Below are observations about ongoing events in Ferguson, Missouri as our militarized police attack people protesting yet another police killing of an unarmed Black person. 

Above is a picture of the militarized police in Ferguson. 

1. Offering people health care is government tyranny that will lead to death panels, but camoflaugedmilitarized police with war weapons blocking off an American city is law and order. 

2. The conduct of the militarized camouflage-wearing police in Ferguson, Missouri along with the silence of the government bashers over such conduct is enough to make a loyal American liberal consider buying a gun for simple self-defense. And then also is the silence of so many fellow liberals.

3. The silence of libertarians about the militarized camouflage-wearing police in Ferguson, Missouri clues you into the fact that they are the very same racist states-rights disloyal folks you imagined they were.And that is damned well what Rand Paul is as well.

4. Hillary Clinton can play off the animus towards our Black President by criticizing him on the central issues of the day, but she can't say a word about events in Ferguson, Missouri that are of such import to the most loyal Democrats of all?

5. Race remains the central issue in American political and social life as it has been since the first time a European met a Native American.

6. Here is the Twitter feed from Ferguson, Missouri tonight detailing the actions of our violent militarized police in a state with a Democratic Governor.  

Read about it all for yourself. 

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Police and citizens are at odds with one another in Ferguson, Missouri after the recent shooting of unarmed 18 year old Michael Brown by Ferguson police. 

Ferguson police and St. Louis County police are responding to both peaceful protest and to some looting with tear gas, SWAT teams and armored vehicles. Police have in some cases directed members of the media to leave the scene of the demonstrations.  

I understand frustration with the police that many people in Ferguson and St. Louis County maintain, and the great concern over the shooting of Mr. Brown. 

It seems sometimes that police can get away with anything.

Protests and demonstrations are a reasonable and fully legal response to allegations of police violence. 

Above is a picture from the Ferguson protests.  Many of the demonstrators have been holding their arms up and calling out "don't shoot" to the heavily armed militarized police.     

It is good, and not at all surprising, that most of the protests in Ferguson have been peaceful.

Our militarized police and our many fellow citizens who worship guns and who are moved by anger and hatred of people who are different, want nothing more than acts of violence to use a reason to respond with brutality and repression.   

Violence will be met with severe measures and the stockpiling of even bigger weapons that will further erode civil liberties and basic freedoms for all Americans. 

The corporations who supply the big weapons do well from militarized police.        

The citizen response to violations of civil rights and basic liberty must be disciplined and creative. 

Smart, persistent and calm action and response is needed if everyday peaceful-minded people are going to successfully fight back against the violence/surveillance culture of modern day policing and the government/private sector collusion against our civil liberties. 

Please read all of NeilAquino.com   

I've made a small donation to UNICEF to assist in the Ebola outbreak going on in parts of Africa. 

There is so much taking place in our nation and in the world, that we can lose sight of people having a hard time in a rough part of our shared earth. 

Here is a story about the current outbreak from The New York Times.

Here are facts about Ebola.

Here is the link to UNICEF.

Here is the link to Doctors Without Borders. 

In the short span of our lives, we can make individual effort to assist larger structures capable of addressing problems we cannot solve on our own.
Government can often be part of the solutions we need to solve big problems.


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As a Texan, I'm not concerned about migrant children at the Texas/Mexico border. 

We are now using game wardens to protect us from these children. 

Kids with the wits and gumption to get here by themselves might well be an improvement on the native population. 

What I'm concerned about is our possible next Governor Greg Abbott, who, like a psychopath, fights the  extension of life-saving health insurance to all Texans in a state with the highest percentage  of uninsured in the nation. 

I'm concerned about the Texas Legislature and Governor Rick Perry who passed the forced sonogram law. This law is no more than state-mandated rape for Texas women seeking a Constitutionally protected abortion. 

I'm concerned about many of my fellow Texans who are angry and armed and who want to form citizen militias. 

I'm concerned about my fellow motorists in Harris County, Texas who contribute to one of the worst drunk-driving rates in the nation.

Many of our political leaders and fellow citizens in Texas are violent crazies who will ruin your life over nothing. 

Immigrant children and refugees from Mexico and Central America are far less menacing and quite possibly far more productive and helpful than many of my fellow Texans.

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Why would a country like the United States which had the transmission of smallpox to Native Americans as a founding act, be concerned about a few falsely rumored cases of ebola in the United States?   

Even if the smallpox epidemic of early America was at first unintended, Indian removal and extermination was time and time again seen as God's will and as indicative of American Manifest Destiny. 

I hope the ebola outbreak in the world ends soon.  

But we should take the current outbreak as a chance to remind ourselves of our own history, and of the fact we so often seem to care a lot more for people we see as like ourselves rather than for people who seem different or who are somehow inconvenient to have around.      

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Peace to the memory of former Ronald Reagan Press Secretary James Brady.  

Mr. Brady died today at age 73.

Mr. Brady was shot and severely injured in the 1981 assassination attempt on President Reagan. 

(Above is a picture from the assassination attempt.)  

Despite his longterm injuries, Mr. Brady and his wife never gave up on gun control.

On gun control and on whatever issues are of value to each of  us, we should follow the example of Mr. Brady and never give up.

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The New York City Medical examiner has reached the conclusion that Eric Garner died on Staten Island due to a chokehold placed on him by a New York City police officer.

Mr. Garner was selling untaxed cigarettes out on the street when approached by police.  

Here is the video of Mr. Garner's chokehold death.  

Chokeholds are banned for use by New York City police.

I don't want to be a reflexive basher of police. We've got to take every person as an individual.  

There are times in life when you need a cop. 

But it is also so that sometimes that police can kill for no good reason and get away with the crime. 

There cannot be justice in America until all people--including police officers-- are treated justly under the law.  

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