America's ‘War on Drugs’ Turned Ferguson into a Warzone

How America's ‘War on Drugs’ turned Ferguson into a warzone

Police officers setup to push protesters to disperse during a protest by using tear gas on West Florissant Road in Ferguson, Missouri on August 17, 2014. (AFP Photo / Michael B. Thomas)

August 19, 2014 

RT.com - The violent protests that continue to plague Ferguson, Missouri, where an unarmed black teenager was shot dead by a white police officer, has brought military-grade hardware onto the streets in a frightening display of force. How did America get here?

Long before most Americans had heard of the names Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaeda, or Ferguson, Missouri for that matter, Washington had declared war on a different sort of evil. This one, popularly known as cocaine, arrived from south of the border: the drug of choice for everybody from middle-class suburbanites to Hollywood celebrities.

On Sept. 5, 1989, George H.W. Bush told the nation he would increase spending on the “war on drugs” to $7.9 billion – “the largest increase in history,” he announced.

The following year, the National Defense Authorization Act (Section 1033) empowered the Pentagon to “transfer to Federal and State agencies personal property of the Department of Defense, including small arms and ammunition, that the Secretary determines is - (a) suitable for use by such agencies in counter-drug activities; and (b) excess to the needs of the Department of Defense.”
 
Predictably, however, these bold plans failed to stop the flow of drugs into American neighborhoods. Rather, the ill-conceived program used the bulk of taxpayer money to purchase military-grade armaments and sprawling new prisons for a long and expensive fight against drugs.

In this drug-fueled showdown against South American drug cartels, Uncle Sam, like Tony Montana, the power-crazed drug kingpin in the film ‘Scarface’ (1983), will go out in a blaze of guts, glory and gunfire against the enemy.

Ultimately, however, the “war on drugs” fizzled out like a wet firecracker. Despite blowing more money than a coke fiend, the UN estimated that opiate use actually increased 35 percent worldwide from 1998 to 2008, cocaine by 27 percent, and marijuana by 8.5 percent.

At the same time, local US communities inherited the spoils of foreign wars – from Iraq to Afghanistan - stockpiling many tons of military hardware, the samples of which are appearing today on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri amid increasing street protests.

Not only are local communities getting upgraded to military-grade specifications, they are also receiving the military training techniques to go with the powerful hardware. 

“The St. Louis County Police Department’s annual budget is around $160 million,” Newsweek reported. “By providing law enforcement agencies with surplus military equipment free of charge, the NDAA encourages police to employ military weapons and military tactics.”

Just as disturbing as the violence that has rocked Ferguson for the last eight days and nights, and the horror over the shooting death of an unarmed teenager by a police officer, is the spectacle of watching armored vehicles roll down city streets and police who look better equipped to fight a war in the Middle East than a protest rally in the Midwestern United States.

In addition to armored vehicles, the Ferguson police have at their disposal body armor, full combat gear and futuristic crowd-control weapons, like acoustic weapons that disperse protesters by emitting a powerful, ear-splitting electronic signal.

The death of teenager Michael Brown, and the ensuing violence it has reaped, has thrown a spotlight on what has been largely concealed from public scrutiny: the militarization of local US police forces.
Many observers are wondering exactly how armored vehicles and other combat equipment landed on the streets of Ferguson in the first place.

Police attempt to control demonstrators protesting the killing of teenager Michael Brown on August 18, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri. (AFP Photo / Getty Images / Scott Olson)

Although police in Ferguson have been seen driving around in a black vehicle that closely resembles a “Bearcat” MRAP (Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles), Mike O’Connell, Communications Director for the Missouri Department of Public Safety told Newsweek that “no St. Louis County law enforcement agencies have acquired any MRAPs through the 1033 program.”
 
O’Connell said that if the vehicle is indeed an MRAP and not one of about ten “utility trucks” acquired by St. Louis County, he admitted he does not know where it came from.

The military gear comes with an additional cost: The image of a paramilitary presence more prepared to fight a war against a foreign enemy can have the unintended effect of creating an atmosphere of fear and paranoia among the public.

Former Seattle Police Chief Norman Stamper warned that when police wear military-style uniforms, it can aggravate the overall level of hostility that the crowd feels for the officers.

"Keeping the peace at a demonstration essentially means having police officers in standard everyday uniforms, not military garb," Stamper told Vox in an interview. “In the process they become an occupational force where they are in charge — in the name of control, in the name of public safety, taking actions that actually undermine legitimate control."

In June, the American Civil Liberties Union released a report that pointed to the acquisition of military equipment by local police, along with a surge in the number of SWAT deployments, as proof that US police forces are morphing into something potentially dangerous.

More incredible is that this ‘military creep’ inside local police forces is occurring without the benefit of public debate.

"American policing has become unnecessarily and dangerously militarized, in a large part through federal programs that have armed state and local law enforcement agencies with the weapons and tactics of war, with almost no public discussion and oversight," the ACLU report stated.

As the United States winds down its military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, US police forces are getting the used ‘hand-me-downs’ from the Pentagon.

“Using these federal funds, state and local law enforcement agencies have amassed military arsenals purportedly to wage the failed War on Drugs…But these arsenals are by no means free of cost for communities. Instead, the use of hyper aggressive tools and tactics results in tragedy for civilians and police officers, escalates the risk of needless violence, destroys property, and undermines individual liberties,” according to the report.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon drafted in April a “U.S. Army Techniques Publication: Civil Disturbances” that anticipated the exact sort of civil disturbances now happening in Ferguson.

The manual, recently obtained by Public Intelligence, discusses situations under which, “Civil unrest may range from simple, nonviolent protests that address specific issues, to events that turn into full-scale riots.”

“Significant ethnic differences in a community can create an atmosphere of distrust, even hatred … (and) can cause an eruption of civil disorder that can lead to full riots,” it continued.

A demonstrator displays a sign during a protest in Ferguson, Missouri on August 18, 2014. (AFP Photo / Michael B. Thomas)

But the “military creep” that appears to be happening in Ferguson is indicative of a nationwide move involving the total transformation of local police departments into paramilitary apparatuses, and despite (or because) of the fact that the “war on drugs”’ has fallen off the national radar.

Meanwhile, this exorbitant investment in both military hardware and techniques seems to be provoking police departments to react with much more firepower against guilty and innocent alike than they normally would.
Peter Kraska, a professor at Eastern Kentucky University’s School of Justice Studies, told the Economist that SWAT teams were deployed about 3,000 times in 1980. Today that number exploded to “around 50,000 times a year.”
 
Kraska provided a litany of disturbing statistics attesting to the growing militarization of American communities, many of them with low crime rates: 89 percent of police departments in American cities with more than 50,000 people had SWAT teams in the late 1990s—nearly double the amount in the mid-80s. By 2007, more than 80 percent of police forces in cities with a population between 25,000 and 50,000 had them, an increase of 20 percent since the mid-1980s.

