$89 million, people.
That is what these football protests were really all about, according to an article in Sporting News entitled “Eagles’ Malcolm Jenkins will end raised-fist demonstration during national anthem” by Ron Clements on 1 December 2017, where we were informed as follows:
Malcolm Jenkins believes he has done his part to raise awareness of racial injustices and inequality enough to end his raised-fist demonstration during the national anthem.
The Eagles cornerback told reporters Thursday he would not raise his fist during the playing of the “Star-Spangled Banner” prior to Sunday’s game against the Seahawks.
“I don’t anticipate demonstrating this week simply because I felt like when I started demonstrating, my whole motivation was to draw awareness to disenfranchised people, communities of color, injustices around the country, our criminal justice system,” Jenkins said, via the Philadelphia Inquirer.
“And obviously through this year and talking with the league and what they’ve kind of proposed, I feel like has presented a bigger and better platform to continue to raise that awareness and continue to [influence] positive change.”
end quote
As we will see, what the league “kind of proposed” was $89 million, and since that is a round number, this dude decided to take it.
Getting back to Sporting News:
Jenkins is one of the leaders on the Players Coalition, a group of player reps who have met with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to address social issues.
The NFL and the Players Coalition reached an agreement on Wednesday for the league to pledge $89 million toward social justice causes supported by players.
Jenkins helped form the coalition with now-retired receiver Anquan Boldin, who believes the new agreement with the league provides the necessary incentives for players to discontinue certain demonstrations during the playing of the anthem.
end quotes
So these protests were really about extorting money from the NFL, which obviously has plenty to give, given that it just gave these football players $89 million to stop their protests.
And as Sporting News tells us, to some of the football players, that $89 million simply was not enough:
Dolphins safety Michael Thomas and 49ers safety Eric Reid disagree and withdrew from the coalition because they don’t think the agreement reached Wednesday best serves the interests of the players.
ends quotes
Notice those words – “because they don’t think the agreement reached Wednesday best serves the interests of the players.”
So when our dear friend and fellow American patriot Chas Cornweller says @ October 10, 2017 at 2:45 pm, “This back and forth is getting beyond tiresome, I cannot begin to count the number of people who have totally and completely missed the point of the ‘Taking of the Knee’ during our National Anthem,” we can now answer him truthfully that the point was to extort $89 million from the NFL.
Paul Plante says
It is interesting, now that these football players “taking the knee” during the national anthem have managed to snag an $89 million payday from the National Football League to stop these football players from further damaging the NFL brand in America with their “protests,” to read in the FORTUNE article “Why the Democrats’ Vote to Impeach Trump Failed” by John Patrick Pullen on 7 December 2017 that in the minds of some Democrats in America, anyway, talking smack about pro football players who take the knee, or disrespecting pro football players who take the knee, or God forbid, openly criticizing football players who take the knee is considered a “high crime and misdemeanor” for which a sitting American president should be impeached, so sacred have football players become in this twisted and sick society in America we now find ourselves surrounded by.
If you haven’t followed the story, according to the FORTUNE article, Rep. Al Green (D-Tex.) introduced a House resolution (H.Res. 646) to impeach President Trump on Wednesday, the articles of which that claimed Trump “is unfit to be president” and should be “impeached for high misdemeanors.”
According to Fortune, in his articles of impeachment, Green issued two specific articles, the first of which said that Trump has “harmed the society of the United States… by associating the majesty and dignity of the presidency with causes rooted in white supremacy, bigotry, racism, anti-Semitism, white nationalism, or neo-Nazism” on multiple occasions.
As to Green’s second article of impeachment, the seven-term representative from Texas’ ninth district said that Trump “harmed American society by publicly casting contempt on individuals and groups, inciting hate and hostility, sowing discord among the people of the United States, on the basis of race, national origin, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.”
Specifically, Green referenced “denigrating” comments Trump made about NFL players, Puerto Ricans, and Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.).
In all, 58 House Democrats voted for impeachment based on “denigrating” comments Trump made about NFL players, where “denigrate” is defined as “criticize unfairly; disparage,” and where “disparage” means to “regard or represent as being of little worth.”
So there we have it, people, just how very serious it now is in the United States of America to regard or represent a pro football player in the NFL taking the knee during the national anthem as being of little worth to the nation.
If we don’t want to get ourselves in political trouble with the Democrats in this country concerned about the civil rights of pro football players taking the knee during the national anthem to shake down the NFL for millions of dollars, we had better praise them, instead, which frankly, leaves me out, because I am not going to praise them for extorting money from the NFL.
As to that impeachment resolution, it failed because it was so stupid and idiotic.
But God bless America, here in the land of the brave and home of the free, you don’t need a working brain in your head to serve in Congress, so you can be an absolute imbecile who thinks a president of the United States of America should be impeached for a failure to talk nice about pro football players shaking down the NFL for money, and you can even get 57 other House Democrats to be dumb enough to vote with you, such a great and exceptional nation this is, Lincoln’s last, best hope of Earth and Reagan’s shining city on a hill and Robert Kennedy’s great, unselfish, compassionate country, all rolled up into one.
Tell me, people, what other nation on the earth can make that boast and live up to it like we can?
The candid world would like to know.
Chas Cornweller says
“The Players Coalition, the group of about 40 NFL players who have been negotiating with the league on its response to social justice issues raised by the anthem protests, is falling apart. Several prominent members of the coalition backed out yesterday, and the NFL has taken a PR offensive by leaking a proposal to contribute $89 million to various causes, intending to make the players look bad for walking away from the proposal. But the real story appears to be a lot messier, and, as is par for the course for the NFL, really, really cynical.”
“A source with direct knowledge of the communications between Reid and other members of the Players Coalition says the 49ers player has major concerns about the deal. Reid is worried that the NFL is trying to co-opt the players’ nascent social justice movement. And counter to what Trotter reported on Wednesday, the source says the 49ers player was specifically asked if he would stop protesting if the league made donations to charity.
