The point I tried to mention was much simpler - that Blacks face a much greater likelihood than Whites to be victims of violent crime. Luna would be a good "poster boy" here because of his professional status that either (i) did not protect him (if the killing was unrelated to his job) or (ii) proves his dedication to standards of professionalism (if it was related).
Black victimization is a dirty secret that liberals and lefties enamored with "counterculture" identity love to sweep under the rug.
> By taking on cases such as the one that spawned this thread isn't the
> NAACP addressing a different kind of racism than the one practiced by
> murderous rednecks - the racism in the criminal justice system and
> specifically the racism in the Drug War?
There is little doubt in my mind that the 'Drug War' is racist - it allows the government to arrest people (mostly minorities) at will while maintaining the storefront image of democracy. But that is a very different argument that pandering to the "counterculture" and delinquency identities and defending violent thugs. That is the main reason why I brought the case of Mr. Luna - he was a black victim of violent crime, but he was a professional not a "gangsta" - so the counter-cultural 'defenders of the people" do not give a shit.
That is fine if such attitudes are espoused by teenagers - but if they are expressed by those past their prime, that is not silly anymore, but scary.
>
> I certainly won't speak for black folk but the kind of racism that
> allows cops to use over-the-top lethal force against black criminals
> and get away with it seems to me much more dangerous and insidious
> than the kind that motivates a bigot to murder.
I think they are using it against anyone they can get away with. Some time ago, our fearless moderator (if memory serves) posted a link to site showing a mug-shot of an scary-looking white redneck, while the caption jokingly commented that his face was disfigured by the sheriff deputies whom he resisted while being arrested.
When I worked for the Santa Clara Board of Supervisors in the late 1980s, one of the cases brought to our attention was a raw treatment that some white upper middle class woman received from the local cops. It turned out that the lady was DUI, and started arguing with the cop who pulled her over. Of course, her case received more attention precisely because of her status, but the bottom line was that the cop did nothing wrong - he just used a standard procedure instead of giving the lady a break, as she certainly expected.
The moral of the story is that a good counter-discrimination argument is not that the cops should go easy on black law-breakers, but that they should give white law-breakers the same treatment they give the black ones.
Wojtek