It should come as little surprise that an increasing number of Americans do not trust their police to protect them. As the ACLU said in its report,  

“It’s time for American police to remember that they are supposed to protect and serve our communities, not wage war on the people who live in them.” 

Robert Bridge is the author of the book, "Midnight in the American Empire," which provides a glimpse behind the iron curtain of corporate power, and how this economic phenomenon is destroying the American Dream.

Stop Transferring Weapons of War to Civilian Police Departments Under the Guise of Fighting a War on Drugs, Which Has Evolved Into a Border War

Stop Arming the Police Like a Military

June 24, 2014

DefenseOne.com - If there’s anything I know after serving the Boston Police Department for 27 years, it’s this: Good policing is all about trust.

This isn’t a particularly novel insight, but my time as a beat cop hammered it into me time and again. Yet it’s incredible how many police departments across the nation have lost sight of this in their rush to transform into something more akin to a standing army rather than a civilian police force safeguarding a democratic people.

Have no doubt, police in the United States are militarizing, and in many communities, particularly those of color, the message is being received loud and clear: “You are the enemy.” Police officers are increasingly arming themselves with military-grade equipment such as assault rifles, flashbang grenades, and Mine Resistant Ambush Protected, or MRAP, vehicles and dressing up in commando gear before using battering rams to burst into the homes of people who have not been charged with a crime. Perhaps more alarming is the fact that the Pentagon has played a huge role in this militarization by transferring its weapons of war to civilian police departments through its so-called 1033 program.

Many communities now look upon police as an occupying army, their streets more reminiscent of Baghdad or Kabul than a city in America. This besieged mentality created by the militarization of police has driven a pernicious wedge into the significant gains made under community- and problem-oriented policing initiatives dating from the late 1980s. The trusting relationships so many police officers painstakingly built within their communities have been eroded by the mindset of the warrior cop.

One of the more alarming trends in the overall militarization of police, which has accelerated since 9/11, is the use of Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT, teams for routine police work. According to the ACLU’s new report, “War Comes Home,” the majority of the SWAT raids it examined was to execute search warrants, usually in low-level drug investigations. The ACLU also found that many of the SWAT raids it studied used unjustifiably “violent tactics and equipment,” often in homes where children were known to be present.

The ACLU also found something far more worrisome but unfortunately not surprising. The use of SWAT teams disproportionately impacts people of color, particularly when the teams were deployed to execute a search warrant for a drug investigation. Of the cases the ACLU studied, when SWAT raids affected blacks and Latinos, 68 percent were for drug searches. But when SWAT raids affected whites, only 38 percent were for drug searches, even though whites use drugs at roughly the same rates as blacks and Latinos.

This discriminatory and excessive use of SWAT teams turns the criminal justice system on its head and eviscerates the presumption of innocence, which is the hallmark of American justice. People who have been charged with no crime aren’t only treated like they’re guilty; they’re made to endure a violent intrusion into their home based on the mere suspicion of low-level crimes. To the victims of unnecessary SWAT raids and their communities, the idea that police are there to serve and protect them becomes a bad joke.

This isn’t to say that the use of SWAT teams is never justified. I know better than most. I participated in one of the very first SWAT deployments at the Boston Police Department when a man who shot a police superintendent barricaded himself in an apartment. But this is the precise type of situation that the SWAT program was created for, not breaking down the door of people in the middle of the night with guns drawn in pursuit of drugs.

Militarized policing undermines the very notion of law enforcement in a democratic society. Rather than reassuring us that we are safe and out of harm’s way, it creates a pervasive sense that we are unsafe and in danger, sometimes from the police themselves. It’s not surprising then that the ACLU also discovered that the militarization of domestic law enforcement occurred without any input, direction, or oversight from affected communities and that law enforcement agencies’ records on acquisitions of military weapons, vehicles, and equipment were “virtually nonexistent.”

The situation, however, is far from being beyond hope or possible resolution. Not all police practitioners — including policy makers, administrators, managers, supervisors and line officers — endorse and support the militarization of America’s law enforcement agencies. Progressive police chiefs in Madison, Wisconsin, and Salt Lake City, Utah, for example, have been publicly critical of police militarization practices and initiatives.
If we want to roll back the militarization of our police forces, the ACLU offers many common sense recommendations, but two stand out as critical first steps. The first is that the use of paramilitary tactics should be restricted solely to situations where there is a true and verifiable emergency, such as a hostage or barricade situation. The second would require that police record and report all uses of paramilitary tactics, including a justification for the use of SWAT, as well as all injuries and property damage caused by the use of SWAT teams.

Our streets and communities aren’t warzones, but the creeping militarization of our police forces and the warrior mindset it creates has the feel of a self-fulfilling prophecy on the part of our nation’s law enforcement agencies.

Dr. Tom Nolan is an associate professor and the chair of the Department of Criminal Justice at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh. He served 27 years in the Boston Police Department before retiring as a uniformed lieutenant.

Border War: Pentagon Program Sends Military Gear South

In Texas and elsewhere, law enforcement agents get weapons and more.

September 17, 2014

U.S. News - When unarmed black teenager Michael Brown was killed in Ferguson, Missouri, by a white police officer in August, images of cops in battle gear spraying protesters with tear gas circulated on television screens and splashed across magazine pages. Suddenly, concerns over the militarization of local police forces became a point of contention and national debate.

Data from 2006 to May 2014 show counties across the U.S. possess military-type weapons ranging from grenade launchers to bayonets. And as the Obama administration reviews the transfer of military equipment from the Pentagon to law enforcement and Department of Homeland Security agencies under what's known as the 1033 program, civil liberties activists along the southern border finally see an opportunity to address the rapid rise of border militarization in their own communities.

Before Ferguson-area authorities used military equipment against protesters, and before mine-resistant vehicles, riot gear, 8,909 bayonets and 228 grenade launchers flowed to local communities, surplus military equipment went to the border. The 1033 transfer program was authorized by Congress for the 1990-1991 fiscal year, but until 1997, only federal and state agencies could request equipment for “use in counter-drug activities.” From the early days of the program, counter-drug activities were mostly synonymous with “the border,” according to a U.S. News analysis of data from The New York Times and the Defense Department's Law Enforcement Support Office, which is part of the Defense Logistics Agency.

From 1991 to 1996, a whopping 80 percent of tactical equipment orders through the program went to Texas alone. The majority were for night-vision equipment in El Paso County, home of a Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection coordination center, which still accounts for a large amount of items distributed through the program.

Now, federal agencies along the border continue to strongly embrace the 1033 program. Records show agencies under the Department of Homeland Security have received at least 300,000 items from the program since 2009, although the actual number is almost certainly much higher, since that 300,000 figure only includes nonmilitary items such as survival gear, office supplies and tools. And since the data for military items like guns or armored vehicles are not released on an agency level, the total number received by DHS agencies is impossible to calculate.

It's “a matter of security,” says Michelle McCaskill, a spokeswoman for the Defense Logistics Agency, about why they do not detail which specific agencies receive military items.

