My Clovis News Journal column for November 22, 2013.
This one was heavily edited, with a lot of "allegedly" added by the newspaper. And some other things I will point out.
After you read my column at the link above, please come back and read this post, then read the column as I originally wrote it at the bottom.
I disagree most vigorously with the addition of the words "alleged" and "allegedly" in the editing of my column. I completely understand that the editor needs to protect the interests of the newspaper, so I didn't fight him on that.
The word "allegedly" has a place when it is one person's word against another's- one who denies the accusation. After all, you and I weren't (usually) there to see what happened- we are taking someone's word for it, and everyone has an agenda. People want to win their lawsuits, or keep their job, or make the other guy look bad, or whatever. So, since the facts aren't known for certain, the word "allegedly" makes that point clear.
But, nowhere are the facts of these cases I am writing about in dispute. Neither the cops, nor their gang's official spokescritters, nor either hospital's staff, dispute that the events happened as described in the lawsuits- the only dispute is that the cops and copsuckers and other "authority" worshipers see the acts as justified and "allowed by law" in pursuit of the stupid and evil War on Politically Incorrect Drugs. That is total BS, and anyone with any morals or ethics knows it. Rape is rape, and wearing a badge while you rape doesn't change that fact. Nor does raping in pursuit of some goal you hallucinate to be "noble".
The newspaper also has to appease the local puppeticians and cops by bending over backwards when discussing even non-local cops and puppeticians in order to look "fair" to these people- to the point of being unfair to those of us who aren't gang members- and I also understand that. The newspaper needs to keep access to these people, or they'll be shut out and denied access to news releases and whatnot. That would damage their ability to function as a newspaper. However, over time this appeasement creates other problems, by not exposing corruption as thoroughly as it deserves to be exposed. Trying to appear "fair" to a known bad guy makes one lose credibility in the eyes of those who are observing from the side.
These cops really did do what they are accused of- they don't even deny it. So let's not tiptoe around the facts- let's call them what they know they are: rapists.
At the end of the "30 day exclusivity" I will post the column as I originally wrote it, below. Come back then and compare the two versions.
Here it is, as originally written, with parenthetical comments and an important link added:
The recently publicized examples of assault by police officers, while supposedly looking for drugs, are much more than "simple assault"; they are acts of aggressive penetration. If you or I did anything similar we would rightfully be called rapists.
Is bodily penetration becoming a weapon of choice in the stupid and evil War on Politically Incorrect Drugs? Texas police began this tactic a few years ago with their road-side syringe assaults to steal blood from drivers- penetrating the body of those they wished to incriminate.
Now New Mexico cops have overshadowed their Texas brethren, getting caught in multiple acts of medically assisted gang rape against drivers who weren't yet sufficiently terrorized, and justified by the 21st Century equivalent of the witch trial: a false "alert" by a drug-sniffing dog- a scam as scientifically invalid as "polygraph tests" and astrology. (The newspaper objected to this characterization, and edited it out, saying that dogs can be trained to sniff out all sorts of substances- yes, they can, but that's not the point. Dogs want to please their handlers and learn how to do so by "alerting" falsely. Also, a dog's alert is only as good as the word of its handler- if he lies to justify a rape, the dog can't come back and testify against him. And, we all know cops lie. If using dogs to find "drugs" were scientific, it wouldn't result in so many false positives. It's a scam.)
No individual involved in these rapes should ever again have any "authority" over anyone. I would never hire them, nor knowingly do business with anyone who did.
I salute the hospital whose staff wisely recognized that compliance with the police demand was wrong, and refused.
The medical staff at the other hospital, who assisted in these rapes in violation of their medical oaths, should all lose their "licenses" and be fired.
Each attacker needs to be paying the victims out of his own pocket for the rest of his life. There is no excuse for letting them get away with this, nor for forcing the "taxpayers" to pay the restitution.
Leo, the "drug dog" who alerted on command for his handler (and whose certification expired years ago, by the way- "according to media reports" the newspaper adds), needs to be retired and rescued from being employed in this vulgar manner.
