After only a year in office, de Blasio finds himself in a crisis largely of his own making...Having antagonized the police by campaigning against stop and frisk policies, he went a bridge too far when he joined in the chorus of those treating law enforcement as the enemy after Ferguson and then the non-indictment of the officer accused of choking Garner. That rhetoric created the impression that de Blasio agreed with those who have come to view police officers as guilty until proven innocent when it comes to accusations of racism or violence against minorities.
The entire article, which isn't that long, is worth the read.The police are not perfect and can, like politicians, make terrible mistakes. But the problem with the post-Ferguson/Garner critique that was relentlessly plugged by racial inciters, the liberal media and prominent political leaders such as Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder is that it cherry picked two extraordinary and very different incidents and wove it seamlessly into a highly misleading narrative about racism that might have been applicable in Selma, Alabama in 1965 but doesn't reflect the reality of America in 2014.
The police turning their backs isn't inappropriate in my view as despite what some say the police aren't the Army and the mayor isn't their commander and chief (to the best of my knowledge). It is an apples to oranges kind of thing.
Much like how "Jackie"'s tall tale will have the ultimate effect of discouraging real rape victims from reporting the crime, overblown hysteria about police brutility by the mayor and Sharpton will create skepticism about the police officers who are "bad apples".
Although it is punishable under the UCMJ for US servicemen to turn their back on President Obama, from a moral standpoint, it's perfectly justifiable. Two examples will suffice: (1) Musa Ali Daqduq, a terrorist who, through perfidy, murdered five US servicemen in Iraq, was released by the Obama Administration--evil is really the only word I have for that and (2) during the Libyan operations, Obama took the position that American servicemen were not in combat--thus risking the position that they were covered by the Geneva Conventions--once again, evil.
The same does not obtain for DeBlasio. DeBlasio attacked the police as a whole and has made common cause with anti-cop zealot Al Sharpton. Why should DeBlasio expect respect in return?
I am not in favor of the police slowdown. However, once again, that's the fault of DeBlasio and his ilk. Dems have given us unionism of public employees. I don't mind seeing it bite them in the butt.
I do not think it is a useful endeavor to attempt to ascertain whether the Obama administrations actions or lack thereof on certain military matters would morally justify such a protest.
I served in the Army from 1998 to 2002 and one of the military engagements during that period was NATO's operation in Kosovo which I believed was wrong both morally and strategically, but I had to put those thoughts aside as I ended up deploying in Kosovo in 2001.
I also believe the entire Iraq operation was immoral in that it was commenced under false pretenses and at the end of the day, a secular strongman is far more desirable than the mess that is Iraq now. The benefit (whatever that is) has certainly not been worth the cost.
Lastly, I do not think any of this qualifies as evil, but more extremely poor judgment.
I don't think we really need to ascertain anything. Obama released a guy responsible for the perfidious murder of five American servicemen. Obama is the commander-in-chief, and has touted (when it served his political interests) the "sacred" bond between him and the troops. If this isn't evil, I don't know what is. As for the Libyan issue, same thing. Obama, for his own naked political interests, declared the Libya intervention not to be combat, thus undermining Geneva Conventions protections for US servicemen participating in it.
It's morally justified to turn one's back on this disgrace.
As for Iraq---"false pretenses" is a pretty strong charge. Saddam, as it turned out, was trying to convince the Iranians (a mortal threat to him) that he had WMD.
In the context of foreign affairs, I think it is often forgotten that war is policy by other means. Concepts like good and evil might make for good political speeches but military actions aren't taken against subjects / entities solely on their relative evilness. If so, Saudi Arabia and North Korea would have been taken out by us a long time ago.
So the rationale of the aforementioned actions were taken to accomplish something which someone in the Obama administration thought would further some objective. It appears it may have been extremely poor judgment, but evil just doesn't apply.
At the end of World War 2, some Nazi's got tried for war crimes and some didn't. It had little to do with evil, but more to do with utility - Nazi's who could build rockets didn't get tried and those who couldn't did. Nothing wrong with that, but was it evil to let certain people off the hook because they were useful? I think not.