Brutality Versus Terrorism

Time for the Occupy Movement to wake up to reality.

The question, until now remained unanswered: Why did city governments and their police officers respond so violently and with so much brutality against peaceful people threatening no one, simply asking for a little consideration?

Today, at least for Eureka, California, we got a partial answer – PARANOIA.

The Times-Standard reveals in their “County emails outragemembers of Occupy Eureka” the existence of “nefarious” “emails” “that led to police action against the Occupy Eureka encampment on the Humboldt County Courthouse lawn.” Why? Read the condemnatory words of the leading police official and law enforcement officer, District Attorney Paul Gallegos:

“While I do not suspect that any of those tents contain any explosives or otherwise dangerous materials, I cannot confirm that they do or do not and I do not believe that we can allow the risk of such an occurrence to continue.” [Emphasis added] 

No fact-based reality contained in anything Gallegos says, only his paranoid, fantasy-based vilifying accusations of “terrorism” that demonstrates his true attitude regarding the people of the Occupy Movement – inept, incompetent, gullible, and stupid terrorist.

Grant Scott-Goforth of the Times-Standard puts it this way: “Gallegos said he worried it was possible for people not directly associated with Occupy Eureka to guise the group as cover for illegal activity.”
The hypocrisy of Gallegos is mind-blowing, if nothing else. He says: “Candidly I support the movement. Unfortunately here it has been somewhat co-opted locally by our local protesters.”

In what way? What could these local protesters possibly want the the movement doesn't want when dealing with the dregs of society; homeless people and a “leaderless nature” that obviously couldn't know what it wants other than issue “hyperbole.” Notice how unreasonable these “Occupy People” are according to Gallegos and why he refuses to recognize and engage them: “If people want to sit down reasonably, they're going to find complete cooperation.” Then immediately contradicts that propagandist assertion by saying: “Occupy Eureka doesn't have a monopoly on concerns about the county and the community.” Why? Because in his mind they do not represent the 99% of Americans. He and his supporters do. That's why he and his police deal with them for the “terrorists” that they really are.

A good lesson on what “terrorism” and what makes “terrorist” – how the wanton accusatory use of the word automatically vilifies, condemns and justifies the extreme forms of sanctioned brutality and criminal conduct – is explained and defined by Glenn Greenwald in his Salon.com article, “Iranand the Terrorism game” - to quote from his:

UPDATE: There’s one point that should be added about why this matters so much: the fact that Terrorism has no fixed meaning does not mean it is inconsequential. The opposite is true. Terrorism is one of the most consequential words in our political lexicon. The term designates Supreme, Unmitigated Evil. Once someone is successfully branded a Terrorist, it means that anything and everything can and should be done to them without constraints.

And concludes with:

As I’ve said before, Terrorism is simultaneously the term that means nothing and justifies everything. That’s why such strong emotions are evoked when it is used in a way that deviates from mandated orthodoxies. It’s a meaningless term, but incredibly (perhaps incomparably) significant in governing how power and violence can be wielded and against whom.

So now you know why Gallegos painted the local Occupy People and their “peaceful protests” as “terrorist” - stupid people that believe they have some God-given or Constitutional right to be recognized for who and what they “think” or “believe” they are. He wants to be, as he claims here, to be the man of the people, but he's co-opted by his own attitude, actions and hypocrisy as defined and established by the Occupy Eureka people.

Whether or not it was the newspaper Editor or their writer's intention or not, they did expose the truth about Paul Gallegos' hypocrisy. The issue, as applied to these people peacefully protesting, went far beyond simply “taking down a few tents” to branding the local people as potential terrorists and their protest actions as terrorism. It went to the very heart of why the local so-called representative government went so far to renounce and denounce the legitimacy of a courageous people willing to Occupy their rightful space on this Earth equal to all others.

The citizens of Humboldt County and particularly Eureka are quite capable of deciding for themselves what is and what is not “public safety.” Despite the arrogance of the one percent, we're not a bunch of dogs that need to be told when to “sit” and when and how to “speak.”
(Credit Times-Standard and AP-Salon.com)

--Joe