While some counties along the southern border receive very few tactical items from the Defense Department through the 1033 program, there are major outliers. In El Paso County, agencies have received at least $38 million worth of items since 2006.

Sheriff Departments Across the U.S. Defending Defense Department Programs for the Militarization of Law Enforcement with Surplus Equipment

Weapons of war beefing up local police arsenals

'Police militarization' faces criticism, though Hampton Roads sheriffs, police officials defend defense department program to turn over surplus equipment to law enforcement. The Department of Defense’s Excess Property Program, commonly referred to as the 1033 Program, sends unneeded military equipment like weapons and body armor to local police forces for no cost.

September 28, 2014

Daily Press - A large armored vehicle that in recent years patrolled the battlefields of the Middle East now stands at the ready in York County.

Once used to help American troops avoid getting killed or maimed by roadside bombs, the imposing vehicle was turned over to the York-Poquoson Sheriff's Office in May under a long-standing program to allow law enforcement agencies to use military surplus equipment.

It's among 620 Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles — also called "MRAPs" — recently doled out to cities and counties nationwide as wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have wound down. And they're free to local agencies, except for shipping costs.

Moreover, hundreds of military assault rifles — most of them M-16s — were sent to local police departments and sheriff's offices in Hampton Roads between 2006 and 2012, according to a recent Defense Department spreadsheet.

Hampton, Newport News, Gloucester, Isle of Wight and Poquoson have together received more than 300 such rifles, according to the Aug. 20 list from the Defense Logistics Agency.

The Hampton Police led the way with 115 rifles, though it's giving them back as it transitions to department-purchased AR-15s that are smaller, lighter and come with night sights, a police spokesman said.

Newport News obtained 85 rifles, including 75 M-16s, while James City County Police Department has gotten 67 rifles, with both agencies saying many of the guns were issued to tactical and patrol officers certified on the weapons.

One police agency in Isle of Wight got optical gun sights, as well as night vision and infrared equipment. Mathews obtained a system to conceal or scatter radar signatures. New Kent received a grenade launcher.

Both the City of Franklin, population 8,600, and Virginia Beach got MRAPs like the one that went to York, while several agencies obtained various trucks.

But now, the surplus transfer program is under increasing scrutiny from the White House and congressional lawmakers. That follows recent events in Ferguson, Mo., where police outfitted with military-style gear — using armored vehicles, tear gas and smoke bombs — responded to gatherers protesting a fatal police shooting in August.

One recent bill, sponsored by a Georgia congressman and co-sponsored by U.S. Rep. Robert C. "Bobby" Scott, D-Newport News, aims to restrict the program.

Equipping police forces

The Department of Defense's "1033" initiative began in the mid-1990s with congressional authorization, mainly to help law enforcement agencies combat drug trafficking. It offers everything from general equipment such as desks and exercise equipment, to guns, armored vehicles and even planes.

Under the program, tactical items are technically on loan to the police agencies. Ownership of the weaponry is maintained by the federal government. If the local agency no longer wants a weapon, they must give it back.

The ACLU — which has been complaining in recent years about what it calls a trend toward "militarized policing" — contended in a June report that having free access to such weapons has led police to use more heavy-handed tactics. The organization also blames equipment grants from the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security.

President Barack Obama expressed concern at a September news conference about the response at Ferguson, calling for a re-examination of the military's surplus program.

One of the great things about the United States, Obama said, is the "distinction" between police and the military, saying it "helps preserve our civil liberties."

"There is a big difference between our military and our local law enforcement, and we don't want those lines blurred," he said. "That would be contrary to our traditions."

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., considered a leading Republican candidate for president in 2016, has also voiced alarm. The "militarizing" is worrisome, he wrote, particularly in light of "eroding" civil liberties, such as an increased use of "no-knock" search warrants and the forfeiture of people's assets without convictions.

"Big government has been at the heart of the problem," Paul wrote in Time magazine on Aug. 14. "Washington has incentivized the militarization of local police precincts by using federal dollars to help municipal governments build what are essentially small armies — where police departments compete to acquire military gear that goes far beyond what most Americans think of as law enforcement."

Controlling the flow of weapons

On Sept. 16, U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Georgia, introduced the "Stop Militarizing Law Enforcement Act," designed to "stop the free flow" of excess Defense Department military weapons "from battlefields directly to the streets of America."

"When law enforcement uses military MRAPs on Main Street, that changes the relationship with the public," Johnson said on the House floor. "Our country is not a war zone, and it should not feel like one."

Scott signed on as a co-sponsor, as did 33 others — 29 Democrats and four Republicans.

Under the bill, the Defense Department would be barred from transferring to police departments "automatic weapons that are not recognized as suitable for law enforcement," including any guns .50-caliber or greater. On Thursday, Scott said many rifle transfers would still likely be allowed.

The legislation would ban the transfer of armored vehicles, drones, aircraft, flash bang grenades, stun grenades and gun silencers.

"If you need a military-style operation, it appears to me that you should call in the military, people that are actually trained in using these things," Scott said Thursday. "How often does a local county sheriff actually use a tank? And how well trained will his deputies be in using a tank? If you need a tank, the local National Guard can get one out there in no time."

Getting such a piece of equipment should be a policy decision, he said.

"If York County needs a tank," Scott said, "the county ought to appropriate the money and buy it."

Scott said he didn't have an immediate answer as to what he thought should be done with the unused equipment if it didn't go to police. But, he said, "getting this equipment so they can practice military operations against local citizens is in my view inappropriate."

Defending the weapons

Many in local law enforcement, however, have a very different take.

York-Poquoson Sheriff J.D. "Danny" Diggs defended his acquisition of the MRAP, saying it won't be routinely used. But it can help rescue and protect citizens and deputies alike in extreme situations, from a natural disaster to a hostage crisis to a school shooting.

"If we had deputies down in a situation, we could roll up to them and rescue them," Diggs said. Or in the case of a barricaded suspect, he added, "we could get in a little closer to establish some kind of communication."

And because the six-wheel-drive armored vehicle can drive into 3 feet of water, he said, "if we needed to evacuate people out of some water, we could do that as well." Sometimes, Diggs said, "you don't just want to show up in a patrol car."

Diggs added that he understands how such equipment "can be negatively perceived." But, he said, "the perceived abuse by one agency does not affect every agency in the country."

"Who's abusing it?" Diggs said of his MRAP, saying it's "not a tank." 

He also disputes the notion of widespread "police militarization."

"Other than having an MRAP, I'm no more militarized than I was 15 years ago when I took office," Diggs said. "So does that one piece of equipment that has multiple uses, and that will rarely if ever be used, make me some kind of military agency now? The answer is no."

Aside from the new armored vehicle, Diggs said, the only other surplus items his 94-person department has received from the program are 40 backpacks, some binoculars, and five shotguns that have been converted to less-than-lethal weapons that shoot beanbags.

He also said the armored vehicle is a good deal for county taxpayers. The Pentagon originally paid $733,000 for the MRAP in 2008, with Diggs saying it's now valued at about $400,000. The cost to the Sheriff's Office was only the $6,500 to ship it from Texas, with Diggs estimating maintenance at about $500 annually.

