https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_George_Floyds
In my police-reporting days
Question: Was their anything racial in Floyd’s death? That is, is there any reason to believe that if Floyd had been a white petty criminal and drug addict, but otherwise identical to Floyd, would Chauvin have behaved differently? Accounts differ. By some he is said to have been reprimanded for being “overzealous,” meaning pushing people around. ” I can find no credible evidence that he singled out blacks. If such evidence existed, the media would have trumpeted it nonstop. His wife was Meng, a member of a nonwhite Southeast Asian hill tribe. This is not consistent with general racial prejudice.
If Chauvin did not act from hostility to blacks, as there seems no reason to believe that he did, then the whole thing was fabricated by the media, not intentionally but because it fit a reflex template.
There exists such a thing as template journalism in which reporters and commentators fit events into expected categories, like filling in a form. One of these is “racist white cop does something bad to innocent black.” This is accepted without investigation. Since the template is accepted as moral certainty, a reporter who disagreed would find himself seriously at odds with is associates. These days racial incorrectness is literally a firing offense.
Now let us consider the events as they seemed to the police at the time, this being what determined their actions. What some other people who weren’t there would think at a later date largely based on political biases was information not available to them.
Floyd had bought minor items in a store with a counterfeit twenty which we will charitably but not very realistically accept that he may not have known to be phony. Noticing this, the store clerk ran out and asked for payment with good money. Floyd refused. In effect, it was shoplifting. The clerk later said that Floyd seemed stoned or drunk. This is consistent with use of fentanyl.
To the cops, on routine patrol, it was a day like any other. They got what seemed, and was, a minor call. Shoplifting or something similar. This was not a crime to have the adrenaline flowing. I have been with cops on many such calls. It was just another day at the office, exciting as a traffic ticket.
Arriving at the scene, they encountered Floyd. He was not violent, not armed, had no outstanding warrants for serious crimes. In the normal run of events the cops would have arrested him, which is what they were supposed to do, and taken him downtown where, if Minneapolis operates as other such departments I have known, he would have been booked, given a court date, and released on recog. He would not have shown up for the hearing, and that would have been thee end of the matter.
They handcuffed him, which is what they were supposed to do. This involved no violence. Then they told him to get into the police car. He refused, resisting arrest. This complicated things. What to do? Letting criminals resist arrest is not an option for police as then all criminals would resist and nobody would ever be arrested.
At some point in these proceedings, Floyd said, “I can’t breathe,” a classic symptom of fentanyl poisoning. Users of the drug often die of it, in factt at a rate of about a hundred thousand a year in the US.
Interestingly, in its account the Wikipedia and other sites play the fentanyl angle down hard. If Floyd died of fentanyl overdose, which is consistent with the evidence, then the most cherished racial murder since Emmit Till, and the resultant riots and destruction, were a product of the media. There is no doubt about the Till murder. Floyd is a probable fraud.
The police did not swarm Floyd to force him into the squad car, four against one. They did not rough him up. Nor did they pepper spray him or tase him. Instead they called for transport, the polite word for a paddy wagon. No violence. In fact, deliberate avoidance of violence. At this point they had no idea that they would be on national television. They could have used force, which would have been justified, but didn’t, apparently because they didn’t want to.
At this point the cops had no idea that anything of note was about to happen. No one had been hurt. No indication existed that Floyd was dying or going to die. It was a minor, mildly annoying arrest. A month later, they probably would not have remembered it.
Then Floyd either fell to the ground or said he wanted to lie down. This is consistent with advancing fentanyl poisoning. In many hundreds of hours of riding with various police departments,I have never heard this request. The cops allowed him to do so. Meanwhile a crowd of blacks gathered.
Then Chauvin, with stupidity that would jusstify sterilization, put his knee on Floyd’s back, or neck, depending on account. The appearance was that of a big-game hunter posing with his prey. This is consistent with a tough-guy attitude–“over zealous” if you will. In a region of blacks not fond of the police, it might have justified firing. Floyd’s continued protests that he couldn’t breathe are consistent with advanced fentanyl poisoning.
At some point, the cops called an ambulance, which is not consistent with hostility to blacks or wanton disregard for Floyd’s life. Somewhat later, they increased the ambulance call to urgent. This is even less consistent with unconcern for Floyd’s life.
In the many accounts I found on the web, almost none even mentionedt that the cops had called an ambulance, instead focusing on the purported errors of the ambulance crew. This suggests a desire to make the police seem as bad as possible, entirely consistent with the usual template journalism. The question arises of why cops wearing body cams would record their commission of murder or anything approaching it.
