Author Archives: Mike

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ICONOC CIVIL RIGHTS LEADERS — GARVEY

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On June 10, 1940, Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., pub­lish­er, entre­pre­neur, ora­tor, and Black Nationalist, died. Garvey was born August 17, 1887 in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica. In 1914, Garvey found­ed the Universal Negro Improvement Association, “To unite all peo­ple of African ances­try of the world to one great body to estab­lish a coun­try and absolute gov­ern­ment of their own.”Garvey moved to New York City in 1916 and found­ed the Negro World news­pa­per. In June, 1923, Garvey was unjust­ly con­vict­ed of mail fraud and sen­tenced to five years in prison. That sen­tence was com­mut­ed by President Calvin Coolidge and Garvey was released in November, 1927 and deport­ed to Jamaica where he is interred at a shrine inNational Heroes Park.images (35) There are memo­ri­als to Garvey around the world, includ­ing stat­ues and streets and schools named after him in Jamaica, Trinidad, the United States, Canada, Kenya, Nigeria, and the United Kingdom. A num­ber of books have been pub­lished about Garvey and his move­ment, includ­ing “Black Power and the Garvey Movement” (1971), “Marcus Garvey: Anti-Colonial Champion” (1988), and “Negro with a Hat: The Rise and Fall of Marcus Garvey and his Dream of Mother Africa” (2008).http://​the​bur​ton​wire​.com/​2​0​1​3​/​0​6​/​1​0​/​p​o​l​i​t​i​c​s​/​a​k​o​s​u​a​-​r​e​p​o​r​t​-​m​a​r​c​u​s​-​g​a​r​v​ey/

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ICONIC CIVIL RIGHTS LEADERS — X

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Malcolm x.

Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little on May 19, 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska. His moth­er, Louise Norton Little, was a home­maker occu­pied with the family’s eight chil­dren. His father, Earl Little, was an out­spo­ken Baptist min­is­ter and avid sup­porter of Black Nationalist leader Marcus Garvey. Earl’s civ­il rights activism prompt­ed death threats from the white suprema­cist orga­ni­za­tion Black Legion, forc­ing the fam­ily to relo­cate twice before Malcolm’s fourth birth­day. Regardless of the Little’s efforts to elude the Legion, in 1929, their Lansing, Michigan home was burned to the ground. Two years lat­er, Earl’s body was found lying across the town’s trol­ley tracks. Police ruled both inci­dents as acci­dents, but the Littles were cer­tain that mem­bers of the Black Legion were respon­si­ble. Louise suf­fered emo­tional break­down sev­eral years after the death of her hus­band and was com­mit­ted to a men­tal insti­tu­tion, while her chil­dren were split up among var­i­ous fos­ter homes and orphanages.

Eventually, Malcolm and his long-​time friend, Malcolm “Shorty” Jarvis, moved back to Boston. In 1946, they were arrest­ed and con­victed on bur­glary charges, and Malcolm was sen­tenced to 10 years in prison, although he was grant­ed parol after serv­ing sev­en years. Recalling his days in school, he used the time to fur­ther his edu­ca­tion. It was dur­ing this peri­od of self-​en­light­en­ment that Malcolm’s broth­er Reginald would vis­it and dis­cuss his recent con­ver­sion to the Muslim reli­gion. Reginald belonged to the reli­gious orga­ni­za­tion the Nation of Islam (NOI). Intrigued, Malcolm began to study the teach­ings of NOI leader Elijah Muhammad. Muhammad taught that white soci­ety active­ly worked to keep African-​Americans from empow­er­ing them­selves and achiev­ing polit­i­cal, eco­nomic, and social suc­cess. Among oth­er goals, the NOI fought for a state of their own, sep­a­rate from one inhab­ited by white peo­ple. By the time he was paroled in 1952, Malcolm was a devot­ed fol­lower with the new sur­name “X” (He con­sid­ered “Little” a slave name and chose the “X” to sig­nify his lost trib­al name.). Intelligent and artic­u­late, Malcolm was appoint­ed as a min­is­ter and nation­al spokesman for the Nation of Islam. Elijah Muhammad also charged him with estab­lish­ing new mosques in cities such as Detroit, Michigan, and Harlem. Malcolm uti­lized news­pa­per columns, as well as radio and tele­vi­sion, to com­mu­ni­cate the NOI’s mes­sage across the United States. His charis­ma, dri­ve, and con­vic­tion attract­ed an astound­ing num­ber of new mem­bers. Malcolm was large­ly cred­ited with increas­ing mem­ber­ship in the NOI from 500 in 1952 to 30,000 in 1963. The crowds and con­tro­versy sur­round­ing Malcolm made him a media mag­net. He was fea­tured in a week­long tele­vi­sion spe­cial with Mike Wallace in 1959, called The Hate That Hate Produced. The pro­gram explored the fun­da­men­tals of the NOI, and tracked Malcolm’s emer­gence as one of its most impor­tant lead­ers. After the spe­cial, Malcolm was faced with the uncom­fort­able real­ity that his fame had eclipsed that of his men­tor Elijah Muhammad. In addi­tion to the media, Malcolm’s vivid per­son­al­ity had cap­tured the government’s atten­tion. As mem­ber­ship in the NOI con­tin­ued to grow, FBI agents infil­trated the orga­ni­za­tion (one even act­ed as Malcolm’s body­guard) and secret­ly placed bugs, wire­taps, cam­eras, and oth­er sur­veil­lance equip­ment to mon­i­tor the group’s activities.

Malcolm’s faith was dealt a crush­ing blow at the height of the civ­il rights move­ment in 1963. He learned that his men­tor and leader, Elijah Muhammad, was secret­ly hav­ing rela­tions with as many as six women with­in the Nation of Islam orga­ni­za­tion. As if that were not enough, Malcolm found out that some of these rela­tion­ships had result­ed in chil­dren. Since join­ing the NOI, Malcolm had strict­ly adhered to the teach­ings of Muhammad, which includ­ed remain­ing celi­bate until his mar­riage to Betty Shabazz in 1958. Malcolm refused Muhammad’s request to help cov­er up the affairs and sub­se­quent chil­dren. He was deeply hurt by Muhammad actions, because he had pre­vi­ously con­sid­ered him a liv­ing prophet. Malcolm also felt guilty about the mass­es he had led to join the NOI, which he now felt was a fraud­u­lent orga­ni­za­tion built on too many lies to ignore. Shortly after his shock­ing dis­cov­ery, Malcolm received crit­i­cism for a com­ment he made regard­ing the assas­si­na­tion of President John F. Kennedy. “[Kennedy] nev­er fore­saw that the chick­ens would come home to roost so soon,” said Malcolm. After the state­ment, Elijah Muhammad “silenced” Malcolm for 90 days. Malcolm, how­ever, sus­pected he was silenced for anoth­er rea­son. In March 1964, Malcolm ter­mi­nated his rela­tion­ship with theNOI. Unable to look past Muhammad’s decep­tion, Malcolm decid­ed to found his own reli­gious orga­ni­za­tion, the Muslim Mosque, Inc. That same year, Malcolm went on a pil­grim­age to Mecca, which proved to be life alter­ing for him. For the first time, Malcolm shared his thoughts and beliefs with dif­fer­ent cul­tures and found the response to be over­whelm­ingly pos­i­tive. When he returned, Malcolm said he had met “blonde-​haired, blued-​eyed men I could call my broth­ers.” He returned to the United States with a new out­look on inte­gra­tion and a new hope for the future. This time when Malcolm spoke, instead of just preach­ing to African-​Americans, he had a mes­sage for all races. After Malcolm resigned his posi­tion in the Nation of Islam and renounced Elijah Muhammad, rela­tions between the two had become increas­ingly volatile. FBI infor­mants work­ing under­cover in the NOI warned offi­cials that Malcolm had been marked for assas­si­na­tion – one under­cover offi­cer had even been ordered to help plant a bomb in Malcolm’s car. After repeat­ed attempts on his life, Malcolm rarely trav­eled any­where with­out body­guards. On February 14, 1965 the home where Malcolm, Betty, and their four daugh­ters lived in East Elmhurst, New York was fire­bombed. Luckily, the fam­ily escaped phys­i­cal injury.