Isle of Wight Sheriff Mark Marshall, whose office has acquired two utility trucks, four rifles and eight digital cameras under the program, said "we're all trying to do more with less, as budgets continue to shrink."

"A lot of this equipment can be appropriately converted to civilian law enforcement," Marshall said. "The community and agency just have to weigh it out. Is there a utility? What's the maintenance? And is there a need that they foresee?"

He spoke of a Los Angeles case from 1997, in which two bank robbers armed with assault rifles had injured civilians, and "the weaponry the LAPD had to confront them was insufficient." Eventually, Marshall said, police had to take over a Brinks truck to evacuate the wounded.

Newport News Police spokesman Lou Thurston also brought up the 1997 incident, saying some of the officers went to a nearby gun shop, telling the owners that, "We're in a gun battle and need some firepower."

James City County Deputy Police Chief Steve Rubino said his department has gotten 67 military rifles during the past 10 years or so.

"It's a necessary piece of equipment to address deadly threats at a greater and safer distance more accurately," he said.

But he said the department tries to factor in public perception when acquiring new equipment. Last year, the police considered buying a new kind of bulletproof vest that's worn outside an officer's uniform. But the department decided against the move, Rubino said, because of the "appearance and image that they presented to the public."

The Williamsburg-James City Sheriff's Office has acquired 15 military rifles under the Defense Department program. The office doesn't provide primary law enforcement, with deputies providing court security, prisoner transport and the serving of court paperwork. But sometimes they help back up the police, Sheriff Bob Deeds said.

"And if someone were to come into the (courthouse) with something aside from a handgun ... then we have to be ready," Deeds said. Given the cost of new rifles, he said, getting the guns at shipping cost "was a pretty good deal in terms of saving taxpayers money."

Dana Schrad, executive director of the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, touted the fact that the military's surplus program doesn't just transfer weapons, but everything from desks to lockers, from bulletproof vests to outer wear.

She asked what would become of the military weaponry if it didn't go to police:

"Do we really want to see them publicly auctioned off to people who are not in fact in a position to protect and serve?"

Schrad spoke of the students walking out of Columbine High School in Colorado with their hands up in 1999. If a sniper was at a school window, she said, "he could have picked off those kids." But an armored vehicle could go in and rescue them.

"On the rare occasion that it's used, it may be the only piece of equipment that can make a difference between saving a life or not," Schrad said. "This equipment can help the public, and not so much endanger the public."

Any potential misuse of the weapons, Schrad said, is curtailed by good training and policy, and by laws and court decisions outlawing excessive police force.

In his application for the MRAP in January, Diggs said his tactical team uses a modified and unprotected Ford Econoline van. Diggs said he initially wanted a smaller version of the armored vehicle, but only the larger version was available.

"We compare it to a generator — it's not worth much to many people until you need it," he said. "Would we have gone out to buy one of these out of local taxpayer money? The answer is no. Is it too big, is it overkill? The answer is yes. But it's at very low cost to us … and we hope we never have to use it."

There's a hatch atop the MRAP, near where a gun was once mounted. There are a couple bullet marks on the windows left over from wartime. The vehicle will soon be painted with a York-Poquoson Sheriff's Office logo, Diggs said, but will be made available to other cities and counties in Hampton Roads, too.

It's all about being prepared, Diggs said.

"Some people will criticize us because we got one," he said. "But others will criticize us if we didn't have one — and some kind of incident happened where we needed it. They'd say, 'It was available. Why didn't you get one?' "

Why Does Your County Sheriff Need Military Equipment?

The Currituck County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina now owns an 18-ton military armored truck able to take on high-powered rifle fire. The $412,000, mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicle known as an MRAP comes free as surplus from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. Currituck is one of five North Carolina and two Virginia law enforcement agencies to receive one of the armored trucks this year. The federal government has given out 165 nationally since August, said Michelle McCaskill, a spokeswoman for the Defense Logistics Agency. “Some people might ask, ‘Why do we need something like this?’ ” said Capt. Sandy Casey of the Sheriff’s Office. “We don’t know what could be next. They say domestic terrorism is what local law enforcement will be dealing with.” [Source] Bear in mind, this equipment comes courtesy of the Pentagon, so it represents only a small part of the picture. Law enforcement agencies also purchase military equipment with their own money, or via Department of Homeland Security grants. A U.S. Department of Defense program that was created in the early 1990s and gives free military equipment to sheriff's offices, local police departments, and state agencies. It became all the rage of the post-9/11 era and today touches every corner of the United States.

Does a Minnesota town with only two full-time cops really need this vehicle?

DOD Transferred Over $4.3B in Military Equipment to Local Police

August 21, 2014

Warren County, NY Undersheriff Shawn Lamouree standing in front of a surplus MRAP his department got for free from the Dept. of Defense. (AP photo)

CNSNews.com - The Department of Defense transferred over $4.3 billion worth of surplus military equipment--including 345 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAPs), 205 grenade launchers and over 12,000 bayonets--to more than 17,000 state and local law enforcement agencies across the nation since 1997.

The transfers were made under the 1033 program of the National Defense Authorization Act and administered by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), according to a report by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) entitled War Comes Home: The Excessive Militarization of American Policing.

The DLA website does not include a comprehensive list of where surplus military equipment winds up, but a spokesman for the agency told CNSNews.com that a database found on the Detroit Free Press website that lists military equipment distributed since 2006 was accurate because the data had previously been obtained from the DLA under the Freedom of Information Act.

A CNSNews.com review of the database found that some of the surplus items, such as binoculars and .45-caliber pistols, can easily transition to a civilian police setting.

But other equipment clearly intended for military use has also been sent to local law enforcement agencies. For example, in March, Wyoming’s Laramie County received an MRAP from the DLA. The Laramie County sheriff’s office told CNSNews.com that there have never been any recorded instances of landmines in the rural county, which has a population of just over 91,000.

Concerns over increased militarization of the police have prompted calls from both the left and the right for an end to the 1033 program.

“Militarization unfairly impacts people of color and undermines individual liberties, and it has been allowed to happen in the absence of any meaningful public discussion,” the ACLU report stated.

“Dressing police officers as soldiers is dangerous because the mindset of a soldier is entirely inappropriate for a police officer,” writes Tim Lynch of the Cato Institute. “Soldiers fight a military enemy; police officers deal with citizens, who are protected by the Bill of Rights.”

“If the Pentagon hands local cops millions of dollars’ worth of hammers, it should be no surprise when suddenly everything looks like a nail,” Lynch added.

But Crisp County, GA Sheriff Bill Hancock disagrees that the 1033 program should be scrapped, pointing out the benefits for small local law enforcement agencies like his.

Hancock told CNSNews.com that Crisp County also received a MRAP in February through the 1033 program, but that the sheriff’s office has removed the gun mount from the top and has not used it to date. He added that it would only be used in a hostage or shooting situation where officers’ lives could be in danger.

