SCORPION, or the Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods unit- “Narcissistic rage is like no other... Logic and reason falls by the way side." The City of Coatesville Police Department has no space for police with narcissistic rage.

In the United States towns & cities police departments operate their own systems. In the City of Coatesville our police serve our community.

“It is with regret and admiration that I write to your department,” Eric Watson Sr. began his letter.

Police said Officer Jared T. Davis was on patrol in a marked police vehicle when Eric L. Watson, 29, of Coatesville, allegedly threw a large rock at Davis’ vehicle, cracking the front windshield.

Police said during the struggle to get Watson to the ground to take into custody, an officer who assisted was injured.

“The regret is that your Officer (Detective) Joseph Thompson was injured in a confrontation with my son Eric Watson,” said Watson Sr. “I would like to extend my sincere apology to the injured officer, his family and your department at this time.”

Thompson suffered from a fractured sternum. He was treated at Paoli Hospital. 

“This apology I also extend to Officer Jared Davis who must have been traumatized by the experience of being attacked by Eric,” Watson Sr. said...

The Watson family had been trying to find Eric for the past two years, according to Laufer. When they heard the news, they traveled to the police station and apologized for his conduct, Laufer said. He informed Thompson, who is home recovering for the next several weeks, about the letter. Thompson told him he appreciated the note."

 

MORE BELOW 

 

 

“Narcissistic rage is like no other.  The intensity is palpable.  Logic and reason falls by the way side.  They have no limits.  They do not stop at the edge.  They do not care if they destroy themselves, as long as they take you with them.  They are willing to go to extremes and commit atrocities you could never imagine.  And this is why you can't beat them.  Why?  I'm reminded of an old fable.

Once, there was a frog trying to cross a flooded river.   As he prepared to cross to the other side on a lily pad a scorpion asked to ride with him.  The frog responded, "If I let you go you still sting me."  The scorpion answered, "If I sting you we will both die.  Why would I do that?"  So the frog acquiesced and they boarded the lily pad.  Halfway across the scorpion stung the frog.  As the frog lay dying he pleaded, "Why on Earth did you sting me?  Now we will both die!"  The scorpion answered, "Because I'm a scorpion.  It's my nature."

We cannot change other people.  This is especially true if you are dealing with a narcissist.  Even knowing this, it's hard to grasp just how far they will go to hurt you when enraged.  Their behavior sometimes defies reason and reality.”

MORE AT:

KELLEVISION

Narcissistic Rage: The Scorpion and the Frog

***

“The Memphis police officers charged with the brutal killing of Tyre Nichols were part of a specialized unit that had been formed a little more than a year ago to help halt a surge of violence in the city.

The unit — called SCORPION, or the Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods unit — was designed as a 40-officer group that would deploy in neighborhoods, with a focus on crime hot spots. The officers have often operated in unmarked vehicles, making traffic stops, seizing weapons and conducting hundreds of arrests.

The unit was such a key part of the city’s crime-fighting strategy that Mayor Jim Strickland touted it in his State of the City address a year ago, at a time when the city was tallying record homicide numbers.

Now, that unit has been involved in a fatal encounter that Police Chief Cerelyn Davis, who created the team in the fall of 2021, called “heinous, reckless and inhumane.” Five officers have been charged in Mr. Nichols’s death, and Chief Davis has ordered a review of the unit.”

MORE AT:

New York Times

Special Memphis Police Unit Was Supposed to Stop Violence

Officers from the unit are now accused in the murder of Tyre Nichols.

Jan. 27, 2023

By Mike Baker

***

“It is in the best interest of all to permanently deactivate the Scorpion unit,” the Police Department said in a statement on Saturday

Police officials said the decision had been reached after “listening intently to the family of Tyre Nichols, community leaders and the uninvolved officers who have done quality work in their assignments.” Cerelyn Davis, the Memphis police chief, met with other members of the unit on Saturday.

“The officers currently assigned to the unit agree unreservedly with this next step,” the department said in the statement. It added that while the “heinous actions of a few” cast a cloud of dishonor on the unit, “it is imperative that we, the Memphis Police Department, take proactive steps in the healing process for all impacted.”