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One week lat­er, how­ever, Malcolm’s ene­mies were suc­cess­ful in their ruth­less attempt. At a speak­ing engage­ment in the Manhattan’s Audubon Ballroom on February 21, 1965, three gun­men rushed Malcolm onstage. They shot him 15 times at close range. The 39-​year-​old was pro­nounced dead on arrival at New York’s Columbia Presbyterian Hospital. Fifteen hun­dred peo­ple attend­ed Malcolm’s funer­al in Harlem on February 27, 1965 at the Faith Temple Church of God in Christ (now Child’s Memorial Temple Church of God in Christ). After the cer­e­mony, friends took the shov­els away from the wait­ing gravedig­gers and buried Malcolm themselves.Later that year, Betty gave birth to their twin daughters.

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Thomas Hagan in an emer­gency room after shoot­ing Malcolm X at the Audubon Ballroom in Manhattan on Feb. 21, 1965

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Malcolm’s assas­sins, Talmadge Hayer, Norman 3X Butler, and Thomas 15X Johnson, were con­victed of first-​de­gree mur­der in March 1966. The three men were all mem­bers of the Nation of Islam. Malcolm X’s lega­cy has moved through gen­er­a­tions as the sub­ject of numer­ous doc­u­men­taries, books, and movies. A tremen­dous resur­gence of inter­est occurred in 1992 when direc­tor Spike Lee released the acclaimed movie, Malcolm X. The film received Oscar nom­i­na­tions for Best Actor (Denzel Washington) and Best Costume Design. Malcolm X is buried at the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. http://​www​.mal​colmx​.com/​a​b​o​u​t​/​b​i​o​.​h​tml

THE MAN WHO DID NOT KILL MALCOLM X.

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Khalil Islam.

The Man Who Didn’t Shoot Malcolm X. He spent twen­ty-​two years in prison for an infa­mous mur­der he didn’t com­mit. But Khalil Islam, con­fined, trav­eled inward. http://​nymag​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​f​e​a​t​u​r​e​s​/​3​8​3​58/

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ICONIC CIVIL RIGHTS LEADERS — MLK Jr.

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Doctor Martin Luther King Jnr.

Born at noon on Tuesday, January 15, 1929 at the fam­ily home in Atlanta, Martin Luther King, Jr. was the first son and sec­ond child born to the Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr. and Alberta Williams King. The son of a min­is­ter, Martin Luther King, Jr. grows up to fol­low in his father’s foot­steps; study­ing at Morehouse College, Crozer Theological Seminary, and earn­ing a doc­tor­ate at Boston University’s School of Theology.Dr. King heads the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) to protest the arrest of NAACP offi­cial Rosa Park for refus­ing to give up her bus seat to a white man. Photo 4Dr. King’s vision expands glob­ally and a trip to India increased his under­stand­ing of Gandhian ideas of non­vi­o­lent resis­tance. With the SCLC King helps orga­nize the Birmingham protests, writes “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, and focus­es atten­tion nation­ally with the March on Washington. King speaks out on the Vietnam War and forms the Poor People’s Campaign, designed to prod the fed­eral gov­ern­ment to strength­en its antipover­ty efforts.http://​www​.thek​ing​cen​ter​.org/​a​b​o​u​t​— d​r​— king

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ICONIC CIVIL RIGHTS LEADERS — Parks

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“Iconic image of Rosa Parks as she sat on the bus await­ing the cops arrival to arrest her.”

ROSA PARKS.

“Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 to October 24, 2005) was an African-American civ­il rights activist, whom the U.S. Congress called “the first lady of civ­il rights” and “the moth­er of the free­dom movement”.[1] Her birth­day, February 4, and the day she was arrest­ed, December 1, have both become Rosa Parks Day, com­mem­o­rat­ed in the U.S. states of California and Ohio.

On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey bus dri­ver James F. Blake’s order that she give up her seat in the col­ored sec­tion to a white pas­sen­ger, after the white sec­tion was filled. Parks was not the first per­son to resist bus segre­ga­tion. Others had tak­en sim­i­lar steps in the twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry, includ­ing Irene Morgan in 1946, Sarah Louise Keys in 1955, and the mem­bers of the Browder v. Gayle law­suit (Claudette Colvin, Aurelia Browder, Susie McDonald, and Mary Louise Smith) arrest­ed months before Parks. NAACP orga­niz­ers believed that Parks was the best can­di­date for see­ing through a court chal­lenge after her arrest for civ­il dis­obe­di­ence in vio­lat­ing Alabama seg­re­ga­tion laws though even­tu­al­ly her case became bogged down in the state courts.[2][3]

Parks’ act of defi­ance and the Montgomery Bus Boycott became impor­tant sym­bols of the mod­ern Civil Rights

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“President Obama relives his­to­ry as he sits in the very seat Parks sat in , an act of civ­il dis­obe­di­ence which changed a nation.”

Movement. She became an inter­na­tion­al icon of resis­tance to racial seg­re­ga­tion. She orga­nized and col­lab­o­rat­ed with civ­il rights lead­ers, includ­ing Edgar Nixon, pres­i­dent of the local chap­ter of the NAACP; and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a new min­is­ter in town who gained nation­al promi­nence in the civ­il rights movement.

MARCUS GARVEY.

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Marcus Garvey.

On June 10, 1940, Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., pub­lish­er, entre­pre­neur, ora­tor, and Black Nationalist, died. Garvey was born August 17, 1887 in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica. In 1914, Garvey found­ed the Universal Negro Improvement Association, “To unite all peo­ple of African ances­try of the world to one great body to estab­lish a coun­try and absolute gov­ern­ment of their own.”Garvey moved to New York City in 1916 and found­ed the Negro World news­pa­per. In June, 1923, Garvey was unjust­ly con­vict­ed of mail fraud and sen­tenced to five years in prison. That sen­tence was com­mut­ed by President Calvin Coolidge and Garvey was released in November, 1927 and deport­ed to Jamaica where he is interred at a shrine inNational Heroes Park.images (35) There are memo­ri­als to Garvey around the world, includ­ing stat­ues and streets and schools named after him in Jamaica, Trinidad, the United States, Canada, Kenya, Nigeria, and the United Kingdom. A num­ber of books have been pub­lished about Garvey and his move­ment, includ­ing “Black Power and the Garvey Movement” (1971), “Marcus Garvey: Anti-Colonial Champion” (1988), and “Negro with a Hat: The Rise and Fall of Marcus Garvey and his Dream of Mother Africa” (2008).http://​the​bur​ton​wire​.com/​2​0​1​3​/​0​6​/​1​0​/​p​o​l​i​t​i​c​s​/​a​k​o​s​u​a​-​r​e​p​o​r​t​-​m​a​r​c​u​s​-​g​a​r​v​ey/

HUEY NEWTON.

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Huey Newton was born in a small town in Louisiana and lat­er mov­ing with his fam­i­ly to Oakland, California as an infant, Huey P. Newton became the co-founder and leader of the Black Panther Party for over 2 decades. Dr. Newton, who found­ed the Black Panther Party with Bobby Seale, became one of the most charis­mat­ic sym­bols of black anger in the late 1960’s. After his con­vic­tion in 1967 in the death of an Oakland police offi­cer, rad­i­cals and many col­lege stu­dents took up the ral­ly­ing cry ”Free Huey.” At the same time, Dr. Newton and the Black Panthers were accused of being con­trolled by the Communist Party and were inves­ti­gat­ed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. In recent years Dr. Newton con­tin­ued to face numer­ous legal charges, served time in jail and fought to reha­bil­i­tate him­self from alco­hol and drug abuse. Newton Co-found­ing The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (lat­er short­ened to The Black Panther Party) with Bobby Seale in 1966, Newton and his com­pa­tri­ots were known for their strong left­ist pol­i­tics, all-black garb and sound intel­lec­tu­al debate. Beyond the activism and fight for equal­i­ty for African-Americans, the Panthers also start­ed “sur­vival pro­grams” designed to assist the less for­tu­nate such as meal pro­grams, self-defense class­es, med­ical clin­ics and first aid. The orig­i­nal Black Panthers would large­ly dis­solve the orga­ni­za­tion in 1982.

