Editorial

“We do not come to this plaza to mourn where he fell, we come to you, we return to the living. There were others before him remember? Yes, you remember. But then the blood was hidden, it was so far. The South's rain washed it from the Earth, far far away. The People's death was as it has always been, as if no-one had died, nothing. As if they were stones falling to the Earth.

The State of Utah used to grant a person condemned death a final choice. The choice between hanging and firing squad. Washington State permitted the rope or the electric chair. Washington replaced the chair with the needle and Utah swapped the rope for the same.

Henry Green was murdered by police in his own neighborhood on June 6. He was shot without warning by plainclothes police who were there as part of a summer program that is alternately called a “Community” policing program or a “Summer Safety” program. Only the Columbus Police Department is investigating his murder. As his family, along with community organizers from his neighborhood press the city leaders for some real initiative towards justice those leaders have further entrenched themselves and their programs.

The Senate is close to bi-partisan approval of new gun control legislation in the wake of the Orlando Pulse massacre carried out by former prison guard and private military contractor Omar Mateen. There had been opposition from both sides of the aisle on the use of the already existing “no-tfly list” as a basis for prohibiting the purchase of firearms by certain people. The no fly-list is secret. How someone gets put on it is secret. How someone gets off it is impossible. The new list will be based on something called the “Selectee List.” This list is even more chilling.

I own firearms. I'm a leftist. Not a #feelthebern leftist. Bernie is too far to the right for me. Because of my politics, men have come to my home to kill me. This has happened more than once. When it did happen the only things that saved my life, and the lives of my roommates, were training and the physical possession of effective tools.

“'I'm afraid we don't believe everything you tell us,” Hardy said. There was deep sadness in his voice. “Not that I ever accepted everything you told us. Priests hear a lot of lies. But we knew you were hiding something.'” –-Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, The Mote in God's Eye pg 533.

Since the The Mockingbird's first report on rape and other sexual abuse in the Fairfield County County jail and the resultant cover up, the powers that be have pushed back. Despite claiming in an interview with ABC 6 that the investigation was closed, Sheriff Dave Phalen repeated called family members of sources for our story demanding to speak to them within 48 hours of our first publication.

At first it was pretty funny: 30% of Republican voters would bomb the make-belief kingdom in Aladdin.  Cosmopolitan Europeans and smug New York liberals guffawed over the headlines – the GOP base is so ignorant and warlike that they want to blow up a place that doesn’t exist because it sounds Arabic.

There is a great deal to be said about Baltimore. A human rights reporter can write a dozen stories. My fact based dis-assembly of the lies from mainstream media sources, the stories told by the police and the aspirations of the politicians will be out soon. This editorial needed to be written now. I've been sitting on some of this for decades, and it is not opinion. This is experience.