Lawyers for Mr. Nichols’s family called the decision “appropriate and proportional.”

The unit — its full name is the Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods unit — had been central to efforts by city and police officials to combat persistent violence and crime at a time when the city’s murder rate had been climbing, stoking fears about public safety. Jim Strickland, the mayor of Memphis, had highlighted the unit’s importance to his crime-fighting strategy during his State of the City address a year ago.

Scorpion was launched in 2021 by Chief Davis just months after she took over the department. The group consisted of about 40 officers who drove unmarked vehicles, making traffic stops and hundreds of arrests as well as seizing weapons.

Mr. Nichols was stopped on the evening of Jan. 7 as he was headed to the home he shared with his mother and stepfather in the southeastern corner of Memphis. The video footage released on Friday that captured Mr. Nichols’s interactions with officers showed him being pulled out of his car, and he can be heard saying, “I’m just trying to go home.”

Mr. Nichols fled on foot, and when officers caught up to him, he was kicked, struck by a baton and pepper-sprayed, at one point screaming, “Mom! Mom! Mom!” He was hospitalized in critical condition and died three days later.

An independent autopsy commissioned by his family found that Mr. Nichols “suffered extensive bleeding caused by a severe beating,” according to preliminary findings.

MORE AT:

New York Times

Memphis Police Disband Unit Whose Officers Were Charged in Tyre Nichols’s Death

Mr. Nichols’s family and activists had demanded the scuttling of the group, the Scorpion unit, which patrolled high-crime areas of the city.

By Rick Rojas

Jan. 28, 2023

The Death of Tyre Nichols

***

RE-POSTING:

Sunday, September 26, 2021

Most police officers would have instantly shot Eric Watson Jr. dead. Not in Coatesville PA. “Even during the injuring of an officer, the rights of Eric were not breached,” Watson Sr. wrote. 

 

"Davis saw Watson approach him in his rearview mirror before Davis pulled over after driving a short distance. With the violence demonstrated toward Davis, Laufer said the officer could have justifiably used deadly force, but instead he used his judgment and pulled out his Taser – which he did not use.

“Even during the injuring of an officer, the rights of Eric were not breached,” Watson Sr. wrote.

Davis was recently verbally threatened in an unrelated incident.

Police said that Gerome Darnell Gray Jr., 22, of West Chester, allegedly threatened Davis July 9 when he attempted to disperse a group and arrested someone for disorderly conduct. According to the police and the criminal complaint, Gray reportedly said, “Davis, I’m going to f— you up.” 

Coatesville police Chief Jack Laufer said when the police hear an apology, it is usually verbal.

“We don’t often get a personal apology from a family member,” Laufer said, including letters.

Both of Eric Watson’s parents apologized in person to police.

Watson Sr. thanked Davis, the Coatesville Police Department officers and the leadership by Laufer for their professionalism during the incident and their assistance afterward.

“In admiration, I want to commend the action taken by Officer Jared Davis by displaying professionalism beyond the norm in a time when madness seem to be the order of the day and the lives of the officers in blue are in danger,” Watson Sr. wrote in his letter.

This incident occurred in the midst of national protests after police shootings in July that killed Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, La., and Philando Castile in St. Paul, Minn., both black men. The assault on the Coatesville officer also came after police were killed, three in Baton Rouge and five in Dallas, in addition to those injured.

Laufer said they learned that this incident did not occur as an act of hate toward police. He said the letter showed that. He said when the community read the letter they were reassured of that and it reinforced that it was not a direct attack on law enforcement or the Coatesville police.

“I think it makes the city feel better,” Laufer said. “Was it a violent crime? Yes and he’ll have to answer for his actions. Maybe this will help him to get the help he needs.”

The Watson family had been trying to find Eric for the past two years, according to Laufer. When they heard the news, they traveled to the police station and apologized for his conduct, Laufer said. He informed Thompson, who is home recovering for the next several weeks, about the letter. Thompson told him he appreciated the note.