“It’s a good program,” Hancock told CNSNews.com. “You take that program away and somebody my size is not going to be able to equip all their SRT [Special Response Team] members with bulletproof vests. We’re not going to be able to equip them with night vision equipment. We’re not going to have some small handguns that we need because you’re gonna do away with the whole program.”

“So let’s put restrictions and guidelines on it; [but] let’s don’t just arbitrarily jump up and say, ‘Do away with the program.’"

First Ebola Case Diagnosed in the United States of America

Similar to the incident in 2009 with the swine flu, paranoia is being heightened by corporate media, which will lead to a heavily-promoted vaccine that will produce massive profits for the pharmaceutical industry.

The Club of Rome in 1968 conducted a study with the aim of determining the limits of human growth. The result of their study was that civilization as we know it would collapse shortly after the year 2000 and natural resources would become scarce for the hegemonic powers; and the capitalist system itself would be in danger unless the population was severely reduced by some medium, either by hunger or disease. Several intelligence agencies of the American government made ​​recommendations to the ruling elite, presented to Dr. Aurelio Peccei, Director of the Club of Rome at the time. The main recommendation was the development of pathogens that attack the immune system and thus make the development of a vaccine immediately impossible. The orders given were to develop pathogens and also develop prophylactic. Pathogens could be used against the general population and could be introduced by vaccines administered by the complicit World Health Organization, O.P.S. Pan American Health Organization, and health agencies in Africa, South America and Asia. The cure would be administered to the survivors when they decide that enough people have died. This plan was called Global Plan 2000. [Source]

Texas patient confirmed as first Ebola case diagnosed in US (Video)

September 30, 2014

Yahoo – A man who recently arrived in Texas from Liberia has been confirmed as having the first case of Ebola to be diagnosed in the U.S.

Authorities with the Centers for Disease Control revealed the finding late Tuesday, two days after the unidentified patient was admitted to a Dallas hospital with suspicious symptoms.

Officials at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas put the man into “strict isolation” and sent a blood specimen to state and federal labs for testing.

Both came back positive for the deadly disease, which has killed more than 3,000 people in Africa this year. According to the World Health Organization, there have been more than 6,500 Ebola cases confirmed in Africa, with Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone among the hardest hit.

“He is ill, he is under intensive care, he's being seen by highly trained, competent specialists, and the health department is helping us in tracing any family members that might have been exposed," said Dr. Edward Goodman with Texas Health Dallas.

Authorities declined to name the adult patient or even say if he is an American.

“The patient was visiting family members and staying with family members who live in this country,” said Dr. Thomas Frieden, CDC director.

Frieden said the man arrived from Liberia on Sept. 20, but didn't start feeling ill until Sept. 24. He sought medical treatment at Texas Health Dallas on Friday, Sept. 26 before being sent home. He was then admitted to the hospital on Sunday the 28th.

“The initial symptoms of Ebola are often nonspecific ... they are symptoms that may be associated with many other conditions,” Frieden said. “That's why we have encouraged all emergency department physicians to take a history of travel within the last 21 days.”

The CDC has a team en route to North Texas to help health officials retrace the man's contacts since he has been in the states. Officials characterized the patient as having close contact with about a "handful" of family members while in Dallas.

“I have no doubt that we'll stop this in its tracks in the U.S., but I also have no doubt that as long the outbreak continues in Africa we need to be on our guard,” Frieden said.

Along with all other passengers, the patient's temperature was taken as a matter of precaution when he left Liberia for the U.S. on Sept. 19. Because he didn't show fever then, Frieden said, officials have no immediate plans to make the man's flight information public.

“At this point there is zero risk of transmission on the flight," Frieden said.

Ebola is highly contagious and deadly, but only spread through contact with bodily fluids. Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson spent most of his day trying to calm the fears of North Texans.

“It is easier to get the flu than it is to get the Ebola virus,” Thompson told KTVT-TV. "You have to get it through secretion, blood, that type of transmission. So this is not a situation where you go to the grocery store and you get infected with the virus.”

Ebola symptoms include sudden fever, fatigue and headache. Officials said symptoms may appear anywhere from two days to three weeks after exposure.

Four American aid workers have contracted Ebola in West Africa and been evacuated to the U.S. for treatment since late July. Three of them were released after making full recoveries. A fourth patient arrived in Atlanta on Sept. 9, but spokespersons at Emory University Hospital have said privacy laws prevent the release of an updated condition.

On Sunday, a U.S. doctor who had been volunteering in an Ebola clinic in Sierra Leone was brought to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, as a safety precaution after he was exposed to the disease (see story below).

In past years Ebola has killed up to 90 percent of those it has infected, but officials say the death rate in the current outbreak is closer to 60 percent due to early treatment.

US doctor exposed to Ebola virus admitted to NIH

September 28, 2014

The Associated Press - An American doctor who was exposed to the Ebola virus while volunteering in Sierra Leone was admitted Sunday to a hospital at the National Institutes of Health near the nation's capital.

The patient, who was not identified, arrived at NIH's Clinical Center about 4 p.m., NIH said in a statement on its website.

NIH said that out of "an abundance of caution," the physician was admitted to a special isolation unit. NIH infectious disease chief Dr. Anthony Fauci wouldn't discuss details about the patient but said that in general, an exposure to Ebola doesn't necessarily mean someone will become sick.

"When someone is exposed, you want to put them into the best possible situation so if something happens you can take care of them," Fauci said.

"NIH is taking every precaution to ensure the safety of our patients, NIH staff and the public," the agency said in a statement.

Four other American aid workers who were sickened by Ebola while volunteering in the West African outbreak have been treated at hospitals in Georgia and Nebraska. One remains hospitalized while the others have recovered.

An Associated Press photographer saw a person dressed in a white protective suit get off a plane and walk to a waiting ambulance at the Frederick Municipal Airport in Maryland about 3:30 p.m. Sunday.  

The plane's tail number matched that of the aircraft that has been used previously to transport other Ebola patients to the United States from overseas.

NIH spokesman John Burklow confirmed that the plane carrying the patient landed at Frederick.

Click here for photos; click here for video of the transfer of the doctor at Frederick Regional Airport.

Editor's Note:

Some are questioning why Frederick was chosen as the relay airport when there are other regional airports closer to NIH in Bethesda than Frederick. One theory is that if an outbreak occurs in the area because of a release of the virus from Fort Detrick, the government can deny culpability and blame it on the transfer at the airport in Frederick.

