The Military Occupation Of Ferguson, Missouri Is Just A Preview Of What Is Coming To AmericaMichael Snyder At one point, police snipers were even using laser scopes to target protesters that were obviously unarmed. Sadly, this is just a preview of what is coming to America in the years ahead. As the economy falls apart and people become even more angry and even more frustrated, there will be a lot more incidents of civil unrest like we have just witnessed in Ferguson. And in response, the federal government and our overly militarized police will seek to crush those uprisings with overwhelming force. How is it possible that our once very peaceful nation has fallen apart so dramatically? What we just watched happen in Ferguson was truly bizarre. If you didnt know any better, you might have thought that you were looking at images from a really bad post-apocalyptic disaster movie. The following is how the New Yorker described the scene And I will certainly agree with that. It did not look like America. At least not the America that I grew up in. In a WND article, one woman was quoted as saying that it looked like something right off the streets of Iraq Was all of this really necessary? The rioting and the looting had already ended. Was there really a need to fire tear gas at unarmed people? In theYouTube video posted below, you can see footage of some of the craziness that took place And in this next YouTube video, there is footage of one protester holding his head after being hit directly in the face with a rubber bullet by the police In this day and age, images like this spread like wildfire. Thanks to social media, people all over the country and all over the planet will get a first-hand look at how brutal our militarized police have become. And the more attention this gets, the more likely that it is that violence will spread to more cities. Already, a major protest is being planned for Sunday directly in front of police headquarters in Los Angeles. A man was shot and killed on Monday by the LAPD and people are upset about it. They have seen what has been happening in Ferguson and now they want to take action. But wherever civil unrest does erupt, our militarized police will certainly be there to quickly stamp it out. Asa recent Slate article detailed, the militarization of our police has reached unprecedented heights in recent years And when police get all of this equipment, it is inevitable that they are going to use it. One result of this has been the astounding increase in the number of SWAT team raids in America. The following numbers come from my previous article entitled 10 Facts About The SWATification Of America That Everyone Should Know #1 In 1980, there were approximately 3,000 SWAT raids in the United States. Now, there are more than 80,000 SWAT raids per year in this country. #2 79 percent of the time, SWAT teams are deployed to private homes. #3 50 percent of the victims of SWAT raids are either black or Latino. #4 In 65 percent of SWAT deployments, a battering ram, boot, or some sort of explosive device is used to gain forced entry to a home. #5 62 percent of all SWAT raids involve a search for drugs. #6 In at least 36 percent of all SWAT raids, no contraband of any kind is found by the police. #7 In cases where it is suspected that there is a weapon in the home, police only find a weapon 35 percent of the time. #8 More than 100 American families have their homes raided by SWAT teams every single day. #9 Only 7 percent of all SWAT deployments are for hostage, barricade or active-shooter scenarios. #10 Even small towns are getting SWAT teams now. 30 years ago, only 25.6 percent of communities with populations between 25,000 and 50,000 people had a SWAT team. Now, that number has increased to 80 percent. And of course African-American communities receive a greatly disproportionate amount of attention from our militarized police. Just imagine how you would feel if every time you saw a police officer you cringed in fear because you might be about to get searched again. The following is how author Michelle Alexander put it in her book The New Jim Crow So what can we do about this? How can we change the system? How can we reverse this alarming militarization of our police? Unfortunately, our system has become so corrupt that there is very little that we can do. In fact, one newly released study discovered that average Americans have a near-zero statistical impact on public policy So what do you think about all of this? Please feel free to share your thoughts by posting a comment below This article first appeared here at the American Dream. Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him on Twitter here. 