“They’re a good, solid family with connections to law enforcement and the military,” Laufer said about the Watson family. “Being in law enforcement (the father) appreciated how bad it could have been.”

Davis saw Watson approach him in his rearview mirror before Davis pulled over after driving a short distance. With the violence demonstrated toward Davis, Laufer said the officer could have justifiably used deadly force, but instead he used his judgment and pulled out his Taser – which he did not use.

“Even during the injuring of an officer, the rights of Eric were not breached,” Watson Sr. wrote."

MORE AT:

The Times Herald

Father apologizes to Coatesville police for his son’s actions

RE-POSTING:

Sunday, May 31, 2020

"resolution condemning police brutality" It’s only a resolution, but I think Pelosi will kill this. DNC leadership is behind a corporate bribery built wall. One of the biggest bribes comes from the “Police Industrial Complex.”

"They are responding to the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis. And the murder of Breonna Taylor by police in Louisville. They are responding to the excessive use of force by police in cities across the country where protests of these murders are taking place.

"[P]olice brutality and the use of excessive and militarized force are among the most serious ongoing human rights and civil liberties violations in the United States and have led to community destabilization, a decrease in public safety, and the exacerbation of structural inequities," the resolution reads, laying out a condemnation of the system racism in law enforcement in three pages of legislative text. "Whereas the House of Representatives has a moral and constitutional obligation to protect the civil rights and liberties of all people from police abuses," the resolution continues, "be it resolved that the House of Representatives" answers.

They call for "'he adoption of sound and unbiased law enforcement policies at all levels of government that reduce the disparate impact of police brutality and use of force on Black and Brown people and other historically marginalized communities."

MORE AT:

DAILYKOS

Democratic lawmakers, all women of color, introduce resolution condemning police brutality

VIDEOS OF COMMUNITY - POLICE FORUM IN COATESVILLE PA ARE BELOW

We had a meeting in a tent about drugs in Coatesville. Our then Republican PA State Rep. Harry Lewis was invited. But was not there. He told my friend Elwood Dixon it was “anti-police.” I think what Harry meant was the “Community Policing” practiced by our Coatesville PD was counter to the military style policing then endorsed by the Philly PD Union, supported by the Republican Party and some Democrats on the take.

Our Coatesville PD is deeply involved in "Community Policing."

"The intensive militarization of America’s police forces is a serious menace about which a small number of people have been loudly warning for years, with little attention or traction. In a 2007 paper on “the blurring distinctions between the police and military institutions and between war and law enforcement,” the criminal justice professor Peter Kraska defined “police militarization” as “the process whereby civilian police increasingly draw from, and pattern themselves around, the tenets of militarism and the military model.”

The harrowing events of the last week in Ferguson, Missouri – the fatal police shooting of an unarmed African-American teenager, Mike Brown, and the blatantly excessive and thuggish response to ensuing community protests from a police force that resembles an occupying army – have shocked the U.S. media class and millions of Americans. But none of this is aberrational.

It is the destructive by-product of several decades of deliberate militarization of American policing, a trend that received a sustained (and ongoing) steroid injection in the form of a still-flowing, post-9/11 federal funding bonanza, all justified in the name of “homeland security.” This has resulted in a domestic police force that looks, thinks, and acts more like an invading and occupying military than a community-based force to protect the public."

MORE AT:
The Intercept

The Militarization of U.S. Police: Finally Dragged Into the Light by the Horrors of Ferguson

Glenn Greenwald

August 14 2014, 8:40 a.m.

 

"Community Policing

Acceptance of constructive change by police and the community is central to the purpose of the Police Foundation. From its inception, the foundation has understood that to flourish, police innovation requires an atmosphere of trust, a willingness to experiment and exchange ideas both within and outside the police structure, and, perhaps most importantly, a recognition of the common stake of the entire community in better police services.

The Police Foundation has done much of the research that has led to a questioning of the traditional model of professional law enforcement and toward a new view of policing–one emphasizing a community orientation–that is widely embraced today.

