Eric Holder’s Attitude Toward the Police
[Guest post by DRJ]
Heather MacDonald profiles Attorney General-designate Eric Holder’s attitude toward race and the police, including the Los Angeles police department, in a column published yesterday in City Journal.
MacDonald begins by pointing out that it was Holder who insisted on imposing a consent decree on the LAPD after the Rampart scandal, a decision that cost the city police budget almost $250M over 5 years. She contends the consent decree assumed every LAPD supervisor and officer were borderline racists and corrupt, and that tending to the decree required the reallocation of 350 police from crime-fighting to paper-pushing.
And LA was just the start. “Columbus, Ohio, Washington, DC, and the New Jersey State Police, among other departments, felt the heat.”
Holder also played a role in claims that some police departments routinely engage in racial profiling:
“The late 1990s also saw the rise of the bogus “racial profiling” concept, in which police departments were deemed racist if their stop and arrest rates didn’t match population benchmarks. That primitive analytical framework, initially promoted by the ACLU, ignores the wildly disparate racial crime rates and the inevitable effect of those crime rates on police activity. The Justice Department under Deputy Attorney General Holder gave a significant push to its evolution, and the momentum of DOJ-sponsored “racial profiling” conferences and DOJ-funded research continued through the early years of the Bush administration.”
MacDonald suggests Holder’s actions impaired the ability of police departments to fight crime through the use of suspect policies. To make that clear, she suggests the Senators ask Holder these questions during his confirmation hearing:
“[O]n what grounds [would] he would inflict his civil-rights attorneys on police departments?”
“[Does] he believe that a racially disparate stop rate provides prima facie evidence of police racism?”
My gut feeling is these questions may not be asked. The GOP is hesitant to irritate the public by fighting too many battles with Obama early in his Administration. I think the main battles will be Geithner and bailout money. Unfortunately for America’s big city police departments, Holder may get a pass.
— DRJ
Holder will get a pass. The lefties are anti-police anyway. Too many of them got busted for drugs during their formative years.
Mike K (f89cb3) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:01 pmTrue enough Mike, but they did not go into treatment. Most of them have continued to use well past the time most people give up things from their childhood. People like Michael Moore prove marijuana is not a harmless drug.
Zelsdorf Ragshaft III (e18128) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:22 pmWho was it that experimented with marijuana over 100 times? Is that Clinton-administration person part of the new Obama administration?
(side note: I’m surprised Obama is still deemed a possible typo.)
John Hitchcock (fb941d) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:27 pm“The late 1990s also saw the rise of the bogus “racial profiling” concept, in which police departments were deemed racist if their stop and arrest rates didn’t match population benchmarks.”
This sentence is oddly phrased — it makes it sound like the author thinks that ‘racial profiling’ is bogus.
““[O]n what grounds [would] he would inflict his civil-rights attorneys on police departments?””
The meanness, ‘inflicting’ civil rights upon cops.
“Too many of them got busted for drugs during their formative years.”
“Most of them have continued to use well past the time most people give up things from their childhood.”
Our first DUI president.
imdw (f636ac) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:33 pmHolder is where Republicans should make their stand. Policy differences are just that, no matter how stupid the policy. Hillary gets a pass for many reasons (not from me, but the enablers in the Senate), and the Geithner tax stuff is mostly theater. But anybody involved in the March Rich pardons is unfit for public office. Even better: that position is easily explained in a soundbite.
fat tony (067281) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:41 pmDoes anyone think the Republicans are smart enough to give these folks a pass so they can get into office and really screw things up?
Huey (4f42eb) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:54 pmA few accountants can keep Geithner in line, if need be – but he, and Rangel should be shown the door (Dodd should be kicked through it).
AD (d614d2) — 1/15/2009 @ 4:59 pmHolder would need another complete Justice Department to undo the damage he has, and will, do.
How can any professional at Justice work for someone who facilitated pardons for PR terrorists so that Hillary could have a few more votes; and Marc Rich, so that Bubba could get a few millions for his library (no telling what he got personally from Mrs. Rich)?