‘Eric received a message,” the source told Slate. “The comment was: Would you be willing to end the protests if they made a donation?’” from an article written by Jeremy Stahl at Slate.com
So, in actuality, the NFL has offered the money (not from extortion) but to silence the movement and in the interim, get back the NFL its wholesome, All-American image. How the Taking a Knee movement got to this payout is anybody’s guess. And in my opinion, there will follow a lot of guess work and speculation on this. I rightly don’t give a flying-rats behind its finality. Colin Kaepernick’s statement, in my mind, still stands. (no pun intended) He made his point, and ALL of America listened. But much like that whisper game, Whisper Challenge, the protest message was filtered, passed along, dissected, and analyzed until it had lost all meaning. In which lies, my point…This protest began in 2016 and not a peep about payouts, buyouts or even handouts were made. The protest was purely for a light to shine on the ills that still plague us as a nation, a people and a society that supposedly lives by the credo “Truth and justice for all!” The moment the NFL offers money to this social cause, it becomes extortion and payout. Sad. And not true. Another bend of the truth to fit inside the mental grasp and to avoid that which is actually going down in our fair land.
And finally this… “NFL owners are pledging to spend a relatively paltry amount, not pledging that they won’t just take that money from previous charitable pledges, not promising that they won’t veto players’ preferences on where the money should be spent, setting up a voting body specifically designed to outvote those players, and expecting that this will stop players from protesting during the national anthem. No wonder so many players from the so-called Players Coalition have walked away in disgust.” from same article written by Jeremy Stahl at Slate.com
See what I did here, Paul Plante…it’s called siting your sources.
Paul Plante says
See what you did there, Chas Cornweller?
You cited sources of your own to back your own narrative that the national government in this country, now in apparent collusion with the NFL, practices institutionalized oppression against black people and people of color, institutionalized oppression being when “established laws, customs, and practices systematically reflect and produce inequities based on one’s membership in targeted social identity groups.”
According to your narrative, the federal government has established laws, customs, and practices which systematically reflect and produce inequities based on one’s membership in targeted social identity groups, which in this case, happens, in your narrative, to be black people and people of color.
Despite Jim Crow having been history in this country for many years now, you are convinced that it is still around, and the only ones doing anything about it are these pro football players taking the knee during the national anthem, as if the national anthem were in any way, shape or manner related to the federal government in this country, or making black power salutes during the national anthem to bring everybody’s attention to the fact that as black nationalists, they do n0t want to be part of white society in this country.
And since a lot of younger people following along here are unfamiliar with “black nationalism,” let us take a moment and go to the Martin Luther King Encyclopedia http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_black_nationalism.1.html to see what it has to say on the subject:
Achieving major national influence through the Nation of Islam (NOI) and the Black Power movement of the 1960s, proponents of black nationalism advocated economic self-sufficiency, race pride for African Americans, and black separatism.
end quotes
There is the root of these football protests today.
Continuing on from the King Encyclopedia:
Reacting against white racial prejudice and critical of the gap between American democratic ideals and the reality of segregation and discrimination in America, in the 1960s black nationalists criticized the methods of Martin Luther King, Jr., the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and other organizations that sought to reform American society through nonviolent interracial activism.
In his 1963 ‘‘Letter from Birmingham Jail,’’ King described himself as standing between the forces of complacency and the hatred and despair of the black nationalist” (King, 90).
end quotes
There is where we happen to be in this country today, actually, with the football players demonstrating “the hatred and despair of the black nationalist.”
According to the King Encyclopedia:
The historical roots of black nationalism can be traced back to nineteenth-century African-American leaders such as abolitionist Martin Delany, who advocated the emigration of northern free blacks to Africa, where they would settle and assist native Africans in nation-building.
Delany believed that this development would also uplift the status and condition of African Americans who remained, calling them ‘‘a nation within a nation … really a broken people’’ (Painter, ‘‘Martin R. Delany’’).
Twentieth-century black nationalism was greatly influenced by Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican immigrant to the United States who founded the United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in 1914.
In an essay titled ‘‘The Future as I See It,’’ Garvey insisted that the UNIA was ‘‘organized for the absolute purpose of bettering our condition, industrially, commercially, socially, religiously and politically.’’
end quotes
Let’s stop and do some quick math here, people – in 1914, which is now one hundred and three (103) years ago, longer than our dear friend and fellow patriot Chas Cornweller has been walking this green earth, Marcus’ Garvey insisted that the UNIA was ‘‘organized for the absolute purpose of bettering our condition, industrially, commercially, socially, religiously and politically.’’
So one hundred and three (103) years later, Chas Cornweller, what happened?
Why didn’t any of that happen?
Because the white people said no?
The federal government wouldn’t let them?
Or was it the fault of the NFL perhaps?
Getting back to the King Encyclopedia:
Garvey and the UNIA also promoted black emigration to Africa as a program of ‘‘national independence, an independence so strong as to enable us to rout others if they attempt to interfere with us’’ (‘‘Speech by Marcus Garvey’’).
One of the UNIA’s main efforts was to establish black-owned businesses, the best known being the Black Star Line, a firm which planned to transport people and goods to Africa.
Although 35,000 investors flocked to buy five-dollar shares of Black Star Line stock, the shipping firm and the UNIA’s other commercial ventures failed.
Garvey was convicted of mail fraud in 1923 and eventually deported, but he remained a heroic figure to many future black nationalists.
end quotes
OH!
But hey, everybody is entitled to their own heroes, at least here in America, the land of the brave and home of the free, and that of course would include our dear friend and colleague Chas Cornweller.
And once again back to the King Encyclopedia:
During the economic depression of the 1930s, Farrad Muhammad, a Detroit peddler, founded another significant organization of black nationalists, the NOI.
The NOI sought to develop an intentionally separate and economically self-sufficient black community governed by a revised version of the Muslim faith.