It was in Kansas City that the foundation learned, in a practical test, that random preventive patrol may not be the best way to deter crime. It was the foundation that was among the first to learn that shortening police response time may have little effect on the chances of a burglar or robber being caught. It was also the foundation, working jointly with the police in Houston and Newark, that began to see the advantages of foot patrol and door-to-door surveys as a way of dealing with the public’s fear of crime and disorder. It is from the foundation’s Newark Foot Patrol experiment that the “broken windows” theory is derived.

What this, and other, research revealed is that there are strategies–several of them new, some of them used in the past but discarded–that can reduce levels of perceived crime and disorder, reduce fear and concern about crime, improve satisfaction with police service, increase satisfaction with neighborhoods, and, in some cases, reduce crime itself. By staying in close contact with neighborhoods they serve, the police can identify problems at the local level, and, working with residents, respond to them.

The name for the model of policing that has emerged varies: in some places it is called community or community-oriented policing, in other places, problem-oriented policing. However it is labeled, it tends to be based on some commonly shared beliefs:

• It is the job of the police to cope with problems, not just respond to incidents. 
• Among the problems with which the police should be concerned are those involving disorder and incivility as well as those involving serious crime. 
• Reducing crime and disorder requires that the police work cooperatively with people in neighborhoods to 
• As the most visible local agency of government on duty 24-hours a day, the police must be willing to serve as catalysts to mobilize other city agencies and services.

The movement toward community policing has escalated dramatically in recent years, due in large part to the Federal government’s commitment of billions of dollars to hire and train 100,000 community policing officers. With assistance from the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services of the U.S. Department of Justice and the national Community Policing Consortium, thousands of America’s police departments–large, medium, and small–are working to develop organizational philosophies and strategies for the implementation of community policing.

The Police Foundation is one of five leading national law enforcement organizations that joined in an unprecedented cooperative effort through the creation of the national Community Policing Consortium (CPC). Under a cooperative agreement with the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, these five organizations–the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, the National Sheriffs’ Association, the Police Foundation, and the Police Executive Research Forum–played a principal role in the development of community policing research, training, and technical assistance.

Since 1993, the foundation has provided community policing education, training, and technical assistance to more than 1,000 law enforcement agencies and communities on issues such as internal changes and shifting paradigms, partnerships and diversity, strategic planning, ethics, and integrity.

Community policing research conducted by the Police Foundation are listed below."

MORE AT:

Community Policing

This is community policing, the type of policing OPPOSED by our PA State Rep. Harry Lewis: 

“Coatesville Police Chief John ‘Jack’ Laufer also praised law enforcement officials for their ‘good investigative work and utilizing a joint team approach.’ He said the city’s Vice Unit was able to ‘remove a sizable quantity of dangerous drugs and firearms from the streets of Coatesville.’ 

 The fight against violent crime most often associated with the illicit drug trade requires a team approach not only within law enforcement, but also with the community we serve,’ Laufer said. “Together we can bring about positive change within the City of Coatesville.” 

 MORE AT: 

Daily Local News 

Coatesville police seize drugs, guns from ‘heavily fortified’ residence 

Ronald Terry Smith

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Recognition of Officer Rodger H. Ollis Community Policing Officer of the City of Coatesville

https://app.box.com/shared/gqkzamlb4y

A JBS Chapter Leader who led a takeover of the City of Coatesville PA was racist tinged grift. The new GOP in Congress is grift tinged Nihilism. "there’s no real establishment anymore. It’s a cannibalistic brawl among extremists”

Pat Sellers was alined with extremist white nationalists like Gun Owners of America, Larry Pratt & American Renaissance editor Jared Taylor. 

The “Bloc of Four” Coatesville city council members were allegedly chosen by John Birch Society Chapter Leader Pat Sellers with approval by Andrew Lehr, Ernie Campos & Harry Walker. 

Their alleged intention was to build a power plant in the city center & funnel residuals from a proposed Coatesville power authority to themselves. Remember what they did to the City of Coatesville? 

