Page 2 The Skanner November 11, 2015
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Challenging People to Shape
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Opinion
Bernie Foster
Founder/Publisher
Truth of Fake ‘Hero’ Cop Proves White Lies Matter
Bobbie Dore Foster
Executive Editor
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Advertising Manager
Christen McCurdy
News Editor
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2015
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AWARDS
WINNER
The Skanner has received 20 NNPA awards since 1998
The Skanner Newspaper, es-
tablished in October 1975, is a
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every Wednesday by IMM Publi-
cations Inc.
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riting under the
headline,
“Police
lives matter too,”
Chicago
Tribune
Columnist John Kass summed
up the sentiment — and mass
hysteria — surrounding the
supposed Sept. 1 murder of a
policeman in a bedroom com-
munity 50 miles north of Chi-
cago. He wrote that the killing
“had nothing to do with our
hashtag politics of which lives
matter,” but that Kass was
wrong.
We have since learned that
it was all a hoax or, as the chief
investigator put it, “a careful-
ly staged suicide” by the man
known as G.I. Joe, who was
about to be exposed as a thief.
Even though the number
of cops losing their lives in
the line of duty by firearms
is down this year, cops and
conservatives have sought to
project a different picture in
the aftermath of the August
28 murder of Harris County,
Texas Deputy Sheriff Darren
H. Goforth, who was repeat-
edly shot in the back of the
head at a service station in
Cypress, Texas, a Houston
suburb.
Just days later, more than
1,000 miles away, the death of
Lt. Joseph Gliniewicz in Illi-
nois brought about increased
attacks on the Black Lives
George E.
Curry
NNPA
Columnist
Matter Movement and Pres-
ident Obama. Now we know
that Gliniewicz was lying
when he radioed in that he
was in pursuit of three sus-
pects — an African American
and two Whites — after he
was supposedly shot by them.
The resulting manhunt cost
more than $300,000.
Though Obama had strong-
“
out, the myth of the ‘Fergu-
son Effect’ — the idea crime
has increased because cops
are more restrained because
of increased scrutiny in the
aftermath of episodes of po-
lice brutality — has been thor-
oughly discredited.”
Even so, Fox co-host Kim-
berly Guilfoyle said, cops
“don’t want to be arrested or
persecuted for just putting on
the blue every morning.”
But Radley Balko of the
Washington Post destroyed
such faulty reasoning.
“On the first point, the impli-
cation seems to be that people
should just keep quiet in the
face of what they perceive to
Though Obama had strongly de-
nounced attacks on police, his crit-
ics pretended he had never said a
word
ly denounced attacks on po-
lice, his critics pretended he
had never said a word.
Media Matters, the watch-
dog group, noted in a head-
line: “Fox Figures Demand
Obama Make Remarks Con-
demning Violence Against
Police Days After He Did Just
That.”
As Media Matters pointed
be brutality and injustice, lest
it embolden violence against
the police,” he wrote. “The
second point is more alarm-
ing. If police in Baltimore and
St. Louis are letting protest-
ers and critics make them too
afraid or spiteful to do their
jobs, essentially turning their
backs to allow people to be
robbed and killed, that isn’t a
problem with protester or so-
cial justice culture, it’s a prob-
lem with police culture. “
The real problem is that
the crew at Fox TV and oth-
er conservatives, some run-
ning for president, took the
easy and popular way out by
rallying around police, even
when attacks on them are
down, all the facts were not
yet in and, in the case of Lt. Joe
Gliniewicz in Illinois, he was
plotting to have a hit put on a
city official because he feared
she was on to his trail.
All of them owe President
Obama and the Black Lives
Matter Movement an apolo-
gy. But, like Donald Trump,
they are incapable of admit-
ting they are wrong.
