Roy Exum: Ballot Bearer Is Shot

  • Wednesday, September 23, 2020
  • Roy Exum
Roy Exum
Roy Exum

Last week was a typical one for Chicago. The weekly shooting gallery was about normal for the third week of September – 100 people shot, 14 homicides and 86 wounded -- on the downtown streets. But there was one shooting that stood out. A United States Postal Service letter carrier was shot four times when she got in the crosshairs of a drive-by shooting and now the USPS is on the brink of demanding those who live in grisly neighborhoods will be required to pick up their mail at area post offices.

Home delivery has gotten too dangerous, the mail carriers say.

Now ain’t this a crispy pickle. The “post office” is the only Federal agency that is allowed to have a union. Therefore, when the National Association of Letter Carriers strongly endorsed the candidacy of Democrat Joe Biden, it became the only Federal agency to legally be enabled to endorse a politician.

But – what’s this? – the admittedly biased letter carriers are the ones who will deliver the millions of mail ballots across the country. Me thinks any fox would revel in such a tempting approach on a hen house.

The COVID flu withstanding, I think mail-in ballots are as just as big a sign of trouble. I see 100 percent of the most ardent COVID watchers stand in grocery lines, walk through hospitals, and enjoy freedom of unrestricted movement all day and night. Our children pack the schools. People clamor to worship with their friends, but you are trying to convince me that early voting, in person ballot drop-offs, rigid distancing rules at the polls and a bevy of other protections are too dangerous? It’s ridiculous.

But in America today we are presented with the absurd and led to believe it is normal. There is empirical evidence 100 human beings were shot last week in Chicago. For the month of September -- this just in 21 days -- we have had 286 people shot and 59 killed. That’s over two needless deaths every day.

Homicides in Chicago in this year of wrath are up over 50 percent. Murders are already more than in all of 2019 and just this past Saturday and Sunday – last weekend – 37 wounded, 10 of them killed. The huge percent is black-on-black, which the liberal media cannot blame on Trump, so it is a non-story. But as the true Americans wear face masks and wash our hands with regularity, within the city limits of Chicago since Jan. 1 of this year, there have been 3,096 people shot, 579 of them fatally.

If you were a letter carrier in Chicago, that is frightening. No wonder Mack Julion, president of the Chicago union chapter, decreed on Friday: “Any letter carrier who does not feel safe … are not to deliver mail and customers will have to pick up their mail. We are not going to have another situation where the letter carrier is shot down.”

The letter carrier, still in critical condition, was shot at 11:35 a.m. on Thursday, Sept. 10. The next day another letter carrier was shot with a paint gun. “That’s not funny,” said Julion. “These are federal employees … our members at work trying to do their job, trying to support their families, trying to support the communities.”

So, forget the noble mantra … “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.” Bullets from relatively unchallenged thugs speak far louder while the voices of Black Lives Matter, Mayor Lori Lightfoot and other liberals are quiet. Mayor Lightfoot reportedly “forced” some of the city’s aldermen not to take part in a “Back The Blue” rally last weekend and there are reports of over 900 vacancies on the Chicago police force.

The Chicago Fire Department is also woefully understaffed but this from Mayor Lightfoot: “Everyone has to contribute to the sacrifices that are gonna’ be made as a result of the massive budget deficit that we have for next year.”

She added, “When you’re staring down the barrel of a $1.2 billion deficit for next year on top of an $800 million shortfall for this year, we’ve gotta look at a variety of options. … Of course, we’re looking at vacancies. The taxpayers would expect us to look at every tool in our tool box. … A lot of tough, hard, painful choices are gonna’ have to be made,” she said.

I’m sure a great number of the 3,096 people who have now been shot in Chicago will agree, this despite the 579 who no longer have a voice in the matter.

* * *

“WHY DO THE POLICE CONTINUE TO HARASS PEOPLE?”

(From the Internet: Author unknown)

Recently, the Chula Vista, California Police Department ran an e-mail forum (a question and answer exchange) with the topic being, "Community Policing."

One of the civilian e-mail participants posed the following question, "I would like to know how it is possible for police officers to continually harass people and get away with it?"

From the "other side" (the law enforcement side) Sgt. Bennett, obviously a cop with a sense of humor replied:

"First of all, let me tell you this...it's not easy. In Chula Vista, we average one cop for every 600 people. Only about 60 percent of those cops are on general duty (or what you might refer to as "patrol") where we do most of our harassing. The rest are in non-harassing departments that do not allow them contact with the day to day innocents. At any given moment, only one-fifth of the 60 percent patrolers are on duty and available for harassing people while the rest are off duty.

“So roughly, one cop is responsible for harassing about 5,000 residents. When you toss in the commercial business, and tourist locations that attract people from other areas, sometimes you have a situation where a single cop is responsible for harassing 10,000 or more people a day.

“Now, your average 10-hour shift runs 36,000 seconds long. This gives a cop one second to harass a person, and then only three-fourths of a second to eat a donut AND then find a new person to harass. This is not an easy task. To be honest, most cops are not up to this challenge day in and day out. It is just too tiring. What we do is utilize some tools to help us narrow down those people which we can realistically harass.

“The tools available to us are as follows:

PHONE: People will call us up and point out things that cause us to focus on a person for special harassment. "My neighbor is beating his wife" is a code phrase used often. This means we'll come out and give somebody some special harassment.

Another popular one: "There's a guy breaking into a house." The harassment team is then put into action.

CARS: “We have special cops assigned to harass people who drive. They like to harass the drivers of fast cars, cars with no insurance or no driver's licenses and the like. It's lots of fun when you pick them out of traffic for nothing more obvious than running a red light. Sometimes you get to really heap the harassment on when you find they have drugs in the car, they are drunk, or have an outstanding warrant on file.

RUNNERS: “Some people take off running just at the sight of a police officer. Nothing is quite as satisfying as running after them like a beagle on the scent of a bunny. When you catch them you can harass them for hours.

STATUTES: “When we don't have PHONES or CARS and have nothing better to do, there are actually books that give us ideas for reasons to harass folks. They are called "Statutes": Criminal Codes, Motor Vehicle Codes, etc...

“They all spell out all sorts of things for which you can really mess with people. After you read the statute, you can just drive around for a while until you find someone violating one of these listed offenses and harass them. Just last week I saw a guy trying to steal a car. Well, there's this book we have that says that's not allowed.

“That meant I got permission to harass this guy. It's a really cool system that we've set up, and it works pretty well. We seem to have a never-ending supply of folks to harass. And we get away with it. Why? Because for the good citizens who pay the tab, we try to keep the streets safe for them, and they pay us to "harass" some people.

“Next time you are in my town, give me the old "single finger wave." That's another one of those codes. It means, "You can't harass me." It's one of our favorites. For those who do have, or have had a close association in the Law Enforcement industry, I am sure that this will have a special meaning."

royexum@aol.com

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