http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/08 ... s-a19.htmlPolice launched several rounds of tear gas and what appeared to be crowd-control percussion devices late Monday night to clear the streets of the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, Missouri after a tense half-hour confrontation between several hundred protesters and a wall of law enforcement officers 60 wide and five deep.
Police in riot gear had formed a barricade, donning gas masks and some sat with guns pointed atop armored vehicles. As an armored vehicle began moving toward the crowd, and as clergymen and other community leaders locked arms to hold the protesters back, people appeared to retreat at about 10 p.m., local time. But tensions later intensified again, with police ordering protesters over bullhorns to keep moving or face being arrested.
The first contingent of the Missouri National Guard ordered into Ferguson by Governor Jay Nixon arrived Monday afternoon and began taking up positions in a local shopping center. The unit, consisting of military police, was not to be immediately deployed on streets of the city.
The official picture of Ferguson as a city in the throes of an armed uprising aimed at the police and local businesses may give expression to the fears of the US ruling class and its police defenders. More ominously, it may foreshadow an attempt to frame up individuals, particularly those most active in the protests over Michael Brown’s death.
There is no resemblance between this gross fabrication and the actual conditions facing the residents of the city, who are being stripped of their democratic rights.
Rather surprised that there hasn't been comment on PS on the remarkable events going on in Ferguson America and the nightmarish police-state images being shown across the world.The events in Ferguson, Missouri over the past ten days mark a political turning point for the entire country. The immense scale of social inequality, the ruthlessness of the financial aristocracy, the disintegration of American democracy—all have been exposed in the execution-style police killing of unarmed eighteen-year-old Michael Brown and the vicious crackdown on protests that erupted in response.
At the heart of all the social and democratic issues raised in Ferguson is the nature of the capitalist system. No struggle against inequality and the police state apparatus in America can be successful unless it is based on the understanding that what is involved is a struggle against the entire social and economic order.
What has taken place in recent days has revealed the political line-up of all factions of the political establishment against the working class. Last week, millions of people in the US and around the world were shocked by the images of tanks and riot police in military camouflage toting automatic rifles and using tear gas and rubber bullets to suppress protesters in the streets of Ferguson. The Obama administration and Democratic Governor Jay Nixon intervened with a maneuver aimed at buying time and defusing popular opposition.
Checkpoints have been set up throughout the city, with police demanding identification from those passing by. The police have arrested and threatened reporters and arbitrarily detained residents for the supposed crime of “congregating.”
Ferguson has been placed under martial law in all but name
What is taking place in Ferguson is part of an attack on all workers. The police-state measures employed on the streets of that city, along with the vast intelligence and military apparatus, are directed against all opposition to the policies of the corporate and financial aristocracy.
If you didn't know it was in America it could easily be images from a Third World military dictatorship.
For those who have been reading the WSWS or have kept up with my posts over the last few years the events going on in America should not be a big surprise. A police-state apparatus has been massively developed ever since 9/11 in the USA and now we are starting to see the increasingly open and blatant expressions of this authoritarian apparatus in action.
What is interesting is the public reaction to these events. I suspect that if a George bush style Republican was president, the potential for a wider social instability from the African-American communities would be much stronger. The American ruling class are lucky that Obama has a declining but still important role to play in smothering class tensions through his bi-racial complexion.
This is certainly a profound fear among the upper circles of the American ruling class.
