Archive for the ‘Homeless’ Category
Class War American Style
Poverty Rates Soar; Neither Party Cares
And why should they care, since both of them are basically a collection of, to put it kindly, bought-and-paid-for corporate whores.
Couldn’t of said it any better.
–Joe
What Does This Mean? :: No Comment – REALLY!
It appears Kevin Hoover came by and commented on his comment.
What does this mean?
Joe,
Your deconstruction is truly majestic. It should go into a blog museum if they ever start one.
K
September 3, 2010 at 4:49 pm
I guess that is saying something. Too bad he didn’t take the time to explain himself. It might have helped with his credibility and legitimacy. Considering what’s revealed – probably wasn’t any better defense than offered.
–Joe
What Does This Mean? :: No Comment
[UPDATE Below]
The Joe Blow Report has a standing policy when confronted with personal, ad hominem vitriolic attacks leveled against the messenger or writer. If they cannot direct their comments to the issues spoken or written about in the published article, we boycott them. We refuse to recognize or personally address these accusers. The enclosed article, “What Does This Mean :: No Comment” is written and published to the general public. It is “about” a statement by Kevin Hoover of the Arcata Eye he left in the “Comment Section” of the post I published on Thursday, August 26, 2010, titled: “What Does This Mean”? At the end of every article is the provision for everyone to leave a comment if they want. Since this blog is by me, the writer Joe Blow, all comments, unless specifically addressed to another commenter, are automatically address to me. It’s what makes the blogging a personal experience. Like any conversation, when you enter someone’s blog and address a comment or observation (even an opinion) directly to the host and they don’t answer you back, you’ve got to recognize their public rudeness for what it is. Specially, if you’ve asked them a direct question. Kevin Hoover did not ask me a direct question.
This post article, “What Does This Mean :: No Comment” is the Report’s observations on some of the issues raised in that comment. It is written and published for the general public and in no way is even a tacit recognition of Kevin Hoover. If I had wanted to recognize him or what he said, I would have left a statement in the relevant comment section. I did not.
Also, for the purposes of clarification and intent, this Report’s observations regarding the citizen’s arrest and picture of “Big Al” Edmunson posted on the Arcata Eye website had absolutely nothing to do with or about any issues with Kevin Hoover. Neither did anyone take issue with his reporting of the incident. Why he felt justified in trying to argue the legitimacy of the police action and his reporting, is clearly defined or explained in his referenced comment to me. If this story was published in the Times-Standard (if it was, I missed it) I would never ever referenced either him or the Arcata Eye. Even so, the story was far more important than whatever recognition or publicity Kevin Hoover might get from me. His complete comment is posted below for reference.
What Does This Mean?
What does this mean? Joe: “Alfred is a sympathetic character in many ways.”
- What is a “sympathetic character”? Daffy Duck is a sympathetic character, too.
- What are his “many ways”? Is he a destitute, homeless beggar with a couple of sorry-looking dogs?
What does this mean? “He is also a large man with issues who is prone to outbursts of hostility.”
- “He is also a large man.” So what? Lots of people are “large.” That doesn’t automatically make them a threat.
- “He is also a … man with issues.” What’s being “large” got to do with “issues”? But then, who is it that says he actually has “issues”? Other people with issues? “Issues” like the fact that he was homeless, was panhandling and has a couple of dogs?
What does this mean? “… [P]rone to outbursts of hostility.”
- Does this mean if someone or a group of someones provokes, harasses, or disparages him, cusses him out, calls him dirty names or in anyway makes him or his dogs feel threatened, he’s prone to retaliate by “outbursts” of anger? Or does his “outbursts of hostility” amount to simply printing a sign that says, “F**K A.P.D.”
What does this mean? “You might want to talk to the wage earners at the Chevron mini-mart.”
- “Wage earners.” Who are they? God’s gift to the great? WAGE EARNERS as compared to who or what? A worthless begging bum? Or someone that’s just lost their job and is collecting Unemployment Insurance or is on County Aid or Welfare?
- “You might want to talk …” Wonder what makes him think I haven’t? Another blatant case of asserting a worthless opinion then using it to make phony conclusions.
What this last statement means to me: First, I think this is the most telling statement Mr. Hoover has ever posted on the Joe Blow Report. Second, this statement, in and of itself as well as in it’s context, identifies Kevin Hoover as a prejudiced, intolerant bigot.
If you have a problem understanding why Mr. Hoover proves himself to be a “prejudiced, intolerant bigot” you need to read and think about this: Modern-day Racism: A Mixture That Calls for Some Clarification. If you can connect the dots, you might even realize why all the violent deaths on the North Coast lately.
What does this mean? “These men and women were extremely uncomfortable in their work lives having to deal with Big Al and his dogs day in and day out, and their gas station pay isn’t high enough to compensate for a daily sense of conflict and danger.”
