Showing posts with label Donna Leiberman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Donna Leiberman. Show all posts

Thursday, June 5, 2014

This week in the CPR veal pen

PUBLISHED : THURS, 05 JUN 2014, 05:21 PM
UPDATED : THURS, 05 JUN 2014, 11:13 PM

A reporter from The New York Times apparently was embedded with NYPD for a military style raid in some Harlem public housing projects, resulting in biased reporting that was pro-police invasions, similar to when The NYTimes sexed up its reporting by printing propaganda to sell the public on the U.S invasion of Iraq.

Commissioner Bratton is exploiting The NYTimes' weakness for shock and awe, showing us once again that the Gray Lady apparently learned nothing of its Iraq War reporting prejudices.

NYPD-Miltary-Style-RAID-NYC-Public-Housing-Projects photo NYPD-Miltary-Style-RAID-NYC-Public-Housing-Projects_zps2ef0b22b.jpg

Selling military style police invasions like war games

RELATED


A report back on activists, who expose and overcome the corrupt nonprofit industrial complex, puppet politicans, and veal pen bouncers (NYC : News & Analysis)

IN THE LAST FEW WEEKS, the New York Police Department have begun raiding homeless shelters to arrest poor people on outstanding warrants (whose only crimes are, basically, being poor), and police have begun invading public housing projects in military style to round up youngsters allegedly involved in gangs on the basis of flimsy evidence.

Many professional, nonprofit organizations that lobby for police reform issued statements to denounce the police actions. "This incident goes against what this administration stands for," said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, referring to Mayor Bill de Blasio's administration, "and is going to drive people out of homeless shelters." But these profession, nonprofit organizations are nothing but talk these days.

Grassroots advocates for wholesale law enforcement reforms are not as restrained as the professional, nonprofit organizations. Last week, some of these advocates attended a meeting, where advocates discussed issues that are blocking professional, nonprofit organizations from resuming the direct action, pressure politics campaign for reforms that were beginning to produce some results in the final year of former Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration.

A large coalition of professional, nonprofit organizations is called Communities United for Police Reform, or CPR. These organizations are either administered by operatives loyal to the Democratic Party, or else they are funded by deep pocket donors, who are loyal to the Democratic Party. These close political ties prevent these professional, nonprofit organizations from making Mayor de Blasio look like he is betraying his many campaign promises to reform the NYPD, as these militaristic police actions most certainly confirm. One way many grassroots activists have, to determine how the CPR member organizations are committed to reforms, is by gauging CPR's actions. Are CPR's actions consistent with the intentions of the movement to reform the NYPD ? Right now, CPR is just talk and no action.

Of special consternation to some law enforcement reform advocates is the apparent silence of Picture the Homeless, one of CPR's member organizations. As people in homeless shelters are being rounded up and arrested, Picture the Homeless is not calling on help from other CPR member organizations to protest the de Blasio administration's policy decision to shock shelter residents in the middle of the night, forcing them to uncomfortably witness the shackling and arresting of fellow shelter residents under such jarring conditions.

Protests by the CPR member organizations against brutal and unconstitutional police tactics peaked on Father’s Day in 2012, when a silent march from Harlem to Mayor Bloomberg’s mansion drew tens of thousands of protesters. Right now, one group visibly pressing for aggressive reforms is New Yorkers Against Bratton. As Commissioner William Bratton continues to stir controversy with the police department's use of aggressive, brutal, and often unconstitutional tactics, more and more New Yorkers are going to plainly see that the CPR member organizations are not committed to reforms, because they are unwilling to back up their talk with action.

While the NYPD raids homeless shelters and public projects with no visible protestations from CPR member organizations and while the media play up the dramatic military style use of helicopters and battalions of cops in dawn surprise attacks, another high-profile police reform group, the Police Reform Organizing Project, or PROP, is organizing an art exhibit next week.

The NYPD's "Broken Windows Policing" escalates into "Preventative Policing" ?