BOBBY SEALE.

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“SHAME “, While The Main-stream Media Does Cooking And Reality Shows.#1 In A Series:

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Juan is Mexican; he tells me he has lived in the United States for over 20 years. I got to know him hav­ing done busi­ness with him over the years. Like most Mexican Immigrants in the city of Poughkeepsie, he is hard-work­ing, a ded­i­cat­ed fam­i­ly man. Then sud­den­ly I did not see him for a while, in sit­u­a­tions where peo­ple come and go it’s hard to say how long he was gone before I real­ized he was no longer around. Even then I though he may have just moved away. Then one day a few weeks ago he reap­peared, I was delight­ed to see him .

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He tells me he has dri­ven with­out a licence for years because despite being in the United States for over 20 years he is clas­si­fied as an Illegal Alien. he relat­ed his sto­ry to me with deep melan­choly in his voice. He choked up at times ‚not want­i­ng to dis­play emo­tions ‚he would stop for a minute before con­tin­u­ing to relate his sto­ry. I have a fam­i­ly , my wife and kids , all I want to do is to pro­vide for them, my kids were born here. He gave me hor­ri­fy­ing accounts of dri­ving his car and a police cruis­er com­ing up behind him , he tells me some­times he is afraid to breathe , know­ing if he is pulled over he will be arrest­ed, his car con­fis­cat­ed jail time as pun­ish­ment. In fact he says, that is exact­ly what hap­pens to him on sev­er­al occa­sions. He would be hit with a hefty fine for dri­ving with­out a licence.He would then pay a licensed dri­ver to remove his car from the pound, pay the fine and tow­ing fees and start the process all over again. He tells me the last time he faced a judge the judge was tempt­ed to send him to prison, he was ter­ri­fied at the prospect of going to prison leav­ing his wife and kids with­out any means of sup­port , the judge told him he would be doing a year in jail. He said he told the judge “you can send me to jail and my fam­i­ly will starve, or you can fine me and I will find a way to pay”. The judge relent­ed and imposed a fine.

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The last time he was arrest­ed (ICE Immigration and Customs Enforcement came, they took him to a deten­tion cen­ter in New Jersey, then to Louisiana. He relat­ed the treat­ment met­ed out to him and oth­er detainees whilst on the flight from New Jersey to Louisana even while they were shack­led and bound. Crew mem­bers tossed sug­ar-buns and bot­tles of unre­frig­er­at­ed waters at them most of which fell on the floor of the plane. When they com­plained about being treat­ed that way they were told they were lucky to receive any­thing at all. The deten­tion cen­ter was just as bad Juan laments, most of the guards were Latinos, yet they were treat­ed like dirt. Frustrated and bewil­dered he asked one guard “how can you treat your own peo­ple this way” . The guard retort­ed “if you came over the fence ille­gal­ly you are a crim­i­nal”.

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He was even­tu­al­ly sent back to his native Oaxaca where he imme­di­ate­ly under­took the per­ilous jour­ney back, brav­ing desert thirst, Unscrupulous Coyotes, hard-nosed bor­der-Agents and a whole list of oth­er chal­lenges. All so he could come back to the coun­try he has called home for over two decades to see his fam­i­ly. He knows the next time he is pulled over, the next time the police runs his ID, the night­mare begins anew . He tells me resigned­ly , I will just have to come back, I love my fam­i­ly. Juan’s Employer is tak­ing a chance hir­ing him, he tried to reg­u­lar­ize Juan’s sta­tus in the United States. The Government refused his peti­tion. The Obama Administration deport­ed a record 1.5 mil­lion peo­ple in his first term.

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GUILTY !!!

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The tri­al of Adijia Palmer (o/c)Vybez Kartel has end­ed with the 11 per­son jury return­ing a ver­dict of Guilty against the accused. The Entertainer has been in jail for over two years pend­ing the out­come of this tri­al. Palmer was con­vict­ed for mur­der­ing Clive (Lizard) Williams. The pros­e­cu­tion alleged Williams was killed in a dis­pute over lost gun/​s. Kartel’s Attorneys have indi­cat­ed they will appeal the guilty ver­dict, as was to be expect­ed. There is also infor­ma­tion com­ing out of Jamaica that the Director of pub­lic Prosecution will be prof­fer­ing charges against one juror who alleged­ly approached the jury fore-per­son with an offer of $200.000 to vote to release the accused. We will talk more about this as more infor­ma­tion becomes available.

Kartel and his co-accused Shawn Campbell,Kahira Jones, Andre St John, were all found guilt as charged with the jury find­ing Shane Williams not guilty. This tri­al cre­at­ed a buzz , not just in Jamaica but in the Jamaican Diaspora. This was evi­dent on social media, where every­one felt at lib­er­ty to let their voic­es be heard. In these Blogs we argued that this was one of the very first time there has been so much incon­tro­vert­ible evi­dence against an accused, yet there was no corpse. It was not the first time an accused was found guilty in a mur­der case where no body was recov­ered. This cre­at­ed much hand wring­ing in social media, those want­i­ng a guilty ver­dict wor­ried about that fact in the case. Others want­i­ng an acquit­tal point­ed out there is no body,so there is no mur­der. There has been the usu­al igno­rant behav­ior from that fringe of the coun­try which defies log­ic. It seemed that the police were pre­pared this time. The jury is still out on whether this ver­dict will result in civ­il unrest as is cus­tom­ary when any­one from the under­world is placed in cus­tody. That speaks to the moral rot which has tak­en over our country.

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In the end there did not need to be a body. The moun­tain of cir­cum­stan­tial evidence,including the words of the accused was enough to gain con­vic­tions against them.They nev­er quite chal­lenged the evi­dence put forth by the Prosecution. Reading what hap­pened in the court room dai­ly, I won­dered if his celebri­ty would allow him to wig­gle out of what I thought was a slam dunk case. Save and except for some alle­ga­tions of impro­pri­ety by police regard­ing a cell phone, the defense’s case appeared to be innu­en­dos, try­ing to cast doubt ‚alle­ga­tions of a frame up, but nev­er seri­ous­ly attempt­ing to indict the evi­dence pre­sent­ed by the state.

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Those who want­ed an acquit­tal may want to hold their hors­es for awhile, in Jamaica any­thing is pos­si­ble. The Appeals court still gets to have a say. That court has nev­er seen a ver­dict it could just leave alone. I have con­sis­tent­ly point­ed to the Liberalism in Jamaican Judicial sys­tem, Jamaican Judges are large­ly prod­ucts of the University of the West Indies a well know far left lib­er­al insti­tu­tion. For now how­ev­er, Jamaicans who are tired of crime and vio­lence may down a cold one and heave a sigh of relief that for once the sys­tem worked. The sys­tem is bad­ly bro­ken, just not dead yet. Maybe, just maybe, it can be salvaged.

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This is not a vic­to­ry for Clive Lizard Williams who clear­ly was no Saint. In fact Williams alleged­ly died because he lost Kartel’s gun. What Williams did, who he robbed or killed with that gun, we may nev­er know. This was a vic­to­ry for the few Jamaicans who still believe in the val­ue of God and coun­try, hard work and sac­ri­fice , edu­ca­tion and the rule of law, decen­cy and hon­est, good com­mu­ni­ties and good friends. It is a vic­to­ry for the Jamaicans who yearn for the inno­cence of yes­ter­year, when neigh­bors looked out for neigh­bors. When every­one raised every­one’s chil­dren, when peo­ple were secure in their right to enjoy their coun­try. Whenever, wher­ev­er, how­ev­er, and with whomev­er they chose. That Jamaica may be only a mem­o­ry on the dis­tant hori­zon in the rear-view mir­ror of time, but for one moment, just once more, these nos­tal­gic Jamaicans may dream of a time when their coun­try was theirs, just this once.….

