax and fee increases on ordinary people. They said this was to “pay for the roads.”
What SHOULD be paying for the roads are CORPORATE TAXES!
Dec 7, 2015
Johnny Melton won $31,690 to settle a lawsuit over his mother’s death while he was incarcerated for a drug conviction. But the Illinois Department of Corrections turned around and sued him for the money–to pay for the cost of locking him up! After he was paroled, Melton wound up in a homeless shelter, on food stamps, and died soon after, destitute.
Melton’s case is not alone. One inmate won $50,000 in a lawsuit against the Department for failing to treat his cancer–and they turned around and sued him for $175,000!
It’s not just people who won suits. In another case, the Department sued a man who had saved a few thousand dollars from his $75 a month job as a prison carpenter. The Department sued another inmate who inherited $14,000 from his grandmother.
And this doesn’t just happen in Illinois. At least 43 states allow officials to seek money from prisoners.
It’s not enough for these disgusting jailors to ruin people’s lives, take their freedom, and make sure they can’t have a job. They want to steal inmates’ last dime.
Dec 7, 2015
In a Michigan Legislature Education Committee hearing about failing schools, Michigan state Senator Knollenberg spouted this crap: “We can’t make African Americans white. We can’t fix that.”
And if all whites were like Knollenberg, who would want to be white?!
Dec 7, 2015
The Climate Change Conference, called COP 21, began in Paris on November 30. It is the 21st international climate change conference to be held, and is likely to produce exactly what the previous 20 produced–absolutely nothing that stopped or even slowed the industrial production of greenhouse gases. Nothing but hot air and platitudes from politicians. Especially politicians from the biggest polluters in the world.
A number of commentators point out that China is the biggest polluter in the world, responsible for a quarter of the world’s emissions of greenhouse gases. But, according to the latest figures, using the population of China, emissions are 6 tons of CO2 for every person. In France, though, the figure is 10 tons of CO2 per person; and in the always-so-virtuous United States, the figure is 17 tons of CO2 per person.
In fact, all the countries participating in the climate change conference adhere, in conference after conference, to the same model. There’s not the slightest sanction against those who break the promises they make at these conferences. And it was exactly the same for the 20 previous climate change conferences that have taken place since 1995. The countries just display the yearly reports; no promises are kept, and global warming is not checked in the slightest. (This year is the hottest year on record—after 20 of these conferences!)
The French minister of foreign affairs claimed, “If a country doesn’t hold to its agreements, the political and psychological pressure will be strong.”
That’s some cold comfort.... This claim was made in the past and has so far prevented nothing!
Dec 7, 2015
The following appeared in the November 27th issue of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the newspaper of the revolutionary group of that name active in France.
The State of Emergency extended by French President Hollande, with the almost universal agreement of the members of Parliament, was supposed to aid the police working in hunting down terrorists and preventing new terrorist attacks. It gave the prefects (appointed officials in each department) the possibility to prevent any demonstrations they wanted, with a penalty of up to six months in prison and a fine of up to $8,000 for violators. Several demonstrations were prohibited, like that calling for migrants to be allowed to travel freely to France, called in Paris for November 22nd. Others were delayed or transformed into rallies without marches, like that called for retirees throughout France on November 24th.
The CGT union is still calling for demonstrations on December 2nd in support of the threatened Air France workers, and it calls on workers to mobilize on that day throughout France. The federation correctly emphasizes “since there is no truce in the attacks against the working class, there won’t be a truce in the union struggle.”
And, in fact, the demands for national unity and the State of Emergency don’t postpone any layoff, prevent any hard blow by the bosses, put off any legal conviction against workers facing repression. On November 16th, right after the emotion raised by the terrorist attacks, the CGT union of EDF (French Electricity Company), was condemned by a judge, which obviously wasn’t called for by the anti-terrorist struggle. On the contrary, the State of Emergency gives additional powers to the judges, police and prefects to raise new obstacles to workers’ struggles. It also makes it easy for the bosses to multiply the humiliations, searches and attempts at intimidation of workers who bother them. It also gives them pretexts to fire workers with the most far-fetched arguments. But far-fetched or not, a firing is a firing.
This is why, far from letting themselves be impressed by appeals to national unity, the workers must emphasize their demands, respond to the attacks, defend their class interests and their perspectives. The day of action on December 2nd will be the occasion for it.
