Page 2—The Portland Observer—April 10, 1991 The Mourning Of Men In Blue Fails To Stir Public Sympathy For Gates L.A.’s Police Chief Awakens to a New And Colder Morning [ by Professor McKinley Burt A three part series by A. Lee Henderson B eautiful that war and all its deeds o f carnage m ust in time be utterly lost, t h a t the hands o f the sisters Death and N igh t incessantly softly wash again and ever again, this soiled world. R econciliation by Walt Whitman You d eal in the raw material o f opinion, and, i f my convictions have any validity, opinion ultim ately gov­ erns the world. A ddress to A ssociated Press, A pril 2 0 ,1 9 1 5 , Woodrow Wilson “ T h is so iled w o rld ” readies itself once more for an uneasy peace­ tim e, sig n ifie d sadly by the recent Los Angeles spec­ tacle o f members o f the Police D e­ partment brutaliz­ Dr.A. Lee ing a young black Henderson man, defenseless on the city streets, who had been appre­ hended for a reputed speeding viola­ tion. The new eyes-and-conscience of the world purrs, its motors humming, in the technology available through video cam eras in the hands of private citi­ zens, instantly available to chronicle the unwitting offenders...this time the blow s adm inistered through batons (nightsticks wielded as clubs) by three officers who struck over 50 times and also kicked the pleading victim, Rod­ ney Glenn King, 25, while a dozen other people, among them police w it­ nessed, standing silently by the Lakeview Terrace area in cid en t Shocking? No more than usual as any o f us know who have been regaled over the years with cries o f “ police brutality” that have gone uncontested for want of proof or pursuit o f law enforcem ent For want o f the average citizens’ abil­ ity to rally people to his defense for fear o f public humiliation, exposure o f an arrest record, and simply...because it’s too hard to prove their story against the police testimony that contradicts their claims as “ unfounded” . It is not a case o f “ them ” against “ us” . It is a case o f non-equal justice. M inorities are the w hipping “ dogs” ...easily the butt o f hostilities meted out by those in police uniforms who are not adequately trained, screened, or prepared for their on-duty assign­ m ents in the role o f “ peace officers” . There are exceptions...good ones, to be sure. Our concern is to more adequately set up the citizens’ watch cross-country w hich can change the face o f our na­ tion’s police enforcem ent bodies into m odels better equipped to protect its citizenry. During the Persian G ulf W ar we saw the m ilitary put into effect a bar­ rage o f sensitivity training program s to alleviate racism and render even more effective the power o f our integrated troops against a common enemy attack­ ing its Victim...Kuwait. Today, our common enemy is crime attacking its citizenry ...you and me. We have got to m obilize to protect the en­ tire citizenry...even a form er criminal returned to its ranks such as Rodney Glenn King. No police rationale can justify the vicious beating we saw through the se c re t eyes o f a v id eo cam era...watching. The w itnesses be­ came you and me. We do not legally batter people to teach them lessons. Not in America. Nor will we allow ourselves to graduate into a police state...not a police state m entality, nor a police state methodology. IT C A N ’T HAPPEN HERE, and it’s time that we assert ourselves through our legislators to re-inforce their posi­ tions. Prom ises to eliminate the plagues o f “ peace” officer violence w ill not suffice. We know the score. And we know that we may invoke the words of our nation’s President Bush to sound the drum roll for Action No w since he spoke o f ‘ ‘setting the face o f the nation against discrim ination, hate and bigotry and to elim inate that.” His State o f the Nation address following the Persian G ulf W ar ironically preceded L .A .’s police bru­ tality. Police C hief Daryl F. Gates in his speech at the Los Angeles Police A cad­ em y took the best defense...a strong offense as he swiped back at his city’s M ayor Bradley and the American Civil Liberties Union. The Police Academy rallied nearly 60 com m anding officers, including A ssistant C hief Robert Ver­ non to support the manner in which Gates handled the incident...the beating o f King, an A ltadena citizen. The L eague’s president Lt. George Aliano said he would send ballots out im m edi­ ately to solicit a “ vote o f confidence” for Gates, their chief, among their po­ lice...8,200 