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BEFORE YOU START COUNTING THAT GANJA MONEY:here’s Something To Think About.

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There’s great excite­ment sur­round­ing the pos­si­ble decrim­i­nal­iza­tion and poten­tial legal­iza­tion of (Cannabis Sativa) Popularly know as Marijuana or Ganja. This sense of eupho­ria is not con­fined to my native Jamaica where feel­ings are run­ning high but in sev­er­al American states as well. In Jamaica, mar­i­jua­na users are in prover­bial sev­enth heav­en at the prospect of being able to smoke to their heart’s con­tent with­out hav­ing to wor­ry about (baby­lon) the police. For their part, some European coun­tries had long eased restric­tions on cannabis use, the Netherlands read­i­ly comes to mind. Colorado and Washington states in the pacif­ic north west of the United States, have moved to legal­ize the use of cannabis, although they have done so under the cov­er of (for med­i­c­i­nal pur­pos­es). Of course the American Federal Government has not done any­thing to sug­gest that it will be mov­ing to decrim­i­nal­ize the use and sale of Cannabis Sativa. In fact as I said in a pre­vi­ous blog ‚the Obama Administration con­tin­ue to deport peo­ple , includ­ing Jamaicans from the United States for the sale of marijuana.

As a child grow­ing up in Jamaica I had mar­i­jua­na tea, I nev­er smoked the weed. My fam­i­ly mem­bers were local farm­ers who plant­ed it among hills of yams for their per­son­al use. One cousin actu­al­ly went to prison for 18 months for plant­i­ng it. Later I joined the Police depart­ment and it was my sworn duty to enforce the laws, includ­ing that of cannabis use, sale and cul­ti­va­tion. I just nev­er went out of my way to make crim­i­nals of any­one who used it. In fact there were a few times that I turned a blind eye to amounts of the weed that would have sent the own­er to prison for long peri­ods of time. I am nei­ther proud of it nei­ther am I ashamed that I did. Yesterday I hint­ed in a dis­cus­sion forum that no one expect­ed brains under the fog of cannabis smoke to be objec­tive par­tic­i­pants in this nec­es­sary dis­cus­sion sur­round­ing legal­iza­tion. That leaves the rest of us who are dis­in­ter­est­ed par­ties, to think through the haze and the smoke from those blaz­ing away with euphor­ic aban­don. Despite the pas­sion­ate zeal of sup­port­ers, it bears look­ing at what poten­tial neg­a­tives may occur from legalization/​decriminalization in Jamaica ! American states tak­ing steps to ease restric­tions have sol­id infra­struc­tur­al sup­port in place to deal with poten­tial fall­out if any.

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US Justice Department not­ed that juris­dic­tions that had enact­ed laws legal­iz­ing mar­i­jua­na in some form, imple­ment­ed strong reg­u­la­to­ry and enforce­ment sys­tems to con­trol cul­ti­va­tion, dis­tri­b­u­tion and pos­ses­sion, and which are in com­pli­ance with such laws, “are less like­ly to threat­en the fed­er­al pri­or­i­ties of enforc­ing the fed­er­al law”. Jamaica can­not say the same . How then can a small nation like ours, which is strug­gling might­i­ly with myr­i­ad issues of crime , child delinquency,unemployment, gang activ­i­ties, drug addic­tion and pover­ty to name a few, not be cautious?

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Does any­one, mind uncloud­ed by mar­i­jua­na smoke, unclut­tered by unre­al­is­tic dreams of excess amounts of gan­ja dol­lars, real­ly believe Jamaica’s prob­lems will not be exac­er­bat­ed if this issue is not looked at care­ful­ly? Where is the evi­dence which shows legal­iza­tion will be a panacea to the coun­try’s finan­cial woes? Was Alumina, Coffee, Sugar-cane, Banana,Cocoa , or even Tourism that sil­ver bul­let? Experts have warned that despite poten­tial pos­i­tives of mar­i­jua­na, it is still an addic­tive gate-way drug which leads to addic­tion to more potent drugs. How do we square this with hun­dreds of thou­sands of our young school-age chil­dren legal­ly puff­ing away on their way to school, while in school or on their way from school? How do we deal with the health effects? And last­ly, have any­one both­ered to think of the effects this will have with free flow­ing weed and the guns com­ing in? Of course not ! Everyone is cur­rent­ly active­ly engaged in talk­ing about poten­tial tax rev­enue to be had. Some are even talk­ing about Jamaica becom­ing some kind of gan­ja smok­ing Utopian par­adise. I am just con­cerned that we do not wake up from our gan­ja induced slum­ber to find we have a reached a point of no return. Before sup­port­ers start count­ing the wind­fall, whats wrong with look­ing at the poten­tial downside?

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UKRAINIAN CRISIS:

Washington has offered threats and sanc­tions to pres­sure Russia, but what kind of com­pro­mise is it push­ing for?http://​amer​i​ca​.aljazeera​.com/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​s​/​2​0​1​4​/​3​/​1​1​/​o​b​a​m​a​-​y​a​t​s​e​n​y​u​k​-​m​e​e​t​i​n​g​.​h​tml

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Ukraine’s inter­im Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk will fly to Washington to meet with U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday to dis­cuss “how to find a peace­ful res­o­lu­tion to Russia’s ongo­ing mil­i­tary inter­ven­tion in Crimea,” the White House announced over the week­end, a sign that the United States intends to advance its patron­age of the new, West-fac­ing gov­ern­ment in Kiev, which Russia has decried as illegitimate.

As is to be expect­ed Obama’s detrac­tors on the right are unhap­py with the fact that he has­n’t moved to start a war of mutu­al assured destruc­tion with the Russian Federation.ukrainecrisis

For all the threats and sanc­tions from the U.S., wrote Leslie Gelb, a for­mer gov­ern­ment offi­cial and a pres­i­dent emer­i­tus of the Council on Foreign Relations, the U.S. has failed to con­vince Putin there is any real imper­a­tive for him to back down. “As it stands today, the Russians may feel that they can get away with their pow­er grab,” he wrote in an op-ed for The Daily Beast. “Putin sure­ly remem­bers how lit­tle [George W.] Bush did to pun­ish Moscow for its med­dling in Georgia in 2008 or for its prac­ti­cal annex­a­tion of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Perhaps he now reck­ons that once again there will be no seri­ous con­se­quences for his ter­ri­to­r­i­al lust.”

There have been a cho­rus of crit­i­cism com­ing from the usu­al quar­ters like the Lindsay Graham of this world, yet no one have been able to say what they would actu­al­ly do against Russia, a heav­i­ly armed Nuclear nation. Neocons love to play brinkman­ship with American mil­i­tary might. Over the last two decades plus , America has engaged mil­i­tar­i­ly in three major wars. In nei­ther of these wars have the Russians or any oth­er pow­er inter­vened . Judging from the con­tin­ued saber-rat­tling from the right, it appears noth­ing will please them unless they force a mush­room cloud vapor­iz­ing all of us.

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ELITISM AND POLITICS MAKING A MOCKERY OF OUR COUNTRY:

Allan Douglas a for­mer Colonel of the Jamaica Defense Force wrote a scathing Article in the Jamaica observ­er crit­i­ciz­ing the pas­sage of the new Suppression of Criminal Organisations) Bill. Most of his ven­om was direct­ed at Opposition Jamaica Labor Party mem­ber Delroy Chuck. Now let it be under­stood , Delroy Chuck is no crime fight­er. Chuck is actu­al­ly a mem­ber of that Elitist club who believe crime can be wished away. Notwithstanding, Douglas blast­ed him for voic­ing his sup­port for the new piece of leg­is­la­tion designed to help law enforce­ment rid the coun­try of the scores of mur­der­ous gangs ter­ror­iz­ing cit­i­zens. It should also be not­ed that Douglas is present­ly employed by the Portia Simpson miller Administration. Was this guy speak­ing as a for­mer pro­fes­sion­al sol­dier or as a true orange-lath­ered mem­ber of the PNP cult? I recall it was his par­ty which stood in the way of the secu­ri­ty forces in 2010. The PNP vot­ed uni­tar­i­ly not to extend the lim­it­ed state of emer­gency after the Tivoli Gardens incur­sion. We know where they stand on crime! It is trou­bling nonethe­less when peo­ple who ought to know bet­ter allow polit­i­cal asso­ci­a­tions and affil­i­a­tions to col­or their judge­ment. It is sad when they put par­ty over coun­try. This is exact­ly what’s at the heart of this broad­side by Allan Douglas.