- “extremely uncomfortable in their work lives” – I spent a lot of years extremely uncomfortable in my “work life” dealing with intolerant employers and some co-workers that wee nothing more than thug bullies, So what? Grow up.
- If “Big Al” and his dogs were affecting these employees to the extent as accused, why didn’t the owner of the business deal with the problem? Perhaps, because it was these same employees that were causing the “sense of conflict and danger” by bothering or harassing “Big Al” and the owner had no standing. A serious issue of safety is easily seen and dealt with or handled accordingly. In other words the police would act on their own authority and simply remove the threat.
- “Daily “SENSE of” WHAT? What did the hardworking, underpaid people do? SMELL the “conflict” or some ignominious “danger”? REALLY! This is a joke.
What does this mean? “Whether their fears were real or illusory is something the know-it-all bloggers can pass judgment on endlessly.”
- Now these poor hardworking, underpaid people’s “sense of smell” defines their real or imaginary “fears”? How do we get from some abject “sense” that smells like “danger” or “conflict” to an absolute, “fear”? And that “sense” justifies arrest? Sounds more like paranoia than fear.
- “Know-it all bloggers.” Is Mr. Hoover talking about himself with his arrogant racist slurs?
What does this mean? “As it happens, Al inspired exactly the same reactions back at nearby businesses during his Northtown era.”
- “Inspired”? “Big Al” actually “inspired” these weak-kneed, underpaid people to “sense” or smell some sort of threat to themselves?
- How do you threaten someone and inspire them at the same time? What is “Big Al”? Some throwback to the Prophets of Old?
What does this mean? “My opinion is that the Nazi brand is bandied about much too frivolously these days. It ought to be reserved for actual Nazis, not deployed against everyday people trying to make a living. Being called a Hitler fan tends to anger some people. That shouldn’t be too hard to understand.”
- What “shouldn’t be too hard to understand”? That neither I nor the Joe Blow Report are the least bit interested in worthless opinions?
- The Arcata Eye web story begins: “VALLEY WEST – The battle of wits and wills between Valley West businesses and corner signholder Alfred Edmunson reached a turning point last week with the citizen’s arrest of Big Al.” That was my question, “Why would “Big Al” call these poor, hardworking, underpaid, with over-active proboscises “Nazis” unless that is exactly how they are treating him?
- Mr. Hoover says calling these provocateurs “Nazis” made these Haustellums “angry.” The truth generally has that affect on such people.
What does this mean? “As to your puzzlement over the law, hopefully this will help:”
- What “puzzlement”? I was simply wondering why Kym Kemp had anything to do with Kevin Hoover, is all. Besides, illegal laws were passed to intern Japanese American citizens, among others. So what? If that man has the legal right to stand where he was and do what he was doing, then he has the same right as everyone else to do it in peace and NOT be harassed by the “Valley West businesses.”
Finally, what does this mean? Law: “Any person who uses offensive words in a public place which are inherently likely to provoke an immediate violent reaction.”
- Who defines the “offensive words”? I asked my wife the other day, “What does sexual harassment mean”? She said, “Whenever I feel threatened.” I asked her if all the women she works with function under the same criteria and she said, “No.” The “feeling” threshold varies with each person. That leaves the implementation of the law strictly in the hands of women with an overactive proboscis. I’ve found in my lifetime that the simple presence of “real men” generally threatens most pseudo or spurious women.
- “Immediate violent reaction,” you mean like “get upset,” “get sick,” or “get angry”? Who knows? I could walk up to someone, say a new neighbor, stick out my hand and say, “Hi. I’m Joe Blow. Who are you”? And get a violent reaction.
What Does This Mean? – No comment.
An additional note, while researching this matter I came across the following website: “Say Goodbye To The Arcata Eye. If I was to boycott some business, I’d tell that business owner and explain why. These people might try getting out their message on Twitter.
Also a Facebook page of the same name plus, “(Boycott advertisers).” With almost 200 friends listed.
[Picture]
[UPDATE :: Monday, August 30, 2010]
This is what happens when there is no accountability or oversight. Where people are treated as sub-humans just because they “resisted.” The threshold for resistance that justifies this sort of brutality is obscene. The latest on The Reporta is about the, “Martin Cotton Incident Going to Trial” – What happens if there is an award for damages in the millions? Who pays those cost? The police officers responsible, the police department, or the court that whitewashed the whole obscenity trying to protect their own? The people that pay for these costs are ultimately the people that are responsible for a police department, District Attorney, city government and Court system of judges that enables and promotes such corruption. You want this kind of law enforcement? Then pay the price. You can be sure you shall. When you do you can thank apologists like Kevin Hoover.
–Joe
Kevin Hoover’s complete comment: Read the rest of this entry »
What Does This Mean? – UPDATE
Pure Harassment! Divine Justice? Or something MORE insidious?