Dec 7, 2015
In Colorado Springs, Colorado, a gunman opened fire on people in a Planned Parenthood clinic and the surrounding area, holding people hostage and finally murdering three people and injuring nine others. He allegedly included in his remarks when apprehended, “no more baby parts.”
His remark is a reference to current slanderous attacks that right wing politicians have directed against Planned Parenthood, the largest and best known provider of contraceptives, mammograms, cancer screening, abortions and other medical services for women. In the most inflammatory language, government leaders are continuing to pump the false allegation that Planned Parenthood is selling body parts from aborted fetuses for profit.
And while the dominant press presents this Colorado gunman as a loner and a “crazy”, he was only following in the path of religious extremist right wing individuals before him–part of a violent campaign against women fueled by right wing politicians in the government and funded by huge capitalist concerns.
At the very moment of the shooting, Congressional so-called leaders were threatening a government shutdown in order to cut all reimbursements to Planned Parenthood from the new federal budget.
Afraid of the political fallout of being connected too closely with the Colorado shooting, Republican Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy abruptly discontinued debate on the matter. Suddenly he was afraid to continue leading the horrendous barrage of remarks from Congressional leaders and Presidential candidates who have referred to the “sale of baby parts,” as did the Colorado shooter!
News reports would have us believe that the U.S. population faces its greatest threat of terrorist violence from “Muslim extremists” connected in some way to ISIS or other “foreign” organizations.
In fact, the most common form of domestic terrorism in the U.S. continues to be violent attacks carried out by individuals connected to the Christian right wing. Hundreds of abortion clinics have been targeted–bombed, burned, shot-up–in the past 30 years, with most case-files against the perpetrators “still open.” At least 14 people have been murdered in attacks since 1993.
It is not just confused right-wing zealots attacking women’s rights today, it is none other than leading Republican politicians.
And while the rhetoric of the Republicans may be unbelievably crass, the Democrats have had an equal or greater hand in slashing away at benefits designed to protect women from unwanted pregnancy. President Jimmy Carter refused to veto a Congressional ban on federal funding for Medicaid abortions, condemning women least able to afford abortion to unwanted deliveries and/or unsafe abortion choices. And Democrats have been helping attack abortion rights ever since.
As a result of this rotten political system, millions of women are losing their rights to control their bodies and their futures. Nationwide, women seek to abort almost one out of four pregnancies. The reactionary measures imposed by Congress are not eliminating or reducing the number of abortions. They are only guaranteeing that more women will die from unsafe abortion.
The fight for women’s rights cannot be limited to reacting in horror to violent attacks on abortion rights. It has to extend to bringing down this rotten, so-called “democratic” system that promotes inequality and injustice toward women on every level.
Dec 7, 2015
The following appeared in the December 5th issue of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the newspaper of the revolutionary group of that name active in France.
The French government established a State of Emergency after the terrorist attacks in Paris. This has been used to prevent the expression of opposition to the government’s policy. The secretary of the CGT (the major union federation), Martinez, is worried that it can represent “a danger for the social movement.”
On November 28th, Secretary of the Interior Cazeneuve boasted about some 2,000 searches carried out over two weeks. The media pointed out the brutality and unplanned way they occurred: smashing doors with battering rams, cutting open low ceilings, overturning furniture, and throwing people to the ground and handcuffing or wounding them. The police put 212 people in custody. According to the police themselves, the majority of those arrested have no connection to terrorist acts, but are involved in petty crime. Further, people on the streets found to have no legal papers were deported from the country.
The State of Emergency also authorized prohibiting demonstrations which in no way constitute a terrorist threat, like that of November 22nd in solidarity with the migrants. This is all the more shocking because many of the migrants have tried to reach Europe to flee the violent acts of the Islamic State in Syria.
Activists against the proposed global warming treaty were the next to be struck by the crackdown. In Dordogne, organic farmers had their homes searched for taking part in an action against the airport at Notre Dame des Landes ... three years ago. Even before the opening of the global warming summit, 80 people were subject to house arrest. And on Sunday the police attacked a peaceful demonstration to protect the environment, under the pretext that there was a small minority present who had smashed windows at previous demonstrations, out of some thousands of demonstrators. Out of 341 people called in, nine were held in custody until the next day, without anyone knowing what they were supposedly guilty of, much less any proof of the accusations.
