Undercurrents

Before considering a curfew to stem violence on Hartford’s streets, Eddie Perez should beg our people, our leaders, our industry, our media to end the sanctioned violence we do in these senseless wars we’re having.  Does anybody think that the lessons of war and tyranny are lost on the criminals who walk among us?

It stands to reason that a corrupt and warlike government will produce an intractable criminal class.  The natural inhibitions against violence are overcome when a nation resolves to rain bombs and bullets on people in distant lands, and a willingness to offend is indispensable when all transactions are fixed to favor the “haves” over the “have-nots.”  

It doesn’t help that we tolerate all this unwillingly.  We have the power to destroy the thuggish government that brought us to this point, but we don’t do it   The violence on our streets is truly an expression of our paralysis in the face of atrocity.  Nobody doubts that criminals in government have compromised our moral authority, and this must harden and embolden predators of every kind.   

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I sent this letter today to my Congressman John Larson: 

“I watched and listened carefully to Congressman Kucinich’s 35-article resolution, as I’m sure you did.  You and I had already discussed a number of the charges he introduced Monday, and there were many more that weren’t included on my list.  On the strength of the public record alone, as Kucinich argued with great eloquence, there is overwhelming evidence of criminal wrongdoing by the President and his agents, causing manifest injury to our country and our people.  (more…)

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Today at the Capitol a coalition of social justice and criminal justice reform groups, including the Clean Slate Committee, Black Lowe, The Alliance Connecticut, People Against Injustice, American Friends Service Committee, and Youth Rights Media from New Haven, held a rally and press conference against the “three strikes” legislation proposed by Governor Rell.

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There were two separate incidents this past week in Hartford in which police shot suspects. On Monday Joseph H. Bak was killed in the Firebox parking lot on Broad Street after a crime spree that ended with him allegedly threatening police with a knife. The police involved have reportedly been placed on “administrative” duty. And on Friday night a man in the same neighborhood (Russ and Hungerford) was shot during an attempted drug bust. He has been treated for injuries at a hospital. A man shot by police in East Haven last night died from those injuries. Today, Courant columnist Tom Condon wrote about another case of a person killed by local police.

This comes days after the release of the Pew Center report that states 1 in 99 American adults are in prison; that number increases sharply if looking at racial and ethnic minority populations.

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Our legal system wasn’t designed to keep the prisons full to capacity, but it accomplishes this with amazing consistency. Today, one out of every 100 people in America is in a penal institution. If we build them, they will come. (more…)

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John Larson made an appearance in West Hartford yesterday before an audience of about 35, and questions of accountability dominated the discussion. Accountability for the breakdown of the economy. Accountability for the state of foreign relations. Accountability for war. Accountability for crime. (more…)