Sometimes your instincts are SPOT-ON. Other times you’re just LUCKY. I’d like to think it is DIVINE JUSTICE. Whatever it is, when it all comes together, IT IS SWEET.
As noted below, I came across this posting on the Arcata Eye website: Big Al Arrested In Valley West and the following caption: “APD Lt. Ryan Peterson said officers stood by as a citizen arrested Edmunson for allegedly disturbing the peace and “using words likely to produce a violent reaction.” [Emphasis added]
Right away that caught my attention. What does it mean “words likely to produce”? What words? What do they mean by “violent reaction”? Words like “Hey good lookin’?” Or “F*** A.P.D.”?
Then there is the “officers stood by as a citizen arrested” … “allegedly disturbing the peace” with “words” they say he used. Come on! Anyone that thinks they’ve got a problem with someone or just plain don’t like their looks can get together with a couple of their friends or neighbors and tell a police officer some cock-n-bull story and the police will go along with a “citizen’s arrest”? Can that only happen in Arcata? I can tell you for a fact, that won’t happen in Eureka with the E.P.D. even when you have credible witnesses and a criminal threat.
What were the Arcata Police going to do? Beat the crap out of him if he resisted? I’d see the day that someone set me up to go along with a “citizen’s arrest.” We still have the right to defend ourselves in this country. I’d make the police do the arresting and then hold the “citizen” responsible for their actions. I’ve got an idea they, the Arcata Police, instigated the “citizen’s arrest” anyway.
Why is any of this important? I watched Democracy Now this morning and learned more about how the law was enforced on a traumatized public in New Orleans, Louisiana after the Katrina disaster. Where the policing authorities from local, state and federal came in prepared for war, building cages for jails or prisons and began arresting mostly innocent people, charging them with bogus, made-up crimes, putting them in prison without any access or rights to a lawyer, phone calls, food or medical attention. They pretentiously called it “doing Katrina time.” I wonder what Alfred Edmunson et al. calls it? Think that could happen here? Like they say, the stage is set.
I was going to use this Update to address some of the more obvious issues in Kevin Hoover’s post on “What Does This Mean” when I decided to write about the issue of marijuana related deaths Kym Kemp raised on her blog article, “More on the Laytonville shooting.” She said, “One person dead in the grows this year from pointing a gun at an officer–I can understand one person foolish enough to do this. But 5? That is harder to grasp.” As do I.
To highlight the issue Kym raised and the wider implications I suggested that she go today’s Democracy Now ( Democracy Now, ) program on what happened in New Orleans five years ago. This sets a good baseline for comparison today. Next, I suggested that she go to today’s Times-Standard front-page article, “Marijuana grow operation shooting leaves one dead, …” and look at the picture of the six Sheriff’s Deputies (also attached here). The caption in the newspaper says: “SWAT team members prepare to depart the Kneeland Airport to a large outdoor marijuana garden on Thursday. …” In the article it says, “…[A] heavily armed SWAT team, dressed in camouflage fatigues and full tactical gear …” Further along the article says, “…[N]early two dozen officers clad in camouflage, wearing bulletproof vests and toting automatic weapons, …” This comment was of interest, “Downy (Undersheriff Mike Downey) said at the time that the team would approach the site with an abundance of caution because it was not clear if any other armed individuals were in the pot grow.”
Next, suggested she read my article, in The Joe Blow Report 2, “What Does This Mean” and also the associated comment by Kevin Hoover of the Arcata Eye that he made about my observations. A couple of things standout here, at least they do for me. One is, why do we need para-military police with automatic weapons in our society? Who are the people that justify such a threat? By the way, how many of those officers are military war veterans from Iraq or Afghanistan trained as “hunter-killers”?
Second, the policing authorities, the combined integration of all agencies, have put themselves on a war-footing against the general population. They hide behind and try to conceal what they are really doing by such things as their pseudo “war on terror,” “war on drugs” or their ultimate “war on class,” using such things as “public peace” or “offensive” or “provocative words” and hurt “feelings” that are so vague they are open to anyone’s interpretation and abuse. This situation is way beyond becoming a police state. You can already see the class warfare as defined and implemented by the attitude and class distinction as exemplified by Kevin Hoover’s opinionated reporting as defined by his comment, and the subsequent use and enforcement of discriminatory, and probably illegal laws. Its okay for one class of people to insult, abuse, incite and threaten, but just let their victims try to respond in the only way they know how to try to defend themselves and the full weight of the “law” and the police enforcement comes down on their heads.
And then there is the third standout, and that’s the general paranoia associated with an illegitimate war. How would you like to be a deer hunter that just wanders into close proximity with one of these “overly cautious” squads skulking around the woods? As we can see, it doesn’t take long to start building cages and parking people in them without any hope of getting out. It’s all about justifying an illegitimate right to exist.
–Joe
Kevin Hoover’s comment: Read the rest of this entry »
The Joe Blow Report 2 