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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Despite risks which include permanent hearing loss, LRADs are increasingly part of police's crowd control arsenal
After a wait of nearly ten months, MuckRock has finally received documents from the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department regarding their response to the protests surrounding President Donald Trump's inauguration early this year. Surprisingly, while we didn't receive any records related to the J20 protests, we did receive documents relating to January 21st's Women's March, which in Washington D.C. alone attracted by conservative estimates between 450,000 and 500,000 people. While it was the largest protest in the city since the anti-Vietnam War protests of the '60s and '70s, no arrests were made.
The After-Action Report provided by the DCMPD, under the header "Improvements," contains the information that the department utilized both a D.C. National Guard Jump Team, and a Long Range Acoustical Device, better known as an LRAD. The LRAD was used "to assist in instructing the crowd flows on continuing to flow away from the entrances of the stations."
Since the first documented use of an LRAD sound cannon on protesters by Pittsburgh Police during the 2009 G20 summit, LRAD use by police against activists appears to be on the rise. The Pittsburgh Police Bureau used it again in 2011 during the Super Bowl, the New York Police Department has used it several times including the Eric Garner protests and during Occupy, the Oakland Police Department also used it against Occupy protesters, and more recently and perhaps most prominently, an LRAD was deployed during the Ferguson unrest and the Standing Rock protests.
There are various models of LRAD, with military grade versions that can send voice communications up to 5.5 miles away, and slightly less powerful versions like the LRAD 500X or 300X which are what police departments generally use. All can produce a sound somewhat akin to a high-powered car alarm that can cause intense headaches, nausea, loss of balance, and potentially permanent hearing loss.
(Score: 2, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 28 2017, @07:48PM (8 children)
So what you're telling us (correctly) is that the system treats the entity of a state as more important than the people in the states. This is manifest in that a voter's power in one state is not equal to a voter's power in another state. Non-proportional voting power.
I don't actually think that's a good thing.
The people chose Clinton. They didn't get who they chose. That's a bad thing.
What we have is a representative system where the representatives aren't representative of the people. Undermines the entire idea of "electing" representatives. As in, we the people chose Clinton by a very significant majority, and we didn't get Clinton.
The thing is broken.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday December 28 2017, @08:39PM (4 children)
Yes, and?
Not feeling the pain over here. It was quite representative, just not quite in the way you preferred. Fix the two party system first else we wouldn't get Clinton and Trump. I don't feel like giving freebies to the Democrat party (who are the ones who would benefit from this shift in power) any more than I feel like giving freebies to the Republicans (who despite this win are probably going to lose in the end). You can lecture me sanctimoniously about what the people "chose", but in the end they voted for shit either way. Not going to expend effort to fix the parts that aren't seriously broken.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday December 28 2017, @08:43PM (3 children)
Oh fuck you, if it had been the other way around you'd be wetting yourself twice daily on here over it. Do you think we can't tell? You're only sanguine about this because "your guy" "won."
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 29 2017, @02:08AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 30 2017, @03:10PM (1 child)
Fuck you too ya piece of shit. As if Clinton would have been a good thing. You're so god damn stupid.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday December 30 2017, @05:03PM
You don't read my post history obviously. I don't trust Clinton, either of them, especially because Bill's "welfare reform" has done more to harm the poor than anything either party has ever done (or, well, HAD ever done before this fucking tax scam...) in the last 70+ years. She would still have been better short term.
I'm actually wondering if America "needs," or at least deserves, a term of Trump in office. It might be just the wakeup call the country needs to get it to join the rest of the civilized world. The problem, of course, is that we may not survive it.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 28 2017, @11:36PM
Be careful what you wish for.
Killery would have given us (at best) a bunch more years of do-nothing, just like O'Bummer.
(With Trump, at least Progressive folks are getting active.)
If Hillary Clinton Had Won, We’d Be Even Worse [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [counterpunch.org]
In November, Jimmy Dore [google.com] reminded us that Donna Brazile's "revelations" didn't really tell us anything we didn't already know about Crooked Hillary.
DNC/DNCC/The Dumbocrat Party are thoroughly corrupt and need reform from the inside.
Are you attending party meetings locally?
Have you signed up for committees?
...or do you think that change just happens through osmosis?
The people [...] didn't get who they chose. That's a bad thing
What's particularly bad is that USAians don't get to hear more than 2 voices because of Lamestream Media (though every USAian is ostensibly an owner of the airwaves).
Remember how CBS's CEO said out loud that Trump was crap for the country but great for his company's profits?
...and because of The Commission on Presidential Elections, which is a monopoly, wholly-owned by The Big 2, whose sole business is exclusion.
(The League of Women Voters, who had run the debates for several years, let you hear more voices.)
the system treats the entity of a state as more important than the people in the states
On his weekly radio show, [ralphnaderradiohour.com] Ralph Nader repeatedly talks about The National Popular Vote bill. [nationalpopularvote.com]
(34 states are necessary to change the Constitution.)
Is your state on the list?
If not, what are you doing about that?
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 29 2017, @12:08AM
That is not exactly true. [soylentnews.org] Just getting rid of the electoral college system would only make the US slightly more democratic; it is insufficient. We need voting reform for all levels of government.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday December 29 2017, @04:46AM
You ARE exaggerating that "win" of the popular vote. The difference in the vote count was LESS THAN, not more than, 3 million.
But, we don't live in a democracy, we live in a republic. The republic has a set of laws and procedures for picking our "representatives". Don't like those laws? Then address those laws, one by one, and work on changing them.
I've pointed out before that the very same laws and procedures that put Trump in the White House also put Obama and Clinton there, before Trump. You who whine about how unfair the laws are were perfectly happy when you were able to make those laws work for you.
And, finally, I question the competence of the voting public. I'll admit that there were no "good" candidates available for this election - but - fact is, about half of the voters voted for the LEAST COMPETENT candidate, while another half voted for the second least competent. FFS, I can't say that either Johnson or Stein are competent, but they both seem to be more competent than either of the leading contenders.
What's that you say? Most voters didn't even know about Johnson or Stein? You make my case for me. Voters aren't competent to vote, so STFU.