Cazeneuve and Prime Minister Valls have already raised the possibility of extending the State of Emergency beyond three months, and some of the right wing politicians have demanded more—like Guaino, who asked for a year and a half. Recently, the bosses and the government treated the Air France workers, who protested layoffs, like hoodlums. With the State of Emergency, the government confirms and reinforces the means of repression against workers.
Dec 7, 2015
The armed attack that killed 14 and wounded 21 at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California, is truly horrifying and barbaric. Employees of the County Department of Public Health were gunned down while attending a training event and holiday party. In this country, which has been swept by one mass killing after another, this massacre underlined the harsh fact that anyone could be attacked at any time.
The two shooters, Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik, led what seemed to be a normal life, with a steady job and a six-month infant child. But according to the government allegations, they were supposed to be “radicalized” terrorists, who acted on their own, with no connection to other terrorist groups, similar to the Fort Hood massacre and the Boston Marathon bombing.
How much of this is true? The FBI claims that it will follow wherever the evidence leads. Yet, barely two days after the investigation began, the FBI let the couples’ home be opened up to the news media, even though the San Bernardino Sheriffs Department reiterated that the home “remained a crime scene,” suggesting that the FBI was more ready to feed the media circus rather than preserve possible evidence.
So, what are government officials going to propose in the name of protecting the public? More police measures? The government, FBI and police, in the name of protecting the population from such violence, have already been militarized, with military-style SWAT teams and tanks–which everyone watched on television in full force in the aftermath of the massacre.
Are they going to propose more monitoring of the population? We are already the most spied upon population on earth. Government agencies monitor and store all communications on phone and internet, including locations in real time. Video cameras are everywhere. Police agencies secretly record license numbers. Financial transactions are monitored. And on and on.
How about more gun control? Well, California is already supposed to have the strictest gun control laws in the country.
Beefed up police and spy agencies, greater police powers, a more authoritarian government–none of these measures have stopped the massacres.
As for the supposed war on terror abroad–it has only spurred the growth of terrorism. This war has already officially lasted more than 14 years. In the name of protecting the U.S. population from al Qaeda, the U.S. military first invaded Afghanistan in 2001. Two years later, in the name of protecting the world from “weapons of mass destruction,” the U.S. invaded Iraq. The U.S. bombed Pakistan. It is bombing Syria and Yemen–all in the name of the war on terror.
Yet, these wars and violence have only spread death and destruction, and along with that, it has fed the growth of terrorism, which today is at a much higher level than it was 14 years ago.
Of course, the supposed U.S. war on terror did not stop terrorism–that was not its goal. Instead, the U.S. government used the threat of terrorism for its own purposes–to secure greater control over the Middle East and Central Asia and its riches for the U.S. oil companies and banks, as well as to clamp down on the rights of working people in this country.
And, just as dangerously, the U.S. government and the ruling class that it serves, has also used this war to fan the flames of prejudice and hatred, opening the door to much more extreme right wing demagogues.
No, there is no security for working people in a world controlled by a tiny minority, the capitalist class, for its own interests.
Dec 7, 2015
Republican Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner wants public workers to pay for the state’s fake budget crisis. He’s made it clear he wants to ban public worker unions from bargaining over salary, pensions, and healthcare. And he wants to impose at least two BILLION dollars in cuts to pensions alone.
The Democrats make a show of blocking Rauner from carrying out these attacks. But the reality is that the Democrats and Republicans are two faces of the same policy.
Rauner and Democratic Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel are famous good buddies. Before either was elected, Rauner sent millions of dollars of business Emanuel’s way. Emanuel was a frequent guest at Rauner’s Montana ranch. And now they’re working together again. As Rauner attacks state workers, Emanuel attacks teachers and other city workers.
And Rahm Emanuel is not the only former Obama chief of staff to have close ties to Rauner. William Daley, brother to the former Democratic Mayor Richard M. Daley, served on Rauner’s transition team after he was elected governor.
The President of the Illinois Senate, Democrat John Cullerton, poses as a friend of workers and pretends he is working to block Rauner’s attacks. But a reporter recently asked him if he was open to a law outlawing public worker unions from negotiating over pensions and salary with local governments, in order to make a budget deal with Rauner. Cullerton said, “if there are ways in which we could help local governments and school districts save money, we are open to that.” In other words, this “friend” of the unions is “open” to destroying them.
Rauner, Emanuel, Cullerton, and Daley may not be in the same party. But they serve the same class–the wealthy. At our expense.