A City Adds a String of Arsons to Its List of Troubles

By Ian Urbina

Jan. 28, 2009

COATESVILLE, Pa.  Though most of them have no place to go, residents here are packing their suitcases and keeping them by their front doors so they can leave on a moment’s notice.

Anxiety binds this community now after a string of suspected arsons  13 in the last four weeks  destroyed entire sections of this troubled city west of Philadelphia, left scores of people homeless and prompted officials to declare a state of emergency. 

 

Monday, July 11, 2022

The New York Times articles concerning Croydon New Hampshire & Coatesville PA. The Croydon New Hampshire article was entirely about politics. The Coatesville PA articles were about arson but ignored larger story of politics and corruption leading to arson. 

Why does something that happened 13 years ago matter? Many of the politicians now active today’s insurrectionist QAnon Republican Party in Pennsylvania have roots in Chester County PA.

There were JBS racists involved in the "Bloc of Four" takeover of Coatesville’s government but the intention was pure grift. The new guys in Congress are nihilists with possible intention to grift. 

“Expect dysfunction and chaos.” “Freedom Caucus members are “bomb-throwing nihilists who try to tear down the institution without regard for consequences.” “It’s not a battle between extremes and the establishment, because there’s no real establishment anymore. It’s a cannibalistic brawl among extremists”

MORE AT: 

How McCarthy’s speaker deals will cause ‘cannibalistic brawl among extremists’

The deals struck between Kevin McCarthy and the far-right House Freedom Caucus will give the most conservative figures considerable power

Peter Stone

China’s economic footprint globally is massive and already surpasses the United States. Although it is assumed by the press that President Biden negotiates with Xi Jinping from a position of strength, in reality Biden negotiates from weakness.

 "The U.S. economy, despite a strong end to 2022, will struggle this year as higher interest rates bite,” In realspeak wealthy dudes don’t like employees demanding higher wages, so the Fed raises rates “Do the hokey economist that’s what it’s all about.”

Chinese "household bank balances are up 42 percent, or $4.8 trillion... Chinese consumers could unleash an amount exceeding Britain’s entire economy as they resume spending.” Americans “savings” are gangster-ish usury banks >22% interest credit cards. 

"Historian Alfred McCoy Predicts the U.S. Empire is Collapsing as China’s Power Grows."

 

The last two paragraphs of the Washington Post article finally get to the point. 

“Although China’s economic growth this year is expected to outpace that of the United States, Europe and Japan, its performance also will fall short of its contribution to the global recovery from the 2008 financial crisis. Thanks to massive government spending on an infrastructure program, the Chinese economy grew in 2010 by more than 10 percent, roughly twice the pace that is considered likely this year.

“There will be a positive spillover from China. But it’s not going to be as intense as in past Chinese recoveries,” said Nathan Sheets, the global chief economist at Citigroup.”

China’s bid to leave covid behind could determine global economy’s fate

The U.S., European and Japanese economies are seen in the latest forecasts as likely to underperform

David J. Lynch January 15, 2023 at 6:00 a.m. EST

Alfred McCoy begins at 2:45:

To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change Hardcover – November 16, 2021

by Alfred W. McCoy (Author

In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of US Global Power (Dispatch Books) Paperback – September 12, 2017

by Alfred W. McCoy (Author)

The Christian/Muslim view, happiness is impossible on earth. Anointed by God rulers taking 1/10 of your wealth so that the gates of heaven open for you was for ages the only road to happiness in heaven. Today street dealers can open heaven for a few hours.

 Sometime in the 1990s:

Me, “What a beautiful day!” 

Farmer, “Beauty is only in heaven. Accept Jesus as your savior and be in heaven with Christ.”

The religious concept that happiness is impossible on earth began to change in the 17th Century. It’s still in the process of change. 

Criminals understand religious restrictions on happiness create opportunities. Prohibition of alcohol in the United States became a huge opportunity for international organized crime. 

