Gaaah… Mine eyes, mine eyes. 
On Saturday, the Black Caucus of the American Library Association planted a memorial tree to Michael Brown along a walking trail in January-Wabash Park in Ferguson. Within 24 hours, the tree was cut down and the memorial stone is missing.
Why don’t we plant a memorial tree for Tamerlan Tsarnaev while we’re at it?
Perhaps we should. If someone who bombs a marathon race with resulting death and mutilation is equivalent to a guy whose worst crime was stealing a pack of Swisher Sweets, that is.
Or maybe you’d like to re-examine the stupidity and insensitivity of your statement.
Most people consider strong-arm robbery and attacking police officers who are trying lawfully to arrest you to be worse crimes than stealing cigars, so I am not sure who you are talking about.
Regards,
Shodan
Do those people also equate robbery and assault to terroristic mass murder?
In general, no, I would expect not. In the specialized sense of “let’s not lie about what he did and pretend he deserves a memorial plaque”, then yes.
Regards,
Shodan
What, specifically, about Michael Brown deserves memorializing?
His drug habit? His strongarm robbery of a hard-working businessman? His trying to steal a cop’s gun and telling the cop that he’s too pussy to shoot?
Yep. It’s distasteful to treat him like a martyr, and disrespectful to those who actually did die fighting for rights and freedoms, not robbing a shop and resisting arrest.
Lets look on the bright side. That is one less tree that those evil white racist cops can lynch a poor innocent black man with.
Wrong thread…
It wasn’t I who gave him a memorial; that was the Black Caucus of the American Library Association, for reasons they believed sufficient. Nor was it I who equated his crimes with those of a terrorist murderer; that was you, for reasons I cannot, and probably do not wish to, comprehend.
Brown smoked weed, as do quite a number of other Americans. Why, I’ve been known to do that myself. In some jurisdictions that’s a crime; in others, not. Too bad for Brown he lived in that jurisdiction. I’ll give you “strong arm robbery” although attaching that name adds quite a bit more spin to the action of taking a handful and daring the shopkeeper to take them back.
But “trying to steal a cop’s gun” is a stretcher. Cop pulled his car up next to two “boys” walking in the street, and commanded them to do something (get out of the street, or come over here and talk to me, we’ll never know which) out his open window. When Brown reached said window, cop removed his gun from his holster. I’m a strong believer that this was for intimidation. After all, cops normally don’t effect arrests at gunpoint through the windows of their patrol cars. Likely cop recognized Brown as a possible suspect in that strong arm Swisher heist, and also recognized that Brown was a bigger “boy” than cop was comfortable with, and felt better with his gun in his hand. Brown saw the gun and, not having read all the SDMB threads about unwarranted cop killings of civilians, taunted cop with a “You’re not gonna shoot me!”. Cop, being trained in the bullying tradition of his town’s police force, raised the gun as if, by gawd, he really would. Brown, realizing now that he actually might, grabbed for it and wrestled to prevent cop from shooting him through the window. Gun went off and Brown ran down the street. At least that’s how I envision the interaction.
At any rate, nothing in this entire crime spree rises to the level of, nor rises within several orders of magnitude of, the actions of the Marathon Bombers. The fact that you see some moral equivalence between them is sad.
Back in November, I seem to recall that you were one of the folks who “envisioned” the interaction as supporting an indictment, a stance that the Justice Department report seems to have shown was not correct.
Based on that, why is your “vision” particularly compelling?
Maybe it just seems that way.
Reasons which you evidently agree with, as you have deemed fit to label the removal of said memorial pitworthy.
The only difference between Brown and Tsarnaev is that when Brown tried to murder an American citizen, he failed.
It is a crime in all jurisdictions, the nullificationist acts of rebellion by a few anarchist states notwithstanding.
It’s well attested to in the grand jury testimony that Brown attempted to wrestle Wilson’s gun away from him.
He observed two men engaged in the commission of a crime and arrested them, you mean.
Cops do not draw their weapons to intimidate. They draw their weapons to kill.
And won himself a Darwin Award in the process.
Yes, because defending yourself against an insane criminal is absolutely the dictionary definition of “bullying”.
You don’t see how attempted murder of a peace officer is morally equivalent to terroristic murder?
That’s your problem, not mine.
Wait a minute. It is your view that getting into a fight with a police officer – not at all a good thing to do by my account, agreed – is less serious morally and criminally than setting off a bomb with the intent to murder many innocent civilians? Yeesh. Your reputation here isn’t an exaggeration.
Close enough to my stance, though not strictly congruent. I believed that an indictment and a public trial, with both sides represented by vigorous advocates, was more likely to reveal “truth” (something close to an objective iteration of facts) than a grand jury who had all manner of evidence, innuendo, and misinformation thrown before them without the benefit of leadership from the prosecutor. I wanted a peer jury to be the finder of fact, not a Grand Jury. I still think this would have been better, even if it resulted in an acquittal. I personally would have been more comfortable with such an acquittal than with the Grand Jury’s failure to indict. That the Justice Department report seems to support this conclusion gives me some relief from the concern that a massive miscarriage of justice occurred. At least in regard to the actual shooting, if not the background between cops and black citizens in Ferguson.
My vision of the earlier action at the patrol car is compelling, perhaps only to me. It seems to explain as many of the supposed “facts” as alternate scenarios, and it is more in line with my own life experiences involving petty hoods and cops. It may be wrong, but it may also be right. The idea that this petty criminal went out of his way to attempt to steal a cops gun, for no reason and with no apparent explanation, just doesn’t satisfy me. My vision makes more sense to me.
Regardless, my vision of the actors’ actions at the police car would have no bearing on the legality or illegality of the final act in the play that occurred some moments, and some distance, away.
I do not understand the question as you have phrased it.
Michael Brown and Tamerlan Tsarnaev both attempted to murder American citizens. One was successful, the other was not.
No, it’s a crime in all locations but not all jurisdictions. There’s no reason the States have to include copies of Federal laws on their books, or enforce Federal law.
The idea that changing the law because of a majority view equates to “anarchy” is absurd. It’s actually “democracy”.
And it is one of the founding principles of this country that we have specifically rejected democracy in favor of republicanism and the rule of law.