Vulnerability

It is dangerous, and often fatal, to be black in the USA. Probably everyone knows now what's going on in Ferguson, Missouri. As Michelle Alexander explains in her meticulous study, The New Jim Crow, the so-called war on drugs gave the USA a cover for militarization of the police. That militarized police, the one that crushed the Occupy movement, has gone mad with its own power.

Mychal Denzel Smith writes in The Nation, "We plead for our humanity to be recognized. We pray for the lives of our young people. We remind everyone of our history. And then another black person dies." If you feel you don't have a handle on what's going on in Ferguson, read Smith's clear, strong, well-written analysis here. Now even the mainstream commercial press admits that riot cops with automatic weapons and tear gas might be a little extreme as a response to unarmed protesters. This careful piece of writing appears in Newsweek.

But that won't bring back the life of Michael Brown. Solidarity protests are being held all over the USA.

Another mainstream but very complete description of the (somewhat encouraging) change in the approach of Ferguson police appears in the NYT, if you haven't yet exhausted your free articles there.