The letter below is a reply to a letter on McManus selection as Police Chief
by Tamit Nolley to the Minneapolis Issues List. He also tried to send it to
the 5th District Green Party but he put in the wrong address (Tamir -- the
corect email address is [EMAIL PROTECTED],)
Robert Halfhill [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tamir:
Just a few thoughts on the selection of McManus as Police Chief and the
Stonewall endorsements.
I supported the selection of McManus and even contacted Mayor Rybak and
Council Member Goodman to urge his appointment. I also called Natalie Johnson
Lee's office to inform them about what I had done. The reason for my support
was that McManus had a TRACK RECORD of cracking down on police brutality at his
previous post as a police chief. While the two internal department candidates
MAY have been progressive if appointed, only McManus had a past record about
what he had done.
The Community United Against Police Brutality indicated that they were
disatisfied with McManus according to the last STAR TRIBUNE quote of a
Committee statement. I, however am still withholding judgement. Given that
McManus has been Police Chief for a year and given how pervasive police
brutality has been, I expect to see far more heads rolling in the police
department than have so far rolled if he is to live up to his past promise.
It is a touchy subject but, even given all the ways women are discriminated
against in this society, I don't think WHITE WOMEN are as likely to be subject
to police beatings, the raw physical brutality, as African Americans are. That
is why the Womens' and African American communities reached different
conclusions about who to support for Police Chief. The MAJORITY of the women
active in the feminist movement happen to be white. This is not so much a
criticism as a statement of fact. The MAJORITY of activists in the GLBTI
movements also happen to be white. And activists in both movements, as well as
in many other movements, have agonized over how to change that. But given this
fact, white women not being subjected to as much of the raw physical police
brutality as African Americans, had the goal of having the first woman
Minneapolis Police Chief uppermost in their minds. Most African Americans
realized the overriding importance of STOPPING police brutality and selec
ting the candidate who was most likely to stop it, no matter what color he was.
I won't have time to dig out the data until tomorrow, but the Stonewall DFL
Caucus' endorsement of such people as Barbara Johnson and Lisa Goodman are
absurd, given their refusal to put the medicinal marijuana referendum on the
Minneapolis ballot. It was through my activism in ACT-UP that I became
familiar with the many medicinal benefits of marijuana, including its benefits
to both cancer chemotherapy and AIDS patients in combatting nausea AND
stimulating appetite. They pled that medicinal marijuana was not a city issue
in spite of the PRACTICAL situation of the state legislature being unwilling to
even let medicinal marijuana bills out of committee and the FACT that the
passage of a medicinal marijuana referendum in Minnesota's largest city would
have told legislators that there was voter support for such a measure.
Given marijuana's medicinal uses in combatting the nausea, vomiting and poor
appetite associated with AIDS, this IS a Gay issue and the Stonewall
Committee's endorsement of Council Members who voted against putting this on
the ballot is deplorable!
In the early 1980's, the Gay Survival fund ran me for City Council two times
and both times my candidacy threw the election to the Republican. I had been
reluctant to do this to Lisa Goodman in the past since I was on friendly terms
with her and knew her from her being the local head of the National Abortion
Rights Action Council and her contacts with ACT-UP. But because of her vote
against medicinal marijuana, I may just run against her in the next City
Council elections.
Robert Halfhill [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://halfhillviews.greatnow.com
http://www.thepen.us/e-fraud.html
REMINDERS:
1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If
you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL
PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list.
2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait.
For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html
For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract
________________________________
Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn
E-Democracy
Post messages to: mailto:[email protected]
Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
