Political Roundtable Part XXVIII

[Pointgod]

Biden is on live speaking right now. I suggest people watch him live instead of cherry picked clips.

[Ruzious]

https://www.arlnow.com/2020/06/01/breaking-arlington-officers-ordered-to-immediately-leave-d-c/

“Appalled mutual aid agreement abused to endanger their and others safety for a photo op,” Garvey wrote just before 9 p.m., about two hours after the incident. “We ordered @ArlingtonVaPD to immediately leave DC.”

I'd say Garvey got that exactly right. All that endangerment for a frikkin photo - so he could stare stupidly for a picture. Certainly more irresponsible than any protester.

[Wizardspride]

Read on Twitter

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Of course Nate won’t respond to this.

LOL. One guy, probably in Europe (where Evropa is based) starts a new fake Twitter account (which presumably had virtually no followers) and makes a tweet and THAT'S how you're going to tie all this rioting and looting to a white supremacist movement? This is all the evidence you have? At least find me one protester on the ground, or better yet, one guy committing actual violence, that is part of a white supremacist movement.

The Minneapolis mayor implied that nearly all of those arrested were out-of-town white supremacist agitators and you come up with a single tweet from a random guy with a new Twitter account.

Fwiw Nate, I actually agree with you...sort of.

Yeah, I do think we're dealing with SOME outside agitators (possibly some white nationalists) but for the most part I do think these are locals.

[Pointgod]

You going??

I am trying to figure out if I can get to the march today - at 3 p.m. but...

It is going to be 89° and feel like 94°. With a mask... and I would have to walk 3 mi there and 4 mi back to get to the march.

Feeling wimpy unlike my younger days.

Lol, be safe if you do. I don't think I can. I'm in the building, and I don't think I'll be able to get out. I'll watch for a bit, but I'm just off Wisconsin Avenue, so I'm guessing I probably won't even be able to see much.

Yeah my wife and I are in the same boat (too wimpy to protest), we'll have to contribute to a bail fund instead :/

You guys aren’t wimps at all. The risk from coronavirus is real. There are many ways to support the protestors. Your family’s health and safety should be first.

[nate33]

Fwiw Nate, I actually agree with you...sort of.

You're gonna get into a lot of trouble for this.

[Zonkerbl]

Nate you said you had seen no evidence whatsoever. So all that's needed to disprove your assertion is to provide one example.

[badinage]

This is a forum for thoughtful conversation of a political nature, but I’m sorry, folks, I can’t do that right now — I can’t hide my anger and rage at what is happening. I want him dead. Now. I want these protests to morph into a movement and then I want that movement to storm the people’s house and take it back. And I want him and his enablers and all the others who have profited off our labor and service, the corporate heads, Bezos and his ilk, to be marched to the guillotine.

ENOUGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is state-sponsored fascism and there can be no debate, none, as to what is motivating it. The speed with which he mobilized the military to brutalize us is breathtaking. Where was that speed and urgency as the coronavirus spread? Where was the money to create systems and testing? Where was the response when all these black men over all these years crumpled at the feet of the police?

The country is smoking and in ruin, and unfortunately now the only path out is to meet their force head on. But they have more guns. Because they have been preparing for this moment for a long, long time.

[daSwami]

Who are the instigators? I've seen the following "few bad apples" narratives posited on my FB feed (and there are probably more):

1) BLM protestors
2) the cops
3) white nationalists posing as BLM protestors
4) Antifa/anarchists posing as white nationalists

Pick one.

[badinage]

The instigators:

Him.
His militarized police state.
Police brutality.
A racist, over-competitive, profit-focused society
Cultural complicity
Red-lining
Gerrymandering
Right-wing thuggery over 40 years
White people moving to neighborhoods for the “good schools”
400 years of this gahdaym sheeyit

[Zonkerbl]

Ok I have a question. Doesn't the tassel normally come out the top? Is Trump HOLDING THE BIBLE UPSIDE DOWN?!?!?!?! (oh the horror)

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52890650

[Wizardspride]

Read on Twitter

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Read on Twitter

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Read on Twitter

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[badinage]

And ... a message to all the right-wingers and Trumpians out there:

It’s not that we want him out. Not anymore. It’s not that we want to push for some form of socialism. We’re beyond that. We want to take it down now. It. The whole shebang. It has to come down. To come down the way the statues of the Lost Cause are coming down. The way the statue of Saddam came down. The way the statue of Lenin came down. You have created or contributed to or been complicit in the making of a society that is brutal and inequitable and in which too many are in pain and struggling. And it doesn’t just have to stop — oh no, it’s stopping NOW, muthafukkers. It’s coming down NOW.

[UcanUwill]

Not every Trump supporter is racist, but every racist is Trump supporter

Disagree. At this point it's clear. You don't have to support the Democratic Party to be anti-Trump. If you're a Trump supporter there are several unsavory characteristics that stick to you now even though such people generally tend to take offence when told as much.

It very much wouldn't be hard here to suggest massive policing overhauls while still being against the Democratic Party. Police do some good things and do some other not so good things. And then people turn around and blame the unions. The unions only have as much power as they do because they have a rather significant part of the voting public behind them.


Edit:

I should add, there is one other kind of person who would still support Trump and may or may not be racist. Scam artists out for a quick buck in cut and run politics who are willing to exploit any tactic that helps them make money, including racism, to that effect. I'm not sure how many of those manage to fall out of the racism boat but it doesn't strike me as many.