One thing is certain: Chauvin had no idea that he was endangering Floyd’s life. Nobody will commit murder with a dozen witnesses a yard or so away, with one of them conspicuously videoing the event.
Of the other three cops, two were rookies and not likely to question what a much senior man was doing. They had no idea that anything of importance was happening. Floyd, not violent, had refused to get into the car, so the cops, not violent, had called for a paddy wagon. This was neither unusual nor ominous. When he started having medical symptoms, they had called an ambulance. That’s what you do when someone has medical symptoms. Then, presumably when the symptoms worsened, they had upped the call to urgent. This is what you do when symptoms begin to seem threats to life. The three had no idea that they were committing murder. Again, murder and racial abuse are not characteristically done knowingly in front of multiple witnesses and video cameras.
For several reasons, Chauvin could not have had a fair trial. And didn’t. For one thing, the jurors had to be intimidated. Their identities were supposed to be secret, but leaks happen and there had been death threats against them. They knew that if they produced the wrong verdict, violent and probably widespread rioting would result. The courthouse was surrounded by barbed wire and the National Guard had been called out. Stores had armored their windows againsst looting with sheets of plywood. The jurors had to have known that a verdict of not guilty, apart from endangering their own lives, would result in heavy damage and perhaps deaths. Might a prison sentence for one man, who had not behaved well, be preferable? It was a show trial with a predetermined outcome.
A doctor testified that if he had found Floyd dead at home, he would have attributed the death to fentanyl poisoning, basing this on the level of the drug detected in the autopsy. This would seem to suggest a reasonable doubt as to what had killed Floyd
As a juror, what would you, the reader, living in the area, have done? Would you have dared vote not guilty, which means “not proved,” against eleven frightened fellow jurors?
Here it is worth pondering the role of the media in promoting riots of the Floyd sort. In the Ferguson riots, witnesses lied, as was later determined, saying that Michael Brown was shot with his hands in the air and saying, “don’t shoot!” The deceased, a disagreeable thug, was in fact trying to take the cop’s gun. The media, having disseminated this story without investigation, refused to retract it. The story, not true, influenced later events. Note that during Floyd’s riots, mobs all across the country chorused, “Hands up! Don’t shoot!”
The media consistently, repeatedly assert, to gullible blacks, that they are hunted down in numbers and murdered by white cops. The President of the United States has explicitly promoted this tale.
Let’s look at a couple of examples of how this is done. We often read of a black man killed in a “traffic stop.” Whether calculatedly or otherwise, this gives the impression that the cop pulls a black driver for a broken tail light and kills him because he doesn’t like blacks. This doesn’t happen. The slightest research, which used to be called “reporting,” reveals that the guy had an outstanding warrant for armed robbery or reached for a gun or tried to run over the cop. The consequences to the cop of a causeless killing include losing his job, pension and mortgage, and wife, and spending years in a penitentiary. He would really have to hate blacks. Given the prevalence of body cams he would be documenting himself as a murderer. Not too likely.
Another term of art is “unarmed black man.” The unstated subtext is “innocent, unarmed black man killed by racist cop because he wanted to hurt blacks from vicious racism, and humiliate them, and ruin their lives.” If the black is trying to take the cop’s gun (Michael Brown) or is beating his head against the sidewalk (Travon Martin), well, he is an unarmed black man.
If you have doubts as to the effectiveness of the media in promoting false narratives, I recommend this survey by the Western Journal. Do read it: It is fascinating. One finding was that forty-four percent of people who described themselves as liberals believe that at least a thousand unarmed black men were killed annually by police. The actual number for that year was twelve, according to the Washington Post, hardly biased against blacks.
The only way these liberals (conservatives were only a bit more realistic) could have acquired such wildly inaccurate ideas is through the media. When blacks are unceasingly fed the same propaganda, is it any surprise that they kill whites?
The extent to which the falsification is deliberate is not clear. Journalists write this stuff but they also read it. Everyone they know says the same things and their is a strong sense of moral crusade. In my view it approaches distributed mass hysteria. Symmetric to the desire of the media to find white cops guilty of murder is the desire to conceal the murder of whites by blacks. The man who compiled the link foregoing posts a similar one every month.
Onward and upward.
The exclamation point is to infuse you with a wild, irrational desire to receive my scurrilous ravings.
Thanks, Fred, for your honest review of this case.