As if all of this just wasn't enough, the NYPD has announced a new program with Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, whereby the police department has entered into a "close collaboration" with prosecutors, sharing electronic surveillance information between prosecutors and police officers on people, who have committed no crime, but who are targets of prejudice for possible suspicion. It's like straight out of Minority Report, where people are arrested by law enforcement for having committed no crimes, yet. The kind of "preventative policing" that NYPD and Manhattan prosecutors envision is an escalation of "broken windows policing," where people are arrested for minor crimes before they theoretically commit bigger crimes. This obsession with preventative and broken windows policing will flood the justice system with many people being tried for minor infractions or no infractions, but these discriminatory approaches to justice will not allow prosecutors to focus on complex public, corporate, and campaign corruption cases -- an imbalance in the prosecution of crimes that lead many law enforcement reform advocates to describe a legal system that treats petty criminals worse than white collar criminals. Indeed, a glaring example of this tale of two justice systems is the police department's military style invasion of Harlem public housing projects for the arrest of alleged young gang members during the same week when former Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes remains free with no imminent threat of arrest for having used the money proceeds of drug deals to pay for his campaign consultant.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Bill de Blasio : Vision Zero on Dissent and Checks-and-Balances

Dissent is one way for voters to keep a check on the power of Mayor Bill de Blasio's new administration.

No ranking city official can keep a check on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio keeps repeating that he is a "progressive." It's as if the more times he says it, the more likely voters will believe him without demanding from him the fundamental reforms we voted for in the change election of last November.

Left to his own devices, the mayor will only answer to his small group of political insiders, as he demonstrated with the controversial appointment of William Bratton to succeed Ray Kelly as NYPD police commissioner. Meanwhile, voters have expectations that the mayor will fulfill on his campaign themes of being the anti-Bloomberg mayor. Three top areas where voters are still waiting to see reforms enacted are at the NYPD (such as ending controversial tactics, such as the use of excessive force) ; the provision of adequate funding that will save all of New York City's full-service hospitals ; and ending the corruptive role of money and lobbyists in local elections.

Nobody is asking why, for example, does it seem that under the mayor's new traffic safety plan known as Vision Zero, the mayor seems to want to achieve lower traffic accidents by trading up for more police brutality. The city agencies charged with overseeing investigations into possible wrong-doing by lobbyists, including the lobbying firm The Advance Group, answer in part to the mayor and to City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito -- two officials who have close political ties to The Advance Group. Because of this inherent conflicts of interest such as these, there's no way for the city to regulate lobbyists that do business with elected officials. City government must adopt realistic reforms to restore integrity to campaign finance and to elections. One way to do that, for example, would be for the city to legally challenge the application of Citizens United to local elections. On top of that, true separation of powers and checks-and-balances must exist in city government. Dissent, a form of political speech that is crucial to the full representation of all citizens, is discouraged by the de Blasio-Mark-Viverito administration. After Councilmember Rosie Mendez backed the wrong candidate in the Council speaker race, she was punished by a demotion that stripped her of a committee leadership post. Councilmember Mendez should not be penalized for speaking up for political convictions.

Just this week, the mayor announced that he will allow uniformed city employees to march in the discriminatory St. Patrick's Day parade, even though the parade organizers discriminate against LGBT participants. Allowing city employees to mark in their uniforms lends the city's approval to the anti-LGBT discrimination by the parade, and it allows city employees, notably firefighters and police offices, to propagandize the parade with official presence. Separately, LGBT groups have begun protesting against the controversial new police commissioner -- even though he serves a "progressive" mayor ! To LGBT New Yorkers, their experience of police attitudes remains today eerily similar to the harsh attitudes of the last police commissioner. Even on the day of his ceremonial inauguration, Mayor de Blasio was the subject of a protest by members of the AIDS advocacy group ACT UP over his refusal to meet with activists to create a city-wide AIDS agenda. And New York City community hospitals remain in dire straits, the same as they did under the previous mayor, conditions for which Mayor de Blasio previously faulted former Mayor Michael Bloomberg. There is no oversight or call for accountability for the new mayor to address the issues that he is neglecting.

Everybody, including the federal prosecutor, is looking to the media for help to keep elected officials accountable. But one major reporter admitted that the media did not fully scrutinize the mayor during last year's campaign. Who can keep the mayor accountable ? Voters can.

Already, one group of activists have formed a protest group, New Yorkers Against Bratton. If you want to organize to increase political pressure on the mayor and the NYPD commissioner to adopt meaningful police reforms, this is a great group to join. Some police reforms that remain outstanding include recommendations made by the NYCLU following the massive 2003 anti-war protest and the 2004 Republic National Convention.

Voters need to be proactive about getting informed on issues, staying involved with government, and demanding the reforms they thought that they were voting for in the last election. If no ranking city official will dissent from the mayor's blatant power grabs, then the voters must come forward and express their displeasure. Dissent is one way to keep a check on the new administration's power.