The Criminalization of Everyday Life

[Scuba]

http://billmoyers.com/2013/12/09/the-criminalization-of-everyday-life/

Sometimes a single story has a way of standing in for everything you need to know. In the case of the up-arming, up-armoring and militarization of police forces across the country, there is such a story. Not the police, mind you, but the campus cops at Ohio State University now possess an MRAP; that is, a $500,000, 18-ton, mine-resistant, ambush-protected armored vehicle of a sort used in the war in Afghanistan and, as Hunter Stuart of the Huffington Post reported, built to withstand “ballistic arms fire, mine fields, IEDs and nuclear, biological and chemical environments.” Sounds like just the thing for bouts of binge drinking and post-football-game shenanigans.


Warren County Undersheriff Shawn Lamouree poses in front the department's mine resistant ambush protected vehicle, or MRAP, on November 13, 2013, in Queensbury, NY. The hulking vehicles, built for about $500,000 each at the height of the war, are among the biggest pieces of equipment that the Defense Department is giving to law enforcement agencies under a national military surplus program. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

That MRAP came, like so much other equipment police departments are stocking up on — from tactical military vests, assault rifles and grenade launchers to actual tanks and helicopters – as a freebie via a Pentagon-organized surplus military equipment program. As it happens, police departments across the country are getting MRAPs like OSU’s, including the Dakota County Sheriff’s Office in Minnesota. It’s received one of 18 such decommissioned military vehicles already being distributed around that state. So has Warren County which, like a number of counties in New York state, some quite rural, is now deploying Afghan War-grade vehicles. (Nationwide, rural counties have received a disproportionate percentage of the billions of dollars’ worth of surplus military equipment that has gone to the police in these years.)

When questioned on the utility of its new MRAP, Warren County Sheriff Bud York suggested, according to the Post-Star, the local newspaper, that “in an era of terrorist attacks on US soil and mass killings in schools, police agencies need to be ready for whatever comes their way… The vehicle will also serve as a deterrent to drug dealers or others who might be contemplating a show of force.” So, breathe a sigh of relief, Warren County is ready for the next Al Qaeda-style show of force and, for those fretting about how to deal with such things, there are now 165 18-ton “deterrents” in the hands of local law enforcement around the country, with hundreds of requests still pending.

You can imagine just how useful an MRAP is likely to be if the next Adam Lanza busts into a school in Warren County, assault rifle in hand, or takes over a building at Ohio State University. But keep in mind that we all love bargains and that Warren County’s vehicle cost the department less than $10. (Yes, you read that right!) A cornucopia of such Pentagon “bargains” has, in the post-9/11 years, played its part in transforming the way the police imagine their jobs and in militarizing the very idea of policing in this country.

[blkmusclmachine]

1. Police State

And here comes Obama's 30,000 Spy Drones to watch you in your homes and neighborhoods.

Thanks, 9/11.

[RKP5637]

5. And NSA creeping around in all communications. I often wonder how many Americans are paying

attention. Most are clueless IMO and many just don't give a fuck. So sad.

[RKP5637]

2. This country is into so much shit even the largest shovel in the world is not going to dig it out!

[Cleita]

3. I used to have immigrant friends from Germany, who lived under the

Nazis and later the Stazi in Eastern Germany. I wonder what they would think of this? None of them are alive today and perhaps that's a blessing for them because back then they never thought they would see the like here in the USA.

[RKP5637]

7. And it crept up on them, some thought Hitler was just a passing fad as he

rose up from nowhere.

[Cleita]

8. Yes. that's true. People around here aren't seeing it either. eom

[RKP5637]

11. It's unnerved me for sometime. I was a little kid then and I remember it well, WWII, living in the

states. It just feels bad here anymore, since 911. Americans just are not sensitive to what might be occurring ... because this country has never lived through anything like that, it's off the radar screen for most ... thinking business will just continue as usual. It can turn quickly.

[Cleita]

13. One positive thing is we don't have a national police, yet.

By that I mean police who answer to one chief and are assigned around the country, living in barracks, like military. That might be our saving grace.

[RKP5637]

15. Yes, that is a positive! n/t

[Lars39]

16. Is that needed though?

We already have Homeland Security training and working in conjunction with many police departments.

[Cleita]

17. I don't know, but when HS becomes THE police department, worry.

When I lived in Chile, the national police were Los Caribineros. They mostly rode around on horseback rather than squad cars, but for the most part were polite. However, they were the organization that gave us Augusto Pinochet.

[tblue37]

35. from "They Thought They Were Free" (about the Nazi takeover of Germany):

http://disinfo.com/2013/10/excerpt-thought-free-germans-1933-45-milton-mayer/

“What no one seemed to notice,” said a colleague of mine, a philologist, “was the ever widening gap, after 1933, between the government and the people. Just think how very wide this gap was to begin with, here in Germany. And it became always wider. You know, it doesn’t make people close to their government to be told that this is a people’s government, a true democracy, or to be enrolled in civilian defense, or even to vote. All this has little, really nothing, to do with knowing one is governing.

“What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise; to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believing that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if the people could not understand it, it could not be released because of national security. And their sense of identification with Hitler, their trust in him, made it easier to widen this gap and reassured those who would otherwise have worried about it.

“This separation of government from people, this widening of the gap, took place so gradually and so insensibly, each step disguised (perhaps not even intentionally) as a temporary emergency measure or associated with true patriotic allegiance or with real social purposes. And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter.