Local airports near Bethesda, MD:

11 miles: Buzzards Pt Sea Plane Base Anc. Rvr Dc - Buzzards Point Seaplane Base, DC
12 miles: Pentagon Army - Washington, DC
15 miles: College Park Airport - College Park, MD
18 miles: Reston Airport - Reston, VA
18 miles: Montgomery County Airpark - Gaithersburg, MD
24 miles: Tipton Airport - Odenton, MD
27 miles: Davison Army Airfield - Fort Belvoir, VA
28 miles: Andrews Air Force Base - Camp Springs, MD
30 miles: Joint Base Andrews Naval Air Facility - Camp Springs, MD
34 miles: Leesburg Executive Airport - Leesburg, VA (JYO / KJYO)

Frederick is the home to Fort Detrick, the center of the US biological weapons program from 1943 to 1969. In 2008, Bruce Ivins, a microbiologist at the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) at Fort Detrick, Maryland, reportedly committed suicide. Fort Detrick was the nation's, and likely the world's, "largest and most sophisticated" BW testing center. Officials admit that accidental anthrax deaths did occur at the facility.

Frank Rudolph Olson (July 17, 1910 - November 28, 1953) was an American bacteriologist, biological warfare scientist and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) employee who worked at Fort Detrick (formerly known as Camp Detrick): he was covertly dosed with LSD by his CIA supervisor and, nine days later, plunged to his death from the window of a New York hotel room. Some — including the U.S. government — term his death a suicide, while others allege murder. First, the Army told Frank Olson's sons that the Fort Detrick scientist's death in a fall from a 13th-floor window of a New York hotel had been an accident. Then a presidential commission revealed that the CIA had given an unwitting Olson LSD as part of a mind-control experiment in remote Western Maryland only nine days before the fall, and concluded that his death had been a drug-related suicide. Eric and Nils Olson believe their father — who had told colleagues before he died that he wanted to quit the top-secret Special Operations Division — was murdered on November 28, 1953.

1967 FT Detrick Biological Weapons Program Victim Speaks Out - True Story of Diana Quintanilla Montoya


Related:

• A SECRET BIOLOGICAL WARFARE PROGRAM
• Pine Bluff Arkansas Chemical Weapons Arsenal

Ben Carson Thinking About Running for President in 2016

Host Chris Wallace noted Ben Carson’s August comment that if the Republicans don’t win a majority in the Senate this year, the 2016 elections might not even be held and asked the retired neurosurgeon if he stood by it:

WALLACE: You said recently that there might not even be elections in 2016 because of widespread anarchy. Do you really believe that?

CARSON: I hope that that’s not going to be the case. But certainly there’s the potential because you have to recognize that we have a rapidly increasing national debt, a very unstable financial foundation, and you have all these things going on like the ISIS crisis that could very rapidly change things that are going on in our nation. And unless we begin to deal with these things in a comprehensive way and in a logical way there is no telling what could happen in just a couple of years.

Carson then noted that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has “over three hundred bills sitting on his desk” that he won’t bring to the floor for a vote, “thereby thwarting the will of the people.”

Carson finished a close second Saturday in a straw poll at the 2014 Values Voters Summit for 2016 presidential preferences. 

Carson's thoughts on the definition of marriage: 

"My thoughts are that marriage is between a man and a woman, it’s a well-established uh, fundamental pillar of society. No group, be they gays, be they NAMBLA [the North American Man/Boy Love Association], be they people who believe in beastiality, it doesn’t matter what they are, they don’t get to change the definition. So it’s not something that’s against gays, it’s against anybody who wants to come along and change the fundamental definitions of pillars of society. It has signifcant ramifications."

Carson compared the Affordable Care Act to slavery at the Values Voters' Summit Friday, saying, 

"It was never about health care; it was about control." 

Ben Carson, a surgeon and bestselling author, receives applause after speaking Monday at a Republican fundraiser at the Marriott in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. (Scott Morgan/For The Washington Post)

He’s already a famous surgeon and author, so why is Ben Carson toying with a longshot presidential bid?

August 28, 2014

Washington Post — Ben Carson sees bullies everywhere.

Maybe that’s what happens after years of being walloped by stronger kids, and ridiculed by the smarter ones at his inner-city schools in Boston and Detroit.

The bullying is central to the stories Carson tells about himself. Onstage here today in Iowa, where all presidential campaigns begin, he starts with a tale about studying hard enough to best his tormentors.

“I went from the bottom of the class to the top of the class, much to the consternation of the students who called me ‘dummy,’ ” he says with a grin. “Now they were coming and saying, ‘Benny, Benny, come help me with this problem.’ I’d say, ‘Come sit at my feet while I instruct you, youngster.’ I was perhaps a little obnoxious, but it sure felt good to say that to those turkeys.”

Fifty years, a pioneering career as a pediatric neurosurgeon and six best-selling books later, Carson, 62, gleefully recites this story as though it happened yesterday.

But he didn’t come to Iowa just to tell his parable about schoolyard jerks. He’s inside this meeting hall, before a sellout crowd of nearly 400 people at the Polk County Republicans’ end-of-summer fundraiser, to discuss bullies of a different order. He wants to talk about the “secular progressives” in the news media, politics and academia who will stop at nothing to change the nation as we know it. He also wants to do this in Iowa, while raising money for local Republicans, coinciding with the start of his new PAC, which will “lay the groundwork” should he decide to run for president.

“The vast majority of people in this country actually have common sense; the problem is they’ve been beaten into submission,” Carson says, standing onstage between two mounted moose heads and beneath a series of chandeliers made of antlers. 

He speaks softly, almost as though he’s reading a child to sleep. But this is a scary story. If Republicans don’t win back the Senate in November, he says, he can’t be sure “there will even be an election in 2016.” Later, his wife, Candy, tells a supporter that they are holding on to their son’s Australian passport just in case the election doesn’t go their way.

“Bullies do whatever they can get away with and keep pushing boundaries until they meet resistance,” he writes in his new book, “One Nation” — one part memoir, one part political tome and one part tactical field guild for dealing with oppressors. “It is the people’s job to stop them before they become uncontrollable.”

It’s the perfect message for people who feel like the government is pushing them around. Carson’s experience — of growing up poor and black, thinking he might not make it past his 25th birthday and going on to become a world-class surgeon — may be unusual here in Polk County, but his feelings of being disrespected are universal.

His views seem to resonate in particular with evangelicals. And, for people who fear they will be pilloried by the “PC police” for speaking their minds on same-sex marriage, or how black voters are bought off by “goodies” from Democrats, or how President Obama’s health-care law is akin to slavery, Carson is a godsend. He isn’t afraid to say any of these things.

It started in February 2013 when he confronted bully numero uno. Speaking just feet away from Obama at the National Prayer breakfast, Carson gave a blistering critique of the Affordable Care Act. Then, as he describes it in an interview, “everything exploded.” The next day, the Wall Street Journal ran a column titled, “Ben Carson for President.” This gave birth to the National Draft Ben Carson for President Committee, which has raised $8.7 million (as of July, Ready for Hillary had raised about $8.25 million). His new book will be No. 1 on the New York Times hardcover nonfiction bestseller list next week (he loves pointing out how much better it’s doing than Hillary Rodham Clinton’s “Hard Choices,” No. 6 on the same list).

Carson says that at the time of the prayer breakfast, he was planning a relaxing retirement. He even bought an organ with designs on honing his musical skills and spending his days away from “The People’s Republic of Maryland,” as he calls it, in sunny Florida.

