PAT BUCHANAN News & Opinion face. One police report says that there was a struggle for the officer’s gun. According to Brown’s companion, however, after he was first shot, he threw up his hands and yelled, “Don’t shoot. I surrender." Then Wilson gunned him down. According to one of three autopsies, Brown was shot six times, once in the top of the head, which may suggest he was charging the officer when gunned down. A second St. Louis County autopsy found marijuana in Brown’s body. What we are witnessing in Ferguson today, and nationally, is not only a collision of reported facts, but also a clash of visions about America. In Sharpton’s vision, America is a country where white racist cops harass, assault and gun down young black males, and Brown’s execution is the latest outrage. Many media echo his indictment and accent the facts that support this preconceived narrative. Disrupting this portrait and particularly outrageous to Sharpton was the release by the Ferguson police chief of a videotape of Brown stealing a $44 box of cigars, 15 minutes before he was shot dead, and manhandling and menacing the store clerk trying to stop him. Brown was 6’4” and 292 pounds. Sharpton contends that officer Wilson did not know of the “shoplifting” that was irrelevant to the shooting, and that release of the tape was a moral atrocity to smear the character of the dead teenager. But while that tape may be unrelated to the shooting, it does testify to the mindset of Michael Brown that morning and to his respect for the rule of law. Ought we not know that? Then there is the rival vision of America rooted in a separate reality. It is that in America today, police, like Darren Wilson, are the first responders and last line of defense, willing to risk their lives battling the criminal elements that threaten us and our free society. Moreover, violent crime in America—assault, murder, robbery, rape—emanates disproportionately from the black community, and especially the young male members of that community. Crime rates, conviction rates, incarceration rates all testify to this truth. If cops are more on guard when encountering black males, is it not because, given the crime statistics, they have more to fear from them? Do not the weekly news reports from Barack Obama’s hometown of Chicago, where black-on-black violence is pandemic, also testify to this?D ecades ago, U.S. newspapers, which used to publish the race of both victims of crime and perpetrators, decided to stop doing so. They felt that this was the kind of news people have no need to know. TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 21, 2014 • 4 COPYRIGHT 2014 RIDGEWOOD TIMES PRINTING & PUBLISHING CO., INC. Since 1908 Published Every Thursday By RIDGEWOOD TIMES PRINTING & PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC. General Publication Office: P.O. 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Classified Manager TIMES NEWSWEEKLY Is Listed With The Standard Rate & Data And Is A Member Of The New York Press Association Reaching The Queens Homes Of Ridgewood, Glendale, Liberty Park, Maspeth, Middle Village, So. Elmhurst, Woodside, Sunnyside, Astoria, Long Island City, Ozone Park, South Ozone Park, Howard Beach, Richmond Hill, Rego Park, Forest Hills, Woodhaven, Elmhurst, And Kew Gardens. Reaching The Brooklyn Homes Of Ridgewood, Bushwick, Cypress Hills, East Williamsburg And Williamsburg. COMPOSITION RESPONSIBILITY: Accuracy in receiving ads over the telephone cannot be guaranteed. This newspaper is responsible for only one incorrect insertion and only for that portion of the ad in which the error appears. It is the responsibility of the advertiser to make sure copy does not contravene the Consumer Protection Law or any other requirement. Is Ferguson Our Future? “America is on trial,” said Rev. Al Sharpton from the pulpit of Greater St Mark’s Family Church in Ferguson, Missouri. At issue, the shooting death of Michael Brown, Saturday a week ago, on the main street of that city of 22,000, a neighbor community to Jennings, where this writer lived in the mid-1960s. Brown, an 18-year-old African- American, was shot multiple times by Darren Wilson, a 28-year-old white police officer with an unblemished record in six years on the force in Jennings and Ferguson. From his patrol car, Wilson ordered Brown out of the street where he was walking and blocking traffic. A fight followed. Wilson appears to have been punched in the -SEE BUCHANAN ON PG. 26- EDITORIAL Here’s a riddle for our readers to consider on a lazy August afternoon: If a government enacts a law, and no one is available to enforce it, does it make a difference? Recently, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a bill allowing New York City to reduce its default speed limit from 30 to 25 mph on local streets. The effort, part of the ongoing “Vision Zero” strategy to reduce traffic and pedestrian accidents, was hailed as a critical step toward making streets safer for everyone. What is the default speed limit? It’s the maximum speed any vehicle may travel on a roadway where speed limit restrictions aren’t otherwise posted with appropriate signage. This would apply to residential side streets rather than thoroughfares such as Queens Boulevard, where speed limit signs are regularly posted. Who would enforce the default speed limit? The NYPD, of course, a force of over 35,000 men and women patrolling a city of more than 