Criminal enterprises now control the market on happiness drugs. Keeping those drugs illegal keeps profits rolling to criminal organizations, You might then think criminal organizations selling illegal drugs pay off politicians. You’re thinking correctly. 

“MDMA is only one of a handful of drugs, especially psychedelic drugs, that the federal government considered to be largely for recreational purposes — and therefore illegal — that are now slowly progressing toward government approval for legal uses. 

The party drug MDMA earned positive results for treating people living with post-traumatic stress disorder, according to a new government study that confirmed other findings.

The new study for the MDMA clinical trial program was completed in November and sponsored by a group called the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. The trial is part of an ongoing effort to obtain federal approval for use of MDMA in therapy as the number of people suffering from PTSD, mental illness, and opioid addiction continues to climb.

Prior to federal criminalization of the use and possession of MDMA in 1985, the substance had been legally used in therapy treatments for at least a decade. As part of its decision to criminalize MDMA, the Drug Enforcement Administration said abuse of the substance had “become a nationwide problem” and posed “a serious health threat.”

MDMA is only one of a handful of drugs, especially psychedelic drugs, that the federal government considered to be largely for recreational purposes — and therefore illegal — that are now slowly progressing toward government approval for legal uses. The drugs, among them psilocybin, which is found in “magic mushrooms,” are being studied for therapeutic uses.

The Biden administration has signaled willingness to explore the potential to use criminalized substances to address a growing national mental health crisis, and officials in Congress have undertaken bipartisan efforts to ease access to federally banned substances for therapeutic uses. The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies’ latest clinical research on MDMA is a phase three study aimed at eventually winning Food and Drug Administration approval.

The stigma against psychedelic and psychoactive drugs and the residual effects of the “war on drugs” kicked off by President Richard Nixon have stalled progress in one of the few areas of drug policy on which there is substantial bipartisan consensus.”

MORE AT:

Tne Intercept. 

Party Drugs for PTSD: Study Moves Therapeutic Use of MDMA Toward Approval

The drug scored positive results in a clinical trial designed to meet FDA standards.

Akela Lacy

January 14 2023, 6:00 a.m.

Did DTE (Detroit Energy) finance terrorism? Armed terrorists stormed the Michigan Legislature. Terrorists plotted to kidnap & murder Governor Whitman.

 “Michigan was a global flashpoint in the cultural and political fight over how governments should handle Covid. Whitmer’s lockdowns were effective at controlling the virus’s spread, but rightwing opposition to the restrictions culminated with multiple protests and armed protesters storming the state legislature in mid-2020.

Against this backdrop, the DTE-affiliated dark money group made its contribution.”

MORE AT:

The Guardian

Group aiming to sabotage Whitmer’s Covid policies funded by dark money

Non-profit affiliated with utility DTE Energy funded effort to repeal Michigan governor’s emergency order powers

Tom Perkins

"A dark money non-profit linked to power utility DTE Energy funded a group behind the effort to repeal the emergency order powers of Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, and end the state’s Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions."

***

"Oct 26 (Reuters) - Three men accused of aiding a 2020 plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer were found guilty on Wednesday of taking part in a conspiracy that prosecutors ascribed to hostility over restrictions she imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic."

FROM:

Three found guilty of aiding plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Whitmer

Tyler Clifford 3 minute read October 26, 2022 3:58 PM EDT Last Updated 2 months ago

***

In the United States charging the leaders and financiers of the terrorist sedition attack on Capitol Hill is a ho-hum maybe we'll get to it in a few years or never. 

Brazil does it differently:

“In a news conference from Sao Paulo state, Lula read a freshly signed decree for the federal government to assume control of security in the federal district. He said that the so-called “fascist fanatics,” as well as those who financed their activities, must be punished. He also accused Bolsonaro of encouraging the uprising.”

FROM:

AP News

Authorities probe who was behind uprising in Brazil capital

By DAVID BILLER

January 9, 2023

Jair Bolsonaro, the right-wing fascist former president of Brazil, lives in Orlando FL about 150 miles from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago. Will Putin be next?

