Ferguson

[Content Note: Racism; police misconduct.]

On Tuesday, the Justice Department found a pattern of bias and excessive force in the Ferguson Police Department. As part of the report, released yesterday, the Justice Department highlighted seven racist emails, containing "jokes" about the President, the First Lady, and black people generally.

Yesterday, Ferguson Mayor James Knowles disclosed that "one police official had been fired and two others were on administrative leave" as a result of the racist emails.

"This type of behavior will not be tolerated in the Ferguson Police Department," Knowles said in an evening news conference, without taking questions from reporters.

At least not while anyone's looking. And, not for nothing, but I suspect "administrative leave" isn't exactly what most people interested in meaningful accountability have in mind.

By way of reminder, Mayor Knowles once called civil unrest in Ferguson the "worst case scenario" if Officer Darren Wilson was not indicted (which he wasn't). The worst thing he could imagine was people exercising their constitutional right to protest, worse than communicating to white police officers that they can kill unarmed black people without consequence, and worse than communicating to black people that their lives don't matter.

So, I don't have a lot of faith in what this guy is willing to "tolerate," in the Ferguson Police Department or anywhere else in town.