Dec 7, 2015
The whole world watched as, one by one, thirty-three Chilean miners were hoisted out of the ground in a small narrow capsule back in October of 2010. The movie The 33 recounts the mine collapse and rescue 69 days later.
On the afternoon of Thursday, August 5, 2010 a massive cave-in occurred in the 121-year-old San Jose copper-gold mine. The entombed men became known as “Los 33” (The 33). They were trapped 2,300 feet underground, three miles from the mine’s only entrance with spiraling underground service ramps. It was 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the mine.
The mine owners ignored warnings of the mine’s instability. After the collapse, the mine owners did nothing but lock the gates. They made no attempt at a rescue. The owners knew they had left the miners no way to survive.
The collapse blocked the only road in or out of the mine. The miners managed to get to the rescue chamber. But they soon discovered that the radio wasn’t worth a damn, the medical kit was empty, the ventilation shafts lacked the required ladders, and there was very little stored food and water.
The movie powerfully depicts what the impact was for the miners. One miner, Mario Sepulveda, steps up to the plate and becomes their leader, dividing food in rations and stopping outbursts of violence or despair. At one point, one of the miners, Luis Urzua, the foreman, blames himself. Mario stops him, shouting, “If you want to blame someone, blame the owners!”
After about 18 days, rescuers drill a hole into the refuge. It’s not wide enough for the capsule, but it’s enough to get supplies down to the men. They are also able to communicate with their families.
The movie also shows the families and how they were instrumental in getting the government to step in and rescue the miners. Campamento Esperanza (Camp Hope) was the tent city that sprang up in the desert as families and others heard of the accident.
After 68 days, it took another 22 hours to extract all 33 miners on October 13th.
Chile is the world’s top producer of copper. An average of 34 people per year since 2000 have died in mining accidents in Chile. The mine operator, the San Esteban Mining Company (CMSE), was notorious for operating unsafe mines. Eight workers have died at the San Jose site in the past 12 years while CMSE was fined 42 times between 2004 and 2010 for breaching safety regulations. The mine was shut down temporarily in 2007 when relatives of a miner killed in an accident sued the company. But the mine reopened in 2008 despite non-compliance with regulations. San Esteban Mining Company was not charged with any crime in this latest incident.
The movie touches on many things, but mostly tells a compelling story.
Dec 7, 2015
A wave of hunger strikes has spread through immigrant detention centers in several states since October. It is part of a larger, on-going wave of protests, in which thousands of detainees have been trying to call attention to the inhumane conditions under which they are held captive.
These “detention centers,” where the federal government holds more than 30,000 people captive on any given day, are in effect prisons. The prisoners’ “crime” is being in this country without proper documents. They not only have committed no real crime; many of them are in fact fleeing crime and violence, especially those from Latin American countries. Many others are fleeing poverty.
About 500 women are detained at T. Don Hutto, an all-women’s detention center in Texas, the majority of them from Central American countries. They are trying to escape from poverty, domestic abuse and gang crime, many with their children. Twenty-seven women at Hutto launched a hunger strike on October 27. Seventeen Hutto detainees described the poor conditions and abuse in the facility in hand-written letters, which were publicized by advocacy groups. Many of the women have family members in the U.S. and demand to be reunited with them, but authorities deny their requests.
When federal authorities arrest and detain undocumented immigrants, they have the choice of either citing and releasing them, or deporting them back to their countries. Many Central American women and their young children have been sent back to their home countries–back to the poverty and abuse they were trying to flee. Most of the women held at Hutto and other detention facilities face the same fate.
But many immigrants the authorities deem able to work are often given a court date and released. Like the decision to deport, this too is a conscious decision by the authorities. Capitalists have always welcomed able-bodied immigrant workers, on whom they are able to impose lower wages and harsher working conditions–especially undocumented workers whose situation is always insecure. The threat of deportation is used by capitalism as a way to keep a “labor market” that can more easily be manipulated for higher profit.
Workers have nothing to gain from the anti-immigrant, “us-versus-them” talk the bosses and their politicians constantly bombard us with. It’s nothing but another way the working class gets divided–and, like every division, it weakens us as a class.
Dec 7, 2015
Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis says that since the uprising following the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of the police last April, the city’s police department has gone “from being ... unprepared and inexperienced ... to the most prepared police department in America in the event of another disturbance.”
Maryland Governor Larry Hogan says that the state police and National Guard are ready to deal with any “violent” reaction to verdicts in the trials now underway of police officers indicted after the uprising following the death of Gray. “We’re hoping for the best but we’re prepared for whatever might happen,” he says.
