American Democrat Republican Rag: Hate Crimes

This past Tuesday, 2/28, there was an interesting article published by The Guardian, a respected British news outlet. The article noted that U.S. governmental tracking of hate crimes is "flawed". I ran some searches on statistics for hate crimes and found the following quote from James Comey, head of the FBI. He said this as part of a speech in 2014 to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL):

“We need to do a better job of tracking and reporting hate crime to fully understand what is happening in our communities and how to stop it.”

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2015-hate-crime-statistics-released

So, what The Guardian is saying is known by the FBI. It is not 'fake news'. Now that I've cleared that up, I'll continue.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/feb/28/documenting-hate-crimes-trump-election

In this article, The Guardian notes that because of the flawed record keeping and because of the anecdotal nature of hate crimes being reported, they, along with other news outlets have joined the Documenting Hate project that has been started by the non-profit group ProPublica. The goal of the project is to better document hate crimes in a timely manner and to build a statistical view of hate crimes to "provide rigorous analysis [and]data-driven investigation". To date, there are 17 news outlet partners. Among those partners are:

- Google News Lab - The New York Times (Opinion division) - WNYC (New York City's NPR affiliate) - BuzzFeed News - Litino USA - Ushahidi - The Huffington Post - The Guardian

https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/hatecrimes

Hate crimes have been reported to be on the rise since trump became the head admin. For instance, the New York Police Department (NYPD) has reported that while crime has gone down in February of 2017 when compared to February 2016, hate crimes for the same comparison have gone up. An article in The New Yorker states that hate crimes include "swastikas drawn inside of subway cars and bomb threats against Jewish centers"

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/03/nyc-crime-stats-drop-again-but-hate-crimes-are-up.html

The Independent reports that "[h]ate crimes in New York City have risen by 55 per cent since this time last year. The New York Police Department said the spike was driven by a 94 per cent surge in anti-Semitic hate crimes"

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/hate-crimes-rise-55-pre-cent-new-york-city-surge-in-anti-semitism-jewish-president-donald-trump-bill-a7610911.html

The Chicago Tribune reports that "hate crimes in Chicago hit a five-year high in 2016, and this year are out pacing last year's reports of bias incidents, according to Chicago Police Department data."
The article goes on to note that there have been "13 in the first five weeks of the new year — more than triple the number of hate crimes reported to Chicago police over the first five weeks of 2016". Furthermore, "the uptick in hate crimes being reported [in Chicago] mirrors national figures, which indicate a hate crime spike following the election. The Southern Poverty Law Center, which has tracked bias incidents since the election on its Hatewatch blog, tallied 1,372 post-election reports nationwide, as of Feb. 7[th]."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/daily-southtown/news/ct-sta-hate-crimes-increase-st-0305-20170303-story.html

In the past week hundreds of grave markers in both Chesed Shel Emeth Cemetery in University City, Missouri and Mt. Carmel Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania were toppled. In Olathe Kansas, 51 year old Adam W. Purinton shot Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani. Kuchibhotla died. Also shot was 24 year old Ian Grillot while attempting to apprehend Purinton (there are still decent and brave people in our country).

While researching today's blog, I found that a 43 year old man of Indian origin, Harnish Patel, was shot and killed in his front yard last night in Lancaster County, South Carolina. Sheriff Barry Faile is quoted as saying “I don’t have any reason to believe that this was racially motivated”. Is this guy an ass. He's certainly not a good police officer if he's eliminating any possibility and he certainly sounds like a typical bigot by discounting the possibility in the current cultural environment we find ourselves in.

https://swarajyamag.com/insta/after-kansas-shooting-store-owner-of-indian-origin-shot-dead-in-the-us

Now........d.j[ackass] trump claims zero responsibility for these actions, and in truth he is not the person that has committed any of these crimes. But, I have a difficult time believing that anyone, including trump, is so blind or dumb as to not see the ways in which a person in trump's position can affect these violent acts. And yes, all of these acts, even those where a person was not physically injured or killed, are violent. Furthermore one act of violence tends to and is seeming to lead to another. These acts are not coincidental to each other. They do not stand alone. They are related!

trump would have us believe that because he told a press conference that he is "the least anti-Semetic person you've ever seen in your entire life. Racism? The least racist", that that makes it so. This remark coming only after having to be asked about the anti-Semitic uptick in threats across our country for weeks. What........he didn't know? trump would have us believe that because his daughter 'converted' to Judaism that he is not ant-Semitic. trump would have us believe that because his son in-law is Jewish and he gave him a job to in the administration, then he is not anti-Semitic. trump would have us believe that, because he began his speech to a Joint Session of Congress this past Tuesday with the following statement, that he is not anti-Semitic, a racist or bigoted in any way. HORSE CRAP!:

"Recent threats targeting Jewish community centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week's shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all of its very ugly forms",

If d.j[ackass] were truly concerned, he would have immediately made a loud and clear statement to our country with an address that would have been broadcast over television and radio in a prime time slot, that hate crimes of any sort will not be tolerated. Those that perform such crimes will be hunted down, arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. No ifs, ands, or buts! Not only did he not do this immediately, he has not taken the opportunity to say this in any forum and at any time, as of yet.

I am including some pictures, below, that I have found of some hate crimes that have occurred recently. I am placing these photos here so that none of us loses sight of what hate looks like.