Senator Sanders of Vermont and others respond to the racial unrest in Ferguson, Mo.

[cal04]

To the Editor:

The New York Times and other media have focused enormous attention on the tragedy in Ferguson, Mo., where an unarmed black youth was shot and killed by a police officer. Unfortunately, there has been very little discussion about the economic and social tragedy that has befallen an entire generation of young black men.

Today, more than 5.5 million young Americans have either dropped out of high school or graduated from high school and have no jobs. Today, while youth unemployment is 20 percent, African-American youth unemployment is 35 percent, and in the St. Louis area, it is even higher than that.

Incredibly, there are estimates that if present trends continue, one of every three black American men born today can expect to go to prison in his lifetime.

If there is anything that we can learn from the Ferguson tragedy, it should be a recognition that we need to address the extraordinary crises facing black youths. That means, among other things, a major jobs program, job training and vastly improved educational opportunities.

BERNARD SANDERS
U.S. Senator from Vermont
Burlington, Vt., Aug. 20, 2014


To the Editor:

The tragic death of Michael Brown and the responses to it have brought a long-simmering distrust in Missouri’s criminal justice system to a boil. Two concrete actions can go a long way toward easing tensions and moving us closer to the ultimate goal of “equal justice under law.”

First, Robert P. McCulloch, the St. Louis County prosecutor, whose father, a police officer, was tragically killed in the line of duty by a black man in 1964, must have no involvement with charging decisions and/or sentencing decisions related to the police officer who killed Mr. Brown. If either side could so very easily have Mr. McCulloch disqualified as a juror under his circumstances, it cannot possibly be just or fair for him to make charging or sentencing decisions in this case.

Regardless of who initiates the action, the appointment of a politically neutral, highly respected special prosecutor is essential.

Second, there is obviously a widespread perception of substantial racial inequities in Missouri’s criminal justice system. The mere fact that African-Americans are incarcerated at about six times the rate of whites is enough to justify the appointment of a politically neutral, highly respected blue-ribbon commission to identify the nature and extent of racial inequities and the steps that will most likely resolve them.

LOU HORWITZ
St. Peters, Mo., Aug. 21, 2014

The writer is a lawyer.

To the Editor:

Police training must be changed from “shoot to kill” to protect police officers to “shoot or act to disable or stop” unless the officer is in clear mortal danger. Sometimes this will mean retreating or using nonlethal force.

Police training overwhelmingly emphasizes officer protection to the point of discouraging “shoot to wound” and allowing or even requiring use of hollow point bullets, formerly outlawed as too destructive of human tissue.

Otherwise, police officers when scared or excited will continue to empty their guns against suspects, unnecessarily killing hundreds where less than deadly force is appropriate.

As a lawyer representing innocent people shot at by the police and as a former general counsel to the New York State Crime Victims Board (1977-87), I have seen this scenario play out over the last 30 years. Equipping the police routinely with military-style weapons is likely to result in even more death and injury to innocent civilians as well as to more criminal suspects.

PAUL HUDSON
Sarasota, Fla., Aug. 21, 2014
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/recent-business/nyt-learning-from-the-ferguson-tragedy

[Jefferson23]

1. Highly Recommend n/t

[Cha]

2. mahalo cal

[99Forever]

3. K&R

[frazzled]

4. Sentiments great, but surprisingly normative proposals for solutions

"If there is anything that we can learn from the Ferguson tragedy, it should be a recognition that we need to address the extraordinary crises facing black youths. That means, among other things, a major jobs program, job training and vastly improved educational opportunities."

Job training, educational opportunities ... he's right, of course, and these are the same solutions we hear year after year after year. I feel we need something more than these broad, rather vague kinds of suggestions. Exactly HOW do we get better educational opportunities? I for one would suggest a return to desegregation plans, which were largely abandoned at the end of the 1990s in favor of "neighborhood" (read: separate but equal) schools. One proposal that isn't so popular here are the focused charters (e.g., black male academies, which have had some successes). I'd like to hear about other things I haven't heard of yet (for instance, perhaps programs aimed simultaneously at adults as well as students, so that they can begin to support and help their kids outside the classroom). But just to say we need educational opportunities is not enough--what kind? how to implement them? Unfortunately, I don't think Vermont has much experience in this area, given that its African American population is a mere 1.2% (compared to 13.2% for the nation as a whole).

In a way, I'm glad the nation is refocusing its attention of these issues of inequality. The "real" inequality—that is to say, racial inequality—that has existed for two centuries in this country, well before it became a fashionable term that appealed to white people feeling the pinch. Till we solve that one, any larger discussion of inequality in this country is premature.

[VanGoghRocks]

5. How about just arresting the mother-fucking shooter, Senator Sanders? What say

you to that?