Dear Kossacks: Don't think that the videos you deconstruct and the posts you post don't matter! Kossack Charlie Grapski has been leading the charge in analyzing the infamous "mace the pinioned girls" video, where NYPD lieutenant Anthony Bologna point-blank pepper-sprayed peaceful protestors in the face even while they were already sequestered from the street action. Well, it is a bad day for Bologna, because these things called video cameras, and this thing called internet dissemination, might make him wish he worked out his brutality in some more constructive way.
The video of Lieutenant Bologna's violence has gone viral. Kossack Charlie Grapski's terrific stop-motion frame by frame photographs derived from the captured video footage have proven to be a very powerful testimonial about a cop who is out of control, delivering blows through the message of anger, spraying violence through the medium of power.
Well, it seems that we Kossacks have some impact in the world... The Guardian's News Blog headline declares:
"Occupy Wall Street: inquiries launched as new pepper-spray video emerges/
NYPD officer Anthony Bologna faces two investigations as video emerges of a second pepper-spray incident"
and goes on to say:
The senior New York police officer at the centre of the Occupy Wall Street pepper spray controversy fired the gas at protesters a second time just moments later.
After new video emerged on Wednesday showing the second incident, New York police commissioner Ray Kelly told reporters that the Civilian Complaint Review Board would investigate the officer, deputy inspector Anthony Bologna.
The New York Police Department's own internal affairs bureau also plans to open an investigation, the New York Times reports.
They also mention that:
On both occasions, the officer appears to have violated New York Police Department guidance on how the gas should be used.
This is the important part, and Kossack Grapski did some digging to find the very policies that were violated, and published the citations here on The Daily Kos.
(See Kossack Grapski's fine diary here.)
Kudos to our Kos Community, and to Charlie Grapski's deeply detailed diaries! The Guardian cites our citizen journalist:
Early on Wednesday, Charlie Grapski, in a diary for the Daily Kos, posted a slow-motion edit of just the portion of the video that showed Inspector Bologna spraying the retreating protesters.
We live the network effect. We can build our movement via the robust model of broad bandwidth: a full spectrum of people vibrating at different wavelengths offering multiple points of connection.
Together we are strong!