Police chief admits: "We have been a paramilitary organization"
“We have historically been a paramilitary organization,” observed Indianapolis Police Chief Rick Hite during a September 17 City Council meeting. “And we serve whoever sits in that chair, regardless of race, gender, creed, or political party. I don’t know what we would do if we had to go to battle, and we had to make a determination, based on past practices, whether or not we wanted to go into battle. … I am a soldier in an army. We serve you in that way…. We should not be in a position where we’re going to have to decide how we’re going to police this city.”
Hite spoke those words in a largely empty chamber, to an audience drawn entirely from Indianapolis’s political class. True, the budget meeting was open to the public, which could attend in person, monitor a live broadcast online, or watch an archived video of the proceedings later. But few, if any, city residents were likely to endure the two-and-a-half-hour-long barrage of bureaucratese that provided the prelude to Hite’s candid invocation of fuhrerprinzip – modified, in this case, to express unqualified loyalty to an oligarchy, rather than a single “leader.”
The Chief’s statement was a rejoinder to Councilor-at-Large Leroy Robinson, who had defended his vote in opposition to a $29 million tax increase to expand the ranks of Hite’s “army” by three hundred officers.
Committing the grievous offense of viewing the proposal from the perspective of the tax victims, Robinson pointed out that the city government over the past several years has spent $286 million on what he called “pet projects and development” – such as expanding the city’s entertainment industry and building new parking garages. A significant portion of that amount – an estimated $120 million a year – is diverted through the Tax Increment Financing Commission (TiF), which is an undisguised slush fund for crony capitalist ventures.
“It’s kind of unfair and disingenuous to the taxpayers of this city, [since] that public safety tax wasn’t needed,” Robinson insists. “What is needed is a permanent change in priorities…. We tend to pay for what we want, and we tax the people for what we need….For years, we’ve been gouging the taxpayers to pay for our pet projects.” That includes $150 million over the past decade to subsidize the Indiana Pacers NBA franchise, $15 million to build an auditorium, and – in one of the oddest corporatist ventures to be found in the American Midwest -- $6 million to build a Cricket field.
“The taxpayers believe that this is their money,” Robinson said, committing what must have been perceived as a civic blasphemy. “We have emotionally pleaded for a tax increase” in order to expand the police department, continued Robinson, while shaking down the tax slave population for the benefit of politically favored constituencies.
http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2014/09/we-have-been-paramilitary-organization.html
Wyoming sheriff claims a grenade launcher is a useful tool for keeping the peace!
Lt. Jeremy Wardell says the grenade launcher, one of three the county has owned, is a less-lethal option for controlling riots. He compared it to pepper spray or a Taser.
"We would use it in situations when less-lethal force is justified to get the situation under control," Wardell said. "That tool gives us an option not to use lethal force."
DOJ & Jewish groups send U.S. police to train in Israel:
The militarization of American police forces hasn’t been paid for by just the federal government. Pro-Israel groups in the U.S. have also played a role by financing trips for hundreds of law enforcement officers to travel to the Middle East for counterterrorism training, according to Ali Winston, a contributor to the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR).
Established after September 11, 2001, JINSA's LEEP program takes local, state, and federal law enforcement executives to Israel to learn about the counter terrorism strategies and techniques perfected by Israeli law enforcement.
The LEEP program is based on the premise that if properly trained, U.S. law enforcement can better prevent and respond to terrorist threats and attacks. And, because of their history and experiences with terrorism, Israeli counter intelligence officers are considered the leading experts on preventing and responding to terrorist threats. According to JINSA Director of Communications James Cetrone, the program enjoys strong support from the Israeli Police Department, all the way up to the Commissioner, who has been known to remark that Israelis don't want Americans to pay with blood like the Israelis have. Mr. Cetrone said that at all levels of the Israeli police department staff and officers are incredibly gracious and willing to share their counter and anti-terrorism expertise with the visiting Americans.
Security Solutions International's slogan: "Protecting The Homeland Together" proudly boasts the next departure to Israel will be Nov. 7-14th 2014.
Monies provided by such groups as the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee’s Project Interchange and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs have made it possible for “at least 300 high-ranking sheriffs and police from agencies large and small – from New York and Maine to Orange County and Oakland, California” to attend privately funded seminars in Israel since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Winston discovered.
There, they have learned how Israeli security forces deal with demonstrators and armed threats by terrorists. The seminars include field trips to such sites as military installations, surveillance outposts, and checkpoints at the West Bank and the Israeli-Egyptian border. The training includes spending time observing operations conducted by Israel’s Border Patrol, Defense Forces, national police and intelligence services.
U.S. police officials who have undergone such training have come from the Los Angeles and New York police departments, the New York and New Jersey Port Authority Police Department, the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police, and the Major County Sheriffs’ Association. The fact that the former chief of Missouri’s St. Louis County Police Department trained in Israel in 2011 recently came to light following the well-armed police response to protestors in St. Louis-based Ferguson.
Israeli training of U.S. police has also influenced the type of equipment being used. Security forces from both countries are now using some identical gear, including stun and tear gas grenades manufactured by the same U.S. companies—Combined Systems Inc. and Defense Technology Corp.
A long-range “sound rifle” that emits ear-shattering noise to disperse crowds, which was used against 2005 West Bank protestors, was also used in the recent police action against protestors in Ferguson.
Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California, told CIR that American police are often copying what Israel does in terms of crowd control and other techniques.
“Whether it is in Ferguson or L.A., we see a similar response all the time in the form of a disproportionate number of combat-ready police with military gear who are ready to use tear gas at short notice,” Syed said. “Whenever you find 50 people at a demonstration, there is always a SWAT team in sight or right around the corner.”
The head of the Maine State Police, Col. Robert Williams, joined a trip sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League in early 2013. Speaking to the Bangor Daily News after his return, he noted that his Israeli counterparts had decades of experience in dealing with protests and he was impressed with their ability to suppress demonstrations.
“They call it riots and we call it civil unrest,” Williams told the newspaper.
Israel’s security forces have also trained police in Mexico since 1994, originally in response to the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas.
The southern Mexican state of Chiapas last month to aid local law enforcement officials in new strategies to combat security threats, according to the Mexican media.
While widely reported in Mexico, the report was denied by Israeli officials in Mexico City.
The Secretary of Security and Civil Protection in Chiapas, Jorge Luís Abarca, met with Yaron Yugman, a representative from Israel’s Ministry of Defense to discuss coordinated strategies in police training, prison security and the use of technology in law enforcement, the government said.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/homeland.html
Last year Santa arrived in a tank:
“Watch for Santa riding through town on a BearCat."
“When Santa Claus rides through Silver Spring on Wednesday, Dec. 18, he’ll be on a BearCat."
"This is a very special night for the children and families at The Inn," Laura King, director of volunteers and community outreach, said in a statement.
It's so special they put Santa in a tank, what a B.S. way of acclimating our kids to the American Police State!
“The BearCat—an acronym for Ballistic Engineered Armored Response Counter Attack Truck—is an armored police tactical vehicle. It’s not commonly driven around Montgomery County, so when Santa rides the BearCat from Germantown to Bethesda, he’ll be sure to be spotted…
http://patch.com/maryland/silverspring/santa-rides-through-silver-spring-on-armored-vehicle