8 million residents—and assigned to a never-ending pile of responsibilities on their plate. The NYPD is tasked with enforcing the city’s noise code, reformed a few years ago through legislation dubbed the “Mister Softee Law.” Recently, the NYPD assumed responsibilities for animal cruelty cases from the ASPCA’s Humane Enforcement Unit. This is all in addition to their conventional policing duties of investigating crime, arresting offenders, preserving the quality of life and keeping the peace. Earlier this year, City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito proposed including funding to hire 1,000 additional police officers in the fiscal year 2015 budget. It only made sense: the NYPD, down from a peak roster of more than 40,000 over a decade ago and with more responsibilities than ever, could use a little help. But Mayor Bill de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton rejected that idea, charging the funds would be better used to raise existing officers’ salaries. The final budget deal authorized the NYPD to hire 200 administrative aides to desk duties which officers currently occupy, shifting those officers back to active duty. Governments across this country, even the most liberal of them, are stuck in a “do-more-with-less” mentality. They keep passing laws and adding responsibilities to public servants who already have way too much to do, and little time to do it. We see this with the garbage situation in Ridgewood, as illegal dumpers continue to plague Fresh Pond Road. The Sanitation Department conducts some enforcement, but the problem persists. When the agency is urged to do more, they claim they don’t have the manpower sufficient to the task. Other federal, state and city agencies cite a lack of manpower as reasons for failing to adequately address issues such as illegal conversions, landmark designations, medical care for veterans, and park preservation. Every law, edict, ordinance and regulation passed by a government is totally meaningless if there is no one in government to enforce it. People will keep dumping, drivers will keep speeding and landlords will keep renting their basements as long as no one in authority is around to stop and punish the offenders. The NYPD and other city agencies, with the massive responsibilities they’ve received in recent years, are stretched too thin to be effective at every task. The city has to choose whether it wants to pass laws for good publicity and nothing more, or to pass laws for the good of the public—and hire enough people to enforce them. Simply put, it’s time for city lawmakers to put their money where their press conferences are. Nolan To Sanitation: Clean Up Fresh Pond! Agrees With Recent Times Editorial by Robert Pozarycki While voicing agreement with a recent Times Newsweekly editorial, a local legislator called on the Sanitation Department to do something about trash problems along Fresh Pond Road in Ridgewood. Letters To The Editor Battling Graffiti One Block At A Time Dear Editor: The scourge of Queens and throughout New York City is that of graffiti vandalism. It makes you so angry and somewhat sad to see these senseless indiscriminate markings of these vandals throughout our communities. In Woodhaven, we are fortunate in that we have the Woodhaven Business Improvement District on Woodhaven’s Jamaica Avenue from Dexter Court to 100th Street where this degenerating vandalism is removed periodically at great expense, making our Woodhaven Business Improvement District 98 percent graffiti vandalism free. I would like to compliment Eric Ulrich, our NYC Councilman, on his allocation of funding to remove graffiti vandalism on the remainder of Jamaica Avenue in Richmond Hill and Ozone Park. Also, the volunteer efforts of the Woodhaven Resident’s Block Association removing graffiti vandalism from our community mail boxes. As I have stated, this vandalism is a very expensive criminal act and in actuality a war between these vandals and we that remove their markings. This war is one that we fight everyday. I believe our civic pride will prevail, for we will not take the -SEE LETTERS ON PG. 26- Times Newsweekly Established In 1908 As Ridgewood Times In a letter sent to Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia last Friday, Aug. 15, Assemblywoman Catherine Nolan stated she supported recommendations made in this paper’s July 21 editorial, which urged the Sanitation Department to return public waste baskets removed last year from Fresh Pond Road while also increasing pickups and enforcement to stop illegal dumping. “The editorial lays out several ways the department can help improve the quality of life for all Ridgewood residents,” Nolan wrote to Garcia, going on to note, “I support and strongly endorse this editorial and would urge the Department of Sanitation to look into all of these possibilities to help alleviate this problem.” “Ridgewood residents deserve the same treatment and respect as any other neighborhood in our great city,” Nolan added. The legislator also repeated her calls for adding businesses on Fresh Pond Road to the Myrtle Avenue Business Improvement District (BID), which offers various services including supplemental sanitation collection. Nolan pitched the idea in a letter last October to the city’s then- Small Business Services Commissioner Robert Walsh. -SEE TRASH ON PG. 26-
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