George E. Curry is Presi-
dent and CEO of George Curry
Media, LLC. He is the former
editor-in-chief of Emerge mag-
azine and the National News-
paper Publishers Association
News Service (NNPA). He is a
keynote speaker, moderator,
and media coach. Curry can be
reached through his Web site,
georgecurry.com. You can also
follow him at twitter.com/cur-
rygeorge, George E. Curry Fan
Page on Facebook, and Peri-
scope. See previous columns at
http://www.georgecurry.com/
columns.
info@theskanner.com
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THE SKANNER
40TH ANNIVERSARY
TOAST EVENT
SLIDE SHOW
at
TheSkanner.com
Child Watch: Helping Children Cope with Crisis
E
xecutive Director of the
Connecticut
Commis-
sion on Children Elaine
Zimmerman helps meet
many child needs in her state
including sharing advice to
help children cope with terri-
ble events.
Some of our nation’s largest
tragedies have hit Connectitu-
cut’s children close to home.
Many lost family members
who worked in New York City
on Sept. 11, 2001.
Then there was the un-
imaginable heartbreak and
horror of the mass shooting
in Newtown, Conn., when 20
first-graders and six beloved
teachers were murdered in a
place where families believed
their children would be safe.
Constant stories about
wars, desperate refugee par-
ents and children, worries
about attacks on places of
worship, and the cumulative
natural and unnatural dev-
astation can make the world
seem like a very scary, unpre-
dictable place.
So Elaine Zimmerman has
shared suggestions she, as
Executive Director of the
Connecticut Commission on
Children gives adults to help
children cope with crisis and
provide all children the secu-
rity they desperately need.
• Connect. Counter isolation
and fear with comfort and
understanding.
•
Marian
Wright
Edelman
Children’s
Defense
Fund
Listen carefully and an-
swer children’s questions
directly and honestly when-
ever possible. Authentic
response in tragedy is so
important to children and
youths.
“
their safety.
• Direct children to a school
or community counselor
who serves children and
families if you perceive that
the response they are show-
ing might benefit from a
professional conversation.
Counseling, often short-
term and focused, can be
tremendously helpful when
needed.
• Show antipathy to violence
and hatred. Bullying and ra-
cial bias in school are local
forms of the cruelty we see
on the world stage.
Authentic response in tragedy is so
important to children and youths
• Provide a message of
warmth and security. Chil-
dren need to know that
home is safe, so show them
you love them and will pro-
tect them.
• Highlight steps to keep
school safe. As a teacher,
note strong school safety
measures and explain that
school is one of the safest
places in our communities.
• Know what to do, as much
as possible, in a disaster.
Develop emergency plans
that include roles for the
children. Ensure they know
adults are thinking about
• Ask children who their he-
roes are. Mention yours.
Talk about heroes together.
• Honor good works and
deeds.
• Help children become ev-
eryday heroes.
• Get back to normal. Do not
let a tragedy leak into play,
routine and normal activi-
ty.
• Bring hope back that
change can happen. For
many, current events have
put hope in a back drawer.
We owe it to our children
to reclaim it. Children need
hope if they’re to lead in
constructive, creative ways.
I am deeply grateful for re-
sources like these.
Children desperately need
adults to help them process
and cope within the violent
and uncertain world we have
created for them.
They also need to see adults
working with and for them
to create a better, safer na-
tion and world for tomorrow.
Elaine Zimmerman reminds
us that “[Children] want to
repair the world. From the
youngest to the oldest child,
there is a stark awareness of
the plight of others.
“To them, our world is un-
safe, violent, hateful – and yet
good. This is a healthy sign in
a complex time.”
Adults should join our chil-
dren with urgency in repair-
ing and building a world safe
for every child.
Marian Wright Edelman
is President of the Children’s
Defense Fund whose Leave No
Child Behind® mission is to
ensure every child a Healthy
Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start,
a Safe Start and a Moral Start
in life and successful passage
to adulthood with the help of
caring families and communi-
ties. For more information go to
www.childrensdefense.org.