JL Gilmer
Most cops ARE racist. But it’s not anti black racism, it’s not anti white racism, it’s not anti brown racism. It’s “you ain’t blue” racism. Meaning you’re not a cop therefore you are the enemy… automatically. It’s their us versus them mentality. They view us peons as beneath them. Subjects to be forced to toe the line drawn by their paymasters. In short cops are now the Praetorian Guard of the political elite…NOT public servants.
As for George Floyd… He likely died from an overdose. And would have if left alone. But his death was complicated by the actions of Chauvin and his associates who put their weight on his back while he was prone with his hands cuffed behind his back. This accelerated his physiologic decline into respiratory and then cardiac arrest. It’s called Positional Asphyxia. There action contributed to his demise therefore they committed a felony… involuntary manslaughter. The arrest, trial and incarceration for that action is both legal and appropriate. Floyd is no saint. Chauvin is no victim. Both made choices and committed illegal actions. It’s time to acknowledge this reality and move on.
Chauvin was convicted of 2nd degree murder and got 21 years, involuntary manslaughter is 2-4 years so your post is nonsense but, hey, lets move on.
Sadly, a journalist job is to peddle drama. People crave drama the way a drug addict craves fentanyl. They never tire of it; it makes life interesting. The Soviets, in days gone by, tried replacing dramatic radio and TV programming with factual shows about agricultural and factory production. Alcoholism quickly soared. The national pastime became chugging bottles of Vodka. When the Vodka ran out, they drank the anti-freeze in their cars. Drama is a drug addition, .. without it people prefer to drink anti-freeze from their cars.
Try reasoning with a drug addict with facts and logical arguments. Totally pointless. Same with drama addicts. The worst are teenage girls on social media. If you’re a parent, never look at the inane conversations going on in those cell phones. It’s the twilight zone of drama.
Nice, Fred. Thanks.
Somewhat off topic but I believe the steady increase in carjacking is a warm-up for kidnapping. The violence escalates decade after decade. [Notice the passive verb. Guns just go off by themselves around victim groups.] Sooner or later we’ll make the jump. Family members, even pets. Why not? Especially with demoralized police, Kneeling Nancy devotion for the “disadvantaged,” “marginalized,” etc. and gun control for the deplorables. They just need to work out a method in the panopticon but they’ll think of something.
“Floyd’s continued protests that he couldn’t breathe are consistent with advanced fentanyl poisoning.”
Conversely, having a knee on your throat is consistent with an inability to breathe.
“Chauvin had no idea that he was endangering Floyd’s life.”
When your knee is on someone’s throat, and they’re protesting that they can’t breathe, and you don’t have any idea that you’re endangering their life, you’re as stupid as Fred’s take in this article.
Negative. The moment he resisted, and he resisted for A LONG TIME, his life was over. Had I known that in the past he had pointed a pistol into the stomach of a pregnant woman during the commission of a robbery, I’d’ve behaved as the Brazilian police (on OR off duty) would have. Knee on neck or whatever.. well, WHATEVER. It’s irrelevant to me. Everyone who reacted in groupthink aka BLM and Antifa should have the same fate befall them. They are SHEEP. The end.
Look at the BodyCam footage it clearly shows the knee was on the Shoulder not his neck! The angle from the Cellphone is decieving but if you look very closely you can see it too.
Recently released body cam footage taken at right angles to that of the onlooker whose film was the only one allowed in court shows Chauvin’s knee on Flloyd’s shoulder ,not neck . Also disallowed in court was a police training manual which contained an illustration of permissible restraining exactly parralleling Chauvin’s action.
You are FOS. I watched the video. The throat is anterior, not posterior. Floyd was in a prone position. There really seems to be an information campaign on t his particular article.
Looks like an honest review and analysis.
Thanks Fred
Random thoughts
I work with an organization “Braver Angels” who offer a framework.for discussion and LISTENING
On several occasions POC on both sides have debated and a POINT made by educated, successful and responsible POC Has been.
” The police brutality, killings” Are widely exaggerated
BA Also holds discussions between members of the Media and even those who identify as “Progressive ” acknowledge that the Media is grossly unbalanced towards the progressives views and agenda
Some years I ran “Parachute instructor courses” with the US Parachute Association
One segment included dealing with the press
I was using the ROTC class room at the U of Oregon and Attempted to get a Representative from the Journalism Dept to speak
“I am not allowed, But off the record tell your people dealing with the press
1. It’s not our job to find facts,
2. We are paid for “colum inches or Air time ”
A. Thus don’t give us any speculations we can build on
I recommend going to YT And listening to hours of reasoned conversations hosted by Braver Angels
MOBS And MOBS And victimhood
The tactics of divide along lines of envy, success are traceable back to the history written by Plutarch’s
ANOTHER Point. The most successful group of recent immigrants has been Black.