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Here is a syn­op­sis of what Allan Douglas had to say Quote :MP Chuck acknowl­edged that some pri­vate indi­vid­u­als and organ­i­sa­tions were con­cerned about the Bill but failed to say why there were more com­pelling rea­sons than the objec­tions raised for pass­ing this piece of leg­is­la­tion. I am sure the mem­ber of Parliament is aware of the man­ner in which mem­bers of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) have con­duct­ed them­selves under the pro­vi­sions of the Suppression of Crime Act (1974), which stayed with us for 20 years. Wasn’t it Mr Chuck’s polit­i­cal par­ty that fought for the repeal of that very Act? Isn’t it that very Act that is wide­ly believed to have con­tributed to the dis­re­gard our present-day JCF shows towards cit­i­zens’ rights or what the Wolfe Report (1992) described as a ‘sup­pres­sion of crime cul­ture’?http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​c​o​l​u​m​n​s​/​C​a​n​-​w​e​-​r​e​a​l​l​y​-​e​n​t​r​u​s​t​-​t​h​e​-​J​C​F​-​w​i​t​h​-​t​h​e​-​a​n​t​i​-​g​a​n​g​-​l​e​g​i​s​l​a​t​i​o​n​-​_​1​6​1​4​9​216

Okay I’m not giv­en to name call­ing , but this guy is an absolute Jack-ass. Quote : Can we real­ly entrust the JCF with the new anti-gang leg­is­la­tion? Who should we empow­er with enforc­ing our laws? I have long argued that one of the great­est imped­i­ment to law and order in Jamaica is Elitism. Some peo­ple who live above Cross-Roads who ben­e­fit from the sac­ri­fice of oth­ers . Those who are so far removed from real­i­ties on the ground that they pon­tif­i­cate and pre­tend the crime and ter­ror­ism is hap­pen­ing some place else. I won­der whether Douglas ever had to deal with the feroc­i­ty of Jamaica’s urban ter­ror­ists? Maybe after Douglas grad­u­at­ed from one of the schools which turn out Liberal Elitists they slapped the Colonel Rank on him !! What did he do to earn that Rank. In real mil­i­tary estab­lish­ments Officers must show that they can com­mand to be a Colonel. If as I sus­pect Douglas was giv­en that rank for sit­ting on his ass at Up-Park-Camp, I sug­gest he leave law enforce­ment to the real heroes who brave the bul­lets. I have dodged bul­lets with many mem­bers of the JDF in almost every ghet­to in our coun­try. Most were fine men who under­stood what’s at stake. Douglas should be ashamed to call him­self a for­mer sol­dier. Where was he when the men of 1, 2 and 3JR were side by side with hero­ic cops, fight­ing, so he can pon­tif­i­cate about some­thing he knows noth­ing about? I do not believe Grenada qual­i­fies Douglas to be an author­i­ty on crime fight­ing and ter­ror­ism .The ques­tion is should Douglas’ broad­side be even debat­ed , or should it be seen as the attack of anoth­er polit­i­cal hack , unwor­thy of mention?

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CITIZENS RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

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Αs Jamaica strug­gles to bring crime under con­trol, some res­i­dents are final­ly real­iz­ing that their safe­ty and secu­ri­ty are ulti­mate­ly their respon­si­bil­i­ty and as such they have to be proac­tive in ensur­ing same. If the Authorities are seri­ous about reduc­ing crime to a min­i­mum, they must launch a media cam­paign edu­cat­ing cit­i­zens on what their respon­si­bil­i­ties are. There is no short­age of peo­ple who pur­port to know their rights, but what of their respon­si­bil­i­ties as cit­i­zens? Usually know­ing their rights means a mis­guid­ed belief that they are some­how immune from law enforce­ment action. As Jamaica reluc­tant­ly move toward becom­ing a coun­try of laws , it is imper­a­tive that cit­i­zens are made aware of their respon­si­bil­i­ties so they may not only obey the laws, but are less like­ly to be ensnared by them.

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Observer photo:

Recently pock­ets of peo­ple in some crime-rav­aged com­mu­ni­ties have tak­en the bold steps to march against crim­i­nal ele­ments with­in their com­mu­ni­ties. This was evi­dent in east and west Kingston recent­ly. This is not new, from time to time var­i­ous orga­ni­za­tions have marched for peace and free­dom from crime. What is ulti­mate­ly need­ed though, is a sus­tained coa­les­cence of actions between all stake-hold­ers, includ­ing law enforce­ment agen­cies that will invari­ably send a strong mes­sage to the crim­i­nal under­world that cit­i­zens will not tol­er­ate their activ­i­ties any longer. Over the years com­mu­ni­ty Over-Lords have used demon­stra­tion against the police as a potent weapon, as they solid­i­fy their con­trol of com­mu­ni­ties. It is time cit­i­zens turn the tables using the very same meth­ods. What is need­ed from the police now, is less brava­do, less emp­ty rhetoric and more lead­er­ship. The Police depart­ment is top heavy with peo­ple who do not earn their pay, it has always been that way, it is time for these peo­ple to get up off their lazy ass­es and go into the com­mu­ni­ties and stay there. It can­not be that peo­ple are scared to report mat­ters to the police any­more because they are afraid of police cor­rup­tion and being labeled inform­ers. It is time for the stu­pid dance-hall jar­gon “infor­ma fi ded” to become a thing of the past.

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“IN SUMMATION”.

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Jamaican Judge Lennox Campbell has began sum­ma­tion in the mur­der case the state against Adijia Palmer o/​c Vybez Kartel. He’s told the jury to con­sid­er two main questions…those ques­tions are:Is Clive “Lizard” Williams dead and did the accused men kill him if he’s in fact dead? 
He’s also warned the jurors not to allow feel­ings of sym­pa­thy or prej­u­dice to influ­ence their judge­ment.http://​rjrnew​son​line​.com/​l​o​c​a​l​/​j​u​d​g​e​-​b​e​g​i​n​s​-​h​i​s​-​s​u​m​m​a​t​i​o​n​-​i​n​-​k​a​r​t​e​l​-​t​r​ial. Campbell also told the jury “If there is any doubt in their minds they must acquit. This tri­al has gone on for over 2 years. There has been charges and counter charges hurled both ways but most­ly by the defense which still has not sub­stan­tive­ly deflect­ed the charge of mur­der from their client. What Juror sit­ting on that jury who believes a pri­mi-face case has been made out against the accused will not feel pres­sured to vote to acquit?

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I’m not a bet­ting man , but these peo­ple clam­or­ing for the accused to be freed may soon have their wish grant­ed. What does it say about a coun­try how­ev­er when peo­ple want accused mur­der­ers to beat the rap?

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HOW QUICKLY SHOULD JAMAICA LEGALIZE GANJA ?

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Jamaican Government Minister Phillip Paulwell, the leader of Government Business in the House, told the nation that Ganga would be legal­ized before year’s end. Ever the cau­tious one, I won­dered how this bold pro­nounce­ment would be received in the International com­mu­ni­ty , despite what appears to be an atti­tude change toward the weed. https://​mike​beck​les​.com/​m​y​w​p​b​l​o​g​/​?​p​=​6​336

It now appears those con­cerns were not unfound­ed in light of America’s large foot-prints on the glob­al stage. As I said on February 24th, despite Pulwell’s grand pro­nounce­ment, Jamaica was a very small nation which is sig­na­to­ry to International agree­ments and treaties as it regards the pro­duc­tion sale and traf­fick­ing of dan­ger­ous drugs. Whether we dis­agree with the idea that Cannabis is a dan­ger­ous drug is imma­te­r­i­al in this sense.The Jamaica Observer report­ed Thursday than in response to queries they received two sep­a­rate state­ments. Both the State Department and the Department of Justice side­stepped direct com­ment on how the US would react to decrim­i­nal­iza­tion of the weed.

