Remember that charming sheriff who spoke at the Republican National Convention, describing protests against police killing people as “a collapse of social order”? (The social order is that police get to kill people without protest, dammit!) The one whose sheriff uniform looked like he’d come out of a high-level meeting at the Pentagon? Anyway, that guy. Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke. Ever vigilant in his quest to stay in the spotlight, Clarke Has Some Thoughts on Tuesday night’s planned Democratic convention appearance by the Mothers of the Movement.
"Donald Trump is the law and order candidate, and this DNC seems to be about embracing criminality and criminal behavior, trying to mainstream criminal behavior, hold these individuals up as if they're martyrs of the civil rights movement,” Clarke told Fox's Megyn Kelly.
Speaking Tuesday: Gwen Carr, mother of Eric Garner. Maria Hamilton, mother of Dontre Hamilton. Lezley McSpadden, mother of Michael Brown. Geneva Reed-Veal, mother of Sandra Bland. Sybrina Fulton, mother of Trayvon Martin. Lucia McBath, mother of Jordan Davis. Cleopatra Pendleton-Cowley, mother of Hadiya Pendleton.
In other words, Clarke is effectively arguing that summary execution is the appropriate penalty for selling loose cigarettes or sleeping in a park or committing a minor traffic violation, and that to object to summary execution as a penalty for these grave offenses is to “mainstream criminal behavior.” To say nothing of the women on this list whose children were killed by civilians for playing music loudly or walking through the wrong neighborhood.
Do we live in a country where, if you’re black, an officer of the state can shoot and kill you for any misdemeanor and face no penalty? Too often, we do live in that country. Sheriff David Clarke thinks we should live in that country. Hillary Clinton is running on the idea that we shouldn’t, and at the Democratic National Convention, we’ll hear from women who know the stakes all too personally.