Rose Colored Glasses By Don Cooper
(2009-12-05 at 19:28:34 )

Rose-Colored Glasses by Don Cooper

I have read my share of columns on Police Abuse and the Police State. I
have seen my share of videos on YouTube of police abusing people for the
most mundane things like speeding, riding a bike on a sidewalk, riding a
bike down the street, and, civil, non-violent protest.

But until just recently I had not experienced it myself firsthand. I was
down in Chinatown in Washington DC for dinner and a movie. After leaving
the movie theater I noticed cops parked on the side of the road in front
of the movie theater. These cops had out their little pen lights and
they were randomly pulling over passing drivers.

I crossed the street and saw a small gathering of other folks standing
there watching what was going on. Each asking the other: "do you know
what they are doing?" Nobody seemed to know for sure but we all know what
it looked like. It looked like a scene out of Nazi Germany or Communist
Russia: YOUR PAPERS PLEASE!!

As we all stood there looking on a black teenager came whizzing by us on
his skateboard. He skated across the street, past the cops and on down
the road. As the cops saw him skate by they yelled something at him that
was too intelligible for us to understand. I would imagine it was too
intelligible for the skateboarder to understand as well because he turned
and looked and kept on his way another 20 feet or so.

That is when our heroic blue uniformed doughnut feeders leapt into action
like Boy George at a Liberace concert. They took off running at full
speed after this Felonious Social Miscreant who so Arrogantly and
Willfully did not kowtow to the fact that they said something.

Once the young man saw the cops running after him he voluntarily stopped
his skateboard and stood there in the street waiting for the eggheads to
catch up. Once they did they grabbed him as if they had cornered the
Devil Himself and Cattle Rustled him up onto the sidewalk and up against
the wall. They forcibly held one arm behind his back and the other
against the wall up over his head, spread his legs and searched his
person. I took a snapshot of this position with my cell phone:
( top photo on right )

As I stood there I could hear the police disciplining the young man on
the error of his ways. How when they say to jump his only option is to
ask: how high? Of course, being in possession of a functioning frontal
lobe, the young man insisted that he had done nothing wrong but the tax
feeders did not care. They simply kept repeating that he was told to do
something and he did not and therefore He Evidently Had Forfeited His
Civil Rights.

In the end the young man received a citation for J-Walking, I kid you
not, since he did not cross the street on the crosswalk. Unfortunately,
it would seem that J-Walking in China Town in DC is tantamount to
Suspected Armed Robbery So Please Use Those Crosswalks.

Unfortunately, this particular incident also gave me yet another
opportunity to observe the Sheep Like Hypnotic Stupor That Most
Americans seem to exist in. While the young man was pinned up against
the wall somebody walking by recognized him and asked him what was going
on. The young man explained the civil injustice taking place and pleaded
that the acquaintance remain as a witness to what was taking place to
which she replied: "Oh, You Will Be Okay, I Am Late For Something, I
Will See You At Church On Sunday"!

I could just feel the attitude in the air that night. Everyone witnessing
this scene no doubt felt that this young man must have done something
very bad, and very wrong; otherwise why would the police be chasing after
him? No doubt they felt that if it had been them that they would have
somehow deserved it because after all: The Law Is The Law.

I remember growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, we were taught that
everything to do with Communism, especially Russia, was bad. That
Communist Countries Were Evil Governments And Evil Empires Which Abused
Their Citizens Civil Rights And They Might one Day Try To Do The Same
To The U.S. They represented everything that was bad in the world and the
U.S. Represented Everything that was Good and We Must Fight the Evil
For The Sake Of Our Humanity.

Is my picture above really so different than this one of Russian police
arresting peaceful civil rights protesters? ( middle picture at right )

Or this one from communist China: ( bottom picture at right )

Then Why Do People Continue To See The U.S. Through Rose Colored
Glasses? I Just Do not Get It. I Guess That Is Why I Drink.

December 5, 2009

Don Cooper is a Florida native, Navy veteran, economist, and editor of
the daily non-partisan column Qaoss.com.

Copyright © 2009 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or
in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.