The “don’t shoot” myth

On the fifth anniversary of the death — note that word — of make-believe martyr Michael Brown, two Democratic presidential candidates chose to go willfully insane and trash the facts of the infamous case that gave rise to the fallacious “Hands up, don’t shoot” rallying cry.

That’s quite a mouthful. Let me break it down: In tweets, both Eilzabeth Warren and Kamala Harris described Brown’s death as murder.

Murder is a synonym for homicide. For there to be a murder, there must be a murderer, and in the Brown case, the other party was police officer Darren Wilson. The white police officer did shoot Brown, an 18-year-old African-American who earlier had strong armed a local merchant and stolen cigarellos, a theft that was captured on video.

The hulking Brown then walked  in the middle of a street in Ferguson, Mo., when Wilson rolled up in his SUV  and attempted to question him. A struggle ensued when Brown reached inside the police car and tried to grab Wilson’s gun.

Brown fled after Wilson’s gun was discharged, then turned around and moved back toward Wilson, who felt threatened. He fired, striking Brown six times, and killing him. 

Brown never raised his hands and said, “Don’t shoot.” It did not happen. 

Some of you are so deeply invested in the myth, you won’t believe me. Maybe you will believe Jonathan Capehart, a liberal, African-American member of the Washington Post editorial board. Flat out, he says if you believe Brown raised his hands and tried to surrender, you are believing a lie.

Capehart exhaustively cites chapter and verse. 

Based on the evidence, the Ferguson police department found Wilson blameless. Sure, you say, what do you expect? I understand the skepticism of the cops investigating the cops. 

So the U.S. Department of Justice swooped in. This was not just Barack Obama’s DOJ, it was Attorney General Eric Holder’s DOJ and I imagine him directing his investigators to find the evidence to nail Wilson to a cross.

Lord knows they tried, but they failed. After tedious, detailed interviews with witnesses and scouring DNA and forensic evidence, DOJ found no case that could be made against Wilson. Given the circumstances, his actions were lawful.

DOJ did make a case against the Ferguson police department for actual bigotry. That was an important finding. 

When the two candidates tried to outwoke each other, they directed attention to a lie, and away from the real problem of racism that exists in some (many?) American police departments.

Warren and Harris — herself a former prosecutor trying to make like a boa and shed her prosecutorial skin — grasped at a straw as wrong as the deluded souls who think Mumia Abu-Jamal didn’t murder police officer Daniel Faulkner.

For there to be a murder, there must be a murderer. 

In Daniel Faulkner’s case there was one.

In Michael Brown’s case, there was not.