Muhammad’s claim that whites were ‘‘blue-eyed devils’’ seeking to oppress blacks made him a controversial figure.
end quote
His claim in the 1930s that whites were ‘‘blue-eyed devils’’ seeking to oppress blacks more than likely did not cause a lot of white people to rally to his cause back then, although today, many white people suffering from white guilt (Hillary Clinton) from having too much white privilege and being racists because of implicit bias in their genetic make-up would probably be flocking to his standard to prostrate (lay oneself flat on the ground face downward, especially in reverence or submission) themselves before him to tell him how very sorry they were to have been born with white skin instead of black skin, which they feel would make them better people, if only they had been born black instead of white.
Getting back to the King Encyclopedia:
When Farrad Muhammad disappeared in 1934 after various factions in the NOI battled for dominance, his disciple Elijah Muhammad became the sect’s leader.
By the late 1950s NOI minister Malcolm X had emerged as the group’s most dynamic and popular spokesperson.
Early on, Malcolm X’s oratory combined calls for racial independence with criticisms of mainstream civil rights leaders who cooperated with whites.
end quotes
Focus in on that last sentence, people – criticisms of mainstream civil rights leaders who cooperated with whites.
That is the cause our dear friend and fellow American citizen is promoting in here where these black nationalist football players are carrying on that tradition of not cooperating with whites.
As the King Encyclopedia tells us:
In his November 1963 speech ‘‘Message to the Grass Roots,’’ Malcolm X defined land as ‘‘the basis of freedom, justice and equality,’’ and declared: ‘‘A revolutionary wants land so he can set up his own nation, an independent nation.”
“These Negroes aren’t asking for any nation—they’re trying to crawl back on the plantation.…”
“If you’re afraid of black nationalism, you’re afraid of revolution.”
“And if you love revolution, you love black nationalism’’ (Malcolm X, ‘‘Message to the Grass Roots,’’ 9–10).
end quotes
For the record, I was alive then, and remember all of that very well.
Getting back to the King Encyclopedia:
Following the defeat of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party in 1964 and a trend of rising violence against civil rights workers and supporters, many activists became increasingly skeptical of the power of nonviolent resistance to influence the white-dominated power structure in America.
Stokely Carmichael’s appointment in May 1966 as chair of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) signaled an organizational shift toward exclusive black self determination in SNCC’s approach to civil rights.
In June 1966 Carmichael began to use the slogan ‘‘Black Power’’ to promote racial self-respect and increased power for blacks in economic and political realms.
He asserted that the ‘‘concern for black power addresses itself directly to … the necessity to reclaim our history and our identity from the cultural terrorism and depredation of self-justifying white guilt’’ (Carmichael, ‘‘Toward Black Liberation’’).
end quotes
And people today wonder why the white folks simply can’t get along with the black folks and treat them as equals – go figure.
And back to the King Encyclopedia:
Rather than publicly criticize black nationalists, King preferred to focus on the social forces and conditions that brought black nationalist philosophies such as ‘‘Black Power’’ to the fore.
He called their departure from interracial cooperation in civil rights work ‘‘a response to the feeling that a real solution is hopelessly distant because of the inconsistencies, resistance and faintheartedness of those in power’’ (King, Where, 33).
King remained fundamentally opposed to black nationalists’ rejection of American society as irreparably unjust and to later black nationalists’ abandonment of nonviolence.
end quote
There I find myself aligned with Martin Luther King and opposed to our dear friend and fellow American patriot Chas Cornweller, who sees American society as irreparably unjust.
The King Encyclopedia then continues as follows:
Because of their view that ‘‘American society is so hopelessly corrupt and enmeshed in evil that there is no possibility of salvation from within,’’ King felt black nationalist movements rejected ‘‘the one thing that keeps the fire of revolutions burning: the ever-present flame of hope’’ (King, Where, 44; 46).
end quotes
There, people, is how long this all has been going on – these black nationalist football players taking the knee today are simply more of those from the past who like our dear friend and colleague Chas Cornweller feel that American society is so hopelessly corrupt and enmeshed in evil that there is no possibility of salvation from within, and you know what, people, in the end, Chas Cornweller just might be right.
So stay tuned, and we will soon find out!
Paul Plante says
Above here, our dear friend and fellow American patriot Chas Cornweller informs us that the Colin Kaepernick protest was purely for a light to shine on the ills that still plague us as a nation, a people and a society that supposedly lives by the credo “Truth and justice for all!,” and in another thread http://www.capecharlesmirror.com/news/paul-plante-on-social-justice-in-america-today/ in here, courtesy of the Cape Charles Mirror, entitled “On Social Justice in America Today,” I have been doing the same, shining a spotlight on the ills that still plague us as a nation, a people and a society that supposedly lives by the credo “Truth and justice for all!,” except unlike Colin Kaepernick, who is using silence to get his message across, whatever it might be, since silence covers an awful lot of ground, I am using actual words and real facts to shine a light on what is really going down in our fair land, and people, depending on your point of view, if you are not a progressive Democrat, you won’t think it is pretty, while if you are a progressive Democrat, you will merely say that it is on accord with progressive Democrat policies whose vision entails nothing less than the radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America, hence the development of a wide range of programs to dismantle the privileges associated with whiteness, maleness and heteronormativity by the progressive Democrats, to which progressive policies it appears I myself have fallen victim in 2005 when then-federal 2d Circuit Court of Appeals circuit judge Sonia Sotomayor, herself a Latina, or “person of color,” made it clear to my face that as far as she was concerned, I was a piece of crap who has no civil rights in this country.
With respect to what is really going down in our fair land with respect to social injustice, in that other thread @ December 4, 2017 at 12:05 am, this is what I said on that subject:
In this above case study of what textbook government-approved institutionalized social injustice actually does look like in this country involving myself, Sonia Sotomayor, then a circuit judge on the federal 2d Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City in 2005, totally ignored those words, “Where a person’s good name, reputation, honor, or integrity is at stake because of what the government is doing to him, notice and an opportunity to be heard are essential,” and “Only when the whole proceedings leading to the pinning of an unsavory label on a person are aired can oppressive results be prevented,” words written by the United States Supreme Court in 1971, before Sonia Sotomayor became a member of it, in the case Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U.S. 433, 435. because to her, what the Supreme Court had to say about justice for an American citizen like myself was totally immaterial.
