This is from www.counterpunch.org
McKinney Abandoned
By Alexander Cockburn
Not one Democrat in Congress (and few outside it) would stand up for
Cynthia McKinney, victim of racial profiling right in their own
hallway. Eventually the Democratic leadership forced her to apologize.
It's not the first time they've thrown her to the wolves. The first
time was when they backed Majette against her in her own district.
Majette repaid the Democrats' favor by eventually converting to the
Republican Party, allowing McKinney to recapture her seat. Then, when
she was back in the House, her fellow Dems denied her the appropriate
seniority from her previous five terms. The uproar over McKinney's swat
of the Capitol Hill cop with her cell phone after he's manhandled her
was grotesque. Tot up the hours devoted to McKinney, as opposed to the
fleeting attention to Republican Rep Duke Cunningham, finally sent to
the Joint for taking upwards of $2 million in bribes; or to David
Savafian, Bush's man in charge of procurement at OMB, arrested for
corruption as a spin-off of the Abramoff scandal.
CounterPuncher Fred Gardner used to work as San Francisco DA Terrence
Hallinan's press secretary, and had plenty of time at the S.F. Hall of
Justice to observe security gates and how they should be supervised.
Here's a letter he sent to the S.F. Chronicle:
The Washington, D.C. cop who grabbed Cynthia McKinney's arm should
not have been assigned to his checkpoint job in the first place. The
basic situation is familiar to millions of American workers -metal
detectors and i.d. checks for the masses, easy entrée for the regular
employees. At the San Francisco Hall of Justice one or, at peak hours,
two cops from Southern Station handle the handbag and knapsack
inspections while casting an eye over who is whisking in. The job calls
for not just a good memory but good judgment, because the regular
employees often are accompanied by guests, some of whom are not what
you'd call classy-looking. It is INCONCEIVABLE that any of the three
SFPD regulars (RIP, Eric R.) would ever come up behind and grab the arm
of a woman who had passed through the checkpoint without apparent
authorization. Inconceivable because righteous men don't grab women.
Inconceivable because it would only take three quick strides to
confront the possible interloper from in front. Blame should go not
only to the D.C. cop who failed to recognize Rep. McKinney and then
manhandled her, but to the captain who assigned him a job he obviously
wasn't fit to handle.
PS: There's another respect in which the officers stationed at the
entrance to 850 are well suited to the job. They don't glare. Their
demeanor is neither friendly nor unfriendly, it's neutral. They
obviously don't pump iron, either. They are in no way intimidating.
They don't add to the inherent unpleasantness of the experience
(getting searched and entering that dismal building).
Here at CounterPunch we don't think McKinney handled the affair deftly.
Why did she have to appear on talk shows with lawyers? Tom DeLay, who's
got a lot to answer for, confronted the press alone, and never stopped
smiling. And why, oh why did McKinney apologize? As Jesse Jackson
learned, it doesn't do any good. You've copped a guilty plea and then
they say, You didn't apologize enough! You have to go on apologizing
for the rest of your life.
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