Obama Should Call in National Guard to Restrain NYPD in Occupy Wall Street

Consider the following -
Professor and author Cornel West was just hauled off in a police paddy wagon up in an Occupy Harlem protest - see photoProfessor and author Naomi Wolf was led off in hand cuffs earlier this week when she was walking on a street deemed off-limits - a public street - by the NYPD - see articlea woman seeking to close her Citibank account as part of the Occupy Wall Street protest was arrested - see videoObama finally announced the end of the US occupation of Iraq today.  Now he should send some of our National Guard to New York City to restrain our out-of-control NYPD.  Clearly Mayor Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Kelly either can't or don't want to restrain the NYPD.

Earlier this week, we also saw the inspiring lecture that former Marine Shemar Thomas delivered to the NYPD - "you're supposed to protect us, not attack us," he said.  Here's the video.  (He was not arrested - Bloomberg still has a clever sense of public relations - he doesn't want a video of the NYPD taking into custody a former Marine.  But professors and authors and other law-abiding citizens are apparently fair game to arrest on camera.)

It is becoming more clear, every day, that what we most in New York City need protection from is our own police.

(I taped an interview and talked about some of these issues yestereday morning - part of a panel discussion to be broadcast on Good Day Street Talk, Fox-NY-Channel 5, Saturday, October 22, 6-6:30am - video to be posted here after the broadcast.)

-Paul Levinson, PhD
Professor of Communication and Media Studies
Fordham University


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