members. The m orale of police was said to be seriously im pacted the the actions “ o f a few ” reflecting the good guys. So we were told. The organized police departm ent in Los Angeles is behaving...or being led to behave...as a powerful cordon of loyalists to their police chief who, their leaders say has been subjected to a “ lynch-mob m entality” requesting his resignation. Los Angeles is no small microcosm of the nation’s police departments. Multiply in cities across the country the unreported misuse o f force by licensed police. That alarms us. The unity rallied behind Gates suggests that he is positioning him self for a vigorous defense against the pub­ lic opposition expressed to date, the actions to redress the unprovoked beat­ ing o f citizen Rodney King by the ACLU .and the questions that have popped into the minds o f the unsuspecting pub­ lic who has either been wearing blinders to civil rights history or prefers to re­ main numb, and can no longer. Gates is clever. He is playing politi­ cal football to m aintain his absolute power, and he is doing it within the police department to maximize his control at a time most crucial for his survival. He is not about to resign or accept charges that he is the father figure too often quoted in favor o f a lethal law that would kill drug offenders. A police chief who disowned his own son several years ago for drug abuses parades macho and m erciless attitudes. T hat is his privilege...to deny his son or renounce any degree o f fatherly guilt, blame or complicity. When Gates displays a blame- less-at-all-costs facade o f sw agger be­ fore the men in his com m and, they get the message. They emulate their C hief in giving themselves permission to judge. Police are peace officers...not judges. They imitate Gates too often with a militancy that stomps on individual rights indiscrim inately under the guise o f “ up­ holding the law.” Are they? And why should they question them selves? Does Police C hief Gates question himself? Obviously those who do question him...the American Civil Liberties Union, for exam ple, com e directly into the line o f his emotional fire...he even sneers at the A C LU ’s invaluable reputation for fairness as an investigative, objective body geared to protecting human civil rights., Gates dism isses the ACLU and other critics because he feels they are displaying a “ lynch mob m entality.” They are out to get him, not defend wrong-doing or due process or civil abuses. The local incident in Las Vegas where three policem en entered a private residence without a search warrant and brutalized a black man on the basis of “ suspicion” , not fact. The “ restraint” resulted in their chokehold killing him. The three policem en were tried in the courts and a verdict o f not-guilty was rendered with a failsafe prohibition locked into the decision...no retrial. The Las V egas incident was cov­ ered in local papers. I was told about it, but to my know l­ edge the “ incident largely avoided na­ tional publicity. Perhaps the local papers nation­ wide preferred to ignore the story as a local incident...nothing impacting other cities or states. If this is true, we had Continued next week Isaac Newton: Black History Student There is good reason to reem pha­ size the many facets o f this noted scien­ tists research and investigations. W hile he is best known for his “ Theory of Universal G ravitation” , it is usually concealed from us that his first aca­ demic pursuits were in the areas of African history, religion, philosophy and m athematics. An exam ination of the early thoughts and writings clearly reveal how and where Newton devel­ oped his concept o f a single, unifying “ U N IV ERSA L” force that unified nature and man. Thanks to the scholars at C am br­ idge University, England, we know what 99% o f American academ ics do not wish us to know; that N ew ton’s ‘first’ book was ‘ ‘A Dissertation upon the sacred Cubit of the Jews and the cubits o f several Na­ tions: in which from the D im ensions of the G reatest Pyram id, as taken by Mr. John Greaves, the ancient Cubit of Memphis [Africa] is determined.” (The “ C ubit” is an ancient African unit of m easurem ent that was proliferated throughout the known w orld-’Temple o f Solomon/Moses’,’Noah’s Ark; Greece and Rome). W hy is this type o f inform ation so im portant at this late date? For one thing, in these times o f organized and m alevolent attacks upon the intellec­ tual capabilities o f blacks throughout history, it