This sure sounds like a threat of more police violence than was used the last time against people rebelling against the killing of Freddie Gray. They want to back off and silence the population. Yet it’s clear that the rebellion following the death of Gray was the only thing that caused any cops to be indicted in the first place!
Dec 7, 2015
Detroit community activist Ron Scott has died. Scott had been active in the black movement around many issues since the early 1960s. Since the ’70s, he was best known for his fight against police brutality, including opposing the Detroit Police Department’s hated STRESS unit. He was a founding member of the Detroit chapter of the Black Panther Party. In 1996, he helped form the Coalition Against Police Brutality.
Scott was unlike those who, when addressing police brutality, restrict themselves to taking up cases of unimpeachably “respectable” middle-class people with clean arrest records. He defended all people, including those in the streets. He took the stance that it didn’t matter who the people were, whether they had a previous police record or tried to defend themselves against the cops–those the police and the media usually try to paint as the cause of their own victimization at the hands of the police.
Scott, for example, spoke up for the family of 7-year-old Aiyana Jones, killed when police busted down the door of her grandmother’s home looking for her father, a suspect in a nearby shooting, and started blasting. He spoke up for Renisha McBride, a young black woman shot by a white homeowner in Dearborn Heights when she knocked on his door late at night looking for help. She had been hurt in an accident, and the media blamed her because she’d been drinking earlier that evening.
The efforts of Scott and others to oppose police brutality have made prosecutors in and around Detroit, like Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy, more likely to indict killer cops than those in many other areas around the country.
The Detroit area has lost a real fighter with the death of Ron Scott.
Dec 7, 2015
Sixteen shots. That’s how many bullets Chicago cop Jason Van Dyke fired into 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. The cops involved gave signed statements asserting that McDonald was coming at them, threatening them, and that he even continued to wave a knife after he had been shot all 16 times. The dash-cam video from another police car showed clearly that they lied. Van Dyke shot McDonald as the youth was walking away. Fourteen of those shots were fired as McDonald lay dying on the ground.
Chicago police have shot 409 people since September of 2007, when the city created the “Independent Police Review Authority,” or IPRA. The IPRA found problems with only TWO out of those 409 cases. Anyone smell cover-up?
The Laquan McDonald case sure smells like a cover-up.
It’s not the only cover-up, not by far. The killer cop Van Dyke was himself involved in investigating the 2005 shooting of a 23-year-old janitor in a sausage factory, Emmanuel Lopez. Van Dyke, who submitted the “official” incident report, admitted he did no investigating at all and simply copied the cops’ version of what happened, word-for-word, into his report.
The stench goes much higher than just a few lying cops. Off-duty Chicago cop Dante Servin fired over his shoulder, into a crowd, and killed an unarmed woman, Rekia Boyd. The case was so egregious that Cook County States Attorney Anita Alvarez was forced to charge the cop. But she charged only manslaughter, not murder. A judge threw out the case–because he said it should have been charged as murder. He let off the murdering cop on legal double-talk. Dante Servin was left on the force–like other murdering cops–until Police Superintendent Gerry McCarthy fired him, just hours before the Laquan McDonald video was released.
Behind the killer cops stand the Cook County States Attorney’s office, the judges, the police hierarchy, and the “Independent” Police Review Authority.
In 2008, a federal jury found that police department officials had covered up a beating, and that a “code of silence” in the department protected cops from facing discipline. Off-duty Chicago cop Anthony Abbate had brutally beat bartender Karolina Obrycka, a case also caught on video. Mayor Emanuel’s response was to promise Obrycka that the city wouldn’t appeal her $850,000 settlement, if she would help them erase the “code of silence” language from the verdict!
Emanuel did everything he could to block the release of the police dash-cam videos of the McDonald killing. Only after the city was forced to release them did States Attorney Anita Alvarez finally charge the cop with murder–a year and a month after the shooting. Only when the release of the video produced wide public outrage did Emanuel fire Police Superintendent Gerry McCarthy.
Lorenzo Davis, a retired Chicago police commander, recently declared: “The public cannot trust anyone who is currently in the system.” He was the cop who refused to change his conclusions in six cases where he found cops had wrongly shot people, even after the IPRA chief ordered him to.
Emanuel said: “Jason Van Dyke does not represent the police department.” No–not just the police department, but also every rotten official in Chicago involved in creating and protecting this murderous system.