police and national guard have been suppressing the media, beating those who have recorded their violent response to disorder in NOLA, according to
news photographer magazine. this would have been unbelievable until this unbridled gop regime made it par for the course. their fear of retaliation has prompted NBC to hire armed security for its teams.
NBC News has reportedly hired a private security firm whose officers are former soldiers or police, and who are licensed to carry weapons and trained to protect news crews as they do their jobs, to protect their staff members in the Gulf Coast region as they report the hurricane aftermath story.
i don't mean to imply that these measures were put into place solely to protect the teams from police and national guard, because the real danger from armed groups of criminals was undoubtedly great. however - and this is a monumental however - the stories of retaliation from official authority is insane, nevertheless, and begs answers. disturbing examples below the fold:
Two veteran photojournalists - NPPA member Rick Wilking of Reuters and Getty's Mark Wilson - were robbed of cameras and computer equipment today while on assignment in a neighborhood in New Orleans, and a photojournalist and a reporter were confronted at gunpoint and slammed against a wall by police following a shoot-out between looters and cops that left at least one person dead.
Toronto Star staff photojournalist Lucas Oleniuk was taken to the ground by police in the Spanish Quarter after he photographed a firefight between looters and police, and police were then reportedly "beating on" a looter. A coworker at the Toronto Star told News Photographer magazine tonight, "The cops saw him and put him down, and took his gear. At first they were going to take all of his cameras, but he talked them into only taking the memory cards and letting him keep the cameras." Oleniuk's coworker says the photojournalist, who was not injured in the incident, went to New Orleans the day after the hurricane hit.
days ago, michael barnett, the ex-special forces blogger "
the interdictor" who has been holed up on the tenth floor of a downtown NOLA building in the CBD since from the beginning, has documented the brash inexperience of the reservists that have been patrolling the streets there:
Law enforcement have absolutely lost their minds. Some guy wearing khaki fatigues and black vests which say Police on them have their faces covered in black ski masks and are touting M4-A1s with front hand grips -- like they're some kind of Delta Force operators waiting to hit the tire house. They're guarding the four corners around the Bell South building for crying out loud. And what, they need secret identities? Come on. You can just tell some of these guys have never gotten out before. Now's their big chance to play Army.
to call this unacceptable behavior trivializes its significance and paves the way for the possibilities of a massive cover-up that goes far beyond just police brutality. this may have been the type of scenario that blanco had to take 24 hours to ponder: what kind of reality would be painted if she ceded full control of the LA national guard to bush and rove?
this is going on in
our country, my friends. heads
must roll.