last decade Archives - Where Is The Outrage?

Stop and Frisk

This is what I’m talking about –

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

Stop and frisk was a stupid policy. Randomly stopping people on the streets is ridiculous. It’s a huge waste of time by the police. It would be different if 25% or 50% of people on the street were causing crime. There would then be a high likelihood of finding somebody by randomly stopping people. Instead, crime is committed by a very small group of people. Basically, you’re looking for a needle in a haystack. We’ve got no evidence that randomly stopping people decreases crime. So, what’s the real purpose?

From NYTimes:

The use of police stops has been widely cited by city officials as a linchpin of New York’s success story in seeing murders and major crimes fall to historic lows. The police say the practice has saved the lives of thousands of young black and Hispanic men by removing thousands of guns from the streets.

But the judge, Shira A. Scheindlin, found that the Police Department resorted to a “policy of indirect racial profiling” as it increased the number of stops in minority communities. That has led to officers’ routinely stopping “blacks and Hispanics who would not have been stopped if they were white.” (more…)

By ecthompsonmd|2013-08-19T21:05:51-04:00August 18th, 2013|Civil Rights|Comments Off

Paula Deen

My goodness, we are so lost. As a society we have completely lost our priorities. Over the last several days, I have read more heartfelt condolences and damnations with regards to Paula Deen. Either she’s a heroine or she’s a villain. The bottom line is she is neither. Paula Deen is just the latest celebrity to slip and fall in the national spotlight. It is no big deal. Over the last 30 years, I’ve seen literally hundreds of celebrities fall flat on their face. Sometimes there are more infractions, sometimes fewer than Paula Deen’s.

Look, I have no problem with Paula Dean. I don’t care if the Food Network changes their name to the Paula Deen Network or not. The bottom line, as I see it, is that Paula Deen is only really important to her family. She is a celebrity. As far as I know, she’s not paying your bills and she’s not paying my bills. If we were only half as upset over our own state of affairs, the median wage would not have been stagnant over the last decade or two. Let me say that again. The median wage in this country has been stagnant or dropping for more than 30 years. Where’s the outrage over that? That’s by leaps and bounds far more important than whether Paula Dean is being treated “fairly” or not by the media or by the Food Network. We aren’t being treated fairly by our bosses. They are sucking up all of the cash and leaving us with the scraps.

Guys, we need to get a grip and figure out what’s important. It ain’t Paula Deen.

By ecthompsonmd|2013-06-28T22:15:07-04:00June 28th, 2013|Economy, Entertainment|8 Comments

Muslim Violence in the Middle East Results in Tragedy

The US ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, was killed when the American Embassy was overrun in Benghazi. Several other embassy staffers were killed. Ambassador Stevens is the first US ambassador killed in the line of duty since 1979. There are lots of things in this world that I don’t understand. Senseless violence (or any violence for that matter) in the name of religion is sad, ironic and goes against the Judeo – Christian – Islamic heritage. The God that I worship, as a Christian, is about love, kindness and understanding. The God that I worship is supposed to be the exact same God of Islam. Then again, when you look back in history, senseless violence has followed religion everywhere. We had the Crusades. We had prolonged and extended violence in Northern Ireland as Protestants fought Catholics. In this country, the United States, we had an Al Qaeda-like terrorist organization, the Ku Klux Klan, who wrap themselves in biblical scripture to justify their acts of barbarism. We’ve also seen the rise of various extremist groups over the last decade or so and many of these groups try to use biblical scripture to justify their unjustifiable acts. (I do not want to forget to mention that other embassies were attacked in the Muslim world, including our embassy in Egypt.)

Tomorrow, or maybe later on tonight, I will talk about Mitt Romney’s senseless attack on President Obama. At some later time we will need to discuss the vulnerability of our ambassadors worldwide.

From NYT:

In a statement confirming the four fatalities, President Obama said he strongly condemned the killings and had ordered increased security at American diplomatic posts around the world. It was the first death of an American envoy abroad in more than two decades.
(more…)

By ecthompsonmd|2012-09-12T20:28:29-04:00September 12th, 2012|Foreign Affairs, Party Politics|3 Comments