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To EVERY SINGLE freakin'national outlet that is gonna pick this shit of a press conference up on #SeattleProtest: THIS IS A SET-UP.
To be clear, it goes like this:
The mayor pulls the strings, saves face, acts like she has no power to do exactly what she has power to do, discusses next steps while plainly avoiding ANY EXISTENCE of next steps already being asked by constituents while (1/)
The mayor pulls the strings, saves face, acts like she has no power to do exactly what she has power to do, discusses next steps while plainly avoiding ANY EXISTENCE of next steps already being asked by constituents while (1/)
the overly-paid ($300+k) face of law enforcement--also hand-picked by the mayor--takes the heat & even gets thrown under the bus by the mayor within the same conference. If in fact the full extent of self-imposed police "identity" is in fact felt by the Chief, bonus points. (2/)
The Chief blatantly obfusicates, cites false claims around crime, danger--not true per the PD's own updated data. Quite literally, dramatically waives a stack of papers around, indiscernable but still meant to be "evidence" likely to, again, be walked back later. (3/)
Does not label a recent, &awful, shooting as an outside agitator but *does* label the regular, everyday protesters outside agitators when the only violence is police--and the RARE liquid water bottle or candle [labeled an "incindary device"] sent to ppl in FULL armor gear. (4/)
The mayor all the while picks and chooses the best public-facing figures to stand beside her, in front of cameras and restricts her private meetings. She picks and chooses who off-the-ground media relays as "leaders," "organizers," and more of #SeattleProtests. (5/)
The mayor and Chief alike get to select which stories get told, deliberately framing the narrative in the best possible light under the worst circumstances. It's a political farce. It is deliberate and strategic and manipulative. It is disgusting. (6/)
Both get to conveniently play a game of she-said-she-said on the highly dangerous topic of teargas and nationwide narrative on *why* the PD voluntarily vacated their own precinct. Tho it took truckloads & services, they get to claim it as sudden, unplanned, and not-a-choice. (7/)
We don't get to clearly c the puppet strings or the devised planning but we are forced to watch an absolutely abhorrent display of local-level politics play out on the national screen while its actors garner fauxgressive virtue-signaling points on some unspoken scoreboard. (8/)
All the while many organizers--accross SO many fronts, from something as weird and niche as building electrification to as core as BLM--watch in anger as the mayor utterly ignores their asks and then takes credit later for only meeting one (1) sliver of the asks. (9/)
It's a dark game of prosecutorial dance masqueraded as a press conference by someone who represented and protected the state and all of its systemic racism. The Chief has been designated the credible "witness." (10/)
A witness who, w/no provocation, cites a shooting--but NOT a near-vehicular homicide in2 a group of protesters &shooting of a Black protester--as reasonable cause 4teargas she would've used, if only it weren't banned. Yet, the SAME shooting her PD took 20min to respond to. (11/)
Meanwhile, the Chief, or witness chosen specifically at the will of the Mayor, paints the CHOP shooting's blood onto the hands of a majority-minority @SeattleCouncil, w/ @CMTMosqueda, @CMTammyMorales, @cmkshama--conveniently making her case for the media judges to garble up. (12/)
[I didn't plan for this to be a thread and I am literally just goin' as things come up (12.5/)]
There is no "at best/at worst" scenario of giving either or any player here the benefit of the doubt. This is a clear display of media, public, and even politico manipulation torn straight from Trump's playbook--mixed with The Wire, honestly. It's sickening. (13/)
This happens precisely b/c the system works exactly as intended. It is no accident, no mere happenstance that something as egregious & calculating as this happens at the hands of a former fed'l prosecuter who has gone after protesters [temporarily] successfully b4. (14/)
And when I say "[temporarily] successfully b4," I mean jailed them for years, and even had one in solitary for two months straight. Please see @TheStranger on this. Search "US attorney Jenny Durkan." (15/)
Meh, I'm still up so I figured why not grab the receipts:
1) Durkan prosecuted two well-known Oly protesters who were OUT OF TOWN for their alleged crime for refusing to answer Q's about their politics on the stand [legally defensible] https://www.thestranger.com/seattle/freedom-is-frustrating/Content?oid=16403520 (16/)
1) Durkan prosecuted two well-known Oly protesters who were OUT OF TOWN for their alleged crime for refusing to answer Q's about their politics on the stand [legally defensible] https://www.thestranger.com/seattle/freedom-is-frustrating/Content?oid=16403520 (16/)
2) when attempting 2infiltrate a group incredibly unsuccessfully, Mayor Durkan justified the $90k to a child-molesting informant with "it's not the saints who bring is the sinners" http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/09/10/convicted-sex-offender-and-police-informant-attempts-to-infiltrate-seattles-activist-community Police 'visiting' ppl well after the fact re: surveillance here, too (17/)
^this $90k is not accounting for inflation.
Compare the showing up on a doorstep afterward to SPD's recent sudden arrest of a protester for "assaulting an officer" https://twitter.com/gncordova/status/1269361821804163072?s=21
https://twitter.com/daeshikjr/status/1269144812155842560?s=21 (18/) https://twitter.com/daeshikjr/status/1269144812155842560
Compare the showing up on a doorstep afterward to SPD's recent sudden arrest of a protester for "assaulting an officer" https://twitter.com/gncordova/status/1269361821804163072?s=21
https://twitter.com/daeshikjr/status/1269144812155842560?s=21 (18/) https://twitter.com/daeshikjr/status/1269144812155842560
3) This police-backing mindset--despite herself relating from the fed'l consent decree's research that SPD used excessive force 20% of the time--from @dominicholden's piece: http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2014/05/30/is-the-us-attorney-defensive-deluded-or-naive-about-seattles-police-reform-crisis (19/)
#3 continued (thanks for so much of your work, @dominicholden) (20/)
Mayor Durkan has a LOOONG standing history of *demanding* credit be given to her where it is not due: https://www.thestranger.com/seattle/sources-say/Content?oid=18086929 & https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/mcginn-seeks-to-set-record-straight-after-doj-criticism/
She contradicts her earlier statements over a concept that came from former @mayormcginn w/in consent decree's outcomes (21/)
She contradicts her earlier statements over a concept that came from former @mayormcginn w/in consent decree's outcomes (21/)
Queue what she always does:
Give some time--NEVER acknowledge efforts pushed on the ground tho, let alone *work* w/who sought em--get *preferred* ducks ("leaders"/orgs/+) in a row 4 respectability performance &swoop in to BARELY do 1 little thing, applause, aaand scene. (22/)
Give some time--NEVER acknowledge efforts pushed on the ground tho, let alone *work* w/who sought em--get *preferred* ducks ("leaders"/orgs/+) in a row 4 respectability performance &swoop in to BARELY do 1 little thing, applause, aaand scene. (22/)
This isn't to say Durkan doesn't work on things ever or doesn't do her research--she clearly has a reputation showing she does [despite being last to denounce our previous serial sexual assaulting mayor], but really tho--she just never does THE work. If you know, you know. (23/)