“This sentence is oddly phrased — it makes it sound like the author thinks that ‘racial profiling’ is bogus.”
imdw – Only if you are being deliberately obtuse, which is clearly your specialty.
It’s sort of like the libtards and progtards objecting to the profiling of people appearing to be of Middle Eastern extraction at airports and other means of mass transit as being unfair even though acts of terrorism were largely committed by people fitting the profiles being sought.
daleyrocks (5d22c0) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:18 pmWhat?
He deliberately cheated. Knowingly, willingly cheated.
I don’t want to have to “keep him in line”. He’s a cheat and a crook, and if he gets approved for the seat, I give up. Obviously the fix will be in, and noting we do will change the fact that the entire administration is willing to OK cheats and crooks.
Scott Jacobs (90ff96) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:22 pmBut at least they’re transparent in their crooked natures.
John Hitchcock (fb941d) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:23 pm“He’s a cheat and a crook”
Scott – If he didn’t get caught it didn’t happen. That’s what bothers me about people like this. They’re dishonest when nobody is looking but expect us to believe they’re fundamentally good people. Geithner fucked up and got caught.
daleyrocks (5d22c0) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:26 pm“…but he, and Rangel should be shown the door (Dodd should be kicked through it)…”
Yes, I said a few accountants could keep him in line;
AD (d614d2) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:37 pmbut I don’t want him in the position he has been nominated for.
Plus, I don’t think his performance at the NYFed is all that remarkable.
He was supposed to be providing oversight to Wall Street too,
and he obviously didn’t get it quite right, did he?
But he DID get caught! We’ve SEEN the fucking documents. It’s on the national freaking news!
I really, REALLY hope the IMF sues to collect the money it gave him – money he took under false pretenses.
Scott Jacobs (90ff96) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:40 pmSo Holder is a racist. What’s new about that, he fits right in with BHO.
Funny, I’ll have 14 years as a volunteer firefighter/EMT (never one dime in pay and payed for most of my own training) next week, and I’ll quit/retire on the 20th. I hope the democrats have lots of volunteers waiting in the wings. They must be waiting since most of them don’t work or volunteer other than to stand in line at the welfare office. I’m sitting here listening to a sister fire department fight a house fire in 9 degree weather. Glad I won’t have to roll out in the middle of the night anymore.
Scrapiron (ce69ff) — 1/15/2009 @ 5:57 pmI do not think he fucked up. To me, that implies some kind of mistake, an accident. He chose not to do pay, and only paid years after the fact.
JD (d1f299) — 1/15/2009 @ 6:21 pmJD – Getting caught was his fuck up.
daleyrocks (5d22c0) — 1/15/2009 @ 7:32 pmSounds like Holder will be mau-mauling the flak catchers for at least the next four years.
His theory reminds me of the OC Register “expose” that all the juvenile criminals charged with murder as an adult were Hispanic. Racism! They left out the stat that all the murders that year in OC were gang related.
Patricia (89cb84) — 1/15/2009 @ 7:44 pmDRJ’s post above on “Anarchy in Mexico” actually relates to this post on Eric Holder. That’s because one of the major reasons a society like Mexico is so chaotic, so full of lawbreaking, is its government is loaded down with people as foolish as our next attorney general.
Mexico’s Supreme Court a few years ago ruled that life in prison without the possibility of parole (mind you, NOT capital punishment, NOT life in prison, period) was unconstitutional. I bet Holder would consider such a ruling as, at best, somewhat rigid (because it wipes out an option for both the judicial and prison system), or mildly interesting. Actually, he may be so idiotic to believe that ruling was a sign of humane and sophisticated judgment.
Mark (411533) — 1/15/2009 @ 8:19 pmHolder plays the race card?
Shocka!!!