He did retire from surgery last year, but his retirement plans changed.

“Sometimes I realize there are forces greater than me,” he says. “I am an instrument that’s being used to help restore this country.”

Last week, he took his “One Nation” tour into the politically important state of Iowa, where, in addition to signing books in various Barnes and Noble stores, he headlined three Republican fundraisers. (Carson, however, does not identify himself as a Republican, saying he wishes there were a “Logic Party” he could join.) He entered the state Sunday saying he was thinking about running and left his final crowd Monday night saying, “There’s a strong chance that [he] will.”

Carson ends this speech in Des Moines to chants of “Run, Ben, run!” Sherill Whisenand, co-chairman of the Polk County Republican Central Committee, makes an announcement over the loudspeaker that Carson has won the group’s presidential straw poll, with 62 percent of the vote.

“In this room tonight, I can probably count on both hands the amount of regular people that come to most meetings,” Whisenand says later. “These are new people we’ve never met. . . . He’s clearly reaching people who aren’t always part of the process.”

In Des Moines, a man who used to drive a limo for Carson in Baltimore showed up because he always has admired him. “He doesn’t see color because all he knows is the inside of a brain,” he says. In Davenport, a black physician who grew up in inner-city Chicago says no other politician has come as close to representing him in terms of background and principles. In Cedar Rapids, a woman named Rebecca Stone drove from Chicago in a rainstorm, arriving at a Barnes and Noble three hours early, and nearly burst into tears when she met him.

“His story is just so remarkable. I know he would be an incredible president,” she says in the parking lot, clutching an autographed copy of his book.

Las Vegas oddsmakers wouldn’t recommend putting a big bet on Carson’s presidential chances. Even his friends give him the nickname “Long shot.” But Stone is right about one thing: His story, which he recounts in his book “Gifted Hands,” is remarkable.

Carson’s mother was one of 24 children, got married when she was 13 and divorced when she found out that her husband had more than one family. The combination of growing up poor, having a broken family and facing constant bullying from classmates made Carson a tinderbox of a child. Once, he tried to stab his friend in the gut, only to have his knife break off on his buddy’s belt buckle.

As he tells it, he locked himself in a bathroom afterward and prayed to God for the ability to control his temper. It worked. His mother told him to stop watching television and to read more, and just like that he became a better student. He attended Yale, got his medical degree at the University of Michigan, at 33 became the youngest director of a major division in the history of Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins Hospital as head of pediatric surgery, and rose to worldwide fame as the first surgeon to separate twins conjoined at the head (note: His middle name is Solomon, perhaps the first person ever to consider dividing a baby).

When “Gifted Hands” was published in 1990, the Rev. Jesse Jackson wrote a blurb on the back calling Carson “a model to all the youth of today.” Carson became so famous that when the Farrelly brothers made the 2003 comedy “Stuck on You” about conjoined twins, they asked him to make a cameo. He agreed to do it only if the movie premiere was held in Baltimore. For that day, Charm City felt like Hollywood. Here’s how broad his appeal was, politically speaking: He said in an interview this week that he turned down offers from George W. Bush and Obama (in 2009) to become surgeon general. He said that he found the job too ceremonial and that it wasn’t worth the pay cut.

If it all sounds like a made-for-TV movie, that’s because it is. Cuba Gooding Jr. played Carson in a film for HBO. The film, "Something The Lord Made," premiered in 2004.

At 33, Carson became the youngest major division director in the history of Johns Hopkins as head of pediatric surgery. Here he is seen with Sharon and Jim Schear of Annapolis after he completed brain surgery on their daughter. (Yoni Brook/The Washington Post)

It’s easy for people to say there are two Ben Carsons: the one who wrote the inspirational “Gifted Hands” and the one who is jumping into the political arena with both feet. Carson says that anyone who reads his past works can see that he’s writing about the same stuff as always: the importance of self-reliance, education and standing up to those trying to bring you down.

“Go back and read my books, they are exactly the same things,” he says in an interview at the Cedar Rapids Marriott after his second Republican fundraiser. He squints through his rectangular glasses, talks slowly and flashes an easygoing smirk. “But now, because they’ve classified you as a sellout or Uncle Tom, then all the things that they praised you about before they’ll say, ‘No, we can’t hear that, that’s not right.’ ”

That’s one way to look at it. Another is that Carson has upped the tenor of his language, daring people to criticize him so he can shoot them down as nothing more than bullies trying to silence him.

Since the Prayer Breakfast, Carson has been in the news for saying the health-care law is “the worst thing to happen in this nation since slavery,” for seeming to compare same-sex marriage to bestiality, and for saying that “America is very much like Nazi Germany.”

Does he worry that perhaps comparing Obama supporters to Nazi sympathizers may sound like something a bully might do?

“You can’t dance around it,” he says. “If people look at what I said and were not political about it, they’d have to agree. Most people in Germany didn’t agree with what Hitler was doing. . . . Exactly the same thing can happen in this country if we are not willing to stand up for what we believe in.” 

So stand up he does, citing Nathan Hale and Patrick Henry along the way. He wants his only regret to be that he has but one life to give. Or at least give him sound bite or give him death.

For there he is with a new contract on Fox News Channel and a column in the Washington Times. There he is on television debating Jesse Jackson about the recent killing in Ferguson, Mo., saying that a white police officer’s fatal shooting of teenager Michael Brown, who was black, had “nothing to do with race.” There he is on Bill O’Reilly’s show saying sure, he doesn’t have political experience, but he didn’t have experience separating conjoined twins when he did it for the first time. And this weekend, he’ll be in Texas at a summit for the conservative group Americans for Prosperity.

“If he can do all those things he did as a surgeon, I promise you he can figure out our immigration system and reduce the deficit,” says John Philip Sousa IV, who in addition to being the famous composer’s great-grandson also started the Draft Ben Carson PAC.

Even Carson can’t pretend that he isn’t excited about being back out there scrapping with people who want to see him fail.

“I have to admit that it’s heady stuff,” he says. “You pull up to a bookstore and there are 500, 1,000 people there. I walk in and everyone starts applauding and chanting, ‘Run, Ben, run!’ It’s everywhere I go, and it makes me realize how important it is to keep going.”

Can he become president? Probably not. But man, it will feel good for him to give it to those turkeys if he proves everyone wrong.

Ebola Manufactured by Western Pharmaceuticals Says Liberia

Liberia’s Largest Newspaper Accuses US of Manufacturing Ebola Virus (Video)

September 25, 2014

Gateway Pundit - The Liberian Daily Observer, which is the largest newspaper in Liberia, just published an article on their front page with the headline, “Ebola, AIDS Manufactured By Western Pharmaceuticals, US DoD?” The article accuses the US of manufacturing the Ebola outbreak in a scheme to use Africa as a testing ground for bioweapons.