 The New York Times, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Washington Post, Rolling Stone all have articles about the Steve Bannon/Jair Bolsonaro’s remake of J-6. 

But I think The Palm Beach Post has the best take on the  Bolsonaro, Trump, Steve Bannon, Mark Meadows & Q remake of the plot to overthrow democracy January 6,2001.

The DOJ NEEDS TO ARREST DONALD TRUMP, MARK MEADOWS & OTHERS AND BRING THE TRAITOROUS SEDITIONISTS TO A HALT

SEE:

Sunday, January 8, 2023

The new congress is a continuation of the J 6 Attack. The vote for speaker allegedly was directed by Mark Meadows. The treasonous insurrection is progressing in the MAGA Congress. I think the insurrection isn’t over until Mark Meadows is in prison.

 

CNN anchor warns Brazil riot is 'real world impact' of Jan 6:

BOLSONARO IS NOW A CRIMINAL

 

"We need to set a quota on deposed wannabe dictators relocating in Florida. 

If not, we could get a reputation here of being the Elba of the Americas…

A state full of refugees ... but not all should be welcome

So, it would seem to be hypocritical of us to withdraw the welcome mat to other people in need. 

But I propose we make an exception for deposed dictators who see Florida as a sanctuary from their failed criminal plots to thwart democracy and establish themselves as kings in perpetuity. 

We took in one of these dead-enders over the weekend. Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro slipped out of Brazil and moved into a house in a gated community in Orlando — where he was seen taking a neighborhood stroll. 

Bolsonaro was supposed to be in Brazil, handing over the presidential sash to the man who beat him in the recent presidential election, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. 

But, instead, Bolsonaro hightailed it to Florida after saying, “We will not throw in the towel. We may have lost the battle but not the war….

Donald Trump, Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro read from the same script

Where have we heard that before? Oh, yeah. From our own deposed would-be dictator, Donald Trump, who also sought refuge in Florida after his plans to subvert presidential election results flamed out in a violent failed coup at the U.S. Capitol. He has since written that the U.S. Constitution ought to be set aside to reinstate him at the White House.

Bolsonaro, who ran by saying he wanted to "make Brazil great again," refused to accept defeat at the polls in his recent re-election bid. He claimed there was massive fraud in the Brazilian election, which was suppressed by “the fake news” media. 

Apparently, wannabe despots just borrow each other’s material….

And we certainly can’t depend on Trump’s mini-me, Gov. Ron DeSantis, to do anything about the dictator immigration problem going on in Florida. In fact, Bolsonaro’s homophobia, immigrant scapegoating, and anti-vaccination posturing puts the Brazilian right in line with DeSantis’ vision of a “free” Florida….

My big concern, though, is that Bolsonaro’s move to Florida is going to open the door for Russian President Vladimir Putin, another despot who may soon be looking for a happy landing somewhere out of the way.

Florida’s got to be looking good for Putin. Especially now that Bolsonaro has paved the way.”

MORE AT:

The Palm Beach Post

Florida's dictator immigration problem: Bolsonaro and Trump | Frank Cerabino

***

FROM Lucid 

Ruth Ben-Ghiat:

“New York Young Republicans Club's (NYYRC) annual gala are no exception. Many extremists who prepared and supported the coup attempt former president Donald Trump instigated on Jan. 6 to remain in office illegally were present. They are mentoring a new generation of Republican operatives who welcome the GOP's transformation into a Fascist party, are immersed in far-right international networks, and believe, in the words of their leader Gavin Wax, that a "total war" on our democracy is long overdue…

Convicted criminal Steve Bannon and Rudy Giuliani (the 2021 Dulles award recipient), both core conspirators of the Jan. 6 coup attempt, also attended, as did representatives of foreign far-right parties like Alternative for Germany and the Austrian Freedom Party.

And there was the new star of the radical right, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who on Jan. 7 had characterized the assault on the Capitol as "our 1776 moment." She maintains she had no direct role in the coup. "I will tell you something, if Steve Bannon and I organized that, we would have won," said Greene in her remarks to the NYYRC crowd. "Not to mention, it would've been armed."

