Saturday, August 27, 2005

Quick notes on the Truth & Rec hearings: --The least likely outcome of this process, should the report have any relationship to the facts presented in public, is the one that many opponents have yelled loudest about from the beginning: the whitewashing of the CWP's role in that bloody day. The evidence is clear and overwhelming that the organizers of the march helped set the stage for what happened. --A big part of this story is that the police failed to do their job of keeping the peace. The peace was shattered. There does not need to have been a conspiracy for this to be true and damning. It does not matter what Nelson Johnson did or did not tell them about staying away. Along with the truth about the lasting impact on Greensboro neighborhoods, this should be one of the key takeaways from this process. -- Bob Cahoon is a southern lawyer right out of central casting, playing that accent so strong that the transcription on the overhead screen repeatedly read "Walla" instead of "Waller." But just like in the movies, he'll eat you alive if you misunderestimate him. --Percy Wall said the state's decision to go with first-degree murder charges against the Klansmen and Nazis contributed to having an all-white jury: it was hard to find black jurors who could say they supported the death penalty. I've always wondered if premeditated murder was provable in a case like this. --Lewis Pitts is a brilliant lawyer, too. His documented account of the FBI, ATF, and GPD knowledge of Klan and Nazi activity was chilling, if not conclusive of active conspiracy by law enforcement in the events of November 3, 1979. More here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. 5:41:42 PM   permalink   comment []

Guernica Pablo Picasso 1937 10:44:39 AM   permalink   comment []

Chewie went to the Truth & Rec hearings, and urges you to go today:  "It was a wonderful, interesting, emotional, exhausting day of testimony, and my brain hurts, in a good way." She is not a fan of the media coverage. 10:40:55 AM   permalink   comment []

N&R coverage of the Truth & Rec hearings yesterday, including testimony from GPD officer Rick Ball. One of the things this process has brought to wider public attention -- one of the benefits that might be acknowledged by its many critics who say this had nothing to do with Greensboro -- is the trauma that 11/3/79 inflicted on the residents of Morningside Homes. I just got an email saying the paper reflects the views of the "white establishment." I have a couple of problems with that. One is the implication that the survivors speak for all non-whites. The other is news value: we know that Nelson Johnson believes it was a police conspiracy, that's much-reported; news is what you haven't heard, and we haven't heard from the cops since the '80s. 10:27:35 AM   permalink   comment []

The new media foodchain...sometimes starts with the old media. Ann Coulter made a stupid statement in a recent column: New Yorkers would likely surrender in the face of terrorism. Never mind that New Yorkers have already shown themselves to be stalwart in the face of terrorism, Coulter had a political point to make. Nobody seemed to notice this gem, and I would have missed it but for a lack of reading material at lunch last week...I blogged it, Atrios picked it up, and suddenly it's being thrown back in Coulter's face on TV...Blogs as media watchdogs -- glad we're having a session on that at Converge. (Thanks to C&L for the tip). 10:17:44 AM   permalink   comment []