You should know about what's happening in Ferguson.

@milkman: What's super fucked up about that situation is that it sounds like people describing some South American dictatorship where the leader of the country lost the support of the military and now there's some sort of imminent coup on the horizon.

yeah seriously, this is bat$hit crazy.

The Police have always been tightly wound, but it's like they all collectively lost their mind across the country all at once.

http://www.tmz.com/2014/12/23/michael-brown-song-video-dead-police-parody-leroy-brown/

The above is pretty minor stuff compared to what is going in New York, but I think unfortunately emblematic of a toxic subculture present in too many departments in the US.

As someone who comes from a family with a lot of cops in it you're kind of right. There's a culture within the policing community that perpetuates the belief that they can do no wrong or that no one supercedes their authority. It's like the worst crime you can commit is disrespecting a cop. When the Michael Brown thing happened cops all over the country were wearing "standing with Darren Wilson" bracelets. They wouldn't stop defending the cop that killed Eric Garner.

#copslivesmatter popped up after the recent tragedy as a counter to the protests rather than a way to say that cops aren't different to those being discriminated against and that everyone should strive to be better. They instead spend all of their time whining about how they are the one's being discriminated against by athletes and the public even though they are the ones in power. They have proven time and time again that they abuse their power but the weak are the ones to be feared. This is gonna break incredibly bad.

Too many outside factors relating to his case to merely pinpoint Police violence as the sole cause. But I see your point about the overall picture being the same. The uniqueness I find is:

- He wasn't shot unlike all other cases.

- Excessive force was used, but nothing one would expect that would kill your average man.

- Pronounced dead on arrival over an hour after the choke hold was applied.

- His health was a contributing factor.

None of these reasons explain why this case shouldn't be lumped in with the others.

Mike Brown died at the scene. Tamir Rice died the day after he was shot. John Crawford died later that night. What is common in most of these cases are the police reluctance to perform first aid on anyone promptly. They rather leave people either bleeding out or in distress from not being able to breathe properly.

Edit: One thing in common between Tamir Rice, John Crawford, and Eric Garner is that none of them had committed a crime at the time of their shooting/choking. The selling loose cigarettes gets mentioned in Garner's case, but he wasn't selling at the time. It looked like the police messed with him because of prior incidents.

Apparently Bob McCulloch is being sued by a grand juror for mischaracterizing the case.

http://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/grand-juror-sues-mcculloch-says-he-mischaracterized-wilson-case

Good!