Divide and conquer and DESTROY the opportunity to succeed via Personal RESPONSIBILITY
Peace and prosperity Through personal Responsibility
Ryan, please read the article. Fred points out that he was doing this while being watched and videoed. The constant friction between non-black and black culture is a bridge too far. For cops in urban areas it’s day after day.
Take the Chinese:
The latest I could find from March 2021: ‘“Now it is very, very quiet,” Dieng says of Little Africa, a nook of Guangzhou informally named after the swell of thriving African businessmen who once lived, ate and prayed there in huge numbers. “Not many foreigners now, and all the small shops are closed. Small business around here? No more.”’
https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/17/china/africans-guangzhou-hnk-dst-intl/index.html
The Chinese, it seems, drove them back to Africa.
Saying “I can’t breath” is most definitely NOT a symptom of opiod overdose. In high doses, opiods suppress respiration, and death IS due to cessation of breathing. However, before respiratory depression becomes serious, the person becomes obtunded, and then comatose, at which point serious hypopnea occurs. Comatose people do not say “I can’t breath”.
Source: I am an ER doctor and have seen and treated opiod overdoses.
Once again, … so??? He resisted arrest. The penalty should ALWAYS be death – at the bare minimum the presumption of death. I for one sure as heck would never, EVER resist arrest. This is also the POS POC who stuck a gun in a pregnant woman’s stomach in the commission of a robbery. Ya like that, buddy? HUH?
His family pontificated, actually LIED, “Ohhhhh he was t-t-t-t-trrrryyyying to g-g-g-g-get his llllife together!
Sure, buddy, suuuuuure.
Well, he was saying I can’t breath before being placed on the ground. Would the methamphetamine (also in his system) have kept him lucid? Or was he suffering from something else not on the autopsy? Heart attack?
I watched a bodycam video of this incident that has now been deleted from the internet. Floyd was saying “I can’t breathe” before he was even out of his vehicle. He repeated it while resisting arrest. It’s too bad that video was not seen by more people.
Yes, I would encourage anyone to watch the ENTIRE video. Floyd started saying “I can’t breathe” at the very beginning and by the time he died he must have said it at least 100 times over a 30 minute period–it kind of loses its meaning at that time.
It was an accepted method of control.
https://rumble.com/v3vyvzv-the-fall-of-minneapolis.html
Indicting “journalists” is like blaming an extinct species. This is not a moral, Constitutional, humane, racial issue–it is purely greed. What gets viewers, ratings, advertising money and secure employment?
The new motto of journalists has nothing to do with truth, justice or ethics, it could be, “Make it interesting, make it scary and if necessary, make it up” There are few journalists running around, unemployed, some living in Mexico and enjoying the winter of their years. When they are gone, the species will truly be extinct. None are being born and none are being created or trained.
I dunno, man.. I never EVER listen to what “journalists” have to say. I never have, and I never will. So what they say or don’t say is irrelevant. Unless the consumer of said “journalism” has a hydrocephalic, syphillitic, mushy brain. Am I wrong here?
” Letting criminals resist arrest is not an option for police as then all criminals would resist and nobody would ever be arrested.”
In the bad old days on the Oakland PD, allowing criminals to resist arrest would invariably draw a hostile crowd, elevating a simple arrest into an “incident”.
They threw Chauvin under the bus as a political expedient.
Fred, you need to watch this.
.
The Fall of Minneapolis | A Crowdfunded Documentary
Fred, I’ll preface what I’m about to say with some background.
I’m retired after 30 years as a state prosecutor, during which time I reviewed police-involved death cases. I’m also a former military, and civilian, paramedic. My wife is a RN. We both repeatedly viewed the video of Chauvin with his knee clearly on the side of Floyd’s neck.
If you look closely, Chauvin’s knee is moving forward and back ever so slightly. Whether Chauvin was doing that deliberately or it was just reflex is unknown – and irrelevant. That sort of movement on the neck can result in Carotid Sinus Pressoreceptor Reflex that will slow the heart rate within about 5 seconds, and should not be continued for more than 10 seconds – which Chauvin did.
If Floyd’s heart rate was already depressed from having fentinyl, or any depressent, on board, the carotid massage of Floyd by Chauvin’s knee could easily have been fatal. If Chauvin’s kneeling on Floyd’s neck unintentionally contributed to his death, then manslaughter was the appropriate charge.
That having been said, I wholeheartedly concur that the regime media were grossly complicit in the ensuing violence. But it was more than just a ‘reflex template’. It was deliberately intended to incite violence to influence the 2020 election.