Here Greene repeated the false Republican claim that no arms were used on Jan. 6, while also acknowledging that any future such operation would have to be dramatically scaled up to be successful. "That's what we fucking need to have, 30,000 guns up here," one insurgent had stated that day, frustrated at the Capitol Police's ability to delay his entry into the Capitol. "Next trip," someone answered him.

The GOP found out on Jan. 6 what generations of authoritarians already knew: coups are hard to pull off. Of 471 coup attempts staged around the world from 1950 to 2000, half were defeated due to operational failures or lack of unity among participants.

Successful coups require the backing of powerful individuals and institutions, whether the military, security forces, or political parties. Peruvian head of state Pedro Castillo's recent "self-coup" to avoid impeachment ended quickly with his imprisonment, for example, because the military, the police and other authorities declined to support his power grab. As the Venezuelan publication Arepita quipped, Castillo "had breakfast as a president, lunch as a dictator, dinner as a detainee.” 

Coups also travel internationally. Jan. 6 has been studied by authoritarians abroad who see it as a blueprint for armed actions. Bannon, an advisor to Jair Bolsonaro, hoped that Brazil (where a 1964 coup led to two decades of military dictatorship) would experience its own Jan. 6 after Bolsonaro's loss to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Brazilian elites and institutions mobilized to certify Lula’s victory promptly, short-circuiting any such attempt, but hard-core Bolsonaro supporters persist, encouraged by GOP activists such as Matthew Tyrmand (another attendee of the NYYRC gala).

The recent coup attempt in Germany, where domestic terrorists wanted to storm the Reichstag to liberate Germany from the "deep state" and replace it with a "Fourth Reich," is another example of the momentum Jan. 6 has given to the global far right. Germany has its own neo-Nazi and extremist traditions, of course, and this group is part of a home-grown sovereign citizen (Reichsbürger) movement responsible for over 180 acts of violence in 2021 alone.

Yet the group has also adopted American QAnon thought as a basis for action. QAnon, like anti-science aggression, took hold in Germany during the pandemic, and the conspiracy theory offers Germans a way to express antisemitic and other banned hate speech. As the German intelligence official Stephan Kramer remarks, "Qanon doesn't openly fly the colors of fascism; it sells it as a secret code."

This matters because the German coup plotters cannot be dismissed as fringe extremists: they include a sitting judge, an aristocrat, and members of the police and the military. "Right-wing extremists are present in all areas and parts of German society," warns Pia Lamberty, a German psychologist and CEO of a nonprofit that monitors extremism.

The same can be said about far-right extremists in America. The GOP's characterization of the Jan. 6 coup attempt as "legitimate political discourse" means that one party in a bipartisan system accepts violence as a means of achieving political goals. As Robert A. Pape, author of numerous studies on participants in the Jan. 6 coup attempt, puts it, "the insurrectionist movement is mainstream, not simply confined to the political fringe.”

MORE AT:

Coups Make a Comeback as GOP Elites Declare "Total War" on US Democracy

Extremists Gather on Park Avenue to Celebrate Authoritarian Actions Past and Present

Ruth Ben-Ghiat Dec 14, 2022

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The New York Times establishes the links between J6 and attack on Brazil’s seat of government in a very good photojournalistic article:

The New York Times

The attack on Brazil’s seat of government resembles the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Jair Bolsonaro, the right-wing former president of Brazil, had for months sought to undermine the results of an election that he lost, in much the same manner that Donald J. Trump did after his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.

Published Jan. 8, 2023 Updated Jan. 9, 2023, 7:21 a.m. ET

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Rolling Stone

Brazil Is Having Its Own Jan. 6 Right Now

Peter Wade January 8, 2023

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Washington Post

Come to the ‘war cry party’: How social media helped drive mayhem in Brazil

Researchers detected a surge in aggressive rhetoric from election denialists in far-right channels online ahead of Sunday’s rioting

Elizabeth Dwoskin

Updated January 9, 2023 at 9:50 a.m. EST