Militarizing America’s police forces
Attention citizens: I have received inside information revealing that global terrorists are targeting us again. Their target is not Washington, D.C., New York City, or even Disneyland. Rather, it
is: Concord.
You know, in New Hampshire. The state capital. Even though only about 43,000 people live there, Concord apparently has strategic significance, for the local police, fully backed by the city council, are preparing for a horrific terroristical assault. Specifically, they’re seeking $258,000 from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) so they can gird themselves by purchasing a Lenco BearCat G3 armored vehicle.
This bold stand to defend the homeland was revealed by the New Hampshire Civil Liberties Union, which obtained a copy of the grant request. Actually, it is not al Qaeda terrorists that have Concord’s police gearing up for war, but “the domestic type” of terrorists.
Really? In Concord? Yes, insist police, referring vaguely to
“daily challenges” and warning that the “threat is real and here.”
Who are these domestic demons? The police finger two groups: Occupy New Hampshire, whose “violence” has mostly been in the form of organizing litter pickup days, and the Free State Project, a libertarianish outfit trying to convince 20,000 like-minded people to
move to New Hampshire.
Neither group is armed or dangerous, and both are committed to nonviolence. Yet, the police claim they need a BearCat G3 to respond to terrorism involving “chemical, biological, and radiological materials, as well as explosive gases.”
The most explosive gas in this case is coming from police officials who have tagged their own peaceful citizens as “terrorists.” And the real threat to our security is DHS, which keeps shoveling our tax dollars into the militarization of police forces all across the country.
This article appears in August 23 • 2013.