Ferguson was in the former Missouri Senate district of my husband, John. I know the politics, and the people there. I remember how hard the business owners fought to bring back Ferguson, which was thriving before the social welfare policies blighted portions of it.
This whole incident is based upon contrived outrage over a sad, sad use – OK, abuse – of the good people of Ferguson by race baiters like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. The truth is, a dirty alliance of race hustlers, leftist Democrats, anarchists, opportunistic looters and hard-core Marxists is pushing clear agendas with zero regard for the pain and suffering inflicted on individuals in Ferguson or anywhere else that’s a target.
This amazing town sits on the edge of the urban blight of the infamous “North St. Louis,” a wretched neighbor over which it has no control. Ferguson, and other communities in North St. Louis County, are like a patchwork quilt of varying jurisdictions of cities, school districts, sewer districts, police and fire districts that cross all over one another. All of these districts have little in common except that they are all suffering from the failed leftist politics that destroyed St. Louis and the creeping blight that these policies created.
We all know the story. Teacher unions and Democrats kill urban schools by blocking any accountability or serious reform of the public-school systems under their control. Socialist Democrats push welfare policies that break up families. They then build alternatively high-rise, low-income housing and Section 8 housing networks. Inevitably, the cycle of poverty creates a death spiral in which kids see rampant crime and few opportunities in their terrible schools. They have few role models outside welfare mothers to inspire them. As Democrats destroyed North St. Louis – however well-intentioned some may have been – primarily black single mothers looked to greener pastures in North St. Louis County and communities like Ferguson.
The do-gooders have attempted to do to Ferguson exactly what they did to the city. The unions control the schools, and the socialists have pushed for low-income housing. Michael Brown was the son of a single mother who lived (you guessed it) in the biggest low-income housing units of Ferguson. If I had to guess, I’d say Brown’s mother and/or grandmother is a product of North St. Louis City Democrat schools and policies.
Why do I call Ferguson amazing? It’s simple. In every Census, we see the insidious cycle of what leftist social scientists cynically dubbed “white flight.” The area grows more black, poorer and more Democrat. As my husband and I knocked on thousands of doors over 16 years of campaigning in St. Louis County, without exaggeration I can say that in some West County, Republican neighborhoods, every fourth or fifth house would be occupied by people who fled North County. What is amazing about Ferguson, neighboring Florissant and several smaller communities there is the staying power, the resolve of committed residents, black and white, who steadfastly refuse to leave.
This is why it is so repulsive to see that fine community blasted for the very things that make it strong. The Marxists blast the city as being majority black but under the control of a white mayor and predominately white council and police force. The divisive and depraved narrative suggests that only blacks can look out for blacks. Who are the racists?
For the record, Mayor Knowles represents a third generation running a local plumbing business. He is successful and could move anywhere he wants. However, he is fully vested in the community, and he is not leaving.
I knew Chief Tom Jackson when he was Capt. Jackson. His sweet wife, Pat, served for years on the City Council. They are fully vested in Ferguson. The demands for the heads of these people made by assorted leftists who do not even live in Ferguson is about as vile an unjust as it gets. They say “no justice, no peace,” but they do not want justice in any form as polite people see it. These outsiders do not want justice. They are vicious bullies who want what they want and have zero regard for who gets hurt in their blood lust for power. Now they are taking the “struggle,” based on lies about Ferguson and what happened there, and using those lies to wreak havoc around the country. It is time for polite people to call them out for who they are and demand authorities do their jobs and shut them down cold.
Within days of the Michael Brown shooting, black St. Louis City Alderman Antonio French left his day job to go open a protest campaign office in Ferguson. In a strange twist of irony, or karma, that office was burned down by the anarchists and mobsters who apparently missed the memo.
Al Sharpton booked the first flight out to St. Louis and immediately did what he does – fire up the hackneyed, lying narrative that a white cop killed an unarmed, innocent, “gentle giant” who was on his way to realizing his college dreams. We were told that Brown was gunned down like a dog, shot in the back by a racist cop in a racist city led by a racist white police chief and a racist white mayor.
The truth is, Brown was a thug on drugs who robbed a store earlier that day and was walking down the middle of the street as if it belonged to him and not the tax-paying motorists who paid for it. He apparently learned the thug life from his mother and step-“father” or common-law boyfriend, who thought nothing of beating up Brown’s grandmother for the crime of peddling Brown swag in territory apparently belonging to the “grieving mother.” Police are still considering charges for the assault and theft of reportedly $500 cash and more in merchandise.
In the ensuing days, weeks and months, the Sharpton/Marxist narrative unraveled. The destroyers continued undaunted as facts emerged that Brown was a thug and that he was shot by a cop with an unblemished record in the front, not the back, and that he did not have his hands up. The “protesters” still chant, “Hands up, don’t shoot,” even though this lie has no basis in proven fact. All across the country, nowhere more than in California, the anarchist, Marxist and race-baiting cabal shuts down highways on the foundation of a lie. Why?
There are three reasons driving the terrorists. First, the Marxists and anarchists love chaos. It is an axiom of the movement that a power structure holds power for the purpose of exploiting the masses. By creating general chaos, any chaos at all, you can bang the chessboard of life and jostle some playing pieces to your advantage. Maybe it’s the head of the cop, or the mayor of Ferguson. It might be the lesson to all in power: If you don’t give us what we want, we will “Ferguson” you.
The Democrats relish the assault on Ferguson more than anyone. Their ideas are being rejected all across the country. Knowing they were going to get killed in the midterm elections, they reached new lows by using Ferguson to steer people from comparing ideas into simply voting against Republicans out of fear. Funny. The people of Ferguson have a black Democrat president, a Democrat governor, a black Democrat congressman, a black trade unionist Democrat county executive, a black state senator, a black state representative and a non-partisan mayor – yet the NAACP would have you believe Ferguson is an example of everything wrong with America.
Finally, we must consider the good-hearted protesters and silly college-student types who are motivated by compassion even as they play the roles of useful idiots. It is a constant challenge to not impugn them as we seek to expose and punish the first two groups. You see them posting on Facebook, confused statements about making sure “Ferguson never happens again,” as if Ferguson were a spontaneous protest launched by local residents toiling under white “crackers” (racists) who crack the whip over good, black residents who are powerless to do anything. We need to help the last group, and all people of good will, to know that Ferguson was a highly orchestrated charade led by a Marxist vanguard operating out a local office with a fully developed command structure in which the vast majority of protesters were paid.
If we really want justice, the instigators of the violence must reimburse the business owners, the insurance companies and the taxpayers for what they have done. The guilt lies squarely in their greedy laps. There is a great injustice, real racism and true tragedy here, and it is this: Jackson and Sharpton will move on from Ferguson to their next useful city, leaving protesters and victims alike in their dust. Lies like theirs caused the problem of a blighted Ferguson, and they burned down the best efforts of those trying to save Ferguson and build a better life for her citizens. I don’t for the life of me understand how people don’t see that.
Good citizens need to spread awareness of the Ferguson lies and push for full accountability for the partisans who hurt people. Heaven forbid that someone trapped on a highway was en route to a hospital when the silly college students were lured by the Marxists into putting a roadblock in their path. Prosecutors and judges need to throw the book at these people and reject the legal pleadings for mercy brought by highly paid ACLU and MoveOn.org attorneys. To do anything less is to tell the victims of the Ferguson carnage that their suffering was for nothing, and the next Ferguson is a matter of fate and the scheming of the leftist haters.