“The US respects that dif­fer­ent nations have vary­ing approach­es on the mat­ter; it is the duty of each nation to decide drug poli­cies that meet its spe­cif­ic needs with­in the frame­work of International Laws,” the State Department said in its response.

But appear­ing to play it safe, the State Department cau­tioned: “Under US fed­er­al law, mar­i­jua­na remains a dan­ger­ous drug, and is sub­ject to high lev­els of con­trol with cor­re­spond­ing crim­i­nal restric­tions on dis­tri­b­u­tion and sale. The United States is com­mit­ted to uphold­ing its oblig­a­tions under the United Nations (UN) drug con­trol con­ven­tions and to work with inter­na­tion­al part­ners to pro­mote the goals of the con­ven­tion.“http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​U​S​-​s​o​f​t​e​n​s​-​_​1​6​1​8​0​412

Jamaican con­ven­tion­al wis­dom is, if Ganga is decrim­i­nal­ized, and or legal­ized, all of Jamaica’s eco­nom­ic prob­lems dis­ap­pears overnight. Ever the con­trar­i­an, I can­not help won­der­ing why our coun­try is still mired in pover­ty and despair, despite the legal­i­ty of Banana, sug­ar-cane, cof­fee, cas­sa­va, cocoa and a host of oth­er agri­cul­tur­al prod­ucts. Even if the nag­ging lit­tle prob­lems of International laws and treaties were to dis­ap­pear , does that trans­late into mass cul­ti­va­tion of cannabis by Jamaicans? Or does it mean much more crime based on exist­ing char­ac­ter­is­tics which fuel crime? Wouldn’t some peo­ple farm the weed , while oth­ers scheme how to kill them and sim­ply take it? Wouldn’t the mass pro­lif­er­a­tion of a poten­tial cash cow like cannabis cre­ate even more cor­rup­tion in an already crit­i­cal­ly lame police depart­ment still try­ing to extri­cate itself from cor­rup­tion? What about the claim by the med­ical com­mu­ni­ty that cannabis is a gate-way drug which leads to even more seri­ous addic­tion to oth­er drugs?

In fact the US Justice Department not­ed that juris­dic­tions that had enact­ed laws legal­iz­ing mar­i­jua­na in some form, imple­ment­ed strong reg­u­la­to­ry and enforce­ment sys­tems to con­trol cul­ti­va­tion, dis­tri­b­u­tion and pos­ses­sion, and which are in com­pli­ance with such laws, “are less like­ly to threat­en the fed­er­al pri­or­i­ties of enforc­ing the fed­er­al law”.Observer:

As we allud­ed to on February 24th, US States legal­iz­ing and decrim­i­nal­iz­ing the weed already have infra­struc­tur­al frame­work in place to deal with poten­tial con­se­quences as a result of pol­i­cy and leg­isla­tive change. Jamaica sim­ply does not, I cau­tion that Jamaica tread rather care­ful despite mass sup­port for legal­iza­tion and decrim­i­nal­iza­tion . Many lives have been ruined over the decades in this so-called war on drugs which includ­ed cannabis. Countless peo­ple have been ensnared in the fight against mar­i­jua­na, even more have been deport­ed . Jamaica has suf­fered immense­ly as a result. Let us tread care­ful­ly as we stop send­ing peo­ple to prison for a weed.

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AMIDST MERGER MANIA!

The long sought after merg­er between the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) and it’s main aux­il­iary the Island Special Constabulary(ISCF) has been approved by the Parliament . National Security Minister Peter Bunting and Police Commissioner Owen Ellington high­light­ed per­ceived pos­i­tives to be derived from the merger.

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Peter Bunting: “By com­bin­ing them you will release more per­son­nel to be on the streets patrolling com­mu­ni­ties, work­ing in crime con­trol and crime prevention,”.

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Owen Ellington :“I think the pub­lic stands to ben­e­fit great­ly from it. “It should result in a net increase in the num­bers that are deployed on the streets as we give up a lot of admin­is­tra­tive and sup­port ser­vices that are dupli­cat­ed because we had to main­tain two com­mand struc­tures.” http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​F​i​n​a​lly – Gov-t-approves-JCF – ISCF-merger-_16189683

Let’s look at the facts, after all what mat­ters is whether the Jamaican peo­ple are get­ting val­ue for mon­ey. Commissioner Ellington start­ed off by say­ing quote> “It should result in a net increase in the num­bers that are deployed on the streets as we give up a lot of admin­is­tra­tive and sup­port ser­vices that are dupli­cat­ed because we had to main­tain two com­mand struc­tures. ” The Minister of nation­al secu­ri­ty agrees with that assess­ment. May I just digress for a minute? I nev­er quite under­stood why there were ever two com­mand struc­tures. The ISCF is an aux­il­iary of the JCF, if there is some­thing in the two Acts which pre­vent­ed the JCF from man­ag­ing and super­vis­ing the ISCF, it could have been fixed decades ago by an act of Parliament. Anyway back to the merg­er. It’s dif­fi­cult to argue that the merg­er will not free up a few more cops for the streets. However the ques­tion remains, “is Jamaica’s crime prob­lem nec­es­sar­i­ly a result of not enough cops”? The Minister of nation­al secu­ri­ty stressed that there should be no prob­lem, as salaries of ISCF mem­bers will be brought up to par with that of their con­tem­po­raries in the JCF .  “The truth of the mat­ter is that the salaries were almost iden­ti­cal before. There will be a mar­gin­al top up for the ISCF mem­bers; but in the scheme of things, it is not even one-tenth of the bud­get of the police force”.

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The Minister is reach­ing here, to inte­grate all mem­bers of the ISCF into the JCF there will be cost. The min­is­ter argues it will be less than 1⁄10 of the annu­al police bud­get. Whichever way the Minister dices it, there is cost to the coun­try. Either in a larg­er police bud­get or a 10% cut in police ser­vice. Unfortunately for the peo­ple after this merg­er is imple­ment­ed they will be just as dis­ap­point­ed as before. The addi­tion of anoth­er 2’000 offi­cers will not change the coun­try’s crime tra­jec­to­ry, unless 1)There are seri­ous changes in the Agency’s inves­tiga­tive capa­bil­i­ties. 2) A com­plete de-annex­a­tion of the force from polit­i­cal inter­fer­ence and influence.3) A seri­ous push to mod­ern­ize the force through con­stant train­ing pro­grams aid­ed by clear and con­cise pol­i­cy direc­tives under­stood by all mem­bers. 4) Proper super­vi­sion of younger mem­bers. 5) Removing some gazetted offi­cers, mak­ing the agency lean­er and more effec­tive. 6) Rebuilding con­fi­dence with­in all com­mu­ni­ties, estrang­ing and alien­at­ing crim­i­nals in the process. 7) Educating the pub­lic on their respon­si­bil­i­ties as cit­i­zens. 8) Eliminating inef­fec­tive archa­ic laws. 9) Passing nec­es­sary laws com­men­su­rate with the coun­try’s needs on a con­tin­uüm . 10) Revamp and redo the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem , which now does lit­tle to inspire con­fi­dence in the process of justice.

