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Jamil Smith @JamilSmith
, 3 tweets, 3 min read Read on Twitter
I wrote about the police killing Emantic Bradford, Jr., and Jemel Roberson, and why “the Good Guy With the Gun” never seems to look like us. My latest, for @RSPolitics. rol.st/2Ri9eqN
I talked to April Pipkins, the mother of Emantic Bradford, Jr., about her son. “I know that, if anything, he was trying to help people,” she said of the Thanksgiving mall shooting where a cop killed him. “That was his character. That’s how I raised him.” rol.st/2Ri9eqN
Trump and the @NRA have both endorsed the theory that “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Yet black men like “EJ” Bradford and Jemel Roberson keep dying when they try to be the good guy. My latest, for @RollingStone. rol.st/2Ri9eqN
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I wrote a lot of words in 2018, and I had arguably my most successful year as a writer. I also had one of my most unhappy years as a human being. But I did good work on the page, and on myself. And that’s why I will always be thankful for this lovely, terrible year.
I thought that I’d start 2019 by adding some context to this, looking back on a complicated year of successes and strife with more than just a list of my favorite bylines.
I started 2018 out of sorts. Caught walking pneumonia in Vegas last New Year’s Eve while going there to see a Bruno Mars concert with my wife. Spent January essentially incapacitated, but recovered sufficiently to interview the great @AnnaDeavereS and later, to take a meeting.
Read 16 tweets
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John Kelly made news with “To be honest, it’s not a wall,” but I was struck more by what is absent here. An apology to @RepWilson for his lies about her. Accountability for his role in Trump’s immigration crusade. Recanting his Confederate apologism. Alas. lat.ms/2GOzY1o
“What happened was Jeff Sessions, he was the one that instituted the zero-tolerance process on the border that resulted in both people being detained and the family separation,” John Kelly told @mollymotoole. “He surprised us.” That is such a fascinating quote, for many reasons.
One, Kelly appears to concede that Trump’s family separation are both inherently bad policies. This is someone seeking to avoid looking having he and @POTUS appear like villains. Ignoring his own role, he displays a consciousness of guilt while simultaneously trying to avoid it.
Read 7 tweets
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This @jmartNYT and @melbournecoal report is full of quotes from people who seem as though they don’t want to just come out and and say that Bernie Sanders should sit this one out, for any number of reasons. I agree. O’Rourke, for me, isn’t the reason why. nyti.ms/2RfuaCd
This argument sums up the main reason that I feel Sanders shouldn’t run again. Any white challenger to Trump will have to prove her or his bonafides on issues specific to voters of color. Sanders may not have the widest credibility gap, but it’ll be close. slate.trib.al/kkcDfiW
Alluded to but left underexamined in this @jonathanchait argument is the fact that a significant part of Bernie’s support came from white guys unwilling to vote for a woman. Those men may have just found a new white, male candidate to back in Beto. nym.ag/2CCwuLb
Read 5 tweets

Related threads

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1/7
 RIP Emantic Bradford Jr. He was a POC, 💯 INNOCENT & "accidentally" shot & killed by white cops. ❣️❣️

"DISMISS PROTEST AT YOUR PERIL, HOOVER"

People ask what protest can do in Hoover.

Why march in the streets? Why disrupt businesses that had nothing to do with the.....
2/7
 .....police shooting of E.J. Bradford on ThanksgivingIt’s just noise", some say. "Just racket and fury and futility."

IT'S NOT!

RIP 2 Emantic Bradford Jr. ❣️❣️
3/7
It is remarkable, really that anyone would dismiss the power of protest in the shadow of Birmingham. Not just because of the dogs and fire hoses of 1963, but because of something else that happened...
Read 8 tweets
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EJ Bradford Jr press conference with attorney Ben Crump and Bradford’s family. Bradford was killed by a Hoover police officer on Thanksgiving. Happening now.
Crump says EJ Bradford was a caretaker to his father, a former Bham jail employee who is retired and battling cancer.
Not only did they assasinate his person but they truly assasinated his character. -Ben Crump, civil rights attorney hired by the Bradford family
Read 26 tweets
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My God.

American police just killed another "good guy with a gun."

Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr., better known as EJ, the son of a police officer, was an active duty officer for the Army, home for Thanksgiving.

Murdered by police yesterday in a mall shooting in Alabama.
EJ Bradford, Jr. was beloved all over Birmingham. This morning I have heard from neighbors, friends, even teachers from elementary to high school - who LOVED this man.

Served safely in the Army, then shot & killed by American police in Alabama while home for Thanksgiving.
#EJBradford with his mother, April.

He was the pride and joy of his whole family. Military service is a huge part of the whole family.
Read 7 tweets
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1) I see a lot of ppl referring to the NRA’s “good guy with a gun” narrative about Jemel Roberson, the security guard police shot. Y’all are forgetting about Philando Castille. He was just a guy. In the passenger seat of a car, following police orders, and the NRA said nothing.
2) Philando Castille was a licensed gun owner. He did nothing wrong, but he black, traveling through a part of town records show black ppl being stopped at extremely high rates. Philando was a perfect case for the NRA to blow up into a big story for the 2A...
3) But y’all don’t understand. The NRA isn’t a 2A organization. Haven’t been for a long time. They are a white fear organization. They are there to drive white fear, because it drives gun sales. Policing is an institution that is also driven by white fear. That’s how DHS...
Read 21 tweets
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#BreakingNews
@POTUS Trump colluded with American people to #MAGA

The House Intel Committee concluded that Trump went out every single day to touch the hearts & lives of the working class & thats why @realDonaldTrump WON

LETS NOW #KeepAmericaGreat
#MarchForOurLives
#NeverAgain
#RETWEET
@POTUS Trump has replaced Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with former CIA Director Mike Pompeo

He also hired Gina Haspel as the first female director of the CIA

Trump treats the Presidency like a business & if youre not doing your job, YOURE FIRED

#KeepAmericaGreat
#RETWEET
(1)The Felonious "Littering" of 7,000 pairs of shoes by #MarchForOurLives #NeverAgain "Forced Protestors" Needs to STOP Manipulating #USA Youth into these Criminal acts

Next "Protect" like this dont say #Metoo that you Participated
Punishments: ncsl.org/research/envir…
Read 161 tweets
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1) Well, everyone, I responded to a Trump tweet with 'Good guys with guns stop bad guys with guns', and of course I was challenged on this notion by this guy, who first wanted to know what mass shooting incidents were stopped by good guys with guns.
2) He later clarified that it had to be NON-Law enforcement. A fair clarification, for which I provided examples that just took a few minutes to dig up.
3) He then tried to change the parameters by trying to have me prove the negative. He does not know how to debate, typical of Clermonts, because in a debate, when you want to disprove something, YOU HAVE TO BE THE ONE DISPROVING IT
Read 59 tweets

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