It's not enough to make these rapists face justice; it's long past time to end that which makes their crimes possible. Abolishing prohibition, which has become the excuse for just about any violation of individual rights you can imagine, is essential. It was never an ethical endeavor, but has become downright vile. It's not a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater- that's not bathwater, it's sewage, and those lumps are not a baby.
Next, dismantle the domestic US police state. Return cops to their only legitimate position- one of servitude- and remove all the perks and "officer safety" protection which has emboldened them over the past several decades. Or end the disastrous experiment in policing, altogether.
The people who will say I am going too far are the same ones who call for freelance rapists to be castrated or executed. I am reasonable by comparison. (The newspaper thought this last paragraph was confusing and deleted it.)
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Kent,
ReplyDeleteAbout 30 years ago I wrote a few Letters to the Editor. Someone (the Editor?) changed my words and even added typos. I complained that I meant my words exactly as I wrote them and if they changed a single word I didn't want my name attached to it. Some pompous hack/editor responded that letters were changed for "clarity" and to prevent "embarrassing" the letter-writer. I won't ever write another letter to a paper.
While I've seen commenters banned from blogs, I've never seen a blogger "edit" a comment from a reader. Some forums will put asterisks in place of ****ing curse words in posts, but you usually know exactly what word the poster intended.
I don't read your columns until you publish them on your blog. I won't jump through hoops to read anything. So it'll be a month before I read the column you linked to.
Dave
The column is about the rapist cops of Deming, New Mexico, the "drug dog" that gave the excuse for the rape, and the hospital staff that assisted.
ReplyDeleteMy original version is better, by far.
Once, long ago, they edited out a sentence without changing the next sentence- which made the next sentence sound odd and grammatically bizarre. That time I complained and they changed the online version, but it was too late for the print version.
I once told them that I choose each and every word very carefully, and when I see what they do to what I wrote, I feel they turned my peacock into a turkey.
I agree with you, Kent. I read the article as amended. I read about the rape of those two men a few days ago. I was both shocked and horrified at the extent to which they went to try and find drugs of some kind in their colons. When the police, with the help of paid medical professionals, can get away with this type of behavior then we are truly in a fascist police state.
ReplyDeleteYou've heard my story, Kent. Eons ago I started a graduate program in "journalism", which eventually I completed under "Human Communications". Before I became remotely libertarian I found that journalism is appeasement pure and simple.
ReplyDeleteIn my early years I bought the dogma that the appeasement was necessary to satisfy "advertisers" -- which is somewhat true. It wasn't until much later (1964) while dabbling in politics (Goldwater campaign) that I began to come to see that "advertisers" are virtually all incorporated by and with agents of state. There is a "party line", and the crooning of that intonation must be and will be adhered to at all cost -- under penalty of death.
Somewhere in that time frame I began to hear the term "mainstream media". I came to recognize an eerie mantra that accompanied each and every news story -- even a report of a minor accident over at 6th and Grand would be embedded with this nationalistic verbiage. The embedding is so subtle only an anarchist will sense it
Journalism students graduating today have been so inculcated with that statist dogma over such long periods of time since they were babies that it never occurs to them to question it. In fact any statement that deviates from that party line will seem unamerican and adulterous to them. Untouchable.
I'm happy that is now changing somewhat, with the advent of the web and bloggs and free and open communication between individuals in forum format.
You write good (and daring) stuff, Kent. Don't back down. But try not to take it personally if they boot you. You're definitely not a party-liner.
Sam
The cops, the doctors and the judge all seem to be in need of long range solutions.
ReplyDeleteI just read about the case and it's hideous. These cops should be required to turn over their pensions to the man they assaulted and be prohobited from government employment. Their identities were revealed in the paper, so at least they're being embarrassed publicly.
ReplyDeleteI have now added the column as I originally wrote it to the post above, in case you've been waiting patiently for the past month to read it.
ReplyDelete"A word means exactly what I intend it to mean, nothing more, nothing less!" - Lewis Carroll
ReplyDeleteI hope you keep us up on how the trial is progessing. These scum should do time and forfeit their pensions. I'll bet right now, people are looking at them as if they're oddities.
ReplyDelete