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HISTORY VS HIS-STORY

native-americanThe American sto­ry is long and com­pli­cat­ed. Relying on what you hear in the main stream Media will not give you an accu­rate pic­ture of the sor­did his­to­ry of this Democracy. The san­i­tized roman­tic ver­sion fed to our chil­dren in the schools belie the sor­did grue­some real­i­ties which was, and still to this day con­tin­ue to be the real facts of America. The geno­cide vis­it­ed on Native American tribes and the anni­hi­la­tion of tens of mil­lions of Africans through forced labor , muti­la­tion, rape and mur­der, are two of the indeli­ble stains no Public Relations Firm, denial, or white­wash can remove. No dredged up roman­tic sto­ry will replace the fac­tu­al events of how this nation came into being. African-Americans just con­clud­ed the obser­vance of black his­to­ry month. The ques­tion remains, have we come far enough ? Are we mind­ful of where we are? Are we con­ver­sant of the pre­cip­i­tous posi­tion of our peo­ple in this land our fore-fathers occu­pied long before Europeans knew the world was not flat. The strug­gle for equal rights and jus­tice is not a fight for black and brown any­more. The fight is a much larg­er one, one which includes aver­age ever-day Americans regard­less of col­or. As President Barack Obama allud­ed to the need for a more per­fect Union, American must face it’s shame­ful past if it wants to have a bet­ter future. African-Americans have an even greater bur­den if they wish nev­er to return to the pogrom vis­it­ed upon them in the past. Yet I am not con­fi­dent that our peo­ple have the desire, or the com­mit­ment of the war­riors who went on before us. Our Generation and the ones com­ing after us, seem to have a sin­gu­lar need, that of being enter­tained. When one exam­ines the real sto­ry of this land, we must do so against the back­ground of facts. The mur­der , rape, muti­la­tion and man­gling met­ed out to Native and Africans Americans can only be ful­ly appre­ci­at­ed for its vile bar­bar­i­ty, when we under­stand that it was only after the Civil war that European mur­der­ers and Rapists were not being shipped here any­more. The demon­ic slaugh­ter of count­less peo­ple of col­or , black and brown, did not occur at the hands of inno­cent Pilgrims flee­ing reli­gious per­se­cu­tion. It hap­pened at the hands of prin­ci­pal felons , their chil­dren and grand chil­dren. Lest we for­get, we must remind our­selves that the Moors had crossed over the moun­tains of Italy and went to the gates of Rome .Historians and archae­ol­o­gist have con­firmed that the first peo­ple in the Americas were black.http://​www​.theafrol​ounge​.com/​2​0​1​3​/​1​0​/​1​4​/​b​l​a​c​k​s​-​w​e​r​e​-​t​h​e​-​f​i​r​s​t​-​p​e​o​p​l​e​-​i​n​-​t​h​e​-​a​m​e​r​i​c​as/ The fact that evi­dence exists that Africans sailed to the Americas and set­tled there, almost 200 years before Columbus is wide­ly unheard. The recita­tion of the Americas dis­cov­ery often begins in the late 1400’s. Yet his­to­ri­ans are well aware of the knowl­edge,.http://​www​.exam​in​er​.com/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​/​e​v​i​d​e​n​c​e​-​a​f​r​i​c​a​n​s​-​d​i​s​c​o​v​e​r​e​d​-​a​m​e​r​i​c​a​-​1​7​0​-​y​e​a​r​s​-​b​e​f​o​r​e​-​c​o​l​u​m​bus.

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We must remem­ber that our peo­ple long trav­eled from Africa and pop­u­lat­ed Australia, North America, and as far away places as New Zealand, long before the British or any European knew they would not fall off a flat earth. All over the world peo­ple of African descent, Black peo­ple, were liv­ing long before the white man arrived. Our fore-fathers trav­eled the seas and set­tled new lands. They did not kill the peo­ple they found liv­ing in those lands. The set­tled the land and peace­ably coex­ist­ed with the inhab­i­tants. Yes, that also includ­ed this land we now know as the United States. When the white man came here he found black peo­ple liv­ing peace­ful­ly with their Native-American broth­ers. Neither our fore-fathers, nor the native Indians thought they owned the land, they looked to the land for sus­te­nance and they respect­ed it. What hap­pened to both peo­ples was every­thing but respect­ful, we should nev­er forget.

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WHAT OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS OF THESE PEOPLE?

I won­der where the Inter American Commission on Human Rights and Amnesty International are on these two New Mexico Stories. Recently Jamaican Cops were crit­i­cized and lam­bast­ed for fail­ing lie detec­tor tests. Amnesty International referred to The Jamaica 2013 Human Rights Report, in which that data sup­plied by the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) revealed that up to August last year, 95 of the 190 police offi­cers who opt­ed to take lie-detec­tor tests, did not pass or com­plete the test. Amnesty said it was unable to deter­mine whether Police Commissioner Owen Ellington would dis­ci­pline those offi­cers who failed the test.

I will con­tin­ue to post these incon­sis­ten­cies on the part of Human Rights Agencies regard­ing police in Jamaica and the devel­oped world. I will also con­tin­ue to ask why are there two stan­dards regard­ing polic­ing in the devel­oped and devel­op­ing world. We will do so even as we decry and con­demn any and all instances of police abuse of cit­i­zens rights all over the world. Those charged with uphold­ing and ensur­ing our safe­ty and secu­ri­ty can­not be the great­est threats to our safe­ty and secu­ri­ty. It should be not­ed that Polygraph (lie-detec­tor tests are incon­clu­sive and unre­li­able . That unre­li­a­bil­i­ty has ren­dered them inad­mis­si­ble in courts of law in the United States and oth­er coun­tries. It must be of con­cern that a source of infor­ma­tion which can­not be admit­ted in a court of law is being used to decide one’s employ­ment or suit­abil­i­ty for advancement.

MAN SEEKS MILLIONS AFTER N.M POLICE FORCE COLONOSCOPY IN DRUG SEARCH.

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Police forced New Mexico scrap met­al trades­man David Eckert to under­go two dig­i­tal anal probes, three ene­ma inser­tions and ulti­mate­ly a colonoscopy after offi­cers incor­rect­ly assumed he was con­ceal­ing drugs, accord­ing to a law­suit filed in U.S. District Court on his behalf. http://​www​.usnews​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​s​/​2​0​1​3​/​1​1​/​0​5​/​m​a​n​-​s​e​e​k​s​-​m​i​l​l​i​o​n​s​-​a​f​t​e​r​-​n​m​-​p​o​l​i​c​e​-​f​o​r​c​e​-​c​o​l​o​n​o​s​c​o​p​y​-​i​n​-​d​r​u​g​-​s​e​a​rch.

TROOPER FIRES AT MINIVAN FULL OF KIDS FACES NO CHARGES.

TAOS, NM — A Tennessee fam­i­ly on vaca­tion in New Mexico end­ed up being shot at by state troop­ers after a vehic­u­lar mov­ing vio­la­tion went awry. What’s more, the troop­er who opened fire on them is fac­ing no charges, and has many sup­port­ers demand­ing he be put back on the streets with a badge and a gun. Oriana Farrell, 39, of Memphis, is a sin­gle moth­er who was haul­ing her five chil­dren (ages 6 – 16) through the American south­west on a fam­i­ly road-trip. The trip was intend­ed to be an edu­ca­tion­al expe­ri­ence for her chil­dren whom were home-schooled . http://​www​.polices​ta​teusa​.com/​2​0​1​4​/​c​o​p​-​s​h​o​o​t​s​-​a​t​-​m​i​n​i​v​a​n​-​f​u​l​l​-​o​f​-​k​i​ds/

OrianaFarrell3On October 28, 2013, on a desert high­way 1,200 miles from home, the fam­i­ly mini­van drew the atten­tion of the New Mexico State Police. Troopers had deter­mined that her mini­van had been trav­el­ing too fast and pulled the vehi­cle over to give her a speed­ing ticket.

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PORTIA WANTS OBAMA TO START TALKING ABOUT GANJA:

Jamaica’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller has called on the Obama Administration to start talk­ing about Ganga. This call came after Phillip Paulwell, Miller’s Minister in charge of sci­ence, tech­nol­o­gy, ener­gy, and min­ing, told the Nation that Ganga would be decrim­i­nal­ized this year. This was a bold state­ment from min­is­ter Paulwell, con­sid­er­a­tion the changes need­ed to undo decades of leg­is­la­tion that attached seri­ous crim­i­nal penal­ties to the weed. We felt it was nec­es­sary to offer our hum­ble opin­ion at the time of the min­is­ter’s announcement.
https://​mike​beck​les​.com/​m​y​w​p​b​l​o​g​/​?​p​=​6​3​3​6​#​c​o​m​m​e​nts.