As I said in that other thread with respect to the endemic social injustice ills that still plague us as a nation, a people and a society that supposedly live by the credo “Truth and justice for all!,” except for me, of course, as Sonia Sotomayor made patently clear to me to my face in 2005, my case was highly political, and she was there to make a name for herself as a federal judge who could be counted on by the “right” people to do the “right thing,” as her sponsor Barack Hussein Obama was fond of saying, and so, justice as defined by the United States Supreme Court in Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U.S. 433, 435 went right out the window, along with my civil rights, when Sotomayor let stand the unsavory label pinned on me by Rensselaer County in 2001 with the issuance of that fraudulent 9.45 psychiatric arrest order Sotomayor put the federal government seal of approval on in 2005.
As I said in that other thread, Sotomayor in 2005 was totally dismissive of that harm caused to myself for the rest of my life, so long as that fraudulent psychiatric arrest order stands in my records, which in my mind, makes her both a sociopath and a monster.
In Vitek v. Jones, 445 U.S. 480 (1980), another United States Supreme Court decision that Sotomayor ignored in 2005 when she raped me as a person by taking away my civil rights, the United States Supreme Court spoke directly to the “direct harm” caused to myself by the defendants and the events of August 22, 2001 complained of in the Amended Complaint in this above matter, the “stigmatization process” caused by defendants through the “pinning” on myself of the unsavory label in a small community of that of a dangerous, mentally ill person, all of this without a stitch of evidence in support thereof, or even a pretense of due process having been afforded to myself in clear violation of Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U.S. 433, 435 (1971):
“We have recognized that for the ordinary citizen, commitment to a mental hospital produces ‘a massive curtailment of liberty,’ Humphrey v. Cady, 405 U.S. 504, 509 (1972), and in consequence ‘requires due process protection.’ Addington v. Texas, 441 U.S. 418, 425 (1979); O’Connor v. Donaldson, 422 U.S. 563, 580 (1975) (BURGER, C.J., concurring).
So what, who cares was Sotomayor’s reply – you are nothing, and nobody cares what happened to you, which actually has turned out to be quite true, especially among the progressive Democrat crowd in here.
Said the United States Supreme Court in Addington v. Texas in 1979:
The loss of liberty produced by an involuntary commitment is more than a loss of freedom from confinement.
It is indisputable that commitment to a mental hospital ‘can engender adverse social consequences to the individual’ and that ‘[w]hether we label this phenomena ‘stigma’ or choose to call it something else …. we recognize that it can occur and that it can have a very significant impact on the individual.’ Addington v. Texas, supra, at 424-426. See also Parham v. J.R., 442 U.S. 584,
600 (1979).
Also, ‘(a)mong the historic liberties’ protected by the Due Process Clause is the “right to be free from, and to obtain judicial relief for, unjustified intrusions on personal security.” Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 673 (1977).”
end quotes
In 2005, Sonia Sotomayor informed me in no uncertain terms that regardless of what the United States Supreme Court might have to say about “historic liberties” in their courtroom in Washington, D.C., in her courtroom in New York City, where she was the law, not the Supreme Court, I was in her eyes nothing more than a piece of crap, not a human being, not an American citizen, so in her courtroom, I had no right to be free from, and to obtain judicial relief for, unjustified intrusions on my personal security, and such it was actually to be, and still is.
So, based on the above, as clearly can be seen, when we read in the DAILY GAZETTE article “Members of Niskayuna football kneel for National Anthem – Several players, cheerleader take knee, a la NFL protesters” by Michael Kelly, September 28, 2017, about Ismail Stewart, a Niskayuna senior, who said he was the one that initially brought up the idea with his teammates about doing something during Thursday’s game, “It was my job as the one who brought it to the team to explain why we were taking a knee,” said Stewart, who is of mixed race, but describes himself as black, when he says, “The reason is there are some social injustices happening in this nation,” what we are talking about above here concerning Sonia Sotomayor stripping me of my civil rights for daring to speak out and confront endemic public corruption in the State of New York government and its political subdivisions the County of Rensselaer and the Town of Poestenkill is a real-life case study of actual social injustice in America as a result of institutionalized oppression, which is when “established laws, customs, and practices systematically reflect and produce inequities based on one’s membership in targeted social identity groups.”
And as I said then, stay tuned, because this story of what real social injustice in the United States of America with the federal government seal of approval on it is far from over, so there is much more to come as we work in here to fulfill the admonition of CCM commentator Charles Taylor @ October 16, 2017 at 11:20 am in the thread “On Citizenship” to do the digging to understand what social injustice in America really is all about in real life, as this story above involving Sonia Sotomayor is, since it is not his job or intent to inform us, and since it has piqued my interest, I have delved further into the message the football protests were intended to send about real social injustice in America condoned by the federal government and I have posted it above in an effort to educate my fellow Americans on the subject, courtesy of the Cape Charles Mirror, which is the only place in America I am aware of where this in-depth discussion on the subject of government-sponsored social injustice in this country is taking place, for which we all owe a debt of gratitude as American citizens to Wayne Creed.
Paul Plante says
So, people, as you all can now plainly see, what we now have in here thanks to my inestimable colleague Chas Cornweller above here is what is called in the debating game two competing narratives about what real social injustice in America l0oks like in real life, one being my narrative regarding Sonia Sotomayor, stripping me of my civil rights for speaking out against endemic public corruption in New York state, versus the silent narrative of Colin Kaepernick which is being put forth in here by the esteemed Chas Cornweller, and frankly, people, in all truth, there is nothing better for our democracy than that, is my thought, especially when one of those competing narratives is being put forth by my esteemed colleague and debating opponent the honorable Chas Cornweller, who is now lovingly known all across America and probably the world as well by this time, that thanks to the global nature of the Cape Charles Mirror, as the Quintus Hortensius Hortalus of the internet, which is high praise indeed, when you think about it.
For those unfamiliar with the original Quintus Hortensius Hortalus, he was a Roman Optimate, and orator, and his oratory, according to Cicero, who held him in high esteem, just as I hold our own Chas Cornweller in high esteem, for his oratorical abilities in here, was of the Asiatic style, a florid rhetoric, better to hear than to read.
Even though his gestures were highly artificial, and his manner of folding his toga was noted by tragic actors of the day, he was such a “gifted performer that even professional actors would stop rehearsal and come to watch him hold an audience captive with each swish of his toga.”
In addition to his style, he had a tenacious memory, and could retain every point in his opponent’s argument.
So, all in all, as you can see, a mighty and formidable opponent to advocate for his narrative of what social injustice in America really is, and what could be better for our democracy that that, I am asking you?
As to the social injustice narrative being put forth in here by my debating opponent Mr. Chas Cornweller, I think it is best outlined in a most eloquent manner by none other than Barack Hussein Obama, until recently our nation’s first black president, who more than anybody would know what it was like to be socially oppressed while growing up because he was black, not white like the privileged kids he went to that exclusive private school with, in an Associated Press article dated 28 September 2014 as follows:
The widespread mistrust of law enforcement that was exposed by the fatal police shooting of an unarmed black man in Missouri (the thug Michael Brown who tried unsucessfully to take a cop’s gun away from him after robbing a convenient store) exists in too many other communities and is having a corrosive effect on the nation, particularly on its children, President Barack Obama says.
He blames the feeling of wariness on persistent racial disparities in the administration of justice.
“Too many young men of color feel targeted by law enforcement — guilty of walking while black or driving while black, judged by stereotypes that fuel fear and resentment and hopelessness,” said Obama, who has spoken of enduring similar treatment as a younger man.
end quotes
Now, there is some real social injustice indeed of the type that has caused football player Colin Kaepernick to take the knee in protest when the Star Spangled Banner is played at football games, so, as I said, a most eloquent presentation, indeed, on social injustice from someone who had to live it, and so knows just what he is talking about on the subject, that being Barack Hussein Obama.
And if that was not enough, our dear friend and fellow American patriot Chas Cornweller has former United States Attorney General Eric Himpton Holder, Jr’s equally eloquent discourse on the social injustices he had to endure when young to buttress his arguments about social injustice in America from an Associated Press article dated 21 August 2014, to wit:
Attorney General Eric Holder sought Wednesday to reassure the people of Ferguson about the investigation into Michael Brown’s death and said he understands why many black Americans do not trust police, recalling how he was repeatedly stopped by officers who seemed to target him because of his race.
The attorney general described how he was stopped twice on the New Jersey Turnpike and accused of speeding.
Police searched his car, going through the trunk and looking under the seats.
“I remember how humiliating that was and how angry I was and the impact it had on me,” Holder said during a meeting with about 50 community leaders at the Florissant campus of St. Louis Community College.
end quotes
Now, what can I say here other than that, people, is some real social injustice alright, and it makes what Sonia Sotomayor did to me, stripping me of my civil rights for speaking out about endemic public corruption in New York state seem rather thin and puny by comparison, most especially since by being white, I have no rights under the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution, and thus, I really have nothing to complain about, it seems, in that regard.
If I had been born black, I would have 14th Amendment rights, but I wasn’t, and that is that.
And if you really take a hard look at it, as Atticus did in Atticus III in the Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser in Boston on November 22, 1787, it becomes quite apparent that if you have white skin in this country as I do, you really have no rights guaranteed to you at all by the so-called “Bill of Rights” which is more a Bill of Goods, to wit:
The Hon. E[lbridge] G[erry] and others, complain, that the system has not the security of a bill of rights.
That series of propositions commonly called a bill of rights, is taken out of lawbooks, and is only an extract of the rights of persons.
Now let us suppose, that it stands in a law-book, which is appealed to, as an authority, in all the Courts of judicature, or is tacked (without pains or penalty annexed to the violation of it) as a preface to the Constitution.
In which case is it likely to afford the greatest security to the rights of persons?
Let the unbiased judge.
On this point we may appeal to fact.
There is a Commonwealth, with which we are not wholly unconnected, which hath a bill of rights prefixed to its Constitution.
Yet ask those of either of the great parties, into which that State hath lately been divided, if this bill of rights hath not been frequently violated?
If you confide in the zealots of each party, will you not be ready to conceive, that the actual Legislators have had as poor an opinion of the bill of rights, as Cromwell had of Magna Charta?
If you speak to the moderate men in that same State, they will perhaps shrug their shoulders, and shake their heads, and give you no answer.
end quotes
Note well what he says there when he says “without pains or penalty annexed to the violation of it.”
When you cannot vindicate a supposed right in a court of law, then is it really a right?
As FINDLAW tells us, a person’s right to air grievances without fear of retribution or censorship is fundamental to democracy in the United States, and free expression of one’s beliefs is encoded in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which generally protects free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly.
But thanks to Sonia Sotomayor, in New York state, my right to air grievances without fear of retribution or censorship, which supposedly is fundamental to democracy in the United States, has been stripped from me, so was it ever really a right in the first place?
As to the so-called right to petition for redress of grievance, FINDLAW tells us that in 1669, the English House of Commons resolved that every commoner in England possessed ”the inherent right to prepare and present petitions” to it ”in case of grievance,” and of Commons ”to receive the same” and to judge whether they were ”fit” to be received, and Chapter 5 of the Bill of Rights of 1689 asserted the right of the subjects to petition the King and ”all commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning to be illegal.”
But that is England, and people, this is not, as Sonia Sotomayor made incandescently clear to me in December of 2005.
In De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U.S. 353, 364 , 365 (1937), the United States Supreme Court stated thusly about the right to petition for redress of grievance, as I was doing in 2001 when I was declared mentally ill and dangerous and in need of incarceration in retaliation:
Furthermore, the right of petition has expanded.
It is no longer confined to demands for ”a redress of grievances,” in any accurate meaning of these words, but comprehends demands for an exercise by the Government of its powers in furtherance of the interest and prosperity of the petitioners and of their views on politically contentious matters.
The right extends to the ”approach of citizens or groups of them to administrative agencies (which are both creatures of the legislature, and arms of the executive) and to courts, the third branch of Government.”
“Certainly the right to petition extends to all departments of the Government.”
“The right of access to the courts is indeed but one aspect of the right of petition.”
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It is the right of access to the courts that Sonia Sotomayor stripped from me in 2005.
So, was it really a right then?
Or just a chimera?
Afterall, as FINDLAW tells us:
Processions for the presentation of petitions in the United States have not been particularly successful.
In 1894 General Coxey of Ohio organized armies of unemployed to march on Washington and present petitions, only to see their leaders arrested for unlawfully walking on the grass of the Capitol.
The march of the veterans on Washington in 1932 demanding bonus legislation was defended as an exercise of the right of petition.
The Administration, however, regarded it as a threat against the Constitution and called out the army to expel the bonus marchers and burn their camps.
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So was Sonia Sotomayor really that out of line for denying me the right to petition through the courts for redress of grievance?
Which takes us back to Atticus, as follows:
When the powers to be exercised, under a certain system, are in themselves consistent with the people’s liberties, are legally defined, guarded and ascertained, and ample provision made for bringing to condign punishment all such as shall overstep the limitations of law, it is hard to conceive of a greater security for the rights of the people.
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And there, people, is precisely what we lack here to the north of you, and that is thanks in large part of Sonia Sotomayor, who has approved state retaliation and retribution against those in the state like myself who would try to use the court system to challenge that status quo – the lack of an ample provision for bringing to condign punishment all such as shall overstep the limitations of law, so that there is no security for the rights of the people.
But is that really social injustice, when a federal appeals court justice has put the federal government seal of approval on such practices?
And that takes us to the question of the difference between oppression and repression as it applies to this discussion in here.
To oppress means to keep (someone) down by unjust force or authority.
To repress is (1) to hold back, or (2) to put down by force.
And suppress, which is broader and more common than the other two, means (1) to put an end to, (2) to inhibit, and (3) to keep from being revealed.
So in my case, we can see both oppression and repression, and certainly, there is an element of suppression present, as well.
But the question is, when a federal appeals court judge like Sonia Sotomayor who was subsequently elevated to the United State Supreme Court as a result puts the federal government seal of approval on those practices, can they still be considered social injustice?
What say you, America?
As I keep saying, the candid world would like to know.
Paul Plante says
So, people, political philosophy!
Despite the immediate focus on the football protests, that is really what we are discussing in here with respect to real-life federal government-approved institutionalized social oppression and repression here in the United States of America – political philosophy, and that in order to shine a light on what is really going down in our fair land.
And as I said above, depending on your point of view, for example, if you are not a progressive Democrat, and you are instead for law and order pursuant to our present Constitution and laws, you won’t think it is pretty, while if you are a progressive Democrat, you will merely say that it is in accord with progressive Democrat policies whose vision entails nothing less than the radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America, hence the development of a wide range of programs to dismantle the privileges associated with whiteness, maleness and heteronormativity by the progressive Democrats.
And for those unfamiliar with the term “political philosophy,” let’s take a moment to review the subject, as follows, from philosophybasics.com:
Political philosophy is the study of fundamental questions about the state, government, politics, liberty, justice and the enforcement of a legal code by authority.
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Our focus in here is predominantly on liberty, justice and the enforcement of a legal code by authority, but government and politics enter in, as well, so you can see we are really talking about all the elements of political philosophy in here when we talk about federal government-approved institutionalized social oppression.
That site then continues as follows with respect to political philosophy, to wit:
It is Ethics applied to a group of people, and discusses how a society should be set up and how one should act within a society.
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How should one act within the society of the United States of America?
And really, in light of these football protests and what Sonia Sotomayor did to me in 2005, how should society be set up in the United States of America?
And who should be the arbiter of that?
Prejudiced and biased federal judges such as Sonia Sotomayor pushing a progressive Democrat agenda and progressive Democrat policies whose vision entails nothing less than the radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America, hence the development of a wide range of programs to dismantle the privileges associated with whiteness, maleness and heteronormativity by the progressive Democrats?
As an aside, a discussion on that topic of progressive Democrat policies whose vision entails nothing less than the radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America began here in the pages of the Cape Charles Mirror on October 22, 2017 in the thread “On Neo-Fascism in America today in the Guise of Progressivism.” http://www.capecharlesmirror.com/news/paul-plante-on-neo-fascism-in-america-today-in-the-guise-of-progressivism/ where this relevant existential question was posed to the candid world:
But are those really an “army of anarchists” as the San Francisco Chronicle claims, or are they something entirely different, such as a paramilitary wing of one of our major political parties, a party with a long and well-documented history of using violence and paramilitary forces to impose its will on others while suppressing the voices of those it does not want heard?
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For that is really what the significance of that 2005 Sotomayor decision stripping me of my rights is really all about – it was a major win for repressive government, and it will take nothing less than a repressive government to impose that radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America on all the people in the United States of America,
Getting back to political philosophy:
Individual rights (such as the right to life, liberty, property, the pursuit of happiness, free speech, self-defence, etc) state explicitly the requirements for a person to benefit rather than suffer from living in a society.
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So, then, with respect to then-federal 2d Circuit Court of Appeals Sonia Sotomayor, now a Supreme Court justice for life, literally stripping me of my identity as a human being in 2005 in retaliation for me using what I thought, mistakenly so, it was to turn out, was my First Amendment right to petition for redress of grievance, it is that last sentence that would apply the most to these discussions right now – individual rights such as the right to liberty, property, the pursuit of happiness, free speech, and self-defence stating explicitly the requirements for a person to benefit rather than suffer from living in a society.
That I was acting as a responsible citizen engaged in speech that was reasonable when I was maliciously attacked and accused of being mentally ill and dangerous in a fraudulent instrument Sonia Sotomayor then put the federal government seal of approval on in 2005 was made incandescently clear in paragraph 8 of the amended federal civil rights complaint that was before Sotomayor in 2005, to wit:
8. This lawful investigation (investigation into endemic public corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health conducted by myself as a New York state licensed professional engineer charged with protecting and safeguarding human life and health in NYS was in furtherance of the due course of justice in the Town of Poestenkill, Rensselaer County and the State of New York and consistent with and in full accord and compliance with a March 1999 directive from the Rensselaer County Board of Health to all residents of the Rensselaer County Health District to report any and all such deliberate falsifications of inspection data and fraudulent submissions to the Rensselaer County Director of Environmental Health, defendant Roy Champagne, which plaintiff (myself) herein had done on August 3, 2001. (See, Exhibits A,B,C)
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That, people, here in corrupt New York state to the north of you, and this is thanks to Sonia Sotomayor, is all it takes to be declared mentally ill and dangerous and in need of incarceration in a secure mental facility – compliance with a March 1999 directive from the Rensselaer County Board of Health to all residents of the Rensselaer County Health District to report any and all deliberate falsifications of inspection data and fraudulent submissions to the Rensselaer County Director of Environmental Health, which is a steel-jawed trap that once sprung, as it was on me. will destroy your life for ever after.
So, as can be seen, stripped of those individual rights as I was in 2005 by Sonia Sotomayor, especially the individual rights to liberty, property, the pursuit of happiness, free speech, and self-defence, and that for acting as a responsible citizen, can it be said that I have benefitted in any way, shape or manner from the society in the state of New York as Sonia Sotomayor defines it from her biased and prejudiced political point of view, for stripping someone of their rights and identity, a form of judicial murder, if you will, is very much a highly political act?
As to “judicial murder,” Wikipedia tells us the term was first used in 1782 by August Ludwig von Schlözer in reference to the execution of Anna Göldi. where in a footnote, he explained the term as “the murder of an innocent, deliberately, and with all the pomp of holy Justice, perpetrated by people installed to prevent murder, or, if a murder has occurred, to see to it that it is punished appropriately.”
In this case, we can say that the “murder” of the innocent occurred when Sonia Sotomayor, with all the pomp of holy Justice, put the federal government seal of approval on a document she knew was a fraud wherein a political doctor had declared me to be a dangerous mental patient in need of incarceration in a secure mental facility, and thus, destroyed my life as a licensed professional engineer charged with protecting and safeguarding life and health in New York state, all to protect political corruption in New York state.
As to fascism and progressive Democrat policies to impose radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America, at pp. 152,153 of “World Wars And Revolutions” by Walter Phelps Hall, PhD, of Princeton, copyrighted 1943, he informs us as follows concerning “fascism” in Europe during their “Weimar Moment” in the 1930s, to wit:
Fascism is an all-embracing doctrine which demands a one hundred percent surrender of the individual will in the name of mystical nationalism – with ends not clearly defined.
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That is why fascism always requires a repressive government, just as the imposition of progressive Democrat policies in this country to impose that radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America will require a repressive government, which is what makes this 2005 Sotomayor decision so important to our future as American citizens.
“World Wars And Revolutions” by Walter Phelps Hall, PhD, of Princeton then continues as follows concerning fascism:
This nationalism is beyond good and evil, and thus is deified.
Therefore, fascism properly should be classed as a kind of religion like communism, the latter based on class-consciousness, the former on nationalism.
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More political philosophy that, people – fascism and communism both should properly be classed as a kind of religion, which gives us an idea of what we are truly confronted with in America today in the form of progressive Democrat policies country to impose that radical democratization of all areas of life in the United States of America – a form of zealotry, which is defined as “fanatical and uncompromising pursuit of religious, political, or other ideals; fanaticism.”
Getting back to “World Wars And Revolutions” and fascism, we have:
As such, fascism is compounded of three elements – violence, state socialism, totalitarianism.
Direct and clear is its repudiation of the Sermon on the Mount, for the Fascist insists that he only is blessed who smites and smites again.
Emphatic is its assertion that the economic life of the people must be controlled by governmental agencies.
And furthermore, since the be-all and the end-all of life is the exaltation of the state, all members of it must act alike, think alike, obey alike.
Such, in general outline, is the Spartan-like philosophy of twentieth century fascism.
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There it is, people – since the be-all and the end-all of life in a fascist society is the exaltation of the state, which is really the ruling party, or faction, or clique, all members of it must act alike, think alike, obey alike, but without violence and oppression and repression, how is the “state,” or in this case, the progressive Democrats as the ruling party, going to make that happen?
Think about that for a moment, people, but not for too long, because if you think about it long enough, you will realize that the future is now, not the tomarrow you thought it was going to be.
So, which side will you be on?
The candid world watches and waits, to see what it will be!
Paul Plante says
So yes, people, “judicial murder,” which Wikipedia tells us was a term first used in 1782 by August Ludwig von Schlözer in reference to the execution of Anna Göldi. where in a footnote, he explained the term as “the murder of an innocent, deliberately, and with all the pomp of holy Justice, perpetrated by people installed to prevent murder, or, if a murder has occurred, to see to it that it is punished appropriately.”
Sonia Sotomayor now sits on the United States Supreme Court because she was willing to destroy the life of an innocent human being in order to protect endemic government corruption in New York state, as opposed to seeing government corruption prevented, or seeing to it that it was punished, appropriately, which takes us back to political philosophy, which asks questions like: “What is a government?”, “Why are governments needed?”, “What makes a government legitimate?”, “What rights and freedoms should a government protect?”, “What duties do citizens owe to a legitimate government, if any?” and “When may a government be legitimately overthrown, if ever?,” as follows:
Western political philosophy has its origins in Ancient Greece, when city-states were experimenting with various forms of political organization including monarchy, tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy and democracy.