“You will understand me when I say that my Middle High German was my life. It was all I cared about. I was a scholar, a specialist. Then, suddenly, I was plunged into all the new activity, as the university was drawn into the new situation; meetings, conferences, interviews, ceremonies, and, above all, papers to be filled out, reports, bibliographies, lists, questionnaires. And on top of that were the demands in the community, the things in which one had to, was ‘expected to’ participate that had not been there or had not been important before. It was all rigmarole, of course, but it consumed all one’s energies, coming on top of the work one really wanted to do. You can see how easy it was, then, not to think about fundamental things. One had no time. <emphasis added>”

- See more at: http://disinfo.com/2013/10/excerpt-thought-free-germans-1933-45-milton-mayer/#sthash.x7OgGLca.dpuf

[Cleita]

36. There is a movie out there that didn't get much attention called

"Good" about a university professor and his best friend a Jewish psychiatrist and how the Nazi regime crept up on them affecting their lives. The professor rises in the ranks of the Nazi party benefitting greatly while his Jewish friend become increasingly marginalized slowly losing everything he worked for and eventually being sent to a concentration camp. It shows how things slowly changed for them while they were going about the business of living their lives, not noticing or paying attention to the changes occurring until it was too late.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

4. It may have 'cost less than $10'

but I'm betting it gets like what, 1 mile to the gallon of gas? And is probably destroying every city street it rolls down, thanks to the sheer weight.

[FSogol]

6. and the yearly maintenance and storage cost is more than $10, I suspect. n/t

[eppur_se_muova]

34. But it's also described as a $500,000 vehicle -- someone (us) paid 500 grand, all right.

This is just DHS mining the taxpayers to keep their contractor sweethearts raking in the cash. Military weaponry is apparently the only thing worth manufacturing in the US anymore. If we're turning into a militarized society, it's largely we already have a militarized economy.

[YoungDemCA]

9. Meanwhile, the wealthy, powerful, and well-connected are doing better than ever!

And that's all that matters, amirite?

[onethatcares]

37. what better way

to block the entry to the gated communities?

for some strange reason I don't think they'll be used to keep the richie riches in the same communities.

[hifiguy]

38. It is ever more apparent that the true purpose of the police

is to keep the poor/brown folks in line by whatever means necessary and protect the 1% from everyone else.

[mopinko]

10. pentagon buys shit, stamps it surplus, and out the back door it goes.

how the fuck can we have this kind of surplus?
i call bullshit.

[JEFF9K]

12. Beware of the military-municipal government complex!

[Warren DeMontague]

14. Here you go.

This is why you have multi-million dollar SWAT teams being sent in to arrest people for smoking pot in their living room.

[madinmaryland]

18. It's Upstate fucking New York. What the fuck is wrong with these people...

Why not transfer the money to the school system rather than buying a penis machine that has absolutely no fucking use in upstate New York.

[L0oniX]

19. They should put big smiley faces on them vehicles.

[fishwax]

20. .

[dgauss]

21. A long excerpt from Milton Mayor's "They Thought They Were Free" ...

The book is interviews with Germans who lived through the 30's and 40's, not a polemic but an attempt to understand the mindset of average citizens during that period. The whole book is enlightening and it's hard to read through this excerpt without recognizing at least some parallels.

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/511928.html

[Half-Century Man]

22. It is a convoy support vehicle, not an assault vehicle.

However it will crash though the un re-enforced wall of a school. Because nothing will do more to make children safe than an 18 ton armored vehicle crashing through a blind wall to take a suspect by surprise.



Take all this military shit away. It does far more actual harm than potential good it might do.

[Hoppy]

23. Tin soldiers and (name your president) marching...

[Spitfire of ATJ]

24. We didn't arm up the cops with war surplus shit to use on the public after WWII....

Much less campus cops.

[winter is coming]

26. +1. We should take that shit back and stockpile it or destroy it. n/t

[ClarkeVII]

27. +1

Excellent point

[Spitfire of ATJ]

31. Here's another: You can bet if the Nazis had won they would have armed up their police.

[LloydS of New London]

25. durec

[Jerry442]

28. "Nationwide, rural counties have received a disproportionate percentage...

...of the billions of dollars’ worth of surplus military equipment that has gone to the police in these years."

More rural generally means more conservative. Makes you wonder if there are plans to call on the "loyal" PDs for some special services some day.

[Uncle Joe]

29. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Scuba.

[littlemissmartypants]

30. Ok I admit it.

Last edited Thu Aug 14, 2014, 07:04 PM - Edit history (1)

I really want to drive it.
Vehicle fantasy.

That and a bobcat.
All those different directions.
Moving, digging, hauling, flipping.
Noise and danger.
And heavy equipment.
Tantalizing.

Bill Moyers and his crew are amazing.
I had the pleasure of sharing space in the gallery at the #NCGA last year with some of them. They were doing a piece on Medicaid funds refusal by NC.
I really love hearing him speak.

Thanks Scuba!
~ Lmsp

[Scuba]

33. I rented a Bobcat once. It was a lot of fun ...

... for the first 10 minutes. After that it was just a very bouncy tool. Sure beat a wheelbarrow and shovel though!!

[bhikkhu]

32. Interesting - I wrote a paper with that title in college

And I'm pleased to observe, the last few years, that things are going the other direction. When I look at criminalization of everyday life I think of homosexuality and recreational drug use. Both of which have been heavily criminalized during my life, but both are now well on the way to normal acceptance. Race would have been more an issue before my time, though its still far easier to come under suspicion than it should, just because one's skin is a darker shade. The end result is a decrease in alienation, a decrease in secrecy and the wearing of two faces - one in public, one in private.

More to the OP's point, I think the MRAPs are a bit ridiculous, and I doubt they will find much use. In my less populous neck of the woods the police got a SWAT vehicle and a bunch of fancy body-armour and training after 9-11. I don't think I've ever seen it leave the police yard.

On edit - if we got one of those it would be great for parades her, we do have a lot of parades.