From the article:

SITES AROUND AFRICA, AND IN WEST AFRICA, HAVE OVER THE YEARS BEEN SET UP FOR TESTING EMERGING DISEASES, ESPECIALLY EBOLA

The World Health Organization (WHO) and several other UN Agencies have been implicated in selecting and enticing African countries to participate in the testing events, promoting vaccinations, but pursuing various testing regiments. The August 2, 2014 article, West Africa: What are US Biological Warfare Researchers Doing in the Ebola Zone? by Jon Rappoport of Global Research pinpoints the problem that is facing African governments.

Obvious in this and other reports are, among others:

(a) The US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), a well-known centre for bio-war research, located at Fort Detrick, Maryland;

(b) Tulane University, in New Orleans, USA, winner of research grants, including a grant of more than $7 million the National Institute of Health (NIH) to fund research with the Lassa viral hemorrhagic fever;

(c) the US Center for Disease Control (CDC)

This is the kind of propaganda relief workers are facing in Liberia and Western Africa.

The Average Household Income By State

Here's how much you need to make to be in the top 1% in your state

September 24, 2014

Business Insider - The nature of income inequality in the U.S. and elsewhere is one of the biggest questions in contemporary economics and politics, with the Occupy Wall Street movement popularizing the division between the top 1% and the remaining 99% of earners.

Using 2012 American Community Survey household income data from the Minnesota Population Center's IPUMS dataset, we estimated what income a household would need to earn (rounded to the nearest thousand) in order to be in the top 1% of the income distribution in each state (click here for larger version of map):

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There's a divergence across the country in what it takes to be in the 1%. In the Northeast, top level incomes are in the area of a half million dollars, while in parts of the South and West, the cutoff is much lower.

These figures should be interpreted as being very rough estimates. Surveys like the ACS frequently have difficulties in capturing the true nature of the very top of the income spectrum. Recent research based on income tax records, like this remarkable slideshow by Berkeley economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, can give us much more detailed insight into what's going on with the super-rich.

If you want to know if you're in the top or bottom half of your state, here are 2012 median incomes, as per the Census Bureau's 2012 ACS estimates:

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South Carolina State Trooper Fires Four Shots at Man, Who Had Just Parked at a Convenience Store, Alleging a Seat Belt Violation; NY City Cop Filmed Slamming Pregnant Women to Ground

Dashboard video shows shooting of unarmed driver

September 25, 2014

AP - A South Carolina state trooper's dashboard video shows an unarmed driver being shot just seconds after he was stopped for a seatbelt offense — and the trooper, who was fired last week, has now been charged with assault.

As Levar Jones cried in pain waiting for an ambulance, he repeated one question: "Why did you shoot me?" Jones' painful groans and then-Trooper Sean Groubert's reply — "Well you dove head first back into your car" — were captured by the camera.

Groubert's boss, state Public Safety Director Leroy Smith, called the video "disturbing" and said "Groubert reacted to a perceived threat where there was none" as he fired the officer Friday.

The 31-year-old former trooper is charged with assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature, a felony that carries up to 20 years in prison. He was released after paying 10 percent of a $75,000 bond.

The dashboard camera video was released by prosecutors Wednesday night after they showed it at Groubert's bond hearing.

Jones was stopped Sept. 4 as he pulled into a convenience store on a busy Columbia road. With the camera recording, Groubert pulls up without his siren on as Jones is getting out of his vehicle to go into the store.

"Can I see your license please?" Groubert asks.

As Jones turns and reaches back into his car, Groubert shouts,

"Get outa the car, get outa the car." 

He begins firing before he has finished the second sentence. There is a third shot as Jones staggers away, backing up with his hands raised, and then a fourth.

Sept. 20014 photo of South Carolina State trooper Sean Groubert

From the first shot to the fourth, the video clicks off three seconds.

Jones' wallet can be seen flying out of his hands as he raises them.

Groubert's lawyer, Barney Giese, said the shooting was justified because the trooper feared for his life and the safety of others. Police officers are rarely charged in South Carolina. In August, a prosecutor refused to file criminal charges against a York County deputy who shot a 70-year-old man after mistaking his cane for a shotgun during an after-dark traffic stop.

Groubert is white and Jones is black. Neither state police nor the FBI keep detailed statistics on the races of people in officer-involved shootings.

Much like the recent police shooting of a black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, the racial aspect of the South Carolina shooting bothers state Rep. Joe Neal, an African-American lawmaker who has spoken out against racism in law enforcement for years.

"You are doing exactly what the police officer asked you do to and you get shot for it?" said Neal, D-Hopkins. "That's insane."

Neal said he doubts the trooper would have been charged without the video. South Carolina has nearly 300 police agencies, and many smaller forces don't have dashboard cameras.

"If it had been the trooper's story versus his story, I'm not sure anything happens," Neal said.

Jones is recovering after being shot in the hip. He released a statement last week saying he hopes his shooting leads to changes in how police officers treat suspects.

"I thank God every day that I am here with a story to tell and hope my situation can make a change," Jones said.

He and his lawyer have not spoken publicly since Groubert was charged Wednesday.

Groubert first worked for the Highway Patrol from September 2005 to September 2009. After going to work for the Richland County Sheriff's Office, he returned to the state agency in July 2012.

This isn't the first time Groubert fired his service weapon. In August 2012, Groubert and another trooper chased a man who drove away from a traffic stop and fired at the suspect after he shot first, according to the Highway Patrol. The suspect was convicted of attempted murder and is spending 20 years in prison.

Groubert was awarded the agency's Medal of Valor Award for his actions in protecting the public.

So far in 2014 in South Carolina, police have shot at suspects 35 times, killing 16 of them, according to the State Law Enforcement Division. The number of officer-involved shootings has been steadily increasing over the past few years, with 42 reported in 2013.

NYPD Officer Filmed Slamming Pregnant Woman to Ground

September 24, 2014

Gawker - An NYPD officer was filmed violently throwing a pregnant woman to ground early Saturday morning. Sandra Amezquita, who is five months pregnant, reportedly suffered vaginal bleeding after the incident, and her arms and stomach remain bruised.

The incident took place in Sunset Park, Brooklyn at about 2:15 am Saturday. Amezquita and her husband, Ronel Lemos, claim they approached the scene and attempted to intervene as police arrested their 17-year-old son, Jhohan, for possession of a knife.

The video, filmed by a witness, shows an NYPD officer slamming Amezquita to ground and handcuffing her before forcefully shoving another woman, identified by the New York Post as Amezquita's friend, to the street.

Amezquita was given a summons for disorderly conduct and Lemos was arrested for assaulting a police officer, reportedly after striking the officer who was arresting his son.

"The first thing I thought was they killed my baby, and they're going to kill my wife," Lemo told the New York Daily News on Tuesday.

"You would think the police would respect a woman that is pregnant," Amezquita added. "I was afraid something happened to my baby. I am still afraid that something is wrong."

The NYPD's Internal Affairs unit is reportedly investigating the incident, which took place just one week after an officer from the same precinct—the 72nd—was filmed kicking a street vendor. That officer was suspended and remains under investigation by Internal Affairs.