Personally, I have no idea why a decent person would like Trump at this point. Unless you really take what Foxnews says as truth, you are a fan of Dinesh D'souza and think Liberals are evil, you cant accept democrat president by design, is that the case? I dont even know why Foxnews likes Trump beside the fact Foxnews are just assembly of same human beings just like Trump who think left wingers destroying America for being on the right side of history on every issue in America basically (I am not a two party system supporter, I think its dumb, you cant just agree with one party on everything and disagree with other party on everything, but man right wingers are making it easy). WHen they interviews Trump, they always start with, oh, you accomplished so much, Like what Did Trump really accomplished, thats a genuine question? What policies he passed that helped American people, just beside trashing liberals on twitter and settling right wing people of how their terrible views with no good intent are acceptable now. When I just see his face, he is only good for putting gasoline into fires and being least presidential person in existence. Guy is just a bully, he is least qualified president ever.

I somewhat understand why people wanted him in 2016. He had blatant xenophobic platform, but he visited struggling towns like every polititian and promised how he would restore their businesses. But now 2020 and people still sticking with this guy, you can still choose side, you probably think you went too far to go back, but you can. All this guy did is made America joke again, or thats the point, to go agains ''liberal'' grain. Who cares what world thinks anymore, they all just must be liberals,right?.. Fu**ing god this world.

[Wizardspride]

Read on Twitter

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[dckingsfan]

And ... a message to all the right-wingers and Trumpians out there:

It’s not that we want him out. Not anymore. It’s not that we want to push for some form of socialism. We’re beyond that. We want to take it down now. It. The whole shebang. It has to come down. To come down the way the statues of the Lost Cause are coming down. The way the statue of Saddam came down. The way the statue of Lenin came down. You have created or contributed to or been complicit in the making of a society that is brutal and inequitable and in which too many are in pain and struggling. And it doesn’t just have to stop — oh no, it’s stopping NOW, muthafukkers. It’s coming down NOW.

But peacefully, right? Let's follow MLK on this one...

[dckingsfan]

Just saying - that is moderate and progressive Ds...

Eighty-four percent of white Democrats and 78 percent of black Americans said they thought the killings of black Americans by police officers was part of a broader pattern, not a series of isolated incidents, according to a 2019 YouGov survey.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-lots-of-white-democrats-ended-up-protesting-the-death-of-george-floyd/

[Zonkerbl]

And ... a message to all the right-wingers and Trumpians out there:

It’s not that we want him out. Not anymore. It’s not that we want to push for some form of socialism. We’re beyond that. We want to take it down now. It. The whole shebang. It has to come down. To come down the way the statues of the Lost Cause are coming down. The way the statue of Saddam came down. The way the statue of Lenin came down. You have created or contributed to or been complicit in the making of a society that is brutal and inequitable and in which too many are in pain and struggling. And it doesn’t just have to stop — oh no, it’s stopping NOW, muthafukkers. It’s coming down NOW.

But peacefully, right? Let's follow MLK on this one...

Where I grew up, if you said the "n" word to a black person you were asking for a fight and if you got punched it was your own damn fault. In some of these instances violence is entirely justified and in fact if you complain about getting punched you need to shut the heck up. And if memory serves, towards the end of his life MLK was starting to lean in this direction. He owned a bunch of guns.

[dobrojim]

The progressive arm of the Dem party is for these things, but they are clearly in the minority. The large majority of Dems still support the racist war on drugs - that's why we're stuck with old racist Biden. The large majority of white Dems don't even realize the war on drugs is racist. I stand by what I said.

I am actually pretty sure that a large majority of dems don't support the war on drugs.
But, if you have data, show me I'm wrong. [edit to add, looks like DCK took care of that]
(without using any real data and just based on WAG I'd say...
If that were true, statewide referendum on ending prohibition would _never_ succeed
since pubs sure as f**k aren't for it, at least not to any significant degree (see Da1).
I'd guess on the whole 50-60% of dems are for it and maybe 25-40% of Pubs.

[dobrojim]

The progressive arm of the Dem party is for these things, but they are clearly in the minority. The large majority of Dems still support the racist war on drugs - that's why we're stuck with old racist Biden. The large majority of white Dems don't even realize the war on drugs is racist. I stand by what I said.

A virus is killing people, our cities are on fire and you're complaining about this. C'mon man! Joe Biden may be racist--as are many, many white people--but he's a whole lot better human being than that a-hole in the WH.

Like many white people including me, we are or fall victims to implicit bias.
I try to be as free of racist attitudes as I can be. But I don't succeed 100% I'm sure.
FWIW, I've done some reading on this to try to improve my thinking.
How to be An Anti-Racist (Kendi), White Fragility (DiAngelo)
Between the World and Me (Coates), New Jim Crow (Alexander).

I think a good quality about Biden is that he is 'teachable' and can be persuaded
or led to the right policies.
But I'll also say that he has supported some pretty bad things, thinking particularly
of the bankruptcy bill and the crime bill. To his credit, to a certain degree, he
appears willing to say that was wrong. He was not my first choice but there is no
question in my mind that he must be elected now.

[dobrojim]

Fwiw Nate, I actually agree with you...sort of.

You're gonna get into a lot of trouble for this.

I think the truth is that the 'protesters', in quotes because their individual motivations
are a very mixed bag. But many many of them are peacefully protesting to put a voice
to their righteous anger.