I’m reminded of the admonition, about ‘the press’, by Thomas Jefferson, who wrote “Our newspapers, for the most part, present only the caricatures of disaffected minds. Indeed the abuses of the freedom of the press have been carried to a length never before known or borne by any civilized nation.”
Jefferson also wrote “even the least informed of the people have learnt that nothing in a news paper is to be believed.” Unfortunately, if that was ever true is is no longer. Our dismal education system, compounded by social media, and (to put it bluntly) the innate ignorance of a significant segment of our population, have rendered much of society terminally gullible to manipulation by the ruling elites.
The Defense and prosecution, instead of talking abstractly about pressure on the neck, should have demonstrated it in court. Many of us watching the trial did try it. My wife put her whole weight on one knee on my neck for 9 minutes. It was not comfortable, but it did not affect my breathing at all. Many on Youtube also tried it without difficulty. Common sense suggests that if this were a problem, 99% of boys would never have survived childhood wrestling and fighting. We don’t see boys dying left and right from this.
Derek Chauvin weighed 140 lbs, compared to George Floyd’s 223 lbs. In the trial, a medical examiner testified that 140 lbs would translate to 32 lbs of pressure on the neck if all the weight on one knee were placed on Floyd’s neck (23% of the body weight). But, Chauvin did not place his weight on the neck, it was on Floyd’s back. Floyd was able to turn, and when he did, we saw Chauvin’s knee rise indicating he used his weight to just keep Floyd pinned, not pressured.
Think about the unequal weight difference between Floyd who was built like a football player (he played football) (223 lbs) and Chauvin (140 lbs). Chauvin was lucky to have subdued him. He likely knew that if he stopped pinning Floyd, he would lose that struggle. Worse yet, if Floyd turned violent, as he has in his violent criminal past, he could have easily taken Chauvin’s service revolver from Chauvin and killed Chauvin along with others. A guy who weighs only 140 lbs is no match for a guy built like a linebacker, 223 lbs of mostly muscle.
What is meaningful to me is what I read that Chauvin was asked by fellow officers if he needed assistance, he said no. Maybe that is not true and someone here might be able to clarify.
Mohamad Noor, the Minneapolis cop who shot a white woman for calling the police has been released.
Wasn’t Mohamad sent to jail and released on probation? Also the city settled for 20M?
Watch the tapes. Chauvin did nothing wrong. Floyd was responsible for his own death. Period!
Bravo Fred….You nailed it again!
You generally cut through the BS and put the hay down where the goats can get it in the real world. I think most all your shots here are squarely in the ten or X rings. The entire deal was tragic, the death of Floyd as well the sentences of the Minneapolis police officers honestly performing their duty were out of line with reality but then the situation was brimming with Black intimidation to burn the place down. I have so many strong feelings about this tragic event I am giving up my attempt to make meaningful comments. It reeks with unfairness, uneducated people including White and Black discrimination –Not to mention the pseudo “White Guilt” syndrome as well as the effectiveness of the media presenting false narratives. The media has indeed become a problem in America which is seemingly unchecked. They reach the large “rabbit-ear” TV watching crowd – easily filled with BS and fiction.
As you have said before and I strongly agree, we definitely have a Black Problem in America. Given the billions of dollars and, special programs that give Blacks head of the line privileges, most reasonable people would think that the 160 years that has expired since the Emancipation Proclamation would be ample time for the Black people in America to assimilate and become a productive part our culture. Indeed, many have but too many have not. After years of “Affirmative Action” and educational programs costing billions of dollars, too many Blacks don’t consider themselves as part of the American culture and seemingly want to create their own culture and drag the White Community down to a lower level that accommodates the Black life style of not staying in school, rundown housing and neighborhoods with a large number of unwed women with large numbers of fatherless children. Included is the life style of Black drug gangs as well as those who burn building and loot retail stores. Burning or threats of burning valuable real estate seems to be a useful weapon that the Blacks effectively use when things don’t go their way. That is NOT the American way!
The opportunity for assimilation into the American culture has been there for Blacks for years and it will continue to be there. I make two simple conclusions: Either they don’t want it or their intelligence quotient is unable to understand what is available to them and learn it. I seriously believe if left unchecked, the Black problem in America will indeed be a leading factor in our self-destruction .
I offer one of my favorite references to the Black Problem in America written to Barack Obama several years ago by Pat Buchanan – it applies as well today.
https://socialkats.wordpress.com/2013/04/30/buchanan-to-obama-the-white-side-of-the-story/
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