More Than Black and White

An accomplished veteran journalist and a former high executive at the office of the Manhattan District Attorney are infected with a virus which has widely infected American liberalism.

Sound points: https://t.co/JX50h8Rr7a

— David Cay Johnston (@DavidCayJ) August 6, 2023

They believe this is acceptable:

Donald Trump is not being treated with kid gloves because he is white. He benefits from being very intimidating; likely to incite a successful riot(s) if not always given the benefit of the doubt; able to use attorneys to manipulate the criminal justice system because of his extreme wealth; and charged with a federal-rather than a state or local- offense. Were he black (or a Muslim) and those conditions prevailed, he still would be at liberty and attacking with seeming impunity judges, prosecutors, and everyone else not named "Donald J. Trump." 

Kai Cenat, who must be presumed not guilty in a court of law, needed to be arrested. On Friday, we learned

A YouTuber is facing charges after thousands of people piled into a New York square for a console giveaway event that turned into a riot.

Sixty five people were arrested at the gathering that promised free PlayStation 5s on Friday afternoon (4 August).

The organiser, Twitch gaming streamer Kai Cenat, faces charges of inciting a riot and unlawful assembly among other charges, the NYPD chief of department Jeffrey Maddrey said following the chaos.

A YouTuber is facing charges after thousands of people piled into a New York square for a console giveaway event that turned into a riot.

Sixty five people were arrested at the gathering that promised free PlayStation 5s on Friday afternoon (4 August).

The organiser, Twitch gaming streamer Kai Cenat, faces charges of inciting a riot and unlawful assembly among other charges, the NYPD chief of department Jeffrey Maddrey said following the chaos.

Video footage of the hyped-up event shows fights breaking out in Manhattan’s Union Square, with rioters hurling stones and chairs at police officers, climbing onto a subway station entrance and tearing down metal barriers.

“Our officers were attacked, we were crushed, we were pushed, I had officers on the floor,” Mr Maddrey said. “You had people were walking around with shovels, axes... a lot of young people got hurt.”

It appears the safety of Cenat, the "influencer" who set the riot into motion, may have been prioritized inasmuch as

Maddrey said Cenat at some point in the afternoon was removed “for his safety” and police were in contact with him. Videos posted on social media and taken from news helicopters showed the streamer being lifted over a fence and out of the crowd and then placed in a police vehicle.

Police didn't whisk this fellow off to safety because he's black. But neither did they neglect to do so because he's black. That's not surprising because, as Johnston, Agnifilo, and some others fail to understand, not everything is attributable to race.

The individuals obsessed with race who believe, incredibly (in the literal sense of the term),  that Donald Trump is being handled with kid gloves because he is white need a better understanding of the criminal justice system. They might acknowledge that prosecutors in federal court face greater obstacles than in state or municipal courts and that a greater proportion of defendants in the latter are black. They'd understand that our system thereby imposes a greater impact upon blacks and Latinos than upon whites, for reason(s) apart from color.

Of course, that same system therein disadvantages poor and working class people of all races, whose representation as defendants in state/municipal courts is greater than in federal court. However, that gets us to the bottom line reality that income and wealth are greater factors in the justice system than is race.  And a lot of people on (even) the right, but more notably in the center and the left, simply won't go there.

(This blog is going on hiatus. Please return on 8/12/23.)

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