The Real Rambo Meets His Maker

Feb. 13^th: Well that ended predictably (and as I predicted). Chris Dorner died in Symbionese Liberation Army style in a besieged cabin. I remember watching on live TV back in May, 1974, the immolation of 6 SLA members. (1) These were my first thoughts on hearing the report of Dorner's demise. As in 1974, people could watch the immolation live on TV, serving both as ghoulish voyeurism and object lesson in what happens to those who violently rebel against the system. (That's not an endorsement of the SLA or of Dorner, just a statement of objective fact.)

Dorner was run to ground in a cabin in San Bernardino County, west of Los Angeles County. He manged to shoot two SB County Sheriff's deputies, one of whom died from his wounds. (Which no doubt hardened like a diamond the resolve of that department to kill Dorner.)

The details provided by the media initially didn't add up (usually a reliable indication of cover-up and lying). Supposedly the police “heard a single shot” from within the cabin (Dorner killing himself would conveniently absolve the police of responsibility for killing him) and then the cabin “burst into flames.” Later in the day we were told that a demolition vehicle was in the process of destroy the last wall and then the fire erupted.

Finally the Los Angeles Times revealed that the police use what the cops call “incendiary tear gas canisters” against Dorner. An audio emerged of the police talking to themselves on police scanner saying they were "going forward with the plan, with, er, with the burn" or "burner".

The truth is that the police premeditated the killing of Dorner. It's laughable that he could have surrendered. It was reported that when he ran out of the cabin at one point, a police fusillade drove him back inside, to his prearranged fate.(2)

One police spokesman said that until they confirmed that the charred corpse was Dorner, or they “had him in handcuffs,” (presumably a reference to a live capture, unless they want to cuff the corpse to be extra safe), they would continue to act as if Dorner was a fugitive. And the LA Times reported that the LAPD “remained on tactical alert and were conducting themselves as if nothing had changed in the case, officials said.” So you could say that drivers of pickup trucks were forewarned that they were still subject to random shootings pending official confirmation of Dorner's extirpation. And the cops get to enjoy throwing their weight around in even more aggressive fashion than usual for a while longer.

The New York Times blacked out use of incendiary grenades to deliberately start fire. Ignoring the information at other news sites, the Times pretended that the fire started from an unknown cause. This is typical of that paper. Instead of informing people about what's going on, the NY Times constantly hides information from the public. They were just caught doing it again, when it was revealed that they kept the existence of a U.S. drone base in Saudi Arabia secret for 18 months. (Or “well over a year,” in the evasive locution of their current “public editor,” a post designed to preempt external criticism.) (So did the Washington Post, that other house organ of the U.S. ruling elite, and the AP.) That's why it's a bad newspaper. It hides information on a daily basis. Sometimes it suppresses news as long as it can, until it risks loss of credibility if not relevancy by that information getting to the public in other ways. “National Security” is the alibi in many cases. But the NYT suppresses a lot of information for many different reasons, usually political or ideological ones.

Burning people alive is a sadistic venting of hatred. Burning someone or something in anger is an expression of utter existential rejection of the hate object, the desire to obliterate it from existence.

Papua New Guineas just burned alive a “witch” on a pile of garbage after torturing her for “sorcery,” just the latest incident of a common social practice by those savages. (A boy died of an illness so these primitive morons blamed it on “sorcery.”) During apartheid mobs draped gasoline-filled tires around the necks of suspected informers and burned them to death. The Catholic Church executed those it deemed ideological menaces by tying them to stakes and burning them alive.

Now the establishment can close the door on Dorner's revelations about the LAPD. No purge of racist officers, no checks on brutality and sadism, and most fundamentally, no change in the LAPD's “mission,” the control of the “lower” classes, a mission for which racism and brutality are basic tools. After this brief eruption that momentarily partially pierced the shield of propaganda, Official Reality is restored. The police are sterling guardians of the people against “criminals” and “terrorists” (virtually entirely dissidents and activists on the “left” side of the political spectrum), and police violence is minimal and justified. (Of course some police violence is justified, when necessary in dealing with violent criminals.) Yet Dorner was no marginal character. He was a Navy Reserve lieutenant, reports the L.A. Times, which is equivalent in rank to a captain in the other 3 main military arms, and someone who trusted enough by the military and LAPD to receive extensive training in their combat methods. And his charges of racism and brutality resonated strongly among the communities which are on the receiving end of those LAPD characteristics.

February 14^th: Today the L.A. Times says flatly that “ the flammable canisters, which caused the cabin to catch fire,” indeed started the fire. The police are justifying it as a “last resort” and because they were afraid of the dark. (They supposedly were worried about dealing with Dorner at night. Perhaps they never heard of searchlights? But I suppose he may have shot them out.) I only saw one article on the matter on the NY Times' homepage today, way down at the bottom in small font size, with a publication date of yesterday. It only talked about the massive police response, and how “traumatic” it all was for the police, what with millions of dollars in overtime and...that's traumatic? Not one solitary word about how Dorner was killed, the cabin fire, etc. Thus is the NYT cover-up central. Why even read such a dishonest rag? [“Fugitive’sThreats Against Police Drew Enormous Response,” NYT,2/13/12.]

1) The LAPD had good reason to cremate the SLA alive. For one thing, the SLA's leader, one Donald DeFreeze, had been an LAPD secret police informer. (In 1973 career criminal DeFreeze took over the SLA by threatening to kill the co-founder, who fled the country.) So no doubt the police wanted to minimize the existence of any evidence in the SLA's “safe” house, as the media falsely called it. (In secret police-speak, a safe house is a covert, secure location unknown to one's enemies. This one obviously wasn't safe.) After firing over 5,370 rounds into the house, the LAPD set the home ablaze for good measure, killing everyone inside. Later, career LAPD propagandist Joseph Wambaugh ran cover for the cops by saying in blasé fashion that those tear gas grenades the cops use sometimes start fires accidentally. The liar knows damn well that some of them are designed to start fires.

2) Supposedly the cops who besieged Dorner in the cabin (it's called a “condo” in some reports, without explanation) demanded via bullhorn that he surrender as they poured gunfire into the building. That's reminiscent of what happened when New York State Governor Nelson Rockefeller, a scion of the top level of the U.S. class hierarchy with Presidential ambitions, crushed the Attica prison uprising. As his murderous state police slaughtered scores of prisoners and guards who the prisoners had captured, a helicopter flying overhead boomed “do not resist and you will not be harmed.” Guess they just have a very dark sense of humor. (Actually they're trying to confuse and mentally disarm their victims.) Rockefeller figured he could wave the bloody scalp of this massacre as establishing his “law and order” bona fides. And in case you were wondering whether that's code for “oppress the blacks,” check out the congratulatory phone call Nixon made to Rockefeller after the massacre. It was dug up by a professor and is at Democracy Now. [“40 Years After Attica Rebellion, New Tapes Reveal Nixon, Rockefeller Praised Deadly Crackdown,” 9/16/11.]

] For good measure, the Rockefeller regime immediately told the media, falsely, that the hostage guards were killed by the prisoners, and castrated for good measure. The media never bothered following up on responsibility for these lies, either the officials who planted them or the media themselves for credulously “reporting” them. Nor was there any political blowback to the outrage. To add insult to injury, the guards' families had to fight in court for years to get the state to cough up some chump change. No murderers or their masters were ever indicted, natch.