is terribly im portant that both w e and our children have in reply clear, docum ented evidence o f our seminal contributions to the culture and tech­ nology o f civilization. Certainly, last week, I made some inroads against the “ tribes of racist detractors’ ’. But, ‘eter­ nal vigilance' is required and I used the school district’s ‘‘Baseline Essays” and Sunday’s “ Town Hall Program ” (KATU) to make my point. Isaac Newton, in order to prove his theory o f gravitation, had found it nec­ essary, first, to establish reliable ‘univer- sal’standards o f measurements in re­ spect to the earth and the solar system. There were only two places on earth where such values could be estab­ lished; at the G REA T PYRAMID; GIZEH, AFRICA and in Israel where conquering Kings o f Egypt and Ethio­ pia had established their adm inistra­ tions, including standards o f measure­ ment. This is why Newton studied the works o f the Jewish historian Josephus to correlate the “ cubit” o f the pillars of the Tem ple at Jerusalem to that o f the African Pyramid. This is also why Thomas Jefferson incorporated the Pyram id and the eye o f the African god, Horus into THE GREAT SEAL O F THE UNITED STATES (See the reverse side o f a one dollar bill). So we see it as an obscene joke when we have a m odem writer saying ‘ ‘...there can never be a scientist like Newton again...for scientists now have books and libraries, microfilms, com puterized information. NEW TON HAD NOTHING...except G alileo’s thoughts and K epler’s laws of Plane­ tary Motion (p.135, Beckman, “ The History o f P i” , St. M artins, 1971). If we blacks are to motivate our youth effectively in this world o f increasing technological complexity we have got to teach them who they are and who they ‘w ere’. In the same vein, they need to know that among that graffiti left by visitors (and plagiarists) to that great African Pyramid is that o f two noted m athematicians who are alleged to have made the discoveries for which they are famous. “ Fibonacci,” son o f Itlay's m erehantile consul to Africa, for whom the most powerful tool of modem mathe­ matics and physics is named. And ‘ ‘ M ercator” , the m aster(?) o f geometry for whom the famous “ M ercator Map Projection “ is named. In his 1971 book, “ Secrets o f the G reat Pyram id” , Peter Tompkins shows how a junior high school student could derive these universal equation from an exam ination o f the African Pyramid (Newton did-YOUR CHILD COULD!) Nothing has changed much has it? We have it, “ In 1720 rum ors spread among the historians of Paris tliat Newton had descended from the heavens where he had DIVINED TH E LAW S o f the movements o f the planets, and had deigned to study chronology, mythol­ ogy and the revolutions o f states and empires” (principally African). See p.21, Maneul, “ Isaac Newton: H istorian” , Harvard U. Press, 1963" and see, West- fall, “ Never At Rest: A Biography of Isaac N ew ton” , Cam bridge U. Press, 1987 ed. Fortunately, at the time Isaac Newton was doing his research and w riting (17th century), Charles Darwin had not yet produced his great work on evolution, “ The Origin o f Species By M eans of Natural Selection-Or The Preservation o f FAVORED RACES In The Struggle For L ife” (published m iddle o f 19th century). I say this because the racists of the world siezed upon D arw in’s book to justify every preconception that ever existed in respect to the ‘Superiority of the northern European races. Newton ‘told it like it w as’-like he found it (and used it)-from African science and as­ tronomy to religion and culture; even in his ‘serm ons’ given in Trinity Chapel. United Way Names Vice President Priscilla Seaborg has been appointed vice president of public policy at United W ay o f the Colum bia-W illam ette. Seaborg has been with United Way for one year as governm ent relations director. She currently working with other human services providers to en ­ courage the 1991 Legislature to main- lain funding levels for those program s, which face potential budget cuts be­ cause o f M easure 5. Before coming to United W ay, Seaborg was a federal public defender in Portland, representing indigent people charged in U.S. D istrict CourL Seaborg received her law degree from Indiana University in 1981 and is a m ember of the Indiana State Bar. This follows a 1977 bachelor o f arts degree in forensic studies from the same uni­ versity. She passed the Oregon State Bar exam in 1990. 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