Decriminalizing cannabis is dif­fer­ent than actu­al legal­iza­tion. I was mys­ti­fied at what was going on behind the scenes which would have pre­cip­i­tat­ed that bold state­ment from the min­is­ter? It was not clear how Jamaica would nav­i­gate the shark-infest­ed chan­nel of inter­na­tion­al diplo­ma­cy, par­tic­u­lar­ly with major pow­er play­ers like the UK, Canada, and the US.
These coun­tries have all shown signs of eas­ing restric­tions some­what, yet none has actu­al­ly gone as far as to promise a def­i­nite time­line for decriminalization.
in the United States, a few states have moved ahead with eas­ing restric­tions, even with those steps Colorado and California are care­ful only to do so for med­i­c­i­nal pur­pos­es. It is impor­tant that even as some states have moved ahead with incre­men­tal decrim­i­nal­iza­tion, any­one caught with the drug by Federal author­i­ties is sub­ject to Federal law’s full force.

The Federal Government has shown no inten­tion of eas­ing Federal restric­tions on Cannabis. Even as the debate rages, the Obama Administration is ful­ly engaged in deport­ing Immigrants caught sell­ing or in pos­ses­sion of the weed. Jamaica is a small coun­try that must obey inter­na­tion­al laws. How exact­ly will this promise of decrim­i­nal­iza­tion work when the major pow­ers are still active­ly engaged in this decades-long war on drugs?

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IS IT TRUE TO SAY?

FEBRUARY 009

Any good thing in the hands of the wrong per­son instant­ly becomes a dan­ger­ous thing. Money, Power, and unfor­tu­nate­ly a lit­tle Knowledge. Education ought to be the vehi­cle chan­nel­ing the oppressed,impoverished mass­es into the mid­dle-class. At least that’s what we were told. Unfortunately we have seen that in far too many instances, peo­ple gen­er­al­ly use the edu­ca­tion and pow­er they acquire for self­ish, destruc­tive pur­pos­es. Nowhere is this more evi­dent than in Jamaica. Those empow­ered to lead take bla­tant and obvi­ous advan­tage of the very peo­ple who empow­er them. Jamaica like many for­mer European Colonies have seen the rav­ages of what a caste sys­tem does to its peo­ple. You Know the lighter hued peo­ple gets all the breaks, the dark­er shades , well.… not so much. Today things have changed in Jamaica some­what, as long as you can afford to pay you can get an edu­ca­tion. We now have a Prime Minister who is a daugh­ter of the soil. Okay bad exam­ple, any­way you would think that edu­ca­tion would nec­es­sar­i­ly improve our coun­try since the major­i­ty of the new col­lege grad­u­ates are peo­ple of dark­er col­or. As a firm believ­er in edu­ca­tion I am dis­traught that new­ly edu­cat­ed Jamaicans seem to be more ungod­ly, more dys­func­tion­al, more decep­tive, more dis­hon­est, more anarchistic.

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What hope do we have for our coun­try if the peo­ple who are to be the new lead­ers, are far worse than the peo­ple we so vehe­ment­ly crit­i­cize today? Jamaica once prid­ed itself in the idea it had more church­es per square mile than any oth­er nation. Many will argue that we had more Bars also. My point though is that what appears to be a sys­tem­at­ic attempt in some quar­ters to remove the very idea of a deity from our nation­al dis­course has cre­at­ed a chasm or vac­u­um now occu­pied by demons. By every met­ric life is more dif­fi­cult. More mur­ders, rapes, child-abuse, shoot­ings. Even the killings have tak­en on a more grue­some more barbaric,demonic com­plex­ion. Could it be when we were unintelligent[sic] you know believ­ing in God, believ­ing in con­se­quence for actions, we were bet­ter off? Is it fair to say enlight­en­ment has induced us into becom­ing a more soul-less bunch of demon­ic las­civ­i­ous , hedo­nis­tic crea­tures who only live for the moment, obliv­i­ous of consequence?

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Or is there some­thing to the archa­ic unin­tel­li­gent notion that there is a God who gave us free will? Is there some­thing to the fairy-tale idea that God not only cre­at­ed every­thing, then cre­at­ed man. That he gave man domin­ion over all things? That he set clear prin­ci­ples for man to live by. Principles accom­pa­nied by clear unequiv­o­cal con­se­quences for depar­ture. Is it true to say God does not take that free will back sim­ply because he can but that he allows us to live our lives the way we see fit, with­out his inter­fer­ence. Is it true to imag­ine that there will be a day of reck­on­ing? Is it true to imag­ine that God does not med­dle unless we ask him to take charge of our lives and direct our paths? Is it true that the rea­son he does not med­dle is that it would run counter to his promise of free will. If God took our free will would that not make him a liar just like man? Isn’t that what the world want to do, prove God a liar?

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WHO IS SURPRISED BY THIS?

Resident Magistrate Judith Pusey hear­ing the Kern Spencer crim­i­nal case, ruled that a cru­cial piece of evi­dence would not be admit­ted into evidence.A thumb dri­ve tak­en from an apart­ment the for­mer junior min­is­ter once occu­pied in 2008 would not be admit­ted into evi­dence. The Jamaica Daily Gleaner report­ed that the rul­ing came after defense attor­neys K.D. Knight and Deborah Martin object­ed as police cyber-crimes expert Sergeant Patrick Linton was about to give details about the con­tents of the thumb dri­ve. My under­stand­ing of crim­i­nal court cas­es tells me the very idea that the defense does­n’t want the thumb-dri­ve intro­duced into evi­dence is because of the poten­cy of what’s on it. I am not fault­ing the defense for wag­ing a spir­it­ed fight on their clien­t’s behalf. What I am against is the real­i­ty that the tri­al judges is seen as aligned with the defense. Even the per­cep­tion of such col­lu­sion is tox­ic and cor­ro­sive to the process.

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It is dif­fi­cult enough to suc­cess­ful­ly pros­e­cute a crim­i­nal offend­er. He/​she has no bur­den to say any­thing, it is up to the pros­e­cu­tion to prove its case. It is a steep hill to climb get­ing over “beyond a rea­son­able doubt” in crim­i­nal cas­es. It is expo­nen­tial­ly more dif­fi­cult to bring a crim­i­nal case against any­one con­nect­ed in Jamaica, much less to get that case to stick. The last thing the process of jus­tice needs is a judge who have demon­stra­bly aligned her­self square­ly on the side of the accused through words and deeds. It is impor­tant to remem­ber that Justice must not only be done but it must seem to be done. I am not a Lawyer, yet I remind my legal­ly trained friends that per­cep­tion is important.

The defense in this case can­not catch a break from this Magistrate Judith Pusey. First she want­ed the Prosecutor to tes­ti­fy on the stand about what if any­thing she offered a wit­ness to get him to tes­ti­fy against the accused Kern Spencer. This would have been a ground break­ing and unprece­dent­ed move had the pros­e­cu­tor acqui­esced. The DPP filed motion in the high court Appealing to the Magistrate’s order. The Court of Appeals agreed with the DPP. That was not enough the Magistrate fought back appeal­ing the deci­sion against her rul­ing and was smacked down by the high­est court in a unan­i­mous decision.

Sounds like some­thing you would expect com­ing from defense coun­sel on behalf of his/​her client right? That was the pros­e­cu­tor bat­tling the tri­al judge, who should be impar­tial , while the defense sits around sali­vat­ing at the spec­ta­cle. Many peo­ple do not see any­thing wrong with this non­sense. Sometimes their views are influ­enced by pol­i­tics. In oth­er cas­es they are influ­enced by loy­al­ty to the legal pro­fes­sion. Clearly this case is yet anoth­er which puts the Jamaican jus­tice square­ly on trial.