Icy Texan (b7d162) — 1/15/2009 @ 10:18 pm“It’s sort of like the libtards and progtards objecting to the profiling of people appearing to be of Middle Eastern extraction at airports and other means of mass transit as being unfair even though acts of terrorism were largely committed by people fitting the profiles being sought.”
I was hoping the attention the Palin family would get rid of the infantile use of ‘tard,’ but, as we’ve learned, hope isn’t always delivered.
imdw (8bb588) — 1/16/2009 @ 4:51 amSometimes the use of -tard is just sooooooo appropriate, imdw. I am sure you have experienced that, right?
JD (b8c13f) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:28 amOh, now you tell us. How about change?
Pablo (99243e) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:32 amNo, Pablo. If you cannot deliver hope, change ain’t got a fighting chance.
JD (b8c13f) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:44 amimdw – Life is like a box of chocolates. Progtards and libtards are as progtards and libtards do.
daleyrocks (5d22c0) — 1/16/2009 @ 6:53 amWhen the Warren Court was busy making it more difficult for the police to do their jobs with such decisions as Mapp v. Ohio and Miranda, the handwriting was on the wall. It was only a matter of time until the hard left would demand similiar rights when actions of the US Army were the issue. Today we have “civil libertarians” trying hard to convince America that captured terrorists are entitled to rights under the US Constitution that relate to search and seizure and the right to remain silent, no matter where they operated. Nazi and Japanese soldiers wore uniforms and “forfeited” such rights under the laws of war. Terrorists live in the best of both worlds, under the leftist/ACLU view of things.
mhr (ff1783) — 1/16/2009 @ 11:23 amThe only right that I will concede to a terrorist is the right to receive 230-grains of copper-jackected lead.
AD (87db80) — 1/16/2009 @ 11:48 am… copper-jacke
AD (87db80) — 1/16/2009 @ 11:50 amcted …“Nazi and Japanese soldiers wore uniforms and “forfeited” such rights under the laws of war.”
Japanese soldiers were also executed for waterboarding. sooo….
imdw (85e8d2) — 1/16/2009 @ 4:17 pmFalse. They were executed for war crimes that far exceeded the non-lethal act of waterboarding. To draw parity between those atrocities and waterboarding is disgraceful; and it is disrespectful to those that suffered at the hands of WWII Japanese soldiers.
Pons Asinorum (b2b187) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:01 pmimdw has never let mere technicalities get in the way of teh narrative.
AD (87db80) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:07 pm“imdw has never let mere technicalities get in the way of teh narrative.”
Or context or facts required to make her statements not misleading.
daleyrocks (5d22c0) — 1/16/2009 @ 5:50 pmI would suggest imdw read about the Bataan Death March, but such a suggestion would be met with deaf ears and blind eyes. Of course, that little thing in that little town of millions that surrendered then got bombed to a pulp then got raped is also irrelevant. It was waterboarding, that’s all.
John Hitchcock (fb941d) — 1/16/2009 @ 6:01 pmJohn Hitchcock,
Forget asking him (and other anti-waterboarding liberals) to read about the Bataan Death March. Have them read Iris Chang’s “The Rape of Nanking.” I do believe those Chinese victims would have loved to have been waterboarded by the Japanese Imperial Army rather than the real torture to which they were subjected and from which they died, and died in the hundreds of thousands.
RickZ (472435) — 1/17/2009 @ 5:37 am[…] I’m not certain how you sue because a “law could lead to civil rights violations”. That’s like suing me because I might hit someone with my car. The potentially illegal act would be me hitting someone with my car, not the fact that it might occur. The Arizona Immigration Law specifically prohibits racial profiling or any other measure that is a violation of civil rights legislation, so any “civil rights violation” that occurs is not a problem with the law itself but the individual who is acting outside of the law while enforcing it. Even the assumption that violations will occur is disgraceful. Is Eric Holder assuming cops are racist and unable to follow the letter of the law? It sure seems like he has a history of doing just that. […]
Eric Holder Plays Politics with Arizona’s Safety (d73f77) — 5/9/2010 @ 1:32 pm