Among the most important classical works of political philosophy are Plato’s “The Republic” and Aristotle’s “Politics”.
Later, St. Augustine’s “The City of God” was a Christianized version of these which emphasized the role of the state in applying mercy as a moral example.
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In that, we can see that Sonia Sotomayor represents the “anti-St. Augustine,” in that she emphasizes the role of the corrupt state in having no mercy towards those who would dare to challenge that corrupt and repressive state as her moral example.
And back to political philosophy:
After St. Thomas Aquinas’s reintroduction and Christianization of Aristotle’s political works, Christian Scholastic political philosophy dominated European thought for centuries.
In Ancient China, Confucius, Mencius (372 – 189 B.C.) and Mozi (470 – 391 B.C.) sought to restore political unity and stability through the cultivation of virtue, while the Legalist school sought the same end by the imposition of discipline.
Similarly, in Ancient India, Chanakya (350 – 283 B.C.) developed a viewpoint in his “Arthashastra” which recalls both the Chinese Legalists and the later Political Realist theories of Niccolò Machiavelli.
Early Muslim political philosophy was indistinguishable from Islamic religious thought.
The 14th Century Arabic scholar Ibn Khaldun (1332 – 1406) is considered one of the greatest political theorists, and his definition of government as “an institution which prevents injustice other than such as it commits itself” is still considered a succinct analysis.
With the recent emergence of Islamic radicalism as a political movement, political thought has revived in the Muslim world, and the political ideas of Muhammad Abduh (1849 – 1905), Al-Afghani (1838 0 1897), Sayyid Qutb (1906 – 1966), Abul Ala Mawdudi (1903 – 1979), Ali Shariati (1933 – 1977) and Ruhollah Khomeini (1902 – 1989) have gained increasing popularity in the 20th Century.
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Here, thanks to Sonia Sotomayor, we have her counter definition of government as an institution which does not prevent injustice other than such as it commits itself, which definition propelled her to a seat on our Supreme Court for life, such are our twisted politics in America today.
But back to political philosophy once again:
Secular political philosophy began to emerge in Europe after centuries of theological political thought during the Renaissance.
Machiavelli’s influential works, “The Prince” and “The Discourses”, described a pragmatic and consequentialist view of politics, where good and evil are mere means to an end.
The Englishman Thomas Hobbes, well known for his theory of the social contract (the implied agreements by which people form nations and maintain a social order), went on to expand this prototype of Contractarianism in the first half of the 17th Century, culminating in his “Leviathan” of 1651, which verged on Totalitarianism.
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Sotomayor’s 2005 decision as an appeals court judge in New York state in 2005 to strip me of my supposed “fundamental” rights to sue, to be a party, and to give evidence, because I had successfully employed those rights in court actions against the corrupt State of New York and its political subdivisions, more than verges on totalitarianism, people; to the contrary it defines it.
As to modern political philosophy, during the Age of Enlightenment, Europe entered a sort of golden age of political philosophy with the work of such thinkers as John Locke (whose ideas on Liberalism and Libertarianism are reflected in the American Declaration of Independence and whose influence on Voltaire and Rousseau was critical), Jean-Jacques Rousseau (whose contractarianist political philosophy influenced the French Revolution, and whose 1762 work “The Social Contract” became one of the most influential works of political philosophy in the Western tradition), and the Baron de Montesquieu (1889 – 1755) (whose articulation of the separation of powers within government is implemented in many constitutions throughout the world today).
An important conceptual distinction (which continues to this day) was made at this time between state (a set of enduring institutions through which power could be distributed and its use justified), and government (a specific group of people who occupy the institutions of the state, and create the laws by which the people are bound).
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And that, people, presents us with our most serious political question in this nation today – what is the distinction between the “state” as a set of enduring institutions through which power could be distributed and its use justified, and “government,” which is the specific group of people who occupy the institutions of the state, and create the laws by which the people are bound?
As to our “government” today, the mockery that it has become, the specific group of people who occupy the institutions of the state, and create the laws by which we, the people are bound are partisan politicians from the Democrat party and the Republican party, both of whom are in the game for themselves alone, which is why we have institutionalized government oppression in this country today, thanks to political judges like Sonia Sotomayor.
As to political philosophy, two major questions were broached by Enlightenment political philosphers: one, by what right or need do people form states; and two, what is the best form for a state.
Capitalism, with its emphasis on privately-owned means of production and the market economy, became institutionalized in Europe between the 16th and 19th Centuries, and particularly during the Industrial Revolution (roughly the late 18th and early 19th Centuries).
In his 1859 essay “On Liberty” and other works, John Stuart Mill argued that Utilitarianism requires that political arrangements satisfy the liberty principle (or harm principle), i.e. the sole purpose of law should be to stop people from harming others.
By the mid-19th Century, Karl Marx was developing his theory of Dialactical Materialism and Marxism, and by the late 19th Century, Socialism, Libertarianism Conservatism and Anarchism were established members of the political landscape, and the trade union movement and syndicalism also gained some prominence.
The Russian Revolution of 1917 brought the radical philosophy of Communism to the fore, and after the First World War, the ultra-reactionary ideologies of Nationalism, Fascism and Totalitarianism began to take shape in Italy and Nazi Germany.
In the 19th and early 20th Centuries, (along with a resurgence in the 1960s and 1970s), the Feminist movement developed its theories and moral philosophies concerned with gender inequalities and equal rights for women, as part of a general concern for Egalitarianism.
After the Second World War, there was a marked trend towards a pragmatic approach to political issues, rather than a philosophical one, and post-colonial, civil rights and multicultural thought became significant.
A relatively recent development is the concept of Communitarianism and civil society.
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So, there, people, is a capsule summary of what political philosophy consists of, and how it came to be a part of our public lives in America today.