← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Blond Knight
Thread ID: 13213 | Posts: 5 | Started: 2004-04-17
2004-04-17 03:26 | User Profile
In the history of our pc-Bolshevik nation has a minority ever been forced to leave a public position for remarks about "crackas, messicans,gringos ect?
[url]http://www.startribune.com/stories/587/4725826.html[/url]
Stanek quits amid furor over racial slurs Conrad Defiebre and David Chanen, Star Tribune April 17, 2004STANEK0417 Gov. Tim Pawlenty's public safety commissioner, Rich Stanek, resigned Friday amid a renewed furor over Stanek's sworn admission 12 years ago that he had used a racial epithet and told racist jokes.
Pawlenty announced the move, which he said came by mutual agreement with Stanek, at an afternoon news conference following a published report Friday about the admission and calls from black community leaders for Stanek's ouster.
"The people of Minnesota need to know that justice is color blind," the governor said. "There can be no basis to question that commitment in our commissioner of public safety."
Stanek's admissions in a sworn deposition as part of a police brutality suit against him in 1992 were reported by the Star Tribune in 1995, as he was making his first of five successful runs for the state House as a Republican from Maple Grove.
Rich StanekDavid BrewsterStar TribuneBut Pawlenty, a member of the House GOP caucus in 1995, said he wasn't aware of the deposition until 10 days ago. He said the information "was immediately a concern" when he received it this month, but he did not act sooner because "we were trying to exercise care and caution."
Pawlenty also said that when he interviewed Stanek for the commissioner's job, Stanek specifically denied that there was anything in his background that "we should know about if it appeared on the front page of the paper." Bringing up the 1992 deposition then "would have been helpful," Pawlenty added.
Stanek was not available for comment Friday, but he issued a statement confirming his resignation and saying: "I have never used a racial epithet in a hateful or angry way toward anyone either during work or at home."
Acting commissioner
Pawlenty named Michael Campion, superintendent of the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, as acting commissioner to replace Stanek. A permanent successor will be appointed promptly, Pawlenty said.
Stanek is expected to return to his job as a captain on the Minneapolis police force, where he began a long and often controversial career in the public arena as a police union activist in the 1980s.
At age 29, Stanek was appointed by then Gov. Arne Carlson to head the state Peace Officer Standards and Training Board. Stanek soon led the ouster of the board's executive director, who later sued the state alleging misconduct by Stanek and received a $148,000 settlement.
Minneapolis also paid settlements totaling at least $55,000 to two black motorists who alleged excessive force by Stanek during traffic stops. It was during a deposition related to one of those cases that Stanek made the statements that led to his resignation.
Asked under oath in 1992 if he had ever used the word "nigger," he said he had "several" times. Asked if he considered it appropriate to use the word, he answered:
"I think it's inappropriate to use that word when I'm out in public. When I'm in the confines of my own home or my friends, then I think it's my business ... I believe it's appropriate in the context I'm entitled to my own opinion."
In the deposition, he also admitted telling a racist joke and making negative comments about people because of their race.
In an interview published Friday in the St. Paul Pioneer Press, Stanek said that using the word is "inexcusable" and that he had "absolutely not" used it since 1992. In his written statement Friday, he suggested that he used the word only "to repeat the statements of others during an investigation or to paraphrase details within an investigation."
He added: "I know that this racial epithet is patently offensive in any use or context and I apologize for having to use it as part of the disposition of my job as a police officer, especially to those who it hurt the most."
Community outcry
Friday morning, State Rep. Keith Ellison, the presidents of the Minneapolis and St. Paul NAACP and about a dozen other black community leaders gathered at the Minneapolis Urban League to demand that Pawlenty withdraw Stanek's name from consideration for confirmation by the state Senate. If that wasn't going to happen, they urged the Senate to deny Stanek's confirmation.
Diane Binns of the St. Paul NAACP said that as one of Minnesota's top law enforcement officials, Stanek would help develop the law and policies that effect the entire state, not just people of color. Besides the comments in the deposition, she said Stanek has shown that his attitude toward minorities hadn't really changed through his efforts to change identifiers on driver's licenses, his lack of support to make it mandatory for law enforcement agencies to participate in the data collection of traffic stops to see if racial profiling is a problem and his lack of public comment after the findings were analyzed.
"Personally, he scares me," Binns said. "Anybody who makes racial statements like he did doesn't have the any citizen's rights in mind."
Ellison said he didn't hear about Stanek's deposition until two weeks after he was given a copy by a government employee.
"Using the word nigger is associated with a person so far below other humans that they aren't fit to associate with them. That is what he is calling us," Ellison said.
Controversial figure
Minneapolis Police Chief Bill McManus said Stanek is entitled to come back to the department because of contract obligations. He said he is willing to sit down with the community to discuss their issues over Stanek's remarks "because I work for the community."These types of remarks are entirely inappropriate in any context," McManus said. Stanek's resignation removes without a fight one of a handful of Pawlenty's commissioners whose confirmation by the DFL-led Senate had been called into question. The others are Education Commissioner Cheri Pierson Yecke and Transportation Commissioner Carol Molnau.
"He is passionate about improving public safety in Minnesota," Pawlenty said of Stanek. "He recognizes, however, that continued controversy over his 1992 remarks would jeopardize his effectiveness and our ability to advance important public safety issues in the Legislature."
Among those mentioned Friday to replace Stanek permanently were Campion, Hennepin County Sheriff Pat McGowan, Dakota County Sheriff Don Gudmundson and Tom Fabel, a former chief of criminal prosecution in the attorney general's office.
The writers are at
[email]cdefiebre@startribune.com[/email]. and [email]dchanen@startribune.com[/email]
2004-04-17 13:14 | User Profile
He is being forced out because he admitted to using the word "nigger" [u]12 years[/u] ago! This is absolutely insane!
It is odd to me how these people have no problem with everyone in our society using vulgarities constantly, but the "N-word", as it is often called, has become totally taboo, almost to the point of superstition. It is almost as if they truly believe that merely to utter it somehow taints your soul forever, and that it is like invoking the name of a demon.
2004-04-17 16:13 | User Profile
Typical cowardly capitulation at the first monkey-screech.
Vote GOP! Bwahahaha!
2004-04-17 19:51 | User Profile
He said nigger 12 years ago? Hell I am lucky to go 12 minutes without using that word. :D
2004-04-17 20:05 | User Profile
[size=3][font=Times New Roman]He should have explained it away as a youthful indiscretion. How was he to know his career as a rapper wouldn't go anywhere?<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />